Half an hour later, Tony and Emma were chatting quietly to each other while McGee did something on his phone. Gibbs watched from outside Tony's room, only half listening to Vance's recitation of Ziva's statement. Until he got to the part where Tony was somehow in danger again, Gibbs didn't need to listen.

"She made it clear that her father would help her, Gibbs," said Vance.

"Help her, how?"

"She wasn't clear about that, but I don't doubt that he'll be coming after Tony. He's in danger, Gibbs."

"No, he isn't. I'll keep him safe, and if Eli David thinks that he can hurt my people, I'll just hurt him instead. We'll see how he likes being targeted."

"Gibbs..."

"Don't worry, I won't get caught."

"I want you to be careful. If I've learnt anything from all of this, it's that Tony loves you and looks up to you. He won't be able to cope if you get in trouble."

"I'll be careful, but I won't let anyone else hurt Tony. He's been through so much already, and I cannot watch him go through anything else."

"So, let us help you. We'll do this the right way, Gibbs. We'll get them both, I promise," said Vance vehemently. "I really do promise you that."

"Emma?" asked Tony suddenly. He knew that it was now or never. He had to tell her how he felt.

"Yes, Tony?"

"I love you... I've loved you since I first met you," he blurted out. "I know that you probably don't feel the same way, but I just had to get it off my chest."

Emma smiled delightedly. "Oh, Tony! I'm so happy to know you feel that way!" she exclaimed. "I was too scared to tell you that I have feelings for you because I thought you were already dating someone else."

"Like who?"

"Well... I really thought it was Ziva. I don't know why, I just always saw you two getting along and thought maybe you were flirting."

"The only time we ever flirted was when we were pretending to be married assassins. That was pretty fun, but it was fake."

"When did that happen?" Emma asked, giggling.

"Maybe three months after I went back to work? It's been a while."

"Tell me about it?"

"Seriously?" asked Tony in surprise.

"It sounds like a fun mission. Please?"

"I'm not sure you want to hear this..."

"You said it was fake. I believe that. I'm not jealous, Tony."

"You're sure?"

"I am."

"Okay... Well, we were trying to find this assassin for hire, but we were getting nowhere. Gibbs came up with the idea of putting two agents undercover when we found the dead bodies of a husband and wife team, which meant that Ziva was going undercover with either me or McGee. I think Gibbs took one look at McGee's expression and decided that I was the better fit for the operation. Abby fitted us out with everything we needed, gave us the background on the people we were pretending to be, and we went on our way."

"What happened?"

"At first, we were just pretending to be a married couple on a vacation. We faked a lot of things, but it wasn't too hard to do it. McGee was undercover as someone from room service, and he found a camera hidden in the room. Later in the day, we climbed into the bed and pretended to be having some fun, but really I was just doing push-ups above Ziva. Whoever was watching us bought it though. That was pretty funny," admitted Tony.

"Who was watching?"

Tony grinned gleefully. "The FBI."

Emma laughed. "I'll bet that those agents still remember seeing what they thought was sex."

"More than likely. After that display, we mostly just hugged and kissed, at least until we met the assassin we were after. He took us to his room in the hotel, tied us up and kept asking us for information on diamonds. We didn't know what they were talking about, but that didn't stop him from beating me up and forcing Ziva to show him where we were keeping the diamonds. He probably would have beat her too, but he thought she was pregnant."

"Pregnant?"

"The woman Ziva was impersonating was pregnant, so we had to keep that going, just in case." Tony shrugged carefully, making sure not to hurt himself. "I got pretty beat up, but thankfully, Gibbs got there with Ziva before it could get too bad."

"I'm glad about that." Emma smiled shyly. "I wouldn't have been able to do this, if things had been worse." She leaned close and kissed Tony gently, but passionately.