Desuetude

Aside from being a bastard if you asked his team what Gibbs was most famous for, you could pretty much guarantee that they’d respond Gibbs’ rules. Some of them may even mention a specific rule like rule 9 never go anywhere without a knife. The one rule that you wouldn’t hear them mention, however, is rule 12 “never date a coworker” which had quickly fallen into desuetude after Gibbs and Tony started dating.

At first McGee and Ziva had assumed that their romantic relationship would go the way all previous relationships for Tony and Gibbs had gone, in other words nowhere. McGee gave Tony a hard time about breaking Gibbs’ rule never date a coworker, but it didn’t bother Tony at all. In fact, he just responded back. “It’s not like it’s the first time, McDateLess.”

McGee’s face had slid into an expression of shock briefly before he remembered EJ. “That’s right. I can’t believe you dated EJ, Tony.”

Tony just smirked at McGee and didn’t comment that EJ also hadn’t been the first.

Ziva was suspicious at first, certain that this meant Tony would become even more insufferable and Gibbs would start letting him get away with more at work. When her fears didn’t manifest, however, she settled back into the team and didn’t worry about it.

It was like rule 12 never existed and the team was happy to keep it that way. McGee appreciated being able to date Abby without guilt and Ziva appreciated the additional blackmail she had on her coworkers. Both Gibbs and Tony were aware of Ziva’s rather mercenary nature and had made sure that there was no one she could tell of their relationship that would actually hurt them.

Vance had been concerned about the Team Lead dating a Team Member at first. He soon saw, however, that it made no difference in the way the team functioned and simply marked it as another one of DiNozzo and Gibbs’ eccentricities. A few weeks later, he pushed through a promotion to co-team lead for DiNozzo without saying anything to anyone, so that they weren’t technically breaking regs anymore.