Sorry for the delay. Had to travel abroad to attend family funeral. Please feel free to let me know what you think!
Chapter 15
Hotch stopped counting the amount of times he had paced around the entirety of his office. As he waited for Reid and Morgan's return, the Unit Chief had gone through every possibility he could think of as he tried to come up with an answer to the burning question. Who took them? Morgan and Reid were taking longer than expected and, having no leads or evidence, the three remaining members of the BAU were left to wait for Will and his sons. Garcia and Rossi, both waiting in Hotch's office with him, were equally as antsy until, finally, a knock on the door stirred all three of them. Hotch opened it, taking in the disheveled appearance of the Metro detective, and ushered him inside. Little Michael was asleep in his father's arms and Henry was well on his way to joining his brother. As the wide eyes took in the mood of the room, they filled with tears immediately, recalling the last time his mother went missing. Penelope was quick to pick up her godson and soothe him on Hotch's couch, having Will place Michael on her lap as well. The detective offered her a quick smile of appreciation before taking her seat in front of Hotch's desk.
"Anything?" Will asked, the desperation evident in his eyes. Hotch shook his head slowly.
"Is it ok if we ask you a couple-"
"Of course." Will, eager to help but also eager to get his sons to bed, clearly didn't want to linger too long. Hotch let Rossi handle most of the questions. By the time Will had explained what happened between JJ and Ava on the night before they disappeared, Morgan and Reid had returned. They listened quietly to the end of Will's retelling of events, walking in as he was describing the state Ava was in when JJ had brought her home. The news of Kate's infidelity was new and obviously troublesome, but the team tried not to dwell on their emotions. If they wanted to find their friends, they needed to be impartial, just like every case before.
"What did you find at Ava's?" Hotch directed his question to the new arrivals.
"We got a recording." Morgan announced, pulling out the DVD he had been given by Ava's landlord. "The angle's not the best but it's better than nothing."
"So that's where they were taken?" Will asked. "Ava's apartment?" The detective tried hard to refrain from being angry with Agent Thorne. However, it was becoming more and more obvious that if JJ hadn't been with her, she would be here, helping them find Ava. While he knew it was not Ava's fault, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of resentment. Instead of answering, Morgan had inserted the disc into Hotch's computer and the five gathered around to watch. Garcia purposely stayed with the children. The men watched as JJ and Ava arrived and entered the complex. Less than half an hour later, they saw Kate running to her car and driving away, practically proving her innocence. Several minutes after Kate left, JJ and Ava returned with Ava's bags in hand. The blonde helped the younger woman put the bags in the back of the car, their backs turned to the silhouette that had appeared on the side of the screen. JJ's cry of 'look out!' seemed to echo in the room, catching Henry's attention as his eyes had begun to close. They watched as Ava was rammed into the car and a man quickly subdued a distracted JJ. As Ava fell to the ground, hands wrapped around her own neck, the men saw another figure approach.
"Is that a woman?" Rossi practically whispered only to be shushed. Hotch turned up the volume quickly as the woman, with her back facing the camera, tilted her head slightly as she looked down at Ava.
"Long time no see, Agent Thorne." The Russian accent was clear and as the woman's subordinate's threw the agents over their shoulders and tossed them unceremoniously into the trunk of a sedan. Just as the woman was about to get into the passenger seat of the vehicle, she stopped and turned, looking directly into the camera's lens. Offering them not only an unobstructed view of her face but a sly grin as well, she slammed the door shut and sped off. Morgan had already handed Garcia the vehicle's information on a piece of paper, knowing that the analyst didn't want to watch the video. Gently easing the nine-year-old off of her lap, the blonde was gone, off to her lair to track the car.
"Why take JJ?" Will asked, knowing that there was no real response. "She clearly knew Ava and was after her. Why bring JJ into this?"
"She probably wants to hurt Ava." Hotch said softly. "And if she knew where she lived, it's safe to assume that she's been following her for some time."
"What does any of that have to do with JJ?" Will's sleep deprived and anxious brain couldn't make the connection.
"It means she knows how much JJ means to her." Reid informed the man. "And if she does then one way to hurt Ava…would be to hurt JJ too."
"Ava won't let anything happen to JJ." Morgan insisted. "She'd die first."
"I'm afraid she might not have much of a choice in the matter." Rossi mumbled, almost to himself. "That woman clearly knew what she was doing. She's done this kind of thing before and so have those men she was with. Not only that but she clearly doesn't care if we know who she is. She's bold and I'm afraid that can only mean bad news for both of them."
"Ava worked four major cases with the CIA." Hotch thought aloud. "When I called them, they told me that two of the ringleaders were in prison and two were killed- one during the raid and the other after she was arrested."
"She?" Morgan frowned. "How many female human traffickers are there?"
"That's exactly my point." Hotch concluded. "The other three leaders Ava brought down were male. I can only assume that that woman who took them was Ava's first assignment. I had all four case files faxed to me." The man began digging through the papers on his fax machine until he pulled up the first two. "Here. Katya Volkov." He handed the first page to Morgan whose eyes narrowed at the photo of the woman.
"That's her." He said as he passed the file to Rossi. "It's got to be her."
"I agree." Rossi said. "Her hair's shorter and lighter and she seems to have lost more than a few pounds but that could definitely be the woman in the video."
"Katya's Russian too." Reid read. "It says here that she took over her father's business after he was killed. Comes from an abusive home, speaks four languages, has an arms dealer for a brother."
"How does this help us find JJ?" Will rubbed his temples slowly, trying to massage the migraine away. The four men of the BAU looked at him with pity in their eyes. He chose to ignore the pang of annoyance that caused.
"We're going to find her, Will." Hotch promised. "Go home, take care of your sons, and we'll bring her home." They could see the determination and drive in his eyes, accompanied with anger and fear. He wanted to help, they were sure, but there wasn't much he could do from both a legal and a physical standpoint. Will's eyes danced from one agent to the other as he swallowed hard. There was no denying how exhausted he was and the last he wanted was his sons to suffer because he couldn't take care of them properly.
"Find her." He said in a low voice. "Please, find her before it's too late." Hotch nodded once, squeezing the man's shoulder as he collected his children and dragged his feet out the door. A few seconds passed in silence as the BAU collected their thoughts.
"I want to know everything about that woman." Hotch's tone left no room for interpretation. "Starting with why the CIA lied to me about her death."
"We have a serious problem." The accented voice on the other side of the line said matter-of-factly. "Volkov's gone off the grid."
"You've got to be kidding me." The woman grumbled, throwing back the covers as she leapt to her feet. "I warned them that this was going to happen. She's too-"
"Interpol isn't exactly in the business of relying on one agent's opinion for something like this, regardless of what that agent used to do. Volkov had what we needed and all she asked for was to not see the inside of a prison cell again. We made the right call."
"What's she done?" she asked as she tied her long, dark hair into a messy ponytail. Kissing the man she had left on the bed goodbye, she rushed to her car and turned the heat on full blast.
"She's kidnapped two FBI agents." The sentence caused a chill to run through the woman and she was sure it wasn't because of the rainy weather. Putting the car in drive, the brunette sped into the fog-filled morning, her heart pounding in her chest as the next set of words rang in her ears.
They're from the BAU.
