NCIS: Live For Ten (5/9)
All disclaimers, notes, warnings and summary are in the Master post: Live For Ten
Chapter Nine
"In and out, DiNozzo. You can do this." He had no way of knowing for sure, but the words seemed to have a positive effect. Tony was trying to hold himself up straighter, trying to open up his chest and lungs the way he'd learned to do three years earlier, and he was struggling to focus blurry green eyes on Gibbs' face.
"Count it with me. In - two, three, four. Out - two, three, four."
It surprised him, how much he remembered from Tony's last bout with pneumonia.
'You don't know that's what this is,' he chided himself. 'Don't borrow trouble. He's got enough.'
"Hurts …"
"I know it does, Tony." And he did know. Even if Tony hadn't told him, the amount of pain written on his face would have given it away. "Doc'll be here in just a second, and she'll fix it. You just keep breathing." He'd said those words to him just a few hours before, and Tony had obeyed him then. He had no reason to doubt that he'd do as he was told again. "Don't stop. Count."
"In … three …"
Tony tried, he did, but he didn't have enough air to waste on talking. He lifted his right hand weakly and grabbed on to the first thing he touched - Gibbs' sleeve. He fisted his fingers in the fabric and tightened his grip on it like he was holding on for dear life.
Gibbs closed his eyes and tipped his face to the ceiling when he realized that was exactly what Tony was doing.
"I'll count," he said. "You breathe."
"Agent Gibbs!"
Dr. Marquardt, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, ran in, followed by two nurses. She threw her jacket across the back of the chair Gibbs had spent the morning sitting in. "What happened?"
He looked across at her. "I don't know," he said. "He was talking. He was fine …"
'He was pretending. He was lying. And you let him.'
"You're having trouble breathing, Tony?"
Tony grasped the sleeve even tighter, let his head fall against Gibbs' shoulder, and nodded his head.
"Okay. This isn't going to take long. We'll have you fixed back up in no time." She pressed the palm of her hand against Tony's chest, and then cursed softly to herself. "That's what I thought, " she muttered. She looked up at Gibbs, and he saw irritation in her eyes. "Down," she said. "Put him down."
Gibbs lowered Tony back to the bed carefully as Dr. Marquardt turned to one of her nurses. "Juanita, I need 2mg of Versed and another 12mg of morphine. IV."
Gibbs got Tony as settled as he could while the doctor and nurses bustled around the side of the bed. But just because he was focusing most of his attention on DiNozzo, that didn't mean he missed what the doctor was asking for.
"Versed, Doc? The vent?"
"No." She answered him without looking at him, and her voice was tight.
A weak tug pulled his attention back to Tony, who hadn't released his grip on Gibbs' sleeve yet. His eyes were still open, but they were wide and filled with panic. His chest was still barely moving when he breathed, and the condensation on the inside of the mask was all but gone. "It's okay, Tony," he whispered. "Doc's got ya."
"Yes," Dr. Marquardt said. She was already injecting the medication she'd asked for into his IV line. "I've got him. And I need you to step out."
"What?" Gibbs jerked his head up and locked eyes with Dr. Marquardt across the bed.
That wasn't irritation in her eyes. That wasn't annoyance. That was anger. She was mad and getting madder.
"Step. Out." When he made no move to do as ordered, she narrowed her eyes and glared at him. "Now."
Gibbs shot another look at Tony, whose eyes were closing as he struggled to breathe. He untangled Tony's fingers from his sleeve gently, and then patted the back of his hand. "I'll be back, Tony," he promised. "You do whatever the doc says, got it?"
Tony's nod was almost imperceptible, but it was enough for Gibbs. He walked briskly around the end of the bed and crossed the room, but he turned back around just as he reached the door.
Dr. Marquardt had her right hand against Tony's chest again, and she was massaging the muscles across his sternum. "I know it hurts," she was saying. "But you need to breathe. I promise, you'll feel a lot better in about sixty seconds, okay?"
Gibbs stayed where he was and watched the scene in front of him with intense interest. Dr. Marquardt was still rubbing Tony's chest, one of the nurses was taking his vitals, and the other was adjusting the dials on the oxygen machine next to his bed.
"Out, Agent Gibbs." She didn't look away from Tony when she spoke, and the amount of anger in her voice hadn't lessened. "Or it will be a long, long time before you come back in here."
Gibbs yanked the door open without a word and stormed into the hallway. The first person he saw was Bruce Rivers, who was standing just to the right of the door, looking anxious.
"Is DiNozzo okay?" he asked. "I heard the alarm and saw the doctor running …"
Gibbs shook his head quickly, more in dismissal of the question than in answer to it. "I need you to call Fornell," he said. "Tell him to get the security videos from the Navy Yard. DiNozzo was attacked in my parking lot."
Rivers' eyes widened in surprise. "How do you know that?" he asked. "Does he remember what happened?"
Gibbs rolled his eyes. "He remembers that he was attacked in the parking lot."
"What about the rest of it? Does he know who it was? Did he …?"
"Sure, Rivers. He remembers everything." Gibbs was starting to remember why this man got on his nerves so badly. "I just thought I'd keep an important detail like that to myself."
Rivers sighed deeply and dropped his head. "Sorry, s … Agent Gibbs."
"Don't apologize to me," he ground out through clenched teeth. "Just call Fornell." Rivers nodded nervously and pulled his phone out. "Not here. Go somewhere else. But not far. I haven't relieved you yet."
Rivers nodded again, walked further down the hallway, and disappeared around a corner.
Gibbs glanced across his shoulder at the closed door to Tony's room. He wanted to be in there; he needed to know what was going on. But he had been thrown out, and pissing Dr. Marquardt off any more than she already was wasn't an option. Besides, once again, he had a job to do. He sighed, pulled his own phone out, and hit a button on speed dial.
The first call went to voicemail, and Gibbs' heart plunged into his stomach.
'Never be unreachable.'
It was one of the Rules; it was one of the most important. There was no way that Tim would ignore it. The only reason Tim wouldn't answer his phone was that he couldn't. And there was a man out there who liked grabbing and torturing his agents right under his nose.
"No way in hell," he muttered as he dialed again.
Tim answered that time, but not until the third ring. Gibbs could barely hear the, "Yeah, Boss?" over the blood that pounded in his ears. "Is Tony …?"
"You answer your damn phone when I call, McGee!"
He heard a sigh on the other end, and in that one sound, he heard a thousand things that no one said. Tim was upset - very upset.
Something was wrong.
"Sorry, Boss. We're at a crime scene. I was talking to Ducky, and I … I didn't hear it ring."
'He's tired,' his mind supplied. 'He hasn't slept in two days. And neither have you.'
None of what was happening was Tim's fault, but he was the one who had to deal with all of it. He was the one who was out there doing Gibbs' job. He was the one going without sleep, pushing himself harder than he should, digging up evidence against DelMar and trying to get justice for Tony. Tim wasn't just doing everything he should have done; he was doing everything Gibbs should have been doing, too. And he was the one Gibbs was taking his anger and frustration out on.
Again.
"Is it Tony? Is he okay?"
Gibbs shook his head and closed his eyes. Then he realized what Tim had said, and he opened his eyes again.
"A crime scene?" he asked. "What crime scene?"
"God damn it."
Ducky looked up and gave him a sad smile. "Hello, Timothy." Tim squatted down next to Palmer, who glanced at him briefly before turning back to the dead body all three were studying. "I take it this development is a bad thing?"
"Not what I wanted to see, no," Tim admitted. He took his hat off and ran his other hand through his hair. "He was the only suspect we could identify. We were hoping he would tell us …" He let the sentence trail off. There was no point in thinking about could-have-beens.
"Who else was involved?" Ducky finished for him. Tim nodded slowly. "He still might, you know. The dead are often very informative."
Tim took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. "What've we got, Ducky?"
"Preliminary cause of death is a single gunshot to the side of the head." He pointed it out, but there was no need. Tim had seen the small hole behind Marco Santori's right ear as soon as he'd walked up. "I do not expect that to change. Fired from intermediate range, somewhere between ten and eighteen inches, I'd say."
"He turned his back on him," Tim observed. "He trusted him. He didn't expect him to kill him."
"It is very likely that Mr. Santori had a belief in some sort of … honor among scumbags."
Tim had to smile at that. It was a rare thing for Ducky to speak ill of the dead, but he couldn't think of anyone else who deserved it more.
"Exit wound?"
"None." Ducky paused, and Tim looked up. When he met the older man's eye, he got a confident nod from him. "We'll have a bullet for you," Ducky continued. "That will give you a weapon to trace."
Tim shook his head. "I don't think it's going to matter."
"Why not?" Palmer asked.
"Could a 9mm have made that hole, Ducky?"
"Yes," Ducky answered without hesitation. "Most certainly it could have."
"A Sig, maybe?"
"Ballistics and weapon identification is Abby's area of … wait. A Sig? Why are you asking that?"
Tim sighed again. He hoped he was wrong, but his gut was telling him he was right. "When you send the bullet to her, make sure she runs it against the weapons checked out from the armory."
"Timothy …"
Tim pushed himself to his feet and put his hat back on. "Tony's weapon is missing," he explained. "He dropped it when they attacked him, and they picked it up. It wasn't in his car or at Gibbs' house. Unless they threw it out the car window, one of them has it. And Santori doesn't have a gun on him, does he?"
"No, he doesn't. I'll make sure she knows."
Ducky turned back to Santori's body, and Tim did the same. "Time of death?"
"Between 10:00 and 11:00 last night."
"And what time did you and Gibbs get to the house?"
"Approximately 10:15."
Tim turned around and let his eyes follow the trail Santori and the other man - he couldn't bring himself to say it was DelMar yet - had left behind as they'd fled. Broken branches, a bent fence, trampled grass. At the end of that trail, so close that Tim could see Fornell standing on the back porch, was Gibbs' house.
"He didn't even make it a block and a half," Tim observed.
