**Hey guys! I'm aliiiive! I survived my tests and papers, so I'm back to writing :) This chapter is about the "surprise" Booth has for Brennan. And after a long day, one shocking question. We're getting to all the mushy-gushy stuff, so just stick with me! :) Oh yeah, I LOOOOVE all the reviews/favorites/alerts that I've gotten! They've made me smile mucho :)
Yeah, I don't own them. Sad day.**
The next morning, Brennan woke up rested and ready to go. Stretching as she got out of her bed, she glanced across the room and saw a picture of her and Booth. She smiled – God, how amazing it was to smile again! – and got ready for work.
Once she had arrived at the Jeffersonian, she noticed it was 7:00am on the dot. She knew she didn't have to be there until 8, but she wanted to get started on her work before all of the others got there. Unlocking her office door, she heard a noise, causing her to turn around. She saw Angela across the lab with a wonderful look on her face as she drug behind Hogins.
"Hey, Ange," she said as she pushed her door open. Angela groaned as she opened her own office door, causing Brennan to chuckle. "Why are you here so early?" Brennan asked her best friend as she sat at her desk.
Angela plopped down on Brennan's couch. "Hodgins had to finish some work that he didn't get to yesterday."
"What work?" Brennan powered on her computer as she took a drink of her coffee.
"Something to do with mold and rats," Angela said with a shudder. "Why are you so happy this morning?" she asked, throwing a grimace across the room.
Brennan let a small smile escape her lips. "No reason," she tried to cover up. Angela sat forward on the couch, now paying full attention to the blushing scientist.
"You forgave him, didn't you?"
Shaking her head, Brennan sat her cup of coffee back down. "I don't know what you're talking about, Ange," she said nonchalantly as she looked towards her computer. Within a few seconds, Angela had bolted across the room and spun Brennan's chair around. "What the hell, Angela?"
"Tell. Me. Everything," she instructed.
Trying to conceal her newfound happiness, Brennan shrugged. "Nothing happened."
"LIAR!" Angela yelled, smiling with her eyes wide.
"Who's a liar?" Cam asked, knocking on Brennan's door.
"Oh…nobody, Dr. Saroyan," Brennan replied. Cam raised an eyebrow at the two women across the room as Brennan turned her chair back towards her computer.
"Whatever it is, I'll find out eventually," she sang out as she walked away from the door.
Spinning Brennan's chair back towards her, Angela gripped both armrests. "Temperance Daesee Brennan. I am sleep deprived, hungry, and moody…tell me right now what happened last night or I'll go ask him."
Brennan's eyes got wide. "Okay, okay…" She really didn't need Booth to be exaggerating anything. "That letter on my desk yesterday?" she mentioned.
"Yeah…"
"Well, there was one in my apartment last night when I arrived home." Angela's eyes got even wider. "Well, I became furious with Booth. So I went over to his apartment." Brennan took a deep breath. "As I was confronting him about breaking into my apartment and office, he…he pulled me into his chest and held me," she said with a softer voice.
Angela let out a slight squeal, causing Brennan to narrow her eyes.
"He apologized…many, many times…and told me-"
"Told you what?" a man's voice interrupted. Both women looked up and saw Booth.
"Hey, Booth," Angela said with a smirk as she arose from the kneeling position in front of Brennan.
Brennan's jaw dropped slightly. "Wha…what are you doing here, Booth?" she finally asked.
"Remember I told you I had a surprise for you today?" he asked as he walked to the front side of her desk. Brennan nodded as Angela turned her head towards Booth with a raised eyebrow. "Well…here I am!" he announced.
"I don't understand..." Brennan said.
Chuckling, Angela shook her head. "It means that you two are partners again, sweetie."
"What? You can't decide that…" the anthropologist tried to argue.
"No, but I can," Cam informed her, peeping into the office again.
"Dr. Saroyan!" Brennan objected.
Booth tried not to laugh as Cam smiled. "Dr. Brennan, working with the FBI is an extremely prestigious honor, and we will take any cases that they offer." Brennan's jaw dropped.
"That's right, Bones!" Booth said as he clapped his hands together. Angela was cackling inside at all that was unfolding before her eyes. "That means we have a case. So…let's go…" he urged, motioning towards the door.
