The connection to anything related to the Navy or Marine Corps was tentative at best. The military ordinance being sold on the black market could have come from any branch of the service and been stolen anywhere. Requesting aid from a federal agency usually didn’t happen until at least the origin of the weaponry had been traced. Asking for NCIS to assist when so little was known was premature.
And the SecNav was several steps above the people who would normally have handled a request from a local law enforcement agency for assistance. He didn’t typically take calls from people outside government channels. And even if he did, by all rights he should have referred the request to Shepard. She was the Director of NCIS and in theory it was her call as to whether or not they got involved. If LaFiamma was right, and she had a hand in Kort’s cover getting blown, Shepard would refuse to allow Gibbs and his team to get involved. She might let another team go, but it would likely be one she had better control of, and one not as determined to find out the truth.
So ordinarily, Beaumont’s call to the SecNav would have yielded nothing. But Gibbs knew better than to underestimate the people he’d met in Houston. Lundy wasn’t the only one who had people owing him favors, and LaFiamma wasn’t the only ballsy bastard on staff.
Before she called the SecNav, Beaumont called the Governor of Texas. From what Gibbs heard of her side of the conversation, the Governor never got a chance to even think of saying no to her. All it took to get him to do as she asked were a few veiled references to something Gibbs guessed was either very embarrassing, highly incriminating, or possibly both. Whatever she had on the Governor had to be good; he agreed, without even a token argument, to contacting two senators and an admiral about lobbying on her behalf. It was impressive that she could make the Governor call in political favors he probably had not planned to use for years and certainly not to the benefit of someone else. Gibbs was tempted to ask exactly what Beaumont had on him before thinking better of it. If she wanted him to know, she’d have told him.
Beaumont waited an hour before calling the SecNav. He agreed to Beaumont’s request for assistance from NCIS and Gibbs’ team in particular without batting an eye. All he asked for was that she keep him posted, and to let him know if there was anything else she needed. She thanked him and then ended the call.
“Your people already have a flight booked, right?”
“Yes.” Gibbs had told Abby to book them seats on Ducky’s flight even though he hadn’t been entirely certain Beaumont could pull off getting official cooperation. It was easier to get forgiveness than permission.
“I didn’t really think the SecNav say yes so quickly,” Gibbs admitted, letting some of his curiosity show without asking directly exactly what she had on the Governor to get that sort of immediate cooperation.
She shrugged. “Never hurts to prime the pump.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Was more like you stacked the deck.”
She smirked. “Your point?”
“Tony said you were the sort who always plays by the rules.” Calling in favors, while not exactly unethical or even illegal, seemed a bit out of bounds.
“Playing by the rules doesn’t mean you can’t play to win.” She smiled tightly. “I want guys dealing in explosives the hell out of my city. And more importantly, whoever gave up Kort also got my people hurt and that miserable fucker needs to pay. But we aren’t on a vigilante hunt. It will be done by the book. All the I’s will be dotted and T’s crossed.”
She pointed a finger at him. “I know I can’t keep you on the sidelines. So the next best thing was to involve you and your team in the investigation in an official capacity. You aren’t here as free agents. While you are in Houston, you answer to me.”
Sky blue eyes measured Gibbs with an implacable stare. “I will not hesitate to put your balls in a vice if you step out of line on my turf. Are we clear, Special Agent Gibbs?”
The calmly delivered threat made it plain she wasn’t just blowing smoke; Beaumont meant every word. Gibbs fought back the urge to salute, knowing she’d see the gesture not as one of genuine respect but sarcastic or insolent. He did draw himself up to attention though.
“Crystal, Lieutenant Beaumont.”
“Good.” She nodded. “When your people get here, let me know if there is anything you need.”
“Will do.”
Gibbs couldn’t help smiling as he watched her walk away. Beaumont’s straightforward way of communicating was refreshing. It was a shame Shepard didn’t do things the same way. But then, Beaumont didn’t have a hidden agenda. Nor did she likely have the same sort of history with any of her people that Gibbs had with Shepard. The partnership between Lundy and Beaumont had obviously ended on better terms than Gibbs’ partnership with Shepard. Rule 12 was in place for a reason.
