A/N: See below.

Wednesday, 16 December 2015

"What the hell is a boutonnière?"

Quinn looked up from his computer screen and frowned over at McGee. "Was that something we tagged as evidence?"

McGee shook his head. "No, no. Delilah's just messaged me to ask if I have a color preference for a bou-tonn-i-air," he said, sounding the word out. "But I don't know what that is or what color it's supposed to be."

"Boutonnière," Ziva said, correcting his accent. "It is the flower that a man wears in his lapel."

"Ohhh," McGee breathed out, and then paused. "Why should I care what color it is?"

"Is this for the wedding?" Ziva asked. "Or for some other hoity-toity event?"

McGee and Quinn both looked at her like she'd made an offensive or inappropriate comment, and she put her hand to her chest in apology.

"Did I use that term incorrectly?"

"No," McGee said.

"It just sounds weird coming from you," Quinn told her. "Sounds like something Abby'd say."

Ziva relaxed. "Oh. Is it for the wedding?" she asked again.

McGee shook his head. "No, not for ours. We don't really have a date yet. This is for her sister's wedding. She says Petronella doesn't care about quote, 'matchy-matchy wedding crap', end quote."

"I've always liked Petronella," Quinn said.

McGee sent Ziva a smirk, and then looked at Quinn. "You've never met her."

"But I've always liked the sound of her."

"This is literally the first time I've ever mentioned her to you," McGee countered.

Quinn sighed heavily, playing the joke for effect. "Stop picking fights with me, man."

"Some days, it's like Tony never left," McGee said to Ziva.

She smiled back at him, but felt a slight pang in her chest. She lived with Tony. She shared her life with him, and intended to stay with him until death stole one of them away. But she still missed working with him every day.

"When you say that, I can never tell if you're making fun of me or paying me a compliment," Quinn was saying.

"Me neither," McGee admitted.

Ziva's desk phone rang, and she picked it up quickly. "David."

"Come down to autopsy," Gibbs told her. "Ducky's got something for us."

"On my way."

…

Gibbs was already in autopsy when Ziva arrived, standing over Bonnie's pale body as Ducky, still in his blue scrubs, ambled over to his desk. Neither man acknowledged her when she arrived—Gibbs because he didn't have to, Ducky because he probably hadn't heard her come in—but she took position at Bonnie's head. Ducky was in the middle of an anecdote about a trip to Sicily, which Ziva quickly decided was not necessary for her to follow. She steeled herself and looked down at Bonnie. A sheet covered her almost up to her shoulders, but her distinctive tattoo and the top of her Y-incision was still visible, and the bruises around her neck that had looked red at yesterday's crime scene were now dark blue. Ziva swallowed and looked up again, only to find Gibbs watching her intently. She gave him a tight smile and a nod, and then looked over at Ducky who was on his way back to the table, his walking stick in one hand and a folder in the other.

"The arancini from the street vendor is something I still crave 50 years after the fact," he was saying. "I have never found an acceptably authentic substitute." He gestured at Ziva with the folder. "Your marito would know all about that."

Ziva's eyebrow lifted at being married off to Tony. "Il mio ragazzo," she corrected, "ate half a donut for dinner last night. Then he passed out halfway through a beer."

Ducky looked back at her with a neutral expression, which was enough to tell her that the news worried him. "He needs to take better care of himself these days."

It wasn't a jibe aimed at her—Ducky was not the kind of man to blame a woman for her partner's bad diet—but she felt guilt over it all the same and resolved to visit the grocery store on her way home. "I know. He tries. He is just busy."

Ducky handed the folder to Gibbs, but addressed Ziva. "Our young probationary agent here had a full stomach when she died. Aubergines, courgettes, fish, cous-cous. Foods popular in Sicilian cooking."

Ziva caught on to why Ducky had brought her Italian partner into the conversation. Although she was certain that Tony's family did not herald from Sicily. Not that it mattered here. "There was no evidence that the kitchen had been recently used to prepare a meal," Ziva told them. "The fridge was mostly full of vegetables. I will have to check with Abby about the contents of the trash, but I am more inclined to think that she may have had lunch at a restaurant."

Gibbs nodded in agreement. "Quinn pulling her bank transactions?"

"He has been working on it this morning," Ziva confirmed. "Abby has her cell phone, so we can check for messages about a lunch date."

"Her mother didn't mention anything when we spoke," Gibbs said. "So, what's the verdict, Duck?"

