Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS

part 2 of part 2. The whole point of separating the chapters was to equal out the chapters but this one still ended up being 3000 words. The only reason I separated them was because sometimes people write an extra long chapter but the next one is really short and it makes me disappointed so I'm trying to equal out all the anyway I'm not going to separate this one because it's not that longer than usual and I can't find a place to separate them. But don't expect the rest of the chapters in the story to be as long as this one though, not that this is that longer.


They walked in silence for rest of her way home, Tony has insisted that he walk her home even though she said she was fine. Even though she would never admit it out loud, she took comfort in the fact that Tony was beside her supporting her right before she had to face her father, even if he did not say anything or see the whole picture. Sure missing a family outing was not probably not a big deal with anyone. Tony probably thought that her father would be like any other father and yell at her for few minutes for not appreciating family traditions. But that was not the case, her father did not care that much about family, hell he probably could not care less about it. But what was important to him, being in IDF and Mossad his entire whole life was orders. You get orders and you follow them period. It was a lesson her father has taught her before she could even read. Everything with him involved orders, including family and this to him was considered disobeying orders. Mouthing off and lying was on top of 'piss him off list' but disobeying and defying orders... well that was more than just pissing him off.

Eli David paced around his front yard waiting for his daughter's return. He was so furious he felt like his lungs was on fire causing him to breath in and out extremely fast. They were supposed to go to the shooting range for practice today and today he called in some of his old friends favors and observe to see if they can get Ziva in to a summer boot camp for older youths since her skill was far beyond her age-level. Ziva, you just had to pick today to miss practice. Ziva loved shooting ranges since the first time he gave her a gun for her birthday present when she was seven. It was a Jericho that he taught her to shoot with which he noticed that she still uses occasionally now. It was her second favorite activity, right under combat sessions. For her to miss this, she must have had a good reason. No, Eli told himself, he specifically ordered her to leave whatever it was that she was doing and come home on the phone three times. You never disobey orders as long as you have one breath left, that was one of his basic principals all his life and it was something that he expected his children to follow too. Ziva disobeyed his order and it does not matter what excuse she think she has, she has crossed the line this time.

He stopped thinking as he saw a couple appear at the edge of the street sidewalk. As they walked towards him, he could see it was Ziva and that boy from this morning. Well, she certainly does not look like someone who is incapable of bringing herself to a shooting range one block away, he though sourly. He was about to yell at Ziva but stopped himself and decided to observe the two before summoning his oldest daughter. The two was talking way too low for him to hear what they were saying. But couple of minutes later they stopped talking and the boy leaned in and kissed her. Eli David drew in a deep breath between his lips ready to see his daughter push him onto the ground and use her knife to threaten cutting the precious part of his body off or something equally violent. But it never came, and in fact from his point of view Ziva seems to be returning the kiss.

On the opposite end of the street Ari walked in casually bracing himself for another round of yelling from his father demanding where Ziva was. He shook his head as he wondered what Ziva was thinking, he knew that his half-sister was extremely stubborn and defiant but even she would not pull this on their father because that would be no longer be considered being rebellious, it would be sheer stupidity. Even though he was irritated by Ziva's bold act and questioning her sanity, he was worried about his sister. Shooting range was one of her favorite things to do, well perhaps not but it was out of all the David family activities, and the access to a close shooting range was practically the only reason she agreed to move to the states. And their father has announced Tuesday evening that one of his friend would visit and see if he could get Ziva into a more challenging summer boot camp than the one she would go to along with other people her age who was all slower, weaker, and less skilled than her. Considering the fact that she had photographic memory in addition to her observant nature, she could not have forgotten that. So where was she? Not only does she know that this would piss their father off, she loved that place and this particular week she could show off all her skills to make her summer less boring.

