"Angela

"Angela? I need some help!" Angela Montenegro pulled herself out of bed. Her fiancé was still asleep next to her.

"What is it sweetie?"

"I need to talk." The connection was rubbish. Brennan's voice sounded wobbly, as though she were on the verge of tears.

"Look, I really need to be here for Jack. Can't we talk on the phone?" She looked down at the sleeping mass of the man she loved. "He's really cut up about Gormagon and Zack-" Her friend cut her off mid sentence.

"Angela, please."Brennan pleaded.

Unable to resist the desperate calls of her best friend, Angela replied, "Alright sweetie I'll be over in a minute." 'What's so urgent that Brennan can't wait to share it with me?' She wondered.

"Jack?" She shook him gently. "Jack I have to go somewhere. Brennan called. She needs me."

"So do I." He told her, only semi conscious. "Come back to bed." He urged.

"I'm sorry hon, I'll be back soon." She pressed a kiss to his forehead. "I love you."

"I love you too." Hodgins relented.

"Tempe?" Angela stepped into the apartment, not seeing any sign of her best friend. The place looked trashed, except that most trashed apartments didn't tend to have clothing strewn over the floor of the lounge.

"I'm in here." The voice sounded like it had on the phone, wobbly, with a threat of tears. Angela walked through into the bedroom, where Brennan was sitting on the side of the bed. Her eyes were closed and her head was bowed. She had the look of a priest presented with proof that their god didn't exist - utterly defeated.

"Sweetie...what happened?" The shock was obvious in Angela's voice. Brennan didn't even move.

"Booth." She replied in an agonized voice.

"So you slept with Booth - what's the problem? You two are obviously crazy about each other, so why are you so worried?" Confusion coloured Angela's voice.

"The problem is that workplace romances are..."

"Anthropologically doomed, yeah I know." Angela cut off her best friend. "But you said the same thing about Jack and me. And we're engaged now."

"Ange..." her voice rose." He used me! I was at my most vulnerable, and he used me! He just up and left me this morning. He was obviously embarrassed about sleeping with me, or he would have stayed!"

"On the worst night of your life, he provided you with what you needed most, human contact. Maybe he was embarrassed, but it wasn't because he was ashamed. It was probably just worried about what you might think."

"I suppose..."

"What does your heart say?"

"My heart is a muscle, with no sentient or moral functions, therefore..." She was silenced by the other woman's stare. "I'm confused Angie. It's so easy to love from afar, when you think its unreciprocated, or never going to happen, but...up close, it's different. He's an amazing man, or at least I thought he was...last night...it has to be more than a one night stand, because of who he is, but he just dropped me this morning, just left..." she trailed off into a saddened silence. Angela didn't reply.

They sat quietly for a moment before Angela spoke.

"Sweetie, for once in your life, let your heart rule your head and call him. He is a good man. I'm sure this morning was...there's probably a perfectly good explanation..." Angela sighed. Her friend had refused to accept that she loved Booth. Or that he returned her feelings. "He loves you sweetie, call him."

Back in his own home Booth also needed to talk, but to whom? His natural instinct would be to bottle it and talk to his partner about it tomorrow. But since his partner was part of the problem...

The squints would side with Bones that much was obvious. He had friends in the FBI and from the army and even old college friends, but none of them would be any help at all. He would never be able to discuss his feelings freely with anyone anyway; anyone whose name wasn't Temperance Brennan.

But he couldn't hope for that. Not after last night. Not after he had slept with her at her most vulnerable and abandoned her when he just knew she needed him the morning after.

He had never felt so alone in his life.

How much would it hurt, tomorrow, when he had to see her? And then again the day after and the day after that...when he had to see her every day and know exactly what he done, know that they could never be together.

Why had he left? He should have stayed; they could have talked it over. She wouldn't be angry at him and they might even have started something.

Who was he kidding? She would have thrown him out. She was too hard a woman to base a relationship on one night.

He smirked, surprising himself. He could imagine her saying those words. It was the kind of thing she would say.

Then he remembered her last night, snot dribbling down her face, tears streaking her cheeks, flushed red. Maybe she wasn't that hard after all.

Maybe he should request a transfer of partners so that he didn't have to put himself through that pain, knowing what he had lost.

The shrill of his phone broke through the ranks of angst and self hatred assembled in his head. He checked the caller ID and nearly dropped the phone.

Why was she calling him?

Maybe I should ignore it, let her think I was busy. Then I could check the message and decide what to say.

But then she might think I'm avoiding her. Might think she had just been an available outlet for my emotion. I should pick up, speak to her.

But my emotions are too fragile; I might shout at her and make it worse.

It can't get much worse.

"Hello?"

In a darkened room across town, Camille Saroyan sat staring at the wall. Loosing Zach had been...awful. She remembered sitting there in the hospital and then Booth and Brennan had arrived and then…

Her heart had sunk lower than she thought was possible.

She had always been the practical, pragmatic type. This feeling was alien to her, an unknown; the emptiness, the loneliness. She never thought that losing a team member would affect her in this way, especially not Zack, the geeky, nerdy grad student who needed social tutoring to so much as say hello to someone.

Part of it was that her gut instinct had been so wrong. She had always trusted her gut, but she had never even suspected Zack, too concentrated on Sweets. How many times could her gut have been wrong before? How many innocent men could she have put in jail with that gut feeling?

She couldn't rely on her intuition anymore, that much was obvious.

A/N Sorry this has taken so long guys!
Reviews would be nice
Thanks to my beta, Dr Temperance Brennan!