Reid My Mind

5. Backup

stand by me - kina grannis

Okay. Okay. I might have a little crush on Reid, I thought to myself at my desk the next morning. That was bound to happen. He was smart, nice, a great profiler. I was just warping my respect for his skills into something else. Perfectly understandable.

But now it had to stop. I mean, I couldn't have a full-blown crush on my coworker. That would be distracting. Even potentially dangerous. I leaned back in my seat. Plus, It would make things very awkward between us if he ever found out.

"Morning Maya," Prentiss said as she walked past my desk. 

"Hey," I said, "Come here a moment?" She retraced a couple of steps to stand by my computer.

"Did you know that Reid's middle name is Walter?"

"It's a possibility." She smirked.

"Well, just so you know, there's nothing going on there," I said quietly. Her face betrayed the slightest amount of doubt but she kept calm.

"I know. I was just messing with you," she said.

"Yeah, of course, but... Maybe just... You know if it was anyone else it'd be fine, but I don't want to screw with Reid. I'd don't know if he'd get it if he found out," I said. I flipped a pen around in my fingers. Prentiss's eyes, deep in concentration were drawn to the twirling pen and didn't leave them as she responded.

"No problem. I think JJ is waiting for us."

"I think we might be looking at a female unsub," Reid said. We were in the Denver police station. Emily was tacking you maps of the surrounding area on an evidence board. "Organized, meticulous. And all the victims are men who mistreated their wives: It could be a revenge killing."

I looked up from the case file. I hadn't thought of that at all. 

"It's possible," Rossi said. He picked up a photo of the lasted victim and examined it.

"Has Garcia found any connection between the victims?

"She's supposed to call any minute," Morgan said. As if on cue, his phone rang. 

"Was just talking about you, sugar," Morgan said into his phone. He pressed a button.

"You're on speaker. What's you find?"

"The only way I can tie them together is that they all were married scumbags looking for a house right before they were killed."

"That makes sense. They were all dumped within a block of an open house."

"House hunting... Can you check the real estate agencies-" Prentiss began.

"One step ahead of you," Garcia interrupted, "They all used the same one. It's called Moore Real Estate. I just texted you the address of its headquarters."

"Thanks, Garcia!" I said before the line went dead.

"Should we inform the public?" JJ asked.

"If our unsub is female then I'm afraid we'll scare her off. She might move and then we'll be out of luck," Hotch said.

"We can talk to the agency," I said, "Ask around?"

"She'll notice that too," Prentiss said.

"So we'll go undercover. Pretend to be buying a house, see who we meet," I revised. Hotch, as always, looked stern. Then he turned to Rossi.

"It's not a bad idea. We need to send a couple, to see if she reacts," Rossi shrugged. Hotch looked back at his audience.

"Davis and Reid will go," Hotch said decidedly, "We'll mike you, just in case." My heart skipped a beat before I could remind it that I didn't care, it was just work. But jeez, what are the chances that the day I decide to keep my thoughts about Reid strictly platonic is the day I have to pretend to be married to him. I glanced at him and he gave me a small smile as if to say "What'd'you know?" I raised an eyebrow in response and tried to ignore Prentiss staring a hole in the back of my head.