A/N2: Five months after Dichotomy.
CHAPTER 6 - To Regret the Past
Angela looked through a small jewelry box. It contained several sets of earrings, neatly kept separated. It seemed Grace Wills favored the color green, like her eyes.
"Excuse me?" Angela looked up to find a girl with long red hair standing at her door.
"You're Billie," she guessed.
"How'd you..." she asked, surprised, as she nodded. Angela indicated a framed picture of Billie and Grace. "That was from a birthday party last year," she smiled. "It was a good night." After a moment reminiscing, she remembered where she was. "Agent Booth told me to come..." She looked at all the boxes laid out around the room, some of them opened. Seeing it all there seemed to strike her hard.
"Want to help?" Angela asked her, sensing her fragility.
"Okay..." she asked, her voice small.
"Have a seat," Angela indicated the floor, where she sat. Billie approached, careful not to knock anything over. As she sat, she seemed unsure of what to do. "I'm Angela, by the way."
"Hi," Billie smiled.
"I'm looking through all these to try and find if there are any things that might help us figure out about Grace, about what might have led to what happened to her. "Billie nodded. "You two were pretty close, weren't you?"
"First time she came into the diner, it was... almost two years ago. She looked like she hadn't eaten for days, like she'd just fall over right there. She had no money left... She asked if I would hire her. I'd only put up the sign that morning, one of the girls had just quit to go to school in LA. She said she could start right away. I told her she could go on for a day and I'd decide, on the condition she ate first." Angela smiled. "She just fit right in, and by the end of that week I had a new best friend, co-worker, and roommate all rolled up into one. It took a while before she told me the whole story about how she ran away. She'd been sneaking off home to get things from her room while her parents were out..."
"Did she say why she ran?" Angela asked. Billie shook her head.
"Grace could be the life of the party, but there were things even I couldn't get her to talk about," she explained, pulling a worn plush lamb from one of the boxes. "Her lucky charm," Billie smiled.
"Billie..." Angela started slowly. The girl looked up. "Did Grace have a boyfriend?" Billie's already pale face dove three tones whiter.
x
"Please, have a seat," asked Miranda Moore, Tilly's former boss. Booth and Brennan sat across the desk. Having just heard of the murder, Ms Moore looked completely on auto-pilot, no doubt needing the sitting herself. "Tilly was... You would never have known that anything was wrong with her, she was absolutely indispensable to all of us, she... When she told me why she had to quit, I was speechless... Murdered..." she trailed off, bewildered.
"Did she ever talk about herself to you?" Booth asked.
"Well... She'd talk about Ian, and... oh, Carlee..." she trembled with sorrow for the child.
"What about from before that?" Brennan jumped in. "Did she mention being in foster care?"
"She... No, she never said..." She seemed to be digging around for something buried in her memory that had suddenly reached up just enough at the question. "Did Tilly have any siblings? Blood related?" Booth and Brennan shook their heads at once. "Three years ago," she suddenly pointed, eyes livened with memory. "August... it was around the time I finalized my div... Doesn't matter," she shook her head with latent bitterness on that topic, getting back on the real topic. "I came in one morning. She was sitting at her computer, crying..."
xx
"Tilly?" Miranda had paused and walked back as the sound of sobs grabbed on to her ears the moment she walked by. She looked up from her desk, tears shimmering in streaks along her cheeks. She snapped her head away, grappling for tissues. "Tilly, what's wrong? What happened?"
"N-Nothing," she lied, desperately wiping to clear away signs of her breakdown. Miranda circled around the desk to come stand by Tilly, briefly seeing the screen before Tilly closed the window. She looked back now, eyes puffy and barely hanging on to remnants of the makeup she'd applied.
"Talk to me..." Miranda begged calmly. Tilly gently tore her tissue to pieces as she remained quiet. Finally, she spoke.
"Do you have any brothers and sisters?" The question caught her off guard, but the look in Tilly's eyes guided her to answer.
"Two older brothers."
"Did you ever do anything... And you wanted to apologize, but... you couldn't, but you figured 'Someday I will...'" Miranda didn't know what to say. "I-I need to refill the printer." After a moment, Miranda stood back and Tilly was able to stand. Miranda watched her go.
