Chapter 14: Apprehended

"Love is the expansion of two natures in such fashion that each include the other, each is enriched by the other." Felix Adler

"Can we narrow down their location any further?" Cam asked Angela. She'd reported their concerns to Agent Burns at the FBI who'd assured her he'd get someone over to the Bellagio to check on their absent friends. That should have been enough to reassure them but ... it was Brennan and Booth and it didn't sit well with any of them to wait idly for news. The timing didn't sit well with Cam either – they'd called in the name of a possible suspect and then less than an hour later Booth's call had come in and they'd subsequently lost touch? She's like to think otherwise but that didn't feel like a coincidence to the forensic pathologist.

"Not from here," Angela admitted. "If we were at the Bellagio then maybe I could get a better indicator."

"Then let's go to the Bellagio," Hodgins suggested matter-of-factly.

"It'll take hours to get there," Angela pointed out.

"I know, I know – and anything could happen while we're in the air, but it's better than sitting around here doing nothing," Jack gave his wife a hopeful look.

"Okay," Angela stood, intent on doing just that.

"Hold on," Cam held up a hand imploringly. "Let's just take a step back here. Until we hear back from the FBI we don't even know if there is a problem. We'll all look more than a little foolish if we rush in there and find Booth and Doctor Brennan enjoying a little downtime."

"You think that's all it is?" Angela looked hopeful, for more than the obvious reasons. "You think Booth finally cracked and dragged Brennan off to have his wicked way with her?"

"I think we're speculating," Cam said in a reasonable tone, "in the absence of hard fact. Although – nice image Angela." The two women shared a 'girly' mischevious smile. "Let me call the FBI again first, see if they've located our missing colleagues. Then we can make decisions about what to do next."

Getting reluctant nods from her team – sometimes she really did feel like she was running a camp for gifted adolescents – Cam moved to Angela's phone and made the call.

"Agent Burns, this is Doctor Camille Saroyan from the Jeffersonian," she began. "I have some anxious people here wondering if you managed to locate Special Agent Booth or Doctor Brennan." She listened for several moments, nodding, her expression giving nothing away. "Okay, thank you."

Putting the phone back on the cradle she paused, took a visible steadying breath and then looked up at her waiting audience. "Agents from the local field office were already at the hotel because Booth called in a team to arrest Christian O'Connor. There was no sign of him, or of Booth or Doctor Brennan. Not only were they not in their room but all their belongings where gone. When they asked back at the front desk they were told Booth checked them out this morning."

"Oh my god!" Angela looked horrified. "He's got them ... the killer – it's the only explanation."

"I'm inclined to agreed," Cam said simply.

"So, we're going, right?" Hodgins looked at Cam expectantly.

"Oh yes, we certainly are," Cam agreed grimly.

Much as Booth wanted to keep the intimacy with Bones going, the part of him that was FBI agent first everything else second had already been impatiently jumping up and down for attention since he'd woken to their current predicament. They'd been unconscious for who knew how long – he wasn't sure how long they'd been awake for either, the darkness and the topic of conversation itself having the potential to seriously warp his sense of time passing.

Pressing a final, firm kiss to Bones' lips, he dropped his head back to rest against her arms again. "The sooner we get out of here the sooner we can have that little chat," he told her casually, not missing the way she tensed a little. "Yeah, you don't mind the physical stuff but talking emotions isn't going to come easy," he thought, knowing the battle was nowhere near won yet. Temperance Brennan loved him though ... he had no doubt about that. No, what he doubted was that she'd be able to believe in herself, in him, enough to want to do something with it. "No point in borrowing trouble," he thought, pushing those worries to the side for the time being.

"You have an idea?" her voice was back to that logical, matter-of-fact tone she often used.

"Yeah," Booth grimaced. "I'm going to suggest something with completely innocent intentions okay."

"What is it?"

Bones sounded suspicious and he didn't blame her ... usually when someone led in with a declaration of innocence it was because they were anything but. He'd tried to come up with something else but they had nothing – no conveniently hidden knife or handy sharp edged object to help them. All they had was the unique arrangement of ropes O'Connor had used – all part of the 'two as one' romance theme he had going. Time to use that against him.

