9.
Booth gets Sweets to Brennan who brings him to the Jeffersonian. She & Hodgins, later Cam dress Sweets injuries when Booth arrives.
Yeah, I don't know what it is but it's just fun to beat up your favorite character.
"I'm glad you're here." Brennan said softly seeing that Sweets had fallen asleep, most likely from exhaustion. "Perhaps you can bring us up to speed."
Twenty minutes later the rest of them had the facts that Booth had though still without any particulars of Sweets injuries except that Carter and his cronies were to blame.
"So let's go get this Carter guy and run him thru the ringer." Hodgins demanded. "You can arrest him right?"
"Yeah, but he's got a network of assholes out there doing his bidding." Booth reminded him. "Whatever this guy is running he can still do it from behind bars with the network he has set up."
"And that would leave Sweets very unsafe." Brennan vocalized the realization to make sure Hodgins understood.
Hodgins looked back at Sweets who was sleeping, Cam followed his gaze. While neither were nearly as close to the young psychologist as Booth or Brennan had grown to be they had a fondness for the man who had help them so much in the past and withstood so much in the recent days.
"We need to do something." Hodgins said taking his gaze from Sweets.
"I agree." Cam said nodding quickly. "Those are some nasty bruises and burns - and if they were just warnings, well, I don't even want to think about anything more happening to him."
"We you able to lose the guy who was following you?" Brennan asked Booth.
"I think so." Booth said not totally convinced. "I pulled up to the police station and he pulled away. I don't know though if they were able to get into the system and see what I was doing there - or not doing there."
"We need to see what these guys are up to." Cam deduced.
"But if we look into - they know we are looking into it." Hodgins said rubbing his head. "Feel like we've got Pelant on our backs again."
"I don't know how many people this guy has working for him." Booth warned them. "It could be people here too."
Cam felt slightly defensive about her staff being implicated but she knew that Booth could be right.
"Sweets shouldn't be too mobile, we should hide him here." Brennan said feeling that was the safest.
"Yeah until this Carter guy realizes that Sweets is hiding out and thinks something is up." Hodgins said. "I doubt Sweets wants to live here forever."
"Especially with such uncomfortable beds." Sweets said joining them with the blanket wrapped around his top as he had no shirt.
"Sweets you should be lying down." Cam said wanting to help the young man into the chair next to them but refrained.
"No, I should be working on this case." Sweets said. "It's the only way."
"Right, and I have an idea." Booth said with all eager to hear.
"The only way we get this guy off Sweets back is to close the case." Booth said earning dropped jaws from each of them.
"That is highly unethical." Brennan reminded him.
"So is letting Sweets die." Hodgins said with a reverence that made Sweets smile slightly inside.
"Just hear me out." Booth asked of them. "Sweets closes the case based on a lack of evidence. That doesn't mean that it can't be reopened. If Carter is then off his back we can continue to investigate this case without the fear of Sweets being attacked again."
"Right, because if it's in the system, Carter will believe it." Hodgins thought of it being put together.
"Yeah, but how will we continue to work on the case?" Brennan asked. "Budgets being how they are we will have to account for our time. If it's being spent on a closed case it will have to be deemed reopened. Unless we work on it on our own time."
"I'm game." Hodgins said.
"Me too." Cam agreed.
"Guys, you have families." Sweets said. "I can't let…"
"You die?" Brennan asked with watery aqua eyes.
Cam stepped in. "I propose we continue to work on the case in near secrecy. We will rename the files something else but all findings should be handwritten - put nothing in the computer right now. When we figure out what Carter is up to we can publish the findings. If the brass here or at the FBI wants to know we will be able to explain the situation we were in and we should be forgiven so to speak."
"Will that work?" Hodgins asked.
"Yes." Cam said hoping she was right. She felt she was right. She doubted that the Jeffersonian were going to let go their brightest staff members in light of extreme circumstances.
"So we will continue to work on the bodies in the case?" Brennan asked.
