Chapter 5

Booth checked the clock in the kitchen as he retrieved a beer from the refrigerator, noticing that it read 10:30. He frowned; he had expected Brennan home already. She had said two hours, and she rarely ever gave an inaccurate time, but it had been two and a half hours now. He supposed he might be overreacting; she and Angela could have been caught up in conversation or perhaps she had been stuck in traffic (though the bar was not that far from the apartment, so he could not fathom what traffic she might be caught in). He picked up his cell phone, his finger hovering over the first number, torn between her certain annoyance if he was being too protective and a feeling that something was wrong. As always, intuition won out, and he hit the button, listening with a sinking feeling in his stomach as her phone went straight to voicemail, indicating that it was off.

Before he completely panicked, however, he called Angela, knowing that there were plenty of explanations for why her phone was off. Angela picked up on the second ring. "Hello?" she questioned, her speech slightly slow.

"Angela, is Bones with you?"

"No, we left the bar maybe an hour ago or so. Why? Is she not with you?" She spoke faster now, her voice panicked. Booth was beginning to panic as well.

"She's not." Booth swore loudly before lowering his voice, remembering the other occupants of the apartment. "Look, Angela, I need to make a few calls. Think you can meet me at the lab in about thirty minutes with the rest of the team?"

"Of course. I'll see you then." Booth hung up with Angela and was already dialing Charlie as he walked out the door to Mrs. Mitchell's apartment. He hated going over to her apartment so late, but at the moment, he really did not have another option. He needed to find someone to watch the kids while he found Brennan, and she had babysat for them a couple times before and offered to do it again, claiming that she enjoyed having children around again.

As soon as he explained the situation, she readily agreed to come over to watch the kids, and Booth thanked her profusely, quickly grabbing his gun and badge before kissing all the kids as he left, his phone still pressed to his ear. He called in a couple more favors, and two agents and a number of police officers met him outside the bar when he arrived there. It was not long before they discovered Brennan's car, the doors still unlocked and the keys on the ground. Booth swallowed hard, ignoring the bile which rose in his throat. Immediately, he began barking orders, instructing the others to fan out and search the area for any sign of her. He himself glanced briefly around, noticing with some relief that there did not appear to be any blood. Of course, that did not change the fact that Bones, the love of his life and the woman carrying his child, was currently missing.

Leaving the others to search the area, he returned to the bar, asking questions of the bartender and the patrons. Few of them remembered Brennan and Angela, and Booth left the bar more frustrated than he had been upon entering it. Leaving instructions with Charlie to call him if anyone found anything, he drove to the lab, finding all the squints already there. They all looked up at him when they heard him enter, none of them daring to speak. In truth, no one knew what to say; sure, they had faced similar situations. Brennan, Booth, and even Hodgins had been kidnapped before, and they had found them every time. But that did not stop the fear which gnawed at their insides each time one of them went missing or the what ifs that ran through their minds as they considered the possible outcomes of the situation.

It was Angela who first broke the silence, approaching Booth from the platform. Her eyes were red and blotchy, and tear tracts still ran down her cheeks. Her hair was rumpled, her clothes wrinkled, and her make up smeared, but Booth knew she did not care for any of those things at the moment. No, all she cared about was the fact that her best friend was missing. "There was a man at the bar who was hitting on Bren," Angela announced, her voice wavering slightly. "I never got a name, but I drew him. I'm running him through facial recognition software now." She turned over her sketchpad, allowing Booth to see the drawing of Mr. Tall-Dark-and-Handsome who now seemed much more sinister to Angela.

Booth shook his head. "I don't know him. Can you get a copy of this to me? I'll send an agent over to check with people at the bar, see if I can get a name." Angela nodded, already moving away.

"What do you want us to do?" Hodgins asked from the platform.

"Just keep processing evidence," Booth told him. "Agent Treesdale here will take you to the crime scene so you can see if you can find anything that the FBI techs missed. I want everything checked and double-checked. There has to be a clue there somewhere, and I want you guys to find it." They nodded, all moving to work, and Booth ran a hand through his hair in frustration, trying not to imagine what Brennan might be going through. He would find her, no question about it. There simply was not another option.

They were lucky with the picture that Angela drew; one of the patrons at the bar recognized the man and was able to provide a name. And so, at just after midnight, Booth strode purposefully into the interrogation room to face an extremely irritated realtor whose name, Booth had discovered, was Keith Johnson. Booth wasted no time with formalities, knowing that every minute was important. "You were at Billy's tonight," he began. It was not a question, but Keith spoke anyway.

"I was. I didn't know that was a crime."

"Did you see this woman?" Booth slid a picture of Brennan across the table.

Keith looked at the picture, and a grin spread across his face. "Oh yeah, I saw her alright. Tried to buy her a drink, maybe get her name, you know, but she would have nothing to do with me. Why? Is she saying I harassed her or something? Because I swear, as soon as I figured out she wasn't interested, I left."

"She's missing."

"Missing? But I just saw her maybe three hours ago or so."

"Do you have any idea where she might be?"

"No. Like I told you, I left her alone once I figured out she wasn't interested. She was with some other woman. Maybe you should ask her."

"She doesn't know either. She did say, however, that your advances were more forceful than you're making them out to be."

"Look, I asked her if she wanted a drink, she said no. I tried to talk with her a little bit, but she ignored me, talked with her friend for a little while. When she finished her drink, I asked again if I could get her something, but she said no again. I waited a little longer, thinking she might warm up to me, but she was ignoring me, so I left."

"And you didn't try to talk to her again?"

"No. It doesn't happen often, but I know when a woman isn't interested, and she wasn't interested. Why all the questions anyway? You don't think I have something to do with the fact that she's missing, do you?"

