Standard Disclaimer: Version 10. I don't own any assets pertaining to Bones. Come to think of it, I don't have any assets at all.

Author's Note: Booth has a lot to say, which is why this chapter ended up being so long...

~Q~

Chapter 10 – Breaking the Rules

~Q~

In the hours since his discovery Saturday morning, Booth had searched every nook and cranny of his memory, their case files, old receipts and any other physical evidence that would give him the proof he needed to reassure her. There was a list of the accusations she'd made, and Booth had rebuttals written for each one, all handwritten on note cards and arranged in chronological order. Then he memorized their contents.

Leaving nothing to chance, he found her only when he was fully ready to make his stand. You don't try to outwit a genius without coming to the debate fully prepared.

Now that he had her flushed and speechless, Booth launched his counter-offensive.

"The first moment I saw you, Bones, you took my breath away with your smoky eyes and smoky voice. You were so beautiful and so damn sure of yourself. I've never met anyone who could be so charmingly arrogant, who could challenge me in a way that made me keep wanting more. You argued with everything I said, but instead of it making me angry, I just wanted to listen to your voice while you cut me up. Then I would watch your amazing eyes widen a minute later when I threw something unexpected in your path and made you stumble. It got to the point where I would say stuff just to get us started."

"I knew you were doing that, sometimes," she admitted softly. "I liked it, too. Sometimes I would start talking about God or the military on purpose, too, just to set you off."

He laughed. "I suspected as much."

Growing more serious, Booth continued to explain the impact she'd had on him. "I did things with you that I wasn't supposed to do with a consultant. I wasn't supposed to take you into an interview room or let you see, let alone actually talk to, witnesses and suspects. Bones, you think I never broke rules for you? I broke them on the very first day, when I let you sit beside me as I talked to Gemma's boyfriend. You shouldn't have been anywhere near that interview room."

The expression in her eyes shifted, betraying surprise and then a warmth as she recognized the truth in what he was saying. Having always been involved in the investigations with Booth, she'd all but forgotten how unorthodox that first case was, or that she'd had to blackmail him in order to repeat that level of participation in their second case together.

"You and Judge Hasty should not have been in the same place. The only reason I wasn't fired right along with you for that was because you helped me link Gemma's last known location to some of her injuries, proving Judge Hasty had opportunity that night. Another rule I broke with you."

Stepping closer, Booth searched her eyes. "When Caroline told me I had to fire you, I felt sick. I loved working with you. You just amazed the hell out of me. I couldn't predict what you would do or say next, and the way you kept piling on evidence was nothing short of miraculous. You turned my case around in just a couple of days, but more importantly, you made the sun shine for me."

Confusion marred her features. "I can't change the weather, Booth."

Smiling fondly, he corrected her. "Metaphorically."

"Oh."

"In Sweets's office, I lied," Booth confessed. "I told you both that I was at a Gamblers Anonymous meeting the morning I met you but that wasn't true. The truth was, I was up all night in a pool hall."

Horrified, she backed away a step. "You lied to me that night?"

"No!" He reached for her hand and pulled her closer once more. She went to him but the tension in her limbs remained. "I told you the truth. The minute I looked at you in that lecture hall, I wanted to be worthy of you. I started working on my gambling problem the moment you lifted those incredible eyes to mine and grinned that little half-smirk while you told me you were the best in the world."

It was true. She was beautiful in a way that had left him stunned. It wasn't just sexual attraction, he'd known that. It was destiny. He'd even asked her about fate and though Brennan had no way to know it, he had never once asked that question of any other woman. Temperance Brennan had looked into his eyes and his entire world had shifted.

His hand tightened on hers. "I know I said love at first sight doesn't happen when I was talking about Jared and Padme. With you, Bones, something happened to me that day I met you. Maybe it wasn't love, but it was powerful. I knew that you were going to change the course of my life. Just seeing you changed me. You made me believe in fate."

He lifted her hand to his lips, pressing a tender kiss against her fingers while his eyes held hers. "For the first time, I wanted to stop gambling. The first Gamblers Anonymous meeting I ever went to, it was the same night we met. The second meeting I went to was after you left me standing in the rain. I stopped gambling because of you."