"No! Absolutely not! I am a world-renowned anthropologist!" Brennan stood up and crossed her arms in front of her chest. "I will not be told who I will and who I will not work with!"
"I take it you don't really like your surprise?" Booth asked, driving through Washington, D.C. Brennan looked across the SUV at him through her sunglasses.
"It's not that, Booth…" she tried to justify her actions. "I just wish Cam would consult me on these big changes."
Booth glanced over at her as they pulled to a stop at a stoplight. "Are you sure that's all, Bones?" he asked.
She looked over and let a smile slip out. "I'm…just kind of nervous that we won't be professional after last night."
"Hey," he told her and pulled his sunglasses down. "We will act as professionally as we did a year ago. We can talk more about last night after work." He noticed as her body became stiff. "If you want to, that is."
"Let's just talk about this later," she insisted. He nodded and pressed on the gas pedal.
"So, what do we have, Bones?" Booth asked, pulling his notebook out of his pocket.
Brennan, decked out in her blue jumpsuit, hunched over the mangled remains lying under a tree. "Male," she said, lifting the tarp that was over the body. "Late twenties, early thirties…180 to 185 centimeters tall…African American." Booth looked over at Hodgins.
"Between 5'11" and 6'1"," Hodgins answered, pulling out culture dishes from his bag. Booth nodded and jotted it down in his notebook. "From the insect larvae, he's been here two to four weeks."
Brennan stood up, squinting her eyes as she glanced around the tree. "He wasn't killed here," she observed.
"Where was he murdered then?" Booth asked, curious as to how she got to her answer.
"There is red clay on the back of the body, and there isn't any around here," she told him, pointing at the back of the victim's shirt. Booth nodded.
"That all for now, Bones?" he asked. Brennan nodded and pulled her gloves off. "Everything goes back to the lab!" he announced to the crew.
Once the partners were back in D.C. in the Jeffersonian parking garage, Booth turned the SUV engine off. Brennan gazed down at her hands as Booth glanced at her. "You okay, Tempe?" he asked softly.
She looked up and smiled. "Yeah. Just thinking," she told him and opened her door. He followed suit, sliding out of the vehicle and meeting her behind it.
"Mind if I ask what you're thinking about?"
She looked up at him and opened her mouth, except nothing came out. She smiled, took a deep breath, and tried it again. "Honest answer?" she asked. He nodded, getting slightly closer to her. Without warning, Brennan reached over and wrapped her arms around his waist.
As naturally as it was, Booth put his arms around her shoulders and pulled her into him. "I'm thinking about you," she spoke softly, almost too soft for him to hear her. He still wasn't sure who this Temperance Brennan was and what she had done with the old Bones.
He ran a hand across her back as she sighed into his chest. "I hope that's a good thing," he whispered back, more of a thought to himself than a statement to her.
Looking up at him with her clear blue eyes, Brennan smiled. "It is." Booth's heart fluttered as she smiled again and backed away from him. "Let's go finish this case so we can leave," she told him and straightened her jacket.
"Yes, mam…" he agreed and followed her to the elevator. "Hey, Bones…" he called out in the elevator.
"Hmm?" she asked and looked up at him.
"Can I…um…would you like to do something this weekend?" he asked. His heart raced as his palms became sweaty.
Smiling, Brennan nodded. "I'd like that, Booth." He didn't remember her ever being so compliant with ideas. It was new, different, weird even…but he liked it.
"Okay, what do we have Mr. Edison?" Brennan asked, stepping onto the platform and pulling on a pair of latex gloves.
Clark, one of her favorite interns, looked over the body with the magnifying lens hooked to the computer monitor. "Multiple fractions, but none of them are cause of death." Brennan nodded as she agreed with his statement. "There are several indentations on the left temporal bone, but I'm not sure what they are from."
Brennan pulled the machine over the skull and examined it closer. As she looked across the dents, Booth leaned against the railing waiting for an answer.
Angela stood next to Cam with a smirk across her face as she glanced from Booth to Brennan and back again. "I can't believe they're finally back together," she whispered to Cam.
"I know!" Cam agreed. "It took some major doings."
"Maybe they'll finally-" Angela was interrupted.
"We can hear you," Brennan informed her, not looking up from the body. Angela chuckled with Cam as Booth shook his head. Clark rolled his eyes, trying to focus on Dr. Brennan's methods. "They aren't birth defects," she decided. "It looks more like…spikes." Standing up straight, Brennan cocked her head to the side. "Definitely cause of death," she concluded.
