I'm sorry, I did actually intend to post this when I said I would but I wanted to change some things and it took me a while to get around to it. I've got more changes to make to the next chapter, which I may get to later in the week. Enjoy.
It was hard not to notice the tension at the dinner table that evening. They'd gathered for another dinner in the main dining room, sitting down at the same table they'd shared on the first night. As before, they were all dressed up, the chandeliers were sparkling, the linens were pristine and the table wear shining. All of Tony and Ziva's dining companions had big glasses of alcohol in front of them, but unlike last time there wasn't a whole lot of laughter coming from them. And, more importantly to Ziva, John Paulson definitely had the beginnings of a bruise marking his chin.
But Tony and Ziva ploughed through the dinner as if they hadn't noticed anything was off. Tony carried the weight of the conversation—sometimes Ziva really was grateful for his verbal gifts—and she gave him the repartee he needed to keep it moving. Sacha and Julie answered direct questions politely, but getting them to really engage was like pulling teeth. By the time their mains were cleared away, Ziva had enough and gave Tony a look. They needed something useful. He reached over to hold her hand and gave her a smile. The expression of an adoring husband to their tablemates, but a signal to his partner to go right ahead.
"So, what did you do with your day?" she asked, looking between them all. "Did you catch up with your friends?"
"Yeah," Sacha said, glancing between the others before offering Ziva a quick smile. "Yeah, it was good to see them." Although she fought it, she sounded flat and her smile didn't reach her eyes. "How about you?"
Ziva sighed internally at Sacha turning it back on them so quickly.
"We went for a hike, actually," Tony told them. He squeezed her hand, and she took the cue to calm down and play along.
"It was so beautiful," she enthused. "Very hot, but we saw all these beautiful butterflies and this waterfall."
"Yeah, we should have spent more time there," Tony went on, following her made up story. "But we didn't have bug spray, which was really stupid. Zara was only in shorts and her legs look like a crime scene."
"Bug bites," Ziva told them, and looked at Tony. "So many. I think we're going to be sleeping in separate beds tonight, or I'll drive you crazy with the scratching."
"You got any rubbing alcohol?" Sacha piped up.
Rubbing alcohol. The substance Ducky found in Will Crawford's blood, and that Tony and Ziva had joked about using today. Ziva felt her heart jump, and she thought she might've gripped Tony's hand hard enough to cause pain. But kept her expression neutral. "No. I did not think to bring any."
"I bring it everywhere," Sacha said, and then reached down for her clutch. She pulled out a travel-sized bottle and handed it to Ziva. "Here. You'll thank me."
Ziva took the bottle and stared at it, stunned that she may have just been handed Will Crawford's murder weapon. How many people carried rubbing alcohol around in their handbags? "Thank you," Ziva said with a sincere smile. "I am sure this will make the night easier."
"Don't want to start sleeping in separate beds," John threw in, piping up for perhaps only the second or third till all night. "Once you start, you'll never stop." He took a long, bitter sip of his drink.
"Zara does snore pretty badly," Tony said, trying to keep things from fracturing. They wanted to keep everyone at the table as long as possible.
"I do not snore," Ziva insisted. Tony just stared at her, as if he couldn't believe she had the gall to argue the point. She tossed her hair over her shoulder. "Well, you sleep through most of it," she pointed out.
"Sometimes," he muttered, then moved the conversation along. "Anyway, we had a great lunch when we got back at some place by the water. The Castaway, or something?"
Julie groaned. "Oh, I hope you don't get sick. A lot of people get sick when they eat there."
Ziva pretended to look worried. "Oh, no! How long does it take for food poisoning to develop?"
"Few hours," Julie said. "If you're not feeling queasy now, you'll probably be fine."
"I do feel kind of queasy," Tony said.
Ziva eyed him. "That is because you ate one and a half entrees and about a pound of pasta."
"You make a good point."
Sacha picked up her wine glass and pointed at them. "Say, weren't you at the beach as well?" she asked. "I thought I saw you two there getting all hot and heavy with each other." She winked, and Ziva felt her cheeks warm.
"It's hard not to get carried away in the moment," Tony said, and lifted their hands to press a kiss to her knuckles.
"I vaguely remember the feeling," John drawled, and then ignored the glares that Sacha and Julie shot him. He raised his eyebrows at Martin, who smirked back at him.
