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jomiddlemarch · 3 years

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Point and Click

3. It was an immense relief that when Alina arrived for work the next day in jeans, a button-down shirt and a fleece vest, her hair in some complicated kind of braid, she still looked entirely like the twenty-six year old woman she was and not like the sixteen year old he’d spent most of the night fretting she would, forcing him to either feel like a lecherous monster or offer her a huge severance for letting her go after one day. He’d expected to spend the day at home, on-call for any questions that might arise or any emergency Papa-cuddles Mila absolutely couldn’t live without, but Alina had shooed him out the door and told him not to come back until 3pm at the earliest.

“If you don’t want to go to the office, you could try that new coffee-shop on Alta,” she suggested. “I’ve heard they make a mean matcha soy latte. Mila and I, we’re good here.”

He left, ready for his phone to buzz with a text from Alina within the next forty-five minutes, when the Mila was done being on her best behavior and insisted on a bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream with extra sprinkles; Ivan and Matthias almost always caved at the sight of a tear or pout, so she’d learned to put up a fuss since the likelihood of getting a treat was pretty high. He wasn’t dressed for the office and he’d probably just freak out his employees with what would seem to be a surprise visit by the boss, so he headed over to the coffee-shop and ordered the latte to go, picking out a two-top by the front door so he could leave easily.

It took an hour for the phone to make a sound and when it did, it was Fedyor, calling to check on Aleksander. Calling, not texting, because Fedyor knew how old-fashioned Aleksander could be and how poorly he would express his emotions using emojis.

“Hang in there, Sasha, the first day will be the toughest,” Fedyor said, huffing a little, which meant he was out jogging. “It’s an adjustment for everyone—”

“It’s Mila I’m worried about,” Aleksander said. “This is the first time I’ve left her with a sitter since, well, you know—”

“I do, but kids are resilient and our sweet Mila is exceptional and Alina seemed to hit it off with her yesterday and omigod, that was an ill-advised choice,” Fedyor said, confusing Aleksander with the sudden pivot from reassurance.

“What?”

“No, not you. Just a woman wearing a matching bedazzled jogging suit along with her terrier, things you can’t unsee, you know?”

“Alina did seem to get along well with Mila,” Aleksander said, picking up the sensible thread of the conversation. “She told me to leave, she told me not to come home before three.”

“You didn’t go into work though, you’re not talking with your Aleksander-the-Architect voice,” Fedyor said.

“I have an Aleksander-the-Architect voice?”

“Oh yes, it’s glorious, all your Oxbridge comes out and there’s this feeling like blueprints rustling, slashing pencils…you don’t sound that way at all now,” Fedyor said. “You sound a bit at loose ends, if I’m being honest, darling.”

“I’m at a coffee-shop. On the corner of Alta and Gregory. Alina told me about it,” he said.

“She is an amazing nanny, she’s got you following her directions to a tee! Did she tell you what to order too?” Fedyor crowed. He’d take credit for finding Alina until the end of days but thus far, Aleksander couldn’t blame him.

“Yes,” Aleksander said.

“And did you?”

“Yes,” Aleksander admitted. “And it’s very good.”

He only made it until 2:30 and that was after listening to the grammar podcast Fedyor recommended, doing crossword from the Sunday Times in blue ink, checking his work email and sketching out an addition for Fedyor and Ivan’s house on a series of paper napkins. When he walked in the front door, the house was silent. He called out, “I’m home” just as Alina rushed up to him, shushing both politely and ferociously, no mean feat.

“Mila’s still napping,” she said in a low voice.

“You got her to go down?” he asked, picking up on the soft, staticky sound of the baby monitor and then the rich, spiced scent of freshly baked goods. For the past six months, Mila had only been napping for him if she had a cold or if he capitulated and let her sleep on his chest while he dozed in his study.

“Yes. Around 2. She was wiped out, we had a busy morning. I’ll warn you, she’s going to lobby hard for a muffin for dessert tonight,” Alina said.

“I try to be careful about how many sweets she eats,” he said.

“I know. It was on the job description Mr. Kaminsky gave me. They’re zucchini and carrot muffins sweetened with applesauce and just a smidge of honey. I only iced half of them with cream cheese frosting,” she said. “She helped make them, but she’s still working on saying zucchini properly in English, Mandarin and Spanish and she thinks they have something to do with giraffes at the beach. Zoos and bikinis, I guess.”

