Emily walks into the room the team will be using to track down Will's killer. She offers a smile to Reid.
"So, solved it yet?"
Reid gives her a small grin. "I wish. How's Henry?"
"Angry. I left him sobbing in Jen's arms. He's so…so confused and angry. He doesn't understand. It's like he thinks we're hiding Will from him."
Reid nods. "I can see why he'd think that."
"When we got here, Jen called and said he was asking for Dad. I have a feeling he's going to gravitate towards his grandfather because of his frustration with us."
"Are you okay with that?"
Emily nods. "I am. Whatever gives him comfort and…and whatever he needs right now."
"Good. If he needs anything let me know."
Emily smiles at him. "Thanks, Handsome. I'll make sure to have him call Uncle Spence if he needs to."
Reid smiles and gets back to his reports. Emily grabs a stack of backgrounds Garcia had printed out and starts to read through them, hoping to find a thread to pull.
Morgan slowly steps into the convenience store. "So, Will stopped here if he had to pick up something on the way home but it wasn't a regular stop for him."
"Right," Rossi agrees. "Gives more weight to the random act of violence angle."
"True. Unless the killer counted on that so nothing definitive there yet." Morgan studies the store. "Four cameras but one wasn't working. Did the killer know that?"
"Doubtful. Unless, of course, he had damaged it or this is an inside robbery job."
Morgan nods in agreement of those two scenarios. Rossi walks back to the coolers where Will had gone to pick up a gallon of milk.
"So Will is back here as the unsub enters. With his back to the doors he wouldn't have seen a masked man enter." He glances around. "In fact, even if he turned here he would have no clear view of the counter."
"So he hears the demand for money, puts the milk down, undoes his holster to give quick access to his gun, and slowly approaches the front of the store." Morgan stands as if he is the unsub as Rossi walks in Will's footsteps. "From here, I can't see you until you come around the end of that gondola," Morgan notes.
"And that is when I get my first look at you, too," Rossi confirms.
Morgan keys up the video feed on his tablet. The unsub continues to yell at the clerk, who seems to be so flustered he can't do anything. Will steps closer, his hands raised in a non-threatening manner and starts to speak.
"The unsub seems to calm down when Will speaks. Is it because another identity takes over or because he has finally figured out where his target is located?"
"We need to know what was said," Rossi states. "Is the clerk conscious yet?"
His answer comes from someone by the doors. "No. And there is still a question of whether he will wake up at all," Detective Todd Baylor replies.
Morgan offers his hand as the Army Reservist walks over. "Welcome back from overseas."
"Thanks. Back a week now. Was supposed to start back to work on Monday. No way in hell was I going to enjoy a few more days off when Will is…is…fuck, man."
Morgan nods. "I get it. So the clerk may never be able to help us."
"Nope. I've got two cops talking to businesses up and down both sides of the street to see if anyone has video that could help us."
"Good," Rossi says. "We've got Garcia doing deep backgrounds on anyone who may have had a grudge against Will in case he was targeted. That would explain why he calmed when he heard Will speak. She'll then start to look into medical records for someone possibly suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder. That could account for his change in mannerisms, too."
Baylor nods. "Good. Needless to say you all have access to a few more databases than we do."
Morgan smiles. "And thanks to Garcia access to some we probably shouldn't be able to see."
Baylor grins. "Don't ask, don't tell. Sometimes there is a good reason for that sort of mentality."
"Damn right," Morgan agrees. He sighs, staring at the blood pool on the floor. "This is a nightmare."
Baylor and Rossi both nod. What more could be said? Random act of violence or an execution…did it really matter when a friend and colleague is dead?
Hotch nods as the press officer runs down the rumors and innuendo the various news outlets had been running with: gang hit, gang robbery gone bad, stranger in town killing people, really the standard fare of misinformation the press runs with to get ratings and ad sales.
"Any chance you all can make a statement? Settle some of this?" the press officer begs.
Hotch nods. "We can. Set something up for 4. That will give them time to get the reports ready for the 5 o'clock news and us time to go over everything we have," Hotch explains.
The press officer thanks Hotch as the agent leaves. He is nearly back to the conference room when the police captain gestures for him to come into his office. Hotch steps in and closes the door when the captain gestures to it.
