Chapter 4
Elizabeth watched with trepidation as Tony knocked on her car window. The window was slowly rolled down and she could hear a frantic voice coming from inside.
“Don’t shoot man, don’t shoot!” the guy said. “I’m just in here waiting for Liz!”
“Oh God,” Elizabeth groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Tony, back away from the car and get your hand away from your gun, it’s just Joey.”
“And what’s Joey doing sitting in your car?” Tony asked, arching an eyebrow. Elizabeth was pleased to see his hand had dropped from his gun, although he still hadn’t backed away from the car.
“I was supposed to give him a ride home from work today,” Elizabeth replied, walking towards the car. “I’m so sorry Joe, my day’s been crazy.”
“So crazy that you forget to lock your car?” Joey asked.
“Shut up if you still want that ride home, Joe,” Elizabeth replied with a glare.
“Shutting up, ma’am,” Joey said, cowering a little. Elizabeth couldn’t tell if he was joking or not but decided not to dwell on it. “So, who’s the Fed? You don’t have someone on protection duty, do you?”
“Nah, this is just Tony, my overprotective, overbearing, over-annoying older brother,” Elizabeth replied with a roll of her eyes. “Joey, meet Tony, Tony, meet Joey Winters, one of the guys I work with.”
Tony scrutinized the man; he was about McGee’s age and, if possible, looked even geekier than the junior field agent did. He was maybe a few inches taller than Elizabeth, skinny and he wore glasses. His hair was gelled back and his clothes were plain.
“Nice to meet you,” Joey said, smiling up at Tony. Tony glared at him and again, Joey cowered.
“Tony, stop scaring him,” Elizabeth said, getting closer and gesturing for Joey to scoot over. He did, shifting over so that he was sitting in the passenger seat. Elizabeth jogged to Tony’s car, grabbed her bag from the passenger side and jogged back, hopping into the driver’s seat. “I’ll see you tomorrow Tony, bright and early.”
“Yeah, sure, whatever you say kiddo,” Tony said as Elizabeth slammed her door shut and started her car. Tony made his way back to his car as Elizabeth pulled out of her parking space. He watched as she drove away, waiting until she was out of the parking garage before he climbed back into his car and followed suit.
There was no way in hell Tony was going to let Elizabeth drive off alone, especially now because she had a strange guy whom he had never met in the passenger seat. He intended on following from a distance, knowing that keeping an eye on her car would be far from difficult; there were only a few new Volkswagen beetles on the roads in DC and Tony doubted he’d find another one in the shade of green Elizabeth’s was.
“Uh, Liz?” Joey asked glancing behind them as she drove, manoeuvring her car through the last bits of late commuter traffic.
“Yeah Joe?” Elizabeth replied, keeping her eyes on the road.
“Did you know your brother’s following us?” he asked, glancing behind them again. Even though he was about three cars away, the shiny almost new Mercedes was hard to miss.
“Yeah,” Elizabeth replied. “It makes him feel better. As I said, he’s overprotective.”
“You never said he was a Fed,” Joey remarked. “What agency is he with?”
“NCIS,” Elizabeth replied as she turned onto a suburban, tree-lined street. “And I was never asked, so I never told.”
“Fair enough,” Joey said as Elizabeth turned into a driveway at the end of the street. “So, where did Fornell drag you off to? He didn’t even give you time to let anyone know where you’d gone!”
“NCIS headquarters,” Elizabeth replied. “Special Agent Gibbs called Fornell, asked for his help and Fornell dragged me along with him. I’m sure it was luck of the draw; if anyone else had been there when he came calling, it would have been that person having to get a cab back to the office to get their car.”
“Oh please, we both know you’re Fornell’s favourite,” Joey said with a roll of his eyes. “The other guys know it too; he would have waited around if you weren’t there.”
“Sure, you just keep telling yourself that,” Elizabeth replied, matching Joey’s eye roll.
