Disclaimer: I own nothing regarding GWTW

Author's Notes: Thank you for all the reviews and feedback.

Chapter Thirty

As Rhett was driving home, he saw a street vendor selling flowers. He stopped and bought a bouquet of flowers for Scarlett simply because he was so awfully glad, she was his partner. And he knew deep in his heart Miguel was right. He was not an easy man to live with and he often took what other people did for him for granted. No, that wasn't right. He never saw what other people did for him.

After buying the flowers while driving home, Rhett tried to remember all the things his dad did to make his mom happy. He was always buying her small gifts like flowers, chocolates, figurines, art supplies, and numerous other things. Surprisingly to Rhett, his father had not bought his mother a lot of jewelry.

Over dinner Rhett told Scarlett, "Miguel said he never pursued Ms. Addy because she only had eyes for Dr. Hodgins."

"I'm sure Emily saw him as a Casanova thus never took his flirting seriously."

"Casanova was a real person. His name was Giacomo Casanova. I read his autobiography Histoire de ma vie. He went to the University of Padua at the age of twelve. He was more than a womanizer. He was a scam artist and scofflaw, an alchemist, spy, and church cleric. He wrote satires, fought duels, and escaped from prison more than once. He wrote that he had an affair with a sixteen-year-old girl and her fourteen-year-old sister at the same time. If that wasn't bad enough, he has sex with one of those women years later and her daughter. He believed the girl was his ….."

"Stop! I don't want to hear this. I apologize to Miguel for comparing him to that awful man."

"Scarlett, you are acting like a prude."

"I am a prude. Have you not noticed that yet?"

"How would I know that?"

"By what we don't do in our bed."

"Oh! I think our bed is very exciting."

Scarlett laughed and said, "Maybe you are a prude too."

"I am happy being a prude with you. There isn't anything else I would want to do in our bed that we aren't already doing. You are a perfect playmate."

"Thank you, Rhett."

Rhett was making himself say the words no matter how uncomfortable it made him feel. He wanted Scarlett to know how important she was to him.

Rhett and Scarlett had been together for almost a year. Neither one of them talked about marriage, but they talked about their future as if they were going to be together forever. It was incredibly special to both of them that since their first night together, they had never slept apart except when she had to go to Texas to interview John Morris. Rhett would have happily gone with her to Texas, but he had to bring the skeleton back to the Jeffersonian.

Rhett took Scarlett out to dinner to celebrate the anniversary of their first date. She wore the dress she had worn that night. He wore the same suit he had worn. She told him how handsome he looked. He told her how incredibly sexy she looked in her dress. She replied, "I know."

Rhett had laughed and said, "You certainly do."

It was March and Scarlett got a phone call from John Walsh telling her that he had donated the bust of John List to the Alcatraz East Crime Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tenn. He had also arranged that Miguel Bender would be noted as the artist.

One night at the Unconventional Diner, Scarlett mentioned to Rhett about the bust Miguel had created. Rhett said, "Pigeon Forge?"

"Yes."

"That was where Heather was from."

"Whatever happened to her?"

"She died from an overdose. After I got sober, I tried to help her. It was partly to fulfil the step about making amends to people we have harmed. I hadn't intentionally harmed her, but I had harmed her through neglect. Until Bonnie's death, I resented her for tricking me into marriage. I went in search of her. I found her at her parents' home in Pigeon Forge."

"Was she happy to see you?"

Rhett looked away. Finally, he said, "She thought I had come for her. I tried to make it clear to her that I hadn't. At last, she got it. She was living with her parents. When I offered to pay for her to return to the University of Tennessee so she could get a degree, she called it blood money. She was irrational. Her father walked me out and told me that he thought she still had a problem with drugs. I agreed to pay for her to go to rehab. She didn't even finish the program."

"That is sad."

"Yes, I think her biggest problem was she couldn't accept her reality. It wasn't what she had planned on, so she was filled with bitterness. She also had to deal with being partially responsible for her daughter's death."

"That is a hard pill to swallow."

"She trusted the wrong man. Maybe that was the story of her life. She had trusted me to be a good husband, but I had never promised her to be a good husband or even try to be a good husband. I didn't want to be her husband."

"No, Honey, that's not on you. She had a dream and she tried to make you fulfill her dream. That would be like putting a square peg in a round hole. It just was never going to work."

"I don't know. Anyway, getting high was her way of escaping her reality. Her father contacted me about six months after she had walked away from the rehab center. He wanted to know if I would pay for her to go back. I agreed. She refused to go. Her parents threatened to kick her out if she didn't get straight. She wouldn't. I don't know all the details. I didn't want to know all the details, but she ended up dying from an overdose in a cheap flop house."

"How sad."

"Yeah."

"Do you feel guilty about her death?"

"A little bit. I guess I always will. I could have been a better husband."'

"Yes, you could have been, but you had your own goals that you were pursuing."

Rhett smiled and said, "I feel even guiltier because I am so happy with you."

"Me too. I sometimes feel guilty that Charlie died, and I am living such a wonderful life."

"I guess we are human."

"I guess so."

Later Scarlett reflected that maybe it had been best that Cade died. He would have resented her for trapping him into marriage. If they were happy, it would have been a little wound. If they had been unhappy, it would have been a festering sore. She wouldn't have wished Cade dead, but that had happened. She had an awful thought. If she had married Cade and Wade had died, then Cade's resentment of her would have been full blown. They would have gotten a divorce not long after Wade's death. She was again grateful for Charlie and said a quick prayer for his soul.

It was a Sunday afternoon and Scarlett got a phone call from Sam. He said, "You will be getting a call from one of the National Arboretum's Caretakers in a few minutes. They found a body at their bird sanctuary."

