**A/N: I just realized that in chapter 2, I had written that "He was 34, the same age as both her and Booth, and he had a family – one that loved him dearly" when talking about the guy from Hurricane Katrina. I totally meant for it to read "He was 34, CLOSE TO the same age as…" Whoops! Just for clarification, Booth is nearly 37 in this fic and Brennan is 32 :)**
**Thanks so much for the comments, again! They really mean a lot to me :) I hope yall are enjoying the case so far…I actually went back and rewrote part of it simply because I couldn't fit one line of dialog into the story lol…regardless, enjoy! REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW!
Don't own them. **
"What do you mean that the TWO bodies have turned into at least FOUR bodies, Agent Booth?" Cullen yelled over the phone.
Booth dropped his head towards the ground as he ran his hand through his hair, biting his tongue in order to not snap at his boss. "That's what Bones said, sir. Dr. Saroyan agrees with her statement. So does the intern."
"Booth, I swear to God, you better hurry your little squint squad up and figure out if Senator Riley's son and daughter-in-law are part of the four bodies!" the Deputy Director spat over the phone.
"Yes sir," Booth replied with clenched teeth as the line was disconnected. Shaking his head as took a deep breath, he returned to the rest of the group. Brennan and Cam were poking and prodding at the body parts, Hodgins was scraping bugs into containers, and Daisy was very obviously trying not to gag as she held an evidence bag open. "How's it coming, Bones?" he asked as crossed his arms in front of his chest.
"It's all been photographed, now we're just packing up the remains so they can be transported back to the lab," she told him, pulling at something long and slimy looking coming off one of the arms.
Booth cringed as he turned his head briefly. "Are you sure there are four different sets of body parts?"
"Actually, it's looking more like six," Brennan said as she carefully placed an arm in the bag Daisy was holding.
"What? How?" Booth nearly objected, his eyes narrowing. He knew that the more bodies involved, the longer it would take for them to solve the case, and the longer it would be before he got to be with her again.
"The length of the arms and legs don't match, along with the skin tones, we're counting up to six victims," Cam threw in her two cents.
Hodgins shook his head as he screwed a lid onto one of the containers. "There are metallic flakes on the torsos of both victims…er…bodies," he spoke up. "I won't be able to analyze them till we get them back to the lab, but I'm almost positive it's just your generic metal. Probably aluminum."
"Okay, then, squints. Let's finish this up!" Booth halfway encouraged them as he clapped his hands together once. Brennan looked up at him, giving him a look before she rolled her eyes. He knew she hated being called a squint, replying to her look by pulling back one of the corners of his mouth as he rolled his eyes back towards her.
"You could help, Booth…" she told him as she wrapped her hand carefully around the wrist of another arm, not wanting it to fall apart when she lifted it off the floor.
"HA!" he laughed out loud. "No thanks, Bones. That's not my cup of tea and you know it."
She slid the arm down in another bag, Daisy shuddering as she held it open. "I don't know what that means," Brennan replied, pulling her hand, which was covered in goo, back out of the bag.
"It means…yeah, never mind," Booth countered, shoving his hands into his pockets. "Just get it moving," he quipped, pacing in a circle. It was going to be a long rest of the night and day, and there wasn't much he could do to help it along until they got everything back to the lab.
Three hours later, Booth climbed into the SUV and shut his door. Brennan turned towards him and smiled, squinting as the sun started to pop through the trees. "Hey," she spoke softly, her voice making Booth instantly feel better.
"Hey back…you hungry?" he asked as he took her hand in his.
Nodding, she said, "I'm very hungry, actually. My stomach has even begun to make growling noises."
Booth chuckled and took his foot off of the brake, carefully hitting the gas pedal. He loved how clueless she was when it came to layman's terms. After driving a short distance, Booth pulled the SUV off of the road into a small parking lot in front of a diner. "Miss Daisy's Diner," Brennan read out loud.
"Looks good, huh, Bones?" Booth asked as he killed the engine.
