Rule 12

Bullpen chatter.

Tony’s PoV

Phew, that was close I thought as I heaved a huge sigh of relief. Since when did I come that close to admitting my feelings like that!? Thankfully I had caught myself and managed an okay-ish save though I knew Ziva hadn’t believed me even for a minute. As long as I was careful for the rest of the day I should be able to get away with it. Or I could hope for the case to get more and more complicated as I knew that Ziva would throw herself into it with gusto, therefore not bringing up the topic again. Sitting down at my desk I began to do some research into Mary Seaford’s family, I knew that McGee would be looking at bank and phone records while Ziva would probably start researching into what the Petty Officer was working on. We decided to split the jobs up like this a long time ago so that we would be able to have the start of a profile by the time Gibbs walked in and we had to report to him.

The sounds of typing soon died down as we finished finding everything that was easy to find and set up searches for any other information that we may have missed. Going by the looks on the others faces it didn’t look like they had found anything that relevant to the case. To be honest, I hadn’t found anything too relevant either despite their being some slightly depressing information in Seaford’s file. I was just opening my mouth to start a conversation while we waited for Gibbs as Ziva’s phone rang. She had been on it most of the morning trying to get some background information regarding Seaford’s naval career but it didn’t sound like she was having much luck.

 Sure enough this phone call went much the same way the others did with Ziva ending it by slamming the phone down and swearing at it in typical Ziva fashion.

“Being stonewalled Zee-Vah?”I asked her, keeping my tone level. There was no way I was slipping up again.

“No one is giving me anything!” She said, exasperated.

McGee looked at her sympathetically, “Don’t worry Ziva, I haven’t found anything either.”

“It is not that I have not found anything McGee! It is that I am unable to access it,” Ziva felt the need to point out, “I have found a court case linked to the Petty Officer but I cannot see any information about it at all! I have phoned everybody I can think of including her previous CO from two years ago. The only people I did not phone were the family because I thought Tony would have done that.”

“You thought right,” I told her, “but I didn’t know anything about a court case.”

“That is alright. It does not look as if many people knew about it anyway. I will just have to wait for her current CO to email me back; he said it would take a couple of days though.”

“Gibbs isn’t going to like that,” I said while McGee wore a face that said much the same.

“I am well aware of this Tony.”

“Oh. Well I just thought I’d remind you. So has anybody got anything relating to the case?” I felt the need to ask. McGee and Ziva both shook their heads at that one. I could feel the beginnings of a smile slip on to my face.

“Don’t tell us Tony, you do.” McGee said.

“I have more than either of you two do. A possible reason for her joining the navy.”

“Are you going to tell us what or do we just have to read your mind,” Ziva muttered obviously getting irritated.

“Oh don’t worry Zee-Vah, I intend to tell you.”

“Well we do not have all year Tony. We have a murderer to catch.”

“I had noticed Ziva and the phrase is all day not all year. Our Petty Officer had a younger sister who was killed in a hit and run 3 months prior to Seaford joining up,” I finally relented. The smile on my face getting bigger.

“And you think that is something to be happy about Tony? You are so insensitive. You have no idea what it is like to lose a sister!” Ziva’s tone was getting louder by the second. Way to put your foot in it DiNozzo I thought.

“I wasn’t smiling at that Ziva. It’s a horrible thing to happen.”

“Then what were you smiling about. I know you. You were probably imagining how good looking she would be if she was still alive aren’t you?”

“NO Ziva. I am not. Just let me explain!” I said, getting annoyed as well.

“Explain what DiNozzo?” Gibbs said walking into the bullpen and heading into the middle beside the screen.

“Err, what we have not found regarding Petty Officer Mary Seaford,” I said as we all followed him over like well-trained dogs.

“I would prefer to hear what you have got.” I sighed and handed McGee the remote, figuring it was probably safer than handing it to Ziva who looked like she wanted to take my arm off and beat me to death with the soggy end.

Completely ignoring what was going on McGee got started, “Looks like she received several phone calls and texts from people all the time. There were four numbers that appear a lot though; one I traced back to her mother who she called every Sunday afternoon, the other three appear to be from untraceable prepaid cells though I’m looking to see if I can tell where they were purchased from,” McGee finished on the phone records before clicking the remote to bring up the victims bank records, “Normal bank statements boss. Apart from the apparent trouble with saving, though who isn’t low on cash in today’s economy, there’s nothing out of the ordinary in them.”

This was my cue to take the remote out of McGee’s hand and start talking about Seaford’s family, not that I had much to say on them. “She grew up in Chicago before moving here. Her parents, Natalie and Darien, still live there along with her youngest brother, Andrew. She was the oldest of three with her sister, Katrina, dying in a hit and run when Mary was 16- her sister was only 12. Joined the Navy pretty soon after and has been there ever since.”

“This hit and run,” Gibbs said, “Anymore information on it?”

“It was a drunk driver that hit Katrina as she was crossing the road after school one day. She was with a group of friends, one’s paralysed from the waist down and the others have all recovered. Katrina was the only fatality. The driver died in prison a couple of months later from liver disease.”

“Make a note of names and addresses, we may need to pay them a visit,” Gibbs told me.

Before I could answer Ziva jumped in, “her service record is clean Gibbs. Joined straight out of high school and has worked in the same unit ever since. She works on the paper trail, keeping track of anything that is sent to American troops. How much, who received it, what it is that sort of thing. As a result she has been out of the country a lot to find missing goods.”

“Any possible link to them and our murder?” Gibbs asked the million dollar question.

“There is evidence of a court case,” Ziva told him, “Unfortunately I have been unable to find out any information on it yet and I cannot get any until 2 days time.”

Gibbs sighed and appeared to be thinking. “Keep working on it Ziver, McGee I want to know where those phones came from. Tony you’re with me.” His tone of voice changed completely as he turned to me and this worried me a little. I did as I was told and dutifully followed him with one thought occupying my head.

What on earth had I done to warrant this tone of voice?