FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2013 AT 10:37 AM | SHERIFF'S STATION
Spencer had sat in front of his map, adding more thumbtacks with the information that Penelope had given them, which an office assistant printed for him. As he read over the police report, he added various color tacks—for unimportant locations and for the significant ones.

Alex, who'd used the time while waiting for Spencer, went through a few of the histories of some of the names that Penelope had found. When done and after relieving herself, then walked into the room and stood by Spencer.

The map was viewed with his tilted head, as if the angle might shift the details into a different perspective, revealing an important detail that would bring the team another step closer to solving this puzzle of a case.

Until they discovered the identities of the other two victims and where they went missing, the information he had right now wouldn't unveil anything for him to work with to assist with homing in on the unsub's comfort zone. These missing links would assist him in calculating the unsub's optimal performance zone, where he best hunted. He would also be able to better calculate the distance of decay and might calculate a general vicinity of where the unsub lived.

"Hey, Reid."

"Hmm?"

She looked at her watch. They had hours of driving and interviewing to do. "Let's get going to all those places those boys went so we can get back here before it's too late. You could probably use some fresh air, and time away from the map will jog something."

"Not a bad idea," Spencer with a quick stretch. He gathered his things into his satchel, and the two went toward the exit. "You know, the last place they went as a group—this Cellar bar—is only two blocks from here."

"Really?"

"Yep."

"Too bad we'll have to make the run starting from Pennsylvania, but at least we won't have to drive for too long at the last location."

They exited the building and stepped around a small swell of people—reporters and concerned citizens, and someone working the grounds.

"How's your head today?"

"It actually doesn't hurt. Yet."

"Good; I'm glad to hear that. Let's drop the yet and hope it stays that way."

"Mm."

They proceeded to switch roles between driving and passengering as they drove to Pennsylvania and back to the other pubs in New Jersey.

Throughout the whole of the day, when Alex and Spencer wanted to share something between just the two of them, they exchanged brief Sign between each other. The car rides were spent in a comfortable silence, with occasional bursts of exchanges regarding the case or due to interactions with the rest of the team.

They interviewed staff, checked inside and outside surveillance if any remained or existed at all, looked at the grounds of each place, saw for places that would be best to watch other patrons, and plugged through, replenishing themselves with food at the second place Noah had gone after conducting their interview of the staff.

Penelope had received Dr Dale's preliminary autopsy report earlier and sent it to everyone's tablets. She'd also received a preliminary report from Dr Bates' team regarding findings on victim C. They were using the opportunity then to look it all over.

Soon, the whole unit was patched into a video conference after Alex received a text from Aaron.

"What's up, Aaron?" Her phone was set on the dashboard and it was on speaker.

"Did you two get a chance to look over the reports, Alex?"

"Yep. We looked at it over lunch," she answered.

"Made for a pleasant table-side discussion," Spencer said with an acerbic edge.

It was good to know that his occasional sarcasm was still intact.

As a team, they discussed the reports:

The case was being given top priority in the lab, so some test results came back quickly, but others would still have to wait a few weeks.

Noah's muscles were slightly atrophic from disuse, indicating minimal physical stimulation during some part of his captivity. He had bed sores on his right side and back. His stomach contents revealed that he was fed the day he died. There were no solid contents found in his stomach, but—testing of the food in his intestines was still being done to see what previous meals may have consisted of.

"So, yeah, this unsub was caring for the victims while in captivity, and probably kept him on a specific regimen. Reminds me about what you said yesterday, Alex. About the victims not being disposable to the unsub."

"Mm. Makes you wonder what causes his moods to shift so violently if he cares so much about them."

"Well, I would say alcoholism might lead him to be abusive, but . . . "

"But it would be difficult for a chronic alcoholic to maintain a normal day to day lifestyle and keep up his ruse. And with someone who has such a strong need for control, the unpredictability of drinking alcohol would be undesirable."

"It might explain how once the effects of the alcohol wore off, the unsub is overcome by feelings of remorse, though."

"We'll put the possibility on the table. Addiction is often synonymous with a serial psychopathology. He doesn't have to be an alcoholic per se. But the slight inebriation will lower his inhibitions."

The autopsy report revealed more:

Noah's slow and painful cause of death was due to being elinguated. Not only had he hemorrhaged when his tongue was removed, but his lungs and stomach both had blood in them, indicating that he'd swallowed and aspirated on his own blood. It would have taken three to four hours at most for him to bleed to death.

