White Flag (Jennifer Jareau x Fem!OC)

Chapter 28

Victoria's POV

            I walk to a pub I know well and sit down at the bar. After some time, two men join me and sit close to me.

"It's about time." I chuckle happily.

"So nice to see you, blue eyes." Luca side hugs me. "How's life?"

"Better far away from you, moron." I hug him too.

"Children..." Simeone giggles.

"Do you have what I ask for?" I wonder.

"Everything is here." Luca hands me a file. "What are you going to do?"

"I'll make him come here." I state. "It has to stop."

            They nod and we walk outside the pub, heading to my hotel room, which looks more like a giant FBI conference room than anything.

"Wow, how obsessed are you?" Luca chuckles.

"A little too much, to be honest." I confess. "I've started this when Sergio started his revenge, I knew he would talk to someone about his plan, someone who will come back after me and my family."

"Who do you think it is?" Simeone wonders.

"Judging by the missing pieces on each scene, I can tell the man who is doing this has only seen the picture of my mom's death." I start to explain. "Which means Sergio hadn't had the time to show him the video."

"Is this video still a thing?" Simeone frowns. "I thought your father made a point of honor in seeing this thing disappear."

"Only one copy still exists, if we don't count my memory." I fake a smile.

"Who has it?" Luca wonders. "And why didn't you destroy it already?"

"I have it, crypted and hidden somewhere only I know." I say slowly and they glare at me. "What? I can't get rid of it like that, my entire life changed that day."

"We know..." Simeone sighs. "Sorry... What about that man, though?"

"I think it might be Brad's son, Fabio." I expose my thoughts. "Judging by the timeline and the fact he didn't know before; I think it's the only plausible person. Sergio couldn't talk to him about it without telling him the truth about his mother's death too."

"So, he had to wait to be sure of his total allegiance." Luca completes. "Which was determined when Fabio chose him over your father that night in Naples."

"Exactly." I nod.

"It would explain the message left on the last victim too." Simeone makes the link.

"That's what I think too, Fabio still thinks his mother was a cop, just like my mother or Lauren." I point out. "Which is not true, even if Sergio never believed that. He convinced Brad Romano his wife was just like the others when she was nothing but a great mother..."

"That's fucked up..." Luca sits on the bed.

"It is, mainly because now, Fabio is searching for the women who betrayed the family." I frown.

"Starting with Lauren, or Emily whatever you call her today..." Simeone acknowledges.

"She is the one who started this and the only one who survived..." Luca agrees. "Which is the reason why you flew away from your FBI team."

"Yes, I needed to make sure Fabio won't be able to focus on only one target. If I stayed there, he could have done it in once, now he has to think about several plans. It's harder, it takes more time."

❖

Emily's POV

            We arrived in NY two hours ago. We are now all gathered in the conference room, files are everywhere, and we can't find something interesting. I can feel JJ tensing up as the time passes by, and I start to get worried to.

"Prentiss, what was the message, again?" JJ yells from the other side of the room.

"Where is she?" I yell back.

"You know, Tori says that a lot in her sleep, right before waking up from her nightmares." JJ walks to me. "She said this story is personal, that the killer is duplicating her mother's death. What if those nightmares she has are about that particular moment?"

"Garcia, what can you tell us about Grace O'Brien?" I ask.

"Grace O'Brien was an Irish woman married to Paul Martinelli, they had a daughter... Victoria... they seemed very in love and happy all together..." Garcia saddens looking at the photo. "Her body was never found but a camera footage of her death has been used by the Police."

"Do you have the video?" David wonders.

"Wait a minute..." Garcia types quickly on her keyboard. "No, the video has been deleted, the police have been hacked five years ago, there is nothing left but a picture."

"Victoria must have deleted all the videos of the worst moment of her life." Luke states.

"It could explain the nightmares, if she still has the video, she could have nightmares about it." JJ whispers to me.

"Okay, guys, look at the picture." Garcia says when our tablet rings. "I can't even imagine what the video could look like..."

"Okay, that's Paul by the bar, drinking whisky." I comment. "The man with the gun is Sergio Bianchi, the man Victoria killed here one month ago, and the last one is..."

"Ian Doyle." David finishes my sentence as I freeze.

            Everyone turns to me, and I find back the ability to breathe.

"If Doyle was here, it could explain why Victoria is flying away from us." David states. "She wants to protect you, Emily."

"But Doyle is dead." JJ points out. "What could be the link to Emily, now?"

"When I ran away, they start to question their wife's integrity, all of them, Grace has been killed for being a fed, Sergio's wife too, maybe they weren't the only ones." I try to think.

"Could someone still be angry at you? Or at what you represented at the time?" Matt wonders.

"Someone who wouldn't understand it all, someone who would have heard things about it, but wouldn't truly be able to link it all together?" Luke adds.

"Garcia, in the video of Tori, she said something is missing." I point out. "Can you compare the picture and the last crime scene to find if something is missing, please?"

"I'm right on it." Penelope answers. "Nothing. Everything seems to be the same. Woman tied up, same gun used, same position of the body, whisky on ice on the bar..."

"I think she spotted something right away." Josh Dustin speaks up. "When we arrived, she looked around the scene as if she knew it by heart already. She was looking for something specific. First, she was stressed because of the whisky, but then, she relaxed."

"She saw something was missing, something that probably exculpated her father." I understand. "What are we missing, guys?"