Disclaimer: I do not own any rights to the TV series, Criminal Minds.


Bravery
Part 3

By N. J. Borba


As soon as the team landed they split up. Rossi and Garcia headed to the DV Tech headquarters. JJ and Reid set off for the field office so they could coordinate with local authorities and start to sift through tips coming in via the abduction hotline that had been set up. The other four went straight to Lucas Donovan's residence and were greeted by Molly Conner. The girl was a short wisp of a thing, with strawberry blonde hair and green eyes. She looked understandably upset, but forced a welcoming smile for them. "I just got a call from Mr. Donovan," Molly informed them. "He landed a few minutes ago and is due home shortly."

"Thank you," Hotch replied. "Miss Conner, I'd like you to take agents Morgan and Prentiss up to Kacey's room so they can have a look around," he instructed. "Agent Morris and I will go talk with the other staff."

Morris shook his head the whole time Hotch spoke. "I'm not leaving her alone with Agent Morgan," he glared at Emily.

Hotch sighed. "They won't be alone; Miss Conner will be with them. And Agent Prentiss isn't going to risk doing anything stupid," he looked to Emily, silently imploring her to heed his warning. His eyes turned to Morris again. "I need my people on this. They're our best chance of finding Kacey right now."

Emily noticed the scowl on the agent's face soften just a little as he gave in to Hotch's request. She and Morgan wasted no time, taking to the stairs behind Molly. Emily entered the pink and white room, grateful to Hotch for getting Morris off her back for a few minutes. From the corner of her eye she saw Derek open closet doors as she walked toward a desk on the opposite side of the room. There was a big box of crayons open on the desk and pictures plastered all over the wall above, with a few lying unfinished on the desk. She smiled to see all the happy-faced animals Kacey had drawn. Then she moved toward a large window that had a built-in bench beneath it.

After a quick glance at the neatly ordered kid's clothes, Morgan joined Emily. The padded seat under the window was blanketed with stuffed animals of all sizes and colors. Derek watched Emily pluck a ladybug from the stack. She held it against her chest and Morgan let her have a moment as he addressed the nanny who was still standing in the doorway. "You didn't hear anything last night?"

Molly shook her head. "After I checked on Kacey last night I fell asleep almost instantly. I was exhausted from studying. There was an exam today in my psychology class, but I was able to get out of it after explaining the situation going on here."

"Where's your room?" Emily asked her.

"Three doors down from this one, on the right," Molly answered.

Derek stared at a picture of a blue dog that Kacey had drawn. "Are you paid well for your job as a nanny?" he continued questioning the woman.

"I live here and get meals. I also make a little bit of money other than room and board. Mr. Donovan has always been quite generous."

"What about tuition?" Emily questioned. "Does Lucas pay your tuition? Or do you have student loans? Maybe the cost was getting to be a little too much and you thought taking Kacey could net you a sizable windfall?" She immediately felt horrible for even suggesting such a thing. Emily detested the fact that she's just treated Molly the way Morris had been treating her. But thoughts of Kacey being with some stranger were plaguing her mind.

"I'd never do that to Mr. Donovan or to Kacey," Molly calmly replied. "I took this job to gain experience, and a bit of extra cash. I honestly never expected to care about Kacey as much as I do. Did you know she beat me at a game of checkers the first time I met her? She was only three at the time," Molly smiled. "She's a smart kid and very funny, also extremely stubborn. Bedtime, baths, brushing her teeth; getting her to do all those things can be a bit of struggle. Kacey loves school, though. She always goes there willingly. Kacey is a sweet little girl, but she's just a little kid. I can't bear to think that someone has her."

Listening to another woman tell her about the girl she'd given birth to was heartbreaking, but Emily could tell Molly had nothing to do with Kacey's disappearance. "She likes animals?" Emily asked.

The nanny's smile returned. "Especially ladybugs," she pointed to the stuffed animal in Emily's arms. "But, you already know that, don't you? You're Kacey's mother. I've seen pictures," she stated. "You sent that one and all the other ladybug things."

"There seems to be one missing, a hand puppet," Emily whispered.

Molly nodded. "The one you sent for her fifth birthday. It's her favorite, and it was the only thing I could tell was missing from her room when the police asked earlier. I mean, aside from Kacey, of course," the young woman held back tears as she spoke. "She never goes anywhere without it, except school, because she doesn't want the other kids to think she's a baby. I'm assuming she has it with her, wherever she is. At least, I hope she does."

Emily stroked the fluffy version of a ladybug in her hand. "She really likes them?"

