You are all amazing, thank you for your wonderful reviews for chapter 11!
Tony found her in the empty conference room. He recognized the irony that it was the same place where she and Talia had sat reacquainting themselves just days before. He stood close behind her, watching in the window's reflection as a few wayward tears tracked down her cheeks.
"It's only a little longer till they call back. McGee will have everything ready for the trace and Abby is down in the lab right now looking for answers," he said softly. When she showed no signs of responding he tried again. "Gibbs is an ass."
She sighed then, allowing herself to lean back against him ever so slightly. "No, he is not. He just knows me too well," she whispered. Tony wasn't sure he completely understood, but she seemed unwilling to elaborate, and so he let it go.
She was silent for nearly a minute, startling him when she spoke again. "I left it better the first time."
"What?"
"When Tali supposedly died before. I had talked to her on the phone just that morning. I was kidding her about a boy, and we laughed. I told her I loved her dearly and would call as soon as I could," her voice choked off slightly and she shook her head. "There was always solace in the fact that those were my final words to my sister. I never had to worry over our last conversation or try to remember the last time I said 'I love you,' as others do when they lose someone. Until now…"
"She knows you love her."
"But yesterday our argument was filled with so much anger and pain," she continued, clearly intent on torturing herself.
"Do you regret Talia coming back into your life?"
Ziva turned towards him, startled. "Of course not. But she may-"
He shook his head. "In the short time I've known Talia, I'm positive that she wouldn't trade the knowledge that you're still alive for any of the romanticized memories she used to have of your family."
She took a deep breath, and he could see she was trying to believe his words. "You are a good partner, Tony," she whispered, reaching a hand up to pat his stubbly cheek. Without thinking and because it felt like the most natural thing in the world, he turned his lips into her palm, kissing it gently, comfortingly. Her eyes snapped opened, brow creasing as she stared at him.
"I'm sorry," he apologized automatically. "I didn't mean to…"
Her mouth was on his quicker than he would have thought possible. His lips parted automatically for her greedy tongue, his body pressing against hers as she ran clutching, urgent fingers through his hair.
He indulged in the feeling for several long seconds before pushing her away gently and taking a deep breath. She met his surprised and confused expression with one of her own, any apologies or explanations seemingly stalled somewhere behind that tempting mouth.
"Huh," she finally forced out, a hand coming up absentmindedly to rub across her lips.
That one syllable seemed to shatter the silence, and as suddenly as the tension came between them, it was gone. Tony's face twisted with a grimace. "Not really the reaction I want after kissing someone."
She chuckled softly, "I kissed you, Tony. I don't know what came over me…"
"You're exhausted and suffering from blood loss; you're allowed some inexplicably foolish moments."
"So what is your excuse for kissing me back?" she countered with a small smile.
He considered that one for a moment. "Actually, I'm going to stick with the same explanation."
"You are suffering from blood loss?"
"In a manner of speaking…"
She scoffed, punching him lightly in the shoulder but her tired eyes were grateful. Gibbs had given her an outlet for her simmering anger, and now Tony was providing her with a few moments of much needed distraction. She truly loved this strange little adopted family.
The levity between them ebbed away in comfortable silence, and with a glance at her watch, Ziva felt the weight of the situation settle on her once more. She turned back to the windows and felt him shift even closer, almost subconsciously, in his unfailing promise to always have her back.
"I am scared," she admitted quietly. "I know my father will try to stall for more time, but what if he cannot? What happens if we somehow manage to trace the call, but we are still too late to save her?"
Tony skipped the canned platitudes and assurances; they were both realists, and they both knew the odds. Instead his hands rubbed gently at her shoulders, and he offered her the only truth he could. "We're gonna do everything in our power to get her back, Zi."
Gibbs was just returning with yet another cup of coffee when his cell buzzed.
"Boss!" McGee's hurried voice came over the line, "The phone is on. They just sent a text to Director David."
"Slow down McGee, I'm just outside," Gibbs muttered, hanging up and leaning forward for the iris scanner into MTAC. He checked his watch; they were an hour early.
"What's the message?"
Tim glanced back at him. "It's in Arabic, we need Ziva."
Gibbs brought the phone back to his ear and barked a quick, "Both of you back here, now." He put a hand to the back of McGee's chair, squinting down at the screen. "Can you trace it?"
Tim shook his head. "I was set up for a call, not texts. But with the phone on, I may be able to…"
"Don't care how. Just do it McGee."
Tony and Ziva burst through the door a second later, Gibbs glancing back at them.
"Translate," he said simply nodding towards the Arabic script displayed on MTAC's main screen.
"They're saying time's up," Ziva said. "But they are early!"
"Call Mossad and tell David to stall," Gibbs barked, and Tony pulled out his phone.
"Eli's responding," McGee cut in.
The reply came in English, flashing onto the screen. We had an agreement. I still have one more hour.
"Hadar isn't answering," Tony growled. Ziva grabbed the phone from him and pressed redial even as the response came from the kidnappers, now in English to match Eli's.
You have had hours and yet we see no signs of progress.
"C'mon," Ziva whispered, swearing when the voicemail picked up. She hung up, dialing again and stared helplessly as the texts continued.