“You can take off early,” Aleksander offered. “I’m home. Don’t worry, you’ll still get paid for the hours.”

“I’d rather stay if that’s all right,” she said. “I told Mila I’d be here when she woke up and I want her to know I keep my promises. And you aren’t going to be home early every day. We need to get our routine set from the get-go.”

“Oh, yeah, okay,” he said. “I’ll just, I’ll be in my study, if you need anything—”

“I’m good,” she said. “You wanted dinner on the table at 5:30, right?”

“Yes, I mean, I can do that, you don’t have to—” he fumbled. She tilted her head to the side, a little like an inquisitive bird, and shrugged.

“Actually, I feel like I kind of do. That’s the job. I was going to make coconut red curry soup with sticky rice and some carrot sticks—I never asked, do you want me to submit a week’s worth of menus at a time?” she said.

“No, um, unless it’s easier for you, every meal doesn’t have to be vegetarian, too, I should have said that—” Aleksander broke off, baffled by his awkwardness dealing with Alina. There’d ever been an employee who flustered him so much and he knew, rationally, that she hadn’t done anything to merit his response.

“Oh, that’s kind of a relief, to be honest,” she said. “Every once in a while, there’s a day that just demands a bacon cheeseburger.”

#shadow and bone #darklina #hallmark AU #widower!aleksander #nanny!alina #romance #humor #fedyor #kidfic #sweetness and light #light on the angst #hallmark amirite?#sending aleksander to a coffee-shop #doesn't a coffee-shop AU make #darklinadaily

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derekswhore · 4 years

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RUSSIAN ROULETTE: CHAPTER TWO.

chapter 0, chapter 1,

2x02. p911.

Kit and Aleksander hadn't even been on their first case with the team yet and everyone already hated them. With the exception of Jason, Derek, and Spencer.

Jason was willing to give the twins a shot. No matter how much the team may hate them, they were still apart of the team. Nothing would change that.

Derek understood Kit and Aleksander had a rough childhood. Hell, they barely even had a childhood. He couldn't just hate them without even giving them a chance. Derek and Kit had grown quite close, he even got a half smile out of Kit.

Spencer and Kit had just simply grown close. He came to find out that Kit was much more than an emotionless killing machine. Rather, the opposite. Kit spilled a lot of the things she's been through to Spencer, and he didn't know how to take it at first. Then, upon finding out Kit actually cried and could express her emotions, caught on comforted her.

Yet only Derek got even the slightest smile out of her. Spencer began to think that maybe Kit didn't like Spencer, despite the interest she showed in him and his rambling.

"Hey," Kit said softly, placing a hand on Spencer's shoulder gently.

"Uh- hey," Spencer said, looking up at her. He smiled a bit, Kit's eyes seeming to light up slightly, "you know, I've noticed a pattern with you. Everytime someone you've grown to care about smiles, your eyes light up. But you never actually smile."

"I don't smile for a reason," Kit said softly, "I'll explain it later. When we have time. But JJ said there was a case..."

"Right," Spencer nodded, "oh, uh- someone sent this to you."

Kit furrowed her eyebrows. She hadn't made any friends. At all. Who the hell could've been contacting her or sending her stuff like this?

Kit opened the envelope and looked at the pictures. She flipped through them, the threats on each getting worse and worse. What finally phased her, though, was when her brother was mentioned. She threw the photos in the trash immediately.

Aleksander walked up to her, also holding a batch of photos. "Вы их тоже получили?" He asked. (You got them too? Or did you get them too?)

Kit nodded nervously. Spencer looked at them. "я напуган," Kit whispered. (I'm scared.)

Aleksander placed his hands on either side of her face gently, shaking his head. "Don't be," he said. Kit nodded and bit her lip, "let's go."

Kit nodded, beginning to walk away. "It'd a sick prank. Just a sick prank."

"40,000 images of child porn are posted every week on the internet, along with the appearance of twenty new children. The appetite for babies as young as four months old has soared," Spencer said, "many of these children have been kidnapped and sold into pedophile rings."

"One year ago, the same boy appeared on several websites used by pedophiles," Jason said, "he was a new face then. After a massive hunt led by our Crimes Against Children Unit, the boy disappeared."

"Until tonight when SSA Cole telephoned us," Hotch said.

"Katie Cole?" Derek asked. Kit looked at him and raised her eyebrows. Hotch nodded.

"She was in the BAU, right?" Spencer asked.

"One of the first profilers, clinical psychologist, brilliant," Jason said.

