Update 29- Willing Sacrifice

Harding stood inches from Rebecca, their eyes on one another's as they spoke in quiet whispers. He reached for her hand, and she wanted to pull away, but his eyes were boring into hers. "It's safe, Beck, I promise."

"Chris, I can't do this to him." She whispered, letting her hand remain in his. "Not again, not if he's going to keep putting himself in danger. Isn't it just easier to just let Parker believe that he's dead? Isn't it just…"

"Easier is not always the best way, Rebecca. If he finds out that Seeley is alive, he is going to resent you for the rest of his life."

"He doesn't have to find out." She said, her voice determined, her eyes staring angrily into his.

"Find out what?" Parker said from the doorway of his mother's office, his hand was behind his back and he was staring at his mother with an angry scowl.

"Sweetheart." Rebecca said as she approached him, glaring at Harding for a moment, Parker took a step back away from his mother.

"No!" Parker said angrily.

"John…" She said, the name that she had been calling him for the past three years.

"My name is Parker!" He exclaimed suddenly. "Who is he?" Parker asked, pointing at Harding, his eyes were red from crying, and his teeth were gritted in a fit of intense anger. "Who is he, Mom?" He exclaimed.

"This is an old friend of mine, John… this is Chris. What's wrong, sweetheart?"

"My Name is Parker! Parker John Booth! I'm going with Doctor Brennan!" He said strongly, his mother's jaw dropping at the mention of her name. She had no idea that Parker had seen her, she didn't even think that he would remember her.

"Why… why would you…? What are you talking about?" She said, feigning misunderstanding, but the little boy stood his ground. His chest puffed out and he glared at his mother, his teeth gritting even harder.

"I think he knows, Rebecca." Harding said as her eyes shot darts at him suddenly, he shook his head as he tried to soften the blow with his words. "He knows, Rebecca."

"He doesn't know anything." She growled through an angry scowl, tears beginning to form in her eyes.

"I know that dad is alive."

"Sweetheart…"

"No!" Parker exclaimed. "I know he's alive because I'm talking to him right now on the phone!" He shouted, showing his mother the phone, she reached for it.

"Parker!"

"No! If I give you the phone, then you'll just hang up on him! He's my dad! He's my dad and you told me he was dead! You told me he was gone forever! If he was gone forever, then why is he on the phone!"

"Give me the phone, Parker!" She exclaimed as Parker ran around the table from his mother, still holding the phone in his hand. She followed him around the table, her heart was beating wildly in her chest, her mind racing. "How did you find a phone number?"

"It was in those papers that Doctor Brennan left, Rebecca." Chris called, watching the chasing game between mother and son, he was feeling very uncomfortable all of a sudden.

"Parker John! Give me the phone!" She exclaimed desperately as he held the phone against his chest as if it were his lifeline, staring across the table at his mother.

"Promise me we can go see him with Doctor Brennan! Promise me we can go see him!" He exclaimed.

"Parker, there is a lot of…"

"PROMISE ME!" He screamed, his face turning red as he slammed his fist on the table. "I want to see my father!" He screamed, tears of rage pouring down his face as he watched his mother lunge toward him, only to have the man that stood behind her grab her around her waist, he pulled her to him, and Parker watched as his mother did not fight back against this stranger, she just stared at him, completely out of willpower. The man whispered in her ear and she shook her head, Parker kept his eyes on his mother. "Promise me, Mom." He said, tears rolling down his cheeks. "It's him, it's really him… please… please just… please?" He sobbed. "Just… talk to him." Parker said, reluctant to hand over the phone to his mother, he pushed it to his ear. "Dad?" He said, his voice was full of sadness, full of despair, and Booth could hear it.

"I'm still here." Booth replied, his words sending tears to his eyes as he listened to the sigh of relief on the other end of the line.

"Tell Mom that we need to come home." He said, sniffling as the man across the room allowed Rebecca to walk toward him. Tell her I love you… that you love us, and that you need us to come home." He said, his voice filled with such an untamable torture that Booth could feel his heart breaking, quite literally.

"I'll tell her. I love you, Bud… I love you very much."

"I love you, Dad. I love you… here's Mom." He said, handing the phone to Rebecca, there was a long pause.

"Seeley?" She finally managed to whisper, her breath sucking in as she tried to prepare herself for the conversation to come.

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Temperance's eyes fell once again to the clock, it had been nearly three hours since Harding had dropped them off, and she couldn't think of any errands that would take that long, not for a man who has never been to this particular city, or so she thought. She smiled to herself a bit cheekily as she turned the page on her book. "He probably got lost." She whispered under her breath as she looked up at the sound of the doorknob rattling a bit before the handle pushed down and a slightly bedraggled Harding stepped into the room.

