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It Leads Me To You

Chapter Twenty

“The Fight Of Her Life”

“To survive it is often necessary to fight and to fight you have to dirty yourself.” – George Orwell

Helena’s fingers were raw from pulling at the plastic ties, skin abraded, wrists cut with burning lines, but finally, with a violent twist and the serrated edge of the knife Voit had tossed her, they gave way. Her hands sprang free, trembling, but it didn’t feel like relief—it felt like the first lungful of air after nearly drowning. She staggered to her feet, legs stiff from being bound, her balance tipping as if the floor itself tilted beneath her.

Darkness pressed in from every angle.

It wasn’t just absence of light—it was weight. The container seemed to breathe around her, the silence so thick it had texture. She stretched her arms out, palms skimming the walls, moving one cautious step at a time, the metal groaning faintly under her boots.

And then the memories came.

Her father’s basement rose up around her, suffocating. She could smell the mildew, hear the faint clink of glass on concrete, feel the way her own breath echoed in a place where sound never escaped. The dark wasn’t just dark. It was him. It was everything he’d carved into her childhood.

Sometimes in the mornings, before dawn crept through the curtains of her bedroom, Helena would wake shaking, drenched in sweat. She’d tell herself it wasn’t the dark that scared her. She was grown. She was rational. It was just adrenaline, a trick of her brain. But here, with the black swallowing every corner, the lie unraveled.

Her breath hitched, rapid, shallow. “Not again,” she whispered, shaking her head hard, as though that would scatter the memories clinging like cobwebs.

Her hand brushed against a metal plate. She fumbled, found a switch, and flicked it.

The overhead light snapped on, glaring, harsh against her eyes. The sudden brightness stabbed through her skull, but worse was what it revealed.

The container was stripped bare, the walls raw and metallic, but threaded with cables—thin black veins running along the ceiling, snaking into the heavy door. Her gaze dropped and caught on a small device sitting on a crate. She picked it up with unsteady fingers, squinting at the readout.

Oxygen detector.

The numbers blinked at her: 82.7%.

Her stomach dropped.

The oxygen wasn’t just low—it was actively depleting.

Her pulse roared in her ears. She turned in a frantic circle, the walls closing in tighter with every spin, her chest constricting as though the numbers on the monitor had already crawled inside her lungs.

She traced the wires again with her eyes, following them to the sealed hatch, the rigged circuitry overhead. The container wasn’t just a prison. It was a mechanism. A trap.

Her throat went dry.

He hadn’t locked her down here to kill her quick. He’d locked her down here to watch her suffocate.

Panic slammed into her chest. Her knees buckled, and for a moment she was ten years old again, curled in a basement corner with no way out, no air to breathe, begging a father who only smiled.

“No,” she whispered, clutching the oxygen meter until her knuckles whitened. Her hands shook so badly she almost dropped it.

Her body wanted to curl, to collapse under the terror, but she forced herself upright, teeth gritted, forcing steel through the tremors. She had to think. She had to fight. Because Voit hadn’t left her here just to die—he’d left her here to break.

And she wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction.

Burney, CA

The rented cabin sat on the edge of the pines, its paint weathered by the mountain air, its windows reflecting only shadow. Voit hefted the last duffel bag from the trunk, his jaw tight, eyes scanning the empty road. He told himself this was safety. That he’d pulled them far enough out of reach of Quantico’s claws. That Sydney and the girls were secure here because of him.

The crunch of gravel behind him snapped his head around. Holly stood near the porch, shoulders hunched, the glow of her phone lighting her face in the fading dusk.

Rage surged hot in his chest.

He strode over, yanking the phone from her hands so fast her knuckles popped.

“What did I tell you about using this?!” His voice thundered against the stillness. “They can track us—track us!”

Holly flinched, eyes wide, but tried to hold her ground. “Dad, please, it’s important—”

“You have to listen to me.” His words cracked like a whip.

“It’s my essay!” Her voice trembled. “It’s due today, and if it’s late—”

“None of that matters!” He hurled the words at her, the truth and the lie tangled together. “I’ll explain to your teacher when the time is right.”

Before she could argue again, he hurled the phone down onto the gravel. The glass shattered with a brittle scream, splintering into a thousand tiny shards. His boot came down hard, once, twice, until the plastic casing cracked open and the glow of the screen went dark.

“Dad!” Holly’s voice broke on the word, tears streaking her face.

Voit exhaled sharp through his nose, forcing his anger into something that sounded like control. “It’s just a phone,” he said, crouching down to her level, though his hands were still trembling. “I need you to help me. Do you understand? This family only stays safe if you trust me.”

Her lip quivered, her eyes darting to Sydney watching from the doorway, then back to him. Wordless, she bolted inside, the screen door slamming behind her.

Voit straightened, forcing a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He slipped his own phone from his pocket, the familiar weight grounding him. The screen came to life, and there she was—Helena Bishop, tiny in the grainy bunker feed, pacing in his cage like an animal.

A ripple of satisfaction rolled through him, smoothing the jagged edges of his temper. He’d caged his enemy. He was in control.

For now.

But then on the feed, Helena turned sharply to the camera, her voice cutting through the static.

“I know what you’re doing, Lee. You think you can use me as a bargaining chip, but—”

With a flick of his thumb, Voit muted her. Her mouth moved silently now, furious, defiant, but powerless. He leaned closer to the phone, his lips curling into a smile as he toggled the live connection to Quantico.

“Hello,” his voice was calm, deliberate, threaded with menace. “I need to speak to the deputy director. Douglas Bailey.”

A pause, and then a clipped voice answered: “This is Emily Prentiss, Section Chief.”

Voit tilted his head, amused. “No. That won’t do. I talk to the Deputy Director in the next five minutes, or you can tell him that he can throw another press conference to explain why he let his pretty little girlfriend die when he could’ve saved her life.”

The live stream of Helena in the container plays on the screen in front of him like a second heartbeat: a rectangle of shadow and breath. He lets it thrum under his fingertips while he dials.

The line clicks. He hears the deputy director’s voice — that clipped, practiced calm he’s seen on television a thousand times.

“This is Deputy Director Bailey,” Doug says.

“Hey, Doug,” Elias answers, smooth as a scalpel. He lets the greeting sit there, informal, the tone of a man who’s stepping over formality to get to the good part. “You ready to make a deal?”

There it is — the pause, the small intake through the receiver, the calculation on the other side. “As you and I speak, there’s a nationwide BOLO issued to local police and border control,” he says. The words are factual; he does not need to lace them with threat.

Doug answers like a man with a ledger of responsibilities balanced on his shoulders. “That’s correct.”

Elias shifts. “Rescind it,” he says. “But — how about this? Only for hours. After that, you’ll never hear from me or my family again.”

He can hear the other end mute for a second, the tell of negotiation. Men who live in politics and law enforcement learn to buy a second before they speak. There’s the rustle of papers, the soft clack of a keyboard. He lets that silence do the work of the threat and lets it fester.

“And what about Agent Bishop?” Doug asks, voice taut.

Elias hears the tug in the question. He smiles into the telephone. “Then she’ll be all yours again,” he says, as if offering up a prize. The smile in his chest feels so like the old small victories, the ones Cyrus used to encourage over some cracked coffee cup. He hears the beep of the line, the network’s little heartbeat, and he knows they are consulting on the other end.

Doug’s next words are steadier than Elias expected. “What about your family?”

Elias’s jaw tightens. He keeps his voice level because the chill in it is more useful than the heat. “What about my family?” he echoes.

He lets the question hang like a mirror: who would you save, Deputy Director? Yourself, the institution, the badge, or the woman who means something to you beneath that badge?

“You and I both know it is only going to be a matter of time before Sydney and the girls learn the truth about you,” Doug says, a warning that slides into pleading. “When that happens, you will have no choice but to—”

“Shut up,” Elias snaps — not loud, but sharp enough to cut the path of argument. He hears the quiet click that is Deputy Director Bailey holding himself together. He’s read the man: the need to stop things from becoming spectacle, the private shame at being shown to care. That’s the hinge. “Listen to me now,” Elias says, slow. “I know you’re not the man in charge, but you’re definitely the one who likes the gold star. You hear me?”