"Cause of death is asphyxiation," Ducky told them, more or less confirming what they had expected. He pulled back the sheet just far enough to expose one of Bonnie's arms, and ran his finger back and forth in the air above the maze of cuts and bruises. "These were perimortem. The bruises on her wrists and ankles are consistent with her being tied down, and once she was immobilized she was slashed repeatedly with a plain blade along her arms. I count 23 individual cuts, although most are fairly shallow."

"What about her deeper wounds?" Gibbs asked, pointing to one cut above her bicep near her tattooed shoulder.

"Made with the same blade as the slashes," Ducky said. "I'd estimate it to be no more than three inches long."

"Like a paring knife?" Ziva asked, thinking about the knife block in the kitchen.

Ducky considered that before nodding. "Yes, that would fit."

"There was a paring knife missing from the kitchen, but we did not find it at the scene."

"I'd look harder for it," Ducky advised.

"So, she was tied down, slashed and stabbed, and then strangled?" Ziva thought aloud. "The pools of blood in the kitchen suggest that is where the attack took place. How did she get from the kitchen to the living room? Did he carry her?"

Gibbs didn't respond to that, but his eyes told her it was something they'd have to consider. "Trace evidence, Duck?"

"It has been sent to Abby," he replied. "Carpet fibers, clothing fibers, a few hairs. The usual, from first glance."

"Anything under her nails?" Ziva asked.

"Nothing obvious," Ducky said. "Abby has the clippings."

Ziva looked down at Bonnie again and felt a flash of irrational anger with her. "She does not appear to have defensive wounds." If she had trained to be an NCIS agent, why hadn't she fought? Ziva knew that Bonnie had it in her.

"No," Ducky confirmed. "Whether that was because she was threatened and was compliant, or whether she was simply taken by surprise, I can't say. That is for you to determine. But I can tell you that the attack probably lasted at least an hour. Some of the slashes had stopped bleeding before she died."

Ziva sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. "Tied up and tortured for an hour," she murmured to herself. "I wonder if she knew it was coming, or if she thought she would get away."

"Sexual assault?" Gibbs asked Ducky.

"Mercifully, no."

"All right. Keep us posted on anything else," Gibbs told him, and nudged Ziva away from the table to lead her to the elevator.

"Thank you, Doctor," Ziva told Ducky, and the elderly M.E. nodded and gave her a kind smile before she walked through the morgue doors.

Gibbs was holding the lift door for her, so she quickened her step to join him in the car. He hit the button for the third floor, and they'd risen just a few feet before he reached over and flipped the emergency brake. Ziva gripped the handrail on instinct—ever since she and Tony had been stuck in the elevator when Harper Dearing bombed the NCIS building a few years ago, she got a little nervous when Gibbs sprung a surprise elevator meeting on her—but quickly righted herself and met his eyes in the dim light.

"Gibbs?"

"Anything you want to talk about?" he asked.

Ziva blinked at him as she tried to work out what he was getting at, and then held her hand up to stop the idea she thought might have sprung in his head. "Tony and I are not married," she told him with a chuckle. "Or engaged. That was just Ducky—"

"That's not what I'm talking about," Gibbs cut in, rolling his eyes over the slightest of smiles. "This case, Ziva. What's on your mind?"

She felt her cheeks flush at her mistake, but carried on as if marrying her boyfriend wasn't on her mind these days. "It bothers me," she admitted. "I know Tony and McGee and I helped Bonnie when she asked us to. And if her ex-boyfriend is still in prison then he did not do this to her, and that is some kind of morbid comfort. But I feel bad about it."

"You can't carry that on your shoulders, Ziva," Gibbs told her, taking a step towards her. "Think of how many people this team has helped in ten years. We can't be responsible for all those people for the rest of their lives."

She nodded easily. "I know. It just…sucks," she settled on.

"Yeah."

She tried to hold his gaze, but shame sent her eyes to the floor. "I am also disappointed in myself for being disappointed in her."

"What did she do?"

Ziva gave a bitter chuckle. "It is that she didn't fight harder. No defensive wounds."

Gibbs took another step towards her and lowered his voice. "You don't know that she didn't," he reminded her, trying to keep her on track. "We don't have all the facts yet."

He was right, but the awful feeling didn't go away. "Gibbs, I just…If it were me? I would have taken a piece of him before he took me." And when it was her, she took strips off his wrists with her fingernails.

"Not everyone has your fortitude, Ziva," Gibbs said gently. "Or your will."

She chuckled bitterly again and leaned back against the wall. She could think of plenty of times when her will ebbed away and someone else—Gibbs, Tony, McGee—had to save her butt. But she didn't want to talk about that now.

