Chapter Fourteen: Crimes of the Class

"Okay so it's basically a doorway with a corridor to other planets?" Booth asked as he turned the corner, heading towards the crime scene he and Hannah had been called to.

"Yeah."
"But that can't be right."
"It's a piece of Science Fiction, Booth. Entertainment on the TV screen."
"I understand the concept of watching TV, Han, but I guess I just fist quite grasp the idea of Stargates and snakes in people's heads." Hannah laughed and rested her head on the head rest.

"Trust me, the more you watch, the more sense it makes." The car phone rang and Booth shot Hannah a smile before answering.

"Yo."
"How far away are you?" Cams voice filled the interior of the car.

"Ten minutes, why?"
"Because we just found a second body and I think Hannah might be interested in this." Hannah frowned.

"Why?"
"It'll be easier to explain when you have the visual as well." Booth checked his rear view and then flicked on his sirens while Hannah ended the call.

"Sirens? Really? They have those in Stargate too."
"But does your Stargate have a possible double murder?" He retorted, flashing her a smile. Hannah shook her head but smiled all the same.

Keeping their relationship a secret for the last month had been both easy and hard. Easy because they could act normal around their friends (of whom didn't actually know but had a theory) and hard because Sweets was attempting to call them out on it but everytime he tried, Hannah mysteriously procured a juice box and cookie from somewhere, to both the shock and amusement of her partner.

"Why would Cam think I'd be interested in two bodies?"
"We're always interested in bodies. It's just that maybe, just maybe, Cam thinks this might be good for you." Hannah gave him an odd look.

"Right. Because dead bodies are ALWAYS something I want to be keenly interested in." Her sarcasm was matched with an eye roll.

"Yeah but you're FBI. You have to be interested in dead bodies."
"Interested but not Brennan interested." Booth gave a toothy grin.

"Amen to that."

Norfolk Beach was a tiny, almost hidden gem within Washington DCs metropolis. It was untouched by the world and when Hannah stepped out of the car, shoving her sunglasses on her face, she took in the breathtaking view of the little paradise.

"I had no idea this was here." She smiled, breathing in the smell of grass and salty water. Booth had put his sunglasses on and looked at Hannah and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, both of them looking around.

"And unfortunately, we have a body." He reminded. Hannah scowled.

"Right. That's why we are here." Booth released her as they trudged down the beach to where the noticeable blue of the Jeffersonian teams uniforms stood out on the golden sand. The necessary FBI forensics moved around Brennan, Cam and Hodgins and the body came into view as Booth and Hannah approached.

"Talk to me, Bones." Booth pulled out a notepad and Hannah handed him a pen as she walked around to the foot of the body and looked at it with her back to the sun. She crouched down and grimaced.

"Well he's male, Caucasian, early to mid twenties."
"I'd estimate time of death being twenty four to seventy two hours ago... Hannah what are you doing?" Cam asked as Hannah moved closer to the cadavers face.

"Who put his finger up his nose?" Hannah asked as she squinted. Booth leaned over and grimaced.

"Maybe he died listening to boogie fever of some sort." Booth offered. Brennan frowned as she attempted to dislodge the finger. Hodgins leaned over as well and patted at Brennan's arm.

"Wait, lemme take a swab." His eye had caught something and he took a swab and sealed it, holding it to the light so that he could look at it.

"What is it?"
"I have no idea." He put it in his carrier and continued looking for other particulates.

Booth looked down at the body again and winced as something shiny blinked on the sun. He knelt down and used Hannah's pen to hook it and lift it up. It was a necklace that Hannah recognised almost immediately.

"Oh crap. I need to make a phone call."
"Let's get this wrapped up people!" Booth called and offered Hannah a hand so that she could get away from the salty water and up the sand dunes.

She pulled out her phone from her pocket and scrolled through her contacts, clicking the right one when it came up. She held it to her ear and waited, each ring making her more jumpy. When it came to voice-mail, she cursed and hung up, going back to her contacts list and calling the next person.

She picked up on the third ring.

"Oh my golly gosh, the famous Hannah Price, calling me?" The mocking tone of Laya Cardinal rang into her ear. Hannah chuckled at her greeting.

