Thank you for the reviews and comments about the extra scene. There'll be another extra scene at some point soon instead of a review reply.

Thanks once more to Chiroho for the beta.

Where the Blue of the Night

"There is only one difference between a madman and me. I am not mad."

- Charlotte Bronte

Chapter Seven

November 12th

She sat in the corner, near the door, exhausted. Sleep could not come; its presence was unwelcome, however much her body was demanding it. The past week had taken its toll on every member of the team; secrets had been revealed, private practises exposed, and they'd still had to deal with a case that had twisted like a snake – and with as much venom. But she couldn't sleep, for she knew that as soon as her eyes closed, he would return.

He had a wife, that was clear. They'd been right about that in the profile. And the conclusion they'd reached about his place of work was also correct. They knew him, though not well though. Certainly not as well as he knew them.

Every single one of them.

But she was his target. She was the reason for the things he had done, and she would have to live with that guilt. But she knew that was one of his forms of torture.

She rubbed at her wrists that were still chaffed from the rope. It was possible that he meant for her to untie them, to break free. He could well be expecting her to be lying in wait for him the next time he opened the door.

The door was a secure one, and it looked new. She had figured there were about five different bolts, which accounted for the time it took him to unlock the door. A dagger of pain flicked from her kidneys and she winced. He would know about her propensity for infections there, he would have read it in her file.

A strong sense of hatred and indignation sprang from her, enough to provide another boost of energy. That was all she was running on; the emotions she could conjure up from her situation, from her friends' situation, from Sophie's.

It was a cruel act, to take her, after everything she had already been through. But he knew that of course, knew every detail about the case in Calverville Point, and although he had no desire to hurt Sophie directly – they knew he empathised with her – she was the perfect bait and the most faultless way to cause pain for Emily. Emily – someone else he blamed.

She stiffened her back, trying to block out the agony that was threatening to double her over. If she could just wrong foot him, just catch him off guard, then maybe she could slip through the door and get out of there.

But would he then use that remote control and detonate whatever cruel plan his brain had been devising over the past five years?

She waited. Right now, it was all she could do.

November 4th

Hotch looked out from the window of his office at the scene in the bullpen below. Morgan and Reid were leaning over Reid's computer, reading something on the screen which seemed important. Emily was seated next to Garcia at her workstation, pointing at a piece of paper that Garcia had just brought over. Rossi wasn't back yet, and JJ was still with Agents Boyd and Sylvester, and had been for about an hour. He knew from what Agent Boyd had said earlier that they were going to interview each member of the team about their colleagues, as getting other perceptions could highlight something important. There was no guarantee that what they said would remain confidential.

He was worried; not just for the safety of the team, but for their capacity to cope with what was now happening and a case during which none of them would rest. Missing children were the worst, whatever the motive and whoever the UnSub. JJ, he could tell, was almost at breaking point. During the snatched few minutes he and Emily had stolen earlier, she'd voiced her concerns, reinforcing the conclusion Hotch had already reached. He wanted her to take a back seat in this case; to stay within the confines of the Academy building itself, and leave the interviewing and footwork to the rest of them.

And there was going to be a lot of that.

Without a local police department on the case, they were going to have to do a lot of the leg work themselves. Strauss had managed to commandeer four other officers, who were going to be supervised by Rossi. One of them, an Agent Harriet McKintyre, had been sent to Ms. Fletcher's house to remain with her. She'd worked on the Hostage Rescue Team for four years, so was used to similar situations, and there was no question of her discretion. The other three agents began tomorrow; their role would be discussed over dinner.

He left his office and went down the steps to the bullpen, eyes automatically looking up at him; they were conditioned to assume that his presence meant something had come up.

"Can we meet in ten minutes?" he said, looking round at them all. "We need to go through what we know so far - on all accounts."

"What about Rossi?" Morgan said. "How long's he going to be?"

