One day, Kate swore, she would find a way to make sure she was able to work with people that were genetically unable to hold an intelligent conversation about hamburgers.
DiNozzo sat there beside her, riding shotgun, nibbling at the bread roll and meat patty while he read over a hastily put-together history of Burke's military career. He occasionally threw comments over his shoulder about deployments and awards, which at least made more sense than the occasional remark about the quality of different brands of mustard. He had an unerring sense of timing, because every time Kate's fingers were starting to itch to hit him like a naughty puppy, he would turn around and say that there had been an ambush on Burke's platoon reported a year ago, and they could maybe check that out this afternoon.
"So, what do you think about all of this?" Tony asked. He stepped out of the sedan and tore his crime scene jacket off.
"About all of what?" Kate returned, mirroring his actions.
"You know. Burley."
Kate smiled her disappointment. She wondered how long it was going to take before DiNozzo finally let that jealousy sizzle to the surface.
"Please, DiNozzo. Don't start this again."
"Don't start what?"
"I told you a year ago. It's a completely different thing. Between you and Gibbs and Gibbs and Burley."
"And if I remember correctly, I had as little idea of what you were talking about then as I do now," he said, flicking on his sunglasses and sports jacket.
"Come on, Tony. Gibbs' probably never had a field agent work under him that didn't fall madly at his feet in desperate need of praise. And he's probably never had one that he did eventually step down to and give a little bit." Tony didn't say anything. He rotated his McDonalds cup on the roof of the car but didn't drink. "He's closer to you, though," she finally said. "In my opinion."
"He isn't."
"So you are jealous?"
"It's not the same thing."
Kate smiled proudly, taking a step up on to the porch.
Tony scoffed when he realised what she'd done. And besides, he wasn't. Just because Gibbs had come to Burley's rescue, just because, for all the much-touted favouritism that he'd heard so much about from Ducky and Abby, Burley wasn't the one on Gibbs' team anymore. He was. And because Gibbs had spoken to him within a year of working together. And he had known his name after two. And got it right.
To their surprise, the door opened as Tony and Kate climbed onto the Burke family's front patio. A woman stood back in the shadows, propping the security door open for them with one foot.
The house was spectacular. Stone brick walls surrounded the manor like a heavily guarded castle and the luscious gardens and elegant wrought-iron fences were reminiscent of the kind you imagine in childhood horror stories. It was what Kate and Tony had expected from the billionaire media mogul turned politician, but that made it no less impressive.
"I thought NCIS would show up soon," the elderly woman said tonelessly. "Although I expected to see Stan first."
Tony dropped his shoulders and looked to her with soft eyes. "Ashleigh Burke?" he asked quietly.
She stepped aside. They accepted her invitation silently.
The house was as clean and magnificent as the exterior. The floorboard was smooth and sleek with polish and the furniture was all dark, hardwood timber with expensive trimmings and cuts. Tony and Kate followed the woman's winding path, but she stayed ahead of them, never turning around. They were left with her back - - her small shoulders and her bobbing blonde hair. She made her way into the living room and offered them a seat, which they both accepted graciously.
Ashleigh Burke brought Kate a cup of coffee and then asked Tony if he wanted anything. When he said no, she only stared at him blankly and then retreated to the kitchen again where he heard the minute clangs of pots knocking against each other. Kate put the coffee cup down carefully on the coaster and looked to Tony. He shrugged.
Mrs. Burke finally returned carrying a tray of biscuits and cakes, a teapot, ceramic cups and a sugar pot.
Tony and Kate stared perplexedly at her as she placed the tray on the small table and smiled at them.
"Please, I made them last night," she said. "Take one."
"We're fine thank you," Kate said. She suddenly shot a glare at Tony as she saw him reach out to grab a cream-encrusted tea-cake. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and retreated his fingers like a small boy who'd just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
"Mrs. Burke..." Kate began.
"Please, call me Ashleigh."
"Ashleigh . . . "
"I've never lost a child before," Ashleigh said, a weak smile forcefully pressed into her lips.
Kate and Tony were both silent.
"I have three, so you'd think losing one would be only a third as bad as losing an only child. Perhaps I should feel grateful." A small, pained smile followed.
"Mrs. Burke," Kate said, shifting forward on her seat and clasping her hands together, "Losing only one child should never hurt any less."
Kate knew her words were redundant, but it was what she'd been trained to say. She felt her mouth squirm. She hated talking to people when they were vulnerable like this, open and hurting. Particularly those who'd lost a child. It was like someone had stabbed them through a dozen times and then trusted them to get up and keep going, keep walking. People were counting on them, after all, so all they could do was just press their hands over the cuts to slow the blood-flow. That was grief. Grief was walking wounded, stumbling around, looking straight ahead, and gradually realizing that the blood on the floor wasn't your own, after all.
"Again, Agent Todd, it's Ashleigh."
"Ashleigh," she returned politely, "do you mind if we ask you a few questions about your son?"
She didn't answer at first, just toyed with the ratty belt of her dress, but finally said, "Whatever I can do to help. Ask whatever you need to."
