Tim held the phone to his ear as Gibbs gave him the name of the man who rented the van.
"Brian Dean," Gibbs said, and then read off the address. "21 Gossamer Court, in Riverdale. We're on our way now."
"You want back-up, Boss?"
"Well. yeah, McGee. Local LEO's. Two cars. And the footage from the surveillance camera at the Redi-Rent is being uploaded and sent to you now. You should get it soon."
"That van was returned after hours, McGee, and the keys went in the drop box. Send someone over to get the van and the keys, to check for prints and anything else we can get from it."
"Okay Bo-" McGee said, but Gibbs had already hung up.
Ziva and Gibbs pulled up in front of the little Victorian house at 21 Gossamer, seeing the police cars with lights off doing the same.
As they exited the car, Gibbs motioned to them to hang back, and follow them.
"Ziva, around back. You two," he pointed to two of the men, "Cover Agent David's six."
The one LEO, Officer Posa, paused and asked Gibbs, "This the Agent we're looking for, Agent Gibbs?"
Gibbs looked at the fax copy of Tony's picture. Bless your heart McGee. "Affirmative."
He nodded and quietly followed the other officer and Ziva in the dark around back, making as little noise as possible as they disappeared around the manicured porch.
Gibbs stepped as quietly as possible up the wooden steps, the other two LEO's behind him.
He knocked softly at the front door. "Brian Dean!" he called. "Special Agent Gibbs with NCIS! Open up sir!"
He heard some noise in the house, and was preparing to kick in the door, when it opened, the brown haired, brown-eyed man looking at Gibbs in alarm when he saw the drawn gun.
On reflex, the man tried to slam shut the door.
Gibbs forced it open saying, "Stay where you are!"
The somewhat shocked and trembling man raised his hands, not finding his voice.
"Honey? Whats-" a woman's voice chimed from the hallway, and then she screamed, seeing Gibbs holding the gun on Dean.
"NCIS, ma'am. Special Agent Gibbs," He held his badge up with one hand, while lowering his weapon only slightly with the other. " Step out where I can see you, both of you, hands out where I can see them." Gibbs stated coolly, but feeling there was something missing here. These people had truly been surprised by his arrival.
"Mr. Dean, did you rent a van today at Redi-Rent in Tacoma Park?"
"It's okay, Hil," the man tried to soothe the woman who looked near fainting with fear. "N-no. I did not," he said, looking angrily at Gibbs. "What the hell is this about?"
"A missing Federal Agent, Mr. Dean. A van was rented in connection with the kidnapping, and your license and credit card was used."
The man sighed angrily. "I knew something like this would happen. Look…Agent…Gibbs was it? Can I put my hands down?"
Gibbs nodded, keeping his weapon lowered but still drawn as he put his badge away.
The man, dressed in a very conservative button down shirt and sweater vest, lowered his arms. "Someone stole my wallet the other night, in Mulligan's. And I called to cancel my credit card…but I got that damned automated system. You'd think the credit card companies bend us all over enough to hire actual people. But I left the info with the fraud department, who said they would have a representative get back to me. I guess they didn't. But- you can check with them that I made the call."
Gibbs stood for a moment, blinking. Mulligan's. Tony had been there the other night…and gotten drunk. And stayed at Abbys. Gibbs knew this because Abby told him, to make him feel guilty about not talking to Tony about the book. Little did she know there was so much more to Tony's behavior.
"Can we search your house?" Gibbs asked, just to be sure.
"Yes, of course," the man said, as Gibbs motioned for the LEO's to go and look.
"Neatly," Gibbs growled after the LEO's, knowing sometimes they were rough in their searches.
"Ok, Hillary, you know…you can put your hands down," the man told his…girlfriend? Wife?
Gibbs believed the man's story. He put his gun back in it's holster.
"Is it Mrs. Dean?" Gibbs asked, as she shakily lowered her arms. She had on a little flower print dress, with a Peter Pan collar, and mousy dirty blonde hair, pulled back in a ponytail.
"Ah…almost," she smiled, pointing at her engagement ring.
"Well, Gibbs said, "Congratulations."
She looked at him sourly.
The LEOs found nothing suspicious, as Gibbs knew they wouldn't. And Ziva came back around, and into the open font door with Officer Posa, after seeing nothing suspicious out back.
"Well," Gibbs said, pulling out a card for Dean, "what can you tell me about the night you were at Mulligan's? Did you have any idea who might have stolen your wallet?'
The man scratched his face, as his fiancé sat down in a chair in the hallway with a sigh.
"No idea Agent Gibbs."
"Did you see anything out of the ordinary?" Gibbs asked, as Ziva listened to the conversation intently.
The man tilted his head. "Uh…yeah. I guess …maybe. But I don't think…well, maybe it was that guy. I guess he could've taken it…but he didn't look the type..."
"Who?" Gibbs asked tensely.
"There was this guy at the bar, just drinking by himself, a few stools down from my buddy and I. He looked…pretty tanked. You know, seemed to be on a mission by himself to get wrecked. And I remember because it was early for anyone to be that far into their cups. Anyway…my friend Frank and I were just having a quiet beer, and he had to go to the mensroom. That's when I looked over again, just out of curiosity to see if this guy was still even sitting upright."
