Ch 30: Grecian Property #1, Done! Lucy & Victoria, Questions
Returning home from their winter break, Tim and Artie were relaxed and refreshed, ready to resume their 'normal' lives. They laughed whenever they said that as they knew their lives were anything but normal!
Once home, they gave the presents they'd brought for the children and their minders, keeping a few things to give on birthdays or Christmas, proud of themselves for making notes on their private calendar so they would remember those items when the birthdays and Christmas came around.
Although they reached home during the first week of March, Artie later agreed with Tim that the rest of the month both flew and crept by.
The work on the Remis' property was officially completed on Saturday, March 14th, mid-month as planned. Artie, Bill and their team had a 'Wrap' party that Sunday, attended by the Remises and everyone's families. Luckily the day was warm enough to party outside as the Remises were reluctant to have anyone traipse through their pristine new home.
On March 17th, James called to report that Sarah had had labor pains but was given medication to stop them and was home again. When the senior Gibbses packed up and left for Jaxton early the next morning, Tim had a difficult time staying back. When Peter and Rhode offered to help with the children until Sarah was safely delivered of her child, Tim and Artie told the children about Aunty Sarah, 'Timpa' packed for wintry weather in the UK and grabbed the first flight available, once again a commercial flight, happy when Rob joined him. Tim didn't care how much it cost, they had the funds and he was reluctant to wait an additional day for one of the Paddington flights. This was Sarah's child, there was no way either Timpa or Robbie would stay away!
Landing in London early on Thursday, March 19th, they were only a day behind the senior Gibbses' arrival. Taking the train to Jaxton, they smiled as they spotted the senior Powells' vehicle waiting for them.
George smiled as they opened the doors, "Welcome home and relax, take a breath. Sarah is asleep, she's not had a contraction since they gave her the medication. Her doctor has said that if they start up again, they'll carry through with the delivery. The baby is over 5 pounds now and in good shape." He shook his head, "I remember this happening when James was born, we were actually closer to 3 months pregnant when we thought it was about 6 weeks."
Rob nodded while Tim decided not to add that he and Artie had believed they were pregnant when she was about 3 weeks along, after the trip to Scotland for Susannah and Ian's wedding. And they'd been right.
The younger men smiled as they pulled up in front of the house, feeling that it had been several months since they'd been here. While it wasn't that long, it had been several weeks, considering the storms, Ziva and Brian's visit with the weekend trip to Varkiza, Christmas in Virginia, the mad dash to escape the hurricane and their extended week in San Diego for Mr. Dorneget's funeral.
As Sarah was still asleep, Tim decided to go for a swim and Rob joined him. When they'd done enough laps, they dried off and headed to their rooms. That was even stranger as Tim could not remember ever staying in their suite without his wife and children. Finding it too quiet and too lonely, he bunked in with Rob.
Friday, he went into the office, surprising everyone and spending the day catching up with his staff along with plenty of emails and paperwork. Returning from a meeting early that afternoon, he answered his phone, grabbed his jacket and quickly left the office, telling Cynthia that Sarah was in labor again. Taking the tube to Jaxton, he sighed in relief when he spotted his parents' car, Dad behind the wheel.
"Thanks! Is Mom at the hospital already?"
"Yes, son. I dropped her and Rob off and then came here, waited less than 5 minutes."
"When did she go into labor this time?"
"We're not sure but James and his folks took her to the hospital right away. We were out for a walk so it took us a few minutes to get back, change our shoes and leave again."
Tim sighed, "I've forgotten how long it can take for babies to actually be on the outside."
"Yeah, we both said the same thing."
"How was Sarah, do you know?"
"After the scare the other day, Edie said she was both calm and excited."
Tim blew out a breath and his father reached out to pat his back. "She'll be all right, Timpa!"
"I know, Artie told me that when she was pregnant with the twins and geez, I need to let her know!"
"Already did that, son. Sent messages to Artie and Char, they'll get the word out to everyone else."
Tim nodded, "Thanks, Dad. How are you doing?"
"Hating to wait, as always, even though it's necessary."
"I can't remember if they've said what names they've picked, I mean to go with Lucy!"
"Neither of us know that either, we guessed they kept the rest to themselves."
Then they were at the hospital and slid into a parking space. Father and son hurried inside, finding Rob and James' father George in the waiting area.
George hugged each of them, "She's doing fine, James, Edie and Lu are with her. Lu said she'll come get us in a few minutes for a quick visit."
Tim nodded before sitting down and then popping back up again. "I forgot to bring the tote bag with everything, cards, books, etc."
