Strauss basically forced Cassidy to work at her desk. She was allowed to work cases that the team received, but she wasn't allowed to leave the BAU office.
"You wanted to know immediately about any unusual Boston homicides?" JJ asked as she handed Hotch a file.
"We're going to Boston." Hotch announced.
"Well- Shouldn't we wait for the official request? We haven't been invited-" JJ questioned, confused.
"We will be." Hotch insisted as he grabbed his go bag and walked through the bullpen.
"Well, it looks like we're going to Boston." JJ exhaled as she met up with the team, all of whom were confused.
"I'll call you when we need you. Love you." Spencer kissed Cassidy before she watched him and the team follow Hotch out of the BAU bullpen.
———
The team sat on the jet, each of them looking at the file on the Boston Reaper.
"The Reaper is driven by a need to dominate, control, and manipulate." Hotch read the contents of the file that JJ had given him.
"So then why would he offer a deal that would stop him from doing that?" Emily asked, extremely confused.
"Well, killing gave him power, but after so many, the payoff began to diminish. So he decided to switch tactics. Offering the deal gave him the ultimate power, better even than killing. He manipulated the police into voluntarily surrendering." Hotch explained, everyone hanging off his every word.
"He even got it in writing." Spencer nodded, shocked.
"He won. Why start killing again?" JJ asked, confused.
"Well, because the only person who knew he'd won, the person he made the deal with, just died." Morgan reminded JJ, who nodded, understanding.
"Narcissistic killers need other people to recognize their power. That's why they contact the media." Rossi mentioned.
"So how did he stop for 10 years?" Emily questioned.
"In 'Night of the Reaper', the author suggests he had been arrested for an unrelated crime or died. Perhaps he's trying to correct that misconception." Spencer suggested.
"What has he been doing all this time?" JJ asked.
"Planning what he would do if he started killing again." Hotch exhaled, still reading over the file.
"So from '95 to '98, He shoots, stabs, and bludgeons 21 victims. Men, women, all ages, all types. No specific victimology or M.O. How did you build a profile from that?" Morgan looked at Hotch, confused.
"We didn't. Shaunessy sent us home before we had a chance. BTK, the Zodiac, and the Reaper all have similarities. They're all highly intelligent, disciplined, sadistic killers who name themselves in the press." Hotch explained, looking at each and every member of the team.
"Highly intelligent may be a bit of an understatement. The Reaper and the Zodiac killer have never been arrested and the BTK killer was only caught after 25 years because he went to the press to counter a book that said he'd died, moved away, or been locked up, just like this one." Spencer informed the team.
"Speaking of the media, when this gets out, it's going to be a frenzy. If they get wind of this...they're going to be all over the Boston police." JJ scoffed, holding up a letter that Hotch had received from Shaunessy before he died.
"The longer we can float the copycat story, the better chance we'll have of catching him. Rossi, Prentiss, and Morgan, go to the field office, set up shop, go through everything there. JJ and Reid, we'll go to the crime scene." Hotch instructed.
———
Spencer, JJ and Hotch arrived at the crime scene, receiving a bit of backlash from the lead detective, until Hotch showed the letter that he had been given.
"Nina Hale, 19, and Evan Harvey, 23. Nina's throat was slashed, she was stabbed 46 times. Evan was bludgeoned and then shot. No shell casings were found." Spencer read the file as he and Hotch got closer to the area. They looked at the car with the symbolic eye outlined in blood.
"He preferred revolvers, .44 magnum. The younger the female victim, the more time he spends with them, usually with a knife." Hotch got closer to the car, inspecting the inside.
"Tan line on her wrist. Probably wearing a watch of some sort." Spencer explained as he looked at the images of the dead bodies. Hotch looked at the image of the male before looking at one of the crime scene techs.
"Do we have his wallet?" Hotch asked.
"The Reaper took items from each victim and placed them on the next, so as to make sure we knew it was him. No corrective lens requirement." Hotch looked through the wallet with gloves on, identifying a key bit of information.
"The glasses aren't his?" Spencer questioned, confused.
"He only took glasses from one victim - the ninth. We should have found them on the tenth and we didn't. They were never found." Hotch exhaled.
"What was so special about the ninth victim?" Spencer asked, confused.
"He survived." Hotch shook his head.
———
Spencer, Hotch and JJ made their way to the precinct, sitting down in the conference room. They turned on the laptop in front of them and pulled up a picture of a man with glasses.
"George Foyet, 28, was the ninth victim and the only one to survive the Reaper." Hotch informed the team as images of Foyet's injured body appeared on the screen.
"Not for lack of trying." Rossi scoffed as the team looked at the images.
"Amanda Bertrand, 19, his date for the evening, was not as lucky. He likes to attack them inside or near their cars, at night, on poorly lit, less populated roads." Hotch shook his head.
"Foyet said he approached them pretending to be a lost tourist. In the hospital, we put Foyet with a sketch artist." Sergeant O'Mara spoke.
"The Reaper always uses some sort of ruse to get close to and spend time with his victims." Hotch exhaled.
"The eye...as he depicts it, appears to be the eye of providence, a symbol adopted by the U.S. Government and incorporated into the great seal in 1782 with the words, "Annuit coeptis" inscribed beneath. That's Latin for "providence"- Or fate - "has favoured our undertakings." The Reaper seems to see himself as the personification of fate." Spencer rambled on, holding up the letter that Hotch was given.
"So, how did Foyet survive?" Emily asked, confused. Hotch pressed a button on the laptop which played a recording.
