"This man is armed and extremely dangerous. We proceed with the utmost caution. Remember, we want him alive if possible, but our goal is rescuing Dr. Brennan and Miss Montenegro. If you get a chance to save either of them by taking a shot at him, take it. Ask questions later." I command my four fellow agents. I give them the nod and two of them break down the door to Emmett Westasp's florist shop. They follow me in, guns drawn.
"Mr. Westasp? It's Booth! The FBI's with me and we're here to serve the warrant for your arrest!" I call, knowing the bastard will know who I am. I hear nothing but dripping water as I make my way through the humid room. It smells rank, like he uses some special kind of fertilizer or something. With how many flies there are buzzing around and how huge all the plants are, it wouldn't surprise me.
They are plants everywhere, mostly ferns and tropical flowers. Big things that are hard for FBI agents to see around and easy for sociopaths to hide in for an ambush. Very comforting.
We make our way through the store, to the back room, behind the counter. I flash a flashlight through the doorway before I enter. I almost gag at what the light reveals. A girl, about 12 years old, maybe a year older or younger, bound and gagged, is curled up on the floor, eyes staring up at us. Blood drips from her face onto the dirty concrete as flies buzz around us. Her blonde hair is stained with blood, her blue eyes glazed, tearstains still on her face, cutting through the grime that coats her head to toe. Her clothes are frayed, like the other girls' were after being captives for weeks.
But the worst part is the blood. It's all over her. I hear a few muttered "Aw, Jesus"s and move to crouch and look at her better. I squeeze my eyes shut as I recognize her. Dana Finn, the little girl whose parents got the FBI involved, has finally been found. After four weeks for her being missing, they'll finally have an answer to what happened to her. Her eyes stare up at me as the dripping continues.
"Booth, perimeter's clear. He's not here." Drip. Drip. Drip.
"Check for signs of him being here, having to leave quickly. It's not his style, He likes to be in charge, to control them…See what you can find. And have someone call the Jeffersonian. Have them send over a retrieval team. We need this processed ASAP." Drip. Drip. Drip. Counting the seconds.
You Can't. Find Bones. You Can't. Find Bones.
Drip drip. Drip drip. Drip drip. Drip, drip.
And then it hits me. Hodgins is in the hospital. The bug and slime guy, the only one who could possibly figure out where she was, is stuck in a hospital bed, knocked out with pain pills. I stand and flip open my phone, calling Bones.
It takes me until the second ring to realize she won't answer, either.
I hang up. It's hard to breathe again. It must be the plants everywhere.
I dial the Jeffersonian and get Dr. Goodman.
"Hello, Agent Booth. Any new-"
"Nothing on Brennan or Angela, but I need a bug and slime guy for a body at "Fleurs Pour Les Belles." By the way, what the hell does that mean?"
"It's French. Roughly translated, it means "Flowers for the Beautiful Ones.""
"That doesn't fit. If he's leaving flowers for the girls, why haven't we found any? There weren't any at the shack…" I trail off in thought. My eyes wander to Dana's body and it all snaps into place. "Because they were all here. He brought them all here. This is the murder scene where he killed them all. That's why we couldn't find the primary crime scene. We just assumed all the dirt and plants could be found in nature." I glance around, seeing exactly what I now expected. "He's growing grass and weeds exactly like where his shack was." A thought strikes me as I notice the placement of the plants. They are at the edges of the room, sporadically spaced, and in dark cup-things. Those that weren't being lit up by FBI flashlights melted into the darkness, seeming to sprout out of the walls. "It looks like the shack did inside. Can you check the girls' charts and see if any of them were drugged?"
He puts me on hold and checks the files.
"They were all dosed with chloroform, but it was either an extremely low dose or it had been absorbed hours, even a day before their deaths."
I thank him and hang up.
I haven't found Bones yet. But I'm in his head, and there's nowhere left for him to hide.
A/N
Be prepared for an even longer wait.
Reviews make it shorter.