"We did not see you," Ziva lied to Sacha, before looking between John and Martin. "But I think we saw you two walking back to the ship early. It looked like you were carrying teddy bears." She laughed as if she thought she was probably wrong about that.
"Just some presents for home," John said.
Ziva nodded, waiting for him to continue. Unsurprisingly, he didn't. "Do you have nieces or nephews?" she prompted.
"Something like that," John said, and then pushed back from the table. "Excuse me. Me and Marty are going to skip dessert and head for the bar."
"Isn't that a little rude, honey?" Sacha asked, scowling at him.
John rubbed his bruised chin in what looked like a deliberate gesture. "You'd know, sweetie," he returned, and then he and Martin left the table.
"I'm so sorry about that," Julie said as Sacha threw back the rest of her wine and then immediately refilled her glass. "They're just grumpy old men."
"Perhaps they could have some of your party product," Ziva suggested with a smile. "That should perk them right up."
Julie chuckled uncomfortably. "Right. Maybe."
Ziva glanced at Tony, and then leaned across the table and lowered her voice. "So, did you manage to get your hands on anything?" she asked hopefully. "The more I've thought about it, the more keen I am."
"It's been a long time between parties," Tony said ruefully.
"Yeah, then maybe it's not the best idea to start up again, you know?" Julie said. "If you're not used to it anymore."
"Oh, no, we'll be fine," Ziva assured her. The bottle of rubbing alcohol that Sacha had just given her was a nice bit of supporting evidence, but they weren't going to be able to prove that the rubbing alcohol in Will Crawford's blood came from the same bottle. They needed to get their hands on the drugs they through the group was smuggling to make arrests for trafficking, and then they could press them on Will Crawford's murder.
"Yeah, we're just looking for a little fun," Tony backed her up. "We're not looking to get completely messed up."
"It takes so much longer for Tom to get over hangovers these days," Ziva told them. "I don't want to lose him for three days while there are beautiful islands to explore."
Sacha snorted. "That's how it begins," she said, and Ziva realized that her glass was empty again. "You start doing things separately because it's easier than arguing about doing things together, and then a couple of years later you realize that you don't do anything together."
"You all cruise together," Ziva pointed out.
"Not necessarily by choice," Sacha said, and Ziva was reminded of their conversation a few days back that left her with the impression that she and Julie were done travelling with their husbands. She gave Sacha a sympathetic smile, but Sacha missed it. She was refilling her glass yet again.
"But we have each other," Julie said, and Sacha tipped her glass to that.
"You seem like very good friends," Tony said. "And I get the feeling you make a lot of other friends when you cruise."
"Like us," Ziva shot in.
"Oh, sure. Friends from all over," Sacha said, and her smile seemed genuine.
"Anyone you stay in contact with?"
"A few. We'll catch up with our friend Oscar when we dock in Key West."
Ziva felt Tony sit up straighter, and she knew why. Oscar McCarthy, the man who ran a charter boat business in Key West, had been posting on Facebook about plans to meet up with John when they docked.
"It must be great to have so many friends all over the place," Tony said. "You never have to pay for a hotel again."
Sacha and Julie burst out laughing.
"I'd die before staying at Oscar's place," Julie said.
"You'd probably die after staying at Oscar's place," Sacha countered. "You're sure to leave with some kind of deadly skin disease."
Julie shuddered, and then reached for her cell phone when it started vibrating. She flipped it screen up and read the message on screen, and her smile fell away. She looked over at Sacha with regret.
"Marty," she said. "He's sent out an SOS. Are you okay for a few minutes?"
Sacha waved her hand as she swallowed another mouthful of wine. "Go, go," she said. "Before they get super grumpy."
"Excuse me," Julie said to Tony and Ziva, and then rushed off.
"I hope everything is all right," Ziva said.
"Prob'ly," Sacha said, beginning to slur. "Who cares? You want another glass?"
"No," Ziva said, just as Tony replied, "Sure."
Sacha poured him a glass that was almost filled to the brim.
"Zara, if you're not going to drink, you should at least get with the baby-making," Sacha told her. "Don't you think?"
Ziva's cheeks warmed again and her eyes fell on the suddenly very attractive glass of wine in Tony's hand. "You know, it's still very early in our relationship. Isn't it, Tom?"