He paused, thinking.
Gibbs and ZIva waited.
"The guy at the bar, this him?" Gibbs pulled the picture of Tony from Officer Posa's hand, and showed it to him.
"Yeah, yeah that's him!"
"Tony stole your wallet! I find that hard to-" Ziva began hotly.
"Nono," the man shook his head. "There was anther guy, who was standing behind him. And you know, this guy," he pointed to the photo, "was just so trashed, I don't think he noticed."
"Why should he have noticed," asked Gibbs, feeling queasy.
"Because…this guy was just…staring at him, with this nutty look on his face…and for a second I thought they were there together. But the guy just, stood near your…missing friend, and ah…made like he was going to put a hand on his shoulder. And then he just didn't. And backed away. Then Frank came back from the mens room, and some girl at the bar on the other side came over, asking us direction to go somewhere…I can't remember. Mostly Frank told her. But my back was turned, and then my wallet was gone. I just left it out for a minute. And I think that guy was gone too…"
"Can you describe him?" Ziva asked.
"Oh yes," he said. "He was very well dressed. Tall, Short, wavy hair. Maybe light brown or blonde. I just thought it was a little weird, so I noticed."
"Mr. Dean, would you be willing to come to the Navy Yard with us and work with a sketch artist?" Gibbs asked, trying to sound as if it really were a request.
"Sure, Agent Gibbs. If someone used my ID and credit card to …hurt someone…well that's just very wrong. And I'd love for you to catch the guy. He did steal my wallet."
Gibbs blew out a puff of air. He sat at his desk, trying to block out any thoughts of Tony being harmed, or suffering.
They now had a composite sketch of the man Brian Dean saw at Mulligan's, the same night Tony was there.
Review of the rental office footage showed a man that could have been Dean coming in and renting the van. He was close in a general sense. Medium height, brown hair and eyes. But not conservatively dressed. More casual. Leather jacket. Jeans.
Abby was running facial recognition in her lab on a screen grab of the mysterious poser. She was also running the sketch.
McGee was running the rental plate to see if the van had gone through any tolls.
Ducky wandered in to the bullpen at 23:15, with coffee for them all.
He took in Gibbs' tight demeanor, and poor coloring.
"Thanks," Gibbs said, taking the cup of coffee Ducky handed him. "You here on another case, Duck?"
"Oh, no, Jethro. Abigail called me earlier…and I just wanted to be here in case I could be of some use in finding our dear Anthony. I'm…very concerned…to say the least." His warm blue eyes looked pained from behind his glasses. "Do we have any new leads?"
"Well," Gibbs said, after sipping the coffee, "We don't know why. We do know what the vehicle was. But not who drove it. It was rented and returned the same day. So he can't have been taken too far…and, someone had to be watching us, to know when Tony had gotten home that morning."
"Us?" Ducky said softly.
Gibbs' mouth dropped open ever so slightly, at the mistake he'd made. "Yeah…" he shifted a little, looking at Ducky with just a flash of guilt. "He crashed at my place the night before."
Ducky looked down, for a moment. He wondered if his new suspicions were correct, but could not bring himself to ask Gibbs anything about it. All he said was, "I see. Well, do you think someone was watching your house?"
"Maybe…" Gibbs said.
"Boss!" McGee said excitedly. "We got a hit on a toll booth!"
Gibbs jumped up. "Show me!"
"North Laurel, off the Beltway," McGee said, clicking the controller as Ziva also walked over to look at the screen.
They saw the van, and the Brian Dean poser driving it.
"And," McGee said, clicking again, "coming back through the other side, only twenty-five minutes later."
"Jethro, If I'm not mistaken, there are several Horse Farms in that area."
"Ziva!" Gibbs barked.
She went back to her desk quickly and started typing furiously, searching out all the listed stables and horse farms in the area.
"The sedative," McGee said, as he looked up from the search he was doing already on his computer as well.
"Yep." Gibbs said, feeling closer now to getting to Tony. But it was still a mystery as to who would want to kidnap him. There were more than a handful of people who'd want to kill him. It was harder to make sense of this.
"It would be very likely," Ducky said thoughtfully, "That someone owning a stable or equine based establishment would have a ready and available supply of Ketamine blended tranquilizers."
Within minutes, McGee breathed out, "Oh my God…I don't believe this…"
Gibbs quickly stepped behind him, looking at the monitor.
His eyes widened in surprise, "Sonofabitch."
Tony came around again, some time later. He couldn't tell how long he'd been out. But he was a little more coherent this time.
He knew he was in a bad situation.
He started to struggle, and pull against the ropes, which rubbed and burned the skin of his wrists and ankles.
His heart jumped, as the bedroom door opened again.
This time, the man wearing the black mask was much clearer.
He approached the bed, smiling again, and though the drugs had worn off to an extent, the leering grin was still just as creepy.
"What the Hell do you want?" Tony growled.
"Patience," the man said softly, holding up a sharp looking pair of shears. The metal glinted in dim light of the lamp on the nightstand to Tony's left.
