This chapter seemed to lowkey fit with the next song on the playlist I told you guys about, it's called A Hair On The Head of John The Baptist by Saltillo and I definitely recommend giving it a listen!
I think by the end of this story I'll share a link with you to the completed playlist once I finish it and publish ! Also I'll have to upload a chapter image later since I'm on mobile, oops.
All Rosemary could think about was how wrong it was for her to be in this room, waiting to be questioned about something she didn't do, while her father's body was lying on a cold table, awaiting an autopsy. She was all alone in the room, and she stared blankly at the table she sat behind.
She hadn't shed a tear since leaving the crime scene, and now appeared to be in a state of silent suffering. Her hands still burned from scraping them and her wrist throbbed- she couldn't tell how hard she'd landed on it, but enough to make it feel like it was pulsing hard enough to pop off her cast. She didn't care. How could she care about minor injuries when her father was dead? And of course, the second she'd gotten back to headquarters she was torn away from Spencer and left in here to wallow in her pain and the chatter of her brain.
She couldn't stay angry at him for having avoided telling her the truth. She was still hurting, but she could not turn an angry eye on him- especially after he had held and comforted her. But that didn't stop her from being enraged at the other agents, especially the ones who had even dared to think her father could have been behind all of this... because of their incorrect assumptions he was dead.
"It's me," Morgan announced as he entered the room.
Rosemary said nothing, though her eyes moved slowly off the table to stare at his approaching form. She knew she probably look insane- like the criminal they wanted. Red-rimmed eyes, smeared mascara, injuries... she didn't care. She just wanted to prove her innocence and get out of this room.
"Rosemary, you know why I'm in here," Morgan began, giving her a look as if she knew exactly what he was talking about and was trying to sympathetically garner the answer he wanted from her.
"No, not really," she finally spoke, her gaze latched onto his almost challengingly. Rosemary was one of the least confrontational people she knew- but now was a moment where she needed all of her strength, and she was not going to let these people off easy for what they'd caused.
He arched his eyebrow briefly at her credence, then let out a sigh as if she was making this harder than it had to be.
"Okay, then let's start with what you do know," he decided, folding his hands on the table. "I bet you can tell me the exact meaning of the way we found your father's body."
Her chin quivered and she glared harder, her teeth clenched together unhealthily tight.
"He was set up in prothesis," she forced out, trying not to begin crying again. "Ancient Greek pre-burial ritual. The body is dressed and displayed for family to mourn over."
"And the conch in his hands?" Morgan pressed, waiting in nonchalant curiosity.
"Representative of Daedalus and the famous puzzle he solved in myth," she finished, her expression more resolute.
"Right," Morgan nodded, turning his head slightly as he watched her.
"Everything she said is correct," Spencer said from behind the window, hands in his pockets and his posture slightly slumped. It was safe to say he was not enjoying the situation he had been caught in. "In myth, Daedalus solved the puzzle of King Cocalus, which was stringing a thread through a conch shell. Daedalus tied the string to an ant, pierced a small hole in the tip of the conch, and put honey in the shell to coax the ant all the way through."
Hotch nodded at the explanation, his eyes still trained on the agent and now suspect in the other room.
"And of course, she knew all that too," he remarked as he watched.
"Sir, I really don't think we're following the right trail," Spencer finally spoke up, expressing his true feelings. "Rosemary's grief over her father's death was incredibly real. Her knowledge of Greek mythology could just be a ploy our real unsub is using to distract us before the big finale. His dormance most likely indicates that he's planning something even bigger than before, and if we don't stop him-"
"Or the quiet period could be occurring because we've had our eyes on her for this long and there's no way she could communicate with anyone," Hotch disagreed. "She could very well be communicating with else to do the dirty work while she's the brains behind it. And we both know faking emotion is relatively easy. She hasn't made a sound since we brought her back- she only broke down for you. Don't you think that she might be preying upon your connection to her? Not to mention the fact only her footage on the laptop was cut off to where we couldn't witness anything else- her kidnapper, her attempted escape- we have nothing to show it. I hate to say it, but with every uncovered fact it's looking more sinister than we thought. And I'm not so sure you want to bring yourself to consider her capable of doing any of this."
Spencer stared in baffled silence at the chief, who looked as if he hadn't quite wanted to say all that he had- but he knew it was necessary.
"Well, when you're done grilling an innocent girl who just lost her father, I'll be outside," Spencer finally responded, giving his boss the most disappointed look he could muster despite his suddenly down-trodden eyes. He turned and left the spectating room, the door shutting behind him.
"Now about the laptop..."
"The laptop that was stolen from my home," Rosemary added, a hint of bitterness in her voice.
"Except the person who took it didn't disturb a single thing in your home and left the door locked behind them," Morgan pointed out.
"Well, if they had my father, which they did, getting into my place wouldn't be so hard with the spare keys they'd have lifted off of him," she analyzed, her eyes never leaving his.
"Fair enough," he gave in, raising his hands in slight defeat. "Except that doesn't explain how all of those images and videos got onto the laptop while only having your fingerprints all over the keys."
