WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 2013 AT 11:43 AM | SUSSEX COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE
It was nearly afternoon when Alex and Spencer returned to the Sheriff's office and shared their findings with the team after placing the goodies they'd purchased on the snack table. On the board the observations went.
"Do we think that this might have anything to do with The Replicator?" Jennifer looked out at the team as they discussed the viewing of Noah's body. "The missing tongue is . . . I mean just last month—that's what Mark Jackson[1] was doing with his victims."
Derek shook his head. "Nah . . . I'm gonna chalk this up to pure coincidence. It's too many dissimilar things going on here. Reid might be right regarding the sensory deprivation."
"Mm."
Looking through old case files yielded too many results: cases involving aggravated assault with deadly weapons, cases of domestic abuse, complaint cases in which the offender threatened the complainants with sharp weapons, missing people, and more. When there were hopefuls, they were shared with Penelope so she could look into the offenders or missing persons' histories, and they all seemed to lead to few results.
A new angle emerged:
"As crazy as it sounds, what if the hands are removed because he views them as dirty?" Derek posed. "The removal of the tongues—can't that be to punish liars or somethin'? Why don't we run with the idea that this unsub feels wronged. Maybe these people are—I dunno—abusive physically or sexually or somethin'. He was abused in some way at some point in his life, most likely as a child, and something recent triggered these murders, like the death of his abuser or protector."
Jennifer scoffed, giving a dubious snort. "What—like an injustice collector who's delivering vengeance? Almost makes it sound like our victims are worse than the unsub in this scenario."
"And to the unsub, they would be," Spencer countered.
"Point taken," she responded. "Either way, the manner in which he buries the bodies wouldn't make sense. Keeping them for so long wouldn't make sense either. If they have offended him, why would he then wrap them and clothe them with such a peaceful send-off?"
The query left them quiet and torn. They took a late lunch break at two o'clock at a nearby fast casual restaurant, sitting at a table outside.
They kept the conversation light and unburdened by work. But once done and heading back to the precinct, their topic of conversation was back on the current case. The sheriff checked in with them to see about the progress.
"I'm sure you understand, agents," Sheriff Reiner said with his hands on his hip. "I'm a little anxious to get down to the bottom of this."
"Unfortunately, in cases like these, Sheriff," Aaron said, "all we can really do is wait for our unsub to make a mistake. His fastidiousness has left little for us to work with. We prefer it not go this way; in fact, we may end up just leaving you with a profile and may not even be able to assist with his apprehension at all. However, we're still waiting on the autopsy report as well as obtaining the ID of at least one of the victims. Knowing who they are will help us with victimology and give us a grander picture of who we are looking for. Once we have that information, we can truly build a working profile for you."
The sheriff nodded in understanding and left them to continue as they were. It had been less than a day—they weren't magicians. On they continued, exploring the unsub's motives:
"It could be about shame," Spencer observed. "Perhaps the unsub is disfigured, so he, um—he covers the victims' eyes to convey the notion of seeing beyond the physical appearance. It could be a manifestation of how he sees himself in this world."
There was merit in the thought. In this case, once again the unsub felt like he was the victim.
Either way, the varying angles, what they could observe about the burial and its location, and what they could observe so far about the newly murdered victim helped them build a preliminary profile.
What they didn't know was what this unsub's stressor was, and where he was getting his victims.
All of their theorizing might change once they received a full autopsy report and once they could find the identity of the victims. This was why they were reluctant to share the preliminary profile with the rest of the officers yet. They had so little to work with, so theories were all jumbled.
The third body was almost disinterred in the late afternoon and it was confirmed that it was a male. Aaron and David went to look at the body and returned within less than two hours.
"This victim was far more decomposed—pretty much skeletonized," David said. "Some of the bones became naturally disarticulated, and it's obvious he's been dead the longest of the three."
"They'll conduct DNA phenotyping to gauge this victim's hair color but we're sure that he was blond like the previous victims," Aaron added.
"Something about these blonde men attracts the unsub," Alex said. "Are they specially targeted because they're blond and the unsub is in some way triggered by them? Or are they just victims of opportunity?"
By half after seven in the evening, they were rapacious again and ordered for delivery, taking a fifteen-minute break to eat when the food arrived.
The fact that the unsub's burial site was now compromised might make him panic. This particular forest seemed to have an emotional tie, so they needed him to return to the forest if at all possible—if he were to kill another victim. So instead of this going public and information getting out that needn't be, they would need to strategize this, let him believe that he was still safe.
Although Aaron was hesitant to reach out to the media, he and Jennifer joined heads and thought of how they might be selective with releasing information to the public so that they could identify at least one of these three victims.
