Chapter III
She was not going to die of wasp stings. Wasp stings were only dangerous if one had allergies; not if one had not. She had stopped counting after more than twenty times. She had given up the hope that she would ever be able to escape. Even if there was an option to run, because the man would leave her unattended, she would not be able to walk, because there were stings in her feet and hands. Also, they were between her legs, her neck, her armpits, her knees.. It was just too much to count.
She scared herself a little bit, because never she would have thought she would be craving to die. And she was craving to die. More than ever. She just did not want to beg for it. The man would be too pleased with her begging, and she was not willing to give him that pleasure. That was what he wanted. He wanted to control her, to make her say the things he wanted to hear. As much as she wanted to die, she was not going to give him that last part of hers.
"Jennifer." The older woman said, before sitting down next to the younger one, still far enough to let her decide if she wanted her to be this close. "You don't have to decide yet. You can tell him you need time to figure out what you want."
"I shouldn't be pondering about this. Will is so sweet." The blonde stared at her knees, still biting her lip.
"Do you want to spend forever with him?" Although she hated the man, Emily kept hesitating about her questions. She did not want to be the cause of a bad break-up. She did not want to be a home-wrecker, but she also could not see her friend get hurt. She cared about the blonde.
The blonde shook her head. "I don't know. I just don't know. I never thought it through, I guess. He's willing to give up his job, Emily." She buried her face in her hands. The brunette laid her hand on the blonde's back to comfort her a little. She was really feeling sorry for the younger woman, but she did not really know what to do.
"Everything will be okay." She whispered, although she did not know if that was true.
"There's another victim. We meet in the lobby in five." Hotch said through the phone, before hanging up.
Emily put her phone back in her pocket, before turning to JJ again. "We have another victim. We have to go downstairs." She looked into the eyes of the blonde. "Are you okay?" She asked, although she knew the answer. JJ wiped her eyes and nodded slowly. "If you need to talk to someone, I'm here for you, okay?" She laid her hand on the arm of the younger woman and squeezed reassuringly.
JJ nodded and finally looked back into the eyes of the other woman. "Thanks. You're a good friend." She said. Emily just wanted to wrap her arms around the younger woman, but she did not do it. She thought it would be little more than inappropriate to do such a thing. Well, they were friends, but she did not know if JJ was the kind of woman to hug.
"Let's go, then." Emily offered, after what seemed like ages. She was about to turn around, when the blonde wrapped her arms around her. She was caught off guard, but she got hold of herself fast and hugged the woman back. She closed her eyes, and breathed in the scent of the younger woman. Her heart fluttered in her chest. It's just a hug. She thought. She felt her face flush in the embrace, so she decided it might be better to pull out of the hug and go downstairs. She did not want to give herself away.
"Really, thanks. You're sweet." JJ said, as she pulled out of the embrace.
"No problem. You deserve it." Emily turned around to walk to the door. She did not want to look into the eyes of the blonde right now. She would give away her intentions. She would give away her feelings. Her true feelings. She did not want anybody to know. She had to pull up her walls as fast as possible, because they had to get back to work again.
Half an hour later, they were at the crime scene, aside the highway.
"The unsub is evolving. This one is only two weeks apart from the last one." Rossi stated, taking off his glasses to take a better look at the girl. "What do we know about her?"
"Her name is Marie van Vliet. She's twenty-six years old." Hotch said, looking at her ID.
"Sounds Dutch. Where's she from?" Morgan asked.
"She is from the Netherlands. She came to Ohio two years ago. She's got an office-job in the city." Hotch answered the question. "We don't know why she came here yet."
"Well, let's ask Pen." JJ said, dialing the number. "Hey, sweetie. What do you got on Marie van Vliet, - V - L - I - E - T?"
"She's from the Netherlands. She came here in the summer of '06. Her sister studied here, so she came to visit for the holidays. It's not clear why she decided to stay here. Maybe a boyfriend or something else? That's for you to find out. She worked at some unknown office in the city."
"So, unlike the others, she did not have a public job. Did she have anything in common with the other three victims?" JJ frowned.
"No, nothing." She could hear the other woman shake her head.
"That's rather odd. Well, could you find out if she has accounts on dating sites or anything?" JJ asked, biting her cheek.
"I will pull everything I can. Garcia out." Garcia disconnected their conversation.
"Well, Garcia will try to find everything on this victim, but as far as we know, she has not links to the other victims and she doesn't have a public job." JJ stated.
"Her roommate reported her missing three days ago. Let's check up on her?" Prentiss offered.
"You and Morgan will talk to the roommate. JJ and Reid will go to the office, see if they know something. The rest of us will go back to the precinct, see if we can find anything useful on the other victims." Hotch said, turning to walk back to his SUV.
Two hours later, all of them met at the precinct again.
"So, what do you got?" Hotch asked, looking at the genius and the blonde.
