Chapter Thirteen

Kristina looked up at the brick apartment building before her, checking the address again on a slip of paper to make sure it was the right place.

Satisfied that Penelope hadn't pranked her and sent her to the wrong building, the brunette pulled into a parking spot and killed the engine.

Spencer's apartment was on the second floor at the end of the hall. Kristina paused briefly, taking a deep breath before knocking lightly on the door.

The younger agent was frozen in shock when the door swung open.

"Hi," Kristina broke the silence, trying to determine if this visit was a big mistake. Spencer didn't look like he was expecting any visitors that day- he donned a old gray sweatshirt, a pair of jeans, and of course, his trademark mismatched socks.

"Hi...come in, come in," Reid replied, opening the door further to let the brunette into his apartment.

She shuffled across the aged wood floors to follow Spencer into the living room, where an old, worn, gray couch faced a tv in front of an exposed brick wall. He picked up a quilt that was crumpled up on the couch, making room for her to sit.

"Sorry my place is such a mess..." he mumbled, but Kristina waved it off.

"No worries, I just want to stop by and...I got you something," she held out the book, a small peace offering that she picked up after coming back from Columbus.

His lips curled into a smile when he read the cover.

"Intermediate French for Dummies..."

"Yeah...I couldn't find Intermediate French for Geniuses but I figured that's the next best thing," she quipped with a smile.

He turned to the back cover and she continued.

"Should take you what, five minutes to read that entire thing?"

"At three-hundred and eighteen pages, assuming it's the standard two-fifty words-per-page, it would take me just under 4 minutes to read it," he replied quickly, and Kristina chuckled.

"Vous ne'êtes pas réel..." she muttered under her breath, catching Spencer's attention.

"What was that?"

"It's all in the pronunciation," she changed the subject, "maybe I could help you practice sometime."

Reid paused, studying her expression.

"Kristina, what are you really doing here?"

She sighed.

"I'm trying to apologize."

"You don't have anything to apologize for," he shot back all too quickly, and Kristina shook her head.

"Yes, I do. I was a jerk. I really hope we can be friends."

"I don't really have friends," Reid mumbled.

The older woman leaned back into the couch.

"Well, now you do."


"Hey, Mama Bear, how's it going?" Penelope greeted her best friend as she let herself into the Jareau household, where JJ and Henry were wrestling on all fours in the living room. While his mom was momentarily distracted by their visitor, Henry took the opportunity to throw all of his weight into her, knocking her to the side. She retaliated by pinning him to the floor with her left forearm.

"Hey Pen, we're great-gimme a second..."

Despite his best attempts to free himself from her hold, Henry was trapped. JJ tickled the four-year-old and sent him into a fit of giggles.

"Say it," she prodded him, and he shrieked in response.

"Uncle! Uncle!"

Jennifer rose victorious, while Henry dramatically sprawled across the carpet in defeat.

"Mama Bear don't mess around," Garcia noted, holding her arms out for a hug from the petite blonde. JJ grinned.

"I let him win, sometimes."

"You guys are just too cute for words," the tech analyst decided, lowering her voice so that Henry couldn't hear.

"We need to talk, Jayje. Minus Baby Bear."

Jennifer nodded, and turned to her son.

"Hey, Henry...Penelope and I need to talk about grown-up stuff, why don't you go upstairs and play with some of your toys?"

Henry bounded up the stairs and the two women were left alone.

"Okay, Pen, spill."

"I'm worried about Morgan." she blurted out. "He called me last night asking for the name of a victim in Nashville from 6 months ago and it just doesn't feel right, Jayje."

Jennifer sighed.

"He called me too."

"Then you know what he sounded like. JJ, he's freaking out over this thing and I don't know what to do."

She glanced down at her lap and then back up at her best friend.

"Y'know, I'm not sure what to think anymore, to be honest."

This made Penelope pause.

"What? What do you mean?"

Jennifer knew that Garcia didn't care for the harsh side of their job, but when Morgan called her last night all the pieces of the puzzle known as Kristina Kent began falling into place.

"Morgan sent me Katie Glenn's autopsy report. She showed signs of being bound, tortured, and sexually assaulted...before being burned in a gasoline fire in downtown Franklin, Tennessee."

Garcia winced as JJ gave her the gruesome details.

"There was different stages of bruising on her torso, meaning that whoever had her, kept her for several days. The guy who did this...he had to be one sick son of a bitch. But none of this was in the file."

"What does that mean?" Penny inquired, not entirely sure if she wanted to know.

"It means there was a cover-up. Agent Kent and Agent Washer's names were nowhere near this case, I checked. But when Katie Glenn applied to the FBI, Kristina wrote her a glowing letter of recommendation. She said Katie felt like a sister to her."

There was a furrow in Penelope's brow as she processed this information.

JJ continued.

"Regardless of what really happened, it was so bad that they were reassigned. Frank Washer, one of the greatest agents on the West Coast, retired twelve years early. They were chasing an unsub who might've been one of the most horrific sociopathic killers in the past ten years and the entire case just...disappeared."

"We shouldn't know all of this, Jayje!" Penelope insisted.