The problem with reaching out to the media would be how many people would contact them about their missing loved ones, and how they would have to filter through them to find a match of their victims:
Are you sure the victims are only male? My daughter has been gone for half a year.
Are you sure about the ages? My son ran away last year. He'll be fourteen soon.
Rejecting these sad but irrelevant inquiries was never easy. Getting as far as they could for today, they all left by half after eight, went back to their hotel, and rested for the evening.
THURSDAY, APRIL 25, 2013 AT 7:00 AM | CHANNEL 12 NEWS
Around New Jersey, around the clock. This . . . Is News12 New Jersey.
"Good morning, New Jersey. Kyle Danvers here. It's seven in the morning and today is going to be sunny and temperate at a high of 64 degrees. Isn't that just amazing weather, Corinne?"
"So, so, perfect for outdoor sports, biking, jogging, hiking, Kyle. Why am I here and not outside?"
"Hah! I'm not much of a jogger myself, but I could definitely go biking!"
"No, no, my friend; I haven't ridden in so long, I'd be terribly afraid of falling over."
"Hah! You know what they say about riding a bike. Well, let's get to some news this morning, then, shall we?"
"Yes, let's. Breaking: Sussex County residents, officials need your help! The officials are on the quest to identify human remains that were found on Monday as quickly as possible for the family involved."
"No release on where the remains were found as of yet."
"That's right, so to expedite that process, they're asking that families or friends of people who went missing in Northern Jersey in the past five years come forward. They'll be matching DNA to the remains found, so it will be helpful to have a personal item of the missing person: articles of clothing, hairbrush, a blanket, or pillowcase are the types of items they're looking for. If you have photographs or medical records, this will also assist in their search. Of note, the remains that were found were of a male in his twenties to fifties."
"Right. If any of these descriptions stand out to you, and you think this may be a friend or family member, please call their tip line at 0."
"Hope we can get closure for this person."
"Yeah. In other news—"
—
"Hey, so why didn't the news anchors mention that the person found is blond, and why'd you give 'em such a huge age range?"
It was half past eight in the morning, and the query was posed to the unit when they were sitting in their conference room, getting ready to start a new day on the search. The young deputy who was replenishing their supply of teas and coffee and snacks looked at them in curiosity.
It was Jennifer who spoke up. "Look at it this way: we're trying to give as little information to the public so as not to alert our unsub. Notice how it wasn't mentioned that the FBI was involved, or that the body was found buried, both of which would indicate a crime was involved. We keep that vague, and that keeps our unsub in the dark."
Derek, in turn, picked up from there. "We need the public's help to identify these victims. If, for example, we're given a picture of a fifteen-year-old redhead, or a Black or a Latino or Asian guy, we can eliminate him as a one of our victims. We do the eliminating, not the public. Yeah, it's more work for us, but that's okay. If our unsub is keepin' up with the news and hears that you guys are specifically looking for blond males between the ages of 25 to 35, this may spook him. Like JJ said, we keep him in the dark for as long as possible."
The young officer kicked his head back and nodded in understanding. "Smart. Neat. Enjoy y'all!"
Enjoy.
This was not something to enjoy doing.
The tips started pouring in a little after nine, and Aaron and David took it upon themselves to speak with and arrange for some people to come in to drop off their missing family member's personal items. Others came into the station of their own volition, not bothering to call, and they had to weed out the potentials from those who didn't fall within the victimology, as they had anticipated.
—
The rest of the team continued pouring over the evidence, staring at the pictures and waiting for things to stand out, theorizing. Finding a commonality from the tip line within just an hour, Alex and Derek decided to go out to local areas where some of the missing males from the tip-lines had gone last—laundromats, gyms, local bars, music stores, cafes—hoping to find flyers or other things at these locations that could attract these men.
Jennifer invited Spencer to look over pictures with her as she saw his frustration grow over the lack of quantifiable data on his geographic profile.
She kept stealing furtive glances at him from time to time to make sure he was doing okay. He looked tired, the warm taupe color under his eyes more pronounced, and he kept rubbing at them. Tucked in his hand was a paper cup of coffee that he sipped in slow increments as he leaned back. What was more, she noticed how every time he came upon close-ups of the pictures of the three victims' faces still covered with a blindfold, he would skip over the photographs. She was sure that he didn't even notice he was doing it.
She opened her mouth and then halted the flow of words she wanted to let out. But after almost twenty minutes of watching him do this—of watching him press the tips of his fingers to his eyelids for a few seconds before breathing out a long and steady breath, pulling his hands away and blinking—Jennifer could no longer abide being silent.
