Chapter Text
Despite being the Assistant Director, and so officially allowed to start his day at eight thirty, Tony still arrived at NCIS at seven. He’d spent his first day in the role feeling like a ball, bouncing from one meeting to another with hardly any time to eat, pee, or prep - let alone start in on the growing task list that Juliet had showed him the day before. If that was the norm, and he hadn’t seen any sign that it wasn’t, then he was going to need the extra hour and a half every day to get things done.
Not only that, but it also struck him as a good time to check in with all the MCRT Teams and other agents who worked out of the building. He didn’t want to be absent from the bullpen like Paul had been.
Today though, Tony’s first order of business was to take his new cellphone down to IT and ask them to get it set up to connect to his calendar. He’d turned it on the night before and tried out a few basic things, but he hadn’t been remotely successful. Mostly because as cool as the phone was - and it definitely was cool - it was way more complicated than his current phone and he had no idea how to even begin switching his contacts across.
Pushing the door that led to the IT bullpen open, Tony was disappointed to see that all of the desks were empty. He glanced at his watch - 07:00 - and back at the empty desks. Maybe IT were another set of staff that weren’t expected to come in until eight thirty.
“Oh, hey, Tony,” Stu, one of the IT techs stood up from behind one of the desks and dusted off his knees. “Uh, I mean, Good morning, Assistant Director Dinozzo, sir. How can I help you?”
Tony opened his mouth to tell him to cut out the formality, but then stopped himself. He needed to get used to people calling him ‘Assistant Director’ and treating him like their boss. “Hey, Stu, here early I see?”
“Yeah, uh, yes, sir,” Stu answered. “I wanted to get some work done on my machine so…it’s completely within regulations.” He added quickly. “I’m not messing around with NCIS property.”
“It didn’t even cross my mind that you were,” Tony reassured him. “I’m actually here about this.”
Stu moved closer as he took in the box that Tony was holding out. “A Blackberry Pearl 8120? Nice! That’s supposed to be a great phone, sir.”
“So I’ve heard,” Tony acknowledged. “I got it because I wanted something that could connect to my calendar. So that I could be seeing it when I’m out of the office, but my assistant could still be adding things to it. I was told this phone would make that happen.”
Stu took the cellphone box off Tony and turned it over so that he could read the back of the box. “Yeah, it should be able to. It will use an internet connection to link the calendar to your work calendar and…”
“And the information will still be secure?” Tony checked, it was a question that had occurred to him in the middle of the night. His calendar might not have been confidential information when he’d been a field agent, but he thought it was probably supposed to be now.
“Yeah, definitely. You’ll just have to install a good firewall onto the phone.”
“Great,” Tony grinned. “Now, when you say ‘you’ll have to install a firewall’, I’m actually hoping you’ll help me out with that. I’m still trying to figure out how to transfer my contacts across.”
“Yeah, I can set your phone up. No problem.” Stu said easily. “Do you want to leave your old phone with me too? I can transfer across all your data while I’m at it.”
Tony fished his phone out of his pocket and handed it to Stu gratefully. “That would be amazing. When you’re done, could you bring them up to my office? I’m on the third floor now. And maybe, while you’re there you could talk my assistant through anything she needs to do to keep the calendar up to date?”
Stu nodded easily. “Shouldn’t take me too long. An hour, tops.”
“How about eight thirty?” Tony asked, considering his own plans. “Both Juliet, my assistant, and I should be at our desks by then.”
“Sure,” Stu agreed, pulling Tony’s new phone out of the box. “Ah, yes, this is a very nice model, isn’t it?”
“It definitely looks smart.” Tony agreed, he didn’t know enough about phones to feel confident about commenting on any other part of the phone. “I’ll see you at eight thirty.”
“Yeah,” Stu agreed distractedly, his focus on the phone. “I’ll see you then.”
1-1-1
JJ entered the Behavioural Analysis’ bullpen nervously, before breathing a sigh of relief when she saw that Elle’s desk was empty. She hadn’t seen Elle since Hotch had talked to her about the complaint JJ had made against her yesterday, and today was the day that Elle was supposed to come back to Hotch with a decision around how she wanted to proceed. JJ had no idea when that meeting was scheduled for, but she had zero desire to run into Elle before things were decided. She’d been awake most of the night worrying about the different ways that Elle could react, or what Elle might say if they were to have accidentally run into each other in the elevator.
