Hey all, here is the next chapter for this fic. I have finals this week and they're kicking my ass-to say the least. I want to give a big thank you to those who have followed and/or favorited this story. You're all amazing! My friend Darcy is all gushy over your reviews of her writing. So, thanks for making her feel great. Anyway, I hope you enjoy and please remember to review! Happy reading. x

All rights go to the owners of Criminal Minds, except for my original character.


Not Like This

Chapter Twenty-four: Nobody is Better Off

January 6th, 2015

Jamie's hand searched her bed for her buzzing cellphone and when she found it, her eyes could barely handle the bright screen that read five o'clock. "Hello?" she answered, her voice a little raspy.

"Carter, we're meeting in the lobby in thirty minutes. There's been another victim." Hotch told her from the other end of the call.

Jamie rubbed her face and pushed her hair away out of her eyes. She inhaled a deep breath and let it go gently, "Okay, I'll be right there." She ended the call and groaned, pulling a pillow over her face. Laying there for a few more minutes, Jamie's head immediately flooded with the memories of four hours prior to her wakeup call. Throwing the pillow off, Jamie rushed to get dressed. There was no doubt that the rest of the team would look like sleep-deprived zombies, but it came with the job. Jamie quickly brushed her teeth, combed her hair, throwing it into a ponytail and put on some casual, but work appropriate clothing. Grabbing her badge and her gun, placing it in her holster, she left her hotel room and made her way down to the lobby.

Jamie's feet exited the elevator, her eyes automatically catching sight of her team members, all but one. "Where's Spencer?" she hesitantly asked the group.

Morgan shrugged, "He should be here. Hotch said he had to call him a few times before he picked up his phone earlier."

"Have you talked to him lately?" JJ asked her.

Jamie scratched the side of her head, knitting her eyebrows together, "…about what?"

"He had that date last night, didn't he?"

"Yeah?"

"Look," JJ said to everyone else, "Maybe he's just tired. Nothing some coffee and a pound of sugar can't fix. So, let's just give him a couple more minutes."

Jamie looked around at her tired and somewhat already impatient team. She sighed and crossed her arms over herself. They had a place to be and none of them had time to be waiting around for one lagging member. "You know what, I'll go get him," Jamie declared, walking with a fast pace to the stairs, knowing it would be quicker than waiting for the elevator.

Reaching the same floor as her own, Jamie sped towards Spencer's room. She paused for a moment, her mind returning to the conversation they shared not too long ago, but she shook it off. She wouldn't let their personal problems get in the way of their work. Jamie raised her hand and balled it into a fist, pounding it into his door.

Bang

Bang

Bang

When it didn't work the first time, she tried it again, her fist delivering three more loud bangs, which she was sure the others could hear from the ground floor. She stood there, waiting for him to answer the door, but there came no reply. Just as she was about to yell through the door, it opened swiftly, causing her to jump back. Spencer stood in front of her, looking more terrible than all of them combined.

"What?" he asked, as if they had nowhere to be.

Jamie scoffed, "Did you not here me banging on the door?"

"No, I heard you."

"Spencer, we have somewhere to be and everybody is waiting on you."

Spencer stepped out of his room, closing the door behind him and looked down at his watch. "Hotch said thirty minutes. It's only been twenty-eight." He walked past Jamie, obviously mad at her from hours earlier and walked casually down the steps to the lobby.

Jamie followed him, letting her face show no emotion that their situation was weighing on her conscious. When they got to the lobby, they spoke nothing of what had just happened. They all simply exited the building, getting into their respective vehicles and made their way to the crime scene.


"This body was found about ten feet from where we're standing at the delivery docks. There isn't that much traffic from trucks this time of the day," Detective Younan told them, "This space is usually reserved for the delivery vehicles, but there's the occasional foot traffic through here."

"You can see drag marks here," Morgan pointed out, kneeing down to the ground. He used his finger to point out the pattern, "Victim wasn't strong enough to carry them, so they had to go with their next best bet."