"Loves would be a better term," the young woman grinned. She maneuvered through the room and pulled a book off the shelving unit beside the window. "The first time we saw this book in the store Kacey really wanted it, but she waited because she was sure you'd send it to her. And you did this last birthday."

Derek stood beside Emily and glanced down at the book. "Ladybug Girl, by Jacky Davis and David Soman," he read the title and smiled, his eyes lifting to rest on Emily. "You send her gifts?" Morgan wasn't all that surprised by the fact. He knew losing custody of Kacey must have ripped Emily apart, but he was glad she'd found a way to keep in contact with the girl, even if it was only one-sided. And he could tell that Emily was touched by the fact that Kacey loved the things she'd sent.

"I never thought she'd actually get them," Emily looked to Molly again. "I figured Lucas would intercept them."

"Mr. Donovan is rarely here when the mail comes. Sometimes, when he notices the new items, I tell him we bought them on a shopping trip." Molly walked over to the twin bed and pulled something out from under it. "I've been helping Kacey put this scrapbook together," she handed it to Emily. "We update it every time you send something new."

Inside the scrapbook, Emily found all of the cards she'd sent to Kacey over the years; for birthdays, Christmas and other occasions. "She's read these?"

"I read a lot of them to her when she was younger, but now she can mostly read them by herself," Molly flipped a few pages and pointed to a card that had an underwater scene on the cover. "She really loves this one."

Emily flipped the card open and read the message she'd written there just three months ago. "Happy sixth birthday, baby. I wish I could be there to help celebrate; to eat cake and open presents with you, but I will be thinking about you and sending all my love. And I'll be remembering the day you were born, because I can still see it like it was just yesterday. You were so pink, and soft and perfect. There was a tuft of golden hair on your head and bright blue eyes looked up at me as if you already knew who I was. And that night, when the nurses and doctor finally left us alone, I nursed you and sang to you. I sang the happy birthday song to you. And I'll be singing it again this year for you. I love you with all my heart. Mommy."

"She had blonde hair as a baby?" Morgan found that surprising, considering the picture he'd seen of Kacey revealed a head of darker hair like Emily's.

"Yeah, she got that from Lucas," Emily replied.

As if saying his name was a means of conjuring, Lucas Donovan appeared in the doorway of Kacey's room. He was tall and dressed rather casually in khaki pants and a dark blue sweater. His hair was a wave of sandy blonde locks, and Derek knew instantly who Kacey got her aqua-blue eyes from. Morgan suddenly had to wonder what Emily saw in him, compared to this Lucas fellow. "Emily," the man greeted her with just a name.

Emily did likewise. "Lucas."

Some of the tension in the room dissipated when Hotch and Morris stepped into the room just behind Donovan. "Sir, as I'm sure you can imagine, time is of the essence and we need to ask a few questions," Hotch let him know. "Earlier police reports state that your alarm code is 1912, is that significant in any way? Perhaps it corresponds to someone's birth date or a partial bank account number?"

Lucas shook his head. "No, it's completely random."

"Well, whoever did this must have known it, because there's no evidence of the alarm being disabled by cut wires or any other means," Hotch pointed out.

"Only those who work here know the code," Donovan said. "Ms. Turner has been the cook here for almost two years. She was recommended by a woman who'd been with my family for the last twenty-five years. And Mrs. Benet works every other day cleaning. She's been with me for four years now. Other than that, Molly and I are the only ones who know the system code."

Hotch turned his attention to Molly. "Typically, when everyone is inside the house for the night, an alarm is switched to an instant setting so the main siren will go off the second any door or window is breached. And the security company calls your house automatically. Did you forget to set it that way last night?"

It was Lucas who answered the question. "We don't use that setting, mainly because Ms. Turner comes in very early to start breakfast. And also because I work out of town a lot and return at all hours."

Emily's face contorted, unable to believe what she was hearing. "God, Lucas, you provide security so that people around the world can buy designer jeans online without having their credit card information stolen, but you don't think your six-year-old daughter's life is precious enough to warrant that extra measure of protection? Do you even care about her?"

"Of course I do, don't be ridiculous," Lucas replied.

"Yet you've got this Morris guy on my butt so I can't even help find Kacey," Emily shot back.

He stared into her dark eyes. "You have no one to blame but yourself for that. I'm surprised you even showed up here. What do you care about Kacey? You haven't been around for the last five years. You don't even know your own daughter."

"Do you really want to play that game with me, Lucas?" her voice was low, dangerously close to an explosive rage. "I carried her and gave birth to her. I nursed her for eight months. I made her first birthday cake…" Emily took a shaky breath. "Whatever I don't know about Kacey is because you and your family pushed me out of her life. But let me ask you this, Lucas, how much do you really know about Kacey?" she asked. "Can you even tell me what her favorite color is?"