Letting go of the hand he'd just kissed, Booth had retrieved the file he'd brought with him and flipped it open. Extracting two sheets of paper, he passed them to her, right into the fingers that still tingled. "More evidence. Hard evidence."

She looked over the papers, feeling her heart dance erratically in her chest. They were sign-in sheets, typically placed at the entrance to meetings and gatherings. This one read 'Gamblers Anonymous, St. Patrick's Church,' the Catholic church she knew Booth sometimes attended on 10th and F Streets because it was only a block away from the Hoover. The first page held the date that matched the day he'd found her lecturing at American University, a Friday. The list of illegible names zipped by unnoted until her eyes stumbled over one signature she knew as well as her own. Seeley Booth. And a box was checked off: "First Time Attending." The second page showed Seeley Booth had arrived more than an hour after the meeting started, on the same night they'd kissed. Stunned speechless, Brennan could only stand in silence while this revelation registered in her consciousness.

"I wanted to impress you," he continued. "I figured you weren't the kind to hang out with 'degenerate gamblers.' Then you told me natural leaders distinguished themselves from others, so I started wearing the flashier ties and socks the next day. Remember?"

He'd pulled out another scrap of paper and handed it to her. It was a receipt from a store in the Crystal City Mall called Hot Topic, detailing the purchase of a "Pin-Up" neck tie, in August 2004. "That's for the tie I showed you at the pool hall."

"You kept this?" she gasped. Who kept receipts for six years, she wondered, other than a man like Booth who tended to keep all sorts of memorabilia.

Another revelation and she hadn't even recovered from the first one. "I thought … I thought that was just you."

"It wasn't me, until you said it and suddenly I wanted to be that man for you."

She shook her head, marveling that small remarks could carry such profound weight. "I didn't expect you to change. It was just a comment. I was nervous and didn't know what to say."

"I wanted to change for you. Bones, you don't realize how amazing you are. I felt completely inadequate standing beside you, like a caveman reaching for Athena. You were so far out of my league."

"How can you say that?" she stammered. "My family is a bunch of criminals who left me. I grew up in foster homes wearing hand-me-down clothes and holes in my shoes. I survived college by eating liters of top ramen. When you met me I was living in a studio apartment and still paying off student loans."

"Yeah, you were a diamond in the rough," he agreed. "I could see it and I wanted you. Within just a couple of days, I knew I needed you."

He gestured to the sign-in sheets still clutched in her hand. "That's why Caroline's order to fire you just about killed me."

Booth found her other hand and waited until she was looking at him. "I never meant to get you drunk. That Tequila was for me. I had to fire you and the thought of doing it almost physically hurt. I didn't know how I was going to manage it, so I got myself drunk to work up the nerve. You kept matching me shot-for-shot and I guess I didn't realize how much you'd had. When you suggested sex so fast, I was shocked."

Brennan smirked, knowing it never took much to shock his Catholic sensibilities. But then her face grew serious again. "I wanted you to say no to that."

"I wasn't thinking, Bones, or I would have been a gentleman. At least, I think I would have." He shook his head, wondering if he truly would have reacted differently had he been sober. Temperance was a temptation when her eyes were soft and a teasing smile danced on her lips. She was tempting the hell out of him now, simply standing there with her lips parted and her gaze fixed on him.

His eyes darkened. He brushed his lips whisper close but not quite close enough, teasing her in belated revenge while he whispered, "God, you have no idea how badly I wanted you that night."

Her eyes had fallen closed as he neared, and she let out a disappointed groan when he pulled away without really touching her. "I had no intention of going home with you," she taunted wickedly.

Refusing to take her bait, he tapped her nose and took a half step back from temptation. There was still more territory to cover between them. "I was fine with you leaving—I actually respected you for being more clear-headed than I was."

"Then why didn't you say anything?" It was a question that had haunted her all these years. "The next day you acted like nothing happened."

He sighed, knowing he'd really made a mistake with that. "Because I'm a man and sometimes we're idiots. The next day when Caroline told me to hire you back, I was so happy I almost danced into the lab. I was looking forward to seeing you; and you were furious. I couldn't figure out what had happened, why you were so cold. I guess I just didn't realize how it must have looked to you. I'm sorry for that. I should have explained instead of being flippant about it."

