whedonist

Title: Putting the Damage On – Ch. 5

Rating: R – Language and Adult Themes Folks…did I mention there’s lesbians too?

Disclaimer: Mostly all my characters – Some mention of Nikki & Nora from the fabulous Nancylee Myatt.

A/N: I’m running late…crap! Not much. Thanks to those that are reading. Take care!

Ch. 5 – Made to Meet Your Maker

John had a bully of an idea. It was a smashing plan that should have panned out, but his plans and mine for that matter seem to go to pot more often than not. Instead of being asleep in my bed, where I really should be, I’m stuck in trial prep because our A.U.S.A decided to pop over right when we got back from Duluth.

I rub at my burning eyes and blink away the bright spots the pressure from the rubbing caused. I could blame myself, it’s really all my fault, I forgot about the upcoming court case that I am subpoenaed to give testimony for. We’ve been in an interview room for the past two hours. He keeps asking the same questions different ways. I keep giving him the same answer the same way.

He opens his mouth to ask a question and I put a hand up. “Paul, I get it. You want the point driven home. My answer to the last question isn’t going to change. I’ve been up since early Friday morning and in case you haven’t noticed, it’s Monday morning. Can we be done now?”

He closes his mouth shut with an audible clack. I don’t mean to be mean and evil, but my exhaustion should be obvious. Paul’s used to better cooperation from me. Well, buddy, my ability to answer the same questions for two hours and not lose my cool went out the window somewhere over Ohio. I’m done.

“Special Agent Flemming is there anything else that you want me to cover during your testimony?” A.U.S.A. Unamuano asks as politely as possible.

I shake my head at the man. He’s not a bad guy. Decent lawyer. We’ve worked two other cases together where I’ve given testimony. He’s good at his job and he doesn’t mess with the investigators.

“Well then, I think we can wrap it up and you can go back to work,” he says, gathering a small stack of papers together. “Or find some place to go to sleep.” I watch as he shuts his laptop closed and prepares to leave.

“Thanks Paul. I need to be in court when next week?” I ask trying to stifle the yawn.

“I think you should be good to go on after lunch on Thursday. We’ll see what the judge’s mood is like.” I nod and watch him scurry out of the interview room. “Good day, Ann,” he throws over his shoulder.

Sighing, I push my hand through my hair and lean back, resting my eyes for a few minutes. They pop open when I feel myself start to drift off. I need to finish out today and then I can sleep.

Jill wasn’t too pleased. I sent her home in much the same fashion that John sent Rebecca home. I think they left together, conspiring with each other to have us taken out.

We don’t do this that often, but there’s just been a ton of breaks over the past twenty-four to forty-eight hours on the case. It’s been crucial and I can’t leave just because I’m a little tired. So instead of doing a full on face plant on the conference table, I push myself back and stand.

Our offices are combined with a small outfit of the N.S.A. The building is nothing but a big rectangle. On one end, we have our department, in the center there are interview rooms, a few offices, restrooms and a kitchen and on the other end there is the small N.S.A. group that does God knows what. Below us are labs that we share and a small corner is given to B.A.U. for a server room and to house some level one counter intelligence geeks.

The N.S.A. director, Kevin Roeffy, is also a Special Forces Alumni. The thought that not only are Kevin and John from the Army, they hold a similar rank and they’re both here makes me think conspiracy. It’s that or the government just doesn’t know what to do with retired military that probably know enough to form their own army and stage a coup d’état.

Knowing John and having worked with Kevin before, it wouldn’t shock me that it’s something that our government should fear. I trust both of them with my life and Jill’s, but it doesn’t mean that it’s smart.

I shuffle out of the interview room and hang a right, heading for one of the bathrooms. The room is empty as I turn the faucet on and splash some cool water on my face. It has little effect, but I manage to wake myself up a little. I need to check with the team and help them catalogue what John and I brought back.

