Disclaimer: Don't own it yet, but I'll keep you posted

Author's Note: Thanks for all the great reviews! I really appreciate them all. I hope you like this chapter, I tried to proofread better this time, but I'm sure I made some typos, so sorry for that. Hope you enjoy this one! Go ahead and read now :-)

While Temperance and Hodgins were in the lab working with the remains, Booth was in his own office, sifting through a stack of phone messages that had seemed to accumulate overnight. And, in fact, they had accumulated over the night. Most of them were from the press, asking him for details, wanting to set up short interviews, wanting to gain access to the site for photographs. Booth sighed. He hated the publicity that came along with murders. It seemed obscene. He picked through a few of the messages, calling people back to inform them that he would not be giving interviews, and, no, they could not rifle through his crime scene with their cameras. After the fourth call, Booth simply pushed the messages into the trash. He had called enough people now; the rest would get the message.

Booth ran a weary hand over his face. It was only 8:30 in the morning, and already he was tired. With a sigh, he pushed himself up from his chair and retreated from the confines of his office. 'Coffee,' he thought. 'I'll get a cup of coffee, and then I'll get to work on this case.'

He shuffled through the hallway, glancing about at his coworkers as he did so. Although some seemed to be truly engrossed in their work, he noticed that a few moved like him, in a lethargic stupor, obviously wishing that they could be fishing, or golfing, or doing anything that wasn't work. For some inexplicable reason, the fact that his colleagues were also having a hard time starting that morning lent him some comfort.

After pouring his coffee, Booth lingered for a moment in the hallway. He made small talk with a few of the people around him, but for the most part they all just stood quietly, as if they were afraid of getting caught for being away from their desks. Booth sighed. He had work to do, and he knew it, but he also knew that as soon as he sat down to actually start working, his phone would start ringing off the hook with reporters and journalists and God knows who else, asking him questions and just generally interrupting his day. He sighed again. 'Oh well,' he thought. 'There's no getting around it. Might as well just go back and face it.' And with that thought, he turned on his heel and began heading back down the hallway.

Before he had even made it halfway back to his office, he heard a voice behind him, calling his name.

"Agent Booth!"

Booth paused and turned to look for the owner of the voice. Cullen came into focus a moment later, striding towards him. Booth gave the other man a polite nod. "Yes, sir?"

"We need to talk, Booth. In my office," Cullen said sharply. Confused, Booth followed.

They entered Cullen's office a few moments later. Booth stood in front of the desk as Cullen settled into his chair, but when Cullen waved his hand towards the chairs in front of the desk, Booth sat as well.

"We received information on another body this morning," Cullen said, his eyes locking with Booth's. "We're going to need Dr. Brennan to help us ID it."

Booth was momentarily taken aback. "We already have her working on a case, sir."

"We have reason to believe that the body she is already working on is linked to the one we found out about this morning," Cullen answered.

Booth paused. "What basis do we have for assuming that? We don't know the cause of death or ID for the first body."

Cullen lifted a piece of paper off his desk and handed it to Booth. The paper was safely locked in a plastic bag. Booth's eyes briefly scanned the paper. It read: "how dArk tHE graVeyard grows. benEath the surface, because of The Stone, dEad she Lies. MigHty OPhelia, the river washed ovEr, Stealing her away."

Booth glanced up at Cullen who, seeing that Booth was done reading, spoke. "That arrived this morning. It's been checked for prints, but we didn't get anything, at least not yet. The bag is a precaution, but we doubt we'll find anything. Along with it, we got this." Cullen handed Booth another plastic bag with a photograph in it. The picture was of a river. Cullen continued, "when we got this, we sent people immediately to the river to see what was there. That's where we found the second body."

Booth nodded, staring at the letter and picture in his hands. Cullen sat quietly for a minute, but before long he spoke again. "The letter and picture came together in an envelope," he said. "There was no address and no stamp, so it was hand delivered here. And it was addressed to you."

Booth's head snapped up. "Addressed to me?" he asked in surprise. "This case is barely public. No one would know that I'm working on it."

Cullen shrugged. "It wouldn't be that hard to guess. You work with Dr. Brennan, and a case involving a decayed corpse would certainly require her input."

Booth nodded numbly, looking back at the contents of the envelope. "Can I have…" Before he could finish his sentence, Cullen pulled the copies from his desk.

"I've got copies for our people here, of course," Cullen said. "We'll be working on deciphering the message if we can as well, but due to a backup of work, I'm afraid this one is more or less up to you and the good Doctor."

At one o'clock that afternoon, Booth, who had been staring at the letter for the better part of his day, decided to go check on his squints. He pulled his SUV into the Jeffersonian lot just after 1:30 and quickly jogged up to Temperance's office.

She was at her desk when he walked in, her forehead knitted in concentration. He saw her blow out a frustrated sigh and angrily hit the backspace key as he approached the opened door.

"Hey, Bones, did I come at a bad time?" he asked, sticking his head in the doorway.

Temperance looked up from her computer screen quickly, the anger in her eyes rapidly dissipating. "Oh, hey, Booth. No, I was just…typing."

Booth walked fully into her office. "You mean writing?"

"No, 'writing' implies that I was accomplishing something. What I was doing was 'typing', meaninglessly arranging words so that they formed sentences but had no real meaning."

Booth smiled slightly. "If you let me read it, I might be able to help you improve it."

"To late, it's been deleted," she answered.

Booth sighed. "If you don't have confidence in your work, you're never going to get anything done."

Temperance began to look more than a little annoyed at this statement. "Is there a reason you came by, Booth?" she asked, her voice a bit sharper than she intended it to be.

