"At first, I thought the worst thing was that they were missing."

Wisely, Angela continued with the explanation for why that belief couldn't have held true. "Except 'dead' means… no more hope." She crossed her arms and set her forearms over the railing on the side of the catwalk. With Brennan in the middle, the three of us stood on a catwalk overlooking the Medico-Legal lab platform from up high. We all leaned over while still being suitably cautious.

Brennan wasn't as angry as she had been at Russ, nor was she so close to crying, but instead she seemed somber and disappointed. "My mother was alive for almost two years after they disappeared." She stared at nothing in particular off the catwalk. "She abandoned me." I knew the pain that she must have felt. It was like Russ leaving, not just something bad happening. They had actively made the choice to leave.

"She probably had a reason," I offered. Even I knew that it was a weak defense. I wrapped my fingers around the railing. "Maybe they got in trouble and didn't want to bring it home to you and Russ." That was a much better thing to think than to just assume that they got tired of being parents.

But could I do that? I wondered. If I had children, people I cared about and wanted to protect, a job, a home, a life – could I just give it all up for years, running away from everything I knew to keep my family safe when the past caught up with me?

Angela nudged Brennan with her shoulder. "Look at it like this," she started bracingly, encouragingly. "You finally got to slap Russ!" At the reminder, Brennan broke into a grin and she laughed. "You've been wanting to do that for years!"

"Another thing off your bucket list," I agreed, thinking maybe someday I'd have to seek out Aaron just to do the same to him.

Brennan looked up towards the high ceiling and the skylights in the roof. "I worshipped him," she sighed, thinking wistfully back to the past when she and Russ were still living together and on speaking terms. "You know? Oh, God, he was so cool." She laughed dryly. Angela and I both shared a look behind her back before leaning forward again and watching her, giving her an audience to talk to that would sympathize with her.

"Everyone knew I was Russ Brennan's little sister. I wasn't… cool, or pretty, so… being his sister…" She sighed and shook her head slightly, in a faraway place. I understood; having someone popular that you were related to got you treated decently, as long as you didn't ruffle any other feathers the wrong way. Brennan shifted, her arms crossed on the railing. "You know that game, Marco Polo?"

I didn't exactly know where this was going, so I just answered the question and nodded. Angela replied with a quiet 'yeah.'

"I'd be sitting in class, and I'd hear out the window, 'Marco!'" Smiling, she laughed, sounding almost short of breath. "It'd be Russ, checking in on me and letting everyone know that I was his little sister."

That was unexpectedly sweet.

"Did you… you know… 'Polo?'" Angela asked, intrigued and knowing Brennan needed someone to listen to her.

She nodded and exhaled deeply, shoulders slumping as she looked at Angela while she answered. It was like someone else talking had brought her back to the reality – that those days had gone a long time ago, and now their relationship was strained at best. "Yeah. Sometimes it'd be the only word I said all day – 'Polo.'"

She turned her head back to those milling down on the ground of the lab. Being in the catwalks gave us privacy and a safe place to be, but we weren't completely alone – Booth came through the front doors. We could see him easily, and we watched him looking around to see if we were in the front of the lab, though he didn't look up to see us.

"And then, Mom and Dad disappeared, and Russ took off. Suddenly, no one cared where I was. I miss that," she seemed to be admitting to herself. "Someone caring where I am all the time."

I frowned. She said it as if it was something she no longer had, and that just wasn't true. She was my friend, a family figure, my roommate, boss, mentor. Of course I cared where she was. I didn't want to know exactly where she was every single second of every day, but that didn't mean I didn't care to know when she needed someone and that she was always going to be safe.

I slid my hand slightly on the catwalk rail so my hand was closer to her arm. "We care," I said, quietly insistent. "Russ left, but we're not going to. And hey, he's back now, so maybe he won't totally disappear on you again this time." If she really needed him, she could at least get in touch; and if they chose to work past their issues, then she could have her older brother back, in a way.

