Criminal Minds/NCIS fic: Reciprocity
Title: Reciprocity
Author: jujuberry136
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Reid/Ziva
Warnings: Language, violence
Word Count: ~3000
Summary: Reid and Ziva have a reciprocal arrangement. In the same ‘verse as Some Days you’re the Statue (from my Five Times Reid is More Social Than You Think drabbles) and Coffee.
Note: Thanks so much to ambrosia4all for the fantastic beta, and for not killing me when I consistently gave her too much to read with too little notice.
“So this is the man that stabbed Spencer?” asked a quiet voice behind Morgan’s left shoulder.
Morgan and Prentiss both jumped. Morgan turned around and was ready to give whoever had snuck up on him a piece of his mind when he realized who the brunette standing behind him was.
“Agent David?” Prentiss asked. Morgan shot her a look, how did Prentiss know her? Morgan had briefly mentioned the NCIS agents he and Reid had worked with on the Bernero and Belisario case but as far as he knew the two women had never come in contact. And he knew Garcia hadn’t told her that Reid was dating Agent David-crazy woman had threatened to post the video she filmed of him doing the Snoopy Dance if he told. He should have known better than to allow Garcia access to technology during the team’s annual Christmas party.
“Is that him?” David replied pointing to Interrogation Room Three, where a man handcuffed to a table could be seen through a small window on the door.
Morgan replied, “Yeah.”
At David’s sharp look, Prentiss hurried to explain further. “Robert Polansz, thirty-seven, preferential pedophile with sadistic tendencies. We’ve got enough to charge him with five murders, but he’s not talking about where he’s holding Veronica Warner.”
“She’s the seven year old kidnapped from Silver Spring?” David asked.
“Three days ago,” Morgan confirmed. “We caught a lucky break earlier this morning when interviewing the neighbor, gave us enough of a description of the car that we were able to narrow the suspect list.”
“Too bad that luck did not expand to Spencer,” David sniped.
Prentiss’ hand was on Morgan’s shoulder before he had the chance to respond, so he settled for grinding out, “It was an accident. Polansz grabbed a knife and Reid was closest.” Seeing the horrified expression he relented and said, “Hotch is with him now, I can call to see if hospital’s allowing visitors if you want to check on him in person.”
Agent David folded her arms across her chest. “Spencer is still in surgery. I have approximately forty minutes before I need to leave to make it to the hospital in time to meet him in recovery.”
Prentiss blinked. “How the hell do you know that? We’ve been calling Hotch every twenty minutes and all he says is they haven’t given him any information.”
“Even Garcia couldn’t find anything,” Morgan muttered.
“Agent DiNozzo’s promiscuity came in useful for once,” David replied over her shoulder as she walked away from the desk Morgan had taken over during the investigation.
“Wait a minute,” Morgan called. “Where are you going?”
“When Spencer wakes up I’d like to tell him the girl has been found. He’ll want to know,” she replied as she continued to walk.
Prentiss and Morgan looked at each other awkwardly. “So you knew about Reid and Agent David?” Morgan asked Prentiss when he was sure the NCIS agent was out of earshot.
“Walked in on one of their dates,” Prentiss replied. “You?”
“Found out during the assist with NCIS last month. Little jerk abandoned me with two of the NCIS guys and no car,” Morgan said with a frown.
“I’m surprised you managed to keep your mouth shut this long,” Prentiss teased.
“Garcia blackmailed me into silence,” Morgan grumbled. “I have no clue what Reid’s got on her, but it must be good.”
Prentiss grinned. “Sometimes it disturbs me how easily professional boundaries get crossed on this team.”
“Oh please,” Morgan said. “We live out of each other’s pockets three weeks out of the month. If that doesn’t make you family, I don’t know what does.”
“I don’t know, I’ve always thought biology played some role,” Rossi said as he walked into the room.
“How’s the interrogation going?” Prentiss asked sympathetically.
“Polansz is still keeping quiet,” Rossi replied disgustedly, sitting on the corner of Morgan’s borrowed desk. He covered his face with his hand, “We’re running out of time though.”
