dangerously ↝ a. hotchner

t w e l v e

Hotch watched uneasily as Reid pinned Ana's picture to the evidence board. "The first letter was delivered on the twenty seventh of April, exactly thirteen days ago. Now we have to assume that he's been stalking her for at least a month before the letter was sent, but that's not what I want to focus on right now."

"Well then what do you want to focus on Reid." Hotch said rather irritably. He didn't mean it, everyone in the team knew he didn't.

Reid ignored him, instead picking up a copy of the first letter. "The letters." He furrowed his brows and bit his lip softly as he silently surveyed the words on the page.

"What about them?" Prentiss asked as she picked up a copy of the card that came with the flowers. She handed it to Spencer after a while and her and Hotch watched him silently as he mumbled words to himself.

"It's a poem. By Pablo Neruda!" He almost shouted as he realized what it was. "Yeah, it goes: I want you to know one thing. You know how this is: if I look at the crystal moon, at the red branch of the slow autumn at my window, if I touch near the fire the impalpable ash or the wrinkled body of the log, everything carries me to you, as if everything that exists, aromas, light, metals, were little boats that sail toward those isles of yours that wait for me. Well, now, if little by little you stop loving me I shall stop loving you little by little. If suddenly you forget me do not look for me, for I shall already have forgotten you. If you think it long and mad, the wind of banners that passes through my life, and you decide to leave me at the shore of the heart where I have roots, remember that on that day, at that hour, I shall lift my arms and my roots will set off to seek another land."

"Okay, what's it mean?" Morgan asked, he had walked in when Spencer started reciting the poem from memory, not an uncommon occurrence with the genius.

Spencer took a sharp breath in before speaking. "The poem is called 'If you forget me' written by Pablo Neruda in 1948 during his exile in Chile. He was, well you could say, well known for having three failed marriages."

Aaron had been focusing on a file that looked like it was about to fall off the table, but his head practically flew up as soon as Spencer mentioned the marriages. "Do- do you think this is about me?"

Morgan frowned and walked over to Hotch, placing his hand reassuringly on his shoulder. "You can't blame yourself for this. We're going to find her Hotch."

Aaron nodded, not even bothering to believe what Morgan was telling him. He tried to shake of the feeling of guilt and panic that was slowly growing inside of him every minute he knew Ana wasn't safe. But he couldn't. As much as he tried, he couldn't.

Reid paused for a minute, not knowing whether to carry on or not. But he was spurred on by Aaron telling him to continue with his train of thought. "It could be. Your divorce was finalized a month before the first letter. The poem was originally written by Pablo for his third wife Matilde while he was in exile, telling her what would happen if she forgot him. But it could also be perceived as the crumbling of a relationship."

"The crumbling of my relationship with- do you think Hayley is apart of this?" Hotch mumbled, looking up at Rossi.

"Don't think about that. If this is about you then you're part of this case now, which means-"

"I'll be in my office." Aaron sighed, standing up and walking out. He was definitely not offering a lot of help to the team before, but now that he was probably a witness, he couldn't help at all.

Usually this wouldn't stop him, but he wasn't in the right frame of mind to work on this alone and he trusted his team. They would find her. They had to. He needed them to find her.