Chapter 11: Contact

After their little talk, Nate became a more sullen and quiet. He wasn't interested in food or anything, so Emily, despite her wanting to go out and get supplies and force feed him if necessary, opted to just stay put. There were old cots and blankets in the church's basement as well as some essentials left behind if they needed anything. They were set for the night and would make do.

Emily stayed close to him, never venturing far, but it became apparent to her that, even though he was ok and the idea was to get out of there the next day anyway, they were limited. Where they went next was limited to what she had in her pocket to get them there. Not only was she physically impaired, but her cashflow and their paperwork were scarce. They needed the fastest, safest route out of Paris. Preferably out of the country.

Unfortunately, they had to bunker down until that could happen, and, with all the adrenaline gone, Emily was really feeling the car wreck. All she wanted to do was sleep and she knew she couldn't take the chance. She had a concussion, and, though not super severe, she couldn't sleep for long periods of time. With no one, because she wasn't going to put the responsibility on Nate, around to make sure she woke up, she was going to have to stay awake.

It was a long night for her and restless for Nate as well. Emily was constantly on guard. The place was safe, no different than any other safe house, just a little more unequipped. Doable, though by the time morning rolled around, Emily felt half past dead and wanted nothing more than to have this whole thing be over already. Nothing was ever that easy.

All she knew was that she couldn't stay there with Nate for long. She couldn't risk him getting hurt and she was in no position to defend him in a fight if it came to that. So, what was she to do? Desperate, she stared at the phone in her hand for over an hour debating whether to use it or not.

There were pros and cons, but the benefits far outweighed the consequence. She could play it safely and still make the call, so that was what she had to do. Standing on wobbly legs, Emily gripped the phone and walked just out of the room, but still close enough to watch over sleeping Nate.

Sighing, she typed in a number she made sure to memorize long ago and waited. Part of her hoped that there'd be no answer, that she'd just went through the whole process of trying to reach her mother for no reason. Alas, Elizabeth did answer.

"Are you alone?" Emily asked after her mother's greeting.

"Excuse me? Who is this?"

"Are you alone?"

"Who is this?" Elizabeth repeated. "Emily? Is this you? What are you doing? I'm not in the mood for your games. I thought we agreed that we needed a little time. Last time we spoke wasn't exactly pleasant."

"Are you alone?" Emily asked more eagerly, a sense of panic and frustration in her voice. "Please answer me."

"Yes. Yes, I am," she said, realizing it was, indeed, her daughter and not just a game. Something was wrong. "What's going on?"

"I'm sorry… about what I said last time we spoke, but I need you to do something for me. Can you do that?"

"I will do whatever I can. Just tell me what you need," Elizabeth promised. Worried by how the call began and the tone of her daughter's voice, Elizabeth would do anything Emily asked of her or try as hard as she could to do it.

"I'm…" She didn't want to say that she was in trouble, but she did want to convey that the help was incredibly needed. "I'm… in a bind."

"Ok…" Elizabeth encouraged her to continue.

"I can't get into the details right now, but I'm stuck here, and I need a plane out. Do you still have that pilot on call?"

"Eduardo? Yes."

"I need to borrow him."

"Emily, dear, please tell me what's happening. Where are you? Why can't you take commercial air or the company jet if it's for work."

"It's not for work," Emily said a little too forcefully. "I just… I need your help. I don't ask for it often."

Or ever, Elizabeth thought.

"But I need it now. I… I just… Please. I can't answer questions. I know you have questions, but I can't give details. I just need your help."

"Tell me what to do and I'll do it."

"Do you remember that private landing strip just outside of Paris that we used when I was a kid?"

"Yes."

"Can you have Eduardo fly there without anyone knowing? There can't be a flight plan or anything. No record at all."

