Disappearance

Investigation Begins

Chapter 4
Enjoy!

Hotch felt his phone buzz and reached into his pocket. "Hotch."

"Hotch, it's Morgan. They just had to sedate Emily again."

Hotch sighed and rubbed his forehead. "What happened?"

"She asked about how we found her and when we said she escaped she started freakin' out. I don't know man, she went through some kinda hell."

"Alright, keep me updated. We're all set up at the Indiana State Police station for the time being."

Morgan glanced back down at Emily, "Ok Hotch, see you later."

Both men hung up and Hotch turned to his team that was holding their breath, waiting for an update.

"She had to be sedated again. Rossi and Morgan were talking about how she was found and she panicked."

"What the hell did he do to her..." JJ muttered, just loud enough for everyone to hear.

Hotch shook his head to attempt to clear his mind. "Do we have any leads? Someone must've seen a..." he paused as images of Prentiss beaten and bloody came flooding in, "an injured woman wandering around."

"If she wandered through a neighborhood the 'bystander effect' may have occurred." Reid stated.

Garcia looked at Reid, obviously confused, "the bystander effect?"

Reid continued, "it happens if there's a crowd of people. When they witness a crime they may not do anything about it because they think someone else will handle it. That's why you would rather be with a small group of one or two people if you need help."

Hotch nodded, "someone else must've seen something. We need to go to neighborhoods within a ten mile radius of the hospital to start."

"I can try and stop the media, I don't know what they already have, but I can try." JJ offered, shrugging her shoulders.

Hotch nodded. "Yes. Do what you need to do. I don't want the media to mess with this investigation."

As JJ left, Garcia followed her back into the tech room at the Indiana station and left Reid and Hotch alone. He could tell the young profiler was holding something back.

"Reid, what's wrong?"

Reid looked down and bit the corners of his mouth.

Hotch pressed further, "Reid."

"Maybe Morgan was right, ya know? We never should've stopped looking for her..." He trailed off as tears fell down his face.

Hotch exhaled. He knew he deserved to take the heat for this. He should've tried harder to convince Strauss to let them investigate. Although he didn't want to admit it, maybe he gave up sooner than he should've. Emily never gave up. Hell, she'd even freed herself before they did.

"Reid we can't blame ourselves. We did everything we could–"

Reid laughed. "Everything we could? Hotch we gave up."

Hotch ran his fingers through his hair, "Reid we need to focus on finding this guy, then we can sort this out, okay? We can't fail her a second time."

Reid nodded, wiped away tears, "deal."