"Yes and Sweets and I will continue to work the case by trying to figure out what Carter is up to." Booth said and smiled at Sweets. "It's pretty much what you wanted to do, but this time you have all of us helping."
Sweets nodded, it was what he wanted to do but he hadn't been able to get it past them, something he should have known.
"Booth, I'll close the case officially but I think from here you should lead the case. I think it's pretty obvious I'm not up to it." Sweets felt exhausted.
"I think if we've seen anything Sweets is that you are up to it." Booth retorted. "This is a radical circumstance for a first case."
"I agree, the methods seemed strange before I knew the circumstances." Cam agreed. "But that's what we do, we work in the conditions we have to. We've done it before - whatever it takes to get the case solved - and keep everyone safe." Cam stared at Sweets a moment to get that she was talking to him.
"Alright, well then on this one, I'd like some help." Sweets said. "Perhaps we can do this one together."
Booth smiled. "Okay, that's a deal."
"Alright so, what is next?" Brennan asked eager to work.
"Well it's eight at night." Cam reminded her. "I think we should all get some rest."
"I'll close the case first thing in the morning." Sweets said. "I'll cite lack of evidence because at this time we don't have any. Thanks to me." Sweets still felt angry at himself for erasing the prints.
"We still have the bodies and McLaughlin's notes in the car." Booth reminded him. "What did you get from those?"
"McLaughlin appeared to have been investigating a missing person, Tallie Roberts." Sweets explained. "I gathered that McLaughlin was hired by her parents. She ran away from home two years ago and she must have kept some sort of communication because they had some record of her whereabouts. Then they dropped off and that's when they hired McLaughlin."
"What had he found?" Hodgins asked.
"He had tracked down to this area working at a trucker's diner." Sweets said.
"Again with the trucking industry." Cam said. "What about the other body, do you think he had something to do with it?"
"In all the notes it didn't seem that McLaughlin suspected Carl Sager, the other victim of being involved." Sweets explained.
"But he must be involved in some way - they were found together." Cam deduced.
"When Carter got me, the first time…" Sweets mind flashed to one of his less than pleasant encounters with the psycho. "He said that one of this people screwed up in disposing of the bodies."
"So the fact they were together was part of a bad body drop." Cam said.
"Which also means that Carter has killed people for multiple reasons." Brennan added.
"I believe Carter has killed several people." Sweets added. "No one's stopped him."
"Well we sure as hell are now." Booth said. "This guy may have been able to build on his little team of people but we need to take down the whole thing."
"If he has this many people this involved? Then he's in something pretty big." Cam warned him.
"He's using his state trooper status to his advantage." Hodgins said. "What a crappy abuse of authority."
"State troopers often pull truckers over to check their loads for illegal immigrants, drugs…" Brennan reminded them.
"That could have been what happened to Sager." Hodgins suggested. "Carter pulled him over and killed him."
"But what was his motive?" Cam asked. "And what about McLaughlin?"
"Perhaps they didn't cooperate with what he was asking of them, tried to escape of something?" Hodgins suggested.
"My guy tells me it's something more than that." Booth said.
"Which could suggest one of two things - either the two he asked to dispose of the bodies were inept at the task OR they weren't used to it." Sweets said.
"You said though that Carter has killed people." Cam said.
"Yes, I think he has - but for what?" Sweets said thinking. "The car that McLaughlin drove was a junker - he used a cheap and old car to put a bunch of miles on it. From the insurance papers in the dash he's also insured 2014 Durango - which wouldn't get the gas mileage that one does for long trips like the one he was on. Nothing was missing from Sager's truck so unless he was running drugs or something - neither of them had something of value."
"So Carter's not pulling people over to rob and kill them." Booth agreed. "If he did he wouldn't be making much, few people carry much with them."
"But pretty much everyone would pull over for a state trooper." Hodgins said. "It's how he gets them to stop."
Sweets nodded, he knew that all too well. "He subdues them with a stun gun."
It took them a second to realize why Sweets knew that.
"So we know why he pulled you over." Cam said to Sweets. "Why everyone else?"