“Rossi?” Morgan asked after a moment, looking towards the interrogation room door curiously.
“Yeah?”
“If you’re out here and Polansz has refused a lawyer, who’s in interrogation with him now?”
The three agents ran across the room to question the police officer stationed outside the room. “Who’s in there now?” Rossi demanded. “I told you not to let anyone in there while I was gone!”
Morgan peered through the door’s small window. He couldn’t make many details beyond the fact that there were two people in the room-the window was only meant to help attending officers with physical checks, ensuring suspects were still in custody.
Officer Todd shrugged. “She had federal ID, said it’d be fine. It’s been real quiet, I didn’t think there’d be a problem.”
“She? Who exactly did you let in to talk to Polansz?” Prentiss asked, trepidation laced in every word.
Before Officer Todd could respond, the interrogation room door opened and Agent David exited. She grinned smugly for a moment and raised an eyebrow. “I think he has something he’d like to tell you now,” she told Rossi.
Rossi looked confused. “Who are you and what the hell were you doing talking to my suspect?”
“Special Agent Ziva David, currently with NCIS,” she replied easily. “I think Mr. Polansz would rather tell you himself, he was quite insistent on that actually.”
“We’re over fifty miles from the nearest naval base, what the hell is NCIS’ interest in the case?” Rossi asked belligerently.
“Personal,” David replied shortly. “And I thought you’d be more interested in what your suspect has to say. Not to mention grateful-I understand he wasn’t exactly a chatty Kathryn for you.”
“Chatty Cathy,” Morgan corrected quietly.
Before Rossi could explode, Prentiss intervened. “Rossi, why don’t you go and find out what Mr. Polansz has to say-we really can’t waste any time. Morgan and I’ll talk to Agent David here.”
“Fine,” Rossi bit off as he stalked into the interrogation room. Oddly enough, it seemed Mr. Polansz was relieved to see him. As the door closed, Morgan and Prentiss could hear a steady stream of detailed directions flow from the suspect. Morgan could only hope they weren’t going to be sent on a wild goose chase.
Agent David was heading to the exit, checking her cell phone as she walked.
“Wait a minute,” Prentiss called to her retreating back. “Where are you going?”
“Spencer got out of surgery early,” David replied. “According to the nurse, he should be fine. I’m off to the hospital-make sure you’ve called with the status of the girl by the time he’s recovered from the anesthesia.”
The BAU members watched as she made her way out of the station. “How do you think she made him change his mind about talking?” Prentiss asked.
Morgan stared at her for a moment suspiciously. “You saw Spencer Reid on a date and didn’t go blabbing to Garcia immediately to hack her info?”
“Well,” Prentiss started, her face starting to heat up. “I meant to, but somehow work kept getting in the way-and after a week it wasn’t like I could tell her. You know how she is! She’d kill me for keeping it from her that long!”
“So you decided to keep it from her longer?” Morgan teased. “Sounds like someone’s high school pictures are going to be making reappearance.”
“Shut up,” Prentiss said. After a long moment, she asked him, “What did you mean about hacking her info? And what does that have to do with making Polansz talk? She’s an NCIS officer, they’re not exactly the world’s best interrogators.”
“She’s on loan,” Morgan replied. “Agent David is Mossad.”
Prentiss blinked. She opened her mouth, then shut it again. Finally, she said, “Are you telling me Spencer Reid is dating an international assassin? Who may have just tortured our suspect into telling where he stashed Veronica Webb so Spencer would be happy when he woke up from surgery?”
Morgan nodded slowly. “When pretty boy goes for it, he goes big.”
Prentiss grinned. “You probably don’t want to call him that anymore, Agent David might get jealous.” She looked over her shoulder to peer through the small window to Interrogation Room Three. “And I don’t think we’d like her when she’s angry.”
Morgan glowered at her. “Oh, you think you’re funny do you? Think you’re going to hold that over my head?” Prentiss nodded gleefully, the expression melting off her face when Morgan pulled out his cell phone.
“Hey Mama,” he said. “Guess what? Apparently Prentiss knew about Reid and Ziva.”
