A/N I want to thank every single one of you for your reviews! You're all amazing! I'm actually almost done with the next chapter too. Recently I've gotten all kinds of ideas for stories. I always wanted to write something with Volker, but until then I'll just mention him in this.
I hope you enjoy this chapter!
—
Chapter 7
April 10th
Cho was worried about Jane. He had already known that if something were to happen to Lisbon, Jane would fall apart. That's why he had previously tried to protect her by preventing her from doing her job. His speech at the funeral had confused many, most of them probably thinking that he was going to take his own life. But Cho knew what the man meant, that he still believed that Lisbon wasn't dead. Of course, Cho wanted to believe him because he wanted Lisbon to be alive just as much, and Jane's instincts were usually right. Except when the case was too personal. He spent so many years trying to catch his first wife and daughter's killer and many times his judgment had been clouded. All the evidence they'd gathered told them that Lisbon was dead. Not only had they found DNA in the barrel, but they'd also found traces of her blood close by, something they hadn't wanted to discuss with Jane. He didn't need to know about the torture Lisbon might've endured the week between her disappearance and when her body was found. Of course, Jane would probably kill them if he realized they'd hidden this from him.
Though none of what they found had brought them closer to finding her killer. He was just a ghost. They'd been rounding up all the criminals she had put behind bars, Tommy Volker high on that list, but if this was connected to the previous killings none of this made sense. There weren't many, but the first one was a cold case dated back a decade. Of course there was a possibility that they weren't at all connected, but they were just too similar.
The team had still checked for connections between the more recent murders and Tommy Volker and checked all the contact the man had had with the outside world. He did have power after all and a lot of people who did the dirty work for him. Plus, he wouldn't have gone to prison if Lisbon hadn't been so determined to take him down.
When they visited him in prison, he had seemed genuinely surprised to hear she was dead. Surprised, but happy. Thouogh, Volker's acting skills had kept him out of prison for years before Lisbon happened. Even if Cho knew Volker was a dead end, he still wanted to keep that window open.
Checking Lisbon's credit cards, they had also been able to see where she'd been prior to her abduction since there was a possibility she'd met the killer in one of those places. Perhaps he worked in her favorite coffee shop or where she did her usual grocery shopping. Though, the whole thing felt like grasping at straws. In fact, Lisbon could've met her killer anywhere at anytime. They might not even have met in person; Lisbon had been in the public eye plenty of times with press conferences or just in the background of news coverages. Everywhere they looked they always seemed to reach a dead end. The team didn't want to fail their colleague and friend, but without any leads, this was impossible.
Cho parked his car in front of the small house Jane had been working on prior to his wife's death. The man had left so quickly from the wake and Cho knew he needed to check up on his friend, just so he wouldn't do anything stupid.
"Jane?" He called out as he knocked on the door. The last time Cho had been there was at Lisbon and Jane's wedding, and since then Jane had really gotten some work done, just like he said he would. The agent knew this house was the reason he'd been absent from work, but he'd never imagined Jane knew how to remodel a house.
"Yeah!" A voice inside called and Cho took that as permission to enter.
The agent knew that Jane believed his wife was still alive and got easily obsessed with seeking the answers so he shouldn't have been surprised by the wall of web Jane had put up. There were newspaper articles, maps, a pool of suspects, information about previous victims and red threads tying the different elements together.
"You've kept yourself busy," Cho commented, studying the wall.
"Someone has to keep looking," Jane replied casually and took a step away from his work, back still turned to Cho. "I was thinking about the coffee. Crime techs said that the cup of coffee that morning had been drugged and that's how he got her out of there..."
"Yeah, but that didn't get us anywhere..." Cho pointed out and crossed his arms over his chest.
"Which means he would've had to get into her house that morning after she made her coffee and slip something in, without her hearing a thing, which is strange, isn't it? So I had the lab run som tests on the coffee still in the package."
Cho raised his eyebrows at the other man. Only Jane could've come up with something like that. "And? Did they find anything?"
"As a matter of fact they did," Jane said, unusually happy for a person who just buried his wife. "Which means he could've put something in it long before. The package had just been opened too. He would've had this past week to accomplish this, but I think he's been doing this for a while actually."
"Why do you say that?" Cho wasn't entirely convinced, but he had to say he was curious where Jane was going with this. He was trying so hard to see something that wasn't there, to explain why his wife was still alive.
"There was no sign of a break-in so he must've had a key because she wouldn't just let a stranger into her house, unless she was getting something repaired or something, which she wasn't... who knows how many times he's been in her house. It's all classic stalker behavior," Jane turned to Cho for the first time since he started his story. "Killing after just one week does not fit in with this. He's already gone to so much trouble to capture her, to study her routine. He still has her locked up somewhere and I'm gonna find her, with or without your help."
Cho looked at him for a moment and then to the wall. Perhaps Jane's instincts were correct after all and the team stopped looking for her. There was still a tiny chance that she was locked up somewhere with a psychopath.
With a sigh, Cho stood straight and gave him a quick nod. "Alright, let's say she's still alive, how do we find her? "
For the first time since Cho got there uncertainty flashed through Jane's eyes.
"I've retraced her steps this last month," he said, quieter than before. "All these red pins…" He pointed to the map. "I've also written down the names of everyone she met during this time and… eh… At least the ones where I was present. I haven't been around… "
"If what you're saying is correct he would've gotten to her even if you were around more. He'd wait until she was alone or he'd take you out too," Cho tried to reason with him.
"But we'd have more to go on. Maybe I could've noticed something she didn't."
"Have you talked to the other victims' families yet?" Cho wondered, stepping in front of the pictures of four other women who had supposedly died exactly like Lisbon.
Jane shook his head. "Not yet." He had planned on it, but he didn't want to give their families hope of their loved ones being alive. Chances were that their kidnapper got rid of the old girl as soon as he found a new one.
"I'll get the team together and we'll question them. If he stalked them too, they might've noticed something we didn't and told someone about it. Even if Lisbon had seen something she probably wouldn't have told us in case it was nothing."
"Yeah, she wouldn't want us to worry… She's stubborn that way," Jane sighed and stared at the picture of his wife. "We need to find her. She's already been missing for weeks."
"We will," Cho told him. Only fifteen minutes ago he had believed his friend and colleague was dead, but everything Jane said actually made sense. Hopefully the rest of the team would also be on board with this because if Lisbon was out there somewhere, they all needed to work together to bring her home.
