JJ's blue eyes seemed to encompass the whole of her pale face. The fragile beauty was currently shivering under the rough wool blanket, and Rossi couldn't figure out why.
"JJ, honey, what's wrong?" Rossi was beginning to have a sinking sensation in his gut, but couldn't quite place the reason. JJ's lips moved, but no sound was made, all the while keeping her large blue orbs on David's face, almost willing him to understand. Leaning over far enough that he could feel her breath against his ear, David asked again, "Honey, are you ok?"
"It's him, David, it's him." The words were spoken with a whisper but their impact was loud enough for Rossi to pay attention.
"It's who, honey?"
"Why's he here? How did he find me?" The young agent's whispers were almost hysterical, yet her body didn't move an inch.
"Everything ok with your partner?" Jason asked the older agent, taking a quiet step towards the couple.
Noticing what little color she had left drain from her already bloodless face, Rossi quickly stopped the young man from coming any further. "I think she's ok." He replied. "Just a little disoriented from the accident. Just give us a minute, if you don't mind. Maybe you can call 911 again for us and check on that ambulance?" Hoping that's all it would take to stall their mystery guess, Rossi put on his best "good cop" face as he smiled at the younger man.
"Sure. I'll see if I can't get the phone to work over here by the truck. I might also happen to have some water in my cooler." His boots made a quiet thud as he slowly walked back to his truck.
JJ did her best to stay as calm as she could, but her body trembled more and more with each thud of the man's boots. What little control she had developed in the past several weeks had disappeared and now, once again, the frightened young woman she had recently thought buried had returned. As if she was watching a movie at a drive-in theater, all of the terrifying moments she had suffered at the hands of this clever cop started playing in her mind.
She remembered their first date, and how their waiter at the restaurant they went to had somehow "tripped" over Will's foot after flirting a little with the blonde beauty. Will had apologized profusely and even helped the waiter up. However, after whispering something in the man's ear, their food and the rest of their evening's meal was served by a waitress.
She remembered the constant calling on her cell phone. At first, JJ found it heartwarming. Feeling a little starved for affection at that time, she enjoyed the attention the detective was sending her way. There was a smile on her face when she found his name displayed on her phone when he called – the first couple of days, anyway. In those days, the calls had been limited to one or two a day. They were short and flirtatious, very innocent and sweet. Then the calls ramped up in frequency. What started as one or two turned in to three or four. By the end of the week, Will was calling every hour. JJ was finding it hard to focus on her work or anything else. She did her best to end the calls quickly, and even jokingly accused him of "checking up on her." When her comment was followed by silence, JJ hurriedly excused herself from the call, practically throwing the phone down on her desk, as if it could hurt her with a simple ring. When Hotch had noticed the incessant ringing while on a case, he asked her about it. Ashamed that her personal life was interfering with her professional, even more so now that her superior had noticed, JJ had Garcia block the number from her phone. That worked for about a day. After that, she decided that any unknown number would automatically be sent to voice mail so that she could screen the calls.
Garcia had asked JJ about the number while she was doing her "techie" thing to block the calls to JJ's phone. Despising herself even more now that she was lying to her best friend, JJ just told the eccentric blonde that it was a wrong number that wouldn't give up. If her friend didn't believe her, she certainly didn't let on.
After a while, the unknown calls stopped. JJ had started to feel safe again. But then, the cards came. Cards would show up in her office, always in a blue envelope, always with a hint of cologne on them, always signed "yours truly." Then they started showing up at home - no return address, no written words professing undying love - just a blank card signed "yours truly."
A week after the first card appeared at her house, JJ felt as if someone was watching her. When she returned home after a particularly hellish day dealing with Strauss, JJ opened the door to her townhouse, kicked her heels off, and headed straight to the kitchen for a tub of chocolate cake frosting and a diet coke. Looking out at her backyard through the window above her kitchen sink, JJ could have sworn she saw Will standing by her large oak tree, hands tucked in his jeans pockets, looking back at her through the window. When she looked again, no one was there. She even walked outside to her back porch, gun at the ready, but - no one was there. But she could feel him there! She just knew it was him. Frantic to find out, either to prove to herself she wasn't crazy or to allay her fears, JJ called the precinct in New Orleans where he worked. Not reaching him at his desk, she immediately asked to speak to his partner, the young detective she had given the French Quarters' profile to months earlier. The detective advised her that "No, Detective LaMontagne isn't in. But, I just spoke with him and he's returning to the office as soon as he's finished with a drug bust he's on. Do you want me to take a message?" Take a message, JJ thought. "No, no message." She replied softly and quickly hung up.
It wasn't until days after that evening that JJ knew she wasn't crazy. At first, she tried to laugh it off and chalk it up to the seriousness of the cases she saw at work. But, despite all of the self talk and her daily mantra, "No, I'm not crazy just tired", she became hyper vigilant with her surroundings. She made sure that she somehow always managed to share a room with Emily or Garcia while away on a case and that she was never anywhere alone, either staying at the precinct helping Garcia or working with Reid on victimology. When not away on cases, staying late at the office became more about not wanting to go home alone than about all the work she was trying to catch up on.
One Friday evening, after Hotch found her asleep at her desk, she was ordered home, and not to return until Monday. Begrudgeonly, but with no other way out, JJ headed home. After letting herself in, she immediately locked all of the locks on her doors, checked all her windows, and engaged and then re-engaged her alarm system – a routine that she was becoming all too familiar with these days. Too scared to be alone in the dark, but too tired to be out with her friends, JJ turned every light on in her house as she headed upstairs to her bedroom. And there, in the room normally filled with pleasant dreams, she walked right into her worse nightmare.