Chapter 36: When the Bough Breaks
By the time Caroline finished everything she could that night and made it back to Booth's holding cell he was pacing a hole in the floor and running through the last twenty-four hours trying to figure out how everything was spiraling out of his control.
"What did I tell you about worry lines?" Caroline's voice brought him to a standstill as she strode in, settling her large frame awkwardly on the cell's hard plastic chair.
She motioned for him to sit down on the cot, but he couldn't, opting instead to lean against the wall across from her and fold his arms, "Where's Bones?"
"Aren't you just a little bit interested in what I've been doing to clear you of the murder charge?" she eyed him, but he didn't care.
"I've been here almost five hours and haven't heard anything from her," he was growing more agitated just thinking about it. "She should be here by now. Even if she was tied up at the lab all day."
"You said you got a text from her saying she was going into the lab, right?" Caroline's question made his stomach drop and he nodded. She looked at him with guarded eyes, "Her assistant got one saying that she was out with the flu. She was never at the lab today, Cherie."
He punched the cinder-block wall, the resulting pain in his knuckles giving him something to concentrate on rather than the truth. "Did you try and call?" he had to know.
"It goes right to voice mail every time," she said softly.
This time he swore and started pacing again.
"You need to go to the house tonight," he told her. "Make sure she's not there before we report her missing. See if there's anything hinting she made it back to the house. Then we should question the neighbors and see if any of them saw anything-"
"Do I look like a PI to you?" Caroline cut him off with a wave of her hand. "It is eleven o'clock at night, you are not getting out of this cell any time soon, and I am not traipsing off to Virginia to poke around your place and see if she may or may not be there."
"She's not there," he told her, shaking his head. "If she was home she'd be here by now. They must've taken her."
"Who?"
"How the hell should I know?" he flung his hands in the air. "Whoever put me in here and killed Vicky. They've got her Caroline and they managed to do a helluva job making sure nobody realized it until it was too late."
"You think she's been gone since this morning?" the prosecutor sighed heavily.
"I'd put money on it," he said grimly. He paced a few more times, "I've gotta get out of here."
"No can do," she shook her head. "Now, I've got the whole team coming together tomorrow morning to help me go over this thing with a fine-toothed comb and help me spring you as soon as possible, but I need you to promise me you won't do anything stupid in the meantime."
He blew out a long breath, but agreed, "We need to report Bones missing. Somebody needs to be looking for her."
"You know as well as I do nothing can be done at this hour," Caroline was sympathetic, but firm. "There won't be any signs of forced entry at your house if she was taken during her run and given everything it just might make them look at you even more closely. No," she shook her head, "we'll wait 'til morning and file the report, and get a team down there to check things out."
"Not Veers," Booth said flatly.
"Agent Veers is a good man who is just doing his job and you know that damn well, Seeley Booth," she chastised him. "All we've got to do is shed a little reason on the situation for him and if we can confirm that Brennan is missing that will help. I think. I've got a meeting with him tomorrow either way. Anything I should know?"
He couldn't think of anything though at the moment his mind was still trying to figure out what to do for Brennan. It chafed being trapped and powerless and if whoever was behind the whole mess had managed to separate them so effectively he shuddered to think what other things they had done to ensure that they stayed apart.
There wasn't anything left to be said so Caroline rose from her chair, promised Booth she'd check in first thing in the morning, and left. Not long after the doors clicked shut behind her, the main lights were shut off and Booth sat down on the cot, realizing for the first time how tired he'd become. A yawn escaped him unchecked and he shucked his jeans and tried to get comfortable under the thin blanket.
His mind, though, refused to turn off, and his anxious heart beat in time with the throbbing of his muscles. He needed to get out and find her before things got worse and he never saw her again.
B&B&B&B&B&B&B
Claustrophobia had set in as soon as the last vestiges of sunlight disappeared, triggering flashbacks that left her paralyzed with fear. No matter how many times she convinced herself that Booth was coming, her heart still raced out of control at the thought of what would happen should they decide to keep her in the trunk indefinitely.
Oxygen was not a problem given the small gap in the trunk lid and a small, circular hole in the floor. She could see the pavement whizzing past beneath her, though she gave up trying to determine how far they'd traveled considering all of the time she'd spent fading in and out of consciousness.
They'd taken an exit off of the highway several miles back from what she could tell and while their speed had decreased somewhat, they were still traveling fast. All of a sudden they made a sharp right and the car jolted, sending her forehead solidly into the floor as hard as the brick wall had hit her at the FBI academy.
Pain exploded in her head and she passed out.
It could've been hours or minutes later when she came to, head throbbing as bright lights danced in front of her. A part of her knew that she was still in the dark and was suffering from the head trauma, but that didn't make her head and neck ache any less.
The car ground to a halt, tires crunching on what was almost certainly not asphalt. The trunk lid swung open and her lungs gulped in the fresh air feverishly. A shadow crossed her vision path and she felt the cord at her ankles bing cut as the same rough hands that had grabbed her before did so now.
Once she was outside and on her feet, she staggered from one side to the other, unable to keep her balance on feet that had become numb over the course of the journey. Her captor caught her as she listed dangerously to one side and she with as much strength as she could muster, she shook him off and tried to run.
Coarse laughter echoed in the night air. Her aggravated injury combined with the poor circulation in her legs was debilitating and she was back in his firm grip before she could stray far. Straining in the dark, she tried to get a good look at his face as he led her forward, but to no avail. The lights on her vision had faded and left her vision blurry instead to the point where she was unsure if there were two men present or just the one.
Hinges protested loudly and she was propelled through a doorway and into a damp room that smelled of must and mildew. The man was gone before she could speak and she was alone, shivering from fear and pain as much as the cold. Groping in the dark, she could find no bed, only a bale of hay and a canteen of water.
It was stale and tasted like aluminum, but she welcomed it anyway, spilling a good deal of it on herself in the process trying to drink with her hands still bound. She tripped on something in the dark, bringing her knees slamming against the rough floor and igniting the pain all over again. It took every last effort to get herself over to the hay bale before she curled up on it and surrendered to the darkness.