For the first time in nearly six years, she squeezed his hand, and he knew she was signaling her forgiveness.

With the question of too much tequila hopefully settled at last, he moved on to the next argument and supporting evidence. "Even though you were mad, and told me you'd never work with me again, it wasn't enough to convince me to go against fate."

Brennan rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "Fate is impossible, there are far too many billions of variables in any single person's ancestry, let along the unimaginable multiplying of those billions by trillions more, for each and every human being that has ever lived. And that doesn't even take into account all of the other events throughout the history of the universe…."

She trailed off when Booth's finger lightly pressed her lips closed.

"My turn, remember?"

She nodded sheepishly.

"Regardless of whether it was fate or infatuation … I wasn't going to let you go. The reason I kept chasing after you is I wanted to see you again." He laughed at the memory. "You made that nearly impossible."

Another dive into the file, and this time he came out with computer printouts detailing … phone calls. "More proof for you that I didn't give up. One hundred seventy three phone calls from my office to yours between August 2004 and July 2005, when you left for Guatemala for two months."

Brennan looked down at the papers he'd given her, a slight blush coloring her cheeks. "Zack hated having to take messages from you. He said it was very unpleasant."

"Yeah, Zack and I got off to a rough start," Booth agreed. "So in order to bypass Zack, I put the order in to Homeland Security to detain you. I know that pissed you off, but it worked."

He passed her another paper, the 'wanted for questioning' order that Special Agent Gibson had acted upon.

The slight blush burned a little brighter. "Actually, I was reluctantly impressed that you went to that much difficulty in order to secure an audience with me. That's why I decided to test you again."

"Test me?" he asked, amused and trying to guess what she'd thrown at him as a test.

"I demanded full participation in the case, remember?"

"Ah, yes. You insisted I break some more rules for you, didn't you, Bones." He leaned in, finishing firmly, but with a smile, "And I did."

"Yes," she acknowledged. "I was certain you would say no and that would be my excuse to get rid of you, so your sudden agreement, along with your invitation that I should spit in your hand, came as a surprise."

Booth grinned. "Scully and Mulder."

"I finally know what that means," she admitted with a bashful smile.

"And do you know how they ended up?" Teasingly he raised a brow and watched as she shook her head.

"The way we're going to," he promised.

"Abducted by aliens?" she asked innocently.

He laughed and corrected her mistake. "Like this." Bending to her, Booth kissed her slowly and deeply. When their pulses had begun racing and showers of sparks raced under their skin, they parted with small gasps of delight.

"You're letting me kiss you, Dr. Brennan."

"You're quite observant, Agent Booth," she replied softly. "Did they teach you that at Quantico?"

"I figured that one out by myself." Another kiss seared them. He pulled away and complained, "God, I can't think when you're this close to me."

Brennan pushed him away lightly, smiling. "Then don't get so close. It's a good thing one of us can be rational."

Hearing her echo what he'd said so bitterly just days ago reminded Booth he still had a few things more to say to her. His argument couldn't end until he'd covered every lapse and accusation she'd noted on Friday.

"On our second case, yet again, I took you places you had no business being. When you went off half-cocked and shot Thomson, I had to break even more rules to keep you out of jail. One of the agreements I had to make was that you were thereafter forbidden to carry a gun while on FBI business. Those times I did give you a gun were more instances of me breaking rules for you."

"Oh," she said quietly. Embarrassment at overlooking something so obvious flooded her. How could she have missed that? Getting the charges of assault dropped most assuredly hadn't been easy for him and she should have recognized that much earlier.

"I found one of your earrings at Dr. LeGiere's house in New Orleans and I grabbed it. I concealed evidence at a crime scene that implicated you for murder, an act that would have ended my career if I was caught. Do you think I would have done that for just anyone?"

She was avoiding his gaze now, so he tipped her chin up and caught her eyes. "I would only risk my career for someone I loved, someone I had absolute faith in. There aren't very many people on that list, Bones. I know I keep saying it but I'm not sure you understand what I feel underneath the words. I love you. I know who you are, everything that makes you unique and a little maddening and so very beautiful inside. You're everything to me."

"Booth…." She wanted to believe it. Brennan was wavering, feeling the pendulum swing her towards a certainty she'd been waiting years to reach. Keep going, she willed him silently. Push me like I pushed you.