Down below, Booth finally looked up and saw us. I grinned. Hiding in plain sight. I would have to keep in mind that he checks the catwalks as an afterthought, just in case I ever wanted to make his life difficult or buy time.

"Bones!" He waved his arms for Brennan's attention, disrupting the lab by shouting up to us. "Come on! Let's go! Chop, chop!" He clapped his hands together loudly for emphasis. His voice, and his clapping, seemed pretty loud in such a normally quieter place. He didn't particularly care. "I found the agent that was assigned to your parents' case!"

The agent had since been promoted to Special Agent Callie Warner. We got her to come in to Booth's office and brief us on what she'd known about the Brennan siblings' parents. She was fairly willing to come in, although I suspected it was because she wanted to know what happened in a case she hadn't been able to close.

She was in her forties now, maybe even early fifties, hair platinum blonde and tied up in a bun with pins holding her hair in place. She had bronze earrings and a blazer jacket over a cream-colored blouse and a black dress skirt, and she brought with her a file on the criminals in question.

"I was the FBI liaison on a bank robbery task force, working out of Cincinnati in the mid-to-late seventies. Secret Service, state police, A.T.F. – all of us were after a pretty bad bunch of armed robbers working Ohio, Kentucky, Iowa…" She trailed off, giving us the general idea of the geographic locations. She shook her head. "Excuse me, am I to understand that I'm addressing the family of one of these robbers?"

I looked down and nodded to confirm it. I glanced over and motioned to the siblings. "Russ and Dr. Brennan, Max and Ruth Keenan's kids."

Callie leaned back, taking that in and seeming slightly mollified. To me, it seemed like she was relieved that they weren't the kids of another couple or individual. "Max and Ruth," she repeated thoughtfully. "Yeah… they never really belonged in that crew."

What, they were a higher class than the rest of the robbers? I glanced at Booth to see if he knew what the other agent meant, but Brennan and Russ, animosity temporarily forgotten, looked to each other for answers.

"Why?" Brennan asked first, going back to the woman behind the desk.

"They worked smart. Specialized in safe deposit boxes. No guns." She shook her head for emphasis. It seemed truthful. Where I could guess that most of them were armed and volatile, their parents had been more careful not to leave traces or, more importantly, hurt innocent people. At least that could be kept in mind. "They'd either con their way in or case out the place to break back in on the weekend. They took their time. We never got a handle on the size of their scores."

Russ lifted his head. His hands were clasped around the fronts of the armrests. "Why?"

I looked sideways to the man I wasn't supposed to like, but whose attitude was slowly drawing me in. Damn it! Stop being a good guy! "Aside from cash and expensive jewelry, people keep other things in safety deposits that they may not want others to know about. So even when it goes missing, they wouldn't report it to the police if, say, they obtained it illegally."

Russ nodded and took the answer at face value, which, given the way I'd blackmailed him, surprised me. He looked back towards Warner for her to continue in her explanation.

"None of us understood why stand-up criminals like Max and Ruth would join the Midwest strong-arm crew." And, just like she said, Warner looked slightly puzzled just thinking back to it. "Links to white supremacists, and a real dedication to firearms and violence." She paused. Meanwhile, I was just getting a little more hopeful that Max and Ruth were a lot better than they could have been. "A job in Dayton went really bad. Two innocent bystanders were killed, one state trooper, and seven were wounded."

Booth cleared his throat. Since introducing himself, he'd mostly let Brennan, Russ, and I ask the questions pertaining to Max and Ruth/Christine. It was his way of giving the siblings more control over the investigation for their own parents. "When was that?" He asked after a second.

"July fourth, nineteen seventy-eight."

"That fits," I said immediately without thinking to stop myself from saying it out loud. Russ and Brennan both turned to stare at me and I raised my shoulders defensively. "What? The earliest paper trails of Max and Christine Brennan started a little after that date. They had the two of you by then, so they changed identities and relocated to protect you from people who would try to get revenge on them for the bad heist."

