Title: Confronting Jethro
Author: CruorLuna (Alison)
Rating: K+ : some mild language but nothing warranting T, I don't think. But some of it gets pretty heavy-going at some bits
Category: NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service
Genre: Angst, romance
Pairings: Jibbs, Mibbs

Characters: Jethro, Hollis
Summary: Jethro knows she's gone behind his back, but does he want to know how much she's discovered? Or does he even care? They're about to find out. Sequel to Understanding Jethro, so I'd recommend reading that first, although I guess it's not completely imperative that you do. But it's advisable.

Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine. A couple of references to the past are invented, but that's why it's fanfic, people.

A/N: All right, so, most people who reviewed Understanding Jethro seemed pretty keen on the idea of a follow-up of some sorts, and I had a rough idea where I wanted to take it anyway, so I thought I might as well have a bash. However people also asked for a Jibbs reconciliation, which I haven't given you, as I wanted to show my version of the Mibbs dynamic on its own, rather than through someone else's point of view … if that makes any sense whatsoever! But I'm also considering doing a third piece, set after Jethro and Hollis talk, where Jethro and Jenny talk about their individual conversations with Hollis.

Okay I just reread what I wrote, and that's confusing. Basically it would make this into a series of three, with each one focussing on two of the three characters involved, always a different pair, and all in sequence. I'm hoping people would be interested if I were to do this, as it would finally involve some proper Jibbs communication, but do let me know anyway!

This piece has Jethro on Mibbs, Hollis on Mibbs, Hollis on Jibbs, and a little Jethro on Jibbs. It's from Jethro's point of view, as the last one was from Hollis', and the next one would be from Jenny's. And I think I'm obsessed with this pattern of making them all the same but different. Anyway, it's the confrontation following Hollis and Jenny's discussion, through Gibbs' eyes, and it's a little angsty, a little angry, and hopefully insightful. I'd love to know your thoughts on it at any rate, even if they're criticisms, because how else would I learn? Hope you enjoy!

Leroy Jethro Gibbs was a man of few words. He didn't like to mince them, and he certainly didn't waste them. But sometimes his lack of communication could lead to problems with those around him; those who wanted him to open up. Sometimes it led to tears on the part of the other party. Sometimes harsh words were exchanged – now those, he was an expert on. Sometimes, although only occasionally, his difficulty expressing himself created a rift too great to be repaired. Sometimes that bothered him. Sometimes it didn't. And sometimes he really couldn't decide what he felt about it. This was one such time.

He had been pondering his thoughts for about an hour already, his mind working along with the steady rhythm of his brush, as he applied the second coat of varnish to the boat in his basement. He had taken longer over it than any of the others he had ever built. Those had all been burnt out of hurt, spite and anger. This boat was built from love, and it was his pride and joy, the way its namesake had been. He swallowed slightly as the memories fought for precedence in his mind. His daughter taking her first steps towards him across a crowded dock when he arrived home from duty. Her satisfied smile when she managed to scream 'Dada' loudly enough to be heard from her bedroom down the hall. Her first day of school. Teaching her to ride a bike. So many other memories he had missed out on being away from home. Had he known then that their time together would have been so short … well, he would have made sure it hadn't been cut short. He would have protected her, and her mother. But he hadn't. He had failed them. And Kelly and Shannon were gone.

Hollis wasn't gone, however. Hollis was very much there, all the time. She was constantly around, usually when he really couldn't be bothered with her. And then, of course, he felt bad for neglecting her. It really was a vicious circle. He cared for the woman, of course, but he had had more than his share of bad relationships, usually ending in bad marriages. He couldn't promise her a ring on her finger, and yet she seemed more eager than ever to push things to the limit. How far would she go before he had to stop her?

