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Tony stared at the disgusting mess the prison considered his evening meal. More than anything he missed the repasts that he frequently enjoyed before he'd been caught. He shouldn't have been caught, but it was too late for that now.
It was stupid really. Purposefully conning a policeman, he really should have known better. His father had even warned him about such things before disowning him at twelve, but he'd forgotten.
After all, at twelve he'd been better than his father at conning people. He shouldn't have been surprised that his father couldn't handle the competition, but he had been. Still it hadn't been a bad life on the streets.
His skill was more than enough to keep him fed and in fancy clothes and anything else he wanted. It wasn't mansions like his father had, but it worked for him. One day, he would pull the greatest con of all on his own father and repay him for disowning him.
Of course, he'd gotten caught and was looking at ten to fifteen years in prison, now. He didn't like that at all. It wasn't good for business or for his plans to repay his father.
He was definitely looking to deal. He just wasn’t sure what deal he could make to get him out of jail time. He didn’t have any information that would be useful to anyone else.
Literally, the only skills he had were in conning people. Luckily for him, Leroy wanted to take his spot. Apparently, the NCIS agent was investigating the policeman who arrested him.
Unfortunately, Tony and Gibbs looked nothing alike, so Gibbs couldn’t take his spot, but Tony was happy to volunteer to wear a wire and rile the policeman up enough to get him to confess to what he’d done. It was surprisingly easy to get the policeman to confess and Tony wondered how he’d gotten caught by such an idiot. Regardless, he was happy to put him away for being the corrupted cop he was.
Even more than that, though, he’d made an impression on Agent Gibbs. Unbeknownst to Tony, Agent Gibbs put in a good word with his director about him. That was enough to earn Tony his freedom and a spot on Agent Gibbs’ team.
Tony was shocked when the warden came and released him, but apparently since he was arrested by the cop that they’d just finished gathering evidence against and since he helped out, he was being released without any jail time. Though, the arrest was on his record and if he got caught again he would likely not be so lucky. Still Tony was happy to be out of jail and to try his hand at legal jobs like working for Agent Gibbs.
In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that operating within the law would be the best con he could ever play on his father. His father had never wanted him to amount to anything, but especially not a cop. Even better, when his father got in trouble with the law and came to him for help he could turn him down to his face.
Yes, this would be the best revenge ever. Tony happily completed FLETC and all the other requirements needed to actually join Agent Gibbs’ team. He couldn’t believe the fact that he was on the premier NCIS team when he finally started at work.
Of course, he soon realized why Gibbs had a team of one. Gibbs worked people to the bone, but Tony wasn’t bothered by hard work. He hadn’t become a con artist because he was bothered by working hard.
He’d become a conman because it was the family business and he’d mistakenly thought it would make his father proud of him. Obviously, he couldn’t have been more wrong. He didn’t care anymore, though.
He had Gibbs now and while Gibbs was hard to please it was actually possible. In fact, Gibbs was a better father to him than his ever had been. At least when he got the plague, Gibbs actually visited him in the hospital.
His father had been the one to put him in the hospital more than once and had never visited. The longer he worked with Gibbs, the more he began to see what he’d done to others during the time he’d been working the cons. Even if you chose to con only the rich, it made an impact on the lives of those around them that he had never realized.
As he started to set about righting those wrongs, he started to see his father in a different light. He started to feel pity for him instead of hatred. By the time his father got arrested for murdering someone, he no longer cared about pulling one over on his father.
Senior was many things, but a murderer he was not. Instead of taking the revenge he’d always dreamed of, he helped Senior prove his innocence. Gibbs quiet, “I’m proud of you,” after that meant more to him than anything Senior said or did.
That more than anything dealt the death blow to his con artist ways. Which wasn’t to say that he never conned anyone anymore, but it was pretty much only to get confessions or other skirting the line things that helped him do his job better. Still he was pretty sure that anyone would agree that Gibbs had succeeded in reforming him as a criminal and he didn’t mind it in the least.