It was far from the worst theory I'd ever had, and it seemed to fit with what we already knew. I was still just glad that they hadn't been outright murderers. I don't know how well Brennan would take that, but since she spends her time putting murderers behind bars, I don't think it would be an easy thing to take in. And since Russ isn't a sociopath, it probably wouldn't be great for him, either.

It was hard to tell is Russ was hopeful or disappointed. "Never caught them?" He asked.

Warner's lips pursed. "Not us, no." She admitted. I thought it probably grated on her pride a little bit to admit that a different unit entirely had gotten them instead. "A few years later, one of them turned state's evidence for an FBI agent out of Louisville and sent the rest to jail." That's the witness of the prosecution documents, I realized. Ruth had testified against the majority of the others in the crew. "My understanding is they're all dead."

"Our parents were bank robbers who… morphed into a high school science teacher… and a bookkeeper?" Stunned, Russ turned to Brennan like maybe his sister was making more sense out of it than he was. She looked equally amazed by the almost unbelievable transition from felon to domestic, comparatively tame lifestyles.

"Their particular brand of safety deposit break-ins stopped. At the time, I figured the strong-arm crew killed them for their cut." Warner shrugged slightly and put her hands over her knees.

Well, someone got to them, alright.

The Asian man on the crime scene team popped in through the open doorway, immediately seeking out Booth and panting slightly like he'd hurried up the stairs and across the floor as quickly as he could. "Agent Booth, we found blood in the car."

Booth rolled his shoulders and stretched his arms forward as the discussion with Warner closed. "Well, we expected that," he pointed out.

"Yeah, but here's the wrinkle." Unimpressed by the dismissal of the evidence he'd found, the man canted his head to the side and deadpanned, "We've got blood from two separate individuals."

Hodgins blew up a chart of four different DNA strands on the monitor at the desk on the exam platform by the time we got back to the lab to consult on the DNA found in the blood in the Brennan family's old car. Hodgins had the top two labelled with numbers – the samples from the car, whose identities were in question – and the lower two were labelled with Brennan and Russ's names, pulled from the databases to compare.

"Now, these two DNA charts are from the blood in the car." Hodgins pointed to both of the top strips before moving his hand to indicate the lower half of the screen. "These two are from Dr. Brennan and her brother. These three match, and this one does not."

Brennan's and Russ's clearly shared similarities. There were partial strips that seemed almost identical, while others varied. The first sample from the car was comparable to both of them, showing distinct similarities where DNA sequences matched and others where it didn't, where their DNA had been modeled after their other parent's as well. The second chart from the car looked almost nothing like the other three and clearly wasn't related to them.

"These three people are related?" Booth translated for himself while mentally comparing the rows on the computer screen.

Brennan nodded and pointed up at the right strands as she mentioned them. "This is Mom, me, and Russ."

"But this chart," Hodgins added, tapping the edge of the screen beside the final, unidentified DNA strip. "A male, but it's definitely not your father."

Brennan stared at the computer like that row of DNA held all of the answers for her life's problems. I'd say it maybe did – several of her problems, anyway. "Okay, so we'll just run it through CODAS and the Convicted Offender Index and see what pops up," Booth reasoned, reaching out and patting Brennan's shoulder when she didn't look away from the monitor. "Alright?"

Angela stopped at the bottom of the stairs, maybe catching just the tail end of the conversation regarding the DNA samples, and she raised a hand to wave up. "Holly! Hey, can I borrow you?"

Considering the last time Angela said she was going to 'borrow' me, I hadn't actually had much of a choice in the matter, I spent a few seconds wondering if this was somehow a trick question before I looked sympathetically at my boss and ventured to the stairs. "What's up?" I asked, pulling my card through the system before stepping onto the first stair, hopping up onto the banister, and sliding down a few feet before jumping off on level tile.

I'm a teenager, I'm practically supposed to misuse stairs. The people who look down on me for my age certainly expect that sort of behavior.

