Disclaimer: See chapter 1

A/N: I may be late posting tomorrow's chapter, the final chapter, as I have to leave to get my plane before 6am so I doubt I'll be able to post until I get home.

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As the team was again on the I95 headed east, Reid pulled a card out of his pocket and dialed his cell. "ER, Thompson," came the response when the call was answered.

"This is SSA Dr. Spencer Reid of the FBI. I was calling to inquire about the condition of my wife, Allie Reid?"

"Just a minute," the woman's voice said and he could hear her yell, "Who's got Allie Reid, the husband's on the phone." Some more time elapsed. "Hold on," the voice said again, "her nurse is coming."

Finally another voice came on the line, "Mike Harrison RN, how may I help you?" This voice was more pleasant and less harried.

"This is Spencer Reid; can you tell me how my wife Allie is doing?"

"She's had ten stitches in her head. Her left ulna is fractured. It was a clean break and she now has a cast on her left arm. She's got a lot of bumps and bruises all over her body. Her neuro checks have all been normal. Her blood pressure is a bit elevated but then in her situation, mine would be too. We did a CAT scan and there's no internal damage other than the gash to her head. She's worried about her daughter, of course."

"Could…could you tell her that I called and that I…that I love her. I hope to have Joanna back soon."

"I will sir," he said

Reid ended the call, "How's she doing?" Emily asked.

"As well as can be expected," was all Reid said as he looked out the window.

"So how do you know this is the place?" Morgan asked as they neared their destination.

"Something Garcia said made me think of it. She said Sharon had put a dead rat in that girl's locker in high school and that made me think of the rat we saw at the Shady Slumber. That's where she first saw me. In her mind, that would be 'our place,' the place where it all began."

It seemed to take forever until the two SUVs at last turned into the former Shady Slumber motel. The blue Firefly was parked in plain sight in front of the second last unit where Reid had found Sharon Webb. Reid was out of the vehicle in a nanosecond and headed for the door when Morgan stopped him. "Hold on man. You can't go in there half cocked." The others had caught up with him and vests were donned and positions were taken outside the door of unit eleven. Hotch raised one, two, then three fingers and the team burst in the door, "FBI freeze," Rossi said to Sharon Webb standing by the bed holding Joanna in her arms.

Reid's heart crumbled at the sight of his precious little Joanna in the pretty mauve outfit in which Allie had lovingly dressed her being held in the arms of this psychotic woman in the dingy dirty room. The baby saw Reid and began to squirm in Sharon's arms, reaching her arms out to her daddy. Reid's hands began to shake as he realized his glock was pointed at his own precious daughter. "Ah…Ah…" she kept saying as her arms reached for Reid.

"Sharon, why don't you hand over the baby to Dr. Reid," Hotch said. "There's nowhere for you to go."

"And if I don't, what are you going to do, shoot me?" She looked at the six weapons pointed at her and the baby in her arms. "I don't think so." She held on more tightly to Joanna, who was beginning to fuss.

Reid looked at his teammates weapons too as he tried not to panic. He had to think of something to end this peacefully. He couldn't risk anything happening to Joanna. At that moment, Gideon's words from years ago when he'd boarded that train in Texas came back to Reid, Play into his delusion. "No, nobody's going to shoot, see," he said as he laid his gun on the bed. "They insisted on coming," he flicked his thumb at his teammates. "I couldn't stop them, I tried. They're really upset with what happened to Allie."

"She was standing in our way," Sharon said.

"I know, I know you're right."

"That's why I took the baby, so we could be together."

"It was a good idea but we really don't need the baby, do we? We just need the two of us."

"But I thought you adored the baby," Sharon asked.

"Yeah, well that's what I let everybody think. Allie went and got pregnant so I kind of had to marry her and be a father even if it wasn't in my plans. So I play the role but the baby is really Allie's thing. So, why don't you ditch the kid and Allie can have the baby and we can have each other." He moved closer and Joanna reached her arms out again, beginning to cry, wondering why daddy wasn't picking her up. He ran his hand up Sharon's leg.

"If I give you the baby, how do I know you won't just run off with her?"

"No, I won't and to prove it, don't even give the baby to me. JJ'll take the baby," he stepped back and motioned JJ forward. JJ holstered her weapon and stepped up. Sharon hesitated for a moment, and then handed over the baby. Joanna reluctantly went to JJ although she was twisting and still reaching out for her daddy who was ignoring her. Reid closed his eyes in relief when his daughter was finally in his friend's arms. As they were leaving the room Joanna continued to fidget in JJ's arms, crying and reaching back for her daddy. When JJ and Joanna were out of the room, Reid turned to Sharon who smiled as he came toward her.

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Allie sat on the stretcher in the ER. She had been attended to by so many people. The doctor had stitched the side of her head after Mike, her nurse had shaved off a big chunk of her hair. They kept checking her pupils, hand grasp and kept asking her how many fingers they were holding up. They'd x-rayed her arm and her skull, declaring she had a fractured ulna but no skull fracture. A CAT scan of her head had revealed no other damage. Then she'd been sent off to the cast room where an orthopedic physician had set the arm and applied a cast that was now drying on a pillow. It seemed every two minutes someone else was in to do something else to her. With all these people around she'd never felt more alone in her life. She wanted her husband and her daughter. What if Spencer couldn't find Joanna? Was this all her fault? Had the letters she'd sent to William Reid fallen into the wrong hands? Tears fell down her cheeks as Mike, a middle aged man with fair hair cut very short and a goatee entered. "Your husband just called to see how you were. He hopes to have your daughter back soon. He said to tell you he loves you."

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When JJ had Joanna out of the room, Reid rushed forward and grabbed the smiling Sharon roughly by the arms. "How could you do such a thing to my wife you bitch? You could have killed her," he said as he shook her while Morgan and Hotch tried to pull him away from the woman.

"I only did it for us," she said as she reached to touch his face.

Reid reached out and slapped her hand away. "Don't touch me. There is no us. There never will be an us. I can't stand the sight of you," he yelled with derision. He heard Joanna wailing loudly. He shoved Sharon hard against the wall. "She's all yours. My daughter needs me." Reid turned and strode out of the room, brushing forcefully by Morgan and Hotch turning them slightly toward the door.

"You can't leave me," Sharon screamed like a banshee while reaching in one swift motion before anyone could stop her for Reid's glock still lying on the bed and pointing it at his back as he walked away. Her finger pressed on the trigger. As Reid took the wailing Joanna from JJ he heard cries of "Drop the weapon," and then gunfire erupted in the motel room. Reid closed his eyes and covered Joanna's ears.

When the team exited the motel room they found Reid jiggling a crying Joanna in his arms and feathering kisses on her head. "It's okay, you're safe now, daddy's got ya." He looked up at his teammates and they shook their heads. "We have to get Joanna to the hospital, to Allie."

"We can't leave now Reid, you know that," Hotch said. "We have to call this in and wait for CSU." Reid nodded, walked to one of the SUVs, got in the back seat and pulled out his cell phone.

Rossi came up to Hotch who stood looking at Reid in the back of the SUV. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That Reid knew Sharon would be so enraged by his rejection that she would go after the object or her obsession, that she'd reach for his gun and we'd be forced to act. And that he also knew how resistant these stalkers are to any treatment, and that as long as she was alive Sharon Webb would be a threat to his family"

"Yeah, that."

"In Reid's state of mind, I mean with what happened to Allie and Sharon taking Joanna, he might not have been thinking clearly."

"Yeah, there's that."

"I guess we'll never know for sure."

"Nope."