"She runs the Crimes Against Children Unit in Maryland," Maribelle said.

"I've always wanted to meet her," Derek said as he sat down.

"Really? I heard she's a bitch," a woman said, walking into the room.

"Nobody ever called you that, Katie," Jason said.

"Well, not to my face," Katie replied. Kit chuckled and looked down. She looked at the screen and sighed, "the first time I ever saw him, he appeared in a series of photos. I named him Peter." She stood there for a moment before walking up to Jason and Hotch, "now he's being auctioned off when that clock runs to zero."

Kit scoffed quietly, looking at Aleksander. "Over my dead body," she said.

"Auctioned," JJ said, shaking her head slightly.

"His face isn't pixilated,"

"'Cause the unsub is confident that we're not going to be able to identify him in time," Hotch said.

"What about the site itself?" JJ asked, "can't we just track it's origin?"

"It's routed through a proxy server in Belarus," Katie replied, "even if that government wad friendly, Peter'd be gone before we finished the paperwork."

"Isn't our grandmother from Belarus?" Kit asked, looking at Aleksander.

"I think so."

"We don't need to worry about the paperwork," JJ said, "we have Garcia."

"Better get on that, will you?" Jason asked.

"Yes, sir," JJ said as she walked away.

"So, what happened a year ago, Katie?" Hotch asked. The question immediately peaked Kit's interest and she sat up.

"We cross-referenced the images of the boy. We talked to known offenders nationwide. We narrowed the location down to the eastern United States. We had some suspects in, but the trail went cold. Until today," Katie said.

"With all due respect, Miss Cole—" Derek started.

"Uh oh," Kit said, biting back a smile.

"Hush. With all due respect, Miss Cole, how is this time going to be any different?" Derek asked.

"We have a starting point," Katie said.

"The location where the image was first discovered," Hotch said.

"A chatroom— hosted by an independent web company in Cleveland, Ohio," Katie said.

"Fun fact, when I was fifteen, I slept with a senior in highschool on a mission in Cleveland," Kit said to Derek. He furrowed his eyebrows and gave her a look, smiling slightly.

"And this time, I'm brining you all in with me," Katie said.

theologian dietrich bonhoeffer said. . . " the test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children. "

Kit and Spencer were walking, Spencer trying to get Kit to smile every so often. They walked past the elevator and Spencer stopped, Kit doing the same.

"Well, if it isn't Dr. Reid," Elle said. Kit stepped back awkwardly, biting her lip as she glanced around.

"Elle. Wow," Spencer said, walking towards her. Kit stayed put.

Not needed, not wanted. Everything's the same.

"Nice haircut," Elle said.

"Thanks," Spencer said, touching the back of his head, "uh, yeah... I like your haircut, too."

God, he's so awkward...

"Is that a boys' regular?" Elle asked.

"Yeah, it is," Spencer replied, "Wa- do you not like it?"

"It's totally you," Elle chuckled.

"So, you're, uh... Okay?" Spencer asked. Kit raised her eyebrows.

Kit and Aleksander had been in court a few months prior to this case. Really, the only people they got to know were Spencer, Jason, and Derek.

Hotch opened the door and walked out of the bullpen.

"I didn't think you were back till next week," Hotch said. Kit rook a deep breath and sighed.

"Oh, um, I got a text message, so..." Elle said trailing off. Kit sighed before walking away to find Derek.

"Hey, mama," Derek said, Kit turning around and looking at him.

"Hey," she said softly.

"You all right?" Derek asked.

Kit nodded. "Uh— your coworker, Elle, is back... Figured I'd give Spencer and Hotchner some time with her," she said.

"You're allowed to call him Hotch, Kit Kat," Derek said, laughing a bit.

Kit sighed and nodded. "Right," she said softly.

Derek sighed. "What's it gonna take to get you to smile?"

"Maybe some coffee after this case," Kit smirked.

"I'm counting that as a smile," Derek laughed.

Kit rolled her eyes, shrugging. "Whatever floats your boat, горячая штучка," she said. (Hot stuff.)

Derek raised his eyebrows as Kit began to walk away. "Wait, wait, tell me what that means," he said.

"Ask Spencer."

"The image was uploaded to one of our C.AC. undercovers fishing in a chatroom," Katie said, "we try to monitor as many of them as we can, pretending to be children, pedophiles, whatever works on that site."

