Title: Salutarem Via
Summary: After an international mission comes into light, Reid has to face the fact that his team will now need to know one of his biggest secrets: his life way from the BAU.
A/N: I want to begin my apologizing. I know I said this one was suppose to be out before I began school again, but a close friend of mine died unexpectedly. Everything else was set aside and I just focused on that for awhile. It has been a difficult last couple of weeks.
I have no idea when the next chapter will be finished since I did not have time to officially start it (I have an outline all mapped out; all I need is to actually fill in the smaller details). Do not expect sooner than a week from now.
As for the story, Many of you have been wondering about Reid. He will not make an appearance until chapter 9 or 10 if you count the prologue. I am sorry for the lack of Reid in a story built upon his character. I just have to establish other things first before we can carry on with his side of the story. I miss writing him more than I thought I would, so I cannot imagine what it is like reading this and having no Reid. Just one more chapter after this one before we meet with him again, and they are both set to be shorter.
I still have no beta, so there will be some mistakes. I try to get them all, but sometimes I miss a few. If you see any, please let me know.
Please review!
Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds or any of its characters. I just pretend that I do, because it brings me joy.
Chapter 7: Powerful Motivator
"If Christ is God, He cannot sin, and if suffering is a sin in and by itself, He could not have suffered and died for us. However, since He took the most horrific death to redeem us, He showed us in fact that suffering and pain have a great power."-E.A. Bucchianeri
Giggles mixed into the air like poisoned wine, a sweet bitterness destroying happiness. Hotch could not enjoy the day off with his son for the very same reasoning the laughter now seemed to wonderful to relish completely. Reid's life barricaded all other thoughts from becoming to prominent in his mind. Lately, only Jack appeared to be more important than finding Reid and helping him in any way he could. The thing was that Hotch could not think of a way to reach him and offer him that help.
"You know we can all see the worry on your face, even Jack."
Hotch moved his head to catch Jessica watching him, eyes intent on discovering all of his secrets. Sighing, he closed his own eyes, "I am trying not to let work get to me, but...Reid is in trouble, and I don't know for what or how to help him. Jessica, how do I help him?"
Jessica sat next to him, "I don't know, but I think that maybe you should talk to him. Here, you are suffering over not knowing when all you have to do is ask him."
Not knowing how to respond, silence thinned the air. The only relieve they received was the sight of their children. Jack noticed his father's gaze and smiled in his direction. That smile carried Hotch until the end of the day. Thanking Jessica and her family for having them over, he grabbed Jack's hand and headed for his car.
On the drive home, Jack looked at his dad and asked, "Hey, dad, everything okay?"
Grasping the wheel, Hotch answered, "Of course, buddy. Why do you ask?"
Fidgeting in his seat, Jack replied, "You just seem worried, and you aren't sleeping. I know because you woke me up the other day. Is everything okay? You only get like this when something is wrong with work. Is something wrong? Is Uncle Dave okay? What about the rest of the team, are they okay?"
Water formed in his eyes, but he refused to let them show. He gathered some strength to end his day, "They are all fine. Everything is fine."
Nodding his head, Jack waited the last few minutes before climbing out of the car when it stopped. He led his father into the building, up the stairs and right into their apartment. He went in his room without seeing his father's face. He smelled the tension. He sensed the worry. He knew a lie when he heard one. He wanted nothing more than believe his dad, yet he knew better.
Getting ready for bed, Jack slipped through his sheets. The door squeaked announcing his dad. He feigned sleep and listened to his dad hoping he would reveal something to a dreaming son.
"Everything is fine. Don't you worry. Good night, buddy."
Disappointed but not surprised, Jack anticipated the darkness. He desired a world filled with happiness and love and most importantly a world with no monsters making his family suffer. They had all lived through enough pain and sorrow. Whoever was in trouble had his father in more worry than he has ever seen. He knew that the person in the middle of it all made a mistake. His father was noble and kind and compassionate. He knew that his dad would never let this go, because so many people were in pain. His father was not going to stop until the person responsible was put away. He willingly welcomed sleep understanding that even if danger lurked causing hurt it would only lead to something powerful. It would cause his dad to find the will to carry on and end all suffering.
A man looked at his hand intertwined with another. He grinned saying, "I love you."
A woman laughed, "I love you, too."
As the happy couple wandered the park holding hands and sharing their smiles to one another, a shadow crept behind them burning their imagine into his dark and twisted mind. He would end all happiness. He would end all love. He would end them.
