Hello again. Thank you all for reading and special thanks to my reviewers. In case I forgot to answer somebody's review, I'm sorry, but since there were some changes on the page, review replies were disabled for some time... Be assured that I value every single review - you are awesome!
Here we go, the next chapter is ready.
Under cover(s) – 13
Brennan was staring at the remains on the steel table in front of her, concentrating on making out abnormalities that may help her find out more about the murder weapon that had been used on Janice and Harry Freeport. After a few hours of work, still no luck. They had determined that it had been a knife of some sort, but since the bodies had been gnawed at by local wildlife for some days, there was not that much tissue left. Which didn't upset her at all, since she had no business working with fleshy remains. The thing was, there were only a few scratches on the ribcage of both victims, and they did not tell her enough about the murder weapon to chose one knife.
She shook her head. She should have known that her grad students would have done a good job examining the bodies, but she still liked to come back and do a secondary examination herself. The only one she'd trusted enough to make an examination on his own had been Zach. Obviously, her trust had been misplaced, so she needed to go over the findings herself again, just to make sure. She had no intention trusting the wrong people ever again.
Suddenly Brennan heard a sound somewhere in the lab and she stilled in her movement for a moment, then resumed her normal work as if nothing had happened. But she was on alert and assured herself that the assortment of knives the grad students hadn't been able to rule out was not too far away. Out of the corner of her eyes, she scanned the area and silently cursed the elevated position of the platform. She couldn't see what was going on in the near vicinity of the platform without moving to the rim. And that would be just plain stupid.
And unfortunately she was standing with her back to the stairs that led up to the platform. But turning around now would show the intruder that she'd heard something, right?
Then she suddenly she heard the unmistakeable sound of the card reader acknowledging a valid card behind her and she let out a relieved breath. She hadn't realised how much the fact that somebody had followed them to her apartment was bothering her.
"Bren." Her best friend addressed her. "What the hell are you doing here on a sunny Saturday morning, huh?"
"Hi Ange. I'm working. What are you doing here?" Brennan said without looking up.
"Looking for you. You didn't answer your phone at home and I guess you once again left your cell phone in your office, cause you didn't answer it. Am I right?" Angela asked.
Now Brennan looked up at her best friend. "I did?" She frowned, then took off her gloves to pat the pockets of her coat. "I guess you're right. It should be in my purse." Brennan reached for a new pair of gloves, then her eyes widened a little. "Would you get it for me? And don't tell Booth I left it in the office again."
Angela rolled her eyes. "Why shouldn't I tell Booth? He always rants at you about it and then I don't have to do it. Why don't you come with me for a moment, Sweetie? Janice and Harry won't go anywhere and you could tell me how you evening in Sinner's Palace went. I'm dying to know."
Brennan gave her friend a long look, then shrugged. She knew Angela would pester her until she had all the details she wanted to know about…. And while getting interrogated by Angela, concentrated working wouldn't be possible anyway.
"I suppose I could take a break." She said and they walked towards her office together.
"Okay, now…. Details, sweetie. How did Booth react to your outfit?" Angela asked when they were sitting comfortably on the couch in Brennan's office.
Brennan frowned again. "I thought you wanted to know about the evening at Sinner's Palace, about our suspects?"
"Oh, la-di-da. Sure, you can tell me about that too…. but hey, I'm at work on a Saturday morning, so indulge me and tell me if Booth's mouth watered when he saw you?" Angela grinned.
"How would I know.? I don't make a habit of checking if he's salivating." Her best friend answered defensively.
"Bren, don't give me the stupid act. You know what I'm talking about. How did he react to your outfit as sexy Roxy, huh?" Angela's voice was stern now.
"I had the coat on when he came to get me." Brennan tried another evasive manoeuvre.
"Which you didn't keep on all evening. Stop stalling and get to the juicy details. NOW." Angela stared at the forensic anthropologist.
"When we were in the car, he kind of implied I could be wearing nothing under that coat." Brennan reported and had Angela's chin fall down. "WHAT? He asked if you were naked under the coat?"
"No." Brennan shook her head. "That's not what I said. He…. Stared at my legs and said something like… "I hope that's not what it looks like." You know, I was wearing a short skirt, so there was a lot of skin showing."
Brennan cleared her throat, recalling how Booth had been staring at her repeatedly. And how she had told him to keep his eyes on the road, telling him that there was nothing he hadn't seen before. She remembered his answer to that and she had to suppress a shudder. His voice had sounded hungry, husky, sexy….
And Temperance Brennan decided to leave that part out of her report to her best friend.
Angela giggled at the thought of a shocked Booth thinking Brennan would go exhibitionistic on him. "Okay. Cute. What happened then?"
