Adult-FanFiction.org : Television / Streaming

Strangers in the Night	By : BlueHarlequin Category: 1 through F > Criminal Minds Views: 6855 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: Nothing of Criminal Minds belongs to me; this is not for profit. No copyright infringement intended.

Chapter List
- 2
- 3
- 4
Strangers in the Night
Chapter 3 – Coming Out and Going In
Author: BlueHarlequin
Thanks for all the GREAT reviews and for being patient while I procrastinated on this!
Disclaimer: Nothing of Criminal Minds belongs to me; this is not for profit. No copyright infringement intended.
Warnings: graphic sex between men, attempted non-con, references to non-con, references to crime scene violence, homophobia
A/N: MASSIVELY unbeta'd, like I am posting right after I finished it. Please be kind. Updates are always posted in my profile. Feel free to PM me with comments, I love hearing from ya'll!
Aaron Hotchner x Spencer Reid, established relationship
Summary: Addiction Series - A night out clubbing becomes a disaster when it outs Spencer to the team. Rossi and Morgan get a surprise and Spencer’s boyfriend gets treated like an UnSub.

The high pitched squeal that echoed through the bullpen brought everyone to a stop. Rossi narrowly missed being run over as Garcia barrelled past him to get to the youngest agent. “Oh. My. God. Reid! That is so hot!”
The young agent let out a startled “Omphf!” as Garcia crashed into him, engulfing the agent in a crushing bear hug. She then pulled back and held him at arm’s length, examining the outfit he had on. Reid looked pleadingly at Hotch, who pretended not to notice. This however, drew Garcia’s attention and she paused, studying the unit chief’s attire as well.
Hotch saw the dots connect in her head and forestalled the outburst as her mouth dropped open. “Wait,” he motioned everyone towards the conference room, “I’ll explain once we’re all settled.” Hotch’s eyebrows went up briefly as he also noticed Prentiss quickly look away from him and take a lingering look at Reid. Shaking his head, he made his way up the stairs.
JJ’s voice drifted up to him as she spoke to Reid, “So this is why you went shopping with us. I never got to see everything you bought. I think I would have remembered that outfit.”
Everyone filed into the conference room and took a seat. Hotch sighed as he placed one hand on the table and the other went back to rub the back of his head absently. Prentiss’ eyebrows rose up into her hairline at the uncharacteristic display of nervousness. She also looked at them closely as she noticed Rossi was sitting next to Morgan and Reid had taken the seat next to Hotch. “Before we go over the case, Reid and I have an announcement to make.” He paused, looking at each one of them. “Reid and I have been seeing each other for over a year now.” Garcia made a little squeak of delight and everyone turned to her in exasperation.
She blushed, “Sorry, keep going.”
The unit chief shook his head and continued. “I want to tell everyone this is not a passing ‘thing,’ we are very serious about each other. We didn’t want to keep a secret from all of you but Reid and I thought it best for the team’s safety.” He let them draw their own inferences from that statement. However, he did not include that Spencer had ultimately wanted to keep it a secret mainly for very personal and selfish reasons. Those were for him and his lover to know. “If any of you have a problem with our relationship, I prefer you spoke to me before going to Strauss.” Rossi snorted under his breath and Aaron looked at him in annoyance.
“Why would any of us have a problem with it?” Emily looked honestly confused.
“Because I am Reid’s superior and ... there is the age difference.” Spencer turned to Aaron with a slightly pinched look on his face.
She looked at him wryly, “Really Hotch? You’re both consenting adults and you know none of us care about something as trivial as age. And as far as you being his boss, I don’t think this changes the team dynamic. Considering you two have been together that long and it doesn’t seem to have affected how you do your jobs, if anything you work even better together.”
After her response Rossi looked at Morgan, who pointedly turned away from the older man. Garcia noticed this and gave him an inquisitive look. She turned back to Reid, “None of that matters to me. I just want my baby and my bossman to be happy.” JJ nodded her head at this and Reid smiled at all of the girls.
“I’m happy. I just hope he’s happy with me.” It was Aaron’s turn to look at him in exasperation.
