A/N: Part 3

Sorry, folks. I had shoulder surgery late last week and haven't finished the chapter, what with the hospital and the pain meds. Here's the little bit I did manage to get done. It's not my intention to string you along with repeated cliffhangers—this is just all I can manage right now. Again, I promise this will not be an endless fic. I have a clear ending in mind and, as soon as I'm back on my feet again, I'll write it.

Thanks so much to everybody who reviewed the last chapter. Reading the reviews made me feel a lot better after being sliced and diced and subjected to physical therapy.

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Brennan glanced down. Her happy evening evaporated in the space of time it took her to notice the red stain suddenly adorning her left breast. She covered herself with one hand and pushed back from the table.

Booth jumped up from his own chair. "Bones—"

She hurried towards the bathroom, avoiding him as he reached out to grab her shoulder. Stepping inside, she shut the door firmly behind her and pulled off her shirt, wincing at the sting as her stitches shifted with the abrupt motion. That had to have been what caused the bleeding—the wrestling for the iPod.

"Bones?"

She stared at herself in the mirror. The previously white bandage was now lightly spotted red. It wasn't a great deal of blood—if she'd been wearing an actual bra instead of just the thin shelf built into the tank top, it would have prevented the stain from leaking through.

"Bones, say something."

She remembered the doctor's instructions. Bleeding is rare. If it does occur, lie down, remove the bandage, put three fingers on the wound and apply pressure for 10 minutes.

"I'm coming in on three if you don't say something."

Brennan reached back and locked the door. "I'm fine, Booth."

He rattled the doorknob angrily.

"Please go away." She applied pressure to the wound and carefully lowered herself to the floor. The bathroom was large and there was ample room for her to lie down with her head cushioned on a clean towel.

"Don't lock me out, Bones." The doorknob rattled again. "What the hell is going on?"

"I can't do this right now." Brennan closed her eyes, feeling the cold of the floor seep into her bare skin. "Go home, Booth. I promise, I'm in no danger."

"Bones! I swear, if you don't open this door, I'm going to kick it in."

"Then you will hit me with it, which will not help the situation. Please stop talking. I need to count to 600."

"I'm freaking out over here, Temperance. Open the damn door."

"I'm freaking out in here too!" she shouted, feeling her self-control start to slip. "You're not helping me by panicking." Fear, which she had managed to hold at bay for days, seeped under her skin. "Go away. I need to be alone, so I can count."

There was a long silence, so long that she thought he might have actually left. Confused by the sudden swell of grief—she had told him to go, after all—she let the tears finally fall, grateful for the slight warmth as they slid down her cold skin.

"I'll count with you. What number are you on?"

"I don't know!" The tears flowed faster as she realized he was still in her apartment. She wasn't alone. Not completely. "You keep interrupting."

"Start at 600 again. Ready? Go. 600. 599."

"If you're going to insist on staying, just set the timer on your cellphone for 10 minutes." She brushed away tears impatiently, even though the gesture was entirely futile. Everything she'd been holding back was finally beginning to escape, in the form of saline catharsis. "Hurry up."

"It's set. Now can I come in?"

"I can't move for 10 minutes, so I can't unlock the door yet."

"I can shoot the lock off."

"Don't. You would be required to fill out paperwork for discharging your weapon, which you hate. And I would have to purchase a new lock." Reflexively, she draped her shirt over her bare chest. "I don't want you to see me like this."

"See you like what?" He sounded very near, as though he was leaning his head against the door. "At least tell me what's wrong."

She was too tired to keep holding him at bay. "The last part of my imperviousness was physically stripped from me this morning."

There was another long pause. "The elevator."

"Yes." She wasn't certain why she had chosen that particular metaphor.

"I remember. But I don't know what that means in this context."

Brennan exhaled wearily. "How much time is left?"

"8 minutes, 37 seconds. Bones. Just tell me. What happened this morning?"

"I feel naked. Unprotected. I dislike the feeling intensely."

"I'll protect you, Bones. That's my job as your partner. But I need to know who the enemy is in order to take him out."

Brennan almost smiled at the thought of Booth taking on her immune system with a sniper's rifle. "You can't protect me from this. I won't have the results for at least 24 hours. And it may be nothing."

"The results of what? Bones, why the hell are you bleeding?"

"Are you still angry? At Hannah, I mean. Women. Me."

A heavy thud sounded against the door, which she suspected was either his fist, or his head, dropping heavily against the wood.

"No, I'm not angry, Bones. I haven't been angry for a long time. Actually, I think maybe I was angrier at myself than you or Hannah."

A knot she hadn't been aware existed in her throat unwound itself, letting loose another flood of tears. "I'm vulnerable and you're not angry anymore. Do you think that means maybe—" she swallowed a particularly hysterical sob—"Maybe we can be together now?" As quickly as she formed the words, she regretted them. "I realize, of course, that your feelings may have—"

"If my feelings had changed, I wouldn't be standing out here with my finger on my sidearm's safety. I'm seriously about to blow the lock off this door if you don't quit stalling. I want to be with you, Bones. I've always wanted to be with you. I was just too much of a coward to admit it after you pushed me away."

She cried harder at the memory, and at the thought that she might get another chance. "How much time?"

"6 minutes, 4 seconds. Bones …"

It was a relief to finally tell somebody. "I had a biopsy done last week on an enlarged lymph node in my axilla and a large lump in my left breast. The first biopsy came back uncertain, so they did a second one this morning."

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Some of you inquired what the song in the last chapter was. It was Heart's All I Wanna Do (Is Make Love to You). Also, in case you're wondering where the idea for this fic came from, my friend Rose was diagnosed with breast cancer a couple weeks back, and she requested a story with this plotline. My intention is to carry this story through to the diagnosis and then let readers' imaginations take it from there. Sorry again for the delay, and thanks for your patience with me.