"From what I can tell O'Connor looped these ropes around us, rather than going lengthwise or between us," Booth began. "I'm fully restrained here but now you've broken that rope they're the only thing holding you in one place. It you can manage to get your arms clear you might be able to -"

"Shimmy my way down your body and get past the ropes around our shoulders," Brennan finished. "Booth, that's very insightful."

"I try," Booth grinned. "So, can you do it?"

"Of course," Brennan returned confidently, her physical capabilities something she never doubted. She began shifting immediately; rocking back and forth to create the space she needed to raise herself high enough to be able to lift her outstretched arms over his head.

Booth raised his head from the floor to help, ending up with a face full of lush female breast. Inhaling her scent he grinned again, despite the fact that it was totally inappropriate given the situation.

"Are you ... scenting me?" Brennan's voice was tight with the effort she was making to move inside ropes that left her very little room.

"Hey, I'm only a man," Booth said unapologetically. "And you know, when the woman you love drops her very pretty breasts in your face it's kind of implied that you'll enjoy the experience."

"Okay," Bones agreed as though it made perfect sense, causing him to laugh weakly. She kept going with the slow, gradual upward progress ... a slow torture that had Booth wishing he'd come up with a different plan. And not just because of the physical intimacy.

"I don't want to rush you here Bones but we don't know how long we've got until O'Connor comes back to, you know, finish the job," Booth said. "Can you pick up the pace a little?"

"I'm almost there," she told him intently, still rocking.

"Yeah, you and me both honey," he said under his breath, shifting uncomfortably as her lower leg rubbed in places he really didn't need it rubbing. This wasn't just a bad idea ... it had to be the worst idea he'd ever had.

With a grunt of effort Brennan managed to wrench her arms over Booth's head through the tight gap in the ropes around her wrists and arms, sending her partners skull crashing to the concrete platform.

"Ow!" He yelled, groaning loudly. "A little warning before you throw my head to the ground next time Bones!"

"Since it's unlikely we'll ever be bound together in this configuration again I think I can safely agree to that," Brennan replied blandly. Where before she'd wriggled upwards now she reversed it, keeping her arms stretched up above her head and undulating her lower body to create movement inside the loops of ropes around both their bodies.

"I have died and gone to hell," Booth muttered, stifling the groan that wanted to surge up from deep inside as she kept the torture going for way too long ... each individual minute feeling like an eternity. Damn she was flexible ... limber ... not to mention warm and soft in all the right places.

"Stop complaining, this was your idea," Bones' voice was muffled as her face pressed into his chest. This time she was the one to pause and take a deep, appreciative breath. "Did I ever tell you that you smell really nice?"

"Ah, no ... no, you didn't," Booth swallowed nervously, wondering how long it would be before she realised just how arousing he found her admission to be. It was either that or the way she was pressing down on him and then raising up and then pressing down and then up again ... over and over and ... "Stop!" he tightened his arms around her abruptly, just at the point where her face rested on his abdomen.

"What?" He felt her head shift as she looked up at him and was suddenly glad for the darkness that could hide his expression even it if couldn't hide how fast he was breathing. "Booth?"

"Just ... I feel the need at this point to apologise," Seeley began. "It's ah ... you're gonna be travelling pretty close to ah ... you know, the family jewels there Bones and ...," he gave up trying to explain the evidence ... hard evidence he could already feel expanding in his pants without actually using the words erection or worse. "It's dark," he muttered defensively. "And you're, you know ... hot and you smell, man amazing and I really, really, love you and ... it's dark ..."

"Booth," Brennan's calm voice interrupted him.

"What?"

"It's a perfectly natural biological reaction," she told him matter-of-factly. "I don't mind ... in fact I find it very flattering that you feel some desire for me even in our current circumstances."

"Well then, I'm glad I could help," Booth got out, struggling between smiling and groaning loudly when he felt her nod before she started up the undulating thing again, her shoulders now clear of the first set of ropes.

