Ziva looked around the living room, pleased with the results. Initially, she had objected to the dark colors Abby was so fond of, but the black and purple walls were surprisingly tasteful and she felt that the living room had come together quite nicely. The dark colors, extending from the walls to the black leather furniture, somehow struck a balance between the two women's personalities, displaying a blending that echoed the harmony they had found in their rapidly intensifying relationship.

"Do you really need all these books, Ziva?" Tony whined as he lugged in yet another box of Ziva's books, slowly headed toward the office, which looked more like a decent sized library than anything else, even without all of Ziva's books being moved in. Between her and Abby, she estimated that they had somewhere around 6 000 volumes, not including the forensic journals Abby subscribed to and kept filed both in her lab and at home.

Ziva just laughed at Tony and continued her tour of the home that was coming together quickly under Gibbs' expert direction.

Easing onto the couch, Ziva smiled with the memory of how they had managed to pull Tony into the slave labor. McGee, Palmer, and even Ducky had agreed without hesitation but Tony, forever avoiding manual labor, was more difficult to convince.

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One week earlier

Ziva, Abby, and Gibbs all stood glaring at Tony who, though squirming under their combined wrath, was refusing to give in without some promise of reward.

Realizing that he would eventually break, Tony tried to think of some compromise. After a few seconds, he realized that he knew exactly what he wanted in return for his labor.

"You guys have a secret."

Ziva rolled her eyes and Abby and Gibbs smiled; well, to be accurate, Abby grinned and Gibbs' smirked, but nonetheless...

"And I will happily trade as much manual labor as my extremely masculine physique can bear, which is a considerable amount, if you agree to tell me said secret when we are done."

Ziva and Abby held a brief, silent conversation. Ziva wasn't quite ready to have the entire team coddling her, as she knew they would once they found out she was pregnant, and she didn't want to deal with the uptick in Tony's continuous sexual innuendo that would inevitably occur if he knew that she and Abby really were sleeping together, but she also knew that she couldn't hide her pregnancy much longer and, since Abby had a habit of sneak attack passionate kisses at work, she was surprised that they hadn't already been caught by the ever lurking Tony.

"Agreed," the women said simultaneously. Then, the team began the business of planning the move, setting up a tentative schedule for cleaning, painting, and moving.

Luckily, the next week was uneventful and, with the dearth of cases, the entire team managed to leave the office early every night and by the weekend the house was move-in ready. With seven sets of hands and Gibbs' skill set, even the normally imperturbable Ziva was shocked with the rapidity with which her new home came together.

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Back to present

After the house was cleaned from top to bottom, Gibbs sealed off the room next to the master bedroom with crime scene tape and threatened everyone with a painful death if they dared to so much as peek into the room. Although this elicited more than a few raised eyebrows, nobody dared to defy the former Marine, so they went about their business, pretending that the room did not even exist.

Since each member of the team had accrued a large amount of vacation time, they took the following week off to move in Abby and Ziva's possessions and spend some time relaxing and bonding, which they all felt they deserved after the difficulty of Ziva's recall to Israel and the uncertainty that had followed.

Not surprisingly, Abby knew exactly how she wanted the house decorated so she and Ziva mostly supervised the move in. Much to Ziva's delight, Tony was either too busy or too scared of the combined fury of Ziva and a very protective Gibbs to mention the sleeping arrangements and so did not comment on the fact that she and Abby were buying a house together, much less on the strange addition of a queen sized bed to accompany Abby's coffin in the master bedroom.

"After all," Abby pointed out, "he's never seen your bedroom and for all he knows the guest room could be your room. And I sleep in a coffin, so how weird can it be that I also want a bed?"

Once the books were moved in, Ziva spent the majority of her time in the office, organizing the books on the wall-to-wall shelves Gibbs had set up for them. Occasionally, she would call in one of the guys to move a box to the bedroom, which also contained a large bookshelf, and fairly quickly she had all of the books arranged to perfection.

By Thursday night, with the exception of Gibbs' mystery room, the house was finished.

Tony flopped down on an oversized chair, exhausted by the unaccustomed exertion of the past two weeks. The rest of the team arranged themselves comfortably around the living room, Gibbs and Abby flanking a very nervous (although visibly composed) Ziva on the couch.

"All right, guys. I kept up my end of the bargain. Now, spill." Tony demanded, looking expectantly at Ziva.