"Didn't you say you'd been together for a couple of years?" Sacha asked.
"Still so early," Ziva repeated.
"We're not really sure about each other yet," Tony added.
Sacha laughed. "Oh, yeah. I can see that," she said sarcastically.
Ziva looked around for Julie to save them, but when she didn't see her she reached for Tony's wine. "A little bit can't hurt," she said.
God save her from this conversation.
…
Half an hour later Julie still hadn't returned, dessert was over and Sacha had reached the messy stage of drunk. Ziva knew they weren't going to get anything else useful out of the night, so she convinced Sacha to let her and Tony walk her back to her room with the hope they could get inside. She leaned heavily against Ziva as they stumbled through the halls, and Ziva found herself grabbing for the wall a few times to stop them both from falling over. Whenever she caught Tony's eye, he was cringing like he expected the trip to end in disaster.
"Home, sweet home!" Sacha announced at the door to her cabin. She opened her clutch and held it up to her face to peer inside. "Where's my key?"
Ziva caught Tony's eye and wordlessly told him to hold on to Sacha. When he did, she quickly stuck her hand in her purse and felt around for the small knife disguised as a pen that she was carrying with her. She flipped off the top, prepared herself, and then sliced the top of her index finger. Then, she reached for the doorframe, and quickly pulled her hand back and gasped in pain.
"Ow!" she cried out, and looked down at her finger. It was bleeding nicely for effect.
"You okay, hon?" Sacha asked.
"Yes, I cut my finger on something." She held it up for Sacha to see.
"That looks bad, sweetheart," Tony threw at her, and he looked genuinely concerned by the injury.
"Do you have any Band-Aids?" she asked Sacha.
"Yeah, of course," Sacha said, and pulled her key out of her purse. "Here it is! Come on." She tried to put the key into the slot, but it was absolutely beyond her at this point. She handed it to Tony. "Tom, you're going to have to do it."
"Sure." Tony took the key and quickly opened the door, then stood aside to let Sacha and Ziva in.
"Come in here, Zara," Sacha said, beckoning her into the bathroom. "Can you fit?"
"Tight squeeze," Ziva said, and then deliberately blocked the doorway so that Sacha wouldn't notice as Tony slipped into their bedroom to start snooping. But Sacha was busy rummaging through one of the drawers for Band-Aids. Ziva turned on the faucet to mask any noise Tony might make, and also to flush out the cut on her finger.
"A-ha!" Sacha cried and brandished a box of Band-Aids. "Never travel without them."
"And rubbing alcohol," Ziva added.
Sacha flipped down the lid on the toilet and took a seat. "You know," she said as she toed off her shoes, "I like to be prepared. Band-Aids, rubbing alcohol, antiseptic cream, antacids—that's usually for John. God, I don't know what happens to men when they get to about 40, but it's like all they want to eat is meat, and a lot of it. They stack on weight and start getting heartburn all the time, and they act like they've got no idea why it happens." She paused to pull the clip out of her hair, and tossed it on the counter. She looked Ziva dead in the eye. "Don't let Tom get like that. Promise me."
Ziva didn't know if she had any power over whatever Tony might decide to do to his body in the future, but she nodded and couldn't help smiling. "I promise," she said, and held up her finger.
"Oh!" Sacha reached into the drawer again and pulled out a tube of antiseptic. Ziva dried her finger off on a piece of toilet paper and squeezed out as much blood as she could, but it just kept coming. She began to think she'd cut herself more deeply than intended.
"You know, I think I'm going to have to go down to the medical bay," she said. "I might just wrap it up and head down."
"What did you cut it on, do you think?" Sacha asked.
"I am not sure. Perhaps a nail or something."
Sacha reached over to squeeze Ziva's other hand. "I'm sorry, honey."
"It is not your fault," Ziva told her.
"Yeah, but you walked me back here." She paused and smiled, but her eyes looked sad. "Thank you. That was really nice."
"Don't mention it," Ziva said with a kind smile. "Do you want Tom to hang around while I go down to the medical bay?"
Sacha waved her hand. "No, no. He seems like the kind of man who'd like to hold your hand through a doctor's visit."
He was, Ziva knew. Although she didn't think a cut finger really called for a bedside vigil. Nevertheless, she didn't argue with Sacha. She wrapped another wad of toilet paper around her finger and turned off the faucet.
