RED

coffee cups, clovers, and conflicts

sorry it's been so long without an update! this semester is busier than I expected and this kinda hit the back burner :/ anyway, enjoy! 

word count: 3227

The police station buzzed with the usual chaos of a fresh case—officers moving in and out, phones ringing, coffee cups piling up on desks. Emily Prentiss stood beside Morgan and Reid, reviewing the crime scene photos spread across a table. She'd barely heard a word since they arrived; her mind had slipped into that hyper-focused, almost dissociative state it had been in more and more recently, especially when Doyle surfaced in her thoughts.

Morgan leaned over the table, eyes skimming the photos. "This unsub's sloppy, man. Three bodies, all shot up close, but no clear pattern in the placement of the wounds."

"Not sloppy—quick," Reid countered, tapping a photo of one of the victims with his pen. "Look at the time between each attack. He doesn't have the luxury of precision. He's prioritizing speed and efficiency, which means he's either running from something or toward something."

Emily barely registered their conversation, her attention drawn to one of the images. It was a close-up of the second victim, a middle-aged man shot in the chest. Over the gunshot wound, just barely visible, was a crude, hastily drawn four-leaf clover. Her heart skipped a beat.

Her chest tightened, the air around her thinning. It couldn't be. Not here. Not now. But the jagged edges of the clover—the way it had been carelessly scrawled, almost like an afterthought—she recognized it instantly. Ian Doyle's mark.

She gripped the edge of the table, knuckles white, fighting to steady her breathing. Don't react. Keep it together. Her mind flashed back to Doyle's face, that cold, unrelenting stare as he carved chaos into the world. She hadn't seen that clover in years, but the sight of it now felt like a punch to the gut.

"Emily?" Morgan's voice snapped her out of the spiral. She blinked, forcing her expression into something neutral. "You good?"

"Yeah, fine," she said, her voice steady, though her heart was pounding. She pulled her gaze away from the photo, trying to act casual, but her hands trembled at her sides.

Reid, who had been studying the board across the room, glanced over his shoulder at her. His eyes narrowed, catching the subtle shift in her posture, the tension that hadn't been there a second ago. He didn't say anything, but the gears in his mind were already turning. Emily's been off lately. More guarded. Jumpy. And now, he'd seen that flicker of fear in her eyes—fear that didn't quite align with the case they were working.

Morgan hadn't picked up on it, his attention still on the timeline of events. "I'm telling you, Reid, this guy's making mistakes. He's in a rush, sure, but there's a recklessness here."

"There's a difference between recklessness and carelessness," Reid muttered, though his gaze remained on Emily a moment longer. He filed the observation away for later, mentally cross-referencing it with her behavior over the past few weeks. She hadn't been sleeping well—that much was clear from the bags under her eyes. Even this morning, though she looked slightly better, an air of dullness surrounded her. And she'd been more distant than usual, even from Morgan. Something was gnawing at her, and now this—whatever this moment had been—was proof.

Emily caught Reid watching her and forced herself to move, shaking off the lingering sense of doom. "Let's focus on the timeline," she said quickly, changing the subject. "We need to find out if any witnesses noticed someone hanging around the metro before the first murder. I'll head to the scene and talk to Metro."

"I'll go with you," Morgan offered.

She hesitated, but nodded. The last thing she wanted was to be alone right now, especially with Doyle's presence hanging in the air like a ghost.