"Did you run forensic linguistics on the chat log? There might be something to Hugz' speech pattern," Aleksander asked. Kit looked at him and raised an eyebrow, "what? I know things."

"It doesn't really work that way with internet talk." There was turbulence, Kit guessed, which caused Katie to gasp and stumble slightly.

"Fear of flying?" Jason asked. "Lengthy, deep-rooted issues of control?"

"I— think better on my feet," Katie replied.

"Imagine thinking at all," Kit mumbled. Derek looked at her and smiled.

"Come on, girly, use that brain of yours. I know you're smart, you're just stubborn and refuse to show it," he smirked.

Kit scoffed. "I wish."

"Most of the talk is abbreviated text- LOL, laughing out loud. IMHO, in my humble opinion. FTF—"

"Face to face," Derek and Kit said.

Derek gave her a curious look and she smirked. "How do you think I managed to get my targets to meet me?" She asked.

Katie looked at the two and nodded. "Right. Uh, pedophiles can be divided into two categories..."

There was more turbulence, obviously making Katie uneasy. Hotch stood up. "Situational and preferential. Situational offenders rarely seek out children, but they'll take advantage of a situation when presented with it, whereas preferential offenders actively target children by age group, hair color... They'll seek out jobs that give them as much access to children as possible."

"They often trawl around residential neighborhoods, hijacking home wireless systems and communicating with children, often outside the very house the child is in," Katie said.

"Or go to a coffee shop with wireless access to find, locate, and arrange a meeting with a child," Kit said.

"And it's growing. It's growing as fast as the internet," Katie said, "they're getting smarter and smarter, and all the security in the world can't stop them from coming through our doors. Hell, the monsters are already in our homes."

"If he's had this kid for a year, this makes him preferential," Kit noted, biting her lip.

"Definitely," Katie said.

"So then why is he selling him?" Derek asked. There was more turbulence and Kit grabbed Derek's hand.

"Maybe, uh... Maybe he's losing interest," Katie said, "Peter's maybe getting too old, too tall. Preferential offenders are very specific about their preferences."

"And if he can't sell him?" Derek asked. Kit inhaled sharply.

"He isn't just going to let him go," Jason said. Kit closed her eyes and sighed.

"Hotch?" JJ asked.

"Yeah?" Hotch asked.

"Yeah, I was thinking, shouldn't we release Peter's picture to the media?" JJ asked.

"No, no, no," Katie said quickly, "if this unsub thinks that we're onto him, he may make a run for it and dispose of the boy."

Kit made a disgusted face and Derek sighed, giving her hand a small squeeze.

"Shouldn't we assume he does know?" Jason asked.

"As I said, we intercepted the image as a part of an undercover operation. These predators have a fairly closed society," Katie said, "the way they run these sites gives them the expectation of anonymity."

Jason nodded. "Right," he said.

"Have Reid, Elle, and Wang check the live feed," Hotch said, "not just the boy, but everything around him- the room. See if we missed anything."

"Okay."

Kit took a deep breath and looked at Derek. "You all right, Kit Kat?"

"I'm... Fine," she replied, biting her lip. Derek nodded.

"Okay..."

Kit and Derek walked into the building, Kit standing behind Derek slightly. "FBI. We have a warrant to search these premises. Stop what you're doing right now," Derek said, holding up the warrant.

Everyone froze and looked at him. "Can somebody tell us who owns this place?" Kit asked.

A man stood up and cleared his throat. "That'd be me," he said.

"I want access to your chatroom databases," Katie said. The man looked at her nervously.

The man scoffed as everyone was going through the databases. "This is so typical," he said, "you feds just can't help yourselves. You gotta pollute the truest form of free expression ever invented."

Kit pulled her stun gun and pressed it against his neck. "You have two seconds to stop talking," she said. Derek snatched the stun gun quickly.

"Agent Morgan, Agent Egorova, find a chatroom of your choice," Katie said, "your name is Susie you're 12 years old."

"With pleasure," Kit said, her and Derek walking over to the computer.

"What are you doing?" The man asked.

"Fishing," Kit and Katie replied as her and Derek watched the screen, Derek typing on the keyboard.

"You know, I've got rights, and so do my clients," the man said.

"And by clients, you mean pedophiles?" Kit asked, raising her eyebrows.

Derek and Kit found a chatroom.

Hi everyone. My name is SUZY. I'm 12yo. Would anyone like to talk with me:):);) Derek typed quickly.

Kit sighed. Why did kids actually put that on the internet?

