The Inquisitor


By: dharmamonkey & Lesera128
Rated: M
Disclaimer: So, we're still here, and by now, we know as well as you do that we don't own anything. However, we are looking into ways to take control of this sandbox by adverse possession. ::blinks:: Okay, not really. But, you get the gist.


A/N: We, the ladies of Dharmasera, Inc. want to take a moment to thank everyone who's been following "The Inquisitor." The interest in this piece has far surpassed our expectations. It really means a lot to know there are so many people out there waiting with baited breath for each update so they can find out what's happening with the good Father Seeley and Mistress Brennan. Who knew the story of a 16th century priest and a heretical midwife would capture so many readers' imaginations? We weren't exactly sure, but we're thrilled you're all enjoying it. Really.

One more thing (and this bit is a message from dharmamonkey): please don't forget that this piece, while posting under the monkey's profile, is absolutely a collaborative effort between Lesera128 (who really came up with the idea that ultimately became "The Inquisitor") and dharmamonkey. This is not my work alone. This is a true Dharmasera team effort. So please give Lesera128 her well-deserved props.

Unf Alert: As you might expect considering where we've taken the story up to this point, this chapter contains the kind of unfness that makes your cheeks flush, your ears turn a bit red and your foreheads dampen with sweat. So, please, if you don't care for reading about such things, please, stop now. Otherwise, read on, our friends, read on.


Chapter 9: A Summer Storm


After they'd finished saying goodbye with not one, but four separate 'good-bye' kisses, Booth reluctantly tore himself away from Brennan. They dressed in silence, although every few seconds, each of them felt the other's eyes staring at them in admiration and longing. At last, when they were completely dressed and stood facing one another, they gave themselves one final look over to make certain that nothing seemed out of place or in anyway betrayed the intimacies they'd just shared. When Brennan sat down in her chair, sitting ramrod straight as she folded her hands demurely in her lap and crossed her legs, they both knew they were ready.

How she managed to keep from even blushing as she sat back down in the chair in which they'd been doing such explicitly sinful and erotically pleasurable things was beyond Booth. However, somehow she managed it, and Booth knew that they'd stalled for as much time as was possible. Giving her one last look of happy and emotional vulnerability that he'd never shown anyone but her up to that point, he hardened his countenance and stiffened his posture as he let the mask of his religion and his profession fall back into place. Once more Father Seeley, Inquisitor of the Holy Mother Church, he strode purposefully towards the door, opened it, and gave a sharp order that he was done with the prisoner for the day and that she needed to be returned to her cell.

A short time later, Booth watched the guards nervously enter the room, careful to avert their eyes from him as they scrambled to where the prisoner sat. He had to swallow a sharp rebuke as he watched them re-attach Brennan's chains and shackles none too gently, roughly jerk her from the chair, and unceremoniously half-drag her away away from him. He stood in the doorway and watched as she was led down the hall in the direction of her cell. When no one was longer looking at him, he winced at the sound the heavy links made as they clattered against the stone floor with every step she took. He noticed with a flush of pride in his chest that Brennan didn't so much as flinch as they moved her. Nor, did she, he noticed with a tad bit of disappointment, even try to sneak a quick gaze over her shoulder to look back at him. It was if, but for the feelings and memories he had, nothing had changed between them.

However, Booth knew better. He knew it in his mind, in his heart, and in his soul. Something radically important had changed for both of them, something that meant that things would never, ever be the same for either one of them ever again. And, for that, Booth was eternally grateful.

After another minute, when he realized he was now alone in the hallway, he realized how odd it would seem if someone saw him. Looking down with a small sigh, Booth knew he needed a few moments to process what had just happened. He planned to retire to his room for a bit of time to think of what had just happened—and, more importantly, to figure out some way in which he could contrive an excuse to come to her that night as he'd promised. His heart skipped a beat as his already shallow breathing grew more labored as he thought of the pleasures that awaited them in just a few hours when he would make love to her properly, in a bed, with no fear that they'd be interrupted or discovered coloring what he hoped would be as an enjoyable encounter for her as he instinctively knew it would be for him. A small smile tugged at the corners of his mouth as he thought of how Brennan would feel beneath him as he moved, how she would taste, and the sounds she would make. Despite his earlier pronouncements that his lust had been sated for the afternoon, he felt his heart rate increase and his already flushed skin redden a bit more in excitement as he thought of her. Thus, Booth was fairly distracted as he began to turn around to reenter the interrogation room and gather what documents he would take back with him to his cell. As he started to move, his mind swirling with a thousand different thoughts as he tried to blink away the haze that lingered in the wake of the mind-shattering encounter he'd just had with Brennan, his unusually high level of distraction meant that he didn't notice the footsteps that softly approached from behind him.

"Father Seeley," Brother Gordon Wyatt's voice boomed in his ear, causing Booth to jump with surprise as he hastily turned around to face the other inquisitor. "God's blessings to you on this good day."

Booth let out a deep breath of relief when he saw who had caught him unawares. "Brother Wyatt," Booth said quietly, inclining his head respectfully at the elder friar. "Good day to you as well."

For a minute, Wyatt's watery blue eyes carefully studied the younger inquisitor. As he took in the sight before him, Wyatt's keen eyes widened as he considered the current state of the younger priest's appearance. Booth's face was flush, his skin damp with perspiration, and dark, heavy circles hung beneath his heavy-lidded brown eyes. Frowning a bit, the friar instantly thought back to a few nights before, when he'd sat across from Booth at the evening meal, and how the young priest—who normally had a hearty appetite, especially for savory dishes that Mistress Bernadette made only for the young priest when she'd discovered how much he liked her simple English fare, like chicken stew with dumplings—had picked at his food, hardly eating a bite. He also recalled also how Booth had admitted to having difficulty sleeping. Any one symptom might be something that he could dismiss, but when taken cumulatively, Wyatt felt a wave of protectiveness for Booth—a feeling he'd had since Pole had commanded that he take the younger man under his wing a month before—reassert itself. He let out a slow breath before he frowned and realized that whatever had caused the younger man's change in comportment, it couldn't be good.

"You don't look well, Father," Wyatt said. "How do you feel?"

"Fine," Booth said with a small shrug. "Tired, but fine. I'm sure I just need to retire to my room a bit before Vespers."

"Are you certain?" Wyatt asked as he gave Booth a dubious look. "I know it's rather forward of me to say it, but it seems to me that you haven't been your normal jovial self in some days, Father."

Booth swallowed nervously as he struggled for an answer. "I-I—"

"Father, remember, although I know it's your native land, it's been many years since you've sojourned in England. The illnesses and temptations to which a man can fall prey are different here than in any other part of the world." Wyatt paused, surveying Booth's face with a certain vague worry as he noted the labored rise of fall of the young priest's breaths. "That's why we always must remain vigilant and not be afraid to ask for help when we need it," he told him quietly.

Nodding, slowly as he realized that his breaths were coming in pants, Booth finally conceded, "I know that, Brother Wyatt. And, but for a bit of a quick pulse, I assure you that I'm quite well—just fatigued."

"A quick pulse?" Wyatt frowned as he took a step towards Booth. "What do you mean?"

"It's just that my heart has been racing a bit—" Booth said, flushing as he realized that he'd said more than he'd intended, and wasn't quite sure how to get out of it without saying the wrong thing that could be a danger to both Brennan and himself. "I'm sure it's nothing. Really, Brother."

Shaking his lips, his thin lips pursed, Wyatt reached up and placed his forefingers on the pulse point on Booth's neck. His already somber eyes immediately grew alight with a serious wave of concern as he felt Booth's pulse. "Holy Mother of God," he whispered as he felt Booth's rapid heartbeat throb beneath his fingertips. "Your heart, Father..."

"It's nothing," Booth said a bit more sharply than he'd initially intended even as he pushed Wyatt's hand away. "I assure you, Brother Wyatt, I'm quite fine. I promise. I'm just unused to the heat and that room is so very stifling. It's very stuffy in there, and I'm sure a bit of fresh air and a period of solid uninterrupted rest will make my headache go away—"

Wyatt blanched as Booth spoke. He suddenly remembered the way his sixteen year-old nephew, Walter, had looked when he fell ill and died from the sweating sickness seven years earlier, in the summer of 1551. At first, the vigorous young man had been on the brink of manhood, ready to take up a post in the Queen's army as a bowman in the infantry. He'd been the apple of both his father and mother's eyes. Then, one day, he'd awakened not quite his normal usually buoyant and jovial self. Like Father Seeley, it seemed, Walter's illness had seemed much like any other cold, with the young man initially complaining of shallow breaths, exhaustion, a headache, and a lack of appetite. But, then, soreness in his muscles and an extreme sensitivity to light heralded the arrival of a much dire prognosis than the sniffles.

