Chapter 2
Booth pulled the SUV up to the Jeffersonian to find Bones waiting for him at the curb dressed and ready with her equipment. He hopped out and helped load her stuff into the back of the vehicle and returning to his seat, he pulled up a bag and handed it to her.
"What is this?"
"Lunch, Bones. I grabbed a couple of burritos from that all-natural place you like so much. Guess you're stuck helping me not eat alone after all." He threw her a wide grin.
She chuckled and opened the bag as he pulled away from the curb to head out to the crime scene. "Booth, there's only one burrito in here."
"Yeah, well, I ate mine already on the way here. I was starving," he said rubbing his stomach.
She rolled her eyes at him and remarked that this meant he did indeed eat alone, after all.
He shrugged his shoulders. "Potato, potahto – you're eating, you're here with me – and it's work-related so none of that 'filling in the empty spaces' psychobabble applies."
"You're not making any sense."
"Exactly my point, Bones." He gave her a smile, eyes twinkling. "Chop chop and eat up! The place isn't very far away – it's at the new development project. Construction workers were digging at the edge near the woods when someone saw the body fall into the dump truck from the shovel."
"I've seen the plans for that new construction; I am thinking of buying one of the new condominium units."
"Wait, what? What's wrong with your current place? You don't want to invest in that new development – it's going to be full of snobby lobbyists and other highbrow folks. They should be building for the rest of us everyday Joes."
"Actually, with our current economic conditions, building high end housing and developing the surrounding commercial support for it gives the economy a bigger boost than the ideological hopes that lower-priced housing will draw in residents who couldn't afford their original homes in the first place."
Booth sighed. "A fresh start, Bones. That's all people want, sometimes, is a fresh start."
"Buying a new home that they can't afford is not a very good way to go about that," she replied matter-of-factly.
"What about for someone like, me?"
"Are you thinking of moving? Because if you are, I have some very good ideas regarding places you could consider."
"No . . . I mean, hypothetically. What if I wanted the fresh start – the new place. What about developing housing units that I could afford?"
Brennan shook her head. "Oh, you couldn't afford what they're building there."
"Well, I know that . . . just, nevermind."
"Is this an attempt to open up another discussion about the discrepancy between our own financial situations? I thought we had already established that it doesn't matter between us."
Pulling up to the construction site, Booth parked and looked over at her before getting out of the SUV. "No. You're right. We are not talking about our own 'financial situations'. Unless it involves you buying us a 100'' plasma TV, we are definitely not talking about our personal economics."
She gave him a calculated expression that was tinged with perplexity. Booth gave her a smirk as he hopped out of the driver's seat, pleased with how he managed to slip the "us" into the comment. He strolled around to the back of the truck and helped her unload her gear.
They started making their way to where the construction crew and the local Metro police had gathered. "So, you don't like my place?" Booth asked.
"What? Of course I like your place. What do you mean?"
"Well, it's just that you were saying you had some ideas of where I could move so I figured that meant you thought I should move."
"No. That's not what I meant at all. I like your place very much. It reflects you very well – an understated location, a bit old-fashioned, comfortable, and welcoming."
"Oh." He paused as his face scrunched into thought. He wasn't sure how much of her statement was actually complimentary. "What do you mean, 'old-fashioned'? I'm a modern kind of guy. I can even follow a lot of the fancy technobabble that Angela spouts out with her computer modeling… well, some of it…"
"You have an array of antique items throughout your apartment that you yourself have described as speaking to a simpler time. These items have parity with some of your old-fashioned views of the world such as your overly-protective nature of females, your insistence at being the one to fix things, and your persistent thinking that males should be the primary provider in a relationship."
"Those ideas aren't old-fashioned . . . well, maybe the last one a little bit, but—" Booth was interrupted by them reaching the forensic site.
The development area was in the beginning stages: temporary fencing, crew parking, directional signage, foreman's trailer, and a few trucks. A pair of Metro police officers was talking to a small gathering of crewmen. One of the officers turned as she saw Booth and Brennan approach and gave a big grin.
"Seeley Booth? Is that you? Look at you all hot-shotted up with the feds!"