"That's illegal…"

Emily pleaded with her mother, telling her exactly how it could be done without anyone getting in trouble. The fact that her daughter knew that and that Emily was willing to do it made Elizabeth feel even more uneasy. Her daughter was not ok and that only made her agree to everything that was asked of her. She promised to get Eduardo in on it as soon as possible.

"Why are you in Paris? You're supposed to be in London."

"I can't explain right now."

Worriedly, Elizabeth asked, "Are you in trouble?"

Exasperatedly, Emily responded, "No questions."

"Please, just tell me… Are you hurt?"

"I'm… I'm ok. I just need to get out of here and quickly. I know I'm asking for a lot, but this needs to happen now." She paused. "I need you to do one more thing for me."

"Anything."

"My friends might come asking questions. I don't know that they will, but if anyone comes by asking about me, don't tell them about this. Don't tell them anything."

"Emily, you're worrying me."

"I'm sorry."

"Promise me that you're ok," Elizabeth begged. There was something that wasn't sitting right with her beyond the topic of conversation. She knew, though, that Emily wouldn't make that promise. "At least tell me you'll stay safe."

"I need to go. I won't call again, not until I'm out of Paris, not until I'm safe. Have Eduardo fly to the strip as soon as possible. If you need money, use this account," Emily said, sharing one of the shadow accounts she set up for James and Vince. The money would be all she had right now, and it had to last them until she was clear to touch her own accounts. "I love you Mom," Emily told her hanging up before Elizabeth could answer.

"Emily? Emily wait!" Elizabeth sighed and hung up the phone. "I love you too," she whispered before taking a breath and making things happen. Whatever was going on with Emily, she was going to do whatever to help.

Of course, Elizabeth was visited by Hotch and Clyde and she played the part like Emily asked, but that only made her worry more for her daughter who had yet to reach her final destination. In fact, Emily struggled just to get to the private airstrip.

After the call to Elizabeth, Emily looked around the church for anything that might come in handy. There wasn't much, but she found a few things and stuffed them in her purse before she decided it was time to get Nate up and ready to go.

"Nate," Emily tried to rouse him. "Nate, time to wake up."

"Emily?" he asked, eyes not yet open.

"Yeah. It's me. Come on, bud. We need to go."

"I had a bad dream," he told her, finally looking at her. "That my dads were hurt, and I couldn't ever see them again."

Emily just stared at him. Her job, hell, even her life, prepared her for so much, but not this. It didn't prepare her to tell her biological son that this was reality and his fathers may both, very well, be dead.

"But it wasn't a dream. Was it?"

"No Nate. It wasn't a dream."

"Will I ever be able to see them again?"

"I really hope so," she said. "I wish I could tell you more, Nate, but I told you everything I know so far. As soon as I find out more, I promise to tell you."

"I know," he sadly responded.

"Ok. I'm going to take you somewhere safe, but we have to get to the plane first. Think you can get up, get your shoes on, and try to use the bathroom so that we can get going?"

"Yeah, I can."

Emily watched him swing his legs over the cot and toss the blanket aside. He walked away so sadly. All she wanted to do was sweep him into her arms and whisper words of comfort. "Later," she told herself. First, they needed to get out of the country and, preferably, out of Europe altogether.

Nate didn't take long to get ready. There wasn't much to do with no food, no change of clothes, or anything else they'd normally have in their morning routine, so they were out of there quickly. Emily slowed them down. Nate's arm wasn't bothering him much. He adjusted and carried on as if he had full use of the appendage, but Emily couldn't do the same. Her body was stiff and knotted, she felt worse than she did the day before, and found herself needing breaks.

Thankfully, she managed to get them to a little shop nearby and shuffle out some cash for a little food to eat and then take with them. The church's old communion wafers weren't something she wanted to subject Nate to unless she had to. Still, she didn't want to waste too much time when the travel itself was hard enough. Her body was revolting with each step and, though he didn't complain, she could tell that Nate was growing tired very easily. The wreck was getting to them both.

