How Dare You [ReidxReader]

(10) Stray Bullet

The next two days are rough. You hit the ground running, new bodies turning up every evening. While still fighting your hangover, you desperately try to do your work. It's been going alright. The only thing that throws you off balance, are the worried and sad looks Spencer shoots in your direction. You don't sleep.

On the second night, however, exhaustion takes over and you finally close your eyes. But not for long. Two hours later, you get woken up by Hotchner banging on your hotel room door to let you know another body has been discovered.

When you step outside, you barely make it to the SUV. Hotchner informs you that you and he will head to the crime scene while the others work on the profile, adding the new information of the latest victim.

The ride to the crime scene is dead silent. Your eyes get heavy and your head droops to your chest. "We're here." Hotchner declares and gets out of the car. Two police cars are parked on the side of the road. The body is in a ditch a few feet to the right.

"He's getting sloppy." You observe. "Throwing her away like that is risky. He's escalating." Hotchner looks around without commenting on what you just said. You put on your gloves and turn to the crime scene technicians: "Are you done with the body?"

They nod at you and you step closer. The victim is laying face down, slightly rolled onto her side. You kneel down and push her over. Her face is frozen in a grimace. Carefully, you brush the strands of hair out of her face. It's hard to look at her with her eyes still open. But she deserves to be looked at, taken care of. You examine her hands. She definitely put up a fight.

There are three entry wounds in her chest. You roll her on her side again and look at her back. "No exit wounds." You tell Hotchner. "He's using a different weapon." The other victims didn't have the bullets in them. Only holes.

Hotchner squats next to you: "You don't need to do that. We have a medical examiner for this."

You want to be offended by his words, but for a change his voice is kind. "Yeah, but we'll have to wait on the report, and we'll lose another day."

When you trace your fingers over the gun shots wounds, he lets you go on and observes you quietly. You take a deep breath and push your finger inside one of them. It makes an unpleasant sludgy sound, and you swallow hard.

Your index finger isn't even fully inside when you feel the bullet. Carefully, you grab it and pull it out. You hold it up and Hotchner aims his flashlight at it. "You're right." He tells you.

"From what I can gather, she fought back more than he expected. He could not use the revolver he used on the others and shot her with hollow-point bullets."

Hotchner gets an evidence bag and you let the bullet fall into it.

"Well done." His praise catches you off guard.

- - - - - - - - - -

Back at the police station your adrenaline from being around a corpse has worn off and you collapse into a chair. Spencer hands you a coffee and a bottle of water. You give him a tired smile.

"Our unsub seems to realize we are closing in on him. He is panicking." Hotchner summarizes your findings.

"What's his endgame?" Morgan asks.

"I don't think he has one." Reid comments. "He wasn't careful with his killings before, barely managed to leave no DNA, and now he risks being captured by being this reckless."

"I think he wants to be captured." You think out loud.

"That doesn't mean he won't put up a fight." Hotchner says.

"But we have more to go on now." JJ reminds you. "We only knew of one weapon. Now we have two. That should scale down our pool of suspects."

While the others call Garcia, you step outside to drink your coffee in silence and get some fresh air. Spencer follows you once again.

"Are you practicing for your next observation job?"

He ignores your question: "How did we get the information about the other weapon so quickly?"

"I looked at the body." You answer deadpan and take a sip of your coffee.

Spencer blinks surprised: "Did you pull the bullet out?"

"Yes." You shrug your shoulders.

He raises his eyebrow: "We are around dead bodies fairly often, but no one has ever had the courage to do that."

"Oh. That explains why Hotchner said something nice to me."

Spencer shakes his head: "You're unbelievable."

- - - - - - - - - -

Your initiative with the body pays off: Garcia is able to narrow it down to one suspect. The team is suited up with vests and gets ready to breach. Hotchner knocks on the front door and yells: "FBI! Open up."

He gives the unsub five seconds to respond, then Morgan pursues his favorite hobby and kicks down the door.

Reid and you go round the back and smash the glass of the back door. Reid obviously withholding a joke about you being an expert for that.

The others scan the rooms downstairs, while you and Reid make your way up the staircase. He's walking behind you, tapping your shoulder before you enter the hallway to let you know he's there. Weapons at the ready, you split up.

Your heart pounding hard, you swing open the door to what turns out to be the bathroom. No one here. Just before you go to open the next door, you hear Spencer's distressed voice. Carefully to not make any noise, you walk towards the open door. The unsub is standing behind his bed, pointing a revolver at Reid.

He hasn't noticed you yet and you make your way to the doorframe. Spencer tries to calm him down. You scream internally when he puts his gun back into it's holster and holds up his hands. For fucks sake. Lowering your gun, you enter the room.

"Stop! I will shoot you!" The unsub threatens.

"Who will you shoot first?" You ask nonchalantly.

His eyes dart between the two of you.

Spencer stiffens besides you, apparently regretting that he put his gun away.

"Do you really want to die here?" He continues to argue with the unsub.

"Do you?" The man counters.

You hear the others coming upstairs and see the panic in the unsub's eyes.

You know what he is going to do before he even put his finger around the trigger.

When his gun goes off, you jump in front of Reid, catching the bullets with your vest. The force of it pushes you backwards into Spencer, but you manage to shoot the unsub in both shoulders, immediately disabling him.

You stumble, but Spencer catches you by throwing his arms around you. Slowly, he sinks to the ground with you. The others storm in. Hotchner walks over to the unsub to cuff him, while Morgan squats next to you: "You okay?"

You point at the bullets in your vest and breathe out: "Been better."

- - - - - - - - - -

Groaning, you take off your vest and let Hotchner bag it for evidence.

Spencer sits down next to you in the back of the ambulance.

"Thank you." He mumbles.

"You're welcome." You squeeze his hand.

"How did you know he would shoot me?"

"The last victim." You answer. "He shot her in panic because she put up a fight. You were the easier target. He always chose the easier target."

"It's because I put my gun away, isn't it?" Spencer sighs.

You don't need to answer that.

When JJ walks over, you realize that Spencer is still holding your hand, rubbing his thumb over the back of it. He only lets go when she is right in front of you and you tug it gently out of his grasp.