As if he knew what she needed, Booth kept arguing his case. "I stepped over the line with Cam because there was nothing at stake for me there. I realize now that it hurt you, but at the time I … well…." Abruptly he pulled her against him into a strong embrace, nuzzling his face into her neck and inhaling her scent.

She stiffened in confusion even as her body reacted to him just as strongly as it always did.

"You feel that?" he muttered against her ear. He felt her shiver and knew that she did. "God, being next to you was driving me insane. Like we're both feeling right now. I ached for you. You would look at me with those amazing eyes and it was all I could do not to throw you over my shoulder and have my wicked way with you. I needed an outlet."

She lifted her head away and the expression in her eyes was more sympathetic than he could have hoped for. "You did?"

"Yeah. I cared about Cam, she was an old friend who was available and willing. But it was never serious between us."

"Booth," she said slowly. "Hacker … I needed an outlet, too. You were driving me to distraction but your line was still there. He was interested and I thought maybe I could, um, blow off some steam. But we never—I realized I couldn't do it. We didn't have sex. I never even kissed him. He wasn't you."

Growling in a fit of possessiveness, Booth plunged his hands into her hair and pulled her into another kiss. Not satisfied to coax or seduce, this time Booth stormed her mouth with the certainty of a man staking his claim. And just as before she didn't surrender—Brennan was not the kind of woman who would allow herself to be claimed. She was every bit his equal and he adored her for it.

He poured everything into this kiss: all of the fire that burned between them, all the longing for six years, all of his love. Oh yes, there were chemicals. Explosions of testosterone, endorphins, oxytocin, dopamines, all soaking their brains in passion and sending electric sparks racing through every nerve in their bodies.

Deliciously sensitized nerve endings in their mouths relayed the softest brush of her lips, the pressure of his deepening kiss, the sliding of his tongue past her teeth, the taste of her, the warmth of him. Burning nerves recognized his hands pulling her head back, his mouth being dragged from hers as he swept moist kisses down the column of her throat and then returned to kiss her again. The same nerves cried out for continued stimulation when he pulled away and held her steady.

Still breathing heavily, he rested his forehead against hers. "Let's not talk about Cam and Hacker, okay?"

"Okay," she agreed faintly, still recovering from their intense kiss.

"You have been my everything, right from the beginning."

Drawing back, Brennan reached for him in wonder, her fingers trailing lightly over his upper ocular orbit, slipping around and down to trace the line of his zygomatic. "You love me," she murmured. "You really do."

"Do you need more evidence," he asked tenderly. He gestured towards the file folder that still contained more than an inch of papers spilling out. "I brought a whole stack of it."

"You're proving it to me?" Tears were in her eyes again, along with the brightest ray of hope he'd ever seen.

"I'll spend the rest of our days providing it to you, one day at a time. I told you a few months ago, I would do anything for you. It's true. I would kill for you, and I have. I've killed and threatened to kill. I would die for you: I almost did twice and I would do it again."

A chill ran through her at the memory of him dying in her arms. She shut her eyes for a moment, trying to push that bloody memory away. Mercifully, something else he'd just admitted to tickled her curiosity and helped her focus on something less terrifying. "Who did you threaten?"

"Roberto Ortiz, the leader of the Mara Muerte gang."

Confusion pinched her brows as she tried to recall what would have prompted Booth to threaten that particular man. He was an arrogant man who'd ordered the beating of a person of interest and showed no fear of the FBI. Furiously recalling her own mistreatment at the hands of similar men, Brennan had angrily provoked Ortiz and beaten him in an altercation in the FBI corridors. Booth had simply watched, choosing not to intervene.

"Why?" she finally asked, and even as she spoke she sensed the answer was going to come as a shock.

"After you beat him up, Ortiz put out a hit on you."

There it was, the shock she somehow should have expected all those years ago. "You never told me."

"I took care of it. That's why I was late to that funeral." He shifted closer, as if to protect her still. "That was what I thought was more important than a funeral—keeping you safe. That was how many months into our partnership?"

It took only a few seconds for her to calculate. "Five."