"It is fortunate that Jethro decided to check the basement rather than follow them." Ducky was standing behind him, just to his left, and staring in the same direction. "Of course, had Tony not been discovered when he was, he would have …" Ducky broke the sentence himself and cleared his throat. "But additionally, a man who could kill his partner so easily would most certainly have had no issues with killing a pursuer."
Fornell was talking to someone on the phone, and Tim watched him for a few seconds. "What else, Ducky?"
"There's quite a lot of blood," he answered. "On his clothes, hands, and the soles of his shoes. Too much to all be his."
"Tony's."
"I will of course have Abby test it, but I do not doubt that it is his, yes."
Tim kept staring straight ahead, a thousand different things running through his mind. Despite his earlier thoughts, he couldn't get the what ifs and maybes, could have beens and almosts, to stop. What if Duncan hadn't left the camera room? What if he had reviewed the footage when he'd gotten back? What if Gibbs had gotten to the house earlier? Or later? What if he'd chased them out the door? What if Santori had been alive when they found him? What if DelMar had nothing to do with any of it?
"Timothy!"
Tim shook his head to clear it and blinked his eyes rapidly. "Ducky?"
"That is the third time I've said your name, and your phone was ringing." Ducky fixed him in place with a stern look. "Are you all right?"
"Yeah," he said dismissively. He reached into his pocket for his phone. "I'm fine."
"How much sleep did you get last night?" Tim didn't answer him as he pulled up his missed calls. "Any? Timothy?"
His phone started ringing again just as he saw who had tried to call him. Missing one call from Gibbs was bad enough; missing two was a death sentence. "Ducky, I …"
"You have got to sleep, my dear boy. I know you want to help Tony, but you can't do that if you're …"
"I've got to take this. I'm sorry."
That was the end of the discussion. Tim turned his back on Ducky and stepped away before he hit the button to answer the call. "Yeah, Boss?" Gibbs could be calling for any one of a hundred reasons, but there was only one that Tim was worried about. "Is Tony …?"
"You answer your damn phone when I call, McGee!"
Tim sighed and mentally prepared himself for the onslaught that he knew was coming. "Sorry, Boss. We're at a crime scene. I was talking to Ducky, and I … I didn't hear it ring." The silence on the other end took him by surprise. Gibbs should have been ripping him a new one for not answering the first call. That he wasn't spoke volumes.
Something was wrong.
"Is it Tony? Is he okay?"
A few more seconds passed in silence, and Tim's worry for his friend escalated with every beat of his heart. When Gibbs spoke again, it was as though he hadn't heard Tim's question at all.
"A crime scene? What crime scene?"
It took Gibbs and Tim less than five minutes to catch each other up on the events of their respective mornings. It turned out that Gibbs hadn't needed to rush to call him with the information about the parking lot, because Tim had known about it for a few hours. He'd just finished telling him about the incompetent security guard, Duncan, and Gibbs was seething.
"Deal with it, McGee."
"Already did."
"And?"
"And …" Gibbs could almost see Tim's nervous expression in his mind. "There's a formal complaint in my personnel file now."
"McGee!"
"Yeah, Boss?"
"Good job."
The door to Tony's room opened, and Dr. Marquardt walked out. She handed her jacket to one of the nurses following her, and then she turned and headed straight for Gibbs.
"Be here in two hours." It wasn't the most polite way to end a conversation, but it would have to do. Gibbs snapped the phone shut and looked up at Dr. Marquardt. "Doc? Is he …?"
She stalked right up to him, tucked her hair behind her ear, and looked him directly in the eye. "Was that your idea, Agent Gibbs?"
He'd known she was mad, but the amount of anger in her voice took him by surprise. "What?"
"That little stunt that Tony just pulled. Did you put him up to that?"
Gibbs bristled at the accusation, and he squared his shoulders as he faced her down. "I didn't put him up to anything," he said. "I'd never do anything to hurt him."
"Oh, but you'll stand there and watch him do it to himself?" He couldn't argue with that, because she was right. "Did you not see how much pain he was in? Did it not occur to you that he might be pushing too hard? Or did you just not care?"
That he could argue with.
"Just who do you think you are, lady? Yes, I knew he was hurting, and I thought about calling you, but I decided not to."
"What stopped you?" she demanded.
"He told me he didn't want any more meds, and I respected that. He's thirty-seven, not seven. It was his decision."
Her eyes narrowed; she apparently didn't like that answer. "I know you've got a job to do, Agent Gibbs, and I know you really want to get out there and catch those bad guys, but I will not allow you to risk Tony's health to do it."
"Hey!" He swallowed the rest of what he wanted to say, took a deep breath, and forced himself to calm down. "I take it you've never had someone try to kill you before."
Dr. Marquardt shook her head in response.
"Here's the thing, Doc. Those 'bad guys' you're talking about? They're the ones who did that to him. He's the only witness we've got, and he doesn't remember who they are." He saw the anger in her eyes starting to dissipate, so he kept going. "I'm not the only one who wants to catch them. He does, too. For him, it's about finding out who hates him enough to hurt him that badly, and for me, it has a lot more to do with protecting Tony than it does with punishing some random sleazeballs. One of them is already dead, but the other one is still out there, and every minute he's free is another minute he can try again."
"But he doesn't remember," Dr. Marquardt protested. "And depending on what drugs they used on him and with those head injuries, he probably never will. All he's doing is hurting himself, and he's doing it for nothing."
"Not for nothing," Gibbs said. "Doing the impossible is one of DiNozzo's things. If he didn't push himself to do things he's not supposed to be able to do, he'd have been dead a dozen times over. And if you know of a way to make him stop pushing himself, or make him start paying attention to his own limitations, I'm all ears, Doc. Because I've been looking for one for eight years, and I haven't found it yet."
Dr. Marquardt sighed, and it was obvious that she'd calmed down quite a bit. She didn't look like she wanted to rip Gibbs' heart out, at any rate.
"If he keeps it up this time, he just might kill himself."
Gibbs nodded slowly. He didn't want to hear it, but there was a part of him that had already known it. Whatever was wrong with Tony, he'd done it to himself. And Gibbs had let him.
"Is it pneumonia?"
"No." Her answer earned a relieved sigh in response. "That was a muscle spasm."
"I've never seen a muscle spasm that looked like that."
"That's because it wasn't just one muscle. It was a few dozen of them." Gibbs relaxed his stance and his shoulders, and Dr. Marquardt flashed one of her tired smiles. "It would have started out as one, probably the muscles under his ribs, and that made it hurt to breathe. Since he didn't have any pain relief, he just breathed shallower to avoid it. When he did that, he gave the other muscles room to do the same thing. The more muscles that knotted up, the more it hurt, the shallower he breathed, and the more room he gave them. It was a downward spiral."
"And if he does it again?"
"He can't," she insisted. "I'm not just saying that, either. He cannot keep doing this. He's got to breathe as deeply as he can, and he has to exhale completely. If he doesn't, he is going to get pneumonia. And with how badly his lungs are already damaged, and the fact that his blood isn't fully oxygenated yet, it won't take long before he finds himself back on that vent."
"But he's not on it now?"
"No, he's not. I used the Versed for two reasons: as a sedative and as a muscle relaxant. The morphine, of course, was for the pain. But I had to get those muscles to calm down, and that wasn't possible with him awake and hurting. By the time I got in there, he was so tense that his arms and legs were starting to cramp, too."
"How long will he be out?"
"Not long." Dr. Marquardt let her own shoulders slump slightly, and she turned back toward the nurse's station. Gibbs followed her. "I only gave him enough to keep him under for about twenty minutes. And when he wakes up, I want him up and walking within the hour. The nurses will help with that."
"That's fast," Gibbs observed.
"He can't stay in that bed the whole time he's here, or this will keep happening. I'm guessing Tony's not usually the 'lay around and do nothing' type?"
"No." Gibbs snorted a small laugh. "I think he sleeps, but other than naps at the office, I'm not sure when."
"And I'm assuming he works out?"
"He runs."
"So his muscles are accustomed to being used more than they are right now," she said. "We need to get him back to that as soon as possible. I'm going to start him on a low dose of potassium, but I don't think he'll need it for long. Once he's back up to his normal activity level, the spasms and cramps should go away on their own."
They'd reached the nurses' station just outside the door to Tony's room, and Dr. Marquardt reached across it as one of the nurses handed her jacket to her.
"I'll be back at 7:00. Dr. Simms will be checking on Tony throughout the day, and if anything happens, or if you need me specifically, he'll be able to reach me. Okay?"
"Yeah." Gibbs nodded as Dr. Marquardt put her jacket on. "And, Doc, I …"
"Don't worry about it. It's over, and luckily, he didn't do any serious damage. Just don't let him do it again."
"Didn't I just say that I don't know how to stop him?"
"I may not know you very well, Agent Gibbs, but I have noticed that Tony listens to what you say." She grinned at him as she turned away. "If you make it clear that you don't want him to do it again, I don't think he will."
She walked toward the elevator, turning her shoulder slightly as she passed Agent Rivers, who was just returning from making his call to Fornell.
"Agent Gibbs," he said as he approached. "Agent Fornell said …"
"That they already know about the parking lot. I know." Rivers looked surprised, and Gibbs almost felt bad for the guy. He should have anticipated that Gibbs would call McGee while he was calling Fornell. The point of calling both wasn't getting information for themselves. It was making sure that both McGee and Fornell knew about the parking lot. Rivers should have known that, and he didn't.
"You might make a good agent someday, Rivers," he said. "Today is not that day." He shook his head at the look of disappointment on the younger man's face. "Go home. Get some sleep. I want you back here at 8:00, and you'd better be rested."
Rivers' shoulders slumped as he walked away, and Gibbs shook his head again. Tony had been twice the agent Rivers was as a newly-hired probie. Even McGee had been better. What had Tobias seen in the guy?
"Agent Gibbs?"
He turned toward the summons. One of the nurses that had helped Dr. Marquardt, Juanita, was holding an envelope out to him. "This was left for you at the desk." She handed it to him with a smile.
"Who left it?"