"It sucks, I know, but if she's going to stay on the team we need to know. Agents need a hell of a lot more than six months of therapy to recover from something like that."

Penelope had to conceded to that fact, based on personal experience that she'd rather not relive.

"One thing's for sure...work is going to be awful awkward on Monday morning."

She froze.

"You can't tell Hotch."

"Why not?"

"Because he has to report to Strauss!" Penelope shot back, frustrated.

"Jayje, you can't do that to her. Think about all she's lost already."

Jennifer's mind immediately shot to that night a week ago when the girls learned about Special Agent Kristina Kent and her sister Bridget, the murder victim. She instinctively reached up and felt the pendant of her sister's necklace around her neck

"You're right," she conceded.

"And don't you forget it, sister," Penelope smiled.

JJ's phone chimed, bringing a much-needed change of subject.

"That was Emily..." JJ grinned, knowing that her best friend would be very interested to hear how her date went.

"He bought her flowers...took her to Tosca."

Penelope gasped.

"Good man!"

"She really likes him."

"Well, at least one of us is having good luck in that area," Penny chuckled.

"Tell me about it," JJ retorted, rolling her eyes playfully.


Kristina shoved the empty take-out box of orange chicken to the side as she propped her feet up on the coffee table. Her phone rang again-the fourth time in the past half hour- and she ignored it, again. The last thing she needed was a pity party courtesy of Derek Morgan. One apology was enough for today-now she just wanted to sink into the couch and distract herself from her mandatory one-week evaluation with Agent Hotchner tomorrow morning.

The way she saw it, she had a fifty-fifty chance of staying in the unit. She had lost her balance a couple of times, had forgotten to keep her composure. The seasoned Agent had been decidedly reckless with her second chance, but she wouldn't let it happen again. She would be the best damn profiler they had ever seen.

A knock on the door broke her focus, and a furrow formed in her brow as she instinctively reached for her gun.

When a familiar voice called out her name, however, she relaxed her shoulders and stood to see to her visitor.

She frowned upon seeing SSA Prentiss standing in front of her door.

"Emily, what are you doing here?"

Ignoring the indignation in her tone, Emily replied nonchalantly.

"The team is going out; Morgan said you didn't answer your phone."

"Yeah, i'm not feeling up to it tonight."

Emily could tell something was bothering her. She had a feeling she knew the answer to the question before she even asked.

"You wanna talk about it?"

Kristina looked down at her feet.

"Not particularly..."

Predictable.

"Okay," she began, "Y'know, I don't think i'm feeling up to it tonight either. But, if you're interested..."

Emily pulled a bottle of red wine out of her purse, and Kristina's eyes lit up.

"You came prepared."

"I had a feeling," she shot back with a smile.

Kristina went in search of a corkscrew for the Bordeaux, while Emily followed her into the kitchen, passing the mountain of books.

"You have quite a collection here," she noted, picking up a hard copy of The Great Gatsby.

"Where did you find all of these?"

"They were my dad's," Kristina explained as she opened the bottle of wine.

"He was a literature professor at Stanford. He gave them to me when I graduated, a sort of passing the torch. That one you're holding there, that's probably the most popular one. First edition, 1925. it belonged to my grandfather."

Emily carefully set it down as Kristina shuffled into the living room with two glasses of wine.

"So the intelligence runs in the family, huh," she noted as the younger brunette handed her one of the glasses.

Kristina shrugged.

"Yeah, I guess."

Emily immediately noticed the hesitation at the mention of her family.

"You miss your parents?"

She let out a deep sigh, confirming Emily's hunch.

"We don't talk very often. I love my parents, but I just...they shouldn't have to know what we do every day."

"My mom and I haven't spoken in probably six months," Emily admitted, taking a sip of wine. Kristina studied her for a moment.

"Emily, what are you really doing here?"

Emily should have known the young agent would rather get to the point than engage in pointless small talk. Kristina was more like her than she realized...which is partially why she had to come here. She could see the pain behind the detached, laser-like focus. She remembered that feeling, all those years ago, when she failed to keep her emotions in check. She remembered the day Lauren Reynolds became more than just a cover, and most of all, she remembered the absolute heartache when the walls around her came crumbling down. Emily resolved to compartmentalize those feelings, to tuck them away and never expose herself to that sort of weakness again. Lauren Reynolds was gone, but Emily Prentiss would never forget.

"Look, I know what it's like," she replied, "to not want to let anyone in. It seems easier, to build up the walls. Emotions are messy."

Kristina chuckled, but avoided eye contact.

"Yeah, i'm a big girl. I can handle myself."

"Oh, I know you are," Emily shot back, "But I also know that this tough girl act is just that-an act."

Kristina arched an incredulous eyebrow.

"Really?"

"Yes, really," the older woman tipped her wine glass.

"I know this because I'm just like you. You just want to do your job, and have that be enough. But you know what happens when you do that?"

She paused briefly, waiting for Kristina to meet her eye before she continued.

"You explode."

The brunette looked down at her lap.

"If you came here to get me to talk about my feelings..."

Emily stood up to retrieve more wine.

"Oh, trust me, I know better."