Tony's breathing hitched a little, fearing what this maniac was going to do to him with the scissors.
"Unhh," Tony let out a small sound, as the man put a hand to his neck, and raised the scissor. He trembled, gritting his teeth, wondering if this was the end. And Gibbs would only have the memory of what happened before Tony had left his house. So sorry, Boss… Lee…
He stared defiantly at the masked bastard, but to his surprise, the scissor didn't hurt or stab him.
No…instead, it started to cut away his shirt.
His mouth went agape for a few seconds. He hadn't thought of that…that this guy wanted to…
Tony closed his eyes, feeling sick, as the scissor snipped and cut all the way down, and the fabric fell away from his chest and stomach.
When he opened them to look again, he saw the very focused blue eyes, following the movements of the scissor as it cut away the sleeves as well.
Tony was trembling, uncertain how to reason with the man. But he had to try.
"Why the mask?" he asked, as casually as he could make himself sound.
The man only glanced at him and chuckled.
"Well, let's just say that, you and I will have a nice time together…and then…I'll let you go. As long as you don't know who I really am, then there's no real danger to you."
Sure, no real danger at all, Tony thought, as the man started to cut up the leg of the jeans on his right side.
"Y-you know," he still tried for an easy, friendly tone. "Those are pretty expensive…"
"I'm sure you have many to replace them," he replied, cutting in a steady rhythm up to the waistband over Tony's hip.
Tony shuddered.
He knew that voice. Where had he heard it before?
The man started cutting up the other leg of the jeans. Tony didn't dare move, in fear of the sharp shears.
"Why…why are you doing this?" Tony finally asked in a shaky voice.
"Because I had to know…I had to find out for myself…" the man said gently, finally done cutting, and dragged the tattered remains of his clothing off and out from under him with a burning yank.
"Find out what?" Tony said in fear and anger. He was completely naked now, fully exposed to this lunatic with his mask and scissors.
"The truth," the man said, touching Tony's thigh, and drifting up towards his genitals with one hand, while the other still held the scissors.
To his disgusted horror, the man leaned forward, climbing a little onto the bed, and started to grasp and pull at Tony's balls and flaccid penis.
He looked away, unable to bear watching it as well as feeling it. But he still didn't dare any sudden movements with the sharp instrument , resting now near his throat where the man had placed it.
It seemed to go on for an eternity. And before the man finally stopped, Tony was silently crying, hot tears of fury and humiliation on his cheeks.
The man frowned and stood back. "Well, I guess that's not going to work."
Tony suddenly laughed and looked at him, "Well, forgive me if this isn't really a turn-on."
The man stared at him and sighed.
"You're right. I suppose we're limited unless I can get some other drugs to inject you with. Hmmm," he tilted his head. "You may be here longer than I planned, but…that's okay." He stepped away, going to the simple dresser on the wall opposite the bed, and put the scissor down. He opened the drawer, reaching in for something.
No. Not okay! Tony thought hysterically.
"I wanted the first experience to be different, but I can see…I'll just move on to other things for tonight. We'll come back to this maybe tomorrow night."
Tony wanted to scream.
And then he did, as he saw the hypodermic needle appear in his captor's hand, as he came closer again.
He struggled, and yelled, but the man just giggled.
"You can yell all you want, but, you're on a pretty good piece of land, and in the evenings here, the only creatures that can hear you aren't the types to care…"
The man grabbed Tony's arm, wedging it painfully up against the metal headboard it was attached to.
"No…" he suddenly pleaded, "please don't…" The man ignored him, plunging the needle in and quickly dispensing the fluid into his arm.
"Now," he said smugly, looking at Tony through his mask, "I didn't give you so much that it will knock you out again. Just enough to…get you a little more willing to be lie back and enjoy it."
"Fuck you," Tony spat weakly, feeling the effects of the injection making him start to float a little again.
The man seemed to shift before his eyes, becoming even more sinister again.
"I needed to know," he stroked Tony's face, and neck…trailing his hand down to tickle his fingers over a nipple. "I had to know…"
He watched Tony's eyes begin to roll a little as he struggled to keep them open.
He began to untie one wrist, and then the other. Tony wanted to take action, to fight back now with his freed limbs…but they would not cooperate. He moaned in frustration.
He felt his ankles freed, and then his body turned over, and dragged a little back in place. Then his ankles and wrists tied once again to the four corners of the bed.
Unable to raise his head, he heard the sound of rustling fabric, and a zipper being opened.
God, no…why couldn't he have given me more drugs…I wouldn't have to be awake for this…
He felt the bed dip, and hot hands on his back. He shivered, as they pinched and stroked his skin.
A tongue licked suddenly up his back, and he gasped in revulsion. He tried weakly, one more time, forming the words as best he could in his drugged state. "Don'do this...don't..."
"Have to..." the man crooned, rubbing himself, his erection on Tony's ass. "I had to know what she wrote was true…had to see for myself…"
Just then, the silence was broken by the sound of a door splintering open, and Tony heard the wonderful sound of Gibbs, growling and with deadly menace, say, "Get the Hell away from him, Pink. Now, or I'm gonna shoot you dick off."