The senior agent turned to Garcia. “Spencer makes me happier than I’ve been in a long time.” Hotch suddenly looked uncomfortable at the unusual amount of emotion being shared.
Reid smiled hesitantly, “So are we okay?” Almost everyone nodded and murmured their assent. This time Garcia was watching Morgan like a hawk and her eyes narrowed when he didn’t respond.
Deciding to pursue it later she asked, “So why the scintillating attire?”
Rossi chuckled and lifted his hand to pre-empt their unit chief as he leaned forward to speak, “I really want to tell this story.”
The girls had a good laugh at Reid and his mistaken identity and were suitably outraged at the detective’s treatment of their fellow agents. Afterwards Hotch went on to describe the case. “Now I don’t think have to warn you we might have a little resistance with the one of the detectives on the case. It was unprofessional of me but I also might have antagonized him a bit while I was held in the interrogation room.”
Prentiss frowned, “What kind of department assigns a homophobic detective to a case involving rape at gay clubs?”
“That’s really not for us to judge. Okay, wheels up in ten. The department has expressed that we work from their station rather than here at Quantico.”
“Hotch I’m going to go change.” Reid walked out of the conference room and Garcia chose that moment to attack Morgan.
“What is up with you?” She stalked over to him.
“Sorry baby girl, I’m just having a hard time with this.” He looked at Hotch and then looked out the door to where Reid had gone.
“Well, Derek Morgan, I don’t understand what you are having a hard time understanding. You should be ecstatic that two people you care about are happy and in love.” She poked him in the chest then whirled around and walked out the door.
The rest of the team filed out of the room and went down into the bull pen to collect their things. Hotch went into his office and came out a few minutes later, the jeans had been replaced with slacks, he had buttoned up his shirt and rolled back down his sleeves, and the customary tie and suit jacket were firmly back in place as well.
Reid joined them as they were leaving. He had doffed his club wear in favour of his usual attire. The dress shirt, tie and sweater vest with his slacks was so different from what he had been wearing previously that Prentiss snarked at him, “You sure your alter ego’s modelling career isn’t going to interfere with your job here?” Reid just rolled his eyes at her as they made their way to the SUVs.

Detective Stephan greeted them as they came into the station. Reid almost laughed as the detective did a double take. His mouth hung open as he stared at the younger agent. Before he could regroup himself Detective Donaldson whistled behind him, “Wow, that’s a big change, wouldn’t have recognised you in that outfit.”
Detective Phelps muttered, “Still doesn’t change the fact he’s a queer.”
Hotch almost had to stop Morgan from stepping up to the man but he backed down as soon as their unit chief held his hand up. “Detective Stephan this is my team, you’ve met agents Rossi, Morgan and Dr. Reid. These are agents Prentiss, Jareau and our technical analyst Penelope Garcia.”
“Glad you could come. We thought we had a handle on the guy until he did this.” The detective led them to conference room with a couple of white boards and a box of files. “Here’s everything we have so far, the box has all the early sexual assaults and this,” he held up a file then tossed it on the table, “is the attack that happened a few hours ago.”
The team spent several hours going over the cases files. “So it’s apparent he’s escalating, and fast. He went from beatings and sexual assault to rape and murder within a span six weeks.” Rossi picked up the latest file and flipped it open, “So he starts by cornering them in a dark area of the club and assaults them. To everyone else it looks like a couple getting frisky in public. The first victims reported that he covered their mouth and their nose and held them against the wall. After a few moments they passed out from lack of oxygen. A few gropes later and he lets them go. Then he finally progresses to full on rape and the hand over the mouth is abandoned in favour of holding them by their throat. According to the ME the throat was crushed in this last victim. He had to have applied far more pressure than all of his previous victims; he knew he was going to kill this one.”
Prentiss spoke up, “So is he evolving and refining his technique or is he devolving and losing control?”