Narrowing her eyes towards him, Brennan shook her head. "How can I possibly know that the food looks good if we're still outside, Booth?" she asked, undoing her seatbelt. Yet again, Booth rolled his eyes.
As they walked to the diner door, Booth ushered Brennan in by placing a hand on the small of her back. She smiled back at him as she entered the door, immediately looking around for a booth nearby. Spotting one, she led her partner to it and climbed in one of the sides. Booth climbed in the other side as an old gray-headed waitress greeted them. "Morning, you two. I'm Louise," her voice was creaky and old sounding.
"Good morning, Louise," Booth replied back with a smile. She handed them two menus that were worn and tattered. Flipping through hers quickly, Brennan folded it back up on the table.
"What can I get y'all today?"
"I would like coffee, please. Black. And two waffles." As the lady wrote down the order, Brennan rubbed her eyes.
"And for you sir?" she asked
Booth focused his eyes on the menu more, eventually nodding, folding it up, and laying it back down on the table. "I want a ham and cheese omelet, hashbrowns, and bacon. Coffee, too, please." Brennan cocked an eyebrow towards him as she fiddled with the butter knife on the table.
"Mmkay, y'all. Your order will be ready soon. I'll bring the coffee right out."
"Thanks, Louise," Booth said with a smile. Once the lady had walked off, he looked up at his partner. "What was that look for?"
Brennan chuckled. "All the food you ordered," she told him, shrugging.
"What about it?" he asked defensively. "I'm a growing boy!"
"You are not a boy, Booth. You're 36. You passed the "boy" stage over two decades ago."
Sighing, Booth shook his head. "Way to make me feel old, Bones," he laughed lightly.
"I didn't say you were old," she informed him. "I just said you are not a boy."
He smiled as he understood how clueless she was, yet again. "How long do you think it's going to take to figure this case out?" he asked as Louise sat two coffee cups down in front of them. "Thanks," he told her.
"Thank you," Brennan's voice was softer as she pulled a cup to her, wrapping her hands around it. "Well," she said, taking a sip of the coffee, "I don't know, Booth. From my count, there are possibly at least six bodies. That means six missing people. And without all of their body parts, it's going to be difficult to identify them."
Booth took a deep breath as he listened to what she told him. "Anything that can speed up the process, just tell me. I'll find someone to get it done." Playing with the coffee stirrer in his cup, he made figure-eight patterns in the brown liquid.
"Why are you in such a hurry to finish this case?" Brennan asked innocently, her blue eyes looking over towards him over the top of her coffee mug, steam rolling out of it.
"Remember what was happening right before the call from Cullen?"
She narrowed her eyes. "You mean us nearly having intercourse?" Her voice was too loud for comfort, causing Booth to cringe, looking around to see if anybody heard her.
"Ixnay the loud squint talk for a little bit, Bones," he told her as a flush of red spread across his cheeks. "And that's not what I was talking about."
"But that's what was going on…" she objected, crossing her legs under the table.
"I was talking about you and me spending time together." His brown eyes surveyed her facial expressions, which were telling him that she was confused…again.
"We're spending time together now…" Brennan picked her coffee cup up again, bringing it to her lips.
Booth shook his head and chuckled. He knew there wasn't much he could do but laugh. "I'm talking about just you and me…alone, Bones…"
Suddenly, her eyes widened. "OH!" she caught on. "Oh, I see now." She stifled a laugh as a smile spread across her face.
"Here you go, folks," Louise announced, sitting two large plates down on the table. "Y'all enjoy!"
Once they were back at the lab, Brennan entered her office and sat her purse down under her desk. "So tired," Booth groaned as he trudged into her office, loosening his tie.
"Why don't you take a nap on my couch?" Brennan asked as she slipped her lab coat over her shoulders, quickly moving the mouse to her computer to wake it up.
"I'm fine, Bones," he said and plopped down on the soft couch.