Judging from the predatory smile on Morgan’s face, Prentiss wasn’t looking forward to work tomorrow.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
McGee slammed his fist on his desk, then immediately regretted it. As he grimaced and rubbed his left hand tenderly, the elevator dinged. He looked up and his face immediately fell when he saw it wasn’t Gibbs.
“Sorry to disappoint,” the tall man said responding to McGee’s facial expression. “Is Ziva in? She was supposed to meet me an hour ago and isn’t answering her phone.”
Crap. This was Supervisory Special Agent Reid, Ziva’s…boyfriend. McGee still had issues with that one, but nowhere near the size of Tony’s. The man hadn’t shut up for three weeks after Ziva had ditched him and the other FBI agent to go on a date with Reid. McGee privately suspected that Ziva threatened Tony into silence-the man hadn’t teased her about her “geeky studmuffin” for the last two weeks.
Agent Reid raised an eyebrow and looked around the empty bullpen quizzically. McGee also looked around, praying someone else would come up to spare him having to break the news. Finally, McGee said, “We actually don’t know where Ziva is right now. She, um, went to interview a suspect and hasn’t checked in yet.”
“Is this the case she’s been working on with the military base bombings?” Reid asked slowly.
McGee nodded. “We’re doing everything we can to find her. Gibbs is out now, Tony’s interviewing our best suspect now, and I’m tracing the money flow. We’ve got a good start.”
“Then why is there a countdown on the monitor?” Reid asked, pointing above McGee’s head.
Crap. This is why he always left Tony or Ziva to explain things to the family. “There might be another bombing planned,” McGee mumbled, ducking down to focus again on the computer screen.
“Probie! Stoddert’s a bust. Every time I press him he starts talking about lawyers. Please tell me you’ve had better luck,” Tony yelled as he entered the room. He stopped short at the sight of Agent Reid. “What are you doing here?”
“Ziva was supposed to meet me an hour ago and wasn’t answering her phone. Thought I’d see if she was stuck in the office,” Reid replied, jamming his hands into his pockets.
“I thought you weren’t supposed to be moving around, weren’t you in the hospital or something?” Tony asked.
“Hospital?” McGee questioned. How did Tony know and he didn’t? Though on second thought, it might explain why Ziva took two personal days last week.
“I’m fine,” Reid said shortly. “What’s going on with Ziva?”
“Look, there’s nothing you can do. Give McGeek your number and we’ll call you when there’s news,” Tony said in a surprisingly gentle voice.
“You’re dealing with a serial bomber, right?” Reid questioned. “I deal with serial offenders all the time. It doesn’t make any sense for me to go home.” He pulled a chair up to McGee’s desk, “Can you show me the locations of the previous bombs?”
McGee looked at Tony questioningly, but the senior agent only sighed and looked up. “Gibbs is going to kill me,” Tony muttered before sitting down to brief Agent Reid.
The younger agent listened raptly to the details of the case, then turned and stared at the map for a few moments. “You said he’s playing like he’ll ask for a lawyer, right?” Reid asked Tony, who nodded slowly. “I have an idea, but you’re probably not going to like it.”
Tony was still muttering under his breath when he and McGee stepped behind the two-way mirror. McGee turned to him and said, “Tony, Gibbs is not going to kill you if this works. It’s not like he’s known for following the rules himself.”
“This is breaking one of his rules Probie, which is way worse than breaking one of Vance’s,” Tony replied after checking to make sure they were alone in the room. “Which one?” McGee asked curiously. Though he had worked for the man for over five years, Gibbs’ rules were still a bit of a mystery-he only learned new ones when he broke them.
“Rule thirty three-never let the FBI do what you can,” Tony recited dutifully.
McGee grimaced. Yeah, this was going to be hard to swing. “What if we tell him we were following rule eighteen?”
Tony thought for a minute, “Worth a try. What the hell is taking Agent Bean Pole so long to get in there?”
“He was waiting for a binder last I saw,” McGee responded.