"9-1-1. What's your emergency?" The operator asked.
"I murdered 2 more." The deep voice spoke.
"Excuse me, sir, did you say you murdered someone?" The operator asked, confused.
"Victims 8 and 9. By a silver Toyota on Riverton past the Tyson Quarry." The deep voice spoke before the line went dead.
"That call was made from a payphone about a mile from the crime scene. E.M.T.'s arrived 15 minutes later. Bertrand was D.O.A., Foyet barely breathing." Spencer informed the team.
"So the Reaper made one of these calls after each of his killings, telling police where to find the bodies." Emily looked around at the team, confused.
"Until this one, the ninth. If he hadn't made this call, Foyet wouldn't have been found in time. The call saved him." Hotch exhaled.
"So the Reaper didn't make any 9-1-1 calls after this one?" Morgan asked.
"Looks like he learned his lesson." Emily shook her head.
"There's a reason he left Foyet's glasses at the last crime scene. Foyet could be in danger." Hotch held up Foyet's glasses that had been put into a plastic evidence bag.
"We'll find him." Emily reassured Hotch as she and Morgan stood up, leaving the table.
———
Night-time had arrived. Hotch and Rossi were called to another crime scene, much to Hotch's dismay.
"Another couple. Much older this time. One shot and one stabbed. No reason to stop out here." Rossi looked around the crime scene, confused.
"His license and registration are out of his wallet. Looks like he used a cop ruse." Hotch noted as he used his gloved-up hands to find anything out of place.
"Good spot. Isolated, few drivers." Rossi exhaled.
"He left Nina Hale's watch." Hotch pointed out two watches on the older woman's wrist.
"Okay. So what'd he take?" Rossi asked, confused.
"His wedding ring." Hotch flashed his light on the male's bare hand.
"Arthur and Diane Lanessa. Weymouth. Married 32 years. They were coming home from the elks where they played bingo twice a week." Sergeant O'Mara informed Rossi and Hotch before heading back to the precinct.
"Looks like he went through her purse." Hotch identified.
"Any idea what he was looking for?" Rossi asked. Hotch pulled down the sun visor within the car, revealing lots of glass and a photo with the word FATE? written on it in blood.
"The question mark is new." Rossi scoffed as Hotch handed him the photo.
"It's for us. He's saying it's not fate. He's saying we had 10 years to save them and that these latest ones are on us." Hotch shook his head.
"You got all that from one question mark. That's impressive." Rossi chuckled.
"I may know him better than I've let on." Hotch revealed.
"What does that mean?" Rossi asked, confused.
"It means that there is a profile on the Reaper." Hotch looked down, Rossi furrowing his eyebrows.
"I thought we were called off before we had one?" Rossi asked, handing the photo back to Hotch.
"We were. I had just started the profile and then he stopped killing, so officially we were done. But this case..." Hotch shook his head, letting out a big and deep breath, one he didn't even know he was holding in.
"It stuck with you." Rossi nodded.
"I kept coming back to it over the years and I worked on it alone." Hotch looked away.
"So you never shared it with anyone." Rossi looked down, exhaling.
"I know I'm always preaching that profiling is a collaborative effort, but this one wasn't. I don't know, maybe if- if I was wrong, I was gonna head us in the wrong direction." Hotch looked around.
"Now you think you're right." Rossi nodded.
"The more I see, the more accurate I think it may be." Hotch exhaled, shrugging his shoulders.
"Okay. Then we need to hear it." Rossi explained.
———
Hotch stood in front of the team and the officers, the board with all the case details next to him.
"The Reaper fits a profile we refer to as an omnivore. Unlike most serial killers, an omnivore doesn't target a specific victim type. Although he tends to focus on his younger female victims with his knife, he essentially is a predator who will kill anyone." Hotch looked around at the team.
"Why is he so democratic?" Sergeant O'Mara asked, confused.
"Because his kills aren't just about his victims. He needs recognition. He needs us to know." Hotch informed the cops.
"The symbols, the placement of prior victims' possessions on subsequent victims. It's all for us." Rossi explained.
"Why?" Sergeant O'Mara asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
"Power. The Shaunessy letter is the clearest example of this. He manipulated Tom Shaunessy into literally surrendering to him." Hotch pointed to the letter.
"The burden was too much to bear. In a very real sense, Tom Shaunessy was the Reaper's 22nd victim." Rossi exhaled.
"Like BTK killer- Dennis Rader, the Reaper is extremely disciplined. In his everyday life, this will very likely make him so inflexible, he can't keep close relationships or work closely with others." Hotch looked at the board.
"I believe our killer has another interest, that may give us our best opportunity to catch him. The Reaper's last victim was an older woman. He killed her quickly, with a single shot. The prior, younger victim he spent more time with and stabbed 46 times." Rossi gestured to the gruesome images on the board.
"Why?" Sergeant O'Mara asked.
"He pays special attention to his younger female victims, and his weapon of choice with them is the knife, a substitute instrument for bodily penetration." Hotch exhaled.
"And the younger the victim, the more time and effort he spends. I think our guy is a Hebophile." Rossi scoffed.
"Hebophile?" A cop asked, unsure of what the word meant.
"Someone who's attracted to adolescent Post-Pubescent children. Teenagers." Spencer spoke up.
"Look for men with access to authority. High school teachers, counsellors, coaches, and anyone who's been charged with sex crimes against teenage girls in the last 10 years. That's all for now. Thank you." Hotch announced as he and the team got back to work, all the cops dispersing.