"I'll call him now," Hotch said. "He went to speak with the private detective, but that was nearly three hours ago. He should be back soon." He found that he was slightly agitated by Rossi's lack of communication, and was trying to put it down to paranoia. He would prefer them to work in pairs, as they normally did, and that might be more possible tomorrow. However, today's agenda, and the need for immediate action, meant that they'd had to take on jobs individually, and Hotch couldn't begin to put into words the worry he'd felt when Emily had gone on her own to Juliet Fletcher's. He'd managed to focus – it had been at the same time as he'd had a meeting with Strauss – but it had been tough. Thankfully, she'd sent a few brief text messages, all case related and he'd been able to control the rate at which his heart had palpitated.

He was also aware that, with the exception of Rossi, most of the team were in denial about what was happening to them. Threats weren't unusual, but it was rare they had to deal with them like this. At the moment, for Morgan, Reid, Emily and Garcia, the threat to them was something that would be dealt with easily. There was a belief – there had to be a belief – that they were somewhat infallible, else they wouldn't be able to do their job. JJ had responded differently, because of Henry, and Hotch had been there before, as had Rossi. Before the end of the week, or even the end of the night, realisation would have hit home hard.

Hotch went back to his office and picked up the phone, dialling Rossi's new number. It rang five times before it was answered.

"Hotch?"

"Dave, we need you back as soon as you can get here," Hotch said, looking at the huddle that was now taking place in the bullpen. JJ had now joined them, looking pale.

"I've just finished, actually. It's been eye opening. Get the scotch open – the bottle you keep in your bottom drawer that you think I don't know about," Rossi said. He sounded upbeat, almost thriving.

"How are you getting back?" Hotch said, his intuition on overdrive.

"I was going to drive," Rossi said, his voice almost drowned out by the background noise of cars and the wind that seemed to be blowing itself into a gale. "But the tone of your voice seems to suggest I'd be better getting a cab."

"Where's your car?" Hotch said. If they were being watched, then there was every chance that someone could have followed Rossi. It was now dark outside; it wouldn't have been difficult for someone to have tampered with Rossi's car. This was something that should have been thought about before Rossi had gone to Pete Germaine's office.

"Parked outside. Have Boyd send one of his minions over when I get back. If it's safe, they can drive it into the lockup," Rossi said. "I've got a cab, Hotch. I'll be back in five." He hung up, leaving Hotch with an unsettled feeling in his stomach still.

He turned off his computer and picked up his briefcase. It would be another couple of hours at least before they even contemplated going home, or in his case, back to Emily's, but he had no intention of returning to his desk.

"Hey," he heard a voice as his door opened. "You okay?" Emily slipped in, her fingers resting on the tops of her jacket pockets. She looked the most exhausted he'd ever seen her, bar Colorado.

Hotch nodded, studying her some more. "I'm fine," he said. "Rossi's on his way. He's taken a cab."

She stared at the floor. "This is a big threat, isn't it? To us."

He wondered how she meant the latter part of her sentence for a moment. Did the 'us' refer to them as a team, or to her and him as a couple.

"I mean to the team, Aaron," she said. "And we need to let everyone know what Strauss said earlier."

"We do," he said, stepping towards her and the door. "And yes, this is a real threat. We need to set up procedures for how we're going to deal with this beyond tomorrow. There's a certain novelty right now, but it will wear off quickly."

"What makes this different?" she said.

He put the briefcase down on the floor. "Close the door," he said, taking a few steps back to the chairs and sitting down. She moved further into the room. "Mansfield missed some words in the letter. If he'd noticed them, we would have been called back from Utah immediately. And we think now there has been other correspondence that hasn't been picked up on."

"This is what you've been doing all day?" she said, sitting down facing him.

He nodded. "I asked to look at all threats that had been made in the past six months that contained the words 'watch', 'seen', 'betrayed' and 'lost'. Four hits came up; one had been sent to Strauss, two to Agent Mansfield himself, and one to an agent named James Faey who was shot four months ago whilst on secondment to the Chicago field office."

