Endgame

"LAUREN" SPOILERS!

Rating is for mild swearing.

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Chapter 3

Emily Prentiss can be surprisingly resourceful.

She's followed the news, she knows all about the 'Laurens' and she knows exactly why the murders are happening. She knows the point is to draw her out. She's the profiler – and a beyond excellent one – but she lived with Ian Doyle for too long. He knows pieces of her. He knows enough pieces to know what buttons to press. As strong as she is, as good as she is, there were parts of Lauren Reynolds that are a part of her.

Well, and it doesn't take a genius to see the drive behind his victim choice.

In fact, in some cases, it's understated for a man like Ian Doyle. His last kills were flashy, ostentatious. They were a play for her eyes only. Only her eyes became their eyes and now she's 'dead'. Except she's not really and she knows she left more than enough evidence in 'Natalia's' apartment for JJ to connect the dots. JJ's wired to hear when something happens to her aliases. She knows the game and she knows between the blond and her once-Unit Chief, the significance of the whole stage won't be lost.

But at the same time, she refuses to give Declan up, whatever that means. She won't do it. She won't allow a child to be bred into what Ian was. What she chose to be for a time. She wants the kid to have a chance and now that she's actually seen the serial killers from the eyes of those who hunt them, she feels all of it with even more conviction. The fact that she literally cannot give Declan up is another story all together.

She knows better. She took precautions. Maybe she didn't take precautions in protecting herself, but she did a damn good job of protecting Doyle's son. She has no idea where the boy is. Young man now, she reasons, sipping tea in the lobby of the Waldof Astoria. New York is huge, and she had figured she could get lost here. At least for a little while. At least until she can go back to DC. Not that she's sure there's anything left there either.

Declan's not dead. Doyle's not gone. But Emily has no idea how to handle either of those things. She doesn't know where they are, Declan by choice, Doyle because he still has enough associates to be a thorn in her side. Enough of a thorn to piss her off too because she hates being a redhead and it's driving her nuts that he even knows the table leg through her abdomen didn't kill her. She doesn't like any of it and she sick of pretending.

Then again, that's why she's stateside.

She won't run anymore. She's not going to hide. She's going to find him, confront him and take him for everything he is. She's going to kill him. Period. He won't stop otherwise.

What she doesn't understand, no matter how many times she goes over it, is how the hell he managed to come to the conclusion that Declan was alive.

Logically, she knows, that maybe that's not true. Maybe he has no idea that his boy is safe. Well, she doesn't either because she's made a concerted effort to never wonder about it. She's never wanted to know. Okay, that's a lie. She's wanted to know she just refuses to be a threat to him. She's given Doyle all of the information she has. For all she knows, Declan is dead because she has no idea where he could be.

She glances up at the screen above the bar, silent, but there's news flashing on another death. A local one. Lauren Jackson. She raises an eyebrow, part of her impressed that he's tracked her this far, part of her settling in contentment. It's time to go home. It's time to bring the fight back to the people she knows will help her end it. Because after six months, she misses them with every piece of her soul. It won't be a happy reunion. They'll be upset, they'll be pissed, they'll be distrustful, but they'll be there because they're family. And never before has she realized how much that means.

She gathers her bags and leaves her teacup. It's time to move on in more ways than one. She's got a bunch of different dyes in her bag, stocked up because she figured sometime soon she'd have to make another change. She abhors the idea of going blonde though, so there's a part of her that's ever-so-glad Doyle's faster than she anticipated. Means she doesn't have to.

Instead, she pulls out a phone. She's got two; this one is a pay-as-you-go burner. The other is connected with everyone. She's kept it on her but off, paranoid of tracking, but needing the connection. This one though… she uses it to send one text message.

I'm coming home.


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