Monday morning, Booth left the house early, which meant Brennan and Hadley were tailed to the Jeffersonian by the FBI agents assigned to the security detail outside their house.

Brennan smiled when she spotted them in her rearview mirror, following her as she switched lanes. Although the reason they were following her was disquieting, she found an innate comfort in the way Booth cared for them, even when he wasn't physically present.

She parked her car in her assigned space and got out as the agents pulled up just a few feet away. Opening the back passenger side door, she lifted the baby carrier out of the base. "You are getting heavy," she told her drowsy daughter as she hefted her bag and the diaper bag onto one shoulder and grabbed the car seat handle with both hands to carry it more easily.

"You need some help, Dr. Brennan?" The agent she now knew was Agent Laurence had rolled down his window and called out to her.

"I'm fine, thank you. You can go ahead and go."

"We're under strict instructions from Agent Booth to wait until you are safely in the building.

"Of course you are." She picked up her pace, made it to the door & swiped the keypad with her security pass. Once it opened she stepped through, turning sideways to give Agent Laurence and his partner a little wave of dismissal.

The agent waved back, but didn't budge, so she stepped all the way in and let the door fall shut behind her.

She made her way to the daycare, moving slowly from all the bulk in and on her arms. Two bags, a car seat and a baby were simply too much to carry as Hadley got bigger. "Next time your father isn't with us, I'm bringing the stroller." She told the baby.

She signed Hadley in, hung up her diaper bag and went over the pick-up procedures with the staff (at Booth's request) one more time. Satisfied that no one but she, Booth, Angela or Hodgins could take Hadley out of the building, she kissed her baby goodbye and went to start her workday.

She was three hours into her day and well engrossed in Daisy Wick's latest paper when her phone rang. "Brennan," she answered absently, still half reading.

"We got the forensics back on the notes and letters." Booth sounded displeased and she knew the answer before she even asked.

"They didn't find anything, did they?"

"Nope. Not one damn thing." He sounded tense and uneasy. "Can you get away for early lunch?"

She checked her watch. "In an hour?" There was a knock on her doorframe.

"No, now," Booth answered. "We're meeting Sweets. He's got some ideas about this guy he wants us to hear."

"Okay." She waved the mailroom boy in as she spoke. "Give me fifteen minutes to finish what I'm doing here." She smiled as she took the bundle the courier handed her and dismissed him with a head nod.

"I'll pick you up in twenty." Booth disconnected.

Brennan hung up the phone, dropped the mail into the bin on the corner of her desk and turned her attention back to Ms. Wick's paper. When she was done reading, Brennan outlined a few areas she thought could be expanded or improved, then put the paper aside and checked her watch. Since there wasn't enough time to begin reading the next research paper on her list before Booth's arrival, she began to sort through her mail.

There was much. An anthropology journal, a letter thanking her for her support of the DC public library system, a request to head up a dig that she'd already turned down twice and a letter from Parker's PTA president, thanking her for her donation towards their new computer lab.

It was only the last envelope that piqued her interest. A plain white envelope, no return address, her name and the Jeffersonian address typed in a familiar, plain font. She pulled some gloves from her desk drawer, and carefully opened the envelope.

"I enjoyed the ballgame with you this weekend. I found the 5th inning especially exciting and you looked so pretty in your team shirt. See you soon."

She closed her eyes, almost as if to will the note away. But when she opened them, it was still there and the ominous words made her feel sick.

See you soon.

"Hey Bones, you ready? Sweets is probably already at-" She looked up to see Booth standing just inside her door and she could see the second he registered something was wrong. "What is it? That's the matter?"

"There was a…another note. In my mail. It just came."

He came into her office and over to her chair. Standing beside her, he peered over her shoulder.

Brennan had never, in all her time with Booth, seen the mixture of rage and fear that crossed Booth's face right then. "Son of bitch," he muttered.

"I…he was watching us, Booth. Watching me. And he'll see me soon? What does that mean?"

"I don't know, but the only way this guy is getting close to you is over my dead body."

"Please don't say that," she whispered hoarsely.

"Hey," he said gently as he swiveled the chair in his direction and leaned in. He placed one hand on the desk, near the note, the other on the arm of her chair, pinning her in, looking her directly in the eye. "I am not going to let this bastard touch you, okay? It's not going to happen."