“So, am I going to have to drive my sorry ass to work tomorrow?” Joey asked. “Or am I going to have to con Amy into giving me the car tomorrow?”
“Well, I suppose I could swing by and pick you up at 6:30 tomorrow morning before I head to NCIS,” Elizabeth replied.
“Uh, no thanks, I think I’ll take my chances with Amy,” Joey said, wrinkling his nose.
“Thought you might say that,” Elizabeth replied. “Now get your sorry ass inside before your sweet wife has a reason to be not so sweet to me.”
“Alright, alright, I’m going,” Joey said, unbuckling the seatbelt and putting his hand on the door handle. “Do you know when you’ll be back?”
“No idea,” Elizabeth replied with a shrug. “Now go, I think I see Amy moving around in there.”
As Joey opened the car door, the front door of the house opened and a small, blond haired woman stepped onto the stoop. Elizabeth waved at her, and although her expression was a little cool, she waved back. Joey waved good-bye to Elizabeth before getting out of the car, slamming the door behind him.
Finally free of her passenger, Elizabeth backed out of the driveway and continued on to her own residence. She was unsurprised to see that Tony was still following her; she doubted he would let up until he knew where she lived.
It wasn’t long before Elizabeth drove up to an old, stately house at the end of a dead end street. She pulled into the driveway before killing the engine. Grabbing her things, she got out of the car as quickly as she could, shutting the door as quietly as possible.
“Nice place you’ve got here,” Tony said as he got out of his own car, slamming the door loudly. “How can you afford it?”
“I rent the basement suite,” Elizabeth replied, looking up at the big picture window in the front of the house. As she expected, the drapes were closed except for a gap caused by someone pulling the curtains open just enough to see what was going on. Elizabeth groaned. “Now you’ve done it.”
“What have I done?” Tony asked, coming over to stand next to Elizabeth. “Aren’t you going to show me where you live?”
“Mrs. Robinson saw you, which means I’m probably going to get a lecture about how young women shouldn’t be around men while unchaperoned,” Elizabeth replied with a shake of her head. Tony’s mouth spread into a grin, but before he could say anything he was surprised to find a warm hand covering his mouth to keep him from speaking. “If you make a single joke about The Graduate I’m going to have to hurt you. And then I’m going to have to hack into your computer and porn spam it again.”
Elizabeth removed her hand and was pleased to see that Tony’s mouth had snapped shut and he was blinking in surprise. She turned and made her way down the driveway to the gate that led to the side of the house.
“You coming or what?” Elizabeth asked as she unlatched the gate and headed to a door in the side of the house.
“Since when do you know about The Graduate?” Tony asked as he jogged down the driveway. He followed Elizabeth into the house, standing in the doorway as if unsure what to do.
“Shoes off,” Elizabeth said, pointing at his feet. Tony obliged, toeing off his shoes. “And I know about The Graduate because my high school English teacher wanted to do a study on Simon and Garfunkel lyrics and thought that movie would be a good idea to see them in context.”
“You had the coolest English teacher ever,” Tony said in awe. He looked around, taking in his surroundings. “Nice place you got here… for a basement, that is.”
The apartment was painted in bright colours; the living room was yellow, the kitchen was red and even though he couldn’t see it, the bathroom was bright green and Elizabeth’s bedroom was painted in blue. The furniture was all in black, brown or white; the accessories in the kitchen were black, white and red. All in all, it was basic, well decorated and didn’t look like it belonged to a twenty four year old computer nerd.
“Thanks, my mom helped me decorate,” Elizabeth replied as she headed into the kitchen. “Sit, make yourself comfortable. Do you want anything? I think I might have some pasta sauce or chilli left over from my last cooking binge.”
“How is your mom, by the way?” Tony asked as he sat down on the sofa. “And I’m okay, thanks, I’ll pick something up on my way home.”
“She’s doing good, still doing the interior decorator thing. I’m kind of surprised you’re asking about one of your evil stepmothers,” Elizabeth replied with a grin as she started rummaging around in her freezer. “Are you sure about not wanting anything? It’s Mama DiNozzo’s recipe, and I think I might have it just right.”