I give myself a once over in the mirror, my blue eyes are a little dull, the dark circles under them don’t help much and my cheeks are a little sunken. In short, I look like shit. I gave up on decent looking hair yesterday at some point. It’s been in a ponytail since then. My green button down has a coffee stain on it and I’m out of a change of clothes. The pants that I have on have seen better days. In fact, the hi-cotton poly blend slacks may just see the trash. Since crawling around on the floor of that shack last night, I don’t know if they’re going to be salvageable. Especially when the labs come back with the results.

It’s one of the down sides to the job. If the crime scene’s in a public place, you never really want to touch anything ever again. I groan and pull some paper towels free, mopping my face and drying my hands. I toss the used towels in the garbage and square my shoulders before stepping out in to the hallway. I go right again approaching our department floor. Music assaults my ears the closer I get. Recognizing the sound of Nirvana’s Heart Shaped Box, I bob my head to the music and stop short of interrupting the sight before me.

Bamby and John are rocking out together, both doing some solid air guitar. I would be shocked had I not seen this before. All of us have different coping mechanisms. Lucy will work a case until she can’t move anymore, then we’ll find her somewhere, usually in a conference room, curled up like a baby on top of a table. It’s gotten to the point where we actually keep a pillow and blanket here for her. John’s been thinking about putting a couch or two in the department so that we can all catch up on sleep when things get tense. I just don’t know where’s he’s going to put them.

Travis, when the stakes get high, goes for runs. He’ll run his ass off, come back a sweaty mess and go straight back to what needs to be done. Bamby, John and I have grown accustomed to using music as our outlet. It helps bleed away some of the stress and if we play the right type of music it will invigorate and remotivate us.

Hence, the rock out session that I just walked in on. John grins as he looks in my direction. He saunters my way and the next thing I know, we’re holding hands jumping up and down together. I laugh and sing along until the song ends. We all stop and catch our breath. I can tell that we all feel slightly better and the biggest plus, it doesn’t feel like my blood is stagnant in my veins. It courses through a reminder that I’m alive and I’m here doing what I need to do to stop someone who takes that away from people.

“Nothing like a little Grunge to bring us back from the depths of sleep deprivation and psychosis!” John yells.

I raise an eyebrow as we all collapse onto the nearest chairs. “We do need our heads examined. That’s my official stance.”

He waves his hand around and grunts, “Duly noted. At least it feels like I actually have a blood pressure now.”

Bamby shakes her head and says, “Yeah, mom’s gonna kill you when you get home.”

“I know,” he says a bit resigned to being in trouble.

I feel his pain. Jill’s gonna give me an earful when I finally get home too.

Bamby turns the music down that was coming from the computer and huffs, “Well that was fun.”

“Aye,” John says, “Back to the salt mines!”

“Besides a shit load of samples, did you two learn anything else out?” Bamby asks across from me.

“A few things actually,” I answer to John’s amazement. “I’ve been thinking that Margaret was the one he perfected his signature on. Our first glimpse at what and who he is is Maria Sheridan. He finalized everything in L.A. She was the first true start of the series. The teams in L.A. did a decent job of gathering everything they could. Our unsub just didn’t leave much for us to look at.”

“So going back over it won’t help?” John interrupts.

“No, I don’t think it will. I think we should take a longer look at Barbara. Obviously, he wants some kind of attention. From us or from someone else,” I reason.

“The letter, Ann, was addressed to you. He’s focused on you,” Bamby chimes in.

I wag my finger, “Not necessarily. I could be a means to an end. Out of all of us here, I’ve gotten the most media attention. I take point at press conferences and interviews. That’s part of my role. It may have nothing to do with me.” I’m not sure if I believe that, but right now I say it like I mean it.

“So now what?” the doctor wonders out loud.

“We can start breaking down what we brought back and try to find some new thread of the investigation,” John answers for me.

“Okay,” Bamby says standing. “Then I’m going to go help Lucy and Travis in the labs. I suggest you take the rest of the afternoon and evening, go home and get some sleep. All the rest of us have been to bed.”

She doesn’t wait for a response, but instead strides out of the office, towards the steps that lead down to the labs.

