On the Gulfstream plane, Reid was enjoying chestnut cake while watching a video on his phone of a father and son playing a trombone and opening and closing an oven door.
JJ and Emily were huddled in a corner, whispering to each other; judging by their touching each other's arms, they were probably discussing skin problems.
Seeing no one paying attention to him, Jack sighed, sat down across from Reid, set up his tablet, and sent a video call to Garcia.
"Honey, have you found Rossi?"
"Yes, he took a business class flight this morning. The FBI system shows he drove off in an SUV from his local office half an hour ago."
Garcia in the video was frowning, still looking shaken.
Jack tapped the table, gesturing for the two girls to co over.
"I just finished going through the file you gave before I left. To be honest, there wasn't much on it."
Seeing that Jack and Garcia were getting down to business, JJ and Emily quickly stopped their chatter and sat down on the sofas opposite and beside him, respectively.
"Uh, there's a fingerprint. It's being compared to the system for the second ti right now. Hopefully, it'll match this ti. Unfortunately, it didn't. Should I find an image enhancent expert to do it?" Garcia asked.
"Contact Dr. Breanna at Jefferson Lab directly. Her team has a Ms. Angela Montenegro, who is an expert in image enhancent."
Jack imdiately took out his phone and sent Dr. Breanna's business card to Garcia. This was Rossi's resource.
Garcia continued, "There's also a cri scene notebook, handwritten by Rossi back then. I'm still organizing it, and I'll send you a scanned copy later. Uh, that's why he ca to my house last night."
"So, he was at the cri scene with the local police?" Emily keenly noticed the key point. This case was clearly not a serial murder case. Twenty years ago, Rossi was already a big shot in the BAU; there was no reason for him to be at the scene imdiately.
"Perhaps that's why this case is bothering him." JJ twirled her Parker pen thoughtfully. "The scene must have been quite grueso; the murder weapon was a long-handled axe."
"I've read all his books. More than twenty years ago, he experienced much worse scenes than this. This doesn't make sense." Reid wiped his hands and put away his phone.
"Don't guess. We'll find out by asking Rossi when we get there." Jack said goodbye to Garcia, turned off the video call, and pulled out a few cri scene photos, tossing them on the table.
"Judging from the photos, even I've experienced cases far more horrific than this. There must be sothing else troubling him."
Hearing his sowhat bossy tone, JJ pointed a finger at him, a little unconvinced. "You should know that you're actually the youngest among us, right? I've seen your birthdate; you're even a few months younger than Reid."
Emily, as if reminded by JJ, suddenly sat up straight. "Yes, you actually dared to talk back to 'Dad' before."
Seeing Emily bring up the previous topic again, JJ gave her a light kick, annoyed. "If you keep talking like that, I'm worried Rossi and Hotchner will co after you."
"Psychologically speaking, Jack is older than Hotchner. He's very good at taking care of people and enjoys it very much." Reid comnted seriously, and Jack guessed that this guy had practiced psychological profiling on other people quite a bit in private.
So he deliberately put on a stern face and simply admitted his role in the team. "Are you judging from the fact that I beat up my dear little brother to correct his behavior? And, these two young ladies in front of , what's wrong with having a 23-year-old older brother?"
"It's still early, let's play cards." Touched on the sore spot of age, JJ took the initiative to change the subject she had started.
Indianapolis is the capital of Indiana, located in the Arican Midwest, slightly closer to the East.
It has a temperate continental climate, and at this ti in early March, the temperature has just climbed above zero.
Before getting off the plane, the girls had all changed into thick winter clothes. Jack also put on a slightly thick jacket, and Reid put on an oddly colored knitted sweater.
As usual, the local FBI arrived in a Suburban. These were practically FBI-only vehicles; Jack felt like they were the sa model in almost every city, just different versions.
"So, where should we look for Rossi?" Reid looked around blankly after getting off the plane.
"Let's go straight to the Palr Hotel. I know where to find him."
Sure enough, upon arriving at the five-star hotel, Jack easily led everyone to the bar in the restaurant, where Rossi was drinking alone.
"What about your promise, Rossi?" Jack's gaze fell on the bracelet beside him. How many tis had he seen that?
"I said I needed ti to sort out my thoughts." Rossi's eyes were bloodshot, and he spoke sowhat absentmindedly.
"Co on, we're all here. Aren't you going to buy us a drink?" Emily sat down next to Rossi, looking at the expensive drinks behind the bar with a slight gasp. "Otherwise, I definitely couldn't afford such a high-class place. Jack, you didn't book the room here, did you?"
"The accommodation is on , and the drinks are on JJ. Are you satisfied?" Jack waved to the pretty bartender.
There was no way around it; all four of them were currently trainee agents, earning less than 100,000 a year. Under normal circumstances, they definitely couldn't afford a five-star hotel like this.
"We were all worried about you," Reid said weakly from the side, finally making Rossi sigh.
"Thank you for coming. Everything is on . Let's go over there and have a drink." He said, taking the lead in standing up, picking up his glass and the bracelet, and heading towards the booth.
"At the turn of the century, I ca here to arrest a serial killer. The job wasn't difficult; I completed it easily."
After everyone sat down, Rossi recounted his experience from back then.
"That guy wasn't very bright. The day after his arrest, on the way to the airport with a local detective, we heard an alarm on the walkie-talkie—a child was calling for help from inside a house."
"The cri scene wasn't far from us. The detective asked if I wanted to go with him. We were the first to arrive. In that house, we found..."
"These?" JJ took out the case file from her bag. Opening it, several photos of the scene were displayed.
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