"I am sure Julie will be by as soon as she can," Ziva told her.
Sacha smiled, then stood and brushed past her towards the door. "I should call her room and see what she's doing," she said.
Ziva couldn't block her way out of the bathroom without looking completely obvious, so she raised her voice a bit to try to give Tony warning to stop whatever he was doing in the bedroom. "Great idea!" she enthused. "Is her room far away?" She stepped out of the bathroom behind Sacha and almost walked into her back. When she looked over her shoulder, she saw Tony standing over by the balcony doors.
"Hey!" Tony said, looking innocent as a baby. "I came over to look at your view, but then I realized that it's the exact same view as ours. The ocean. At night." He smiled.
Sacha didn't move, and with her back to Ziva she couldn't see what was going on with her face. Ziva raised her eyebrows at Tony, and he walked towards them.
"So, is your finger bad?" Tony asked her. "Should we go see the doctor on board?"
"Yes, I think that would be a good idea."
"You're such a klutz," Tony told her, and he and Sacha did a little dance as he tried to move past her towards the door. "Thanks for your help, Sacha."
"Yeah," Sacha said, sounding a little more sober. "No problem."
"Will you be all right?" Ziva asked her as she backed up towards the door. "Do you want us to wait until Julie reappears?"
Sacha stared at them for a moment, then shook her head. "Uh, no. Thanks. Me and John just had a little fight. Happens all the time. We'll be fine."
Ziva reached back for the door handle and pulled it open. "Okay. Well, sleep well. We might catch up with you tomorrow."
"Sure," Sacha said, and offered them a smile. "See you later."
Ziva led Tony into the hall, and they both gave Sacha a little wave before the door closed. She blew out a breath of relief as Tony slung his arm around her shoulders and steered her down the hall.
"Do you really need to go to the medical bay, or…?"
"Yes," she told him, and held up the bloodied makeshift bandage around her finger.
"What did you do?" he asked.
"Cut myself on a knife in my purse," she told him under her breath. "What did you find in the room?"
"A teddy bear," he replied quietly. "With a ledger or something next to it. I took photos."
"Good work," she said with a smile.
"Back at you," he said, and kissed her cheek. "Suffering for your art? I like it." His smile quickly fell to a stern frown. "But I'd prefer you didn't."
"Understood," she said. "But this also gives us a legitimate opportunity to check out the medical bay, and the ship's doctor."
"You're a genius."
"No," she said as they reached the elevator. "I am duplicitous."
Tony grinned. "Just the way I like you."
…
Ziva and Tony shared a small, triumphant smile when they found Dr Mona Mercurio, also known as the physician who had treated Will Crawford, on shift. It wasn't too busy in the medical bay—the only other patient was a nervous-looking woman in sweatpants and a t-shirt who didn't want to make eye contact with anyone—so Ziva wasn't concerned with taking up the doctor's time with chatter as she cleaned out Ziva's fingertip.
"It's pretty quiet down here tonight," Tony said, taking the lead on the conversation as was his wont. "Has it been a busy trip for you?"
"Not so much," Dr Mercurio said with a smile. "Pretty standard, really."
"No crazy injuries?" Tony asked, trying to build a rapport.
Dr Mercurio pretended to think about it. "Hmm, there was the patient with the koala bite, but I can't go into detail. Doctor patient privilege."
Tony cocked his head in a way that Ziva knew meant he wasn't sure whether she was being serious or not. Ziva thought it was obvious she was kidding. "I heard that the ship had an outbreak of food poisoning a few months ago," she said. "We were talking to a couple who have been on this cruise…How many times did they say, honey?"
"Four or five," Tony supplied.
"Right. They said the last trip they were on, there was quite an outbreak."
Dr Mercurio smiled kindly, but shook her head. "Nothing recently that I would call an outbreak," she said. "But it's not uncommon for people to get food poisoning from food they buy onshore."
Ziva and Tony shared a quick look at the crew again blaming onshore food for illness.
"Yeah, we heard someone actually died," Tony said, lowering his voice and wincing like he knew it was unseemly to gossip, but he couldn't help himself.
"That's very uncommon," Dr Mercurio said firmly.
"Did that actually happen?" Ziva asked, playing up her alarm. "I can't believe that really happened."