Angela didn't comment, just kind of smiled. Personally, I was thrilled that I had the mobility to easily jump up and ride down banisters again without hurting myself or running the risk of hurting my wrist. "You've kinda got a feel for Russ, right?"

If she was referring to the fact that I'd spent several hours with him, all but maybe ten minutes of that time with either Booth, Brennan, or Zach's company, then yes, I did have a general grasp on his attitude.

"I guess so," I decided to say, because I didn't think Russ was a very complex person, and even if he was, then his behavior didn't seem very out of the ordinary for someone in his situation. "Why? What's going on?"

"He's in my office right now." Huh. Well, that explained why she wasn't up there. Immediately after coming to the conclusion I realized that it was a bit of a harsh conclusion to come to. Meanwhile, Angela started to turn around towards the stairs that led to the second level overlooking the lab, where her office was located. She gestured with one hand. I followed after her, obeying the beckoning command. "I'm supposed to get him to draw someone for me. I don't want to get played if he lies." A waste of time, and a blow to the pride.

"Ah. Got it." Of course I'd sit in if she wanted, and at least make sure Russ wasn't lying to her, but I felt it was necessary to let her know he's not going to be passing any polygraph tests soon. "But don't worry, he's not a very good liar."

Russ was already in Angela's office, settled on a couch opposite of a chair. Angela picked up a medium-sized spiral sketch pad and a neat sharpened pencil and separate eraser. While I pulled out her spinning cushioned chair from in front of one of her computers and dragged it in front of the couch to join them, Angela sat down and set her supplies in her lap, balanced on one leg that was crossed over the other.

"So, you describe someone to me, and I draw them. That's the drill," Angela informed Russ, making it as simple as she could. There was more to it than that for her, but it was the extent of what Russ needed to do.

Amiably but a little confused, Russ shifted in the couch with his hands in his lap. "Who do I describe?" He asked.

I knocked my ankle between the legs of the spinning chair, making it rotate back and forth in degrees slowly but keeping Russ in front of me. "That's part of why I'm here," I said, not entirely lying. It wasn't the main reason, but it was buyable. Somehow I didn't think Angela would particularly want Russ to know the real reason. "Chances are, it's pretty obvious, but in case it's not, you'll tell me what you remember, and if someone seems suspicious, then that's who you describe and Angela draws."

"Booth put us together so I could charm you into telling me the truth." The artist honestly informed the mechanic.

"And if you lie and find out, then Dr. Brennan won't be the only one taking swings at you." He winced at the reminder of the painful slap he'd earlier received, while I raised my fists for emphasis.

Russ held his arms out like to show that he was helpless and harmless. "Trust me, I've got no more truth."

Angela bent her arm at the elbow, setting her arm on one armrest of the chair and propping her head up, tilted to the side with her cheek on her closed fist. "You know," she said, her tone seeming like a warning, "Your sister is my best friend, so when she says you can't be trusted, I trust her."

"This is you being charming?" Russ asked incredulously, before grinning and jerking a thumb towards me. "You know, she said almost the exact same thing to me. Or along those lines. You should get it on a T-shirt," he recommended wittily.

I narrowed my eyes. "Hilarious," I proclaimed dryly.

Russ took a deep breath, rolled his eyes, and started to drum the fingers of his right hand on his jeans. "You know what's ironic?" He asked, leg bouncing restlessly. "Tempe doesn't trust me because I kept a promise."

What promise? I tried to convey through a glare and scowl. The promise to abandon her and leave her?

"What promise?" Angela asked aloud, her voice notably more gentle than mine would have been had I been the one left to ask. She also left out the other part.

