Chapter 5: The Body in the Locker

2 hours earlier

The noise of steel grating against steel filled Booth's ears. The gate buzzed and Alexander Krieg trudged in, hands held out in front of him. Booth rounded the interrogation table, motioning for Krieg to sit.

"I pass," Krieg spit out.

"We could be here a while," Booth smiled sarcastically.

Reluctantly, Krieg sat, plopping down in his seat. The chains on his feet drug across the floor, making a clinking sound. Booth opened the folder and started to browse the files.

"Extortion, mob affiliation, black market body parts, malpractice. Geez, where do I begin?" Booth said, playing the part by hyping up the disbelief factor. "Do I add murder to that?"

"I never killed anyone on my table."

"What about off the table, huh? In that shady world you lived in?"

"I want a lawyer if we are going to do this."

"Well you killed your last one didn't you?" Booth said, watching the anger spread across Krieg's face.

"Wow, you will stop at nothing to make you feel all macho."

"I know you killed Christine Brennan," Booth growled in a whisper.

"Prove it," Krieg smiled with amusement.

Booth's jaw clenched and he backed away. Right now, he couldn't. After looking at Christine's file, all he had was the who, not the motive and proof he needed to tie Krieg to the murder. He had nothing and Krieg knew it.

"I thought so," Krieg laughed. "Then we are done. Guards!"

Booth watched as he walked away, silently banging his own head against the wall. His phone sounded, shattering all of his thoughts.

"Booth," he answered.

"You need to get over here quick. I've done something really stupid."

Booth listened as the voice on the phone gave a quick rundown to him.

"I'm going to strangle you Blake!"

Quantico Medical Labs

"I can't believe you got him to sign the papers!" Booth yelled.

Blake watched as Booth paced the floor. Glancing above his head, her eyes watched the minute hand move again. Twenty minutes and counting. He had been screaming at her since he had arrived. Maybe she deserved it.

Moving her eyes to the exhumation request, she stared silently at Russ Brennan's signature and the judge's. Grabbing another document, she moved to the overhead projector and turned it on. She turned off the light and a faint glow filled the room.

Booth kept talking, but not a lot of it registered with her. Something about talking to Cullen, write up and censure, on and on. Nothing new about any of it. It had all been said before. Grabbing a marker, she began to speak.

"Slow down Paco and listen. This is the basic schematic of what an autopsy report looks like upon completion. This..." she said adding a slide "Is the basic protocol and procedure for every autopsy performed by an ME."

They both stared in unison at the list, looking at the notes scribbled in the margin on the projector. She handed him a paper, his eyes questioning her after taking a look.

"That is the example of proper autopsy procedure as I stated. It's thorough and detailed. Here is Christine Brennan's."

Booth looked at the sheet. Parts of it had been pieced together, making it look more like a ransom letter than a report.

"Where did you get this?" he asked.

"Someone went to a lot of trouble to make that look like an official report. It's fake though."

"What?"

"There was never an autopsy done on Brennan's mother. Morris Cavanaugh, the ME that signed this, was later brought forth on faulty work. He was paid off by Krieg, which is half of the reason why both men are in jail right now."

"So where did you get this again?"

"Max Brennan."

"What the hell?"

"Daddy's been in Maine trading stock online. Only now he is Jacob Holmes."

"Witness protection?"

"Yeah. He suspected foul play with his wife and became suspicious, so he went underground so to speak. Russ and Temperance were pulled apart to protect them."

"This is too much at one time."

"There's more," Blake sighed.

Booth winced as she pulled open the locker that she had been standing by, revealing a human skeleton.

"Meet Christine Brennan, I think," Blake announced.

"Shit, you think?"

"No autopsy has been done!"

"I'm not an expert on this stuff, but isn't there supposed to be skin and stuff?"

"Yeah, someone really screwed it up for us. Or so they thought."

"How are we going to determine cause of death now?"

"You have learned nothing from the year you have been working with Brennan, have you? The woman is a miracle worker. She will find something. I know it."

"I can't take this to her!"

Both agents stood silently for a few moments. Booth looked sideways to the body and sighed. Placing his hands on the sides of the gurney, he pushed the bones back into the locker. Not just bones, Booth thought. This is Brennan's mother.

"So what do we do now?" Blake asked. Booth said nothing, instead just stared at the floor.

"Why did you exhume her?" he finally said.

"I thought we get one of our people to take a look at her, see if they can determine the cause of death," she finished.

Booth let out a sarcastic laugh and shoved his hands in his pockets. "Always the one with answers eh?"

"Oh right!" Blake exclaimed. "You've forgotten that we have a division like that. We are sort of a jack of all trades, us FBI folk."

"I guess you could say the turnover rate isn't as good. Or as quick."

"What? You mean the time it takes for them to finish a case or for you to get into Brennan's pants?"

"Take that back! I told you to never say anything like that about her again!"

"I'm all for helping people Booth, but you've turned this into a crusade. And you are dragging me along too."

"You are the one running around digging up bodies and talking to people's vanished fathers. Then you walk in here and insult me about Brennan."

"I did all of this to help you, and Brennan, as hard as that may be to believe."

"I'm pulling you off of this," Booth said angrily.

"Yeah and pulling rank that you don't have. Don't worry, I quit," Blake growled.

She threw her pen on the ground and kicked a medical table out of the way. Adolescent b.s. Booth watched her storm out of the room and disappear. He groaned to himself and rubbed his face. Now how was he going to take care of all of this?