Well, here it is. The last chapter to this one. Thank you so much for the great reviews and responses to it. I wrote the first chapter on a whim and it turned into what you have read thus far. I hope you enjoy this one, no matter how "out in left field" it may be. Gregg.
Disclaimer: I don't own, or profit from, these character or franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Booth was not in a good mood when there was a loud banging on his door. He reluctantly got up and went to answer it. He was shocked when he saw a wet, obviously angry, Bones standing there with a couple of suitcases and an overnight bag.
"Bones!" he said in surprise. He was so shocked he actually forgot his manners.
"Are you going to let me in?" Bones demanded in a huffy tone. She'd had a miserable day and her late afternoon and evening thus far was even worse.
"Oh!" Booth said as he stood aside and watched as she entered, her luggage in tow. "Uh, Bones? What's going on?" he asked.
"You've got a house guest for a couple of days," she announced, not in the mood to debate, or engage in pleasantries. This was embarrassing enough as it was. She flung off her drenched trench coat and handed it to Booth who immediately hung it on the coat rack, not bothering to worry about the dripping water. It had been pouring like a damn monsoon out all day.
"House guest?" he asked as he followed her to his living room. "I already have one!"
Bones whirled and glared. "Catherine?" she demanded. She knew she was showing her intense jealousy, and the anger she felt towards herself over being so foolish as to reject Booth a few weeks before, but she was too tired, cold, and wet to give a damn.
"Actually," Booth started, but halted when the front door opened.
"Ah! You're here, Baby," Max said with his best father loves daughter grin in place. "I wouldn't have expected you here for another couple of hours as stubborn as you are."
Bones ignored him and whirled back to Booth. "My Father is your house guest?" she said angrily. What about her? Didn't she rate her Father at least asking if he could stay with her for a short time?
"He showed up an hour ago," Booth explained. "I can't turn him out into the streets, Bones."
Then something Max had said caught her attention. She whirled on Max now. "You expected me to be here a couple of hours from now?" she questioned archly.
"I planned all this," Max said with a grin.
"Planned what?" Booth asked, now getting a bit upset himself. He didn't like being set up for anything.
"Sitting you two down and having a little chat," Max said with a knowing smile.
"What did you do?" Booth asked again, making it more clear.
"Had the lab closed for four days, had Hodgins pay to have every vacant hotel room become unavailable in the reasonable area, arranged for Angela's apartment to be completely fumigated under a tent..." he said, giving the impression that there was a lot more, but not tipping his hand.
"Why?" Bones demanded, seething now. "I couldn't even get a room in any of those disgusting pay by the hour motels!"
"Why would you need a hotel?" Booth asked.
"Some structural work on her building for a few days," Max grinned.
"Let me guess," Booth offered. "You conned Hodgins into paying for it all?
"He can afford it," Max shrugged. "It worked, didn't it? You two in the same room with me?"
"Why?" Bones demanded once more, her tone lowering into that dangerous one that Booth had heard once or twice before and the results hadn't been pretty those times for the criminals that she'd used it on.
"Because, Baby, the two of you are too damn stubborn for your own good," Max told her. He looked at Booth. "Easy, Kid. I may be older, but I can still make that shot to the jewels feel like a love pat if you push me on this."
Booth cringed as he remembered Max hitting him square on the balls a couple of years before. There was no way he was about to experience that again if he didn't have to.
"You're behind Andrew suddenly leaving for Baghdad!" Bones put it together in her extremely active and laser like mind.
"Yep," Max said with a grin. He'd enjoyed making that putz piss himself.
"Great job, Max!" Booth said with a grin. When he'd heard the news of Hacker hightailing it to a virtual war zone, he'd known that someone must have scared the crap out of him. Now that pansy was out of his hair once and for all, and more importantly away from Bones! Then he did a little deduction of his own. "And you're also behind Sweets afraid of his own shadow now!"
"I just let him know that his roadblocks in the way of my baby's happiness weren't appreciated," Max shrugged, a mischievous grin on his face.
"I am responsible for my own happiness!" Bones objected vehemently.
"And sleeping with Hacker would have made you happy?" Max demanded to know, cutting out all pretense.
"You slept with Hacker already?" Booth shouted, not having wanted that info at all!
"Of course not," Bones told him. "I barely like him, but as he is someone I could possibly utilize to relieve my urges with since you so obviously have moved on as you told me you were going to, I had lunch with him a couple of times."
"I moved on because you rejected me!" Booth shot back. In a way he felt like this was a good conversation because at least they were talking about it, well, shouting, instead of her stomping all over his heart without letting him get a word in edgewise to plead his case.
"ENOUGH!" Max shouted and glared at both of them, his smile no longer in evidence. "Sit down!" he commanded both of them pointing to the couch, making damn sure that they were practically fused together before he stopped glaring and pointing.
