"Suicide?" Burley choked. "Impossible, Gibbs."
"Because?" the voice crackled through the cell phone.
Burley flicked his overcoat out from within the car and slammed the door behind him. "Because, I said so. Harry was not suicidal."
"And what if he was?"
"And if he was, he wouldn't have done it out the back of some deadbeat nightclub."
Gibbs was silent. He knew Burley was right. Marines died with honour and pride, not with a gunshot to the heart in the middle of some putrid alley. But a profession couldn't be used as evidence.
"The evidence shows otherwise."
"The evidence shows that he was shot with his own gun, Gibbs. Doesn't mean he pulled the trigger."
"The gun was found in his hand, Stan. And there aren't any other fingerprints."
Burley stopped walking abruptly. The tension in his shoulders suddenly climbed to his neck. "You know damn well that there are a hundred other reasons why that could be."
"And suicide's a viable one of them, Stan."
Burley scowled quietly. "You know what, Gibbs, you hired me because you trusted me as an investigator. You pulled me back on to this team because you trusted my knowledge of the victim. You called to ask if I thought suicide was a viable route and I've said no. Now either accept or reject my opinion, stop pussy-footing around and let me get back to my job."
Burley hung up.
He exhaled violently and thrust his cell phone back in to his pocket.
He'd never done that before. He took a wild stab in the dark and guessed that no one had ever done that before. Gibbs hung up on you, not the other way around.
Still, Gibbs should have known better than to ask him back on to the team and not expect there to be some frustration. One of his best friends was dead, for God's sake. Harry was dead. Harry. Harry from downtown New York who was always pointing out the perfect girl for him sitting at the other end of the bar or beating him sixty-one – twelve in weekend basketball. And he was dead. And that was just - - unacceptable. An offence. Things like death didn't happen to people like Harry. Dead was permanent. No one could fix dead. Not even Gibbs. He wanted to grieve and Gibbs hadn't given him space to grieve. The killer hadn't given him space to grieve.
He was allowed to grieve. He had a right to grieve. And if making icy comments to Ducky and hanging up on Gibbs was the way he had to do it, then everyone had to wake up and damn well realise that.
Burley let a long breath escape through his nose and finally calmed himself, pulling his overcoat off as he walked into Club Neon.
The club seemed to be all one room at first glance. A huge concrete dance floor was surrounded by neon pattern-coated walls that seemed to just drift off into darkness, leaving more than a hundred square feet of space for deeds to stay hidden. Multicoloured fluorescent lights were stamped to the high ceiling and Burley could count next to fifty industrial-power studio lamps around the corners and stage that would no doubt be used for strobing.
Once your eyes had adjusted, however, it became apparent that this was merely "the commoner's" ground, the floor still slick and sticky from alcohol, and still littered with dead glow-sticks and broken heels from the night before. In the far right corner Burley could see a small, glowing red hallway leading off toward backstage. The back left had an equivalent, flooded with a lime green glow that would put Hollywood alien tractor beams to shame. As he turned to look around the room, more and more doors sporadically appeared, hidden in the shadows behind couches and booths.
He turned his attention back to the one man standing behind the bar. He looked young, no older than twenty-five, and was delicately washing out martini flutes and shot glasses.
"Special Agent Burley. NCIS." He flipped his I.D. wallet out and over.
"You're here about the dead guy out the back, right?"
"Right."
"Can't tell you much. I did serve him almost every time he was at the bar, though. That shirt was pretty hard to forget. Looked like he was in some Havana club in Cuba. Gave him rounds of five tequila shots all night. Came to the bar a few times with another guy and sometimes a really good-looking blonde chick. Don't think she was his girlfriend, though. The guy was getting pretty drunk, and unless he was gay, he would've had his hand snaking up her top within four shots."
"I don't know if Lieutenant Burke was the kind of guy to - - "
"Look, believe me Agent Burley, if you saw this girl, you'd understand."
Burley eyed the barman for a moment. If there was one thing he had picked up as his years as an agent it was that barmen and bargirls picked up on a hell of a lot more than people gave them credit for. They profiled their customers better than most professionals; they were able to tell you exactly what kind of money John Doe entered the club with, how likely he was to be pulling or puking on the dance floor, and even if Johnny Boy had gone home with Blonde #3 or Brunette #5, whether they'd seen them leave or not.
