Hello my darlings. I would like to thank kirallie, Guest, girl who loves reading, Petunia3116 and thewatchtower300341 for the wonderful reviews. I would also like to thank those of you who have followed and favoured since my last update.
So this chapter is again set in season 2, episode 12 'Overwatch'. I hope you like it.
Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS: LA, nor any of the lines I have used from the show.
Callen met Deeks and Kensi as they walked back through the door of the mission, and while he eyes passed quickly over the female agent, their main focus was on the man he loved.
"You good?" He asked, trying to keep the worry out of his voice. When he had heard the van had exploded he first panicked thought was to make sure Deeks was okay.
"We're fine G. Nothing like a quick dash away from a bomb to get the blood pumping in the morning." Deeks replied though his smile was soft as he saw the underlying fear in his boyfriend's eyes.
"Ha-huh." Callen responded still not looking away from the younger man, not sure he was completely convinced that he was in fact uninjured.
Though his staring was interrupted by a cough coming from his partner. One that sounded very much like the words "over-protective." But Callen decided to ignore that and instead turned so they could all go upstairs to ops and see what Eric had discovered about their mysterious missing body.
Which it turned out was pretty much nothing. The guy was the most boring guy ever, and the only thing they could come up with was the idea that maybe he wasn't who it was calmed he was. That maybe Yusef Afzal was a deep cover. Therefore Kensi and Deeks were sent out to see what they could discover from the man's house. To see if they could find anything which would explain why firstly the guy had been killed, and secondly why his body had been taken.
Walking up the house of the victim Deeks recounted what he had read in the LAPD crime report about the home invasion that had cost the man his life. Though as they entered they found a whole new aspect to the case that neither he nor Kensi expected. Inside was Yusef's girlfriend, well if they wanted intel on the guy, who better to ask than the woman who was in a relationship with him? Deeks felt a bit mean playing the role of bad cop on a woman who had just lost her partner, but one of them needed to do it. Needed to find out the secrets Yusef held which could have caused this to happen.
But then she said one sentence that made his head spin. It was something he hadn't ever really thought about. In fact it hadn't even crossed his mind as something he needed to even consider. But as soon as she said the words, his world turned upside down.
"Does your partner hide anything from you?" Yusef's girlfriend asked with such an earnest expression, as if the idea of someone in a relationship keeping secrets was beyond her. Deeks couldn't get his head around it.
He couldn't help the deep breath he took at those words as his mind, unbidden by him, turned back to a tin box on the mantle of G's home. The one he had covered up at New Year, and the one he still had no idea what it contained. Letting his eyes stray to Kensi, he wondered how to answer the question. He could play if off, use her keeping secrets from him, or he could answer honestly and hope to gain this woman's trust, even if it did reveal more than he wanted to his partner. More than he wanted to himself as well.
"Yes, as a matter of fact he does." He responded in an even tone after all a beat of silence, it was the best way to get the woman to talk.
Kensi could help the raise of her eyebrows at those words from her partner. She had thought Callen and Deeks were solid, yet here he was saying Callen kept secrets from him? Okay, so Callen kept secrets from everyone, but from Deeks too? It was then it hit her. Was this the real reason he hadn't told his mom about the two of them? Was her partner unsure about Callen? Did he doubt his trust? Because there was no way Deeks could doubt Callen's love for him, even she could see that that could never be questioned… But Callen's trust? That was a whole different ball game. She knew her team leader enough to know that. But now was not the time to think about those things. Instead she turned back to their victim's girlfriend and continued to find out what she could about the man they were investigating, hoping that something she told them would help find his killers. But all they while they talked she couldn't help running the questions through her mind about Deeks and Callen.
It wasn't until they were on their way back to ops that she decided to broach the subject to Deeks. He had brought it up himself, therefore there was no way he could think that she would forget it for a minute. She had seen in his eyes that he was being completely honest after all.