“I think, my daughter has the right idea, partner.” John stands and claps his hands together. “We’ll hold off on our dinner plans and regroup when I feel more awake.”

I nod my agreement and snag my keys, leaving everything else at my desk. It’s time to finally go home.

The first thing I feel is fingers gently combing through my hair while blunt nails scrape gently across my scalp. I know that hand and I know the body that is pressed against mine. What I don’t know is the time and how exactly I ended up in here.

I am home, I am safe and Jill is next to me.

That’s good enough for me right now. Slowly, I open my eyes and position my head so that the first thing I see is her face. She’s propped up on her right arm, looking down at me. Her left doesn’t stop playing with my hair and for that I’m thankful.

“Ah, there’re those eyes,” she whispers to me.

“Hi,” I rasp my voice thick and dry from sleep.

“Hey, stranger,” she purrs back, “good to see you here.”

“Well, here is my favorite place. What timeizit?” I wonder and yawn. My eyes burn and the inside of my lids have been downgraded in sandpaper coarsity. They were at a twenty and have dropped to a fine blend of one-twenty-grade coarseness. I can live with that. In fact, it feels damn pleasant in comparison to what it was when I was at work. “When did I get home?”

Her eyebrows knit together, but she smirks and answers, “It’s late, around eleven or so and you got home around four. Apollo is a little crooked, but you didn’t hit anything.” She doesn’t sound peeved, just worried. “You came in, kissed me all sloppy like and then fell face first into bed.”

“Hmm,” I moan and curl myself around her stomach, causing her to fall back into the bed, onto her back. “I don’t have clothes on. You take advantage?”

She snorts and grumbles, “No, you’re clothes are being burned the next time we light a fire or perhaps, I should call HAZMAT and they can dispose of them. I just changed the sheets; I wasn’t letting you in bed with dirty, stinky clothes.”

I blink up at her scrunchy face and feel warmth spread over me. I’m still tired, but I feel a lot better. “Thank you, babe.”

“It’s what I do,” she says off handedly.

“Nah, you’re just way too good to me. Worries me on occasion,” I say a little too honestly. It’s a thing when I’m tired, my filters go away and they’re not especially thick where Jill’s concerned.

“Uh-huh, after this last stint, I’d be worried too if I were you,” she says, her voice taking on a slight edge.

I tighten my hold on her midsection and wrap our legs together. I knew this was coming. Hell, I’m even slightly prepared for it. “How much hot water am I in?”

“Don’t Ann, don’t try to be coy or cute or try to play this off like I’m not upset and what you’ve put yourself through doesn’t matter,” she says this, she says this gently, but the intensity behind the softness is not lost on me. Sometimes dealing with Jill and learning to speak her language is an art. It’s subtle, but intense.

“I’m not,” I say as honestly and clearly as possible. “We’ve been through too much therapy and too many fights for me not to understand that you’re upset.” I would look up at her, but I’m afraid to see the look in her eyes.

When I get on a case like this, which is less often than what it used to be, her eyes always vacillated between hurt, anger and worry. All of them are reasonable. None of them are concern for her.

“This was you’re last one,” she warns. The message is clear. After an intense set of therapy sessions, we agreed that me, doing this, with the this being not sleeping or taking proper care of myself for more than two days, was only something that I could do once a year. I’d get one free pass to push myself past my breaking point. Only once would Jill tolerate it before she would step in.

I guess I just used up my pass this year.

“Hey, it’s June, I think that’s pretty good,” I try to joke.

She grunts, annoyed at my attempt at humor. “I hate when you do this.”

“I know,” I reply tiredly. “It’s not intentional, Jill. I don’t...”

“It never is. Never, Ann. You just push and push and I get it, don’t think I don’t understand.” I feel her hands grip my forearms as she tugs me up to look at her. I shut my eyes as soon as I see her face. I see her long enough to notice the tears leaking down and the wounded look in her eye.

Instead, I plant my hands on either side of her, hanging my head so that her lips just brush against my forehead. My hair drapes down and covers my face.

