We Found Love In A Darker Place

Chapter 17 - Free Falling

"Clarity, I know this is hard, but you need to breathe." Rossi said, holding me in a tight hug.

I rested my head on his shoulder and forced myself to take in a breath. "Thanks Rossi." I looked back at Mackenzie, who was playing patty cake with J.J. at a desk. "I gotta go talk to Penelope." I said, kissing his cheek and turning on my heel.

"Clarity, I'm glad you're here. I have some news." Penelope said, looking up from her screen. She looked like she had been crying.

I felt a sharp pain in my heart and I had a bad feeling about her next words. "What is it Pen?" I asked.

"Mackenzie was the only child of Matthew and Sarah Taylor." She said. With the way she said that, I knew that was only the beginning. "Matthew was the youngest of three boys. Also, he was the only survivor in a fatal car accident in which both of his older brothers and father died when he was seven. They were on their way home from a camping trip."

I sat beside her and looked at the computer screen where the pictures of the crash stared right back at me. "What about his mother?" I asked.

"She died just a year later of what the m.e. declared as a broken heart. He was taken in by his older aunt and uncle. They are in their seventy's now. Sarah, on the other hand, was an only child. Her parents were loving and caring. Mother and father are also both dead." She said, looking at their death certificates on the screen.

I looked at it in almost disbelief. "Mother died of heart attack at sixty-three and Dad died of high blood pressure."

We sat in silence for a few minutes. "So there is no next of kin to take her. She will go straight to foster care. That is, unless she get adopted first." Penelope said, looking at me.

I looked at her through the window. She looked do adorable. "She looks so much like you, it's weird. Those dark red curls, her blue eyes. She could be your reincarnation. Except you're not dead of course."

I whipped my head back to her. "That's it. That why they chose her. She looks just like me. Someone who knew me in the past must he behind this." I said. I hugged her and smiled.

"What was in that box Clarity?" She asked, nervous.

"Four friendship bracelets. Two were bloody. Hotch sent them to trace. I have a feeling they were Mia's and Nichole's. The three of us wore them everyday. It was a gift for my seventh birthday from." I froze as all memories came rushing back to me.

"Hotch!" Penelope yelled out the door and he and the rest of the team come running to the door.

I looked at SSA Aaron Hotchner directly in the eyes and said the words I never thought would cross my lips. "I know kill Mia and Nichole. I remember everything. All the blood, the smell. It was Barry Miller and his daughter, Holly Dunn."

"Barry Miller as in the criminal defense for Christian Bell, Barry Miller?" Rossi asked me.

"The very same. Holly told me herself that Barry killed them because I didn't remember us being friends. She got held back a year in elementary school and afterwards, all the way to graduation the four of never really talked. We grew up while Holly wasn't ever the same." I said.

"Why did she get held back?" Reid asked me.

"She was in an accident. All I remember is that she kind of always had a child likeness about her. I think it was because of whatever happened to her. She does whatever her dad wants." I said.

"Do you remember where they took you?" Hotch asked.

"All I remember is it's  a house. I was in a basement room." I closed my eyes and dropped my head. "734." I said, looking up.

"What was that, Clarity?" Rossi asked.

"That was the addres. I remember it was on the front of the house by the door. 734 was beside the door in black." I said smiling at my regained memory.

"Penelope." Hotch started.

"Already on it." Penelope cut him off.