Two days passed. Hotch, Derek, Prentiss, JJ, and Rossi all flew up to New York City to investigate the crime scenes and locations as well as to speak with Maryanne's supervisor. Despite your protests, neither you nor Preston were permitted to accompany them yourselves. Hotch wanted strictly unbiased eyes on the latest victims and for it to be under the guise of an unrelated BAU investigation.
You'd had to explain to them all what little you did know for certain from that night: you and your family had been leaving Lincoln Center after watching a performance of Handel's Messiah by the New York Philharmonic. Your family's usual driver had been ill for the past few days. Your parents had arranged for a different service to pick you up from Lincoln Center. You hadn't even glanced at the driver as you got in the car. He pointed out that there were mini water bottles in every cup holder for all of you. You'd drunk half of yours and then...
Darkness.
And you were launched into a swirling world that mixed nightmare and reality, and every time you became a little bit more lucid, you'd feel a sharp pain in your neck and get sent straight back. You were only half certain that the man who had tortured your family members was wearing a mask. Either way, you didn't know what he looked like.
You weren't sure you ever really even wanted to know.
Truthfully, the idea of walking around where Maryanne and Samantha had been propped up with the exact same MO as your family made you sick. Perhaps it was a good thing that you weren't permitted to go.
But Preston was a little less content to stay in Quantico sorting through files with you.
The two of you were sitting in the briefing room. You were running a program on your laptop that was trying to match similarities between all of the victims; it ran through work histories, past residencies, memberships to clubs or stores, and email subscriptions alike—anything that could draw a potential connection between any of them.
Besides the fact that all of the families between the initial killings and Samantha and Maryanne each were fairly well-off and had at least two children with a daughter being the oldest, there didn't seem to be much else.
Preston was searching through the ViCAP database for anything within the past fifteen years that could have been related, and you could tell that he was getting increasingly more irritated as each passing case file yielded nothing fruitful.
Neither of you had spoken about your argument, nor had either of you addressed the tension that still hung thickly in the air between you. You didn't want to broach the subject, and Preston was just as stubborn as you were.
So you were sitting in uncomfortable silence as you went about your tasks.
You looked up from your laptop when you heard footsteps approaching and saw Spencer standing in the doorway. Hotch had ordered him to stay and work from the office to help you and Preston parse through files and paperwork and databases since he'd be able to do so at a far faster rate than either of you could.
But he had been keeping his distance, too, and if he wasn't at his desk, he was with Garcia, who was running a program to slowly slip through layers of security to try and find information on whatever operation your parents were involved in.
You hadn't really spoken to Spencer much in the past two days, so you were a little surprised to see him there. "Do you need something?" you asked.
He pressed his lips together in greeting before answering, "No, uh... Garcia just wanted me to give you these—" He placed a thin folder with papers inside on top of one of the many stacks of folders and boxes you already had littering the table. "They're resumes for... all the victims."
"Why didn't she just send them to me herself digitally?"
"She's busy searching for information. Morgan and Prentiss are following a lead, so they..." He trailed off, shaking his head slightly to himself. "It was faster for me to print them out and deliver them than it would have been to send them to you myself electronically. I figured you'd want them sooner rather than later."
"Okay. Thanks, I guess."
"You're welcome."
Spencer lingered in the doorway for one second before giving you a tight-lipped smile and turning on his heel.
You turned back to your laptop screen and resumed your typing. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see Preston glancing between you and the doorway.
Then he whistled under his breath as he returned to his work as well.
You looked over at him.
He clicked his tongue but kept his eyes down at his papers. "That wasn't just cold; that was fuckin' freezing."
You didn't respond. You just stared at him, your fingers frozen over the keys of your laptop.
He glanced over to you with a shrug. "It's getting painful to watch, honestly."
"What?"
Preston sighed through his nose. "Now, I'm not a profiler, or a doctor—" He gave you a pointed look to punctuate his words. You'd had to delineate your entire childhood to the team (genius status and academic record included) before they could start their investigations. Preston had seemed the most caught off-guard to learn that you had a PhD, but he hadn't commented on it until now. "—but even an idiot can see that you've got it bad for each other. This is like... watchin' two scared puppies circle each other."
You pressed your lips together and turned back to your computer. You didn't want to get into it, and certainly not with Preston. You didn't have the mental capacity for it. "Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about."
"That's a joke, right?" And when you didn't answer, Preston set his papers down on the table and looked you head on. "For fuck's sake, the guy was reading a fuckin' book on your bed. Since when do you even let people in your apartment?"
"It's irrelevant. I don't want to talk about it."
"That's usually when you need to talk about something the most."