She shook her head. "No one seems to know. It was just sitting in the inbox with the internal mail that came up from downstairs."
"Thank you." He took it from her, and looked it over quickly. His name was on the outside of the envelope, but there was no other information. He opened it quickly and pulled out the piece of paper inside. He glanced up at Tony's door as he unfolded it, and he narrowed his eyes. There was a dartboard hanging from the metal hook just above the room number.
That hadn't been there before.
He made a mental note to ask the nurses about it, and then looked down at the note in his hand. The words were handwritten, and the message was short.
Bullseye on the Golden Boy.
He threw the note down on the desk, pulled his weapon, and bolted for Tony's room.
Chapter Ten
Tim watched the medical examiner's van pull away with Marco Santori's body. His eyes were focused on what was happening right in front of him, but his thoughts were a million miles away.
In reality, they were only five miles away, at George Washington University Hospital. Where Tony was awake and healing, but lying in a bed with no memory of what had happened to him or who had done it. Where Tim was going to have to look Tony in the eye and tell him that one of the men who attacked him was dead but that he hadn't been able to find any proof of who the other one was.
He was going to have to tell Tony that he was failing him, and he wasn't quite sure how he was going to do that.
"McGee?"
Tim turned toward Fornell as he approached. An older man, short and squat, with thick glasses and grey hair that wasn't so much receding as it was completely gone, accompanied him.
"I'd like you to meet Gibbs' neighbor, Edgar Collins."
"Hello, Mr. Collins," Tim said tiredly. He looked at Fornell in confusion; he was sure there was a reason behind the introduction, but he couldn't think of what it might be. "It's nice to meet you."
"Edgar has a dog," Fornell went on. "A boxer named Mugsy. A very … regular … boxer named Mugsy."
McGee's eyes widened in sudden understanding, and he took a step forward. "What time did you walk Mugsy last night?"
"The same time I do every night," Mr. Collins answered. "I came outside at 8:15 and went back in at 8:30."
"And what happened while you were outside?" Fornell was actually smiling as he asked the question, and Tim couldn't stop the surge of hope that he felt wash over him.
"Well, I saw that blue Mustang pull up, which isn't all that strange. It belongs to that young man, the tall handsome one? Jethro's boy."
Tim nodded his head. "Tony," he said. "His name's Tony."
"That's right! Tony. He's a nice boy. He's over here two or three times a week, so I know his car. He always says 'hi' when he sees me, and he pets Mugsy. And Mugsy likes him, which is odd, because Mugsy doesn't like anyone. He doesn't even like Jethro. Come to think of it, not many people like Jethro, though I don't know why. He's a perfectly quiet and respectable neighbor."
Tim smiled, and Fornell chuckled.
"What about last night, Edgar?" Fornell asked. "Did Tony pet Mugsy last night?"
"Oh, no. I don't think he could have, even if he'd tried. Mugsy was mad last night, growling and barring his teeth and snapping."
"At Tony?"
"Well, no. I told you, Mugsy likes Tony. But he sure had his hackles up at the two men who were with him."
Tim's heart leapt into his throat.
"They told me he was drunk and they were taking him home, which, I know he spends a lot of time at Jethro's house, but I also know he doesn't live there, so I don't know what they were talking about. But he couldn't stand up, I know that, too, because they were holding him up, kind of dragging him between them. He looked like he'd passed out, had his head down, didn't say 'hi' when I talked to him. And I kind of keep an eye on things, you know. Me and Mugsy. We know who belongs here and who doesn't. Tony belongs here. Those two men with him didn't."
"And you saw them?" Tim had to fight to contain the excitement he was starting to feel. Edgar Collins just might turn out to be the best nosy neighbor Gibbs could have asked for. "You saw their faces?"
"Well, of course I did, young man!" Mr. Collins sounded offended at the question. "They were standing no further from me than you are. And make no mistake about it. I might be old, and people think I'm senile, and my eyes aren't what they used to be, but I know what I saw. And I know Tony wasn't drunk."
"How do you know that?" Fornell looked surprised.
"Well, his head was bleeding, and I didn't think he did that to himself. But mainly, it was because I know what booze smells like," Mr. Collins said. "And I know that boy didn't smell like it."
"Did you call the police and report it?" Tim asked.
"I did. They told me they'd look into it, but they tell me that all the time, and I never see them here. I was going to tell Jethro when he got home, but I fell asleep watching the news." Mr. Collins looked regretful, as though he felt that he hadn't done enough even though he'd done everything he could have been expected to do. "When I woke up, the ambulance was here, and I thought that Jethro already knew what had happened. So I went to bed. Then I saw all the police cars this morning, and saw you on Jethro's porch, and thought that maybe I should say something."
Fornell smiled at McGee again, and he put his hand on Collins' arm. "Edgar and I are going to stop by the Hoover Building and look at some mug shots, Agent McGee. You can finish up here, right?"
"Yeah, I've got it." Tim reached out and grasped Mr. Collins' hand tightly and shook it. "Thank you, Mr. Collins. You and Mugsy are good neighbors. Gibbs is lucky to have you."
"Jethro's a good man," Mr. Collins said. "And that Tony, he's a good boy. I just hope they're all right."
Fornell led Mr. Collins to his car, and Tim watched after them for a few moments. Five minutes earlier, he'd been wallowing in the fact that all of their leads were running straight into a dead man, and he'd been convinced that without Tony's memory, they wouldn't be able to solve the case. But that had all changed. All they needed was for Edgar Collins to recognize Santori and DelMar from their mug shots, and they'd have the proof that they needed.
He turned back to the crime scene in front of him, feeling more hopeful than he had since Abby stopped him from pounding Duncan into the wall.
Gibbs ignored the shocked looks on the faces of the nurses as he passed them and barreled through Tony's door shoulder first. He led the way with his weapon, clearing the hospital room just as he would any other potentially dangerous scene. He checked the closet, the bathroom, under the bed, in the cabinets and dresser drawers. Only after making certain that the entire room was empty and safe did he make his way over to Tony's side.
He placed his right hand on Tony's uninjured shoulder and closed his eyes. Tony's breathing was easy and even, his expression one of calm and comfort, and the beeping of the monitor indicated a strong and steady heartbeat.
'He's okay. Nothing happened.'
"Excuse me?"
He spun toward the door on instinct, raising his gun and leveling it at the person standing there as he did.
"Who are you?"
The mousey-looking man who stood just inside the door cleared his throat and pushed his glasses further up on his nose. It was the only sign of nervousness he showed. "I'm Dr. Simms. I assume you are Agent Gibbs?"
Gibbs lowered his weapon slowly and carefully.
"Dr. Marquardt explained Agent DiNozzo's situation to me. I know that this is a special case, and I understand your concerns about his safety." He didn't sound as mousey as he looked. There was strength in his voice that his appearance didn't imply. "But I'm afraid that I am going to have to draw the line at you running around the hospital with …"
"He needs a new room." He'd dismissed the doctor as a threat, and he moved on to more important things.
Dr. Simms tipped his head. "I'm sorry?"
"A new room," Gibbs repeated. "He can't stay in this one. It's not safe."
"Agent Gibbs, I assure you that our security is …"
"Incapable of keeping the man who tried to kill my agent out of this hospital, off of this floor, or away from this room." He spoke slowly, clearly, and through clenched teeth. "Now, go out there and do whatever you need to do. Call Doc Marquardt. Fill out your paperwork. Just find him a new room."
"Agent Gibbs …"
"On a different floor." Gibbs finally holstered his gun, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket. "I'll be bringing my own people in to handle security. I'll need a list of the nurses who are assigned to the floor, and to Tony, with photo IDs for my people to check against."
"But that's not …"
"I'll need the security footage for the past half hour," he continued. "From the time I hit the call button until five minutes ago. I want the front door, the emergency entrance, all employee entrances, the elevators and stairwells, and every camera within fifty feet of this hallway. I might need more than that later, but that's good for a start. And I want all of the nurses and the person who brought up the mail available to be interviewed and fingerprinted."
"You can't just …"
"Don't tell me I need to get a warrant first." Gibbs stepped toward the doctor, but he didn't move far from Tony's bed. "We're on the same side here, Dr. Simms. My job is the same as yours - keep Tony alive and safe."
"Of course." Dr. Simms nodded his head slowly and turned away reluctantly. "I'll see what rooms we have available on the other floors, and I'll start the transfer."
"And everything else?"
"I'll speak to our head of security," Dr. Simms said as he pulled the door open. "I'm sure he'll be more than willing to coordinate with you."
Gibbs nodded briskly. As the doctor walked out into the hallway, he turned back to Tony.
"It can't ever be easy with you, can it, DiNozzo?"
He dialed his phone, and the call was picked up on the second ring. It was a vast improvement over the last time.
"Boss?"
"Get your ass to the hospital. Now."
"Gibbs has not yet called to tell me about Tony."
Tim spun around, both surprised and reassured by the voice behind him.
"Ziva!" He smiled broadly at her. "How'd you get here so fast?"
She glanced down at her watch, and then up at him in mild confusion. "It has been twelve hours, McGee."
"Has it?" He checked the time for himself.
It was almost 11:00. It had been fifteen hours since Tony was attacked. It had been thirteen hours since Gibbs and Ducky found him. It had been nine hours since Gibbs handed him the picture of Tony's back, seven hours since he and Abby first watched the security video, three hours since Fornell told him that Marco Santori was dead …
"Did you lose track of time?"
Tim shrugged. "I've been busy."
"I can imagine. You do not look as though you have slept."
A few moments passed in silence as Ziva appraised Tim silently and he pretended not to notice that she was doing it. It didn't take long before her attention made him uncomfortable, though, and he decided to divert it.
"How was your flight?"
"How is Tony?"
The two questions were spoken over one another.
Tim smiled softly and held up his hand, indicating that he'd answer Ziva's question first. It was the more important of the two, especially to her. She'd been on a plane for twelve hours, and the only information she had was the little bit that Tim had been able to give her on the phone.