Various samples from his liver, vitreous humor, and his hair were sent for toxicology. Of all the other reports she needed from the lab, these were labeled as top priority with a special note to look for muscle relaxants—benzodiazepine, cyclobenzaprine, carisoprodol, diazepam, ketamine, and rohypnol. She also gave direction to check for his blood alcohol level and to perform various blood tests. Those results might take a few days more.

Everyone was surprised to note that Noah's hyoid bone wasn't fractured despite the repeated strangulation. There was, however, significant damage to his larynx and trachea as well as hemorrhaging, both a result of the strangulation. The cricoid cartilage was also fractured by manual throttling, meaning that pressure was applied rather lower than usual, just above the clavicles.

What surprised no one was the findings that indicated that Noah showed signs of repeated sexual assault. There were anal fissures that were in the healing stages, but in looking further, it was found that he also had fistulas forming in his rectum. It was a savagery done to him. However, no foreign fluids or pubic hair could be found, which either suggested that he'd been sodomized, that the unsub used protection, or that he had been cleaned so thoroughly that any traces of any DNA or foreign material had been washed away. Due to the scabbing that formed over the fissures, Dr Dale concluded that his last rape hadn't been recent.

Dr Dale noted that if Noah hadn't been elinguated, and if he had been kept in captivity for just a couple weeks more, he would have died from septic shock due to the assaults. The fistulas that formed from the untreated fissures situated deeper in his rectum had caused a bacterial infection, which had resulted in sepsis.

"He suffered from the rape even when he wasn't being raped," Spencer pointed out, voice even. "The fistulas were likely to have caused Noah intense pain and swelling, which worsened with his bowel movements."

Derek's voice growled out from the phone. "This unsub is sick."

"Also, guys, I sorta found the, uh, source of the new leak from this morning," Penelope said. "Turns out it wasn't just one person, but multiple people. After the news requested the public's help yesterday, social media wigged out and this story broke crazy viral."

"Of course it did," murmured Jennifer.

"People put two and two together and locals realized it had to do with Stokes State Forest 'cause of all the police activity going to and coming from there for the last few days."

"There are three bodies, but the news only spoke of two," Aaron stated. "This is good."

"Why? What does that mean?" Penelope inquired.

"It means they haven't actually discovered the burial site yet. It probably won't be long before it's found, though. They may have only seen the coroner vans the two separate occasions and concluded two bodies."

"So what do we do?"

"Nothing. What's out is out; we keep the public misinformed and let it remain that way for as long as possible until we have need to release additional information. These things tend to have their own momentum and can often become tangential."

"Sounds good, sir. By the way, people love us on the interwebs. Like, a little too much. You should see some of the things they've said about us in the comments?"

"I'm terribly curious," Alex said with a note of humor.

Penelope sent them screenshots of various tweets—comments based off the press release shown by News12 itself.

"What the heck is BDE?" Derek asked after reading the one that was written about him.

"Yeah," Penelope drawled. "You don't wanna know. But you definitely have it."

"I'll find out."

"Sure you will, Brown Sugar." The tweet had called Derek as such, and Penelope was going to have fun with it.

There were others, ranging from interested in Spencer to professions of having lesbian awakenings for Jennifer and Alex, and some off-color ones about domination vibes that Aaron gave off, and interest in David as one of the founding fathers of criminal profiling (and yet, that comment also managed to make mention of his physical appearance from back in the day).

"Like I said," Aaron murmured. "Tangential."

They then moved onto Dr Bates' preliminary report on Victim C. The findings showed that this victim had a low bone density and clear osteoporosis, which indicated that he either had a chronic health problem, or that the victim was a substance abuser. They were conducting tests to see which of the two it might be and would be comparing it to any remaining organ samples taken from the victim.

There were significant healed fractures to the victim's mandibular, zygomatic, and maxillary bones, and several healed fractures of the victim's right arm and hip that were from years ago.

"I would say that from those findings," Spencer started, "Victim C was likely a high-risk substance abuser."

"Perhaps the unsub started out hunting high risk, easy prey?" Jennifer posed.

"It's not an impossible theory," Spencer began. "Those kinds of unsubs often begin with high-risk victims that they find expendable before working toward the real object of their rage. But if that were the case, Victim C would have been disposable and wouldn't have been buried with the same reverence as the other two.

