A/N: This is the last chapter before the holiday. I hope you like it and I hope you have a Happy Thaksgiving. :)
Chapter 14
The Jeffersonian Medico-Legal Lab, Friday at 10:00 am
"Bones I think we've got something," usually Booth was excited when they found something but this time his tone was different.
"Isn't that a good thing?" She questioned as he swiped into the platform. Hodgins, Angela, Cam, and Simon gathered up onto the platform eager to hear what was going on.
"It would be if it weren't so depressing," Charlie filled in after Booth didn't answer Brennan's question.
"My theory was that our shooter was probably not missing in the first place. She may have been Slagle girlfriend until she discovered what he'd been doing. It would be easy enough to hide. Her place might have been close to his job and then there would have been no reason to go to his place. Anyway since Cam informed me no local hospitals had anyone missing a finger, I checked the morgues. A body was brought up from the river and was sitting in the county coroner's office near Richmond," he handed the file to Brennan and she flipped through it.
"Shelly Alexander, twenty-seven, has only nine fingers. It would appear to be our victim," she sighed as she handed the file to Cam to look at the pictures.
"Her finger was in fact bitten off. The conclusion reached by the medical examiner seems to be correct. She was only in the water between eight and twelve hours, which fits the time frame for Slagle's death. But the pieces aren't falling into place. Is there anyway we can reconstruct what happened?" The Head of Forensics looked to Angela.
"The Angelator might be able to come up with something. I'll need the reports for both bodies so I can input the data," the forensic artist said.
"What about the sketches?" Brennan asked.
"I'd be glad to help Miss Montenegro," Simon smiled.
"With what?" Hodgins inquired, his dander slightly up. He and Angela may not be together anymore but he didn't like the implication.
"Inputting data can't be all that hard. Besides I'm waiting on the skeleton X-rays anyway," the intern was just trying to be helpful.
"Very good Mr. Lawler. Help Angela. I want to look more closely at the report as well so I'll join you," Brennan nodded. With that the group split up. Booth sent Charlie back to the Hoover building and followed Bones into Angela's office.
"Well we're going to be having a party in here," the forensic artist teased as she picked up the handheld console for the Angelator and began to show Simon how to use it so that Brennan could look at the report.
"Do you need something Booth?" The forensic anthropologist asked as they sat on Angela's couch.
"More than you?" He whispered. This made Brennan give him a slight smile.
"Case wise," she said quietly.
"I read that file Bones. If Slagle followed a pattern, those poor girls last days were filled with pain and fear," he shook his head. Brennan scanned the file and found that her partner was right.
"Somehow none of this fits. Shelly kills Ivan and then kills herself. If she would have gone to the police, I'm sure they would have understood," she sighed.
"I'm not sure she could live with herself. Her attacker might have been dead but he'd still always be there in her mind," Booth explained.
"So she finds out that her boyfriend is kidnapping, raping, and killing teenage girls and somehow gets herself into the same situation? She wasn't his type. She was older, taller, more physically developed, why would he stray from his pattern?" Brennan wanted to know.
"She probably caught him with Anna Smits. The only way he doesn't get caught is if she's dead. With Anna already dead, he chases her upstairs. He grabs the gun. But here is when things get complicated. According to the county medical examiner, Shelly was assaulted shortly before her death, which he listed as drowning. So when Slagle caught her, he got his jollies off and then she grabs the gun and they fight for it? Then who locked the door?" Booth even questioned his own theory.
"That would work except Slagle's body was fully clothed when he was shot. I think Cam would need to look at the body before jumping to conclusions," Brennan said.
"Already in the works, Bones. I sent Charlie to retrieve Shelly and bring her back here so Cam could do her own autopsy. The county coroner did a good job but because he wasn't looking for elements of the crimes we're investigating maybe he missed something," her partner shrugged. With all the theories floating around and only parts of them making sense, the two partners headed back to the forensic anthropologist's office to lay the facts out better.
A few hours later the team stood in Angela's office and watched the Angelator put the evidence together. The three dimensional image ran and showed Shelly Alexander shoot Ivan Slagle in the groin then go up close for the head shot. It all seemed to fit even the finger-biting incident.
"Ok but I'm still not satisfied with everything. No way Shelly gets bitten and then locks the bedroom door on her way out. There was no reason to. Slagle is dead," Booth pointed out.
"Hey the Angelator only does what it's told. I tried entering the data for the door-locking part and the computer found no way to explain it other than after shooting Slagle, Shelly went out the window. Considering the amount of blood she was losing, I highly doubt she would have been able to do that. Oh and the fact that there would have been blood on the siding would rule that out," Angela said.
"So maybe Shelly didn't kill Slagle after all," Cam put the thought out there. Silence followed for a few seconds.
"There is no evidence to support a third party. Unless there is something you can get off Shelly Alexander's body the coroner missed," Charlie spoke up.
"Before I even look at the body sitting on our autopsy table I can tell you all DNA and other viable evidence would be washed away once she went into the water," Cam explained.
"The rest of the crime doesn't implicate there is a third person but it could explain why we found Slagle fully dressed when he was shot and why the door was locked in his bedroom," Booth suggested.
"Is the FBI lab sifting through all those fingerprints and other evidence they collected?" Hodgins wondered.
"It's a top priority. They have matched most of the prints to Slagle and Charlie gave them Shelly's to rule out some more," Booth told the entomologist.
"All the fluids in the room point to Slagle and Shelly. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell the difference as to which time was the assault," Hodgins said. There was a look on Booth's face as if something clicked.
"Slagle assaulted the girls in the secret basement. Why take Shelly upstairs when he could restrain her and do what he wanted downstairs?" The senior FBI agent asked.
"He wouldn't. If Shelly was trying to escape him she would run out of the house not up to the bedroom," Cam said.
"Exactly," Booth nodded.
"That only leads to one possibility," Simon deciphered.
"There is a third person involved," Brennan shook her head.
"But how do we prove it?" Charlie wondered.
To Be Continued…