"The doctor says he'll be fine." He guessed that was what she would want to hear first, and the way her face lit up at the news told him that he'd guessed correctly. "He's awake and talking, but he doesn't remember what happened. There's a chance he might get his memory back, but we're working under the assumption that he won't."
"Where is Gibbs?"
"At the hospital with Tony."
Ziva tilted her head in confusion. "He is not running the investigation?"
"No," he said. "He handed it over to the FBI. We're working with them, and for the time being, we report to Fornell."
"That does not sound like Gibbs."
"No, it doesn't. But this time, well, Gibbs can't be involved, and he wanted to make sure that …"
"Why not?" He could hear the growing suspicion in her voice, and he remembered just how much information he had that she didn't.
"A lot has happened in the last twelve hours, Ziva. I'll bring you up to speed." His phone started to ring, and he pulled it out of his pocket. When he saw the name on the screen, his heart dropped into his feet. "Boss?"
"Get your ass to the hospital. Now."
"What happened? Is it Tony?" Ziva stepped forward when she heard the question, apprehension and concern clear in her eyes. "Is he …?"
"DelMar was here."
"What?! At the hospital? How do you …?"
"He was here, McGee." Gibbs sounded so certain that Tim had to remind himself that they still had no evidence of DelMar's involvement. "The son of a bitch was here."
Fornell scrubbed a hand through his short hair in frustration.
"And you're sure, Edgar?" he asked the older man.
Edgar Collins was sitting in front of the computer in Fornell's office at the J. Edgar Hoover Building, where he'd been sitting for the past hour. Fornell had put together a collection of mug shots for him to look at, and he'd gone through them all twice. The good news was that Edgar had identified two people from those pictures.
The bad news was that he'd picked out the two they already knew about.
"I've told you three times, young man." Edgar took his glasses off and wiped at them with the hem of his shirt. It was the fifth time he'd done it, and Fornell was starting to think it was a nervous habit. "The big, ugly one with the scars on his face was there. He was driving the car, and he pulled Tony out of the back seat, and he's not the one I talked to. None of these pictures are of the man I talked to."
Fornell reached out and hit the scroll button on the computer. He did it almost absent-mindedly, like he was just scrolling at random, but he did have a purpose.
"I still don't believe Tony has ever been arrested, though. That just doesn't make any sense. He's a good boy, and Mugsy doesn't like criminals."
Fornell let his head fall forward slightly, but he didn't stop scrolling. Throwing DiNozzo's mug shot in there had been a last minute decision, to make certain that Edgar actually knew him. That part of the plan had worked, because Edgar had identified DiNozzo the second his face appeared on the screen. He'd picked Santori out almost as quickly.
"None of these other men look familiar? Not at all?" Fornell slowed his scrolling speed as he neared the mug shot he was looking for. "You've never seen any of them before? Not this one?"
Fornell had no idea whose face was on the screen at that moment, but the question did pull Edgar's full attention back to the monitor, and the older man leaned in to study it closer.
"Or this one?"
Another random face, and a shake of Edgar's head.
"How about this guy?"
The guy in question was a mugger who'd gotten his kicks attacking people in national parks until Fornell had arrested him two years earlier. He was serving a ten-year sentence. As expected, Edgar shook his head again.
"This man?"
It was old and out-of-date, but it was the most recent one they had. Fornell wished they had a newer one, but the man hadn't changed much in ten years. To anyone who had seen Stefano DelMar for any amount of time, or who had a reason to remember him, it would be enough. Even if Edgar couldn't match the entire face in his head to the one on the screen, there would have been enough similarity to pique his interest.
But there wasn't. There was nothing. Not even the slightest hint of recognition on Edgar's face.
He'd been less than a foot from DiNozzo and his would-be murderers. He'd been close enough to see the blood on DiNozzo's face and know that there was no alcohol on his breath. He'd had to hold his dog back from attacking them. He'd spoken to one of them. He'd picked Santori out without the slightest bit of hesitation.
"If I saw the man I talked to, I would tell you."
"I know you would, Edgar." Fornell patted him on the arm, drew in a deep breath, and then blew it out slowly. "Do you think you could describe him?" he asked. "To someone who could draw him?"
"Well, I don't know about the drawing him part," Edgar answered. "I never have understood how it is you agents do the things you do. But I can see his face in my head plain as day. If you've got someone who can draw what I say, then I can do it."
Fornell flashed Edgar a tight smile as he stood up and walked out of his office. He had no doubt that Edgar would describe their second suspect in almost perfect detail. It was obvious that the old man was a lot sharper than most people gave him credit for, and that he saw - and remembered - everything that went on in that neighborhood. It would be a matter of hours before they knew the face of the man who'd murdered Marco Santori and tried to kill DiNozzo. But Fornell knew with certainty that it wasn't going to be the face Gibbs expected it to be.
Stefano DelMar hadn't been there.
Tim's phone rang again just as he and Ziva were stepping off of the elevator.
Gibbs had told him about the note and the dartboard and had hung up immediately afterwards. He'd called him back once to give him Tony's new room number, but that conversation was equally as short.
"Well, at least Tony's getting better," he'd said after the second time Gibbs hung up on him.
"How do you know that?"
"Gibbs is starting to act like Gibbs again."
The rest of the drive was spent filling Ziva in on everything that had happened since Tony first mentioned the possibility that the man or men who murdered Brewer and Strauss were still unidentified. He told her everything that he knew, and answered every question she asked. Then he'd called Abby to check on the status of the tests she was running on the evidence from the basement, and she promised she'd call him back the second she had anything.
Obviously, that second had arrived.
"Hey, Abby," he said. "I'm going to put you on speaker so you can tell Gibbs, too."
He saw Gibbs standing further down the hallway, right next to the door to Tony's room, talking to one of the doctors. Gibbs looked up, and Tim raised his hand in greeting. The doctor smiled at Tim and Ziva quickly before he said something to Gibbs, then turned and walked away.
"Hang on a minute," he said into the phone. "Boss, we …"
"Officer David." Gibbs' voice was a combination of irritated and confused, but if he felt any guilt about not having called her himself, he hid it well. "I thought you were in Tel Aviv."
"I was." Her words were short, clipped … angry. "Fortunately, at least one person thought I deserved to be told that someone abducted and tortured my partner."
The look that Gibbs shot him could have melted ice and refrozen it again. At the same time. Tim glanced down at his feet and shrugged.
"Do not blame McGee," Ziva said. "I would have done the same."
"And you'd better not be grumpy that she's home," came Abby's voice through the speaker on Tim's phone. "Because we need her."
Gibbs took a breath and looked as though he were about to say something, but after one look at Tim and Ziva and a quick glance at the phone in Tim's hand, the aggravation fell from his face and he nodded. "All right. What have you got, Abs?"
Abby's briefing was short, and though she had quite a few results back, none of them provided any new information or insight.
Marco Santori had left fingerprints in and on Tony's car - on the steering wheel and the handles of both doors. The soles of Santori's shoes matched one of the two sets of bloody footprints left behind on Gibbs' floor. It would be several more hours before the DNA results were back, but the blood on Santori's clothes and shoes was A positive, the same type as Tony's. The evidence that had been collected from Tony by Dr. Marquardt's team was still being tested, but Ducky had found deep scratch marks on Santori's right arm that matched the size and shape of Tony's fingernails. He'd also found rope burn on the palms of Santori's hands, which was consistent with him having been the one who'd attacked Tony in the parking lot.
Gibbs wasn't writing anything down, but Tim and Ziva were making careful note of every word Abby said. He glanced between them before speaking again.
"Did you find anything new, Abby? Anything we didn't already know?"
There had to be something. If all of the evidence led them to the dead man they already knew was involved, they'd never be able to prove that DelMar had anything to do with it.
He heard Abby sigh on the other end of the phone, and he could imagine the distressed and upset look on her face. "Two things," she said. "Neither is good."
He waited a few seconds for her to elaborate, but contrary to how she usually acted when she had evidence to share, she didn't.
"Well? Are you going to tell us?"
"The tox screen results are back on the blood from the basement floor."
There was another long pause, and it went on long enough that both Tim and Ziva looked at him. He shook his head at them. Abby wasn't just reluctant to tell them what she'd found; she didn't want to tell them at all.
"Abby," he said gently.
All three of them heard the shaky breath she drew, and they braced themselves for bad news.
"Rohypnol," she finally said. "And GHB."
"Both?" Tim was visibly upset by the news, and Gibbs shared the feeling. "Together?"
"Yeah."
"Then it does not matter how hard Tony tries," Ziva said. "He will never remember."
"No," Abby confirmed. "He might remember flashes, impressions, shadows … maybe sounds, feelings. Smells. But nothing else. That combination, in the amount I found … from the second they put that needle in his neck, it's all gone. It was never there to begin with."
Gibbs closed his eyes and rubbed his eyebrows with his hand. He'd been prepared to hear it - they'd known Tony had been drugged since Dr. Marquardt had told them hours before - but part of him had held out hope that Tony's memory might return. Abby's find proved that it was impossible for Tony to remember anything. It also proved that Dr. Marquardt was right; he had let Tony hurt himself for nothing.
"What else, Abs?"
The answer was more silence. As much as he usually enjoyed indulging Abby in her more emotional moments, he was finding himself quickly running out of patience for them.
"Abby!"
"The ballistics are back on the bullet that killed Marco Santori."
Gibbs started in surprise. "That's fast." He thought about it for a second, and he narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "That's too fast."
"Well, it matched the first weapon I ran it against, so …"
"Damn it!" Tim turned away and dropped his head.
"I should be saying 'good work, McGee'," Abby said. "But I don't think you want to hear that, do you?"
Gibbs had no idea what that meant, though it was clear from Tim's reaction and the look in Ziva's eyes that they did, and it was bad. "Explain, McGee."
"You're sure, Abby?" Tim asked.
"Positive."
"What are you talking about?" Gibbs demanded.
Tim huffed out a breath, and the effort it took for him to make himself look Gibbs in the eye was obvious. "It's Tony's," he finally said.
Gibbs' gut churned.