In a matter of hours, the boy was overtaken by a sudden fever that caused him to sweat profusely and his pulse to race as he spiraled into a delirium from which he'd never recovered. He was dead before the sun rose the following morning. Wyatt had offered wondered if Walter's life might've been saved if he'd seen a doctor as soon as the first symptoms had manifested instead of waiting until the fever had taken him. By, then, of course, it had been too late to do anything for Walter. Wyatt had vowed on the day his nephew had died that he'd never make the same mistake again. And, maybe, the knowledge that he'd taken from Walter's passing had been a part of God's plan so that he would know what to do when confronted with an eerily similar set of circumstances with Father Seeley. His decision made, he shook his head sharply as he looked at the younger man.

"No," Wyatt said insistently, grabbing Booth by the arm. "I'm afraid that's not good enough. We can't take any chances—not with symptoms like this and not with you. I'm taking you to the infirmary, Father. Directly. As in, immediately—right now." Booth began to shake his head and opened his mouth to speak as he tried to shrug free of Wyatt's grasp, and counter the older man's sudden impressive show of stubbornness. However, Wyatt was not to be challenged on this point. He tightened his grip of Booth's arm as he dragged the younger man in the direction of the makeshift infirmary that had been set up not too far from Mistress Bernadette's kitchen. The mental image of his dying nephew spurred Wyatt on in his resolve. Cutting off Booth, he said sharply, "No, this is not up for discussion, Father. You're coming with me—now."

"But," Booth still protested, turning around and looking back down the corridor where Brennan had been taken and realizing that with each step that Wyatt made in the opposite direction, he was taking them further and further from one another.

Damn it, he cursed silently. No. This isn't happening. I have toI need to be free to get to her. I can't let her think that I've just taken the precious gift she's given me and abandoned her once the taking of it was done. No, I just can't. I won't. I must be free to be able to go to her. She'll be expecting me. I must

"I'm...look, it's really nothing, Brother, and—"

"Father," Wyatt snapped, placing the palm of his hand on Booth's clammy cheek and turning the younger man's face so that their eyes met as he spoke in an impressive tone that brokered no contradiction as the older man spoke—and from Booth's standpoint, as a widely traveled man who had conversed with popes, kings, nobles, and princes of the Church...well, that was saying something. "I'm the definitor of this divine constituency of ours, Father, and I must insist that you go to the infirmary. And, that's the end of this discussion. We are going to the infirmary, and we are going now," Wyatt told him in a firm voice. Booth again tried to speak, but Wyatt firmly shook his head. "If Brother Paul says you are fine, then of course, you are free to go where you wish. But, until he sees you and makes that pronouncement, you will do as I say. Now, have I made myself clear?"

Booth swallowed, knowing in that moment that there was likely nothing he could offer up to explain his condition that would not make the conundrum he faced much worse than it already was. He stared at Wyatt's impassable gaze, and then slowly nodded his head in a defeated and glum manner. Wyatt, pleased, released his grip on Booth's jaw. He stepped aside and then gestured towards the opposite direction in which Brennan had gone, making it clear that he'd be the one to follow Booth. Daring to take one final glance at the long corridor behind him, as he silently mouthed his nickname for her, Booth reached up and threaded his fingers through his sweat-damp hair.

"Yes, Brother," he whispered as he turned and reluctantly began to walk down the hall as Brother Wyatt followed him as if Booth was a prisoner and Wyatt the guard standing watch over him. "Very well."


Some time later, Booth blinked a couple of times, trying to clear away the haze that clouded his vision as he slowly realized he was in a bed.

His body felt heavy, weighed down by some unseen and overwhelming force, as he lay there, clad only in his leggings, a thin sheet of coarse cream-colored linen draped across his stomach. He reached down to move the sheet aside, but the movement was aborted almost instantaneously as his left arm was stilled by a dull, stiff ache that screamed from his muscles as he shifted his hips in bed. Groaning, he turned his head and saw the infirmary monk, Brother Paul, and his young assistant, a lanky novitiate with red hair and pale green eyes whom Booth thought was named Noel—but he couldn't really be certain in that moment—coming toward him. Booth winced as his eyes were suddenly blinded by a flash of late afternoon sunlight gleaming off the polished rim of the bleeding bowl.

"No, no," he murmured as the bald, snaggle-toothed monk extended Booth's right arm and tapped on the bulging vein in the crook of his arm. "No, no—no, I'm fine. Brother...Paul. Please, wait. I don't need this, so don't..."

As soon as the monk's razor-sharp fleam pieced Booth's skin, everything faded quickly to black.

After a time, he once more became somewhat aware of the things that were going on around him, although they were hazy and far away in an unfocused manner that exhausted him. He heard a voice calling for him, but the words themselves sounded distant and liquid to him. He struggled to recognize the voice or to hear the words clearly enough to understand what was being said.

Where am I? he murmured, unsure whether he had actually spoken.

"Father," Brother Wyatt said in a quiet but firm voice, holding Booth's hand between his palms. "Look at me, Father." Booth's eyes flickered open again, and he opened his mouth to speak, and though he seemed to move his tongue as if forming speech, no words came out.

Wyatt watched Booth's glassy eyes flutter for a moment as his lips smacked together uselessly, and then saw the young priest's eyes roll back in his head as his eyelids blink shut. Wyatt squeezed Booth's hand, his face blanching as the priest's hand merely twitched in response.

"Brother Paul," Wyatt said as he turned to the infirmary monk. "You must do something for the Father."

The old monk shrugged weakly. "I've already bled him three times," he explained. "Whatever bad humours have invaded his body have taken root deep inside of him. If the bleeding hasn't purged them, then I fear they are too strong, and his constitution too weak. I'm fairly certain whatever affliction he's suffering from isn't the sweating sickness as you'd initially feared, but I'm at a loss of what else could be the cause. So, I'm sorry, Brother Wyatt, but there's nothing more I can do for him."

Wyatt let go of Booth's hand and stood up, walking over to the old monk and glaring down at him, his nostrils flaring in anger. "This bleeding business is utterly worthless balderdash," he spat. "You've done little more than take a relatively healthy man who'd taken slightly ill and made him even weaker and sicker than he was before. Forget about the blasted humours, man, and set about to making the good Father stronger that he can fight this thing that has taken him, whatever it is." Wyatt shook his head in frustration and glanced again at Booth, whose right arm dangled over the edge of his bed.

"I don't know what you expect me to do, Brother Wyatt," the physician monk protested.

"Whatever in God's holy name you have to, Brother Paul," Wyatt growled. "This man is the Archbishop's favorite—his protégé, as it were." He paused, arching an eyebrow as the old monk flinched at the mention of Cardinal Pole's name. "He must survive," he said, "as there is still much of God's work for him to complete on earth before he earns his respite. As you said, if he'd been taken with the sweating sickness, he'd be dead already, so it can't be that. But, even still, you must heal whatever is afflicting him as the Lord still has plans for him, and he must survive to fulfill his destiny."

"But, Brother—" Brother Paul tried to protest.

"He's been here nigh three days," Wyatt said with a sharp frown marring his normally placid demeanor. "Have you fed him? Or only bled him?"

"He drank a half-measure of watered-down wine yesterday," Paul began to explain with a small shake of his head. "But, no, he's not been conscious long enough to get any solid food down—"

Wyatt's heavy jaw tensed as he pointed his finger in the old monk's face. "You will, as soon as this man wakes up, give him a full ration of mead. If he manages to keep that down, you'll give him another one hour thereafter and begin giving him boiled porridge with honey. Then, as he becomes more conscious, if the food agrees with his stomach, then bread, cheese and eggs, and so on until he begins to regain his native strength."

He sighed as he glanced over at the bleeding bowl and fleam on the table next to Booth's bed.

"And if I so much as see those damned things within ten feet of the good Father again, I'll have you relegated to the stables and shoveling horseshit until you can't raise your arms to wipe your own pathetic brow. Am I making myself clear, Brother Paul?"

