Well, you know what they say: two short chapters make a...decently sized chapter?

Chapter 16

"Found anything out yet?" Desiree asked, sitting down on the floor next to Alex and his enormous pile of paperwork.

"Sadly, no." Alex sighed, rubbing his face with tired hands.

It was eleven at night. Gibbs, Ziva and Tony were still gone, interrogating Willard over the BZ Gas from their own case. Everyone else in the hotel room were fast asleep – everyone but Alex and Dessi.

"There's just too much stuff to go through," Alex said, "And half the things contradict with the other. Seriously Dessi, you should tell whoever is in charge of sorting through this stuff to do it better."

Desiree laughed, probably the first true laugh Alex had heard in a long while. "That'll go down well. The guy who's currently in charge of collecting intelligence hates me. And is scared of me," she added as an afterthought.

"Who is in charge?" Alex asked curiously.

"Agent Harvey."

"Harvey...Harvey," Alex trailed off, "It sounds kinda familiar."

Desiree raised an eyebrow, slightly impressed that he'd still be able to remember someone he'd only briefly met after four years. "That was the guy who cornered you when you somehow snuck into the Intelligence Surveillance Building."

"Oh yeah. Huh, funny that," Alex laughed. "Maybe I'll pay him a visit."

"Yeah, and get another black eye," Dessi smirked.

"Oh, shush," Alex grinned, giving the girl a slight shove.

"Hey!" Dessi laughed, shoving Alex back.

That Alex hadn't expected, and so he couldn't steady himself in time. He fell back onto the floor, scattering the nearby stack of files every which way. "Ahh, crud." He groaned as he sat back up.

"Ooops," Dessi smiled.

"This is all your fault, Swan," Alex said, unable to contain a laugh despite the increase in his workload, "Now I have to put them back into order!"

"Well, maybe you don't," Dessi said. "I mean, if it made no sense before, maybe it'll make more sense when it's out of order."

"Hm...interesting logic. Well, we could try that," Alex said, picking up a file at random.

"I find if you just skim through and look for key words, you'll get through it a lot quicker," Dessi said softly, leaning over Alex's shoulder, "So we could look for 'counter-intelligence'," she whispered, using her finger to gently trace out the three times 'counter-intelligence' was mentioned, "Then go from there."

Alex turned his head slightly, suddenly very aware of how close Desiree actually was. Crystal blue eyes met his gaze, before flickering down to his lips and back up again. Slowly, Alex leaned in, tilting his head slightly to the side. Dessi seemed to imitate him, lifting her chin up slightly.

They drew closer and closer.

Crystal blue eyes fluttered shut, their long lashes resting against Dessi's cheekbones. Alex could feel the gentle puffs of warm air against his lips as the girl's breathing quickened in anticipation. He smiled softly, inclining his head to close the distance between their lips.

And then, when he was just millimetres away, the door to their hotel room burst open with a frightfully loud 'bang'.

Alex and Desiree jumped apart in shock, hastily shifting apart, as Ziva and Tony came in, arguing loudly. Gibbs was nowhere to be found.

"...All I'm saying is that if you turn the indicator lights on when you intend to turn, other people wouldn't be beeping us so many times," Tony said, dumping a pile of things on the table.

"They don't need to know my business," Ziva said, folding her coat carefully.

"Yeah, but see, the thing is, this really isn't just your business," Tony said, rolling his eyes. As he looked around the room, he spotted Alex and Desire staring at them with incredulously looks. "Hey, what're you two still doing up?" He asked, though the question was directed more towards Alex.

"Paperwork," Alex said, gesturing to the stack of files that lay scattered around the two teens.

"Riiight..." Tony trailed off with a suggestive wink.

"Tony," Ziva said with a disgusted look on her face, "Get your mind out of the sewer."

"'Gutter', Ziva, its 'gutter'," Tony rolled his eyes.

"'Gutter', 'sewer', I see no difference," Ziva replied, before heading off to the bathroom.

Alex raised a questioning eyebrow at Tony who just shook his head with a sigh.

"Don't ask," he muttered, before disappearing into the adjoining room, careful not to wake the sleeping agents and SAS men.

Finding themselves alone again, Alex turned to Desiree only to see the girl turn away with a slight blush on her cheeks.

"Dessi?"

"Uh...I should go," the girl muttered in an embarrassed fashion.

"Why?"

Crystal blue eyes flashed in his direction for a moment before Desiree glanced away without answering. She got to her feet surprisingly gracefully, before leaving with a muttered "Goodnight".

Alex watched her leave the room, highly confused.

Was it something he'd said?

.

It's my Birthday! Happy Birthday to me! I'm a hundred and three! I smell like a monkey...and I really have to pee!

Right, well, how was it? Good? Bad? Made you want to hurl? Tell me in a REVIEW!

Thanks for reading,

Love Chariots99

By the way, how awesome was HP7? I honestly thought it was going to be really bad because of how HP5&6 turned out...but OMG, this was amazing! Hope I didn't just ruin it for some of you...