Gibbs eyed her. "You going to be able to work this case?"

Her eyes snapped back up to his again with surprise. She was offended that he had even asked. "Yes, of course," she said firmly.

"That's what I want to hear," he said, and leaned over to start the elevator again.

They rose a few more feet as Ziva argued with herself over whether or not to divulge more information about their previous case with Bonnie. She didn't want to revisit some parts of that case—the parts that she had confided to Tony that she hadn't properly dealt with—but she wanted to be honest with him. It was Gibbs, for God's sake. He wasn't just her boss, but also a father figure, and a man she trusted with her life. She wanted to tell him before anyone else did.

Impulsively, she reached around him and gripped the handrail before flipping the emergency brake again. Gibbs turned his head slowly to look at her, one eyebrow arched in question. Ziva clasped her hands in front of her and chewed her lip.

"What is it?" he asked.

She took a deep breath and just went for it. "Bonnie's ex-boyfriend, Eddie. He attacked me. He managed to get the upper hand despite my best efforts and—" She stopped abruptly as she was hit with an epiphany. "Hmm. Perhaps that is why I am disappointed in Bonnie. Misplaced anger at myself."

"You should let go of both," Gibbs advised her. "And we don't know it was Eddie."

"No," she accepted. "Anyway, I just wanted you to know it happened before you found out from a background search."

He watched her closely for a moment, no doubt trying to determine how much it bothered her. Either she was getting better at deceiving him or he was letting her off the hook, because all Gibbs did was touch her arm briefly before turning to start the elevator again, and they got back to work.

Wednesday, June 26 2013

"Rosie? Hi, my name is Ziva. We spoke on the phone."

The young woman who looked back at Ziva and Tony from around her apartment door could have been Bonnie Stewart's sister. With blonde hair, blue eyes and delicate features, she looked younger than what she probably was and positively fragile. But she didn't shy away from the strangers on her doorstep. Instead, she opened the door wider and gestured at them to come in.

"Yeah, hi," she said. "Sorry about the mess."

Ziva barely looked around at the living room. She wasn't that interested in Rosie's living conditions tonight. She gestured at Tony. "This is my partner, Tony DiNozzo," she said before it occurred to her that she couldn't really introduce him that way anymore. They were still coworkers, but not really partners. Were they?

Rosie cared about Tony's title about as much as Ziva cared about the books and magazines strewn across the carpet. "Hey," she said to him with a nod of her head, and then jerked her thumb at a table and chairs off the kitchen. "We can talk over here."

Ziva and Tony followed her across the apartment and sat down on mismatched dining chairs.

"We appreciate you agreeing to talk to us," Ziva told her.

"Are you cops or something?" Rosie asked.

"Private sector," Tony told her. None of them were that comfortable with being tagged as private investigators yet. Not when they'd all spent so long looking down on those who were in business for themselves.

"Okay," Rosie said cautiously. "But you want to talk about Eddie?"

Ziva pulled out a small notebook and flipped to a blank page. "Yes. We are investigating Mr Hertzog for a client, and during a routine background search we found that you took out a restraining order against him last year."

Rosie brought one knee up to her chest and rested her heel on her chair seat. "Is that, like, something anyone can find out?" she asked.

"It's difficult," Tony told her, trying to put her sudden worries at ease. "We have a background in law enforcement so the channels are a little more open to us."

"Oh."

"Can you tell me what prompted the restraining order?" Ziva asked gently.

Rosie ran a hand through her hair. "Well, he was a creepy weirdo asshole," she said.

Ziva smiled as though she understood the type—and she did—and encouraged her to share more.

"We met at a party maybe two years ago," Rosie said. "Dated for a while and he was pretty normal right up until he wasn't. Out of nowhere he started getting really possessive and wanted to know where I was all the time." She gave a humorless laugh. "Actually, he didn't want me to go anywhere if he wasn't there."

"He was controlling," Tony said.

Rosie rolled her eyes as if that was an understatement. "Oh, yeah. Then he started getting mean. He put me down, called me names. If I cried he'd call me worse names."

"Did you tell anyone?" Ziva asked.

Rosie dropped her eyes and shook her head. "No," she said softly. "Not then. I was embarrassed. I thought it was my fault. He convinced me it was my fault."

