"Dr. Brennan. You missed our appointment this morning."

Brennan barely spared a glance at Sweets as he stood at the base of the platform stairs. She was currently focusing an imager on the imprints on the hipbone of the second victim. Angela stood nearby, readying the computer system for a linked in conference with Booth.

"We've had a lot of breakthroughs in the last day, Sweets, my time was more valuable here," Brennan replied nonchalantly.

"And you've had a lot of breakthroughs in our sessions, now is really not to the time to back away from meeting."

"I'm not backing away, I'm prioritizing."

"After what happened with Cullen, I would expect your priority would be to follow the Bureau's protocol."

Brennan stiffened at his words, feeling at her wits end with hearing people tell her that she should be bossed around by this man. Choosing to ignore the comment, she flipped the switch on the imager and locked it into place. She straightened and headed for a nearby cart with the findings of the last day's work, meeting Angela's concerned gaze with a roll of her eyes in Sweets' general direction.

"Dr. Brennan," Sweets began again, more quietly. "You do know he's threatening to remove you permanently. Is now the time to be toeing out of line?"

Snapping the file she was holding shut, Brennan whipped around and stormed to the edge of the platform. For a moment, Sweets feared for his life. With great relief, he watched her come to a firm stop at the top of the stairs, though he would not soon forget the look she fixed him with. He had never seen Brennan so worked up.

"As a matter of fact, I know exactly what Cullen is concocting in that sorry organ he calls a brain. And contrary to popular belief, I am not trying to get myself removed. But I will not lie down and be walked on. I will do my damn job. And after I'm done doing my job and ready to talk to you, I will. So… you can just go wait in my office until I'm done here. Okay?"

To Brennan's surprise, a hint of a smile appeared on Sweets' face. Placing his hands in his pockets, he gave a short nod.

"Okay."

Brennan watched him walk away and towards her office and felt a sense of power and confidence that had been eluding her for days. Tilting her chin up in triumph, she turned back to the center of the platform only to catch Angela's stunned look.

"Bren," she said emphatically. "You didn't tell me Cullen might remove you permanently."

"It's an empty threat, Angela," Brennan said firmly. "I won't let that happen, and neither will Booth."

"Are you sure everything's okay?"

"It's fine," Brennan insisted, grabbing a pair of latex gloves and snapping them on. She smiled up at her friend. "Let's get ready for the call to Booth."

Angela lifted her eyebrows in surprise, but took the few short steps to the monitor without argument. "All right then." With the flip of a switch, Booth's face appeared on the screen.

It was the first time Brennan had seen his face in a week. She felt her heart leap and couldn't help but smile at the sight.

"Booth, good to see you got the equipment up and running so quickly!" Angela exclaimed as she stepped into the picture on their end.

"Well, y'know," Booth shrugged in false modesty and gave his patented cocky grin. "Anything I can do to speed up the investigation."

"Wait, I thought you said you got a techie from the local high school to set it up for you last night," Brennan interjected. Booth's face immediately went serious again.

"Potato, potahto, Bones. Whatcha got for me?" he asked, quickly changing the subject. "It's nothing but dead ends up here and I need some good news."

"The second victim is Mitchell Adernos, age thirty-one," Brennan started without missing a beat. She pointed to the hipbone that had been her focus over the last day. "Cause of death was the severing of a major artery along the hipbone as the result of metal grating being driven into the body at a strength great enough to leave an impression on the bone. In addition, the pelvis was fractured and several vertebrae in the spinal cord were dislocated. These injuries are consistent with being hit by a car."

"A car accident?" Booth asked, slightly confused.

"Specifically, one of these models," Angela added, bringing up a screen that displayed some twenty cars. She pointed to the front of one of them. "We used the imager to match the pattern of the indentations. Our victim was hit by a model with this distinct metal grating on the front."

"All right, send me a list of those models," Booth said eagerly.

"On its way," Angela told him, clicking away with the mouse.

"There's more." Brennan and Angela turned to see Cam approaching with a file in her hand. "I just pulled the phone records for our vic. You'll never believe who he was calling almost every day for the last two months – Michelle Roult."

"The first victim?" Booth questioned. "Who was this guy?"

"He was an environmental activist and a leading proponent of sustainable housing," Cam informed them as she looked through the file. "He's been helping to publicize the use of old shipping cartons to create recycled homes."

"I've heard about that," Angela said. "There's a lot of interest in that kind of building."

"So how is he connected to Michelle Roult?" Brennan asked.

"That's what we need to find out," Cam said. "He was extremely careful about not leaving a paper trail to her. Booth, maybe you can dig something up on your end."

"I'm on it."

"Let us know if you find anything," Brennan told him. After a moment's hesitation, she added, "And be careful."

"I will, Bones," he replied with a smile that seemed to be just for her. Cam and Angela exchanged knowing looks. Booth cleared his throat and muttered a quick goodbye before the screen went black.

"We've made excellent progress," Brennan said matter of factly as she removed the gloves from her hands. "Now I just have to get rid of the psychologist in my office."

God, she'd looked beautiful.

Booth knew that of all the things he should be thinking at the moment, that was probably the least helpful, the least useful. He couldn't help it. The way the blue lab coat made her cerulean eyes stand out, the elegant way she moved her hands as she handled the bones on the exam table.