Gibbs got another cup of coffee from the doctors’ lounge, swiping several homemade cookies from the tray that had appeared on the table since his last visit. They weren’t great, but he hadn’t eaten all day and they were free so Gibbs wasn’t going to complain about them. Certainly not where anyone might logically ask why or how he’d come by them in the first place.
Gibbs nodded to the cop guarding the door to Tony’s room. He made a point of knocking this time. LaFiamma had said something about stopping in to check on Tony, and the last thing Gibbs wanted was a gun in his face again.
Stepping into the room, Gibbs saw not LaFiamma, but rather Carol Dewing. She smiled when she saw him. She held up a file, offering it to him.
“I thought you might want to have a look at everything we’ve got so far.” Her lips curled upward in an indulgent smile. “I’d have brought a laptop, but since you’re more hidebound than Lundy when it comes to computers, I thought you’d prefer paper.”
Gibbs gave her a rueful look. He didn’t hate technology; he just despised things he didn’t understand. And he’d never fully understood computers.
“It’s not complete. We’ve still got a lot of ground to cover, but it will give you some information to work with until your team arrives.”
Gibbs took the file. He wasn’t surprised they’d already be including him in the investigation. Once it was cleared with Beaumont, it was obviously a done deal for her people that they would be working with Gibbs and his team. He might not be sure he liked them or that they liked him, but Gibbs knew they weren’t interested in a jurisdictional pissing contest. They wanted help to catch the bastards who’d done so much damage to them and theirs. Jerking him around or denying him access to information would not be productive.
Gibbs smiled at Dewing. It wouldn’t hurt to show a little gratitude for the way they were prepared to work with him. “Thank you.”
She raised two fingers to her forehead in the casual salute that was trademark response for her team. She bent down to speak to Tony.
“Roberto will stop by later. He said to tell you Angela is cooking up a storm so that there will be plenty of real food for you to eat when you wake up. And with all she’s making there is no reason you can’t share some of her apple pie with me.”
Dewing sighed, her fingers carded through Tony’s hair in a gentle caress. “Shame your favorite isn’t cherry. Angela makes a mean cherry pie. She’d make a dozen if you asked her too. I’m pretty sure you painting the nursery gave you favored status. It was either that or the fact that you figured out how to put together the new stroller. All part of your dastardly plan to win friends and influence people I’m sure.”
She kissed his cheek. “I’ve got a bet on how soon you’ll blow this joint and I need new shoes so I expect you to make me a winner, DiNozzo.”
She straightened, her attention once more on Gibbs. “Just so you know, we haven’t questioned Kort’s girlfriend yet.”
Gibbs frowned. Surely by now they’d recovered enough equilibrium to get back to work. Letting the case get cold wouldn’t make things any easier. He knew they understood that so they must have a good reason for not talking to her yet.
“What are you waiting on?”
“You.”
Gibbs blinked. “Me?”
“Tony said interrogation was your specialty.” She smiled. “And once we knew you were going to be part of the case, we all had a feeling you’d want to talk to her yourself. And we might as well let the best man for the job do it. No reason to cover the same ground twice.” Her smile took on a hard edge. “Letting her stew for awhile longer won’t hurt her.”
Gibbs pursed his lips. “She being difficult?”
“Not any more.” There was a definite note of satisfaction in Dewing’s voice.
“Oh?”
“Spouted a lot off in French that I couldn’t understand but she was kind enough to repeat it all in English. I think she’d have made a sailor blush with some of the stuff she was saying. I was tempted to wash her mouth out with soap.”
Dewing shook her head. “Then she wanted to leave and tried to hit me when I told her no. Cuffing her to the radiator and gagging her with her the too expensive silk scarf she was wearing has made her far more manageable.”
Gibbs smirked. “I don’t think that’s playing by the rules.”
“Depends on the game.” Dewing chuckled, unrepentant. “She may be a material witness, but she could also a suspect. Keeping her safe and sound is part of the job•her agreeing with the methods we employ to do that is not a requirement. She’s damn lucky we didn’t just put her in a cell and introduce her to some new friends.”
