Chapter 14

Brennan thought longingly of a quick meal and an early bed then she arrived back at the lab that evening. She moved the disinterred infant remains and collected samples to a refrigerated locker near the platform. Her desk was the next to receive her attention. She checked messages and prioritized the current projects piled in her in-basket and was relieved there were no new files from the FBI.

That would mean Booth had probably not been in. She had planned to call him when she got home to check on any developments in the case and to fill him in on her day. Early on in their partnership, they had established the habit of speaking most evenings if they weren't actually in each other's company. Her resolve on that front was weakening with every thought. All of her best reasons for keeping their relationship the same had been reduced to momentary fears easily reasoned away. "Oh, stop mooning," she berated herself and refocused with difficulty on the task in front of her.

Before she could let herself go home, she wanted to get a head start on the DNA tests for the two remains. The lab was fortunate to have its own "state of the art" equipment able to perform several of the currently accepted techniques. The only drawback was that the tests were expensive, took time to produce their results and involved reams of paperwork. With her desk as organized as it was going to get, she returned to the storage area to retrieve two samples for testing and completed their accompanying requisition forms. Hopefully the lab staff could get started on the tests first thing the next morning with results by the end of the day.

Of the techniques at her disposal, the logical choice for her purposes was the test that sequenced mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). Mitochondria, small structures within every cell was unique in that it preserved DNA passed along the generations through maternal lines of inheritance exclusively. This would serve to definitively prove if either sample had a familial connection to her mother and to Russ and herself. She was fortunate to already have the genetic sequences for her entire family but, of course, for this test her father's would not be needed.

She had completed the tasks she had felt were most important and was more than ready to go home. She had just grabbed her bag and jacket when her cell phone rang. She dug it out of her jacket pocket. The display told her it was Booth.

"Hey, Bones. Are you home yet or are you still on the highway playing chicken with the truckers?" asked Booth, trying to be humourous.

"Yes, I'm back. Don't know what chickens have to do with it. If you're making a comment on my driving skills, I'm an excellent driver. I'm not the one who has to be constantly reminded to look at the road. Actually, I'm just leaving my office to go home. I'm exhausted and hungry," replied Brennan, stifling a yawn.

She knew, of course, what playing chicken was. She remembered Russ coming home with cuts and bruises a few times when he was 11 or 12. He and a friend had decided it was cool to test their skills in a friendly contest by playing chicken on their bikes. He came home one day with road rash on his chin and a chipped front tooth. As soon as their parents found out, he got grounded for two weeks.. Whenever their father brought up the incident, he liked to call Russ' punishment "stupid tax". Brennan was in full agreement with her parents as she had always found such displays of testosterone pointless and ridiculous.

"Good, I was just on my way home myself with a huge order of Thai...all our favorites. You know how I hate to eat alone. I'll be there in 5 minutes," said Booth obviously pleased to find her back in the city.

"All right, Booth. I'll see you in a few minutes," Brennan said, with a chuckle. She had just enough time to retrieve some paper plates and utensils from the staff lunch room before she recognized the sound of his footsteps approaching her office.

"So, is there anything new with our bomber?" Brennan said as she took the large bag of takeout food from his loaded arms when he entered. She placed the bag on the coffee table and sat on the sofa to unpack its contents. He took off his jacket and laid it over the back of a chair and sat down beside her. They each grabbed a paper plate and proceeded to load them with the aromatic food.

"Well, we got a confession from him for what its worth. All the evidence is fairly conclusive but he refused to say anything to implicate Graves. He said he bought the fingers from an orderly at the hospital but he wouldn't identify who or how he even knew about them. We have him on surveillance video at the hospital a couple days after Graves' so called accident. None of the staff at Graves' residence have identified Walters as ever being a visitor or seen on the premises. We did confirm Walters was "in the system" temporarily in his teens but he wasn't assigned to Graves. We can only assume they had contact. His psych evaluation is scheduled for next Monday. I hope he passes so we can charge him for murder and his other crimes."

After a pause to eat a few mouthfuls, he continued, "He hasn't revealed a specific motive for targeting the bookstore other than practice. He said he didn't intend to kill his cousin but didn't seem too torn up about it. We found that he had a couple of arson charges that got conveniently wiped from his juvenile record. That would have been the only way he got as far as he did with the fire department. Probably family connections helped him along until he got himself kicked out of the department."

