Chapter 15
Week 05
Kelly MacDonald and Mike Brennerman, both agents from the IIU team, were assigned to go through Agent Reid's personal effects, starting with his briefcase down at the break table where they could spread out. They found a lot of what they expected, files, notes for various classes, a couple of paperbacks waiting to be read, phone charger, a toiletry kit. And they found a few unusual things. "Are these magic tricks?" Mike asked.
"I think so." Kelly took one, a pen and showed him how to make it move across the page.
"Huh." He kept digging. "Man, he lived on sugar. There are five candy bars in here and three packets of gummi bears."
"The brain runs on glucose, a brain like his would need a lot of fuel."
"Nice stationary." He pulled the pouch out of the bag.
"Any letters in it?"
"No." He pulled out a handful of paper slips. "Man, he spends a ton of time on the shooting range. "
"Let's see." She took the paper slips and started organizing them. "It looks like he goes twice a week. I bet he's good with all that practice."
"Yeah, I bet." Mike ran his hands along the inside of the bag. "That's it."
"That's it?"
"Yeah."
She blinked at him. "Johnny said he hadn't been assigned a tablet, he didn't carry any electronic devices other than his phone, so, no paper organizer, no calendar, nothing like that?"
"Nope, not a thing."
"Huh."
While Mike went to check out Reid's car in the impound lot Kelly took his desk. She started with a long, slow look, then she walked around the other desks in the room, giving them each the once over. "What?" JJ asked her.
"Have you taken anything off this desk?" Kelly asked in reply.
"Only case files, but those were all documented. Why?"
Kelly sat and started going through the drawers. Each one was meticulously organized, note pads here, paper clips there, and pencils ready to go. It wasn't hyper-organized, like you would expect from someone with OCD, but it was pretty close. "Do you know who gave him that?" Kelly asked at last, pointing to a lime green, heart shaped post-it note.
JJ looked. "Yeah, my son, a while back. Why?"
"Because that is the single personal thing on this desk; there isn't a family photo, there isn't a little toy; there isn't even a menu to his favorite lunch place. The only personal item is that heart and it doesn't give a single hint to its meaning."
JJ blinked at the desk. "You're…right." She admitted. "But that doesn't fit Reid."
"Oh?"
"Yeah. He's open. He shares everything with everyone; his life is an open book. I mean sometimes he babbles incessantly about what's going on in his head. He doesn't hide anything from us."
"Well, if I didn't know better I'd say the person you're describing and the owner of this desk are two completely different people."
"Yeah."
Mike joined her. "We need to add a stop at his gym to the list." He told Kelly. "I checked; he doesn't use the one here. We might try Georgetown."
"Reid doesn't go to the gym." JJ told them.
Mike looked at her. "Then why was there a bag of seriously funky gym clothes in his trunk?"
JJ turned to a figure walking by. "Hey Morgan? Did you know Reid was hitting the gym?"
"Reid?" He started chuckling, only to see the confused look on the IIU team's faces. "Wait, you're serious?"
"Yeah," Mike and Kelly just look at each other a long moment.
"Right," Morgan nodded, suddenly fascinated by his coffee. "Let us know what you find."
The next stop was, naturally, his apartment. No doorman, of course. "Does he know his neighbors well?" Mike asked Rossi.
"I have no idea." Rossi replied as he let them in. "The apartment is exactly the way he left it, with the exception of cleaning out his fridge. There wasn't anything in the trash to take out; it looked like he had done it that morning. The last time we were here we were looking for any indication that he was in some kind of trouble, but we didn't find anything."
"Books," Kelly murmured as they went inside.
"I hope we only have to go through the important ones." Mike said.
"Given that he went through something like fifteen a week I think these are all important ones." Rossi replied. He settled into a leather chair by the door and watched for once.
"Great." Mike groaned. He started looking around the place, inch by meticulous inch.
Kelly went to the closet sized kitchen where she started opening cupboards. "Very bachelor. Loves his coffee and tea, does not cook, likes his takeout spicy, Indian, Thai, Asian. Hmmm, this magnet is from a coffee place that doesn't deliver, we'll have to check there. But…he has a shelf full of cookbooks." She pulled out a few and brought them to the door. "Not exotic stuff either, this is all comfort food."
"Huh." Mike replied. "No conversational group, he doesn't have company over. Cozy, this is clearly a private space. Chess set, I wonder who he plays."
"Himself, most likely," Rossi replied. "He's well-ranked, loves the game."
"Okay. His car originally belonged to his Mother, I bet that record player and his phone did as well, he is the original Luddite." He turned to the couch. "But when it counts he spends, this blanket looks to be authentic."
"He is from Vegas, he'd known genuine western from crap." Kelly pointed out. She crouched down. "I think the rugs are authentic as well. The art doesn't fit someone his age though, and they're not very good quality. You know, it almost feels like he just dragged his mother's stuff out here to get things started and never changed it." She looked behind a picture, then another. "D. Reid. This one too. And these books." She put the one she was holding back. "None of this is actually his."
"So you think he's still attached to the past?" Mike asked. He turned to Rossi. "What was his childhood home like?"
"His father abandoned the family when Reid was seven; he had to care for his mother on his own; paranoid schizophrenia."
Mike sighed. "He's not attached to the past. When did he come out here?"
"When he was eighteen, I don't know what he did before Gideon got him into the BAU"
"Eighteen, new job, no mother or father to help out, but probably the kind of job that pays moving costs. So he packed up the furniture that he had available and brought it out here." Kelly sighed. "None of this is personal. Where are the family photos?"
Mike looked around. "Good point. There isn't a single personal photo anywhere in here."
"He's so closed down he can't even open up in a private space." Kelly wandered toward the bedroom and bathroom.
Meanwhile Mike looked at the box on the coffee table. "Letters," he said. "What is this?"
"His girlfriend Maeve Donovan," Rossi replied. "The entire relationship was conducted by correspondence and over the phone. They actually met face to face moments before she died."
"How did she die?"
"Murder/suicide. She had a stalker, a former student, who finally caught up with her."
"And Dr. Reid saw the whole thing?"
"Yeah."
"Ouch."
"What is this?" Kelly asked from the bedroom.
They both went to look, and found her taking pictures of the room. She indicated a drawing in a simple, contemporary frame, the only such piece in the apartment. It was three stick figures, two large, the one in the middle small, done in crayon by a very young artist. "This and those cookbooks are the only unique things in this apartment. Any idea who the artist might be?"
"Probably Henry LaMontagne," Rossi replied, "His godson."
"Godsons give lots of drawings. Why was this one special enough to frame and hang across from his bed?"
Rossi sighed. "I have no idea."