Gibbs bit the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling. Kort’s girlfriend might well be feeling more cooperative when he got to talk to her. He could play ‘good cop’ to their ‘bad’, except being the ‘good cop’ was not something he excelled at. Maybe he could just play ‘worse cop’ to their ‘bad’. He’d have Ziva sit in on that one, Gibbs decided. Ziva’s French was far better than Gibbs•she could insult and threaten Kort’s girlfriend in her native tongue. If that didn’t work, Ziva did silent intimidation very well.
“Anything else I should know?”
“Not right now.” She shook her head. “I’m sure there will be plenty you’ll want to know after you get a chance to look through the file.”
Gibbs nodded. He needed a better sense of what they had so far before he started asking questions. It would also be easier to direct his team with the background in place.
“Joe gave me the flight info for your team. I’ll pick them up at the airport.” She cocked her head. “You want me to bring them here first or to the office?”
Gibbs’ gaze went to Tony. He hadn’t moved and was still too pale, but he was alive, and if he continued to do well they’d take him off the drugs keeping him in a coma in a few days. He could tell the others that, but hearing it wouldn’t be enough to convince them Tony was doing better than expected. They’d want to see for themselves. Gibbs knew they wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the case until they did. This wasn’t just a case---it was personal.
“Bring them here.”
She nodded and smiled approvingly. Gibbs got the impression he’d just passed some sort of test and found himself feeling strangely relieved. It was weird to find himself wanting Tony’s team to think well of him. He hadn’t made a good first impression, but they were clearly willing to give him a second chance---he didn’t want to mess that up.
Gibbs waited until she said good-bye to Tony and left before eyeing the chair in the room. It didn’t look like the same one. He frowned. Why would anyone in the hospital switch chairs? Gibbs smiled when it came to him. No one on staff would have bothered to rearrange the furniture. The comfort of their patients was a concern, not that of the visitors. It had to be one of Tony’s teammates.
Gibbs’ money was on LaFiamma. Spending the entire night and most of the day at his partner’s bedside had no doubt given Tony’s cousin insight into the benefits of a decent place to sit. And since he couldn’t be in two places at once, LaFiamma probably wanted to make sure whoever stayed with Tony was comfortable enough to settle in for the long haul.
He sat down, gingerly testing the new chair before nodding in satisfaction. This one was definitely better than the old one. He kicked off his shoes before propping his feet up on Tony’s bed, stretching out his legs so that he could touch Tony. He didn’t know if Tony was even aware of the contact, but he felt better for it.
Gibbs pulled out the reading glasses he habitually kept handy since Tony had left the team. Neither McGee nor Ziva were comfortable enough with Gibbs to even mention his need for glasses much less tease him about it or keep a spare pair on hand for him to use. Gibbs sighed.
“Damn it, DiNozzo,” he muttered quietly, “how could you be so necessary on so many levels and I failed to notice?” Gibbs no longer wondered why an ex-wife took a golf club to his head. What he now wondered was why no one else had followed her lead.
The past was over and done with, Gibbs reminded himself. It was better to focus on the present. He opened the file and began reading. The first few pages were background on the case Vice was putting together. Gibbs studied the timeline. The drugs were first documented about a month after Tony had returned to Houston. Vice had worked hard to make even to make even a tenuous connections to the new supplier in the area.
He raised an eyebrow when he found a map in the file. He didn’t know if that was something normally included, or if it was something they’d added for him in deference to how little he knew about Houston, but he was glad to have it for reference. The drugs’ distribution was outlined and he could literally trace how Vice had started narrowing down where the drugs were showing up in the city and the players involved.
There was also an overlay showed various gang territories, and Gibbs wasn’t surprised to find notes mentioning which gangs had been present the night the bust went down. The names of the dead or wounded gang members didn’t mean anything to Gibbs but he memorized them any way as well as their particular gang affiliations.
There didn’t seem to be a clear connection between the drugs and the weapons, at least not that they had been able to establish yet. It could have simply been a coincidence that Kort’s gun deal had gone down in the same area Vice had staked out, but that didn’t seem very likely. Besides, Gibbs didn’t believe in coincidences. Somehow the drugs and weapons were tied together.
