Chapter 2

Emily made her way into the bullpen Morgan couldn't help but raise his eyebrow at her as she placed her bag underneath her desk. The darkened circles seemed to make her eyes sink in; her pale skin was more paler and even Morgan didn't believe it was possible. Though each time he had asked, each time he had shown some concern she had shot him down in his first breath, just as the words left his lips.

Though it hadn't gone unnoticed by anyone that she seemed worn out, arriving late each morning, normally she would be five minutes late but over the past few weeks the five minutes had turned into half an hour, each member of the team were getting more concerned but Emily was too stubborn to allow anyone in. Her private life was exactly that, private and that was how she planned it to stay.

Morgan was pulled out of his thoughts by the vibrating sound of his phone; he could only give a sad smile as he looked at the message. "Something is seriously wrong, she blew both me and JJ off last night" Morgan let out a sigh as he read the text.

"If I try and push her anymore baby girl I think she will pull her gun on me" Morgan replied.

Emily always seemed stand offish, the persona she portrayed was like a mask keeping her emotions hidden, not all emotion but she had placed steel walls in front of her now pushing everyone away. In truth she felt numb as though the carpet had been ripped out from beneath her feet and in truth it had been.

There had been jokes about the butch look, how they always thought she was a lesbian though she never denied nor did she conformed anything either. This seemed to make her more stand offish than she meant to do.

"What?" Emily asked as though she could feel eyes upon her skin.

"Do you want a coffee?" Morgan offered up instead of asking the question that was on everyone's lips.

Emily gave a somewhat smile followed with a nod but even the smile didn't light up her face like normal, there was no joking around these days, her consults seemed to be finish before JJ had chance to place more on her desk, not that JJ was complaining but over the past few years Emily had never finished her consults so fast, in fact Emily hated doing consults and paper work she preferred being out in the field much like Morgan did.

Emily frowned as she looked at the latest consult, Canon City, Colorado had seen a spike in murders, Emily had already worked on a profile for Canon City were ten males had been killed, her initial profile leaned towards someone that was struggling with their own sexuality since there was evidence of sexual activity as well as them being left exposed.

Though now she was looking at a different case yet in the same City, eight women had been butchered to death, each female victim had been hit over the head though from the ME reported that wasn't what had killed them, much like the other case she had look at there was evidence of sexual activity a couple had been identified as prostitutes while the rest had been attacked as they cut through the back alley. Emily pulled out the other consult which held the male victims.

"You okay Prentiss?" Morgan asked hoping she wouldn't bite his head off.

"Can you have a look at these two consults and tell me what you think, please?" Emily asked handing him both files.

Morgan opened the case files reading the first profile Emily had given before opening the second; he too wore the same frown as Emily.

"Let's take these into the conference room so we can spread these out" Morgan said, Emily nodded before they both made their way up to the conference room.

They sprawled each of the pictures out on the table placing them in the orders they were found. Each of the victims had been found on different days but they were evenly spaced out, two victims a week.

Morgan pulled out his phone allowing it to ring before he was greeted by the bubbly voice of Garcia. "How may I be of service my sexy chocolate bear?"

Emily couldn't help the chuckle that escaped her lips as she watched Morgan blush slightly. "I need you to run a few background searches for me, baby girl" Morgan said in slight amusement.

The MO was the same on each victim, the males were all struck from behind, the shards of glass found in their scalps told them both that the unsub had used a bottle as his weapon before beating them to death. The women had all been taken from behind. Each of them being left exposed each showed they had recently had sex.

Morgan couldn't help but noticed the pattern on the female victims they were all brunettes. Slender build, each one showed signs they had struggled the blow to the back of their heads didn't seem to show the same force that had been used on the male victims.

"I think this is the same unsub" Emily said as she placed the last picture on the table.

"I agree, I'll go and have a word with JJ and see what Hotch thinks." Morgan said before retreating out of the room.

Before long the whole team was sat around the conference room, both Emily and Morgan explaining what she had found and why they both now thought they were connected, Garcia had run backgrounds on each victim only a couple had something in common which were the women, three were known prostitutes while the others had no common links.

Emily fell silent as the group discussed the case. "JJ can you see if we can get an invite" Hotch asked. "Explain what we have come across, we need to go through everything" Hotch said as JJ disappeared out the door to make the phone calls.

"Wheels up in thirty, if JJ can get us the invite" the team picked up the case files.

It hadn't gone unnoticed that Emily was more withdrawn; her usual fire seemed to have vanished over the past few weeks. Garcia watched her on the security camera as she made her way back to her desk grabbing her go-bag, "Why won't you talk to us princess" Garcia whispered into the empty room, the only other sound was the whirling from her computers as they ran background searches.