Dad chuckled, "You left it on the kitchen counter this morning, Timmo, and we grabbed it along with our bag."
"Thanks, Dad. I uh, I need to walk a bit."
"Don't go too far."
Nodding nervously, Tim started pacing, around the room, down a corridor, up another one and repeating. When he spotted his mother and James' mother Edie with Dad, George and Rob, he hurried back to them.
Malu smiled as she turned to him, giving him a kiss. "Sorry, Timmo, your visit will have to wait. She'll be on her way to the delivery room very soon."
Tim frowned, "Is everything all right? Isn't that a very short labor?"
His mother chuckled, "Yes and no. It seems her labor started again shortly before midnight, hours before she said anything to James, who slept through the whole thing. When her water broke, she finally woke him."
"And they are all right, Sarah, the baby, James?"
"Yes, Timpa, both of them, and James, are doing well. The doctors don't anticipate any problems."
Tim nodded, sitting down and pulling out his phone before getting up again. He needed to speak with his wife, he wished she was here with him or he was there with her. Then he relaxed, smiling a little as his phone chimed with a call from his beloved.
He answered saying, "I was just calling you. They're taking them to the delivery room soon, Sarah's labor really started just before midnight. She didn't wake James until her water broke."
"She's all right, the baby as well?"
"Yes, Mom says Sarah and the baby are doing fine and James is all right. I remember being a wreck."
"Yes but then we were having twins and we were the first in the family to produce grandchildren."
"Thanks for the save, sweetie!"
They spoke a little longer and then Tim smiled as he heard the children entering the house. Speaking with each of them further calmed him and he was still smiling when he finally disconnected.
Returning to the chairs, he sat next to Rob who looked as nervous as Tim felt. Resting his hand lightly on Rob's arm, he held on until his little brother began to relax.
The two of them were playing cards with their parents when James appeared again. "She's on her way to the Delivery Room now, I just came to tell you. Everything's fine. Love you all, have to get back!"
Over what seemed like days but in reality was hours, Rob, Tim and the other grandparents played more card games, went for walks, had hot beverages and snacks from the cafeteria, read whatever reading material they had with them or on their phones, chatted on their phones and in Tim's case, managed to get a half days' worth of work done, also using his phone.
None of them bothered looking at the time when James appeared, a huge smile on his face. "She's here, Lucy's here and Sarah's fine, tired and sore but the doctor said she'll be fine. Lucy is 5 pounds, 11 ounces and is 20 inches long. I guess that's good considering the difference between Sarah's height and mine!"
Looking at his mother-in-law, he added, "Malu, Sarah and Breena made an agreement about baby names. Our daughter's middle name is Isabella after your mother, her maternal great-grandmother."
Lu's face lit up and she kissed her son-in-law, "Thank you, James, that's wonderful, I know my mother would be thrilled! It's so sweet that her names honor both Edie and me!"
Edie's smile was just as happy as she told Jethro, Tim and Rob that "Lucy is my middle name."
Eventually, they were able to visit Sarah and baby Lucy, although they went in pairs rather than the whole group at once. Going to visit after both sets of grandparents, Tim and Rob were smugly happy when they found their new niece awake after finishing nursing. Tim was given the honor of burping her and he laughed softly at the noise the little one made. Rob held Lucy until she was asleep, carefully placing her in the crib.
The brothers stayed over again that night and Tim worked at NCIS until mid-afternoon the next day, meeting Rob at the FBO for a Paddington flight back to Athens. While they hadn't minded the commercial flight flying from Athens the other day, they'd forgotten about the lines at Security beforehand. Now they smiled as their IDs, visas and passports were quickly checked before they boarded the flight home, smiling when they saw Tony's cousins Nigel and Emma Paddington who welcomed them, congratulating them on their new niece and adding that they were having a late winter break, on their way to Cyprus while Emma's parents were staying with their children.
After napping for most of the flight, both men smiled as they entered the Baggage hall at the Athens airport a few hours later, happy to see Bill waiting for them.
He grinned, saying, "I won the coin toss. Do you have more photos of Lucy? How's Sarah? Does the baby look like her or James or his parents?"
Tim laughed, shaking his head, "We're happy to say Sarah's doing well as is our littlest niece. She looks like her mama and a bit like Edie but you know it's really too soon to tell, although her hair is lighter than Sarah's and she has a lot of it."
He shook his head, "I'd forgotten that we have no idea what Sarah's biological parents looked like or any of her birth family."
"Maybe she'll finally have her DNA tested."
That was from Bill and both of his brothers laughed at him, "Sure, right after you do!"