“I love that you care. I love that you try so hard, but I don’t love you enough to watch you drive yourself to an early grave. I won’t stand by and watch it,” she finishes, placing a tender kiss on my forehead.

I slump against her and bury my nose into the crook of her neck. Her hands ghost up and down my back. “You’re not Wonder Woman or Spider Man or Bat Girl. You’re Ann. You’re mine. You’ve been mine since you were fifteen,” she stops and I feel her shudder. “I wish sometimes that being mine was enough for you to be happy.”

I want to tell her I am happy and that it is more than enough. But the tears that leak from my eyes and the hard won truth of long therapy sessions would cause those words to be a lie.

I won’t lie to her.

“I want that to be true, too, baby.” I feel her nod.

“But then you wouldn’t be you,” she says without malice. I feel her draw a deep breath and release it. “Do you think maybe we can curb your hero complex the rest of the year? I like sleeping next to my wife.”

I nod, but don’t pick up my head.

“Good. Then maybe my wife can get the hell off me and join me in the shower. I was clean until I was mauled by a stinky federal agent,” the tone of her voice takes on a slight lilt.

“Well,” I mumble into her chest as I begin to poke my head up, “If you weren’t so sexy, said federal agent, with her stinkiness probably wouldn’t have mauled you.”

Her nose crinkles as I finally meet her gaze. The wounded look is gone. In its place, I see love and a little mischief. I sober slightly, “You really are too good for me, you know that right?”

She shakes her head at this. “I think sometimes you have it backwards, Mrs. Flemming.” Her fingertip comes into my line of sight as she drags her nail from between my eyebrows, down the gentle slope of my nose, over its tip and over my lips to end at my chin. “I think that I’m just trying to make up for the years I was away from you.”

“I wish you’d let that go,” I say and lean down to gently trap the tip of the assaulting finger between my front teeth. I shake it and she giggles. A full-throated giggle and the pain in my chest lessens marginally.

“I will when I quit feeling like an asshole for it,” she states, letting me know that’s as far as I’m going to get on that subject.

That’s as far as I ever get with her on that subject. Instead of arguing my point, I take the finger in my mouth and lave the tip, running my tongue over the pad and around the tip. This elicits a slight groan. The groan sets off a chain reaction. My body responds on its own, igniting a small fire in the pit of my stomach and a painfully delicious contraction between my legs.

I let go of her finger and lower my head. I inhale and catch a whiff of my B.O. Right, I stink.

I need to shower. Shit.

Sighing, I trample the arousal that was building and flop over to her left. We lay side by side as she asks, “You got a whiff of yourself didn’t you?”

I laugh, a full on belly aching, pain inducing laugh.

“I told you, you fucking smelled,” she says while running her hand up my outer thigh, over my hip and grabs the waistband of my underwear. I get myself under control as I feel her pull on the elastic band. Looking down, I see it hovering above my hipbone, pinched between her thumb and index finger right before she lets go.

It snaps against my flesh.

I turn my head to her and lift my eyebrows.

“You do know,” I say as my right hand creeps towards her exposed thigh, “what that means?”

She shakes her head smiling despite her attempt at a serious face.

“Too bad,” I sigh, rolling away from her and off of the bed. “I was so going to offer hot make up sex in the shower. I figured we’d fought. It was only fitting, but…” I trail off and strip the tank top off.

I see her eyes rake down my body. When they come back, there’s a slight frown.

“What?” I ask.

“You lost weight,” she pouts.

My eyes bulge.

“You’re one to talk! I’ve been threatening you with bondage and milkshakes for years,” I grumble, wiggling out of my underwear.

“The tank top and underwear can go with the clothes. We’ll burn them soon.” She bounces off the bed, shedding her clothes and throwing them in the vicinity of our dirty clothes hamper. She slides up to me and presses our bodies together.

Flesh melds together and her tongue trails up my neck, along my jaw line to allow her lips to cover mine. I groan and open my mouth to her questing tongue. I pull back, breathless after a few minutes. She rests her forehead against mine and I walk us backwards to the bathroom.