He lets the phrase hang in the air — gold star — and hears the small, unconscious click it makes inside Doug’s head even as he says it. It isn’t a code only they share; it’s a pressure point. Elias knows the taste of the thing he named. He knows Doug Bailey. He knows the deputy director’s private, quiet interest on the matter. And that knowledge is a lever as good as any code or bomb switch.

The image of Doug, cool and bureaucratic and already imagining his own tidy narrative, bleeds through: the deputy director playing cost–benefit with people’s lives, the “gold star” glinting on some invisible scoreboard. For a beat Elias envies him — the simplicity of being able to choose the badge over messy attachments — and then a darker surge follows: a preening, possessive thought that he will not let some official calculus decide the fate of the people he calls his. He hears himself, stupidly, longing for Helena to be present, to register the thing he is about to make happen — not for her compassion but whether she would finally understand how neat and terrible his geometry is, how he can turn other people’s loyalties into the exact shape he needs. He imagines the look on her face if she could see him do this — curiosity, revulsion, recognition.

And there is another, darker flicker — a possessive itch that wants her to see him at the centre of the storm, to register that he, not the bureau, not Doug, is the one pulling strings tonight. He wants her to know the full measure of his power and the cost he is willing to pay to keep his family breathing. The thought is soft and naked and frightening; he pushes it down and returns his attention to the line, to the slow arithmetic of threats and concessions.

On the other end, a breath that could be a laugh or a choke. Elias leans forward, the phone pressed to his cheek like a talisman. “So if I don’t see that BOLO lifted in the next hours, Helena Bishop is a dead woman.”

He hangs up the phone and the woods answer him.

The gravel path that skirts the Voit house falls away into a rutted track between pines; the air is cooler there, full of sap and the damp, loamy smell of last week’s rain. Elias moves without thinking, boots crunching dead needles, heading deeper until the house is a low box of light behind him. With every step the world narrows to the sound of his own breath and the small, insistent thrum of his pulse in his ears. The trees take him in like a cloak; they make it easier to believe for a moment that he’s alone with the thought and the thing he wants to do.

Doug’s words loop in his head — it is only a matter of time before Sydney and the girls learn the truth about you, and when that happens, you will have no choice but to kill them. The sentence lands like a stone. For an instant his chest clips and the careful edifice of reason that lives in him fractures into hot, sharp fragments. He imagines his wife discovering the headline, the neighbour’s whisper, the teacher’s phone call that names him in a way she can no longer dress in excuses. He tastes panic — not the animal panic of a man surprised by danger, but the hungry, precise panic of someone who has always known the geometry of endings and now sees the coordinates shift.

Anger comes next, sharp as a cut. How dare someone else tell him what he will do for love? He sees Cyrus’s shadow in the bark of the trees, the old man’s rules echoing like a litany: keep them close, teach them obedience, never miss a sign. The memory tightens — nights in the cupboard, the taste of damp wood, the slow accretion of a lesson that terror rewires. The thought that Doug would predict his descent as inevitable tastes like contempt; it is an insult and a challenge both. He tells himself, quietly at first and then with growing ferocity, that he will not be boxed into a fate decided by other men.

But beneath the fury there is another, slipperier reaction: fear braided with the strange, hollow warmth of relief. Doug’s warning does not only frighten him — it maps an outcome he knows how to avert in a single, ugly calculus. If the world will not be kept from him, then he will keep the world at gunpoint. The plan forms with the terrible efficiency of old training: delay, leverage, a clean exchange — his family for the promise of silence. The thought steadies him in a way confession never did. It calms the animal inside him, because a plan is a thing he can control; panic becomes task.

He turns, hands shoved into his jacket pockets, and looks back toward the house. He knows, with a clarity that is more like hunger than insight, that he has edged himself to the moment where he will have to choose between the life he built and the violence that defines him. The woods around him hold their silence like a verdict. He folds that silence into his pocket like a weapon and starts walking back toward the light — not uncertain now, but coldly resolved.

Helena’s breathing rasped loud in the dim, close air of the container. The zip ties she’d shredded off her wrists lay in a heap at her feet, but her hands still trembled from the effort. She pressed her palms against the slick steel wall, feeling the condensation beading there, cold and clammy. Her mind skittered between two images: Voit’s smirk as he left her here, and a much younger version of herself, locked in a basement, the world above oblivious to her terror.

If this was the place where Lee Duval died, then it wasn’t just a cage — it was a monument. A shrine to the boy who became Sicarius. If he brought me here, she thought, he’ll take his family somewhere tied to his past too. She turned toward the camera mounted in the corner, its little red light glowing like an unblinking eye. If her team were watching, maybe she could help them.

Come on, she pleaded inwardly.

You’ve got the breadcrumbs. Follow them. Find me.

She wiped her wet palms on her thighs and forced herself to stand. The floor vibrated faintly beneath her feet. At first she thought it was just her heart hammering, but then she heard it — a low hiss building outside, the unmistakable roar of rain turning torrential. It rattled against the metal roof like handfuls of gravel.

A new, raw fear seized her chest, sharper than before. Flash floods. Underground. No exit.

She stumbled to the camera, craning her neck up toward the lens. “Is this what’s supposed to happen?” she shouted, her voice cracking. “I die in a flash flood down here?!”

Another hidden clue for the team to work with.

Above her, the camera’s red LED winked like a watchful insect. She met its glass as if it were a person.

“Lee,” she said into the lens, and let the name hang there like a dare.

She spoke into the camera once more, because there was a voice inside of her that still needed to be heard by the monster who’d put her here.

“I know you think time is running out for me me, but it’s running out for you. Because Lee you thought you could bury me in the same place you killed your old self. But bodies often find a way to the surface. So when my team hunts you down, I want you to know why you will never outrun Lee Duval. Even though that why you killed your Uncle Cyrus and why you’re going to kill your family. You are what you are, always will be. So whether I live or die….you remember what I said. We are not the same.”

She let the words hang in the charged air for a beat, then she severed the feed.

Cutting the camera felt like taking a small, private step into a plan she didn’t want Voit to anticipate; whether or not he was reading the moment, she wanted the motion to belong to her.

The portable oxygen meter on the table chirped its soft, useless chirp; a quick glance was enough. The number on its little screen read low. Lower than comfortable. Panic pressed right under her ribs, but she kept moving.

She had been here before—at crime scenes, at autopsies, in alleys where a body had been left like a punctuation mark—and she had always let the facts determine the plan. This time, the fact was much simpler: the hatch would not open unless something violent forced it to. If she stayed, the air would thin and she would die.

She worked fast, hands a blur, using the only things she had—the memory of all the dumb contraptions Spencer had taught her to build over the years. She thought about the way his face would light up when an experiment worked the way it was supposed to, the way he’d laugh off a mistake and hand her a rag. That memory felt tender and ridiculous and useful, all at once. She did not have a kit from him in any formal sense; she had a hundred small, useless things that, when combined with a dark intention and a strike of stubbornness, could produce an outcome. She told herself, sharply and without illusion, that this was not about bravado. It was about whether she could pull herself out of the hole Voit had dug for her.

She set the small device and did not look at it as if it were a thing she might admire. She set it like a surgeon lays a scalpel beside an unconscious patient—necessary, not celebratory. Her finger moved to the trigger. Time bunched into a single lint of seconds. She pressed, and the world answered.

When it went off, it went off like a god’s cough.

The blast did not look like the movies.

It was uglier

A pressure wave rolled through the bunker, knocking the table she had took shelter behind and slamming her onto the concrete. Dust swallowed the air; a dry, choking taste filled her mouth.

She coughed until her lungs burned, clawing for purchase on the slick floor. A hot, gritty film coated everything: her palms, her face, the inside of her nose. She thumbed the beam of the tiny flashlight in her hand; it trembled.

At first the door she’d hoped would be unlatched merely sagged under the pressure and belched grit into the room. The hatch had not been swept clean; the earth above had not been loosened by her furious, optimistic plan. Gravel cascaded through a scoured opening, filling the lip of the hatch and then pouring, grain by stubborn grain, into the bunker.

Her stomach dropped. She had forgotten one vital, brutal fact about cellars that had the audacity to call themselves bunkers: they lived under the earth.

She had forced an exit and found only another wall.

Panic clawed at her throat. She stumbled back, her breath catching. And that was when she saw him.

Her father.