Ziva looked over to Tony, and he gave her a small nod. The story sounded very familiar, and that was good news for them, if not for Rosie and Bonnie. The background search they and McGee had started on Eddie Hertzog after Bonnie left their office had been far more labor intensive than they were used to. They no longer had access to the databases that they'd taken for granted at NCIS, so they'd needed to rely on public records, lots of phone calls and niche Google searches. When they found the restraining order against Hertzog it had been a major breakthrough for them, but they'd tried not to get their hopes up that it would lead them to anything useful. After all, they weren't federal agents anymore and they didn't carry the badges that had often been the key that got them through the door with witnesses. When they'd found Rosie's name, Ziva had been very careful to sound trustworthy when she'd called to ask for her help. They were lucky Rosie had agreed, but they still had to tread carefully and protect this witness. It sounded like she had useful information for them.

"Men like him are good at twisting things to their advantage," Ziva said softly.

"If I only knew that then," Rosie said wistfully.

"I'm sorry to ask you this," Tony said, softening his voice. "But did it go beyond verbal abuse?"

Rosie got a resigned look on her face as she nodded. "Yeah. When I tried to stand up to him. Eddie doesn't like rejection, and he sure as hell doesn't like people trying to assert themselves over him. I went to the police when he threw me into a wall and broke my arm because I said I didn't feel like going out with him one night."

"I'm sorry," Ziva said.

Rosie shrugged. "Thanks, I guess."

"Was he arrested?" Tony asked.

She shook her head, and then had to brush hair out of her eyes. "Nope. They interviewed him but one of his friends gave him an alibi and said he'd been at his place all night. Went so far as to say that I was obsessed with Eddie and that I should be arrested." She laughed bitterly. "I don't think the cops bought it. But they didn't charge him either."

"So you got a restraining order," Ziva said.

"Yeah. It still took a while for him to pay attention to it. He was good at skirting the edges of violating it. He'd send me these creepy photos of me when I went out, but I couldn't ever prove they were from him." Rosie paused and frowned. "I have no idea why he eventually gave up on me and walked away, but he did. It was like one morning I woke up and I suddenly had my life back."

"When was that?" Tony asked.

Rosie bit her lip as she thought it over. "I can't be totally sure, but I think it was only, like, December."

Tony and Ziva shared another look. December was when Bonnie said she met Eddie. Had his interest in Rosie disappeared as soon as he thought he found another woman to try to control.

Rosie noticed the look. "What? Is he stalking some other woman?"

Ziva didn't want to share the details of Bonnie's case. But she did want to set Rosie's mind at ease. "We are not sure," she lied. "But I think you can be sure that Eddie Hertzog won't bother you again."

Wednesday, 16 December 2015

"Eddie Hertzog is still in prison," McGee reported as Gibbs and Ziva returned from the morgue. "I just talked to the prosecutor in his case. He's not up for parole until next year."

Ziva stopped by her desk as a glimmer of relief tugged at her chest. "Are you sure?"

McGee gave her a knowing, supportive smile. "I checked," he assured her. "And double checked."

She blew out a discreet sigh of relief, and walked around her desk to sit down. "Well. We can strike one person off the list."

"So, who does that leave us with?" Gibbs wanted to know.

"Her mother did not mention anyone hanging around when you spoke to her yesterday?" Ziva asked him.

Gibbs shook his head. "What other family does she have?"

"A sister in Sacramento," McGee said.

"And her best friend, Kavita," Ziva added. "They used to live together. They were very close."

"Get back in touch with her," Gibbs told her.

Ziva nodded and turned to her computer to find Kavita's contact details. Gibbs took a step towards Quinn's desk.

"Quinn, go down and see Abby," he instructed. "Find out what help she needs processing everything we brought in yesterday. I want to move faster."

"Sure thing," Quinn said, and got up straight away to head off to the elevator.

Gibbs turned and faced McGee. "Abby's got Bonnie's phone, but I want you to get hold of her Internet activity. I want to know if she's been talking to anyone in particular. Or ignoring anyone. Look her up on the Facebook thing."

"On it," McGee said, and got down to work.

With his three agents distracted with tasks, Gibbs took off towards the elevator. He needed to have a quick coffee date.