"Marco Santori was murdered with Tony's weapon."
Part Six
Chapter Nine
"In and out, DiNozzo. You can do this." He had no way of knowing for sure, but the words seemed to have a positive effect. Tony was trying to hold himself up straighter, trying to open up his chest and lungs the way he'd learned to do three years earlier, and he was struggling to focus blurry green eyes on Gibbs' face.
"Count it with me. In - two, three, four. Out - two, three, four."
It surprised him, how much he remembered from Tony's last bout with pneumonia.
'You don't know that's what this is,' he chided himself. 'Don't borrow trouble. He's got enough.'
"Hurts …"
"I know it does, Tony." And he did know. Even if Tony hadn't told him, the amount of pain written on his face would have given it away. "Doc'll be here in just a second, and she'll fix it. You just keep breathing." He'd said those words to him just a few hours before, and Tony had obeyed him then. He had no reason to doubt that he'd do as he was told again. "Don't stop. Count."
"In … three …"
Tony tried, he did, but he didn't have enough air to waste on talking. He lifted his right hand weakly and grabbed on to the first thing he touched - Gibbs' sleeve. He fisted his fingers in the fabric and tightened his grip on it like he was holding on for dear life.
Gibbs closed his eyes and tipped his face to the ceiling when he realized that was exactly what Tony was doing.
"I'll count," he said. "You breathe."
"Agent Gibbs!"
Dr. Marquardt, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, ran in, followed by two nurses. She threw her jacket across the back of the chair Gibbs had spent the morning sitting in. "What happened?"
He looked across at her. "I don't know," he said. "He was talking. He was fine …"
'He was pretending. He was lying. And you let him.'
"You're having trouble breathing, Tony?"
Tony grasped the sleeve even tighter, let his head fall against Gibbs' shoulder, and nodded his head.
"Okay. This isn't going to take long. We'll have you fixed back up in no time." She pressed the palm of her hand against Tony's chest, and then cursed softly to herself. "That's what I thought, " she muttered. She looked up at Gibbs, and he saw irritation in her eyes. "Down," she said. "Put him down."
Gibbs lowered Tony back to the bed carefully as Dr. Marquardt turned to one of her nurses. "Juanita, I need 2mg of Versed and another 12mg of morphine. IV."
Gibbs got Tony as settled as he could while the doctor and nurses bustled around the side of the bed. But just because he was focusing most of his attention on DiNozzo, that didn't mean he missed what the doctor was asking for.
"Versed, Doc? The vent?"
"No." She answered him without looking at him, and her voice was tight.
A weak tug pulled his attention back to Tony, who hadn't released his grip on Gibbs' sleeve yet. His eyes were still open, but they were wide and filled with panic. His chest was still barely moving when he breathed, and the condensation on the inside of the mask was all but gone. "It's okay, Tony," he whispered. "Doc's got ya."
"Yes," Dr. Marquardt said. She was already injecting the medication she'd asked for into his IV line. "I've got him. And I need you to step out."
"What?" Gibbs jerked his head up and locked eyes with Dr. Marquardt across the bed.
That wasn't irritation in her eyes. That wasn't annoyance. That was anger. She was mad and getting madder.
"Step. Out." When he made no move to do as ordered, she narrowed her eyes and glared at him. "Now."
Gibbs shot another look at Tony, whose eyes were closing as he struggled to breathe. He untangled Tony's fingers from his sleeve gently, and then patted the back of his hand. "I'll be back, Tony," he promised. "You do whatever the doc says, got it?"
Tony's nod was almost imperceptible, but it was enough for Gibbs. He walked briskly around the end of the bed and crossed the room, but he turned back around just as he reached the door.
Dr. Marquardt had her right hand against Tony's chest again, and she was massaging the muscles across his sternum. "I know it hurts," she was saying. "But you need to breathe. I promise, you'll feel a lot better in about sixty seconds, okay?"
Gibbs stayed where he was and watched the scene in front of him with intense interest. Dr. Marquardt was still rubbing Tony's chest, one of the nurses was taking his vitals, and the other was adjusting the dials on the oxygen machine next to his bed.
"Out, Agent Gibbs." She didn't look away from Tony when she spoke, and the amount of anger in her voice hadn't lessened. "Or it will be a long, long time before you come back in here."
Gibbs yanked the door open without a word and stormed into the hallway. The first person he saw was Bruce Rivers, who was standing just to the right of the door, looking anxious.
"Is DiNozzo okay?" he asked. "I heard the alarm and saw the doctor running …"
Gibbs shook his head quickly, more in dismissal of the question than in answer to it. "I need you to call Fornell," he said. "Tell him to get the security videos from the Navy Yard. DiNozzo was attacked in my parking lot."
Rivers' eyes widened in surprise. "How do you know that?" he asked. "Does he remember what happened?"
Gibbs rolled his eyes. "He remembers that he was attacked in the parking lot."
"What about the rest of it? Does he know who it was? Did he …?"
"Sure, Rivers. He remembers everything." Gibbs was starting to remember why this man got on his nerves so badly. "I just thought I'd keep an important detail like that to myself."
Rivers sighed deeply and dropped his head. "Sorry, s … Agent Gibbs."
"Don't apologize to me," he ground out through clenched teeth. "Just call Fornell." Rivers nodded nervously and pulled his phone out. "Not here. Go somewhere else. But not far. I haven't relieved you yet."
Rivers nodded again, walked further down the hallway, and disappeared around a corner.
Gibbs glanced across his shoulder at the closed door to Tony's room. He wanted to be in there; he needed to know what was going on. But he had been thrown out, and pissing Dr. Marquardt off any more than she already was wasn't an option. Besides, once again, he had a job to do. He sighed, pulled his own phone out, and hit a button on speed dial.
The first call went to voicemail, and Gibbs' heart plunged into his stomach.
'Never be unreachable.'
It was one of the Rules; it was one of the most important. There was no way that Tim would ignore it. The only reason Tim wouldn't answer his phone was that he couldn't. And there was a man out there who liked grabbing and torturing his agents right under his nose.
"No way in hell," he muttered as he dialed again.
Tim answered that time, but not until the third ring. Gibbs could barely hear the, "Yeah, Boss?" over the blood that pounded in his ears. "Is Tony …?"
"You answer your damn phone when I call, McGee!"
He heard a sigh on the other end, and in that one sound, he heard a thousand things that no one said. Tim was upset - very upset.
Something was wrong.
"Sorry, Boss. We're at a crime scene. I was talking to Ducky, and I … I didn't hear it ring."
'He's tired,' his mind supplied. 'He hasn't slept in two days. And neither have you.'
None of what was happening was Tim's fault, but he was the one who had to deal with all of it. He was the one who was out there doing Gibbs' job. He was the one going without sleep, pushing himself harder than he should, digging up evidence against DelMar and trying to get justice for Tony. Tim wasn't just doing everything he should have done; he was doing everything Gibbs should have been doing, too. And he was the one Gibbs was taking his anger and frustration out on.
Again.
"Is it Tony? Is he okay?"
Gibbs shook his head and closed his eyes. Then he realized what Tim had said, and he opened his eyes again.
"A crime scene?" he asked. "What crime scene?"
"God damn it."
Ducky looked up and gave him a sad smile. "Hello, Timothy." Tim squatted down next to Palmer, who glanced at him briefly before turning back to the dead body all three were studying. "I take it this development is a bad thing?"
"Not what I wanted to see, no," Tim admitted. He took his hat off and ran his other hand through his hair. "He was the only suspect we could identify. We were hoping he would tell us …" He let the sentence trail off. There was no point in thinking about could-have-beens.
"Who else was involved?" Ducky finished for him. Tim nodded slowly. "He still might, you know. The dead are often very informative."
Tim took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. "What've we got, Ducky?"
"Preliminary cause of death is a single gunshot to the side of the head." He pointed it out, but there was no need. Tim had seen the small hole behind Marco Santori's right ear as soon as he'd walked up. "I do not expect that to change. Fired from intermediate range, somewhere between ten and eighteen inches, I'd say."
"He turned his back on him," Tim observed. "He trusted him. He didn't expect him to kill him."
"It is very likely that Mr. Santori had a belief in some sort of … honor among scumbags."
Tim had to smile at that. It was a rare thing for Ducky to speak ill of the dead, but he couldn't think of anyone else who deserved it more.
"Exit wound?"
"None." Ducky paused, and Tim looked up. When he met the older man's eye, he got a confident nod from him. "We'll have a bullet for you," Ducky continued. "That will give you a weapon to trace."
Tim shook his head. "I don't think it's going to matter."
"Why not?" Palmer asked.
"Could a 9mm have made that hole, Ducky?"
"Yes," Ducky answered without hesitation. "Most certainly it could have."
"A Sig, maybe?"
"Ballistics and weapon identification is Abby's area of … wait. A Sig? Why are you asking that?"
Tim sighed again. He hoped he was wrong, but his gut was telling him he was right. "When you send the bullet to her, make sure she runs it against the weapons checked out from the armory."
"Timothy …"
Tim pushed himself to his feet and put his hat back on. "Tony's weapon is missing," he explained. "He dropped it when they attacked him, and they picked it up. It wasn't in his car or at Gibbs' house. Unless they threw it out the car window, one of them has it. And Santori doesn't have a gun on him, does he?"
"No, he doesn't. I'll make sure she knows."
Ducky turned back to Santori's body, and Tim did the same. "Time of death?"
"Between 10:00 and 11:00 last night."
"And what time did you and Gibbs get to the house?"
"Approximately 10:15."
Tim turned around and let his eyes follow the trail Santori and the other man - he couldn't bring himself to say it was DelMar yet - had left behind as they'd fled. Broken branches, a bent fence, trampled grass. At the end of that trail, so close that Tim could see Fornell standing on the back porch, was Gibbs' house.
"He didn't even make it a block and a half," Tim observed.
