xiii. Lowlands
She's officially assigned to the BAU for all of twenty minutes when he calls her from the empty bullpen.
"Close the door, Agent Prentiss," he orders her. She does a great job of hiding the wince at the hardness in his voice, light years different from his sweet, gentle tones in her dreams.
"Your resume is bullshit," he says by way of introduction, then tosses the file across the table to her. "You worked in the Midwest field offices? St. Louis, Chicago?"
She doesn't respond or even glance at the paperwork. Clyde Easter did a bang-up job of putting together her fake dossier, a list of references and cases that she's supposedly worked as she began her career with the FBI. Just not good enough to fool him.
"It's funny because I distinctly remember a case involving 15 missing girls where you said you were with Interpol. Tell me why a Midwest field agent would go undercover on a high profile case with a foreign intelligence agency."
The Lisette Geroux case. She wonders if Morgan will bring it up too. She racks her brain for a plausible explanation, but he continues as if her response wouldn't matter anyway.
"I'm supposed to trust you with the lives of my team when I don't even know what your actual employment history is?" he asks, his voice eerily calm. "I'm supposed to trust you when you've never once told me the whole truth?"
"Is this really about trust? Because I trusted you when you said you weren't married back in Lucia," she shoots back, her rediscovered voice laced with caustic acid. He visibly recoils at that comment. She knows it's a below the belt shot, but she won't be treated as a second-tier agent.
"That's not fair. I signed my divorce papers before I met you."
"And I was assigned to a different mission both of the times I left. I had a job to do. A job I did willingly and well. I had to walk away–"
"Had to walk away? No one forced you," he snarls.
"You can't even begin to understand the shit that I've done for this country," she laughs mirthlessly.
"Feel free to enlighten me."
"Classified. Half of what I did isn't even on record." She's a bit surprised that she offers that detail. She rushes out her next words to keep from revealing her secrets.
"Now if you want me to prove my skill and capability as a member of your team, I am more than happy to train hand-to-hand combat or marksmanship with you. Hell, quiz me on the fucking FBI handbook, but I will not stand for you looking at me as if I can't be trusted to perform competently as a member of this team."
He stares at her and it scares her that she can't read him anymore.