The computer began dinging and Kit sighed, biting her lip. "That's the sound of pedophiles looking to hook up with a 12 year old girl named Suzy. You let them run everything through SSL connections from proxy servers in offshore countries," Katie said.

"So they can't be identified?" Derek asked. Katie shook her head.

"Not in 12 and a half hours," she said.

"Hey, I'm just a middleman here, okay?" The man asked, "what can I do?"

"There's a little boy for sale on one of your sites. "What can I do" just isn't good enough," Jason said.

JJ had told them there was another kid being held. Everyone got out of the SUV quickly and ran up to the house, Derek kicking in the door. Everyone ran in.

"FBI!" Hotch yelled.

They walked upstairs and made it to the room where there was heavy metal blasting. They ran into the room and walked around. "It's... Clear," Kit said softly, sighing.

Jason turned the music off and said something to the kid, but Kit was too disoriented to know exactly what it was.

"Safe?" The kid asked, getting up.

Kit had done that before. Pretended to be tied up and in an inescapable situation. To look vulnerable to her target, only to kill him.

The kid walked over to his bed and put on a shirt. "What's your name?" Kit asked.

"Kevin."

"The man who did this to you. Is he still here?" Hotch asked.

"This is my house," Kevin said.

"Graham Rose is the owner of this house," Katie said, "where is he?"

Kevin dropped to his knees to use his computer. "Don't touch that," Kit and Aleksander said quickly.

"Back up."

"Where is he?"

"He's gone," Kevin said.

"What do you mean, gone?" Kit asked, saying it so quickly it sounded like one word.

"He's just gone, okay?"

"Graham Rose is your father?" Jason asked.

"Yeah, sure. You can call him that," Kevin said, standing up, "I just call him a bastard." Kit pursed her lips and looked down.

"I called my dad names too, kid, you're not alone," she said.

"The father's been in jail for the last eight months. In that time, Kevin's been selling the only thing he's got, which is himself," Hotch said.

"Just like a street hustler," Derek said.

"Is that comparing sex workers and drug dealers to a kid?" Kit asked, "if that's the case, don't ever compare me to him again."

"Only now the street is the internet," Katie said.

"And his client base spans the globe," Jason said.

"Well, this kid definitely uploaded Peter's video to the chatroom, 'cause it's still on his computer," Derek said.

"Yeah, but not the live feed," Aleksander pointed out.

"He say how he got ahold of the video?" Kit asked.

"He said it came from one of his clients," Hotch said, "it was a shared file. They'd gone around these chat groups."

"It's possible. Buyers and sellers routine. They trade files because the act in itself is an illegal act, which proves they're not the police," Katie said.

"Let's go see what else we can find out."

"Kid, the boy whose video you've been sending around to all those chatrooms, he's gonna be sold from one pedophile to another," Derek said.

"Boo-hoo," Kevin said.

"Just because you're a minor doesn't mean I won't hit you right here and now," Kit said warningly.

"These are dummy logs. What's the password to get me into the real transcripts of your sessions?" Katie asked.

"You're the FBI. You figure it out," Kevin said. Kit narrowed her eyes at him and started to walk towards the young boy, Aleksander pulling her back immediately, "yeah, that's right. Keep your lap dog under control."

"I know you don't think so, Kevin, but we are trying to help you here," Hotch said.

"Help me? What I do is consensual. No one's getting hurt," Kevin said.

"Come on, Kevin, what's the password? Your birthday?" Katie asked, "your... Favorite band."

"Kevin, this is prostitution," Derek said.

"But I'm a minor. I don't even really know what I'm doing," Kevin said, "plus I never leave this room, so no one, no one ever touches me."

"Anymore," Jason said, "your father's been beating you since you can remember. First it was he was drunk on the weekend, then he was always drunk. You never knew why he was hurting you... Why he was so angry. At night, you'd cry yourself to sleep, hoping someone would come and save you. No one ever came."

"You have the chance to be the one who saves someone, Kevin," Hotch said, "you can be the one who answers him, the one who stops his pain. You can't get to your father, but you can get to the guy who's hurting this boy."

Kevin looked at Katie. "Move," he said. Katie got up and Kevin sat down in front of his computer, "this backs up all my transcripts. The screen name of the guy who sent me the file is mehtevas."

"How long as mehtevas been a client of yours?" Kit asked.

"Like, six months," Kevin said.

"Where is he located?" Katie asked.

"He's a local. He's always asking to meet with me, but I don't do that," Kevin said.