The man looked off to the side and scraped his teeth over his lower lip for a second, like he was questioning whether or not he should really tell this story, before he actually started to. "Seven years old, Dad and me in the backyard – this was in Ohio." Where they'd lived before Chicago? Russ seemed angry, but I suspected it was at the events he was remembering. "My dad tells me, "You're not Kyle anymore. Forget about Kyle. You're Russ."" He pointed emphatically at his own chest, mimicking what his father had done. "He says, "If you ever tell anyone – the police, anyone – you will be killing your mother, and your sister.""

That's a hell of a lot of weight to impress upon a seven-year-old. So maybe the point that Max had been making was important, but still, there had to be better ways to handle it. Seven-year-old boys can still remember something and if it was urgent that he know it, then he could have just told him, not threatened that his family would be killed if he slipped up.

Russ wasn't done. ""Swear," he says. "You swear on your baby sister's life you won't tell." He makes me say my new name a hundred times." I thought that might be an exaggeration, but then he started to repeat his first and last name like a mantra. "Russ Brennan, Russ Brennan, Russ Brennan." Russ said it powerfully enough to really drill it in. "He says it with me. Russ Brennan, Russ Brennan, Russ Brennan."

Way to go, Max, I thought internally, sarcastic, and fought not to roll my eyes. You did a fantastic job at traumatizing your son.

Angela had become more sympathetic as she heard the story and saw the intensity behind the retelling. Russ calmed himself down some but his eyes were still angry at his father for putting him through it.

"Around that time, when Kyle became Russ…" Again, to myself, I thought the distinction wasn't necessary. Kyle and Russ were the same person. More psychological, self-identity stuff, I supposed. "Maybe you saw someone who… scared you?" Angela suggested gently. "Someone who scared you because you had instincts. The instincts of a frightened kid. Was there someone like that?"

Russ rolled his eyes, looked up towards the ceiling, but locked his jaw and I could see when he remembered someone who fit what Angela had described. He looked back down, slowly nodding.

"Yeah. A man came to the house one day. My dad said if I ever say this guy again to grab my sister and hide."

Evidently, even if Russ hadn't thought of the man as remarkable enough to remember, he'd been a threat to Max. Max and Christine/Ruth had believed him to be a danger to their kids.

Angela nodded, confirming that that was the man we needed to identify. "Well, when you're ready, you'll describe that man to me."

Russ nodded, shutting his eyes and breathing. "Alright," he agreed, amicable to the plan when he opened his eyes again. I glanced to Angela, but she still didn't seem anything other than compassionate and empathetic to him, if a little guarded. "Just… can you give me…" Time? To gather his thoughts?

Angela realized what he was asking for and nodded, standing up from her chair and picking up her supplies at the same time. "Of course," she graciously allowed, understanding that digging something like that up from the past might be more difficult than it sounds. "Just sometime today."

Angela left the room to give Russ some privacy and do something she wanted for a little while, leaving me alone with Brennan's brother. I leaned back in my chair and kicked on the floor, spinning the rotating chair around to face Russ again.

Getting comfortable again on the sofa, Russ crossed his arms and looked up at me, looking over me curiously like this was the first time he could actually converse with me at all. It was the first time we'd been alone and I wasn't pushing him into anything. "How long have you been living with her?" He asked, the 'her' clearly implied as his sister.

I debated telling him that it was none of his business – after so long away he barely knew who Brennan had grown up to be, but I compared the situation to myself with Parker and realized I'd probably want to know the same thing, at least so I had an idea who my sibling was spending time with. Reluctantly I decided that I might as well answer his questions, as at least he was being a little bit responsible and caring about who his sister had in her company.

"Not too long," I replied carefully, not tensing up but not exactly relaxing, either. I still tend to be careful about letting my guard down around strangers. "A few months ago, I was kidnapped by the murderer we were after." I had to swallow when I noticed that he was starting to look concerned. I gestured to my abdomen. "He stabbed me. After I got out of the hospital, everyone here was of the opinion I had to move in with someone. At the time, things were kind of tense with Booth and I, and your sister would have known what to do if I needed medical attention."