When Reid finally entered the interrogation room, both NCIS agents were surprised. Gone was the quietly confident man who had entered looking for Ziva. Instead they saw a pale man, his body obscured by the stack of large binders he was awkwardly balancing in front of him, with several file folders precariously stuck under his arms. Agent Reid staggered to the table and dropped the binders with an audible thump.
Stoddert had been surprised when the door opened, though by the Reid managed to arrange the binders and folders to his liking and found the chair Stoddert’s face relaxed into a poor imitation of carelessness. “I thought you guys couldn’t talk to me once I asked for a lawyer,” he asked once Reid sat down.
“Oh, I’m just here to do your intake paperwork,” Reid replied hurriedly. “Did you ask for a lawyer? Because there are a lot of questions here and I need to get them in ASAP.”
“What kind of questions?” Stoddert replied.
“Did you ask for a lawyer?” Reid countered. “I got in trouble last week for doing in-take processing last week because my asshole boss didn’t bother to tell me he’d asked for one. I got written up and everything.”
“Someone’s always trying to screw you right?” Stoddert answered, shaking his head in sympathy. “I know how that goes. Why’s he riding you?” At Reid’s look, he finally said, “No, I didn’t ask for a lawyer-you happy now?”
“Look, I already told you, I’m on probation. I have to ask or my boss is going to fire me, he just hates me because he knows I’m in line for his job,” Reid said as he opened the first of the two massive binders. “Can you spell your last name for me?”
McGee watched as Reid continued to ask Stoddert basic questions that slowly drew some personality out of the previously passive-aggressive man. Reid asked about his address, birth date, family, and job-and McGee had never realized the world of paper shredding could have such vicious internal politics.
Every so often Reid would check materials in one of the loose folders on top of the binders and then rearrange the folders in some new order. After about five minutes Reid said, “Hey, wait a minute, you’ve been in here for hours and they haven’t gotten you anything to drink? That’s ridiculous, you want water? Coffee?”
“Coffee’d be great, thanks,” replied Stoddert.
“What the hell is he doing?” Tony asked McGee quietly. “This isn’t going anywhere!”
Reid stood up and knocked one of the folders free from its perch on the second. It hit the table and sheets of paper fly out, several landing in front of Stoddert. While Reid nervously cursed under his breath, Stoddert picked up several sheets of paper. His face turned white. “How’d you get these?” he demanded.
“What are you talking about?” Reid asked as he continued to shove papers back into the file folder.
Stoddert froze, then hastily shuffled the papers in his hand. “Right, of course. Never mind, got confused there,” he laughed nervously.
“Can I have the papers back?” Reid asked mildly, confusion still playing across his face. “Sorry about that, did you say you wanted water or coffee?” Stoddert’s eyes widened, “Water’s fine. Just great. Thanks a lot.”
Reid exited the interrogation room and entered the backroom quickly. “Well, you were right about one thing,” Tony said when Reid closed the door. “I didn’t like that. What a huge waste of time!”
Reid glared at him and waved the folder in front of his face. “If you consider finding out where the next target is a huge waste of time, then yes I can understand why you didn’t like it.”
“Wait, what?” Tony asked.
Reid opened the folder and pulled out a map of a suburb of Anacostia. “This is what he freaked out over, the next bomb is most likely in this area. My best guess is here,” he pointed to a two-block circle outlined in red.
Tony grabbed the map and ran out of the room. McGee could hear echoes of his call to Gibbs as the senior agent ran for the garage. Knowing he had only moments before DiNozzo reached the garage and left without him, he still had to ask, “How?”
Reid grinned. “I like maps and patterns,” he replied. “And Stoddert’s a classic narcissist-Agent DiNozzo’s intimidating, I’m not. He let his guard down enough for me to narrow down the location. The folder was a bluff and it worked. Tell Ziva I went back to my place when you find her. I’ll have dinner waiting.”
McGee nodded once before jogging out of the room himself. He made a mental note to ask Abby to investigate Agent Reid-she’d been oddly uninterested the first time he and Tony mentioned Reid. But given that the man had just interrogated their prison so she could make their dinner date, he and Tony were going to need some dirt.