"Yes, Brother Wyatt," the old monk said glumly. "I will do as you say. I will try."

"This man will not die," the senior friar declared. "Not on my watch. Make him strong again. We need him. God's Holy Church needs him, so do what must be done. Understood?"

The monk nodded in the affirmative to give Wyatt his response, but wisely remained silent. For his part, Wyatt regarded Booth's limp form one last time, pursed his lips into a firm, thin line and then stomped out of the infirmary praying that he wouldn't have to be the one to write the letter to Cardinal Pole informing him of Booth's untimely and unexpected death.


For a week, Brennan hadn't slept well.

It wasn't for lack of trying on her part. However, each night after Angela brought her her supper tray, and the young woman could only give her a small shake of her head in response to her unasked question, Brennan felt more and more like her only lifeline to the outer world had slipped out of her hands—and she wasn't quite certain how it had happened. Even more importantly, it wasn't like she had many alternatives that she could act upon to alter her situation. It wasn't like she could reveal to the servant girl the actual reasons behind her inquiring after the man that theoretically held the power of life and death over her in the power of his hand. Although she liked Angela well enough, and she did want to trust her, Brennan had learned at a very early age from her parents, particularly her father, that trust was a luxury that she usually couldn't afford. And, since she didn't really know Angela very well, she knew it was too big a risk to take. Besides, she'd already unusually reached out and trusted one person in recent times...and that was how, she came to realize, her situation had changed so drastically in such a short period of time. It was all because of him. And, that was why Brennan had to keep her inquiries about Father Seeley—Booth, as she'd come to think of him in her own private thoughts—as casual and innocuous as possible.

The first night that he hadn't come to her, Brennan had tried not to make that big a deal out of it. He hadn't slept in some time, and he'd told her himself that he was tired, so she wondered if perhaps the exhaustion, when combined with their pleasurable exertions, had simply been too much for him. She pictured him having fallen asleep in his cell, missing Vespers, dinner, and sleeping through their assignation, only significantly chastising himself when he finally awoke, well rested, but with a growling belly as he stared at the morning light and realized what he'd done. She chuckled at the thought, and she hoped he wouldn't berate himself about it...not too much, at least.

But, then a night and another day passed, and she wasn't even called to the interrogation room. On the second night when she stayed up and waited for him, thinking perhaps he needed some time and distance between them to throw suspicion away from them so they wouldn't be found out, thoughts continued to swirl in her head as she tried to figure out what might've happened to keep him from coming to her as they'd planned. Not once as she let her mind work over the situation in her thoughts did she ever doubt the veracity of his promise that he'd never regret what they'd done.

But, on the second night, when he didn't appear, she began to become afraid. Something had happened—she was certain of it, but she just didn't know what it was...and that lack of knowledge made her fear grow much worse than she knew it needed to be. The fear and the uncertainty began to gnaw at her as she pictured all the worst case possible scenarios, ranging from someone having found them out, reported them, and Booth having taken all the blame (and punishment on his shoulders)—because that was the type of thing she knew Booth would do—to the fact that maybe, just maybe, he'd been rattled more than she'd thought when he realized the truth of what they'd done.

On the third day, finally, some meager explanation (and the most mild of relief) came when Angela asked her if she'd heard the gossip about Father Seeley. He was ill, Angela had said—dreadfully sick and confined to the infirmary, some of the brothers said—and they feared he was fighting for his very life, although he wasn't so far gone that Last Rites had been given to him, she told Brennan to help pass the time more quickly as she waited for the midwife to finish her breakfast. It turned out that Angela didn't have to wait long since Brennan lost the majority of her appetite after that point, and she quickly thanked the serving girl for bringing her the breakfast but said she wasn't as hungry as she'd originally thought that morning. With a small shrug of her shoulders, Angela nodded, reached for the tray, said her goodbyes, and then disappeared from whence she came, leaving Brennan alone with her thoughts.

From that point on, Brennan felt some modicum of relief since she knew that Booth hadn't broken his word and abandoned her. Something beyond his control had prevented him from coming to her as he'd promised. But, each morning it was the same whenever Angela came, since each morning Brennan couldn't ask more than the obvious: was there any news from the infirmary about Father Seeley? Angela, Brennan supposed, probably believed she just wanted to know about the man's prognosis since his recovery would indicate the resumption of her regular interrogation sessions. In reality, Brennan feared for him for more personal, and more prurient, reasons. Still, she wasn't above letting Angela think her interest was self-serving when she asked why Brennan cared one day.

It's not just because he said he'd help me, Brennan found herself thinking one night...somewhat ironically, since it was exactly one week to the day since an unexpected visitor to her cell in the middle of the night had turned her world upside down. That's not the only reason I've got this tightness in my chest whenever I think about him. It's...it's more than that. As much as I hate to admit it, it's more than that. I know it is. I never expected to find such kindness or gentleness is another human beingespecially not an Inquisitor of the Holy Church. He...he's not like the rest. And setting aside the fact that we've bedded, I-I...I think I

Again, Brennan's thoughts trailed off, as they often did during the day when she wrestled with making sense of what had happened to her because of him. And, as they always did when they reached that one particular point in her thought processes, Brennan's mind turned a sharp curve and refused to look beyond what they'd done and how he'd made her feel to consider the greater significance of both events. And, in between the constant loops of circular logic, a more pernicious thought crept into Brennan's head as she wondered if the timing of his illness had a more divine origin than she'd originally thought.

If I were to confess to what we did, would I really regret what happened and admit that I didn't intend for it to happen again? she wondered. Because, I don't think I honestly could, my aversion to papist rituals aside. I-I...what we didit was enjoyable, she conceded. I can freely admit that. It was very enjoyable. And, I freely admit that I want to do it again. I want him. I want him badlyso very badly. But, even still, I knowbecause of who he is, and what he isthat what we did...what we shared, it's wrong. I know that. I do. What we did contravened his vows. But...stillGod, just let him be alright. Don't punish him for our sins. I tempted him. It's...what happened, it happened because of me. I wanted it. I wanted him. I still do. I'm the one who's responsible for this temptation. It's not him. It couldn't be him, because he's a good and honorable and noble man. So, maybe, in a way...maybe I did bewitch him after all. But, he's the innocent in this. Don't...please don't make him pay for something that's my fault.

Sitting up in bed, Brennan realized she'd never get to sleep if she was once again thinking about Booth and what they'd done all night. Sighing, she glanced at the window, and seeing how dark it was, knew there to be many hours of night left even as tell-tale droplets of water heralded the arrival of the storm that Angela told her all expected to brew this night given the overcast skies of the previous evenings that came and went with no falling of rain. A low roll of thunder told her she'd get no sleep that night anyway if the storm promised to be as bad as Angela said everyone expected.

Brennan made a face at the thought. For some reason, she'd always hated thunderstorms. They made her uneasy, and slightly anxious in knowing that she'd be at the mercy of the howling winds, uncontrollable thunder, and unpredictable torrents of rain that Mother Nature conjured. Yes, she was at their mercy but for the meagre shelter offered by the four walls and roof of the wooden building in which she'd now been a prisoner for seven weeks.

I suppose it doesn't help that Mother died during a summer storm like this, Brennan thought morosely, her maudlin thoughts a clear reflection of her grim mindset. Is that going to happen again, I wonder? Is it happening right now? Could he be drawing his last breath? Could he be leaving me, just like Mother did, even though they both promised they never would? Or, maybe, has it already happened, and I just don't know it yet? Oh, God, help me

A knot formed in her throat as realized there were tears falling down her cheeks that had caused her vision to blur.

Don't take him away, she suddenly found herself praying silently. Please, God...don't do this. Let him be alright. Don't...just...please...please save him. Please save him. Don't let him go. Don't let him leave me. Just...all I need to do is be able to see him one last time. That's all. Justjust let me see him one last time. That's all I ask. Justplease.

Brennan's impromptu prayer eventually segued into a series of more formal prayers that she began to silently mouth as the storm grew worse. Eventually, at some point, she realized she must've dozed off in the course of her nightly conversation with God. Blinking away the grogginess that coated her eyes, she tried to make sense of how she'd fallen asleep in such an uncomfortable position, praying, as a storm raged outside. A crack of lightning illuminated the aged panes of the glass in her window, and Brennan realized that it must've been the storm that jolted her awake. She gingerly tried to stretch out her stiff back and winced as her neck protested from the odd angle it had been forced to stay in for so long as she'd dozed.

