Ch. 9 The SecNav's Bourbon

It was dark when Gibb's rang the door bell. All day he'd occupied himself with paper work and drinking coffee, unable to do anything else involving Ziva until he received intelligence from his team or the day was over. It was now that the day was over that he could finally go to work.

The door was answered by a butler.

"Yes sir, how can I help you?"

"I'm here to see the secretary. I know he doesn't expect me, but please, tell him it's Gibbs." moments later the SecNav himself was at the door.

"Jethro. I must admit, this is a surprise." Phillip Davenport opened the door wide for Gibbs to come in.

"It shouldn't be Phil. You had to have known I'd be back to talk to you."

"This is about that last conversation we had in your basement, isn't it?" Davenport shook his head, a knowing smile on his face. "Come into my study. I'll pour you a drink and then we can talk."

Gibbs swirled the bourbon in his glass, watching the amber liquid glow in the dim light of Phillip Davenport's study.

"Alright Gibbs. Tell me why you couldn't leave well enough alone." Gibbs eyes hardened.

"Well enough? Because with all due respect, nothing is well enough. Something stinks and I'm trying to figure out what."

"Why Gibbs? It doesn't effect you. Has nothing to do with you."

"No, but it may effect a certain young lady who I hold very dear to my heart. So, if it concerns her, it concerns me. Now, tell me. What is the op that Vance is point man on?" Davenport began to pace, wondering how much to tell Gibbs and where to start.

"As I told you before, Vance is going to be point man on a major op. You see, myself and the other intelligence heads feel that it is somewhat unwise to have such a high ranking intelligence officer around so much sensitive information. Information about our national security."

"A control officer is suddenly a top ranking officer? Am I getting old Phil?" Gibbs voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Cut the crap Gibbs. She'd Eli David's daughter. Her brother became a mole for Mossad before switching over. Who's to say she's not a mole, huh? Lord only knows what kind of information she's passed on. It was unwise to keep her on staff for so long."

"Officer Ziva David is loyal to NCIS. Damn it, Phil, if you only knew her you'd know that."

"That so Gibbs? Okay, then explain something to me. Why did she disobey direct orders during that war game? She was ordered specifically not to engage. Does she enjoy beating the crap out our Marines?" Phil stopped pacing looking at Gibbs for an answer.

"She disobeyed orders because of her partner." Gibbs never let on to his agents that he suspected why they had failed to follow orders to a tee. "A gunshot went off and she saw her partner go down. There was no way to tell that he wasn't shot. I would have done the exact same thing."

"Gibbs, why do you trust her? I know about your famous gut and it's got to be more than that."

Gibbs took a deep breath. He knew that the only way to get SecNav on his side was to put a certain amount of trust in the man. He needed to provide proof.

"I trust Ziva David because she shot Ari Haswari to save my life. He was about to pull the trigger when she shot him. And I don't give a damn about what Vance says her orders may have been. All I know is that it broke her heart to shoot Haswari. Broke her heart to pieces." Gibbs took a sip of bourbon.

"She could have been on orders Gibbs. I know you don't like Vance. But the fact is she could have been on orders. If that's the only reason you trust her, it's a weak trust."

"When I lost my memory, she came to the hospital. She made me angry, intentionally. She forced me to remember. When she was accused of murder and treason, instead of accepting Mossad's protection, she called me, asking me to help her. She has pulled her weight as an agent. And, that's it. What you're not understanding is that none of my agents are exposed to intelligence worth passing on. She said it herself. She's an investigator now, not just a killer."

"Then why did she stay in Israel?"

"Because she needed time to discover who she could trust. Look Phil, somethings wrong. The situation isn't so cut and dry. I'm tired of talking about Ziva David's loyalty to the agency because it has never been in question. Now, I need to know about Vance's operation."

SecNav refilled his drink and sat on winged arm chair.

"Well Gibbs, like I said, the op is against our friends, the Israelis. Regardless of what you say about young David, and regardless of whether or not it's true, you can't deny that Mossad has been rather active on the state side recently." SecNav paused watching Gibbs face as he processed the information.

"You want to know why." stated Gibbs.

"Well absolutely. We wouldn't be doing a good job of protecting the home front if another country's intelligence agency had free reign to do as they pleased. We planned that meeting after the events in Los Angeles. We decided that Rivkin in town without us knowing was too risky. We want to know what they know about potential threats. So who better to use to get the intel than Vance?"

Gibbs was slightly confused. "Vance work with Mossad before?"

"Really Gibbs, you should have read that CIA report. You see, Vance and Eli David go way back. They did some joint NCIS Mossad work back when you where still a gunny. They worked together in Europe and as far as I know, which is a lot more than people give me credit for, they're still close buddies. We figured the friendship is a good cover."

Gibbs felt a flash of anger. "Phil, you destroy a friendship by using it as a cover. David figures out he's being played and the US is screwed."

"Well then we better hope that Vance plays his cards right Gibbs. Understand that Vance has free reign to do as he sees fit. We don't know or even care about the methods really. Just so long as he doesn't get caught and we don't lose one of our closest allies."

Gibbs was still angry. Vance with free reign was terrifying to think about. "Do you even realize how many people could get hurt, will get hurt, if this goes wrong?"

"It's a risk we're willing to take Gibbs."

A/N: Again, thank you all so much for reading. Like I mentioned before, the action will pick up.

And now, I have a favor to ask: So during the summer, I like to catch up on reading. So if anyone has a book the really like and think others should read, lemme know.

Again, thanks for reading.