"I think we'd need more data in the form of additional victims to really determine what might or might not be an escalation. And obviously there are more victims since what we're seeing right now is a consistent signature. He had to have started somewhere. Right now, having three victims is hardly enough to quantify an aberration, and it might just be a coincidence that Victim C is a substance abuser."

"I'm inclined to agree with Reid on this," Aaron declared. "And since it's not likely that we'll be lucky enough to find more victims in other areas of the forest, we might have to shelve that idea."

"Mm. Noted," Jennifer responded.

Victim C's skull had also been CT-scanned, and that the scan was being sent to the same facility as Victim B so that they could get a facial reconstruction done on him.

The information was coming, but not fast enough for them to continue making good progress.

The call ended soon thereafter; everyone continued onward in their tasks.

Penelope was contacting the managers for surveillance footage to be sent to her via a special link she would give them, or, by using their IP address for direct access to their computer system. Alex and Spencer concentrated on footage taken around the times they left. Penelope, though, would have the displeasure of having to go through each frame for the duration of the time that the boys were in each place, if there was surveillance. She was already considering sending some of the videos to digital forensics technicians.

By the time Alex and Spencer reached The Cellar, they were nearing the seven o'clock hour.

After parking in the lot and walking inside, Spencer gave a sweeping survey of the interior. He lingered behind while making his observations; Alex, for her part, sauntered up to the bar.

The place was full of dining customers—a clear indication that this establishment had good business.

The barkeep, who was wiping the counter with a towel, flung his washcloth over his shoulder and leaned forward. "What can I do you for, ma'am?"

"Actually, it's agent," Alex corrected, holding up her badge but keeping her voice soft.

"Agent? Like FBI stuff?" He looked at Alex with widened eyes, brows raised. But understanding flashed in them. "Oh, you're here about those murders , aren't you?" His voice was pitched low, head tilted and jaws clenched as the words passed his lips.

"That'd be correct," she answered. "That's Doctor Reid." She pointed her thumb behind her at Spencer, who just waved a hand. "We'd like to ask the owner and staff a few questions. Is the owner . . ."

"You're lookin' at 'im, Agent. You wanna sit in a booth for some privacy? We don't have an office if you get me."

"Yes, sure. Thank you."

Spencer turned to them and followed where the owner led them to a booth seat by a window.

"So, what brings you guys here?"

"A few months ago, late January fifth evening, you had a group of men come to this restaurant, all in their late twenties and early thirties. Do you recognize any of these men?"

She turned her tablet so the bar owner could see the picture of Noah and his three friends.

"Mm, to be honest I don't really recognize them as regulars, and I can already guarantee you that I wasn't working that day, either way. I was taking a two-week vacation with my wife and kids. But Nate was covering for me as he's my assistant manager. Maybe he might recognize them. Gimme a few minutes to grab 'im."

"While you're at it, please bring me a glass of water, if you would?" Alex asked. Some of the staff members from the other places Noah and his friends had visited here in New Jersey recognized her and Spencer from the press release earlier, as did some patrons. The more they blended in, the better.

"Could I, uh, get a small coffee with milk?" Spencer added.

"You got it."

Alex gave him a look of long suffering, shaking her head in disapproval, but she was smiling.

"What?" Spencer asked with an innocent expression, shuffling in his seat. He reached in his satchel, pulled out his lactase enzyme pills, and set a tablet on a napkin to drink down with the coffee.

"You know what," Alex responded. She pursed her lips when he raised his eyebrows at her. "Naughty." Her tone was playful. "You should go for the tea."

Spencer shrugged his shoulders and averted his gaze, hiding his flush.

They had a couple of minutes. Alex figured that she would dip her toes in. "You seem to have tired throughout the day, Spencer," she began. "And you didn't eat much of your lunch. Did you at least have breakfast this morning? It looks like you've dropped a couple of pounds."

Spencer's lightened mood dissipated, and he averted his gaze, swallowing.

Tilting her head, she then tapped the table. "Spencer." At the sound, Spencer looked back at her. "I know you heard me." This time, she said it in Sign, hoping he would open up to her.

Spencer had thought about Jennifer's words yesterday in the conference room, considered them during his solitary drive back to the precinct and later in the nighttime hours. Of all the people in his life he knew most about him, that was Jason. Even then, Jason had known mere fringes of the things that plagued his mind. And he left without a trace of contact. To commit to laying himself bare to someone was a petrifying concept. Derek came second in that aspect, and he was safe, but Spencer felt that he might be moved to act with an immediacy and without reserve, whereas Spencer might need to dip into things in measured increments.