"Jethro?" He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Not so long ago, the sound of her voice had been a welcome break in the silence of his basement. Now it sounded harsh and intrusive, and he wasn't quite sure when the change had taken place. He still enjoyed her company more than most people's, and when he was in the right mood, he was glad of the distraction from his own memories. But the right mood didn't seem to come around nearly as often as it used to. He heard her footsteps descending his stairs, soft and careful in the dimness, and a moment later felt her presence behind him.

"Hey." One-word sentences were something of a speciality of his. Hollis usually used that as her starting point when she began her 'you never want to talk to me' speech, and he was expecting tonight to be no different. But it was different.

"Hey," she said right back. "It looks good." He frowned slightly to himself, but didn't turn around.

"Yup." He could sense her hesitation as she took a few breaths, seeming to change her mind repeatedly about whether or not she wanted to speak.

"Would you mind stopping?" she asked quietly. And he did stop. Something in her tone told him this was more than just another lecture, another argument. He laid down his brush carefully and turned to face her, straightening up to look into her eyes. Emotion was written all over her face, and he was able to read every line. She was upset. She was hurt. She was nervous. She was … understanding? That wasn't right. Something had shifted.

"Bourbon?" he offered, taking a step towards the bottle he kept on his workbench. She shook her head with a smile he could make neither head nor tail of.

"I've had my fill for the time being."

"Uh-huh." He wasn't about to demand an explanation for the obscure sentence. If anyone understood privacy, it was Jethro. "You don't mind if I do?"

"No."

"Good." He turned his back on her once more, pouring what had to constitute at least a triple measure and gulping down half of it at once. He then topped up the glass again and stood for a moment, contemplating how to approach her when she was behaving so unlike herself. But she took the decision out of his hands.

"Can we sit?" Hollis had already sunk to the floor, leaning against the side of his boat. He nodded curtly and joined her there, glad this part hadn't had its second coating yet.

"You okay?" he asked, and she let out a hollow laugh.

"Now you think to ask?" she asked flatly. He glanced into her eyes, but there was no anger there. Mostly, it was resignation. "This isn't working, Jethro."

"No." He wasn't arguing with her.

"I wanted to understand." Now the anxiety was creeping through, and Jethro knew she was ready to tell him what she had come here to. "All I ever wanted with you was to understand, at least a little. But you didn't want to let me. I got sick of waiting."

"There someone else?" It surprised him a little to discover how little the notion bothered him. She shook her head with a wry smile.

"Not for me." Again with the cryptic answers. Maybe she had been spending too much time with him after all. "But I really wanted to know, Jethro. I thought if I knew, it would let me help you. I thought I could make things perfect between us if I just understood you a little better. But when I heard the answers I'd been looking for, they weren't what I'd expected. And I know now that you and I are never going to have a happy ending."

"Should I even bother asking what you heard?" he queried. He couldn't deny a part of him was intrigued, and even more so by the way her cheeks coloured.

"I didn't want this to end in hatred," she whispered. "But if I tell you, I know you will hate me … but I suppose if I don't, she will."

"Who will, Hollis?" he asked, a little more sharply than he'd intended. She closed her eyes, and he saw a few tears escaping the lids onto her pale skin.

"Jenny." Jethro felt his chest constrict and he fought the urge to shout at her. What difference would it make now? The damage was already done, and they were over either way. But why did it have to be Jenny? Why, of all people, did she have to go to the one person in the world who would tell her the absolute truth? Most people didn't know the whole truth about him, and he could have lived with knowing she had heard all the secrets Abby or Ducky knew about him. He would still have had something to hide behind. But Jen knew him inside out, upside down and back to front, several times over. There was nothing she didn't already know about him that he knew she couldn't read in his eyes.

"Why?" His own voice sounded strangely distant now, as if he were totally detached from the situation. And in some way, he supposed he was. He cared more about what Jenny had been forced to reveal and relive than about what Hollis knew now.

"She understands, Jethro," Hollis said, a slight note of pleading in her tone. "She knows you better than anybody, and you trust her more than you trust me. I thought if I could get her insight, maybe I could get your attention the way she does. But now I realise that was a naïve idea. I'll never be Jenny Shepard."