"So let's summarize here, Bones. The day we met, I stopped gambling for you. In the first year of our partnership, I was ready to kill for you, I nearly died for you, and I risked my career for you. I did all that even though I thought you didn't love me and you never would. What does that evidence tell you?"

"You drew a line, Booth. You said we couldn't. Why?" It was the last question she needed an answer to.

"I drew that line for me," he explained gently. "I kept falling deeper and deeper into you and what I was feeling for you was dangerous. I knew that. Partners can't get too close—it messes with judgment. I hoped just saying it would hold me back. I know, in hindsight, that it was wishful thinking to just say 'there's a line' and somehow that would put some distance between us. We've always been too close for that, haven't we."

Brennan's eyes never strayed from his. She nodded slowly, the gears already turning while she processed everything he'd told her. Every feeling she'd ever harbored for him was beautifully painted on the canvas of her face. "I've always loved you, Booth."

"I know." He kissed her gently on the forehead and dared to hope he'd convinced her. "I've always loved you."

"I know…" she trailed off, dazed and delighted. And unspeakably grateful that he didn't give up. "It is real. You made sure I know it's real."

"Just so you realize, you lost this argument," he teased.

She shook her head, knowing he might not quite understand. In losing, she had won. "I wanted you to win. I wanted you to prove me wrong. I'm so relieved that you did. I've never been so happy to be wrong."

"So, now that we each know where the other is standing, what should we do about it, Bones?"

After giving it a moment of thought, she announced, "I think we should go to lunch."

"Wha— Now?!" Booth's disappointment was almost comical.

"Yes, now."

Brennan was moving quickly. In a flash she'd moved away from him, the files she'd been working on earlier already tucked back into the storage bin of her Civil War era Jane Doe. She had the bin replaced while Booth was still trying to figure his mysterious partner out.

"You just want to go to the Diner? That's it?"

"I never said anything about the Diner." Brennan shucked off her lab coat and tossed it over her arm. Next she briskly picked up the evidence Booth had given her, tucked it back into his folder and handed it to him. "You ready?"

"Then … where are we going?" He didn't move, just stood at the base of the stairs leading back to the lab and gaped at her as she started upstairs without him.

Sensing he hadn't followed, she stopped and looked down at him quizzically. "To my place, as it's the closest. I need to stop by my office quick on the way out."

"Your place," he echoed blankly, realizing she was several steps ahead of him once again, both literally and figuratively.

"Yes. We'll be needing privacy. I believe Angela calls it a 'nooner.'"

He found himself laughing. Yep, completely unpredictable. Sprinting up the steps after her, Booth caught her arm once more. "No, no, no."

"No?" She stood one step higher and tipped her head curiously.

"No." Firmly, he took the last step and remained her equal. "You just got done putting me through hell proving myself to you. No way am I letting you rush us through the best part with a quickie nooner."

"A quickie is a hurried sexual encounter," she defined.

"Yeah, Bones."

"I thought you preferred to make love."

Now he was confused again. "Yeah, which rules out a nooner."

"No," she corrected. "A nooner is any activity that takes place at lunch time."

Booth shook his head in exasperation. "You just said we'd need privacy."

"Yes. We need privacy to discuss how we're going to proceed, what to tell the FBI, and so forth. I think we should undertake that discussion immediately."

"Um, that's not what people do during nooners."

"Yes it is, Booth. I looked it up in the dictionary when Angela said she was meeting Hogins at the Egyptian place for a nooner. There's an Egyptian restaurant on D Street. I hardly think they'd be engaging in intercourse in a public restaurant, thus the first definition must be what Angela meant…."

The door at the top of the stairs clanged shut, leaving Limbo in restful silence once more.

~Q~

Author's Note: Yes, that little dig was intentional, lol. Hart Hanson gave us the equivalent of a 'quickie' when he finally put B&B together without any real conversation or resolution between them. I know he was going for the surprise cliff-hanger, but I think we all deserved that six-year romantic arc to end a lot more romantically than it did.

There is one more short chapter to go after this.

Thank you to the people reading this silently. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, your words of encouragement have made this story a much more interactive experience than I expected. And a special thank you to those reviewers who left me critical reviews, pointing out flaws or questions. I took your words seriously and at times I did use them to improve my writing. You made a positive impact, so thank you for not holding back. :)