…

Tony pulled his overcoat collar up against the chill as he walked the path through the Navy Yard. He always felt that these meetings with Gibbs—they usually had them at least once a week—were so clandestine. Two men in overcoats sitting on a park bench off the beaten track. In this town a passerby could assume they were trading in secrets. The reality was that Tony usually complained that his team had not developed a psychic connection to him yet and still needed to be told what he wanted them to do, and Gibbs usually wanted to talk a case over with his former senior field agent. Tony liked it when Gibbs did that. He still felt the ache of loss from leaving the team that had been his home and family for 13 years. Of course the team still was his family—and Ziva in particular was literally in his home every night and would officially become his family one day—but he felt removed from them these days. Meeting with Gibbs like this made him feel like he was still a necessary member of the extended team. And although Gibbs would probably never say it, Tony knew the boss man really did still need him around. He'd played the part of Gibbs' safety net for more than a decade, and while McGee had shown the same skills as SFA, Gibbs was a man who liked routine. Tony was his routine, even if some of the steps had changed.

Gibbs was already sitting on the bench they used as a meeting place, and Tony was pleased to see there was a second cup of coffee in his gloved hand. He took a seat and the coffee before they properly acknowledged each other, and Gibbs waited until Tony had taken a healthy sip before looking over at him and speaking up.

"It's going to snow tonight," he told Tony.

Tony looked up at the grey sky. He feared Gibbs was right about that. "I'll sure look forward to digging my car out tomorrow morning."

"Should've bought something in the suburbs with a garage," Gibbs told him.

"Tell Ziva," Tony replied. "Technically, the house is hers."

Gibbs swung his head around to look at Tony with growing interest. "You got any good schools around there?"

"There's a private school a few blocks away. Public is a bit further."

Gibbs sipped his coffee thoughtfully. "It's handy if they're within walking distance."

Tony felt a little flutter in the part of his chest that wanted to get with the baby-making already, but avoided any serious discussion about it. "Any kid of Ziva's will probably be capable of walking 50 miles thought a snowstorm on their own by the time they turn three."

A fleeting smile of affection touched Gibbs' face. "Maybe. Can't imagine you two being that hands off, though."

Tony sighed quietly to himself. He thought Gibbs was probably right about that. "So, what's up?" he asked, moving the conversation along.

"Ziva told you about our case?"

Tony nodded heavily. "Bonnie Stewart," he said. When Gibbs called him to meet, Tony had an inkling the case was the reason for it. "But you want to talk about Ziva."

Gibbs looked him in the eye, and Tony noticed that the tip of his nose and his cheeks were turning red in the cold. "She gonna deal with this okay?"

Tony frowned, not keen on being stuck in the middle of the two of them. "What did she say?"

"That it wouldn't be a problem for her."

Tony nodded. "So, why would you question that?"

They held eye contact for a few seconds with Gibbs trying to force Tony into filling the silence, and Tony determined to back his partner. Eventually, Gibbs gave in.

"I'm worried," he admitted.

It felt strange to hear that from him, but Tony conceded that Gibbs had been more honest and open with him since he left the team. They were both team leaders now and closer to being on equal footing. And to Tony's surprise, Gibbs seemed to respect that. Unfortunately, he wasn't respecting the duty Tony had to keeping Ziva's business in confidence.

"Have you talked to her about it?" he asked, making it clear that it should be Gibbs' first step.

"She's holding back from me," Gibbs replied bluntly.

"Gibbs—"

"I ain't here to gossip, DiNozzo," Gibbs said. "She's bothered by it. Too much. And I got two other agents to think about."

Tony leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and hung his head. This was one of those grey areas that he didn't like being in. But another part of him (one that he wouldn't divulge to his beloved unless she asked him directly) was relieved that Gibbs was onto it. It had been clear to him last night that Ziva had already let it bother her (not that he blamed her), and he wanted to have her back while she worked the case. It wasn't practical for him to do that these days, so he needed the next best thing. And that was Gibbs.

"We met Bonnie a couple of months after Ziva's father died and she and I were in a weird kind of place." He stopped and shot a quick smirk at Gibbs. "Imagine that."

Gibbs lifted an eyebrow in acknowledgement. The two of them spent eight years in a weird kind of place.

"You'd gone, we'd quit," Tony went on. "And I think Ziva really needed something to make her feel normal again. Normal for her is protecting people, so she got a bit, well, intense with that particular job." He paused for an introspective moment. "I think you might actually get her to admit to it these days. Hell, if it happened now she might actually ask for help. Or, at least, she'd accept help if I forced it on her. I think I might have to this time. But working the case will be good for her, I think. She'll work through what she needs to." He paused. "I might have problems."

Gibbs frowned at him, not following what he was saying. "What are you talking about?"

Tony eyed him carefully. "What did she tell you about that case?"

"She said she was attacked," Gibbs said, getting to the point. "But it sounded like it wasn't a big deal."

