It was nearly one thirty, and Brennan stepped into the diner almost cautiously. Her eyes scanned the chairs for a familiar face, and found that their table in the back corner was empty. Her brow furrowed as she paused in the doorway, and when she felt a hand on the small of her back, and a warm breath on her neck followed by his deep voice, she gasped. "You made it."

She turned her head to find herself nose to nose with her partner, and couldn't help but allow the smile rise on her lips as she raised an eyebrow at him. "I always keep my promises." She replied, trying to keep her reaction to his closeness to herself, but it was beyond her control and her cheeks were already burning before she had a chance to check her emotions at the door.

He smiled a boyish smile, his eyes sparkling at her as if he had found something that he had been looking for, something that he had thought he had lost. "Shall we?" He said, nodding toward their table, he carefully walked with her across the crowded diner to their usual table, and he watched her pull the chair out for herself and settle in her seat.

"Did you get anywhere with the missing persons reports?" She asked immediately, and watched him wave his hand to the waitress who nodded and turned to put in their usual order.

"I got a hit… we're looking into it." He said, obviously dismissing her question, but trying to remain friendly as he settled in his seat, leaning on the table slightly, he folded his hands in front of him. He lowered his voice, and kept his eyes on hers. "What I would like to do, is continue our conversation from earlier."

"Do you think that is wise to do in such a public place?" She replied, leaning across the table toward him, she also kept her voice low. Her eyes were a cloudy blue, and she appeared to be a bit more refreshed than she had been earlier. He wondered for a moment if her change in demeanor had anything to do with the conversation that morning, and he was incredibly curious about what she had to say about this entire situation. She eyed him for a moment, her eyebrow raised in curiosity as she sat back in her chair and placed her hands on the table in front of her. "Though, you're right, if we do have this conversation now, being in public will establish the proper boundaries needed to keep our emotions in check."

"Right, what you said." He nodded, understanding her reasoning, though the reality of the situation was that he didn't think he could go another evening wrapped up in his thoughts. The familiarity of the diner, mixed with the possibility of work talk was just what Booth needed to instigate his courage. He sucked in a deep breath and gave Brennan a bit of a nervous smile, his head nodding as he watched her eyebrow rise just a tiny bit. He knew that look, that subtle expression that passed across her face. This was an expression of challenge, and if it were anyone else, he'd pass, but she could see the questions in his eyes. He had instigated this meeting, and she was going to allow him to begin it. "If I had asked you not to go to Maluku, would you have stayed?"

She seemed genuinely surprised by his question, and her sharp intake of breath was a clear indication of that fact. Her lips pursed and her eyebrows knitted, while his eyes remained on her lips for a split second before moving back to her eyes. She suddenly looked more tired than she had just a moment before, and he feared that his first question would end up being his last. He thought of retracting it, apologizing for being so forthcoming, but stopped himself. These were answers that he was looking for, and she was the only person that could provide them for him.

"If you had asked me to stay?"

"Yes."

"In what capacity?" Her question was innocent enough, but by the expression on his face, she could see the frustration that was building. She felt her lip slide into her mouth, her teeth biting down on it in a subconscious nervous tick. "I ask too many questions." She whispered, and he said nothing, his brown eyes imploring her to speak, trying to find the answers in her eyes as if he were looking into a crystal ball. She straightened her posture and leaned forward, ensuring that his eyes were focused completely on hers. "You are my partner." She paused, hoping it would have the effect that she had hoped, but knowing that she needed to expand, for there was so much to say, so much that she had thought about and needed for him to know. "If you had asked me to, I would have stayed."

That sentence finally spoken, breathed with a sigh of relief from one, was sucked in by the other and swallowed as if she had reached into his chest herself and wrapped her fist tightly around his heart. His breath caught in his throat, and he physically felt her pain. She watched his hand clench, and unclench and tried to read him, but the emotions were so quick, so fleeting, so real, and there were so many of them all at once, that she found that she could no longer speak. His reaction had been so visceral, that she knew that he would have to recover before this conversation continued.

His mind was racing, and she was staring into his eyes. He couldn't concentrate, couldn't focus, and he felt his ears burning red as his heart clenched in his chest. He could hear his heartbeat in his ears, the blood rushing through his veins as he tried to control his frustration with himself and his partner. He was somewhere in the middle of deciding if he should stand up and walk out, or asking for her to continue.

