Twisted Justice (an NCIS story)

Chapter Eight

Tony lit up with an idea.

"I'll grab the car."

Gibbs sighed and shook his heard the slighted traces of a smile on his face.

In the elevator they almost ran into Ziva. She looked even more shocked to see Tony there than Gibbs did. She looked at her watch.

"What time is it?"

"A cold day in hell." Gibbs said moving past her into the elevator.

"What?" Ziva asked looking confused.

"It's an expression when something improbable happen, like me beating you to work." Tony said grinning he joined Gibbs in the elevator.

"Where are you going?"

"To talk to McGee." Tony answered

She was silent for a moment the stuck her hand in the elevator to stop it from closing.

"May I come?"

"You want to?" She nodded and stepped in the elevator.

"Shouldn't one of you be working?" Gibbs asked with mock exasperation.

She smiled slyly "I will be thinking very hard on the case on the way to McGee's apartment."

Her smile disappeared.

"I should have said something to him on Friday. Carelessness with evidence is not like McGee, Tony maybe, but not McGee."

"Hey!"

"Something has been wrong with him, I should have made an effort to find out."

"So your crashing our crashing of McGee?"

"Yes, I feel it needs a woman's touch."

"Yeah but where are we going to get one of those?"

He grunted as Ziva hit him.

"You two knock it off or you're both staying." And just like that it was finished.

They arrived at McGee apartment and Gibbs knocked on the door. There was no sound inside.

"McGee, open up." He yelled still banging.

"I suppose we will have to pick the lock," Ziva said with a glint in her eye.

She reached for the knob and was surprised when it opened without any persuasion for her lock set.

Gibbs peered inside and immediately drew his weapon.

Ransacked would have been an overexaggeration, but there had clearly been a struggle in McGee's apartment. His computer was lying on the ground with several books scattered around. The writing desk in the back of the room had been pushed several feet and was skewed at an angle.

Gibbs slowly advanced followed closely by Tony and Ziva each with drawn weapons.

"Clear"

Making his way to the bedroom Gibbs noticed drops of blood on the carpet and some smears on the wall and his heart quickened. He hoped they belonged to the other participant in the struggle and not McGee.

The bedroom was pretty much untouched except for a knocked over lamp. The sheets had been thrown back as if the occupant had left in a hurry. With every room cleared they all stood for a moment in silence observing the mess around them.

"There is a spare scene processing kit in the trunk of the car." Ziva said breaking the silence. She headed downstairs to get it.

Tony shook his head as the moved around the room.