“Your mom probably was the only one that wasn’t evil,” Tony shot back playfully. “After all, she gave me you, didn’t she? And you didn’t say it was Mama DiNozzo’s recipe. If you were going to make some anyway, I’ll get in on that.”
“Please, you’re not trying to tell me you actually wanted a sister?” Elizabeth asked as she pulled a box of pasta down from the cupboard.
“Well, maybe I didn’t show it too well, but I’d always wanted a younger sibling,” Tony replied with a shrug. “I just didn’t want someone as young as you.”
“Thanks, I’m touched,” Elizabeth said sarcastically as she walked over to the living room and flopped onto the couch. Two pots were on the stove now, one with a frozen block of sauce in it and the other with water ready for boiling. “Ugh, I’m beat.”
“So, how did you enjoy your first day working with NCIS?” Tony asked as Elizabeth flipped on the television.
“I liked it. Abby’s cool, and it was great to finally see where you worked,” Elizabeth replied. “Although I don’t think Gibbs likes me all that much and Ziva kind of scares me.”
“Of course Abby’s cool, she’s Abby. Gibbs doesn’t like most people and Ziva scares nearly everyone when they first meet her,” Tony said with a smirk. “So, how come you never told me you were working in DC?”
“I wanted to make sure I was settled before I mentioned it to you,” Elizabeth replied with a shrug. “You know my history with jobs.”
“Yeah, but a year?” Tony asked. “That’s a little long, don’t you think?”
“Maybe, but I wanted to make completely sure this was for me and this was where I belonged,” Elizabeth replied. “I was going to tell you, I just wanted to make sure I fit in. Out of the family, only Mom and Dad know I’m here.”
“And do you think you belong here?” Tony asked. Elizabeth couldn’t be sure, but she thought she heard a hopeful note in his voice.
“Yeah, I think I do,” Elizabeth replied. “I love my job, I love the people I work with and besides the fact that Mrs. Robinson is nosy and a little more old-fashioned than I’d like, my place is pretty great too.”
“Good, ‘cause I’ve missed my annoying bratty kid sister,” Tony said with a grin. He had, really; it was probably why he had treated Kate like a sister when she had been alive.
“And I’ve missed my overprotective old fart big brother,” Elizabeth replied, poking him in the ribs once before getting up to check on dinner.
“Need any help with that?” Tony asked, turning around to see what Elizabeth was doing.
“Nah, don’t worry about it,” Elizabeth replied as she puttered around the kitchen.
“So what was with McGee and the hand thing?” Tony asked, turning back to the television and flipping through the channels. It was Monday night, which wasn’t very good for television anyway.
“You don’t have to watch TV,” Elizabeth said as Tony channel surfed. “Pop in a movie if you want; DVDs are in the left hand drawer under the TV.”
“But your taste in movies sucks,” Tony whined, although he still crossed the room and started rummaging in the drawer. “And you still didn’t answer my question.”
“Damn, and here I thought distracting you with movies would make you forget about that,” Elizabeth joked as she stirred the sauce and turned the water on to boil. “And there was nothing about it. I didn’t even ask for it, he just grabbed my hands and started working his magic on them. I guess he understood how typing at top speed for four hours is on the hands.”
“Would have worked if I didn’t really want to know the answer to that,” Tony replied with a winning grin as he pulled out a DVD. “I don’t think I’ve seen this one.”
“A movie you haven’t seen?” Elizabeth asked. “That’s not something you hear every day. What one is it?”
“Sweeny Todd,” Tony replied. Elizabeth grinned; it was one of her favourites. “Is it any good?”
“Well, I loved it,” Elizabeth replied with a shrug as she started dishing up pasta and sauce. “If you need a TV table, you might want to grab one now.”
“If that’s the case, then it must be crap,” Tony remarked with a smirk as he spotted the TV tables.