She dipped a toe in and tested the water, tipping her head. "Spence, can we talk?" He didn't answer. "You okay?"
He squinted his eyes but didn't look at her as he answered, "I'm fine, JJ." It came out as impatient, but she felt no ill will.
"Mm. You don't seem fine. Do you"—her voice lowered until she was whispering the rest of the words—"have another migraine?" After a pause, she continued, "Do you need to take a break?"
"I'm perfectly capable of doing my work, JJ." The words were clipped, and she felt this time that he meant to give her the tone. "Please don't coddle me."
She tightened her jaw, trying not to be offended by his tone. She knew he was coming from a place of hurt, and of other things besides.
"I'm not trying to coddle you, Spence," Jennifer replied. "I ca—" She paused, tightening her lips. She lowered her voice even more but made sure that her tone remained sincere and gentle. "Spence, we all care for you, and we know that you—you're struggling."
Spencer bridled, rearing his head back. Jennifer knew the expression well; he was going to put up his walls and become defensive.
"Struggling?" he replied, eyebrows furrowed and face contorting to something almost repulsive. "What—do you—do you think I'm using again? Like I wanted to do when you lied to me for weeks about Emily?"
"Wha-what?" This hadn't at all been her intention, and her stomach sank.
It had made her defensive and angry at first, Spencer's petulant behavior over a year ago. But she came to understand it. Trust with Spencer Reid was difficult to earn, and when broken it was difficult to regain. Through action, she had to earn it back, and she never quite did.
She was agitating him. But she shouldn't be offended by the accusatory questions. Guilt gnawed at her, though, because escapism wouldn't be a far-fetched reaction to his trauma. It was grim, but it was realistic.
Expression weighty, she furrowed her eyebrows. "No, no, Spence. That's not what I'm asking." This wasn't going well. "I'm upsetting you. I'm sorry I brought anything up at all."
He was quiet for a moment, and then he averted his gaze downward. Was it shame? Was it hurt? An unwillingness to divulge things to her?
"Please talk to me?" Her head grew hot, and her eyes stung with the knowledge that her friend—someone she cherished—was slipping away from her, and she didn't want this to happen. It couldn't happen, and she wouldn't allow it. She pushed her hand out—hesitant at first to make the connection—but then she let her fingers fall over his wrist, giving a gentle squeeze, thumb moving back and forth upon his skin. She felt him tense under the tips of her finger. "Please, Spence, I'm sorry for what I did to you with Emily, do you understand that? I want to tell you all the time. I know brief conversations and Rossi's dinner did nothing to stop the hurt. I want you to be able to trust me again like I still trust you, and like you did for me for years. I know that's not easy to get that back from you, but I want you to trust that I want to help you and that I care for you."
He didn't pull away, but he didn't reciprocate. Over the years, he came to reciprocate at the least.
Oh, Spence.
"I—" His voice caught, and he cleared his throat as his eyes fluttered again with the rapid blinking, still shifted to the table and not to her. But after a beat, he whispered out with a dry and cracking voice, "I'm okay." She had to lean forward to hear it at all. Sucking in a deep breath, he seemed to shake off a layer of dust that settled over him, then he looked at her.
"You're really not," Jennifer objected.
His chest expanded before he let out another shaking breath, as if it might rid him of something. She wondered what it might be.
"Just a little tired is all, JJ," he said. And then he did that thing—that fake thing: he smiled at her. "I'll be okay."
Jennifer pinched her lips and then pulled up his hand, clasping it in both of her hands before bringing it near her lips. With an incisive and desperate gaze, eyebrows upturned and eyes large, she spoke. "We love you, Spence. And we want to help you and cover over your hurt." He kept his gaze averted, and she squeezed his hand in hers. She then supplicated, "Please don't forget that we love you?"
She saw him stare at his hand, at her hands holding his. He opened his mouth, but words didn't come out. Instead, he breathed out a quick breath through his nose as he pulled his hand away.
The sting of that rejection for her concern was tangible. But she wouldn't dwell over it. She did what she could for now. This might have to be tabled for another time. So, she stood back up and walked to the evidence board.
No. I can do more. I have to do more.
She began speaking, not looking at him, but hoping he was paying attention to her words.
"When my sister died—" she paused and cleared her throat. "When Roselyn killed herself and it hurt for weeks and months and I thought that I could never pull myself out of this dark, hopeless place, my mother told me something that always sticks with me. Humans are like persistent plants, Spence, that can push through and grow between the cracks of hardened concrete. They don't give up. They move onward and upward and push towards the sunlight. You can, too. In time, you will."
A quiet air settled in for a little while.
