Past and Present

Chapter 14

The next morning, Reid and I were woken up by a loud knock on the door.

"Ayo lovebirds, we gotta be at the station in fifteen minutes!" Morgan yelled from outside our room, definitely waking up the neighbors.

Reid and I got ready in a hurry and made our way down to the station within exactly fifteen minutes.

"Smart AND punctual," Emily commented, as we entered the station at exactly 8:15AM.

"More like tired and in need of caffeine," I said, making a b-like for the coffee machine.

Reid followed, making his own cup and pouring way too much sugar into his cup.

"How are you feeling?" Reid asked, turning to face me.

"I'm okay," I said smiling.

I grabbed his hand.

"Spence, I'm glad I told you about my dad. I knew I would eventually, it was just a matter of when."

"I'm glad I can be someone you trust Jo."

"Don't get all mushy at me Doctor, I already wanna kiss you," I said, winking and walking away.

Before I joined the BAU, I was never someone who made sly comments. Yes, I was somewhat confident, but not nearly as confident as I was now. Something about becoming a profiler changed me. It changed the way I viewed myself. I was more open, confident, loud, and easy to talk to. Reid played a huge part in that too. I never thought that in almost two months I would change so much because of one person. He made me better, happier, and just the most me I've ever felt.

Throughout the day, the team gathered more info on who we thought the unsub may be and decided it was time to deliver the profile.

"The unsub is white and in his late 20s and while he may not have grown up here, he knows someone who did," Hotch began.

"This guy has a type," Morgan continued, "females of average height in their late 20s with blonde hair and hazel eyes."

"Because of the victim's physical appearances, we are confident that our unsub may be targeting our very own agent, Dr. Josephine Mills," Rossi said gesturing to me.

"Because of this," I began, "we have reason to believe that our unsub may be Noah Daniels.

Reid continued my thought, seeing I was uncomfortable.

"The stressor we identified is some sort of altercation with a past girlfriend, triggering a physiologic break, which Noah and Dr. Mills had gone through around a month and a half ago, exactly before the killings began."

"Along with this," JJ continued, "Our unsub gets off at asserting dominance over his victims, strangling and stabbing them each ten times in the back."

"These ten stabs to the back also represent what happened to him. A woman, in this case Dr. Mills, betraying what he thought was a real relationship when in reality, he was imagining their love was more than it was," Emily continued, "He becomes extremely obsessive, controlling, and demands power, to the point where we think he may have been stalking Dr. Mills for weeks, maybe months."

"Okay, get to work. Thank you," Hotch said in a straight tone.

After delivering the profile, I looked at the clock and saw it was around 2PM, and my stomach began to growl. I walked over to the rest of the team who all seemed to feel the same way.

"Guys, there is this great sandwich shop down the street. I could go down there and get us all some lunch?"

Everyone squealed in excitement.

"Alright," I said laughing, "just text me what you guys want, it's make your own sub."

I walked down the block realizing it may not have been a good idea for me to be out alone without someone with me, but it was the middle of the day. All of the girls had been taken and killed at night, so I doubted anything would happen. As I walked into the sandwich stop with that familiar childhood smell, I got a text from Garcia.

"Hope everything's okay! Miss you, buttons. Girls night when you guys get back. ;) XOXO"

I texted back saying I was excited to get absolute shit faced after this case, laughing to myself.

Receiving a chain of texts, I ordered lunch for my team and waited patiently for all the sandwiches to finish being made. After about ten minutes, I left the shop, making my way back to the station.

When I was about only two buildings away, in front of a small ally between a convenient store and a nail salon, I turned to my right to see a tall man in a black hoodie hit me over the head.