"Do you..." she found herself asking. Tilly stopped. "Have brothers and sisters?" She remained turned away.
"I did."
xx
"What was on the screen?" Booth asked, not seeing the awareness settling with Brennan. August three years before... she knew what happened then.
"It was a news clipping, a car crash..." Miranda frowned.
"Brianna," Brennan told Booth. He looked at her. "That's when she died." Booth looked back to Miranda.
"Thank you for your time." And they walked off. Once in the elevator, Booth had to ask. Brennan saw him coming, answering before he'd asked.
"I don't know what she was talking about, not off the top of my head. For all we know it can be a common event, or individual ones..."
"Well, finding out could help find her killer. You could get together, talk about it." Brennan didn't reply, but he knew she agreed.
As they returned to the car, Brennan's mind was miles away... years away. What had Tilly done to her? As deep as she looked, she couldn't think of anything that Tilly would be so bent on apologizing to her for before she died. All the memories she came up with where Tilly was concerned were nothing but good ones. She'd always been so kind to young Temperance, to all of them. So why did she want to apologize?
"What if I can't..." she started. Booth waited to see if she'd go on. "What if I can't remember? Maybe I do know what she wanted to apologize for, but I'm just not remembering it now?"
"If it's in you to find, I know you'll get to it."
"Can't let her killer get away, Booth."
"Hey, listen to me. You listening?"
"Yes."
"We'll solve it. Have you known me to give up? Have you known yourself to do it either?"
"No," that seemed to boost her up some.
"It can take as long as it needs to. It won't end until we can close the case. Okay?"
"Okay," she nodded.
"No more doubting yourself."
"I promise," she breathed.
"Good."
"I think the doctor can wait. If we're going to find something, maybe we should go where it started, the home where we all were."
Wordlessly, Booth turned the car to head in a new direction. Brennan looked back out of the window, now considering her earlier visit to see Richard Brody. Booth still didn't know about that. It wouldn't feel right to keep it from him, after all he'd done to help her. And if there was one thing she held as an undeniable truth, it was that if she told Booth something in confidence, that was how it was going to remain.
"There's something you should know..."
x
"You go tell him," Hodgins told Zack as the two of them stood on the platform. They'd spotted Dr. Goodman coming along, and their most recent discovery was coinciding.
"Why me?"
"Do I need a reason?" Zack frowned and walked off to cross Dr. Goodman.
"Excuse me Dr. Goodman, sir..." He stopped, turning to face Zack.
"Yes?"
"We've found out a few things, I... On the remains of Matilda McCrea, only one of the fingers had a pad left, which we could see had its print burnt off?"
"What about it?"
"On closer inspection, it showed that it couldn't have been done recently, very likely it occured more than a year ago."
"So for all we know, her other fingers may have been fine until..."
"That's right. However, the murder theory still holds. Accounting for what we've found though, I'll take a closer look so to rule out suicide."
"Or prove it..." Goodman sighed. Zack nodded. "What else?"
"It'll be a while longer before we get the full results on the blood from Brighton Young's apartment, but we do have a blood type match."
"Alright. Anything new on Grace Wills?"
"I examined what I'd originally believed to be a fracture. It looks as though she was stabbed, and she bled out."
"Have you informed Dr. Brennan and Agent Booth?"
"Not yet. But I'll... get on that now," he turned back and started on his return to where Hodgins still stood.
x
"Billie..." Angela gently prodded. The girl hadn't spoken for minutes, retreating into the boxes of Grace's belongings. "If you're scared, we can protect you." Billie's grasp on the edge of the box tightened.
"I know."
"Whatever you have to tell us, it could help find whoever did this to Grace."
"Yes... Grace had a boyfriend," Billie finally spoke.
"How long?"
"Six... six months, but then they broke up, Grace left him. It was two days before she disappeared." The way Billie looked down, Angela started getting a feeling.
"He was abusive to her, wasn't he?"