I let her go and start up the shower. We both love really hot water so I fix the temperature before I turn around to see her leaning against the sink shyly.

I pull her to me and she kisses my chin. “I love you,” she states earnestly.

“I love you too, Jill,” I say with as much conviction. I take her left hand and kiss her knuckles and then the wedding band. “I’m sorry.”

“I know.” She tucks a strand of hair behind my ear and smiles at me. “Come on, let’s get you all soapy. Then you can service me.”

“As you wish,” I say and follow her into the shower.

The moon is just starting to peek through the clouds as I hang a right on an access road that runs parallel to the I-95. It’s the wee hours of the morning, the dashboard tells me it’s a little after four in the morning. After my shower, we went to bed for a little while. I finally got out of it when I woke Jill up with my tossing and turning.

My wonderful wife just told me to get dressed and go. She knows me entirely too well. So I took her advice. I got ready and left her there amongst rumpled sheets that smelled of us. A smile ghosts over my face and I depress the gas pedal. I’ve decided to go on a small drive before hitting up my office.

A tried and true form of escape, I drive on back country roads, listening to whatever my iPod selects on shuffle mode. The moon shines through the clouds just a little and the air is cool despite the time of year.

With my window rolled down, I hang an arm out and let the wind blow through my hair. When we were younger and Lee got his license we would take off out of Richmond and find ways to get out and into the city without using the highway. We had a lot of fun on those nights.

Being a teenager, it’s all so intense and angsty and really fucking annoying. But having good friends to share the experience with is a gift. I thank any god that will listen because I had Lee and Jill. I don’t think I would have survived. My parents weren’t ever really around. My grandfather took up the task at raising me when I turned nine years old. It was actually on my birthday that the cops came and arrested my dad. My mother had been out of the picture for a while and it was just him and me for a while, but he couldn’t stay clean long enough. There were times when I’d get dropped off at one of his friend’s house and left for a month or two. He’d come back around eventually to pick me up with apologies and promises.

Then something would happen, he’d get fired or his girlfriend would dump him, then he’d go on benders. When I turned nine, they came and got him for armed robbery and drug trafficking. Then I went to live with my grandfather, Darren Flemming. He was okay. A bit of an asshole on his good days and on his bad ones I just made it a point to not be home all that much.

We moved right before I started high school and that put me in a different district. That’s when I met Jill and Lee. We became friends the first day and neither has really gone away. Sometimes, when I take drives like this, I have to wonder what I would be like if it weren’t for them.

Would I be doing what I’m doing? Would I have survived past my twenties?

They both say I give them too much credit, but they don’t understand. Jill’s family is like the Walton’s but totally cooler. Lee’s family is slightly less together, but at least they’re there for each other. Mine are an inconvenience. I’ve lost track of my mother, she used to come and go at times after she split and left me and my dad. My aunts and uncles could never manage to secure a job above minimum wage and I have cousins that can’t seem to keep a job.

So to get away from it, Lee would drive me around and Jill would come along for the ride. Those were some of my fondest memories of an adolescence I’d just rather forget. So now, when I need to think or when Jill and I are at home and not doing anything, we’ll hop in Apollo and take off for a few hours. I’ve learned all of the ins and outs of the area. I can actually get from here to Quantico twenty minutes faster, but in the winter it’s a pain so I usually just stick to the highway.

This morning I head towards John’s house. I figure I can swing by and pick him up and we can get started on the finalization of the profile. Submit it to a colleague in B.A.U. and see if there’s anything that comes back from the system. I’m guessing that the search won’t yield anything. The profile is hard to match and it feels like a new type of mindset for me. I think that’s why I’m having such a hard time getting a structured profile together.

Usually, I’ve found that there are three types of killers, there are the crazy ones, the smart ones and then a hybrid of the two. The hybrid is usually the worst because not only are they able to think outside of the box, but they have no limits. It doesn’t matter to them and they know what they’re doing.