"Does he know where you are?" Aleksander asked.

"Just the city," Kevin said.

"How do you contact him?" Katie asked.

"He contacts me," Kevin said.

"Come on, Kevin. You don't just sit around here waiting for these guys to look you up. That's no way to run a business," Derek said.

"Right now, you're the only person who can help us find Peter," Katie said.

"What do you want me to do?" Kevin asked.

"Ask him for a face to face," Kit said.

"No. No way, I don't do that. I've never been out of this room," Kevin said.

"It'll be fine. He won't lay a finger on you," Kit promised.

"We'll be right there, Kevin, the whole time," Hotch said, "I promise you."

"Won't he be suspicious if I suddenly want to meet with him?" Kevin asked.

"He's a need driven offender, Kevin," Katie said.

"What does that mean?" Kevin asked.

"If you offer to meet with him, he won't be able to resist," Jason said.

Aleksander sighed. "He can't help himself."

The second Kevin walked away, Derek and Kit immediately got out of the SUV. "FBI. Turn around," Derek said.

"I didn't do anything!"

"Derek, take it easy," Kit said, "I hate pedophiles as much as you do, but-"

"We need his cooperation," Katie said, "we just need to ask him a few questions

"Here's a question," Hotch said, "what's the principal of a school doing hooking up with a 14 year old boy?"

Hotch tossed Jason his ID. "Let's go. Put 'em on here."

"I wish you would inform me what exactly I'm being charged with," Rawlings said.

"Anything we could possibly stick to you," Derek said, glancing at Kit.

"I haven't done anything," Rawlings said, pulling his arm away.

"You're an educated man, Mr. Rawlings. You know you're in trouble here," Katie said.

"I believe I just walked outside of my school. Is that a crime now?" Rawlings asked.

"It is when we know you've watched a 14 year old shirtless boy tied to a chair online and got turned on by it," Kit said, putting pressure on the pressure point behind his ear.

"Ah!" Rawling yelled. Derek pulled Kit's arm away, keeping a hand on her wrist.

"You know where he is?" Katie asked, handing Rawlings a picture of Peter.

He sighed. "How could anyone hurt something so..."

"Pure? Innocent? Purity and innocence are the two very things being ripped away from him," Kit said, "that takes a toll on your mental health, even as you grow older. It doesn't just affect you as a kid."

"You sent that image to Kevin," Aleksander said.

"Well, that was wrong of me, I know, but I was so shocked. I wanted to try to save this poor boy. I thought Hugz- Kevin- might know him," Rawlings said, "that's why I sent him the link to the website, see if he knew."

"Please. You were trying to save him?" Derek asked, walking closer to Rawlings. Rawlings backed away.

"Help search his office," Jason said.

Kit gave him a look. "I got this," he said. Kit and Derek walked away.

"What a load of bullshit that is," Kit scoffed, scratching the back if her neck slightly.

"You know, you never told me about the brand on your neck," Derek said.

"What's there to tell? Show's my rank in the Academy. The higher the number the better. It went up to 560 in each age group," Kit said.

"You're is 550," Derek said quietly.

"One of the top ten," Kit said. Derek nodded.

"What about the tattoos?" Derek asked.

"Another time, Derek," Kit said as she looked away, cracking the slightest of smiles.

"Tell us we got something we can nail this son of a bitch on," Derek said.

"Not unless we can break the password on this guy's computer," Spencer said.

"Call Garcia," Kit said. Elle gave her a look.

"Take too long," Elle said.

"Come on, genius. Do something genius-like," Derek said, looking at Spencer.

"If this guy does has child pornography on his computer and we type in the wrong password, it could trigger a virus that wipes out the enitre hard drive," Spencer said.

Elle stood up and looked out the window. "What's he saying out there?"

"He's a preferential pedophile who claims he's trying to save them," Derek said.

"Save them. Save-" Spencer cut himself off and got up, grabbing a piece of paper and a marker. He wrote "Save them" on the paper before flipping it over.

"Mehtevas."

Jason, Katie, Aleksander, and Rawlings walked into the room. Derek picked up a chair and walked closer to the four before putting it down. "Mr. Rawlings. Have a seat," he said.

Elle slid his laptop in front of him. "Your laptop."

Derek's phone rang. "Yeah, it's Morgan. Okay, hold on, Garcia. Hold on." He walked out.

"It's, uh, research. I'm writing a book," Rawlings lied.