Standing in the far corner of the bunker where the shadows draped heavy, as if he’d been waiting for her. His white doctor’s coat was streaked with blood, his hands stained to the wrists. His eyes — those cold, unblinking eyes — locked onto hers with the same feral intensity she remembered from that night.

“You always were weak, Helena,” he said, voice low, almost tender. “All that rage, and you still couldn’t finish me.”

Her breath hitched. She blinked, and for half a heartbeat she thought he might cross the floor and put his hands around her throat. Her pulse raced, the bunker pressing in tighter, the air thinning with every gasp.

“No,” she whispered hoarsely, shaking her head. “You’re not here. You’re dead.”

But he smiled. “Dead or not, I’m in you. You’ve carried me all this time. You think Elias Voit is your monster? No, Helly. I am. And you’ll never outrun me.”

Her vision blurred.

Helena stumbled back another step, her shoulder colliding with the cold concrete wall. Her throat worked as she forced out the words, her voice shaking despite herself. “No. I’m not you. I’m not.”

Then — a flicker of clarity. A jagged, desperate thought that fought through the fear. He wasn’t real.

He couldn’t be.

He was dead.

When she looked again, the corner was empty. Just dust and the twitching beam of her flashlight.

But still… she could see him. Still, she could feel the weight of his presence, as if the darkness itself had taken his shape just to remind her what she’d always feared: she would never escape him.

For a second she curled inward, the way she had when she was small and the house felt too full of someone else’s footsteps, and she thought: Voit wanted that. He wanted her small and gasping and scattered on the floor. He had dug into her history, set the bones of her childhood like bait, and here, in the place where a new life had been ended, her old life had reached for her and almost pulled her back.

She pressed her palm to the wall, felt the concrete’s coarse insistence, and let that anchor her. The bunker was a room she could measure and map. The hallucination was a thing the mind had thrown at her to see how she would fall. She would not allow it to be the final measure. Not here. Not now.

“You don’t get to win,” she muttered to the shadows.

To her father.

To Elias Voit.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Nineteen

“Through The Looking Glass”

“Until we have met the monsters in ourselves, we keep trying to slay them in the outer world. And we find that we cannot. For all the darkness in the world stems from darkness in the heart. And it is there that we must do our work.”

– Marianne Williamson

She surfaced like a body dragged from deep water—lungs burning, head splitting, every breath a fight. Pain bloomed at the base of her skull, a raw throb that made her vision stutter as it bled back into focus. The world tilted, spun, then steadied into the low vibration of an engine beneath her and the blurred streak of trees sliding past the window.

The smell of old leather and motor oil filled her nose, heavy and suffocating. Disorientation clawed at her chest, confusion warring with memory until it came rushing back—the house, Voit’s taunts, the gun, the sudden weight of him crushing her to the floor.

It took a beat before she registered the pressure: her wrists fused behind her back, ankles cinched together, plastic biting deep into her skin. The zip ties cut mercilessly with every twitch, every breath. She tried to work her fingers, flex them, pull them apart, but the more she struggled the tighter the bands seemed to cut, a plastic garrotte digging into her bones.

Panic clawed at her throat. She braced her feet, jerked hard, twisting her wrists to find even the smallest slip of space, but there was none. The ties were industrial-strength, unforgiving.

He knew what he was doing.

And then a voice, smooth and low, floated back through the hum of the car.

“There she is…”

Her head snapped up, and through the blur she saw him twist slightly in the driver’s seat, his eyes flicking over her like a man savouring a work of art. His mouth curved into a smile that was almost tender.

“…and those big, beautiful green eyes.”

The words slithered over her like oil, as if he’d been waiting to say them, rehearsing them in the dark.

He reached back, fingers brushing the ends of her hair. She recoiled, but it only made him laugh.

His gaze lingered just long enough to make her skin crawl before he turned back to the road, one hand loose on the wheel, the other drumming lazily against the leather as though this were a casual Sunday drive.

“You want the radio on?” His tone was conversational, almost polite.

Helena dropped her chin, biting down hard on the inside of her cheek to keep her breath even. The zip ties cut into her skin with every flex. She twisted her wrists until fire licked through her veins, tried pulling her knees up to her chest to leverage against the seat, but the plastic was unyielding, biting deeper the more she fought. A bead of sweat slid from her temple into her eye, stinging, but she refused to blink. She couldn’t afford weakness. Not here.

“We’ve got a long journey ahead of ourselves,” Voit continued, his voice smooth as silk, threaded with a humour that felt like a blade pressed to the skin. “We could at least make some conversation. It’s lonely here up front.”

Helena glared at the back of his head, her pulse hammering against the inside of her skull. She tugged again—wrists grinding raw, ankles burning where the plastic bit bone-deep—but the restraints didn’t give. All she earned was the sound of plastic creaking and the faint sting of blood welling beneath the bonds.

The ceiling of the car hovered above her like the inside of a cage.

Trapped.

A coffin on wheels.

“My team will be looking for me,” she said, low but certain. “It’s only a matter of time before they catch up to you.”

Voit’s laugh was soft, almost fond, like she’d said something he was hoping for. “Oh, Helly. I’m counting on it.”

He flicked his eyes up to the rearview, meeting her gaze, the corners of his mouth curling. “Especially the good deputy director. I bet he’s losing his mind right now, pacing holes into the carpet at Quantico, worried about his girlfriend.”

Helena clenched her jaw, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a reaction, but her pulse betrayed her.

How did he know about Doug?

Voit saw it instantly. His grin widened. “Ah. There it is. The little crack.” He tapped the steering wheel with one finger, drawing out every word. “I read your messages on Beltway Elite, by the way. God, they were nauseating. All that handholding and whispering through screens. I bet he tells you you’re nothing like your father, doesn’t he? That you’re good. That you’re different. Pure.”

Helena’s chest tightened; she forced her wrists against the plastic again, anything to distract from the heat crawling up her throat.

Voit’s tone darkened, quiet and cutting. “And I bet you believe him. Because you want to. Because it’s easier than looking at the truth. But here’s the thing—Doug Bailey will do anything to keep you safe. That’s why you’re valuable. That’s why you’re mine. My bargaining chip.”

He let the words hang, then leaned back in his seat, savouring it. “That and Gold Star.”

Helena blinked, trying to keep her mask in place even as confusion cut through her fear. “What’s Gold Star?”

Voit smirked, eyes back on the road. “Oh. He hasn’t told you?” His chuckle was low, delighted, cruel. “Well, well. Maybe the good deputy director does keep secrets from his precious Helly after all.”

Helena’s heart gave one hard knock against her ribs at the mention of Gold Star, but she forced her face blank. “You’re bluffing.”

Voit laughed softly, almost like a parent amused at a child. “Bluffing? Helly, I’ve been two moves ahead of you from the start. You think Doug hasn’t told you because it’s classified? No.” His eyes met hers in the mirror, grey and shark-flat. “He hasn’t told you because he doesn’t want you to know.”

His words seemed to coil around her chest tighter than the zip ties, squeezing, suffocating. She clenched her jaw, forcing herself not to flinch

“Funny, isn’t it? He tells you you’re nothing like your father, but he doesn’t tell you everything. That’s love for you. Always just a little conditional.”

Helena turned to the window, focusing on the streaks of rain sliding down glass. Don’t give him more. Don’t let him in.

Voit caught it instantly. His smirk sharpened. “There it is again. The little tremor. Don’t pretend you’re not rattled, Helly. You’re my mirror image, and Doug Bailey is your weak spot.”

He shifted slightly in his seat, still one hand on the wheel. “I know exactly how far a man like that will go to keep you safe. And when he does, when he finally comes crashing through my door like the hero he wants to be, I’ll be holding all the cards.”

He let the silence sit for a beat, then added, almost tenderly, “You’re not here because you’re brave. You’re here because I called you. Because you had no choice.”

He smirked faintly, eyes flicking back to the road as the storm outside rolled closer, a crack of distant thunder punctuating his words.

Helena snapped her gaze to the window, jaw tight, but inside she could feel the crack widening. The worry, the nervousness that hides behind her eyes when Voit sees a truth about her that no one else knows—that she won’t admit to herself—is there.

“There’s always a choice Elias.”