However, as she tried to figure out how to stretch her muscles so that she might ease the pain she felt in her neck and shoulders, she felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up straight on end as some type of faint noise caught her attention. Her eyes darted around the room as she tried to determine what had made the sound. After a minute, all was quiet, but then another loud crash from outside made her jump in bed. Another loud boom of thunder startled her slightly, as it had followed so closely on the heels of the first. Realizing that the noise was probably just caused by the weather, Brennan chided herself for letting a mere thunderstorm catch her off-guard. Shaking her head, she'd resigned herself to the task of once more going about the order of trying to fo begin stretching her muscles, when the first noise that had caught her attention returned. This time, it was louder, and before Brennan had realized what was happening, the wooden door to her cell slowly creaked open and a small beam of dancing illumination pierced the blackness of her solemn abode.

Quickly, a lone cloaked figure silently crept into the cell, shut the door, and secured it behind him. Brennan's eyes widened as she took in the sight before her.

Am I still asleep? she silently mused, blinking several times as she wondered if she'd only dreamed that the summer storm had awakened her. Trying to ascertain if the vision before her was real or not, the question echoed in her mind, Am I...that is, am I-I...am I dreaming about him now?

As she continued to stare at the hooded figure, Brennan couldn't help but wonder if what she was seeing now was indeed what she'd originally thought it to be—just a dream. But, when the figure walked slowly to the table, and meticulously set the candle he carried down in exactly the same spot as he had a week before, Brennan knew her subconscious was not so perfect as to get that particular detail right as she slept. Still, fear gripped her as she watched with baited breath as her visitor moved to push back the hood of his robe.

After a moment, a familiar dark-headed face emerged, and Brennan felt her breath catch in her chest.

"Bren?" came the quiet whisper. "It's me. Ummm...are you...Bren, are you awake?"

As soon as she'd heard his voice, Brennan decided she didn't care if she was dreaming or not. Like a shot, she was out of the bed and on her feet. She hurtled towards his form, her speed catching him slightly off guard as she threw herself at him. By the time her arms were wrapped around him, her grip was so tight, it almost made breathing difficult.

Coughing lightly, he said quietly, "Bren—air. I, uhhh, air...I...need...to...breathe."

As some part of her brain processed his words, her iron-like grip loosened slightly so that he could take a breath. However, her hands refused to let go of him as she clung to him like some type of life raft. Somewhat surprised—although, pleasantly so—by her intense display of emotion towards him, Booth felt a warmth blossom in his chest as he wrapped his arms around her and gave her a reassuring hug.

Moving his lips to her ear, he chuckled lightly, "I'm guessing someone missed me, huh?"

Her grip on his torso tightened as she said softly, "Are you really here? Is it...is it really you?"

The pain Booth heard in her voice caused him to pause. Suddenly, he used his superior strength to move Brennan just enough so that her head was no longer pressed into his chest as it had been, but was instead looking up at him so that he could see her eyes. Moving one of his hands, he lightly cupped her jaw and tilted her head up to meet his questioning gaze.

"Hey," he asked. "What is it?"

She stared at him for a long moment, her pale eyes ablaze with intense emotion, and then she slowly shook her head. "I-I...I didn't...no one told me anything," Brennan finally managed to ramble. "All Angela knew was that the night after you left after we'd...well, you know—after the last time I saw you in the interrogation room...and, errr...when we were together? Well, she said that you'd been removed from your normal room and your normal duties were postponed because you had taken ill. She said you'd been taken to the infirmary because of some sickness, but didn't know anything else besides that...and I didn't even know that part until three days after I'd last seen you."

"I was," he said simply. "I convinced the monk in charge of the infirmary that I was well enough to return to my quarters after Vespers today. I couldn't come before now without arousing suspicion, though." He paused, and his heart melted a bit when he saw the concern she obviously felt for him shining out of her eyes, but still, for some reason he needed to know for certain. "Were you worried about me?"

Brennan flushed a bit at the question and then looked away as she nodded. "Yes," she whispered. "I didn't know...that is—I didn't know what had happened to you."

"Initially, Brother Wyatt believed it might be the sweating sickness," he told her lightly. He felt her body tense at the words as he further explained, "You see, he saw me leaving the interrogation room after the guards had already left to escort you back to your cell. He saw me sweating, and with my face flushed, and my heart was racing...because...well, not to put too fine a point on it, but because of what we'd been doing, but he thought I'd finally taken ill. He'd been concerned about me over the few days before it because he'd noticed my lack of appetite and the dark circles under my eyes, and he knew I wasn't sleeping. So, when he suggested that I might be coming down with the sweating sickness, they believed quarantine in the infirmary was the safest choice, just in case you see, to take precautions lest there be an outbreak if I was indeed sick with it. I knew I wasn't, but since I couldn't really tell him why I was like that in the first place without giving us away, I didn't have a choice in what was happening to me. There wasn't anything I could say to get him to believe that I just needed to sleep. Believe me—I tried, but Brother Wyatt...well, once he sets his mind to something, he can be one of the most stubborn individuals whom I've ever encountered. So, before I knew it, he was shoving me off to the infirmary, and they were getting ready to bleed me." He stopped and shook his head as he sighed, "I think the bleeding did more harm than good. I slept for the first three days, and by the time I realized you'd be wondering about me, I didn't know how to get word to you in a way that wouldn't attract undue notice."

"You...you were worried about what I thought?" Brennan asked slowly as she finished listening to his explanation.

Booth nodded. "Of course," he said simply. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I thought..." Brennan began, her voice wavering a bit as she spoke. "I thought, given the timing of what had happened, that maybe I'd done something to merit retribution—to punish me for my sins, perhaps—and...maybe this was God's way of punishing you for what I'd done...for what I'd made you do."

Another flush of warmth at her words caused Booth's heart to feel even larger than it had felt just a moment earlier—and when he'd realized that she'd been concerned about him, that had made his heart feel pretty enormous. She'd looked away from him in the course of his explanation, and so Booth had to move his hand to reclaim his earlier grasp of her face. Lifting a hand to cup her jaw, he tilted her head until she reluctantly met his gaze once more.

"Bren?" he asked in a quiet voice.

She stared at him for a moment, and then sighed softly, "Yes?"

He held her gaze firmly with his for a long moment to emphasize what he was about to say. Then, taking another breath, he nodded at her. "This is very important, so...please. Pay attention to me, alright?"

He waited for Brennan to nod her head to confirm that she understood what he was saying. After another minute, he told her in a low and soothing, but very firm voice, "First, you didn't make me do anything," he said. "What I did...what we did...it was a choice. It was a choice I made, a choice you made, a choice we made together. And, it's a choice that I know I don't regret...and one that I hope you don't regret."

"I don't—" she interrupted him.

Flashing her a toothy grin, he nodded, "Good. Because, I want you to know that given the same choice, I'd do everything exactly the same way all over again. Do you understand?"

He felt some of the tension that had been in her body dissipate as soon as the words let his mouth. A spark of hope, and for the first time since he'd known her, if Booth didn't know better, what he'd say was vulnerability, shone in her eyes as she nodded her head again.

"Really?" she asked.

Nodding slowly, he said, "Really." He let the pad of his thumb caress her cheek for another minute before he asked quietly, "Did you mean it, though? Because...it's alright if you need to tell me that you've changed your mind. I...I-I...it's alright. I just need to know—you don't regret it...do you?"

Brennan's answer came as she once more moved so quickly that Booth was taken aback slightly as she reached up, knocking his hand away from her cheek in the process, and slammed her lips against his. It was all the response Booth needed to banish any doubts he'd felt about what he feared she'd come to think of him and what they'd done in the time they'd been apart. It was a significant amount of reassurance that significantly bolstered his confidence...and then some.