"Great. Now who is he?" Booth asked.
"Angela, can you reconstruct the face?" Brennan asked.
"Sure thing, boss," Angela agreed, earning several strange looks. She chuckled and went about her business.
"Hodgins, see if you can find any particulates off of the clothing," Brennan instructed.
"On it," Hodgins said as he started to carefully remove the clothing.
Brennan headed towards the exit of the platform before she stopped. "Clark…"
"Help Dr. Saroyan de-flesh the bones," he finished.
"Call me if you find anything," she finished as Booth followed her off of the platform and into her office.
Before much time passed, Brennan's office phone beeped. "Yeah…" she called out as she clicked away on her computer.
"Got a face," Angela told her on speakerphone.
"We'll be right there, Ange." Walking into Angela's office, they saw the artist with a confused look on her face. "What is it?" Brennan asked.
Book took a look at the face on the screen and stopped. "He looks familiar," Angela said as she turned her head to the side.
"That's not…it can't be…" Booth added.
"Does somebody want to fill me in?" Brennan asked.
"Joseph Wilkerson…" Booth acknowledged.
"That's not…that's the Homerun King, isn't it?" Angela asked.
"I don't know what that means…" Brennan said with a strange look on her face.
Booth couldn't take his eyes off of the digital image. "Oh MAN!" he groaned. "He was predicted to beat his record from last year this season!" Booth turned and looked at Brennan with a confused look plastered on her face. "He's a baseball player, Bones. One of the greatest of our time."
"Oh…" she said, still not necessarily getting the importance. "We need dental records-" she started to say.
"Got 'em," Cam announced, handing a folder to Brennan as she walked into Angela's office. "Just matched on the database."
"Joseph Cole Wilkerson," Brennan read off the chart. "Twenty-nine, 6 feet 1 inch, African American. I concur that this is a match."
Booth sank down on Angela's couch. "Wow…" he couldn't get over the shock.
Joining the rest of the crew, Hodgins came into his wife's office, an immediate look of shock covering his face. "What…No…NO…." he said, running a hand through his hair. "MAN!"
"This guy was the greatest player since Babe Ruth!" Booth exclaimed, putting his face in his hands.
"Dammit! What are the Pirates going to do now?" Hodgins asked, slumping down on the other end of the couch.
"I don't understand what baseball has to do with pirates," Brenna said, looking across the room of upset faces. Angela smirked and shook her head.
"Pittsburg Pirates, Bones. It's the team he was on," Booth told her. Her mouth made an "oh" as she grimaced, as she started to understand that this was something important to him, and apparently several other people.
Clark walked into Angela's office, immediately groaning. "It can't be him…why was he in D.C.?"
"No clue," Booth shrugged.
"We have obviously established that the victim is Joseph Wilkerson, the famous baseball player," Brennan announced. "Now we need to find out who, why, and how," she added.
"I think I know the how-part," Angela piped up across the room. The group of people turned to look at her, not expecting her to know much about baseball. "What?" she asked defensively. "Look…" she said and pointed to the screen. "Cleats…" A digital representation of the murder was acted out on the screen with a person wearing cleats stomping on the victim's head.
"Yeah, that'll do it…" Cam said as she flinched.
"Okay, we still need to find where. Hodgins, go take care of your dirt thing. Clark, help him," Booth delegated. "Bones and I need to go talk to his teammates."
"Aren't they all in Pennsylvania?" Cam asked.
"Road trip, Bones. Let's go." Booth hopped up and left the room, Brennan right behind him.
After four hours on the road, Brennan yawned. "So who are we talking to?" she asked as Booth parked his SUV on the side of the small road.
"The wife," Booth replied, killing the engine. "Listen, Bones. Since we've been out of the game for so long," he told her as he pulled his sunglasses off of his face, "Let me do the talking?"
Giving him a strange look, Brennan nodded. "Sure," she reluctantly agreed.
As they approached the door, Booth straightened his tie and took one last look at Brennan, who stood impatiently at the door, before he rang the doorbell. The "talking to people" thing was definitely not her forte. Booth chuckled as he noticed her fidgeting with the dolphin ring on her hand.
Before much time had passed, the door opened, revealing a petite, African American woman with puffy eyes. "Yes?" she asked, feebly.