"I never asked you to be," Jethro defended himself, but she scoffed.

"Exactly," she replied. "You don't even realise yourself how much of a hold she has over you. You're blind to it because neither of you wants to see it. But I see it. I've seen it every day since we met, and it's killed me. I'm tired of fighting."

"Jen – Jenny," he amended swiftly, "and I are colleagues. We used to be partners. We're friends, I guess. But anything more than that was over a long time ago. You can't possibly blame her for the fact that things aren't working any more between us."

"I don't blame her," Hollis corrected him, the tears still spilling over her cheeks. "I blame myself, but not for that. I blame myself for pushing you so hard. I tried to convince myself that given enough attention, and enough of a change from the impossible relationships you seem to force yourself into, that you might see that you could be happy with someone who was just happy. My life when I met you wasn't complicated, at least not the way you're used to. I thought you could use the stability. But I was wrong."

"Hollis …"

"Let me finish," she interrupted him firmly. "I shouldn't have expected more of you than you were able to give. That wasn't fair to either of us. And I see now that you'll never be content with stable. You need complicated, or you don't see the point. You need a relationship with obstacles for you to work around or overcome, because you need to feel like you've earned the right to be happy. I was never going to be enough of a challenge for you. And I can be as stubborn as Jenny or any of your ex-wives, I'm sure, but I'm never going to dye my hair red. I don't have the temper they do, and I don't have that fire I see in Jenny's eyes every time she looks at you. I'm a simple girl, Jethro, and you're a very complex man. I was kidding myself to think I could make you happy."

"You did make me happy," he said as gently as he could, leaning his head back against the boat with a sigh. "I owe you a lot, Hollis. You've made me smile and laugh and want to be happy again. Believe me, that's no easy task."

"Oh, I know!" she said, half-laughing through her tears. "I figured that one out the first time I met you. And I'm glad I did meet you. We've had some really good times together, and I'll never forget them. But I have to stop pretending it was ever about anything more than a good time. You could never love me, Jethro. Not the way I love you, anyway. And I can't wait around in case one day you decide you might be able to."

"I'm sorry." She gaped at him, and he half-grinned at the irony of the situation.

"What happened to 'sign of weakness'?" she questioned him.

"Someone very smart pointed out that it takes strength to apologise," he answered quietly, reaching out and squeezing her hand. She smiled sadly.

"I'd tend to agree."

"If I could control how I feel, I'd want to love you," he said with some difficulty. He really wasn't good with words, after all. Her fingers tightened around his, but she didn't speak, for which he was glad. Now that he'd started, he wanted to get it all out in one go. "I wish I could offer you a ring, and a dog, and a house in the country with a white picket fence. You're an amazing woman, Hollis, and I'm lucky to have known you. I'd be lucky to call you mine for the rest of our lives. Any man would be. But you were right. It wouldn't be fair to either of us. I'm not capable of that right now. I don't know if I ever will be. And I couldn't be happy knowing I was stringing you along that way."

"I never felt strung along," Hollis murmured. "You've made me very happy too, you know. What we have … what we had, was great while it lasted. But it just can't last forever."

"No."

"I'm still glad I spoke to Jenny," she said, and he shot her a sideways glance. "Even though it means we're over. We were going to be soon enough anyway. At least now I have some idea as to why we are. You may not like it, Jethro, but I really did have to know. She was honest with me when you couldn't or wouldn't be. I needed that from somebody. Don't be angry with her."

"I'm not," he said truthfully. He had never been able to stay angry with Jen for very long. Even after she had left him behind and broken his heart, he had offered her a second chance the next time they met. That was just how it had always been. "I know she would have tried to help. I just don't know how much I want her to have told you."

"I'm guessing not as much as she did."

"Why's that?"

