Tony and Ziva sat at their respective desks in the squad room back in DC.

“Do you think we should have told him” Ziva questioned Tony.

“Shh, Ziva. We are in the squad room” Tony said while looking around. “We can talk, later tonight” he said, knowing Vance could be hiding around the corner.

Ziva nodded her head and got back to doing her paperwork that had been backlogged. As she wrote down mindless information her thoughts drifted back to last week.

They were supposed to be protecting her, and she ended up getting shot. Luckily she had a plan and made it out alive, but just barely. It was torture not to be able to tell Gibbs. The look in his eyes when he arrived at the crime scene tore at her heart and she flashed back to when they found Jenny and Franks in the diner.

They burst through the diner doors with their guns pointed out for potential targets. As soon as they saw the bodies on the floor they quickly lowered their weapons, the targets were already down. They saw Jenny and Franks on the diner floor, Jenny was down and had a small pooling of blood beneath her. Franks was putting pressure on her wound and trying to help her get up so they could get out of this place. Franks saw her and he motioned for both of them to come closer. She and Tony were told to tell no one of Jenny’s situation, and that included Gibbs. They both nodded and Ziva quickly sprang into action, telling Franks to go to the Israeli embassy to get Jenny stitched up and safe from the men that were still following her. When Franks and Jenny left Tony turned to her, “what now” he said looking around.

“I believe it is time to stage a scene Tony” she said, calling the embassy to alert them of Jenny’s arrival.

“You have had at least some training with staging a scene right” he said skeptically.

“It’s in the first page of the handbook Tony, pay attention.”

She started calling all the shots, making sure Tony knew not to touch the body and called in another favor from a contact. She needed someone to take the bodies to the airport and get someone who resembled the Director who was dead and have them all back in Washington DC at the same time. The contact told her he would take care of everything.

Tony had the task of telling Gibbs about the scene, wishing they could somehow clue him in, but knew that was not possible. They needed to get a real reaction from him and the only way they knew to do that was to stick to Mike Franks’ plan.

She had called the embassy again to check on Jenny’s progress and found that she was doing exceptional for a person who took a couple rounds. She made sure the doctors would bag Jenny’s clothes and send them in a box to NCIS.

As her mind drifted back to her paperwork she looked guiltily over at Gibbs’ empty desk, hoping that he wasn’t taking Jenny’s death too hard down in Mexico with Franks.

Tony carefully watched for the new Director as he and Ziva finished up their paperwork. Gibbs was gone to Mexico to most likely down his sorrows, sorrows he shouldn’t have because she wasn’t really dead. It was tough to act like she was dead, and he hoped their performance was Oscar worthy because this would not be happening again. He needed to tell Gibbs when he got back from his vacation. Well whenever he is supposed to return, after all he didn’t specify when he’d be back, all he knew was he was team leader again until Gibbs got back.

Vance came up slowly behind them, quietly as to not let them tune into the fact that he was there trying to eavesdrop. But Gibbs must have taught them well because they weren’t saying a thing to each other, in fact they didn’t look at each other, they only had eyes for their paper work, which was slowly building up in the completed pile on Gibbs’ desk.

“Tony, Ziva” the Director said.

They both looked up at him from their paperwork.

“No cases have come in, your paperwork is practically done. Take the rest of the night off” he said, putting a toothpick in his mouth.

“Alright” they both stated at the same time.

Vance nodded a goodnight and went back upstairs to his office, leaving Tony and Ziva to collect their things to go home. Once packed they called Abby’s lab and told them they were done for the day and then quickly headed for the elevator.

They reached the parking lot and went to their respected cars, each nodding to the other, the code for going to the safe house to talk.

As they reached the house they each pulled into the driveway, and ran up to the front door. He found the spare key and opened the door, pushing it open and proceeded into the darkened entry way.

“Feels weird. Him not being here, us creeping around” Tony said flipping on a light.

“Oh shut up Tony” Ziva said as she went to the kitchen, hoping Gibbs had something besides coffee in his pantry.

Tony followed her to the kitchen and looked around, “looks like it has a womanly feel, you think” he trailed off.

Ziva looked back at him and shot him a look, “I wouldn’t know. When did they ever confide in us about their personal life Tony?”

“True Ziva. But still, don’t you wonder if they ever got back together? I bet we could have made big money with that” Tony rubbed his hands as Ziva brought out some chips from the pantry.

“All I could find” she stated, throwing the chips at him to open.

“Think he’s got something to drink?” Tony looked around.

“Basement” they both said at the same time.

Heading to the basement and turning on the light Ziva froze. There were boxes next to the boat Gibbs was building. Not just any boxes, they were full of Jenny’s things.

Tony noticed all the boxes and looked toward his workbench, noticing the bottle that looked out of place in this dusty dungeon. “Look” he said quietly to Ziva, pointing to the workbench with his chin.

Ziva looked towards the wall and noticed the bottle, recalling she had seen it at Jenny’s on the occasions of ‘girl bonding time’, well that’s how Abby put it anyway.

“We have to tell him Ziva. He shouldn’t have to go through this” Tony said, moving back towards the stairs.

“You heard Franks. We can’t” Ziva said exasperated.

“Damn it Ziva. Look at his basement. Does it look like he is okay? He has boxes of her stuff, that’s no way to remember a person” Tony shouted at her, gesturing to her the condition of Gibbs’ basement.

“If he isn’t okay after he returns from Mexico we will tell him. But he went to Mexico to grieve, if he comes back at least a shiver happier we don’t tell him” Ziva shouted back at Tony.

“Sliver Ziva, sliver, not shiver” Tony said automatically. “Fine” he agreed.

They went back upstairs, grabbing the chips and shutting out all the lights as they headed out the front door again. “Dinner” Tony questioned Ziva.

Ziva nodded, “my place, don’t get lost.”

They both headed back to their respective cars, Ziva getting in her Mini Cooper and zooming off to her apartment. Tony stared at his boss’ empty house, wishing that he could ease Gibbs’ pain, but knew his boss wouldn’t open up to him. In fact, Tony thought, the only person he fully opened up to is suppose to be dead. He banished that thought from his head and got in his car, heading off to Ziva’s place where they would hopefully come up with some sort of strategy to tell Gibbs that Jenny wasn’t dead.