“Don’t be insulting the person feeding you, Tony,” Elizabeth replied as she brought the plates of pasta and homemade sauce over to the living room.
“I wasn’t insulting you,” Tony said as he settled in.
“You insulted my taste in movies, which insults me,” Elizabeth retorted as she set down the plate in front of Tony before heading back to the kitchen to grab a glass of water. “Besides, it’s different from other musicals; probably one of the reasons why I like it so much.”
“Okay, fine, I’ll give it a try,” Tony said with a sigh.
“You’re so hard done by, you know that?” Elizabeth said sarcastically as she sat down on her sofa, balancing her plate on her knees. She grabbed remotes for the TV and the DVD player and pressed a couple of buttons, making sure everything was on the correct modes before starting the movie.
A hush settled over the room as two movie enthusiasts sat, enthralled with the images in front of them. The only sounds made besides the movie soundtrack were the sounds associated with eating a delicious meal, and after that complete silence. Elizabeth had to resist the urge to sing along with some of the songs because she knew it would annoy Tony; even though annoying Tony happened to be one of Elizabeth’s favourite pastimes when they got together, she really didn’t want to detract from his enjoyment of the movie.
“So, did you enjoy the movie?” Elizabeth asked, turning to Tony. Her face fell a little when she saw that Tony was fast asleep, his head lolling on the back of the couch and his mouth slightly open. Grinning evilly, she stuck her finger in her glass of water and wriggled it around in Tony’s ear.
Tony squealed and jumped up, rubbing his hear; Elizabeth laughed so hard she fell off of the couch. Wiping tears from her eyes, she sat up and leaned against the couch, watching Tony.
“Real mature, Lizard,” Tony said with a glare. “I think you might have inherited your mom’s evil genetics.”
“You’ve already said my mom wasn’t evil,” Elizabeth retorted. “Besides, you fell asleep; I had to wake you up somehow.”
“Can you blame me?” Tony asked. “Before you and Fornell were brought in we’d been dealing with two other cases. Now we got another one this afternoon and we still have no leads.”
“That’s what I’m here for,” Elizabeth replied. “The helping with the leads, not the blaming. “You’d better get home then, especially because we both have to be back at NCIS bright and early tomorrow morning.”
“Yeah, bright and early,” Tony said, making a face. Elizabeth grinned, remembering that Tony wasn’t a morning person either. Must be a DiNozzo thing. “Do you need a ride tomorrow?”
“No, I’m fine, I’m sure I can get in on my own,” Elizabeth replied with a sigh, wondering why people seemed to think she was incapable of driving her own car.
“You sure?” Tony asked. “I know you got in pretty easily this morning, but you were with Fornell. They might not let you in if it’s just you.”
“I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it,” Elizabeth said with a shrug. “Now get out of here before you fall asleep again.”
“Ma’am yes ma’am,” said Tony with a mock salute. Elizabeth got up to show Tony to the door, and was surprised when he pulled her into a one-armed hug. “It’s got to have you around, kiddo.”
“You too, old fart,” Elizabeth replied with a cheeky grin. Tony sighed and tapped her on the back of the head before grabbing his jacket and slipping his shoes back on.
“See you tomorrow Munchkin,” he said, ruffling her hair before heading out. Elizabeth grinned to herself, closing the door and locking it behind Tony. Grabbing the plates, she placed them in the sink before heading to bed, turning off all of the lights on her way.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Gibbs and his team have a new case, one that incorporates serial murder and computer hacking. Gibbs needs help, so he calls in a favor from Fornell at the FBI. Fornell brings an interesting and unexpected expert to lend a hand.
Chapter 4 - Brother/sister bonding time! I'm sure you've got some questions about Elizabeth by now; I hope some of them will be answered here.
Chapter 4 - Brother/sister bonding time! I'm sure you've got some questions about Elizabeth by now; I hope some of them will be answered here.
Chapter End Notes:
Not mine, don't own, CBS and Bellisario do. Although I really wouldn't mind a McGee to take home with me :P.