"This is my apartment, Max," Booth pointed out indignantly, seeing that Bones was almost speechless. He'd have to file that memory away as he could never remember her being speechless before.
"And I'm your landlord as I arranged to buy the building today with a small gift from Hodgins," Max said, now holding the trump card.
"Crap," Booth muttered. He'd settle Hodgins' hash when this was over. Maybe a well placed gunshot wound in the ass, or possibly the kneecap? Making it possible for Max to become his landlord was so not cool!
"Which reminds me," Max said. "New rule. Unless it's Tempe, Parker's Mom, Cam, or Angela there's no girls in the apartment."
"WHAT?" Booth shouted.
"That's a very sensible rule," Bones said from her seat. She'd go along with any rule that kept women away from Booth's bed.
"Shut up, Bones," Booth said in a pout.
"Both of you shut up," Max directed. "Now, I'm going to have my say, and then the two of you are going to be locked in this apartment until the two of you come to your senses." He paused and made a chopping motion with his hand when the inevitable protest started. "Zip it! I'm talking. Now the two of you have acted like idiots the last five years and it's going to stop."
"We are hardly idiots," Bones said harshly.
"When it comes to each other, you most definitely are, Baby," Max said sadly. "So, I'm going to say a few things, and then the two of you are going to be stuck in here until you come to your senses once and for all."
"WHAT!" came the expected outraged exclamation in unison.
"Didn't I tell you?" Max grinned. "The whole floor is going to be quarantined for the next 96 hours beginning in 20 minutes. I have a little arrangement with the Health Department, courtesy of a generous donation from Hodgins and a sworn statement from Cam."
"96 HOURS!" was the next shouted outrage.
"I said I was doing the talking," Max reminded them. Then he began pacing. "A father only wants his kids to be happy. I'm a Father, so it should be obvious that I want only for my Baby Girl to be happy. So I spend a lot of time in the last few years observing, making notes and what do I discover? There's only one thing that makes my Baby Girl happy."
"Work," Bones interjected quickly.
"Nice try, Baby, but dead wrong," Max said, a sympathetic smile on his face. "There's only one thing that has made Tempe really happy. Booth."
"Me?" Booth cried out. Not that he was really against that idea, but he wanted to survive this conversation and with Bones sitting right next to him, he was a serious risk of having her rip his manhood off if he said the wrong thing.
"You're not that naïve Booth," Max said with a withering look. "Remember the jewels, Son."
"Keen eye, Max," Booth said instantly. That got him a quick kick to his ankle from Bones. "OW!" he said out loud.
"The boy has taste, Tempe," Max chided her. "Why else would he remain celibate for the last two and a half years despite all the offers?"
Booth wanted to sink into the floor right at that moment. The open mouthed stare that Bones was giving him wasn't helping. He would love to kill Sweets right at that moment. The walking pimple was the only one he'd revealed that pathetic secret to. He made a mental note to make sure that Sweets learned very soon just how accurate a shot he was at long distances.
"Now that's devotion, Tempe," Max told his daughter. "And what does it say when after all the Hell you have each put each other through at times, you still are more worried about hurting the other than your own happiness. So. I think the two of you need some time to talk, and I mean honestly. So the two of you are under quarantine. No computers, no lab, no work, and no phones. You're locked in and have to deal with this once and for all. Bye, Kids," he said as he walked out the door and left them.
"This is all your fault!" they shouted in unison at each other loud enough that Max heard it as he stood out in the hallway. He smiled as he walked out of the building and to his van where he had the audio equipment to be entertained by the next 96 hours of happenings in Booth's apartment.
96 Hours Later, the door to Booth's Apartment
Max, a smile firmly in place given that he had listened in for the first 48 hours, opened the door to Booth's apartment moments before they would have to leave in order to go to work. What he saw brought a deeper smile to his face. There were Booth and his Baby Girl standing there in a firm embrace with a liplock that would have done anyone proud. He slowly closed the door and walked away knowing that his solution to the problem of his daughters happiness had worked. Now all he had left to do was to give friendly little reminders to his three, reluctant, cohorts that there would be no more interfering with his Baby Girl's happiness.
A/N: There it is. Max's Solution. Hodgins buying out all vacant hotel rooms in the DC area, Angela allowing her building to be fumigated under a tent, and Cam closing the lab for four days forcing Booth and Bones to be together in close quarters. Naturally Max buying Booth's building and arranging a quarantine was all a part of it, too. Like I said, over the top, but with those two stubborn individuals it was necessary. LOL. For me, Hacker volunteering to go to Baghdad for five years was a nice bonus, as well as Sweets constantly in fear of his own shadow. I hope you all enjoyed this one. Thank you for the great reviews and support for this story. Greg.
