Prelude
Chapter 28
It was ridiculous. They were all at the reception following Hayley's funeral when JJ's cell sounded. The FBI had been informed of a serial killer with a rapid turn-around time. The BAU's services were urgently needed.
"Tell them to send another team," urged Reid.
But the message had already dismissed that possibility. "There's none available. It has to be us."
Perversely, each of them flashed on a mental image of Hotch getting on the jet with them, to lead them on this next case. Even, maybe especially, Morgan, who'd been given charge of the team. He'd stepped in for Hotch very successfully in the past, and had agreed to do so again, hoping that it was just that…stepping in, and not replacing.
Morgan went to make their excuses to Hotch, who was engaged in conversation with Rossi. The grieving unit chief verbalized his understanding of the situation, and reiterated his confidence in Morgan's ability to lead the team in his absence.
The others made their way slowly out to their vehicles. Most of them had traveled separately, not expecting to be called out from a funeral. JJ walked with Will to their car, and grabbed the go bag she always kept nearby.
"I'll catch a ride to the airport with one of the others. They can drop me home when we get back." There wouldn't be time for her to go home to collect her own car.
"All right. You be careful, Cher. You know I don't like you leavin', especially now. You come home to me and our little man soon as you can."
She smiled as she hugged and kissed him goodbye. "And you know I don't like to be away from Henry a minute longer than I have to."
She watched and waved as he pulled away from the curb, then made her way over to where the others were still waiting for Morgan.
"Catch a ride to the airport?" She'd directed her words to Reid, who was still holding himself apart from where the others were talking.
He gave her a small smile. "Sure."
He opened the door for her to deposit her bag. As she placed it inside, JJ was met with a sight that told her exactly how little time she and Reid had spent together recently. The back seat was littered with coffee cups, receipts, books, and assorted other papers. She'd known of his vehicle's reputation, but apparently he'd always cleaned it out for her before.
He became aware that it was taking her a long time to perform a simple task, and realized she was looking at the mess. Embarrassed, he tried to reach in from the other side and scoop some of it up. But he had only the one good leg, and he couldn't keep his balance without the cane.
"Spence…stop. You don't need to do that for me. Besides, here's Morgan. We'll need to get going."
Their temporary unit chief gave them a short briefing on the case, and then they all dispersed, to meet directly at the airport, thirty minutes away.
The ride began in silence, each of them still processing the funeral and the unbelievable fact that they had already been called back to work. JJ stole a few sideways glances at her partner as he drove, and saw the same firm set of his jaw that she'd seen at the graveside.
At least I've had Will to vent with. I'll bet Spence has held this completely inside. She could tell from his look that this was not a good thing, and decided to try to draw him out.
"I missed you the other day. You were already gone by the time I got down to the bullpen."
"There was no point in sticking around."
Really. "Well….I was thinking we might talk a little bit, you know? I was hoping we could."
He looked surprised when he turned to her. "You were?"
"Of course, Spence. God, it was so awful. So awful. I can't even….. And I just wanted to talk with my best friend about it. I thought maybe you might, too."
He shook his head, ever so slightly, as he turned his eyes back to the road.
"I thought you'd want to get home to Will. I thought you'd probably need him. And I didn't want to go and get drunk, like the others." Maybe he should qualify that, he thought. "Not that I blame them, mind you. It's just….it wasn't what I wanted to do. So I just left."
She sighed. "It's not that I didn't want to get home to Henry and Will. Of course I did. How could I think about Hayley, and Jack and Hotch without thinking about my own family? But I…."
She'd stopped abruptly, and he didn't understand why.
"You what?"
She hesitated, feeling strange about what she was about to say. Because Reid was right. She should have wanted to seek solace from Will.
"I guess I thought that only those of us who'd been there, who'd heard…..and seen…..I thought we were the only ones who could really understand. I didn't think Will would really know how I felt. But I thought you would."
He was silent for a while, taking that in. She'd needed him every bit as much as he'd needed her. Even though she had a lover waiting at home for her. Reid pondered, once again, the complexity of relationships among human beings.
He cleared his throat, but still only managed a squeak. "Me too."
JJ squinted her confusion. "You too, what?"
More forcefully now. "I needed you."
"Well, then, why didn't you call…"
He'd turned his head to throw her a look, and she understood. He hadn't reached out because he thought she was reaching out to someone else.
She shook her head in regret. "Well…we're talking about it now, aren't we?"
He acknowledged it. "I guess we are. So, how are you doing?"
She gave him a sad smile, acknowledging their foolishness, while also acknowledging the situation.
"Terrible."
"Oh. Good. Me too."
That produced a wry chuckle. "We are a match made in heaven, aren't we? We have so much in common."
He was cynical. "If you count being miserable, yes."