"I could do that as long as my DNA doesn't get attached to any family trees. I have no desire to know who gave me up."
Tim tilted his head, "Find a private lab over here. Or use the security options on the online sites, as Ducky did. Or contact Carly Ross, she has a private lab."
"Carly, your Carly?"
Tim laughed, "She's hardly my Carly! I haven't seen her since my going away party at the diner in Silver Spring in 2008! Although Artie and I do exchange Christmas cards with her. Sometimes we include notes, you know, catching up."
"All right, so tell me about her private lab?"
"She can run your DNA and pull your ethnicities, even find people with DNA that connects with yours or from a family tree that connects with their DNA without any of it showing up on the other peoples' family trees or the national or international databases."
"So if my birth mother, for example, is on someone's family tree and her DNA is also there, Carly could get the information without having to put my information in?"
"Kind of." He explained how Carly worked her 'magic' and both Bill and Rob nodded, Bill adding, "Sarah could also do that, and, no never mind."
"Yeah, there's no way Freddie or Barry would ever want to risk that."
Rob nodded, "They don't want to know anyway and neither of them will have children of their own, no way they'll ever pass those genes along."
Tim sighed, "Yeah."
Bill patted his shoulder, "Relax, your kids are great, they don't show any signs of impending cruelty and don't forget Liam and Chloe don't have the same genetic background as Jack and Ellanni."
Tim rolled his head, relaxing his tense neck muscles. "You're right on both counts. I'm pretty sure the worst bad guy in my scenario, I mean as far as the people I lived with, was the Navy guy and he was not my father."
Rob raised an eyebrow, "You've never been a big fan of the woman you believe to have been your mother."
"You're right, I'm not. However, I am the very proud and thankful grandson of Donald Mallard and the equally proud and thankful son of our parents and that's good enough for me! Besides, the brother of that woman is also a good guy, a USN officer with a strong, clean record, along with a wife and two kids."
"How do you know about his record?"
"Vance. I was pretty upset when I was told that I was sold and he told me about the good guy, the good Navy guy who is my uncle. He's looked for me ever since I was taken."
"Is that Matt guy his son?"
"No, his nephew; Matt is my half-sibling through his mother. The other Navy guy, the one who lived with us sometimes, was his father."
Reaching the rental home where Tim and his family were staying, Tim and Rob thanked Bill for picking them up and grabbing their belongings, headed into the house.
The men smiled as Artie and the children swarmed both of them, glad they'd been able to be with Sarah and were now home again.
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Now that the 'no-contact' rule had been lifted, Tim and Nikki resumed commuting together, rotating who drove to and from the embassy. Nikki chuckled as she told her husband, "What that really means is that one of us gets a few more minutes of sleep on the way to and from work!"
"So there wouldn't have been a problem before."
"No, we rarely talk about work outside of the office." She shook her head, "While I can talk a little about my work with him although not with anyone else except my fellow Intel Analysts and Director Vance, Tim can't say much of anything about his. After all, his work encompasses mine and every other European based NCIS employee's work, including all the SSAs!"
"That's true, I hadn't thought of that. Still, I know it's a relief that the gag order has been withdrawn."
She nodded and then frowned, "They said all the suspects have been rounded up, but does that also include the mother?"
Bill shrugged, "They didn't say."
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When neither Andreson nor Vance mentioned the woman who'd given birth to him, Tim asked before the two returned to the US.
Agent Andreson shook his head, "Not yet, she's next on our list."
Tim nodded, relieved that Andreson and his team were on top of everything.
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With the somewhat tumultuous weeks of traveling, the gag order, the death of Ned's grandfather, finishing the Remises' new home and the Powells' baby, the weeks following Lucy's birth were blessedly quiet, although that didn't apply to Lucy herself. With her very healthy lungs, she soon had her parents and grandparents trained to jump into action when she needed them.
Geo and Bec, who had planned to renovate a 3rd floor double and a half room into a suite with three bedrooms and a lounge for their new family, that is their foster children Brian and Mia, quickly changed their minds when they realized they would be entering Baby Lucy's territory. The four of them decided they were just fine with their rooms on the first floor, their quiet, peaceful rooms.
While Lucy trained her minions, her aunt Breena, uncle Jimmy and cousin Donnie waited impatiently for the birth of their baby.
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Although in some ways, Breena's second pregnancy had been easier, this time she knew what to expect, it was also harder as she was more impatient for the baby to arrive.
One afternoon, she was stretched out on Artie's zero gravity chair when her mother-in-law sat down next to her. Breena turned her head with a smile, "Hello, come to keep me company?"