"I asked some pretty personal questions," Hollis revealed, having the good grace to look abashed. "I didn't expect her to answer half of them, but … she's a far better woman than I ever gave her credit for. I guess I just didn't want to see it."

"How personal?" Jethro asked, not sure he wanted to hear the answer.

"Do you really want to know?"

"I guess we'll find out."

"Very," she sighed. "She told me a lot more than I could have expected when I went to her, and a lot more than she had to. I wouldn't have blamed her for telling me to mind my own business. She told me a little about your relationship – about how it came about, how you were together. You sounded happy."

"We were," he agreed before he had a chance to stop himself. He cringed slightly as he realised how harsh that had sounded. "Once."

"I'm glad," she said, surprising him. "It's good to know you let yourself be truly happy again after Shannon, even if it was only once and for a little while. I'd hate to think you'd spent your entire life trying to replace her."

"Nobody will ever replace Shannon," Jethro snapped, his defensiveness getting the better of him. Hollis sighed.

"I'm well aware of that, Jethro," she said soothingly. "And I'm just saying that I'm glad you are too. But I think she would have wanted you to be happy."

"You didn't know her."

"But she loved you." Hollis' tone was gentle, and almost envious. "And she was the love of your life. If she was the kind of woman you could care that deeply for, then I can't imagine her being selfish. And if that's true, then she wouldn't want to see you making yourself miserable. You'll never forget her, and you shouldn't. But you're allowed to love others as well. I think you did let yourself, with Jenny. And she hurt you, so you swore to yourself you would never let a woman get that close again, because when she left you, it hurt you almost as much as losing Shannon did, and you were sick of feeling that much pain."

"Damn it, Hollis!" Jethro cursed, getting to his feet in one swift movement and turning away from her. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"It seems like I must, if I've got you this riled up," she pointed out rationally. "And I don't blame you, Jethro. Nobody deserves to go through what you have. But don't give up on the world just yet. There are good people out there."

"Who'd be better off without me, just like you will be," he shot at her, crossing the room in two brief strides and pouring yet more bourbon into his glass. "This is who I am. You're right – I don't let people in, because I don't want to. And I don't try to replace Shannon, because I never could. That's who I am. And you're still just trying to change me."

"I'm trying to help you!"

"Well don't waste your time," he retorted, wondering in the back of his mind where all this anger was coming from.

"You want to know what Jenny said to me?" Hollis snapped right back, climbing to her feet and taking a few steps towards him.

"I doubt it."

"Well too bad, because you're going to hear it!" she informed him angrily. "God damn it, Jethro, the woman was in tears over the guilt she feels about hurting you! She doesn't think you're a waste of time – she cares about you, just like I do, and she wants you to be happy! She let me go to her and ask her a lot of questions I never should have dared to, and tore herself up over her mistakes all over again, just because she thought it might help you to be happy! She told me she loved you as a friend, a mentor, a partner and a confidante – she said she cares about you more than anyone else in the world! This is the first female Director of an armed Federal Agency, Jethro, crying because the most important person in her life makes her feel like a failure! Do you really think a woman as strong and intelligent as Jennifer Shepard would let herself get tied up in knots over somebody who wasn't worth it?!"

"What the hell do you mean, I make her feel like a failure?" Jethro's voice had returned to normal pitch, so stunned was he at the vehemence in Hollis' tone. Never in a million years had he expected to hear her defending Jenny, and certainly not getting so worked up about it. The words coming out of her mouth on top of that were enough to shock him out of his temper.

"She's never going to forgive herself for leaving you," Hollis said bitterly. "She thinks that her hurting you has led to you being the way you are now – miserable, reclusive …"

"She needs to get her ego checked," Jethro bit back.

"No, you need to get over your own wretchedness and look at the good things in your life, for once!" she argued. "Jenny told me that you two aren't so different. She described you as two incomplete and broken people. I don't know what her situation is, but she hit the nail on the head with you. She cares about you, and she's not the only one. Your team look up to you like a father, and I can see why. You've got so much going for you, Jethro, but you refuse to open your eyes."