Just a few moments passed before the thump of a falling figure sounded and the scream of his companion rung in the air being heard by no one but the culprit.
That love once declared shattered in an instant as the green-faced man stuffed them in his car. He drove away with terrified friends and a new-found sense of pride. He fell asleep respecting himself for the first time in a long while.
His phone's buzzing woke him from his nap. He had been working well into the night on his new robotics design. "Hello."
The voice on the other side reached his ear in a harsh yet hushed manner, "Hey, Dash. Did I wake you?"
Rubbing his left eye, Dashiell yawned, "No...of course not."
"It sounds like I woke you."
"Well, you didn't."
Ready to get back on the subject, the voice dropped it, "Okay, well, I need to talk to you. Do you have a minute?"
Dashiell's sleepiness washed away with the sound of his seriousness. He knew exactly what this was about, "Sure, Owen. I have all the time in the world for my favorite brother-in-law."
Owen continued, "I want to offer Addie my help in any way that I can. Ellie would hate me for saying this, because she wants both of us as far away from her job as possible. But I can't just stand and watch. I know something big is going on, and I am in a good position to give some help. I have friends with money and power. I work under the goddamn Attorney General most of the time."
Dashiell interrupted his monologue, "Hey, hey, hey...Owen, Eloise knows what she is doing. You want no part of this. I am not officially a part of this. Addie is not taking any of our help, because that is her job. A job she may not have picked for herself but one she prides herself on. She is not going to take your help as she should."
"I can't watch my family suffer without doing anything about it, without standing up for them. There is this powerful force telling me that my family needs me. Adelaide needs someone in her corner, and I just want to be in her corner."
Dashiell sighed, "Owen, don't be the guy in her corner. The guy in her corner always dies. Addie would not want you in her corner. People closest to her in that line of work always end up dead. You don't want be that guy. Leave that position for someone else, someone we won't be miss. We won't grieve. Do you understand?"
"Yes, but..."
"No, buts. Leave it alone. Carry on with your life. Actually, go to New York with your sister and take Ellie with you. Don't be here. I'm headed to California, because she does not want us near."
"Maybe, she's wrong."
Dashiell cringed, "No, she's never wrong. Look, don't do anything stupid. Hang up, ask for some time off, and go somewhere you think you and Eloise will be safe. If you can without rising suspicion, take mom and dad with you. If you can't, don't worry about. I'm sure Adds will take care of it."
The breathing on the other end was raspy and sporadic. Owen was displeased at the advice Dashiell had given him, "Fine. Look, I have a meeting. If you change your mind about this whole thing, please, please call me."
They hung up, and Dashiell felt alone. As he sat there in the dark, only one thought crossed his mind in the next ten minutes: this must be how Adelaide constantly feels when she must make a decision about the big stuff, whatever that stuff may be. He did not like it, and thanked the heavens that her job was not his job. He slowly remembered that once upon a time it could have been. If his parents had not been surprised by an unexpected pregnancy, he would had been in her position.
Rubbing his face, he argued with himself. He knew that the smart thing to do would be to fly far away from DC, yet the turmoil laid in the guilt churning his stomach. Nope, he could not do it. Owen's force may be telling him to run into the line of fire, but his force screamed to duck and cover. He called to confirm his flight, and finished packing.
He would be gone by the end of the day.
He hated them.
They ruined his beautiful work, and now he roamed the night for another couple just as perfect, just as wonderful. How in the hell was he suppose to that? Tiptoeing, he heard voices whispering and laughing and cooing to one another.
The woman was amazing, blond hair, thin, medium height. The man was tall and broad. He looked strong and handsome in the moonlight. They would be brilliant even better than the last two whom did not last. They turned on each other faster than he would have liked.
These two would do better than them. It would be beautiful and magical and powerful. His fingers twitched in anticipation of the blood and the screams and the tears. Not able to hold it together, he attacked much like the time before this with the man landing on the ground and the woman crying into the void.
Driving off, he smiled to himself pleased with his new conquests.
Big laughter burst through the glass office doors into he bullpen as Morgan and Glover walked out of the elevator and through those doors.
"Hey, it doesn't matter anyway. I knew this would be the end, but I ignored it and took the job anyway. I must've wanted her to leave me."
Morgan's laugh died down with the mention of the failed marriage. He held no experience in that area to be able to give him any real advice. Maybe, he should send him toward Rossi's office.