Booth gave her a half smile and dropped the copy of the letter onto her desk. "Yeah, actually there is. This was delivered to my office today, I was wondering if you could help me think of some ideas on what it means."

Temperance, her irritation forgotten, lifted the letter and began to study it. Booth pushed his hands into his pockets, rocking back on his heels as he waited for her to finish reading.

When her eyes lifted back up, the blue irises were filled with concern. "When you said this was delivered to your office…"

Booth tried his best to look reassuring. "It's not a big deal. But the letter did lead us to another body, which it would be great if you could look at, by the way."

She nodded absently. "Where was the body found?"

"In the river."

"Huh," Temperance said, looking back at the letter. "Interesting."

"Interesting?"

Temperance glanced back up at him. "The Hamlet reference. 'Mighty Ophelia, the river washed over, stealing her away.' Ophelia committed suicide in the play by drowning herself."

Booth paused for a beat, suddenly wishing he had paid more attention in English class. "Does that help us at all?"

Temperance shrugged. "I'm not the cop. I don't see how it would, though. You already have the body." Booth nodded, and Temperance continued. "The capitalization seems strange. And why the one bolded letter?"

"I was wondering about that, too," Booth said. "But I'm not coming up with many theories. Well, not many probable theories, anyway. I ran the name 'Ophelia' through a missing person's search, and came up with a few hits. Maybe one of them is our victim."

"Any way of tracking down the author through the typing?"

Booth shook his head. "Not that I can think of. It's in a basic font, available on any computer with even a basic word processing system. Paper is standard, nothing much to go on for a trace."

Temperance nodded, still looking at the letter. A moment later she said, "I don't like this."

Booth gave her a soft smile. "It's nothing to worry about," he said, his voice low and smooth. Temperance knew he was trying to ease her mind, but somehow the sweet sound of his voice didn't make her anxiety go away. Preferring not to dwell, she switched topics.

"When will the body be delivered?"

"Should be getting here soon," Booth said. Almost before the words were out of his mouth, a stuffed up Hodgins appeared in the doorway.

"Dr. Brennan," sniff, "a body just got here."

Temperance immediately pulled on her lab coat and headed out to start going over the remains. Booth followed her, out of her office, and then said his goodbyes as he headed back to his own office. Temperance began organizing the few stray bones into anatomical order on the table, and when she had completed this process, she stepped back to survey the entire set of remains.

The first thing that Temperance noted was that the remains were male. Clearly, whoever this was, it wasn't Ophelia.

Temperance worked with the remains for hours. At 6:30, a very tired Hodgins had announced that he was calling it a night. His skin looked clammy, his cheeks were flushed, and he just generally looked as though he wanted to curl up in a ball and never wake up again. Angela had left a short time later as well, leaving Temperance alone to work in the lab.

At 9:30, Temperance was the only one left working. She studied the remains, soaking in any and all minute details, searching for anything that could appear to be a linking factor. Something about the case was bothering her, something didn't feel right. In some strange way the case felt…familiar.

When Temperance heard the sound of footsteps approaching, she momentarily froze. However, a moment later when Booth came into focus, she relaxed. His tie hung loosely around his neck and the top button of his shirt was undone. Generally, he looked weary.

"Hey, Bones," he said, his voice heavy and cracked with tiredness. "Got anything for me?"

Temperance gave him a small smile. He looked good when he was slightly disheveled, she decided. She felt the sudden urge to smooth is hair and fix his tie. When the realization of the implications of this urge hit her, she quickly averted her eyes back to the bones and began speaking.

"Victim was male, Caucasian, age 37-41. Around 5'9" and 5'11"."

Booth sighed. "Not Ophelia, then?"

Temperance smiled. "Not unless she had a BIG secret."

Booth gave her an appreciative smile. "Thanks, Bones. Really, I appreciate all of this," he waved his hand, gesturing at the table by way of explanation.

"Hey, what are friends for, right?" she said, stripping the gloves off her hands and tossing them into the bio-waste bin that sat nearby.

Booth's heart felt warm in his chest. Friends. Though they never seemed to talk about it out loud, he liked the way that sounded. "Hey, have you had dinner yet?" he asked, his mouth jumping ahead of his brain."

She glanced over her shoulder at him as she pulled off her lab coat. "What did you have in mind?"

"The usual?"

Temperance smiled. "Sure," she answered. "Just give me a few minutes to get my stuff."

And so, Temperance and Booth had a relaxing dinner where they discussed the case and talked over some thoughts on what they should do next. Although they sat opposite one another at a booth, and although there was no move to touch or to make this into anything romantic, both of them felt that something was different tonight. They weren't there as colleagues. They were there as friends.

Before the bill arrived, they had lapsed into conversations about Temperance's writer's block and the rampant cold that was being passed between the squints. When the meal was over, Temperance snagged the bill and paid it, despite Booth's protesting. They headed to the parking lot, where they exchanged a friendly goodnight and climbed into their cars. Both were tired, and although they had enjoyed their time together, both were happy for the silence that came with being alone.

Although Booth ended up turning on the radio when he was halfway home, Temperance made her entire journey in silence. The letter was weighing heavily on her mind. Who had sent it? The logical choice was that it was a message from the killer, but why? And how had whoever sent it known to send it to Booth? Temperance shook her head. It wasn't so strange that the letter had come to Booth; he had solved some big cases, people knew his name, he had been on the news, and it was widely known that he often was involved in cases that would require her expertise. More than likely, whoever had sent the letter had picked his name and gotten lucky. Still, the letter made Temperance feel unsettled. She thought about it the whole way home and through her nightly routine of getting ready for bed.

'Ophelia,' she thought, as she lay in the dark. 'Why Ophelia?' And with this thought, she drifted to sleep.

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