“Is there?” he asked, musing. “What an interesting stance for Helena Bishop to take. So, then was there a choice when you killed Arthur Kiel?’ He paused for dramatic effect, and Helena did not disappoint. Her surprise is visible, and charming in the fashion of a child’s sudden realisation that she’s been caught in a lie. Voit tilts his head in the direction of Helena and taps a finger on his chin, feigning thoughtfulness, inexpertly hiding a smile. “Not where you expected this conversation to go, Helly?”

“I didn’t know he meant that much to you” Helena replied, regaining her composure quickly now that the surprise has worn off.

“He didn’t”

“Does anyone?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Does anyone mean anything to you, Elias? Anyone, but yourself?”

“Don’t change the subject Helly, I want to hear about Arthur Kiel. I want to hear about your choices.”

Helena snorted slightly, somehow conveying her lack of actual amusement with the noise. “No you don’t. You want me to admit that I killed him, that it doesn’t bother me, that I’d do it again. Well I would, Elias. I’d do it again and sleep just fine. Is that what you want to hear?”

Voit draws in a loud breath, considering her words. It’s clear that Helena is trying to put an end to this conversation as quickly as possible, just as much as he isn’t going to let that happen.

“Did you enjoy it?”

Helena’s stare is hard, unforgiving. “No.”

But Voit can see beneath that her armour. Because beneath that, Voit understands.

And Helena knows he can see that.

That’s why she hates him. Not just because he has killed so many people, but because Voit understands her, and she understands him. She hates him for it, but that’s not even the core of it. She hates herself for how she understands him, for seeing her reflection in him.

And Voit loves to chip away at her armour. He loves these moments when Helena collapses in on herself, the weight of her guilt and revulsion pulling her under inch by inch.

“Maybe it’s not Kiel’s ghost that is haunting you then. Maybe it’s the inevitability of there being a man so bad that killing him would feel so good.”

The words hit like a blow. Helena’s chest tightened. Her first thought was he’s wrong—but the echo inside her was too loud, too familiar. Kiel’s blood on her hands, the terror in Ramona’s eyes, her father’s body gasping on the floor. For a moment she could almost feel the knife again in her palm, slick and heavy, the rush that had terrified her even as it had saved her life.

Was he right? Was that why she couldn’t let go of Sicarius? Because somewhere in the dark corners of herself, she wanted the excuse? Wanted the release of it—the power of ending him, and telling herself the world was better for it?

Her throat went dry. She clenched her jaw and forced her eyes to the window, refusing to meet his gaze in the mirror.

But he kept watching her. Smiling faintly. Savouring her silence like a confession.

Helena thought of Doug then, of Rossi, of the team. People who had seen her at her worst and never looked at her like she was broken. But Voit’s words wormed under her skin anyway.

What if he’s right?

What if the only reason I want to save lives is to balance out the part of me that still wants to take them?

She shook her head, hard, as if that could banish the thought. But it stayed. The inevitability of it.

The inevitability of him.

The hum of the tires filled the silence, broken only by the warbling voice of some forgotten ’80s ballad playing on the radio. Voit, of course, was singing along — tuneless, but loud enough that it felt obscene, a man at ease in the middle of abduction.

Helena kept working at the zip ties, wrists raw, plastic biting deeper each time she twisted. Her breath came short, ragged — not just from the pain but from the helplessness gnawing at her chest.

Her vision blurred again, sweat dripping into her eyes. She jerked her legs, tried to curl onto her side to snap the zip ties against the corner of the seat frame, but the car hit a bump in the road and slammed her back down, the impact knocking her breath out in a strangled gasp.

For one brutal second, panic clawed higher than her training—hot, feral panic like being a little girl again in that basement, darkness pressing in while her father’s voice promised pain. Her heart hammered so violently she thought it might split her chest.

And then, as if he could smell it, Voit laughed low and satisfied.

“There it is,” he said softly, almost reverently. “That’s what I wanted to see. The fear. You wear it so well, Helly.”

She stilled, glaring through wet strands of hair plastered to her face, her breaths ragged but defiant.

She forced her voice steady. “Go to hell.”

He ignored her. “You know what I see when I look at you right now? Not Agent Bishop. Not even the woman trying so hard to break free. I see the girl in the woods. The night your daddy came after you.” His tone shifted, deeper, darker, like he was savouring every word. “I can picture it — branches tearing at your skin, lungs burning, that knife slick in your hand. You knew he was going to kill you, didn’t you?”

Her throat tightened. “If you know the story, why are you asking me?” Her voice trembles, not from fear but from the raw, remembered shape of that night.

Voit’s eyes gleamed in the mirror, cold and curious. “Because I want to know how it felt. Not what happened. Not what the reports say. I want to know what went through your pretty, little head the moment you turned that blade on him.” He tapped the steering wheel in rhythm with the radio, casual as ever, but his words pressed down like a vice.

He leaned slightly toward the mirror, his gaze locking on her. “Did it thrill you? Did it make you feel alive?”

Helena swallowed, heat rising in her chest, every muscle pulled taut. She refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing her break — but the truth of his question lingered in the dark like a hand on her throat.

“Mm,” he hummed, low, deliberate. “That silence is almost better than an answer. Do you know why?”

Helena pressed her lips tight, jaw trembling with restraint.

“Because silence means you’re thinking about it,” he continued, soft and certain. “The knife in your hand. The blood. The power. You’re replaying it right now, aren’t you? And the longer you keep quiet, the louder it gets in here.” He tapped his temple with a single finger.

The storm outside rumbled, a long, rolling growl that made the air inside the car feel heavier. Helena shut her eyes, fighting to steady her breath, to keep the images from rising the way he wanted them to. But he pressed on, voice silk over steel.

“You’ll tell me, Helly. Not because I force you, but because you need to. You want to.”

He leaned toward the mirror again, his gaze sharp and unrelenting.

“And when it comes out of your mouth…” He smiled faintly, almost tenderly. “…it’ll taste so sweet.”

“Why don’t you just shoot me now?” she spat. “If you’re so sure, if I’m just another body to you, then do it. Just end it.”

Voit’s grin widened, slow and feral. “Oh, Helly,” he purred, almost pitying. “That’s the end game.” He flicked his fingers against the steering wheel, a little drumbeat of anticipation. “But we’re not there yet.”

He leaned back, eyes flicking to her in the mirror again. “First comes the shock. Then the awe. Then the part where you finally tell me what I want to hear.” His tone was a caress, but his words were a knife. “And by then, you’ll beg me to pull the trigger.”

Helena’s stomach twisted. For a heartbeat she almost lunged forward despite the ties, the rage so hot it blurred her vision. But she forced herself still, nails biting into her palms, knowing he was trying to pull her apart piece by piece.

She will not let him rewrite her story without a fight.

The rain had turned from a distant threat into a hard, cold sheet by the time Voit finally killed the engine. He yanked the car door open and hauled Helena out with a force that made her ribs sting. The world smelled of wet earth and old metal; lightning threw the ridge into brief, white relief. When she looked up, the place hit her like a punch — the flattened rise in the ground, the scar of disturbed soil and the faint, familiar geometry of the shipping container’s footprint. It was the first one. The place where everything began.

The memory came back in a physical jolt: the way the air had felt wrong, the weight of other people’s crimes hanging in the space like a second sky. She mouthed it aloud without thinking. “The shipping container.”

Voit stood framed against the dull horizon, the bruise of the sky behind him. He moved with the casual, deliberate calm of someone showing another person a treasured thing. “They always come back,” he said, voice silky over the rain. “You know how the books put it: where it began, they return to remember. Poetic, isn’t it?”

He took a step closer, the click of his boots on wet gravel loud in the thin air.

Before she could form a plan he had a gun in his hand and he pointed it to her temple with slow, ceremonial certainty. The rain beaded along the metal. “You admit it,” he said, voice low and almost tender, “and I make it quick. If you tell me the truth—I’ll pull the trigger now. That’s mercy.”

Helena’s mouth went dry. Anger rose hot and fast through the fear. She spat — the old reflex born of a thousand humiliations — straight into his face.

Voit didn’t flinch. He wiped the spit away with a slow, languid hand, brought his fingers to his lips, and, as if tasting something rare, licked them clean. The sight of that small, obscene intimacy in the middle of a thunderstorm snapped something in her. Her lungs heaved.

A voice cut through the wet air, sharp as a blade. “Drop it.”