Paranoid and constantly looking over her shoulder, never letting go of Nate's hand, their trip, that would normally only take about an hour or two ended up taking four. The took multiple forms of transportation, but nothing they would stay in for more than twenty minutes in fear of leaving a trail. At one point, they passed a tow lot where Emily was sure her car must have been stowed, and she thought about breaking in and getting their things before realizing what a bad idea that was. She knew they would be looking for them. That was where their stuff was, so someone was bound to be watching.

"No use," she told herself.

It was better that way, and by the time they got to the air strip, hiding out in a secluded area, Emily knew they had at least another hour to spare. Emily gave strict instructions. Eduardo was supposed to land, step out, refuel, and while he was doing that, they would board. From then, they were to be taken from Paris to the US. Thankfully, that part of the excursion would be much more comfortable and less anxiety inducing.

However, the same could not be said for the agents working so hard to find out what was going on. While the pieces were starting to come together, the exact whereabouts of their friend, the child, and the true understanding about Emily's role in everything were still being explored.

Spencer and Hotch were just arriving at the Virginia house. There were no cars in the driveway, the door was locked, and, after picking it to get in since this technically was not a real case, they saw that the house looked unlived in. There were a few boxes scattered and pictures laid out, but nothing that really told much of a story.

"Come look at this," Hotch called out. He was in, what he presumed to be, Nathaniel's room. There was a box of toys on the ground and children's books. When he heard the younger man approach, Hotch showed Spencer a picture he found. "Here's a better picture of Nathaniel," he said. "We should take it back with us."

Spencer examined the photo carefully. There was something about him that Spencer couldn't put his finger on.

"And there's another over there with James, Dominic, and Nathaniel," Hotch said. "Did you go through the stuff on the table?"

"Yeah. Just more photos. There's not much here. We could go through boxes, but that could take days and I don't know that we'll find anything useful."

"You're right," Hotch agreed. "Let's just take another pass of the house. If we don't see anything, then we can go."

Spencer nodded and went back down to the first floor where he rummaged through a few boxes with labels that told him there might be something of interest inside. There wasn't, but he did stumble upon something. There was a pile of mail stacking up in the box just outside. On a whim, he decided to check it. Most of it was just junk, fliers and things that were addressed to current resident rather than personalized. None of that was interesting or helpful, but when he went back in and put the mail down, he saw a small lock box somewhat hidden under the couch.

He looked around and then examined it, seeing the key taped to the bottom of it. Deciding to just go for it, he used the key, popped open the top, and pulled out stacks of paper. At first, it looked like nothing more than a bunch of documents, mostly billing statements, but there was more to it than that. He quickly read through it all, committing everything to memory and then read it again to ensure his eyes weren't playing games with him. There were a couple things of interest in there.

They still had eggs frozen and stored at the facility. There was nothing wrong with that, but attached to all that was a copy of another document… A notarized agreement between them and the private egg donor, one signed by James Hadley, Vincent Hadley, and Emily Prentiss… Emily Prentiss?! His eyes bulged as he did a double take. Did that mean what he thought it meant? Was Emily… No. That couldn't be right.

"Find something?" Hotch asked, quietly entering the room.

"No," Reid squeaked and coyly slipped the one paper into his vest pocket. "Just some files. Nothing that helps us, but maybe there's a more secure file box somewhere that will have something on the Bardolino family that could help."

"I didn't see anything."

"No, me either, but that doesn't mean it's not there."

Hotch couldn't agree more and the two exhausted every effort to find such a thing if it existed. Two hours spent in that house and the search was fruitless… For Hotch anyway. Spencer left there with his mind in a jumble and thoughts racing trying to make sense of what he saw. Every day, it seemed, he learned something else about Emily. This was just as confusing a possibility as anything else.

After their search ended, they retreated to the offices, hoping someone else found something that either pointed to where Emily was going so they could go to her and bring her to safety, or gave them the ammunition they needed to prove both her innocence and Bardolino's guilt. They needed to accomplish that and soon because it looked like the goons were starting to catch up with her just like they did her friends. Though, there was something curious to them about how that was happening, and Clyde had the same questions.