He noted the little girl, sleeping quite comfortably against her mother's legs, her stuffed elephant gripped ever so tightly in her hands as Temperance raised her eyebrows at him. "I bet you're hungry." He said with a sheepish grin, and he noted the lack of emotion on her face and knew that she was not humored in the least. "You're probably wondering where I went." He said, crossing his arms over his chest as she tipped her head curiously, still not saying another word. "Well, I got lost."

"Figures." She said, looking down at her book, she flipped the page and sighed. "And to answer your earlier question, yes… I'm quite hungry."

"Well let's get going… wake up sleeping beauty, and we'll be on our way!" He said with a smile. He tried to hide the emotions behind it, but in her years with Booth, and even more so in her time without him, she had taken to watching people very closely for any sign of lying or deceit, and she could tell from many of Harding's mannerisms that there was something that he was not telling her. Instead of pressing, however, she leaned over gently and ran her fingers through her daughter's soft hair, attempting to wake little girl, without sending her into a grumpy post nap slump.

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Focused on finding a place to eat, Temperance kept her eyes outside the car while Harding drove them around the city. She told him that she was letting him drive as punishment for abandoning them for three hours in the hotel room without calling, when in reality, she just didn't feel like being behind the wheel. Her mind was far too cluttered, and her thoughts of the tasks ahead were far too thought provoking for her to focus on driving the car at the moment.

"You know, there's not really a lot to do in Boulder." Harding said as he drove, glancing to Temperance, he noticed she wasn't looking at him. "I mean, there's some natural stuff, a few museums, but nothing really cool."

"Are you saying that museums aren't interesting?" Temperance asked, turning her face to give Harding an incredulous look.

"No! No…" He laughed at his remark and shook his head. "No… museums are cool in their own right, but you know… things for kids… like Antonia's age."

"Antonia enjoys the museums in Washington."

"Except the dinosaurs, Mommy."

"Except the dinosaurs." Temperance nodded.

"We don't do dinosaurs, right, Mommy?"

"Correct." Temperance smiled as she looked back at her little girl, her smile was bright and knowing and her eyes sparkled. "I'm sure you had a point in your little escapade just there to see how far you could fit your foot down your throat."

"In my mouth… its put my foot in my mouth."

"Oh, I know what the saying is, Harding…" She said with a knowing smile that made him laugh out loud.

"Very funny… clever…"

"I have been told that I am quite amusing." She said, sighing wistfully. "There… we can eat at that place right there."

"Are you sure, it looks a little run down…"

"I really don't care, Harding… I just want to eat dinner." She said as Harding pulled up to the restaurant and looked back at Antonia. "So are you going to tell me why you were mentioning the many places that are not in Boulder?"

"I was just thinking that we could take a trip to Denver for a day or two… before we leave on Friday. There's no use wasting our time in the hotel room. There's a children museum there, they have the Denver Zoo, an amusement park, there's…"

"Stop." Temperance said, holding her hand out to him as she turned to see Antonia becoming quite excited at the prospect of all of this fun. "Just… stop, okay? We're not here for fun… this isn't vacation, the three of us… are not a family… we don't do family things together, okay?"

"Fine, then you can do those things with her alone, I was just suggesting, since we have so much time here, we could…"

"But we don't have a lot of time here… I have to go back to Rebecca's… I have to come up with another way for her to understand the importance of all of this. She needs to sign the form, she needs to go back to Washington." She stated clearly, concisely and very seriously.

"You mean this form?" Harding said, pulling a folder from the door, he turned it around and unfolded the folder so that she could see inside it.

"Christopher." She said, as soon as she saw the signed paper, releasing Rebecca and Parker from witness protection. "This… this doesn't mean anything other than she agreed not to have U.S. Marshall protection. This is just the first step."

"Yes… and I have her word that she will be on that plane to Washington on Friday morning."

"Her word." Temperance said, giving him an incredulous look that made him smile.

"Yeah, her word… trust me, Doc… it's all you're going to get unless we handcuff her and Parker to the plane until Friday."

"There's a thought." She mumbled to herself as Harding let out a soft chuckle.

"Don't worry, Temperance, they'll be there."

"I want to hear it from her."

"We can call if you want." He said, watching her stare into him sharply, he could feel her cutting holes in his skin with her steely stare.

"Perhaps after we eat." She said, letting out a resigning sigh, she looked to Antonia, who had been watching the entire exchange with careful pause. "Let's go my little princess…"

"Can we call daddy after we eat?" She asked as Temperance climbed out of the passenger side, opened Antonia's door and lifted her into his arms.

"Maybe we can." She said, kissing the little girl's cheek. "But I think the people watching daddy are getting pretty tired of bringing him to the phone."

"Then we need to bring him home." Antonia said with a sweet smile that made Temperance smile back.

"That's exactly what I'm trying to do, princess." She said, kissing the little girl's cheek again, she followed Harding toward the restaurant doors.