Hai there!

It's been long since I updated. Sorry

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Easing on the chit chat, onto the story!

Chapter 11

The door opened slowly, it was Kate who came over and by using her spare key, had excess to Ziva and Adam's apartment.

"Ziva? Aria? Adam?" she called out

Silence greeted the detective.

"That's odd, Ziva should've been home already." Kate shook it off and reminded herself to ask Ziva about it.

With that, Kate left the apartment stealthily.

Ziva took in a deep breath and crept in cautiously from the fire escape.

She picked up her luggage, hopped into her car and headed off to her booked motel. At the motel, she made a call to the mum of Aria's sleepover mate and said that instead of Adam fetching Aria, she will be doing it instead.

Ziva disconnected the call, showered and went to try and get some sleep.

The next day,

Ziva was up early to go for her daily jog and to pick up Aria. After dropping off Aria at school, she headed off to work with a cup of coffee in an attempt to try and hide her fatigue.

Before heading up to the squad room, Ziva went to the ladies room and applied on another layer of makeup to hide the dark eye circles. After convincing herself that she looked presentable enough, she headed up to the squad room.

Up at the squad room,

Both teams were staring up at the murder board, two heads were better than one. Ziva abruptly entered the squad room.

Ziva slid down to her desk and sighed at the paper work left at her desk. Esposito came over

"Mornin' Zi, the paper work was from the night you went undercover, so fill em' out and hand that to captain Gates okay?" he said gently

She nodded her head slowly. Esposito left a donut on her desk and gave her a pat on the shoulder.

Kate kept her gaze on Ziva. Something was bugging her. She made a self- reminder to ask her about last night soon.

Kate wasn't the only one looking. Gibbs could read Ziva like a book. He knew that look, that behavior. Something was up.

At lunch,

Ziva scurried off to fetch Aria before Adam could get the chance to. Luckily, she arrived at Aria's friend's house earlier. She picked her up and scurried off to their motel. The motel was a hard to locate one. Out in the middle of nowhere. Since it was a holiday, Aria stayed in the motel and watched Barbie movies.

"Mommy, where's daddy?"

"Well, umm. He needs a break from us for some time. So I decided to check us in here for the time being." Ziva lied

Aria, being a little innocent girl, accepted that answer and went back to her movie. Ziva contacted the regular sweet nanny who was really flexible to come over and watch Aria. Half and hour later, the nanny arrived. It took her some time to find this out-of-place motel.

Ziva hurried back to work and made it barely on time to the precinct only managing to grab a burrito at Taco bell on the way back.

Another body got brought in during lunch break, Ziva and Kate went down to get Lanie's findings.

On the elevator ride down, Kate was looking at Ziva nervously. Ziva noticed and snapped at Kate,

"What? If you have something to say, just say it already."

Kate was taken aback by Ziva's cranky attitude

"Fine, you know what? Everyone on both teams is worried sick about you! You have been acting like some lifeless zombie. You think I don't notice the bags under your eyes, how unfocused you are at work and your absent mindlessness out on the field. What the hell is going on Ziva?"

Ziva looked like she was about to cry. Kate felt really guilty then,

"Sorry, I didn't mean to lash out…"

"It is okay Kate, I want to apologize for being such a, what do you call it, a wreck."

"Don't be sorry. I just wanna know what is going on."

The elevator landed at the morgue level and Ziva walked out quickly to avoid answering the question. Kate sighed, so much for being saved by the bell. This time actually being killed by the bell. Kate walked out to catch up with Ziva.

That night Ziva returned to the motel and saw that Aria was already put to bed by the nanny and she was just packing up to leave. Ziva offered her a ride home but she politely declined saying that she had other plans. She smiled graciously and took her leave.

Ziva then decided that she most definitely could not sleep. She decided to stay up and read through the profiles of all the victims.

The next day,

Ziva dropped off Aria at school and thankfully, Adam wasn't there to do anything funny. "Probably off plotting his revenge plan." She thought.

She stopped by Starbucks and got herself a cup of coffee and a banana nut muffin.

At the precinct, she realized that she was the earliest in the bullpen. She checked the wall clock: 0700 am. Usually she would be here at 09.30 am as Adam was the one to drop Aria in school. Geez, what was she going to do.

She went over to the murder board, she noticed that there were still some empty spots of information that only Ziva knew that were still not filled out. She was tempted to fill them out but refrained from doing so.

But what she did was fill in the blanks for the "connection" she wrote "same platoon". She capped the marker and wrote down personal notes.

Gibbs filed in next. Surprisingly, alone. Gibbs noticed that Ziva was alone and decided to go over and catch up with his former agent.

"Ziver," he said in a warm voice

Ziva jumped and turned around. She stood up and felt the urge to embrace him. Gibbs must have sensed this as he extended his arms. Ziva willingly walked into them. He wrapped her in a gentle hug. Oh boy did she miss these. He pecked her on the forehead and got down to business.

"I haven't got the chance to talk to you yet Ziver. How are you?"

"I'm fine Gibbs."

"Don't seem that way."

"Why does everyone say that?"

"Cause it's a fact."

Ziva sighed and kept silent.

"Well whatever it is, remember this Ziver, secrets are like time bombs. They explode sooner or later. Teams don't keep secrets"

"Is that a rule?"

"Not really."

With that, teams began pouring into the bull and a regular work day resumed.

At night,

Kate was in the kitchen preparing a chicken casserole for dinner until a knock on the door interrupted that.

Kate placed the casserole in the oven and went to get the door.

Ziva was at the door,

"Can… can I come in?"

Kate stepped aside and Ziva entered. Kate noticed that Ziva had her bags with her.

"Do you mind if… I stay here for a little while? My apartment is being fumigated."

"But there was no notice…." Kate noticed the wary expression on Ziva's face.

"Okay sure. Adam?"

She flinched at the name but answered, "Out of town"

"Aria?"

"At the nanny's" Ziva had placed her there for her own safety.

And this was where things started to go downhill.

R&R please! Sucky chapter I know.