A/N: It had been a while since I last saw or wrote anything "Bones". This week's episode was just begging for a "missing scene". Hope you feel the same way, too.

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Booth looked towards the man slumped over the steering wheel, blood pouring down his face; blood which he had coaxed into action by shooting at him.

It hadn't been the fact that he was holding Lily Stegman hostage; or the fact that he had killed two men over less than two thousand grand. It was the fact that he had shot her that made him snap into sniper mood. The moment he had pulled the trigger he knew the cop's days had reached their end.

Booth looked at Bones: shaky hand still holding to a gun she had easily removed from his own belt holster; labored breathing, more from the shock than form the actual blood loss caused by being shot; eyes wide open, disbelieving.

Beyond her, Booth could see the Stegmans hugging each other, making sure over and over again that they had not been harmed in any way; kissing… rejoicing in the fact that they were still together, that they had survived the ordeal. Booth considered their relationship: she looked out for him in ways that were not simple but could easily be overlooked or considered overbearing; he cared for her, perhaps in a childish, sometimes petulant way, but he hadn't hesitated to put himself in harm's way to save her...

Booth looked from the Stegmans back to Bones and back again. That's how people who had been close to losing what mattered most reacted. That's how you were supposed to show them you cared…

Fours strides in all, before he reached her. Gun dangling from his left hand, his right hand snaking behind her neck, tangling in her hair, pulling her to him. Lips crashing on hers; a kiss that was both angry and hungry, a kiss that said 'what the hell were you thinking' as well as 'I'm glad you're okay'. A kiss that had taken too long in the making. A kiss that said that she was his, and nothing and no one could change it.

Just as he was hers.

The rest was unimportant.

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A/N: Just in case you're wondering… yes, I also watched CSI: NY's eppi before writing this…