A/N: Ok, I have worked through the night just for you folks. See, that's how blooming nice I am! It's now 7.51am and I desperately need a shower. Although I have made a start on the next chapter, I've got a busy couple of days ahead so I can't guarantee when the next update will happen though I promise it will be soon.

Read away, and let's see how many people were actually right with their theories. Thanks as ever to everyone who reviewed. Oh, and so you know, the more reviews I get the more guilty I'll feel if I don't update. So there's your incentive people: review and you get more to read! Don't worry, only a couple of chapters left now.

Temperance Brennan groaned loudly. Slowly, she opened her eyes, doing her best to focus on the room that was spinning around her. Blinking rapidly, she stared straight ahead until the place stopped moving.

Her head throbbing, she tried to sit up, finding it a lot harder than she hoped for with her hands and ankles bound. Eventually, she shuffled into an upright position, leaning her aching back against the wall and was surprised by the strange crinkling noise behind her.

Arching her neck upwards, she saw that the wall was covered in plastic sheeting. Her eyes roamed the rest of the dusty room, finding every wall covered with the clear plastic. Movement caught her eye.

Turning her head quickly to the right, Brennan instantly regretted it. The back of her skull throbbed, sending shooting pains across her temples that created lights which danced across the inside of her eyelids. Taking a deep breath, she steadied herself and attempted to focus on the far corner of the room.

A pile of mismatched clothing was all she could see. Slippers, a hospital gown, a suit jacket, all just piled together in the darkness.

Except the pile was moving.

Straining her eyes, Brennan caught a glimpse of blonde hair and her breathe caught in her throat. Swallowing hard, she whispered as loudly as she dared.

"Katie?"

The shape huddled in the corner jerked at the raspy voice, a pair of terrified eyes slowly revealing themselves from behind the suit jacket.

"Temperance…"

The anthropologist felt a wave of relief surge through her as she smiled at the profiler.

"Yes, it's Temperance. Are you ok?"

The eyes blinked slowly in the darkness as they darted round the room, probably searching for their captors.

"Yeah, I think so. Well, I've been worse…"

Brennan couldn't help but see her hanging from that tree again and smiled grimly.

"Yeah, I suppose you have. Are you restrained?"

The blonde hair rippled in the minimal light as she shook her head.

"No. You?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Can you help me get free?"

"Why?"

Brennan blinked with surprise, her mouth hanging open.

"Because otherwise we can't escape."

Katie let out a strangled giggle.

"Don't be silly, Temperance. We're not going anywhere. We're never going to escape."

A fresh wave of nausea hit Brennan as the sound of Katie's hysterical laughter echoed through the dusty rooms and right through Temperance's heart.

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Booth stared at the scrunched up file in front of him, frowning as he read. Somewhere behind him, Hodgins was searching the lab for any other evidence that may have escaped the intruder's purge.

Skimming the reams of scientific jargon that he would never understand, Booth flicked impatiently through the pages of the file. About to discard it altogether, something caught his eye.

Pulling five sheets of loose paper from the back, he frowned. Doctor Reynolds had computer printouts of the FBI summaries on Agent McAvoy, Joy Marshall, Katie, Nate and Bones.

Hodgins dropped himself on to the stool beside him with a frown.

"What've you got, G-Man?"

"I don't know. Maybe nothing…"

He slid McAvoy and Joy's details across the table for the scientist to examine and returned his attention to the rest. Temperance's face stared back up at him, a ghost of a smile on her lips. His fingers tracing the outline of her jaw, he sighed heavily.

Where are you, Temperance?

Feeling Hodgins's eyes boring in to him, Booth shuffled the pile, pushing Brennan's sheet to the bottom as he cleared his throat. He stared at Nate's information absently. He already knew all of this. He had reviewed the file before ever taking a step inside the interrogation room.

Flicking Nate's sheet to the bottom, he stared down at Katie's photo. The blonde hair pulled in to a tight bun, she looked the consummate professional but there was that ever-present glint in her eye, that hint that she could burst out laughing any moment and show you a real good time.