"It is fortunate that Jethro decided to check the basement rather than follow them." Ducky was standing behind him, just to his left, and staring in the same direction. "Of course, had Tony not been discovered when he was, he would have …" Ducky broke the sentence himself and cleared his throat. "But additionally, a man who could kill his partner so easily would most certainly have had no issues with killing a pursuer."
Fornell was talking to someone on the phone, and Tim watched him for a few seconds. "What else, Ducky?"
"There's quite a lot of blood," he answered. "On his clothes, hands, and the soles of his shoes. Too much to all be his."
"Tony's."
"I will of course have Abby test it, but I do not doubt that it is his, yes."
Tim kept staring straight ahead, a thousand different things running through his mind. Despite his earlier thoughts, he couldn't get the what ifs and maybes, could have beens and almosts, to stop. What if Duncan hadn't left the camera room? What if he had reviewed the footage when he'd gotten back? What if Gibbs had gotten to the house earlier? Or later? What if he'd chased them out the door? What if Santori had been alive when they found him? What if DelMar had nothing to do with any of it?
"Timothy!"
Tim shook his head to clear it and blinked his eyes rapidly. "Ducky?"
"That is the third time I've said your name, and your phone was ringing." Ducky fixed him in place with a stern look. "Are you all right?"
"Yeah," he said dismissively. He reached into his pocket for his phone. "I'm fine."
"How much sleep did you get last night?" Tim didn't answer him as he pulled up his missed calls. "Any? Timothy?"
His phone started ringing again just as he saw who had tried to call him. Missing one call from Gibbs was bad enough; missing two was a death sentence. "Ducky, I …"
"You have got to sleep, my dear boy. I know you want to help Tony, but you can't do that if you're …"
"I've got to take this. I'm sorry."
That was the end of the discussion. Tim turned his back on Ducky and stepped away before he hit the button to answer the call. "Yeah, Boss?" Gibbs could be calling for any one of a hundred reasons, but there was only one that Tim was worried about. "Is Tony …?"
"You answer your damn phone when I call, McGee!"
Tim sighed and mentally prepared himself for the onslaught that he knew was coming. "Sorry, Boss. We're at a crime scene. I was talking to Ducky, and I … I didn't hear it ring." The silence on the other end took him by surprise. Gibbs should have been ripping him a new one for not answering the first call. That he wasn't spoke volumes.
Something was wrong.
"Is it Tony? Is he okay?"
A few more seconds passed in silence, and Tim's worry for his friend escalated with every beat of his heart. When Gibbs spoke again, it was as though he hadn't heard Tim's question at all.
"A crime scene? What crime scene?"
It took Gibbs and Tim less than five minutes to catch each other up on the events of their respective mornings. It turned out that Gibbs hadn't needed to rush to call him with the information about the parking lot, because Tim had known about it for a few hours. He'd just finished telling him about the incompetent security guard, Duncan, and Gibbs was seething.
"Deal with it, McGee."
"Already did."
"And?"
"And …" Gibbs could almost see Tim's nervous expression in his mind. "There's a formal complaint in my personnel file now."
"McGee!"
"Yeah, Boss?"
"Good job."
The door to Tony's room opened, and Dr. Marquardt walked out. She handed her jacket to one of the nurses following her, and then she turned and headed straight for Gibbs.
"Be here in two hours." It wasn't the most polite way to end a conversation, but it would have to do. Gibbs snapped the phone shut and looked up at Dr. Marquardt. "Doc? Is he …?"
She stalked right up to him, tucked her hair behind her ear, and looked him directly in the eye. "Was that your idea, Agent Gibbs?"
He'd known she was mad, but the amount of anger in her voice took him by surprise. "What?"
"That little stunt that Tony just pulled. Did you put him up to that?"
Gibbs bristled at the accusation, and he squared his shoulders as he faced her down. "I didn't put him up to anything," he said. "I'd never do anything to hurt him."
"Oh, but you'll stand there and watch him do it to himself?" He couldn't argue with that, because she was right. "Did you not see how much pain he was in? Did it not occur to you that he might be pushing too hard? Or did you just not care?"
That he could argue with.
"Just who do you think you are, lady? Yes, I knew he was hurting, and I thought about calling you, but I decided not to."
"What stopped you?" she demanded.
"He told me he didn't want any more meds, and I respected that. He's thirty-seven, not seven. It was his decision."
Her eyes narrowed; she apparently didn't like that answer. "I know you've got a job to do, Agent Gibbs, and I know you really want to get out there and catch those bad guys, but I will not allow you to risk Tony's health to do it."
"Hey!" He swallowed the rest of what he wanted to say, took a deep breath, and forced himself to calm down. "I take it you've never had someone try to kill you before."
Dr. Marquardt shook her head in response.
"Here's the thing, Doc. Those 'bad guys' you're talking about? They're the ones who did that to him. He's the only witness we've got, and he doesn't remember who they are." He saw the anger in her eyes starting to dissipate, so he kept going. "I'm not the only one who wants to catch them. He does, too. For him, it's about finding out who hates him enough to hurt him that badly, and for me, it has a lot more to do with protecting Tony than it does with punishing some random sleazeballs. One of them is already dead, but the other one is still out there, and every minute he's free is another minute he can try again."
"But he doesn't remember," Dr. Marquardt protested. "And depending on what drugs they used on him and with those head injuries, he probably never will. All he's doing is hurting himself, and he's doing it for nothing."
"Not for nothing," Gibbs said. "Doing the impossible is one of DiNozzo's things. If he didn't push himself to do things he's not supposed to be able to do, he'd have been dead a dozen times over. And if you know of a way to make him stop pushing himself, or make him start paying attention to his own limitations, I'm all ears, Doc. Because I've been looking for one for eight years, and I haven't found it yet."
Dr. Marquardt sighed, and it was obvious that she'd calmed down quite a bit. She didn't look like she wanted to rip Gibbs' heart out, at any rate.
"If he keeps it up this time, he just might kill himself."
Gibbs nodded slowly. He didn't want to hear it, but there was a part of him that had already known it. Whatever was wrong with Tony, he'd done it to himself. And Gibbs had let him.
"Is it pneumonia?"
"No." Her answer earned a relieved sigh in response. "That was a muscle spasm."
"I've never seen a muscle spasm that looked like that."
"That's because it wasn't just one muscle. It was a few dozen of them." Gibbs relaxed his stance and his shoulders, and Dr. Marquardt flashed one of her tired smiles. "It would have started out as one, probably the muscles under his ribs, and that made it hurt to breathe. Since he didn't have any pain relief, he just breathed shallower to avoid it. When he did that, he gave the other muscles room to do the same thing. The more muscles that knotted up, the more it hurt, the shallower he breathed, and the more room he gave them. It was a downward spiral."
"And if he does it again?"
"He can't," she insisted. "I'm not just saying that, either. He cannot keep doing this. He's got to breathe as deeply as he can, and he has to exhale completely. If he doesn't, he is going to get pneumonia. And with how badly his lungs are already damaged, and the fact that his blood isn't fully oxygenated yet, it won't take long before he finds himself back on that vent."
"But he's not on it now?"
"No, he's not. I used the Versed for two reasons: as a sedative and as a muscle relaxant. The morphine, of course, was for the pain. But I had to get those muscles to calm down, and that wasn't possible with him awake and hurting. By the time I got in there, he was so tense that his arms and legs were starting to cramp, too."
"How long will he be out?"
"Not long." Dr. Marquardt let her own shoulders slump slightly, and she turned back toward the nurse's station. Gibbs followed her. "I only gave him enough to keep him under for about twenty minutes. And when he wakes up, I want him up and walking within the hour. The nurses will help with that."
"That's fast," Gibbs observed.
"He can't stay in that bed the whole time he's here, or this will keep happening. I'm guessing Tony's not usually the 'lay around and do nothing' type?"
"No." Gibbs snorted a small laugh. "I think he sleeps, but other than naps at the office, I'm not sure when."
"And I'm assuming he works out?"
"He runs."
"So his muscles are accustomed to being used more than they are right now," she said. "We need to get him back to that as soon as possible. I'm going to start him on a low dose of potassium, but I don't think he'll need it for long. Once he's back up to his normal activity level, the spasms and cramps should go away on their own."
They'd reached the nurses' station just outside the door to Tony's room, and Dr. Marquardt reached across it as one of the nurses handed her jacket to her.
"I'll be back at 7:00. Dr. Simms will be checking on Tony throughout the day, and if anything happens, or if you need me specifically, he'll be able to reach me. Okay?"
"Yeah." Gibbs nodded as Dr. Marquardt put her jacket on. "And, Doc, I …"
"Don't worry about it. It's over, and luckily, he didn't do any serious damage. Just don't let him do it again."
"Didn't I just say that I don't know how to stop him?"
"I may not know you very well, Agent Gibbs, but I have noticed that Tony listens to what you say." She grinned at him as she turned away. "If you make it clear that you don't want him to do it again, I don't think he will."
She walked toward the elevator, turning her shoulder slightly as she passed Agent Rivers, who was just returning from making his call to Fornell.
"Agent Gibbs," he said as he approached. "Agent Fornell said …"
"That they already know about the parking lot. I know." Rivers looked surprised, and Gibbs almost felt bad for the guy. He should have anticipated that Gibbs would call McGee while he was calling Fornell. The point of calling both wasn't getting information for themselves. It was making sure that both McGee and Fornell knew about the parking lot. Rivers should have known that, and he didn't.
"You might make a good agent someday, Rivers," he said. "Today is not that day." He shook his head at the look of disappointment on the younger man's face. "Go home. Get some sleep. I want you back here at 8:00, and you'd better be rested."
Rivers' shoulders slumped as he walked away, and Gibbs shook his head again. Tony had been twice the agent Rivers was as a newly-hired probie. Even McGee had been better. What had Tobias seen in the guy?
"Agent Gibbs?"
He turned toward the summons. One of the nurses that had helped Dr. Marquardt, Juanita, was holding an envelope out to him. "This was left for you at the desk." She handed it to him with a smile.
"Who left it?"
She shook her head. "No one seems to know. It was just sitting in the inbox with the internal mail that came up from downstairs."