Good Lord, he never in his wildest dreams thought a woman handling human remains would do it for him. How things changed.

Shaking his head and trying to clear his thoughts of all things Brennan, he leaned forward and focused as best he could on the files Angela had sent to him. Scrolling down the file and looking at the models displayed, he couldn't help wondering how much he would have to save from his yearly salary just to buy one the cars that had killed their second victim. He was nearing the end of the list when his acute eyes narrowed on a particular model. A BMW M6, silver, convertible. Booth had seen that car before. At a crime scene, in fact, and the owner was very personally connected with the victims. Hot damn, his Bones was good. She'd just given him enough evidence to warrant the arrest of Michelle Roult's boss. He smiled and snapped the laptop shut.

In ten minutes, Booth was at the sheriff's office and striding up to the desk where Sheridan sat going over paperwork. The older man looked up as he heard Booth approach.

"Agent Booth, what can I do for you?"

"Sheriff, does Jon Jackson stay here when he's overseeing the construction site?"

"You mean that suit from New York?" Sheridan barely concealed the disdain in his voice. Booth nodded. "Sure does. Rents a small house about a mile out of town."

"I think I'd like to go pay him a visit. Can you take me there?"

Sheridan recognized the look in Booth's eyes. He may have only been the sheriff of a small town, but he was still law enforcement and he knew that look. Booth was hot on a trail of evidence. Sheridan stood up and grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair.

"Jackson left town yesterday morning," he told Booth.

"Damn it," Booth swore quietly.

"You got reasonable cause?"

"Yeah," Booth answered, holding up the file with the printout of the car that had run down Mitchell Adernos.

"Then I've got a key. Let's go."

Within minutes, the two men were pulling up to a modest but modern log cabin home, dark except for a winking, yellow porch light coming to life in the last moments of daylight. Booth climbed out of Sheridan's ranger vehicle and followed the sheriff as he headed up the path to the house. The recent summer rains had left all sorts of night creatures in a blissful mood and they were surrounded by a chorus of frogs, crickets, and cicadas just waking up. Booth would have preferred quiet as they entered the home of Jon Jackson.

The cabin was pristine and reflected the tastes of a man in the business of selling homes. The blinds were tightly pulled and Booth retrieved his flashlight from his pocket and flipped it on, his actions followed closely by Sheridan. Booth took in the environment, assessing where his priorities would lie. The front door had opened into a huge main living room, impressive in its décor but lacking in any official appearance. An archway to the back left of the room led to the kitchen and another in the center revealed what appeared to be a library. In the far right corner, a hallway opened up and disappeared around the corner.

Sheridan gestured to the library.

"I'll start looking around in there."

Booth nodded and headed towards the hallway. It was longer than he expected. He counted four doors on the left side of the corridor and was displeased to see that the entire right side was lined with paned windows. Not the best situation for snooping around in someone else's home. The first door revealed on a hall bathroom. The second, however, led him to a home office.

Bingo.

It took very little time rummaging through the only file cabinet in the room to come across the right manila envelope hidden in the back. Booth almost chuckled when he opened the file.

"Not too bright when it comes to hiding things, apparently," he muttered. At the bottom of the file was an external hard drive. Booth quickly spotted the laptop that had been left in the room and turned it on, inserting the drive. On the desktop, an icon popped up.

. Well that's not incriminating at all, stealing a dead guy's hard drive.

Booth double clicked and the screen was flooded with documents, nearly all of them detailing the business expenses of Dream Homes and the company's stock information. It wasn't until he read an email exchange between Jon and Michelle that he understood – Dream Homes had been advertising their use of recycled and eco-friendly material for their construction and had been charging through the nose for the projects, garnering huge stock investments based on their practices, and Michelle had uncovered the truth that Jon had been secretly using logging companies to supply materials and taking the cheap way out. She had been supplying Mitchell with the information to expose the company and bring a lawsuit against them.

He grabbed his cell phone and dialed Brennan. She answered quickly. "Bones, we got 'im – Jon Jackson, Michelle's boss. He's got photos of Michelle and Mitchell meeting and exchanging files, copies of emails, Mitchell's hard drive… looks like Johnny was a bad boy when it came to investors - "

A crash from the front room sent Booth into high alert. He pulled the phone away from his ear and strained to hear any noise following the crash. He was vaguely aware of Brennan calling his name through the receiver. Quietly as he could, he shut his phone off and slipped it back into his pocket and retrieved his gun, making his way cautiously into the hallway. As he made his way back into the main room, he saw Sheridan lying in a heap just outside the library and the front door wide open. His already heightened senses became even more so, his FBI training kicking into overdrive as he tried to see and hear everything at once. A movement in the kitchen caught his eye and he quickly trained his gun on the opening, moving forward slowly. He positioned himself against the wall as he neared the archway, heart pounding. In one quick movement, Booth thrust himself through the doorway, gun raised, and faced an empty kitchen. In the next instant, he felt what must have been a rope flung around his neck and tightened. Time seemed to move in slow motion. He could feel the roughness of the rope grinding against his throat as he stabilized himself to prepare to get a good shot at his attacker's leg, torso, anything, really. As he raised his arm, agonizingly slow in his own mind, he felt something solid connect painfully with the side of his head. Then nothing.