CM/WMC Crossover - The Unexpected, part 11/?
Title: The Unexpected, 11/?
Fandom: WMC/CM Crossover
Pairing: Emily/Cindy; Cindy/Lindsay and Emily/JJ implied.
Rating: PG-13, maybe higher due to some pretty descriptive violence.
Disclaimer: Don’t own a damn thing so don’t sue.
Warnings: This is un-beta’d. All mistakes are mine.
AN: I don’t know how long this is going to end up. I’m honestly surprised it’s been this long. Having this kind of dedication is kind of shocking for me.
She sat on the bench craddling the lukewarm coffee in her hands with Jill and Claire on either side of her, rubbing comforting hands across her back, hoping to ease some of her fear. She watched silently as Lindsay and the BAU team gathered their resources and began to analyze where to go now.
“Garcia was able to isolate an image of the person our second victim left with. We traced to her apartment and got footage from the lobby of the vic leaving alone. After that, she disappeared for several hours before being found late morning by a jogger,” JJ finished.
“So both victims left the apartments in the early morning hours, perhaps even before sunrise, never made it to their jobs that morning, but were found during the day by passerbys. It seems like our unsub has a lot of morning time free. We’ve ruled out the chance of random homeless people fitting the profile…,” Rossi locked onto a new piece of information with Hotch finishing it up.
“Meaning our unsub has a job that allows him to be free when these women are leaving the bars and to hold them for most of the day before killing and dumping them.”
JJ nervously ran her fingers through her hair, before looking at her watch, “We’re running out of time. If he sticks to his routine,…”
Morgan shook his head, “No, this has thrown off his routine. If she had her ID on her, he could very well be aware that he’s kidnapped an agent. It could be the perfect opportunity to toy with us or her,” indicating Cindy sitting outside.
JJ swallowed hard at the other possibility, “Or she could already be dead.”
The whole team was silent. JJ slumped into a chair, letting her inner fears and regrets finally catch up with her. When Garcia heard the strangled cries that JJ desperately tried to hold in, she went to her and put an arm around her.
“Come on, honey. Let’s go take a walk.”
Cindy watched in stunned silence as JJ was escorted down the hall by Garcia. She turned frantic eyes towards Lindsay, her shaking hands causing some of the coffee to spill onto the floor.
Lindsay turned back to Hotch, “I better go talk to Cindy before she thinks the worst.”
Hotch turned stonily to Rossi, a determined look on his face, “We’re missing something. It’s right here and we’re missing it.”
He looked to the door where JJ and Garcia had passed, then back at Rossi, shaking his head, “I hope JJ’s wrong. For her sake. I don’t think we’ll get her back from the brink if she is right.”
Rossi clamped a hand on his friend’s shoulder, “Emily’s tough. She can handle herself until we can get to her.”
Lindsay crouched down in front of her friends, “Lindsay…”
“Hey, it’s okay. It’s not what you think.”
Claire looked beseachingly at Lindsay, “Tell us some good news then.”
“Well, we think we’ve narrowed potential suspects down a little more. Since this guy is taking the victims in the middle of the night and they’re being found the next day, during the day, he must have a night job or at least nothing that makes him have to be somewhere first thing in the morning.”
Cindy did some quick mental calculations, when it clicked, “He gets rid of them the day after he takes them. She could be…”
“No,” Lindsay quickly stopped where she was going, feeling her stomach lurch at the unsubs real intentions, “They seem to think that Emily’s different. She wasn’t who he intended to get, so he may not stick to his routine. He may hold her longer.”
“Or he may just get rid of her quicker,” Jill blurted, making Lindsay glare at her, “Sorry.”
Cindy looked at Jill with a shocked face, while Claire buried her face in her hands, “I need to go to the bathroom.”
Claire and Jill stood to go with her, when she turned on them, “Alone…please.”
Lindsay gave her a cautious smile, “Sure, take your time.” No matter how much it hurt to see, this was exactly why Lindsay couldn’t let them be anymore than friends. That pain in Cindy’s eyes was too much to bear, and she didn’t want to be the one to put it there with a uniform showing up in the middle of the night to give her the bad news.
“Thanks,” Cindy wiped at her eyes as she went on a hunt for the nearest bathroom.
She rounded the corner and saw the blonde agent and the other woman heading out the side door. She wondered what had her so upset and had a brief moment of wondering if Lindsay was telling her all of the story. Cautiously, Cindy followed the pair, keeping a safe distance until they rounded a corner out of earshot. She stopped at the edge, listening to the conversation.
JJ ran her fingers through her hair, “I’m sorry, Garcia. I’ve just got to take a deep breath, get myself together.”
“Yes, eventually you do, but right now, you need to tell me what’s going on with you and Emily.”
“It’s nothing…really.”
“Those tears aren’t nothing. You haven’t been yourself for weeks. Pretty much ever since Barney Fife showed up in Miami,” JJ gave Garcia a pointed look.
“Please, Garcia. Don’t start in on that.”
“Hey, I don’t have to point out the obvious.”
“And what does that mean?” JJ crossed her arms.
“Well, let’s see, before Mr. Yuck-Yuck showed up, you and Emily were practically inseparable. You laughed, you joked, you even went clubbing with us after work. He, and yes, I refuse to say his name, shows up and suddenly you and Emily stop talking. Morgan told me he heard her crying after you took off with him that night.”
“She told me to go for it. I thought…,” JJ looked away.
“I don’t think she meant him.” JJ took a few steps away, letting the words sink in. Realizing she had nothing left to hide from her best friend, she turned back and threw her hands up in the air.
