A/N: I'm glad you liked the last chapter. Get the answer to your question in this one.

Rating: Something else new for me. The beginning of this chapter is a near M. But since I can't really change the story's entire rating just for one chapter, you have been warned.

Disclaimer: Also, I own nothin' except Ryan and the Bradford kids.

"Don't worry Booth." Temperance said, exasperated.

Booth chuckled sarcastically.

"You don't want me to worry? Temperance, can I remind you everything that has happened over the last few days? First there was this call in the middle of the night from some unknown person and today you receinve an e-mail with a picture of a badly beaten body on it. Do you even know who it was anyway?"

"I don't discuss ongoing investigations." Temperance replied, hoping to change the subject.

The body was badly beaten and beyond recognition but a FBI coroner had analyzed the picture and, much to Temperance's own conclusions, the doctor had come up with an eight- or nine-year-old girl. Immediately all thoughts were turned to Melina, the last of the two victim in the Bradford children disappearance. Ryan and Temperance had exchanged opinions and they had both agreed that time was running out. Either this was a picture of a dead Melina or she was still alive somewhere in the city, with only a few hours to live. Ryan had then jumped on his cellphone and dialed the number to St. Sebastian's. Another interview with Allison would be necessary and was scheduled for the next morning.

Booth's eyes followed his wife as she got ready to go to bed. He watched as she took off her shirt and bra and he groaned in response. Temperance turned around.

"What?" she asked, teasingly.

"You're so hot."

"Careful, Booth. You're drooling."

"So I am. I've done worst over your body."

Temperance felt her cheeks burn. She couldn't believe that, after all these years, she still wasn't used to Booth getting a little dirty with her. She watched as his eyes grew darker in lust for the fourth time in four days.

She resumed getting ready for bed, pulling on a tank top over her and climbing into bed beside her husband. The second her head hit the pillow, she reached for the lamp beside her bed and turned it off. The room was thrown in absolute darkness. She felt someone towering over her and, seconds later, felt lips on her neck. She immediately ran her hands through her husband's hair.

"Does this mean we can try for a third baby?" she asked, hopeful.

"Nope." Booth replied before kissing his way down to her throat. "But we can practice making one."

The ring of her cellphone rose Temperance from her slumber. Reaching out for it, she snatched it from the nightstand and checked out the caller ID. She sighed in frustration. It was the private number again. She set it down back on the nightstand and turned on her side. Snuggling against her husband, she tried to fall back asleep but her mind was now fully awake. She thought of the unknown number. Who could be calling her?

She looked up at the clock in front of her. It was a little past five in the morning. Who would even be up at this time of day? A weird feeling crept through her. Someone who wouldn't want to get caught maybe.

Sighing, she gave up trying to fall back asleep. She got up, wrapped her bathrobe around her and walked out of the room. The hallway was quiet and the only sound was made by her bare feet on the hardwood floor. She quietly made her way downstairs, checking in on her twins as she passed in front of their respective bedrooms.

In the kitchen, she began preparing the morning's coffee. As she mechanically went around her kitchen, her mind was thrown to the case and the mysterious things that had happened over the last few days. The picture in the e-mail had been chilling. Ryan's gut had told him that the girl was Melina but even though his gut feeling had then been comfirmed by the coroner's examination, Temperance chose not to believe it. If the little girl on the picture had been in fact Melina, then the little girl was in great danger, if she hadn't died from her injuries already.

If it were in fact Melina, new questions now arose: where was she? Was she okay now? Was she dead? Where was she kept? Who was her abductor and why had she been kidnapped? Her little brother had been found in a local park. Would Melina undergo the same fate?

She fixed herself some breakfast and ate it silently, enjoying her moment of tranquility and solitude. She was rarely ever alone anymore. When she wasn't surrounded by her colleagues at work, it was her kids who kept her company at home. Moments of silence like she was experiencing this particular morning came seldomly. She welcomed it with open arms.