"Okay, so the unsub drugs the victim in a decently lit area and then drags them back here before they were fully sedated?" Spencer asked, clearly trying to work through the logic.

"Either that or they're getting over confident," Jamie responded, eyes still trained to the drag marks in the dirt.

"Or maybe the victim has some sort of appeal that makes the extra risk worth it."

"What do we know about the victim so far?" Rossi wondered, walking towards Detective Younan.

The detective cleared his throat and put his hands on his belt. "Her name is Mary Connors," He pulled out a small notepad from his pocket and flipped through the pages. "She's thirty-five years old. She just spent a month in the hospital for another suicide attempt, has one son who lives with her and her mother."

"That's pretty detailed for just having found her." Hotch said.

Detective Younan nodded and focused his attention behind the BAU members, "That's the nurse who found her here. She claims to have known her from her stay at the facility."

"I'd like to speak to her." JJ told him.

"Sure, she's right there, but she's pretty shaken up."

"Morgan, go with JJ." Hotch told him. The two compiled and made their way to the nurse.

"Do you mind if I take a look at the body?" Spencer questioned.

"Follow me," Detective Younan told him. Spencer followed him, leaving Jamie with Hotch and Rossi.

"Jamie, go with him." Hotch told her.

"What for?"

"You don't need to question it, just go." he told her, turning to Rossi, discussing something else.

"Sorry," Jamie said, pretty much to herself. She sighed and jogged until she was able to reach Spencer's side. They walked over to the loading dock where the body could be seen with a sheet covering it.

"The officers wanted to wait until your team got here before we move anything," Detective Younan told them. He grabbed three pairs of latex gloves from one of the coroners on site and handed them out to Jamie and Spencer. He knelt down with one knee on the pavement, pulling back the sheet that had been covering the victim.

Jamie shook her head and looked away for a moment. When her eyes returned to the gruesome sight, she could clearly see the woman's hair was matted with her own dried blood and it puddled around her. There were contents of her purse and prescriptions bottles scattered beside her and to make matters worse, her eyes were wide open.

Jamie was pulling on her gloves, ready to approach the body when Spencer stepped up before her. She watched him as he walked over, but paused while looking down at the body. Jamie moved over to him and saw his face. She looked at him questioningly before attempting to say anything.

"I'm fine," he said firmly, stopping her before she could show concern. While he, himself believed it to be true, Jamie knew better than that.

Jamie let her eyes go back down to the body and she instantly saw something unusual. She took her finger and pointed down, "Look, there's something in her hand."

Spencer noticed it and crouched down to the ground. With his own hand, he took the victim's hand and very gently, pried open her fingers. In her hand was a picture and what appeared to be a handwritten note. Spencer grabbed the note from her hand and uncrumpled it, reading it out loud.

"You all should be thanking me."

"I think that's her son in the photo," Jamie said, holding the victim's wallet in her hand. As she looked through, she noticed that there were other pictures of the same little boy.

"What do we have?" Hotch asked out loud, walking over with Rossi.

"There's a note and a picture of a boy who I assume is her son," Jamie filled him in.

"The unsub might have been using the picture as a way of addressing the role of Mary's son. With Mary being suicidal, the unsub could be...sorry; they could be telling us that the kid's b-better off without her."

"There hasn't been any other notes with the other-" Jamie began, but ultimately stopped at the sound of Spencer emptying the contents of his stomach, despite there being very little to let go of. She watched him tear off his gloves and throw them to the ground.

Those around him were shocked. They had never seen him act this way at a scene before. His sudden lack of composer put Jamie on her toes, her mind trying to work through what could be causing him this sort of trouble. There was definitely more to it than Spencer was letting on, but Jamie knew she would get to him eventually.

Spencer took several deep breaths and ran his hands over his face. He walked over to Hotch, who watched him with stern curiosity. Hotch waved off Detective Younan and the coroner, letting Jamie and Rossi stand by, though.