As he felt her tongue twirl inside his mouth, for a moment, he forgot where he was and what he was doing. In that moment, all he could think about was how warm and pliant Brennan felt in his arms, how good she smelled as he deeply inhaled her scent, and how sweet she tasted as she pulled his tongue deeper and deeper into her mouth. At some point, when the need for oxygen made him reluctantly pull away, he smiled as he heard Brennan make a kittenish sound that seemed to simultaneously convey both her deep satisfaction at his kiss and her significant displeasure at his action of moving away from her—whether it was for pure basic necessity's sake or not. After Booth had separated them just enough so that he could suck some much-needed air into his deprived lungs, and hoped she'd take the chance to breathe as well—since he knew as talented as she was that even Brennan couldn't hold her breath for that long—he felt her press her body into his as if she were both reminding of what he was already missing and punishing him with that reminder for daring to pull away.

"Come on now," he whispered into her ear, moving his mouth so that it rested no more than an inch or two away from her earlobe. "Don't be like that."

"Don't be like what?' Brennan finally managed to gasp. "I'm just trying to make a point here."

"And what point would that be?" Booth asked playfully. "Because I have to tell you, Bren, I can't tell if that was a kiss of happiness, a kiss of relief, a kiss of lust, or a kiss of temptation—all designed to drive me mad, no doubt, whichever one it is, hmmm?"

"Why does it have to be just one? Can't it be all of them?" Brennan asked, her voice breathy as she blinked at him in a sultry way that let him know what she wanted from him in that moment—and, more importantly, letting him know that she planned not to let him leave her until she'd gotten it. "Because, in reality, the point I was actually trying to make is that, for more than one reason, I'm very glad to see you," she finally said as she punctuated her point with a twist of her hips as she grinded her pelvis against him. She felt his body tense and as his eyes dropped to see what she was doing, and she smiled as she added, "So very, very glad."

"You know," Booth said as he pressed his hip against her body in response to what he knew was an invitation to resume what they'd begun a week earlier. "I honestly didn't come here tonight expecting that you'd let me bed you again. I didn't dare hope. I'm not lying when I say I only came here to tell you that I was alright and to apologize for not seeing you for so long after...what happened between us."

"So," Brennan said as she twisted slightly as she thrust her pelvis towards him again and caused him to moan softly. "Does that mean that you don't want a chance to bed me again? Especially considering the fact that we...errr, have a bed this time?

"I want you," he said quietly, his voice already dropping half an octave in a wonderfully rough way that made Brennan want to shiver with each word that he spoke. "I've spent every single day and night of this past week going out of my mind with want of you." He stopped and moved his mouth so that it was near her earlobe. He nipped it slightly before he whispered, "If I thought it was bad before I knew the feel and taste of you, I didn't know what hell could be to have had you once and realize with each passing day how long it had been since I last touched you. That was true madness."

Brennan shivered again at his sensuous words. Smiling as he moved his mouth to her jaw, and began to trace a light line of kisses towards her mouth, she sought out his lips again. He eagerly welcomed her attentions as he opened his mouth and bypassed the worship of her soft lips with his. Instead, he pushed his wet tongue inside her mouth, greedy and demanding as it entered her soft sweet lushness. He used the tip of his tongue to trace the edge of hers in a semicircle, their combined saliva speeding his slick movements on as he plunged into her wetness again and again. The sweetness of her breath tickled the small hairs in his nostrils, causing him to twitch his nose in spite of himself. The movement obviously caused Brennan some amusement as she smiled against him and a throaty chuckle rumbled at the back of her throat once again. Slowly, Booth pulled back, and Brennan looked up at him with her eyes ablaze with longing and want.

Taking his hand, Brennan threaded her fingers through his hand and nodded at her sleeping space. "Come to bed," she murmured both inviting and tempting him in the same breath. She tugged on his hand as she gently led the way, Booth offered no significant resistance to her overtures. Still, she chuckled as she tried to encourage him to take the lead. "Take me to bed," she coaxed him again.

Booth didn't need to be told twice as he followed close on her heels.

Brennan fell back onto the bed and pushed herself towards the center as she waited for him. She sat watching as Booth quickly pulled his outer cloak and his thin woolen white robe over his head. Kicking off his sandals, and hastily pulling down his woolen leggings, once free of his clothes, he stalked towards her, charming and assured in his movements. The faint illumination of the single candle he had brought cast a warm light over his body. In the week since she'd last seen him, she could already see a slight change in his body.

"You've lost weight," she said quietly as she tilted her head at him.

Booth stopped and glanced down at his naked body. After a moment, he shrugged his shoulder slightly and then quirked an eyebrow at her as he asked, "How can you tell?"

"Your body," she pointed at his chest with her index finger. "It's a bit more lean in the musculature of your torso than it was before. Granted, I didn't have as much time to study your body as you did mine, but I've been told I have a very keen eye for details."

"And, I've been told," Booth said, as he gave her a sly grin when he stepped closer to the bed. "That I have an excellent memory. I think, maybe, I should see if you look just as I remember in case I need to study you some more to correct any imperfections in my memory, hmmm?" He took another step and then knelt on the edge of the bed as he awaited her response.

Slowly, Brennan gathered a fistful of fabric in each hand as she pulled at the hem of her white linen shift that she'd taken to wearing while she slept in during the term of her imprisonment. Pulling the garment up and over her head, she silently let the bunch of fabric fall to the floor next to the bed. Extending her hand, she then used her index finger to beckon him.

"Let's see, I think, how good a memory you've really got," Brennan challenged him with an evil smile. "I believe you said as a student, you claimed to have a very steep...what was it you called it? A 'steep learning curve'?"

Booth nodded with a toothy grin as he shifted closer towards the center of the bed and closer towards her as he moved on his knees. "Yes. I've always been an excellent student," he told her.

"Mmmm," she said thoughtfully. "Then, I suppose the next question is...what does the student remember from his last lesson?"

As he moved so that he was closer and closer to her, Brennan let her legs fall open a bit so that he could move between them and have easy access to her most sensitive parts. He rested a hand on each of her knees, a small look of hesitation crossing his face as he stared at her. A serious look then crossed his face as he frowned slightly and nodded.

"I remember that...I was selfish the first time," he said softly. "I remember that I had no thought beyond burying myself inside you so that things went so quickly that you achieved no release."

"But," she said, lifting her pale eyes to meet his. "Be fair to yourself, Booth. It was your first time. It only stands to reason that you were slightly...preoccupied with your own release. And, besides, you more than made up for it with the second time."

"Even still," Booth said as he began to use his palms to rub small circles over her flexed kneecaps. "That's bothered me all week because I was more than just preoccupied. You're being kind since we both know I was damn near obsessed with getting inside you as quickly as possible with no thought to anything else that was going on, so I'd still like to make certain that it doesn't happen again." He paused and then said with a tilt of his head, "I seem to recall that you said, unlike men, women can spend more than once if their partners are...what was it? Patient and persistent?"

A curious look came into Brennan's eyes as she slowly nodded her head. "Yes, they can."

"Well," he said as he let each of his palms travel from her kneecaps and upwards to the soft skin of her inner thighs. "I'd like to think that I'm very patient...and I know I'm very persistent...so tell me—if I did to you with my fingers what I did before, would that make you spend?"

Brennan felt a gush of wetness between her legs as her eyes riveted on his hands as they moved to touch her thighs in long and languid strokes. Her mouth, too, she suddenly found dry as she croaked softly, "Yes."

"Really?" he asked her.

"Yes," she repeated, as his hands went tantalizing closer and closer to her pelvis with each touch. "But—"

Booth slowed his motions as he tilted his head and asked, "But what?"

"But," she clarified, her voice almost hesitating to share with him the rather libertine knowledge that she'd gained not from firsthand experience, but from talking to other women in her trade as a midwife. "There are...other ways...other things you can do besides...well, besides fingering me."

"Hmmm," Booth responded, as he stared at her beautifully flushed body and contemplated her words.

Leaning forward, he let his hands fall away from her thighs. Placing a hand on either side of her hips, he lightly covered her body with his as he sought out her mouth. Brennan groaned when he kissed her, twisting a bit beneath him as one of his hands left her hips and began to knead the creamy white skin of her ass.

When they at last pulled apart, he gave her a toothy grin of encouragement as he commanded her, "Tell me."

Swallowing heavily, Brennan nodded as she gasped for breath. "Three ways," she managed to explain. "There are...three ways...that you can bring me to release."

"One is with my fingers," he said, playfully flexing them as he squeezed her ass for emphasis. "Right?"

"Yeeeesss," she moaned, the single word coming out unintentionally like a hiss of a snake rather than the verbalization of a rational human female.

"Two is with..." he prompted her enthusiastically.

