Seeley Booth was not a happy man. No, he was not. He was angry and disappointed and just plain pissed.
He'd been at the diner with Brennan when he'd gotten the call. It came from Christine's school, asking him to confirm her absence from fifth and sixth period.
As far as he knew, she wasn't supposed to have been gone from fifth period or sixth.
Brennan was needed back at the lab, so he headed for the first place he could think to look for his daughter. His office.
When he was finally standing in his office doorway, he could clearly see Christine sitting in his desk chair, her legs crossed with her feet propped up on his desk, leaned back and leisurely. An FBI file sat open in her lab and she was engrossed in it.
He quelled the immediate flare of anger in his chest at the sight of her so relaxed, knowing shouting at her would only make her yell back. Christine was a feisty, stubborn child with authority problems. Regardless of who she was talking to, she would still speak her mind.
"This is the third time you've cut school this month," he said calmly.
She didn't look up from the file, merely flipped over a page in the file. "Biology is a bore. I already know everything."
"Maybe you should stop spending so much time around Hodgins, then. That way you won't know everything." She's a seventh grader. Since when was she in biology? I was taking bio classes in high school, he thinks. He doesn't, however, voice his thoughts. "What are you doing with that file?"
"Reading it, clearly," she says, as if he didn't know that. "Who was Heather Taffet?"
"Whose file are you reading?" he countered.
"I asked first," his daughter said petulantly.
"That stuff is confidential. You could get sent to juvie for reading that," Booth told her, intending it as a threat, but it wasn't all that scary. Not to her, anyway. He stepped all the way into the office and closed the door behind him as he said this.
"Yeah, but you're not gonna send me to juvie because you're an FBI agent and these are your files and I'm your kid. Plus Mom would kill you," she responded easily. "Tell you what, I'll tell you whose file this is, and you'll tell me who Heather Taffet is."
Booth frowned. She was a manipulative child, that was for sure. "You first."
Christine sighed. "Some guy named Thomas Vega. There isn't much on him. What was his deal, anyway?"
"You only get one question," Booth told her. He was still angry, but anger would get him nowhere with Christine. He had to give her what she wanted before he made sure she learned her lesson.
She sighed again. "Who's Heather Taffet?"
Booth sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk. He beckoned with his hand for the file. Christine pouted but closed it, passing it over the desk to him. "Heather Taffet was a district attorney with a night job as a serial kidnapper and murderer."
Christine didn't look surprised. "Figures."
"Yeah. She would take people, bury 'em somewhere with twenty-four hours of air, then demand a ransom from the family or whoever. Most of the time, anyway. They called her the Gravedigger, and she had a total of eleven victims."
"What happened to them?" Christine asked curiously. She changed position so she was sitting with legs crossed in the chair, leaned forward with her elbows on the armrests, clearly intrigued.
"Four of the victims paid the ransom, got out alive. Three didn't. They died," Booth said uncomfortably.
"What about the other four?"
"Well, she tased Thomas Vega to death when he got too close to the case," he told her evasively.
"That still leaves three more, Dad," Christine told him matter-of-factly.
Booth sighed. He hadn't wanted to tell her about this part. "The other three were your mother, Hodgins, and I."
That seemed to shock her into silence. "Oh."
"Yeah." Booth focused his eyes on his nameplate.
"That explains a lot," Christine said simply.
Booth furrowed his brow. "What do you mean by that?"
Christine gave her father a 'no, duh' look. "I'm not stupid, Dad. I have ears. My room is right next to yours and I know Mom still has nightmares."
No, Booth thought. No, she most certainly is not stupid.
Booth studied the hockey poster behind his desk. Christine's hard expression softened and she focused her eyes on his keyboard.
His daughter let out a puff of air. She stood up from his desk and grabbed her backpack by the left strap, walking calmly across the office without a word.
"Hey," Booth called after her. "Hey, where-where are you going?"
"Oh." She stopped by the door of the office and looked over her shoulder at him. "I've got a study date with Michael. I'll be home around six."
"Five. You and your mother and I need to have a talk."
Christine huffed. "Five-thirty."
Booth bit back a groan. "Fine."
She was halfway across the bullpen when what she said truly hit him. He bolted up from his seat and fast-walked to his office door, sticking his head out to shout after his daughter, "Date?" Christine looked over her shoulder at him, smiled, raised her eyebrow, but didn't stop. She was already in the elevator when he called, "But you don't even study!"
And of course, her only response was to smirk and wave as the elevator doors closed before her.
A/N: Just a fun, cute little OS between Daddy!Booth and Baby!Booth who's not very much of a baby anymore. Thoughts?