Dr Mercurio applied some antiseptic to Ziva's finger. "I'm sure you'll both be fine," she assured them. "So long as you stay away from…was it a nail that you cut yourself on?" she checked.
Ziva nodded. "Yes. I should probably let maintenance know."
"When was your last tetanus shot?"
"Last year." It was the truth. She'd fallen at a construction site while chasing a fleeing suspect and ripped open her pants leg and skin on her shin on an unidentifiable piece of machinery.
"So, no eating from street vendors is what I'm hearing," Tony said, and put his hand on Ziva's shoulder. "I'm sorry, sweetcheeks. I know you wanted to go to town on lobster in St Croix."
"Just stick to the lobster in restaurants, and you'll be fine," Dr Mercurio told them. She stepped over to a cabinet and pulled out a bandage.
"What do you do when someone does get bad food poisoning?" Ziva asked her.
"We look after them down here," Dr Mercurio said. "We've got hospital beds and we can put them on a drip. Then we transport them to a hospital onshore as soon as we can, and they get well looked after."
"Do you stay in touch with the hospital?" Tony asked, and Ziva cringed a little to herself. That sounded like a question a detective would ask, and Dr Mercurio did give him an odd look. But she nodded.
"Yes, sometimes," she said. "Depends on how unwell they are and whether it's likely that they'll return to the ship at another port."
The doors to the medical bay burst open then, and a very, very drunk man in his 20s with blood running down the side of his face stumbled in. A small woman about the same age and half the size, but only marginally less drunk followed him in.
"Are you the doctor?" she asked.
Before Dr Mercurio had a chance to respond, the man stumbled closer to her and pointed at his head. Ziva wondered if he had any idea how much he was bleeding if he felt the need to point to his injury.
"I cut my head open!" he yelled, although he wasn't being aggressive. He was just very, very drunk.
"I see that," Dr Mercurio said without missing a beat. "How about you sit down there before you fall and hurt yourself more, and I'll be with you in just one minute."
The man turned his head this way and that as he looked around the room, and Ziva watched Tony reach out most likely on instinct to steady him before the action made him fall over.
"You okay, buddy?" Tony asked.
The man focused in on Tony and pointed to his head again. "Yeah, yeah, man. I just cut my head open."
As Dr Mercurio wrapped the bandage around Ziva's finger, Tony helped guide the man to a seat across from the quiet woman in the track pants.
"How'd you do that?" Tony asked him.
"Dancing," the man told him, and then pumped his arms above his head as if in demonstration.
"Dancing into someone's elbow," his companion said. "You're going to have a black eye tomorrow. I just know you're going to have a black eye."
The man made a weak attempt at beatboxing, and Tony aimed a smirk at Ziva. She smiled back.
"Okay, Zara. You're done," Dr Mercurio said. "I'll give you some antiseptic cream and another bandage. Keep it dry—I know that's hard when you're visiting beautiful beaches, but you can tape some plastic around it. Come back if you run out of bandages."
"Thank you," Ziva said, and got out of her chair. Without asking specifically about her treatment of Will Crawford, there wasn't much else she and Tony would be able to get out of the doctor. And besides, it looked like she would have her hands full with her new patient.
"Come back if you think it's infected," Dr Mercurio threw at her as Tony opened the medical bay door. "Or if you eat too much lobster in St Croix."
"Will do."
They walked a few steps down the hall away from the medical bay before Tony nudged her.
"How do you cut your head open on someone's elbow?"
"Anything is possible when you are that drunk."
"I vaguely remember that," he said. "I was always more of a mystery bruise drunk."
"And you called me a klutz," she reminded him.
"That was just for show," he told her. "We both know you're a super ninj—AGH!"
Ziva saw a flash of silver flying towards her face from around the corner in the split-second before Tony ducked, threw his arm up in front of his face and threw his other arm out to shove her behind him. She recovered in the next instant to see John Paulson standing in front of them with what looked like a silver serving tray raised above his head and an angry look on his face.
"John? What the hell?" Tony cried.
The angry look fell from John's face, to be replaced with one of unconvincing apology. "Oh, Jesus, man! I'm so sorry!" He dropped the tray by his side and reached out towards him. "Oh, man. I thought you were someone else. Geez, I feel terrible."
"Someone else?" Ziva echoed, trying desperately to keep a hold on her adrenaline so that she didn't go full ninja on him. "Who did you intend to hit in the face with a serving tray?"