Booth smiled at the barrage of memories that came flooding back from their time together at Quantico. She was always getting him in to trouble with her hair-brained schemes and bootleg alcohol. It was like being high school kids again.

Booth's smile slipped as he remembered the last time he had seen her, her lips blue and eyes red. Swallowing hard, he tried to focus on the information.

Name: Catherine Anne Harwood, PhD (Katie)

Date of Birth: 5th November 1973

FBI Badge Number: JTT0331613

Current address: Quantico, Virginia

Previous address: 528 Gelson Drive, Washington DC, 20010

Marital Status: Single

Booth paused, frowning down at the file. There was something familiar about the address, something he couldn't quite place.

Hodgins's voice nearly made him jump right off the stool.

"What exactly are we looking for here, Booth? Cos I'm not seeing anything useful."

Booth snapped the cell phone off his belt, punching in the number for the DC field office. Listening as it rang, he glanced at the scientist.

"I think I may have just found something."

The line connected as Hodgins just stared at him, one eyebrow raised questioningly.

"Bobby, I need you to run a check on a DC address for me going back as long as you can. Got a pen? Great. It's 528 Gelson Drive, Washington, zip code 20010. Thanks, I'll hold."

Hodgins folded his arms as he watched the agent in front of him.

"What's so important about that address?"

Booth shrugged, tapping his pen impatiently on the side of the desk.

"I don't know. It just rings a bell with me, that's all. And right now, that's not a good thing."

He blinked rapidly and started jotting down the information that was being recited to him down the line. Suddenly, his eyes went wide.

"Woah Bobby, wait! Run that last name. Yeah, that one. No, I need it now."

Hodgins frowned, examining the glint of fear in Booth's eyes. Suddenly, the agent slumped forward, dropping his head in to his hands as he continued to hold the phone to his ear.

"Any surviving family? Uh huh, right. Thanks Bobby."

He hung up the phone and stared in to the middle distance, his eyes unfocused. Hodgins leaned forward.

"What is it? What's going on?"

Booth blinked rapidly, crossing the room to the computer in the far corner. He quickly entered his username and password, accessing the full FBI records instead of the Cliff Notes versions on the desk.

Hodgins leaned over his shoulder, squinting at the screen.

"Did you find something?"

"I think so, but right now I'm just hoping I'm wrong."

Seeing the name that Booth typed in to the search area, Hodgins nearly fainted.

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Katie had finally stopped laughing, much to Temperance's relief. Struggling with her restraints, she tried to wriggle free to no avail. Sighing heavily, Brennan decided to try her fellow captive again.

"Katie, please. I need your help, I need you to focus."

The huddled form giggled in the shadows.

"Can't focus. Morphine makes everything pretty."

Great, I'm stuck in here with a doped up psychologist…

"Katie, I need you to try to get up and come over here."

The blonde head rose above the crumpled mess of clothes.

"Why?"

"Because I need you to help me get free."

"Why?"

"Because we need to get out of here before they come back."

"Why?"

Brennan tried to swallow back her frustration.

This is worse than trying to hold a conversation with Parker…

"Katie, please, listen to me. I need your help. We have got to get out of here before whoever is holding us captive comes back because they'll kill us."

The huddled form seemed to twitch for a few moments before Katie staggered to her feet. Brennan sighed with relief, watching as the profiler wobbled there before crossing the room slowly.

Stopping right in front of her, Brennan looked up at Katie. Her face was dirty, her hair dishevelled, the angry red mark still prominent round her neck. Swallowing hard, Brennan offered a grim smile.

"Can you help untie me?"

Katie stared down, her head cocked to one side. Slowly, a smile spread across her face as she shook her head.

"No. You can stay down there with the rats and the worms."

Brennan blinked, not understanding what was going on.

"Katie, I need you to…"

The blonde cut her off with a wave of her hand as she sneered down at her.

"I need this, I want that. Well, boo hoo for you."

She crouched down in front of the anthropologist, their faces just inches apart.

