Chapter Six
Heartache
When Abby arrived at NCIS, driving into the lower level garage, she felt so wretched from the 160 mile round trip that she didn't care what time it was, who she saw or anything else for that matter. Thus, when Director Jennifer Shepherd stepped beside her as she used the retinal scan for access to the elevator, she was wholly surprised by the woman's sudden materialization. The car doors opened and they stepped in.
"Getting in late," Shepherd observed. With any of the others, Abby might have made the same observation in return, but sometimes she wasn't entirely sure of her position with the redheaded Administrator, and decided it was best to err on the side of caution.
"I had to drive a friend home. It's eighty miles each way."
"Yes, I heard about your friend. My condolences."
The car started to ascend, and would be at the half submerged level of her Forensics Lab in less than five seconds. Impulsively, Abby reached out and slapped the 'Emergency Stop' switch. The car stopped instantly, the lights dimming to three-quarters intensity. "Director Shepherd, could I talk to you privately?" the words were out in a rush.
The woman glanced about the large, silver car. "Can't get much more private than this," she observed. "What's on your mind?"
"You heard about my friend. How much do you already know?"
"A lot, actually. I wanted to talk to you about it, and this seems as good a time as any. As to how much I know, when one of my people starts behaving like she's under extreme stress, I get brought into the loop." She fixed the dark woman with a wry look. "Did you really threaten to castrate Jethro from his tonsils down?"
Abby felt herself blushing. "Something like that. I wasn't really … that is, I …I didn't really …" Shepherd held up her hand.
"Let it go, Abby. It's not like it's anything I haven't thought of doing myself from time to time." Abby fought not to gape at the woman who clearly was not finished. "I wanted to talk to you about something far more serious."
"What's that, Ma'am?" Something in her tone called to her the word ominous.
x
"Abby, you are the best Forensic Scientist I have ever met, possibly the best this side of the Mississippi. As such, you are an enormous asset to this Agency, and I feel both proud and lucky to have you with us. I know you could easily outsource yourself to the FBI or any other Agency and they would have you in a moment, possibly for more than we can afford to pay you. But I've always admired your loyalty as much as your ability. You work well with our teams, and as such I have been more than willing to overlook certain … eccentricities." She glanced over Abby's black pig tailed hair past her black and silver stud skull and crossbones tee shirt, past her above-the-thigh length black skirt decorated with silver studs, past black fishnet stockings to her calf high black boots.
"And I really appreciate that, Ma'am," Abby assured her, not certain where this was going and not liking the uncertainty one bit. "I've always felt close to everyone here, and that means a lot more than a few bucks."
"I'm glad to hear that. Nevertheless I am concerned about something. You've just returned from a month's vacation – and it was a Vacation. I didn't think the term 'Medical Rest Leave' needed to be on your record, nor should you need the requisite Psychological Exam in order to return to your duties."
"Thank you, Ma'am."
"Unfortunately, less than three hours after you're back, you're UA. Now I'm not addressing the issue itself – if a friend of mine were in need as yours was I'd probably drop everything too, though I would tell someone where I was going."
"Understood. Sorry."
"My concern is that while you were there you came into the possession, shall we say, of certain evidence you knew you had no right to acquire, and you used the resources of this Agency in a manner that could only hurt your friend's case. That's not only atypical behavior, but I wouldn't have thought you capable of it."
"Ma'am, Special Agent Gibbs ordered me to return everything to the Virginia State Troopers and I have."
"I know you did. Remember, I heard about your offer to Gibbs. But I also know that, while you were there this morning, you insinuated yourself into another investigation, and gathered evidence in that case."
"No, Ma'am," she countered definitely, knowing how Shepherd knew about the Higgins incident. The bad feeling in the pit of her stomach got a lot worse. "I was dragged into that incident, and I collected nothing. I merely observed."
"And what did you observe?"
"That the same perp who attacked Dawn yesterday attacked Dorothy Higgins early this morning when she returned from her jog."
"I have no doubt." The woman took a deep breath, held it for several seconds and then let it out. "Abby, you are a fantastic Forensic Scientist, as I said you're the best I've ever seen. But your expertise shows itself best in the Laboratory, not in the Field. You are not a Field Agent, and I want it to be perfectly understood that in your future dealings with Miss Caldwell you are not functioning in the capacity of a Field Agent."
"I'm not entirely sure I will be having many more 'dealings' with Dawn."
"Oh?"
"At least not for a while. When I returned everything to the State Troopers and told her I can't work on the case because of jurisdiction, she accused me of betraying her. She's not speaking to me anymore."
"I'm sorry. But we both know where that comes from, and that it won't last."
"I know that. It still hurts."
"I know. However, when you go back - and I know you will go back - I want your word that you will not act in an official capacity." The request was all the more ominous for having been made twice.
x
"Director, what aren't you saying?"
Jenny sighed. "I received a call half an hour ago. It's no coincidence that I met you in the garage; I had the gate alert me when you arrived. If you hadn't hit the Stop switch, I would have. I wanted to talk to you outside the office. I didn't want any of this to be official."
"What?" Abby felt an unwelcome chill that slid through her body like slush down a slope.