A few minutes later while both of them were helping themselves to a noodle dish at the same time, their spoonfuls resulted in being connected by a long section of the same noodle.

"Looks like we have a revival of "Lady & the Tramp," Booth said with his characteristic twinkling eyes and smile.

"You look a little wrinkled, Booth, but I wouldn't describe you as a vagrant," Brennan observed. She simply used a fork to break the adjoining noodle and moved her portion to her plate.

Booth frowned slightly and looked himself over. "That's classic Disney, Bones. Don't tell me you've never seen 'Lady & the Tramp'."

"Yes, Booth, I've seen that movie. I may have been culturally deprived as a teenager but before my parents left I did have a normal childhood, all things considered," she replied. "In fact, that was one of our favorites. I'll bet I know as much about it as you do."

Although chagrined by the reminder of Brennan's difficult teen years, Booth couldn't pass up a challenge. His face took on a sly expression in anticipation of the contest.

"Well, I don't know, Let's see. In fair warning, I'll have to tell you that Parker has recently discoveredthis movie and I've had to suffer throughat least a dozen viewings of itin the last few months," Booth said. He looked at Bones directly and tried to gauge her level of confidence.

"Okay, Here's an easy one. True or false: A man gave his wife a wicker basket containing Lady as a birthday present," Booth started.

Brennan thought for a fraction of a second before saying, "False. Lady was a Christmas present and was wrapped in a large round hat box." Knowing she was right, she went on with her question for Booth. "What kind of dog was Trusty and what was his job when he was younger?"

Oh, oh! She did know the movie. He always appreciated a contest with a worthy opponent.

"Trusty was a bloodhound who worked with his grandfather, Old Reliable as a scent dog tracking criminals through swamps. He had to stop working when he lost his sense of smell," came Booth's correct answer.

His next question was "Who died, Pedro or Trusty, by getting run over by the dog catcher's wagon when they were trying to rescue Tramp?"

"Nobody, Trusty was supposed to but Disney vetoed the scene because of the public response to the death of Bambi's mother. He made the animators include him in the Christmas scene at the end so everyone would know that he had survived." Brennan said easily.

"Ah, hah! Got you!" he said triumphantly.

"That's correct. I know it is," Brennan protested.

"True, but you wouldn't know about Disney's decision by watching the movie as a kid," Booth said, "That means I caught you studying."

"Okay but I always knew he didn't die. I discovered IMDB on the internet a while ago and, yes, I looked it up. What's wrong with that? So how did you know Trusty was supposed to die?" Brennan asked.

"It was in the movie's voice over commentary," he answered sheepishly. He believed that it was "nerdy" to listen to the commentary option on DVD's. In his defense, he said, "Parker was playing with the remote and got the settings messed up. I was working on something in the kitchen so wasn't really paying attention until he asked me to fix it."

Brennan started laughing although her ribs protested her jerky movements.

"Okay, okay, I concede defeat. The next time Parker insists on watching that movie, I'm bringing him over to your place. You have that brand new giant plasma tv I noticed the other night going to waste. I meant to ask you when you got that," Booth said.

"I got it after Christmas. A full set of Disney movies came with the deal so I have been honesty watching them." Brennan explained.

Booth started laughing with her and put his arm around her shoulders. Brennan tried to laugh with him but had to wrap her arms around her ribs.

"Booth, stop...making me laugh...it hurts," she tried to say between giggles and breathing deeply to ease the painful jabs.

Booth leaned towards her, cupped her cheek with his free hand and kissed her gently. He pulled back a moment to let her catch her breath and to look into her eyes for any indication that he should stop. Brennan had felt an electric shock as their lips touched leaving a tingling sensation that spread down her spine. In answer to his unspoken question, she laid her hand on his warm chest feeling his rapid heartbeat before moving it to the back of his neck to pull him closer to continue their kiss. Her other hand entwined itself in his thick hair.