"Thank you." He took it from her, and looked it over quickly. His name was on the outside of the envelope, but there was no other information. He opened it quickly and pulled out the piece of paper inside. He glanced up at Tony's door as he unfolded it, and he narrowed his eyes. There was a dartboard hanging from the metal hook just above the room number.
That hadn't been there before.
He made a mental note to ask the nurses about it, and then looked down at the note in his hand. The words were handwritten, and the message was short.
Bullseye on the Golden Boy.
He threw the note down on the desk, pulled his weapon, and bolted for Tony's room.
Chapter Ten
Tim watched the medical examiner's van pull away with Marco Santori's body. His eyes were focused on what was happening right in front of him, but his thoughts were a million miles away.
In reality, they were only five miles away, at George Washington University Hospital. Where Tony was awake and healing, but lying in a bed with no memory of what had happened to him or who had done it. Where Tim was going to have to look Tony in the eye and tell him that one of the men who attacked him was dead but that he hadn't been able to find any proof of who the other one was.
He was going to have to tell Tony that he was failing him, and he wasn't quite sure how he was going to do that.
"McGee?"
Tim turned toward Fornell as he approached. An older man, short and squat, with thick glasses and grey hair that wasn't so much receding as it was completely gone, accompanied him.
"I'd like you to meet Gibbs' neighbor, Edgar Collins."
"Hello, Mr. Collins," Tim said tiredly. He looked at Fornell in confusion; he was sure there was a reason behind the introduction, but he couldn't think of what it might be. "It's nice to meet you."
"Edgar has a dog," Fornell went on. "A boxer named Mugsy. A very … regular … boxer named Mugsy."
McGee's eyes widened in sudden understanding, and he took a step forward. "What time did you walk Mugsy last night?"
"The same time I do every night," Mr. Collins answered. "I came outside at 8:15 and went back in at 8:30."
"And what happened while you were outside?" Fornell was actually smiling as he asked the question, and Tim couldn't stop the surge of hope that he felt wash over him.
"Well, I saw that blue Mustang pull up, which isn't all that strange. It belongs to that young man, the tall handsome one? Jethro's boy."
Tim nodded his head. "Tony," he said. "His name's Tony."
"That's right! Tony. He's a nice boy. He's over here two or three times a week, so I know his car. He always says 'hi' when he sees me, and he pets Mugsy. And Mugsy likes him, which is odd, because Mugsy doesn't like anyone. He doesn't even like Jethro. Come to think of it, not many people like Jethro, though I don't know why. He's a perfectly quiet and respectable neighbor."
Tim smiled, and Fornell chuckled.
"What about last night, Edgar?" Fornell asked. "Did Tony pet Mugsy last night?"
"Oh, no. I don't think he could have, even if he'd tried. Mugsy was mad last night, growling and barring his teeth and snapping."
"At Tony?"
"Well, no. I told you, Mugsy likes Tony. But he sure had his hackles up at the two men who were with him."
Tim's heart leapt into his throat.
"They told me he was drunk and they were taking him home, which, I know he spends a lot of time at Jethro's house, but I also know he doesn't live there, so I don't know what they were talking about. But he couldn't stand up, I know that, too, because they were holding him up, kind of dragging him between them. He looked like he'd passed out, had his head down, didn't say 'hi' when I talked to him. And I kind of keep an eye on things, you know. Me and Mugsy. We know who belongs here and who doesn't. Tony belongs here. Those two men with him didn't."
"And you saw them?" Tim had to fight to contain the excitement he was starting to feel. Edgar Collins just might turn out to be the best nosy neighbor Gibbs could have asked for. "You saw their faces?"
"Well, of course I did, young man!" Mr. Collins sounded offended at the question. "They were standing no further from me than you are. And make no mistake about it. I might be old, and people think I'm senile, and my eyes aren't what they used to be, but I know what I saw. And I know Tony wasn't drunk."
"How do you know that?" Fornell looked surprised.
"Well, his head was bleeding, and I didn't think he did that to himself. But mainly, it was because I know what booze smells like," Mr. Collins said. "And I know that boy didn't smell like it."
"Did you call the police and report it?" Tim asked.
"I did. They told me they'd look into it, but they tell me that all the time, and I never see them here. I was going to tell Jethro when he got home, but I fell asleep watching the news." Mr. Collins looked regretful, as though he felt that he hadn't done enough even though he'd done everything he could have been expected to do. "When I woke up, the ambulance was here, and I thought that Jethro already knew what had happened. So I went to bed. Then I saw all the police cars this morning, and saw you on Jethro's porch, and thought that maybe I should say something."
Fornell smiled at McGee again, and he put his hand on Collins' arm. "Edgar and I are going to stop by the Hoover Building and look at some mug shots, Agent McGee. You can finish up here, right?"
"Yeah, I've got it." Tim reached out and grasped Mr. Collins' hand tightly and shook it. "Thank you, Mr. Collins. You and Mugsy are good neighbors. Gibbs is lucky to have you."
"Jethro's a good man," Mr. Collins said. "And that Tony, he's a good boy. I just hope they're all right."
Fornell led Mr. Collins to his car, and Tim watched after them for a few moments. Five minutes earlier, he'd been wallowing in the fact that all of their leads were running straight into a dead man, and he'd been convinced that without Tony's memory, they wouldn't be able to solve the case. But that had all changed. All they needed was for Edgar Collins to recognize Santori and DelMar from their mug shots, and they'd have the proof that they needed.
He turned back to the crime scene in front of him, feeling more hopeful than he had since Abby stopped him from pounding Duncan into the wall.
Gibbs ignored the shocked looks on the faces of the nurses as he passed them and barreled through Tony's door shoulder first. He led the way with his weapon, clearing the hospital room just as he would any other potentially dangerous scene. He checked the closet, the bathroom, under the bed, in the cabinets and dresser drawers. Only after making certain that the entire room was empty and safe did he make his way over to Tony's side.
He placed his right hand on Tony's uninjured shoulder and closed his eyes. Tony's breathing was easy and even, his expression one of calm and comfort, and the beeping of the monitor indicated a strong and steady heartbeat.
'He's okay. Nothing happened.'
"Excuse me?"
He spun toward the door on instinct, raising his gun and leveling it at the person standing there as he did.
"Who are you?"
The mousey-looking man who stood just inside the door cleared his throat and pushed his glasses further up on his nose. It was the only sign of nervousness he showed. "I'm Dr. Simms. I assume you are Agent Gibbs?"
Gibbs lowered his weapon slowly and carefully.
"Dr. Marquardt explained Agent DiNozzo's situation to me. I know that this is a special case, and I understand your concerns about his safety." He didn't sound as mousey as he looked. There was strength in his voice that his appearance didn't imply. "But I'm afraid that I am going to have to draw the line at you running around the hospital with …"
"He needs a new room." He'd dismissed the doctor as a threat, and he moved on to more important things.
Dr. Simms tipped his head. "I'm sorry?"
"A new room," Gibbs repeated. "He can't stay in this one. It's not safe."
"Agent Gibbs, I assure you that our security is …"
"Incapable of keeping the man who tried to kill my agent out of this hospital, off of this floor, or away from this room." He spoke slowly, clearly, and through clenched teeth. "Now, go out there and do whatever you need to do. Call Doc Marquardt. Fill out your paperwork. Just find him a new room."
"Agent Gibbs …"
"On a different floor." Gibbs finally holstered his gun, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket. "I'll be bringing my own people in to handle security. I'll need a list of the nurses who are assigned to the floor, and to Tony, with photo IDs for my people to check against."
"But that's not …"
"I'll need the security footage for the past half hour," he continued. "From the time I hit the call button until five minutes ago. I want the front door, the emergency entrance, all employee entrances, the elevators and stairwells, and every camera within fifty feet of this hallway. I might need more than that later, but that's good for a start. And I want all of the nurses and the person who brought up the mail available to be interviewed and fingerprinted."
"You can't just …"
"Don't tell me I need to get a warrant first." Gibbs stepped toward the doctor, but he didn't move far from Tony's bed. "We're on the same side here, Dr. Simms. My job is the same as yours - keep Tony alive and safe."
"Of course." Dr. Simms nodded his head slowly and turned away reluctantly. "I'll see what rooms we have available on the other floors, and I'll start the transfer."
"And everything else?"
"I'll speak to our head of security," Dr. Simms said as he pulled the door open. "I'm sure he'll be more than willing to coordinate with you."
Gibbs nodded briskly. As the doctor walked out into the hallway, he turned back to Tony.
"It can't ever be easy with you, can it, DiNozzo?"
He dialed his phone, and the call was picked up on the second ring. It was a vast improvement over the last time.
"Boss?"
"Get your ass to the hospital. Now."
"Gibbs has not yet called to tell me about Tony."
Tim spun around, both surprised and reassured by the voice behind him.
"Ziva!" He smiled broadly at her. "How'd you get here so fast?"
She glanced down at her watch, and then up at him in mild confusion. "It has been twelve hours, McGee."
"Has it?" He checked the time for himself.
It was almost 11:00. It had been fifteen hours since Tony was attacked. It had been thirteen hours since Gibbs and Ducky found him. It had been nine hours since Gibbs handed him the picture of Tony's back, seven hours since he and Abby first watched the security video, three hours since Fornell told him that Marco Santori was dead …
"Did you lose track of time?"
Tim shrugged. "I've been busy."
"I can imagine. You do not look as though you have slept."
A few moments passed in silence as Ziva appraised Tim silently and he pretended not to notice that she was doing it. It didn't take long before her attention made him uncomfortable, though, and he decided to divert it.
"How was your flight?"
"How is Tony?"
The two questions were spoken over one another.
Tim smiled softly and held up his hand, indicating that he'd answer Ziva's question first. It was the more important of the two, especially to her. She'd been on a plane for twelve hours, and the only information she had was the little bit that Tim had been able to give her on the phone.
"The doctor says he'll be fine." He guessed that was what she would want to hear first, and the way her face lit up at the news told him that he'd guessed correctly. "He's awake and talking, but he doesn't remember what happened. There's a chance he might get his memory back, but we're working under the assumption that he won't."
