“-He could still be in town after all these years.” Hotch finished his statement and the members of the team all looked towards me, waiting for my response.
To think that the unsub had stayed close by all this time? Disconcerting to say the least.
“I guess that’s a possibility.”
“Well that’s a first,” Rossi spoke up.
“What is?”
Spencer interjected with his quick words.271Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5IvFW59OYQ
“That you aren’t defending the town or people you know. Usually, in cases like this, we almost always have someone say that it isn’t possible for any of the people there to commit such a crime.”
“This isn’t your normal small town. At least, not to me. If people move here or life ends up spitting them up here, this is where they’ll stay. We get enough tourists during the summer and winters to stay afloat, but people who want to get away from the larger cities usually retire in towns like Leweys. If the man who did this is possibly a local, then he is probably still here. You guys do think it is a man, right?”
“We usually refer to the unsubs as he,” Prentiss stated. “Someone had to have been strong enough to carry those two bodies to the site.”
“And subdue Daniel before shooting him,” I added.
“True-“ Hotch added, and I could tell that once a team member would add a deduction, the gears in all of their brains would eat it up, adding more to their theories. “And since there hasn’t been any other bodies discovered and the supposed personal relationship with the first victim, he must have known Jennifer as well.”
“It wouldn’t have been hard, small town remember?” I said.
“Did you find anything else about the bodies?” Hotch turned to Spencer and Rossi.271Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfEUTyXskjl
Rossi shifted his weight in his chair.
“Whoever did this had to have had knowledge of hunting and preparing animals. The coroner said the methods used to open up the victims' bodies were similar to how one would cut open a deer- long cut up the body and disemboweled…” he paused and looked at me, “There is a difference between the bodies, minor, but important.
“What is it?” We all asked.
“The first victim has already gone through years of deterioration, only preserved luckily by the type of soil in the forest- the line was clean, and had to have been done with the victim either sedated or postmortem. Jennifer’s… was shaky, rough, and unsteady. Since he’s already done this before, it wasn’t hesitation that caused it.”
“Oh my god,” Prentiss said, reflecting everyone’s thoughts.
“She- was awake when it happened,” My voice wavered out.
My worst fears concerning Jennifer were confirmed to be true. She went through the worst pain possible and all these years her body was buried in the woods, under the town’s nose.
“I need some air, please- excuse me-“ I stood, lightheaded and walked out of the room rather ungracefully.
All the pent-up disgust at the burial site and the trauma of her disappearance and death finally overloaded and I ran to the restroom in the station, releasing my earlier light lunch.271Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKHrwVwz603
I stopped vomiting, but I still sat at the toilet, my throat burning and eyes tearing up. I barely heard the small knock at the door.
“Lynn?” JJ’s voice softly called out.
I didn’t bother telling her to go away.
She entered the two-stalled bathroom and opened the door to the larger stall, seeing my on the tiled-floor, crying.
Images of the bodies resurfaced in my mind and I went up to vomit again, this time JJ holding my ponytail and rubbing my back.
“I’m s-sorry,” I said in between my sobs. I was the graduate all over again after Daniel’s funeral.
“Don’t be. You’ve been so brave during the investigation, considering the fact that you knew Jennifer,” she stopped rubbing my back and held onto my arm as I leaned against the wall.
“I didn’t just know her. She was my best friend the lost two years of high school. Before her I never really had anyone. She introduced me to my ex-husband senior year.” I wiped my mouth and sighed, suddenly extremely tired.
“And no one saved her.” I covered my face in my hands, my cheeks burning of embarrassment, “I’m sorry.”
Here I was in the bathroom, throwing up like college girl after too many drinks and a real-deal FBI agent was next to me.
“It’s not your fault. We don’t know when these things are going to happen.”
I smiled at her, her blue eyes comforting, and I felt like a child.
“Please don’t tell your team about this. I know I can help with this case. I need to.”271Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpsQBUf3xQu
“It’s alright Lynn. I won’t.”
We both walked out of the restroom and entered the conference room together. I knew my puffy eyes would tell them I had been crying and who knows what else- I always felt they were profiling me.
They didn’t ask me if I was ok, but every time I looked back down at the files. I could feel Agent Hotchner’s eyes from his seat next to me.
We returned to the case, relating the victims to how Daniel was found, concluding that Jenifer must have been taken at the lake, explaining why Daniel might have struggled against the Unsub.
The evening quickly swallowed us up and we decided to call it a night in order to work efficiently the next day. Even if they claimed not to have it, I could tell some of the agents had slight jetlag after having to travel back in time a few hours.
I gave them the keys to the rental cars and directions to the lodge at the north side of Leweys where they would be staying. And with that, we all parted ways, and I headed to my house. We had large neighborhoods here, not with green front lawns or suburban houses- we had front lawns and backyard full of the woods. Winding roads connected our town, and everyone had a rifle or two to deal with the wildlife that often found its way to our doors.
I entered my small house, one I managed to buy after my divorce with Kevin. He lived two miles away from me, but in these mountain woods, it felt like a small trip every time I went to see Paul.
I smiled thinking of my growing boy. Though Kevin had custody after the divorce, where my law enforcement job was too risky and straining to care for him alone, I visited him often and had him over every other week or so. He was lucky that Kevin and I weren’t at each other’s throats.
With memories of Paul growing up in my mind to block out the earlier day’s gruesome details, I went to sleep, knowing that I would have to emerge myself once again in the grisly case with the BAU the next day.
My dreams of dinosaur toys and guns were shattered apart as I heard my living room window break. I stumbled out of bed, grabbed the rifle under the mattress and flicked on the lights. A car screeched out front and before I flung my door open, it had vanished, only faint tail lights fading from my view. Too tired to even think of jumping into my car to follow in pursuit, I looked at the floor where the glass was shattered.
Unknowingly, I had stepped through the glass on my route to the door and my feet were stained with a thin layer of blood.
“Shit,” I sighed, and I hobbled to my bathroom to clean myself up.
Ten minutes later after my feet were cleaned and covered in band-aids, I went back to clean the glass and noticed what had broken my window in the first place, lying faceup on my floor.
It was a large rock with a paper note taped all around it to make sure I would get the typed message.
271Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtQPLANLmra
"You found Jenny. Congratulations."
ns 15.158.61.6da2