Kit and Aleksander rolled their eyes dramatically. "Sit down."

"I swear to you this is all just research!" Rawlings said.

"It's not research. It's 100 years in a federal penitentiary," Katie said.

Rawlings closed his eyes for a moment before looking at Jason. "I'd like to make a deal," he said.

"No deals. All you have is a very, very small amount of good will," Jason said.

"Tell me about Peter," Katie said.

"I was contacted by the man who was holding him. I didn't search for this boy. I didn't go looking for this," Rawlings said.

"Stop trying to cover your ass and give us a name," Kit said.

"Well, I only know the screen name," Rawlings said. Kit rolled her eyes, "it's manchild."

"Did you bid on Peter?" Jason asked.

"How much?" Katie asked.

"8,000 dollars. But it was only in order to save him," Rawlings said.

"You the high bidder?" Kit asked.

"I-I think so, yes," Rawlings said, "I was, anyway. I was supposed to go back online and contact him on his website and get the address."

"So you can inspect the merchandise?" Elle asked.

"Look, this child is being auctioned off, and I am trying to save him," Rawlings said.

"Trying to save him," Katie said, "he'd have given you a code. What is it?"

"Come on. I have a family. I have children of my own. I love children. I would never harm them," Rawlings said.

Kit felt tears flood her eyes.

"He loves you, Kitty," the Director said, "he'd never hurt you."

Part of Kit's training as a spy was to sleep with older, more mature men for missions that might involve it. They were all over the age, and Kit was only fourteen. He said they wouldn't hurt her, that they loved her.

It was a lie. All they did was hurt her. She cried herself to sleep every night. Because of them.

"Bullshit," Kit whispered, "I speak from experience when I say that's just a tactic to get children to trust you, you creep." She let a tear slip, her eyes red.

"In your pursuit to save them, you think you could've avoided having sex with them?" Katie asked.

"Mr. Rawlings. The code," Jason said.

Rawlings took off his glasses and placed a hand over his eyes, sighing as he rubbed his face a little. "Butterfly," he said.

Katie walked over and grabbed the computer, typing something in quickly.

"What happened?" Jason asked. Kit looked at the screen, the chat no longer up. Instead, it was a screen that said "error" on it.

"I don't know. He broke contact," Katie said.

"We got reporters outside of the school. This thing is all over the news," Derek said. Kit sighed and looked at him. Derek's face immediately became worried once he saw the tear stains and red eyes.

"Oh my God, that's why the site went down. He knows," Katie said.

"She's sure about this, right?" Elle asked.

"If Garcia says that tadpole shirt came from a unit in Mount Pleasant, then I gotta believe her," Derek said.

"She better be. Mount Pleasant is 60 miles away and there's only two hours left on the auction clock," Spencer said.

"I don't think anyone has anything stronger than Tylenol here, correct?" Kit asked, "that crying gave me a killer headache."

"Maybe. If the unsub knows we're onto him, he may move that clock up," Elle said.

"Recognize him?" Derek asked the man.

"Can't say that I do," the man replied. Kit sighed softly.

"But you're certain that the shirt came from this unit of the tadpoles, right?" Kit asked nervously. She couldn't let this kid go through what she went through. Not happening.

"It disbanded six months ago," the man told her, "before I took over the congregation."

"Why?" Derek asked.

"I was told there wasn't enough interest," the man said, "only a few boys participated."

"Do you have the records of those who did participate?" Spencer asked.

"How could anyone do this to a child?" The man asked as he looked at the picture.

Elle cleared her throat as she sat down. "We need to find this boy," she said, "the records."

"I'm sorry. I don't think so," the man said, "wait. There may be a photo of the tadpoles."

"This may be what you're looking for," the man said as he walked back into the room. He handed Derek the picture.

"Yeah. That's him, right there," Derek said, pointing him out to Kit, "is there a name? Address? Anything?"

"As I said, there are no records left. The church was run pretty sloppily until I took over," the man said.

"Let me see that," Kit said. Derek handed it to her and she took the backing off of it, revealing the three names on the back, "Charlie. His names Charlie."

Everyone got out of the SUVs and met each other in the road. "The name the school has is Charlie Sparks," Aleksander said.

"No Sparks in any of the phone directories," Jason said.

"Garcia can't even find a Sparks within 100 miles for the last ten years," Derek said.

"Probably not his real name anyway," Katie said.

"The school said he may have moved away," Hotch said.

"Then we start over again."

