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Booth checks on Parker and then pokes his head into his daughter's room. He smiles at her sleeping form snuggled under the covers and pulls the door shut again. He lets out a breath and heads down the hallway. He walks into his bedroom and notices the sliver of light poking out from the bottom of the bathroom door. He pads over to the adjoining bath and knocks. "Bones?" He hears a muffled 'hmmm' and a sigh. Worried, he turns the handle and steps into the bathroom. "Bones?"

Brennan, who's mindlessly running her palm across the surface of the water as she reclines farther back in their tub, opens her eyes and turns her head towards the door. She smiles. "Would you like to join me?" She shifts, sitting up, and stares at him, one eyebrow raised in anticipation for his reply.

His eyes slowly drift from her face to the tips of her toes, which are sticking up out of the water.

When he doesn't answer, she asks, "Is everything okay, Booth?"

He nods. "Yeah."

"You're lying."

"Since when can you tell when someone's lying?"

She sighs and decides not to answer him. She moves on, saying, "You didn't deny my accusation, which tells me that you were lying. Everything isn't fine. What's wrong?" She pauses and watches his eyes dance across her submerged body. "Am I distracting you? Would it help if I got out of the tub and wrapped myself in a towel?"

He walks over to her and sits down on the rim of the bathtub. "I lost it earlier, Bones. I lost it. I've lost it before, a few times, but this, this was different. I punched a guy—in my house, with my son and daughter a few feet away."

"Booth." She rests her hand on top of his. "You're not your father."

"If Christine had come running inside three minutes earlier, she would have, she would have seen it, Bones." He pulls his hand away, his eyes falling to a chip on a tile near his left foot. "I don't want my kids seeing that side of me—ever—and I got this close to having that happen today."

"I'm sure if Christine or Parker were standing in the foyer, you wouldn't have done what you did."

"That's the thing, Bones." He looks at her again. "I would have. You know why? Because I lost control. I didn't know what I was doing. I saw his face, I saw him smile like everything was fine, like he didn't almost kill my kid, and I lost it."

She swallows.

"And you had to see me lose it. If it was so easy for me to punch that guy, knowing my kids were close by, what's stopping me from hitting you when we're having an argument or hitting Christine or Parker when they do something wrong?"

Well, this isn't where she saw this conversation going. She stands up and reaches for her towel. She steps out of the tub and dries herself off quickly before wrapping the towel around herself. She pulls up the drain stopper and sits down on the edge of the tub beside him. She places one hand on his cheek and looks into his cloudy brown eyes. "You would never do that because I know the kind of man you are, Booth."

He leans his cheek against her palm and finds her gaze.

"Did you use the best judgment? No, not at all, however, if I were to put myself in your shoes, momentarily, I would have done the same thing. After you told me who he was, I did want to punch him or at least, I wanted to give him a swift kick in the testicles."

He lets out a laugh.

"You're the father of a teenage boy whose life is forever changed because of that man's poor decision making. Your reaction was natural and no one can fault you for acting the way you did."

He closes his eyes and lets out a breath, listening to her.

"Parker would have understood. If he hadn't been so distracted and had heard and seen what happened, he would have understood. He wouldn't love you any less. If Christine had seen you punch that man, she would have understood why you did what you did too. You know why? Because she, too, got physical with him after she found out that he's the man responsible for hurting her older brother." She pauses. "I am in no way condoning violence, but both your reactions are understandable given the circumstances." She pats his cheek and scoots closer to him. "She's a lot like you."

He lifts his eyes to meet hers again.

She smiles. "That man, he's being charged and he'll spend a considerable amount of time in prison. We cannot change what happened today, but we can move past it. It doesn't matter why he came by our home or how he found out where we live. Right now, we need to focus our efforts into helping Parker heal. Dwelling on this moment, analyzing it, is not going to help the situation any. This moment doesn't define who you are, Booth, because as far as I'm concerned, that man deserved that punch and a lot more."

He leans forward, lowering his head just a smidge, and inching closer. His lips touch hers lightly at first, his eyes falling shut as he deepens the kiss and pushes back some of her hair with his hand.

She moans softly against his lips, her hand snaking around to the back of his neck.

He breaks the kiss and tilts his head, brushing his lips along her jaw and down her neck. He stops in the hollow of her right collarbone, showering it with soft pecks. He stops and looks her in the eyes. "Thanks for, um, talking me off the ledge, there, Bones."

She shrugs, mumbling something as his lips make contact with her neck again.

"Do you still want me to join you in the tub?"

"I'll have to refill it," she moans, biting her bottom lip, "which is not a problem," she breathes out.

He laughs against her skin and feels her shiver. He pulls back and smiles at her. "I love you." He touches her stomach over the towel and tickles it. "I love you too," he whispers.

She rolls her eyes, letting out a laugh herself. "You're ridiculous, but I, I love you too, Booth, and I'm sure the fetus loves you too." She shakes her head at that and bites back a smile.

"Of course our baby loves me." He stands up and reaches over, turning the knobs on the bathtub. He runs his finger under the stream of water to test the temperature and then turns the hot water knob a little more. He stands up straight and pulls his T-shirt over his head.

"Are you okay?"

He nods. "I'm okay now, Bones."

"I helped?"

"You always do." He smiles and removes his sweatpants and boxers.

She gives him a quick glance, her eyes drifting over his now naked body, the corners of her lips twitching into a smirk. She stands up and lets out a gasp when he immediately loosens her towel and tosses it behind him. He takes her hand, helping her into the tub, and then joins her. He settles under the water and leans against one of porcelain walls.

She sits down and scoots along the tub floor until she's sitting between his legs with her back flush against his stomach. She leans her head back on his chest and closes her eyes as his arms wrap around her, his hands resting delicately on her stomach.

He buries his face in her hair and presses a kiss to the back of her head. "Are you still mad at me for confirming the pregnancy earlier?" He asks after a couple minutes of calming silence.

She shakes her head. "I wasn't mad at you."

"You seemed mad."

"I assure you that I wasn't."

"So I don't have to sleep on the couch?"

"Don't be ridiculous. I wouldn't make you sleep on the couch. It's not good for your back. If I was mad at you, I'd make you sleep in the guestroom. That would be more logical."

He smiles. "You know, we're gonna have to start turning that guestroom into a baby's room soon."

She nods. "I'm well aware of that, Booth."

His thumb skims across her submerged belly and he lowers his head, pressing a kiss to her neck, just below her ear.

She shivers and lets out a satisfied moan. "We need to talk about what Parker said at the cemetery this morning."

"Not now—later," he mumbles against her ear.

"Booth," she starts, but loses her train of thought when his lips slide down and peck at her shoulder and his hand starts to caress her left breast. "We can talk about that la—," she gasps, "ter." The last syllable falls off her lips as a whisper and she relaxes against him.


So I've decided to keep going with this story and I'm planning on having the next chapter skip ahead a couple months. Right now, I'm thinking that in this chapter the sex of the baby will be revealed and there will be some baby shopping with Angela and Brennan.