Author: jujuberry136
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Reid/Ziva
Warnings: Language, violence
Word Count: ~3000
Summary: Reid and Ziva have a reciprocal arrangement. In the same ‘verse as Some Days you’re the Statue (from my Five Times Reid is More Social Than You Think drabbles) and Coffee.
Note: Thanks so much to ambrosia4all for the fantastic beta, and for not killing me when I consistently gave her too much to read with too little notice.
“So this is the man that stabbed Spencer?” asked a quiet voice behind Morgan’s left shoulder.
Morgan and Prentiss both jumped. Morgan turned around and was ready to give whoever had snuck up on him a piece of his mind when he realized who the brunette standing behind him was.
“Agent David?” Prentiss asked. Morgan shot her a look, how did Prentiss know her? Morgan had briefly mentioned the NCIS agents he and Reid had worked with on the Bernero and Belisario case but as far as he knew the two women had never come in contact. And he knew Garcia hadn’t told her that Reid was dating Agent David-crazy woman had threatened to post the video she filmed of him doing the Snoopy Dance if he told. He should have known better than to allow Garcia access to technology during the team’s annual Christmas party.
“Is that him?” David replied pointing to Interrogation Room Three, where a man handcuffed to a table could be seen through a small window on the door.
Morgan replied, “Yeah.”
At David’s sharp look, Prentiss hurried to explain further. “Robert Polansz, thirty-seven, preferential pedophile with sadistic tendencies. We’ve got enough to charge him with five murders, but he’s not talking about where he’s holding Veronica Warner.”
“She’s the seven year old kidnapped from Silver Spring?” David asked.
“Three days ago,” Morgan confirmed. “We caught a lucky break earlier this morning when interviewing the neighbor, gave us enough of a description of the car that we were able to narrow the suspect list.”
“Too bad that luck did not expand to Spencer,” David sniped.
Prentiss’ hand was on Morgan’s shoulder before he had the chance to respond, so he settled for grinding out, “It was an accident. Polansz grabbed a knife and Reid was closest.” Seeing the horrified expression he relented and said, “Hotch is with him now, I can call to see if hospital’s allowing visitors if you want to check on him in person.”
Agent David folded her arms across her chest. “Spencer is still in surgery. I have approximately forty minutes before I need to leave to make it to the hospital in time to meet him in recovery.”
Prentiss blinked. “How the hell do you know that? We’ve been calling Hotch every twenty minutes and all he says is they haven’t given him any information.”
“Even Garcia couldn’t find anything,” Morgan muttered.
“Agent DiNozzo’s promiscuity came in useful for once,” David replied over her shoulder as she walked away from the desk Morgan had taken over during the investigation.
“Wait a minute,” Morgan called. “Where are you going?”
“When Spencer wakes up I’d like to tell him the girl has been found. He’ll want to know,” she replied as she continued to walk.
Prentiss and Morgan looked at each other awkwardly. “So you knew about Reid and Agent David?” Morgan asked Prentiss when he was sure the NCIS agent was out of earshot.
“Walked in on one of their dates,” Prentiss replied. “You?”
“Found out during the assist with NCIS last month. Little jerk abandoned me with two of the NCIS guys and no car,” Morgan said with a frown.
“I’m surprised you managed to keep your mouth shut this long,” Prentiss teased.
“Garcia blackmailed me into silence,” Morgan grumbled. “I have no clue what Reid’s got on her, but it must be good.”
Prentiss grinned. “Sometimes it disturbs me how easily professional boundaries get crossed on this team.”
“Oh please,” Morgan said. “We live out of each other’s pockets three weeks out of the month. If that doesn’t make you family, I don’t know what does.”
“I don’t know, I’ve always thought biology played some role,” Rossi said as he walked into the room.
“How’s the interrogation going?” Prentiss asked sympathetically.
“Polansz is still keeping quiet,” Rossi replied disgustedly, sitting on the corner of Morgan’s borrowed desk. He covered his face with his hand, “We’re running out of time though.”
