Disclaimer: NCIS as well as the NCIS characters do not belong to me. This is just for fun.
A/N: Rated PG-13 for violence.
I would like to thank my betas, Rinne and Tweeter. Rinne not only gave me good comments on the story and corrected my grammar, but also taught me some useful rules that seem to have already improved the way I write dialogue. She also saved me from a rather significant plot hole in this chapter. Tweeter helped me decide between two versions of the chapter and made useful comments that improved the text.
Any mistakes made are my own.

Chapter 5

In nearly 20 years of working at NCIS, Gibbs had met his share of liars. Some of them were better at it than others. Mr. Arnold, if he was in fact lying, could be considered the best of the bunch.

After realizing that the gun that was registered to Mr. Arnold could no longer be accounted for, Gibbs asked him to accompany them to the NCIS headquarters. Mr. Arnold immediately agreed to come. He did not ask for a lawyer and agreed to be printed and to give a DNA sample for testing. He was now sitting in the interrogation room, waiting to be interviewed. He seemed to be baffled, yet curious, and ever since entering the NCIS headquarters had been looking around with a sense of interest that seemed almost childlike.

"He isn't really acting like a guilty man," observed Tony.

Gibbs ignored him and entered the interrogation room. As he entered, Mr. Arnold stood up. "Ah, Agent Gibbs…"

"Please, Mr. Arnold, sit down," ordered Gibbs.

Mr. Arnold sat down.

"Let's discuss what we know," Gibbs started. "Sergeant Charles Richards was found dead, the day before last. He was shot by a .45 caliber gun, similar to the gun that is registered to you and that has conveniently gone missing. We also know that Sergeant Richards was planning on proposing to your daughter, that he wanted to talk to you about it first, and that he was nervous and thought you might not approve."

"Oh, he was nervous all right, poor kid," said Mr. Arnold. "I don't really know what he thought I was going to say. He came over to my office during my lunch hour, in his fancy dress uniform, no less. Looked like he was scared I was going to bite his head off."

This was hardly what Gibbs had expected to hear. "What happened then?"

"Well, it was really quite old-fashioned, in a way. He told me of his intentions and I asked him if he didn't think they were a bit too young. He said that he had thought about that, but that his experiences in Iraq, and his injury had taught him that life was short. He also said that he really loved my daughter and wanted to spend the rest of his life with her."

"And what did you say?" asked Gibbs.

"What could I say? I gave him my blessing," answered Mr. Arnold.

"And you didn't have a problem with the Sergeant's skin color?" Gibbs inquired.
Mr. Arnold shifted uneasily in his chair. "Look, I'm not going to say that it didn't bother me at all. The world is still not a perfect place, and there are still bigots out there. You heard about what happened just a week ago? How Charlie got into a fight with some racist degenerate? I can't say that it didn't worry me that my daughter would have to face such things for the rest of her life. Not to mention any children they might have."

"And yet you gave Charlie your blessing?"

"I had no choice! Natalie loves, I mean loved, him, and he was a good man. I guess I thought she could have done much worse."

Gibbs couldn't help but believe him. "What happened next?"

"What do you mean, what happened next?" asked Mr Arnold. "I used the remainder of my lunch hour to call my wife and tell her the news, and then I went to my next class."

"You called your wife?" Gibbs asked, interested.

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McGee and Ziva returned to the NCIS headquarters after conducting what turned out to be a long and fruitless search of the skinhead's warehouse. They were covered in dust and not a little cranky.

"That was an enormous waste of time," Ziva said, falling into her chair.

"I don't know Ziva," said McGee, trying to remove the dust that had gathered on his tie. "You sure seemed to enjoy ripping up all those racist posters."

Before Ziva could reply, the phone on her desk started ringing. "Officer David," she said, after picking up the receiver. "Okay, send her up."

Ziva put down the receiver and turned to McGee. "Mrs. Arnold wants to see us. She says she has information relevant to the case."

After a very short while, the elevator doors opened and Mrs. Arnold stepped out. She looked extremely agitated. She didn't even greet the Agents and got straight to the point. "You need to release my husband right away!"