But Alex was . . .

Alex was one of the safe ones.

Unable to vocalize how he felt, he lifted his hands. "I'm very tired," he responded in kind.

It could have taken on multiple meanings, from physical fatigue to a jadedness, Alex thought. As the conversation progressed, though, she felt that both meanings were appropriate.

Spencer hesitated for a moment, before admitting. "I'm not sleeping well. And I'm finding it difficult to eat or keep food down."

Alex blinked, tilting her head. Is this it? Will he have a full and good conversation with me? "Why? What's wrong?" Though she knew what was wrong, her goal was to draw things out of Spencer, to have him use his words for how they made him feel. This he had trouble doing. He could state what the problem was—what he often failed to do was quantify his emotions.

Spencer hesitated, and in the moment that words formed on his lips, a young woman put an ice-ladled glass of water atop a coaster on the table in front of Alex, and the mug of steaming coffee in front of him.

"Can I get you guys anything else?" she asked.

"No; we're fine, thanks." Alex's smile was tight. After she nodded and walked away, Alex fixed her attention back to Spencer.

He reached for the sugar packets and grabbed a handful of them.

At Alex's aborted sound of censure, Spencer paused. She put up two fingers, and he sighed before putting most of the packets away and just fingering the two between his thumb and index finger, showing them to her with a distinctly Spencer-esque, straight-lipped expression of unaffected irritation. She laughed as he ripped them open with a delicacy that would allow not even a single grain to be lost before pouring them into the coffee. He stirred it with his spoon, took a sip, and a small grimace of distaste washed over him, causing her to snort in laughter again.

Many seconds passed before he set down the empty coffee, and his finger tapped at the porcelain a few times, making it clink against his nail. "I have," Spencer started, struggling for the right words to express his thoughts. "How do I say"—he paused, and here he began to fingerspell— "disquietude."

Oh! He's continuing . . . Alex was glad she didn't have to prompt him to continue. She gave him a warm smile, humming. "Okay. The best equivalent is"—she spelled it out—"distress." She then demonstrated the proper word for him.

Spencer repeated it and she tilted her head, nodding.

"Go on," she encouraged.

"I just feel . . . disrupted. I feel like my life has been disrupted. I'm not able to . . ." Here he thought again, before just fingerspelling: "I'm not able to traverse this."

Alex nodded and didn't interrupt him as he tried at his fluency while assigning labels to his emotions.

He found himself looking down at the table as if the words were written there for him to use. "It's all chaotic and I don't have any inner peace." He paused, and then raised his hands as if he were about to say something else, then lowered his hands again. He swallowed, throat dry.

When Alex pushed her untouched water to Spencer, he pinched his lips before taking it and drinking a couple of sips. He swiped his hands over his face after, comforted by the soothing, cool condensation that had transferred from his fingertips upon his skin. He swallowed again.

The din of the bar seemed to quiet.

"Go on," Alex prodded. "Don't worry. Just say whatever is on your mind, please. Say anything."

He felt a heat behind his eyes. "Everything is—just wrong. I'm always thinking of her." He then spelled out her name. "Maeve."

She tilted her head, eyebrows puckering, and nodded. "You feel pain," she acknowledged. She knew this kind of pain.

"Deep," he agreed, dragging out the gesture to convey its profound hurt, eyes watering. "I can't stop." He couldn't stem the torrent: "I can't sleep because I think of Maeve. I can start to hear her from just a single word that someone says, or I can see her in someone that has no resemblance to her except for her hairstyle. If I sleep, I dream about her. I dream of her murder, or . . . or dream of going along with her on a date, and it hurts. So I can't sleep. I avoid it. And as for eating, it's because when something passes my lips, I—"

"Are you Agent Blake?" interrupted a young man. His timing couldn't have been any worse.

Spencer startled, and he cleared his dry throat, hands wiping over his face as he was wont to do when flustered.

Alex held back a moan. She saw him trying to swallow something down, saw his fingers clench and unclench.

The man looked a few years older than Spencer, but was a stockier sort. His long, red hair was tied up in a messy bun, and he sported a full beard. "I'm Craig; I was working that night that Danny mentioned to me."

"Hi, Craig." Alex moved in from her seat in the booth. She gestured to the empty space and he sat.

"Heard you guys are investigatin' something," Craig said, eyebrows quirked. "FBI only comes for serious stuff."

