𝐋𝐀𝐁𝐘𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐇- spencer reid ✔️

𝐓𝐄𝐍

𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐀𝐓 𝐀 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐃 𝐄𝐍𝐃. The BAU team had been at it for nearly two weeks, yet they hadn't had a single clue as to who might have been capable of it. It seemed that the more they cracked down on security, the more inventive their unsub became. They attacked Nate while he was in the car on the way to the hospital, a car that Celia and Sebastian Clairmont were supposed to be in. 

Spencer could tell that Celia felt guilty for her cousin's accident. He didn't need to be a profiler to see it, because he was all too familiar with the feeling of guilt. The guilt of surviving, knowing that it should have been me. Sebastian was feeling guilty as well, but he was much more difficult to read. If he hadn't had that argument with his cousin, then perhaps they may not have been in this predicament. But none of that mattered because either way, that car was destined to crash, no matter who was in it. Someone was meant to die. 

And someone did. 

The driver of the car hadn't made it out of there alive, and Nate had barely gotten out of there himself. The doctor's told Celia that he was lucky, that he was lucky he'd been sitting on the opposite side where the car had been struck. 

"None of this feels lucky," she muttered. She hadn't left his side once, not since he'd been put to bed without knowing when he'd wake up. The doctors said his body needed time to heal, and they weren't sure when he'd wake up, or if he'd ever wake up at all. "It should have been me," she whispered. Spencer wasn't supposed to hear it, but he did. 

He was worried about her. 

She'd experienced so much trauma in such a short period of time, and she was stronger than most people, because she still tried to put on a brave face every day, but it was crumbling more and more. Every day, a piece of her facade cracked and fell apart. Behind all of it, Spencer saw nothing but a scared girl who wanted nothing more than to protect her family. But she couldn't, and it was killing her. Celia wasn't used to not having control, that much was clear. She was suffering, and Spencer couldn't think of a thing to do that could relieve her troubles. He'd told her they would catch the person that did this, and he felt like he was letting her and her family down with each passing day that this person stayed out there. 

She was deteriorating. 

The nightmares, the lack of sleep. She'd barely been eating anything, too stressed to even consider it. She'd only gotten worse. Celia had slept comfortably for the first time in a while yesterday, which was why he couldn't bear to wake her up. She was exhausted, and she didn't feel safe in her own house. They had been offered the option of a safe house before, but they had been hesitant to believe that there was a real threat against them until now. The only thing stopping them was their stubbornness. They both had responsibilities, and they couldn't just go off the grid and abandon post. Spencer's team had advised them against staying in the house, but at the end of the day there was nothing they could do to make them change their minds. Whether or not they went into protective custody was their choice, and they didn't want to. 

"I'm so sorry," she whispered to Nathan's unconscious body, stifling a sob. Spencer felt strange intruding on her like this, like he was sitting in on something he shouldn't be. "Please wake up," she pleaded softly. "I need you to just wake up, Nate. Don't go leaving me just yet." A sound of someone clearing their throat caught Spencer's attention, and Morgan stood outside the door with a phone to his ear. He spared a glance at Celia, who hadn't left her chair, and let himself out of the room. 

"Is that Garcia?" Spencer asked, gesturing to the phone. Morgan nodded and put her on speaker. "So, I took a look at the security footage from the intersection and I was able to get the car model and a partial plate. And I got a match. The car that hit them was reported as stolen about two days ago."