"What about your parents? Why didn't you just stay with them?" Russ asked, shaking his head at what, to him, didn't make sense. Who am I kidding? Of course it doesn't! He doesn't know my insane backstory.

"It's complicated." Ah, the universal excuse for brushing off a question I didn't want to answer. "Like… really complicated," I added, smiling and trying not to laugh at the understatement.

Russ held out his arms and shrugged. "We've got the time here."

I raised one eyebrow at him. You're kinda pushy, aren't you? "The foster family I'm in? The parents went missing last year. Just up and left. Not too unlike yours." It was a subtle dig that I almost regretted, but it made me feel a bit more in control. "And then, when I was in the hospital, the doctors accidentally found a DNA match. Turns out, this whole time, Booth was my biological father and hadn't even known he had a daughter." When I say it out loud, I secretly thought to myself, it sounds like a fairytale of some sort. "I didn't want to move in with him because it was tough for both of us to adjust, so Dr. Brennan helped me move into her apartment."

Russ shifted like he was in his own home, leaning on the side of the sofa with one arm leaning on the armrest at the edge. "How long have you known them? I mean, before all that happened," he added to clarify that he meant how long I'd known them altogether. "She's not very social, in case you haven't noticed," he chuckled like we were reconnecting friends.

I started to smile and made myself stop, rolling my eyes. "Late January, early February." I shrugged. I knew the exact date – had it memorized, even though at the time it had seemed almost inconsequential – but he didn't need to know I had found it so important that I had remembered exactly when it was. "It doesn't seem like very long, but I don't know, some cases we've had… there are only so many things you can get through without bonding. It seems this job is one of them."

Russ grinned. "I wouldn't know. Seems like getting stabbed would enforce the point, though." I blinked at him, not really amused. I saw the humor in it, it just was far from the best I'd heard and I wasn't in the mood to laugh at a joke. Russ grimaced, thinking he'd crossed a line. "Too soon?"

I shook my head. "Nah, it's fine, I just didn't think it was that funny. Truthful, yes, funny, no."

"You know, when you first came up to me, it was like you thought I was some evil, cunning villain." The amusement on his face suggested that, of all things, he was flattered by this initial assumption. "Did I not pan out the way you thought?"

I stared at him flatly for a second. So you're aware, you made this into a deep conversation by asking that question. "I knew you left Dr. Brennan when she was fifteen," I responded, toeing off my shoes and pulling my legs up to cross underneath me on the big, spinning chair. Angela's office was a personal, homely place in the lab where she generally encouraged her friends to be comfortable, so this wasn't the first time I'd taken off my shoes and relaxed for a while on the furniture. "She has my loyalties, so I assumed I shouldn't give you any wiggle room. Don't feel too bad, I probably would have blackmailed you no matter what…" Russ blinked and then frowned. "… But I guess you're not as awful as I had thought you'd be. She doesn't talk about you much, though. At all, really. She doesn't know if she can trust you." I paused, took a deep breath, and added, "I can't blame her. She nearly iced out Booth just for calling you a few months ago."

Her brother looked down for a second and then back up at me, leaning forward with a curve in his back as his posture slacked. "Does Tempe really hate me that much?"

"No. I don't think she hates you at all." I told him the truth, but it wasn't meant to reassure him. I caught his eyes and held contact. "Hatred is a lot easier to handle than love," I advised, talking from experience. "It takes a lot less energy. I think she feels betrayed… because you left."

"I was nineteen!" He exclaimed when I placed subtle… or not-so-subtle blame. He reeled back. "My parents were suddenly gone, I needed a job… all the adults I know and then some are telling me that I can't take custody because I can't afford it, and I don't know how to raise a kid!"