The look on his face revealed that he thought the question was stupid, but he had no intention of backing down from her challenge. His eyes danced around the room for a few seconds before he finally answered. "Pink."

Emily scoffed, rolling her eyes. "I'd be willing to bet the pink walls were your interior decorators' idea."

Lucas took another quick look around. "It's red. The ladybugs, right?"

She sighed, shaking her head at his second answer. "No, actually her favorite color is blue."

Molly's eyes widened. "How did you know that?"

"For one thing," Derek spoke up before Emily. "Nearly two thirds of the clothes in her closet are blue, or have blue in them. And the bed," he waved a hand toward the white quilt and white pillows. Morgan picked up the smallest pillow. "In the center of all the white is a blue heart-shaped pillow."

"And the crayons," Emily reached for the box on Kacey's desk. "Every shade of blue in this box is worn down nearly twice as much as the other colors. You can see that reflected in her drawings," she pointed to the wall. "A blue dog, blue cat, blue bird, blue fish. Even this picture of a house; the grass is green, the sun is yellow and orange, but the house is blue." Emily concluded.

Donovan's jaw twitched. "And all of that is supposed to help find Kacey somehow?"

"Maybe not the fact that she loves blue," Hotch answered. "But figuring out behavioral details about this kidnapper is going to make all the difference in finding Kacey." He tried to get things back on track. "Mr. Donovan, have you received any ransom calls or notes that you haven't told the police about?"

"No, nothing. I thought…" Lucas looked to Emily, his eyes clearly revealing that he'd believed it was her who had taken Kacey. "There should be a call, right? The kidnapper will demand money?"

Hotch kept his features neutral as he delivered the facts. "Mr. Donovan, ransom calls and notes are usually delivered within the first few hours of abduction. A lot of the time they're even left in the spot where the person was taken from."

"But, if this isn't about money…" Lucas shrugged. "Then what?"

"There are three basic reasons children are taken," Morgan began. "Ransom is one. Also, people who can't have children often kidnap them. They want them to be their child, live with them, have them call them mom and dad."

Lucas looked a little relieved. "So, they wouldn't hurt her?"

"If that's the kind of person who took Kacey then, more than likely, no," Hotch answered.

"What about the third reason?" Lucas asked. He glanced around the room, but received only silence in return to his question. "What aren't you telling me?" the man's tone changed, fear dripping from each successive word. "Molestation? Murder?" he guessed.

Some of the bad thoughts Derek had previously entertained about the man evaporated as he listened to the voice of a scared father. They all watched Donovan's stern face melt into a barely contained façade of sorrow. Hotch's cell phone rang and he answered. "Okay, Reid. Morgan and I will look into it, thanks." He hung up. "There's been a tip. Someone claims they might have found Kacey's pajamas in a park across town."

"Just her pajamas?" Lucas asked. "Not Kacey's body, right?"

"Sir, we really won't know anything more until we visit the site," Hotch replied, knowing his words weren't much comfort.

"I'll show you two out," Molly offered.

Derek passed by Emily on his way to the door. He wanted to say something to her before they left, wanted to comfort her and apologize for what had happened between them on the jet. But the timing was all wrong as Hotch motioned for him to hurry up. When Emily tried to follow after them, Morris stopped her with a hand against one shoulder. "You're not going anywhere without me."

With the others gone, Lucas closed the gap between himself and Emily. "Tell me this is all your doing. Please, tell me you have her and that she's safe. I'll give you visitation rights, whatever you want. Just please, tell me it's you who took her and not some monster who will hurt her."

She did her best to hold back tears. "I wish I could tell you that, Lucas. You have no idea how much I wish I could."

Donovan took a deep breath and spun around. "I need to make some calls," he quickly exited the room.

Morris turned his accusing eyes on Emily. "When I first spoke to Mr. Donovan over the phone this morning and he enlightened me about you having taken Kacey five years ago, I decided to dig deeper. I only had a few hours before I flew out to Quantico, but it was pretty easy to find one rather interesting case that you worked on six years ago. It involved a drug dealer by the name of Cory Davis. Do you remember him?"

Emily nodded, doing her best to cooperate. "He was the key suspect in the deaths of three police officers who were killed in a major drug bust. I compiled evidence for that case, but what does that have to do with Kacey's disappearance?"

"You somehow misplaced a very important evidentiary document, which turned out to be why Davis slipped through the FBI's fingers. They had to let him go."

"And I was disciplined for that infraction," Emily was growing tired of his big bad wolf routine. "If you're going to slap me on the hand for every mistake I've made in life we'll be here for a really long time. Personally, I'd rather be out there finding Kacey," she concluded.