John held his heaving chest. "Just…just this guy I had a bit of a disagreement with," he told them breathlessly. "He said some crap about Sacha. God, I'm so sorry." He paused and gestured at Ziva with the tray. "What did you do to your finger, Zara?"
Ziva looked down at her finger. "Uh, I cut it outside your room when we were walking Sacha home."
"Oh, right," John said, and then stared at her for a long, creepy moment. "Thanks for looking after her."
"No problem. Please thank Sacha for helping to patch me up."
He pointed at her with the tray again. "You bet I will," he said with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Hey, you guys've got some good reflexes."
"Thanks," Tony said cautiously.
"Good thing," John said with a dead chuckle. "Or else I guess I would've broken your noses. Good night!" With that he turned and walked away, whistling as he went.
When they were sure he was gone, Tony and Ziva looked at each other with the same expression. One of shared conviction that John Paulson absolutely had something going on aboard the Caribbean Carnivalé that he didn't want other people to know about.
"Let's head back to our room, honey," Tony said, and took her hand in his before practically pulling her towards the elevator.
Her heart was racing all the way back to their room, and as soon as they were inside she put her finger to her lips. Tony nodded, and they split up to do a sweep of the room on the small chance that John or Martin had gotten in and bugged the place. She knew it was unlikely, but it paid to be careful. When she didn't find anything her heart rate started to return to normal, and she met Tony in the bedroom.
"Laptop and passports still in the safe," he told her.
She nodded. "So. That was weird, yes?"
Tony blew out a laugh. "Yeah."
"I think you may have seen something important in John and Sacha's room," she said. "You said something about a ledger?"
Tony pulled out his cell phone and sat on the end of the bed. Ziva sat beside him as he unlocked the screen and flipped to the last photo he took. They inclined their heads in unison to peer at the screen, and Tony enlarged the photo of the piece of paper. Ziva frowned as she tried to make sense of it. It looked like a long list of letters that didn't make words, and each was paired with a scratch tally.
Tony grunted. "Well, I think it's clear that we can put them away for life with this, Ziva."
She allowed herself to smirk at the joke. "The letters could be initials of peoples' names," she speculated. "Next to a tally of home many baggies or bricks or…whatever size packages they are distributing."
"Could be," he said with a shrug, then added, "Stop scratching."
"Hmm?"
"Stop scratching your legs," he elaborated. "You'll make it worse."
Ziva looked down, and realized that she had been working her fingernails over a bug-bitten patch of skin below her kneecap. She pulled her fingers into a fist, but now that he'd pointed out that she was scratching, the itch was too much to resist. She rubbed her knuckles over the skin that was burning hot from all the blood rising to the surface, on top of itching.
Tony stood up. "Where did you put that rubbing alcohol?"
"Call me paranoid, but I do not want to use it."
"Want to go back to Mercurio and get some calamine lotion?" She shook her head no, and Tony checked his watch. "You want to try to get McGee on the line? Unlikely he'll still be in the office now, but let's make an attempt."
"Sure."
As Tony went to get the laptop, Ziva darted into the bathroom and found the bottle of aloe vera gel she had brought with her on the assumption that Tony would get sunburned and complain about it. She rubbed a generous amount into both legs, enjoyed the cooling sensation for a few moments, and washed her hands thoroughly but carefully before returning to the bedroom. She took a seat beside Tony again as he booted up the machine, and he turned his head sharply towards her.
"What is that smell?"
"Napalm."
He gave her an odd look, and then the two of them watched the computer desktop while they waited for the Internet to connect.
"How was that pasta you had tonight?" she asked, killing time.
"Really good. Relatively speaking."
"Relative to what?"
"Proper Italian pasta."
"Of which you are an aficionado."
Tony lifted a shoulder and switched to Italian. "Can't help what's in my blood, Ziva."
Her stomach flipped much like it had the night at her apartment when they'd kissed. "You will have to make me a pasta dinner one night." And show me your damn apartment, she added in her head.
"Consider it done," he said, and pulled up Skype. McGee was indeed online, just like he always seemed to be. The question would be whether they got him at work, or at home in his jimmy-jams.
A bleary eyed McGee answered the call, but it was a bleary eyed McGee sitting between the too-familiar walls of the bullpen. "What?" he answered.
