Chapter Ten
"What are we doing here?" complained Brennan as she and Booth made their way across the Browder grounds, heading towards the original crime scene. "I thought we were over the whole 'Claudia's' a killer thing."
"But she's the murderer," argued Booth childishly. "You'd have to be blind not to see it."
"Let's drop it for now, okay?" Brennan insisted. "I'm tired of hearing you go on about this." She paused as they continued towards the yellow tape. "We need to consider other possibilities."
The team grew silent upon reaching the crime scene. "What exactly are we looking for?" asked Brennan. "I assume that there's something in particular that you're wanting to find."
"Not really," shrugged Booth, "But I'm kinda hoping for some drugs… DNA, of course… or possibly some foreign blood."
Pouring over yet another crime scene, Booth and Brennan were taking advantage of the last two hours of sunlight. Unfortunately for them, the search radius was approximately a half mile. That made for a lot of searching.
Deciding to cover a brush-covered area together, the duo began scanning fervently. The case's lack of evidence was becoming exponentially clearer as their time waned and the sun began sinking lower and lower in the sky.
"Think I've got something over here!" called out Brennan, almost stumbling over a half-rotted log. "There's three large rocks covered in blood!"
"That makes good for more evidence," panted out Booth as he ran to his partner's side. Regardless of their close proximity, he hadn't wasted any time answering her call.
Carefully, Brennan began taking two or three samples from each rock. She wasn't taking the chance of mistaking blood from multiple sources as coming from one.
"Search around this area right here," ordered Brennan, pre-occupied with her discovery. "There could easily be something else."
"On it," complied Booth, not contesting Brennan's superiority complex for once. Peering around the rocks, he began looking under every stone and clump of grass.
A cry of joy brought Brennan out of her trance and brought her to Booth's side. "What did you find?" she asked with interest. One might have thought that she was afraid that the importance of her own discovery might be mitigated.
"It's a brown paper bag," he said, a curiously large amount of pride in his voice.
"So?" the forensic anthropologist asked, obviously unimpressed. "What good can an old paper bag do? It's not exactly incriminating."
The characteristic grin of her partner then arose suspicion in the woman. "What else did you find?" she inquired.
"There're lots of maggots in here," answered Booth, "And they don't look very normal."
"Give me," commanded Brennan, reaching out quickly to grab the bag. Instinctively denying her at first, Booth finally consented.
"These look exactly like the larvae that Hodgins showed us," exclaimed Brennan in surprise. "They have to be the same."
"Why would they look the same?" argued Booth, the reality of the situation sinking in. "I'm not an entomologist, but I think that the insects wouldn't be in the same stage of metamorphosis."
"There're numerous explanations for that," explained Brennan, dismissing Booth's trepidation. "When we get this back to Hodgins, he can tell us more."
"Look," ordered Booth, pointing towards a spot on the inside of the bag. "There's some blood."
"Maybe we'll get lucky," Brennan suggested, holding the bag up to inspect the blood further. "Hopefully this'll be the murderer's blood."
0-0-0-0-0
"I'm heading over to the diner," called out Zack, taking advantage of the break that the squints were receiving. What with Booth and Brennan's absence, the team didn't have a lot to take up time. "Does anybody want to go with me?"
"I'll go!" called out Angela, coming down the stairs with her jacket over her arm. "I could do with some coffee and a piece of pie."
The friends entered their favorite diner a few minutes later and sat down at the bar. After ordering their food and coffee, the two began talking about nothing about a particular part of the case that was stumping them. It was totally natural, as if they were discussing a favorite television show.
Until Zack saw somebody enter the diner that he'd never imagined seeing again. That really cute lawyer from the courthouse.
"Shit!" he whispered, turning to face Angela and covering his face with his hand. At least he no longer had that signature messy, unruly hair to draw attention to himself.
Inconspicuously, Angela slowly turned her head in the direction that Zack was avoiding. She too noticed the attractive man who had walked in.
"Who is that?" Angela hissed at Zack. "He's looking around… might he be looking for you?"
"What makes you think that?" Zack whispered back, still hiding his face.
"The fact that you hid yourself rather desperately as soon as the hunk walked in, I'd say that that makes me think he's looking for you," explained Angela. "Now are you going to tell me what's going on, or what?" She paused. "Did you sleep with him or something?"
"No," answered Zack. "But he hit on me a few days ago at the courthouse, and I don't want to deal with him."
"He just came up and asked you out?" asked Angela with interest. "He didn't even bother to ask if you were gay? It must be awesome to have gaydar like that."
Zack playfully hit her with the newspaper. "Don't draw attention to yourself," he commanded in a low voice. "Or to me, for that matter."
"No problem," she said. Then she got up, giving the lame excuse of "I'm going to the bathroom." Which, of course, attracted the attention of one Mr. Cute Lawyer Dude.
"Zack Addy!" he called out, just noticing the young scientist. Wanting to avoid suspicion, Zack quickly threw down his newspaper. The cat was out of the bag now; there was no turning back. He threw a quick glare at Angela as she sat in the corner.
"Hi… Michael," Zack greeted reluctantly, turning to face the man as he took a drink of coffee. "How are you?"
"Please, drop the formalities," the lawyer asked, flashing a sparkly smile. His teeth were flawlessly white and perfectly straight. How anybody could resist him, Zack didn't know.
"Okay," conceded Zack. Acting out of instinctive politeness, he indicated the seat next to him. Then he looked peripherally at Angela and jerked his head, telling her to come back to the bar.
"Well this looks cozy," the facial reconstructive expert, retaking her seat. "I'm Angela," she said in salutation, holding out her hand.
"Michael Grey," the man answered, offering his own hand.
Clearly wanting to know more about the man and the situation in its entirety, Angela nodded politely and went back to eating her pie and sipping coffee. She was waiting for the two men to start talking.
"You never called," Grey said after a few more seconds of silence. He must have thought that being blunt was better than remaining silent.
"Sorry," returned Zack quietly. "But like I said, I have a boyfriend."
The lawyer grinned sheepishly. "I was sorta hoping that you'd lost the boyfriend, to be perfectly honest. Sometimes those… relationships… don't work out. Pesky things, relationships."
"Well… this relationship is working out," Zack answered brusquely, "Guess I'm just lucky."
At a loss for words, Grey distracted himself by ordering a cup of coffee. That bought him a few seconds to think.
"So how serious is your… relationship?" the lawyer pushed further, "I mean, are you two exclusive?"
"Very," Zack answered, now clearly trying to make the man leave. Entranced by the dialogue, Angela looked down at her plate and listened intently.
"Too bad for me, I suppose," sighed Grey, downing the coffee. Gathering his coat and briefcase, he stood up. "Like I said, if you leave your boyfriend sometime soon, give me a call." He threw another card down on the table and left.
"Wow!" whispered Angela, taking another bite of pie. "Who knew that such a hottie was after you? Where'd you even meet him?"
"At the courthouse," Zack answered, seemingly worn out from the five minute conversation. With that much tension in the air, anybody would've been somewhat exhausted. "He practically threw himself at me. Then and now."
"Lucky you," said Angela. "Except for the fact that you're with Booth." She was definitely fishing for information now.
"Hey, don't let the stupid gay stereotype of promiscuity fool you!" warned Zack, clearly onto his friend's thinking process. "It's absolutely impossible that I'd do something like that."
Angela watched through the window as Michael Grey walked down the sidewalk. "Zack, a man with that ass... I don't know if even Booth would blame you if you cheated."