"Not so much miserable, Spence. Just sad. And overwhelmed."
Now he was curious. "Why overwhelmed?"
She turned her face away, sorry she'd used the word. She was feeling overwhelmed. But it was a tender subject to discuss, even with Spence. Still….if not to him, she knew she'd never speak it to anyone.
"It's just…..everything. That we just came from Hayley Hotchner's funeral. That Hotch killed Foyet. That we listened to…"
She had to break off there.
It was the thing that wouldn't go away. Listening to that final, three way conversation among Hotch, Hayley and Foyet. Hearing the dreaded crack of the gunshot. But mostly, for JJ, the thing that stayed with her was how calmly Hayley spoke with her son Jack, in Foyet's presence. How she hugged him, and told him she loved him, even as she knew she was about to be killed. And how she did it without crying, so she wouldn't scare her son. In that moment, Hayley became a hero to JJ, the living...and then, dead...example of mother-love.
"JJ? You okay?"
She brushed at her eyes. "Yeah. It's just…" And she told him.
When she was done, Reid blew between pursed lips. "Wow. I don't think I even picked up on that…at least, not the way you did."
He chanced a look in her direction. "And you were wondering if you had it in you to do the same thing." A statement, not a question. He knew her very well.
She nodded, and sniffed.
"Not me."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, there's not a question in my mind. You love Henry with…ferocity, I guess, is the word. I see it whenever we're together. I don't doubt for a minute that you would do anything you had to for him….anything at all. Not for a minute. Not for a nanosecond."
He was so firm, so adamant. She had no choice but to believe him. But still…
"But….. I guess." She smiled her appreciation at his confidence in her, then immediately sobered. "But it was so awful, Spence. Oh, my God, I can't imagine what it was like for her. And for Hotch….."
He swallowed. "I know. I don't know how he can live through this, JJ. I mean….. hearing the woman you love be killed by the very person you've dedicated your life to putting away. Knowing he's doing it just to hurt you. That he's treating her like a pawn, like something that doesn't really matter at all."
He shook his head, still unable to get past that, past the inhumanity. But there was more. "And Foyet was so smug about it. Like he knew that he was taking the rest of Hotch's life away from him."
That was it, exactly. Not that a person couldn't recover from a personal loss. Not that husbands and wives didn't survive each other all the time. But that, with the purposeful taking of this one life, in the way that he'd done it, and making sure who would witness it….he'd taken the other life as well. He'd taken the survivor.
"I hate him, JJ. I hate Foyet."
He heard her prepare to speak, and cut her off.
"I know he's dead. And I still hate him. If I thought he had an immortal soul, I would curse it."
She studied him for a moment, uncomfortable with what he was saying. But mostly uncomfortable that it was Spence saying it.
"Don't you always say that it's their illness that drives them? That they only do these things because they're sick?
"Not Foyet. He was perfectly sane. He was just a sociopath. He had choices along the way. And he made them. Now let him rot with them."
She'd never heard him speak this way about one of their perpetrators before, and it unsettled her. And, despite the vehemence of his words, she could see that it unsettled him as well.
"Spence?"
He cast her a quick, embarrassed glance. "I don't know, JJ. You're right, I've never felt this way before. Not about one of our unsubs, anyway. I've never felt this kind of….it's not even anger, it's…rage. It's rage. I think I know exactly how Hotch must have been feeling. That this ….I don't even want to call him a man….. that Foyet could just decide to take what he held most precious in the world. And then gloat over it." He shook his head, reliving it. "God, JJ. I just…. I don't know."
She heard the subtext. He'd scared himself. Not thought himself capable of that strength of violent emotion. In truth, he was scaring her as well. JJ leaned over and rubbed his arm, needing the connection, needing to offer a small gesture of comfort.
Reid's sympathy toward the people they hunted didn't always come naturally to her. But she respected that he felt it, and that he so often voiced it. It felt like he maintained faith in humanity on the part of the whole team. He kept it up when the rest of them were struggling. It gave JJ, and the rest, something to come back to after the heat of the case ended. Something that reminded them that human beings weren't so depraved, so callous, so evil. Just broken. So to hear Spence speaking this way about Foyet felt like it threatened a world view that she'd come to value. One that sustained her in her job.
She sat, quietly, absorbing his words. Then, "Are you saying that you think some of us are inherently evil?"
He kept his eyes on the road. "I'm saying that I think Foyet was."
At her protracted silence, he asked, "You don't agree?"
She met his eyes, briefly. Responded in a quiet voice. "I guess I'd come around to how you always said it was. That they were sick. I took that to mean that humans were inherently good, if flawed. So….I don't know…it's a little scary to hear what you're saying now." And it's rattling me to hear it coming from you.