"I'm sorry," Spencer told him, his eyes watery and red from the vomiting. "I don't-I can't handle this right now."

"No need to apologize," Hotch told him, "If you need to sit this one out, I understand."

"No, no, but you guys need me here."

"We need you focused and it looks like you can't do that right now. Take some time to clear your head. We'll meet you back at the precinct later, unless you need more time."

Spencer just nodded and hung his head. He walked slowly past his other teammates who just arrived to see the scene. As much as he wanted to sit down and talk about it, he couldn't look one specific person in the eyes at that moment. He could feel her eyes trained on him as he walked by her, but he was grateful that she just let him go and didn't try to say anything.

"What was that about?" Morgan asked Jamie, standing by her side.

Jamie shook her head and pulled off her gloves, balling them up in her hand, "I don't know."

"You guys alright?"

"No, not really, but this isn't the place to talk about that," she told him.

"Carter," Hotch called out, catching Jamie's attention.

She rushed over to him, looking back the body on the ground. "Yes, sir?"

"I need you to go with the coroner to the morgue. Get the toxicology reports filed and make sure that we get the cause of death. If it matches the other's, we shouldn't be that far from catching this one."

"Right away," Jamie complied.

Hotch nodded at her acknowledgement and gathered the others to return to the precinct. They had more work to get done.


When Jamie returned to the precinct, it was around two in the afternoon. She had spent all morning beside dead bodies and she was glad to be away from it. Being successful with the orders that Hotch had given her, she was content that she was able to bring back the information that he wanted. Exiting her SUV, Jamie closed the door and began her walk to the front door. As she entered, her eyes searched for her team, finally seeing them through the crowd of officers in the back of the building. When she entered the conference room, she was quite surprised to see Spencer had returned to the field.

She walked in slowly, placing her file down on the table and removing her jacket. "You're back?"

"Yeah."

Jamie looked around at the others in the room, Morgan and JJ. They weren't paying attention to their conversation, but if they were, they weren't showing it. "You feeling okay?"

"Better, I guess."

Jamie tilted her head with sympathy. As she walked over to Spencer, she reached out and placed one hand on his shoulder. "You know you can talk to me, right?" she told him, making her voice somewhat quieter.

He nodded at her words and gave her a half-hearted smile.

"Carter, what did you get from the M.E.?" Morgan asked.

Jamie quickly removed her hand from Spencer's shoulder and walked over to where Morgan was sitting with JJ. Grabbing the file from the table, Jamie handed it to him, "It's the same C.O.D. as the other victims, a clean cut to the carotid. This victim was also dosed with Haldol, but not as much as the others."

"That explains the dragging of the body." JJ concluded.

"Sure does," Jamie agreed. "What're you guys up to?"

"Hotch has us going over more victimology, in case we missed something. Reid's being going over the note, looking for anything we can profile."

"Where is he anyway? What about Rossi?" Jamie wondered.

"They have a suspect in custody. They're interviewing him right now." Morgan informed her.

"Wait, seriously? Do they think this is it?"

JJ shrugged, "I'm not sure. They're still trying to get something from him if you want to go over."

Jamie nodded and left the conference room, on her way to the interrogation room. When she found it, she stood quietly on the other side of the glass, watching Hotch and Rossi work over the suspect.

The man looked shorter than average and he was bald. From what Jamie could hear through the speaker, his name was Chuck.

"Look man," Chuck said, putting his hands in the air, "I don't know anything about dead people with their throats cut!"

"You work at one of the pharmacies near the location of the victims and you were working in the hospital pharmacy where Mary Connors had been killed. You expect us to believe that you know nothing about this?" Rossi questioned him, hands gesturing to the gruesome photos laid out on the table.

"You don't think that Mary's son would be better off without her?"

"I just told you I know nothing about any of this!" Chuck claimed.