It’s a dangerous combination that’s gotten a lot of people killed.

But this killer, I can’t seem to figure out. Why keep the women alive so long before killing them? To what end?

I know I said he wants to witness their misery, but even then…it just seems so…

Elementary.

I want to think that there’s more to it than that.

And if there’s not, I don’t know what that could mean.

He’s not raping them, he’s not injuring them. There are no other wounds on the body.

Then, there’s the quote. Did he know that he misquoted? If did know that he misquoted was his intent to draw our attention to the book. I’ve looked and read over the book. It’s an anti-philosophy book in a sense. From the all the research I was able to dig up without having to read the book because one, I don’t have that much time and two, I’m really not that sadistic, he was a pompous man. He thought too much, lived too little and liked even less.

I know that I’m supposed to be drawing parallels between Nietzsche and the unsub, but honestly, what the fuck is the killer trying to overcome? His heritage, his ego, his concept of self that he finds baseless? Does he think that the keys to his psyche are embedded within the pages of the book or just the lines of the quote?

I’ve thought about that a lot. What exactly is he trying to say? Is he wearing the monstrous mask so that humanity will recognize him?

There are a lot of incongruences within the case as a whole. It lacks a certain amount of cat and mouse gaming that sociopaths and serial killers like to build. What is also mildly disturbing is that he doesn’t seem to want to be caught. There’s always an end to these things. It’s more often than not, due to their over inflated sense of imperviousness. Then the killer or killers are shocked when we catch up with them.

With these killings, it feels like it’s just getting started and the idea to me and to our team is rather unfathomable. I don’t want more people to suffer because we’re not smart enough to connect the dots or discover the dots. I’m afraid that’s where this is going.

I bring the car to a stop outside of John’s home. It took a little less time than I thought to get here, but then again I was pushing sixty on roads that really shouldn’t see a car move above forty-five. I shrug and kill the engine. The downstairs lights are ablaze and I know he’s awake.

I pull the keys from the ignition and step out of Apollo. The sun’s just starting to peek over the hilltops. I trot up to the door and punch in the security code to unlock the front door. Inside, it’s cooler and I hear Becca and John bantering in the kitchen.

“I told you your daughter was going to get into trouble,” John says.

I pause just outside the doorway and listen in.

“Why is Spencer my daughter when she gets in trouble, but your daughter when she figures out some weird ass experiment and pens a formula?” Becca asks.

“I think it’s because John’s an attention whore,” I joke stepping into the kitchen.

“Ann!” Becca nearly shouts, “Thank God! A reasonable voice.”

“I would not be calling my partner reasonable,” John retorts pointing a finger at me. “She’s the one that insisted we go to Duluth, she’s the one that said we should break down that shack.”

My mouth drops open.

“You fucking liar,” I say, smiling as he hands me a cup of coffee.

He shrugs.

“Sweetie,” Becca croons from her perch on a kitchen stool, “I know you’re full of shit. Quit throwing your partner under the bus and get ready to leave. And while you’re up stairs getting ready, go try to talk some sense into Spencer.”

I raise an eyebrow in question and wonder what my adopted niece has gotten herself into.

Sensing the unasked question, John answers, “Spence decided to quit M.I.T. and move down here indefinitely.”

My mouth forms a perfect ‘o’.

That’s not really like the girl I’ve come to know.

“She say why?” I ask.

Becca answers, “She didn’t like the bureaucracy.”

I grin.

“I’m not surprised,” I say.

Two heads swivel my way and I shrug trying to offer them a different perspective, “She’s not into politics and in academia it’s all politics. She hates being told what to do and she hates it even more when it’s some guy who thinks that she’s dumber than him because she has enlarged mammary glands.” I set my now empty cup in the sink and turn to them, folding my arms across my chest. “We all know she’s had problems in the past wth some of the faculty. Obviously, there’s something that happened and that something was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.”

“See,” Becca says, “voice of reason and now go get ready for work and while you’re at it, take those daughters of yours with you.”

John salutes his wife and scurries off. My partner needs some help. I just don’t know what kind yet.