"I take it you didn't watch the news throughout the day."

"Nope. Hate it. Depressing as all hell most of the time."

"Well, you don't have the wrong idea." Not wishing to entertain the light preamble anymore, though, Alex turned the conversation. "You were working when these four men"—she brought up the picture of the four—"were here."

"Um, yeah," Craig said as he dipped his head and looked at the picture of the four people, eyebrows furling. "To be honest the faces are familiar. I mean, that was months ago, and we get tons of customers. But you know what? I do remember that they were sitting in a booth." He peered over the side of the booth and pointed. "That one right there by the window. They were watching the basketball game from there. I think that's the only reason I might remember them so well, 'cause it was a damn good game. They stayed 'til like half after twelve or so."

"Could you remember if anyone left right after them? A single person perhaps? Or if anyone in the pub was making any patrons uncomfortable?" Alex's eyes slipped to Spencer, and she saw shoulder bobbing as his arm moved under the table, as if he was rubbing his leg.

Craig hummed, tilting his head left and right like a puppy as he squinted his eyes. "I really can't remember, Agent. I mean, we have a camera at the bar where people pay, if you want to look at the footage. We usually delete them after a few months, so we haven't gotten around to it yet this year."

"We'd like to see that, yes."

"Craig." Spencer's tight, whispery voice cut into the conversation. Alex's eyes slid over to him again, but he didn't notice the incisive gaze. He swallowed again but was able to continue. "Was there anyone here that night . . . that didn't order alcohol or food? Or someone that ordered just one drink or a meal, but neither ate nor drank? Someone perhaps that just sat and watched people?"

The man squinted at Spencer and sat back. "Not that I know of, but—hey, Randi," he called over the din. The girl perked up. "Come 'ere for a sec?" he then turned back to the two. "This chick has a really good memory. It's kinda scary."

Randi, the young woman that'd given them water a few minutes earlier, walked over. "What's up?" she asked with a smile.

"You recognize these guys?" He remembered her working that night with him.

"Mm." She looked down at the tablet and looked up at them. "Hell yeah, I do." She sported a huge grin. "They gave me a whopping $85 tip."

"Ooh-ho-ho, nice," Craig said with a congratulatory bark of laughter. He put up his fist and she, without breaking eye contact with Alex, pounded the fist with her own.

"Why? What are they—some total creeps?" Randi scrunched her nose.

"You remember anyone not eating or gettin' drinks that night around the time they were here?" Craig asked her.

"My memory is flawless," Randi asserted, jutting out her hip towards Spencer as she flipped her dark bangs out of her eyes. "There were maybe five or six people that didn't get anything that night that were here for a couple of hours. And there was one guy that got a drink but didn't actually drink it."

"Would you be able to describe them?" Spencer looked up at her. "To a sketch artist?"

She tilted her head. "Ooh, you got me there, sugar. My memory is not that flawless, unfortunately. I don't remember what they really looked like. I'd say that I have more of an"—she squinted her eyes and looked up—"empathic memory?"

Alex gave Spencer a comical, dubious stare.

"So, you can't describe them?"

"I just said I had an empathic memory, sugar. Meaning that I remember, like, the moods that the people gave off."

"Ah."

"So, there were maybe . . . two couples?" Randi then looked up and to her left, scrunching her face as she wracked her memory. "And then there were like three creepy guys by themselves. Lusty, nasty, also wanting to bone anything with two breasts and an ass."

Ah, so she's just good at reading people and storing that info away, Alex thought.

"And then there was this really sad guy. And I mean—oof—that guy just had such a dark, glum aura? Bought a drink and just never actually drank it. Wasn't creepy—was just as depressed as anyone can get. Just kept staring out. Sat right over—" She then pointed to a corner where there was a high table occupied by three people.

It was in direct view of the booth where Noah Turner and his friends were seated that night.

They continued a line of questioning regarding this man, who could be their unsub. When asked if he'd paid in cash or by card, Randi revealed that it was the former.

A setback—but still not an impossible task to identify him via the surveillance video.

It wasn't until they watched the video, though, that two obstacles stood out to them. The first was that they couldn't get a good glimpse of his face. The second was that the timeline didn't match. Noah and his friends left this place around half after twelve. This man didn't leave until a few minutes after one.

Where every second and every minute counted, this was too large a time gap for an abductor.

It was another hitch in all this.