"He's a crazy person, Booth. We don't know what he's capable of."

"No, but I know what we're capable of and no one does this to us and gets away with it, okay?"

She nodded. "Okay."

"Let's bag and tag this. I'm sure it's clean, but we'll check it, anyway."

She handed him a bag and he held it open as she slipped the letter inside. She then bagged the envelope as well.

"You ready? Sweets is waiting. Maybe he'll have some insight for us."

She took off her gloves and stood and he grabbed her hand, giving it a little squeeze of support and confidence.

"Thank you, Booth."

"For what?"

"For behaving like you've got this handled. Just the other day I was the confident one and now you are and…" she smiled softly. "I needed that."

He smiled at her, the genuine, all-the-way-to-his-eyes-smile that she loved so much. "That's what it's all about, Bones. Give and take." He squeezed her hand again. "We'll get him. We'll stop this. I promise."

She believed him. "I know."

"You ready?"

"Yes. I find I would like very much to get some fresh air."


They left the lab, Booth's hand at the small of her back, his demeanor deceptively calm.

But she knew him. She noticed the way his eyes swept the area constantly, looking for anything out of the ordinary. She felt him tense when a man passed by them, bumping her arm and she saw the way he cased the diner as they entered, assessing the other customers.

Sweets looked up from his coffee and smiled, but the smile faded and a crease formed between his brows as he looked from Booth to Brennan and back again.

"Agent Booth, Dr. Brennan. You both look a little tense," he said as they took their seats across from him. "Is something wrong?"

"Bones got another note."

"Another one?"

"Yes." Brennan confirmed. "This latest one seems more…ominous than the rest."

"Ominous? How?" Sweets looked back and forth between them.

"See for yourself." Booth handed over the evidence bag.

Sweets read the note, eyebrows raised. "Wow. Okay. This guy is escalating big time and fast."

"Break it down for us, Sweets."

"Okay, the first letter or two to the publisher were pretty normal. 'Dear Dr. Brennan, I recently read your first novel. I think you are very talented.' Blah, blah, blah."

"Blah, blah, blah?" questioned Brennan.

"I'm paraphrasing." Sweets defended

"Seems inaccurate." She shot back.

"Okay, let's just move on." Booth refereed. "What else, Sweets?"

"The third letter gets a little more personal. His word choice here is interesting. He says 'I'm so happy to have discovered you.' Not your novels or your writing, but you. That's telling."

"What does it tell you?" Brennan asked.

"It indicates an interest in you, the person, beyond you, the writer."

The partners both frowned as Sweets continued.

"The fourth letter is slightly escalated again. He comments on your picture on the jacket of the hard cover. He says you're lovely. The fifth letter is more rambling. He talks about how smart you are, how pretty you are, how he hopes, someday to find someone like you to be with. All those things are not typical fan musings."

"That's true."

"Why the hell didn't your publicist catch that?" Booth snapped, turning to look at her.

"She likely did and was waiting for one more letter, a more direct threat, before she said anything," guessed Sweets. "None of these letters indicate any kind of harm. More like an anonymous schoolboy crush; a…a secret Valentine, if you will."

"And now?"

"Well, now the notes are showing up in person. He's finding you in public, sending letters to you at the lab and these newer notes are escalating, as well. In the first one he seems to indicate an awareness that he doesn't know you, hasn't met you yet. In the second note, he compliments your family, comments on your child's eyes matching yours. That's a social nicety, something you might say to someone you know, an acquaintance. He's either pretending to know you personally, or he thinks he does."

Brennan felt Booth's entire body tense up as Sweets went on.

"The third message, the one over the phone, that's gutsy. He saw an opportunity and he took it. He's watching. And again, saying it's nice to see you all again indicates he thinks he has a place in your life. It's the kind of thing you say when you're leaving a party or after you bump into someone on the street. There is a familiarity to these letters that doesn't actually exist to anyone but him."

"What about this last one?" Booth pointed at the bag.

"He's not being shy anymore. He's watching you and he tells you so. He feels like he watched the ball game as an invited guest. He says he will see you soon. He's straight up telling you his end game, here."

"Which is?" Brennan asked, not at all certain she wanted to hear the answer.

"It's you, Dr. Brennan," Sweets said solemnly. "His end game is you."