“I’ve messed up, Garcia. I’ve really lost her. I kept thinking I could find a way to fix things, that I could talk myself out of this thing with Will, but he’s been so persistent and he’s made it so easy and…”
“And he’s safe,” Garcia stated matter-of-factly.
“I can’t fix this,” she shook her head and closed her eyes, fighting new tears that were springing to her eyes, “I’ve lost her to a cute little redhead that’s fun and open and cute.”
“You said that already,” Garcia smirked slightly, hiding her amusement at JJ’s mini rant, “You still care about her though.”
JJ nodded, “And I always will.”
The tears started to fall again, “But I won’t get to tell her. She might…”
“No, you will. Let’s think this through and get our girl back.”
JJ wiped at her eyes and laughed at the innuendo, “So, she’s your girl too!”
“Oh honey, I am all things to all people. You should know that by now! Okay, so, what are we missing here?”
JJ started pacing, walking through the information. Cindy listened carefully, running through her own mental inventory of what she knew and what she had heard. Suddenly, a thought struck her and realization shocked her so that she had to put her hand over her mouth to stop from blurting it out.
She ran back inside and cut through a back hallway out of Lindsay’s line of sight. She jumped in her car and had to remind herself not to spin out of the parking lot with cops everywhere.
“Son of a bitch,” she mumbled, “Maybe Emily was right. I should have been a profiler.”
********
Thirty minutes later, she pulled into the parking lot. It felt weird to go into a bar in the light of day, but she couldn’t wait with Emily’s life in danger. Before getting out, she checked her makeup. She knew Charley’s type so it wouldn’t hurt to use every available resource she had, just in case she was resistant. It wasn’t like she intended to follow through!
She walked in and looked around for the bartender. Hearing noise in the back, she walked around the bar and went into the kitchen.
“Charley? Is that you?” Charley poked her head out from behind a shelf.
“Don’t tell me that your day’s been so rough that you need one of my special concoctions already,” the lanky woman leaned against the shelf and gave Cindy a wink.
Cindy smiled coyly at her, “Well, I do need something from you, but it’s not a drink.”
Charley cocked an eyebrow at her, “Really?”
Cindy ran her tongue over her lips and stepped closer to Charley, “Yeah, I was hoping you could help me with something.”
She stood and put her arms out, “I’m at your disposal.”
“I was hoping you’d say that.”
********
Garcia and JJ came running back into the room with the rest of the team, “It’s not a guy.”
Everyone turned at the simultaneous interruption. Lindsay stepped up, “What do you mean?”
Garcia, not wanting to waste precious time, ran to a computer to start running checks on all the faces she saw go into the bar last night. She accidentally bumped Reid in the process.
“Hey!”
“Sorry, sugar. You can’t stop magic when it’s in progress.”
JJ excitedly told Lindsay, “All this time we’ve been saying ‘he,’ ‘him,’ and ‘this guy.’ What if we’re not even looking for a man?”
Noticing the perfect opportunity for statistical information, Reid happily jumped in, “Research has found, by and large, that most serial killers, indeed killers in general, are of the male gender.”
JJ had Hotch’s attention, “Yes, but there’s always an exception to every rule.”
“Exactly!”
Hotch turned to the tech, “Garcia, could you…?”
“Already on it, boss.”
Morgan wondered, “So what would be the motivation for a woman to kill another woman?”
“Jealousy,” JJ stated unequivocably. Garcia paused and turned to look at her friend.
He shook his head, “But there has to be more to it than that. These were brutal murders. Well thought out and planned. This killer watched these women before actually kidnapping and killing them. He/she took the time to send warning information to both the victim and the press. These weren’t revenge killings or even spontaneous moments of rage or jealousy.”
“Trust me, it’s a factor.”
The computer whiz broke the moment, “There are no matches on the patrons. A couple with some shoplifting convictions, but nothing major.”
Hotch felt they had one last chance, “Check the bar staff too.”
Garcia nodded and went back to work. Lindsay knew it would be a few minutes before they learned any new information so went to tell Cindy what she knew. She went out to the hallway where they were waiting to find one redhead reporter noticeably absent.
“Where’s Cindy?”
Jill shrugged, “She hasn’t come back yet.”
Claire looked at her watch, realizing how much time had passed, “She’s been gone for about 30 minutes.”
Lindsay threw her hands up into the air and took off in the direction of the bathroom. She threw the door open, “Cindy, are you in here?”
All three stopped at the silence and looked at each other. Lindsay lost it first, “Goddamn it, Cindy!” She turned back to the others, “I swear that I’m personally pad locking that girl in a cell!”
“I’ll help,” Jill added, making Claire smirk and quip.
“Can we just make it a party then? I’ll bring the dip.”
“Come on, I think I know where she’s gone.”
*******
Charley smirked at the redhead, “And to think that I was flattered by your interest. Seems you have a thing for older women. Guess I’m out of luck.”
“It’s nothing personal, Charley. Really. I’ve just been watching her for a long time and I had to know. They say bartenders know everything, so…,” Charley shook her head and laughed.
“Well, now you have her address, phone number, everything. Go, go get the woman of your dreams,” she said, doing the word dreams in air quotes, “I tell ya, you’re going to make her day.”
Cindy gave Charley a quick hug of appreciation, in case she never got a chance again to thank her, and ran to her car. Her heart was pounding in her chest. This certainly had to be the craziest thing she’d ever done and if she made it out of it unscathed, Lindsay would probably throw her in not just a cell, but a padded one at that.
She revved the engine and zipped through the congested San Francisco streets, praying she wouldn’t get to Emily too late. Taking a deep breath to settle her nerves, she turned on a side street heading to the outskirts of the city.