"What can I do for you, Captain Mueller?"
The man's face is saggy and his hazel eyes tired. "Been behind this desk a month and a half. Right now I am damn ready to call my predecessor up and tell him to come take it back."
Hotch gives him a small smile. "I don't blame you."
"What can you tell me?"
Hotch shrugs. "Not much yet. We have several theories we are looking at while we gather more information. Truth is, Will was on the force for many years. As was his father before him. If this was a revenge killing we'd have to track down which LaMontagne was the object of hatred. If it was random…well, no need to quote the statistics to you."
"No, not at all. I was robbery before I took this desk. Was there for more than 15 years. Sometimes my cases crossed with homicide as we tracked down some of these bastards down. But…"
"You have a theory of your own?" Hotch presses.
Captain Vance Mueller studies the ceiling for a second. Finally he sits forward and meets Hotch's dark chocolate eyes. "I've watched the video more times than I can count. He didn't act like a typical stick-up man. He didn't appear to be drugged out or drunk but he was frantic. Then he calms himself down when he hears Will speak. The bastard almost smiles like…like he found his target. Hotchner, I think that bastard was targeting Will. Otherwise his actions and mannerisms don't make a damn bit of sense to me."
Hotch studies the man a moment. This is not a wish or a whim. This is a detective using his knowledge to come up with a viable avenue of investigation. Hotch slowly nods.
"Key it up for me. Walk it through the way you see it."
Mueller pulls it up on his computer. When Will appears, he hits pause.
"Now, see, the way this fuck had been acting, Will's appearance should have startled him or…or at the least he should have spun his gun that way. He doesn't. He calms and look at his face…he's smiling. None of that is right. This guy was too calm at the end."
"We also noticed the unexpected reaction to Will. We have speculated he could have D.I.D. and a secondary personality took over when Will inserted himself into the situation. That would explain the oddity."
Mueller nods. "Okay. Sure, I can see that. Does that happen often?"
"Not very. A lot of defendants will try to use it to defend themselves but most times they are proven to be perfectly fine mentally."
Mueller sits forward, a thought in his head. "Say…what if some schmuck Will put away tried to use it but it failed? Maybe he takes jail time to study up on it and then sets Will up when he gets out. Maybe stalks him a few days until he gets him in the right place at the right time to kill him?"
Hotch thinks a moment before slowly nodding. "Good theory. I'll make sure Garcia filters for anyone who failed using that defense. We'll look at them closely and what they did once they got to jail."
"Good. Anything you all need, you will have. My department is at your disposal until this guy is caught."
Both men stand and shake hands. Hotch then hurries down to the conference room to give Garcia yet another search to run and another filter to add to her current ones.
Morgan and Rossi are with Baylor looking at a small TV showing the outside camera's from a clothing store down and across the street from the convenience store. It has a perfect shot of the parking area.
"Okay, there's Will," Rossi points out.
They watch as Will enters the store and another car pulls in and parks beside his.
"No plate," Baylor notes.
"Nope," Morgan sees.
They watch as a man steps out of the car. He studies the back end of Will's car a moment.
"Checking the plate number?" Morgan asks in surprise.
"Looks like it," Rossi answers.
The man pulls out his gun, glances around then enters the convenience store. They fast forward the feed until they see the shots inside. Back at regular time they see the unsub walk out and calmly move to his car. He pauses a second, head whipping up.
"He hears the sirens and realizes the clerk managed to trigger the alarm," Baylor surmises.
"Yeah," Morgan nods.
The man puts his gun in his coat pocket and tosses the bag of money…into Will's car!
"What the fuck! Did anyone check his car?" Morgan demands.
Baylor shrugs, already dialing Florence to let him know.
"That son of bitch didn't even want the money. Just took it so the concentration would be on robbery gone wrong," Rossi concludes. "Then tossed it in Will's cruiser knowing that when it was eventually found it would throw a wrench into the investigation."
Morgan nods. They watch as the man drives calmly out of the lot in one direction and a moment later the first police cruiser arrives from the other direction. Morgan and Rossi stop the feed and look at each other.
"The target was either the clerk or Will," Rossi starts.