"Well, we drove to the Sinner's Palace. I drove by the house during the day once and it didn't look all that outstanding, but it's quite amazing in the dark. They have fake torches leading towards the house and there are flames painted on the building, which they seem to illuminate with something, too. I'm not sure how they…"
Angela interrupted her. "I'm not interested in the HOUSE, Bren. Well, maybe how it looks on the inside, but I really wanna know what Booth had to say about your outfit."
"Well nothing, really." Brennan answered truthfully. "We were already inside and he had to play his role. He… failed a little though. He stared. The man that took my coat got suspicious so I told him that this was kind of a game, me dressing up without him knowing what I'll be wearing."
"Smart." Angela nodded approvingly. "So he HAD a reaction to your outfit." She snickered. "I knew it."
"I was …. practically advertising my female attributes, Angela…. Men generally are susceptible to that. It's a natural reaction." Brennan threw in.
"Sweetie. Booth is not just any man and you're not only boobs and ass to him, that's for sure. But it's nice to know he can admire those parts of you too, right?" Angela waggled her eyebrows.
"He didn't say that. I think he was merely surprised." Brennan gave back.
"Su-u-u-u-re. Just surprised. I'm so NOT convinced. But go on." Angela nodded toward her best friend to continue with her story.
Brennan told her about how they had met the owner and their brief talk to him. The image of the wooden door let Angela sigh. "I'd love to see that myself." She nodded dreamily, then snickered. "I bet Booth blushed."
"He didn't." Brennan was quick to defend her partner. "He's pretty good at playing a role."
"Is he, really?" Angela gave the other woman a sly smile and winked at her. "What then?"
Brennan informed the artist about the people they had met, gathered around the big wooden table in the impressive hall. When she mentioned the bed in front of the fireplace and the alcoves Angela shook her head. "Wow. They sure aren't shy."
"Definitely not. Vivian and some of the others even had intercourse in one of the alcoves when Booth, Terry and I returned." Brennan agreed.
"What? Wait, wait… RETURNED? As in you were gone with the two hunks? Hot damn, Bren, what did you do?" The artist's eyes were huge, her excitement barely contained.
"Nothing, really! Terry gave us the tour." Brennan quickly answered.
"Oh." Angela sighed, and she seemed almost disappointed.
"They have a big whirlpool and a sauna." Brennan informed her. "The room is held in roman style. Impressive. And we had Terry telling us about the video-equipment. They have one bedroom where you can type yourself and your sex partners. We don't know where they keep the originals yet, but I made Terry tell us about how you can take copies home." Remembering how she had felt during that talk let her take in a deep breath.
Angela grinned. "God, I would have loved to see that. Booth and you talking about taping your sexcapades."
"It's not Booth and me, Angela. It's Roxy and Tony. And what are sexcapades?" Brennan threw in.
"Sex escapades, Sweetie. And you really want to tell me that there's no Brennan in Roxy?" The artist asked. "Just remember you keep on saying Booth and I… not Tony and Roxy."
Brennan scowled at the other woman. "Well, I'm telling this out of my viewpoint, that's why I use first person. I would be perfectly able to give my report in third person, if you want me to."
Angela shook her head. "You sure are touchy today. Is… something wrong, Bren?"
Brennan bit her lip but shook her head. "No. I didn't get much sleep, that's all. We came back at about 12:30 and then we had to write down everything to make sure we didn't forget anything. Booth's trying to find out as much as possible about the people we met before deciding if we should meet them again this evening."
"They're having another meeting this evening? Busy, busy. Or greedy." Angela grinned.
"My impression was, Terry didn't want to invite us. It was Gloria who told us about it. I don't think we'll be going there this evening…. Booth thinks pushing it too much would look suspicious." Brennan explained.
"Or he doesn't want to see other men ogling you again." Angela winked at her friend.
"Angela, why are you always implying Booth could be jealous or territorial about me? He doesn't … see me like that." Brennan had to swallow hard and Angela's eyes widened when she heard the faint note of hurt in her best friend's voice.
"Wait a minute. Did he say that, Bren? Did he say that he doesn't see you like that?" Angela asked, genuinely concerned now. She was sure she hadn't been imagining the pain in Brennan's voice.
"No. But there is no need. I know it." Brennan replied and the tone in her voice didn't leave any place for discussions.
Angela opened her mouth to ask Brennan something, when the ringing of a cell phone interrupted them.
Brennan reached for her phone and looked at the caller ID. "It's Booth." She informed Angela before answering.
Yeah, yeah… I know. Why leave it there, huh? Because the chapter would be too long otherwise. YES, it would be.
And I like it when you invent colourful insults - insert evil laugh - sooo, fire away :)
Please let me know what you think!