"It's just the truth, JJ. I think Foyet was different from the others. Mostly with the element of choice. The unsubs we find who are so sick…they have no choice. They certainly wouldn't have chosen the illness, or the delusions. But Foyet….. everything about how he worked indicated it was all about choice. He challenged Boston PD by vowing not to kill if they stopped looking for him. And then he stopped, because they met his demand. For ten years, he stopped. Someone operating out of a compulsion couldn't have done that. So, yes….I think he actively chose to torment Hotch, to torture both of them with that phone call…and then to kill Hayley."
She followed his train of thought. "But, unlike our typical unsub, he didn't get any great satisfaction or release from killing her. Just from the pain he knew he was inflicting on Hotch."
Reid drew a deep breath.
"It's more than that, JJ. I think Foyet might have actually wanted Hotch to kill him. Because he was smart enough to know the kind of man Hotch is. He profiled us every bit as much as we profiled him. And he knew he could inflict the greatest pain on Hotch by making sure he survived, to live with the guilt. To have to think that, in the end, they weren't really so different."
JJ squinted at him, not sure she understood. Or agreed.
"You think he purposely let Hotch kill him? I don't know, Spence. From what Emily said, Hotch was pretty much out of his mind when they came upon him. He was very actively beating Foyet to death."
Reid nodded. "I know. Morgan told me the same thing. I'm not saying that Hotch wouldn't have done it anyway. But, think about it, JJ. Foyet could have easily just surrendered himself. And, why wouldn't he? He'd already escaped prison once. He might have been able to do it again."
"You think he goaded Hotch into killing him. Because he knew Hotch would have trouble living with himself." She thought a moment longer. "But isn't that a sickness in itself, Spence? I mean….. how could he enjoy it if he was dead?"
Reid had thought long and hard about this.
"JJ, Foyet was probably the most brilliant profiler I've ever encountered. He probably rivaled Gideon. He knew how to engage his victims, he knew how to manipulate the police. And he knew how to manipulate us. Including, and maybe even especially, Hotch. He knew how Hotch would respond to every last taunt he launched at him. And he knew how Hotch would react, afterward. That was all Foyet wanted. He didn't need to see it play out. He knew he'd already won. And, besides…"
This was something Reid had only theorized to himself. But the more he'd thought about it, the more he thought he was right.
"I think Foyet knew he'd gone too far with harming himself. That he'd done too much to his body. I don't think he had all that much time left anyway. And I think he knew it."
"You think Hotch killed him, but he would have died anyway?" She was aghast at the implications.
Reid nodded. "I think he wanted Hotch to think that he was no different from him…from Foyet, I mean. That he has as much evil pent up in himself as Foyet had."
JJ was stunned by the turn of their conversation. She'd been so focused on the sorrow associated with Hotch losing his ex, and Jack his mother. She'd not even thought about how Hotch might be at risk of losing himself. But what Spence was saying threatened their supervisor's self-image. His ego. Maybe his soul. She became concerned, in a whole new way, for the man she considered her leader, and friend.
She shivered, chilled by the thought. "God, Spence. I'm never leaving you alone again. You go to a scary place when you're on your own."
She watched as he just continued to look forward, that firm set to his jaw still there. Worried about him in a new way, she asked, "Spence…..are you still in that place?"
His voice was so low she almost couldn't hear him. "Can't seem to find my way out, JJ."
There wasn't time for anything more, as they'd just pulled into the airport parking lot. Reid found a spot, and they both got out, ready to retrieve their travel bags. But before they did, JJ made her way around to the other side of the car.
"Spence." He was bent, trying to reach for his bag and his cane while he balanced himself on the seat. At her voice, he straightened as best he could.
"I'm sorry I didn't call you the other night. I wish I had. Because I really needed you. I really needed to talk about this with you. But, mostly…mostly, I just really needed to be close to somebody who understood. To you. I needed my best friend."
He gave her a regretful smile. "Likewise."
"So, maybe you're in a dark place. Maybe we both are. But it will be easier to find our way out together, don't you think?"
She'd led him out before. He'd learned that her words, her touch, her many kindnesses served as a beacon whenever he'd been lost in the shadows. But things were different now. She had a family, and he wasn't a part of it.
"How?"
JJ didn't think it was all that different. She opened her arms. "I think it starts like this."
Drawn as a flower to sunlight, Reid stumbled forward into her embrace. He hadn't realized how detached the whole ordeal had made him feel until he held her, and felt connected again. Grounded, in a way, after he'd nearly lost his tether.
JJ felt the newly-acquired strength in the arms that held her, the power of emotion equally as strong as that of sinew. She'd been right. This was the kind of comfort Will hadn't been able to give her.
It lasted less than a minute, this respite from the depths. Then they silently broke apart, and made their way together to the plane. Duty called.
