YAY! Finally I can login! I dunno what happened, site problems, I guess. Oh well, hope this chap was worth the wait!

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CHAPTER 23

I woke to darkness in a car, an uncomfortable sitting position and the sound of my breath, too loud. For a moment panic gripped me, because I didn't know where I was. But I frantically looked outside and saw lights, so I wasn't trapped inside with hours to live… or die.

I was safe, and Booth was beside me speaking into his phone.

"I just want to make sure she…"

"Booth?"

Was it my voice, sounding so child-like and frightened? It couldn't be, surely. I was still groggy from sleep.
"Bones… hey, you're up."

I blinked rapidly to ease the contracting of my pupils and looked around. We were in the parking lot of the Hoover building, and Booth just hung up to whoever he'd been talking to mid-sentence. He turned to look and me with a concerned expression.

"Bones, you look a bit sick."

I looked sick? When had that happened?

I felt dizzy and confused. My mind tried to go back to earlier, when we'd gotten back on the road after our talk. Someone had called Booth to inform him that a team of FBI techs had been dispatched to Margaret's safe-house to sweep the place. He'd said something like 'Let's see if we find any evidence. If we don't we won't know for sure it's the same person, because our guy doesn't leave a trace behind. If we do, we won't know either because since the guy doesn't leave evidence behind we have nothing to compare it to…' and after that I couldn't remember a thing.

Had I been so exhausted that I'd simply fallen asleep listening to his voice?

"What… how long was I asleep?"

"The entire way since I began to drive again. Have you been sleeping well lately, Bones?"
"I… I can't honestly…"

"Let me rephrase. Have you been sleeping at all?"
I sat a bit further in my seat, feeling uncomfortably cornered. "I can't honestly…"

"Dammit, Bones, you need to take care of yourself! What about last night? Did you sleep at all?"

I shook my head, exasperated at his attitude, but also weary because Booth had a temper and right now he was angry.

"Was it because of the case?" he asked, and his voice sounded strangely hopeful. Of course. He was hoping it was because of a murderer and not because of him, because of what we'd done.

"I can't. No, it wasn't." I said, feeling my eyes glisten. I couldn't lie. "Last night wasn't because of the case."

He looked away from me and stared straight ahead. "Was it because you had a cold, Bones?"

"No, it wasn't because of that. I'm not sick, Booth."

So this was as close as he was going to go, wasn't it? As close to 'Was it because of me, Bones?' as he would get.

He didn't ask again, but the sentence was there in the air around us nevertheless.

So what choice did I have? Didn't Booth always say that not answering was like saying…

"Yes."

I answered the truth to his unspoken question. What else could I say? He'd forced me to do this and now he'd have to face the consequences. He had to know it had been more than sex, more than nothing, as he'd put it. I'd felt more. I loved him, for Christ's sake! Would he understand that I was admitting that I loved him?

I braced myself for another one of his "I'm sorry" speeches, but it never came.

"I slept, Bones."

"What?" the moisture in my eyes spilled over. He was outright telling me he'd felt nothing. Telling me he understood what I had meant and that he'd been just fine.

I stumbled out of the car, feeling dizzy again.

"Bones! No, wait…!" he got out and caught me before I could walk two steps. He cradled me into his arms and held me strongly, not so that I didn't escape, but so that I wouldn't fall.

I swayed where I stood, crying into his chest and feeling wretched and pathetic. "Bones…" he began, stroking my back. "I need you to tell me again that you don't feel anything."

"What?" I tried to push away, but he was too strong.

"Just… I need to hear it again right now or else I'm going to do something really stupid. Please. For me, Bones."

"Of course I feel….!"
"No. I mean… romantically. You don't feel anything romantically, right? Just say that again. I need to hear that again, Bones."

I drew a deep, shuddering breath that smelled of Booth and whispered in his ear.

"I don't." I lied once more.

He seemed to deflate suddenly. "Thanks, Bones. I just… I'm a real asshole sometimes, I know that. I start to… I get confused, okay? Listen, I'm sorry you didn't sleep because you felt bad about what happened. I have no right to be angry at you for that. It's normal. I knew you might feel like that. It's okay. I'm sorry I got mad."

I didn't say anything. Correcting him felt like too much.

"Bones, I slept because I needed to dream. Dream that we could be somewhere together without the strange stuff that's been going on between us. You are my best friend, and I dreamt we could be just that and that it wasn't quite so hard, this not kissing you business."

I stiffened in his arms and he squeezed tighter.

"Bones, I needed to dream that Anne and Margaret were safe at home, finally at peace. Dream that we had nowhere we needed to be. Just relaxing. That's why I slept. I went inside my apartment and ran to the bed without changing because I couldn't take it anymore."

"You slept with a wet suit jacket on?" I asked quietly, my voice muffled by him.