"Yes, although I also have a question I shouldn't be asking."
She chuckled, "Go ahead, ask away."
"I've been thinking about this since before Donnie was born."
Breena grinned, "Let me guess, why we don't seem to be worried about our children's health, specifically about diabetes?"
Making a face, Lu nodded and Breena reached out to grab her hand. "It's all right, I don't mind."
"I've been thinking about it ever since Ed brought it up while you were in labor with Donnie."
"Malu, you should have asked before." Struggling to sit up, Breena gladly accepted her mother-in-law's help, getting up from the gravity chair and moving to a cushioned, wooden chair with arms. She knew she could still get up from this chair without any help.
"When Jimmy and his brother Steve started chatting regularly online, one of the first things they did was to catch up. Steve was in college overseas and Jimmy was working and going to college when he was first diagnosed with diabetes. As there was nothing Steve could do to help, Jimmy never mentioned it to him.
"Now, recently, while he and Steve have been getting to know each other as adults, one of the things Jimmy finally mentioned was his diabetes and his fear of passing it on to any children we might have. Steve and his husband Troy had already had their DNA tested, including their genetic health and what illnesses or conditions they might be susceptible to. After Jimmy told Steve about his diabetes, his brother consulted a geneticist and was told he does not have the gene that could make him predisposed to diabetes, nor does his son. Steve is the biological father of their older son while Troy is the biological father of the younger one.
"Once Steve knew he didn't have the gene, nor does his son, he and Troy talked about it and then called us. First they told us about their DNA testing and that they'd done it with one of the companies that offers health information, or possible health conditions. Then Steve mentioned the consultation with the geneticist and finally, he offered his sperm for any children we might want to have. By that time, I'd also had my DNA checked for that gene, as well as any other nasty ones and come up clean.
"Jimmy and I took our time coming to a decision, finally deciding that this would be a way to have healthier children. Children who we wouldn't have to feel like we were playing the odds against them having diabetes. And yes, we knew diabetes or something as yet unknown could still happen, there are new discoveries in the genetic field all the time and not all of those discoveries are good news.
"Once we told Steve and Troy our answer, Steve went to his doctor, explained the plan and his doctor agreed, telling him he was not his first patient to donate less volatile genetic material to friends or relatives. Steve's doctor contacted Jimmy's doctor. By that time, Jimmy had met with his doctor who was happy to hear the news. Even though Jimmy is healthy and takes excellent care of himself, his body, his life, is still compromised by the disease. While we were waiting for the donated material to arrive, Jimmy had a vasectomy to lessen any chance of any unplanned pregnancies with the 'bad' gene.
"So here we are, Donnie is also free of that gene and we're not worried about our daughter having it either. And we can have more diabetes-free children if we want. As you can see, my Malu, there is no need to worry!"
"Oh, this is wonderful, Breena, I'm so happy and relieved! Does your mother know?"
Breena shook her head, "No. I decided not to tell any of them about this. They never ask about Jimmy and had very little reaction to his getting in touch with his brother. It's as if he's a stranger who shows up at their place. Everyone except my dad is polite, although my brothers-in-law get along great with Jimmy, they're the only ones who seem to care. I don't want to expose our children to the Slater family, at least not until they're old enough to see what jerks they are and in that I'm including my father, mother and my sisters."
"Your sisters, too? Oh Breena, I'm so sorry. They were at the hospital, in and out, while you were having Donnie and seemed to be close to you."
"When it suits them. They're still angry that we didn't ask either of them to be godmother to Donnie."
Lu nodded, chuckling, "Rob told us about that, they still don't get it?"
"No. Sometimes I wonder how it happened that they married such nice guys when they can be just as nasty as their father." She grinned, "Maybe I have more Baker family genes than they do!"
Laughing, Lu gave her a hug and then helped her up, she needed to keep moving!
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While to most of the family the weeks after the birth of baby Lucy passed quickly Breena, Jimmy and their Gibbs and Mallard parents felt time was dragging its feet. Or the baby was!
Baby Victoria eventually made her debut, weighing in at 7 pounds, 6 ounces and 20 inches long. Arriving on April 12th, after both the Orthodox and Western Easters, her very happy parents announced that her full name was Victoria Roseanne Camilo-Mallard. That pleased Granducky, Grama Lu, Poppy Gibbs and Grandpa Jack. Rose was Lu's middle name, Anne was Poppy Gibbs' mother's name and of course Victoria was the baby's paternal great-grandmother's name.
With no Slater relative being included in the baby's name, Lu wondered if there would be any backlash but when Ginny arrived to help, she never said a word.