"And that's my problem, Hollis!" he reminded her. "You keep saying you're sorry about pushing me – then for God's sake, just stop!"

"You'd love that, wouldn't you? Then you could sink back into your self-induced isolation, cutting yourself off from people so it won't hurt if they walk away. Well I am walking away, Jethro, because you don't want to be helped. You're so comfortable the way you are that I don't even know if you remember how to be truly happy any more."

"So I'm wretched, miserable, reclusive, and too comfortable to be happy," Jethro rattled off, too impatient to attempt to control his rising temper. "Anything else?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact," Hollis snapped. "You're also one of the best men I know, Leroy Jethro Gibbs. You're sweet, and intelligent, and funny and kind. But right now, I don't think I've ever met a man so selfish."

"Selfish?!"

"You are aware that this self-hatred you have going on is slowly but surely tearing the people around you apart, right?" she asked, raising one eyebrow, as though this were the most obvious fact in the world.

"Don't exaggerate," he said, rolling his eyes, but she glared at him.

"I'm not," she assured him, so forcefully that he couldn't help but wonder if she truly believed what she was saying. "The people who care about you most are the ones you treat the worst. You yell at DiNozzo and smack him on the back of the head every chance you get, and yet he hovers at your shoulder like a lost puppy, just waiting for another slap if it'll mean he's got your attention. Abby lives for the moments you'll kiss her on the cheek and tell her she's done a good job, even though she's had a third of the time she should have to do it in. Ziva and McGee work themselves to the bone for you – if you said 'jump,' any one of them would ask 'how high?' They put up with your treatment of them because they love you, Jethro, and they know that's just how you are. Anyone who didn't care wouldn't bother looking for the hidden meaning in the head slaps, but your team would cross to the ends of the earth and back again for you, and be grateful to get a lecture as thanks. Imagine caring for someone that much, and realising that they didn't care about themselves. How would you feel?"

"It's not …" Jethro trailed off, once again surprised and impressed by her understanding of the situation and her determinedness to defend his family. "I don't hate myself," he tried finally. The eyes that met his were filled with sadness.

"But you don't like yourself, either," she said softly. "That's plenty of damage to be getting along with."

"What's your point, Hollis?" he asked, suddenly tired. He didn't want to argue any more. He didn't want them to part on these bad terms. She sighed.

"There's nothing I would like more than to be able to help you, Jethro," she said with the air of someone choosing their words very carefully. "But we both know that's something I can't give you. The people around you would do anything and everything in their power to keep you safe and make you happy. I'd love it if you would let them."

"Why?" It didn't make sense to him that she would care so much, when they were in the middle of a break-up.

"Just because things aren't going to work out between us, doesn't mean I have to stop caring, Jethro," she said with a gentle smile. "I get the impression your wives may have done just that, but … not all women are like that. Jenny still cares, too."

"This isn't about Jenny," he pointed out.

"No," she agreed. "This is about us. I'm going to say goodbye to you very soon, Jethro, and I doubt we'll ever see each other again. But I would like to know that you're not going to let all my efforts in making you want to be happy again go to waste. You do deserve to be happy, even though it can't be with me. I'm going to do what makes me happy, and I'd feel a lot better leaving here tonight knowing that you're going to try it for once as well."

"What are you going to do now?" he asked, surprised he hadn't thought to ask sooner.

"Retiring," she said, and he nodded. He had been half-expecting that one for a while now, on some level. "I'm thinking Maui. I could get used to spending ten hours a day working on my tan."

"You deserve a break," he agreed.

"Well, if you ever decide you need some sun, give me a call," Hollis said with a half-hearted attempt at a smile. "I'd like to stay in touch. Even you must rest sometimes."

"After Mexico, I promised myself I wouldn't set foot on another beach unless I sailed there on this," Jethro replied, patting Kelly with one hand. Hollis smiled slightly wider at that.