"Your manhood," she moaned as she felt his erection pressing into her thigh. She couldn't help herself as she twisted her head away from his face, revealing a creamy expanse of neck that Booth immediately longed to kiss.

"And, three?" he questioned her, giving into his impulse, as he placed a light kiss at the base of her exposed neck.

"Three," she whispered, her eyes clenched shut as she felt his hands and lips skate across her skin. "Ohhh, ummm—"

"Yes?" he chuckled.

"Uhh...three...is with...your...ohhh," she moaned softly. "With your mouth."

As soon as the words had fallen from her lips, Booth considered what she'd said, admittedly a bit surprised furrowing his brow as the image she painted—the idea of placing his mouth on the part of her body that had made him nearly explode when he'd come within just a few inches of it in his earlier exploration of her most intimate places and felt his eyes roll back into his head at the mere delicious smell of her. He felt his throat grow dry as he realized that he might actually get to not only smell her, but taste her, too. He was lost in thought for a moment, pausing long enough to get Brennan's attention. She felt the change in his demeanor, and her eyes snapped open.

Afraid she'd shocked him, she did a quick about-face as she quickly sputtered, "You...don't—" she struggled to explain. "That is, you don't have to do that. I wasn't telling you that because I thought you'd want to do that to me. I was just saying—that's, errr...that's...well, I-I...it's just that...that's how it can be done. I wasn't saying it because I was asking you to do that to me. I just wanted to give you a complete answer, and—"

"My mouth," he began, testing each word as he spoke, as he cut her off with a gentle smile. "Would...you like that? If I were to touch you...there...with my mouth?"

Brennan felt her pulse increase as she heard a roaring in her ears get louder as she realized that from his response, Booth wasn't as shocked or as adverse to the idea she'd initially thought. Exhaling a deep breath of relief, slowly, she nodded her head as she didn't dare to even breathe a word out loud, lest she somehow jinx her luck. And, in that moment, she very, very much hoped that she'd be lucky enough to have him remain open-minded enough to actually do to her what it seemed he was considering doing to her—and the mere thought of it made her so giddy she wondered if she might pass out from just the pleasure of the thought before he'd even had a chance to touch her.

Almost as if he'd heard her inner thoughts somehow, Booth smiled at her. "I would touch you," he began, pulling back slowly from her, but trailing his fingers down her torso and towards her navel. As he made his way towards her pubic region. "I would touch you here...with my mouth—" He stopped and toyed with a few of the coarse curls that greeted him at the apex of her mons. "With my mouth...and my tongue?"

Brennan could only moan a bit in response as she nodded her head furiously.

"So, I can bring you...release this way?" he asked, even though he seemed to already know the answer as he saw her squirm in excitement and with want at the mere thought of it. Even still, he waited with baited breath for her response.

She again nodded.

"Hmmmm," Booth said thoughtfully, as he saw her staring at him without even blinking once. Chuckling, he nodded at her. "I think I can do that...that is, if you want me to..."

"Oh, God, yes," she moaned. "Yes. Please. Do. That is...I do...want that...want you, to do that...more than anything. If you do? That is...my answer is yes. I want you...I want that—please?"

He nodded once and then smiled at her as he moved to dip his head between her legs. Before he plowed forward, he lifted his playful glance to meet hers, his brown eyes shining as he looked at her with excited exuberance clearly visible in his gaze. "Are you ready? Are you comfortable?" he asked. "You need to tell me because I would have you enjoy this...that is, if I can do what I need to do to help you spend. I want this to be good for you, so just tell me—"

Brennan shifted a bit and leaned back into her pillow. Slowly, she nodded with a breathiness to her voice that came to him as another shot of heated encouragement. "Ohhh...yeeeessss."

"Good," Booth murmured with a sexy and almost cocky leer before his head finally bobbed down between her thighs. "So good."

He began his tentative efforts by resuming his kisses of the inside of her thigh. She could feel the moist in and out rhythm of his breath on her skin, and as he exhaled each short puff, the warmth penetrated her like she desperately hoped some other part of his anatomy would soon do to her in relatively short order. Brennan wasn't disappointed when she felt his warm hands move to her slit. This time, however, instead of using his fingers to touch her as she'd shown him the week before, he slowly peeled her apart with his thumbs as if she were a very ripe nectarine. She groaned as he exposed her soft and wet flesh to the air, but the sensation lasted only a minute before she felt the air pushed away as he lowered his head and moved his lips up and down her drenched core in a straight line. He wasn't actually touching her with his tongue yet, and the sensation not only worked to inflame her desire, but nearly drove her out of her mind.

"Tongue," she groaned, as she twisted against him slightly. "Oh, please—don't tease me. You're a damn lawyer, so I know you've got to be good with that tongue of yours, so...please, Booth. Use it."

Smiling against her, a small chuckle made her squirm even more as he slowly, ever so slowly let the tip of his tongue dart out and skim the surface of her wet entrance.

At first, he was a bit leery about what he was doing. He desperately wanted to please Brennan, that much he knew. But, he'd never tasted another person before, and wasn't quite certain what to expect. Her scent was unlike anything he'd ever smelled before, the mere sensation of her scent burned into his memory from seven days earlier when he'd first taken a deep breath of iit. As he inhaled her scent again, from that moment on, Booth knew he'd never be able to think of her ever again in his mind's eye without recalling this particular scent. Emboldened by her writhing, and the small titillating feeling that he knew that he was the one causing it, he let his tongue dip slightly deeper, tracing the ring of her entrance. The taste of her was an unexpected and delightful surprise. Later, when he tried to think about how to describe it, he would find himself at a loss for words. The tangy sweetness was so unique that he couldn't come up with any other adjective to describe it but...well, it was just her. The moment he tasted her on the tip of his tongue, he felt quite certain he would never again savor anything as incredible as her in his entire life no matter how long he shuffled in the mortal coil of this earth.

"Mmmmm," he murmured against her warm skin as he withdrew his tongue slightly and whispered against her softness. "Sweet...so sweet."

Brennan, for her part, moaned as he continued to touch her. She arched her back as she groaned his name, her voice fading to almost a whisper before she cried out. "Ohhhh...my...mmmmm...Booo-tthh."

Lifting his head, he panicked when he heard her call out his name, and she whimpered at the loss of contact.

"Are you alright?" he asked, genuinely concerned as he lifted his head from between her legs to look at her reclining form.

She nodded quickly, her head jerking as she whispered, "Yes. God, yes. Just—please...keep doing that."

"What?" he said as he gave her a lopsided grin, even though he knew exactly what she was talking about.

"Touch me," she pleaded. "Mmmmm...please. Please. Touch me...taste me."

"Mmmmm," he said as he moved his head again and ducked back between her legs to what he was rapidly beginning to think was one of his favorite places to be in the entire world. This second time he moved, Booth again used his tongue to trace the rim of her wet hole, slick with silky creaminess, and growing more and more so, he judged, with each passing moment.

Brennan, her impatience growing, shifted in the bed again so that she was no longer laying flat. Lifting herself up on her forearms, her body shook as she tried to get Booth's attention.

"Inside me," she moaned as he continued to lick her moving up and down her slit in abject adoration. "Oh, God—" she whispered. "Don't...I need—you can do more than that..."

"How?" he breathed against her, causing Brennan to shudder lightly again.

"Penetrate me," she begged, her voice hoarse as she pleaded with him. "With your tongue...inside. Bury it... inside me...like you did before with your fingers...and your manhood."

Only too happy to comply with her spirited suggestion, Booth let his tongue pass out further and began to plunge in and out of her wet folds. With each pass, he skimmed deeper, and the sound of her moans began to grow louder. Fortunately, as a storm of one kind raged in her cell, the crack of lightning and the booms of thunder outside drowned out her moans of ecstasy that heralded the storm that was cresting inside the cell between the pair of lovers. Booth continued to lap up as much of each bit of sweetness as he could when her hips bucked and the sounds she made continued to become more and more unintelligible.

A moment of inspiration suddenly occurred to Booth. Remembering the previous week how it had been when he paid close attention to the firm nub of flesh near the tip of her entrance, he moved his mouth higher and began to suck on the bundle of nerves.