—
The words had gone in one ear, percolated in Spencer's mind, and filtered out something important while the rest of it was stored in a separate bin for later ruminating. Spencer sat upright, not having registered the weight of Jennifer's words, but mere bits of it. "Like plants," he murmured. He started rifling through the pictures on the tabletop, looking at each of them for something.
Jennifer turned toward him in curiosity. "Spence? What is it?"
"I . . . I'm not entirely sure," he murmured as his hands shuffled atop the photos. He found what he was looking for; in his hand he held one photographs. It was a wider angle shot of the gully, wherein the white flowers and the ferns and birch trees could be seen. "Yesterday, Blake said, This might be hallowed ground to our un sub ," he said without explanation. "Hallowed ground." He pulled out his phone and called Penelope. "Hey, Garcia?"
"My dearest little Junior G-man, what would you like?" Penelope asked.
"I dunno, Garcia. Something that's been on my mind since I went to the burial site yesterday. Well, actually, JJ said something a moment ago and it made me think of something I saw at the burial site. Would you be able to let me know where in this area I can buy some books related to symbolism in horticulture?"
"Isn't that . . . information you can get—" She sucked in a breath as she interrupted herself. "You know, if you got with the times and used a tablet, got a new cell phone and used it to your advantage instead of being such a technophobe, you could search these simple things all on your very own?" The last few words were said with mock wonderment.
"Yes, I know," he answered in exasperation. "But—"
"But you wanted to hear my pleasant voice because you missed me, and you wanted to make me feel needed?" Penelope supplied in an all-knowing, tickled manner.
Spencer didn't respond.
She gasped. "You do love me," she gloated.
"Is there a bookstore nearby?"
"Oh, not responding to my postulation? Avoidance, hmm? Can I profile that? Let me profile that."
"Please, Garcia," Spencer begged, flushing at her innocent goading. "You're not a profiler," he stated in his matter-of-fact tone. "Besides, you're a lot faster."
"Fine, fine," she groused. "And to prove your point about my speed: I found a Barnes and Noble a couple of towns over that has books aplenty covering symbolism found in horticulture." She then gave him the address.
"Got it; thanks, Garcia," he responded, hanging up the phone. He grabbed his bag and the keys to the other SUV.
"Spence, what is it? You need me to come with?" Jennifer intoned, walking back over to the table to look at the photograph that he'd been looking at. Aside from the fact that the photo was a wider view of the burial site, nothing about it seemed significant to her.
"Just an idea I have. I'm just going to go to the bookstore to buy some books—no need to come with," he rushed out. He left the room, and then he paused. He turned back around, peeked his head back through, bracing the doorway with his hand. "JJ."
Jennifer looked up from the photograph, pulling her curled hand away from her mouth. "Hmm?" She looked at him.
Spencer, unable to speak for a moment, sighed out and then pinched his lips.
"Spence?"
He needed to order his thoughts. So instead, he said, "Thank you."
She smiled back at him.
He walked through the bullpen over to his unit chief, who had just handed over a labeled, sealed bag to one of the officers to add to the other belongings that a few other people had given him and David.
"Hey, Hotch, I, uh—" He gripped his hand around his satchel.
Aaron gave him a soft but grave look.
There was a reason Spencer was avoiding speaking with Aaron lately.
"I'm going to head to a bookstore; I should be back in about an hour and a half, two hours tops?"
Aaron straightened and regarded his colleague. "What's going on? Do you have a lead on something?"
"Just a theory, really. I'm trying to determine if there is any symbolism at all connected to the flora found at the burial sites. I'd like to pick up a few books to read through."
"Okay. We'll see you when you get back."
Spencer nodded and moved to the exit without looking back.
After plugging the address into the GPS, Spencer spent the 25-minute drive thinking about Jennifer's words. Now he could think on how some of her words had processed in his mind through a separate filter. It was shaking where it had been stored, and now, like an anchor, it sank into a wide and tenderized crevice in his chest.
Dealing with things on an emotional level had never been easy for him. He wanted to unburden himself from all the things he was suffering, yearned to do it, but years and years of unstable foundation could not be built in one day. He didn't know how to explain this all to anyone. It went far, far deeper than just losing Maeve. What more, he was trying to regain his trust in Jennifer.
He was set back by traumatic events in his life with a bitter constancy, from his father leaving him to his mother's unpredictable schizophrenia that made her more and more distant and violent as her symptoms progressed. But he had been loved as a little child by both of his parents. Things just worsened when his father left. He sought the adoration of his teachers and professors, and they did nothing beyond brandishing him like a prized possession. From the age of ten to the age of nineteen, the construction of that foundation was almost stopped, exposed to weathering elements and other ravaging things.
