BOOTH

I'm woken up by Bones saying my name where she lays nearby. I push myself up on an arm, pausing to watch her. Dreaming? I wonder, then grin. Yeah, I can't help hoping for just a second that she's dreaming of us making love. That hope is quickly dashed when she frowns in her sleep and shakes her head, mumbling…

"Where's Booth? Booth! Booth?!" The fear edging her words can't be missed. My smile fades and the protectiveness I've always felt towards her rises up. Instinctively, I shift closer then stroke a firm hand down her arm.

"Bones," I call her name quietly, "Wake up, Bones," I encourage, with a brisk rub against her upper arm. Her eyes fly open, wide and confused, her breath short and shallow, as though I've scared her. I force a smile onto my face. "Hey," I greet softly. She stares up at me for a long second, then her eyes clear and she really looks at me.

"Booth." A smile spreads across her face. She reaches up and palms my cheek as though to be sure I'm real. "You're here." I laugh quietly.

"Yeah, I'm here," I smile and nod, then, reaching out and brushing my fingers through her hair, turn serious. "I'll always be here." I'd expected my words – honest and sincere words – to make her happy. Instead, her smile falters then disappears. "You okay, Bones?" She sighs, heavily.

"Can you… Would you…" she stumbles, then gives up with another sigh and slants her eyes towards my pillow instead. It's not hard to interpret what she's asking for. Only two nights ago, she'd done just about the same.

"Yeah, yeah, of course," I answer quickly, laying down on my back and offering her my open arm. She hesitates for just a second, then melds her body against my side, resting her head on my chest. I tighten my arm around her a little more then, resting my chin against her head, reach out to stroke her arm with my free hand. "You know, Bones," I speak, keeping my voice low, "It's not a bother or inquisition to –"

"Imposition," she interrupts to correct, as I'd hoped when I intentionally used the wrong word. She always feels a little better when I do something that confirms her position of being the brains of the outfit.

"Huh?" I pretend ignorance.

"You said 'inquisition' which, as you should know, means to investigate, to interrogate," she explains as a teacher would, before she yawns long and deep. "You mean imposition: to demand or to force a burden upon."

"You know what I mean," I 'scold'. "The point is, Bones, you never have to wonder if I want to hold you. You? Trusting me enough to allow me to comfort you? I consider that one of my biggest accomplishments. It's a privilege… an honor." With another yawn, she rubs her cheek against my chest, trying to get more comfortable.

"I do trust you," she murmurs, already giving in to sleep again. Her hand flexes against my chest. "I love you, Booth." I gather that hand in mine.

"I love you, Bones."

And I do, to my very soul.

I didn't hear or see Bones leave the bed. I sense it in my sleep. It's only been three days and already the bed seems too big, too empty without her beside me. I drag open my eyes and lift my heavy head, forcing my eyes to focus on the alarm clock. With a groan, I drop my head down onto my pillow and close my eyes again. It's just after five-thirty in the morning and even if I had to report to post before reverie, I couldn't have done it. The Army trains us to go days without sleep and still remain battle ready, but you aren't tested against three nights and two days of nearly non-stop, mind-blowing sex with the woman you've coveted for seven years. I'm exhausted and my aches have aches.

I roll to my back, pillowing my head on my hands and looking up at the ceiling.

And I'm thankful.

I'm so damned thankful, that I'm here, now.

I had come close – way too close – to never being here at all.

Standing hip high in the frigid winter waters of the James River with a fishing pole in hand has a way of forcing a man to reflect on his life. There's no cell signal or TV in the remote location I'd chosen. Just you and your thoughts, so whether or not I wanted to look honestly at my life it was just me, left alone with my thoughts, for hours at a time.

Memories of a Christmas Eve Day flashed through my mind: Mistletoe being hung from the ceiling. Bones wearing a form fitting maroon dress with black belt and me wearing a black suit and maroon tie. Pure coincidence… or was it? Another sign that we belonged together? I couldn't say. What I could say was that kiss had erased any question I had of whether our first kiss had been as electrifying as I remembered or if I had just built it up in my mind. That kiss under the mistletoe left me stupid, stumbling and wanting more – the same as the first.

That same Christmas Eve, Parker and I had set up and decorated a Christmas tree outside the prison fences for Bones and her family.

Good times.

I realized I had missed doing those little things for Bones, to comfort her or for no other reason than to make her smile. I can still remember the look in her eyes when I'd given her Jasper after a difficult day. I'd been proud of myself, giving her exactly what she needed when she needed it.

A hard tug on my line drew me away from my thoughts. It was a battle to bring that fish in, a blue catfish long as my forearm, and I could still hear it flopping around in the cooler, determined to get away. He'd put up a good fight, but out of the water a fish can only last so long. We'd eat good, but I cast the line again anyway.

In the weeks before Bones had left for the Malapeepee Islands and me for Afghanistan, I'd seen the changes in her. At first, I hadn't been sure if I wasn't – what does Sweets call it?... transferring – transferring my feelings to her and imagining the sadness I'd seen in her eyes in rare, unguarded moments. But, like I'd failed to realize how much I'd demanded of her when I told her I wanted to give us a chance, my own emotions were reeling and I didn't grasp the importance of those times. It wasn't until Taffet's trial that I started paying close attention.