But Ari's whole world halted to a stop as he got close enough to his house to see the scene that was unfolding. His father was somewhat hiding behind a tree observing two teenagers maybe a mile or two way. A boy who is Ari's height was gently kissing a girl, but that was not the surprise since Ari has noticed that many American couples kiss very passionately in public so the gentle kiss was actually a nicer scene, but the surprise was that the girl was his sister. And the boy was Tony, one of Ziva's new friends at school who Ari guessed was the one at their doorstep this morning, and has he wrapped his arms around Ziva's waist. Even though he was still far away he could just feel his father giving them a furious, perhaps even homicidal, glare at them as Ziva did absolute nothing to stop him. This cannot end well. Ari think! You have to stop this before you father jumps at the two with one of his weapons that he surely hide on himself somewhere. Ziva had to pick Tony? Tony is not only not Israeli, but is not even Jewish. Nobody other than Tali in their family ever really followed their religion really closely, but dating Jewish men was one part of the religion their father followed. Probably more for the family reputation rather than the religion itself but it did not matter since it was not helping this situation at all. With no better idea coming to his mind he yelled for his father extreamely loudly.

Ziva David froze as she heard a familiar voice yelling 'Papa'. Ari, it was Ari, and her father was somewhere within his and her earshot. She stopped kissing Tony and pushed herself away. Tony who also heard what he thought was Ari's voice calling probably his father, who was also Ziva's father, had his suspicion confirmed when Ziva pulled herself away. "Is this where I should pull a Chandler?"

"What?" Ziva asked in a mixture of annoyance and amusement.

"You know Chandler in Friends when Ross saw him having sex with his sister, you know? No? I should really get you to watch more TV."

If it wasn't for the circumstances, Ziva might have laughed at Tony's comment. Only he could ever make a movie reference, or was it a TV reference, when the Deputy Director of a very intimidating international Intelligence Agency probably wanted to strangle him. "Tony we can do whatever you want later, right now just leave. Leave. And stay away."

"That serious huh?"

"Tony I am over two hours late to get home and my father just have witnessed you sticking your tongue down my throat, I do not think this is a good time for you to make jokes."

Tony getting the hint that nothing he said would make Ziva less nervous, scared, whatever it was that she felt, so he said a quick goodbye and left even though more than anything in the world he wanted to stay and support her. But he knew if he did that not only will it not help but would make things worse for Ziva so he gave up.

Ziva looked at her house and saw that no one was in the front yard anymore so she figured that Ari has already dragged her father into the house. She felt relieved that they could do this inside the house, not that it would be any better or anything, but at least nobody would watch them. She took a one last long breath in as if that was the last one she was going to have, not that it was far from what she was facing, and opened the door.

---------------------------

She checked one last time that Ari was sleeping peacefully instead of unconscious before she went down stairs and grabbed her jacket. The fight that has started over two hours ago in the David household was anything but pretty. Ziva cursed herself for the millionth time since the fight started for forgetting her father's announcement on Tuesday. How did you get so distracted that you did not notice that your father was eating with you and actually talking that day.Now because of her stupid mistake, her father has driven away nearly an hour ago to deal with 'business'. Not that she minded that but what she did mind was it ended up getting Ari unconscious.

When her father threatened to ship her back to Israel, Ari stood up for her. While she stayed determined in not giving her father any satisfaction, giving absolutely no sign that anything her father had yelled at her had any effect, he being the protective caring older brother that he was and seeing that she was happier here for the past two weeks than she has ever been for the past fourteen years and despite the cold face she put on back there she really wanted to stay, he even begged her father to reconsider. But her father being much more stubborn than she was, did not care and went into his office to book a ticket. Her father was furious to the point where he did not realize Ari was following really close and slammed the door way too hard. It had hit Ari's head and face really badly and he shortly drifted into unconsciousness. When his head hit the floor it made him regain his consciousness, so by the time Ziva yelled his name in panic and her father realized what he has done and opened the door he was sitting again. but it still made Ziva feel really horrible, Ari should not have been the one to get punished, not that she was implying that it was intended, it was all her fault.

After they got an ice pack for Ari and took him upstairs into his bedroom, her father decided that he's going for business and they will discuss the issue later. But Ziva has known his father long enough to not trust that he would reconsider anything he said, in fact she was surprised that he even felt guilty enough after Ari fainted to leave rest of the fight for later. For nearly an hour she sat beside Ari's bed making sure he was feeling better and imagining all the different ways this would end and none of them had happy endings. She stopped walking as she realized she has reached her destination. She pulled out her cell phone and pressed speed dial 3.

