"Hailey, you good?" Kim walked by my desk as I snapped out of my thoughts. Jay was no longer sitting at his desk, and I realized he was on the other side of the room as I looked around to what had changed while I had zoned out.

"Yeah. Give me a minute." Pushing back from my desk, I let out a sigh as soon as I had reached the stairs and made a beeline for the front desk. I hoped Trudy wasn't too busy, which upon further inspection I was worried I was seeing her surrounded by files.

"Hey, Sarge. Got a minute?"

"Just living my best life with all this paperwork." She quickly pointed towards the stack of files without looking up, finished typing what she needed on the computer and closed the folder before starting a new stack of finished work. "What do you need?"

"Upstairs?"

"Hey, Harry." Trudy nodded, casting a glance behind her to an older man who had just hung up the phone. "Cover the desk for a few minutes, would you?" The older gentleman with neatly trimmed peppered hair turned to nod at her before she made her way out of the desk area. I could tell she wanted to ask me what was going on by the look on her face. She stayed silent as we walked up to the landing, each step feeling more weighted than the last.

"Trudy." Kim greeted her as we walked into the room, her eyes silently asking if she knew what was going on. She shrugged and turned her attention back to me, as if to say I don't. I have a feeling we will in a minute as the rest of the team followed suit and turned to look at me for answers.

"I've been putting off what I'm about to say long enough, but I thought you deserved to know this. Years ago, I had a partner named Garrett. He was tasked to help me take down Booth. We did everything we could to find evidence on him. When we got close to throwing him in jail, Garrett went missing."

"Did you ever find him?" Adam stopped turning back and forth in his chair as he leaned against his arm in a concerned manner.

"No. Booth did everything he could to evade what he was doing. He never told us where Garrett was. I don't believe he ever will." I refrained from telling them what really happened, as only Jay knew about what Booth had tried to do to me on New Years Eve.

"Basically he kept giving you the slip." Kevin piped up as he sat down on the edge of his own desk as he listened to the conversation unfold.

"Garrett and I had talked a few times about getting married when it was all over. So, after he disappeared, I couldn't help feeling like Booth had taken all of that away from us. What I didn't expect was Garrett had left a part of himself with me." Everyone in the room seemed to straighten a little, their expressions in various stages of understanding. "A beautiful little girl that I knew I was in no condition to raise myself."

"You were-" Kim couldn't quite get the words out as her gaze shifted towards mine. "Why didn't you tell us this?"

"I didn't tell anyone, not even my family because I wanted her to be safe. The more people who knew about her, the more likely Booth would find out about her somehow."

"So, why are you telling us this now?" Al had been quiet until now, almost sitting in the corner of the room listening.

"Because her adopted parents were killed in a car accident."

"And now she's with you." Trudy mumbled quietly behind me, her eyes searching the room as the wheels turned. "The little girl who was waiting with the social worker. She was yours wasn't she?"

"I wanted her to be protected from Booth, so I did the hard thing and gave her up for adoption to someone who would love her just as much as I did. So when she showed up here with her social worker," Taking a step back, I looked at Trudy and nodded confirmation to her question before continuing. "I never thought I would see her until she wanted to find me."

"What's her name?" Antonio prodded gently, looking up at the board. We were still waiting on Voight to get back so I knew we were in no rush to wrap up this conversation. Even if it was a short one, I felt a significant weight off my shoulders now that the team her.

"Eva."

"I believe which means, full of life."

"That's right. Your daughter's name is Eva too."

"It is. She's sixteen now and I'm finding she is definitely living up to her name." He mentioned, having just dealt with his daughter's fake social media account. "What about yours?"

"I think she is full of light, but right now she's having a really hard time adjusting, hence me answering phone calls a little more than I used to." I emphasized the word little, although that term didn't seem accurate since I always felt like I was on the phone.

"Anything we can do, just say the word." Trudy said, giving my shoulder a light squeeze to let me know they were there, her gaze rounded around the room, then pointed over to Voight who had just walked back into his office. "I should get back."

"Thanks, Trudy." As she disappeared out of sight, everyone settled back in and prepared themselves for going back over the case. I sat back down at my own desk around the same time Jay did.

"You did great. How do you feel?"

"Good, I think." I didn't really know how I felt, other than relief. It was still sinking in that more people were finding out about her. After so many years of keeping her a secret, I still had to be careful, but I had thought a lot about what my old boss, Arthur Carson had mentioned about how I had many people who would be willing to love and protect her if given the chance. "Kind of like I just lifted an elephant off my chest."