A/N: This is my first (posted) story. I've tried several times to write something but I can't think of what to write beyond the beginning. Hopefully I finally have something better that I will figure out how to continue. Reviews and suggestions welcome. Also I'm not a profiler so the profiling may be inaccurate.
The entire BAU team were sitting around the table in the debrief room. All were looking at their tech analyst as she sat the closest to a blank screen. During a pause the rest of them looked around at their teammates and fidgeted before turning their eyes back to the screen. It now had two pictures of women.
"We have a case in Riverdale, Florida. Nicole Wade, Sandy Jackson. Both 19 years old, white, blond hair, blue eyes. They were found on Saturday evening at the same park, both within 15 minutes of TOD. One week apart from each other. They only had a knife stab wound to the chest, right in the heart. They bled out immediately. No defensive wounds or any other marks. No other evidence had been found."
"So we have a type. Also either they knew or trusted the unsub and it was a blitz attack. He's also efficient." Morgan stated.
"How were they dumped?" Emily asked.
Garcia looked at her notes again and replied. "They weren't. The reports say the bodies weren't moved."
"So who last saw the victims and when?" JJ asked.
Garcia again replied. "Saturday afternoon. Nicole's mum saw her leaving the house at 19:00. Sandy's sister was actually at the park with her and had stepped away for about 5 minutes only to find her sister's body waiting for her."
"Maybe she saw something if she was in the area." Then Hotch spoke in an official tone. "Everyone get to the plane in 30 minutes. Be ready. Saturday is in 3 days." He then turned to Garcia. "Run their histories, get everything and anything you can dig up."
"On it." Garcia quickly replied and she immediately when back to her computer room.
When everyone else got to Riverdale, they immediately went to the department and met the lead of the investigation. A 50 year old greyish haired man, Carl Adams. Hotch introduced his entire team, David Rossi, Derek Morgan, Jennifer Jareau aka JJ, Emily Prentiss and Dr. Spencer Reid.
Reid got the usual intrigued by people wondering about his doctorates at his young age, which he impressed everyone with random facts. Until, he was stopped by his boss and went into their assigned room. It was moderately sized and the local cops were just finishing moving in blank whiteboards.
Hotch immediately started barking orders. "Okay Morgan and Emily, you go to the park. Rossi and Reid, go talk to the families. I'll check with Garcia on what she's found and look over the files. And JJ, check what's happening with the media." With that the team left to do their assigned jobs.
While Morgan drove, Emily was going over the case file. "Alright, this park stretches along the river for about 1.2 km. Both victims were found on the west side on the same path. Wouldn't the park be full of people on a Saturday evening? No one saw anything but the victims were found within 15 minutes."
"Actually, that stretch of the path is a bit lonely. It's a smaller side path." Ethan Toms, an officer in his mid 30s spoke up from the back. He was tagging along and helping Morgan navigate the streets.
They arrived at the west entrance of the park and left their vehicle. The entrance had a large gate towering overhead. The agents paused a minute before Toms directed them along a path. "This is a short cut."
The officer paused by a very large oak tree and a fork in the path. "Right here. Miss Wade was killed here." Then he pointed forward. "Where the drinking fountain is over there, that's where Miss Jackson was, uh..." he trailed off and pointed about 10m away.
"Okay, it's fairly in the same spot over here. It might have some meaning to the unsub. Has there been any incident that happened around here before?" Morgan asked the officer.
"No, I don't recall any. But then I've only been here about a year and a few months."
"What made the victims come over to this stretch of the park on Saturday evenings and fit the exact type." Emily wondered. "What's the possibility that the unsub waited around here for the right victim to walk along this path, be alone and attack?"
"Yes, and it was evening. I don't see that any lights around here. It would be rather dark for the unsub to judge eye colour." Morgan replied.
"And if the unsub had a light, they'd have to walk up to many potential victims, which means someone saw him." Emily put in and then added. "However, I just don't see that happening."
"So I think the victims coming to this part of the park wasn't a coincidence. They were picked and somehow the unsub had them come here." Morgan thought.
"But what about the sister?" Emily wondered. "She also conveniently stepped out for 5 minutes while the unsub murdered her sister."
"That is something we have to think about too. Hopefully we'll get something soon."
They wandered the area looking to see if the local police had missed any evidence.
Reid and Rossi were at the house of Harriet Wade, Nicole's mother. Harriet was severely distraught. She was a widow who lost her husband 5 years ago and Nicole was her only child. They didn't find out much unfortunately. Harriet last spoke to her daughter an hour earlier and didn't know where she left to. She loved her daughter but knew little of what she did. She couldn't even say whether it was common for her to be at the park. Also, also according to her, no one would want to hurt her daughter and that she didn't have many friends and wasn't dating anyone.
They then went to the house of Gabrielle and Sean Miles, Sandy's 24 year old sister and brother in law and they were distraught as well. Her parents have passed away. Rossi had just got off from a phone call from Morgan updating them.
Rossi started the questioning and asked Gabrielle about the visit to the park. "We always go to the park together, about 3-4 times a week, but not at the same times. We've been out there about every hour of the week at some point."
"So did anything out of the ordinary happen last Saturday?" Reid asked.
"Not really. She called in the afternoon about 15:00 asking when we could go. I said anytime and she said 19:30. We walked for about 20 minutes when I received a phone call. I walked away to take the call."
Rossi interrupted. "Who called you?"
Gabrielle looked nervous and stole a quick glance at her husband before figeting. Her eyes started to get teary.
Sean looked at her wondering. "Gabbie, what's wrong? Who is it?"