Jamie could see through the glass that the guy was telling the truth. He wasn't giving justifying statements for any of the killings and he was beyond antsy, something that guilty people usually aren't.

"Look at this picture." Hotch told him, placing it down in front of him.

"Wha-what am I supposed to do with this?"

"All of the victims had children. We believe that our killer is convinced that he's doing the children a favor."

"Christ," Chuck sighed, rubbing his face hard with his hands.

"Now, thanks to you, her son will have to grow up without his mother. Or were you counting on that? This child not having to grow up with a burden like his crazy mother?"

Chuck slammed his hand down on the table, making Jamie jump from the other side of the glass. "Do not use that word!" he screamed, his tone threatening. "Family is not a burden! I would never do this to someone!" His yelled turned into sobs, which caused long withheld tears to be shed.

Jamie watched as Hotch and Rossi shared knowing looks, then exited through the door of the room, leaving Chuck to drown in his tears.

"He's not our guy, is he?" Jamie questioned her boss.

Hotch shook his head, "No, he's not."

"He didn't offer any justification for the murders. Our unsub believes that they're in the right and would be desperate to explain their actions." Rossi added.

"Okay, so we look somewhere else," Jamie said to them, following their lead back to the conference room.

"We're still waiting on that list from Garcia about the employees." Rossi reminded him.

When they entered back into the conference room, all three of them noticed Morgan and Spencer looking closely at the note that was found with Mary's body.

"You have something, Reid?" Hotch questioned him.

"Will you come here a second?" Spencer asked him. "Do you see how the ink blots as if the pen stopped periodically along the letters?"

"Yes," Hotch acknowledged, scanning the note with his own eyes.

"That's very common in forgeries. It indicates that the writer is pausing, typically in an attempt to imitate someone else handwriting."

"Why would our unsub need to forge someone else's handwriting?" JJ wondered.

"Maybe they're trying to frame someone." Morgan offered.

"Possibly," Spencer agreed, looking back at the note, clearly deep in his thoughts. "It's weird…"

Jamie looked at the others around her, then spoke for all of them. "Don't leave us hanging there, Spencer."

"Sorry," Spencer said, shaking his head a little. "It's just this handwriting looks familiar."

"How is that possible?" Rossi questioned.

"I don't know. I just know that I've seen this writing before and it's bothering me, because I can't remember where."

The room was silent for a moment before Spencer sped off, saying, "I need to check something really quickly." He left the whole room looking perplexed.

"Does he seem okay to you guys?" Morgan asked the room.

"No, but that's not surprising. Running into his friend from years ago looks like it's affecting him," JJ said, "Things seem to be out of perspective."

"I just wish he would talk about it."

"He will," Jamie answered, "He'll talk when he's ready."

"I know, I just hate seeing him like this."

"We all do," Hotch spoke up and as he did, his cellphone rang. He took it from his jacket pocket and put it on speaker phone, letting the others know it was in fact, Garcia. "What do you have for us?"

"Remember how you asked me cross reference all of our victims' psychiatric and psychological treatment facilities to see if any of the same individuals worked at any or most of the treatment centers?"

"Yes, we've been waiting for the list."

"Right…well, I have it now and there is one person that stands out. Hanna Lynch is her name."

"Garcia, did you just say Hanna Lynch?" Jamie asked, putting extra emphasis on the woman's last name.

"Sure did. Apparently, she was an intern at the first hospital, a resident at the second, and now she works with the medical examiner's office which is run out of the morgue of the facility that treated the most recent victims. I'm sending you her picture now."

Everyone's tablets dinged, signaling the incoming photo. When Jamie opened the message, her heart dropped into her stomach and she felt sick. "Son of a bitch…" she said, not able to tear her eyes away from Hanna's picture.

"Carter, what is it?" Hotch asked her.

Jamie looked up from the tablet and saw all of them staring at her with wondering faces. She held up the picture and pointed, "This is Hanna. As in Spencer's friend, Hanna."