“Rossi?” Morgan asked after a moment, looking towards the interrogation room door curiously.
“Yeah?”
“If you’re out here and Polansz has refused a lawyer, who’s in interrogation with him now?”
The three agents ran across the room to question the police officer stationed outside the room. “Who’s in there now?” Rossi demanded. “I told you not to let anyone in there while I was gone!”
Morgan peered through the door’s small window. He couldn’t make many details beyond the fact that there were two people in the room-the window was only meant to help attending officers with physical checks, ensuring suspects were still in custody.
Officer Todd shrugged. “She had federal ID, said it’d be fine. It’s been real quiet, I didn’t think there’d be a problem.”
“She? Who exactly did you let in to talk to Polansz?” Prentiss asked, trepidation laced in every word.
Before Officer Todd could respond, the interrogation room door opened and Agent David exited. She grinned smugly for a moment and raised an eyebrow. “I think he has something he’d like to tell you now,” she told Rossi.
Rossi looked confused. “Who are you and what the hell were you doing talking to my suspect?”
“Special Agent Ziva David, currently with NCIS,” she replied easily. “I think Mr. Polansz would rather tell you himself, he was quite insistent on that actually.”
“We’re over fifty miles from the nearest naval base, what the hell is NCIS’ interest in the case?” Rossi asked belligerently.
“Personal,” David replied shortly. “And I thought you’d be more interested in what your suspect has to say. Not to mention grateful-I understand he wasn’t exactly a chatty Kathryn for you.”
“Chatty Cathy,” Morgan corrected quietly.
Before Rossi could explode, Prentiss intervened. “Rossi, why don’t you go and find out what Mr. Polansz has to say-we really can’t waste any time. Morgan and I’ll talk to Agent David here.”
“Fine,” Rossi bit off as he stalked into the interrogation room. Oddly enough, it seemed Mr. Polansz was relieved to see him. As the door closed, Morgan and Prentiss could hear a steady stream of detailed directions flow from the suspect. Morgan could only hope they weren’t going to be sent on a wild goose chase.
Agent David was heading to the exit, checking her cell phone as she walked.
“Wait a minute,” Prentiss called to her retreating back. “Where are you going?”
“Spencer got out of surgery early,” David replied. “According to the nurse, he should be fine. I’m off to the hospital-make sure you’ve called with the status of the girl by the time he’s recovered from the anesthesia.”
The BAU members watched as she made her way out of the station. “How do you think she made him change his mind about talking?” Prentiss asked.
Morgan stared at her for a moment suspiciously. “You saw Spencer Reid on a date and didn’t go blabbing to Garcia immediately to hack her info?”
“Well,” Prentiss started, her face starting to heat up. “I meant to, but somehow work kept getting in the way-and after a week it wasn’t like I could tell her. You know how she is! She’d kill me for keeping it from her that long!”
“So you decided to keep it from her longer?” Morgan teased. “Sounds like someone’s high school pictures are going to be making reappearance.”
“Shut up,” Prentiss said. After a long moment, she asked him, “What did you mean about hacking her info? And what does that have to do with making Polansz talk? She’s an NCIS officer, they’re not exactly the world’s best interrogators.”
“She’s on loan,” Morgan replied. “Agent David is Mossad.”
Prentiss blinked. She opened her mouth, then shut it again. Finally, she said, “Are you telling me Spencer Reid is dating an international assassin? Who may have just tortured our suspect into telling where he stashed Veronica Webb so Spencer would be happy when he woke up from surgery?”
Morgan nodded slowly. “When pretty boy goes for it, he goes big.”
Prentiss grinned. “You probably don’t want to call him that anymore, Agent David might get jealous.” She looked over her shoulder to peer through the small window to Interrogation Room Three. “And I don’t think we’d like her when she’s angry.”
Morgan glowered at her. “Oh, you think you’re funny do you? Think you’re going to hold that over my head?” Prentiss nodded gleefully, the expression melting off her face when Morgan pulled out his cell phone.
“Hey Mama,” he said. “Guess what? Apparently Prentiss knew about Reid and Ziva.”