Her sleepless night had left JJ tired and wishing that she had ignored Derek and Tony’s advice and left the situation with Elle alone. Sure things had been uncomfortable before, but she couldn’t imagine them getting any easier now.
Quickly making her way up the stairs, JJ unlocked her office door and then quickly closed it behind her. She had more than enough paperwork to keep her absconded in her office all day, especially with all the extra forms that were required for the team to take their holiday leave in less than two weeks. And, when she needed a break, she could start looking at the calendar to find possible times for her and Tony to take their own leave to go visit her parents.
She was fine. She had plenty to do. There was no reason for her to leave her office and risk running into Elle. She was fine.
1-1-1
After leaving the IT offices, Tony went back upstairs to the MCRT bullpen to catch up with the field agents and see how their cases were progressing. He hoped they didn’t mind his visiting them for the second day in a row, but right now living vicariously through them felt like the only way he could maintain his sanity during his transition to an office job.
As he stepped out of the elevator, Tony was gratified to see Steven Cramer, Team Lead of MCRT four, waving him over with a smile.
“Tony, hey,” Steven greeted, when Tony approached his desk. “Thanks for that tip yesterday, man. We just got the results back and you were right. It was the wife. Andrew and Hayley are on their way to pick her up now.”
“It’s always the wife.” Tony said. “Well, almost always. Most of the time. It’s sometimes the wife.”
Steven laughed. “Yeah, well, thanks.”
“No worries,” Tony frowned, as a thought occurred to him. “Wait, do you have a warrant for the arrest?”
“Not yet, we’re hoping to get a confession out of her to make things easier.”
“Right,” Tony sighed, yesterday’s conversation with the JAG replaying itself in his mind. “Do you think you have enough evidence for a warrant?”
Steven shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. We have motive, opportunity, and a fingerprint match.”
“So why not get the warrant first before making the arrest and putting her in interrogation? Unless she’s a flight risk?” Tony asked, feeling like a hypocrite. He’d brought people without warrants plenty of times in the past.
“It’s just easier to not bother with a warrant,” Steven admitted. “You know how long lawyers can take to get things done.”
“A stitch in time saves nine.” Tony quoted. “I met with the JAG yesterday and he told me that in the last month they’ve had three cases put in jeopardy because of our inability to follow procedure. One of those cases ended up with an acquittal.”
“Three in a month?!”
“I know,” Tony said seriously. “I promised him that we’d stop making their lives harder and start worrying about more than just catching the guy. We need to make sure that our cases are airtight.”
“Yeah,” Steve’s eyes were wide. “So someone got let off because we didn’t get a warrant?”
“There are several issues,” Tony admitted. “But our habit of getting warrants is one of the biggest ones. I think the JAG is going to come in and make his point to us in person at a later time, but for now we need to start following procedure.”
“Yeah,” Steve said again, reaching for his phone. “I’ll call Andrew and Hayley and tell them to come back and wait for the warrant to come through.”
“Thanks, man.” Tony clapped the other man on the arm. “Oh, and you probably already do this, but make sure you read her the full Miranda Rights when you bring her in and then stick to them. There’s no point in getting a confession if the way we got it makes the jury doubt our integrity as investigators.”
“Right,” Steve shook his head, as he brought the phone up to his ear. “We’ve been causing that many problems?”
“The JAG was not pleased.”
“Hi, Hayley, it’s Steve,” Steve spoke into his phone. “I was just talking to Tony and we’re going to wait on the warrant. It’ll probably take a few hours, so you guys should head back here and get started on your paperwork.”
Tony offered Steve a silent wave before making his way towards the desks belonging to MCRT three. “Hey, Kara, how’s your fraud case coming?”
1-1-1
It was almost eight when Tony left the bullpen and made his way back down to his office. All three of the current MCRTs were making steady progress on their cases and, thankfully, none of them had seemed to find Tony poking his nose in irritating. He was sure that the fact that he’d been able to offer all three of them the help of fresh eyes probably helped with that.