You laughed humorlessly, shoving your laptop to the side—disrupting a small pile of papers in its path—and folding your hands on the table top. Preston raised a brow at your actions.
"The last time you shared your opinions on my personal life, you basically called me a slut outside of my own apartment, so forgive me if I'm not the most receptive to such comments anymore," you snapped.
He sighed heavily through his nose. "Sweetheart—"
"Don't call me that."
Preston deflated a bit, and you could see him chewing on the inside of his cheek—his nervous tell. "Look," he began, settling back in his seat, "maybe I was a little... out of line—"
You cut him off with a scoff and went to reach for your laptop again. You knew that you were being petty, but you had barely slept in the past two nights. You were running on little more than a coffee-espresso combination, and you didn't even remember the last time you'd actually eaten a meal instead of snacks from the vending machine.
He narrowed his eyes. "Would you quit the attitude? I'm tryin' to be decent and fuckin' apologize."
You paused, looking back over to him.
Preston took that as an indication to continue. "I'm sorry, alright? For everything that I said. I was just... scared—"
"Do you think that I wasn't? That I'm not?"
"No, just... listen—"
"No, you listen," you cut him off again. You cursed the waver that was growing in your voice and tried to swallow it down. "I have been terrified every day of my fucking life for the past fifteen years—terrified of... of—" You huffed a laugh, running your hands down your face. "—of the possibility that this monster might decide to come and finish the job, of how often I've wished that he would so I could finally just... rest."
Preston's face fell, and you had to look away. Your gaze took you to the windows of the briefing room, locking on Spencer sitting at his desk, rapidly scanning through printed out files.
Your eyes softened despite yourself, your heart aching as you continued in a soft voice: "And Spencer made me... a little less afraid of everything that's so terrible in the world. He made me remember what it was like to be alive, to look forward to something, to want to do more than just exist."
And then you remembered what he'd done, what you'd failed to detect because of that illusion, and you cleared your throat and turned your eyes back to Preston. "But... that fear is the only thing that holds me accountable. So you were right. I was distracted. I lost sight of everything I was working towards. That's why I don't want to talk about it; it's not important right now. It never was. I shouldn't have thought it was."
As you went back to typing on your laptop, Preston grew quiet. You could see him staring at you out of the corner of your eye. Then, he shifted in his seat, rubbing the overgrown stubble on his jaw with his hand.
"But that's the thing, Y/N," he said. "I wasn't right."
You looked back over to him.
"Do you remember how we met?"
Of course you did. Preston, however, didn't. You'd gone to a bar fairly far from the academy after your third week of training. You just wanted to grab a drink by yourself while eating shitty food without the possibility of running into someone in training with you before going home and getting drunk. Unfortunately for you, trainee Christopher Preston had had a similar idea and was already plastered when you arrived. You recognized him from a few of your courses, but went to the other side of the bar to indulge in your nightly sulking.
And then fifteen minutes later, Preston had gotten into a violent brawl with a random group of guys, and, considering the fact that Preston was so drunk he couldn't even walk straight, had gotten his ass handed to him on a silver platter within a minute of its commencement. The bartender had thrown them all out, but it seemed like the group of guys weren't quite finished wailing on Preston.
And you had told yourself that it wasn't your business, that he was an idiot for getting that drunk by himself, but letting him get the shit kicked out of him didn't sit well with you. So you had sighed, paid the bartender for the beer you didn't even get to drink, and walked outside, following the sound of drunken slurring and men acting like dogs.
It felt like something out of a movie, honestly. You had approached their group (unashamedly beating on a nearly unconscious Preston on the ground), and just began talking about how illegal it was to assault a federal officer (in training, you omitted).
You were lucky that they were such idiots, you supposed. They didn't check. They just took in your sober demeanor and FBI t-shirt, still slightly sweaty from earlier training, and assumed you were telling the truth. They'd stumbled away, and you had let out a sigh of relief, turning on your heel and walking away.
And then you had heard a groan of pain, and you sighed again.
You couldn't in good conscience just leave him there.
So, frustrated that your evening "plans" had been interrupted for this, you had turned back around and approached him.
"Hey," you said, crouching down beside him. He'd rolled onto his back with a groan. "Christopher, right?"
He'd nodded (or at least you had thought he did). Blood was leaking out of his nose, and he had a nasty black eye. From what you could tell, he seemed to be fine everywhere else, but...
"My name is Y/N Y/L/N. We're in training together at Quantico. Let's get you to the ER, alright?"
You went to try and tug him up, but he had grabbed your hand. You instinctively yanked it away from him.
He'd shaken his head, unfazed. "Not hospital. 'M fine. Hate hospitals," he'd slurred.