The green-eyed agent hardly blinked as she spoke. "I find it interesting that Cory Davis was set free just shortly before you lost custody of Kacey. Did you make some sort of deal with him?" Morris persisted. "Maybe you helped him get away in exchange for some favor in the future, to be determined. Was this the favor; kidnapping your daughter so you could finally follow through with your plan to get her out of the country? Did he help you that first time too?"

Her right hand balled into a fist and struck Morris before she could even consider the consequences of her actions. Emily's clenched fingers connected with his jaw and she couldn't help feeling a little satisfied as she watched him stumble backward. He wiped blood from a split lip and grabbed the cuffs at his side. "You are under arrest for the kidnapping of Kacey Donovan and for assaulting a federal agent," he continued to ramble off her rights as he cuffed her hands behind her back.

xxx

The holding cell in the basement of the St. Louis field office was a place Emily had been before, but never as a criminal. For an hour she'd been starring at the stone walls, her thoughts jumping through time as she tried to figure out how her life had spiraled so far out of control. Now she watched as the cell door rolled open and stopped with a clang. Derek silently stepped inside and then the guard closed and locked the door. From her seat on the cot's thin mattress, she noticed the way he was staring at her. "You look a lot like my mother the day she found out I'd joined the FBI; a combination of shock and disappointment."

"What were you thinking?" he asked.

Emily shrugged. "Obviously, I wasn't thinking," she admitted. "He started in on some ridiculous theory about me being in cahoots with a drug dealer and I lost it."

"Morris told us all about Cory Davis, and Hotch is still up there trying to argue that he's way off track about you. But, don't you think we'd be doing the same thing if we were in his shoes?" Derek posed the difficult question.

"Are you defending Morris?" It was her turn to appear shocked.

His head shook. "I think the guy's an asshole. But, if it was us, we'd overturn every stone; like you asking the nanny about her tuition. You hated that, I know you did. But it needed to be asked." Derek could see in her eyes that she knew it was true. "So, do I even need to tell you how pissed Hotch is right now?" Morgan watched her gaze lower to her lap. "He's going to bat for you, even though it's eating up valuable time in which we should be looking for Kacey." Derek sat on the cot beside her. They both turned so they were facing one another. "We found the pajamas with her initials in them, but not Kacey," he let her know.

"I kind of figured," her voice was practically a whisper. "So, I guess this really isn't about ransom, is it? Someone who takes a child for ransom doesn't want to deal with them this long, and they wouldn't go to the trouble of changing her clothes or appearance. Which means…"

Morgan stopped her, reaching out to rest his hand on her thigh. "Don't go there, Emily."

She gnawed on her lower lip. "How can I not go there, Derek?" A lone tear escaped and trailed down her cheek. Emily brushed it away as her thoughts drifted through life again. "Two weeks before Kacey was born I bought her a blanket. It was white cotton with little red and black ladybugs embroidered all over it. I brought her home from the hospital in that blanket. And I would swaddle her in it almost every day and call her my little bug in a rug," her voice hitched. "She was safe wrapped up in that blanket, and safe in my arms. But for the last five years I've had to wonder about her safety. And now..."

Morgan had seen her take on a lot of roles in their line of work, but seeing her as a worried mother was something he wasn't really prepared for. Unlike on the jet, where he'd been self conscious about someone seeing them, he didn't care now who walked in on them as he embraced her. "We're going to find her," he whispered words of comfort in her ear as her head rested against his shoulder. "I swear we will."

"Alive?" Emily asked.

Derek swallowed a lump in his throat, knowing he couldn't answer that question. "Emily," he slowly broke away from her, though both his hands rested against her forearms. "I'm really sorry about what happened on the jet. For just standing there like an idiot and not answering you."

"It's okay," she replied.

"No, it's not. Why do you keep saying that?" Morgan questioned.

"You can't help feeling the way you do," she shrugged. "And I don't want you to be anything you're not, because I love who you are." Emily knew she'd never come close to telling him she loved him before that moment. "But I do need to tell you that the Derek Morgan I know is great with kids," Emily insisted. "I remember one kid in particular that you helped; a young boy. He was holding a gun in his hands, afraid of the place that was meant to take care of him. But you talked him down. You promised to walk him out of there and find him a safe place to live. You gained his trust. You went above and beyond the call of your job to make sure he was okay."

He instantly knew the boy she was talking about. "Maybe I can relate to the kids we deal with on cases, but that doesn't mean I know how to be a dad. My dad died when I was still pretty young. It's hard to know how to be something without guidance."

