The next morning, Jen and Deeks flanked by Sam and Kensi arrived at the mission.
Sam looked up and gave a slight smile.
Jen glared at him, and moved to stand beside her brother.
"Mr. Deeks, Miss Brandel…My office if you please." Hetty said. They walked off to Hetty's office and Callen walked up to Sam,
"We need to talk." He said and walked off in the direction of the gym.
"OK so what's this about?" Sam asked.
"Deeks is joining NCIS." Callen told him.
"Really?" Sam replied.
"look I've noticed you've been riding him pretty hard since he started, I calmed down for a while and got worse again after he was shot but you don't seem to trust him like you do the rest of us…Is this going to be a problem him being a full time member of my team?" Callen asked.
"Yes." Sam snapped. "He doesn't take the job seriously, He's always joking around. I don't trust him to watch my back, especially if there is a pretty girl in the vicinity to distract him, he doesn't focus."
"Sam!" Callen exclaimed, some of what Sam said was undoubtedly true, but to say he didn't take the job seriously… "Deeks is the most committed cop I've ever seen and I would trust him with my life."
"You trust him?" Sam was taken aback, Callen didn't trust…ever.
"Yeah, you didn't see him last night, after Hetty left he locked up, made sure Jen was settled and I don't think he slept all I could hear from his room was him moving about, He gave up his job at LAPD for her…his only focus is that she makes it out alive."
Sam stared at his partner. "But he's lied to us…for years!"
"Sam! He's in the witness protection program, it's need to know…we didn't, would you think he'd call you a liar because you haven't told him about the classified missions you went on as a seal?"
"That's different!" Sam countered.
"Yeah..." Callen was really mad and walked a few steps away from Sam, "Well it's the best I can come up with...Am I a liar because you never knew I was Romanian or that I came from a family with a gypsy blood feud!"
"You didn't know." Sam said softly trying to placate his friend.
"I did…somewhere in this jumbled up mess of my head I knew…" Callen replied.
"I…" Sam didn't know what to say.
"Deeks is now a member of this team Sam, so whatever crawled up your butt….get over it! For the team, when this is over take him out get to know him, the real him…Make an effort Sam." Callen growled and stalked off.
Sam sat on a bench. He hated it, he hated the face Callen was right, he had fallen for the false personality that Deeks showed he needed to know how much of that was really Deeks/Brandel or whoever he was. But that right now didn't matter, what he was right now was a teammate and he needed him to stick by him and by God that was exactly what Sam was going to do.
Deeks and Jen walked into Hetty's office and Deeks put an envelope on Hetty's desk.
"Is it signed Mr. Deeks?" Hetty asked.
"No." Deeks replied.
Jen and Hetty both looked at Deeks in shock.
"I can't…I want this so bad, but I can't sign if I'm gonna lose it again." Deeks said his sadness and tiredness evident.
Hetty handed the siblings each a cup of tea and motioned them to sit down.
"Before you gave me these papers, did you tell Director Vance, who I really am?" Deeks asked.