Tony pulled a face. "Yeesh. What's with you?"
"New case," McGee said, and his eyes flicked beyond his computer screen to track someone as they approached. "Some of us have to keep things running while you're on your Caribbean vacation."
"It's not a vacation," Tony argued, but then Gibbs' head popped into view, close to the camera. Tony and Ziva both instinctively leaved back from the screen.
"Hello, Gibbs," Ziva started, but he was about as interested in pleasantries as McGee.
"Tell me you've got something besides a tan," he barked.
Ziva sighed softly at the fully expected but still annoying greeting as Tony plastered a thin smile on his lips.
"It's hard, outdoor work, boss," Tony told him, eliciting eye rolls from both of their colleagues. "Seriously," he insisted. "You should see Ziva's legs. They're disgusting."
Ziva's head snapped around to glare at him. Disgusting? So why was he touching them so much of late?
She watched him cringe at his badly-worded comment "I mean the bug bites," he said, choosing to stare at Gibbs and McGee rather than make eye contact with her. "The bug bites are the worst. And probably driving you crazy."
Ziva sighed again, much louder, and took over the conversation as Tony regrouped. "I received the disgusting bug bites this morning when Agent DiNozzo and I hiked through the jungle to look at Rodney and Nadine Preston's property," she said, managing to rebuke both Tony and their colleagues in Washington at the same time. "We followed the Paulsons and Roses to the location, and then continued on foot through a neighboring property to the fence line so that we would not be detected."
"They've got a building back there that's separate from the main house," Tony told them. "A lot of activity going into and out of that building. Wrapped packages came out of that building and were put in the back of a Jeep that our suspects were using."
"What was in the packages?" Gibbs wanted to know.
Tony and Ziva glanced at each other.
"Not sure," Tony admitted. "We left and then set ourselves up at the same restaurant that Will and Alicia Crawford ate at when they made that video. The one that showed John and Martin walking in the background with stuffed bears."
"And we saw the Paulsons and Roses pull up on the street," Ziva continued. "Sacha, Julie and another woman, possibly Nadine, left the others and went to the beach. But John and Martin went into a toy store carrying the packages that were put into their car at Rodney and Nadine's property."
"And our buddy Herschelle from the ship joined them in there too," Tony added.
"And what?" Gibbs asked with a shrug.
This time, Tony sighed. "And, Herschelle left before the others, wiping his mouth like he'd been in a fist fight."
"John Paulson had a bruise on his face tonight," Ziva shot in quickly, backing up their suspicions.
Tony nodded. "Right. When John and Martin left the store, they weren't carrying the packages but they were carrying two big stuffed bears."
"Which they carried down the ship," Ziva told them. "We followed them to the security check point. Both bears were scanned, but John was working hard to distract the security guard who was not watching the x-ray screen."
"We think because the guy who was watching the screen must be in on it," Tony added.
"Why do you—" Gibbs started, but Tony cut him off.
"Wait, there's more," he said, waving his hand. "Just now we managed to get Sacha to let us into their room. Ziva kept her distracted in the bathroom while I snooped. One of those bears was on the bed next to a kind of ledger. I'll send you the photo, but we're thinking it's some kind of delivery list for the drugs we're pretty sure they picked up from Rodney and Nadine."
"But—" Gibbs started, but Ziva talked over him.
"Sacha seemed suspicious of us when we left her room. And later John Paulson attacked us with a silver serving tray."
"Nearly broke my nose," Tony told them.
"He suggested he thought that we were someone else," Ziva told them as Tony shook his head. "But he was clearly after us. It was a warning."
"They are definitely getting suspicious of us," Tony told them. "And they are definitely trying to hide something."
When they paused long enough for Gibbs to get a word in, her came at them with both barrels. "So, you have nothing," he stated.
Tony shot him a severe frown. "What? Is the sound crapping out on this call? Didn't you just hear—?"
"You've got no hard evidence of anything," Gibbs pointed out. "It's all speculation. So why are you both still there?"
Ziva felt Tony's arm tense against hers, and she knew what he was thinking. Why was it okay for them to spend money and resources any time Gibbs had a gut feeling about something, but not when anyone else did? She felt Tony teetering on the edge of throwing the question out there, so she jumped in before he could ruin his career.