"You became a cop and an FBI agent because of your father's influence," she countered. "He's always been guiding you, Derek, even if you can't see it. And as for knowing how to be a parent," she chuckled softly. "I was so scared when Kacey was born," Emily confessed.

"You were?" Derek found that hard to believe, having seen her with kids numerous times. She always seemed so in control when dealing with them.

"Actually, more like petrified," she amended. "I remember one night when Kacey was about three weeks old and she wouldn't stop crying. She cried for hours. And I nursed her, I burped her, changed her, rocked her, and walked up and down the hall a million times. But nothing would calm her, and I felt like the worst mother in the whole world because I didn't have any idea how to comfort my own child."

His heart ached a little for her as she told the story. "When I was a teenager my mom would sometimes watch this baby boy for a friend of hers in the unit down the hall from us. I remember once when the baby was really upset, my mom told me that sometimes babies just cry," Derek said.

"Exactly," Emily nodded. "The point I'm trying to make is that most of the time we work things up in our heads to be worse than they are. Eventually Kacey fell asleep that night, and eventually I learned more about how to care for her. I also learned to accept that I wouldn't always know what to do for her. It's just like anything else, Derek; it takes time and patients. Although in the case of being a parent, it also takes a whole lot of courage."

Morgan's hands gently moved up her arms and clasped behind her neck. "I'm still not so sure about all this kid business," he spoke the truth, leaning forward so their foreheads were pressed together. "But I know I never want to watch you walk away from me again." Their lips sought each other out after that; words fading as emotions were left to traverse a familiar pathway.

JJ found them that way, kissing in the holding cell. She suddenly had a pretty good idea what Strauss had wanted to talk to Morgan about back at Quantico. The guard's key in the lock alerted them to her presence and they pulled apart lingeringly. "The ten o'clock news crew is headed out to Donovan's house," JJ explained as the door rolled open. "I want you and Lucas to make an appeal to the kidnappers."

Emily's brows furrowed. "Morris agreed to let me be there?"

"Reluctantly," JJ nodded. "But Hotch and I explained to him that women are more likely than men to report anything they've seen. And having Kacey's mother on screen is going to trigger their memories and endear them to you, especially if they're mothers too."

"Mother?" a hollow chuckle escaped Emily's lips along with the word. "I haven't been her mother for the last five years."

A supportive smile spread across JJ's face. "That's not true. You've always been her mother, Emily," she assured her friend.

xxx

The man flipped through channels, not paying attention to what was on the television screen until he stopped on a news report and saw a picture of a little girl on the screen. The image soon changed to that of a man and a woman. "My daughter, Kacey, was last seen at midnight in our St. Louis home. She's been missing for nearly twenty-four hours. Kacey is only six years old and is probably frightened. We just want her returned to us. Her mother and I…"

"Mommy?" Kacey's squeaky-soft voice was filled with trepidation and joy as she watched her father stand beside the woman she'd only ever seen before in pictures. She inched toward the television to get a better look at both her parents.

"What the hell is she doing awake?" Mel spun around to face his wife who was standing behind Kacey. "She should have been asleep hours ago."

"She's been frightened about everything that happened today, Mel. I've been reading to her, but I brought her out to say goodnight to her daddy," Doris explained.

Kacey pointed to the screen. "That's my daddy!"

Mel looked down at the girl for a second and back to the TV. "I can't believe you stole my boss's kid," he looked to his wife. "You're smarter than I thought. Donovan has got money, Doris; lots of money."

"No," the woman shook her head. "You promised I could keep this one. You always promise."

"We could easily get a half million dollars for this girl. Then we can go somewhere else and find another kid."

"I want her," Doris pulled Kacey close, wrapping an arm around her. "She's so much like Katie."

He thought about it for a moment. "Maybe I can figure out a way to get the money and keep the kid." Mel went to the kitchen and opened a drawer. He pulled out a length of rope and rushed back to Kacey. Crouching down, he grabbed hold of her hands and began to wrap the rope around her wrists. He looked up at his wife. "Make sure her bedroom door is locked tonight, and the window too. We can't risk her trying to get away again."

"You're hurting her," Doris watched the girl's tears fall as her hands were bound. "I don't think we should…"

He swiftly got to his feet and backhanded Doris across the cheek without warning. "I told you I would figure out how to keep her. But if you don't cooperate with me, I'll get the money and let her go. So, shut up and do as I say," he demanded. Mel finished tying a knot to secure Kacey's wrists then he shoved her toward his wife. "Now put her to bed," he growled.

"Daddy, mommy…" Kacey whimpered, straining to see their images on the TV as long as possible while Doris led her out of the room.


To be continued…