After breakfast, Temperance realized that it was nearly six-fifteen. Forty-five more minutes and her kids would be up, demanding food and eating it so quickly that their mother would fear a stomach ache. She'd have less than fifty minutes to make them eat, dress the both of them, comb her daughter's wild hair and make them brush their teeth. There was just something between children and toothbrushes. The two of them just didn't seem to get along.

She cleared the table and set down her empty plate in the sink. She trotted back upstairs and to her room, grabbing a towel from the pantry on her own. Locking herself in her bathroom, she turned on the water and climbed in the tub for a very warm shower.

Twenty minutes later, she was stepping out of the shower and into a very foggy bathroom. The door was ajar making Temperance believe if Booth was already up and had come into the bathroom. Wrapping a towel around herself, she opened the door and stepped in the cold of her room.

Her bed was empty and Temperance could hear a faint noise coming from the kitchen. Booth was awake. He had probably peeked in to see if she had been in the shower before going downstairs to fix himself some breakfast.

She dried her hair before getting dressed. She looked at the clock: 6:50. Might as well head from Lukas's room to wake him up. It would take ten minutes to drag him out of her bed anyway.

Her son's room was quiet and dark when she walked in. She could hear the boy's steady breathing as she walked past his bed to flip the drapes open. A ray of sun entered the room. She sat down on the bed and gently rocked her son.

"Lukas." She whispered. "Sweetie, it's time to get up."

Her son rolled onto his stomach, mumbling some incoherent sentence. She tried again.

"Come on Sweetie, you don't want to be late for school."

Still nothing.

Why must you be like your father? She thought.

Booth, just like his son, was a heavy sleeper.

Temperance shook him a little rougher. Two little eyes opened and Lukas turned to face his mother. Everything was blurry but three or four blinks took care of the situation. He smiled at his mother.

"Dad usually wakes me up." He whispered in a groggy voice.

"Not this morning." Temperance said, kissing his temple.

"I'm glad it's you Mommy." The child replied, smiling sleepily at his mother.

Temperance felt her heart beat quicker. She stood up before the tears that threatned to fall did just that.

"I'll go wake up your sister. I'll be back in two minutes."

Lukas nodded before closing his eyes shut. Temperance hoped that he wouldn't fall back asleep.

Two breakfasts, two school buses and thirty minutes later, Temperance was walking down the halls of the Medico-Legal Lab. Her cellphone rang just as she was stepping through the sliding doors.

"Booth." She stated.

"Are you the lab?" Ryan's voice asked her.

"I just got here."

"Good. Meet me in the parking lot in five minutes."

"Why?"

"We're going back to St. Sebastian's to talk to Allison."

"She's not going to talk to us."

"We'll just have to see about that."

St. Sebastian's hadn't changed since their last visit. As they waited in the waiting room once again, Temperance still thought that if she was quiet enough she would hear some kind of chanting. She listened carefully but nothing except silence reached her ears.

It didn't take as long for a teacher to bring the child and to them and, just like they had done the last time, Ryan led them into the teacher's lounge. Pulling a chair, Temperance and Ryan took a seat across from Allison. The child looked at them with neutral eyes.

"Allison, you must know why we're here?"

The child nodded.

"And you must think that you've answered all of our questions the last time we came, right?"

The little girl nodded once more.

"There's one tiny question you didn't answer and that we desperately need to know."

Allison said nothing.

"You already told us," Ryan went on, "that what you said was everything that you knew but we have reasons to believe that you know more than you told us."

Still nothing. Ryan sighed.

"You have to talk to us, Allison. We need to find out what happened to Carl and Melina."

The child nodded but said nothing.

"What are you afraid of?" Temperance asked, gently.

Allison looked down at her hands.

"Are you afraid that whoever kidnapped Carl and Melina is going to come back to hurt you?"

It was a long shot but it was worth the try. Allison said nothing but she shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Temperance looked at her partner. Bullseye.

"He's not going to hurt you." Temperance assured her.

A tears trailed down Allison's face.

"Tell you what." Ryan said, standing up and walking to the other side of the table.

