It's an unspoken rule in the BAU - "don't profile your team mates" but the team can't help the curiosity they feel when they notice that Neville has gone pale white at the mention of the hotel chain.
Morgan can easily tell that something has hit a nerve with Neville, you don't need to be a profiler to see that though.
"Longbottom, what is it?" asks Hotch urgently.
"I-" he licks his lips as he prepares an answer "The hotel chains, I know the owner"
"Well it looks like we have our first suspect, what's his name Neville?" asks Rossi.
"What? No! No, he wouldn't do this, he's one of my closest friends!" Neville frantically tries to reassure his team.
"Doesn't matter Neville, we need his name anyway"
Sighing, Neville hopes his friend wouldn't be too mad. "Harrison James Potter - I'm not sure where in the world he is right now. He has hotels all across the globe"
"Longbottom, when we bring him in for questioning, you cannot be part of the discussion ok?" Hotch feels a little sorry for his newest agent, but this is the first and only lead so far.
"Yes sir"
Hotch gives a slight nod to Garcia, allowing her to start looking up the first lead.
"Longbottom, are you in contact with him? Please give him a call. On speaker." Hotch continues "The rest of you, go through the rest of the victims and note down all the letters and symbols that pop up on the bodies"
Neville reaches to the phone and dials his friends number.
"Hello?" answers a husky British voice.
"Harry, it's Neville. Where are you at the moment?"
"Nev? What the fuck? It's 2 in the fucking morning! I'm in Sydney and I WAS asleep"
"Sorry!" whines Neville "How am I supposed to keep up with where you are going?"
"What's going on Nev? You wouldn't call me like this if something was wrong"
"Harry, When was the last time you were in the States?"
"Last week? I was checking up on some of the hotels there"
"You didn't hear of anything weird while you were here?" asks Neville.
"Neville stop beating around the bush. What's going on?"
Neville pauses to get the ok from his boss.
"Har, there's been a load of murders...and the victims were all staying in your hotels"
The team could hear swearing on the other end.
"Bollocks. Nev what do you need me to do?" asks Harry.
"We need you to come in for questioning, sorry Harry"
"Jesus Christ, that's what I get for having LEO for a friend" replies Harry with a little heat.
"Hey that was you at one point too Har" snarks Neville "And you would still be one if you would-"
"Enough Nev, I'll catch a flight back to the States today. Where am I required to be?"
Longbottom mutes the call for a second and looks toward Hotchner. "Boss?"
"Have him get to the Anaheim precinct, we will meet him there"
"Harry, we'll meet you at the Anaheim precinct Saturday 9am and Harry? Happy birthday"
Harry snorts and replies back "Sure and what a great birthday it has turned out to be so far" The call ends here while the rest of the team looks to Longbottom.
"What?"
"Longbottom, before Garcia informs us on what she has come up with about your friend, care to tell us about him? We would prefer it to come from you, as much as possible" said Hotch.
'Well, Harry can't be much more mad at me than he already is' thinks Neville 'well in for a penny in for a pound as they all say'
"Harry and I met each other on the way to our boarding school when we were eleven. The boarding school is an elite private school that is usually attended by the aristocracy of Britain - you know, the heirs of the Lords and Lady's"
"Friendship came later on, so I didn't really get to know him all that well in our first year. It wasn't that we didn't want to be friends, it was more his two best mates always seemed to monopolize his time so that no one else could have a chance to talk to him."
"Tell us about the school Nev"
"The school is an ancient castle in the highlands of Scotland. Students attended for 7 years and would only go home during the Yu-Christmas break and Summer holidays" cursing his slip which he was sure the profilers picked up on, Neville hurries to continue on to avoid any questions. "Each student undergoes a small test that would sort them into one of four houses based on their personality. Their house would become their family for the entirety of their schooling years."
"I'm interested in hearing about these houses, this would surely help to build a profile on Harrison" JJ seemed entirely too interested in the topic.
"As I said, there are four houses. You have Gryffindor, whom favors the brave, Hufflepuff the loyal, Ravenclaw the intelligent and Slytherin the cunning. Harry and I were sorted into Gryffindor" informs Neville "Not sure how I managed that sorting, I was the total opposite when I was eleven. Harry though, he is either brave or just lucky; trouble seemed to find him everywhere"
"Even though we shared a dorm for 7 years, we only really became close in our fourth year. Harry's friends were at odds with him due to jealousy on their part so were not talking for the rest of the year. Harry and I would spend time together studying either in the library or on the school grounds."
The team are quite riveted by the story their teammate is weaving.
"Anyway, Harry helped me come out of my shell, especially when he formed a study group when we were 15. After that, schooling was fairly normal. By the time we graduated, Harry had blitzed his way through our end of year exams with the best scores anyone had ever seen which made everyone realise he was hiding his intelligence up until our fifth year." you could hear the pride for his friend in Neville's voice.
"After school we both went to University to get our degrees in Criminology. Harry being Harry went on to get his Doctorate in Criminology and also his Masters degree in Politics and International Studies. With our education taken care of, we both went into law enforcement with Harry working his way up the ranks."
"At some point, he became rather disillusioned with the task force and decided to leave to take care of some businesses he inherited, one being The Marauder chain of hotels." taking a breather, Neville finishes with "and that's pretty much it really, he's been taking ownership of those for the last 5 years and usually pops into random hotels to check up on the management and such"
"Is there anything else Longbottom?"
"I'm sure there is but I think Garcia will have the rest"
"Garcia , you have the floor" states Hotch who proceeds to sit down to allow Garcia to speak freely.