"It was Will. Three shots center mass? That's pretty damn deliberate. If it was the clerk why not make sure he's dead?" Morgan points out.
"Could he have ditched the money in case he was caught?" Baylor asks.
"Nope. He kept the gun, kept his mask," Rossi answers. "Those are important to him. The money meant nothing. It was either personal revenge or…or someone paid him well to pull this off."
"Want to bet that car is destroyed? Either by the unsub or he left it in an area that crime would deal with it," Morgan notes.
Rossi shakes his head. "Not taking that bet."
Baylor hangs up his phone. "Will's car is in the impound lot. It's considered part of the crime but hasn't been processed yet or returned to service."
"Let's go do it," Morgan suggest. He looks at the store owner. "Thank you for letting us watch this." He hands him a card. "Please send a copy to this email address."
"Anything to help, Agent Morgan," the owner agrees and prepares to send the file to Garcia.
The two agents and the detective leave to go look through Will's car for the money from the robbery and for anything else that can give them insight into this heinous crime.
The team weeds through paperwork and reports until nearly 8 that evening. The money had been found and it, as well as the bag it was in, was being processed. Being as the unsub was seen wearing gloves it is doubtful that they will get lucky on prints. Hotch runs a hand through his already mussed hair.
"That's it. Until we get more off all the damn searches we have going we can't do any more tonight. Let's- -"
His words break off as a man opens the door and walks in. Though the team has never met him his outfit and manner in which he carries himself says "FBI Agent" to all of them.
"Hi. Sorry to interrupt but I think I can offer some help," he states. He offers his hand to Hotch. "Chief Hotchner, I'm SSA Ed Mink out of the New Orleans office. A bullet in your case popped an alert into several of mine." He takes a deep breath. "You guys are looking for an assassin. And maybe if we work together we can finally find this fucking bastard." He glances at Emily and Garcia. "Apologies for the language, ladies."
"Sounded appropriate to me," Emily notes as Garcia nods in agreement.
He grins and turns back to Hotch. "So, any chance I can insert myself into this investigation?"
Hotch gestures to the table. "Pull up a chair and let's talk."
The man nods and sits down.
"This guy has at least 30 kills under his belt throughout the Gulf area. Same gun every time, different m.o."
"Is it always cops?" Morgan asks.
"Nope. Has killed attorneys, defendants, plaintiffs, and even an insurance investigator. Thing is we cannot tie these victims together. We don't know how they find him or how they pay him. Hell, we don't even know for sure who hired him."
"How do you know he's an assassin and not an angel of mercy?" Emily asks.
"One of his victims didn't die right away. Lived long enough to say he thanked his gun for another job well done," Mink explains.
"Sick son of a bitch," Rossi mutters. "So is that the only reason you know he's a contract killer?"
Mink nods. "Yes. That and, well, I know it's not scientific, but a hunch. These people have absolutely no connection to each other except that they ended up the victim of the same damn gun. And with them gone the cases they were involved with went to hell." He taps a finger on the table to stress his belief. "This unsub is an assassin and if we don't find him he will kill again."
Hotch looks around at the team and sees they are intrigued. He nods. "You have us convinced. Get us any info you can." He looks at Garcia. "Run those victims again as well as those that would benefit from their death. No stone unturned."
"On it, sir." She looks at Mink. "Can I assume you have a flash drive for me?"
He grins and slides one down the table to her. "I've heard about you, Ms. Garcia. If there is info to be found I know you can find it."
Garcia's grin widens. "Oh, you are so sweet and smart and honest."
Her team chuckles. Hotch looks around the table.
"I stand by the fact that we need to step away tonight. Once Garcia loads those names we'll have another pile of reports to go through. I can guess none of us got much sleep last night. Let's try to change that tonight. The rest of you are dismissed. Garcia, I'll stay with you until you get that information uploaded. Prentiss, there is an SUV outside for you to use."
"Thanks, Hotch."
"See you all at 7," he says, dismissing the team.
As the group walks outside, they all look at Emily.
"How's Helen?" Rossi asks.
"Still in shock mostly. But she is fighting through it for her daughter and for herself. She knows Will wouldn't want her to wallow."
"If she needs anything, tell her to call," Reid offers.
Emily smiles and pats his arm. "She knows. Trust me, she knows."