I could see how that was overwhelming, but he had more than a few seconds to make a decision and damn it, how could he have chosen to give up his sister? I don't care how difficult it would be for me; if, God forbid, something happened to Booth and Rebecca, I'd do everything I could and then some to make absolutely sure Parker stayed out of the foster system. I could trust myself to make sure he was taken care of, but I couldn't extend the same trust to some strangers who wanted to foster a little boy. I can't just say I love Parker unconditionally, and that's understandable, because I've spent very little time with him, all things considered; but as his sister I have a familial responsibility and I think I could learn to love him the way older siblings are supposed to love their brothers and sisters. Because I know how bad the foster system is, even if we weren't related, I'd do what I had to in order to make sure he was safe.

"Raising a child and keeping your sister are two totally different things!" I protested vehemently, letting myself get a bit worked up as Russ allowed himself to do the same. "Her guardians were gone, she had no one else she could go to, and she depended on you to keep her in a safe place! Then you left – abandoning her – forcing her into a situation where she went home to home and as a result, never actually had a home until she was an adult!" I highly doubted Brennan had been bounced from as many "homes" as I had, but I knew she had had several.

"But she was with people who could handle taking care of a teenage girl and could afford it. They knew how, they had the time for it!"

"You should have made time!" I interrupted to retort, face feeling hot with anger.

"How was I supposed to know that the foster system wouldn't put her in one good home to stay?" Oh, I don't know, doing some research before you dumped her and skipped town?! "That's not my fault, that's the foster family's! They could have kept her. They pushed her away!" I felt like punching him in the face and screaming at him that he did the exact same thing he was now blaming others for. "I sent her to people who could actually provide for her and keep her in school, and because of that she's a doctor in this place!"

Okay, so education was important, but it was far from the only factor to think of and this is an incredible institution, but by no means do those lame excuses get him off the hook or able to just walk away without guilt or remorse or the understanding that he should have done better by her.

It also pissed me off that he was accrediting her triumph in life to his decision to leave her alone. No way is that fair! He left her alone and now thinks he deserves the credit for what she accomplished in his absence? "Her successes now aren't because you ditched her when she needed you! You can't just leave your sister with strangers and say that she's now their responsibility! You pushed your sister away like she wasn't worth anything to you." No way he didn't understand how that felt like! Isn't it how he felt when his parents went AWOL? And he knowingly did that to someone else! "She needed you and you left her all alone, Aaron!"

A second after I'd said it I realized exactly what I'd said, and I clapped a hand over my mouth, lips parted and eyes wide, stunned that I'd let myself slip that far. It had stopped being an argument for Brennan's sake and I hadn't realized it until I'd already used my brother's name. Russ became a convenient outlet and I let it become personal to me.

Russ, though surprised, didn't immediately respond to it, raising his eyebrows and staring at me for a moment as he seemed to realize what had happened.

I lowered my hand from in front of my mouth slowly. "I'm… sorry I said that," I forced myself to say at a normal volume.

Maybe I thought Russ would be agitated further, but instead… I don't know. He seemed calmer, more thoughtful. Tension draining out of his posture, he fell back into Angela's couch cushion, arms falling almost limply into his lap. "Who's Aaron?" He asked, curious and calm but surprisingly not demanding.

I deflated and lowered my arms. I'd sort of shown my hand there, hadn't I? I started to pop my knuckles against my knee absently while deciding to answer. Being honest might make him more likely to answer honestly, right? And he did kind of deserve to know why I was picking a fight with him, didn't he? …

"My older foster brother, who joined the army as soon as his parents took off." I brushed off the severity of it by rolling my eyes and scoffing as if I didn't care.

Russ leaned forward, settling his elbows on his knees. I was amazed he took this so well but I was still on guard in case there was something I wasn't expecting about to figuratively (or literally) backhand me.

"I'm sorry he did that… but I'm not Aaron. I had my own reasons for what I did." Russ looked past me and to the door. I twisted around and saw Angela paused, talking to Hodgins outside of the glass wall. Quickly I turned back around to Russ, intent to finish this and get it in the past before Angela heard what was going on with someone I wasn't even sure it was okay to get along with. "And, you know, maybe I regret how I handled it at the time, but I don't think I could have supported Tempe the way she needed. She did well for herself here." He glanced at Angela again meaningfully, and I think the point he was making was that she had a lot of great people here for her, not just a fantastic job and a renowned name. "I don't know… who she would have been if I'd stayed in Chicago, but I made my choice and I can't go back."