But this was a potential suspect, they felt. They kept in mind that there was still a possibility that there were two unsubs. If that were the case, the other partner, who didn't even need to be in the bar, could have followed Noah after the group left. Spencer had Penelope get in contact with the staff so she could look over the video to get his identity somehow. Having a partner closed that 35-minute time-gap, and this man in the surveillance video could have stayed behind for effect, knowing that he didn't have to be there for the initial attack, since he and his partner would have weeks—months—to enact all manners of atrocities against Noah.

Just before they stepped back into the precinct, Alex stopped Spencer, placing a hand on his arm.

"I only want to help, Spencer, and I'm not the only one. You know this, right?"

Spencer blinked at her, head kicking down. "I know," he responded, voice thick.

"Do I have your permission to ask others to help me help you?"

Spencer's eyes fluttered. His heartbeat rushed while his stomach pinched. He placed his hand over his belly to stem the flutter, nervous at the thought of his thoughts being open to everyone. That would be the only way in which Alex would be able to invite anyone else into this. He might have to take more control of the situation.

No one knew how deeply this cut him; how complicated Maeve's death was for him; how faceted her absence was. They would pry, and he, wishing to unburden himself, would reveal things that were too difficult to think about, and that he never fully came to terms with. Might they accept these things, or reject him?

The fear of that looming rejection—like slipping down a river that at its end plunged into raging, frothing waters—was something he swam against for most of his life.

Might he need to be selective in what he told Alex?

"I can water things down or I can be detailed—whatever you want—but we all just want to collectively help you. That's our main interest because we care for you. You're not alone in this. You know this. We only want to help. I won't speak of anything I shouldn't if you don't want me to."

Or did he reveal everything with the trust that she would keep some things close to her chest if he asked her to? To her credit, when he told her about the blindfolding incident when he was in high school, she hadn't—as far as he knew—revealed this to anyone on the team. So, he trusted that she might do the same for him in the future.

"I don't know, Alex." He then looked up at her. "I don't know. I've . . . gotten over worse."

Alex's gaze was saddened. He was dismissing his problems as inconsequential, and they were anything but that. It was a layered statement, and his response was neutral at best.

But, she realized, he didn't say no.

And perhaps that was Spencer's way of seeking help.


7:45 PM | SUSSEX COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE
Everyone had returned to the station to share what they had each learned about Noah Turner. Penelope was detailing the team on Noah's life. He made no strange transactions, and comments on his social media—Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram—showed nothing untoward from or aimed at his followers.

His fiancée had access to his accounts, and so she posted a message to his friends and followers that was drafted by both her and Noah's mother. It was a simple, heartfelt message with a more recent picture of him among all of his friends, and it was thanking everyone for all of the efforts they'd put into finding Noah, all the kind words that they had shared, and all the support they had given. Nearer its end, it acknowledged that the searching had come to a sad close. They wished to have time to grieve and would hold a vigil for him in a week's time. No additional details were added.

There was an outpouring of positive comments from friends and family and his workmates on his social media.

David and Aaron began the retelling of the things they had discovered at the rest stop, ending with the rope indentation that had been found.

Derek shook his head. "This unsub was determined."

"I'd say," Jennifer murmured.

"And Javier basically confirmed our theories about the cleaning," David continued. "He said that when he'd landed in the bathroom, his feet slipped out under him and that it smelled distinctly of cleaner."

Jennifer quirked a brow. "So . . . pretty much yes on the forensic countermeasures."

"Oh yes," David agreed, tilting his head as both of his brows ticked upwards. "As you can see from the report, CSU had found little workable evidence. Could also point to OCD behavior."

Jennifer and Derek next spoke of their excursions, starting with the conversation they had with Mrs Turner. They detailed everyone on how patterned Noah's life was. His workmates, his gym trainer and his indoor obstacle course trainers all spoke highly of Noah, but Penelope was going through their histories and checking their alibis.

"Hm. He was into extreme physical fitness," Alex observed. "And he was a fit individual. He must've given the unsub hell when he was abducted."

David tipped his head from side to side. "The unsub had the advantage in that situation. This isn't to say, as we've already theorized, that the unsub isn't very fit himself. A drunk, fit person might be a tornado. The unsub may have sustained offensive wounds."

"But he subdued Noah then, and had the means to keep him subdued and ultimately weaken him."

"Garcia, what did your search bring up for the forest rangers and volunteers?"