"How drunk was he?" Burley asked.
"Look, he was by no means stumbling around the floor or throwing up in the corner, but he definitely would've been heading that way had he not stopped when he did."
"And what time was that?"
"Probably around two-thirty, maybe three."
"And you never saw who he was here with?"
"Like I said, another guy and that girl came to the bar a few times with him, and he was ordering five shots at a time, but other than that, I have no idea. All I know was that he had a damn good time while he was inside."
- - - -
Ducky looked worn. His field examination of the body had been clipped and concise, with no divergences in the flow of thought, and that, if nothing else, had told Gibbs that the case was taking its toll on him. Or at least Burley was taking his toll on him. He'd heard Burley's remark before they'd left the crime scene.
Hell, he could sympathise. He only had to find the bodies. Ducky was the one who had to cut them open, had to be shut in with them for hours in autopsy, and his refusal to let them be just empty flesh multiplied the problem. Ducky didn't see a shell. He saw a young man, still there, still present. And then he had to reach in and cut out his torn and mangled heart.
Gibbs could never have done it. There was a reason Ducky was one of the best men he knew.
"It is possible, Jethro. The angle of the bullet's trajectory is consistent with the Lieutenant having fired upon himself. Although, in my professional opinion, it's still far less likely - - "
"What else did you find, Duck?"
Ducky sighed. "Internally, his body was the picture of perfect health. A non-smoker, heart was in good order. Even his liver was far less damaged than most men his age. An average marine."
"And externally?"
"The beating that the Lieutenant received was indeed inflicted before his death. You can see here," Ducky pointed to the X-Ray on the light-board, "mild amounts of internal bleeding and a very small level of cerebral haemorrhaging. Although, they weren't the cause of his death. As I suspected, that prize went to the bullet wound." Ducky paused quickly, as if stopping to form his next sentence. "I can also tell you now that whoever did this had training, Jethro. The blows to his chest and head were selective and precise. There are hardly any wayward bruises on his shoulders or the neck. In a usual beating or mugging, the bruising is messy and sporadic, spread out all over the body. These injuries are consistent with an attacker who knew exactly where to hit. Specific ribs. The temple. The base of the skull."
"Military training?" Gibbs asked.
"I couldn't say. Although there is one other thing I need to show you . . . "
Ducky picked up Burke's right arm by the wrist and twisted the hand around to face Gibbs. He pointed at the knuckles. "There are hardly any defensive wounds anywhere on his hands or arms. And neither myself nor Mr. Palmer could find any scrapings from under his nails. If the victim struggled, he didn't begin until it was far too late."
"Also consistent with a suicide, Duck."
Ducky sighed. "Jethro, I believe you're coming off as rather cold-hearted to Agent Burley at the moment. I don't see why you're so adamant that the lieutenant committed - - "
"Ducky, I am not the one being adamant. I am following the trail that the evidence leaves us, not relying on friends' opinions to sway my own. Yes, I brought Stan back because he has insight into the victim's life. No, I'm not going to base our entire investigation on every word that he says about him."
Ducky paused and looked softly at Gibbs. The man was right. Gibbs wasn't being cold. He was just doing his job.
Ducky sighed. "Well, if indeed it was a suicide, then yes. The lack of wounding is consistent. But if it was a murder - - "
" - - Then he didn't fight back," Gibbs finished, already stepping through the sliding doors.
- - - -
"Okay," Tony said, flicking the plasma on. "So we have Lieutenant Harrison Burke. Thirty-four. Marine. Heir to Daddy's publishing empire. Shot out the back of Club Neon on Saturday morning. Ducky confirms time-of-death to be approximately three am."
"Right," Kate replied, getting up from her desk. She walked to Tony's side in front of the plasma. "Now let's just say, for theory's sake, it wasn't suicide." She looked gently at Burley, who was leaning against Gibbs' desk. He returned a soft smile. "We know that he got in at around midnight. So that means, within the space of those three hours, he met someone who wanted him dead."
"Or they could've come in with him," Burley answered, crossing his arms. "Bartender said that he was ordering rounds of five shots all night. He was there with four other people. We know at least one male and one female and that the woman wasn't his girlfriend."