She clicked the mouse a few times, hunched over her desk chair, and stood back upright. "I'm going to go work on the bodies," she told him, taking a few steps towards the door.
"Hey, come'mere for a second," he said, curling his finger towards her repeatedly.
Buttoning up her lab coat as she walked to the couch, Brennan stopped as she got to Booth. "What?"
"Come'mere…" he said, waving his hand to tell her to get closer.
"Booth, what is it?"
"I need to tell you something, Bones, now get closer so nobody else can hear." She rolled her eyes and conceded to his request, leaning down to face level with him.
Booth quickly leaned up, pressed his lips into hers, and pulled back with a smile on his face. "That's all," he said with a chuckle.
"Booth! Someone could've seen that!" she whispered through clenched teeth as she slapped his arm and stood back up. Putting her hands on her hips, she glared down at him as he laughed lightly.
"Go play with your dead things, Bones. Let me know if you find anything."
"Ass…" she mumbled as she walked towards the door, glowering over her shoulder at him one last time before she left the privacy of her office.
"Find anything yet, Miss Wick?" Brennan asked as she stepped on the platform, pulling a pair of gloves out of a box.
"No, Dr. Brennan. The pieces are laid out exactly how they were at the scene. All I can tell just confirmed what you already found." The intern sighed loudly as her ponytail swung back and forth behind her head.
"Okay," Brennan started, moving the magnifying camera over the top of the first leg. "It's still mostly flesh, which is not my field," she reminded everybody. "But where you can see bone, there are slight indentions in nearly perfect intervals."
Cam, being silent across the platform, crossed her arms as she walked towards the examination table. "Like…from a knife?"
"Yes. Possibly…" Brennan paused. "Possibly a scalpel. The lines are too thin and perfect to be just an ordinary knife." Still looking at the cuts on the bone, she easily pulled away an area of skin to reveal more bone. "Only the exposed bone has cuts on it."
"Okay…so we're looking for…a possible surgeon with a grudge?" Cam asked, leaning over the leg.
"Maybe. Miss Wick, take the fingerprints of all four hands and see if there are any matches in the system."
"Yes, Dr. Brennan."
While Daisy ran the victims' fingerprints through the computer system, Cam and Brennan continued examining the body parts. Eventually, the intern came running back onto the platform. "Dr. Brennan!" she called as she was running.
"Yes, Miss Wick?"
The intern hunched over, resting her hands on her knees as she caught her breath. "They…they're…Senator Riley's son and daughter-in-law…"
Brennan and Cam's eyes both widened as their hearts sunk. Brennan, keeping her composure, pulled her gloves off. "I need to inform Booth," she told the team as she left the platform.
Walking into her office, she looked around but didn't see him. "Booth?" she asked, twisting her neck around the top of the couch. Slightly smiling, she saw that he was sound asleep, stretched out on the couch. She sat down on the edge of the couch and ran her hand across his chest. "Booth," she gently shook him.
He didn't move. "Booth," she whispered as she leaned her head down by his, pressing her lips into his temple.
"Mmm," he groaned as he finally started moving, blindly finding her side with his hand. Barely opening his eyes, he saw Brennan sitting back up. "Where are you going…" he whined, gently placing his hand around her and pulling her back towards him.
She smiled as his brown eyes fluttered open and closed, leaning over to kiss in between them. "We have two of the bodies identified," she told him.
"Shh," he hushed her, pressing his lips into hers. "Give me one more minute without work."
Brennan rested her forehead on his, pressing her lips into his again. As she started to trace his lip with her tongue, they both heard someone at the door clear their throat, causing them to jump up quickly. Brennan immediately reached to push some hair back in place on her head as Booth straightened his tie.
Looking over at the door, Brennan saw Angela, a smile plastered across her face as she leaned back into the door frame. "Ange!" Brennan scolded. "You almost caused me a myocardial infarction!"
"I think you mean 'heart attack', Bones," Booth told her and got off of the couch. She glared in between her best friend and him.
"That's what I said, dammit!" she yelled. Angela chuckled across the room.