Tony played softball for a few minutes, tossing out easy questions about daily routine and family friends, trying to stop himself from tapping his fingers against the coffee table.
"Did you know of anyone who may have wanted to harm your son?" he asked.
"No," she said. He thought he could hear the low thrum of defensiveness and ferocity in her voice, her anger at being underestimated. "He only made enemies overseas."
"He'd been deployed recently," Kate said. Tony had told her between mouthfuls of burger on the way over.
"To Iraq, last August. He only got back three months ago." She whimpered slightly, as if tears were about to follow.
Tony dove in before they did. "And you haven't noticed any strange behaviour from Harrison lately?"
"No," she said. "We're very close . . . We were very close. I would have asked him if anything was wrong. But I knew all of Harry's friends. Who he worked with. Everyone he knew adored him."
As gently as he could, Tony said, "It may not be someone he knew that we're looking for, Mrs. Burke."
"There wasn't anyone. There wasn't anyone like that. Harry wouldn't have ever gotten himself mixed up with anyone dangerous."
"Ashleigh - - "
"Agent DiNozzo, don't you think I would have known if someone had been . . . wanting to harm my own son?" The anger that had sustained her suddenly rushed out in those words and Tony could only see a woman again, a mother without her child, her fingers knotted in her bathrobe, her hair stringy and oily, and she bit her lip against the tears. "No one - - no one would've gotten Harry mixed up in that kind of life. He never said a word about anything being wrong. He was happy. He was the good one."
The two agents looked pointedly at her. "The good one?" Kate asked.
The woman dropped her eyes to the floor and swallowed. She picked up a teacup resting on its saucer and Kate watched as it began to rattle violently. Ashleigh placed it back on the saucer before it fell with a sharp clank.
"My other son, and my daughter. They - - "
Ashleigh's words choked in her throat.
"Ashleigh, it's okay," Kate said, resting soft eyes and a hand on hers. "Take your time."
"Dean and Emma. They've been . . . The family . . . We don't have much contact with either of them. I couldn't even tell you how to find them." She scrubbed at her eyes with her sleeve.
"Can we ask why?" Tony said.
"Dean. He's, uh - - " Ashleigh quickly looked out the window, as if to find something that would distract her. "Dean tended to spend a lot of his father's money and he . . . he's had a few problems with drugs and . . . You can understand that David feels he needs to keep himself as far from that as possible."
"And Emma?" Tony asked.
"Emma is very close with Dean. They're the two youngest. They share the same social circles, as far as I'm aware. I haven't seen or talked to her in months, agents. I'm very sorry."
"Is it at all possible that Harrison may have told Dean or Emma something that he wouldn't have told you?" Tony asked.
"Harry and Dean were brothers, Agent DiNozzo. They were inseparable from birth until college. But once Dean began to - - " She paused and swallowed painfully. " - - Harry was always the one getting him out of trouble. Debts, money, women. Harry was always there for him, paying off his dues and pulling him out of groups before it got too bad. David and I began to notice that it was getting to him. We told him to leave Dean alone. That if Dean had problems, he needed to sort them out for himself. He didn't talk to his brother for a while, even after he returned from Iraq, but I'm sure it was only to satisfy myself and his father. Harry wasn't the kind of boy to leave his brother in trouble."
"Thank you for your help, Ashleigh," Kate said.
"But - - My, God. You . . . You don't think that this had anything to do with - - " Ashleigh stammered.
"We can't tell you anything at the moment, Ashleigh. But for the time being, nothing points to Dean being involved in any way," Kate said.
Kate knew she was lying through her teeth. More than anything, now at least, they would be turning to Dean's problems for some answers.
"Dean sounds like Harry's unlicensed confidant," Tony said. He peeled off his sunglasses and stepped back into the sedan. "It's not like he's going to let Daddy dearest know if he's got problems going down on the other side of town."
"Don't get too excited, DiNozzo. Dean could also be a dead end," Kate replied. She slammed the door and turned the key in the ignition.
"Could also be a lead, Agent Todd. If you had a brother you'd understand how much they're really willing to share with each other."
"Oh, and an only child would know?" she snapped back.
Tony whipped his head around to face her. He sent her an icy stare and squeezed his jaw together. Kate looked back at him. Maybe it was the midday light coming through the window accentuating the lines across his face, but DiNozzo suddenly looked older. Hurt and misunderstood and old. What had she said?
Tony pursed his lips and exhaled through his nose. "Keep in mind we found Burke out the back of a high-profile underground nightclub, Kate. Probably Dean's kind of atmosphere. It sounds to me like Harry kept Dean out of trouble and Dean kept Harry grounded," he said calmly. "It's a hard life being a Navy Lieutenant about to take over Daddy's billion dollar empire." His final comment was iced with sarcasm.
Tony was right. And at least they had somewhere to go from now. They weren't working blind. Harry may have told Dean something, when he was having a few drinks with him in the local bar or shooting hoops with him at the local court. And if he had said anything, anything at all, they had to find it. It was like doing an autopsy, and they could tell Ducky that - - it was like cutting through the surface and finding all the blood the body had skilfully hid inside.
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.