"Why is it my problem?"

"The sanctuary is federally protected because it is the home of the bald eagle."

"Great. This is going to be an unsolved case."

"Get Rhett to go with you. The body is mostly a skeleton."

"Alright. Bye."

Almost as soon as Scarlett hung up the phone rang again. It was the Caretaker at the bird sanctuary. He started giving her all the information. Scarlett interrupted him to say, "Save all of that until I get out there."

"Yes ma'am. Let me try to tell you where I am on the sanctuary."

"Wait! Keep everyone who found the body there. I will be right out. Just drop me a pin. It will be the easiest way for me to find you."

"Yes, ma'am."

"What is your name?"

"Dick Loeb."

"I should be out there in no more than thirty minutes. I will have to contact the forensic anthropologist, Dr. Butler. I don't know how long that will take. Goodbye."

"Goodbye."

Soon Scarlett heard her cellphone ping. She said to Rhett who was sitting next to her, "We have a dead body to go retrieve."

"Skeleton?"

"I believe it is or close to it. The weather is finally nice enough for people to spend an extended amount of time outdoors. All the bird watchers are out in droves. One of those groups of birdwatchers found something they didn't want to find. A decomposing body that was mostly a skeleton. Since the area is federally protected the FBI was called in."

"Why did you get the case?"

Scarlett smiled and said, "Because of my relationship with you. Everyone knows I can get more out of you than anyone else."

"How do they know about our relationship?"

Scarlett smiled bigger. She said, "We go out to dinner with them, attend parties they give, and we invited them to Christmas dinner."

"This is what comes from socializing."

"I know. That is why I like to socialize."

Rhett scowled at Scarlett and said, "Let me call Ms. Addy."

"Is she close to finishing her dissertation?"

"Probably another three or four months. Now that she is not working at forming a relationship with Dr. Hodgins, she is working on it all the time."

"I will miss her when she is gone."

"Why?"

"She is almost human."

Rhett smiled and reached for his cellphone. These days everyone had his number. He had conceded it was a lot easier for people just to call him on his cellphone instead of his landline or his office phone.

Scarlett got up to get dressed. All she had been wearing was her nightgown. She often didn't get dressed on Saturdays or Sundays until it was time to go out to dinner. A fact that boggled Rhett's mind, but he never questioned her about it. Well, except for the first time.

When Emily answered Rhett's call, he said, "Meet me in front of your apartment building in five minutes."

"Wait, Dr. Butler, you must give me fifteen minutes. I need to get dressed."

"Alright."

When Emily got in the SUV, Rhett said, "Do you not get dressed at the beginning of the day?"

If it had been anyone else Emily would have thought the person was being extremely intrusive but with Dr. Butler, she knew he was just trying to get data for some reason. She said, "I don't get dressed until I have to go out."

"Why?"

"Because if I don't go out that day then I save a set of clothes that doesn't have to be washed."

"That is what Scarlett said, but that doesn't make sense. We go out every day for dinner."

"I would not presume to guess at what Scarlett's thought processes are."

"Who could? She is the most illogical person I have ever met."

Emily risked everything by saying, "Yet, you love her to the moon and back."

Rhett grinned and Emily thought, 'He really is a handsome man.' Rhett said, "Yes, I do." In a moment of openness foreign to him, he added, "And she loves me although I don't know how."

"Who can ever figure out matters of the heart. What do we have?"

Rhett was grateful to return to a safe subject. He said, "All Scarlett knows is that a body has been found at the National Arboretum. Actually, a skeleton."

"So, it has been out there a while."

"No, it doesn't take long for the flesh to be stripped away by wildlife. Let's just hope all the bones are still there."

"There is a good chance they are because it was left at a bird sanctuary. Most of the larger animals don't live there."

"True."

Once Scarlett got to the location that the body was at, she dropped Rhett a pin. She questioned everyone, but nobody could tell her much more than – they were walking along looking at the birds and they stumbled upon the body literally. Scarlett kept the smile on her face and wondered, 'How much evidence did this group of civilians damage?'

Soon Scarlett let everyone go. Yet the caretaker remained. He was a young man of nineteen or twenty. She guessed he was a lookie loo. There were a lot of people, who were fascinated by crime. She point-blank told him, "Go back to work. You are not needed here."

At that point Rhett drove up in his SUV. He got out and Dick stared at him. Scarlett turned to the young man and said, "Good day, Mr. Loeb."

Scarlett said, "Hi, Emily." She turned to Rhett and said, "Now that you are here, I will call for transport."

"Will you drop them a pin?"

"Yep. Easiest way for them to find us."

Rhett squatted down by the corpse then got up and while looking at Emily said, "Ms. Addy, do the initial recap."

"Yes, sir."

"He is a young man between twelve and sixteen, he still has his genitals although they appear to have been disfigured in some way, his face has been disfigured probably in the same manner, but we will confirm once we get the body back to the Jeffersonian."

"How long has he been here?"

"Judging by the amount of decomposition no more than six months, but again we will confirm. I think that whatever the perpetrator used to destroy the face and genitals kept the animals from eating that flesh for it is mostly intact."

"Very good, Ms. Addy."

"There are a pair of glasses near the body. Scarlett, look at their location. Don't you think that is too far away to have fallen off the victim's body?"

"Yes, but we can't rule out that the glasses are the victim's."

"Of course."

Rhett said, "Ms. Addy, photograph everything while we wait for the transport."

"Yes, Dr. Butler."

Author's Notes: I made this crime up sort of. This is going to be two young men copycatting another murder that happened one hundred years ago. No more or I will be giving out spoilers.