"You just better be glad it was me and not someone else, sweetie," Angela told her with a laugh as she walked away.
"So," Booth said, approaching Brennan from behind, "You have two names?" He slid his hands onto her hips as he stepped behind her.
She jumped, spun around, and smacked his chest. "Booth, we're going to be caught if you don't stop," she warned. "And yes, we have two names." She straightened out her lab coat and crossed her arms in front of her chest.
"Are you going to tell me the names?"
Brennan looked up as she picked a file off of her desk. "Patrick and Charlotte Riley," she told him as her voice softened.
Booth's heart sunk. It was the senator's kid and daughter-in-law. "Shit," he huffed, pulling his phone out of his pocket. "How were they killed? Do you know?"
"Since we don't have the whole bodies, it's hard to say. But Cam and I concurred that the pieces were cut on with possibly a scalpel. The bones were cut with a saw of some sort."
"Has Hodgins gotten anything yet?" he asked, pressing a few buttons.
She shook her head. "No, not yet. He is having problems sorting through the different types of metal flakes."
Booth pressed his phone to his ear, not looking forward to making the call to Cullen. "Yeah, it's Booth," he spoke more softly than usually. "Two of the victims are them, sir. They identified two of the hands with fingerprints in the system. "Yessir. I believe Agent Millican is in New Jersey, he should be available. Yessir, I'll keep you updated."
"Is he furious?" Brennan asked, stepping closer to Booth.
"Something like that, Bones." Shoving his phone back in his pocket, Booth sighed and squeezed out a smile towards her.
"So, what now?"
"Now, Bones, we have to figure out who the others are and how. There's an agent in New Jersey that will be our eyes and ears there. He'll be corresponding back and forth as needed."
Brennan nodded. "Then let's go figure the rest of this out so we can leave," she said with a smile, quickly getting on her tippy toes and pressing her lips against his cheek.
Smiling down, Booth chuckled. "Actually, I have to go talk to Cullen. He wants to make sure I'm adjusting correctly to being back at work. I'll be back in a little while though."
"We'll be here," she told him as she left her office.
Booth took a deep breath before he reached up, knocking the door. He was silently praying for the strength to not go off on his boss, knowing that he was running low on sleep and a filter for his brain. "Come in," he heard Cullen call out.
He pushed the door open, straightening his tie as he stepped in the door. "Agent Booth," Cullen greeted, stacking a pile of papers. "Have a seat," he instructed. Booth followed orders, sitting in the chair across from Cullen's desk. "You know why you're here, right?"
"Actually, I don't, sir," Booth replied, sitting back and crossing his arms in front of his chest.
Cullen sat back in his chair, narrowing his eyes towards Booth. "Agent Booth, I need to be sure that things are working out before I can sign the papers to keep our contract with the Jeffersonian."
"I'm at the top of my game, sir."
Chuckling, the Deputy Director shook his head. "Not with you, Agent Booth. With Dr. Brennan."
"Wha…what about Bones?" Booth asked, confused.
"Well, from what I've heard…" he started, causing Booth to lean towards the edge of his chair, "Since the incident last year," he cleared his throat, "She hasn't been quite right. I mean, obviously, she's never been normal," he chuckled again. "But I'm concerned that she will hinder our investigations."
Booth shook his head, narrowing his eyes even more. "Bones…uh, Dr. Brennan," he corrected himself, "Is completely fine, sir. She's working right this second on finding the son-of-a-bitch that killed Senator Riley's kid and daughter-in-law."
"Are you positive, Agent Booth, that she's okay?" Cullen reached a hand up and ran it across his head, confused. The rumors going around told him that she was anything but okay.
"Yes sir, she's absolutely fine. We've moved on from the incident from last year," Booth cringed as the thoughts came back to him. "Now, if you don't mind, sir, I need to get back to finding our murderer," he told his boss as he stood up.
"Let me know when you find anything," Cullen informed him, returning to his stack of papers.