"Where is Gibbs?"
"At the hospital with Tony."
Ziva tilted her head in confusion. "He is not running the investigation?"
"No," he said. "He handed it over to the FBI. We're working with them, and for the time being, we report to Fornell."
"That does not sound like Gibbs."
"No, it doesn't. But this time, well, Gibbs can't be involved, and he wanted to make sure that …"
"Why not?" He could hear the growing suspicion in her voice, and he remembered just how much information he had that she didn't.
"A lot has happened in the last twelve hours, Ziva. I'll bring you up to speed." His phone started to ring, and he pulled it out of his pocket. When he saw the name on the screen, his heart dropped into his feet. "Boss?"
"Get your ass to the hospital. Now."
"What happened? Is it Tony?" Ziva stepped forward when she heard the question, apprehension and concern clear in her eyes. "Is he …?"
"DelMar was here."
"What?! At the hospital? How do you …?"
"He was here, McGee." Gibbs sounded so certain that Tim had to remind himself that they still had no evidence of DelMar's involvement. "The son of a bitch was here."
Fornell scrubbed a hand through his short hair in frustration.
"And you're sure, Edgar?" he asked the older man.
Edgar Collins was sitting in front of the computer in Fornell's office at the J. Edgar Hoover Building, where he'd been sitting for the past hour. Fornell had put together a collection of mug shots for him to look at, and he'd gone through them all twice. The good news was that Edgar had identified two people from those pictures.
The bad news was that he'd picked out the two they already knew about.
"I've told you three times, young man." Edgar took his glasses off and wiped at them with the hem of his shirt. It was the fifth time he'd done it, and Fornell was starting to think it was a nervous habit. "The big, ugly one with the scars on his face was there. He was driving the car, and he pulled Tony out of the back seat, and he's not the one I talked to. None of these pictures are of the man I talked to."
Fornell reached out and hit the scroll button on the computer. He did it almost absent-mindedly, like he was just scrolling at random, but he did have a purpose.
"I still don't believe Tony has ever been arrested, though. That just doesn't make any sense. He's a good boy, and Mugsy doesn't like criminals."
Fornell let his head fall forward slightly, but he didn't stop scrolling. Throwing DiNozzo's mug shot in there had been a last minute decision, to make certain that Edgar actually knew him. That part of the plan had worked, because Edgar had identified DiNozzo the second his face appeared on the screen. He'd picked Santori out almost as quickly.
"None of these other men look familiar? Not at all?" Fornell slowed his scrolling speed as he neared the mug shot he was looking for. "You've never seen any of them before? Not this one?"
Fornell had no idea whose face was on the screen at that moment, but the question did pull Edgar's full attention back to the monitor, and the older man leaned in to study it closer.
"Or this one?"
Another random face, and a shake of Edgar's head.
"How about this guy?"
The guy in question was a mugger who'd gotten his kicks attacking people in national parks until Fornell had arrested him two years earlier. He was serving a ten-year sentence. As expected, Edgar shook his head again.
"This man?"
It was old and out-of-date, but it was the most recent one they had. Fornell wished they had a newer one, but the man hadn't changed much in ten years. To anyone who had seen Stefano DelMar for any amount of time, or who had a reason to remember him, it would be enough. Even if Edgar couldn't match the entire face in his head to the one on the screen, there would have been enough similarity to pique his interest.
But there wasn't. There was nothing. Not even the slightest hint of recognition on Edgar's face.
He'd been less than a foot from DiNozzo and his would-be murderers. He'd been close enough to see the blood on DiNozzo's face and know that there was no alcohol on his breath. He'd had to hold his dog back from attacking them. He'd spoken to one of them. He'd picked Santori out without the slightest bit of hesitation.
"If I saw the man I talked to, I would tell you."
"I know you would, Edgar." Fornell patted him on the arm, drew in a deep breath, and then blew it out slowly. "Do you think you could describe him?" he asked. "To someone who could draw him?"
"Well, I don't know about the drawing him part," Edgar answered. "I never have understood how it is you agents do the things you do. But I can see his face in my head plain as day. If you've got someone who can draw what I say, then I can do it."
Fornell flashed Edgar a tight smile as he stood up and walked out of his office. He had no doubt that Edgar would describe their second suspect in almost perfect detail. It was obvious that the old man was a lot sharper than most people gave him credit for, and that he saw - and remembered - everything that went on in that neighborhood. It would be a matter of hours before they knew the face of the man who'd murdered Marco Santori and tried to kill DiNozzo. But Fornell knew with certainty that it wasn't going to be the face Gibbs expected it to be.
Stefano DelMar hadn't been there.
Tim's phone rang again just as he and Ziva were stepping off of the elevator.
Gibbs had told him about the note and the dartboard and had hung up immediately afterwards. He'd called him back once to give him Tony's new room number, but that conversation was equally as short.
"Well, at least Tony's getting better," he'd said after the second time Gibbs hung up on him.
"How do you know that?"
"Gibbs is starting to act like Gibbs again."
The rest of the drive was spent filling Ziva in on everything that had happened since Tony first mentioned the possibility that the man or men who murdered Brewer and Strauss were still unidentified. He told her everything that he knew, and answered every question she asked. Then he'd called Abby to check on the status of the tests she was running on the evidence from the basement, and she promised she'd call him back the second she had anything.
Obviously, that second had arrived.
"Hey, Abby," he said. "I'm going to put you on speaker so you can tell Gibbs, too."
He saw Gibbs standing further down the hallway, right next to the door to Tony's room, talking to one of the doctors. Gibbs looked up, and Tim raised his hand in greeting. The doctor smiled at Tim and Ziva quickly before he said something to Gibbs, then turned and walked away.
"Hang on a minute," he said into the phone. "Boss, we …"
"Officer David." Gibbs' voice was a combination of irritated and confused, but if he felt any guilt about not having called her himself, he hid it well. "I thought you were in Tel Aviv."
"I was." Her words were short, clipped … angry. "Fortunately, at least one person thought I deserved to be told that someone abducted and tortured my partner."
The look that Gibbs shot him could have melted ice and refrozen it again. At the same time. Tim glanced down at his feet and shrugged.
"Do not blame McGee," Ziva said. "I would have done the same."
"And you'd better not be grumpy that she's home," came Abby's voice through the speaker on Tim's phone. "Because we need her."
Gibbs took a breath and looked as though he were about to say something, but after one look at Tim and Ziva and a quick glance at the phone in Tim's hand, the aggravation fell from his face and he nodded. "All right. What have you got, Abs?"
Abby's briefing was short, and though she had quite a few results back, none of them provided any new information or insight.
Marco Santori had left fingerprints in and on Tony's car - on the steering wheel and the handles of both doors. The soles of Santori's shoes matched one of the two sets of bloody footprints left behind on Gibbs' floor. It would be several more hours before the DNA results were back, but the blood on Santori's clothes and shoes was A positive, the same type as Tony's. The evidence that had been collected from Tony by Dr. Marquardt's team was still being tested, but Ducky had found deep scratch marks on Santori's right arm that matched the size and shape of Tony's fingernails. He'd also found rope burn on the palms of Santori's hands, which was consistent with him having been the one who'd attacked Tony in the parking lot.
Gibbs wasn't writing anything down, but Tim and Ziva were making careful note of every word Abby said. He glanced between them before speaking again.
"Did you find anything new, Abby? Anything we didn't already know?"
There had to be something. If all of the evidence led them to the dead man they already knew was involved, they'd never be able to prove that DelMar had anything to do with it.
He heard Abby sigh on the other end of the phone, and he could imagine the distressed and upset look on her face. "Two things," she said. "Neither is good."
He waited a few seconds for her to elaborate, but contrary to how she usually acted when she had evidence to share, she didn't.
"Well? Are you going to tell us?"
"The tox screen results are back on the blood from the basement floor."
There was another long pause, and it went on long enough that both Tim and Ziva looked at him. He shook his head at them. Abby wasn't just reluctant to tell them what she'd found; she didn't want to tell them at all.
"Abby," he said gently.
All three of them heard the shaky breath she drew, and they braced themselves for bad news.
"Rohypnol," she finally said. "And GHB."
"Both?" Tim was visibly upset by the news, and Gibbs shared the feeling. "Together?"
"Yeah."
"Then it does not matter how hard Tony tries," Ziva said. "He will never remember."
"No," Abby confirmed. "He might remember flashes, impressions, shadows … maybe sounds, feelings. Smells. But nothing else. That combination, in the amount I found … from the second they put that needle in his neck, it's all gone. It was never there to begin with."
Gibbs closed his eyes and rubbed his eyebrows with his hand. He'd been prepared to hear it - they'd known Tony had been drugged since Dr. Marquardt had told them hours before - but part of him had held out hope that Tony's memory might return. Abby's find proved that it was impossible for Tony to remember anything. It also proved that Dr. Marquardt was right; he had let Tony hurt himself for nothing.
"What else, Abs?"
The answer was more silence. As much as he usually enjoyed indulging Abby in her more emotional moments, he was finding himself quickly running out of patience for them.
"Abby!"
"The ballistics are back on the bullet that killed Marco Santori."
Gibbs started in surprise. "That's fast." He thought about it for a second, and he narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "That's too fast."
"Well, it matched the first weapon I ran it against, so …"
"Damn it!" Tim turned away and dropped his head.
"I should be saying 'good work, McGee'," Abby said. "But I don't think you want to hear that, do you?"
Gibbs had no idea what that meant, though it was clear from Tim's reaction and the look in Ziva's eyes that they did, and it was bad. "Explain, McGee."
"You're sure, Abby?" Tim asked.
"Positive."
"What are you talking about?" Gibbs demanded.
Tim huffed out a breath, and the effort it took for him to make himself look Gibbs in the eye was obvious. "It's Tony's," he finally said.
Gibbs' gut churned.
"Marco Santori was murdered with Tony's weapon."
Part Six