"Oooooohhh," Brennan moaned. "Ooooooh, ahhh, ahhh, ahhhhh—"

He smiled as he continued to alternate between sucking her clitoris and using his tongue to draw circles around it, as she'd taught him how she liked to be touched the previous week. As he continued to taste her, Brennan felt her pulsing orgasm continue to crash closer and closer towards the shoal of her eventual fulfillment.

"Oh, God, Booootthhh," she groaned. "Oh, God—I'm...I'm close. I think I'm, ohhhh...damn it. Booothhhh—"

As she bucked her hips once into his mouth, she moaned one final time as the tell-tale flutters of her inner walls tightened. Booth gave her clit one last swipe before she came, and she grunted his name again and punctuated it with another arching of her back. A wave of pleasure at what he'd accomplished sent his own need for some type of release clearly into the forefront of his mind. Lapping up the taste of her, it was as if he couldn't get enough of her. She fell back on the bed replete, and her eyes were shut and the warm, a rosy pink glow making her skin helping her to seem even more beautiful to him in that minute than he'd ever seen her before.

Lifting his head, he had a relatively pleased, if somewhat stupid, grin on his face as he placed a delicate kiss on the flat of her abdomen.

"You spent?" he asked, even though he knew the answer to his question.

Brennan could only murmur a soft, but unintelligible sigh of affirmation.

"Good," he said as he began to trace a line of light kisses from her navel towards her breasts. "That's good."

"Damn straight, it's good," Brennan finally managed to speak, cracking open one eye playfully as she talked to him. "It was very, very good." She smacked her lips once in appreciation, and then took her hands and reached for him. Pulling him up to meet her mouth, she whispered, "Kiss me."

Booth didn't have so much as a chance to either speak his agreement or voice his disagreement before her lips were on his, greedy and demanding entrance.

"Kiss me," she murmured into his mouth. He opened wider, and a small part of his brain marveled at the fact that she wanted to kiss him even though his mouth had just been on a very different part of her body. His chin was damp with the silky fluids of her desire, but as her mouth grasped at his, she was unfazed and her tongue sought his in a desperate, frenzied kiss. "Kiss me," she breathed softly.

The persistent demands of her tongue quickly pushed any of the fleeting thoughts she'd had of expanding his education about sexual positions temporarily out of her head. Letting her hand snake between them, she sought out his stiff cock. Her slim fingers wrapped around him, and she pumped him a couple of times just to make certain he was ready for her.

"Inside me," she groaned as he moaned into the crook of her shoulder. "Now...you need to be inside me, right now."

"Yes," he muttered in obvious agreement. "Yesssss," he hissed in response. "Oh...yes."

"Stay with me," she whispered in encouragement as she tried to help him line up the swollen tip of his cock to press against her dripping wet entrance. "Don't...that is, try not to rush it."

"I'll...try," he grunted as he felt her hand fall away. Pushing himself up so that he used his forearms to brace his body so it didn't crush hers uncomfortably, Booth almost felt himself start to spend as soon as the felt the tip of his shaft being sucked into the depth of her warm, moist folds. "Oh, God—Bren..."

"Stay...with...me," she whispered again, almost as if she could sense that he was close to breaking before either one of them were ready for him to do so.

Furiously, Booth bit down on the inside of his lip as he tried to still the overwhelming urge he felt to let himself go. He vaguely felt Brennan lift her right leg up and wrap it around the back of his thigh as he haltingly pressed into her. They both let out low cries as he slowly buried himself in her until he was seated to the hilt.

After a minute—during which Bren adjusted to the full feeling of having him rooted so deeply inside her and Booth attempted to gain enough focus so that he didn't come at that exact moment—she tilted her head so that she could whisper in his ear, "Move, now. You're inside me...and it feels...wonderful. Move. Please, Booth. Please. Move."

"I-I...I..." the words trailed off, Booth struggling with words as he realized that, if he diverted his attention from keeping focused on not coming that he might lose the tenuous thread of self-control he had. "If I move...I'll spend."

"It's alright," she said as she wrapped her arms around his broad torso and lightly raked her nails across the muscular plane of his back. "It's fine. Do it. I want you...I want you to do it. Do me, err—I...don't wait. It's fine. Please. Do it—"

"Bren—" he groaned as he rolled his hips a bit, but hadn't moved more than a couple of inches before he rammed home again. "I can't—"

"It's alright," she crooned again. "I'm close...so close. So are you. Just...do it."

Biting his lip, he felt a bead of sweat dribble off his forehead, across his muscular jaw, and down the curve of his corded neck. "Oh, God—ohhhhh, Bren."

Taking her at her word, he started to move. It took only six or seven more strokes before his self-control unraveled completely as he emptied himself into her with a cry. She wasn't far behind as she needed to grind her hips against him only a couple of more times before she too called out his name and felt the waves of a second orgasm carry her into the land of sexual repletion and languid satiation.

Once he'd collapsed on top of her, the world still was visible through a haze of pinpricks of light that almost made it seem as if stars had temporarily clouded his vision. His heart pounded in his ears, and slowly he suddenly became aware of the world around him once more. The first thing he realized was how sweaty and hot he was. The second thing he realized was that he didn't know how Brennan was supporting his crushing weight. Carefully, and with a mewl of annoyance on her part, he reluctantly slipped out of her warm folds and rolled away onto his back. She followed like a magnet, for once grateful that her bed wasn't so large that he could get that far away from her. Reaching for her, he pulled her onto his chest and tilted his head so that he could place a light kiss on her forehead, somewhat pleased that her hair was as damp and wispy as his own from their joint exertions.

Eventually, taking a deep breath, he said quietly, "I don't think I could possibly imagine a time when or set of circumstances under which I would ever grow tired of being with you like this." He paused and then a smile cracked the edge of his lips as he said, "Never."

"Mmmm," Brennan arched against him, melding herself as much as she could against his body. "You're not so bad yourself."

He held her for a few more moments in contented silence before a large crack of lightning illuminated the thunderstorm outside her window. He felt Brennan start next to him and asked gently, "What is it?"

She was quiet for a moment before she said, "The storm—I-I just...well, 've never really liked them—the storms, that is."

"Why?" he asked, his curiosity truly piqued at her statement. "It's just a simple weather phenomenon, Bren—wind and water making its way back to replenish the earth and and make the land plentiful again."

"I know that," she said after another moment of soft silence that was shared between them. He sensed her hesitation and knew she was holding something back even as she struggled to explain. "It's just that—"

Her voice trailed off, and Booth knew the softness in her voice spoke volumes so he knew to tread carefully.

"What is it?" he asked, his voice calm but gentle in its firmness. "It's alright. You know you can tell me anything, right, Bren?"

She stared at him for a minute and then slowly nodded.

"So, please," he pleaded with her. "Tell me."

She looked away for a moment, gathering her thoughts. Then, taking a slow breath, she began to speak. "My mother—" she said softly. "My mother...she...that is..." Brennan's voice trailed off as she took another breath and finally told him what she'd hinted at before, but never really spoken of to anyone save her father and that had been many years ago. "She died during a storm very much like this...late at night, during the heat of the summer, when there was no one to hear her screams of agony because the thunder and lightning were louder than she was." She paused and then added softly, "I've never spoken of this to anyone save my father right after my mother died, as I believed, as her husband, he had a right to know what happened in that room when we lost her, but I...for some reason, I feel like it's alright to tell you. It's...I'm not sure why, but I do."

Booth was quiet for a minute before he moved his arms so that he cradled her against his chest. She trusts me, he told himself. Wow. I'm sure how or why, but she trusts me enough to tell me something she's never shared with anyone outside of her family. He felt his heart flutter at the thought. This trust I have in her, he mused, is matched by the trust she's shown me. The trust that she's shown me just now, it means...we're not alone. We're the same. Thank God. Though the sad, painful story she had revealed was not something that itself made him happy, he took pleasure in knowing that she considered him a confidant. God, I want you. Just you. Only you. He had a goofy smile on his face as he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. She smiled in return, and the pair were content to enjoy the unexpected moment of peace that Brennan's impromptu confession had brought for them.

After a few moments of holding her, Booth finally chanced to speak as he said quietly, "Your family means a tremendous amount to you, don't they?"

Lifting her head off of his chest, she slowly nodded her head. "My father...my brother...his wife and their children...they're everything to me. I'll do whatever I have to do to protect them."

"Which is why you've let yourself stay here for as long as you have," he said, finally giving voice to a thought that had been rattling around in his brain for some time. "Isn't it?"