"You trust the bartender that much?" Tony asked.
"I trust my gut, DiNozzo. Harry didn't go for blondes."
Tony sneered. "Well, if we don't know who she is, then that might be a place to start, Agent Burley."
"The sketch artist is already at the club working on it, Agent DiNozzo." Burley grinned.
"Nice work, Stan," Gibbs said, striding into the bullpen. "Get an I.D. on the male as well?"
"Again, sketch artist is working on it. Keep in mind it was midnight on a Saturday, Gibbs. Barman's never going to give a perfect picture of either of them while all the music and drinks and lights were going on around them."
"Well, that's why we need to get something to compare it to," Gibbs said, taking a seat at his desk. "If this was a murder, I wanna know why the hell a marine wasn't fighting back against his own attacker." He paused and looked over his shoulder. "McGee!" he shouted.
McGee shot out from behind a laptop sitting on his desk.
"What the hell are you doing?" he asked.
"I . . . uh, I'm trying to get into the lieutenant's computer?"
"And?"
"Well," he looked toward Burley with a apologetic frown, "If he was suicidal, he may have written something in a blog or ordered medication over the internet. . ."
"I don't want to hear what you're looking for, McGee, I want to hear what you've found."
"Well, so far nothing, boss."
Gibbs dropped his elbow to the desk heavily and turned to glare at him.
"Boss, Burke's hard drive's been encrypted."
"Well . . . " Gibbs waved a hand around in the air. "Uncrypt it."
"It's not that easy, Gibbs. The encryption coding on here is pretty sophisticated. He's using a sixty-four bit . . . " McGee looked up from his screen and saw four pale-blank faces staring down at him. "It's uh . . . "
"Can you work with Abby?" Gibbs asked.
"I can do just about anything you want with Abby."
DiNozzo made a lurching noise. "Probie!"
"But to be fair - - " McGee continued.
" - - and not disgusting," Tony added.
" - - it'll still take hours to crack this kind of coding."
Gibbs paused. "You've got two."
McGee quickly snatched up the laptop and began moving toward the elevator.
Gibbs turned back to the three other agents. "Stan, why the hell does a marine lieutenant have software on his computer that's able to keep my top computer forensic specialist out?"
"I don't know, boss," Stan answered, quickly standing to attention. "He could have had files pertaining to delicate operations in Iraq . . ."
"Hasn't been involved with one since January."
"Could've been need-to-know."
"I know what's need-to-know," Gibbs said, standing slowly to Burley's eye-level.
"Gibbs could get access to the dead aliens at Area 51, Burley," DiNozzo said quietly, yet still with a hint of smugness.
"I know what Gibbs has access to, DiNozzo."
"Well then maybe - - "
"DiNozzo!" Gibbs suddenly shouted. Tony's head snapped around.
"Yes, boss."
"I said I wanted to know everything about anyone he knows. Why do I still not have interview reports from his brother and sister sitting neatly piled on my desk?"
"Well, Gibbs, see there was a slight problem with that," Kate said, taking a step toward him.
"And in what way would that be, Agent Todd?"
"In the way that - - " she looked desperately to Tony for help. Tony held up his hands defensively; she wasn't getting any from him. "Gibbs, we can't find any record of a Dean or Emma Burke."
"Why the hell not?" Gibbs growled.
Kate began to loosely open and close her mouth, as if she were trying to say something but the words just weren't coming out.
Burley sighed and stepped in quickly. "Both Dean and Emma have lived and worked under aliases for the last six or seven years, Gibbs," he said. "I'd met them a few times when I'd gone out with Harry. They don't like to keep any connection with their father's name."
"So what name are they connected to?"
"I don't know, boss. They never told me."
Gibbs stared fiercely at the three agents standing in front of him.
"So . . . " Burley stammered. "I'm . . . going to . . . go through their past social security numbers, past employment records . . ."
"No you're not."
"I'm not?"
"You're coming with me," Gibbs grabbed his overcoat and stepped out from behind his desk. He began walking toward the elevator. "We are going to take a quick trip down to your old office. Kate, Tony, if I don't have Dean and Emma Burke's aliases, locations, occupations, and even what they put on their toast in the morning on my desk by the time I get back, you two will want to be out of here so fast you'll be asking what names you can change your own to."
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