"Hello?" Emily asked again. "Hotch?"
"Hotch?" a man's voice came through the phone, mocking Emily's inflection. They didn't recognize the voice and Garcia's fingers were practically flying across the keyboard as she tried to get a trace.
Emily didn't have a chance to say anything else before the man on the phone spoke again. "Listen up. If you want your agent and his kid back, you're going to do exactly what we say."
"I hear you." Emily said calmly. "What is it you want?"
"What we want is one million dollars in non-sequential, unmarked bills. Nothing bigger than fifties. You have twenty four hours to get it together."
"That's reasonable." Emily said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. "But before I can get started on that I need to know that Agent Hotchner and his son Jack are okay. Could I speak to them?" she spoke calmly but she could tell by the expressions on the faces in the room that the tension was mounting. Garcia was biting her lip in frustration and she shook her head; she couldn't get a trace on the call.
"You're pushing it. We're the ones giving demands around here." The response was angry.
"You're absolutely right; you're in control. But in order for me to convince my superiors that this is legitimate, I need to know that Agent Hotchner and Jack are still alive."
"I just texted you a picture." Emily looked down at the screen of her phone and saw Hotch and Jack on the small screen.
"I really appreciate that, but since the picture doesn't have a date or a time on it, I really need to talk to Agent Hotchner and Jack before we can do anything else.
"Fine. Hold on." There was a beat of silence and then, "Talk."
"Hello?" Hotch's voice came through the phone.
"Hotch? Are you alright?" Emily forced the personal concern out of her voice for the kidnapper's sake. She had to be professional, now more than ever.
"I'm fine." That was all he had time to say before the phone was taken away.
"Satisfied?" the kidnapper asked.
"Thank you for letting me speak to him. Could I talk to Jack?" Emily asked, still reeling from the relief she felt that Hotch was still alive.
"You are trying my patience, woman!" the kidnapper yelled.
"I understand your frustration. We're working toward the same goal here but my supervisors aren't going to let us work this out if I don't talk to Jack."
Deep breaths came through the speaker. "Fine. Here." There was silence on the line, then the sound of someone whispering. Emily spoke up.
"Jack?" she asked tentatively.
The only response was more whispering before finally, "Emily?" Jack's voice, small and scared.
"Jack." Emily breathed with relief. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, but they hurt daddy. Emily I wanna come home. They have guns."
"You're going to be home soon Jack, okay?" There was no response. "Jack?"
"You have your proof. Now you have twenty four hours to get us the money or both of them die." The call was disconnected without another word.
"I couldn't get a trace." Garcia said, close to tears. "They were using a pre-paid cell, they're impossible to trace even for me."
"It's okay Baby Girl." Morgan reassured her, putting a hand on her shoulder.
"Well, at least we know Hotch and Jack are okay." JJ said.
"Okay enough to talk at least. Jack said Hotch was hurt." Reid pointed out.
"And we know for sure now that there's more than one Unsub. Whoever we were talking to used 'we' instead of 'I'." Rossi said.
"I didn't recognize the voice." Emily said, gaining affirmative nods and head shakes from the team.
"Something feels off about this." Morgan spoke up. "Why wait forty eight hours to call in a ransom demand?"
"And why ask for cash?" JJ asked. "If these Unsubs are as smart as we think they are, why didn't they ask for it to be transferred into a numbered Swiss account? That would have been much safer for them."
"Maybe this isn't about ransom at all." Reid said quickly. "What if they're trying to misdirect us? Guys, I think that someone we talked to today has Hotch and Jack. They got freaked out when we got to them so quickly so they came up with the ransom idea to make us think this wasn't personal."
"If that's the case then we've already talked to the person that has Hotch and Jack." Emily said.
Everyone around the table let that sink in. Rossi looked at his watch. "It's seven now. Everyone should sleep until eleven or so." He spoke louder as people started to protest. "Listen, we're going to go back over all of our notes, with Garcia this time. We're going to run down everything about all of them. But we need fresh eyes. We're too tired and too close to this right now. Get some sleep. Be back in here at midnight. I'll bring the coffee." Rossi commanded. "Go. Now," he told them in a tone that left no question as to whether it should be followed. One by one the team stood and filed out of the room to catch whatever sleep they could in the next few hours. Emily couldn't help herself; she ended up in Hotch's office again. If anyone asked, his couch was just so damn comfortable.
When they'd come back into the room and asked Hotch for a phone number he'd rattled Emily's off without thinking. He protested when they'd pulled Jack off his lap and pushed him toward Kayla but Jack clung to her without any apparent apprehension. When she picked him up he wrapped his arms around her neck and his legs around her waist. She held him up with one hand and put the other on the back of his head reassuringly. She kept his face turned away from Hotch, just in case things got bad. Jack didn't need to see that.