"Not that famous, Lay."
"Really? Not that famous?"
"Shut up."
"Fiiine. What can I do for you?" Hannah paused as she got back onto concrete and brushed sand from her pants.

"Have you heard from Timothy lately?" Hannah queried as she gritted her teeth and pulled her shoe off, emptying the sand that had snuck in. Booth, who had followed behind, snorted at the sheer amount of sand that had managed to get into her shoe. She glared at him.

"No, now that I think of it. You should ask Raley though. She would probably have heard from him more often than I." Aurelia Diamond and Timothy had seen each other on and off through out the Quantico days and, from what Hannah could glean from Layas tone, was still a continuing factor.

"Okay, thanks Laya."
"No problem, sweetie. Tell James he still owes me that five bucks!" Hannah chuckled and hung up before getting into the other side of the car, a grim look settling on her features. Booth, who was already in and starting the car, frowned.

"Everything okay?"
"I just have a bad feeling,  ya know? My gut... That necklace is similar to one that belonged to my friend." She said as she searched for Aurelia's number.

"So now..."
"Now we need to make sure that it's not him." She pressed on Aurelia's name and put the phone to her ear. Booth reached over to hold her hand, squeezing it tightly.

*********************************

"Timothy Manson. It's a confirmation." The team were stood on the platform, Mansons face staring back at them from the screen. Angela held her tablet close to her as she moved so that Hannah could see the reconstruction.

Hannah breathed heavily through her nose, an exasperated sound that sounded like a trumpet blowing it's nose filling the silence.

"Well that's just great." Brennan was pulling off her gloves so that she could sign a delivery and then turned back.

"I'm sorry, Hannah. This must be hard..."
"It'll be hard when it's done. Tell us what you've got." Hannah turned with her arms crossed over her chest to the body of her friend. Wendell looked at Brennan, Cam and Booth, all of whom nodded and started to get back on  work.

"We've found multiple hairline fractures here, here and here," Wendell pointed to Mansons shoulder, wrist and knee.

"The particulates in the nose that was keeping the finger lodged up there was cyanoacrylate." Hodgins added, causing  some confused expressions. "Super glue, for those who need subtitles."

"So he fell while after using superglue and got his finger stuck up his nose?"
"No... There's post mortem bruising along the finger... The finger was broken while he was alive but the lack of blood loss from the tear," Brennan pointed to a tear in the finger that was still lodged up Mansons nasal cavity. Wendell moved the camera so that the tear came up on the screen, making it easier for all to see. "Suggests that the phalange was only interested into the nasal cavity after he died." Brennan looked up and down the body as she scanned. She made more observations that flew over Hannah and Booths head.

"I need damn subtitles when I walk in here." Booth grumbled.

"I'm pretty sure she's saying he went through hell." Hannah mumbled back to him.

"His tox-screening came back clear. No drugs, no alcohol... Completely clean." Cam handed the tox-screening report to Booth who took it and scanned it over.

"So what killed him?"
"Cause of death is still unknown."
"Where did he die?"
"I found traces of gravel and pollen in his boots that I'm running traces on." Hodgins added before turning and going back to his lab. Booth nudged Hannah.

"We should go and talk to his mother."

"And Aurelia. I'll see if she can come in. She's up visiting her mom." Booth nodded. Brennan didn't look up as they left but Cam did and she watched the two of them leave. Wendell noticed and saw what she was looking at.

"Do you think that it'll work?" Cam smiled, knowing that Wendell was ever observant and saw what she was seeing. Hannah and Booths hands touched slightly, purposefully.

"If I know Seely, he'll make it work."
"Make what work?" Wendell and Cam both turned back to Brennan who was holding Mansons arm and staring at the two of them. Cam shook her head.

"Don't worry. Get back to work." Cam walked off the platform and Wendell went back to his observations.

******************************
Aurelia Diamond stepped out of the interrogation room, her heart shaped face red and contorted into one of rage. Hannah met her halfway and gave her a meek smile.

"How dare you make me bring up that incident." She hissed. "I thought you were my friend!"
"I am, Raley. But this is a murder investigation and all we ask is that we get all information that could help us find Tim's murderer." Aurelia growled slightly.