Any chance of having a heart to heart disappeared once Garcia paraded pass them and straight into the Hotch's office. They talked briefly before joining the rest of them in the bullpen.
Hotch marched into the conference room announcing, "We have case."
Morgan analyzed the situation. By their boss's appearance and Garcia's frown, this one was not going to end well. Searching for the rest of his team, they all found themselves in the room. He sat in his usual seat turning to talk to Reid. "Sorry, Reid's always here. It's kinda weird when he's not."
Glover chuckled, "He doesn't miss work much does he."
"Pretty Boy? Only when Hotch drags him out of this building."
Garcia gripped the remote control, "Prepare yourselves, my heroes with white hats. This one is a dozy. We are headed to Washington state to help the police solve the gruesome deaths of Maya Finn-Davis, Trevor Cox, and Timothy and Allison Silverman. The women had been repeatedly raped and eventually stabbed, while the men had been castrated and shot. Women found a day before the men, but relatively in the same type of location. All four of them had been found by a beach."
JJ spoke first, "Well, something about couples angers him. It could mean that he recently lost his own significant other."
Taking his cues from her, Glover added, "I imagination he lost a wife or a girlfriend to another man. You don't show that much anger to both parties unless the man was not you."
Hotch turned to Garcia, "Was there any DNA recovered from the bodies."
Garcia shook her head, "No, sir. He used a condom when he raped both women and gloves when he did everything else. Both bodies were relatively clean. No evidence found."
Rossi stared at the pictures, "There was only two days between the police finding the first couple and the abduction of the second. We are running on borrowed time here. We already lost a day, if he keeps to the same schedule."
Hotch agreed proclaiming, "Which is why we are headed to Kent now. Wheels up in thirty."
Everyone sprang up from their chairs and headed out but Morgan. He simply glared at his tablet with all the information they had on the case.
Walking closer to him, Garcia asked, "Hey, Hot Stuff, you okay?"
Morgan stood up and faced her, "This case is one of those cases were everyone knows it would go a lot faster, a lot smoother, if Reid was here. This one is not going to end well, Baby Girl. I know it. It won't end they we want it, not without Reid."
He left Garcia trembling in his wake. Fear was just a powerful motivator as pain was. She was going to find Reid, if it killed her. She stomped toward her lair, not knowing that the person on her mind had just entered his own lair in the opposite direction.
Jonas hated driving which was why he had been so thankful that Boston was not that far from DC.
Hasim hung up the phone, "Well, you see that guy, right there." He pointed to an averaged sized man with chestnut hair. "We have to get him. We can't screw this up. Nolan and Adil messed up in London and let one of the suspects get away. We follow him. We wait for the best opportunity."
Jonas nodded, "Yeah, I got it. Let's go eat. I'm starving, and he's just sitting there."
Hasim agreed and went to get some food as Jonas kept watch. They needed this. They needed a win. Those murders were going to pay for what they had done, for what they were doing to this world. Anger and pain were powerful manipulator. It always got what it wanted in the end.
He needed another couple. The others were gone, and he needed another one. He wanted another.
The night came and he followed a lovely brunette home who had a husband and baby waiting for her arrival. She went in and an hour later came out with her husband. Baby was inside with a sitter. He waited for two hours before he snatched them up just like the last two.
Husband was tall and firm. Wife was thin and beautiful. They were perfect.
Adelaide rarely left her office on a good day, but lately only an emergency would coax her out. She desired to find these people and bury them before she had to bury anyone she knew.
Calling her one trusted friend, she wished for a days rest.
"Hello."
Addie sighed in relief, "Hey, Javi. I need you to do something."
"Sure. Anything."
"Do you think you can get away from watching Manny for a few hours. I want you to do another sweep of Spencer's apartment. I have something for him that he desperately needs."
"I don't know. I mean if I leave who's going to keep an eye on her. Someone has to stay, if I am gone for more than an hour."
Automatically, Adelaide's hands cradled her face, "Fine, Can you just give him something. I have a message for him. It should not take long. I would send Susana, but I don't want everyone knowing about Spencer."
"Got it. I'll leave in the middle of the morning. Just send me a shout when it looks like he's coming home."
"Thank you."
"No problem, Adds."
As Javier hung up, Adelaide stilled for a minute. Her heart raced and tears ran down her face. She was hurting, and she was suffering, and so was he. His pain came first. Spencer always came first. Pain made you realize what you love the most, what you scares you the most. Losing him frightened her, and she would do anything and everything to endure his safety. Something great and powerful was forcing her to ensure it.