I look out of my rearview mirror, checking to make sure that Bamby and Spencer are ready to go in Bamby’s truck. The other anomaly with Bamby, the girl drives this huge ass Chevy Silverado 1500. It’s got a crew cab and it’s outfitted much like my Apollo. I’ve no idea what she was thinking, but she gushes over her truck much like I gush over my baby so…

I can’t really judge.

As she pulls up behind me, I pull away from the curb and head towards work. John’s sitting in the passenger seat, happy to not have to drive into work this morning. I take the access rode to his house slowly, the gravel kicking up behind me. I look over and see John slumped over in his seat, his head resting against my tinted window.

“You wanna talk about it?” I venture.

“She just showed up. Her sister picked her up at the airport. What’s there to say really?” He rights himself and looks at me. “She’s just not talking about it.”

“She’s not even been in town a day, John. Cut her some slack,” I try to reason with him, but his jaw’s set.

“It’s not that Ann. She is…I can’t put my finger on it, but something’s up and I’m worried,” he admits.

Nodding, I worry my lower lip. “How are you and Becca?” I try for a topic change. They went through this rocky patch last year and sometime around the holiday they worked it out.

“Good, really good actually,” he grins. “She wasn’t impressed with our weekend stunt, but we’re back on track.”

“Good,” I say letting the car lapse back into silence.

We hit the highway soon enough and I open Apollo up. He purrs as I depress the pedal and zips down the highway. A glance in my rearview and see Bamby keeping pace, making me smile. That girl can dive. It takes no time to pass through the security checkpoints at Quantico to have us all filing into the office. Bamby talking to cover up the fact that Spencer looks like she lost her puppy and toy all on the same day.

I don’t know why they insisted she come with us this morning. We’ll be discussing case details and this isn’t really Spencer’s thing. She likes physics and music. Her love of music not as rabid as her sister’s, but she’s definitely an audiophile. I set my keys in my drawer and look up as the team assembles. Lucy and Travis are sitting on the edge of Lucy’s desk greeting Spencer and catching up.

John catches my eyes and nods. I dip my chin and give him the green light.

“Good morning everyone,” he booms. “We ready for today?”

Everyone just looks at him and he shrugs. “Can’t blame me for trying.” He claps his hands together and goes over to our boards with the case detail on them. “I think we should ask if there was anything significant pulled from the samples brought back from Duluth?”

Travis steps up and says, “We’re still processing. You brought back a ton of stuff. We’ll let you know. Lucy and I have a couple of junior lab techs cataloguing and cross referencing the samples.”

“Good enough,” John says and looks over at me.

I stand and move to his right. “As you can see, John and I were trying to peg the profile of our unsub. I’m comfortable assuming that we’re dealing with a male. Some of the stats you can see here. I need to know if we have any evidence that would contradict what we have listed,” I say pointing to the brainstorming session John and I had on the whiteboard to my left. Everyone shakes their heads and I continue, “All right with that in mind, there are questions that we can’t answer, such as why they were kept alive for three days and the results of how they were kept alive?”

Bamby perks up, “I’m waiting on the final reports, but it wouldn’t shock me that the combo of drugs in Seevers blood will match Denbow’s. The wound patterns and the healing of the cuts were consistent with victim three.”

I nod. “That’s what I thought. To help steer the investigation, finding out why is just as important. I think we can all agree that these killings feel different than what we’ve encountered in the past.”

My hands rise to rest at my hips and I drum my fingers on my waist. “What I’m theorizing is that they were kept alive to torture.”

“What?” Lucy asks.

“Yeah, Ann, you were there for two autopsies, uh…did you not see the lack of wounds?” Bamby asks, clearly confused.

“I’m not saying they were physically tortured. We’ve all been up for a few days at some point. That’s a form of torture. Doped up the way they were, he could have done any number of things to them.” I reason. “Look, we’ve all seen the evidence; the missing face is the only indication of physical harm. There are very few reasons why someone would keep a captive around for that long just to skin their face off. I think the skinning is a by-product of his true intent.”