"I'm sorry Temperance, but your time's up. There's a cost for the things you've done."

Katie straightened up with a grin. Somewhere nearby, Brennan heard a door slam. She was tempted to scream but the glint of the knife in Katie's hand quickly drove that idea from her mind. The blonde's smile widened as she pointed the blade directly at Brennan's throat.

"There's always a cost, Temperance. And now you pay."

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Booth entered the name Howard Epps in to the FBI search engine, praying he was wrong. Hodgins squirmed beside him.

"What the hell are you looking up Epps for?"

Booth clicked on the button next to known accomplices. A list of names popped up and he scanned the list, eventually clicking on the name Gil Lappin.

"Who's Gil Lappin?"

Booth stared at the screen. Under the banner word 'Deceased' there was the regular information. He quickly found the address, mumbling it aloud.

"528 Gelson Drive, Washington DC."

Hodgins frowned.

"But that's the address you just told your FBI guy to check. What the hell is going on?"

Booth scrolled down to the family information, clicking on Lappin's younger sister and only sibling. A file appeared, claiming that Anne Catherine Lappin was dead, killed in a tragic automobile accident. Except he knew the face in the photo. Hodgins's eyes widened.

"Is that Katie?"

Booth just nodded, his mouth dry.

"Doctor Reynolds must have figured it out. That's why they took all the evidence."

Hodgins nodded, his conspiracy-fuelled brain kicking in to action.

"So Katie wasn't abducted from the hospital room, she left all on her own. It would have been easy for her to kill Agent McAvoy seeing as they were close friends, and she was in charge of the lecture arrangements so she had access to the hall. As for Joy Marshall, well what girl would suspect your pretty blonde teacher to be a murderer?"

Booth nodded, his heart racing.

How could I not have seen this? How could I not have stopped it? What happened to my instincts?

Hodgins was staring at him.

"How did you remember that address?"

Booth blinked rapidly.

"He had the traditional serial killer wall of death in the basement. You don't tend to forget those."

Hodgins was shaking his head as he began pacing up and down the room.

"But she had to have help, right? Is that where Nate comes in?"

Booth shrugged.

"I honestly don't know. Maybe he's guilty of nothing but being a royal pain in the ass."

"But you found Katie basically dead and hanging from a tree! Why would she do that to herself? Unless she knew you were coming... Waiting up that tree would have given her the perfect vantage point to see you and Doctor Brennan's arrival. All she had to do was jump at the right moment and she knew you'd find her in time. That's an excellent double bluff, throwing us all right off the scent and straight on to Nate."

Hodgins stopped pacing, staring Booth straight in the eye.

"But why is she doing this? Why has she been playing all these games with Doctor Brennan? I mean, she must have faked her death years ago to get in to the FBI. Nice security checks there by the way."

Booth pointed at the computer screen.

"She probably did it the first time her brother got arrested. Something like that wouldn't exactly help your application, especially when your old man's a convicted master forger too. It was probably him that sorted out all her new documentation, birth certificates and alike."

Hodgins shrugged.

"Ok, so she fooled the system. That's great and all but it doesn't explain why she's so intent on taking down Doctor Brennan."

Booth felt his palms turn clammy.

"Her brother, Gil Lappin, the one with rap sheet? He was Howard Epps's accomplice. He murdered Sarah Korskoff and would have killed Helen Majors too if you hadn't pointed me and Bones in the right direction."

Hodgins eyes widened as he stared at the computer screen.

"Oh God, does that mean…? He's…?"

Booth nodded slowly, his stomach churning.

"He's the man that Temperance shot to protect me. He's the man she killed."

A/N: Here's a little nugget for you, fact fans. Katie Harwood's FBI badge number is the same as Dana Scully's on The X-Files. And, after much pausing of the episode, I can assure you that Lappin's address is the one that Booth and Bones really do go to in 'The Blonde In The Game'. Oh, and her birthday's November 5th cos that's my birthday... Yes, I really am that sad. Say thank you with reviews!