"Mrs. Wilkerson?" Booth asked. "I'm Agent Booth, this is Dr. Temperance Brennan from the Jeffersonian…"
"Oh, God…" the lady gasped, her hands visually shaking. Brennan looked down at the small space of porch that stood between the widow and herself.
"Mrs. Wilkerson, we're sorry to have to inform you that your husband has been found murdered," Booth told her, trying to break the news gently. "And we need to ask you a few questions." The lady nodded, covering her mouth with a trembling hand.
"Of course, come in…" she motioned, stepping out of the way. Booth and Brennan entered the house, both gazing around as they stopped in the foyer.
"When was the last time you saw your husband, Mrs. Wilkerson?" Booth asked.
"Um…" she started, a tear falling down her cheek. "Three weeks ago…He left to go to spring training and never came back home." Brennan admired several vases that were carefully placed along the mantel.
Booth nodded. "Did your husband have any problems with anybody? Possibly on the team or family?"
The lady shook her head and sat on the arm of a couch in the den. "The only person that I could even think of possibly having a problem with Joe was Turner Hedden." She took a deep breath and looked back up at the tall FBI agent. "A month or two ago, Joe threatened to expose Turner for steroid usage."
"You know, steroids-" Brennan started before she saw Booth shaking his head at her. "Sorry," she mumbled and went back to observing the beautiful decorations.
"Did Mr. Wilkerson ever keep his threat? Tell a manager, coach, owner, anybody?"
Shaking her head again, the widow sighed. "No…I talked to him about it and he said that it wasn't his business to tell."
"Okay, Mrs. Wilkerson," Booth said with a sympathetic smile. "Thank you very much for your time…" he said, showing Brennan and himself to the door.
"Please let me know if you find the killer," the woman called from the den.
"Of course," Booth replied, giving a slight smile one last time before he left the house.
Brennan looked back at Booth as she walked to the vehicle. "Are we going to question Hedden Turner now?"
Booth smirked. "Turner Hedden, Bones. And yes."
"Brennan," she answered her phone as Booth began to drive.
"The body had ultisols and scales from micropterus dolomieu," Hodgins announced proudly over the speakerphone.
Booth rolled his eyes. "Fantastic. Now, what are those?"
"Red clay and scales from a small mouth bass."
"So…he was killed at a body of water?" Booth asked, swerving around a car.
"A pond, most likely. It was fresh water, and there aren't any lakes anywhere near where the body was found."
"Okay, thanks, Hodgins," Brennan said, hitting the end button.
Booth took a deep breath. "So we're looking for a guy that wears cleats and has possible access to a pond." Picking up his phone, he held it to his ear.
"Who are you calling?" Brennan asked.
"Stolts, it's Booth. I need a favor. I need you to look up any player on the Pittsburg Pirates that owns a pond. Yeah, you heard right. A pond." Booth slowed down at a stoplight suddenly, causing Brennan to grab onto the door handle. "Great, thanks." Snapping his phone shut, Booth smiled over at Brennan.
"What?"
"We got him," he announced.
She looked over at Booth with a raised eyebrow. "Who?"
"Hedden. He built a pond behind his house three months ago."
"That was an easy first-case-back," Booth declared as he entered Brennan's office behind her. "I wasn't expecting the bastard to confess that easily, to be honest."
"I've noticed that you get answers more quickly when you put someone in a lock-head," Brennan told him as she shut her computer down.
"It's called a headlock, Bones. And yeah, it's one method of getting things done," Booth smirked.
Looking up, Brennan smiled as she saw Booth looking down at the picture on her desk. "That was a good night," she told him. He looked up and smiled back at her.
"One of the best of my life," he admitted. Once Brennan had zipped her laptop case, she slid it on her shoulder and walked towards the door. "Let's go start our weekend, Bones," he told her and walked out of the door.
As she shut the door, Brennan walked silently next to Booth. "You okay?" he asked as they got to the elevator.
"Yeah," she said with a slight smile. As they exited the elevator and walked towards their vehicles on the parking deck, Brennan stopped as they were about to part ways. "Booth," she called out.
"Hmm?" He looked back towards her, his heart starting to speed up.
"Do you…um, want to come over for a drink or something?" she asked shyly.
With a grin on his face, Booth nodded. "Of course."