And that tugged on a more empathetic part of your heart just because you could relate, so you softened and sighed. If there was more reason for concern, you could check him yourself and determine whether or not he needed to go to the ER. Despite only having attended medical school for a semester, you'd already known everything that constituted the first two years of lessons for medical school. You had been in classes with third-years for that one semester. You knew enough to tend to a drunk idiot who'd gotten the shit kicked out of him.
"Okay," you'd answered, "can I drive you home? Where do you live?"
His face had scrunched up. "Can't remember."
It seemed like some cosmic force was testing you that night. You shoved away your reservations and discomforts and ended up just taking him back to your apartment. He was barely responding to what you were asking, and you couldn't just leave him there.
When you'd gotten to your apartment, he'd promptly collapsed and passed out completely on your couch. You tried to wake him up to get him to ice his eye, but he was out for the night.
You left him a glass of water and a bottle of ibuprofen on the coffee table, and your hallway bathroom trash can on the floor in case he needed to puke. Then, you wrote a note that said your name, the fact that you were in training together, and that you'd taken him there after he got beat up behind the bar, and you left it beside the ibuprofen.
And then you had just gone to bed, locking your bedroom door and shoving a few still-unpacked boxes in front of it due to paranoia.
When you'd woken up the next morning, you found Preston with his head buried underneath one of your decorative pillows, the sun from the windows streaming directly on him. He'd shot up with a loud groan when he heard you approaching. He was very obviously still drunk.
With his head dropped in his palms, he mumbled to himself about how he never should have left Dallas for Quantico, how he shouldn't have quit his job as a junior partner at a law firm to become an agent. And completely unprompted, he'd looked up at you with red-lined-eyes from exhaustion and a tortured expression, and had told you the only reason he started training was because of his mom.
He'd told you that she had been a social worker and that she'd been killed in a drive-by gang shooting while checking up on one of her cases. He'd just wanted to help stop such things from happening in the first place. That had been when you'd told him about what had happened to you, because when you looked at Preston, you'd just seen a version of yourself.
You'd just seen someone alone, and grieving, and struggling, and desperately trying to fix something that was completely out of their control, just like you were, and you'd wanted him to know that you understood even if you barely knew him.
The two of you had been close ever since.
So you just nodded, and the corner of Preston's lip quirked upwards into a sad smile.
"I, uh," he began, "I was going to drop out of training, actually. Made up my mind that night. That's why I got so fucked up. I was kinda on the self-loathing pity party bender."
You softened just the slightest. "You never told me that."
Preston shrugged and looked down at his lap. "It didn't come up. And, also, kinda embarrassing." His eyes flickered back up to you. "I'm sayin' it now because if you hadn't been there that night, I don't know where I'd be now. Dead, probably, if I'm bein' honest. You were a friend to me before I even really knew who you were. Made me feel like I wasn't alone, you know? So I stayed." He paused again, breathing a laugh through his nose. "I owe my career to you, sweetheart."
You shook your head. "That's... you're giving me too much credit."
"I'm not. I promise, sweetheart, I'm not. You're the best friend I've ever had in my sorry life. That's why..." A look of shame passed his face. "That's why when you stopped picking up the phone for me, I got a little... pissy. You know, you were getting harder to reach just when Maryanne went missin', and you were the only one I could talk to about it. I got a little... lost." He paused, his brows furrowing with grief for just a second. Then he cleared his throat and sniffed. "But I shouldn't have said what I said to you. I'll be honest; I've had my doubts about whether we'll catch this son-of-a-bitch, whether there was really a case, but I've never doubted you, sweetheart. Never. Not really. So I'm sorry."
You were quiet for a few beats. Then, you whispered with barely restrained emotion, "That's a pretty good apology."
Preston winked at you. "I've been workin' on it for a few days." Then, his face sobered up again, and he glanced at the window towards Spencer, still seated as his desk. When he looked back at you, he reached across the table to grab your hand in his. "We're gonna get him, Y/N. We will. And when we get him, I want you to get over yourself and figure out whatever you've gotta figure out with the doctor. You deserve to feel like you can do more than just survive. You deserve to live, sweetheart. Find love, happiness, all that crap."
You swallowed. "It's not that easy. It got... more complicated," you rasped. And Preston didn't know your romantic history. He didn't know about Alexander, and you weren't eager to delve into that now, of all times. If you explained what Spencer had done, he wouldn't understand.
"God, you're the worst," Preston laughed with a shake of his head. "It's only as complicated as you make it, you idiot." Then, a shadow passed over his face, and the levity vanished as his voice dipped. "Just try. Please. Don't wait until it's too late."
