LAUGHTER LINES, spencer reid.

chapter twenty four

Baggage claim was full of returning travelers from the holiday, and Reid tried looking for Gwen's bushy brown hair. After ten minutes of being pushed and shoved by hurried families, rushed businessmen, and frustrated airport security, Spencer moved to the edge of baggage claim and pulled out his cell phone. He quickly entered Gwen's number. You've reached Gwenevere Thompson. You know what to do.

"Gwenevere, your phone has been off all day. I'm at the airport on the edge of baggage claim," Spencer hung up and looked around, pausing when he saw Scott and Emily making their way towards him. Spencer glanced at his phone wondering for the first time why Gwenevere had her phone off. It wasn't like her. How many times had they gotten phone calls in the middle of the night? More than once, and every time, her phone was on.

"Where's Gwenevere?" Spencer asked as Emily and Scott came to a stop in front of them. He looked at his phone again for a text, phone call, voicemail, anything that would chase away the foreboding that had crept in.

Emily bit her lip and looked to Scott to provide the genius with an answer. Scott rubbed the back of his neck nervously before looking around. "We don't know," he answered slowly, looking at Reid carefully.

Despite the fact that they were standing in a crowded, loud, busy airport, Spencer felt his world grow quiet, waiting for Scott or Prentiss to say something. He looked at one and then to the other, moving back and forth between the two. "Where did she go?" he asked.

Emily stepped towards Spencer to avoid a man yelling into his cellphone about the wrong doll bed arriving at his home in Alexandria. "Reid," she began. "Gwen went out to take the trash, and she didn't come back."

"What happened?" Reid asked. "Why was she out at night, alone?"

Scott shook his head. "Our parents place is in a safe neighborhood. Gwenevere always goes out on her own, and it was just to put the trash bin out." He looked around anxiously and turned back to Reid.

"There's more," Reid said, reading it on his teammate's face. Emily couldn't even look him in the eye. "What is it? Prentiss, what else happened?"

Emily sighed, knowing that she couldn't hide it and he was going to find it all out soon. Emily had called Hotch in the mountains; Rossi was in Italy, and now on his way back. Morgan had a flight out of Chicago in the morning. JJ and Will would also board a plane the next morning in New Orleans. Hotch called them all back once he heard the news. Everyone was coming back to help.

"There was some blood, and signs of an ambush," Emily pushed her palms together like she was praying that Reid wouldn't react too badly. "Two sets of footprints, drag marks, the police think that she was abducted."

Abducted. The word seemed to make the world slow down for Reid. How could Gwen be missing? She knew several forms of martial arts and somehow two people managed to get the high ground, and they took her. He didn't really wonder who had taken her. There was only one person he knew of that had managed to take Gwen before.

"Where's Adrienne Foster?" Spencer asked.

"In the wind," Scott said quietly. "We're almost certain it was her."

"Almost certain?" Spencer asked.

"Gwen's job… It could be someone else. We doubt it, but we can't rule it out. The footprints at my parents' house belonged to two men. There was a third set farther down the road. That one was female. We're checking traffic cameras around the area, but it hasn't been much help," Scott explained. He hated that there weren't more answers to give to Spencer, but he simply didn't.