Chapter 7
Kat's POV
I walked back to the station the next morning half dead. But what can one expect from a night if next to no sleep? I thought I was finally past the nightmares but this case brought them back. I shook my head slightly and took another sip of coffee. I'm not going to think about it. Not until we catch this guy anyway.
Everyone was already there when I walked in and sat down. "Morning. What's on the agenda?" I said trying to seem more awake than I really was.
"You and Reid are going to talk to Keith Perry, Leah Kane's ex-husband. Rossi and Prentiss will talk to Eli Clark, Kristy Thomas's ex. And Morgan and JJ will talk Jason Michaels again. I'll talk to Detective Williams and bring him up to speed." Hotch said.
We nodded and headed out. Mr. Perry's house was about 20 miles out of town. I snagged at set of keys and looked at Reid. "It ok if I drive?"
I swear I saw him blush just a little before replying, "Sure."
I didn't occur to me until I started driving that a car ride with a profiler can be the most annoying thing in the world if they wanted to know something that you didn't feel like sharing.
The first few minutes of silence were killing me and I had no idea what to talk about so I flipped on the radio. One The Band Perry song later Reid cleared his throat. I glanced at him and he looked down nervously. When I turned the radio down he cut straight to the point. "Is everything ok with you Kat?"
My grip on the steering wheel tightened slightly. "I'm fine." That sounded fake even to me. "Why do you ask?"
"You seemed a little upset by the scene photos on the jet and today you look like you got maybe two hours of sleep."
"Two and a half hours." I corrected him. Then in hopes of turning the conversation down any path but the one it was taking I turned to him as I said, "And are you profiling me Dr. Reid?"
I grinned as his face slowly turned red. "No." I cut him off right there.
"Seriously Reid? I'm a profiler too. I can also tell when someone is lying and that answer right there was one."
He looked down. "I was just worried about you."
Whoa. Alright maybe it won't hurt to tell him. Just give it with as little details as possible. One side of me said. Are you kidding? The other side piped in. If you're going to break that easily for him then you're going soft. Is it a sign of insanity that I listened to my friendly side only to spite my antisocial side for calling me soft? If so then I'm going to need to be committed.
I sighed. "On one of my tours my team and I ran into some trouble. There were four of us and only two of us made it out alive. Problem was when I thought we were far enough away I asked Johnson to stop so I could try to patch up the cut on his neck enough to hold him over until we made it back to base. He said no we should just keep going. So we did. And after a while he just collapses. I tried to help him but he bled out."
Reid was silent for a couple minutes before speaking. "Kat that's terrible." He paused. Then, "If that was me I would have asked to be off this case."
I gave a half smile. "I think you'd do what I'm doing. Use that experience to drive you forward." He looked skeptical. "Seriously Reid, I think you're tougher than you think."
He smiled for a moment then looked serious again. "There's something else that's bugging you about that day isn't there?"
"Yeah. The ironic part. We were about five miles out from base. I probably could have dragged him at least until we were in sight."
He opened his mouth but I cut him off. " 'You can't blame yourself. You didn't know' I've heard that a million times Reid."
He looked like he wanted to say something else but figured it would just be safer to nod. By then we had made it to Keith Perry's house.
"Oh and Reid," I said as we got out of the car. When he turned to me I continued. "Thanks."
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