An echo of grief was etched into his voice—but a cloud in the storm that no doubt raged inside him as well.
So you just retracted your hands from his and, looking for something to do with them instead, reached for the folder that Spencer had dropped off. "Let's just focus on one thing at a time," you whispered back. You cleared your throat and flipped open the folder, skimming through the resumes and making it clear that the conversation was over.
Preston just shook his head to himself and went back to his own work.
As the first technical victim after the initial killings of the FBI agents, Samantha Lark (or Elena Webber, you supposed) was the first resume in the pile. Her family had been killed—and she had been kidnapped—just two weeks before she left for college at Dartmouth in 2005. As such, her resume was severely outdated, still listing her high school GPA and summer volunteer positions as well as high school clubs.
It was a frozen image of innocence, of a teenage girl on her way to excellence.
You barely took in anything. There wasn't anything that stood out, but as you scanned the last line of her impressive volunteering section, you froze.
Then you blinked. Furrowed your brows. Read more carefully.
Internship at Marseille and Company Corporate Law.
That was... that was Victor's law firm. While, yes, he was the founder of The Monet Society, his day job was being a corporate attorney at the firm he'd started. And at the level that Victor worked at, there was no legitimate reason for them to have a freshly-graduated high school student as an intern.
So her family must have known him beforehand. Victor was a generous man to those he cared about and respected.
But, still, you flipped through the rest of the resumes to see if there was another connection to Victor Marseille.
You came up with nothing.
But when you thought about her parents, who worked well-paying jobs on Wall Street with senior positions and who indulged in the high-society bullshit that you knew all too well...
The Monet Society was highly exclusive, and membership was only granted through invite, but maybe...
You stood abruptly, gathering the resumes in your hands and grabbing your laptop, before striding out of the room. You heard Preston ask where you were going before you heard footsteps following you.
He was right behind you by the time you made it to Garcia's office.
"Garcia, I need you," you said as you entered. The door was left open behind you. Preston followed you in, and within seconds, Spencer was in the doorway as well.
You ignored both of them.
She glanced back at you. "What do you need?"
"I need you to find me a membership list for a social club in New York City. It's called The Monet Society." You knew a list had to exist somewhere. The Monet Society kept all information of its members under heavy lock and key, and because it was a completely private organization, there was no possible way to draw connections between members through membership alone. Someone would have to either already have access to the membership list (which you did not), or have a way to find it. You already knew you didn't have the skillset to track it down, but Garcia definitely did.
She turned back to her monitors and began typing rapidly. "One membership list coming up in three... two... one... and..." A long scrolling list of names took up the screen.
"Can you cross check it with our list of known victims?"
"Cross checking..."
You held your breath as the information loaded but kept your face the picture of composure.
Her computer pinged, and her eyes scanned the screen. "The Webber family were members—joined in 2003—but no other matches."
You sighed heavily through your nose. It was just a coincidence, and you wouldn't have known any of them because you'd already left by the time they joined.
"Okay, thanks Garcia. Sorry."
"No prob—" She was cut off by another ping, this time originating from a different monitor. Garcia gasped. "Oh... oh! We got it! We got it!"
"Got what, Gar—"
"What is it?" You and Spencer spoke at the same time.
You glanced at each other before turning back to the monitors. Preston had taken to leaning against the wall beside the door as you and Spencer crowded around her chair.
Garcia turned to her keyboard again, laughing triumphantly to herself. "Excellent questions, my little Einsteins—" You forced down an exasperated sigh. "—After two days of breaking through walls upon walls of security, I have just gained access to the 'does-not-technically-exist' FBI database of 'failed' assignments. This is a secret graveyard, my friends, and I am your medium." She wiggled in her seat out of excitement. "Let's talk to some ghosts."
You took a deep breath, grabbing a free chair and rolling it beside Garcia so you could sit. If evidence of the case that your parents and the other three agents involved still existed, it would have to be here.
The room went silent save for the sound of her typing. At one point, Preston walked up behind you and placed a comforting hand on your shoulder. In your peripheral vision, you saw Spencer glance over. You ignored it.
Then Garcia grinned. "Got'cha."
And several documents filled the screens, including official pictures of your parents and the other agents as the members of the operation.
Your eyes couldn't scan the screens fast enough.
From what the documents detailed, the operation was to expose an underground organization with ties to the Corsican mafia that had grown its roots in New York City. In the 1950s, a known ringleader for the mafia moved to Brooklyn, evading Interpol's efforts to crack down on organized crime in Europe, and laid low for several years before beginning operation, first within his own family, and then expanding as more members trickled in from France. Suspicions of its existence in the United States grew in 1998 when a handoff of young women to be trafficked to France was raided by agents, along with several hundred kilos of heroin.