"Yes," she agreed, without any pause or hesitation whatsoever in her voice. "But, you know that already."

"I do," Booth nodded, feeling that he needed to be as forthright with her as she'd been with him. "But...well, it's hard to explain, but knowing the facts of something and then knowing the reasons that explain the facts, well—it's just different." He stopped for a moment and then said, "You know, Bren—I wasn't lying when I said I would help you. I meant it. You do know that, don't you?"

Brennan's hands rested along the side of his chest that she wasn't covering with her own body. Her fingers were splayed across one of his pectoralis muscles, playing with the faint peach fuzz hair that covered his upper chest. She was quiet for a moment, saying nothing as she toyed with his skin, causing Booth to frown a bit at her lack of response.

"Bren?" he tried again. "You...you do believe me when I say that, don't you?"

She was quiet for another moment before she said softly, "Yes. I-I just...I have a sudden feeling that you're about to tell me something I'm not going to like."

A bit surprised that she'd read him so well, Booth let out his own slow breath before he spoke again. "You know, while I was in the infirmary, there wasn't much to do but think. So, when I wasn't praying or sleeping, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to keep my word to you—"

Lifting her head off of his chest at her words, Brennan suddenly interrupted Booth as she said, "I won't do it, Booth."

"Do what?" he asked, shifting in the bed slightly as he look at her in confusion.

"I won't give up my father to the Inquisition just because that old shrivelled bat of a queen thinks that he has some magic evidence that she can use to disinherit the Princess Elizabeth. I understand she's bitter over what happened to her and her mother because of King Henry's second marriage, but anyone who takes a single glance at Princess Elizabeth can tell that he fathered her. It's as plain as day." She frowned and shook her head. "No matter how much the queen thinks my father has evidence of some conspiracy that put a changeling into the royal nursery the September day at Greenwich when Princess Elizabeth was born, it's not true," Brennan said, the words coming out in a tumble. Stopping to take a breath, she sighed, "I won't lie and not admit that the queen has had a hard life. I knew that even before I attended on her when she thought she was pregnant. She's suffered through more grief and misery, and come out the stronger for it, than much better women than her have had to endure. But, even still—"

Cocking his head in confusion, Booth arched an eyebrow and asked, "What are you talking about?"

"You know what I'm talking about," Brennan replied.

"No," Booth said with a shake of his head. "I don't."

Waving her hand dismissively, Brennan explained, "Surely you remember when we spoke of it. I was called on to attend the Queen during what was supposed to be her first confinement. I knew then that there was no child inside her, and told them as much when I conferred with the royal physicians. Apparently, none of them liked what I had to say, so it struck me as no surprise that I ended up arrested after rumors began to circulate that this latest pregnancy was as much of a ghost as the last one had been. But, even still, I know as well as anyone else, that it was merely happy coincidence for her that she could have me arrested at the same time she needed to bring pressure to bear on my father in hopes of compelling him to produce whatever ridiculous evidence she thinks my father's been hoarding that might be used to harm the Princess Elizabeth and threaten her place in the succession for over twenty-five years." Her nostrils flared at the thought as her short rant ended. She then shook her head, her jaw tight, as she told him, "I won't give her the satisfaction, I tell you, and I wouldn't even if he weren't my father. Because it's just ludicrous, Booth—absolutely ridiculous."

"Bren," Booth began, reaching out his hand to calm her, as he could see she became more and more irritated the more she spoke of her father, the queen, and the connection both shared to the circumstances that had resulted in her imprisonment at the hands of the Inquisition—and he knew that even if she was entitled to her personal opinion, to say such things to anyone but him was treason of such a kind that she'd end up in the Tower and never come out with her head attached again if someone heard her. "I know you'd never do anything to betray your father or your family. I know that, I swear I do. And, I'd never ask it of you, so please...relax."

She stared at him for a minute, and then took a deep breath, finding comfort in his words. Relaxing slightly, some of the fight went out of her. He smiled, more because he was pleased that he'd been able to get her to calm down than anything else.

However, knowing he still needed to share his idea with her, Booth nodded at her and said, "You know, Bren, while I was in the infirmary and had all that time to think, I believe I've come up with a potential solution to the situation that will allow you to have your freedom without giving up your father."

"What?" she asked with an arched eyebrow of her own as she stared at him with some mild suspicion in her eyes. "What is it?"

"Hear me out before you gainsay me, alright?" he asked, knowing she felt skepticism at his words, but also believing that she'd hear what he had to say because it was him doing the speaking, he waited for her to nod her head in response before he continued speaking.

After a minute, as Booth had anticipated, Brennan slowly nodded her agreement, even as her pale eyes still gleamed with incertitude in the flickering candlelight.

Booth took a breath and then began to explain his idea. "Obviously, of the charges against you, the witchcraft charge is the more serious one," he began. "If we can somehow make that charge go away, that only leaves the charge of heresy, which has nothing to do with your father and everything to do with your own personal behavior. If you were to...well, if you admitted that you've espoused heretical views that contravene canon law, like reading the Bible in English and holding true to King Henry's Church of England reformist practices, all that would be required would be a fairly simple confession and then you'd have to complete the penance assigned to you. Your father would also have to pay a fine on your behalf, but once it was paid, and you'd done the penance you'd been given, no one would have anything against you. As far as the Inquisition would be concerned, there wouldn't be any need to continue to hold you once you repented and gained forgiveness for your sin. The prosecution of your case would be at an end."

She blinked at him several times, the surprise clear on her face as she registered the meaning of what he'd told her—obviously, his words not being those she'd expected to hear. Brennan considered his words for a very long moment, and then smiled as she realized the rather subtle genius of his suggested course of action. She smiled at him wryly as she commented, "Given my blunt tongue, I suppose there's no way I can legitimately deny what my opinion of papist doctrine is, is there?"

"No," he chuckled, a smile cracking his severe face for the first time since they'd started talking about the issue of her prosecution. "You can't."

"And you think...if I confessed to the charges of the dogmatic heresy, that it would be enough to satisfy the Inquisition?" Brennan asked, some of the amusement she'd briefly displayed giving way to more practical considerations as she nodded at him.

"Well, given the fact that I know your inquisitor fairly well, I'd say yes...provided that your charges of witchcraft went away," he smiled at her, refusing to let her moodiness ruin his own rather pleased mood. He nodded at her as he asked, "If they did, that is, if the witchcraft accusations disappeared...would you agree to confess to the charges of heresy?"

After another moment's thought, Brennan slowly nodded her head. "That is, if you think I can gain my freedom this way, and will no longer be used as a compulsion against my father?"

"I think this might achieve those goals, yes," he nodded in the affirmative.

"So long as the witchcraft charges go away?" Brennan asked.

Booth again nodded. "Yes."

She looked at him for a moment, and then sadly said, "But, Booth—how in heaven's name can we count on that occurring? The depositions...Michael and Daisy Stires. They'll never recant their statements, and without them recanting what evidence they've offered, there's no way to make those accusations of witchcraft accusations go away."

Booth was silent for a moment, and then his brow furrowed again before he gave her a rather sly smile. "Oh, I don't know if I'd say that, Bren. I don't know if I'd say that at all." He gave her a strange look that Brennan didn't understand, and she was even more confused with he vaguely said, "But, for now...why don't you let me worry about that one, hmmm?"

Frowning, Brennan gave him another questioning look, but when he smiled at her in calm reassurance, she temporarily conceded the point and slowly nodded her agreement to his plan. When they were done, their bargain struck, she leaned forward to reward him with a kiss of gratitude.


A/N: Well, well, well...

Looking back at the first few chapters of this story, would you have ever guessed these two would get to where they are now? Okay, well, you might've guessed, since Dharmasera is all about getting B&B together. But still, wow, huh? Isn't that something? And while these two clearly have an incredible, raging attraction to one another, there's a bit more going on than just brain chemicals and biological imperatives, right?

We sure hope you're enjoying this so far. We've got a few more chapters to go, and we've got the very serious business of how Booth is going to deal with the accusations laid by Michael and Daisy Stires.

This is a very different kind of story than any of the other Bones fanfics that are posting right now. We know that. But because we kind of went out on the edge to give you something that's a bit out of the ordinary, and because we don't have a lot of experience with presenting a story quite like this one, we really need you folks to tell us what you think. It's important. Please take the time to leave us a review.

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