“Either way we can expect another attack soon. He only attacks on Friday and Saturday nights. It’s now Saturday morning; we only have one more night before he stops for the week. Detective Stephan has informed me that they have undercover operations going at three of the clubs he hasn’t attacked yet, let’s narrow it down for him.” Hotch moved over to Garcia, “We know the UnSub specifically targets underage boys getting into these clubs. How does he know? Garcia, is there any way to cross reference violations these clubs have had with underage drinkers and employees or vendors that work at there?”
“Hotch, I may have something even better.” Morgan nodded at Reid and everyone turned. “Pretty Boy, I asked how you got into the club looking like that and having no ID. You told me “I have my ways,’ is that something you made up yourself or something a teenager would know?”
Reid looked a little sheepish, “Well ... it all depends on how well you can carry a case of beer.”
“What?”
“If you look like you belong then no one questions you. Sometimes clubs leave their backdoors open for a short period of time while vendors do late deliveries for liquor or other things. If you walk up while they are busy and grab a case of something and carry it in no one questions you. They just think you’re another bar employee helping out.” Reid leaned back in his chair. “It wouldn’t be hard to figure out, especially for a lone teenager with a lot of time on his hands.” Morgan raised his eyebrows at this and Reid blushed as he realised he just confessed to sneaking into clubs as a youth. He continued, hoping to gloss over that quickly, “If our UnSub is doing any type of stalking of his victims beforehand he would watch them and see how they are getting into these places and know when his victims would be alone. The ruse I mentioned doesn’t work for groups.”
“Any other techniques that might get you in?”
“Other than fake ID, that one is the most successful if you want to avoid interacting with any employee that might remember you. There are other ways, like ‘my mom’s a bartender and I need to give her something’ but things like that draw too much attention and unless the club employee leaves you alone for a moment so you can slip away they ultimately don’t work.”
“We need more to go on than that. Okay, it’s 1 a.m. now. I know it’s late but everybody reconvene here at 8 a.m. and we’ll work on additional angles.” Hotch caught up with Reid as he was getting into one of the SUVs with Prentiss and Morgan. He whispered into the younger agent’s ear, “Since we’re on a case I’m just going to go back to my apartment. I’ll make it up to you after this is over.”
Reid smiled, “I understand. But now that everyone knows I can do this to tide me over.” He dropped a quick kiss on the older man’s lips and then climbed into the car and shut the door. Morgan took off, leaving Hotch standing in the parking lot looking completely scandalised.

In the morning, Hotch split them up into groups. “Morgan and Prentiss will visit the ME then go and interview the first rape victim. Rossi take Reid interview the second one. Afterwards Reid I need you to work out if there is some sort of pattern in the clubs he is hitting. JJ and I will go to the club where the latest attack happened.” He walked over to Garcia, “We can’t rule out that this may be some sort of hate crime. Garcia also cross reference the employees and vendors with any assaults or hate crime related disturbances as well as any outspoken groups in the area.”
By the afternoon everyone reconvened at the station. Garcia spoke up first, “Sorry guys, no go on club employees and vendors. Just the usual stuff, bouncers with a few assault charges filed by patrons that were thrown out for breaking the rules. And out of all the places he’s hit; only one club was cited for underage drinking.” She frowned and looked at the rest of them expectantly for the next angle to explore.
Morgan went next, “The ME confirmed that the murder victim was strangled with the UnSub’s bare hands. She said he had to be in good shape to exert the pressure needed to crush the windpipe like he did. He didn’t use a condom and they are running the DNA through the system now. The victim, Mark Simon, was no match for him physically. ”
Prentiss finished up, “We interviewed the first rape victim, Alan Kinsey. He also was easily overpowered by the UnSub. He was coming out of the men’s room when a man hit him upside the head and dragged him into a dark corner just out site of the dance floor. He didn’t get a look at the man cause he hit him from behind then held him face first against the wall. He said the man was a few inches taller than him, which from the victims height would be about 6’1” and that he kept talking to him the entire time telling him he was ‘dirty’ and his lifestyle was ‘an abomination.’” They heard detective Phelps snicker at this. The team ignored him but detective Stephan shot the man a dirty look.
