Ok, here is the next chapter. Thanks everybody who is reading, reviewing, alerting this story or making it a favourite one! =)

Katrina, you are an amazing Beta!

Enjoy!

Sourire)

Chapter 2. Future lives, part 2

The same day

Near 2.00 pm

She was smiling; smiling openly and sincerely, that had happened very rarely. He could see in her blue-gray eyes genuine happiness, freedom and something else what looked painfully familiar, but what that was, he couldn't clearly define…and would never be able to define…

The thing that he was one hundred percent sure of was that this smile had been addressed to him, only him and nobody else. She had been staring exactly into his eyes, which had made him feel extremely happy for being the only one to see her smile like that. He would remember that moment forever.

Seeley Booth inhaled and exhaled not letting the tears fall. Brennan had been smiling to him from that picture for eight years now…

He thought about her all the time, even in his dreams. How he wished it could be otherwise. Brennan had been one of the two most important people in his life and he had lost her. She was the only one to whom he could tell everything and not be afraid of seeing disgust or condemnation. He had always known that she would understand and do whatever she could to help…but she was no longer beside him. She was roughly pulled out of his life when they had just started something new, something really amazing…

Booth had woken up that unfortunate morning alone in his bed. His heart had immediately told him something was wrong. His first thought had been that she had just left, not able to cope with their new relationship. He'd intended to give her time to sort things out, but when Angela had called asking for her, he'd known something was not right. She'd been nowhere to be found. And nobody had known where she was.

They'd searched for her for a long time…but they'd found nothing. No link, no evidence. The only fact they'd known for sure was that she had left Booth's apartment approximately at 2.30 am and headed towards the city center. Then her trail had been lost…it had been impossible to find any accidental witnesses in such a big city.

For some time they'd waited for the ransom demand but had got nothing. And then…then a lot of them had started to look, not for Dr. Brennan, but for Dr. Brennan's body…but Booth hadn't given up. He hadn't wanted to and just couldn't believe that she was dead, so he'd tried to convince the others that she wasn't. He'd known that he would have felt it if she really had died.

But years passed by and even the most precious gave up searching…even her father, Russ, and Angela moved on with their lives, lives without her.

It seemed that Booth did, too. He continued to work as a liaison to the Jeffersonian, took care of his son, went out with his friends…his appearance hid his true feelings deep inside where nobody could see them. He was still hoping to see her someday.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

A small restaurant

3.00 pm

"On TV, in books, in magazines, in theatre performances – everywhere says that pain weakens as the years pass. That after some time it is easier to think of the one you have lost. And that those thoughts cause just melancholy not hysterics. This is true but…but what happens when your loved one has disappeared, not died? What feelings has the person in this case? They are different, because there is still hope that he or she is alive and will return some day…I've always thought that, 'disappeared with no evidence', is better than, 'died'. Because there is a slightest chance that your loved one is breathing the same air somewhere…but now…now I know that such an uncertainty scares…especially after so many years. I'm dreaming to see Bren again, hug her…I can't let memories about her go. I think it'll be easier for us to know for sure that…what has happened to her."

Six pairs of eyes watched Angela talking. Everybody, except Booth, searched for and found the same feelings in their hearts. But Angela didn't even see them. She saw her best friend's smiling face right in front of her. She had seen it so many times before…but very rarely in the last couple of years…

"Despite all of this…I'm trying to hope…I hope that she is somewhere and that she wants to see all of us…and that our mutual desire will come true. For Brennan."

She carefully lifted her glass not to scare the phantom, but it disappeared anyway when the others stood up to drink for the slipping hope.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

The same time

The cottage in a forest zone

'I had to do something! Anything! I had to…'

She had been living in a constant fear, fear for her children's safety, for many years already. What wouldn't a mother do to protect her kids? What would she sacrifice only to make their lives safer? That's why Diora had changed her own life, even her personality. She had hidden her past before meeting Donald far away and forgotten whom she was, what she had dreamed of…

But deep inside that intractable woman was still alive waiting for the best time to return. And that time finally came. Alex's escape roused feelings that she had learnt to suppress a long time before and reminded her of what she very successfully had tried to forget. Now that was time to change everything. She wished to have enough strength to withstand Donald.