During the interrogation, Hannah had remained behind the mirrored window and given small insights and suggestions to Booth and Sweets. One of those recommendations was referring to an incident in 2008, their final year at Quantico.

"Tim changed, Hannah. You know he did. He hasn't done anything like that since." Hannah raised a fair eyebrow, crossing her arms across her chest. Aurelia matched her gaze and they both fought a silent battle, neither of them blinking. They were interrupted by Sweets walking towards them, Booth not far behind him.

"Agent Diamond, if I may speak with you..." Aurelia turned to Sweets, breaking eye contact. Hannah hid a grin.

"Of course, Doctor Sweets." Aurelia nodded and then she turned back to Hannah, mouthing,

"This isn't over." She followed Sweets away to his office, leaving Hannah shaking her head.

"Sometimes I wondered how we were friends."
"Why, because of how much she looked like she wanted to murder you?" Hannah snorted.

"Nah, that feeling was always mutual. She was always so conceited and treated Timothy like he was a piece of toilet paper." Booth raised his eyebrows.

"Thanks for that wonderful analogy. You may have just put me off my lunch." Hannah brightened.

"Lunch? I like the sound of lunch." Booths phone rang, thereby cancelling the idea of lunch.

"Bones and the squints found something."
"So no lunch?"
"After." Hannah nodded, the mention of food began a series of stomach rumbles that she now had to ignore.

Heading to the Jeffersonian, Hannah flicked through her notebook, shaking her head.

"So what, Aurelia finds out that Manson was cheating on her and then she turns on him, kills him and then decides that to really pull it all off, she superglue his finger up his nose?" Booth thought aloud as he drove. Hannah shook her head.

"It's so not Aurelia though. She's always been more delicate and refined. Whenever we came up with a scenario in our field class, one person was chosen as the murderer and when she was, it was very clean."
"No finger up the nose?"
"No." Booth chewed on that.

"Okay but she's angry, right? Angry, hurt and wants revenge so she does the finger up the nose to disgrace him even more." He said once again, making Hannah think. "She really was mad about '08 so maybe it happened again and she lost it."
"That.... That kinda makes sense?" Booth looked over at Hannah, seeing her writing a list of names in her little book.

"What's that?"
"People from our class who we managed to characterise as finger up nose Murderers." Booth frowned as he pulled into the Jeffersonian.

"You're joking,  right?"
"I never joke about noses." Booth rolled his eyes.

Walking inside, the found Hodgins at his work desk, looking more excited than one should about a dead person. Cam and Anglea were beside him,  Angela giving him a slight nudge to calm down.

"What's up?"
" Manson was killed in California." Booth frowned again.

"Are you sure?"
"One hundred percent. The pollen in his boots belongs to a flower only found in California. It was also mixed in with fecal matter of a bird that is native to California as well." Hodgins brought up the necessary images and graphs. The graphs, Hannah couldn't comprehend but the pictures she could.

"Then how did he get from California, to Washington? Was he dumped in the ocean?"
"Unfortunately no. I had a look at tidal charts and there was no way he would've washed up here." Hodgins answered Booths question. Booth seemed to think for a moment.

"What about if he was air dropped? Would that match any of the injuries?" Booth looked to Cam. She chewed on it for a moment and nodded.

"It's possible that a majority of the post-mortem fractures occurred from a drop into the ocean, especially because he would be, well, floppy."   Hannah nodded.

"Angela, can you make up a scenario on your thingymajig." Anglea raised an eyebrow but nodded.

"I'll see what I can do."
"Thank you." Angela squeezed Hannah's arm before disappearing to her office. Hannah watched with mild amusement as Hodgins watched her, a sad look in his eyes.

"I'll go see if Bones has anything."
"And I need lunch."
"Soon." Booth promised. Hannah refrained from pouting but nodded.

*******************************

Much to Hannah's disappointment, the week passed with little progress. Aurelia was no longer returning her calls and Brennan and Wendell had yet to determine cause of death. Anglea, at least, had indeed lead to the discovery that Manson had been dropped from an airplane. Hannah had thanked her friend and gone home, mulling over it all.