He claimed her lips again hungrily with a moan as if this contact was really the only nourishment he needed and had waited for so long. This time, he could not doubt her level of consciousness. Her passionate response equaled or rivaled his own with an intensity only glimpsed at before during their other intimate moments. His hand moved from her cheek to feel her long hair glide through his fingers.

Brennan had always believed that sexual attraction and love were just the workings of body chemistry but discovered that knowing this did not make her immune to its affect on her. The taste of his kisses and the combined smell of his aftershave, shampoo and his natural musk seemed to be like fuel to a fire inside her. At the moment she didn't care why it worked, just that she felt good and safe and never wanted the feeling to end.

She murmured into his ear, "So much for professional decorum."

Booth chuckled between long passion laden kisses. "So what happened to your reservations about us?" he asked, hoping his question didn't jinx their current closeness.

"I'm still taking them under conditional advisement," she said softly.

"Any conditions I should know about?" he asked with their lips barely an inch apart.

"As soon as I can come up with a condition I can't talk myself out of, I will advise you. I'm still afraid of some of the things I mentioned before but not enough to throw away this chance to be with you," she said with a happy contented smile. "I may not believe in love but it seems to believe in me."

"You know I love you and you have my love as long as I live... but life is hazardous. There are always things I can't control..." he said but was interrupted by a slender finger placed on his lips to silence them.

"I know. I'll take every moment I can have," she said as she wrapped her arms tightly around him and rested her cheek on his shoulder. "That's all I could think about while I was out at Salisbury."

Booth had been expecting Bones to say something about her day but hadn't wanted to ask. She leaned back and Booth reached over to hold her hand.

"You know all those times you or Angela would take me out to visit my mother's grave? I simply went through the motions I thought were expected of me. But truly, I felt nothing different and it seemed that you both thought I was just doing something wrong. I realized today that those times at the grave site, I was thinking of my mother as dead. I mean I was standing on her buried bones. Hell, I had handled all of them. They were just bones like the thousands of others I have held and there was nothing left of who my mother was," Brennan paused, as she wiped the tears that had started to roll down her cheeks. She laughed as Booth helped by dabbing her cheek with a paper napkin.

"Booth, it wasn't until Dad explained their life on that farm waiting for the birth of my sister that I suddenly felt connected to her again in life...her life, not her death. I saw spring flowers that might have been planted by her own hand in a flower bed at the farm house. Dad told us that Mom loved living there and wandered in the woods and grounds of the cemetery every day. It is a beautiful place that overlooks the valley with the mountains in the distance. I could almost imagine her there."

"That little cemetery beside the house wasn't just the place where she buried the baby or where her body was left when she died. It was a place that held a part of her life as well. It was almost like all those years being separated from her were gone and I had just caught up with her. When I left the farm this afternoon, I swear I could feel her love around me. You and Angela were right. You just didn't know the right place was just as important. Oh, and I'm sure you won't be surprised that Anna's picture was a perfect match."

All Booth could do was lean over and kiss her gently and hold her in his arms. He hadn't realized until that moment how much the events of this week had affected him as well. He had started just wanting to be with Bones through whatever happened duringthe aftermath of the explosion. Meeting that extraordinary little girl had gotten to him as well. The message from his grandfather had tested his faith but in a good way. He had trusted for so many years that his blind faith in God was not in vain but, in all honesty, he thought he would have to die himself to get proof that his faith wasn't misplaced.

The focus in recent years had been trying to relieve his guilt and atone for his perceived sins, mostly while he was a soldier. Apart from the birth of his son, he hadn't seen a miracle that proved God existed. A message from a four year old was like getting a telegram from God himself. This revealed a reality he would never have expected and wasn't really prepared for.

Booth suddenly realised that he held a yawning exhausted woman in his arms in danger of falling asleep there. Not altogether a bad prospect but not here in her office.

"Bones, you need to go home and sleep," he said giving her a kiss on the cheek.

Brennan smiled sleepily and got up to clean up the remains of the food, re-packed the leftovers for Booth to take home and threw away the rest. Within moments, they were ready to leave. Booth walked Bones to her car. The cold evening air perked her up sufficiently to be able to drive herself home safely.

They said "Good night" to each other with a kiss. Booth watched as she drove away before getting into his car to head home as well.