DARK RED ★ a.hotchner

002

CHAPTER 2
BEAUTY AND BRAINS

THE HISPANIC WOMAN HAD INTRODUCED HERSELF TO HER COWORKERS AFTER HER NOT SO FRIENDLY INTRODUCTION WITH THE UNIT CHIEF.
to say the team was shocked was an understatement, none of them had expected an arrival of a new team member on such short notice, and the fact that this extremely gorgeous woman was their new agent was even more surprising.

"Briefing room everyone, we can proceed with introductions later." The stern voice of Aaron Hotchner spoke, each team member whipped their heads around to look at him before gathering the stuff necessary for the debrief of the case, and beginning their walk towards the room with the round table.

The team had barely made themselves comfortable before Agent Todd placed images of the most recent case across the round table, each agent leaning forward to take a look at the images as Jordan began to describe the horrors that occurred,

"Vanessa Holden, age 25. Last friday night, she was clubbing with her sister. A stranger, white male, roughly her age, picked her up. They left the club at 1A.M and went back to her place. Forced her on her hands and knees. Then proceeded to cut her open just below the stomach." The mocha-skinned woman described, her eyebrows furrowing in disgust as she gazed upon the rest of the agents in the room.

"Jesus Christ." Valentina murmured under her breath, as she picked up one of the images and began inspecting it steadily.

"The gutting causes the intestines to spill out, You can survive for a few hours, actually even days." the youngest genius spoke out indifferently, his voice held a lack of emotion, however he showed clear interest in the case as his eyebrows knitted together in confusion, small wrinkles scattering across his forehead.

"Post-Mortem indicates that he slit her throat at 5A.M."

"So he sliced her open, left her for four hours and then killed her, you think he gets like sexual gratification from it? sexual sadist possibly?" Valentina butt in, her voice was stern yet inquisitive and as she glanced up to look at Agent Hotchner she swore she saw a slight twitch in his eyebrow, showing he was slightly impressed at how fast the new recruit caught on.

"see, i thought that too but then i found two priors from a year ago, prostitutes, actually, in motel rooms."

"keep running with it, why do you think this is the same unsub?" derek asked, his tongue rolled slightly in his cheek as he looked back down at the images before him.

Jordan turned around abruptly as she started flicking through the case images on the large screen in-front of her,

"in Vanessa Holden's Apartment, the following were discovered; bleach, ammonia, trash bags, all in a triangular pattern," the screen beeped as new images form the prior victims were revealed, "one year ago, motel rooms, bleach, ammonia, trash bags. also, in a triangular pattern.

as the team gave their opinions on the situation, valentina looked closely at the images,

"perhaps he has OCD? it's common with people with ocd to keep belongings in a specific pattern, the fact that the unsub keeps all items in the exact same place could show some kind of superstition in his mind, that he needs to follow these exact steps consistently in order to prevent something happening to him."

The agents turned to her as they analysed the probability of her theory, derek had an impressed smile on his lips as he sized the dark hair woman up, his eyes residing longer on her chest in a flirtatious manner.

"But.. there's one other commonality between both of the murders.. bleach and ammonia were found under the victims' fingernails."

"the victims are cleaning up their own murders." The hispanic woman stated, leaning back in her seat as she gazed hard at the images presented before her. her eyes flickering up as they caught her boss's stare from across the table.

"it's the same unsub."

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"some pretty smart stuff in there sweetcheeks." derek grinned as he walked out beside the much shorter woman.

"i'm an FBI agent, Agent Morgan, it is quite literally my job to analyse what no one else does." the black haired beauty huffed, grabbing her jacket form the back of her chair and her bag which she pulled over her shoulder.

"guess you aren't just a pretty face then, angel." the darker skinned man chuckled, a small smile quirking up on Valentinas face at his heroic flirting attempts.

"i'm going to grab some coffee does anyone want anything?" the 5,5 woman asked, she pulled her sunglasses out of her purse as she slipped them into her face, her aura radiating a fierce energy.

"please may i just have a coffee, however i like five sugars and a lot of creamer!" the scrawny genius asked politely, as he tapped his leg slightly.

"of course, boy genius! anyone else?"

Despite the fact that the bureau's coffee tasted like straight up dirt, the rest of the team declined valentinas offer, to which she hummed at and muttered a "i'll see ya soon!" to the members surrounding her.

As the brunette left the formal building and began her approach towards the small café, where she picked up her coffee most mornings.

the woman who owned was a very old lady, in her old 70's now and still got business booming!

as the bell dinged in a familiar chime the young woman was greeted speedily by the woman she considered a form of mother figure.

"Teeny! Hello my darling!" the older woman enthusiastically greeted, her hair was silver and tight ringlets fell loosely from her scalp, her eyes wrinkled in the corners and her face adorned a sweet smile.

"Hey Sandy, how's business been?" Valentina asked, although most of the time her smiles were cocky, and her face was far too serious, the dark haired woman had a soft spot for the elderly, and Sandy was a woman that Valentina held very closely to her heart.

"Oh darling, it's just been same thing different day! Say it's quite early for you to be here, have you got a local case?" The kind lady questioned, Valentina had told her previously about her line of work but she had also told Sandy that she often travelled and didn't spend much time in state.

"Well actually, i've been transferred to a different department, i'm just.. on a coffee run." the young woman stated, looking down into her purse to pull out a couple of dollars to pay for her coffee when she ordered it.

"ahh.. well, what can i get for you dear?"

"uhm, regular coffee, 5 sugars, and a bit of creamer, a caramel latte, and a black coffee, 1 sugar." the newest agent ordered,

it didn't take a profiler to see that Hotchner was a black coffee type of guy.