After sending Tony and Ziva to Bethesda, Gibbs tried to settle back into his work but found it hard to concentrate. He was having a hard time trying to wrap his mind around the fact that his youngest agent had not only, got married and hadn't invited any of his team mates, but hadn't even told them about it. Tim hadn't told him. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. On a personal level, if he wanted to be honest, it hurt him a little to think that the man he thought of as his youngest had met, fell in love with, and married a woman that he hadn't even hinted about. And that made him feel like a hypocrite, because Gibbs wasn't sure he had the right to be upset about it. Gibbs had never had the relationship with his junior agent that he had with the rest of his team and Abby. Not because Gibbs didn't think of Tim as he did the rest of them but because Tim had never seemed to need him the way the others did. Tony needed him to be the father that his father should have been, Ziva needed him to be the father that her father hadn't been and Abby needed him to replace what she had had and lost all too soon. Gibbs settled back into his desk chair with a sigh and ran a hand down his face wearily. On a professional level, what did this say about his team? As team leader, it was his job to know what was going on with each agent under him. It was his job to know each of his agent's strengths and weaknesses, his job to know what each of them was capable of. He had to know which cases affected which agents negatively, had to know which part of their jobs left a sour taste in their mouths. He had to know so that he could act accordingly.

Tony DiNozzo was one of the best undercover agents that Gibbs had ever seen. He could slip into another life as easily as someone else could slip on a pair of shoes. He was brash, cocky and borderline insubordinate. He was also smart, streetwise and one of the most loyal people that Gibbs had ever worked with. It was the undercover cases that got to Tony the most. As good as he was at them; he sometimes forgot that they were just cases. He sometimes got too attached and it wasn't a good idea to get too involved because then one forgot which life was real.

Ziva David was one of the strongest women, both in body and spirit, that he had ever known. She was quite inspiring, actually. She had not only survived, but managed to come back from situations that would have completely destroyed most people. She was also as loyal as DiNozzo. It was the cases that involved good men that got to her. Men that embodied what the men in her life always seem to lack.

Timothy McGee was the best man he had ever had to privilege to know. He had a kind of quiet strength that most, even Gibbs, overlooked. He was loyal, trustworthy, and completely brilliant. And at one time, he had been the most honest person that Gibbs had ever known. He had once told Ziva that Tim McGee was nothing like her father or brother. That he didn't know how to lie. It came as quite a shock to Gibbs to realize he couldn't say that anymore. McGee has changed in the ensuing years and Gibbs had failed to get to know the man he had become as well as he should have.

~NCIS~

Kelly Gibbs McGee waited a good ten minutes after her husband and sister-in law went into the hall before she slowly got out of her bed and carefully walked toward the door of her room in the emergency department. She knew that she shouldn't be eavesdropping on her husband's conversation with his sister, but she couldn't help herself. She needed to know what Tim's thoughts were on what the doctor had advised and she had a feeling that Sarah would get him talking on the subject.

Kelly was well aware of how her sister-in-law felt about her. And she knew that Tim's sister thought that Kelly felt about the same way, but it wasn't true. Well, not exactly. She amended silently. It wasn't that Kelly didn't trust or like Sarah McGee. It was that she didn't know her husband's sister that well. Not like she knew Tim. Kelly was aware that Sarah would argue the point, but Tim and Kelly did know each other. They understood each other, which was much more important. They understood why they were the way they were. They're connection had been forged through shared experiences; through pain, anguish and fear. She had never believed she would ever escape from the hell that had been her life since she was eight years old. If it wasn't for Tim should never would have. Kelly had resigned herself to never getting away from Paloma and had stopped trying to. But Tim had given her the hope of rescue back when he was brought to the compound. That hope intensified when he did manage to make a getaway with her in tow. But even though she was no longer a prisoner didn't mean she wasn't still afraid. She was always afraid. The only time she felt safe was when she was with Tim. He had done everything for her. He rescued her, he married her so she could come home, he shared his apartment and his life with her. He was going to claim her baby, if he wasn't the father, as his own. Without Tim McGee, Kelly wasn't sure what she would have done. She owed him everything. She wasn't stupid, even if she did only have a third grade education. She knew why he was doing this. He may have done it out of the goodness of his heart, but he also did it because he was guilt ridden. He felt he had taken advantage of her, he felt that he was no better than the people who had hurt her. Tim had once said that no matter what he did, he would never be able to make that night, the one she refused to discuss with him, up to her. But Kelly didn't know how she would make everything he had done for her up to him. He was even keeping her a secret from her father and she knew what keeping that secret was doing to him. But she just wasn't ready. She wasn't sure if she would ever be ready, if the truth be known. Would her father even really want to know? It had been twenty years. What would be the point now? They had lived longer without each other then they had lived with each other.