Staying back at the BAU office, Clyde made a few important phone calls. First of which, was a call the hospital Emily and Nathaniel were brought to. He wanted any and all information he could get, though they didn't give him much at all. It was a start, so he'd take it, but there was so much more he needed to figure out. And so, he enlisted the help of the best technical analyst he knew.

"Penelope, darling, would you allow me to bend your ear?"

"Is that the only thing you'll be bending?" she flirtingly teased.

"I shall take that as a yes."

She nodded and told him, "Of course."

"It has come to my attention that I, alongside Emily, have been tied to this crime back in London."

"I know. We have an alert set up to let us know any new developments."

He should have known. "Good. Well, I didn't do it."

"We know that too. You're not stupid enough to come all the way here just to have us prove you were a part of it."

"Ok then. I'd like to clear both of our names before we become fugitives at large with a bigger bounty over our heads."

"Sounds good to me," Penelope agreed. "What can I do?"

"Emily's good at what she does," he began.

Penelope readily agreed.

"She has both the resources and natural ability to disappear if she wanted to disappear."

"Right," Penelope responded, trying to see where he was going with this.

"So how did they know where to look for her? She didn't leave a trace. If she did, you would have picked up on it."

"That's true, but we did pick up on it."

"No. That only happened because she became part of an international incident with Italian residents attacking two foreigners on French soil. That was an occurrence out of her control and just a coincidence that allowed us to find her. But we know her enough to also know France is a comfort zone because she knows it so well. But these criminals found her before us. How?"

"What are you trying to say?" she asked defensively. "That they're better than me?"

"No! I'm saying that there must have been something that they had that we don't have."

"And what's that?"

"An inside source."

"Like a mole?"

"Exactly like a mole. Emily picked up a few more skills at Interpol. She made friends with the tech guys and was friendly with the team. She was eager to learn from them and have them learn from her."

"But wouldn't that just make her better at her job and probably better at disappearing?"

"Unless one of them knew her tricks or knew where to find her all along."

"So, what you're saying is that we're looking for an actual mole, not just something like a mole."

"I'm saying it's a possibility. I'll give you a group of names and access to all databases Interpol has. See if you can find anything suspicious."

"I'm not going to get arrested for this, am I?"

"If I told you that I couldn't promise you won't, would you still do it?"

"For Emily and that little boy? Absolutely."

"In that case, I will take whatever punishment comes your way should there be any. Don't worry about anything, just search."

He made a list of names and told her how to access databases she didn't have the ability to before. Most of them had histories like Emily and, she imagined, most people in one agency or another. They were clean, records full of accommodations and accolades, but not all of them were squeaky clean.

"Hmm," she said.

"Find something?"

"Possibly. You know them well?" She pointed to two employee profiles.

"She's a great agent. Worked several cases with Emily. What did you find on them?"

"Just little things. Weird, random deposits of money. Things like that."

"Interesting. Can you look for any connections to them and Bardolino, especially Darryl Ingram. He's the male equivalent of you there, so keep an eye out for any cyber threats."

"Will do."

And she was thankful for that warning because, though it would take some time to find anything at all, it would come in handy once she did.

Leaving Penelope to begin a deeper search, Clyde excused himself to check in with Dave and Hotch. Dave told them Elizabeth wasn't at home. No one on staff knew where she was heading. She simply left on her own with instructions to hold all calls. JJ and Derek didn't have much luck with the pilot either. The small plane took off probably moments before they got there and, though there was a flight plan, they doubted it was accurate, mostly because it said he was flying to Italy, not France.

While it was possible he would fly to Italy, it wasn't likely that that was the final destination. Since that turned out to be a dead end, the two returned to the office as soon as they could, hoping to be of help elsewhere. Derek and JJ were roped into the mole hunt with Penelope and Clyde while Hotch and Spencer finished up at the house.