"Where did Reid go off to?" Hotch quickly asked.

"When he said he recognized the handwriting on the note he took off." Rossi informed.

"He's not answering his cell, either." JJ claimed, trying to get Spencer on the other end.

"Garcia, we need an address for Hanna Lynch." Hotch instructed, more like demanded.

"It's already on its way, sir. Is Reid okay?"

"We hope so, good work, Garcia." Hotch said before hanging up the phone. "We all need to split up. Rossi, take JJ and Morgan, go to her house. Carter, you're going with me to the morgue."


As Hotch drove through the traffic on the road, sirens blaring, Jamie couldn't help but feel sorry for Spencer. Here, he thought he was reconnecting with a long, lost childhood friend, but in reality, he was reconnecting with a murderer. Thankfully, the drive to the morgue wasn't too long and they were pulling into the parking lot before they knew it. They jumped out of their vehicle and ran together towards the entrance. Hotch entered first, going around every corner with stealth, sending signals to Jamie to let her know it was okay to proceed. As they came down the long hallway that lead to the morgue, both agents stopped abruptly, as they could hear conversation going. One voice definitely belonged to Spencer and the other, Jamie recognized it as belonging to Hanna.

While they listed sharply, they moved forward against the wall.

"I can't let you stop me!" they heard Hanna cry out.

"W-why?" Spencer asked, sounding different than usual.

"Someone has to continue my work. Someone should keep the children safe. I can't ever stop, not even for you..."

That was it. With the right opportunity, Hotch rounded the corner first into the open door. The sudden burst scared Hanna and the scalpel in her hand went to Spencer's throat.

"Hanna Lynch, drop it and put your hands where I can see them!" Hotch yelled, aiming his gun.

Jamie entered right behind him, eyes wide and gun drawn as well. She was steady, but that didn't mean her mind was. Her eyes were going back and forth, from Spencer to Hanna; and she prayed to God that if Hanna knew what was best for her, she would listen to Hotch and allow herself to be brought in.

Hanna sat there on her knees next to Spencer, eyes watery and scalpel still in hand. "I can't stop."

"Yes, you can. Just drop the scalpel and put your hands in the air." Hotch said, not faltering in his words.

Hanna shook her head as tears went down her face, "No..." she whispered, looking back at Spencer and then at Jamie, "Take care of him, okay?"

In one smooth movement, the hand that held the scalpel, shot away from Spencer's throat and was brought to her own, with the intention of ending her life.

Which was ultimately successful.

Hotch and Jamie watched in shock, their guns still trained, but not ready to shoot someone who did the unexpected.

Jamie slowly lowered her gun, watching as Hotch placed his gun in his holster and helped removed a limp and very dead Hanna from on top of Spencer. When she was off of him, Jamie saw it instantly. There was a pool of blood around Spencer and it was soaking through his clothing. Jamie threw herself down to the ground and put her hands over his bleeding abdomen.

"What did she do to you?" she asked, trying to remain calm, but kind of failing.

"Sh-she stabbed me with t-the scalpel."

"Hang in there, okay? You're going to be okay."

"Hold on Reid, we have a medic coming, should be here shortly." Hotch told him.

"Al-alright." Spencer replied, trying to sit up from the floor.

"No, no, what are you doing?" Jamie questioned him, not letting him sit up.

"I don't know…"

"Keep your eyes open for me, okay? Promise me?"

"I promise…"


Jamie's attention was taken from the window when she heard groaning coming from a bed-ridden Spencer. She walked over to him, placing her hand gently on his, "Spencer, don't try to get up, okay? You're safe in the hospital."

Spencer took his free hand and wiped at his eyes, "What happened?" He was still groggy and looked like he was trying to make sense of his surroundings, even though Jamie told him where they were.

"She cut you pretty deep," Jamie told him, creating a tighter grip on his hand. "You had some internal injuries, but the surgeon was able to patch you up."