Tyler Green’s shape exploded from the shadow of the trees, gun level, breath ragged but steady. He was a silhouette of fury and grief. “Found you. Finally.”

Voit’s arm locked around Helena’s throat, pulling her flush to him so the gun at her head was an intimate thing. “You are?” he asked, a smile ghosting his mouth.

Tyler’s voice was a raw thing. “You know who I am.”

“No,” Voit said smoothly, wholly disingenuous. “No, I really do not.” His voice was a challenge and a provocation, an invitation to prove him wrong.

“Tyler,” Helena spat between his shoulder and arm. “He’s baiting you. Just shoot him.”

“You killed my sister,” Tyler said to the man holding her like a shield. “Alison.”

Voit’s face adopted a casual, bored expression. “Alison? You’ll need to be a little more specific. I killed a lot of Alisons.” The words were meant to wound Tyler — to reduce a name to a statistic.

Tyler’s hand shook, the gun wobbling. He fired once. The shot cracked — a ragged, brutal sound — and the bullet slammed into the dirt just past Voit’s boot. Gravel jumped. Voit didn’t flinch; he turned toward the shooter with a slow head-tilt as if sampling a tune.

Tyler’s fingers curled harder around his weapon. “Her name was Alison Green! Tell me you killed her!”

For a long heartbeat Voit’s eyes went distant, as if watching a scene only he could see. He painted the memory with a storyteller’s relish. “Oh….Alison….Alison Green? Yes. Okay.” He made a little apologetic sound. “I’m sorry but I cannot tell you I killed her. But I can tell you what I did to her.”

“Please, Tyler, don’t listen!” Helena shouted, voice raw with panic.

She thrashed in Voit’s grip, jerking her bound wrists, trying to twist free, but he was immovable. His arm was a bar of iron across her throat, dragging her back tight against his chest. She slammed her shoulder into him, dug her heels into the dirt, even tried to drive her head backward into his chin, but he anticipated every move, tightening the chokehold, locking her in place like he’d rehearsed it a hundred times.

The gun bit harder into her temple, cold and unyielding. Each breath she tried to take was shallow, laboured, her chest heaving against his hold. She could feel the rise and fall of his ribs against her back, steady, calm, as if her frantic resistance was nothing more than a child’s tantrum.

Her lungs burned with the effort, but the more she struggled, the more inescapable his grip became. She couldn’t break free. She couldn’t stop his words.

And Voit’s voice, steady and venomous, filled the space that her screams could not.

He turned his head slightly to watch Tyler lower his gun under the weight of the story. “I gave her a choice. I told her she could take her own life or I could go back and kill her baby. And she chose her own life. But the one thing I’ll never forget about when she put the noose around her own neck, was that she said ‘Please, please just tell my mom…. and Tyler…. I love them.’”

Tyler’s jaw worked; his shoulders bowed. The gun slackened for the fraction of a second Voit needed.

Then Voit’s voice hardened into something ugly and precise. “I’m lying,” he said, low. “She died crying like a little bitch.” He lifted the pistol and fired.

The round tore into Tyler’s shoulder. The man fell, a sound of air and broken, stunned fury. He hit the ground on his back and slipped sideways into the mud, clutching his arm.

Voit’s hand was at Helena’s arm before she could register movement. He dragged her sideways with the practiced efficiency of a man who knew every balance point on a human body. His arm locked around her neck, elbow pressed into the back of her jaw so her face was flushed close to his chest, and the muzzle of the gun rested against her temple like a metronome.

“Congratulations, Helly,” he breathed in her ear, voice low and gloating as he manhandled her. “You just earned yourself a stay of execution. Don’t go getting sentimental.”

He shoved her forward, her feet dragging uselessly against the dirt as she tried to dig in. Her body jolted painfully as he flung her against the open car door. She caught a glimpse of Tyler, crumpled and writhing, before Voit forced her inside.

Her shoulder slammed against the seat. The air punched out of her chest as she landed twisted and bound, helpless in the dark interior.

The door slammed shut, sealing her in. The cold leather pressed against her cheek, and for the first time Helena felt it—raw, bone-deep fear.

Not just for herself. But for the terrifying possibility that she might not get out of this alive.

The car door yawned open, and Voit’s hand clamped around her arm, dragging her out like she was nothing more than luggage. Her knees scraped against gravel as he hauled her across the dirt clearing. She stumbled, zip-tied ankles catching, her shoulder wrenched with each brutal tug forward. The metallic silhouette loomed ahead—another old shipping container, rust streaks bleeding down its sides, half-swallowed by weeds.

Her breath hitched. “Where are we?”

“Someplace special.” Voit replied with mock gravitas, gesturing at the container as though it were some grand cathedral.

He unlatched the heavy door. Hinges groaned like a dying animal. Stale, metallic air wafted up from the darkness inside, and Helena’s stomach clenched.

“No—” she rasped, digging her heels in, panic flooding her voice. But Voit gave a sharp shove, and she pitched forward into the void.

She tumbled down the short flight of stairs, her shoulder cracking against concrete. The impact jarred her bones, rattled her teeth. She landed hard on her side, bound hands scraping uselessly against the cold floor. The walls swallowed her whole—metal pressing in, shadows crawling like ink.

Basement.

The word knifed through her brain.

Her father’s basement.

She was a child again, in the dark, waiting for footsteps above. Her heart pounded so loud she thought it would echo off the steel.

“Don’t. Don’t… don’t do this,” she begged, voice cracking. “Don’t leave me down here.” Her chest heaved, eyes burning. “You want to kill me, kill me. But d-don’t do this.”

Voit leaned casually in the doorway, his silhouette framed by the faint storm-light outside. The smirk on his face was cruel, knowing. “Scared of the dark, Helly?” he teased.

He turned as though to leave. Panic seized her. “Wait!” Her voice echoed harshly off the metal walls. “I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you.”

That caught his attention. He lingered, half-turned, eyes glittering with anticipation.

Her throat closed around the words, but she forced them out, the memory as sharp as glass.

“The knife,” she whispered. “It was heavy in my hand, heavier than I thought it would be. It sank in like cutting meat, like I wasn’t stabbing a man but carving through something already dead.”

The container seemed to shrink around her as she kept going, her voice shaking, each word tearing out of her like confession. “Blood was everywhere. It was on my hands, my face. I’d never seen that much blood—it was pouring out of him like a broken faucet, and the smell—iron, thick, choking—I can still smell it.”

Voit’s smile widened. He crouched on the top step, savouring every word. “But he was still alive, wasn’t he?”

“Yes,” she croaked. Her eyes burned with shame. “He was still breathing.” The memory sat on her tongue like an accusation.

“And?”

“I knelt down.” She swallowed hard. “I could hear the sirens. So I just… watched.”

Voit tilted his head. “Watched what?”

“I watched him nearly die.” The words cracked apart.

“And why didn’t you do anything?”

Her jaw clenched. She could barely push the answer out. “Because I wanted him to die.”

There it was — the confession she had never given herself permission to say aloud. It felt like ripping open a wound. The admission was shameful and electric; the word cut her throat as soon as it left her lips.

For a moment there was only silence, Helena trembling on the floor, the confession hanging between them like smoke.

Voit’s face lit up, delighted, almost reverent. “There it is,” he whispered. “The truth.” He leaned forward, savouring her shame like wine. “And how did that make you feel, Helly?”

Her eyes flickered up to him, wide and raw. “…Free. Powerful. Like you said earlier. A god.”

He smiled slow and satisfied, as though she had just confirmed a theory. “And there was nothing you could do about it,” he said, a fact turned into a weapon. “Why do you think you’re surrounded by death, Helena? Stabbing your father, nearly killing him — didn’t it fuel you? Didn’t it… motivate you?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered, shaking her head as though trying to throw the thought off.

“Of course you do.” He grinned, teeth sharp in the dim light. “It motivated you, didn’t it? To play saviour?”

She could feel the walls compressing, the container swallowing her like a mouth. His voice moved around her like cold hands. He turned his taunt into an argument: “Every life is your responsibility, isn’t it? Oh Helly, the narcissism of that is… truly exquisite.”

Her eyes burned with anger. “That’s not true.”

“Then what drives you?” he pressed, voice soft, intimate, as if he were coaxing out her deepest secret.

She shot the question back at him. “What drives you, Elias?”