"Clyde," JJ called to him walking toward the breakroom where she spotted him making coffee. "Have you heard anything from your contacts?"

"Nothing of any help, I'm afraid. Emily's prints were all over the security cameras that were put up in the apartment, so they're thinking that she's definitely guilty. She was smart about coming and going and always hid her face from local CCTV cameras, but it was obvious she had been to the place multiple times. They found a phone call to Emily around the time she asked for holiday that came from a burner."

"They think it was James?"

"Yes. They believe that Emily initiated the attack and was already in the building before signaling for the two others to come in."

"We're going to get her out of this, right?"

He nodded and stirred his coffee. "We better, or she and I are going to have to spend a lot of time together in hiding."

JJ laughed. It was the first moment she let herself relax all day, and, she realized, it wasn't even day anymore. They had been searching through Emily's past month but everything there in the states had unfolded in twenty-four hours. They were all exhausted and, right now, all they were doing was mulling over the same information.

And that was why, in the wee hours of the next day, Hotch sent them home. "There's nothing we can do right now," he told them. "Garcia's running her searches, we're waiting for calls or something new to come about. Our minds and our bodies are tired. Let's head home, rest, and hopefully we'll come up with a break in this tomorrow."

No one could argue. They were all just wiped and home sounded good.

"Do you have somewhere to stay?" Dave asked Clyde as the others took off.

"I didn't think that far ahead when I left."

"Come with me. I've got plenty of room and we can discuss this theory of yours a little more."

The younger man nodded and thanked Dave.

"Come on. There's a bottle of scotch with our name on it."

"Brilliant," Clyde said.

He wasn't a man to refuse a good drink and decent company which was exactly what was being offered. The two traveled to Dave's where the older gentleman told Clyde to make himself comfortable as he broke out the bottle and two glasses.

"So," Dave broke the ice. "Are you really here just because Emily's in trouble?"

"Of course I am. I care for Emily, same as you. I didn't know I was implicated in this matter until I was already here."

Dave scrutinized his reaction. He seemed sincere. "Then what aren't you telling us?"

"I think Emily may be in far greater danger than we're aware of."

"What's worse than someone trying to kill her?"

"A whole crime syndicate searching for an FBI agent on loan to Interpol… That doesn't end well in any circumstance."

"No, I suppose it doesn't. And the possible mole… You think he or she is working for someone in the crime family?"

"I personally worked with many of the agents on Emily's team. I don't think that the mole started out as such, but odd things have been happening."

"How so?"

"Before Emily decided to take some time off, she called me. It was a social call, but she mentioned in passing that it felt like something was happening, like they were all in a chess game that they weren't aware they were playing."

Dave's brow furrowed. "Did she say why she felt that?"

"A few informants ended up dead, more cases than usual turned sour. An agent was recently killed in the field. Separately and spread out, no one would think anything of it, but it's all together and all at once."

"Did you come here thinking the mole set Emily up?"

"Absolutely."

"And you didn't say anything because?"

"Because I needed to know if you saw what I saw. The mole and Emily's fleeing didn't necessarily seem connected at first. But if it wasn't then, it does appear so now."

"We're going to have to tell the rest of them tomorrow."

"I was planning on it."

"Tonight, though, we better rest. I have a feeling we have a lot of work ahead of us."

Clyde nodded his head, refilled his glass, and held it out as if giving a toast. "Nothing is ever simple with Emily."

Dave mimicked the actions and responded, "No it's not. She likes to keep us on our toes. We wouldn't have it any other way."

Everyone would get a little rest that night, even Emily and Nate would get some much-needed downtime as they flew for hours. They would all need it. But there was one person who, despite his eidetic memory, kept reading the papers he found over and over trying to make sense of it. Spencer did that until his eyes could remain open no longer and he too succumbed to sleep.