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A/n Adele asked me to thank you all for your lovely reviews, adding this story to your alerts or favorites. Oh yeah, thanks from me too!
"If you'd please be sure not tell her that there's a problem. Yes, as I said, there's reason to think he's missing, but I don't want to upset Diana Reid. No, I'll call you Dr. Norman, as soon as I know something more concrete. No, I don't think he'll contact you, but if he does, please call me. Thank you!"
Hotch slammed his phone shut. The room was quiet enough to hear a pin drop. The team averted their eyes as one from the scowl that they should have been used to, but that still terrified them.
"Hotch," Rossi was the first to break the silence that had descended like midnight in winter. "What did her doctor say?"
"Oh Dianna Reid is in perfect health. Reid hasn't been in to see her since the Riley Jenkins case closed."
The rest of the team resembled statues made from stone as Hotch gave them the bad news that included the fact that Reid had never been summoned to Bennington.
"Sir, I don't know Agent Reid that well, but couldn't he have just gone off on his own. Maybe he wanted to go some place that -"
"He wouldn't just go off on his own without telling anyone."
"Morgan, I'm not trying to say that -"
"You're right Jordan, you don't know him!"
"Morgan!"
"She doesn't know Reid."
"Be that as it may, we have a case to solve. I need all of your heads in this one. The sooner we wrap it up the sooner we get back to Quantico and figuring this out."
"Hotch!"
"No, we're not here to find Reid. We're here to find Glen Simeon."
Morgan had been on his feet as though he was about to tear out of the building and walk back to the jet. He took his seat again and ignored Jordan who was studying her file and ignoring him.
"Everyone listen to me…" Hotch said. All eyes turned to him and he went to the head of the conference table. "I understand that you're all concerned about Reid. I am too… I don't want this to be another Georgia. We function well as a team because we care for each other like a family. That caring makes focusing on this case, and not on Dr. Reid, that much more difficult. I ask you all to think about Glen Simeon. Doesn't that little boy deserve our full attention? You know that statistics for missing children. We have less then a day to find him. Do I wish that we didn't have to choose between a small boy and our friend? Yes I do! So let's get back to work and find Glen so we can go home."
"Hotch is right… We have to focus on the case. Reid wouldn't want us to drop this just to help him."
"I hate to be the one to say this, but what we need right now is Reid." Emily said, looking right up into Hotch's dark eyes.
"Yeah… We need him, but he's not here. Let's get going on the profile for this and close it."
"Okay, we have little to go on. There are no finger prints, hair, or fibers at the scene. The boy was taken in broad daylight, which suggests some level of organization."
Morgan's phone beeped and they all jumped. Emily laughed in reaction and Rossi looked at the phone as though it held the answers to all the secrets of the universe.
"Hey Baby-girl… Give me some good news." He put the phone on speaker.
"I can't, I haven't found anything that peaks my interest in the good citizens of Rock Creek. That's the good news ladies and gentlemen.
"What's the bad news my lady?"
"I can't find anything on the entire Simeon family or Evelyn Cash before they moved to Rock Creek. It's like they sprang fully formed from the brow of Vermont."
"I thought Athena sprang from the brow of Zeus." Rossi said.
"Someone other then Reid got my mythology analogy." Everyone went very quiet. "Hey you guys are you still there?"
"We're fine Garcia. Thanks for the info."
"I'll see what else I can find out."
"That's an interesting turn of events."
"Yeah Dave, that's what worries me."
---
Agent Calloway opened the lock on the door to the room he was using till this was over. It was right down the hall from where Agent Reid stayed. What would the young man think to know that his new boss was just feet away from him?
His quarters, as he called them, were much larger and better equipped than the small room that Dr. Reid had although that room was much bigger than the young man's apartment.
Agent Calloway went to his kitchen and took down a bottle of vodka. He grabbed his martini shaker out of the cabinet and set to work mixing his drink. The wood block counter in the center of the kitchen was empty, but for his glass and the shaker as he stood there sipping the drink and thinking about his latest triumph.
It was time to share the news with his dear old mother. He went down the hallway that with its white painted walls that were devoid of photographs or paintings just like the rest of the "apartment." The room at the end of the hall had another locked door which he opened with his key. It was empty but for blood red carpet, white walls and a carved wooden pedestal at the very center of the room. Atop the pedestal was an urn, hand painted in black with white lilies and green leaves.
Lilies had been his mother's favorite flower. She'd grown them all over their yard when he was a child. The garden had flourished while he'd been ignored except for the endless lectures. And after his father had had enough and left, it had only gotten worse. But, she was his mother and he did everything in his power to please her.
"Everything is in place mother. Soon I'll be right where I deserve to be." He put out a trembling hand to touch the smooth surface of the urn. "You'll be so proud of me mother." His voice shook and caught in his throat.
His hand became a fist that wanted to smash the urn to the floor. "Bitch… Nothing I ever did was good enough for you. But I'll show you now, soon everything will be right and you'll see that I'm not a failure."
He opened his hand and watched the red blood well up out of the crescent marks made by his fingernails. One drop ran down the palm of his hand and fell to the carpet, blending in with the deep crimson pile. He touched one finger to the bloodied palm. The glistening red blood was suddenly too much like the blood his mother had coughed at the end of her terminal bout with pancreatic cancer.
"No, I won't think about that now. You can't make me remember."
He ran out of the room to the bathroom that was nearly identical to the one in Reid's quarters. The ice cold water from the taps he turned on made the wounds sting and hurt, driving out everything but the face of Aaron Hotchner. Oh how long had he waited to wipe that look of superiority off the man's face? It would happen soon when he failed to find Dr. Reid. Section Chief Strauss wouldn't be able to turn a blind eye this time.
---
Reid picked up the photograph Calloway had left on his table. If Calloway had a team of profilers working with him, then what other resources did he have at his command? What if he got her killed by refusing to cooperate?
But he couldn't remember that night. It was all a jumble of light and darkness and trees that trembled and sang in the wind.
The trunk opened to darkness and light at the same time. The light was bright enough to blind but he tilted back and struck out with his legs anyway. There was a crunch and a loud cry before the light fell away and left them in half darkness. The owner of the light cursed loudly and tried to grab him as he attempted to pull himself out of the trunk.
"No… "
He rolled away, falling over the edge of the trunk and into leaves that crackled and crunched under his body. The ground was damp and it smelled like…"
"NO!"
His breath whistled out of his chest. His heart raced so hard that it hurt. And for the first time in months the craving for the drug that had held him captive burned in his blood like acid. Oh he wanted to feel that release that was nearly sexual in its intensity. It would take him away from all of this and then maybe he could forget where he was.