15 Forty miles of bad road

They wait in the car while Ziva goes into the hospital alone. On her way out she asks Ducky to please, please find someone to wash Tony's hands. Becks will be frightened enough without seeing that. Back in the car she is trembling, excited that Rebecca will be back in an hour or two, worried that Tony is worse and Ducky has nothing encouraging to say. But she believes that Tony is waiting for Becks, and when his daughter is in the room, his eyes will open at last.

There are three cars, and they take up positions covering the open area but well back and well hidden. McGee has a mobile hotspot sync'd to the satellite of the dread unnamed agency. "Great coverage, boss, really great." He can see the three NCIS cars and nothing else. "Not even a mouse."

"We're early," Gibbs says. "Ziva, go right to the center of the clearing. Take your phone, too. He may send more directions by email." He sees her removing her service weapon and says, "You don't go out there unarmed."

"Take the cannoli, leave the gun," she says. "It's what Tony would say, yes? Gibbs, he might pat me down. It's not worth the risk. McGee, pass me the cannoli." And she trudges off into the center of the clearing. It is fifteen minutes before midnight.

It is a cool night. After a while she is blowing on her hands and stamping her feet a bit. At 12:15, Gibbs tells her to send an email: "I'm here w/money. More instructions?" But there are no more instructions. At 12:30, they can hear her crying softly. At 12:45, she sends another email. At 1, she begins shouting. "Where are you? What do you want? Your money is here. Come get it. You've already killed my husband. Kill me if you want. Take the money. Just send my daughter home."

In the backseat, McGee is crying, and Sarah too. Gibbs can hear what sounds like sniffling from the other cars. Abby, he feels certain, is crying too, alone in her lousy lab. "Anything on infrared, McGee?"

"Nothing, boss. Nothing this whole time."

Ziva has stopped shouting. Nor is she crying. She is sitting on the ground, very still. Gibbs gets out of the car and walks into the clearing. He holds out a hand and says to her, "Come in, Ziva."

There is no answer. She doesn't take his hand, but finally she stands, brushes herself off, and they walk back to the car.

"Allen and Burns will stay," Gibbs says. "We'll keep the area under surveillance all night."

"It doesn't matter," she says. "My daughter is dead. Please take me back to the hospital. I just want to be with Tony."

x x x

Back in the squadroom, Sarah and Abby hang onto each other like sisters, still crying. McGee is wiping his eyes when he thinks no one is watching. The agents who have spent the day running down BOLOs are blank and shocked.

Gibbs starts another pot of coffee. "I hope no one's planning on going home," he barks.

"What do you want us to do?"

"Rebecca DiNozzo is not dead. This is still a kidnapping. So work the case, damn it. This guy may be a sick bastard. Or he may have been picked up for driving without a license. He may be in an emergency room. Start looking. Cosgrove, in the morning you get those warrants signed. I don't care what time Judge Alhambra eats his breakfast, you get them signed. You—who are you and where the hell have you been?"

"Running down BOLOs. I'm Winfield Hancock the fifth."

"You—you're joking."

"No sir. My great great great grandfather was a Union general in the Civil War. Hancock the Superb."

Winfield Hancock. The Superb. The fifth. What could the man who came up with Probie Wan Kenobi do with that mouthful? "You take the hospital rooms and the local jail cells. Our perp is a male, mid 20s, Caucasian, blond hair. Scratches on an arm or arms. And what happened with the BOLO at the gas station?"

"Dad, son, and 12-year-old daughter."

"And you?" Gibbs says to the next agent.

"Mark Green. I've been with Win on the BOLOs."

"See if you can help Abby in the lab. McGee, find out what we can about that email address. When it was opened, where it was opened, anything. And Tim. Would that infrared have picked up a camera?"

"Probably not."

"Is there some other way to find out if there's a camera transmitting by wifi from there?"

"I can't think of a way. But we might be able to come up with something. And we can do an actual search in daylight. If he comes sooner for the camera we'll get him on the infrared. You think this whole thing was a setup just to torment Ziva?"

"I can't rule it out."

"Saleem," McGee says.

"I'm not ruling it out. Cosgrove. The carrier group is due in tomorrow—no, today. Every single ship has an NCIS agent on it. You get their names. We'll need help."

"What are you going to do, Agent Gibbs?" Cosgrove asks.

"I'm going to wake up the FBI and see if they know of any similar cases. And get a profiler on the job. And then I'm going to call Interpol and do the same."

"Let me know if you need any help," she says. And they are all tired and shell-shocked and heartsick, but the office is moving again.

x x x

Five a.m. is a hard, hard hour for those who are awake unwillingly, and there aren't many who are awake willingly. A fresh BOLO with the vague perp description and Rebecca's picture has been sent throughout Spain and to every airport and train station in Europe. Allen and Burns and a carful of MPs are still at the drop site, waiting for daylight. Abby and Green are trying to make sense of the print evidence on the café computer and hoping for a hit on the DNA sample. McGee has finally gotten access to the encrypted cellphone info. Hancock has checked the hospitals and local lockups and is out running down yet another BOLO with an MP for backup. Cosgrove is on the phone to LEOs in the U.S., trying to find the missing bad conduct discharges. Gibbs has talked to the FBI, Interpol, the Spanish state police, police forces in Gibraltar, Lisbon, Marseilles, and Naples, looking for information on kidnappers, carjackers, knifemen. For the last four hours they have all worked at frantic speed, and the coffee pot has been emptied for the fifth time.

Rebecca DiNozzo has been missing for 20 hours. They've gotten no news from the hospital. And they still have nothing solid.

McGee is yawning and rubbing his eyes. "The gmail account was opened yesterday from an internet café in Rota. Not the one by the base, one in the resort area in the western part of the city. The account has only been used once."

"Send Hancock to pick up the computer."

"The café's closed."

"Then find out who owns it and have Hancock wake him up."

"Will do. I haven't found anything interesting from Tony's cellphone." McGee hesitates, then says, "Do you think we should go to the hospital? To be with Ziva."

"I doubt she wants any company."

"Ducky probably does. He's been there all day and all night. And I have Ziva's phone. She left it in the car. She might need it."

"You have her phone?"

"No calls, no emails, no texts."

McGee is right. "Go get Abby."