It was clear that Gibbs didn't buy that. They were having this conversation for that very fact. Tony felt nausea roll though his stomach, and he put the remainder of his coffee on the ground beside his feet.

"Yeah," he confirmed weakly. "She was attacked in my apartment. We were using it as a kind of safe house for Bonnie while we were trying to gather evidence on her ex for stalking her. Ziva went over to pick her up. Bonnie wasn't there—McGee had taken her out and the word between him, Ziva and me got confused. But Bonnie's ex followed Ziva in. Demanded to know where Bonnie was and threatened her to get out of their business. As you can imagine, Ziva didn't take kindly to that. Somehow it ended up in a physical fight."

"Ziva said he got the upper hand," Gibbs said gently.

Tony nodded as the nausea turned to a stab of panic that reflected what he'd felt at the time. "He hit her with a vase. Did you know I had a vase in my apartment back then?" he asked Gibbs, but didn't wait for an answer. "I didn't have a clue. But now I know I did, because he smashed it into her head." He paused as he clasped his hands together tightly. "She doesn't remember exactly what happened then, but we think he hit her head against the floor or the kitchen counter or something a few times. She was really dazed but she remembers that he got her down on the ground and got on top of her, and…um…" He paused for another moment to swallow down the lump in his throat. "She started to panic. After Somalia, you know…" He couldn't make himself say it. After all the years that had passed and all the therapy he'd had—alone and with Ziva—he still couldn't make himself say the horrific word when it related to her. Even thinking of it made tears prick the back of his eyes, and if he wasn't holding his hands together so hard he knew they would be shaking.

"Yeah," Gibbs said roughly, saving Tony from having to explain himself.

Tony cleared his throat and blinked, and forced himself to move on from the thought. "She panicked and she struggled," he told Gibbs. "The more she struggled, the harder he fought her, until he started to strangle her. And she passed out. Eddie must've thought he'd killed her then, because he ran." He blew out a long breath that turned into a white cloud in the cold. "I came home probably only a few minutes later and found her lying on my kitchen floor. Bleeding from the head, marks all over her and her clothes all torn and bunched up. She wasn't moving. And I thought she was dead too."

He took a shaky breath and shot Gibbs a self-conscious glance. "Last night it occurred to me that I haven't fully dealt with it yet. I thought I had, but now I just want to be sick. So I can listen to her talk her way through it, but I'll have to take breaks every few minutes so I can go to the bathroom and puke."

There was a long silence then, and Tony thought Gibbs might be dealing with his disappointment over Tony not being able to step up and be a dependable partner when he was needed. But when he chanced a look over at him again, he found Gibbs looking away across the yard with a look of hurt on his face. Not the kind of hurt that a person felt at being let down or excluded from a secret, but the kind a father felt when his kids had been hurt and there was nothing he could do about it. Tony looked away quickly.

"I didn't know," Gibbs finally said, and he sounded like he was giving Tony an apology for the fact.

Tony shook his head. "It was while you were away," he said. "Months before you got back. And Ziva has a tendency to bounce back from these kinds of experiences like they never happened. You know, until they come back to bite her in the ass again."

He heard Gibbs sigh heavily before he got back on track with the case. "Bonnie was strangled to death," he told Tony.

"Yeah. Ziva suspected so."

"Her ex is still in prison," Gibbs went on, delivering Tony a sense of incredible relief. "McGee just confirmed it."

"Good," Tony sighed, and sat up straight again. "You know, I almost came back to work last night to check that for myself."

Gibbs smirked knowingly. "Uh-huh. You know, it's not your case."

"I'm aware. But I'm ready to come off the bench if you need me."

A few more moments passed in silence until Gibbs turned another, wider smirk on him. "I heard you found a foot."

Tony held up one index finger. "One foot. Just one. And some dog tags that definitely don't belong to the poor guy who's either dead now or has a hell of a limp."

"Sounds like an interesting case you got there, DiNozzo."

"Time will tell."

Gibbs threw back the rest of his coffee and then the two of them stood up and started walking back to the NCIS building. They had made half the trip in silence before Tony found his tongue.

"You gotta watch her back, Gibbs. I've got a feeling it's going to get rocky." He held up a hand. "I'm not saying protect her, because she doesn't need it and she'll kill us both if she finds out. But just…watch her."

Gibbs tossed his coffee cup in a trashcan as they passed by, and then gave Tony a solemn nod and recited the line so often aimed at him in the past. "On it, boss."

A/N: Thank you again for your interest in this story. I'm blown away, and hope you continue to enjoy it.