Gibbs grimaced, the cynical part of him knowing money made for an obvious connection. Drugs were a lucrative business, and that meant anyone looking to get big there would want firepower to either protect what they already had or to take what they wanted. The gangs simply provided manpower and a network for distribution. They also were muscle to act as shock troops or enforcers.
He made another mental note to have McGee work with whoever was trying to track down the players Vice had expected that night. Why hadn’t those guys show up? And more importantly where were they now? If they knew Kort was going to get taken out, they might well know who had broken his cover. What role had they played in that set up, if any?
Identifying exactly what weapons had been there and where they’d come from would also be a priority. At the moment all they had to go on was what Dewing said Tony had seen and told them. Tony’s identification was too generic to track the exact origin. Forensics was still working on the bits and pieces that survived the fire. They’d started to narrow it down, but it was too soon for a precise identification.
Annie Hartung, Houston P.D’s forensic specialist, seemed like a capable, level headed sort. Gibbs didn’t think she’d object to working with Abby to speeding up the identification process. And he hoped Abby wouldn’t object to working with her. He wasn’t sure if the lab would have all the equipment Abby was used to, but he had no doubt she’d be able to use whatever they did have.
Gibbs studied the pictures of the scene in the file. The first few showed the warehouse, probably several days before the bust. It looked like every other warehouse he’d seen---a large, rectangular building with sliding bay doors at one end and several loading docs on the other. A to scale sketch showing the warehouse in relation to the streets and other buildings attached to one of the photos gave Gibbs a momentary pause when he recognized the precise lines and surprisingly neat labeling as Tony’s work.
Gibbs took a deep breath and released it slowly. No one on his team did hand drawn sketches any more. The used a computer program to plot the information gathered at the scene. He’d forgotten how much detail Tony added to his drawings, so many little things that either Ziva or McGee didn’t pick up on or the computer program didn’t allow for. And there were always little notes in the margins•sometimes useful things like the witness names or the time they’d gotten to the scene, and sometimes unrelated things like a movie the situation reminded Tony of.
This sketch was surprisingly free of any side notations. Gibbs frowned. Maybe Tony had no longer did that. Or maybe he didn’t see the need since they were only supposed to be back up for Vice on this case.
Gibbs missed those little insights. He shook his head, eyes moving from the photo to Tony. In a few days he could talk to him directly. Gibbs nodded to himself. “I’m thinking positively here, DiNozzo, just like Abby told me to.”
Feeling a little silly talking to Tony when he knew he couldn’t talk back, Gibbs redirected his focus to the file again. There were a few shots from the actual bust. In spite of the low light levels, the resolution was still good. Gibbs couldn’t tell if they were stills isolated from streaming video or camera shots. Whoever took them did a good job catching licenses plates of the arriving vehicles as well as the faces of each person readily visible.
Someone had probably already searched the DMV database for the names and address for the owners of each car. But it wouldn’t hurt to confirm that. If they had, then Gibbs wanted to know what they found. If they hadn’t, then he wanted someone to get on it.
Gibbs recognized Kort immediately. The girlfriend was only vaguely familiar. He’d seen her once, from a distance, when they’d gone to Canada with Ducky taking the place of the British dealer who’d died unexpectedly of a heart attack. Gibbs hadn’t really paid much attention to the woman; he’d been more focused on Benoit, Ducky and the Director.
Some were labeled and Gibbs quickly realized the ones with names were among the dead or wounded. Fingerprints would have made identifying anyone in the system fairly easy. It was putting names to the ones that managed to get away or weren’t on file that was the challenge. Abby’s facial recognition software might be helpful in naming them. He didn’t know if she packed it, but he’d told her to bring everything she might need that she could carry. Hopefully the program was already on her laptop.
There was no name for the buyer Kort had been meeting. He had evidently been one who’d managed to escape the chaos. Gibbs glared at the shot of him holding a gun to Kort’s head. The girlfriend would undoubtedly know who Kort had been meeting. Although, what she new was more than likely an alias, it could still give them a viable starting point.
Did she know Kort was with the CIA? Could she have been the one to betray him?
Gibbs frowned. The girlfriend was certainly a viable suspect. She’d known Rene Benoit. She might have even liked the man enough to feel obligated to avenge him.