"Uh, nothing." Gabrielle spoke quickly. "Let's go on. After I got back my sister was just lying there and there was blood all over. I called 911 and tried to get her to respond but nothing."
Rossi felt that she was telling the truth but there was something she wasn't telling. Something she wouldn't say with her husband in the room so he got Reid to take him elsewhere.
"Alright. Mrs Miles?" Rossi spoke softly. "If we are to find your sister's killer we need to know everything."
"Nothing! What are you suggesting? That whoever called me did so so they could kill my sister without me in their way?" Gabrielle started yelling and clenched her fists.
"We're not suggesting anything at the moment." Rossi tried to calm her down. "And I'm not judging anyone. Okay?"
Gabrielle sighed.
"So let's ask where did you go when you walked off?"
"I went around to the other path and sat on a bench. I couldn't see where my sister was."
"Okay. So, who called you?" Rossi hope she would answer this time.
"My... my boyfriend." Gabrielle spoke in a soft voice. "I walked off so my sister wouldn't know about him." She then started sobbing. Rossi pulled a tissue from a nearby table and handed to her.
Rossi shook his head. At that moment Sean stormed back in with Reid tailing after.
"What did you do?" he yelled at Rossi giving him an evil glare. He came over to his wife, who started sobbing even more.
Reid said, "What happened, Rossi?"
Rossi was looking at Sean. "There's not an easy way to say this. Perhaps she might like to tell you herself."
At that moment Gabrielle tried to wipe her tears. "It's my fault my sister's dead. All because I'm a bad person."
Sean wondered, "What? You're not a bad person."
Gabrielle turned around to face her husband. "The person who called me. He's my boyfriend." Her voice gradually became softer and pulled herself out of her shocked husband's grip.
"I.. I don't know what to do." Sean stammered. He wanted to console his wife but at the same time was furious at her betrayal.
They didn't get much out of the two of them after that so they left to continue another time.
Back at the station, there were a few reporters hanging around and JJ was fielding their questions. There weren't much but she had to address a certain reporter's unfounded fear that everyone should stay away from that park and any nearby parks. There was definitely no need for such a panic.
When the entire team returned, they gathered and put everything together.
Hotch told the team that Garcia had found nothing linking the women other than their age and physical appearance. Nicole was a University student studing biology and Sandy was taking random jobs like waitress or salesgirl. They don't shop in the same areas and they lived 5 blocks apart from each other. Also, Nicole's family was not very wealthy, Sandy had family who had money.
Except that they both went to the park, they never crossed paths. Although if Sandy often walked in the path with her sister, they could have seen Nicole there. But it wasn't likely they knew each other, considering Nicole is not very social.
Nothing in their histories nor family histories sent up any triggers either.
They were interrupted when an officer walked in. "We have another body. And it's.. very gory."
The team was surprised. The unsub was escalating. It was only Wednesday at 17:30.
They gathered at the park. This blonde victim was lying about 2m away from where Sandy was found. One look at the victim saw not only a stab wound in the heart, but also 2 more stabs in the stomach.
The attending officer passed her wallet. "Amelia Jones, 25 years old. Green eyes?"
"So the unsub is changing his victimology?" Emily asked surprised.
"Any chance of a copycat?" Morgan asked.
JJ responded. "The media didn't get hair or eye colour. However, they also didn't get which path in the park either. But we did give them Saturday."
Hotch replied, "It's possible it's a copycat, and anyone could go to the park and find cops combing a certain area."
Reid looked at the woman's face, trying to ignore the bloodied torso. "How old do you think she looks?"
Rossi started at the woman. "Well, she does look young for her age. I would say 18 to 20."
Morgan replied. "So it's possible our unsub is targeting whoever looks 19, not actual age? As for different eye color.. that I'm not too sure about."
Hotch put in, "Well it could be an escalation as well. And he may know we are here and killed in rage, without caring who the victim is."
A random officer spoke up. "Would it be wise to set up surveillance? So far it's only been this location."
Hotch replied. "So far there were no kills with eyewitnesses present. But I think that would be a good idea. Perhaps they could take cover. Like on the opposite side of those trees and hedges. It'd be hard to spot a cop there."
On Friday evening they had not progressed much. Absolutely nothing else came from digging deep into the victim's histories. The recent victim was a loner like Nicole and her parents had nothing to add.
Garcia was still running a few searches. She had not found similar incidents happening in the park or anything that occured on that particular section of path.
Then an officer came into the room. "There's been another victim."
The team immediately set out to the scene. This time, it was a young 15 year old brown haired brown eyed male. He was stabbed 3 times like the last victim on the same path but further east about 100m.
Morgan said, "I think this unsub actually doesn't care who he's killing. Just for the thrill of it but this path is definitely important to him. Even though there are no incidences happening on this path, it might be something that wasn't reported."
Hotch said, "For the beginning, maybe the unsub did care. Perhaps eye colour wasn't important as we have established that it would be difficult to see in the dark. Something that a blonde young woman triggered it, also something about this path. After that, he found out he liked it and just killed for the thrill, finding it more thrilling to stab 3 times. The first to the heart killed the victims, then stabs twice more just for the heck of it?"
Prentiss continued, "So are we thinking it's a young male? Teenager to under 25? He would also be normal without looking creepy to get close to these people."
Reid spoke up this time. "Agreed, and he's starting to go on a spree now. I think he's trying to tell us he's also not afraid of us. He definitely seemed to escalate as soon as we got here. Do you think JJ could get the videos of all press conferences. Perhaps the unsub was watching."
Hotch responded. "Okay, JJ. Go get the tapes and go over them with Reid."