No Ordinary Love - G.Callen NCIS L.A

Chapter 44

The next Tuesday he woke up with a splitting headache. Dee fed him aspirin and caffeine free tea, and made him promise not to overdo it. He felt ill at ease, and it was not only because of his headache.

Dee called Sam for the first time in a long time to carpool, and his partner showed up a little while later, pleasantly surprised. "To what do I owe the honor of picking you up?"

Dee shook her head at him. "Don't get your hopes up; he won't be approachable until the aspirin kicks in."

"What'd he do?"

"Bad night." She searched for Grisha's eyes. "You take it easy, today, okay? Don't make me call Hetty."

Grisha grumbled something and went after Sam. Sam looked back at Dee. "He hasn't been like this in a while."

"Splitting headache. The aspirin should help, but something's bothering him and I don't think he has figured out what it is yet." She shrugged. "Make sure he takes it easy today? Whatever it is, he'll tell one of you eventually. I'll give Hetty a call just in case."

"Yeah." Sam winked at her. "I'll take care of him."

"Thanks, Sam."

The uneasy feeling he had stayed throughout the day. It was there when Kensi and Deeks argued about the last details of the wedding and when Sam threatened to throw them in a room together until they worked things out. Thankfully, the aspirin took the sharp edges of his headache, but he still wasn't in a good mood.

He felt slightly nauseous when Eric called them up to OPS for a case. It stayed when it turned out that one of Arkady's contacts was involved, and he lashed out, mad, when Arkady threw the same smoke curtains he always did. Hetty called him into her office halfway through the day. Silently, she handed him tea and he sat down. She let him brood for a moment before she spoke. "What has gotten into you? Something has you worried. Are you worried about your new house?"

He shook his head. "Technically, it's not our house until we get approved. So no, I'm not worried about that."

"Then what is? Mr. Kolcheck didn't deserve such a lashing out, no matter what he did."

Solemnly, he tilted his head and looked down into his cup. "I know. I'm sorry."

"You should apologize to Mr. Kolcheck, not to me."

"I will." Taking a deep breath, he lifted his head to look at her again. "I don't know what it is. I didn't sleep well for the first time in.. a while, and I can't seem to shake the feeling that something is not quite right. But I don't know what it is, exactly."

Hetty eyed him. "Is it the case?"

"Not particularly. It was there when I woke up this morning. And trust me, Hetty, I usually sleep fine these days."

"Mmm." Hetty stared into the distance for a moment. "Well, you know your sixth sense. There's no café to be blown up, and last I checked, all your enemies were either dead or under lock and key. Try and stay out of trouble and keep yourself in check."

"Yeah." Still not feeling better, he rose, put his cup and saucer on her desk and went back to work. Arkady's trail took them to the hospital, then to the morgue and back to the hospital again. And while passing one of the waiting rooms in the hallway, he knew exactly where his trepidation had come from. Because in one of the rooms was his father.

Sam was standing next to him as his father offered a greeting and Callen felt his shoulders sag. So that was why he had felt at odds with himself. He'd only met the man once the year before, but he'd known, somehow, that he was around.

He was hostile during questioning; maybe more so than he should have been. But here was the man that had abandoned him when he was five, and he couldn't shake the feeling of wanting him to pay for everything he'd gone through when he was growing up.

Nikita, or Garrison, or whatever his name was, stonewalled him, not wanting to reveal what he was doing in the States. His father was almost as good in throwing up walls as he was. Callen bristled when he didn't get anywhere and stalked out of the room.

He barked orders at Eric and Nell, and went outside, throwing the door closed. The three team members left threw each other worried glances before Deeks went out after him. He found Callen leaning against the car, staring off into the ocean.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really."

Deeks shook his head. "Why are you so mad at him?" he asked, trying to get him to open up anyway.

Callen let his breath out. "He's stonewalling me completely. He won't let me help. He comes waltzing in here, thinking that he doesn't have to tell us why he's here..." Shaking his head, he halted. "He's not going to give me answers."

Deeks understood. After all this time, all Callen wanted was answers instead of the smoke screens and half-truths. He wanted honesty. And if there was something Deeks could understand, it was the need for answers. "He might. But like you, he's done things by himself for a long time. I'm sure he knows you're angry with him. And from your point of view, you have every right to be. But frankly, we have a case to solve. So all your personal stuff has to wait until we know what's going on."

Callen knew that Deeks was right. Not that he liked it. So he took a cleansing breath and stowed all his anger deep down inside, saving it for later. Going back inside, he tried again, trying to keep his temper in check. But his father kept stonewalling him, and Callen gave up.

He threw Nikita/Garrison out of the boatshed, but not before he put a tracker on the older man, so he could figure out where he was going. As they threw around ideas of why his father was here, he texted his fiancée, telling her that it was going to be long day. He got kisses in return.

In the end, he found out his father had come to protect someone from his past. Someone his father had loved, like he had loved Callen's mother and his sister. Him. They were nowhere near reconnecting, but Callen had a better idea of why his father had done what he had done. By 9 PM Callen was standing outside of the boatshed again, his father by his side. He turned to the older man. "We're done keeping secrets, okay? If you're here to stay, and you want to have some kind of relationship with me, you and I need to talk."

His father looked older that night than he had when Callen had found him in the hospital that morning. But Garrison nodded, giving in. "Yes, we do."

Callen eyed him. "Do you have somewhere to stay?"

It took a lot of resolve from his father to admit that he did not. "I'll go to a hotel."

"I'm not letting you stay in a hotel. You're coming with me."

"Whereto?"

"Home."