"Callen keeps secrets from you?" Kensi asked, looking at her rather too quiet partner as she drove.
"G keeps secrets from everyone." Deeks answered with his usual deflection techniques, though he knew it was pointless, and in truth his heart wasn't really in it. His mind was too busy trying to wrestle with the thoughts it had discovered so far during this, seemingly unrelated to his relationship, case. wow who knew it would reveal so much about him and G?
"Is that why you haven't told your mom? Don't you trust him?" Kensi asked biting the bullet. It all made so much sense to her now. His argument earlier that he was worried that she would scare Callen away just didn't sit right with her. I mean Callen loved him, anyone can see that, so there was no way his mom would be able to get him to leave him. But not trusting him because he kept secrets? That made everything become crystal clear from where she was sitting. She just wondered if it was as clear when you were as close as Deeks was to the whole thing. And if not, then she would have to make sure she made him see the truth that she saw now.
"He loves me and I love him, Kensi." Deeks protested turning to stare at her with hard eyes. How could she question that?
"I know that. And it's not what I asked. Do you trust him?" Kensi asked again hoping to get through to him. Hoping that maybe she could at least start him thinking about what he had told her earlier, and about what he had revealed just now and how they were connected. There was no question there was a connection between the two, not in her mind. She just hoped Deeks saw it too. He needed to let Callen in if the other man was ever going to return the favour.
But rather than answer Deeks turned to look out of the window. Because Deeks realised that he couldn't answer that question. He was suddenly wondering what the answer was. Did he trust G? Yes, with his life and his heart without thought… but, did he trust G to share all of him with him? No, he didn't. But then he really couldn't say anything. Because as Kensi had so pointedly stated earlier, he wasn't trusting G with part of him either. He wasn't trusting G with his friends and his family, so could he really blame the guy from holding back on the things that were of most important to him?
Okay, so he hadn't even gone with G to his sister's grave yet, or more to the point G hadn't ever asked him to do so. But then again, the counter to that was he hadn't told his mom about the man he loved. Oh man, when did this become so freaking complicated? Oh yeah, when he fell in love with G Callen, that was when. But then, he had always known it wouldn't be easy. He had just thought that he would be the open one, the one willing to share in the hopes that G would follow when he was ready. When G knew he could trust him with his secrets and the deepest thoughts and feelings of his soul. But here he was, holding back. There was no way he could expect G to share anything until he did first. He had always known that this relationship would be one where he lead and G would follow… so the question was, was he ready to lead in this next step?
By the time they returned the case had started to progress at a much faster pace, what with discovery of the navy tracking system called Overwatch. And the fact that someone had hijacked it to track American citizens. Yeah, that wasn't so good. But on the up side, when they finally got to the end of the case and the recovered the medical chemicals that could be used to make a dirty bomb, that was definitely one for the win column, even if they had only managed to reclaim three out of four canisters.
At the end of the day, when G went to talk to Rose and tell her about the conclusion of the case and how she had manged to help them stop the sale of the chemicals, Deeks decided to go home.
He had spent the day, or at least when he wasn't fighting for his life or trying to solve the case, thinking about the startling revelations that had come his way. Therefore making his way into his apartment he fed Monty before going to sit on his couch, pulling his phone from his pocket as he stared at it. He needed to decide what he wanted from his and G's relationship now, needed to decide whether he was ready to trust him in the hopes that the older man would follow his example. Though in truth he had come to realise that there was not really anything to decide. He wanted to know everything about G, he wanted to go with him to his sister's grave, to be there for him as he honoured the girl he could barely remember. But if he wanted that then he needed to let G in too.
Therefore taking a deep breath he tried to relax back into the cushions as he pressed the number he needed to call. It was time to let G in.
He wasn't sure if he wanted it to be answered or not, but that was solved for him by the person he was calling answering on the second ring, and he could help the smile that appeared on his face at the sound of the voice on the other end, or the way the tension left his body as he spoke.
"Hey mom…"