Your parents, both having previously practiced in international criminal law before joining the FBI (your mother for the International Operations Division, and your father as a field agent), were selected alongside the three other agents to work the covert operation cracking down on this branch of the mafia and, specifically, to figure out the money laundering front they were using.
The report then went on to detail the operation's failure, on the stain it had left on the bureau's reputation, on the civilian deaths involved (as well as your survival, you noted grimly). The operation was ended and deleted from public records and databases until "further notice."
"Further notice," evidently, meant never.
Preston's voice broke the silence. "Hang on—sex trafficking." He looked back down at you. "We found Samantha because of the list Boucher gave us from Anti-Trafficking. She wasn't random like the other victims we've been looking at."
You blinked, and with your heart descending into your stomach, you grabbed your laptop and went back to the Missing Persons list that Boucher had sent you in November. True, all of the girls on that list had murdered parents, but they didn't fit the trend in any other way. They weren't the oldest daughters of their families, nor were their bodies ever found.
The other cases you had found had no signs nor indication that trafficking was ever in the picture. That was why neither you nor Preston thought twice about them.
But you sent the list of names to Garcia and said, "Cross check members of The Monet Society with these family names." Your hands were shaking as you closed your laptop again.
She typed a few strokes on her keyboard, and then...
Perfect matches. Every single one of the families had been a member.
And no one would have ever known because The Monet Society was a private organization.
You closed your eyes and thought back to your childhood, wracking through every single party, gala, and event that was hosted by The Monet Society, trying desperately to try and remember something of use.
It couldn't have been Victor.
It couldn't have.
Your parents would have known.
You would have known.
But even as Garcia called your name gently, even as Preston's grip tightened on your shoulder, you couldn't help but hear Victor's voice echo in your mind: D'autres choses peuvent nous changer, mais nous commençons et finirons comme une famille.
Other things may change us, but we start and end as family.
And you recalled the first time he had said it to you. Your parents had invited him, Alexander, and his other son Leo, over for dinner. You were young—no more than seven-years-old—and had gotten into an argument with Elizabeth, as all children and siblings do. You had stormed out of the room despite your parents calling after you.
And Victor was the one to find you sulking in your bedroom.
"You are Elizabeth's big sister, ma fille. You have to be there to protect her. There is no stronger bond than family, you know," he had said.
And when you had crossed your arms and turned away from him, he had chuckled.
"Do you know what my father used to say to me when I would fight with my brothers?" he'd asked. You didn't react, but he continued on. "He used to tell me: D'autres choses peuvent nous changer, mais nous commençons et finirons comme une famille. Other things may change us, but we start and end as family. I remind my boys of that every time they argue, too." Then he had tapped on your shoulder, turning you around gently. "Family is everything, ma fille. Everything."
That was his mantra, and he had said those words to you several times throughout your life.
He'd said them to you while you were in the hospital after your family had been killed.
"I will always be your family, too," he'd said afterwards, his eyes shining with agony. "Always, ma fille."
Agony was impossible to fake. You knew that.
But as your head started spinning, a foggy memory from that night became crisper.
Your mind was still heavily sedated when you were led out of the building where you and your family had been held for several hours. You didn't remember much from your rescue. You looked down at the snow covering the ground and saw red streaks of blood dripping from your body and marring its innocence. You saw a blur of colors—red and blue sirens. And then you remembered sandy brown hair and blue eyes.
Sandy brown hair and blue eyes.
Yes, now that you remembered it, Victor had been there on the scene. Comforting you. Holding your hand as you were rushed to the hospital.
Your eyes snapped open.
How had Victor been there?
He wasn't an agent. He wasn't an emergency contact. He shouldn't have known anything.
There was no way for him to have been there unless he already knew where you were.
"Oh my god," you whispered. Your entire body began trembling. "Oh. My. God."
"What is it?" Spencer asked urgently.
But you couldn't speak yet. Your mind was reeling as all the pieces began falling into place.
Victor was not the man who killed your family, but you finally realized that you were thinking too narrowly. How could one man hold an entire family, especially one with two federal agents? How could one man have killed all the families of the agents involved in your parents' operation?
No, you were looking for a group, and you had found it.
So Victor may not have done the deed himself, but he must have known about it. He must have ordered it, because there was no doubt in your mind that Victor Marseille—the man who helped raise you, the man you had seen as an uncle for your entire life, the man who nearly became your father-in-law—was the leader of the Corsican mafia.
And he was likely responsible for the murder of your family. At the least.
So you took a shaky breath and looked up at Spencer, whispering, "I think I know who the unsub is."