In general, he's still very nearly verging on sociopathic. It's been trained and ingrained in him. Stripped of any emotional weakness, given an order, removed of guilt. Removed from empathy and firmly placed in a position of forced apathy. He cannot care if he's to do his job correctly. He cannot divorce himself from what he has become - from what all his training has created in him – if he is to succeed.

"Gibbs." But he's not that self when he's got his mouth between her breasts and the capably strong spread of each palm against her bare arching back. "Jesus Christ, you're killing me."

And he's not that self when he laughs heat against her clavicle, unashamedly letting her tug into the run of his hair. "Now you're breaking commandments? Your mother would be ashamed of you."

"My mother would smack my ass and have me doing penance." She's absolutely sure it's the first time she's ever held his face in both hands this way and it's so completely and strangely (perfectly) new to her. "Holy hell, get up here."

When he smiles, that moment just before he kisses whatever he can catch of her, he's just the goodness that gets quietly buried in the sand, muck, mud, dirt, dry land, right before the mission. Before the operation commences and he becomes just a mechanization. He's just a weapon, that's all he sees himself as sometimes.

"Hi there." Not this time - she won't allow it. "You have gorgeous eyes."

More like overkill to the ovaries, Sweet Christ in heaven.

He flinches a little into the statement and she doesn't know why but it makes his head bend down so that he can wipe his mouth back over her collarbone, a growl coming off him that reverberates down her ribcage as he pries her closer and bites down against skin. She lets him graze teeth and tongue against her collarbone, lets his mouth travel higher as she skirts her hands up under his shirt and catches against his ribs. A seethed breath heats against her jaw as he pulls her even closer, the force of his hands and arms bending her into forced arch.

When she drives her jaw down, runs her mouth back to his, he cages her back so hard onto the bench that a shunting sound of surprise catches in her throat. She lets him swallow it as he answers her attempt at force with the sturdier and stronger show of his own. He's got her locked up and she can't find any particular reason to fight it because he's the best laid trap she's stumbled over in long awhile.

He's nipping his teeth against her bottom lip like he owns it, "We need to take this upstairs."

"Why?" She pouts her palms higher under the fabric of his shirt, letting her nails dig marks on him that lead his hips jutting her harder back.

She's eighty percent sure there's some sort of handle jammed right up her –

"Kate." His hands catch her up closer against his erection and he cocks her a glance that tends to repeat whenever she says something that he finds redundant or just too close to being annoyingly spot on. "Condom."

"Birth control." She waves off into sliding flat palms farther up the run of his chest, enjoying how completely solid he is in the way he leans weight into the touch.

"Kate." He gives up a groan to the way her mouth is rising on his stubbled jaw, the nails of one hand scraping a line down center sternum. "I have a bed."

"And you've had sex in stranger places, Gibbs. I'd put money on it."

There's a sharp shake to his head that says he's not gonna give on this, not gonna budge, not gonna let her win, "Next time. I want - "

"You don't even sleep in your bed." Laughter is in her voice and it lathes off into quietness as he catches her face up, forcing her perfectly still with both sturdy palms.

"Caitlin." He's used her full first name more in the span of two days than he has since they've met – and maybe she likes the way he claims it back away from the unnamed man who recently broke it over her like a lascivious threat. "I want you in my bed."

You win. I give. Uncle. Surrender. Big-damn-white-flag. Armistice. Anschluss.

But then, he's so often right, she is stubborn… "Tell me why first."

"Because it's my bed," Even sitting above him keeps her smaller as he leans farther and lays his forehead pressing to hers, his eyes gliding closed as he exhales admission, "and I want you naked in it."

"Well, it's a reason." She grins her eyes shut into his stillness.

"It's a damn good one, Todd." He's back to drawing small but persistent kisses off her lips and he finally loosens up his hands from her face, letting them drop back down so that he can grip her thighs and dig in. "You belong there."

You charming son of a bitch. You knew that'd kill me.

Damn him to hell.

"You keep delaying me."

"Kate," she makes a noise of pleased surprise into his jaw as he jerks her thighs tight on him, leveraging her off the table and up into the way she's bracing on his shoulders as she kisses roughly back against his sudden sway of forcefulness, "I'm making it last longer than five minutes. You really got a problem with that?"

"Not in the least." She smirks down over the lift of his head as he shifts her higher against his hips, completely at a loss as to how the hell she's actually gotten into this craved position.

I could live in this position. Hell with that, I could die happy in this position.

He answers the bemused smile, "Then shut up and do what I tell you to do."