His decision was made for him as a plate was placed in front of him, and the air rushed back into the room as his focus moved to the waitress. He looked up at her and nodded his thanks, as Brennan thanked her for her lunch as well. The waitress turned and walked away, and when Booth looked to his partner, he had found that he had lost her attention.

Brennan stared down at her plate, her fork in hand, she moved the bits of lettuce around. Her stomach felt sour, and she suddenly didn't feel hungry anymore. She could feel the intensity of his eyes on her for a moment, and then it was gone, fading into nothingness once again. She poked at the lettuce leaves, and he stared at his sandwich, slowly pulling the toothpick from the center of half of it, he lifted it and took a bite, the silence between them thick with meaning and screaming silence. The moment his bite reached his stomach, he felt as if he were going to be sick, and without warning or reason he tossed the sandwich down onto the plate. "Why the hell didn't you tell me this before, Bones?" He asked, his whisper so angry that it almost wasn't a whisper. She looked up at him with a wide eyed expression and he shook his head and pushed his plate away from him. "This is stupid." He said, failing to give her anything to go on as far as specifics of his outburst, she stared at his now disheveled sandwich. "This is just stupid."

"Booth." She whispered, hoping that she would keep his voice down, it was obvious that her theory that being in public would be a way to control their emotions was incorrect. "We don't have to talk about this now, okay?"

"No." He said, watching her lip tremble as she watched him with wary eyes. "I can't sit here another minute with you looking like this." He said, his eyes passing over her quickly, and for a moment she sensed an air of disgust in his words. "Like… like you lost your favorite puppy." He stammered. "I have been trying, so hard to work through this day to day hoping that you're just going to snap out of this funk that you're in. It's not happening." He said, shaking his head. "It's not working…"

"What's not working?"

"We're not working."

They were apparently taking turns reaching into one another's chest and squeezing their hearts, because this time it was Brennan that felt the painful sting of his words. "Booth."

"No, I'm not done." He shook his head. "You're not eating right, you're not sleeping… you call me up in the middle of the night and you say nothing. You gave me this journal… and… and the things that you say, the things that you wrote, the things that you felt are just sitting there right in front of me, staring at me, stabbing me… telling me that I am wrong, when it was you that broke my heart! It was you that rejected me!"

She tried to remain calm, but she couldn't help the tremble in her lip, the tears forming in her eyes. "Booth, stop." She whispered.

"You know what you mean to me, Bones. You know that I would do anything for you, that I trust you like I trust absolutely no one else in this world. You know what doing this to yourself is doing to me, yet you won't stop it…"

"Booth."

"Just stop it, Bones… stop the phone calls, stop with the cryptic conversations… stop with the…"

"Booth, stop." She said as she slammed her hand down on the table.

The diner went silent for a split second, or at least it seemed to for the two of them. She had never looked so determined in her life, and despite the tears that were threatening to fall, she gritted her teeth and moved forward with what she wanted to say, for it was now or never.

"It is not my intention to cause you pain. It is not my intention to get you to break up with Hannah. It is not my intention to get you to rescue me. The truth is that I am in love with you, Booth. I am and have always been in love with you, the journal should have told you that much. Seeing you happy makes me happy, happy that you have found happiness, but disappointed in myself. For as honest and as blunt, forthright and logical as I can be, and have always been… for as many equations and puzzles and mysteries as I have solved, the only thing that I have never managed to understand, is how you fell in love with me… because more than anything else in the world, I want to get that back… and I am not a gracious loser." She said, reaching into her purse, she pulled out her wallet. She dropped several dollars onto the table and avoided eye contact with him as she shoved her wallet back into her purse.

"Bones."

"Lunch is on me." She said, looking him directly in the eyes, he could feel her determination and knew that he couldn't say anything to get her to stop. "I have to get back to the lab." She said, standing up, she walked past him. He sucked in a defeated breath, and was about to turn when he felt her hot breath over his ear. A chill ran down his spine as she whispered into his ear. "Come to the lab when you have something that I can work with." She then made him almost jump as she reached over his shoulder, grabbed a fry from his plate and shoved it into her mouth, she then turned sharply and exited the diner without a second look.