His grin widened. “Death. Death fuels me.”

She glared. “Me too. Isn’t that what you want to hear? That we’re the same?”

His eyes glittered. “Because we are. We both seek it out.”

“No. I don’t. I don’t seek it out.”

“Oh yes you do. Every case, every corpse, every time you put yourself on the front line—it motivates your every move. It’s why you’re here. Do you really believe you don’t feel the same things I feel? We are the same, Helena. It is through death that we both live.”

Helena forced herself to sit up, breathing hard. Her eyes roved the container, its damp walls, its echoing emptiness. “What is this place for, Lee?” she asked, deliberately using his birth name. “I don’t smell death here. So you don’t use it for bodies.”

For the first time, a flicker of irritation crossed his face.

“Breaking it in with you,” he said with a smirk, covering it.

“I don’t think so.” Her voice cut sharp. “I used your real name, and you didn’t even notice. You know what that tells me? You’re more of a cliché than even you realise. This isn’t about me. This is about you. This is where it all started, isn’t it? This is where Lee Duval died… and Elias Voit was born.”

His eyes darkened. Slowly, deliberately, he stood. “No. This is where you and I end.”

He pulled a knife from behind his back and tossed it onto the floor. The clatter rang out, sharp and final.

“Good luck,” he murmured, before stepping back and slamming the heavy door shut.

Helena stared at the knife gleaming in the dark, her chest heaving, terror pressing in from the steel walls.

Voit thought he’d won.

The metallic slam of the container door was louder than a gunshot. Helena flinched, the vibration shuddering through the floor beneath her knees. Then came the sound that made her stomach drop—the metallic click of the lock, final, echoing like a judge’s gavel.

Silence.

Her breath rattled in the dark, too fast, too shallow. The air was cold, stale, and it clung to her tongue with the taste of rust. Every sound seemed magnified—the rasp of the zip ties cutting into her wrists, the frantic drum of her pulse in her ears, the faint drip of condensation from somewhere in the shadows.

Basement. The word carved itself into her mind, jagged and merciless. She wasn’t in Voit’s container anymore. She was a child again. Back in her father’s house. Back in the dark.

She squeezed her eyes shut and the memories flooded, merciless. The smell of damp concrete. The clink of his tools. The scratch of his shoes on the floorboards above. That crushing certainty that no one was coming. That no one would ever come.

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head violently as if she could throw the memories out of her skull. “Not now. Not here.”

She forced her eyes open, but the dark pressed against her all the same. She could feel it wrapping around her throat, cold and suffocating.

Her gaze landed on the knife Voit had thrown, its blade catching the faintest gleam of light from the crack under the door. She stared at it, transfixed. It felt like a cruel joke.

That was how it had all started for her—with a knife.

Her hands trembled as she shifted closer, dragging her bound wrists across the gritty floor. The scrape of zip ties against concrete burned her skin. She couldn’t get free. Not yet.

Her chest heaved, breath fogging in the dark. For the first time in a long time, she wasn’t sure she would get out of this alive. Doug. Rossi. JJ. Her team. Faces flickered through her mind like ghosts. Doug’s voice especially—steady, grounding, telling her she wasn’t her father. Telling her she wasn’t doomed to the darkness.

But here she was, in the dark again.

“Get it together, Bishop,” she hissed under her breath, forcing steel into her tone. She was still alive. That meant she still had a chance. Voit hadn’t broken her—not yet.

The knife gleamed at her feet, waiting. A gift or a curse, she couldn’t tell.

But she knew one thing: if she let herself drown in fear, in memories, in the shadows of her father’s basement, Voit really would win.

And she would not give him that satisfaction.

She tilted her head back, trying to steady her breathing. And then she saw it.

A small, black camera, mounted high in the corner above her. Its red light blinked steadily in the gloom. Watching. Recording.

Her stomach lurched.

He wanted her on display. He wanted every crack, every confession, every moment of weakness captured. Maybe for her team. Maybe just for himself.

“Help!” she shouted, her voice raw and desperate as it echoed off the metal walls. “Help me!”

Her words bounced back at her, hollow in the dark.

But still, she stared up at the camera, praying—pleading—that somehow, some way, her team would see.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Eighteen

“By The End Of This You’ll Know Who You Were Meant To Be”

“Light and shadow are opposite sides of the same coin. We can illuminate our paths or darken our way. It is a matter of choice.” - Maya Angelou

Helena sat in the car across from Voit’s house, rain streaking her windshield like veins of mercury. Officially, she wasn’t an agent on this case anymore.

But that didn’t matter.

Her fingers drummed against the steering wheel, a jittery rhythm that matched the thunder rolling across the sky. In her chest, something burned hotter than the storm. It wasn’t duty anymore. It wasn’t orders, or the Bureau, or even the oath she’d once believed in.

It was him.

Elias Voit.

Sicarius.

The man who had walked into her life and smiled while dragging her past into the open like it was his to dissect.

He’d taunted her with her father’s ghost, with her loneliness, with the reflection of herself she didn’t want to admit was true. And still, she couldn’t look away. Couldn’t back down.

Doug’s texts lit up her phone screen in frantic bursts: Answer me. Helena, don’t do this. Come back. Please. Rossi and Prentiss had called too—missed calls stacking like evidence of her betrayal—but all she saw was the porch light glowing warm and ordinary in front of Voit’s house. A lie of normalcy. A mask, just like him.

I’m not backing down, she told herself, knuckles whitening on the wheel. Badge or no badge, I finish this. Whatever it costs.

A sharp rap on her passenger window made her jump. She turned, and there he was—Elias Voit, leaning down, eyes lit with amusement.

“You want to come in?”

Her pulse spiked. She rolled the window down, slow.

“I’m good.”

“Come on.” His smile widened, almost gentle. “We can open a nice bottle of wine. Talk.”

“We both know that’s about the dumbest thing I could do.”

“Probably for the best,” he said lightly. “I’ve got a hot blonde in there with about three minutes left before she suffocates. Anyway—if you change your mind, park around back. You’ll get a ticket out here.” He didn’t raise his voice; he didn’t have to. The phrase landed like a stone.

Her heart jolted. She slammed her fist against the steering wheel. “Shit!”

She knew it was bait. She knew. But she couldn’t risk a victim. Victims paid for hesitation; it was a price Helena had paid and she would not make others do the same.

She drew her gun and walked up the path into the house, shoulders squared against the storm.

He was on the couch when she swept into the living room, a glass of wine half-empty on the coffee table. He had the calm, practiced poise of a man who’d invited strangers into his house a thousand times and never flinched. He tapped the rim of the glass with one finger, the small, compulsive rhythm of someone setting the tempo of a room.

She moved through to the next room, flashlight beam cutting long, nervous lines across a tidy kitchen, a children’s drawing pinned to the fridge. No victims. No drama. The whole house was staged to reassure, to lull, and it did its job too well.

When she came back into the sitting room, Voit sat his glass down, palms splayed on his knees as if he was about to talk business. “Helly,” he smirked — a familiarity intended to unbalance. “I was kidding about the blonde.”

Helena stood in the centre of the room, gun still in her hands, eyes locked on the man across from her. Voit picked up the glass and swirled his wine lazily, as though this were nothing more than an after-dinner conversation. “Glass of wine?” he motioned to the bottle.

“No thanks,” she said, holstering her weapon for a second. “Your body count’s at fifty-two. I’m not betting on your hospitality.”

He laughed like a man pleased with himself. “Do you really think I’m going to drug you? So I have these friends — Dan and Sheila. Well, they’re actually podcast hosts. They’ve gone through every single one of your cases. And they make a pretty compelling argument that the BAU is secretly terrible at profiling.”

Helena’s voice came out flat and steady. “I was good enough to catch you.”

For a moment Voit just looked at her — and then he laughed. A rich, deliberate laugh that filled the quiet house. He leaned back against the couch, set his glass down with care, and began clapping slowly, each smack of his palms sharp in the air.

“Touché,” he said with mock delight. “Bravo. That round goes to Agent Bishop.”

Helena didn’t so much as blink. “This isn’t a game, Elias.”

His smile widened, as if her refusal to play only proved his point. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes fixed on her with the intensity of a predator scenting prey.

“Then tell me,” he said softly, almost tenderly. “If it’s not a game… why did you come here?”