"Yes, sir." She lingers her lips along his jaw, lining the kisses up and toward his ear as his hands shift her weight tighter into his center, a hand flush to her back while the other strokes against her ass in a way that has her eyes rolling shut.

"Don't - "

"Call you 'sir'. Don't mess with your coffee." Playfully she ticks off the orders with her fingers against the back of his neck, tapping sweated skin while she kisses along his ear and lets her lips wipe down the side of his neck. "Don't bait my boss. Certainly don't kiss him when he's absolutely covered in sawdust and - "

"Don't stop doing that." The gritted groan of his voice makes her lift her head with a surprised grin, biting into her bottom lip as she looks over his laxed jaw.

"You like that?" her voice sounds astonished even to her and she laughs through her nose as she bites on a smile.

"Is there a man on the planet who wouldn't like a woman like you doing that?"

"A fairly large cross section of the population, yes." Her fingers wipe his throat as he settles her to the floor. "Mostly homosexuals. Men who prefer blondes. Or redheads."

His eyes thin conspiratorially before he slaps lightly against her thigh and jerks his head toward the staircase, "Get upstairs, smartass."

"Why?"

His hands curl her up and turn her sharply, the angle of his head leaning his face into her hair as he drives her forward with his hips, "Because I'm done waiting."

Kate smirks into the rub of his jaw on the side of her head, letting him lead her steps forward to the stairs, "No more talking yourself out of it?"

"No more givin' a damn." Light kisses against the back of her head are miming the rhythm of their steps but his hands are intent on guiding her in a single specific and demanding direction. "Get upstairs. Bed. Now."

"Where I belong?"

"Naw." The full break of his laughter against the back of her head is a prize of a sort, one that even she hadn't completely realized she'd been playing to win. "I'm not stepping into that one. I'm not DiNozzo."

"Thank God."

She suddenly understands, while he's pulling another long moan out of her, how he's managed to get three (four) presumably intelligent women to marry him, regardless of how much of a bastard he can be. It's the proudly boyish grinning he flashes at her as she shudders out a ragged breath, her fingers so tightly curled on his arm that she's digging crescented marks into the soft pulse of his wrist. The slowness of his fingers as he teases another jut of her hips up after she's already come by wiping against her sensitive clit and laughing into her growl of warning. It's the fact that she assumes he's pulling away and instead he just lifts his head and interestedly watches her body arch hard as he drives two fingers back up into her and lets her muscles clamp around them.

It's the fact that he could have fucked her anywhere he wanted and be done, satisfied, sated. But he'd stripped her back on his bed, kept his pants on, and started working her over with a bemused smile, terrifyingly knowing fingers and bright beautiful eyes.

Then he'd silently put his mouth between her legs and it had been crystal fucking clear.

"You're a bastard." She soothes the accusation by rolling her fingertips up and down the back of his neck, arching into the way he's hushing her rapid breathing by sliding slowly back up over her.

"I already told you that." His mouth has a way of finding the weakest point between her shoulder and throat and laying damp heat there, his hand pressing her hips flat again as he stretches up beside her and teases her thighs apart again. "C'mere. I want you to come again."

"Stop teasing me, Gibbs." She realizes that she's shivering, that her hand is shaky as she presses solid into the center of his bare chest.

"I'm not teasing you." He kisses her harder than she expects and she lets him own the moaning he justly deserves, tasting his lips and tongue as his full palm presses her thigh into his groin, "I'm watching you."

She smiles smugly, knows he can see it as she lets her eyes close and she shifts her bare leg tighter into the rub of his crotch, "Learning anything, Agent Gibbs?"

"Plenty." he chuckles over her, letting his erection drive harder into her leg as he cups his hand between her thighs and lets one fingertip dip into her just slightly.

"That why you watch me all day?" she asks past the sudden upswing of her lungs searching for more air, her hands quickly pulling at him to lean closer. "To learn things?"

"Not the only reason." he admits, letting her hands push at the clothing he still has on, smirking into how intent she suddenly seems on making sure he's not going anywhere but back between her legs.

She makes a small sound in her throat as she draws his hand from between them, curling his damp fingers into her palm as she pulls. "Tell me?"

He lets her pull on him this time.

Same as she lets him press so closely over and around her any other time.

"Please?"

He can usually ignore the pure unintentional pouting that tends to twist her lips to the side or tuck her bottom lip under white teeth when she's frustrated. He can usually avoid watching it happen because he's come to inherently know when it's coming. But this time she's managed to silently and quickly shift him from his clothing and between her legs and when she loosens on his fingers he lays his palm flat to the mattress and drops his eyes closed into the stroke of her hand. His palms stay flat to her sides while his hips drive into the run of light fingers against his length, a groan grifting off his lungs and eyes opening as he watches her teeth scrape her lip.