By Saturday night, Hannah was sat on her couch with her legs over Booths, using him as a leg rest. She had the remote in one hand and a slice of pizza in the other, feeling content to a point. Booth, who had noticed how distracted she was, tried to bring her out of her head with light, teasing kisses that tickled slightly.

"Stop it." Hannah finally said with a slight giggle. Booth stopped and shook his head.

"Not until you come out of your head and back to the real world."
"I am in the real world." Booth gave her a toothy smile and gave her a light jab in the ribs. Dropping the remote, she jabbed him back, resulting in a small tickle fight that ended with Hannah still holding her pizza but Booth leaned over her, her legs pinned beneath his and his face directly above hers.

"Get off-" He cut her off by pressing his lips to hers. Hannah didn't hesitate in responding but when she pulled away, her face was quite serious. "Booth I'm serious."
"And so am I. You need to get out of your head." He pushed off her, sitting back and pulling Hannah's legs so that they were once again rested in top of him. Hannah took a bite of the somehow lucky slice of pizza and moved over so that she was nestled next to Booth more comfortably.

"I'm just... I can't help but think that there's something I'm missing. It seems so familiar. The nose thing." She added as she cleared her head. Booth nodded.

"Okay so maybe someone from your class?"
"Possibly."
"Are you sure Manson had no enemies?" Hannah shrugged.

"I don't know, now. I mean, Laya, James, Aurelia, Timothy and I were a tight knit group who spent more time together training and studying than we did with anyone else so it may be possible but Tim did but didn't tell us." Booth rubbed her shoulders.

"We'll solve this."
"I know. It's just sad. Poor Mrs Manson." Hannah looked up at Booth and kissed his cheek. He reddened a little bit that caused Hannah to smile.

"Hey, I know... Have you talked to your brother lately?" Booth asked. Hannah nodded as she shoved the last bite of her pizza into her mouth. Booth admired the amount of food she could eat at once but the sheer amount she could fit into her mouth made him slightly nauseous. After watching Aubrey eat, he could see how the two of them got along so well. But yet, her disturbing eating abilities made him happier to be with her. Although their relationship was very much a secret to all, he was happier than he had been since Parker was born.

"I talked to him this morning. Why?"
"He contacted me yesterday. About your dad." Hannah paused as she leaned for another pizza slice.

"My dad?"
"Your dad. Apparently he wants to see you." Hannah moved back into her seat and stared at her hands. Her face had gone blank which made it harder for Booth to read.

"Han?" Hannah blinked. "Gus called me because he didn't want to ruin what you two were starting to build. He thought you might hate me less if I told you your father wanted to see you." Hannah blinked again and curled her hands into fists and took a breath. Booth took one of the fists and ran a thumb over the whitened knuckles. "Hannah,  please say something."

"What could he possibly want to say to me?" Hannah finally said after some time. Booth gave a small shrug. "I wouldn't know.  I don't know what he could possibly say. Considering my own father left and I haven't seen him since, I really don't know." Hannah looked at Booth and gave a soft sigh. Booth lifted his hand from her hand to cup her face.

"He murdered my mom and my baby sister. I haven't seen him in sixteen years, Booth. Sixteen years. I have no use for him."
"He's your dad."
"And when has that counted?" Booth sighed. "Do... do you think I should go?"
"Yeah." He said without hesitation. Hannah screwed up her nose before nodding, as if in some sort of discussion with herself.

"Then I will." Booth smiled and kissed her once more before gently dislodging her and pulling her up. "Bed time?"
"Bed time." Booth agreed. Hannah grabbed the TV remote and turned it off, dumping it back on the couch and tiredly let Booth lead her to her room, her eyes beginning to close as they walked through the doorway.

Authors Note

 Woooooow that was a long chapter. Very long. It kinda just kept going and going and going and going and then when I finally realised I needed it to stop, it was already long.
So now the next chapter will be the other half.

But wow! Can you guys imagine? Only a few more to go and we close of this half of their stories. Hannah's life will continue on but it'll just be weird to not have this book to write for...

But anyway. It's been a long day, I'm tired and I have work to do so enjoy and this next chapter will be up soon.

Love ya'll.

》Bree《