I took a deep breath and studied him. He seemed sincere. And he kind of had the advantage on me for not losing his composure. He empathized with me in spite of how I'd treated him, and it sounded to me like he was trying to make a truce with me for what he'd done. He was right that he couldn't change what he'd done and he'd acknowledged that he could have done a better job at making that decision. Could I really expect more than that from someone who I'd blackmailed?

"Fair enough," I said, nodding and resigning myself to grudgingly getting along with Russ, although I would still be on Brennan's side. "I still don't agree with you, but I don't think it'll help anything to make a fight about something that can't be undone." I clapped my hands together and forced a faux, thin smile onto my face. "So how ready are you to talk to the fabulous sketch artist?"

"If you keep bringing Chinese food in the middle of the night, we're all going to get fat," Brennan remarked. Despite that it sounded like an objection to the developing habit, she didn't seem that bothered by being brought take-out after midnight by Booth, who was still claiming that he was able to see our lights from the main road. As this is all but an impossibility, I'm waiting for him to outright announce his belief that he's Batman.

"I think I can be okay with that," I said, nodding wisely over my box.

"I know what you've been thinking," he told Brennan, seated on her right while I was in an armchair to the left of the couch, happy with my take-out box and chopsticks. Again, Booth had quickly given up and gone for the silverware drawer in the kitchen.

"I doubt it," the anthropologist replied.

Booth continued on knowingly, not pausing even when Brennan claimed that he didn't know what was going through her mind. "You've been thinking that your family is made up of liars and criminals." The way her back tensed and shoulders rolled slightly forward was enough of an answer. "And that makes you feel lonely." He patted her shoulder. "There's a story here we don't know yet," he assured.

"Like what?" She asked with frustration, looking to the side to see him and demand an alternative explanation for her family's criminal behavior.

Booth laughed patiently. "Bones, 'don't know' means that it's a mystery."

She sighed. "What were your parents like?"

His father was a drunkard who abused him, and his grandfather kicked his dad out when he realized what was going on. He has a little brother. I realized that, aside from what I knew of Rebecca and Parker (which admittedly wasn't all that much), I didn't know too much about his immediate family, and when I thought of his parents, I immediately went to his father's abusive habits. Maybe because it stood out, or maybe because I could relate. Either way, it was hard to think past it.

Booth laughed. Apparently asking what his parents were like wasn't the same as asking what mine were. Then again, his hadn't ditched him, and he seemed able to remember good memories without obsessing over the worse ones. "My parents? Uh, my dad, he drove thuds and phantoms in Vietnam." Military slang, I assumed. Brennan looked a bit confused, so he explained, "Those are fighter jets. After that, he was a barber in Philadelphia. And my mom, she wrote jingles for a local advertising agency!"

I wondered if I'd heard any of those jingles written by Booth's mother – my grandmother (that connection came suddenly and with a start) and hadn't realized the significance at the time. Then I realized again that those people Booth had told me about – his father, grandfather, brother – they were all my relatives, too, and while that, empirically, wasn't a surprise, I hadn't really thought about it yet and so it still seemed a little shocking.

Brennan looked down to the take-out boxes. "So they didn't go out at night after you were asleep and rob banks?" She assumed bitterly.

Booth sighed, cheer faltering. "Listen, Bones. Parents, they have secret lives. If they didn't, they wouldn't be parents." I considered this. Sure, parents had aspects of their lives they didn't share with their kids, but somehow robbing banks seemed a bit more than just a secret deemed inappropriate for children. The FBI agent sighed and stretched, leaning forward and pushing his Chinese box onto an empty space on the coffee table. "It is a little late for Chinese, isn't it? Thanks for the meal. See you tomorrow."