"Well if it is her…" Tempe continued, "I will do everything in my own power to bring the bastard who did this to her to justice. He will meet his maker don't you worry about that". With that Tempe instructed the Medical Examiners and the FBI agents on scene to deliver the body to the Jeffersonian for her to analyse it later, in the mean time, Booth's distantness worried her. He wasn't normally like this; uncomfortable around a crime scene, he normally cracked sarcastic jokes or made witty remarks, today he wasn't himself. Body analysis can come later, she thought to herself, right now this is Booth time, she had to get him home, or rather back to her place.
As she walked to her car, Booth was leaning against the front, looking anxious and again, fidgety.
"Are we going now?" He said.
"Yeah we are, you ready?"
"I thought you'd never ask. I don't know what it is Bones, but today I don't really feel like looking at human remains" He told her.
"Yeah some days I'd rather not either, but it's my job to find these people an identity and give their families closure"
"No it's not that, I don't know, I'm just not in the mood" he said.
"Booth what's been happening lately" she asked him.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean first I find you with a hangover and smelling like Tequila, next you walk into my office with a bullet in your arm. I've got to start asking questions. I'm worried about you that's all"
He looks into her deep gaze and turns away.
"I'm fine Bones" he said. That was the usual Booth method of avoiding a subject of conversation about his personal life. He could have said "Piss off" for all she cared.
Tempe felt like giving up on quizzing Booth about his "Un-Booth-like" behaviour. He was always such a mystery, was she ever going to break through the shield he had put up in defence? This is so ironic, Tempe thought; usually I'm the one with the defence shield.
She tried one more time to get through to him, If he doesn't open up this time I should try plan B, she said to herself. She didn't really have any ideas to what exactly plan B was. I'll get there, she said in her head. Eventually.
"Please Booth, please tell me what's wrong, it'll help if we talk about it, trust me" She looks at him and followed his gaze to the back of the Coroner's van, which was a black van with no windows in the back doors, only in the driver and passenger side doors, though they were tinted so it was almost impossible to see in from the outside.
"It's my sister" he said finally, disturbing the invisible silent void between them.
"Your sister?"
"That body in the tunnel, that's Lucy".
Tempe stared after the departing Coroner's vehicle; she felt her heart sink deep into her stomach, being attacked by stomach acid, and making its way up her esophageus and into her throat, making her feel like she wanted to vomit. She suddenly felt all the pain Booth was feeling, it was almost as if she was a part of him, sharing his pain.
While she was empathising with Booth, another thought suddenly resurfaced in her twisted mass of brain tissue and nerves; If that woman in the storm water drain is Lucy Booth, I can now end Ange's grief and tell her that her cousin isn't the woman found in the storm water tunnel by a group of teenagers.
Now more than ever, Tempe felt anger wash over her and blood rush to her head like the mercury in a thermometer on a hot day. She felt hot too; hot, red and angry. Angry that the sick lowlife that committed this crime was still out there, maybe taking more innocent lives. I have to take this sonovabitch down, she said to herself, making a pact and a solemn promise to Booth that she'd give this monster the punishment he deserves.
"Let's go" she said. "I think we've both had enough for one day" that was an understatement. Booth and Brennan both got into Tempe's rusted mustang, Booth taking the passenger side, Tempe driving. She just wanted to get out of that depressing scene. She decided the only remedy for grief right now is a few stiff drinks on the rocks, and she knew Booth was thinking the same thing.