Juliet was already behind her desk, typing at her computer, but she stood with a smile when she saw Tony approaching. “Good morning, Assistant Director Dinozzo. How are you this morning?”
“Simply superb, thank you, Juliet,” Tony answered brightly, as he flashed her a wide smile. “How are you?”
“Not quite superb,” Juliet admitted. “Sarah isn’t well, so she was up a lot in the night.”
Tony wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say. Should he console her on having had a child? Ask about the child? Offer her the the day off? Did parents usually take time off work when their child was sick? He’d never realised how little interaction he had with parents before. In fact, he didn’t think he’d worked with someone who had kids since he’d been a detective in Baltimore.
“Is she alright?”
Juliet sighed. “She’ll be fine in a couple of days, and Mark, my husband, is staying at home with her. We take turns.”
“Oh, good,” Tony said in relief. He didn’t know what he would have done if Juliet had taken the day off. “Wait, you’re married?”
Juliet laughed. “For three years now.”
Tony looked down at her hand, a bit taken aback to see two rings on her finger. Wedding or engagement rings were normally one of the first things he noticed about a woman. How had he not noticed them before?
“Do you always wear your rings?”
Juliet looked confused as she followed his gaze down her finger. “Yeah. I know agents are encouraged not to, but I’m not an agent so…”
“It’s not a problem.” Tony quickly assured her. “I’m just trying to figure out why I’ve never noticed them.”
“Oh, is that unusual?”
“I always see rings,” Tony explained. “Or, at least, I used to.”
“You were checking for their availability, right?” Juliet asked, amusement creeping its way into her voice.
Tony swallowed a wince, it sounded so stark when you put it like that. “Yeah, I guess.”
“But now you have Agent Jareau.” Juliet pointed out. “You must have stopped looking.”
It was a scary thought. Tony knew his and JJ’s relationship was serious - they’d been living together for four months now - but it wasn’t something he liked to spend too much time thinking about it. It felt dangerous. As though the more he dwelt on their relationship, the more likely he was to realise that it wasn’t going to work in the long term.
Sure they loved each other and everything seemed to be going well, but Tony had thought that about his relationship with Wendy too - and she’d left him without any explanation.
1-1-1
JJ had only been absconded in her office for an hour when she saw the flaw in her plan to avoid Elle. How was she supposed to get her usual coffee fixes without leaving her office? She supposed she could ring Derek and ask him to bring her coffee, but then everyone would know she was avoiding Elle. (Not to mention the fact that Derek had his own work to be doing.)
Pushing her coffee craving away, JJ forced her attention back to the form displayed on the computer in front of her. She’d already completed the details of Hotch and Gideon’s holiday leave forms, and now she was working on Derek’s one. It was an easy enough job, especially when you were filling out several of them at once, but it wasn’t diverting enough to distract her from her desire for coffee.
She wondered if she could get a coffee machine for her office. Except, when she wasn’t avoiding Elle like a middle-schooler, she enjoyed the trek down to the break room for coffee. It gave her a chance to stretch her legs and interact with people in person rather than just over the phone.
JJ sighed in frustration as she realised that her mind had wandered from the task again. This was ridiculous! Maybe she’d be able to focus better if she exchanged the forms for some of the case files that they’d been asked to consult on? Though, chances were she’d still be unfocused and then she’d feel guilty about letting her personal problems distract her from a gruesome case. There was just no winning today.
It was a relief when her office phone began to ring, promising a diversion from the circles her mind was running in.
“Agent Jennifer Jareau speaking.”
“JJ,” Hotch’s voice came through the receiver. “Could I see you in my office please.”
JJ glanced at her clock in surprise. She hadn’t been expecting to hear from Hotch until lunch time at the earliest. “Of course.”
Opening her office door, JJ pointedly didn’t look down into the bullpen where Elle was likely working, but that didn’t stop her from catching sight of her out of the corner of her eyes. Elle did not look happy.
JJ walked to Hotch’s office quickly, her stomach twisting uncomfortably as she could feel Elle’s glare burning into her back. It was a relief to step into the office and out of sight of Elle.