"I've received a complaint about you. A serious one. I won't go into the specific words used, but the subject had to do with your taking evidence from a hospital and … 'tainting it' is a polite way of phrasing it."
"Sergeant Johnson said he didn't care who did the work; he was not getting into a pissing match over jurisdiction, as long as the bastard was caught."
"Sadly, Chief Grimby isn't so far sighted. The bottom line is that you have been declared 'persona non grata' on this case, and you have been banned from the present and future sites of any crimes." She didn't give Abby a chance to interrupt. "I told him what I thought of his ban, that you have a personal interest in Miss Caldwell and that if you did go there it would be as a friend, not as an NCIS Agent. I also told him that if he doesn't like that, he can come up here and I'll stick his 'persona non grata' where the sun doesn't shine."
"Thank you, Ma'am."
She reached out to the E.S. control. "Don't make me sorry."
"I won't." The lights resumed their normal intensity and the car started to rise.
"As far as I'm concerned, this conversation never happened." The doors slid open.
"I understand." Abby said, getting off. She knew that the next time they spoke, if there was a next time, the conversation would be official.
Shepherd gave her a brief, reassuring smile before the doors slid shut and Abby turned and made her way down the corridor to her lab.
xx
She worked for some time on several old and completed reports from before her vacation, but she was normally so meticulous that this was nothing but empty work; adding unnecessary words, a waste of time to keep her mind busy and off her real problem. Every few minutes her eyes would dart to the telephone, and the bitter words of her friend seared her mind. As the interval between glances grew shorter and shorter, she tried her best to hold out. Finally, she could stand it no longer.
Picking up the receiver, she punched in the ten digit number, and listened to the muted ringing. Five, ten, she started to think maybe Dawn was out, or asleep. Fifteen, she started to feel more wretched. Twenty, she was about to give up when the ringing stopped. /Hello?/
She had never heard her friend sound so morose.
"Hi, Sunshine, it's me. I just wanted to–" *click*.
Abby looked at the receiver in her hand, unsurprised but stung nonetheless. But she was not about to give up on her friend. Pressing the call button down, she released it and got the dial tone again, then hit the redial button.
Five, ten, fifteen, an eternity to eighteen… /What?/
"Sunshine, don't hang up please. I just–" *click*.
Gritting her teeth, Abby reestablished the line and hit redial. 'Bzzz… bzzz… bzzz… bzzz.' Sighing, she set the phone down again.
She sat for what felt like forever, not thinking. Pointedly, she wouldn't think of what she was tempted beyond all reason to do. It went against all her morals, all her principles, was a gross violation of her – oh, the Hell with it!
Stalking over to the fingerprint comparison database, she called up a file she had preserved, a single clear fingerprint lifted off the long broom handle that had held Dawn's legs spread apart. The latex glove the perp had worn had been damaged in the struggle when Dawn bit it, and the damage hadn't been noticed before it had allowed a perfect print to be deposited on the painted wood.
That print appeared on the left side of the screen, a full twenty points of distinction marked, more so than was necessary for a positive identification that would stand in any court in the country. Prosecutors loved to go to court with at least twelve; six was a 'minimum', though cases had been confirmed by one or two. She turned on the unit's full capacity; and on the right side, too quickly for the human eye to distinguish; print after print flashed. She'd start by finishing up the National Sex Crimes Database, then move on from there.
xx
More so than the proverbial watched pot, Abby knew that staring at the screen would accomplish nothing. It would go through its hundreds of thousands of samples, moving on with a single-minded devotion to detail that would not change whether she did other work, slept, ate or played hand ball.
Nevertheless, she found herself staring at the screen, lost in the hypnotic images flashing on the right side of the screen in an attempt to match the static image on the left. She knew that no amount of staring could make that bright green bar proclaiming 'Positive Match' appear any sooner, yet still she stared. And in those flashing images were the scenes of a lifetime of memories, hours and days and weeks and months and years flickering too fast to resolve, but they were all there. She could lose herself in the memories, lose herself in the images, lose herself in the guilt.
When she could stand it no longer, she reached out and turned on the radio, switching from her usual fare of chaotic rock to a more sedate station. It was cosmic misfortune that Michelle Branch's 'You Get Me' was playing. Much as she liked the song, she always seemed to equate it in her mind with Tim McGee, and this time was no different.
As the poignant words evoked memories, she saw again their first date, even before he had joined the Washington NCIS, when he worked out of Norfolk. Then it was thoughts of their working closely together while he was trying to rebuild a circuit board and she had kept close to him, and closer still, saying she wanted to improve her skills but not telling him which ones. The memory of the night they had spent in her coffin, when she wouldn't turn on the lights, keeping him from seeing it was, was particularly intense. He'd thought it was a box bed until Gibbs had revealed otherwise. Then it was the memory of her pushing him into her private sanctum for some aroma therapy when he was stressed out from thinking he had shot a Metro Detective in the line of duty. Then that turbulent evening in his apartment when she been hiding out from Mike Mower; had undressed before him, stripped down to a skeleton tee shirt and very brief panties imprinted with the pelvis, all of which had fairly screamed 'jump my bones' and he had utterly failed to get her.
She shrieked when a hand closed on her right shoulder.