"We don't have a lot of time left," Elle said.

"Guys, maybe we're looking at this the wrong way," Spencer said.

"What?" Aleksander asked.

"The behavior, it's odd, right? The unsub apparently listed this kid in school and the tadpoles until about a year ago. At that point, he had pictures of him online in a regular looking room. But now he's in a prison like room with no windows, no doors, completely hidden."

"Preferential pedophiles don't change overnight," Katie said.

"So what happened a year ago to make his behavior change so much?" Hotch asked.

"Fear," Kit and Jason said.

"Katie almost caught him," Jason said, "you probably talked to him. The unsub's in your records."

Derek's watch beeped and Kit gasped. "No," she whispered.

"Guys, we just ran out of time."

In a fit of rage, Kit punched the back window causing everyone to panic. "Hey, hey, hey," Derek said, grabbing her wrists, "calm down."

Kit closed her eyes as Derek sighed and looked at her bleeding knuckles. "I never really had a good suspect. I only did some general interviews with child offenders on the east coast," Katie said as she began to call someone.

"One of them was the right guy," Hotch said.

"You okay?" Derek asked quietly. Kit hesitated before nodding.

"Fine," she said softly.

"You're gonna need to clean that up," Derek said.

"Later."

"Amanda, hey. Uh, I need you to pull all of the original files on Peter's case. Uh, somewhere in my office. Try my desk. I need the names of everyone I interviewed."

"Have her call Penelope Garcia at the BAU," Derek told Katie, "she'll be able to tell us if we can cross any off."

"You got it? Thanks." She hung up.

"All right guys, listen up, we might have something," Derek said, "twelve men were interviewed. Eight are back in prison, one is dead. One lives in California and two have the last known addresses within ten minutes of us- a Patrick Forest and a Micheal Earlson."

"Patrick Forest isn't smart enough to put this all together," Katie said.

"What about Earlson?" Kit asked.

"Definitely."

The SUVs got there right as Earlson was about to leave. He was surrounded and everyone got out of the SUVs, guns pulled as he tried to run. Derek grabbed him and threw him against the car.

"Where are you going?!" Derek asked, "who's up now, punk?! Don't move!"

Derek cuffed him and put him in the back of the car. Kit sighed as she messed with her knife. "You okay?"

"You've asked me that three times today," Kit pointed out, "you care. A lot."

"Of course I do," Derek said, "now answer the question."

"I'm fine," Kit said, "I bit shaken up... If we were just another minute late-"

"But we weren't," Derek said. Kit nodded and sighed.

"You're right," she said, biting her lip. She glanced at Derek and sighed. Derek wrapped an arm around her.

"You sure you're okay?"

Kit groaned. "Yes!"

"Okay, okay! Just checking."

"Peter's real name is Dustin Powers," Katie said, "he abducted him in Newark, New Jersey when he was one."

Kit scoffed and shook her head, crossing her arms.

"Sometimes it seems there's no punishment enough," Jason said.

"I can think of one. Electric chair," Kit said. Derek bit back a smile. Kit gave him a sly smirk.

"JJ traced his mother. She's on her way," Derek said, beginning to walk out. Kit followed quickly.

Kit sat on Derek's desk as he looked at the paperwork, messing with the pen in his hands. "I just can't thank you all enough," Dustin's mother said.

"Feels good, huh?" Derek asked. Kit looked at him and furrowed her eyebrows, "being able to help reunite a mother and her child."

"You don't even think about putting the pedophile away?" Kit asked.

"I try not to," Derek said, grabbing her hand, "it's easier just to think of the people we made happy." Kit thought for a moment before looking at Derek and nodding.

"It's the beauty of it all, isn't it?" She asked.

Derek smiled. "Now you're getting it."

Kit stood up with a smirk. "Let's go. We still have coffee to get."

Kit and Derek walked around Kit's current neighborhood where she lived with Noah and Aleksander. "It's really pretty at night around here. Especially on holidays," Kit said softly, taking a sip of her coffee.

"Not as pretty as you," Derek said. Kit bit back a smile, or tried to. She looked down with a large smile, causing Derek to smirk, "I did it."

"Great," Kit laughed, "now try and do it next time without flirting with me."

Derek smiled. "Challenge accepted, Egorova."

DAI SPEAKS the wholesome content i signed up forrr

#criminal minds #spencer reid #derek morgan #aaron hotchner #david rossi #jennifer jareau #emily prentss #jason gideon

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