Hotch could only just barely hear Emily's voice come through the phone. Gary was doing the talking and Hotch strained to hear Emily's side of the conversation. He saw Gary tap a few keys to send the picture and when he watched his face morph into an annoyed expression he had to suppress a small smile of pride at his team's skill. Gary held the phone to his ear and motioned for Hotch to talk. He knew who it was but greeted them anyway. Emily's voice sounded more tired than it had when she'd been here earlier and he wanted to reassure her in any way he could. He kept his assessment to "I'm fine" and it was a good thing he did because the phone was ripped away almost immediately.
Jack jumped when Gary yelled and Kayla tightened her grip on him. Gary put the phone by Jack's ear but Jack shied away from it.
"It's okay Jack. Say hi." Kayla whispered to him softly. He lifted his head when he heard Emily say his name but still didn't talk. "Say something, Jack. It's okay." Kayla whispered again.
When Jack finally spoke his voice was small and terrified. When Jack told Emily Hotch was hurt Hotch had to suppress a groan. He wasn't that hurt and he needed his team to focus on finding them, not what kind of shape Hotch was in.
Gary finished up his demands and disconnected the call. There was a second of silence before Gabe cheered and clapped his brother on the back.
"Nicely done little brother!" he yelled. He turned to his father. "In twenty four hours we're going to be rich men! Rich men with all the time in the world."
Gregory's tone was still icy. "You may have all the time in the world. They don't," he jabbed a finger at Hotch and Jack but then cracked a smile. "Let's go celebrate boys. Let loose. Gear ourselves up for tomorrow."
"What, are we just going to leave them here alone?" Gary asked, indicating Hotch and Jack. And Kayla?
Gabe smiled. "I'll do what I always do. Go get ready, I'll be right back." All three walked out of the room.
Kayla looked over Jack's head at Hotch. "Don't fight him." She pleaded. "It'll be fine."
Hotch didn't have time to respond before Gabe came back into the room carrying what looked like a handful of black strips of some kind of material and a damp white cloth. Hotch could smell the chloroform from where he was sitting.
Gabe walked to Kayla first. "Put him down," he directed her. She obliged and set Jack on the ground behind her. He grabbed her leg and buried his face against the back of her thigh.
"Gabe, he's six. Leave him alone. He can't do anything," she told him softly. He slapped her and her head snapped to the side.
"Shut up," he told her, as if he was bored with the whole situation. He lunged behind her and grabbed Jack's arm. Jack cried out and tried to pull his arm free.
"Don't touch my son!" Hotch yelled at him. He tried to stand but the short chain wrapped around his neck only let him get as far as his knees.
Gabe ignored him and wrapped a beefy arm around Jack's small torso, pressing the chloroform soaked cloth over his mouth and nose. Jack's cries grew softer until he went limp in Gabe's arms. The man set him on the floor and handed Kayla some of the material he'd brought in.
"Tie him up."
She looked at him angrily. "He's six. What do you think he's going to do, break down the wall when he wakes up? Leave him alone."
"Let me put it to you this way. Either you tie him up or I shoot him." He pulled his gun from his waist band and pointed it at Jack's unmoving figure. "Do it. Now."
Kayla obliged, binding Jack's wrists and ankles as loosely as she could without drawing suspicion. She balked when Gabe handed her another length of material and told her to gag him, but she did it anyway.
Gabe came toward Hotch. "This can be hard or easy. But make no mistake that it's going to happen." He pressed the cloth against Hotch's face and Hotch offered no resistance. He held his breath and mimicked the effects he knew chloroform would have. His eyes slid closed and he slumped back against the wall.
"Gag him." He heard Gabe tell Kayla.
Hotch felt her hands holding his head gently and he managed to keep his neck limp. He felt the rough material slide into his mouth and felt it pull as she knotted it behind his head. She laid his head on the floor gently and Hotch heard her stand up. This was what he'd needed to hear; what went on between Gabe and Kayla when no one was supposed to be listening.
"How long are you going to be gone?" she asked him. Hotch opened his eyes just a sliver to watch the scene unfold in front of him. Gabe and Kayla were standing about fifteen feet away from him near the far wall but neither one was looking at him.
"I don't know. Turn around." She did and Gabe wrenched her arms behind her back. He secured them with more of the material then gripped her shoulders and roughly spun her around again, pushing her against the wall. He bent his head toward her but she turned her head away. He growled and gripped her cheeks between his massive hands before pressing his lips to hers and kissing her hard.
When he stepped back he was breathing hard. "You forget your place." He told her menacingly before slamming the cloth against her face. Her knees buckled and Gabe didn't bother to catch her before she fell, landing on her right shoulder. He quickly bound her ankles and gagged her. He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and surveyed the room, examining his work.
Hotch closed his eyes again and kept them closed until he heard the door slam shut. Even then he waited a few minutes, listening for any sounds he could make out but he heard nothing. He opened his eyes and could just barely make out Jack and Kayla in the dark room. He maneuvered himself to a sitting position and, since his hands were still cuffed in front of him, pulled the gag out of his mouth. He took a deep breath and tried to shake the exhaustion out of his head. Looking over at his son's still figure, he vowed that he would end this immediately, one way or another.