"I remember that. It was put down to an armed robbery – he was outside a seven-eleven at the time two masked men walked in," Emily said, Hotch knowing she could have given the details of the case as well as Reid could have. "You don't think it was something else, do you?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Three other people were killed in the incident, the bullets all matching the guns used by the men who were caught. They haven't been tried for Faey's murder, so I'm looking at it from a different angle."

"Does that mean you'll have to go to Chicago?" she said, and this time he could see the worry in her eyes.

"No. I think I'm pretty much tied to the office and your apartment, and anything I need from there can be faxed or emailed." He paused for a moment. "This is someone who seems to know us well. They're well planned and organised, and I don't think they're afraid to cross that line that most people who make threats are." He stood up again. "We should discuss this together. There's something else that's making me nervous, but I'll save it until Dave's back."

As if on cue, he heard Rossi calling out to Morgan, and Hotch and Emily made their way to the conference room where they found JJ and Reid, a carafe of coffee already made.

Hotch sat where he normally did, Emily taking the seat to his right. JJ gave them a weak smile, passing over a mug of steaming coffee. "I figured we're in for a long night," she said.

"Not if I can help it," he said. "We need to go through preliminary profiles for both cases, and share some relevant information, but sleep is going to be key over the next few days if we're going to get anywhere quickly." He hoped he was right with the few days part.

She nodded, passing another mug to Rossi, and then sitting down between Morgan and Reid.

"We're going to start with Boyd and Sylvester have discussed so far and where we are with the threat case," Hotch said, everyone settling quickly. He explained to them what he had just told Emily, giving slightly more detail about the circumstances around Faey's death.

"But how would Agent Faey be connected to us?" Reid said. "If it's an attack on our team, then he doesn't fit."

"And there, boy genius, you are mistaken," Garcia said, tapping a fluorescent pink pen against a notepad. "James Faey spent two months in the BAU about eleven years ago. It didn't work out as he couldn't deal with cases involving children so he moved into the drug squad, hence taking a secondment to Chicago." She caught Hotch's eye, and he gave her a discreet nod. Garcia had been swamped all day researching many different people. She'd had a tough few hours, especially when he'd told her to say nothing about what she was looking into for him. He did not want to alert the others if it wasn't going to be necessary.

"There have been several people on this team in the past few years," Morgan said. "Gideon and Elle, for example. Shouldn't we be keeping tabs on them?"

"They've both been contacted and told to keep a look out. However, both are out of the country. Elle's currently in Europe, and Gideon's non-contactable," Hotch said. "So far, there's nothing that suggests this is more than one person. It's someone who has a grudge against the team itself, or a member of the team, and is intent on taking revenge."

"We should rule out people who are seeking revenge on behalf of someone we have helped to incarcerate," Morgan said. "It's rare that someone would go that far."

Reid nodded. "It's more personal than that. They know too much about us."

Hotch raised his eyebrows. "They seem to know a lot more than we thought they did. We've had further correspondence from them this afternoon. A letter was passed to Marcia Davies who works in the cafeteria. She put it through security, and it ended up with Agent Boyd, then me. She doesn't remember who gave her the letter – it was put into her purse while she queued in a shop."

"What was in the letter?" Rossi said, his voice calm but determined.

"I'll read it to you," Hotch said. He glanced round at them. "'Dear Behavioural Analysis Unit. I see you're back from Utah and I hope your flight was a comfortable one; it may be the last one you take for some time, as I imagine you'll be confined to Virginia until you find out who I am. If you find out who I am. I hope Agent Morgan isn't too concerned about how he'll be reprimanded; they won't kick a black man out of the BAU. Ethnic minorities are too precious. And Dr Reid – stab wounds can be nasty. Make sure you get the dressings changed.'"

"'I'm sorry about the damage to Agent Rossi's house, but I know he can afford to get it repaired without getting his hands dirty. Working where you do pays quite well, I think, although some of you have expensive tastes. Derek should really shop around more instead of importing furniture from England – think of the carbon footprint he's creating too.'"

