Untouchable

The Popular Kids (S1E10)

A few weeks later, Lydia was woken by a call from her sister. She did her best not to sound shocked as she picked up, but Rebecca always seemed to know what she was thinking. Lydia considered herself a very good liar until Beck was around.

"Hey Beck, how have you been?"

"I'm sorry I didn't call you back, okay?" Right out of that gate, she was pissed. But Lydia felt some relief to know that she wasn't calling because something was wrong. "You know that I'm just frustrated you left again."

"I know," she replied. "How's school?"

She could hear her sister huff on the other side. "Boring. I don't see what mom expects me to learn there."

Lydia grimaced slightly when Rebecca said 'mom', but quickly recovered.

"College is good for you. It'll help you figure out what you want to do."

"You know how often I change my mind. I don't understand how I'm supposed to just... decide my whole future. And if school didn't help me the first 12 years, what's another four going to do?"

"You have more freedom in college," Lydia reasoned, but it was just more fuel to the fire.

"Which you obviously took and ran with," she grumbled.

"Beck, I went to Santa Cruz. That's barely an hour away."

"Yeah. And then as soon as I thought I was getting you back, you hopped on a plane to DC. And I wanted to follow you, but mom keeps insisting that I go to community college first."

"Sonia is just trying to look out for you," Lydia explained. "I mean, what are you going to do when you get here? Have me take care of you?"

The other end was silent for a minute. Lydia felt guilty, knowing that implying her sister was a burden really wasn't the best way to handle this situation, but Rebecca sometimes forgot that if she wasn't making money for herself, someone else was.

"When will you be back?" she demanded.

"I don't know. I'm going to try to keep this job as long as I can and after that I'm going to go where the work takes me. But I'll come visit as soon as I can..."

As she spoke, her phone vibrated against her ear and she pulled away to see a message from Gideon.

Round table room in 20. Bring a go bag.

She sighed. "Beck, I have to go. My boss just texted me. Tell Sonia I miss her!"

Her sister was quiet for a minute, before snapping, "That job is going to suck the life out of you," and hanging up.

Lydia shut her eyes tightly, counting the seconds between breaths. "I love you," she whispered into the unresponsive phone.

~ ~ ~

"McAllister," JJ started as Lydia rushed in, stepping up next to Gideon. "Western slope of the Massanutten mountain in Virginia. Two bodies discovered in the woods, both with apparent blunt trauma to the head."

"Skeletons?" Reid asked as he looked over the photos in his case file.

"One of them. The second victim was just killed this morning."

"How do we know there's a connection?" Elle asked.

"Found about 75 feet apart with nearly identical head wounds," Hotch explained.

Lydia shook her head slightly, still looking at the details over Gideon's shoulder. Forest is an open area and the victims didn't look like they'd been tied there. How could someone plan to hit both of them in the same spot over the head, when the victims were in open space and could move easily? That was difficult.