"I hope you do, someday. And maybe not alone."

"I guess anything's possible," he said vaguely. He wasn't thinking that far ahead right now. For the time being, he was wholly content to keep working at NCIS and perfecting his project. Romance tended to complicate things, he had found. Most of the time, anyway.

"Well for your sake, I hope there is someone out there who can help you the way I can't, Jethro," Hollis said, her tone sober. "I meant what I said. I'd really love to know that you were able to find happiness again."

"I'll keep you posted," he offered with a half-grin.

"I'd like that," she agreed quietly. "I think I'd like it a lot. Either way, I wish you the best of luck." She moved forward and wrapped her arms around his neck, and for the first time in months, he found it wasn't a stifling embrace. He supposed that she had really already let him go.

"Goodbye, Hollis," he said into her ear, returning her hold gently. She moved out of his arms and he made every effort to avoid looking at the tears shining in her eyes.

"Goodbye, Jethro," she answered, her voice wavering ever so slightly. She turned from him before he was forced to watch any droplets escape, and lifting her coat from where she had draped it on the boat, she ascended his staircase a little more quickly than he had expected. Stopping on the top step, she turned back to him, her face cast into shadow. "It's the little things you do that define you, Leroy Jethro Gibbs," she said with what he thought was the faintest shadow of a smile. "It's the only way you know to show how you feel. And I'd be willing to bet good money there was never a boat called Jenny."

"I don't –"

"Your boats are for the women who've left you, Jethro," Hollis interrupted him, stopping him from finishing the sentence. "But she's always going to be a part of you." Before he could think up anything even remotely resembling an appropriate answer, she was gone from his basement, and from his life. It didn't hurt. He would miss her company, the same way he might miss Palmer in the Autopsy lab. He had simply gotten used to her presence over time. But her words, not her absence, were what affected him now.

She had been right about his team. He treated them the way he did because it was the only way he knew to get the best from them. They certainly did put up with a lot more than they should have to from him, but then again, they wouldn't be his team if they didn't understand why he acted that way. He shook his head. They knew he didn't hate himself. If they knew he didn't like himself very much, then he owed them more credit than he was wont to give. He had spent the majority of his life with a cloud of self-loathing hanging over his head. Sometimes he wondered if it should have its own mention on invitations. Forget 'Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Partner' – 'and Cloud' would do just fine. But this was the way he had been for more years than he cared to think about, and that wasn't about to change now. Hollis wanted him to change. That was the real reason they could never have worked. She had fallen for the man she thought he could be, instead of the man he knew he was. Those were at far too different ends of the spectrum to be merged in any way.

Jenny had never tried to change him. Sometimes he had suspected she wished he were more communicative, or less paranoid, but she had never spoken of it. No matter what her views on who he could have been, she had always respected him for who he was, and he had returned the courtesy. They had loved each other almost as passionately as they had hated themselves – a dangerous combination of emotions, thrown together along with fiery tempers and secrets. He chuckled to himself. No wonder Hollis had always had doubts about the nature of their relationship. He had certainly never understood it. Maybe that was what made it so difficult to detach the memories from the present sometimes.

Jethro lifted his brush again and began to varnish the spot where he and Hollis had sat not half an hour ago, his arm moving steadily from left to right as he turned her words over in his head. She had said that Jenny Shepard was always going to be a part of him.

Hollis had been wrong. She understood him a lot better than she gave herself credit for.

A/N: Again, I sat down to write this, and it wound up being different than I originally planned … but this is where the muses took it, anyway. There wasn't too much Mibbs romance, I don't think – just discussion. And I tried to make it a little Jibbsy without being too much, so I hope the Jibbs fans are satisfied with what there was. As I said, I'm looking at doing a third one, and if I do it will only be Jibbs, having their own little talk. I'd love to hear your feedback, as always, and thanks loads for reading!

Alison xx