"'Anyway, this was just meant to be a short note to welcome you back. No doubt I'll be in touch soon – one way or another. Best keep your eyes open.' And that's where he leaves it. It's typed in an identical manner to the last one and the addressee – The BAU – is on a label on the envelope. There's nothing to identify it any more than that," he said, sitting back.

"He's issuing a challenge," Morgan said. "You can't catch me. He's also showing off about what he knows."

"Emails will have been intercepted and phone calls," Rossi said. "We've got a hacker."

"If he's a hacker, then he's one of the best," Garcia said, still tapping her pen noiselessly. "The other alternative is that he works here. You'd still have to get hold of passwords as each department's documents are encrypted differently, but if you're good, that's not difficult."

"Will he be traceable?" Rossi said, making Garcia visibly uncomfortable with his stare.

"It's unlikely. I can set up traps and monitor them, but if he's half good enough to get into our system, then he'll be bouncing off IP addresses all over the place, and sending false ID's," she said, putting the pen down.

Hotch nodded. "We need to do that in such a way it's not obvious. I've been working on a preliminary profile, and I'd like you to take a look to see if it needs amending before I send it over to Agent Boyd." He handed round copies. "We're looking for a white male between thirty and fifty with exceptional knowledge of computers. He's local, and has probably lived in this area for some time. He has no criminal record and will be perceived as a quiet, upstanding member of the community. He's likely to have been married and had a family, although a family disturbance may have triggered his obsession with this unit. It's unclear whether his focus is the team as a whole and what we do, or an individual within the team." He finished his summary, allowing a pause for any comments. None came. "Tomorrow I'm going to profile each of you individually with Agent Boyd. We need to see if anyone stands out as being a likely target. I will have access to what you have told Agents Boyd and Sylvester today – does anyone wish to say anything before we move on to the Alfie Fletcher case?"

Morgan shook his head. "You already should be aware of everything we've said in the interviews," he said. "It's all on file."

Hotch nodded. "I may need more information about relationships you've been involved in, and close friendships. It's possible that this is a stalker whose target has expanded to include the whole team."

"But we think it's a male, don't we?" said Reid. "That kind of narrows it down."

"Not necessarily," Rossi said. "Previous partners could have spoken to new boyfriends or husbands. You could be looking at something from a decade or more ago that's begun to manifest itself."

Morgan gave a nod. "I'm fine with that," he said. "I can't think of any old girlfriends with whom there's been an issue, and I've always been discreet with what I told them about my job. A lot of them didn't even know exactly what I did."

"Beyond Secret Agent, you mean," Reid said, casting a disapproving look.

"Well, kid, let's see how many of your past girlfriends Hotch needs to check up on. I could count them on a hand that only had two fingers..."

"That'll do Derek," JJ said, placing a hand on Morgan's forearm. "I'd like to get home before Henry's bedtime." It was enough to silence him.

Hotch added a glare to make sure Morgan stayed quiet on the matter. He was glad he wasn't being defensive about having to share aspects of his life outside of work, given what had happened in Utah. "If it is someone who works here, or someone who is watching us closely, they are going to know that our routines have changed – it's possibly what they're looking to happen, so the bomb at Rossi's may be a success in their eyes. We need to be vigilant. Don't leave your vehicles in public areas where they will be unattended, do your grocery shopping online for the next few days and don't go anywhere alone. Double check you homes when you enter. When we've finishing here we will be taken home by members of Boyd's team. You can stop off where you like on the way. What's happened is seriously going to impede on our lives until we catch whoever's responsible. You'll be picked up in the morning at eight." He paused again to give them time for questions or comments.

"I'd say it's unlikely for another attack to occur for at least twenty four hours. We'll get regular updates from him, and hopefully in his eagerness to communicate with us, he'll become sloppy and give something away. Are checks being done on new agents or workers here?" Rossi said, reaching over and picking up the carafe.

