Ch 4 Beauty and the Beast

Two Days ago

A little before nine in the morning, JJ came rushing into the conference room where the rest of the team sat working.

"Abby Parking was just found mauled to death by dogs." She said as an uncontrollable shiver ran down her back, she still held a fear of dogs from the case four years ago when Reid had been kidnapped and she was attacked by a pair of dogs. "She was found in the back yard of a house that was on the market to be sold. The previous owners had already moved out, the Realtor found her or what was left of her. The house sits on four point five acres of land much of it woods and it seems the Unsub set the dogs after her."

"What book was found at the scene?" Morgan asked not really wanting to know.

'Beauty and the Beast" She answered flatly.

"So in our Unsub's mind Beauty just go eaten by the Beast" Rossi said shaking his head.

"He is continuing to evolve." Prentiss commented.

"Prentiss, Rossi, and I will go to the crime scene, Morgan and Reid help JJ create a profile we can give the public, with so little evidence to go on we are going to have to hope that someone out there has seen him." Hotch Said as he, Emily and Dave quickly left the room.

The crime scene was further outside of town than any of the other disposal sites. Once they arrived Rossi and Hotch quickly headed towards the back yard where the body was found.

Emily began to follow them yet before she got too far from the car she felt this strange feeling that she was being watched. She turned around and scanned the crowd. It was common for an Unsub to return to the scene of the crime sometimes to even try and inject himself into the investigation. But all she saw where a bunch of bystanders taking pictures with their cell phones. She suddenly felt very silly; shaking off the feeling she quickly followed her fellow agents.

The three spent the next half an hour looking around the crime scene and talking to the police officers who were first on the scene and with the Realtor who discovered the body.

Rossi turned around to the other two, "This guy is far too smart, he never leaves a trace and we just can't seem to catch a break. We can't even find anyone to give the profile to except the general public and they haven't been able to provide any help. How can he get away with all of these abductions and murders without being seen." Dave said echoing Morgan's question from the day before.

"We need him to slip up and usually that means another victim but we have five victims now and we have learned almost nothing, no witnesses, nothing." Hotch said visibly frustrated he hated difficult cased like these, where the dead bodies kept stacking up and they could do nothing to prevent it.

"The Police didn't find any of the dogs that attacked and killed her?" Rossi asked.

"They are checking with animal control but I don't think we are going to find them." Hotch answered him.

Rossi noticed that Emily wasn't paying very much attention. "Emily are you all right?"

"Yeah I just—yeah I'm fine" she said, though for some reason she couldn't get over the feeling she had earlier. "There was no evidence that the Unsub was inside the house it was locked up and there was no sign of forced entry." She said quickly covering for her previous statements.

"It appears that he stayed outside, the police are trying to find any clean foot prints but it doesn't look like that is going to pan out, the ground is soft and the dogs we running all over this place. Nice way to dispose of evidence." Rossi said.

"How can anyone get away with five fairly complex murders and never leave a trace?" Emily asked in disbelief.

"I don't know, lets head back to the station, we aren't going to find anything else here." Hotch said.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Back at the station Morgan and Reid had finished a basic profile for JJ to release to the media. While she made the necessary preparations for the press conference the others attempted to find some way to catch the Unsub.

"Ok he never leaves a trace of himself, he grabs women from public places close to their homes and then leaves their bodies in an area just outside the city limits of New Haven. "Morgan said grumpily from his chair.

"He is getting more confident." Hotch added.

"His plans and methods of torture are growing more complex and yet the time between abductions is getting shorter. It almost feels like he has already mapped out these plans far in advance." Prentiss said.

"If he follows his current pattern he will take another woman in two days." Reid determined.

"Good thing JJ is warning the public, maybe if people are being extra vigilant then someone will see something, maybe if we get lucky the next potential victim can avoid him all together." Rossi said hopefully.

"Luck hasn't been on our side at all during this case." Prentiss injected.

"Our luck has to change sometime," Rossi countered.

"This guy has to be to torturing these women at some other place and then killing them at these crime scenes."

"Morgan's right the only blood and prints found at any of the scenes belonged to the victims." Agreed Hotch.

"That would make it easier to prevent any trace of him to be left behind." Rossi added.

"It's interesting with the first two women they had no sedatives in their system while the last two and I would bet Abby Parking all had been given sedatives ." Prentiss commented.

"With the last three he has kept them for longer periods of time it is possible he is using the sedatives to control them further." Reid hypothesized.

"Ok There has to be someone out there who saw something. JJ is asking anyone who believes they might have seen anything to contact the hot-line. I want us to split up, each of us will head to one of the abductions sights tonight around the time these women were kidnapped, talk to the people who are working at that time and look around for places where the Unsub could have hidden himself while he waited for these women." Hotch ordered.

Everyone nodded in agreement, doing anything was better than waiting for another woman to be abducted.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

That was how Emily Prentiss came to be standing in front of a video store a little after eleven o'clock at night. The parking lot was almost entirely empty; the only other business next to the video store was a local pizza place and it had closed an hour before she got there. She had already spoken with the two teenagers working the late shift at the video store. They swore they didn't see anything that night a month before.

She then headed back out to the parking lot to search for a place where the Unsub may have hidden himself while waiting for Angela Banks.

She was nearly to the back edge of the parking lot when she heard a noise from behind her. She turned around but nothing seemed out of place. The next thing she knew someone had delivered a hard blow to the back of her head, she never saw him coming.

Emily Prentiss only had a few moments of blinding pain before the world went dark.