It'd been three weeks since Rhoda left for her day trip.
No text. No call. No anything.
Abby and Tim had both tried to trace her via her phone, to no avail. It was either trashed or dead. Gibbs wasn't sure whether she'd run away or something had happened to her. Putting an APB out on her could get her into more trouble.
It wasn't until Tim got a hit on a BOLO he'd put out on her bike that they'd started piecing things together. They'd made the trip to Charlotte, North Carolina when McGee was able to track down an address connected to the insurance on the bike. Local PD told them that the bike had been abandoned at a local bar parking lot, though no one witnessed who the rider had been. The owner had let it sit there a while before calling it in, especially since it hadn't taken up too much space. He had figured someone would've been back for it, but three weeks was a long time.
"Doesn't look damaged," Tony commented as he looked the bike over. "I feel like she wouldn't have just left this behind. Something must've happened."
"Maybe Gibbs and Bishop have a better idea," Tim said as he pulled out his phone to call. "Hey, Bishop, I'm gonna put you on speaker," he said as Tony approached to listen in.
"Well she's not here," she began. "But Tony, you should really check out this movie collection. I think you might actually need a moment alone with it."
"She had some packed," Gibbs' voice added. "She came here and started doing what she'd said she would."
"Any sign of her phone?" Tony asked.
"Nothing yet," Bishop replied.
"You thinkin' someone called her up and they were gonna meet here?" Tim asked as he looked over at him.
"She stopped mid-packing," Gibbs said. "Must've been in a hurry."
"If she was running, she wouldn't have stopped at a bar," Tony said.
"Her cell record didn't show any incoming calls," McGee reminded them.
"Uh...hey, guys?" Bishop cut in. "There's a landline..."
*~.~*
"Y'all find anything useful?" the bar owner asked as Tony and Tim came back into the bar. Tony gestured to the payphone near the restrooms, and Tim looked over at it before looking up at the corners of the ceiling.
"Do you have a security camera in here?" Tony asked the man at the bar.
"Sure. It's Charlotte."
"I'm gonna have to ask to see the footage if possible."
"Uh yeah, sure. It's one of those digital things. Holds up to 30 days worth, then starts recording over the earliest ones. You should be good though. It's back in my office. You're welcome to it. Got the lunch crowd heading in any minute now and I'm short-staffed as hell, so help yourself."
"C'mon, McGee. You can do the honors."
*~.~*
"I sent you the guy's photo, did you get it?" McGee asked over the phone.
"I got it!" Abby replied. "Running it through facial recognition software as we speak. So she never even set foot in the bar, huh? Sounds hinky."
"One call was made from that payphone, Abs," Tony said. "He leaves right after that. Never comes back in."
"And the timestamp matches the call on Rhoda's landline records," Tim chimed in. "Question is, did she leave with him willingly? And if she did, why wouldn't she contact us?"
"Have you checked the lost and found in the bar?" Abby asked.
"We established she never came in, remember?" Tim said.
"Well yeah, but if she dropped it in the parking lot, someone could've turned it in." She could hear shuffling on the other line.
"Abby, you're a genius!" She heard Tony say from a distance.
"Wait. How do you even know if that's hers?"
"Because I saw it when she set it down on the table at the diner, and I'm a trained and very talented investigator, Timmy."
"Yeah okay, but there are millions of that same exact cellphone, Tony."
"There sure is! But! What are the odds that this phone would have the very same two cracks intersecting one another on the bottom right corner?"
"You're so sexy when you're observant, Tony," Abby said with a wide grin.
*~.~*
"And we have power!" Tony said victoriously where he sat in the passenger seat, Gibbs in the driver's and Bishop and McGee in the back.
"What if there's a password?" Bishop asked.
"This old flip phone is from the stone age," Tony replied, then glanced at Gibbs. "No offense, boss. People don't steal stone age phones."
"Just another reason to have one," Gibbs commented.
"It is more economical, actually. If I wasn't addicted to being able to literally do everything I need from my phone, I'd switch back. Oh hey! See?" He held the device up. "Case and point, she tried to send a message and it failed."
"Smart phones do that too," Tim said.
"She was sending me a message," Tony said a little more seriously now. "I guess because I'm her only contact. 'Family emergency. Not gonna be able to get back when I said I would." Tony scrolled up in the text box to where she'd texted him once when she had initially arrived in Charlotte to let him know she got there, and then his reply of 'see you tomorrow!'. Something stirred in his gut.
"What is it, DiNozzo?" Gibbs asked, eyes narrowed on the agent. Tony shook his head.
"Something about this...seems familiar somehow."
"Familiar how?"
"Something about this family emergency text. It's like I've seen it somewhere else."