"Where is everybody else?"

"They're outside," Jamie told him, wondering if she should drop the bomb now. "Hotch really needs to speak to you, Spencer."

Spencer nodded, "Will you go get him?"

"Of course," Jamie replied, letting go of her hold on his hand. She gave him a reassuring smile and left the room.

She found everybody in the same exact spot as they were in when she left. They were all sitting in the waiting room with coffee in hand, waiting for him to wake. When they noticed Jamie, they all stood up from their seat. "He's awake," she informed them.

"How's he feeling?" Morgan wondered.

Jamie shrugged, "I'm sure it hurts, but um, Hotch, he's asking for you."

Hotch nodded, walking past Jamie and leaving the rest to head for Spencer's room.

Jamie didn't look back at him, instead she sat herself down in an open chair and placed her face in her hands. She wanted to cry, but she wasn't one for the dramatics-at least right in the moment.

"Hey, he's going to be okay." JJ said to her, rubbing her back as she sat next to her.

Jamie nodded, pushing her hair back from her face. "I know. I just-I don't know. I feel like I should've seen it. Like, I should've known or-"

"That you should've protected him." Rossi finished for her.

Jamie didn't respond, but she knew that they all understood. The remaining minutes before Hotch came out were silent. Nobody wanted to be the one to say the wrong thing or cause any more stress than they were already under.

When Hotch did reenter the waiting room, they were also graced with the presence of Diana. Everyone looked surprised for a moment, everyone except Jamie.

Diana approached Jamie and to Jamie's dismay, pulled her into a hug. "Thank you for calling me."

"Absolutely," Jamie replied.

"How's my son?" Diana asked, making the question open.

"He'll recover, but he won't be back in the field for about a month," Hotch informed her, "I'm sure he'd love to see you."

Diana nodded and gave one last look at Jamie, "If you need anything, you know where to find me, Jamie."

Jamie gave a small smile and crossed her arms over herself, "Shouldn't I be saying that to you?" she asked, wary with her humor.

Diana didn't reply with words, just a soft, grateful grin before leaving the waiting room.


Jamie felt as if her heart had jumped out of her chest as she heard Spencer startle awake. She rushed out of her chair, over to his bed side, "Relax, Spencer. It's just me."

"It was just a dream…" he told her, catching his breath and wiping the sweat from his forehead. He looked around the room, noticing the open window revealed a dark sky. "You didn't go back with the team?"

"Um, I thought I'd stick around, make sure that you get back alright."

"You didn't have to do that."

"I wouldn't be here if I didn't want to be," Jamie said, earning a grin from Spencer. She was echoing his words from when she was in the hospital after being shot. "Besides, I'm sure you would get bored of crappy hospital television."

They shared a small laugh, easing back into a calm demeanor. Jamie pulled her chair up closer to his bed and sat down in it. She looked out the window and then back at Spencer, who's eyes were shut tightly.

"You know that what happened isn't your fault, right?

"Oh yeah, and how did that work out?" he bit back.

Jamie sighed, "Hey, that girl was hurt and damaged long before you came back around. She let that hurt destroy her, but it's over now and it wouldn't be if it weren't for you."

"Those women…"

Jamie grabbed his hand, sighing as she was finally able to recognize hours earlier where his uneasiness was coming from. "They looked like your mom."

He nodded, sniffing so he wouldn't shed his tears. "Your mom is fine, she was here earlier."

"She told me you called her."

"I did."

"Thank you for that. Jamie, thank you for everything."

Jamie tightened her grip on his hand as he did the same, "You don't have to thank me…you never have to say that to me. Just know that I'm here for you." Her eyes closed, her mind wandering to their place before. "And I'm sorry about the other night, when you came to see me. I-""

"Don't be," he told her, "It's not like you were wrong…about any of it."


Thank you for reading and please remember to review! I would really appreciate it.