"They didn't know a lot about Van Vliet. She never went to any parties or gatherings. She was a very introvert person. Nobody knew her well enough to know if something was out of place, or if was acting strange." Reid stated. "She was a little socially awkward, and I'm under the impression that they thought she was autistic on some level."
"So, she has that in common with the unsub." Hotch turned around to the board and wrote down some things. "You?" He turned to the Prentiss and Morgan.
"The roommate reported her missing. Van Vliet called right before she left work. She had been working overtime, and they arranged on eating together that evening. When she wasn't home after an hour and some phone calls, she decided to call the police. She didn't notice any changes in behavior, only the stress due to her job. They were having finance issues." Prentiss informed the rest of the team.
"What about the relationship between the roommate and Van Vliet?" Hotch asked.
"She told us she wasn't very open to her. She didn't know her that well. She never talked about feelings or boyfriends or anything personal." Reid answered.
"So, we got ourselves a victim, who was pretty much invisible for her neighborhood, but somehow, the unsub knew her. She caught his eye. How?" Prentiss frowned. JJ's phone buzzed.
"Pen, you're on speaker." She said.
"So, I tried to find something about Van Vliet's life before America, and I found out she studied mathematics in Leiden until she got her master's degree at age 23. She was amazingly smart, because she graduated summa cum laude. She lived with her parents until she moved to Ohio."
"Hmm, that's odd." Reid intervened. "Why would she have a minor job in an office, if she could do something much more challenging? And why in America? In the Netherlands are enough job opportunities, especially in that field. She could have done research and get her PhD. Instead, she moved to Toledo." He frowned, sunken in thoughts.
"Thanks, baby girl." Morgan said, before JJ hung up. "So, I guess our next step is to search her home."
The man looked at himself in the mirror. He put his hands at both sides of the sink, looking down. He missed the presence of the woman. He got attached to her. At the same time, he had ached for some space. He wanted to get rid of her. She had never been nice to him. She had always mocked him, because of his hair, because of his smile, because of his whole existence. He had never understood why.
All those women, rejecting him, mocking him for who he was. Never had a woman told him he was beautiful, or strong, or cute, or just nice. They all looked down on him. They all told him he was a creep or just ignored him, just like he was a pile of trash. They just did not know him. They did not know what he was capable of. They underestimated him.
He had to do these things. He had to strangle them. He had to push every little bit of air out of their lungs, to feel the same suffocation as the man felt when they rejected him. And he would look into their eyes too, to see the light leave their eyes, to see their last piece of hope crumble, their last desperate scream for life. They wanted you to feel some mercy for them, but all he could do was squeeze. They just made him feel mad, enraged.
They had to stop talking, to stop breathing..
That evening, the two women of the BAU team laid in their separate beds in their hotel room.
"Emily?"
"Yes?" She watched the ceiling in the dark. She could not bring herself to sleep yet. And she had the feeling the younger woman could not either.
"Have you ever been in love?" She asked, a little unsure of asking the question.
"Yes, why?" Emily decided to be honest, although she would not be totally honest about whom she actually was in love with.
"I don't mean just a crush or something. I mean, you look at a person, and you just know you could spend the rest of your life with that person. You just know you would love him forever."
"Well, I'm not married. I'm not even in a relationship." Emily answered, biting her lip.
"Still, you're not answering my question." It was quiet for a couple of minutes. Maybe it was longer; Emily did not know. She could never lie to the woman next to her, but she did not want to admit it either. "So, I can conclude he didn't love you back."
"Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe it's not that simple. Maybe I never told the person I was in love. Besides, it doesn't matter anyway, because I'm married to the job. I don't have time for a relationship. I never got passed the first, maybe second date. It's never more than just one night." She paused. "And I'm okay with it. I can handle it. I can live with it."
"Can you?" JJ shifted in her bed.
"I guess." She bit her cheek. Sure, it would be nice if there was someone to come home to, especially the person in the bed next to hers, but she was accustomed to the idea that she was never going to marry. "I've done this my whole life."
"You're only thirty-nine."
"Already thirty-nine."
"But you have like forty years to go. You're not even halfway yet. How can you be sure?"
"You can't be sure. You can't be sure of anything. That's life." Emily said, closing her eyes. She was glad it was dark, because otherwise the other woman would have noticed she was feeling uncomfortable with the subject. She did not like people interrogating her about her life. She was really secretive.
"True. Nothing is certain." JJ responded. The subject had passed. Emily breathed out in relief. "Still, it's a waste, because you're such a beautiful woman, and you're nice and kind. And you're very protective of the people you love." The brunette grinned in reaction.
"Yeah, right." She chuckled. "Well, let's get some sleep, otherwise we will be two zombies in the morning."
"Good night." JJ said.
"Sleep tight."
Emily would never admit how much those words meant to her..
A/N: I'm not entirely sure about how I feel about this chapter. Well, let me know, maybe I can change some things. :) You're great for still reading this. ^^