"Julie Rose offered us drugs," she reminded him. "We are waiting for her to follow though on that offer."
That made Gibbs' eyebrows rise. He hadn't been on their previous call when Julie's offer was mentioned, and Ziva wondered if McGee had forgotten to tell him.
"What kind of drugs?" Gibbs asked.
"We are not sure yet," Ziva told him. "Some kind of party drug—she has not been specific. But we are working to build trust with her, and have been making it clear that we would be very interested in taking what she has."
Gibbs nodded along, visibly relaxing now that things were moving in the direction that he wanted them to. He even moved back from the camera a little.
"In addition, Sacha handed me a bottle of rubbing alcohol to help with my disgusting bug bites."
"You might recall, boss, that rubbing alcohol was found in Will Crawford's blood." It was an unnecessary reminder, and Gibbs shot them an irritated look for it. But Ziva understood Tony's sudden urge to be bitchy.
"Sacha told me that she always travels with a bottle," Ziva told them, and then laid it all out. "So, we have the murder weapon, as it were. We have the promise of a drug deal. We have our suspect behaving violently towards us after we have been in his room and seen what could be his drug delivery system. We have identified two people on board the ship who could be assisting the Paulsons and Roses with their alleged drug smuggling operation. And that is to say nothing of the personal relationships involved in all of this that show two marriages ready to fall apart as a result of the husbands' activities." She sat back and crossed her arms, pleased with her round up. She expected Gibbs to at least nod in acknowledgement, but he barely even moved an eyebrow. She pursed her lips and dug her fingernails into her leg with frustration.
In the prolonged silence that followed, McGee glanced between then tentatively until he finally threw in the two cents he had found.
"I've been doing some work on this end," he said. "Remember Oscar McCarthy? The guy in Key West with the charter boat business who's friends with John?"
Tony nodded. "Yeah. Sacha mentioned him tonight. She said they were going to catch up with him in Key West."
McGee's face fell. "Uh, yeah. That's what I was going to say. John posted a photo of the cruise on his Facebook page yesterday, and McCarthy made yet another comment that he'll see them in a few days at the usual place."
"Well, there's another nail for us," Tony muttered to Ziva, but loud enough for the others to hear.
"And something else," McGee said. "After that post I did some digging into Oscar McCarthy. His business receives regular payments of a few thousand dollars about a week after every cruise trip. I'm trying to determine where the payments are coming from, but if this all pans out the way we think it will, I expect those payments will be coming from Jim Paulson."
"John's older brother," Ziva remembered.
"The physical therapist in Manhattan who bought John's house and cars," Tony said. "He's bankrolling the whole thing."
"When are you due in Key West?" Gibbs asked.
"Few days," Tony said. "We're in Saint Croix tomorrow, then at sea the one after. We're in Key West after that."
Gibbs nodded. "We'll meet you there," he said, finally getting on board. "If we're going to prove any of this, we're going to need more than two sets of eyes on all the players."
"Oh, so you think we might be right?" Tony asked pointedly, but McGee had cut the transmission before he'd finished speaking. Tony shut the laptop with a profane mutter, but then turned to Ziva with a smile. "Nice job on getting him to come around on it."
"Thank you," she said, and then gave him a dirty look. "What did you say about my legs?"
Tony tipped his head back to groan, and then placed the laptop on the nightstand. "I meant the bug bites," he insisted again, and then reached over to run his hand over her thigh. "The legs themselves are perfect."
She glared once more, but then let it go. "I think we should give our new friends some space tomorrow," she said. "As you said, they are suspicious of us now. And John is clearly capable of violence. We should keep as far back as we can."
"Agreed," he said as his hand kept stroking her thigh. "But with any luck, they'll just head to the beach tomorrow and we can watch them from the water."
Ziva nodded, but honestly she hoped for something a little more stimulating than that. As much as she had enjoyed their time in the water today—and that included some necessary conversation about falling in love with their best friends—she was not the kind of person who could spend all day, every day at the beach.
But that was tomorrow's problem. Tonight, she was content to focus on Tony's hand sliding up the inside of her thigh with determination, and on his mouth moving in to get reacquainted with her neck. Enjoy it while it lasts, she thought to herself. Because she had a feeling that once they returned to Washington, spending lazy and love-soaked days alone together would be few and far between.
Hope you Tiva peeps are coping OK :/