Gibbs grimaced. Thinking about women hell bent on vengeance led him to Shepard. If she had been the one to break Kort’s cover, who had she told? It wasn’t like they moved in the same circles. Getting the information to the buyer Kort had met would have taken some deft planning.
Had Shepard done more than simply leak his identity? Had she set him up to die in Houston or was it just dumb luck his getting killed where Tony now worked? The city was out of La Grenouille’s usual operating area. Maybe Kort hadn’t planned to expand into new areas but was offered a deal he couldn’t resist.
Gibbs didn’t know if Shepard would have the ability to make that happen, but he wouldn’t put it past her. There were drug connections in South America NCIS regularly monitored. She could easily have encouraged someone to expand their markets. He’d get McGee or one of Tony’s teammates to look into that and see what turned up.
Shepard had been keeping an eye on weapons dealers for more than a decade. She would know the ins and outs of the trade. It wouldn’t be impossible for her to have set up Kort.
Getting Kort killed was one thing. Making sure it was done in Houston would be another. It would mean Shepard might have seen Tony as a loose end as well. While the clusterfuck of two nights ago couldn’t have been predicted, if Kort had simply been killed during the deal, it was likely that Tony’s team would get assigned to lead the investigation.
It would be exactly the sort of thing the Major Case Squad had been set up to handle. The weapons alone would have been enough to remove it from the Vice Squad’s purview. It wouldn’t be hard for the mystery buyer to arrange a drive buy shooting, or some other means of dealing with the detectives working the case. That scenario became even more likely if someone made it known that Tony and Kort knew one another, that they’d worked together at one point. The mystery buyer might well assume Kort had shared information with Tony. He might not believe in coincidence either. Suddenly a guard on Tony and Lundy didn’t seem like an unnecessary precaution.
Gibbs took off his glasses and rubbed tiredly at his eyes. All this was conjecture, and it seemed like a lot of effort for one person to go to. Was Shepard really that vindictive? Gibbs sighed, deciding that yes she could very well be that nasty.
She’d spent years focused on getting La Grenouille. She could just as easily devote the same time and attention to ensuring his death continued to be ruled as a suicide. That was her ultimate revenge---making sure his death was just as ignominious as her father’s. Kort hadn’t killed Benoit. And as LaFiamma had pointed out, that made him a liability to Shepard’s plan. She also knew Tony didn’t think Kort had actually killed Rene Benoit, and he definitely didn’t think the man had shot himself in the head.
Gibbs didn’t think he had either. Although, he’d never come right out and accused Shepard of killing the man, she had to know he suspected her. She knew him well enough to know he wouldn’t just drop an unsolved murder. Did she know he and Tony had discussed it? That they were still looking for proof? That he’d made copies of the case file?
Gibbs found himself checking his weapon, making sure the action moved smoothly, and the clip was fully loaded. He didn’t like where his thoughts were taking him and he silently cursed LaFiamma for pointing him in that direction in the first place.
Gibbs looked at his watch. He was sorely tempted to call McGee and get him working now, but he knew there wasn’t much that could be done from a plane. They’d be on the ground in another hour.
Gibbs pulled his shoes back on and stood up. He reached for Tony’s hand, holding it gently for several moments. He didn’t want to leave, but to keep Tony safe he had to at least talk to LaFiamma again. He needed a sounding board and someone he could trust to talk to about what he suspected. And he needed to arrange for additional security, just in case.
“I’m going to go talk with LaFiamma again. I want to pick his brain a bit about what happened during the bust. See if he’s got any more insights to offer. I don’t have the full picture yet, but I don’t really like the pieces I’ve put together so far are telling me. When McGee, Ziva and Abby get here, I want them to be able to hit the ground running.”
Gibbs cupped Tony’s face, his thumb caressing his cheekbone. “I’ve got your six. All you have to worry about it getting better.”
He squeezed Tony’s hand, trying to reassure him that everything would be okay even though the younger man wasn’t aware of anything at all at the moment. It might have been just his imagination but Gibbs could have sworn Tony squeezed back. He decided to take that as a sign Tony understood and still trusted Gibbs to look out for him.
"I won't let you down, DiNozzo."
Author's Chapter Notes:
Gibbs gets permission to work the case.