He sat down on a chair beside the child's.

"What if I brought you back to my work and we can talk more privately there. You'd be safe to tell us what you know."

Allison shook her head.

"I don't want to." The child murmured through her tears.

"What if I took you?" Temperance asked.

The child looked up and the tears stopped.

Ryan wrapped up the interview with a promise to the child that they would come back for her the following day. As the three of them walked out of the room, Ryan noticed a man standing not too far from the lounge. He almost swore that he had seen a knowing look between Allison and the stranger as she walked back to her class. The man came out of the darkness.

"Agent Longström?" the man asked.

"I'm sorry. You are?"

"We met last week. I'm James Collins."

Ryan nodded.

"Right. Melina's former teacher. You know, every time we come here for a visit we always end up bumping into you. How about a little routine questioning in the teachers' lounge?"

The man agreed. Temperance followed her partner and the teacher back into the room. They took their same spot and Ryan began the questioning, noting every little thing in his black notebook.

"How long have you known Melina?"

"Since her first grade."

"And what grade was she supposed to be in right now?"

"She would have started her third one."

Ryan nodded.

"I thought you weren't investigating Melina's disappearance." Mr. Collins said, looking alternatively between Temperance and Ryan.

"We're not but it doesn't change the fact that she has disappeared and that her brother has died. We have reasons to think that Melina could have been the victim of the same crime."

"What makes you think that?"

"That's really none of your business, Mr. Collins."

The teacher nodded.

"We heard that you two were really close."

"Of course. She was like my little girl."

Ryan raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Like your little girl?"

"I don't have children, Agent Longström."

"First of all, how do you know my name? I don't think we ever formely introduced each other."

"You're Brandon's father."

Ryan nodded, knowingly. His son, of course. But how Collins had figured that out was still a mystery for the father. He'd ask his son about the teacher tonight.

"You were saying?" Ryan said, wanting to divert the conversation from his son.

"I don't have children and Melina became my little protegée. Her father isn't a good male figure and I volunteered to help on that aspect."

"How close were you with her?"

"Are you implying something, Agent?"

"I'm not implying anything, Sir. I'm just asking a few formal questions, that's all."

Collins nodded, unsure.

"We were very close. The other students got jealous and started calling her a teacher's pet."

"Yet you didn't try to keep a distance."

"At school, I did. I love all of my students the same amount and I didn't want to prefer one of them over the other. At soccer practice, it was a different matter. The kids on the soccer team don't come from this school. I was a little bit more free."

"A bit more free?"

"I didn't have to hide that I liked her a lot."

Ryan nodded. Temperance felt sick just listening to the man.

"Did you know Carl Bradford?"

The man shook his head.

"He was supposed to be in my class this year or so I heard. I guess we won't be coming though."

"Why do you say that?"

"Well he's dead, isn't he? The Feds found him in a local park near the school? It was all over the papers."

Ryan agreed before shutting his notebook closed.

"One more thing, Mr. Collins. Where were you the night of the disappearance?"

"I was at home, watching a movie with my wife."

"Is there any way I can confirm this alibi?"

"You can call my wife. She'll tell you."

Getting up, he thanked the teacher for his time.

"No problem. My students are in phys ed right now."

Standing up, he bid them goodbye before walking out of the room. Temperance and Ryan followed soon after. They walked to the car in silence and Temperance didn't feel safe to talk until Ryan had turned the corner, away from the school.

"What did you think of Collins?" she asked her partner, knowing fully well what he was going to answer.

"I think the man has a lot in common with the children's dad. They are both attracted to little girls."

Temperance nodded, sickened at the thought of what Collins could have done to Melina when he had been more free. She was about to add something else when her cellphone rang. Without looking at the caller ID, she snatched it open.

"Booth."

Ryan turned to look at his partner.

"What's wrong?" he asked, concerned.

Temperance handed him her cellphone in response. Ryan put it to his ear and his heart sped up as he listened to the harsh breathing and the sobbing on the other end of the line.

Oooh what's going on!