Thanks so much for the reviews! I just wanted to thank PIEMANIA (since I can't write a review reply for her) because she compared me with Shakespeare. And no matter how awesomely inaccurate the comparison is, it's flattering. *blushes*

Enjoy! (and if you do, tell me about it!)

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CHAPTER 11

The sun had set.

"We should go inside."

"Yes."

I turned and entered the emptying building, and felt a stab of sorrow because it had been a lie. All our assurance that everything would be fine, that it would go back to normal. Whatever the hell normal was.

But it wouldn't be the same.

I knew this suddenly and with conviction because his hand never touched the small of my back again.

*

"Dr Brennan!"

The moment I was in sight Cam ran toward me across the busy platform, looking like she'd just seen a ghost. Which is impossible, since ectoplasm…

But I suppose you know this.

"What is it, Cam?"
"I've just discovered who we're trying to save!" she looked from me to Booth, her expression flickering to confusion for a moment before settling on a blend between excitement and dread.

"What?"

"I was thinking… revising my notes on the case, Jeanie Whitmore."

"Thank you, I really wanted you to double check everything…"

"Yes, well it got me thinking. Something is strange about the blood we found on her pant leg."

"What? Why? We already matched it to the patient's blood sample the hospital gave us…"

"Bones, wait." His hand brushed my arm, I felt it, light as a feather, and then it was gone and he regretted reaching out to touch me. "Let her explain."
"It's strange that blood would get on her clothes, don't you think? A doctor would be wearing a white coat over her normal wear, or scrubs. And even if the stain got there, it would be advisable to immediately clean it off, or at least change clothes when she got home before going to walk her dog."

I pondered this new development.

"Yes, it's alarming."

"Dr Brennan… could Jeanie have got the blood on her pants because she hurt her killer?"

I sensed that she was building up to a truth that would change everything.

"There were no signs of that; no skin on her fingernails, not a trace of DNA that wasn't hers except the blood. Are you suggesting the teenage girl killed a forty year old doctor, the doctor trying to help her? Moreover, a woman who fits the victim profile and was killed exactly a month after Helen Evans, following the pattern of a serial killer? The odds, Dr Saroyan… the girl's arm was broken, or so she said. Is that a lie too?"

"You don't understand, Dr Brennan. I'm suggesting the teenage girl is a potential fifth victim."

"What? We spoke to her on the phone a week ago…"

"What does that mean? He could have let her speak, controlled her. It doesn't feel right, he's got her, she's the one who'll die unless…"

"But it's conjecture without basis in fact. A teenage girl wouldn't fit the profile, why would she be a victim?"

"Because I've just discovered something."

"What, Cam?" Booth asked, his tone impatient. My feelings exactly.

"I compared the girl's blood to Mrs Stoker's. Call it a hunch."

"A hunch?"

"Listen to me! I compared the blood and there were too many matches… that girl, the patient who we spoke to a week ago… she's Margaret and Kevin Stoker's daughter!"

The silence which followed this statement could have been hurled to the floor and shattered into little shards of silence.

"She's what?" Booth was the first to recover.

"Daughter. No doubt about it."

"But Mrs Stoker didn't have a daughter! I never saw, no records! … Oh shit."

"What? What is it Booth?"

"Mrs Stoker was in Witness Protection, right? I'll bet you anything her daughter was too. I'll bet you her file is buried deep, so that no one can find her. What was the girl's name? Do you remember?"

"Anne. Anne… something." Cam said.

"Anne Harris! Her name was Anne Harris!" I said suddenly, struck by the memory.

"Great, I'm going to make some calls. Why did no one tell me Anne Stoker has been kidnapped!" and he was gone.

*

It was a long hour until Booth came back with information. I asked Cam to tell me where the blood came from; arm, leg, head, where, and then had a long and frustrating conversation with Angela about which scenario would explain how the blood could have gotten on Jeanie.

We couldn't come up with a single plausible sequence of events. Jeanie Whitmore was killed four months ago, a month after Kevin Stoker went to prison. Anne Stoker was staying in a safe house during that time, protected with a new identity; that of Anne Harris.

The lack of particulates relating to Anne suggested the blood had dripped, because there were no fibres of other clothing on or around the stain, not even dirt, skin or a hair. But how on earth? And if Anne Stoker had seen or been near a dead body wouldn't she have said something? Was she in on it? What had happened during the four months of separation between the last death and Anne's kidnap?

Nothing made any sense.

So when Booth finally came running toward my office, I exhaled a sigh of relief.

"What's happened?"

"It was Anne… I know everything now. I was kind of pissed, yelled at them until they told me what the hell's going on… it was Anne. Anne spied on her father when he met with Lucien Bohnn, do you know…?"

"Mob?"

"Yes, but a slippery fish, and not a particularly big one."

"Wait. The reason Margaret Stoker was in witness protection was that she'd testify against Bohnn and her husband?"

"Yes, but it was Anne who really saw what happened."

"Then…?"

"Wait, just listen. We didn't have Bohnn on anything until Margaret Stoker said she'd testify that she'd seen and overheard what happened in the meeting… she lied to everyone to protect her daughter. She said it was her, not Anne. Her only demands were that Anne be given a new identity, and lived away from her mother, for safety. Everyone agreed to the conditions because Bohnn was worth the effort, he has connections, see?"

"Booth, slow down." Angela said, walking through the door. "Anne saw her father meet with this mob guy? Margaret said she did… so how do we know she's lying?"

"Has anyone talked to Mrs Stoker about this?" I asked.

"Everyone calm down." He took a deep breath and turned to look at Angela. "We did talk to her. One of my guys just had a very interesting conversation where and she admitted to lying about seeing her husband."

"So… why is he doing it?"

Booth and I exchanged a glance, and for a moment I forgot what I was going to say, because Booth was looking at me and the way his eyes glimmered in the crisp light scrambled my thoughts.

"It's obvious, isn't it?" he said, wrenching his gaze away from me. "Kevin kidnapped his own daughter and is threatening Margaret with hurting her child so that Margaret won't testify. Anne disappeared two weeks ago. So when we talked to her, she was already being held captive. Meaning Stoker has an accomplice, the same one who killed Jeanie Whitmore."

I went cold, thinking about the frightened young girl, terrified somewhere, being threatened by an accomplice of her father's. Kevin Stoker escaped from prison three days ago. They were probably reunited by now.

"Did no one tell Margaret Stoker her daughter had disappeared?"

"Ten days till the trial. They were still debating whether they should tell her or not by the time Stoker called his ex-wife and told her himself."
I looked at Booth again, and he gave me a small smile, which I returned. Finally things began making sense. Even though we could hate what was happening, we could know why it was happening.

"That makes absolutely no sense."

"What?"

"What do you mean, Angela?"

Why? Why couldn't one simple thing be right?

"He's kidnapped his own daughter? Unlikely. And also, why on earth would he escape prison and then start making phone calls? Sloppy, and doesn't sound like him. Besides… he escaped from prison. Do you think he cares about a trial right now? He's already out, and if they catch him with this there will be a whole bigger list of charges against him!"

I was impressed. As was Booth, who said so.

"I'm impressed, Angela."

"You pick up stuff, working with geniuses."

She smiled and walked away.
"I'm going to go shower now. The sex you two are radiating is making me feel dirty."

And with this she left us, jaws (metaphorically) hitting the ground in unison.

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*Dances caught in a whirwind of post double dose of Bones eps HAPPINESS*

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