“Derek,” JJ said in surprise, when she saw him sitting on Hotch’s couch. She hadn’t been expecting him, but it was comforting to have him there. His presence was a reminder that she wasn’t in this alone. Derek had made a complaint against Elle too and, from something that Hotch had let slip last week, his complaint had been more serious that hers had been.
“Hey, JJ,” Derek’s smile looked grimmer than usual.
“Shall we get started?” Hotch suggested, shutting the office door and gesturing JJ towards the couch. He took the armchair.
“Sounds good.” JJ said, resisting the urge to nervously rub her hands on her trousers.
“Lay it on us, Hotch.” Derek agreed. “What did Elle decide?”
Hotch’s expression was stony. “Elle has turned down the offer of mediation and has opted to involve an HR representative. In addition, she has submitted her own complaint for against JJ for insubordination. She claims that JJ called her ‘a dick’ and accused her of being ‘bitchy’.”
JJ stiffened, as her stomach dropped in horror. She’d never considered that Elle might turn around and make her own complaint.
“That’s bull!” Derek snapped. “She’s talking about that time in January right? When she baited JJ while Tony was being arrested by that dick Fornell?”
“I believe so,” Hotch confirmed. “The thirtieth of January.”
JJ nodded numbly. “That’s the day Tony was arrested. I remember because we moved in together on the 28th. I didn’t call her a dick though. I told her that it wasn’t the time to prove herself to be as much of a dick as the guys.”
“I’m surprised you still remember it that clearly.” Hotch said evenly.
“I’d been wanting to say it for months,” JJ admitted. “And just about every week since.”
Derek leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “So what happens now, Hotch?”
“I have spoken with Human Resources and emphasised that we need this dealt with quickly.” Hotch explained. “They are going to contact each of you today and arrange for you to meet with them and give your side of the story. You can take legal representation or a support person if you want, however, they can’t be anyone from this unit.”
JJ nodded in understanding. Is was tempting to ask Tony if he would accompany her, but she knew that she wouldn’t. Tony was busy enough as it was, and she doubted the powers that be would appreciate her inviting the Assistant Director of one of their rival agencies to attend an HR meeting with her.
“Those meetings should take place before the end of the week.” Hotch continued. “After which, they may decide to call you back and ask you some follow up questions. As the Unit Chief, I will also be meeting with them to offer my perspective. It is possible that they will speak to Gideon and Reid as well. Once they have collated the data, they will deliberate before coming to a decision.”
JJ nodded again. “What,” She cleared her throat before trying again. “What could happen to me? Worst case scenario?”
“If the HR representatives agree that you were insubordinate then a note will be placed in your employment file.” Hotch answered. “But I don’t think that is a likely outcome, JJ.”
“Okay,” JJ swallowed, her mouth felt so dry.
Derek leaned back. “Besides, one little note from insubordination won’t do much to you in the long run. I got so many notes in my file during my first few years on the force that I almost got fired. Didn’t stop me from becoming a FBI agent and joining the BAU.”
“Derek is right,” Hotch said, though it looked as though it pained him to admit it. “Two years from now no one will look twice at a single insubordination note amid years of positive performance evaluations.”
“What about Elle?” Derek asked. “What will happen to her?”
Hotch’s expression tightened. “I don’t know. That decision is in the hands of the HR representatives.”
“So we just go ahead as usual until that decision is made?” JJ asked, it sounded very uncomfortable.
“Yes,” Hotch answered. “HR have asked me to remind you that you cannot discuss the complaints, or the investigation, with any one in the unit aside from each other. If anyone tries to engage you in a discussion, report it to me immediately. Also, please keep your interactions with Elle restricted to work until this matter is resolved.”
“Sure,” Derek agreed.
JJ nodded, she planned to avoid Elle whenever possible. Thankfully she didn’t actually have to interact with her much, unlike Derek whose desk was only a few feet away from Elle’s.
“The office will likely be uncomfortable for the next few weeks,” Hotch said, standing up and brushing the lines out of his trousers. JJ and Derek quickly stood with him. “But my door is always open if you need to talk.”
“Thanks, Hotch.” JJ said sincerely. She couldn’t imagine a better boss. She could hardly imagine how awful it would have been to go through the process when Gideon had been the Unit Chief.