She stopped half way to the door and rubbed her protruding stomach, taking a deep breath, willing the sharp pain to go away. Kelly only made it another couple of steps when a severe cramp hit her, the worst yet, causing her to double over and let out a small sound of pain.

~NCIS~

"Tony…Ziva." Tim said. "What are you doing here?" He turned to his sister. "You called them?" He hissed, his sea green eyes flashing with accusation.

Sarah's brown eyes widened. "What?" She sputtered. "No!" She denied swiftly. "I wouldn't do that!"

"Relax, Probie." Tony said tightly. "Gibbs sent us."

Tim turned back to his two partners. "Why would he do that?" He asked incredulously.

Tony and Ziva eyed him for a minute.

"You have been keeping secrets from us, McGee." Ziva said finally, anger clear in her earth colored eyes.

Tim felt the color drain from his face again. "I—I don't know what you're talking about." He stuttered before he swallowed, trying to moisten his suddenly dry throat.

Matching hurt looks came over his two co- workers faces and Tim felt like a heel. He took a deep breath and blew it out on a sigh. "Tony..." He said, shaking his head. "Ziva…" But before he could finish there was a Kay screamed from inside the room and Tim quickly switched his focus from his partners to his wife. "Kay!" He exclaimed, rushing into the hospital room. What he saw made his heart beat out of his chest and fear consumed him.

Kay was doubled over holding her stomach, breathing heavily, and standing in a small pool of blood.

"Get a doctor!" He shouted over his shoulder, not caring who obeyed his order. He ran the few steps to Kay and picked her up without ceremony, cradling her in his arms, and hurriedly depositing her on her bed. "Kay." He said in anguish, looking into her pain filled ice blue eyes. Tim wasn't an idiot. He knew that something bad was wrong.

"Tim." She said, tears pouring down her face, pain clear in her voice. "Tim, the baby…" She trailed off as another sharp pain stabbed her abdomen. She felt a gush between her legs and knew that her water had just broken. "It's too soon, Tim!" She wailed, curling in on herself. "It's too soon!" Fear consumed her, suffocating her. She'd truly believed that she didn't want the baby, so afraid that it wasn't Tim's. It could be Tim's but the odds were it wasn't and she didn't believe that she could be the right kind of mother to it. The kind of mother her mother had been to her. But she had been wrong. Because all Kelly could think at that moment was, 'Please, someone, save my baby.'

Tim grabbed her hand, holding tightly to it. "I'm here, Kay." He said. Her familiar blue eyes begged him to tell her it would be okay, that everything was going to turn out alright, but he wasn't sure of that and he had promised long ago that he would never lie to her. So he couldn't lie, not even now, when she so desperately needed a lie. "I'm here." He said lamely again.

She grabbed his hand like a lifeline and he could see the gratitude in her eyes, because she wouldn't have believed him if Tim had lied. And the lie would have damaged what they had managed to build together.

Tony and Ziva stood in the doorway, stunned. They were shocked by the familiarity of a woman that both was quite certain they had never met before. They were surprised—and really shouldn't have been—that the wife they didn't even know their friend had was pregnant with their child. But what struck the two of them most of all was the strangeness of the scene that was being played out before them. There were no desperate pleas for comfort, no false promises made that everything was going to be alright, no whispered confessions of love. It was quite disconcerting. The two partners weren't sure what to think or even what to do. That they're partner was tore up about the fragile looking woman that lay on the bed was clear on his face for all to see. Whatever other that wasn't between them, there was at least that. Tony pulled Ziva to the side. "Go call Gibbs." He whispered. "I'll stay with Probie."

She glanced at her younger partner before she quietly made her way out of the room.