For the first time in years, Bones and I had not driven to the courthouse together. When she arrived, I hustled to catch up with her.

"You okay, Bones?"

"Of course. Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, we're about to go head-to-head with the woman who tried to kill both of us."

"So are you. Are you okay?"

"Sure. Yeah, yeah. I'm just checking in. Just want to make sure you're okay and if you need anything, I'm—"

"It's just another case, Booth."

Of course, it hadn't been 'just another case.' We'd each been a victim of the Gravedigger and two of the very few who survived the psychopath's murderous reign. Maybe it was because it was the Gravedigger that I started stepping out from behind my own feelings and really seeing that Bones was struggling. Or maybe it was the way she'd arrived cool and composed at the courthouse… too cool and composed. I'd been to war and had faced death on more than one occasion, but this case had me wringing my hands as we walked through the courthouse hallways. Then, as we'd sat next to each other in the court room, it was impossible not to notice how wound tight Bones was and when Taffet challenged her?

"You're so brilliant, Dr. Brennan. Why couldn't you find something as simple as the number?

It's not the first time a criminal has thrown down the gauntlet and dared Bones to get them if she could. In the past, she'd risen to the challenge without a blink of an eye. But not with Taffet. No, she had shaken Bones' confidence in a way I had never seen before. As we sat in Bones' office searching file-after-file, box-after-box of evidence and records trying to find this number, I realized how much crisis she was in and alarm bells sounded.

"What if her dispassion makes her more logical? What if that gives her an advantage over me?"

"Wait a minute. Now you're upset because you're not more like a psychopath?"

"I just think maybe I've lost my advantage because of all the people I'm involved with now. All of the relationships… they complicate logical thought."

She was looking for a reason to push everyone away so she could retreat back into the person she'd been before we met. Now, when I looked into her eyes, I had no question that the sadness I'd seen in them had been real and she was hurting as much as I was… maybe even more. I hadn't given her the credit she was due. Five years before, she'd never have noticed the distance I'd been putting between us and even if she had, wouldn't have cared. But that was then and this was now. She'd changed. She was more observant of people's personal interactions… especially when it came to me and her.

Staring at her, I could hear Pop's reminding me…

"Shrimp, if you get so wrapped up in what you're feeling that you can't see what's happening to the people around you, you'll be no good to yourself or anyone else.

He'd sounded so sad when he'd spoken those words that I couldn't pretend not to know he was talking about him and my father… my father and me. My anger at my father was like a living, breathing thing in the months after Pops had taken Jared and me away. Our trip to Florida had helped to lessen it a little bit, at least while we were gone, but when we'd gotten back home, I was consumed by it. More than once, I'd laid into Jared for crying that he wanted to go home. I didn't understand it. It had felt like a betrayal. How many beatings had I taken in Jared's place? Then, one night I'd lost it, screaming at Jared to grow up and realize our father never wanted us, didn't give a damn about us and I'd wished the man dead. I'd left Jared in our room, sitting in a corner, legs pulled up to his chest, hands over his ears, rocking and crying. I ran into Pops only a few steps out our bedroom door. He didn't yell at me or raise a hand to me. It had been worse… far worse. He hadn't minced words, telling me he was disappointed in me, then had said those word to me… words that have followed me through my life, guiding me, making me a better man.

It was because of those words that I scrambled to find a way to make things better for Bones, beginning when I'd dropped my own attempted murder charge against the Gravedigger, allowing us to focus solely on the little boy's remains we'd found. And, that night I'd appeared at her apartment, hoping the news would provide her some relief and to assure her that Taffet had underestimated her. It hadn't really done the job, the sadness in her eyes even more pronounced as time ticked by. That night, I'd come to really understand that I was watching her break before my eyes. When she'd told me…

"I have nightmares, Booth…"

Her world was spinning out of her control and—

"Ah, damn," I say aloud, lunging out of bed. I search the floor for the sweats and t-shirt she'd peeled off my body earlier and put them back on, then shrug into my robe, one of a pair that had been hanging in the closet waiting on us when we arrived.

It's a really great robe.

Her words play over-and-over in my head, like a scratched vinyl record, permanently stuck on one track. How could I have missed it? I berate myself as a glance in the darkened bathroom shows she is not in the room. Last night I'd just assumed her nightmare was about Vincent's death and tonight? Well, I hadn't pursued tonight at all, assuming she was still trying to process watching her squintern die right in front of her. Only it hadn't been the English squintern's name she'd been mumbling in her sleep.

It had been mine.

"Where's Booth? Booth! Booth?!"

"Bones." I call out her name as I enter the living area of the suite.

Bones is nowhere to be found. I check the second bedroom and bathroom, as absurd as that might be, and find they are also empty.

I'm at a loss and more than a little concerned. Where could she have gone at this time in the morning? I double back to the bedroom and it's then that I realized the terrace doors that had been open all night are now closed. Crossing the room, I quietly open one side of the doors and step through…