"It's lucky that your shoulder width exceeds mine by such a large margin," Brennan commented, continuing her downward track. "O'Connor may have more than a passing grasp of forensic anthropology but his knowledge of physics is lacking."

"Yeah, how so?" Booth queried, glad for anything to distract him from what she was doing to him.

"The points of contact holding these ropes in place are unevenly distributed," Bones explained. "The widest points of any restraint are what keep it in place. Anything inside the restraint of lesser width could be removed from within the circumference with relative ease, if the potential for upward movement exists."

"Like different sized sticks tied in a bunch," Booth commented.

"Exactly," Booth heard the smile in her voice and felt like a student who'd made his teacher proud. "It is only the sticks on the outside of the stack that provide the holding force for all the others, thus any one of the innermost sticks can be removed with relative ease. Your shoulders and hips are much wider than my own -"

"Making me the outer sticks and you the inside ones," Booth concluded smugly.

"Yes," Bones' voice was muffled as her face pressed just below his rib cage. "Instead of anchoring all but my wrist restraints to you O'Connor should have at the very least tied my legs independent of yours as well."

"His mistake, our gain," Booth got out, feeling his already low comfort level dip even lower as Bones continued her movements. Her breasts were pressed against his groin now and if she'd been in doubt before about his desire for her she wasn't anymore. "God," he shifted his lower body, sucking in his breath and pressing back into the concrete in an effort to give her more space. "Is it hot in here?" he swallowed hard.

"On the contrary the temperature is well below what would ordinarily be comfortable for our level of attire," Bones replied. "Physical exertion can lend an additional few degrees to body temperature, as it has here."

"Right, that must be it," Booth agreed quickly, ignoring the fact that she was the one exerting while he just lay there trying not to think about how much he wished she was pressed against him this intimately for all the right reasons.

It was the most excruciatingly painfully uncomfortable and at the same time stimulating experience he'd ever had with a partner while remaining completely clothed - and it couldn't be over soon enough to suit him. Finally Bones manoeuvred herself past the now blaringly obvious bulge in his pants, clearing the rope around their waist.

"Oh, thank you Lord!" he exclaimed, waiting impatiently for her to undo the ropes around their legs.

She was up and kneeling beside him, concentrating on the ropes tying him to what turned out to be four metal loops concreted into the platform moments later. It was difficult in the darkness, even with their adjusted eyesight, but eventually she'd untied them all. He returned the favour by untying the remaining restraints at her wrists. Their hands collided as she moved to help him shift all the rope from his own body. And then they were standing and he was holding her really tightly, burying his face in her hair. She didn't seem to mind, wrapping her arms around him and holding on just as tightly.

"Bones, I meant every word I said before. Every word," he muttered, squeezing her even tighter and just breathing her in.

"I know Booth," her voice trembled with emotion, her hold on him turning desperate for a few moments. "I know."

"Right," he squeezed her one last time and then stepped back, taking her hand and turning to assess what their next course of action should be. "There's some light coming in from over there," he raised their still joined hands and pointed to their right. "Let's check it out."

Doctor Jack Hodgins might not live the life of a multi-million dollar heir to a vast corporate empire but there were times when he freely admitted it came in handy. Like right then, when he and the team from the Jeffersonian where ensconced in the back of a Westland Lynx helicopter doing in excess of 250 miles per hour in a straight line flight from DC to Vegas. Even with the specially designed high-speed rotor blades the trip across the country had taken more than six hours. Booth's cell phone call to Cam had been disengaged soon after they'd decided to make the trip and everyone had deliberately not said it - that it might have been cut off for the worst possible reason.

"This is awesome," Wendell commented for the fiftieth time since they'd taken off. He was leaning close to the window, watching the ground below passing by in a blur of greens and browns.

"You do take the cake, Jack Stanley Hodgins the Fourth," Angela commented in a low tone, kissing his cheek.

"Hey, not just the cake baby," he shot back. "The whole bakery."

"I'm sure Doctor Brennan and Booth will be grateful as well," Cam agreed. "Any ideas on how we're going to locate them. From what I know the Bellagio is one of the larger hotels in Vegas. The sun will be up by the time we get there which gives us less than a day to find them."

