Police in America

When the BAU team arrived, Tim was directing the officers to set up a perimeter. Seeing Jack get out of the car, Tim placed his hands on his hips, hooked his thumbs into his belt, and tilted his head as he commented.

"Aren't FBI agents supposed to wear white shirts, ties, and black suits? You're the least FBI-looking agent I've ever seen."

Jack stepped aside, revealing Reid behind him, and smiled without saying a word, letting the contrast speak for itself.

To be fair, aside from Hotchner, the rest of the team dressed rather casually. Jack preferred to wear dark, easy-to-clean long-sleeve or short-sleeve T-shirts paired with jeans when on the job, with a jacket to cover the spare gun under his arm. He avoided formal suits and ties unless absolutely necessary.

"Where's John?" Jack glanced around, not seeing the older rookie.

"He's inside. They found some bloody footprints and are tracking them. Here, take this," Tim handed him a walkie-talkie and then pointed to the dilapidated community behind the barricade. The area, located on the town's edge, had been abandoned for a long time. The row houses built on the hillside were in terrible condition, covered in graffiti.

Unlike the typically aloof FBI agents, the BAU team always tried to maintain a good relationship with the local police. These psychologists knew full well that the success or failure of an investigation often depended on cooperation. Besides, Tim and the others were old friends of Jack. Even Hotchner, who rarely smiled, managed a brief one during the introductions.

Seeing Tim, who usually kept a stern face, making small talk with a forced smile, Jack and Hannah couldn't help but exchange amused glances.

As they walked into the scene, Hotchner turned to Reid, "How far is this place from where the body was dumped last night? Five miles?"

"6.2 miles to the south," Reid corrected.

"Why would they go through all that trouble? They knew the police were searching for the girls, yet they took the risk of driving the body that far?" Hannah questioned.

"There must be a reason that forced them to do so, and that's why we're here," Rossi replied as he put on gloves and led the way.

Inside the row house where Tim and his team had found clues, the walls were also covered in strange graffiti symbols. The floor was littered with beer bottles, needles, cigarette butts, and reeked of urine. 

In the back room was a tattered mattress, stained with blood and other unidentifiable fluids. Torn clothing lay scattered around it.

Emily and Hannah quickly moved in, carefully avoiding the visible footprints on the floor as they approached the mattress to examine the clothing fragments.

JJ used her phone to pull up a statement to assist them in matching the items. The statement was from Katie's mother, Mrs. Owen, describing what Katie had been wearing when she left the house that day.

"Yes, this is it. These clothes match the description. Katie was... she was..." JJ's voice trailed off, unable to finish the sentence.

"This might be the weapon used to kill Katie. It matches the marks on her neck," Reid said as he examined a belt Jack had handed him, closely inspecting the metal buckle.

"There's DNA evidence everywhere—cigarette butts, beer cans—this is too unprofessional for a killer," Jack remarked as he tried to navigate the cluttered room. Unable to find a clear path, he had to kick away a few empty cans before reaching the back.

He carefully lifted the mattress a bit and, as expected, found a pink cell phone wedged between it and the wall.

"Katie's phone. The battery's dead. That's why the call got cut off. The killer didn't even realize the girls had secretly dialed out."

Everyone exchanged glances, realizing that this was nothing like what they had anticipated.

Given Kison Vaughn's status under witness protection, they had assumed the most likely scenario was that professionals had kidnapped the two girls, tortured and killed one as a warning to Kison, and then took his daughter to pressure him into refusing to testify.

But what they were seeing now didn't fit that narrative at all.

Hotchner's phone rang; it was Garcia. After a brief conversation, he hung up.

"Garcia says she combed through all the databases. There's no one fitting the profile of an Irish person arriving from Boston recently."

"Then, is it possible that Katie and Lindsay left the theater voluntarily with someone, not realizing what would happen to them?" Emily asked, her face pale as she packed the torn clothes into evidence bags.

"You mean this has nothing to do with the Irish or the mob?" The group fell silent. If that were the case, it would just be a typical case of random teenage violence.

The person who managed to lure the two girls from the theater was likely someone they knew, probably of the same age. A little alcohol could have caused everything to spiral out of control.

"If that's the case, then it explains why they tried to destroy the body and drove several miles to dump it," Reid said, his expression also darkening. Their goal wasn't just to solve the case but to save lives. And with the case developing this way, solving it was only a matter of time, but time was precisely what they lacked.

The longer it dragged on, the more desperate the killer would become. Adolescents were particularly prone to extreme actions, which meant Lindsay's chances of survival were diminishing rapidly.

"Jack, did your guys have any luck tracking those bloody footprints out the back?" Rossi asked, his eyes on the police walkie-talkie in Jack's hand.

Coincidentally, as Jack was about to press the talk button, John's excited voice came through the walkie-talkie. "Hey, guys, I found a body in the southwest corner of this house."

Everyone's hearts sank. Jack quickly called out, "John, it's Jack. Is the body the missing girl?"

"Huh? Jack? Oh, no, it's not. It's a boy, about sixteen or seventeen, looks like he was stabbed to death."

The group quietly sighed in relief.

After signaling to the two LAPD officers at the door, Jack handed them the evidence bags the team had collected and headed to where John was.

The body John had discovered was hidden in another corner of the abandoned row house, in a dark attic.

The boy lay on his back, clutching a cell phone in his hand. A trail of blood led from the floorboards behind him, which was likely how John had quickly found the body.

"Three stab wounds to the chest. They probably hit vital organs and major blood vessels," Jack said as he crouched by the body, staring into the boy's lifeless eyes.

"The corneas are cloudy, with a white, misty appearance. Time of death is over 15 hours ago, likely shortly after Katie was killed."

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