The words hung in the air like a dare, pulling the silence tighter around them.

“To make a deal,” she said. Her throat was dry. “You let Sydney and the girls go, I’ll let you go.”

Voit’s smile altered; it went almost apologetic. “And you think I would trade my family for freedom?” He looked at her, and for the first time there was a sliver of something she hadn’t seen before — not fear, exactly, but something unsteady. “I love them.”

For an instant her father’s face flickered in her mind — her father at the breakfast table, her father reaching for her hand. Love was a strange, broken thing.

“I believe you.” she admitted quietly. “And that love makes you unique among psychopaths. And it’s how I knew I would catch you…through your family. And why it would be difficult to kill them. Harlow, especially. But…you will….eventually.”

He took a sip as if she’d said something amusing. The wine left a ring on the coffee table. For a beat he looked rattled; she saw him swallow hard, fingers tightening around the glass. The ripple in his composure lasted a second before his face rearranged itself into amused cruelty. “I guess for you, everyone is like your father if you stare long enough.”

“Maybe,” Helena shrugged. “But you’ve had intrusive thoughts about murdering them since Cyrus, haven’t you?”

The name hit the room like glass breaking. For the first time in their sparring, something moved under Voit’s professional surface — a quick, involuntary contraction in his jaw; his eyes blinked too slowly. He straightened, looking for a redirect, and she took the moment.

“Oh,” she said softly, tasting the small victory. “That’s a yes.”

“There’s a term for what you’re going through Elias. It’s called devolution.”

She let the word hang in the air, clinical and precise.

Voit’s lips curled, but the smirk didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I know what devolution is.”

“Then you know it never ends well.”

That struck him like a slap. He rose from the couch, every inch of him a controlled threat, and began to close the space between them. The tapping of his wedding ring against the side of his glass earlier had been the gavel; now the sentence was coming.

“Here’s what I think, Helly,” he murmured, voice low, deliberate. “I think you’re devolving a bit yourself. Because I’m standing right here…” he stepped closer, shadows stretching around him like a cloak, “…and you can’t do a damn thing about it.”

Helena’s hand moved like a reflex to the gun she’d holstered at her hip. Her fingers curled around the grip. “Don’t come any closer.”

Voit’s smirk broadened into a leer that was part admiration, part challenge. He closed the space between them with a slow step. “Or what? You going to shoot an unarmed man in his own house?” He spread his palms, mock surrender.

She felt the old, hot temptation rise — the same sharp, animal instinct that had slept under her skin most of her life. The idea of order, of closure, of the end of a thing she had been chasing for years. Her ribs contracted. The gun felt like the only true thing in her hand.

“Well maybe I am devolving,” she said, voice low. “My career is over. What have I got left to lose?”

That’s the point he’s been pushing toward — she feels it like pressure building behind the eyes.

Voit’s eyes flared with cruel interest. “That’s an interesting question,” he said softly. He kept coming, slow, testing the air between them. “But the most interesting question is this: do you have the nerve to pull the trigger?”

Lightning cracked, and the house seemed to hold its breath. Outside, the storm rolled closer like the beginning of an ocean. Inside, two people — hunter and hunted, mirror and reflection — measured what the moment would demand. The gun was warm in Helena’s grasp. Her grip on the gun trembled as her finger found the trigger.

His smile turned knife-sharp. “You going to arrest me like the good little FBI agent you pretend to be… or shoot me in the head and become exactly what you pretend not to be?”

Her breath came out in a ragged line, and for the first time in a long time the muscle in her forearm trembled. The world narrowed to the barrel and the wet gleam of Voit’s skin. He was waiting, as if he had known this would be hard. His head tilted like a cat’s.

Her knuckles whiten around the gun. “What makes you think I’d break my oath? To the Bureau? To my country? For you?”

“Everyone has their defining moment,” he murmured. “The moment where they cross over. Mine’s was the day Cyrus bought me those spiders. The Sicarious ones. Little carvings of nature’s cruelty. He handed me the jar like it was a present.”

Helena’s breath comes shallow. The memory he sketches — the arc of his hand, the slow tilt of a jar, the soundless slide of small bodies — is precise enough to make her stomach flip. She wants to step away, but she is rooted, every nerve a wire.

“So I poured them down Robert Sesper’s throat.” Voit continued, almost conversational, as if he was describing a photograph at a museum. “Slowly. Watched him fight, watched the terror pry his eyes wide. It felt… incredible. Like being handed power for the first time. Like God was a word that finally fit.”

Her skin crawled at the picture he was painting inside her mind.

“And your moment,” he went on, “was when you turned that blade on your father. You felt something that day — power, relief. Don’t deny that to me now.”

“I’m nothing like you.” she snapped, voice raw. The sentence is a gut-punch, meant to yank him back, but it doesn’t. He steps forward again, as if to close the distance between them with the most comfortable intimacy.

“Oh, we are so alike,” he said softly. “Damaged by terrible fathers. Childhoods soaked in blood and death. And we both tried to overcome, didn’t we? We both tried to lead normal lives. But it turns out, you can’t pave over what you’re born with.”

She stepped forward until the barrel of the gun was pressed firmly against his skull. He lowered himself down onto his knees, hands raised — the pantomime of surrender or of begging; she can’t tell which one he’s offering.

“There’s no saving us,” he whispered. “We’re both killers. And what, at the end of the day, is more liberating than killing someone? Take me in. Or—” He tilted his head into the gun. “Shoot me, Helly. Shoot me.”

Her finger tightened. She wanted to. God, she wanted to. The weight of every victim, every case, every scream pressed into her bones.

“Do it, Helena. I dare you.”

His words are a knife. They strip her hope down to bone.

Her hands shake, the weapon steady against his temple. She sees a simple sequence: breath, sight, trigger. She imagines the smell of hot metal, the slow red that would spread across the floor, the finality she craves. The thought is a hot coal in her chest.

“Do it,” he says again. “Do it, Helena. I dare you.”

The taunts come faster now, a flurry meant to shred restraint. He leans into her mind like a predator, pulling out the rawest pieces: her father, the fear, the words that once slid across her skin as if from someone she should have trusted.

His voice leeches warmth from the room. The images he pulls are surgical, crafted to unmoor. Heat builds behind her eyes, a pressure that liquefies reason. She tastes iron. Her finger trembles on the trigger. The gun is a weight she hardly feels until it slides down the side of his head, against bone.

She wants to pull. To end it, to silence the voice telling her she’s the same, that darkness runs in her. She imagines the relief, the cleanup, the scrubbing of hands until the skin peels away, until no trace of blood remains, until sleep is possible. She wants to be free of the image of victims looking at her accusingly, of mothers’ faces, of a child’s empty chair. The world would be safer.

His daughters would be safer.

But as her hand shook she felt the truth like a blade — she couldn’t. She wouldn’t. Not like this.

I don’t want to live in my father’s shadow.

If she pulled the trigger, what would she become? The same girl who stood over her father once, knife slick with his blood, waiting for him to die. The daughter who learned too early what power and rage felt like.

She cannot pull the trigger. The thought of becoming him — final, absolute — smothers her. She feels vomit rise, an animal recoil.

Her breath hitched. She finally lowered the gun.

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. “I’m not you.”

For a fleeting moment, silence pressed down like the weight of the storm outside. And then Voit smiled — slow, triumphant, vicious.

“There it is,” he murmured. “The weakness. The line you’ll never cross. And that’s why you’ll never beat me.”

He moved faster than she expected. One hand smacked the gun from her grasp; the other caught her wrist and twisted. She tried to strike him but he pivoted, shoved her hard against the wall, then swept her legs out from under her. The floor slammed her ribs. Her breath shot out in a gasp.

She scrambled, reaching for the weapon, but he was already on her, heavy and unyielding.

Her chest heaved as she tried to suck in air, her cheek pressed to the cold hardwood.

She tried to twist, to knee him in the gut, but he was heavier, stronger, driven by the thrill of her unraveling. He forced her down onto the floor, pinning her wrists behind her back. She bucked beneath him, fighting like a trapped animal.

His face was close enough. that she could feel his breath. “You had your chance, Helly. You could’ve ended me. Instead… you chose to prove you’re nothing like him. Noble.”

Then his voice dropped, dark and gloating: “But it’s going to cost you everything.”