Perhaps you've forgotten which daughter we've got.
A moment later a low quality picture flashed on the screen. Talia, tied to a chair, tear tracks evident on her dirty face. A ghostly figure loomed behind her, a hand holding a menacing blade to her throat.
"McGee!"
"They're bouncing the signal through six countries so far, I need them to keep the phone on."
"Ziva," the sudden growling in her ear startled her; she had already forgotten the cell in her hand. Amit's voice was low and rushed. "I do not have time! The Prime Minister found out and has ordered the Deputy Director to relieve Eli from duty and shut down all negotiations…"
"You put this phone to my father's ear Hadar! Achshav!"
She could hear his momentary hesitation before a scramble of sound and her father's sudden, bewildered voice.
"You stall them," Ziva ordered even as another text appeared before them.
Your youngest child.
"Ziva, how did you-"
The one you protected. The one you loved enough to hide.
"We are close to tracing their location," she interrupted. "But you must convince them you will concede, and you must buy us that hour!"
"I don't know that I can..."
It would be a shame Director if all that effort, all that sacrifice was for nothing.
"Please Abba!" she choked out.
"Ziva, I am so-"
Her father's words were masked by a flurry of sound. Shouts. Eli's voice, angry and indignant, was suddenly much further away before the call cut off abruptly.
The phone dropped from her fingers as she realized what was happening. "McGee stop!" She yelled, all eyes snapping to her. "I need you to reroute the messages to us directly. Cut my father's phone out of the loop. Can you do it?"
He hesitated only a moment before grabbing Tony and pulling him over to the desk. "Just keep hitting these buttons," Tim instructed, sliding over a computer to resume his frantic typing.
Tony and Gibbs were staring at her, and she answered their silent questions without tearing her eyes from McGee's screen. "They've relieved my father of duty, and they are done negotiating."
A final text appeared from the kidnappers, just two simple words.
Well Director?
"Okay, I'm in," Tim said, sitting back. "They still think they're talking to Eli. Now what do we say?"
Ziva took a shaky breath, her entire body vibrating from the adrenaline. It was suddenly silent in the large room, save for the the thundering of blood in her ears. Gibbs took a step towards her, gripping her arm tightly.
"Pull it together, Ziver. Take a deep breath." She complied, closing her eyes for a long second. "You need to respond. What would Eli say?"
Her eyes snapped back open, and she straightened up, her gaze fixing on the screen where the picture of Talia remained.
"McGee, type exactly what I say. Harm my daughter, and I will line up every one of the names on your list, plus another dozen of my own choosing, and put a bullet through their heads. I am not a man to make idle threats. Now we had an agreement. One more hour and your demands will be met. Otherwise, we are done here."
She watched her message appear on the screen, fighting the waves of nausea and apprehension as they waited.
One more hour.
Ziva almost sobbed in relief at the final message, her fingers gripping tightly on Gibbs' arm for a brief moment.
"Line's dead!" McGee called, pushing Tony's chair aside and rolling back to his original computer. "Got a fix to Rockville, Maryland, radius of about ten city blocks." A map replaced the texts on screen, though Ziva could still see the picture of Talia behind her eyelids.
"That's it?" she whispered.
McGee's expression was apologetic, "Best we could do given the circumstances."
"It's better than what we had," Gibbs asserted. "Gear up and get local PD involved. That's an industrial neighborhood and a lot of space to cover." The others jumped up, following him out of MTAC when the door opened and Abby rushed in.
She waved a fistful of papers in his face, it looked like the breakdown of some chemical compound. "GibbsGibbsGibbs!"
Gibbs nodded for the others to go ahead without him. "Calm down; whadya got Abs."
"The metal we took off al-Fulan's shoes, they are shavings of copper with a coating that is unique to the manufacturing of certain circuit boards."
"Circuit boards can be from anything."
She shook her head quickly, "No! Not when you combine it with the trace elements Ducky found under the fingernails. I just got the results and there is an abnormally high concentration of lead and phosphors. You would only find those three elements in Cathode Ray Tubes."
"Like in TVs or computer screens," Gibbs said patiently, even as he silently willed her to hurry up.
"Right! CRTs are a dying technology though, almost everything is LCD and plasma now, so they don't really manufacture them anymore. More likely this came from a recycling plant. It's a really really tricky process though; only a handful of warehouses are licensed in the area."
"We traced the phone to somewhere in Rockville, find us the plant," he said, hurriedly kissing her cheek and jogging for the door. "That's good work Abs!" he called over his shoulder.
Gibbs took a deep breath and glanced at his watch; fifty-eight minutes. We've got the location, we've got some time, he thought to himself as he punched the elevator button. Now all we need is a little luck...
I'm glad you all liked the callback to Paula Cassidy...Grace Period is a favorite episode of mine. I know it looks like Ziva forgave Gibbs pretty quickly, but I truly think that even in her state of mind, she would have recognized what he was doing. There are so, so many similarities between the two that she just gets him and vice versa. Doesn't mean she's not still a bit ticked off, and they'll talk about it again before the story is done.
I'll be working on the next chapter all day and will post it sometime next week. Thanks, as always, for reading! :)