"That's impossible," Rosemary shook her head, not having heard this piece of information before. "I couldn't have put anything on there."
"And funny enough, the video clip of your captivity was cut much shorter than the others," Morgan added, now drilling everything he had. "We didn't see the kidnapper come into the room, your escape, anything... it's almost as if what was on video could have been staged and then you were put out in the open to look as if you had escaped."
"What would I have to gain from doing all of this?" she asked with a disbelieving and almost hysterical laugh. "Why would I kill all those people? My own father."
"You're smart, you're well-versed in everything your father taught you," he suggested, shrugging. "You became obsessed with myth and you had to prove your knowledge and ability, but you couldn't do the dirty work alone. You were just the brains behind the operation- you have an IQ over 120, Rosemary, people with a head like that don't just let it all go to waste! Your father was in the way of you proving your superiority, and you and your mother are hardly close. You push her away, just like you always have-"
"You're wrong," she shook her head, growing simultaneously angrier and frightened by the escalating situation.
"Why keep denying it? You're a narcissist, that's why you've been showing all your knowledge off for everyone to see with the scenes, putting the footage right there for us to find... you even went as far as to manipulate an agent to feel sorry for you and defend you-"
"Stop!" she shouted, her fingers digging into the table. "Just- stop, okay?"
"Tell me the truth, Rosemary, and this is all over," Morgan finished quietly, the climax coming to a startling end.
"The truth?" she asked, now feeble under duress. "I've been telling you the truth since the beginning, Agent Morgan. I don't know why I was taken- maybe because it would be so easy to frame me or my dad. If this unsub you keep talking about is so clever, he knows how to deflect the attention away from himself so while we're sitting in this room arguing about my innocence, five more people are being murdered."
The agent stared back at her with intrigued eyes, though he couldn't seem to come up with an adequate reply. Instead, he rose from his seat, exiting the room and leaving her solo again. She looked at the glass she knew had people watching her from behind- possibly even Spencer. If he was watching, she felt even more ashamed of herself.
She didnt usually let herself act the way she had. But she'd gone very quickly from bitter to outraged and scared. It was giving her emotional whiplash, and the constant reminder of a dead body in the building that had once been someone who meant the world to her only made tears leak out of her eyes again. She put her face in her hands, not wanting anyone to witness this moment of ultimate vulnerability- they owed her some privacy, at least in this.
Five minutes later, the door opened again and Agent Morgan held it open with his body.
"You can come out now," he told her.
Rosemary wiped under her eyes and rose from the chair, trying to stand up tall in order not to seem weak. She brushed past him lightly as she left the room and allowed herself to be guided back to a waiting room.
"We need you to stay in here for now," Derek requested, glancing back out into the main bullpen. Spencer looked up from his lap and glanced over, seeing Rosemary had finally been let out of questioning.
"Keep an eye on her for a bit," Morgan told Spencer as he passed by, nodding with a slight look of sympathy in his eyes.
Spencer was somewhat glad for the opportunity to be alone with Rosemary again, wishing he could convey to her just how much he believed in her and was trying to fight for her innocence. His mind lit up as he decided one slightly cheesy way to show her he was there for her despite the mess, and he turned around to rummage in his bag and desk, looking for a book he could bring to her. None of them felt good enough, he thought in frustration as he searched around. But hazel eyes brightened as they landed on the perfect novel, and he grabbed it and turned around to head to the waiting room.
But she was gone.
Spencer eyebrows twitches into a frown and he looked around, wondering where she'd gone to. The bathroom maybe? He could not check, though. The agent jogged over to the conference room to interrupt the others, blurting out, "Rosemary's not in the room. I thought maybe she went to the restroom but..."
J.J. caught on and nodded, glancing at the group and saying, "I'll go check the bathroom for her."
She followed Spencer out to follow the path to the restrooms, entering the women's restroom.
"Rosemary? Are you in here?"
She pushed each door lightly until she hit the end of the row of toilets, all revealing themselves to be empty. J.J. exited and Spencer waited expectantly for an answer.
"She's not there," the blonde sighed, and Spencer suddenly looked as if an unsavory idea had crept into his brain.
"She must have run," he murmured, staring into blank space, fingers gripping the book in his hands painfully tight. "She probably got freaked out, she was so upset- J.J., what else did he say to her?"
The blonde's mouth opened slightly and she shook her head, concern in the blue orbs. "We need to catch her before she gets far.. she either ran because she was upset or... because she's guilty."
The evidence was piling on top of Spencer and the more it settled, the more he could feel the doubt in his heart. Maybe he had really been played, for all his intelligence, and now Rosemary was saving herself from punishment. He didn't want to accept it, but the thoughts infiltrated his head regardless. He numbly followed J.J., blinking back a few tears as he tried to focus on them catching up to Rosemary before she could get far.
As they entered the bullpen again, the other agents had emerged, and upon seeing J.J.'s face, Hotch quickly ordered them to get a move on.
"Morgan, take them down the East staircase, Blake and I have the West," Hotch said firmly, hurrying already towards the elevators which split the corridor and lead to both staircases.
The group split and went rushing towards the stairs, running out of time with every passing second.