"Wait, Rhoda doesn't have any family," Bishop said. "You're literally the only contact in her phone."
"Maybe it's some kinda code?" Tim offered. Then Tony's phone was ringing. He looked at the ID and answered it on speaker.
"We're all here, Abby," he said when he answered.
"My search just got shut down!"
"What do you mean?" Gibbs asked.
"I mean there's a flag on this guy's face, Gibbs! I just got a call from Fornell. He's sending the BAU."
"Wait, he's what?" Tony asked, surprised.
"Apparently the guy in the photo you sent me? He's on their watch list."
"Watch list for what?" Bishop asked.
"Oh my god..." Tony's eyes widened and were searching the air in front of him.
"You have JJ call me right away," Gibbs told Abby, the ended the call though the phone was still in Tony's hand. "You know something?" he asked Tony.
Tony looked over at him. "The Death Texter."
"What?"
"Cheesy name for a serial killer that chooses his victims with a similar modus operandi. Women. Usually college kids leaving for spring break or something like that. People who would already be leaving town and wouldn't necessarily be missed for a while. All of them had a message sent to whomever they were keeping tabs with, saying there was a family emergency and they wouldn't be back when they said they would..."
"A...a killer," McGee said. "So uh...he can't exactly make that stick for Rhoda."
"Doesn't mean she won't be suffering. And if he's figured out she's different..." Tony's sentence tapered off with the thought. Then he jumped when Gibbs' phone rang, letting out an embarrassed breath afterward as Gibbs pulled out his phone to answer it.
"Gibbs."
"Agent Gibbs, it's JJ. Your forensics expert told me to call you."
"You're flying into Charlotte?"
"We're in the air now. Shouldn't be much longer actually. We've been hunting this guy for years. Abby said you know the latest victim?"
"Yeah," he said, flinching almost imperceptibly at the word 'victim'.
"And she's been missing for three weeks?"
"She was supposed to be back in DC three weeks ago. Timestamp on the phone call matches the date she disappeared."
"And no body has been found? This is different somehow, unless he's upping his game..."
*~.~*
"The Death Texter, or as we're calling him 'DT', usually dumps the body within nine days of taking them," Prentiss explained as she, Reid and Rossi met up with the NCIS team in the hotel lobby where they'd be staying."He's escalated drastically."
"That or he's been building up to this and simply not leaving his signature for us to trail," Reid added.
"But that doesn't seem like him at all," Prentiss argued. "DT wants to be heard. He wants us to know when he's struck again. He's taunting us."
"By the time he dumps the body, he's already decided where he's going next," Rossi said. "Normally he leaves the state. It's why it's been so crucial to try and get to these disappearances as soon as possible. So far we haven't ever been able to figure out where and how he chooses to do his dirty work. None of the crime scenes have ever been discovered."
"Which means that wherever he takes them and tortures them," Prentiss said, "They can't be heard. We've never had a sighting aside from a similar phone call security footage capture back in 08."
"Whatever he's doing," Reid added, "He's expertly formulated the perfect ruse for luring them in, capturing them and transporting them to wherever he does his work."
"And when he's finished, he cleans the body, likely cleans the crime scene, and somehow manages to know exactly where and how to dump a body without being noticed," Prentiss finished.
"So what you're saying is that we won't find this guy," Tony said.
"Not necessarily," Reid said, but his explanation was cut short when JJ walked up to the group with two other team members.
"Hey, guys," she greeted the NCIS team. "Good to see you again. Introductions... Special Agent Gibbs, DiNozzo, McGee and Bishop, this is SSA Simmons and SSA Alvez." They all shook hands.
"Are they okay to discuss...Contingency in front of?" Gibbs asked.
JJ raised a brow. "Yeah, but...what does that have to do with this?"
"Most likely? The reason he upped his game." Gibbs looked at her and she narrowed her eyes for a moment.
"Okay. Then...we should probably go someplace a little more private to talk." She turned to Rossi. "You mind if we use your suite as a conference room?"
*~.~*
"She's like me," Tony said.
"Like...like mad scientist serum experiment you?" Prentiss asked.
"She's been around a lot longer than me," he told them. "We just crossed paths the evening before she took the trip to Charlotte. She was gonna come stay with us."
"Uh...hang on," Alvez said from where he sat on the couch in Rossi's room. "Mad scientist experiment? What am I missing?"
Rossi turned in his chair and took a long breath. "What you're about to hear, Luke and Matt, is absolutely confidential between the people in this room. It's imperative that you never speak of this to anyone. Not friends, not family. No one except those of us in this room right now. Do you understand?"
"Yeah," they said in unison.
"Buckle up," Rossi told them. "There's no getting off this ride..."
tbc...