"I've got that covered too," Hodgins grinned, reaching for the folder he'd brought with him and had been studying for most of the flight. "I took the liberty of acquiring the original plans for the hotel, along with a list of all the touring shows they've hosted there over the past ten years."

"You're thinking about the fencing sword?" Wendell narrowed his eyes thoughtfully.

"Where does a guy who studied anthropology and works as a lowly desk clerk get the resources to acquire an antique weapon that would be worth a small fortune?" Hodgins posed the question but then moved to answer it himself, holding up a printed black and white advertisement. "Answer, he doesn't. Why buy your own when you can just borrow the one the hotel already owns?"

"The Magic and Movie Hall of Fame," Angela read aloud.

"Right," Jack nodded approvingly. "The largest collection of magic and movie memorabilia anywhere, valued at over four and a half million dollars."

"How does that help us?" Cam asked. "Even if the killer stole the weapon used in all the murders from this collection it's unlikely to lead us to Booth and Doctor Brennan."

"Au contraire," Hodgins smiled, obviously pleased with himself. "The hall of fame isn't located at the Bellagio but they never display all the items owned by the collection at the one time. When they're not on display they're stored at the originating hotel. In the case of the Bellagio that would include the tools of one Master Coulé – it's a fencing term that describes an attack or feint that slides along the opponent's blade. Coulé specialized in sword work – very popular over a decade ago."

"And you think that the murder weapon is one of this Coulé props?" Wendell looked at the other scientist hopefully.

"He used a mix of real and doctored weapons, gave the show a level of authenticity and risk," Hodgins explained.

"I guess if it's the best lead we have right now we'll just have to run with it," Cam said, clearly disappointed they didn't have more to go on.

Angela knew her husband well and her eyes were already trained on him when he got that smug, 'king of the lab' look on his face. "It's not the best lead," she deduced.

"Cam's right – finding the murder weapon won't necessarily lead us to Dr B and Booth," he admitted. "So no, that's not the best part. That would be the props used in one of the acts that opened when the hotel did in 1998. 'Reconstructing Houdini'. It was an escapologist act that reproduced all the great man's escapes, including the Chinese Water Torture Cell."

"Is that the one where Houdini hung upside down in a tank full of water?" Angela asked.

"That's the one," Jack grinned. "The real tank was destroyed in a fire in 1995 so they created another one. The reproduction tank held almost 800 gallons of water and -,"

"And currently resides in storage at the Bellagio," Cam concluded.

"Indeed. From what I can find out it's been collecting dust since the show closed in 2001. We find that tank presumably housing our killer's school of flesh eating piranhas and with any luck it will lead us to Booth and Doctor B," Hodgins concluded.

"Not bad Hodgins, not bad," Cam smiled.

"And not a mention of dirt anywhere," Angela teased. Before he could protest the inaccuracy of that term she was leaning in to kiss him. "I do love you Doctor Hodgins," she declared, her eyes sparkling with emotion.

"That's lucky, because I love you too Mrs Hodgins," he declared in return, kissing her back.

"How long do you think it will take for them to get sick of that?" Wendell asked Cam.

"I have no idea but I wouldn't hold your breath," Cam replied, smiling fondly at her still oblivious friends.

When the pilot announced that they'd be landing on the roof of the Bellagio in a few minutes they all felt the relief and the rush of adrenalin as each prepared to do what they'd come so far for. Find and rescue their friends.

"Do you think this is where O'Connor kills his victims?" Brennan asked. She'd spoken in a low voice but still it sounded too loud in the oppressive silence. They'd been walking slowly for a while, clearing that dark, cold room and entering a corridor that so far hadn't revealed a way out.

They were still holding hands – at first it had been necessary because it had still been dark and they'd needed to keep close but when that changed neither of them had let go. Brennan took comfort from the contact, from every instance of Booth squeezing her hand reassuringly, despite the fact that it made no logical sense to do so. "I'd say that's more than likely," he agreed.

"You're thinking the same thing I am, aren't you?"