"For the last damn time-" The furious voice from the other end of the phone screamed.

"Tony, it's me Ziva. I'm in front of your house right now would you mind if you could came down for a few minutes?"

"Ziva. I,,, that...that was not intended for you. Anyway yeah I'll be down in one sec." Tony answered and Ziva shut the phone before Tony could say anything unnecessary.

"Why did you hang up on me Ziva?" Tony asked playfully as he appeared from his house.

"I have to talk to you."

"Wanna go inside and do that. I mean it's kinda cold out here and at least we can have some cocoa right, you know I never know why it's spelled 'coco-ah' but-"

"Tony." Ziva simply said but it was enough for Tony to get that she was completely serious. "I just want to talk to you about this afternoon."

"Why are you frowning Ziva. Didn't you enjoy it as much as I did? Wait, what happened after I left? Is it your Dad?" Tony started to ask all the questions but Ziva was in no mood to answer any of them. The less they said, the easier this was on her.

"Tony, I just think that ...it is ridiculous, we only... it is hard for me to tell you this but I do not think us being more than friends is a good idea. It...we..." Ziva bit her lips as she saw how hurt Tony looked. Although it seems ridiculous, but in the past two weeks she has observed enough to conclude that Tony and Gibbs were very alike. Although from the outside it seems that they are what they call ice opposites, no polar opposites, they have been both hurt very deeply before. They just used two very different ways to cover up their vulnerability, Gibbs acts all hard and unbreakable to prevent any enemies to break in while Tony joke to dance around the serious topics to avoid getting hurt. It hurt her more than she thought it would when she realized that she was adding another scar to his already broken heart.

"What? You...just like that? Just few hours ago you...and now you're telling me that it's a bad idea after I completely throw myself at you?" Tony finally managed to say as he found his voice back.

"I am sorry but it is for the best. I do not expect you to forgive me, but please understand that I did not mean for this to happen this way. "

"Yeah sure whatever." She winced as Tony responded flatly. The three dismissive words hurt Ziva as if a bullet passed through her heart, shuddering it into a million pieces. And at that point Ziva knew that this was not another one of her imaginary scenes but it was real. There was no turning back now. She had just destroyed the relationship of her and the boy that she liked, no, he was not another one of her crush, the boy she fell in love with single handedly. Now not only can they not be together but they cannot even be friends anymore.

"Tony I..." Ziva managed to say through her dry throat.

"What Ziva? What?" When Ziva didn't, no, chose not to continue, he did. "Just as I thought. You know you're right. Maybe this was a bad idea. But don't worry we can still be friends, right?" Tony smiled but it neither reached his eyes nor his heart. A men called his name from the front door of his house. "I should go. See you Monday?" Tony said but nothing he said had anymore emotion in them anymore. He ran casually to his house but he wondered to himself where he found that energy because he felt numb as if his whole body was frozen.

Ziva closed her eyes and let a droo of tear fall down her face. She quickly wiped it away scolding herself for crying. You did what you had to do Ziva. It was best for Tony. Your father is going to send you back to Israel anyway. He is not going to change his mind because your brother fainted protecting you. It's best for Tony to think that you did not want this and left than for him to find out that there could have been something but you were not capable of getting it. Maybe you father is right, if you are not capable of getting something, you do not deserve it. So why have two broken hearts when it could be just one? He'll forget you eventually, he will find a nice girl to date again real soon, he was Tony, he always got better. But it did not matter what she told herself because she knew that none of it was true. She wanted to turn the clock backwards and start the day all over again. Maybe if you had remembered that there was a guest today this would not have happened. Maybe if you had checked your clock at the park, it could have ended differently. Maybe if you had begged your father instead of defying him completely, he could have seen your point or at least not send you back to Israel. At least then Ari would not hate you for dragging him into this mess and and you would not have broken Tony's heart and maybe you could even have found something to work things out with Tony without your father knowing, she told herself. But none of the maybe ifs was going to happen because this was reality and at that moment, to Ziva David, reality hurt more than anything in the world.


TBC and please review