Judging from the predatory smile on Morgan’s face, Prentiss wasn’t looking forward to work tomorrow.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
McGee slammed his fist on his desk, then immediately regretted it. As he grimaced and rubbed his left hand tenderly, the elevator dinged. He looked up and his face immediately fell when he saw it wasn’t Gibbs.
“Sorry to disappoint,” the tall man said responding to McGee’s facial expression. “Is Ziva in? She was supposed to meet me an hour ago and isn’t answering her phone.”
Crap. This was Supervisory Special Agent Reid, Ziva’s…boyfriend. McGee still had issues with that one, but nowhere near the size of Tony’s. The man hadn’t shut up for three weeks after Ziva had ditched him and the other FBI agent to go on a date with Reid. McGee privately suspected that Ziva threatened Tony into silence-the man hadn’t teased her about her “geeky studmuffin” for the last two weeks.
Agent Reid raised an eyebrow and looked around the empty bullpen quizzically. McGee also looked around, praying someone else would come up to spare him having to break the news. Finally, McGee said, “We actually don’t know where Ziva is right now. She, um, went to interview a suspect and hasn’t checked in yet.”
“Is this the case she’s been working on with the military base bombings?” Reid asked slowly.
McGee nodded. “We’re doing everything we can to find her. Gibbs is out now, Tony’s interviewing our best suspect now, and I’m tracing the money flow. We’ve got a good start.”
“Then why is there a countdown on the monitor?” Reid asked, pointing above McGee’s head.
Crap. This is why he always left Tony or Ziva to explain things to the family. “There might be another bombing planned,” McGee mumbled, ducking down to focus again on the computer screen.
“Probie! Stoddert’s a bust. Every time I press him he starts talking about lawyers. Please tell me you’ve had better luck,” Tony yelled as he entered the room. He stopped short at the sight of Agent Reid. “What are you doing here?”
“Ziva was supposed to meet me an hour ago and wasn’t answering her phone. Thought I’d see if she was stuck in the office,” Reid replied, jamming his hands into his pockets.
“I thought you weren’t supposed to be moving around, weren’t you in the hospital or something?” Tony asked.
“Hospital?” McGee questioned. How did Tony know and he didn’t? Though on second thought, it might explain why Ziva took two personal days last week.
“I’m fine,” Reid said shortly. “What’s going on with Ziva?”
“Look, there’s nothing you can do. Give McGeek your number and we’ll call you when there’s news,” Tony said in a surprisingly gentle voice.
“You’re dealing with a serial bomber, right?” Reid questioned. “I deal with serial offenders all the time. It doesn’t make any sense for me to go home.” He pulled a chair up to McGee’s desk, “Can you show me the locations of the previous bombs?”
McGee looked at Tony questioningly, but the senior agent only sighed and looked up. “Gibbs is going to kill me,” Tony muttered before sitting down to brief Agent Reid.
The younger agent listened raptly to the details of the case, then turned and stared at the map for a few moments. “You said he’s playing like he’ll ask for a lawyer, right?” Reid asked Tony, who nodded slowly. “I have an idea, but you’re probably not going to like it.”
Tony was still muttering under his breath when he and McGee stepped behind the two-way mirror. McGee turned to him and said, “Tony, Gibbs is not going to kill you if this works. It’s not like he’s known for following the rules himself.”
“This is breaking one of his rules Probie, which is way worse than breaking one of Vance’s,” Tony replied after checking to make sure they were alone in the room. “Which one?” McGee asked curiously. Though he had worked for the man for over five years, Gibbs’ rules were still a bit of a mystery-he only learned new ones when he broke them.
“Rule thirty three-never let the FBI do what you can,” Tony recited dutifully.
McGee grimaced. Yeah, this was going to be hard to swing. “What if we tell him we were following rule eighteen?”
Tony thought for a minute, “Worth a try. What the hell is taking Agent Bean Pole so long to get in there?”
“He was waiting for a binder last I saw,” McGee responded.