"Kelly Nelson! Wow. How the hell are you?" They shook hands warmly.
"It's Kelly Gorman, now." Booth gave a nod and introduced his partner.
"This is my partner, Dr. Temperance Brennan. Bones, this is Kelly. She and I go way back. We went to school together in Philly."
Kelly and Brennan shook hands and Kelly started to introduce her partner, but Brennan interrupted, "Officer Pete Daniels. Yes, we've met before."
Both Daniels and Booth looked at her in surprise. "You remember me?" Daniels asked.
"Of course. We worked with you on the Patterson case last month."
Booth covered his own disbelief with a proud smile. "What?" Brennan asked.
Booth leaned in and whispered, "You usually don't take the time to remember the other people we work with, Bones. We're just kind of surprised, is all. But in a good way," he hurriedly added, noticing her frown.
"Where are the remains?" Brennan directed her question away from the current slant of the conversation.
"Right." Booth looked to Daniels and he led Brennan to the dump truck, which she scaled easily and disappeared beyond the rim of the bucket.
"So, you ever get married?" Kelly asked.
"Nah."
"You and Dr. Brennan . . . ?"
"Not yet."
Kelly raised an eyebrow at that response, followed by a laugh. "Still as cocky and confident as ever, hey Seeley?"
Booth just gave a smile and pulled out a pen and his notecards. Truth be told, as much as it seemed fun to run into her at first, Booth was now ready to move past that slippery slope and pressed into the business at hand and asked for a rundown of the situation. Construction on the site was only in its beginning stages and bulldozers were only just starting to clear away the first layer of ground and according to the crew, it was by a stroke of luck that they even happened to notice the remains at all as they fell from a shovel into the truck.
Booth made his way over to the truck and hopped on the bumper. "Bones, whaddaya got?"
Brennan was kneeling in the dirt, gently sifting around the remains, looking out for any obvious identifying objects to accompany her basic identification. She knew Booth was not going to like what she had already determined.
"Male. Based upon decomp and probable depth, I'd say he might have been dead for about two weeks, but Hodgins should be able to get much more specific than that."
"Just 'male'? That's all you got? Usually you have more . . ." He caught her expression and felt his stomach clench. "What? Since when do you hold back? He's a kid, isn't he." He gave this last comment as a statement rather than a question because he knew the answer she was going to give.
"I'd put him at about twelve or thirteen years old. Possible signs of physical abuse, but I won't know that for sure until I can examine him more closely. There's still a lot of flesh and some clothing for Cam and Hodgins to look over."
"How'd he die?"
"I can't be certain, but there is a mark on his occipital bone with an angle that would be difficult to occur without added force beyond a basic fall."
"So, a homicide?"
"Yes."
Booth sighed and told her he'd call it in. They could shunt it to Metro, but with the victim being a minor, it was an easy decision for the FBI to take point. Booth made the requisite calls to both the Bureau and the Jeffersonian and worked with the foreman to determine if and when they would be able to continue with their work.
As Booth continued to survey the area and wait for the forensics teams to arrive, Kelly suggested they get together for drinks to catch up.
Booth hesitated for a moment. "Yeah, give me a call sometime, we'll figure something out."
"What about tonight, Booth? She and her husband could join us for dinner." Brennan called out unexpectedly.
"Tonight? My husband's out of town, but I'm free after my shift." Kelly offered.
"Bones, I thought you couldn't make it to dinner tonight because of that other set of bones you were working on."
She shrugged. "They can wait. I'll have time tomorrow morning while I wait for Cam and Hodgins to get what they need from this set of remains. We can meet at the Fou-"
"How about that new sports bar and grill that opened over on L street?" Booth rapidly interrupted, avoiding Brennan's puzzled gaze.
Kelly smiled. "Sounds great. Nice to see you haven't changed much, Seeley."
Booth grinned, but felt uncomfortable with the sudden change of plans for the evening. "Catching up" was not really something he wanted to do. With the whole mess with Broadsky behind him, he felt that he had done enough catching up for awhile.
On the other hand, given that Brennan had only just that morning refused to have either lunch or dinner with him and was ending up doing both gave him cause to believe that the result, however convoluted, proved favorable.