“Uh, and that would be?” Travis pipes up.

“To watch them suffer. His end goal isn’t a body with a missing face. His end goal is to soak up as much misery as he can. As I’ve looked at the victims, there are certain consistencies with their personality types that indicate they were marginally superficial. They were all attractive women in their early thirties. Evidence and they’re profile indicate as much.”

“That’s a bit of a leap,” Lucy interjects.

“Not really,” John says, backing me up. “I agree with Ann. He’s after their misery not their face. Now that’s not to say that he isn’t keeping the faces as trophies. Hell that’s nearly a gimme. But I agree that I think the faces are just a bonus for the guy.”

“The killer could care less about the skin,” I pick up, “There’s almost always a sexual bend or semi-sexual bend. These cases lack that on the surface, but then we don’t know what he does with his trophies.”

“Goes home and masturbates with them?” John offers.

“Oh, eww, thanks Dad,” Bamby and Spencer groan at the same time.

“Like I need that mental image,” Spencer grumps from her chair on the side of my desk.

“It’s a possibility,” I say. “It’s not pleasant, but it has to be considered. The profile we’re dealing with is someone with an above average intelligence, I wouldn’t rule out medical training. Our unsub also has a very robust narcissistic personality. The profile suggests that he feels superior to not only his peers, but to others like him, to other sociopaths.”

I go to the tack board with crime scene photos posted. “If we look at the position of the bodies, the women are fully clothed, they are resting almost peacefully. There’s a certain amount of respect with the bodies after they’re killed. I feel that’s one of the reasons why they weren’t assaulted. The other is the idea that he has of him being better than the average killer. He probably feels he’s above the cheap tawdry behavior generally associated with profiles similar to his. It also seems like he’s making a point to thumb his nose at the perception.”

“So then why the note?” Bamby asks.

“His need for recognition. We’ve kept these cases from the media. There’s been no press. He wants to point us in some direction and he wants recognition for the things he’s done,” I answer.

I move across the room to sit on the edge of John’s desk to face my team. “The letter is a way to get the recognition. He put a number on the envelope that’s common knowledge. It was supplied on one of our largest cases in New York.”

“But how’d he know you were looking into his killings?” Spencer contributes her two-cents. “Bamby’s filled me in on some of the details and if what you say is true, which seems logical, why and how did he know about you and everyone working his killings?”

“That,” John answers, “is a question that we don’t have an answer to just yet, kiddo. But, it’s on my list of things to find out.”

“Also, since we’re talking about the letter why that quote? Moreover, why the misquote?” Travis shifts his weight to his other foot and folds his arms across his chest as he asks.

“Another excellent question that I don’t have an answer for just yet. It’s been stewing, but there’s not a lot of answers or even a way to get the answers that we need short of finding him and asking.”

“Which means,” John stops the line of questioning, “We focus on what we can which is all the physical evidence. There are things that we can run down. Leads that need followed up on. I’d like to have your,” he points to Bamby, Travis and Lucy, “efforts focused around processing all the samples that we’ve collected and doing a broad analysis. I know he’s left nothing of himself behind, thus far, but we still need to keep digging. When we catch this guy, we’re going to need as much physical evidence as possible for our A.U.S.A.”

“In the meantime,” I pick up. “John and I will be drafting a profile to submit to a friend over in the B.A.U. He can do some research and see if there are any unsolveds that line up with what we’re going to put together.”

“I’d also like for you and I to go back over to the Seevers residence and do some scouting,” John follows up. “We know that they’re being held and killed elsewhere. We need to find where that elsewhere is.”

“Agreed,” I say, “I’d also like to re-interview a few of the neighbors. I still find it weird that no one saw anything or at least remembers seeing anything.”

Everyone accepts the doled out responsibilities and the meeting breaks up. John and I watch our team march down the hallway towards the lab access doors. Spencer trailing behind the three others.

I look at John and he gives me a half-hearted smile. “Let’s get to work, kid.”

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