When Reid finally entered the interrogation room, both NCIS agents were surprised. Gone was the quietly confident man who had entered looking for Ziva. Instead they saw a pale man, his body obscured by the stack of large binders he was awkwardly balancing in front of him, with several file folders precariously stuck under his arms. Agent Reid staggered to the table and dropped the binders with an audible thump.
Stoddert had been surprised when the door opened, though by the Reid managed to arrange the binders and folders to his liking and found the chair Stoddert’s face relaxed into a poor imitation of carelessness. “I thought you guys couldn’t talk to me once I asked for a lawyer,” he asked once Reid sat down.
“Oh, I’m just here to do your intake paperwork,” Reid replied hurriedly. “Did you ask for a lawyer? Because there are a lot of questions here and I need to get them in ASAP.”
“What kind of questions?” Stoddert replied.
“Did you ask for a lawyer?” Reid countered. “I got in trouble last week for doing in-take processing last week because my asshole boss didn’t bother to tell me he’d asked for one. I got written up and everything.”
“Someone’s always trying to screw you right?” Stoddert answered, shaking his head in sympathy. “I know how that goes. Why’s he riding you?” At Reid’s look, he finally said, “No, I didn’t ask for a lawyer-you happy now?”
“Look, I already told you, I’m on probation. I have to ask or my boss is going to fire me, he just hates me because he knows I’m in line for his job,” Reid said as he opened the first of the two massive binders. “Can you spell your last name for me?”
McGee watched as Reid continued to ask Stoddert basic questions that slowly drew some personality out of the previously passive-aggressive man. Reid asked about his address, birth date, family, and job-and McGee had never realized the world of paper shredding could have such vicious internal politics.
Every so often Reid would check materials in one of the loose folders on top of the binders and then rearrange the folders in some new order. After about five minutes Reid said, “Hey, wait a minute, you’ve been in here for hours and they haven’t gotten you anything to drink? That’s ridiculous, you want water? Coffee?”
“Coffee’d be great, thanks,” replied Stoddert.
“What the hell is he doing?” Tony asked McGee quietly. “This isn’t going anywhere!”
Reid stood up and knocked one of the folders free from its perch on the second. It hit the table and sheets of paper fly out, several landing in front of Stoddert. While Reid nervously cursed under his breath, Stoddert picked up several sheets of paper. His face turned white. “How’d you get these?” he demanded.
“What are you talking about?” Reid asked as he continued to shove papers back into the file folder.
Stoddert froze, then hastily shuffled the papers in his hand. “Right, of course. Never mind, got confused there,” he laughed nervously.
“Can I have the papers back?” Reid asked mildly, confusion still playing across his face. “Sorry about that, did you say you wanted water or coffee?” Stoddert’s eyes widened, “Water’s fine. Just great. Thanks a lot.”
Reid exited the interrogation room and entered the backroom quickly. “Well, you were right about one thing,” Tony said when Reid closed the door. “I didn’t like that. What a huge waste of time!”
Reid glared at him and waved the folder in front of his face. “If you consider finding out where the next target is a huge waste of time, then yes I can understand why you didn’t like it.”
“Wait, what?” Tony asked.
Reid opened the folder and pulled out a map of a suburb of Anacostia. “This is what he freaked out over, the next bomb is most likely in this area. My best guess is here,” he pointed to a two-block circle outlined in red.
Tony grabbed the map and ran out of the room. McGee could hear echoes of his call to Gibbs as the senior agent ran for the garage. Knowing he had only moments before DiNozzo reached the garage and left without him, he still had to ask, “How?”
Reid grinned. “I like maps and patterns,” he replied. “And Stoddert’s a classic narcissist-Agent DiNozzo’s intimidating, I’m not. He let his guard down enough for me to narrow down the location. The folder was a bluff and it worked. Tell Ziva I went back to my place when you find her. I’ll have dinner waiting.”
McGee nodded once before jogging out of the room himself. He made a mental note to ask Abby to investigate Agent Reid-she’d been oddly uninterested the first time he and Tony mentioned Reid. But given that the man had just interrogated their prison so she could make their dinner date, he and Tony were going to need some dirt.