“Wait a second,” Rossi cut in. “That is what Ryan Watts told us. The UnSub spoke to him the entire time during the assault. He said that for some reason the voice sounded familiar but he couldn’t place it. So he chooses young non threatening types and overpowers them, going so far as to attack them from behind. He might possibly have an issue with this looks.” Detective Donaldson stepped into the room and went to stand next to his partner. He was carrying a small piece of paper in his hands.
“Guys, guys look, I think I know where the UnSub is going to strike next and how he finds his victims.” Reid pointed to the map. Reid had plotted out all of the clubs on the map with red pushpins. Around each one of them he had drawn a circle and there was a green pushpin and a few yellow push pins marking things just inside each one of them. “So the circle is a three mile radius around the club and each of the green markers is a youth counselling centre the yellow markers are area high schools. When we spoke to Ryan Watts I remember him telling us that he had recently spoken to someone about coming out to his family at an outreach program that came to his school. Garcia, are you able to pull up the event calendars for the youth centres and cross reference them with the attacks at the clubs?”
“Anything for you my minorly mistaken maestro! Starting with the first rape, there was an awareness event held on the Thursday before at Alexander High.” Reid removed the other yellow pins in the first circle on his map. “Oh, Reid, that’s it! Alan Kinsey went to Alexander High. Wait, let me see about Ryan Watts. His school had a Pride parade organized by the local youth centre the Monday before his attack. Okay, so let’s see where this skeevy perv is going next. There was a LGBT rally at Garfield High Wednesday and the same rally was held Thursday at Memorial High. Both of those are within a three mile radius of last night’s club.”
“Mark Simon went to Garfield High.” Reid looked contemplative. “Is there anyway to cross reference the employees at the youth centres with the each of the events?”
“No, most of the events are manned by volunteers that are not on the payroll. We wouldn’t have time to contact each one and get a list before this evening.”
“Okay then, what other clubs are in a three mile radius of Memorial High?” Hotch moved over to stand behind Garcia, Detective Stephan joined him.
Garcia began typing furiously, “Oh! Oh! I know this one! They …”
“…like to drop glitter on the crowd.” Morgan finished for her. The dark skinned agent shook his head in resignation. “Of course it had to be that one.”
“That was one of the next ones we were going to stake out.” Detective Stephan, turned to Detective Donaldson, “We still go for that?”
The younger detective frowned, “That’s what I came in to tell you. The club owners offered to help us in anyway they could. They want this guy almost as badly as we do. The only problem is that officer Moore got food poisoning last night.”
Stephan explained, “Detective Donaldson and Officer Moore are the only two in our department that look young enough for the perp to go after. We want to put out some bait for him instead for looking out for potential targets. That approach did not work so well last time.”
Detective Phelps cut in, “It worked! We just didn’t catch the specific pervert we were looking for.” He smirked at Hotch who pointedly ignored him.
The lead detective rolled his eyes and continued, “I don’t want to send Donaldson out there on his own …”
Reid interrupted. “I’ll go.” Most of the team started protesting. The young agent held up his hand. “No, guys think about it. I fit the type. I’m non-threatening, I can pass for underage. Even if he already has a victim lined up, the extra security at the club will prevent them from getting in. I don’t think he stalks them to the club. That would be too obvious and they might remember him. So he must get there beforehand and wait until the right moment to ambush them. Given the escalation, if his target doesn’t arrive, he’ll get desperate and begin searching the crowd for a replacement.”
Hotch sighed, “Reid’s right, if we want to catch this guy tonight this is the best course of action. Garcia, contact the youth centres anyway and see if they can get you a list of volunteers from each event. Maybe we’ll get lucky and we can identify him before the operation begins. We’ll give the profile then the detective can fill us in so we can join the officers at the club.” Everyone filed out of the room except for Garcia. She began calling in earnest, wanting to save her young genius from putting himself in harm’s way.

tbc
OMG, I spawned a casefic! – Oh and detective Phelps gets his comeuppance in the next chapter!
Reviews really motivate me!
- 2
- 3
- 4
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Strangers in the Night