Gibbs lays his lips down near the corner of her mouth, daring her to turn her head into the words, "You think other men don't notice that I keep my eyes on you?"

Pouting again. But playfully this time. With her palm stroking him harder. "That's not fair."

"Why, Kate? Why isn't it fair? Didn't I bring you here?" He takes a kiss from her, nips the end of it off her bottom lip. "Don't I take care of you? Aren't I right now?"

She ignores the slightly chauvinistic twist to his words because, frankly, the way he's saying it has her moaning as she arches into his kissing.

"You're the reason Tony's never actually made a move on me."

He's leaning laughter along her throat, nudging her jaw up with his nose so that he can nip along soft skin "Did you want him to?"

"God, no, but - "

"You were mine. Soon as you walked into my office." His fingers pull lightly at her wrist, forehead riding her collarbone as he replaces her hand with his own, and he lifts his glance back to hers as he teases himself into wetness. "He knew that. Knows that."

She feels the whimper break off her and turns her head into his throat, letting him lean completely around her – just like he does in the daylight. "Don't tease me."

"I am not teasing you." he whispers the words perfunctorily down the side of her head. "Am I?"

"No."

"Jesus, Kate. I make you this wet?" It's a breathy surprise that nears laughter as he exhales, shaking his head down over her watching. "What am I doing?"

She can feel how cockily she smiles as she lifts her head into finding a kiss from him, completely unashamed of searching it out. "Breaking your own rules."

"Why?" There's a tone in his voice that nears what sometimes echoes off the interrogation room microphone, but softer, more inquisitive.

And she shrugs her arms up against his shoulders, hooking a leg against him as she squints him a glance that she's seen on his face often enough. "For me."

"Yeah." he says it unaffectedly, just (surprisingly) easily agrees. "I am."

There's no teasing left and he's tired of talking and if there's anything she's ever been able to read off him it's when he's simply finished with a conversation. He's never been shy about letting her know when being silent is a better option and she can see the quiet rise of silence in his eyes as he searches over her face. She just smiles into the quietness, wiping her fingers against short trimmed hair and the back of his ear before he downs his mouth against hers and lets his weight shift. His pressuring palms shift her legs and hips and she lets him make the movements because it just makes the angling of him into her seem excruciatingly slow. His patience in this is… more than she'd expected.

Which is, she realizes, exactly what she should have expected of him.

He's tracing fingertips against the thigh she has hooked up against his hip, the groan that leaves his lungs pressing her down deeper into the mattress, "Christ, Kate."

Her palms wipe down the slow slackening of his cheeks, letting his head lean into her hands and down against her collarbone as he shifts a little farther. "Gonna make it past five minutes, Gibbs?"

The taunting lifts his head and he shunts his hips forward, driving deeper into her and watching the way the shift arches her spine as her palm presses into his chest.

Such a deliciously dangerous smile… smug son of a bitch.

"You doubt me?" He's got her hand wrapped up in his own and she watches his lips part slightly as he slopes their combined fingers down her stomach and between her legs, his head lifting with a taunting smile, "Huh?"

"No."

She's learned not to.

He's trained her better than she'd even realized.

"Good." He's still smirking as he rubs his lips to hers, aiming her fingers against her clit and keeping the both of them touching. "Now, shut the hell up."

The next sound she makes is a whimper as he drives tightly into her and he takes it up into his own mouth, tongue on hers as she curls her palms up his back, bracing on his shoulders.

He's fairly sure that a naked Caitlin Todd stretching off his mattress is not the finish he'd planned to a seemingly unending day. He's also pretty positive that he doesn't give a shit that the day hasn't panned out the way he'd figured.

This is better. So much better.

"Don't go anywhere." he murmurs after her, letting his eyes follow the petite stretch of her as she bends and nicks his shirt off the floor, her fingers catching up in the fabric as she turns him a soft glance.

"I'm not." She shakes it off as she tugs the fabric over her shoulders and down and he thinks maybe the hemline cutting along mid-toned-thigh is exactly how the shirt was made to fit.

Gibbs cocks his head into his hand, letting his spine stretch as he studies her, watches the way she's taming dark hair from her face. "It's a direct order, Todd."

"I'm not." she repeats on a full wattage smile, obviously debating a step closer or a step away. "I promise. I'm just going to the bathroom, Gunny."

"You're right, ya know?" He stretches down onto the mattress, letting his face land into the pillow with a ragged drop of his head and shoulders.