"Yeah. Shoes, too. You know what though? I dreamt I was riding a blue horse through a white forest."

I managed a strangled squeak of laughter.

"Booth…"

"No, listen." But I could hear the smile in his voice. "I need you to eat and sleep properly, Bones, okay? We are human, like you said. In all aspects."

I nodded awkwardly, movement restricted by his arms and the hollow of his throat.

As we drew apart, my lips accidentally brush his cheek. He look at me intently for a moment, wondering whether to ask me something.

But he didn't.

*

"Hey Booth, so far nothing of Mrs Stoker."

"Yeah, I guessed, Charlie."

We walked quickly, as though a fast pace would help staunch the sense of urgency building up like a ticking clock inside of us. The victims never had any signs of sexual assault, or of any form of torture, in fact, but the timeline… it took us a month to find each woman. One woman a month for four months. Four women. Helen, Lily, Sandra, Jeanie… and now Anne, Margaret. Anne was the strange link, the different one.

I was back on track. Rested and ready to focus once more.

One month. Almost a week since Anne had gone, but hours since Margaret had disappeared. What did it all mean? I tried to classify the facts and make sense of them as I could. We needed to look for Frank Bram, he was our main suspect now that Mr Stoker had disappeared.

Booth spoke quickly to Charlie, and his broad back looked contracted and tense. I fought the urge to offer help with that, and instead came up with an explanation… for the anomaly Anne presented.

"Booth!"

"What is it?"

"I think… okay, this isn't my area of expertise, but the killer liked women who looked like Margaret Stoker, right? Tall, dark hair, beautiful, strong women, intelligent, mid to late forties, and in a relationship with someone else."

"Yeah." Although he flinched at the words beautiful and relationship, he didn't mention my fitting into the profile of the newly reinstated prime suspect. "What's your idea, Bones?"

"Well, Anne is nowhere near the age and she's not in a relationship, right?"

"Right."

"So… Anne doesn't fit the profile."

"No, Bones, she doesn't."

"What if Anne was bait?"

"Bait?" he repeated, not sounding surprised at all.

"Bait for Margaret. A way to get Margaret to… I don't know. This is all in your area of expertise, anyway. But it could be, right?"

He nodded, still not looking either surprised or awed at my conclusion, which really annoyed me. "Yeah, Bones, I figured that's the reason Anne was taken. She was more than bait, though, she was bargaining and blackmail."

"You already knew? Why didn't you tell me?" I asked, feeling cheated.

"My area, right? My rules, Bones…" He smiled his charm smile and walked ahead, leaving me scowling after him. But not really frustrated anymore.

About the case.

"I don't like Bram for this." Charlie was saying to Booth when I caught up with them in his office. "I mean, he didn't even know Helen or Sandra, right?"

"Maybe not. Maybe he passed them on the street and that was enough. We don't know anything, Charlie. This is all… messed up. Go tell Peter to find me Bram once and for all, and bring him in for questioning again."

Charlie nodded and left. When he passed me by the door, he shot me an apologetic glance and whispered: "Good luck, Dr Brennan."

Good luck with what?

"Bones, do you want me to get you a car to get back to the Jeffersonian?"

"That's okay, I'll stay here with you. Cam is performing the autopsy on Kevin Stoker, and I don't work with flesh."

He gave a tired smile. "I'll never get tired of your prejudice against muscle and tendons, Bones."

"Actually, there are many types of body tissue, Booth, including bone. The adipose tissue, for example, also known as body fat…"

"Okay, Bones, I know."

Stupid Temperance. Telling him things he already knew. Booth was smart, and I wasn't because I kept forgetting.

"Yes, sorry."

"Don't apologise!" He grinned, a true charm smile (he was really using up his quota for today) of his and sat down on his desk. "Bones, I've got to do some stuff right now, and later I'm going to check out Margaret's safe house. You want to come?"

"Of course. Field work!"

"Yeah, field work. So I was thinking, while I do this stuff you can stay here in the department and when I finish we'll both go, that sound okay?"

I nodded.

"Great. Then would you mind…." The ringing phone cut him off. Booth picked it up, looking curious. "Booth."

I couldn't hear what the other voice said, but Booth's face went pale with shock.

"Send it to the Jeffersonian immediately. Yes, the Jeffersonian Institution. Now. Dr Temperance Brennan will examine it there."

And he slammed the phone down.

"Examine what, Booth?"

He turned to look at me with wide eyes, and an expression I knew too well.

"What is it, Booth? What's wrong? Is everyone okay?"

"Security intercepted a package meant for my office. It's a box with a lock of dark brown hair and a note…"

"What does it say?" The steel in my voice glinted in the light from the lamp in his office.

"'They're running out of time'."

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Oh yeah, stuff is happening!

Cooooome on. Cooooome on now. There we gooooo… there we goooo! Review this Story/Chapter. Just like it says here. You can do it!