Working with Gibbs (a NCIS story)

Chapter 47 - Lessons in Trust

-a few days later-
Things were unusually quiet, so Jackson went back home.  Meanwhile, the usual babysitter that Gibbs and Grace use got sick, so they couldn't find a replacement.  They wound up taking the kids to work, which inevitably led to mayhem. 
"Hey, guys, why don't you let me sister watch the kids?" Mackenzie asked one morning after 3 days of bringing the kids in.
"I didn't know you had a sister" Grace commented.
"What's her name?" Gibbs asked.
"Ella.  She doesn't like me to talk about her much, but she's great with kids" Mack replied, and the parents looked at each other.
"Mack wouldn't say something if it wasn't true.  Let's give her a try"
"Okay"
-a day or two later-
Ella did well her first day with the kids, so they decided to officially hire her.  On her second day, however, things went wrong...they were working on a case when Mack got a call from her sister.
"Hello?"
"Mack, it's me.  Make sure you're alone" she raised an eyebrow but got up and left the room, saying she'd be right back.
"Okay, what's up?" She heard a kid crying in the background.  "What happened?"
"I was feeding the kids when some woman came in, and she...she held all 3 of us at gunpoint.  She took us somewhere and Kenzie and I were able to get away, but AJ is still there..."
"What?! Are you okay?"
"Yeah, she and I are fine..."
"Well, I have to tell them what happened -"
"No! Don't, please!"
"Ella..."
"Mack, promise me you won't say anything, at least for now."
"I'm sorry, but I can't keep that promise.  They're going to find out when they get home anyways."
"Yeah...okay." Mackenzie hung up and took a deep breath as she walked back over to break the dreaded news.
-about 10 minutes later-
"I better go and get Gibbs..." Grace said as she slowly stood and went to the back stairs where she knew he was.  He had stormed off almost as soon as they heard the news about AJ, and as much as she wanted to do the same, she had to try to keep order the best she could while she assigned tasks to the rest of the team.  She made her way outside and sure enough, there he was sitting on the bottom step.  "Thought you might be out here" he looked up with a start at her voice. 
"How are you so calm about this? Someone has our son, probably to get to me"
"Trust me, I'm not calm.  But I also know that we have a job to do, and we're going to use every resource we can, and even some we shouldn't, to find him.  And don't blame Mack's sister for this either, this wasn't her fault - sounds to me like they took her by surprise."
"I don't blame her..." she heard him say.
"Don't tell me you blame yourself...listen, we haven't even seen a sign of them for several days, how were you supposed to know this was going to happen?" A moment of silence, then "exactly.  So don't blame yourself.  There's only two people to blame for this, and we're going to find them and get our son back, by any means necessary."
"You sound like me"
"Well someone has to if you don't" she replied with a chuckle.  "Come on, all hands on deck, that includes you"