"She hid it at first. I didn't know until one night, I came home from work, she was in the bathroom and I could hear her crying. I begged her to let me in, and when she did I saw..."
"Did she report him?"
"Never. I told her she had to get out of it and she had to go to the cops, but she said she couldn't. I wanted to go for her, and she freaked out. Somehow she convinced me. Now I don't know how or why I didn't go anyway."
"What happened then?"
"I tried to stick around more, give him as little of a chance to get at her, and I continued trying to convince her to go. That went on for a month. Then one night, she came home and she said she'd done it. She said she would move back home, to get away from him. Then when she disappeared, I thought maybe she'd just gone, but it didn't track," her face shivered with fear and sadness.
"Didn't you tell anyone about this?" Angela asked. Billie looked at her for the first time in minutes. "Did he threaten you?"
"Not... openly, not that he had to try. I'd see him around the diner, he'd walk by. His eyes, it was just... Every time I thought of it, I'd see it, and..." She paused, deeply shaken. "Then he stopped coming, but by then..."
"Do you think he killed Grace?"
"I don't think it, I know it. I kept hoping somehow she had gotten away, but now... If she's dead, then it's because of him."
"Tell me who he is. They'll bring him in." Angela could see Billie was still scared.
x
"Richard and Jane, they were a good place for us. When I arrived here, I was scared... When I left, I was still scared, just not for the same reason. I was afraid I'd lucked out just this once, and then it'd be a nightmare."
When they got up to the door, Booth rang the bell. After Brennan had told him of her earlier visit, he advised her not to let anyone know, and not to let them know he knew - including Richard and Jane Brody.
"Yes?" a woman answered.
"Jane Brody?" Booth spoke up. She nodded, and then her eyes found Brennan. A moment later, she smiled - she knew her.
Her smile quickly faded as they told her about Tilly - Richard had apparently kept his word. They went to sit. Brennan could see in her the same deep-seated emotions that Richard had displayed upon learning of Tilly's death.
"When was the last time you saw her?" Booth asked.
"She left... six years ago, for work. We'd kept in touch before then, but... I had a feeling once she'd gone we'd lose her... and we did. I last spoke with her a few months after the move." From Ian, they'd learned she'd moved back into town two years later.
"Jane..." Brennan started. "Did Tilly ever say anything to you about... wanting to apologize about something? To me, and some others?"
"I'm not sure I understand," Jane frowned.
"She was trying to find some of the kids from here. She appeared to have some things to say..." Jane shook her head.
"She didn't really confide in me. You should talk to Richard, maybe he knows..."
"Where is he now?" Booth asked.
"He had to go out, after I came back. I don't know..." Booth looked to Brennan.
Once outside, they got quiet. "Booth, I..."
"If he had something to do with this and your visit made him run, I..."
"I know," she spoke shortly. "I don't think he did though." He nodded.
"I hope you're right."
When Brennan's phone rang, she was met with Zack's voice. He spoke in a steady stream of information. As she listened, not speaking, Booth only seemed more curious at her side. "Thanks, Zack," she hung up.
"What..."
"Blood type match on the blood I found, not a full match yet. COD on Grace Wills came to stabbing and a bleed out. And... Tilly's print burn is old." The last bit seemed to crush her spirit some. Booth put his hands on her shoulders, giving them a squeeze. She nodded absently, and after a moment he let go. When she looked up, she'd found her resolve again.
"We'll track down Richard, we'll clear it up."
"Speaking as a witness..." she started and he nodded. "Richard would never hurt Tilly."
"How sure?"
"Very." Booth considered this. "But we should still talk to him."
"So we will," they headed back to the car. Just then, Brennan's phone rang again. Both stopped as she answered.
"Brennan."
"It's me," Angela spoke, and her tone sent pricklings up Brennan's spine.
"Everything alright?" she replied while signaling Booth.
"Well... we have a newwrinkle."
"How so?"
"Spoke with Billie Webb. Grace Wills had an abusive boyfriend. She left him, and two days later..."
"Got a name and address?" There was a pause. "Angela?"
"Took a while to get it out of her. Brennan... Grace Wills' boyfriend was Brighton Young."
TBC