"Actually, Mr. Johnson, that's exactly what I think."

"Look, man, I was at the bar until about an hour ago. Ask anyone there." Booth watched him carefully as he spoke, realizing quickly that he was most likely telling the truth. The guy might have flirted with Brennan, but he had nothing to do with her disappearance.

Brennan awoke to find herself on a cold, unyielding surface with a faint metallic taste in the back of her mouth. Her hands and feet were immobilized, and she realized quickly that this condition arose because they were bound together. She tried to swallow, and a sudden wave of nausea rose up. Rolling to the side, she emptied the contents of her stomach onto the floor beside her, coughing and shaking. When she had finished, she rolled away, pulling herself up into a sitting position. Her head swam for a minute, and she thought she was going to be sick again, but the feeling passed.

As the nausea subsided, Brennan looked around at her surroundings. She seemed to be in a small, dungeon-like room with cement floors and no windows. The area smelled strongly of urine and dogs, and she had a moment of panic as she remembered the last time she had been captured and smelled that particular odor. But she fortunately did not hear any dogs barking, so she doubted that there were any around. Perhaps she had mistook another odor for that of dogs; after all, Zac was the one with the highly developed olfactory sense. The room where she sat was dark, but the walls were close enough on all sides that she could see them. Though three were cement, the fourth appeared to be some sort of wire mesh like a cage or something similar with a gate set into it. Before she could move toward it, however, the gate swung open, and a dark figure entered.

"Awake, I see," he remarked. His voice was cold, lifeless, and though Brennan would discount the feeling later as a draft, she felt a chill travel through her. The man approached, crouching down beside her, far enough away that she could not try to incapacitate him. She still could not make out his features clearly in the dim light; in fact, his face seemed to be shifting, changing even as she watched him. Logically, she knew it was simply shadows which gave his face the appearance of changing, but she could not stop the goosebumps from rising on her arms.

"Well, that just means it's time for fun." And with a wide grin that Brennan could make out even in the dim light, he stood, bringing his leg back. She knew what was coming even before he swung the foot, and fear coursed through her. She tried to move away from him, but the space was small, and he was much quicker without the bonds to contend with. Backing her into a corner, he brought his foot back again. "Oh, yes, I'm going to enjoy this very much," he remarked, his foot swinging forward and connecting solidly with her torso. Rib number six, Brennan thought to herself, attempting to keep her mind off the stinging pain. His foot struck again, this time on rib seven. Neither blow was hard enough to break her bones yet, but Brennan knew those blows would come. He pulled his leg back again, aiming lower this time.

"I'm pregnant," Brennan said quickly. "Please, don't hurt my baby."

The man smiled wider at this. "Oh no, we wouldn't want to do that," he told her.

Keith's alibi checked out as Booth had suspected it would. The man did not seem like the type to kidnap someone. He was simply another man who had fallen victim to Brennan's beauty, Booth sighed in frustration before asking another agent to let Keith go and returning to his office. He wanted to punch something or, better yet, shoot something. He briefly considered going to the shooting range to blow off some steam, but he could not do that, not when Bones was missing. He needed to devote his time to finding her and bringing her home safely. Her and their baby.

Unable to stay in his office any longer, Booth left, making his way down to the basement where he knew the FBI techs were working on Brennan's car, trying to amass any evidence they could. One of his friends was running the operation; when he walked in, a single look at his friend's face told him all he needed to know. "Sorry, Booth, but there's nothing here. In all likelihood, your guy never touched the car and neither did Dr. Brennan. We checked the area immediately surrounding the car, too, and found nothing though I guess that's to be expected. The wind would likely have removed most trace evidence by now.

"So you can't give me anything at all?"

"Sorry, Booth."

"Dan, you know this is important to me."

"I know. And we're trying, but we can only work with what we have."

Booth nodded, already turning to leave, his hand making its way into his hair for what had to be at least the hundredth time that night. He returned to the Jeffersonian to find Hodgins and Cam were still at the crime scene and Angela was sitting in her office, staring at the screen of her computer. "Come on, Angela," Booth instructed, grabbing her arm and pulling her up.

"Where are we going?" Angela inquired.

"We're going to interview people around the area where we found her car."

"Why do you need me to come?"

"So that if anyone saw anybody, you can draw that person."

"That's not the only reason."

"Also because you're going to go stir crazy just sitting her at your computer screen. Now, come on, let's go."

Unfortunately, they turned up nothing. No one had seen or heard anything, and Cam and Hodgins were unable to find any trace evidence. At 6:30, Booth finally forced himself to go home, knowing he needed to take care of the kids. As much as he wanted to find Brennan, he could not shirk his other responsibilities. He knew the kids were likely confused and frightened, and he also knew that he needed to explain the basic details of what was happening to them because not knowing was often worse than knowing. And so he went home and helped them prepare for school before giving a watered-down account of what had happened and taking them to school. Once they were where they needed to be, he returned to the lab.

Unfortunately, they had found nothing new. Booth began to pace around the lab, growing increasingly more agitated with each passing second. He had no leads to follow, no suspects to interview, no hunches to pursue. Just as he was beginning to think he might go crazy with worry, a voice behind him called, "Agent Booth?"

"Yeah?" Booth spun on his heel to see a woman in her mid-twenties standing in the doorway to the lab, her blond hair pulled into a neat ponytail. Booth had seen her a few times before; she sometimes worked at the desk in the front of the Jeffersonian.

"I've got something for you," she told him, holding out a white envelope. Feeling an odd sense of déjà vu, he took the envelope from her hands, tearing it open quickly. Again, a single note card fell out. Turning it over, Booth once more found a single phrase using words cut out from a newspaper. "I warned you," he read.