"What, that we're still at the hotel?" Booth queried, not surprised she'd come to the same conclusion. It was there, in the pipes that lined the ceilings, the signs that pointed to things like the electrical room or maintenance, and just something internal inside each of them that knew they hadn't gone far, that not enough time had passed to get them anywhere remote. "I'd guess there are plenty of rooms down here no one's been in for years. It wouldn't be hard for an employee of the hotel to get access and for a killer as smart as this guy seems to be it would be irresistible to claim a space that no one can link back to him."

"And clever too since no one would think to look for a missing couple at the place they disappeared from," Brennan added.

"Cam and Hodgins are smarter than the average law enforcement officer," Booth assured her. "Angela would have traced my call so they'll know we're still at the hotel."

"If O'Connor didn't find your phone before they could do so," Brennan pointed out.

"No point in being negative Bones," Booth told her. "I haven't finally gotten you to agree to talk seriously about us only to have a psycho killer ruin it for me."

"I -," Brennan broke off when they turned a corner and arrived at a closed door. They had no choice - either to go through it or turn back the way they'd come.

Booth grabbed the handle and turned it slowly. "It's open," he murmured in a low tone. "Get behind me."

She would have protested that order but feared it would both distract her partner and potentially alert anyone who might be in that room before they could be taken by surprise. Letting go of Booth's hand she moved to stand at his back, determined to back him up.

Booth slowly pushed the door open a crack, peering inside. After a few moments he opened it wider, motioning for Brennan to follow him.

It was dark inside ... all Temperance could make out were weirdly shaped shadows looming all around them and the sense of clutter, the absence of space.

"Wait here," Booth left her side, quietly shutting the door and plunging the room back into complete darkness.

"Booth?" she called softly, disconcerted.

"Hang on," his voice came from behind her and she swivelled around just as the lights suddenly blazed to life, stabbing at her eyes.

"Holy ...," Booth's voice trailed off as they both got a good look at what surrounded them.

A large coloured box on a rolling table. A collection of mirrors that reflected back the array of items around them. Capes, scarves, masks, colourful costumes hanging on a wardrobe rack. Wooden chests, big and small. And on the walls a number of swords of various types displayed prominently, the way their blades shone in the light suggesting they were maintained regularly.

"Booth," Brennan drew his attention to a distinctively thin blade that took up pride of place in the centre of the display.

"I see it," he said grimly. Walking forward he passed through the mirrors and stopped abruptly. "Bones," he glanced back at her, his expression that mix of worry and distaste she was more used to seeing when they first arrived at a murder scene.

"What is it?" She moved to join him, stopping just as suddenly as he had as she saw what had captivated him. Before them was a large metal structure, taller than Booth and half as wide. Inside the metal was a glass tank ... full of water and inhabited by hundreds of sharp teethed menacing looking fish. They cruised around the tank, hugging the glass before skimming away ... maybe they were just fish but they were more than a little creepy too, with their fixed gazes, beady eyes, and mysteriously in sync movements.

"This is bad," Booth muttered. "When it was just another squint theory of Hodgins' it was bad enough but the reality? This guy is one sick bastard."

"Come now Agent Booth, there's no need to be insulting."

Booth and Brennan spun around to confront the owner of that voice.

One Christian Michael O'Connor. Front desk clerk for the Bellagio and recently confirmed psycho serial killer and 'sick bastard'.

"This is very bad," Booth murmured, exchanging glances with Bones.

Authors Note:

Fanfic wouldn't let me do anything last night so excuse the unavoidable delay. For this chapter I used wiki for research - magic stuff mostly, plus the helicopter (a real one, fastest recorded helicopter, from helis dot com), Bellagio history, Houdini escapes, and volume/distance calculations where required. Check out the wiki 'Chinese_water_torture_cell' page if you want to see an old picture of the Houdini escape. I made up the magic acts though.

I've been too slow editing again tonight to the point it's now 2.30am and I haven't done review replies again (I WILL get to them as soon as I can, I promise) ... so once again thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, it was very interesting seeing what you said about that one and I really appreciate the wealth of support! I look forward to reactions to this latest chapter too! We're cruising up to the ending now!