But Diora couldn't just stand up and go. And the main reason was not the lock on the door, but a little girl, who was still in Donald's power.

'I had to do something!'

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

'Hope…we understand this word in different ways. They all have families, well except Zach, but…' Booth's gloomy thoughts were interrupted by a ringtone from the next table:

"I come home in the morning light

My mother says when you gonna live your life right

Oh mother dear…"

It took a few moments for Booth to realize what song was it…a picture appeared in his mind: Brennan light-heartedly and openly dancing on the stage with a microphone in her hand...

He ran out of the restaurant as fast as he could. He didn't want his friends to see him crying again.

Sweets intended to follow him but Daisy stopped him shaking her head.

"Don't. Booth needs to be alone for some time."

Angela had tears in her eyes…

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

Booth decided to walk instead of driving to clear his head. He understood that it had been not a good idea to leave everybody like that but he was not able to do anything else. They were sure to understand.

He dragged himself down the street deep in thought. Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by a head-on collision. Or rather not head-on. Dumb-founded, Booth looked down. The boy, approximately six years old, sat on the ground hugging his bent legs. The boy's brown eyes were closely and, without much fear, studying the special agent's astonished face.

Squatting to have his face at the same level as the boy's, Booth noticed the bad condition of child's clothes. His trainers were covered in dirt, even torn in some places, the same as his pants. Booth couldn't see his short-sleeved shirt but he assumed that its condition was the same. The kid also had small cuts and bruises on his arms and face. And the colour of his clothes amazed him too: black pants and dark-grey shirt on a sunny, summers day was rather strange for a little boy.

Booth looked around only to find out that there was nobody there who could be the boy's parents. Occasional passer-bys cast sidelong looks at them but nobody stopped to ask what was going on. But Booth couldn't just stand up and leave. Something about the child had caught his attention, he just was not able to understand what exactly. But he didn't think that the boy lived on the streets.

"Hi, kid. What are you doing here all alone? Where are your parents?"

The boy tossed his head and answered:

"Don't call me a kid! I'm a big boy, I'm seven years old!"

Booth suppressed a smile.

"Fine. What should I call you than?"

"Alex. My name is Alex."

"Ok, Alex. Now tell me, where are your parents?"

The boy shook his head.

"Mommy told me not to talk to strangers. I won't tell you anything. And I have to go."

He got up and turned around ready to walk away.

"Wait! I'm not just a stranger! I'm an FBI agent. You can tell me."

Alex's eyes narrowed with suspicion.

"Why should I trust you? If you really are an agent, than prove it!"

'What a smart imp!' Booth smiled and started to search through his pockets. The longer he searched, the more suspicious Alex looked and the tenser his posture became. After some time Booth finally realised that he didn't have his badge. He made a helpless gesture.

"Listen, ki…Alex. It seems that I've left my badge at home. Let's go there and I'll show it to you."

With his mind Booth understood that he should take the boy to the police station, but his heart wouldn't let him. He had already decided to help Alex. He had a strange feeling that there was a connection between them.

"I won't go anywhere with you!"

Booth sighed.

"But you have nowhere else to go, right?" Alex looked down. "Let's do it in another way. Now we walk to my apartment. You'll stay outside while I go get my badge. And then we'll talk. Deal?"

Booth was waiting for the answer holding his breath. 'If he refuses, I'll take him to the police…yes, I can do it…'

Alex tried to find a solution. That stranger didn't arouse a suspicion and he really didn't know where to go. But he was used to listen to his mother and she had said not to trust anybody… Finally he nodded.

A smile appeared on Booth's face.

"Ok, let's go."

But when he tried to take Alex's hand, the boy shrieked back with such a terrified expression that he didn't try to do it again and just walked beside the boy instead.