"Yes, okay, sir," Penelope said. "So, I've . . . just . . . sent to your tablets a folder of potential suspects, along with some of their records or histories or any medical histories if applicable. These are all of people who still live in the general vicinity; some now live in East Pennsylvania or Southwest New York. You'll notice that it has two subfolders—one for those who have been abused, and another for those who have a history of battery and assault. There's a third folder of people who could've served as the—the—y'know—the blueprint? The person that Noah might be modeled after? These were victims who were abused in their past or who were killed by an abuser."

"Amazing," Aaron responded, going through his cloud. This was far more than he had expected. "Three hundred and fifty-one names," he murmured in dismay. They were going to have to trim this down.

"My good man, did you expect any less of me?" Penelope boasted. "Aim high, you say, and I am but a slave to this command. And that's just the number of potential offenders. There's like . . . almost 260 of the potential abuse victims who have died or moved away in the timeframe you gave me that fits into the whole blond-male-between-the-ages-of category. If you look through it, you'll see that this list goes back as far as nineteen seventy-eight, sir."

"Excellent. And you're right, Garcia. You're a veritable turner of stones."

"Hohn-hohn-hohn," Penelope gloated with a distinct, French lilt.

"Are these potential suspects that also have vehicles that fall under the same category as your previous searches?"

"Do you doubt me, sir? Moi?"

"Of course not. We're going to have to go through all of these names, but for now can you . . ." He paused and swiped through some files of suspects. "Mm. Send me a narrowed down list of these suspects by cross referencing them with bank card and credit statements that show inordinate purchases of any kind of cleaning materials, or if they have access to cleaning material, please."

"Ooh , yes of course, sir. I'll be right on that!"

"Great. Have it over to me by tomorrow morning."

"Will do, sir. Bonne nuit to all my kings and queens."

"We're working her ragged," David said after she hung up.

"Unfortunately, it's one of those kinds of cases," Alex responded. "But I feel like this" —she winked and gave a tilt of her head—"is where she excels."

"Mm-hmm."

"What about you, kid?" Derek asked, leaning on the table. "Anything with the geographic profile or your trip?"

Spencer huffed, lips in a straight line as he hunched and gave a slight shake of his head. "The geographic profile continues to need more data, unfortunately. As of now, there are only two significant points of reference: where Noah was abducted, and where he and the other victims were buried. Between those points alone, we get a comfort zone with a wide area of over 804 square miles spanning New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania.

"If we get just one more point of reference by finding out the identity of one of the other two victims and figuring out where they were abducted or last seen, then it could certainly help me to triangulate a central reference point so that I can more accurately identify where the unsub lives. Conversely, since the unsub is so organized, he could very well live outside of this comfort zone, and the central point is just the focus of his hunting grounds, as he wouldn't want to hunt too closely to where he lives. "

"That's too much probability for me," David declared. "Way too much thinking."

"Thankfully, I live in probabilities and I can do the thinking for you," Spencer countered.

"Thankfully," David echoed, grinning.

"So, we're at a standstill for that, then," Aaron concluded, to which Spencer nodded. "And what about what you were able to gather from the places Noah went the evening before he was abducted?"

Alex began, "Well, for all of the establishments that do still have surveillance going back as far as January, Penelope is carefully going through the videos to see if she can catch anything. We're also having her look through surveillance of the parking lots, too, if they have any."

"Most of them couldn't even remember the four of them," Spencer added. "The best we got was the last location they went to, The Cellar, which, by the way, is less than two minutes away from here."

"You're kiddin' me," Derek said in shock.

"I am not."

Alex continued Spencer's train of thought. "Yeah, we have one potential person of interest there, and though he left much later than Noah and his friends did, we're having Penelope look into him anyway." She then shrugged. "Just to entertain the slight chance that this might be a partnership," she added. "He had direct visual access to where Noah was sitting, and the waitress distinctly remembered that he bought a drink but never drank it, and that he had a sad disposition."

"Good," Aaron said. "There's a seed of potential there, and it's an angle we can continue to explore on the side."

"If it is a duality and he is one of the unsubs, he'd probably be the one consumed with guilt or remorse?" Jennifer offered.

"Mm."

"Whoa boy," Alex groaned as she scrolled through the suspect list Penelope generated. "We have a lot, lot, lot of data to go through."

"We do," Aaron confirmed. "Let's call it a night—reconvene in the morning. "I'll apprise Sheriff Reiner of where we are with the investigation. Good job, everyone."