Hotch nodded. "Garcia's going to be doing that tomorrow. Which means she's going to be busy all day," he gave her a quick glance. She was sensitive, and did her best to please. The threat of further attacks on the people she regarded as her family was upsetting her greatly, and she had the propensity to become flustered. "We need some extra man power to assist with the Alfie Fletcher case. Four other agents have been seconded to us to do some of the usual police work. One of them is currently with Ms. Fletcher; the other three start tomorrow and I'm going to have them report to Dave. We have to be careful whom we involve in this. We need someone to assist with the technical side of the Fletcher case, so we have Kevin Lynch with us for its duration. I think we can assume that he isn't the one responsible for these threats." He looked at Garcia's face which had broken out into its first smile of the day. She hadn't known about Lynch's involvement, and although he knew she liked Kevin to be out of the way when she worked, she would take this as recognition of his skills.

"To keep this manageable I'm going to split the team," he glanced around again. They were used to working as a team of seven; now he was about to cut their resources in half and he wasn't sure what the reaction would be like. "Reid, JJ and myself will work on the case against us, with Garcia in support. Rossi will lead the Fletcher case. We'll meet at the end of each day, or if any issues arise, to pool resources then." There were nods, agreement, and he felt relieved. Reid was still injured, and probably shouldn't be working. Keeping him in the Academy building would be beneficial for his recovery, and with the UnSub corresponding regularly his analytical skills would be useful. JJ wasn't needed in her usual role; she was sensitive to other people and knew the team well. Apart from Rossi, the rest would open up to her easily should they need any personal information, and Rossi he could handle himself. "We need to talk through the Alfie Fletcher case. Dave?" He looked to Dave to start.

"Geoff Thompson is a piece of work. He is under the impression that Alfie has been taken by someone from a protest group connected with Juliet Fletcher's work..." Rossi began.

"Juliet Fletcher thoughtthe same," Emily said. "Jennifer Keeley has been making threats for about nine months. However, it appears that she has been in Dallas for the past ten days."

Rossi nodded. "I've just spoken to the private detective employed by Ms. Fletcher. He said that a room had been booked under that name where a right-to-life conference was taking place, but it hadn't been used. He only found this out a couple of hours ago. Pete Germaine – the PI – isn't the quickest, which is unfortunate for us."

Reid leant forward, reaching for the sugar bowl and taking a cube. "Is there a chance that this is an inside job? At some point it would be likely for Alfie Fletcher's parentage to come out, which would all but destroy Geoff Thompson's career. Disposing of him means there's less risk."

"If that were the case, don't you think he would have ended the affair with Ms. Fletcher already?" JJ said. "Why carry on with something that would cause so much trouble?"

"She could be blackmailing him," Rossi said. "There is the possibility that she is using her son as leverage to make him continue the relationship."

Hotch loosened his tie. "I think we can almost discount that. If she suspected Thompson was involved, she would have said something to confirm that."

"I agree," Emily said. "She comes across as a strong, independent career woman. She's clearly mortified about her son's disappearance – she broke down quite badly while I was there – but still holds Thompson in high esteem. Her panic is stemming from Keeley being in Dallas."

"Then we need to find Jennifer Keeley as soon as possible, and get a warrant to search her house. Tonight," Hotch said, glancing at JJ. "JJ, can you get onto that now, please. Reid, you look confused."

Reid nodded. "Morgan and I have been looking at the Evangeline Dwyer case, and two that preceded it. Amber Livesy went missing just over ten years ago. Her body's never been found. Matthew Horsfield went missing four years later. Eight months after his disappearance his skeletonised remains were discovered in a field – parallels with the Dwyer case. All the children were the same age, and all were from affluent backgrounds. There is a pattern there."

Hotch suppressed a groan. This could have been clear cut. "If nothing comes of Jenifer Keeley, then we need to dig out these old cases tomorrow. Look for who was suspected at the time of each disappearance, and cross reference them."

He sat up as JJ came into the room. "We have the warrant for Keeley's address," she said. "There are cars waiting to take us there now. Strauss is contacting the local PD to make them aware that we are carrying out an operation in their area and may need back up. No other details are being given."

"Great," Rossi said, standing up. "That'll get them on our side."

Hotch cast a look to the heavens, to whichever God was on duty, and asked for the type of rain they desperately needed.

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