McGee tried to use his most soothing voice. "As soon as-" he started saying, only to be interrupted by an almost hysterical Mrs. Arnold.

"You don't understand," she rushed on. "My husband didn't shoot Charlie. You're making a terrible mistake!"

"Mrs. Arnold, I understand that you want to help your husband, but getting hysterical isn't going to help," said Ziva.

Mrs. Arnold turned towards Ziva. She opened the bag she was carrying and took out a gun. Ziva, who hadn't had time to secure her gun in her desk drawer after returning from the warehouse, immediately drew her weapon and pointed it at Mrs. Arnold. McGee, who was slightly slower to react, drew his gun a couple of seconds later.
"Put the gun down!" ordered Ziva.

Mrs. Arnold seemed confused. "Oh, yes of course," she said and put the gun on a nearby desk. "You don't understand. I just wanted to show this to you. My husband didn't shoot Charlie. I did."

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The interrogation was short and conclusive. Mrs. Arnold seemed so anxious to talk that Gibbs didn't even need to ask any questions.

"After my husband told me that Charlie had visited him, I called Charlie and asked him to come over so we could talk. I wanted to convince him to change his mind. I told him that by marrying Natalie he would put her in danger. That people weren't ready to accept them as a couple and that what had happened last week was just a small example of what they would have to face everyday. He wouldn't listen. He said he loved Natalie and that was that. I didn't really expect him to understand. That's why I took the gun out of the lockbox. I waited till he turned his back to me and than I shot him.

"I wore the gloves I use to wash the dishes, and used a wheelbarrow to take his body to the car. I drove to the warehouse where Jeff White and his friends hang out and left the body next to it. I wanted to put the gun with the body, but then I remembered that it was registered and could be traced back to us, so I just hid it."

After a short pause, she started talking again. "I'm not racist. Really I'm not. I just didn't want my daughter to have to face that ugliness every day. People can be so very cruel."

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Ziva and Tony were sitting at their desks. It was after 19:00 on a Friday, and they were the only people currently in the squad room.

"Can you believe she claimed not to be a racist?" Ziva asked.

"She probably doesn't think of herself as racist." Tony was sitting with his legs propped up on his desk. "She tries to convince herself that it's not her that's racist but, rather, the rest of the world."

"And you buy that?" asked Ziva.

Tony removed his legs from the desk and sat up. "Of course I don't buy it! The lady is a racist, not to mention completely off her nut. What I don't get is how she managed to sneak that gun in. I mean they have metal detectors down there. Those guards must be complete morons."

"I'd be much more surprised at that, if it didn't happen all the time," said Ziva.

"What do you mean it happens all the time?" asked Tony.
"In Israel, for obvious reasons, there are metal detectors at the entrances to each shopping mall. You go through those things, and they start screaming, because you left your keys or you cell phone in your pocket. If you look like an old lady, or generally harmless, the guards won't usually even check. A few times a year the police conduct this country-wide test. They try and sneak fake bombs into some of the malls. Their success rate is extremely high.*"

"So what you're saying is that our guards didn't feel the need to search June Cleaver very well, even after the metal detector started making noise?" Tony asked.

"Who the hell is June Cleaver?" asked Ziva.

"Oh, it doesn't matter," Tony said, propping his legs up again.

Tony and Ziva sat in silence for a while, before Ziva spoke again. "What do you think is going to happen to Martin Short and the other skinheads? Are they going to walk?"

"I doubt it," said Tony. "What they did to the Sergeant's body was still a hate crime. They'll probably end up in jail for at least a couple of years."

Ziva got up and started gathering her things.

"At least we managed to close the case before the weekend," Tony offered.

"Yes," Ziva said. She approached Tony and patted him on the head. "I'll see you tomorrow night at eight, yes? Bring a bottle of wine." She put on her coat and headed for the elevators.

"I wouldn't miss it for the world, partner," Tony said, a big smile on his face.

The End

*Ziva's account of the police, succeeding in sneaking fake bombs into shopping malls in Israel is true. About once or twice a year, Israeli papers publish articles with the results of such tests. Several of the shopping malls that are tested, fail these tests.