Her knuckles tentatively press just along his lower ribcage and he grins into the laundry smell of the fabric. "About?"

Gibbs lifts his head only enough to mumble off to the side, "I do sorta like it."

"I know."

She can't help but smile into the way he's fallen asleep. Face down and hips askew and the fresh sheet ragged down on the lowest sling of his back so that she can let her eyes trace the line of his spine. It's so much more relaxed and open and vulnerable than she'd expected. Still, he shoves his face into the bunched up pillow like he needs to suffocate in order to breathe easily.

"Gibbs." She knows better than to startle him, her voice stretching over him as she wipes against a tensed shoulder. There's a scar that jags below one flexed shoulder blade and she apologetically moves her fingers against the ridged skin, weighing pressure against what her single moment of a mistake had left on him.

He wakes just enough to reach his hand against the stretch of hers and jerk her closer.

And she doesn't argue with the way he just silently and sleepily pulls her under the full stretch of him and buries his breathing into the side of her neck.

Tony's waiting at her desk, intentionally fiddling with her things just to get a rise out of her as she slows her steps, "I wouldn't let the boss man see that."

She just gives him a glance and a shrug, "See what?"

"The love bite you've got right," his fingers flick at the hair along her right shoulder and throat and she slaps his fingers away reflexively, "here."

"Get off me." She slaps again, shoving him a fraction farther away from her as she drops her paperwork to her desk. "Why would he care?"

She would usually ignore the less-than-subtle implication. Let it blush her cheeks before turning herself away from the possibility that his attraction to her could possibly match hers for him. But she's gotta test this theory. She has to know that it wasn't just a sleepless fluke of some sort. And Tony's always been more perceptive than she'd like.

He makes a better barometer than he realizes – which makes her shoulder rise a little in guarding.

"Might get jealous." he winces the words to the side with a glance along her throat, his hips leading back so that he can relax on the edge of her desk.

Gibbs was right.

He usually is, Kate.

Tony knows she's off limits to him. He knows other men should be annexed too.

He knows that a mark left along her collarbone is exactly the sort of thing that Jethro Gibbs would notice had he not been the one to intentionally leave it there.

"Don't be ridiculous. Are you?" she taunts into the realization that he's been the long term victim of, possibly, one of the most impressive cock blocks in recent NCIS history. "Jealous, Tony?"

He pulls a face at the playful way she leans closer, intentionally lowering her voice toward flirtatious. "Or are you trying to make me blush?"

DiNozzo just gives her a shrug as his back straightens, his body still leaned into the front of the desk, "You sleep at all last night?"

"A little." She shrugs at him amiably, letting a smile tip her lips. "You?"

"Yeah, a bit." Tony grins back automatically into her humor. "You're smirking, Kate."

She broadens the smile, letting it dimple as she nods toward his desk, "Go away now."

"You're smirking." he repeats quickly, pressing up to stand but not shifting any farther as he wags a finger in her face. "Katie-Cat got the cream. Meeee-ow."

"Ya know…Tony?" Her voice whispers low enough that he's unintentionally leaning into her to hear it.

"What?"

Kate just blinks as she shrugs her jaw up a little higher, "I'm just distracting you."

"Because?"

The slap comes up against the back of his skull and bounces his eyes shut and she snorts a laugh into the shift Gibbs makes as he continues around the both of them. "You don't need to help him put his foot down his throat, Kate."

She catches the half smile he passes back at her even as he swings around his desk, her shoulders lifting lightly once again, "Sometimes I just can't help baiting him."

She thought maybe it'd be difficult to act like nothing had happened.

He makes it easy, though. Doesn't hold back, doesn't favor her, doesn't pull any punches or soften his tone.

He is, undeniably, rudely, sharply, Jethro Gibbs.

And still damn gorgeous…

"You get everything you need?" His eyes rise from the camera in her hands as he pockets his cell phone, jaw lifting into the question. "Satisfied, Kate?"

She shrugs at him, keeps her tone blank, "Mostly."

His bright eyes thin as his head angles slowly, the scrutiny of his glance making her shoulders tight as he leans his stolid jaw forward, "What else could you possibly need, Agent Todd?"

It's barely perceptible – the fraction of a smirk that lives more in his eyes than on his mouth.

She's seen that millisecond once or twice in the last couple of days.

She's learning to find it. He's training her to see it.

"A little more time."

He grins into the nod of his head as he starts away from her, his fingers strafing on her arm as he heads from the door in the cramped apartment turned crime scene, "I'll give you another five minutes."

She's absolutely looking forward to that.