Jason managed to come in at a critical juncture in Spencer's life and continue building a life that he thought he could never have: a life of clear direction and purpose. So, when Jason left, when Jason abandoned him, and Spencer could sit back and think upon the years under his tutelage, he sometimes felt like an imbecile that had been swept up under the false charm. Jason Gideon had been a great man, yes, but was he a good man, or was he at his core a little self-serving? Had he been that different from Spencer's teachers and professors? Had Jason truly been that different from his own father? How dare he carve a hole into Spencer's heart, fill it with himself, and then just leave it gaping.
Knowing Jason had come with trauma. He couldn't have foreseen it, and he couldn't have known it. That clear direction that he had, that purpose that he came to have—they were not without emotional and physical casualties. Friends who almost met their ends by perpetrators, innocent lives endangered and some who were killed, his own abduction and his subsequent drug addiction, deception, and betrayal—some of which nearly ruined his sobriety. Being forced to accept a situation that continued to hurt him—that of having been lied to regarding Emily's death—left him fighting feelings of bitterness.
It was a lot.
That didn't count when he began to fear his own mind and body when he began suffering his migraines and bouts of vomiting, although that had nothing to do with his workplace. But the fear compounded the effects of the other things.
When his position in the FBI—the very thing that he came to hold dear to him—had been threatened when he was reassigned to a different unit after Emily's death, it made him begin to question all his choices, all of the things he had done in life to lead him up to that point, wonder if he was enough, had done enough, could still do more. The torturous thoughts stayed with him for months even after he regained his former position.
Then something happened that started to change things, something new and curious. It was Maeve: her first correspondence, his cautious response (he never had normal fans, after all, and it overall seemed suspicious), her response to his response, and more responses that trickled into regular letters that were exchanged once or twice a week but then three or four times a week, first about her stalker, and then about innocuous things, and then about his medical condition. He felt that foundation building again.
Even when Emily left, he felt stable.
His and Maeve's continued letters, which lasted for three months, and then the first call, and all ensuing calls—they all kept him grounded, and it all gave him a strange sense of safety. It led to him considering pursuing other correspondences to heal past long-term wounds that he hadn't thought possible to heal until he met her. One such example was that he would try—just try—to allow things to heal over with Emily and with Jennifer.
Despite the surreptitious nature of their relationship, he cherished her more than he wanted to. She made the structure in his life sound and solid. When he mustered up the courage to see her, he knew—he knew—that he had found true, unbridled happiness and a correctness. The course of events that followed tore all this asunder.
Losing Maeve, who had filled in whatever gaps were chiseled into his chest, was akin to someone pulling out his heart, blending it, and pouring it back into him and expecting him to continue living. It simply wouldn't happen.
So hearing Jennifer trying to tell him that she loved him—that the whole team loved and cared for him—trying to get past this pain, and trying to let that love into a dark, empty place that no longer had a true form was something he was afraid to trust he could have or find again.
He came to his senses when a horn blared behind him. He was standing at a light that had just turned green, and had also succumbed to highway hypnosis, he realized. The GPS indicated that the Barnes and Noble was just further down the local state route.
After parking and walking inside, he walked to the counter and asked the cashier where he could find books related to horticulture and symbolism. After a couple of minutes of searching, the young woman told him where in the store it was, and he went over to the section.
He found the books he was looking for within a few minutes: Folklore and Symbolism of Flowers, Plants and Trees; The Language of Flowers, Herbs, and Trees; The Complete Language of Flowers: A Definitive and Illustrated History (First Edition); Flowerpaedia; Floriology, and a few more. He also grabbed a couple of photobooks about flora found in the deciduous northeast. He perused some other books and stopped at the ones of vintage botanical illustrations and art nouveau floral prints. Maeve had once expressed how much she loved these kinds of vintage illustrations. He looked over some of them and grabbed a few as well to look at for personal fulfillment.
Most of the books he had were large and hardcover, just the way he liked them, but he was ladled with their weight. As he made his way back toward the register, a toddler crashed into his legs, causing him to drop a couple of the books. He cringed in his hopes that none of them fell on the child. The boy got up and continued on his merry way, unfazed. A woman rushed over and bent down, picking up the fallen books for him before handing them over to him. He thanked her, she smiled at him, and he continued to the register to pay for the books.
He went back to the car with his purchase, stopped at a café, and drove back to the precinct with another large paper cup of iced coffee loaded with sugar and milk, popping a lactase pill before consuming the drink as he walked to the SUV.
In reference to the footnote [1] in this chapter, you can find additional information on my tumblr.