"That's what we need to know." Booth surmised.
"And that will have to wait until morning." Hodgins said looking at the time. "Hey, how do we get Sweets out of here?"
"We don't. " Booth said. "I think until we can get the paperwork signed off on then it is the safest place."
"Except we don't have security at night, not the kind you might need if Carter thinks he's here." Cam interjected.
"I'll stay." Booth added.
"That will only arouse suspicion on Carter's part." Hodgins reminded him. Sweets was trying to get a word in but was so far unsuccessful.
"He can go home with us." Brennan suggested.
"That will only bring more suspicion." Cam added quickly.
"I should go to the FBI building." Sweets said. "It's the most secure and I was planning to stay there tonight anyway - one of them saw me pack a bag to go there."
"Oh." They all said.
"Maybe we should have left him there." Brennan said wondering how to sneak Sweets back in.
"No, he needed medical attention and we had that here." Cam said. "Booth did the right thing. Just how do we get him back in?"
"I walk in." Sweets said. "Look Carter may or may not know that I left, if I casually go back in and he were to ask then I'll say I was destroying evidence here."
"Oh." They said again. "Yeah that could work."
"Okay, well I'm taking Sweets back." Booth said. "Carter won't try anything if we are together."
"No Booth it's okay, if he did I could tell him I'm dropping the case." Sweets interjected.
"I'm not taking complete faith he'll believe you." Booth said. "Besides are you going to take a cab? Look, if Carter sees you back at the Hoover you can tell him we were investigating, ran out of evidence and that led us to close it. Besides, by morning that will be the case. If the bosses give you any grief about dropping it - I'm there to back you up."
"And then we go back to work." Brennan said and they all agreed.
Booth and Brennan said goodnight to each other while Hodgins found a new shirt for Sweets to put on having cut up the old one. Cam looked over Sweets bandages once more and once satisfied she helped Hodgins pull the shirt over Sweets head. He was glad that the marks were hidden again and perhaps forgotten.
Cam wanted to remind him to be sure and watch them since they had gotten infected already and that was what caused his fever but she could tell Sweets wanted as little attention drawn to them as possible.
"Okay, until morning." They said as they watched Booth & Sweets walk out the door. Brennan couldn't help but feel her own gut tell her something wasn't right.
Booth pulled up at the Hoover as the two walked casually into the building. They could feel eyes on them and tried to act as normal as possible.
Once they were at Sweets office Booth looked over the office to make sure it was secure. He felt pretty good knowing that Sweets was in a secure building. He hoped Sweets felt the same way and that would help the kid get some rest.
"You know I could stay Sweets, I mean there's work we could be doing." Booth said but Sweets shook his head to the negative.
"No, you should be home with Brennan, just in case." Sweets said knowing that it would prompt him to go home.
"Yeah, okay." Booth spied Sweets blood stained button down shirt from earlier that night. "But call you know…if anything…"
"I will." Sweets promised.
Soon Booth was gone and Sweets flopped on his couch - the same one he had grown accustomed to living on when he and Daisy split. He doubted that Carter would go after her, they hadn't been an item in a long time so he decided she was fine. Sweets felt relaxed that his friends knew and were going to help. For the first time in days his nerves felt relaxed as he began to get some much needed sleep.
His phone rang and with sleepy eyes he accepted the call.
"Agent Sweets, I'd like to know where you've been." Carter said on the other end of the line.
Sweets sat up quickly making his broken rib prick at his side. "I…" Sweets was flabbergasted how did he get my personal cell? Calm down Lance, stick to the plan. "I was on the case, working for you." There you go Lance, pad his ego some. "We will not have enough evidence. We will be dropping it - officially in the morning."
Sweets had the bait out there, dangling, waiting, hoping.
"I see." Carter said in a non-committal tone. "I hope for your sake you are telling the truth. Or at least for those little ones."
The phone clicked to end the call and all desires to relax and sleep were gone. Sweets looked at his phone to call Booth but decided against it.