She kicked, fought, clawed, but his fist caught the base of her skull, her vision changing as the pain shot through her head. She blinked rapidly and winced at the pain as she waited impatiently for her eyes to focus.

The world tilted as Voit hauled her upright, her wrists bound cruelly tight behind her back with zip ties. He tightened the ties with a sharp yank, savouring her hiss of pain.

He shoved her into the chair he’d sat in minutes earlier, only now she wasn’t the profiler in control — she was his prey.

Helena’s head lolled for a second, her lip split, blood sharp and metallic on her tongue. She blinked hard, trying to clear the daze.

Voit crouched in front of her, studying her face like she was a puzzle he’d finally solved. His smirk widened when her eyes focused on him again, green and defiant even through the haze of pain.

“You could’ve done it,” he said softly, almost admiringly. “I saw it in your eyes. For a second, you wanted it — the blood, the power. That’s the real you, Helly. And you pulled back.”

He tapped her cheek with two fingers, mock-gentle. “You’re not weak because you won’t kill me. You’re weak because you want to — and you won’t admit it.”

Her stomach twisted. She wanted to spit at him, to scream. But all she could do was glare, jaw clenched, chest heaving against the restraints.

Voit stood, towering over her now, his shadow long and jagged in the lamplight. “I’ve waited for this,” he murmured, half to himself. “To peel you apart. To show you what you really are.”

Helena’s pulse thundered in her ears, every instinct screaming don’t give him anything. But even bound, bruised, and disarmed, she forced herself to meet his gaze.

“Go to hell,” she rasped.

Voit smiled at that, a slow curl of his lips, satisfied. “Oh, Helly. You’re coming with me.”

His hand shot out, one final blow across the temple, and darkness swallowed her whole.

When her body slumped, limp against the chair, Voit lingered, staring down at her. For the first time in months, maybe years, he felt… alive. A worthy opponent at last, bound at his mercy.

Voit stood over Helena’s unconscious body, her chest rising and falling in shallow, steady breaths. He flexed his hand, the sting of the punch still in his knuckles, and let the silence of the room fill him. The storm outside cracked with lightning, illuminating her face for a split second — pale, bloodied at the lip, defiant even in sleep.

For a long moment, he just stared.

It should’ve been victory, clean and complete. But it wasn’t. Something twisted inside him as he looked at her: frustration, exhilaration, a jagged rush of recognition.

She hadn’t pulled the trigger. That told him everything. She wasn’t her father, not yet. But the way her hands had trembled, the way her breath caught when the barrel pressed against his skull… she had wanted to. God, she had wanted to.

“Almost,” he murmured, crouching to brush his fingers across her cheek, an obscene imitation of tenderness. “You almost crossed over. I saw it.”

He rose again, pacing the room, his shadow flickering across the walls with each flash of lightning. He thought of Cyrus — the beatings, the rules, the endless lessons in pain. Cyrus would’ve spat on him for letting her live. Weak, that voice hissed from the grave.

But Cyrus was gone. And Voit was no longer the boy who obeyed.

No, he had something better: Helena Bishop. His mirror. His rival. His prize.

He poured himself another glass of wine, savouring the bitter taste as he looked down at her again. Bound, bruised, but not broken.

Doug Bailey’s face flitted across his mind, and Voit laughed under his breath. The righteous Deputy Director, so desperate to save his agent-lover. Gold Star tangled around them like a noose neither of them could see. Oh, when the Bureau came knocking, it would all collapse.

But not yet.

He drained the glass, set it down, and crouched to tighten the cable ties around Helena’s wrists once more. She stirred faintly at the pressure, a soft sound escaping her throat, but didn’t wake. He leaned in close, whispering into her ear as if confessing a secret.

“You’re mine now.”

With a grunt, he hauled her limp form into his arms, carrying her toward the door. The storm outside was waiting, and so was the road.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Seventeen

“Like Father, Like Daughter”

“You can be the hunter, or you can be the hunted.” – Lisa Gardner

Helena fixed her eyes on the back of Elias Voit’s head as he sat at the desk, his posture unnervingly patient, almost expectant. Yet every instinct inside her screamed. There he was. Sicarius in the flesh. She took a slow breath as she and Rossi stepped forward, pulling out chairs opposite him.

Rossi broke the silence. “Sorry to bother you, Mr. Voit.”

Voit turned, lips curving into a polite half-smile. “No bother. How can I help?”

Calm. Too calm. Helena clocked the measured cadence in his voice — the cadence of someone who’d practiced these exchanges in his head a hundred times.

Rossi leaned forward. “We’re looking for a suspect in a serial-killer investigation. We think we spotted him in Chattanooga. Is that…?”

Helena tilted her phone toward him, the photo of the surveillance still from the hardware store on the screen.

Voit didn’t even hesitate. “That’s me. I was in Chattanooga around….last Thanksgiving.”

“Lucky us,” Rossi said lightly. “Can you confirm details of that trip?”

“Y-Yeah, sure. Um…” Voit paused, then leaned back, fingers drumming the laptop bag like a gavel. He pivoted suddenly, eyes flicking between them. “I’m sorry. It’s just… You’re famous.” He looked at Rossi. “I’ve read every single one of your books.”

“Every one?” Rossi asked.

“Every one.”

The exchange might have sounded like harmless admiration, but Helena could see it — the way Voit mirrored Rossi’s posture when he leaned back, the way his gaze landed on her a beat too long. This wasn’t fandom. It was study. Manipulator’s trick. Keep them in sync, blur the power dynamic. And when her eyes, just for a second, flicked down to his wedding band, Voit adjusted it with his thumb — subtle, deliberate, reminding her of his mask. Married man. Family man. Harmless.

Rossi nodded. “Get a lot out of them?”

Voit smiled thinly. “I liked that one, Obsession. About the guy who disarticulated bodies so he could dissolve them in acid.”

“Mm. No kidding. Our suspect had a shipping container in Yakima,” Rossi said. “Tried different methods of murder.”

“Ooh.” Voit gave a rehearsed wince. “Creepy.”

Helena fought the urge to grind her teeth. He’s enjoying this.

She felt his gaze shift then. He looked at her differently than he did at Rossi — sharper, surgical, as if peeling her apart layer by layer with his eyes. She sat perfectly still, refusing to give him what he wanted.

Voit leaned forward, lowering his voice as if confiding. “But you know what one I liked even more? Uh what was it called again? Anatomy Of Evil. Especially the chapter about The Surgeon.”

Helena’s stomach lurched. A hot, involuntary flinch. Her father. He’d done that on purpose.

“And,” Voit went on smoothly, “I read The Surgeon had a daughter. That one day, terrified he was going to kill her, she stabbed him. Can you imagine that? Growing up in that household, living by his rules?”

Helena cut in sharply. “Did Cyrus give you rules?”

Voit blinked, all innocence. “Who?”

“Cyrus,” Helena pressed.

For the first time, there was the faintest pause before he answered. His expression didn’t move, but she felt it — the stillness of a man reining something in. “I don’t know a Cyrus.”

He played ignorance perfectly, but his eyes had flashed at the name. Just for an instant, a fracture. And Helena caught it.

Voit tilted his head. “Hmm.”

“This guy, Cyrus…” she leaned in, eyes never leaving his, “…bad guy.”

“How bad?”

“Oh, the worst. Local police found him dead in his house. But from what we know? If someone had to grow up under his thumb…” She let the pause stretch, her voice sharpening. “…I’d almost feel sorry for that poor son of a bitch. Almost.”

The tension in the air tightened like a wire pulled taut. Rossi kept his voice level, but Helena could feel his eyes watching her, protective.

Voit shifted, finally letting his gaze rest fully on her. It wasn’t admiration now — it was dissecting, peeling. “You know I think what you do is quite remarkable Agent Bishop. Helping people. But I imagine it must get quite… lonely. Living in such a dark world.”

Her chest tightened. Because for the smallest fraction of a second, she felt seen — and that unsettled her more than the mask he wore.

She wanted to say yes. Wanted to claim that each family reunited, each killer caged, filled the hollow parts of her. But the truth — the truth was it never fully did. And the way he tilted his head, the barest quirk of a smile, told her he could see that.

He was circling her, not with fists or knives, but with words. Testing the perimeter, looking for weak spots.

His eyes searched hers, not taunting now but something darker, hungrier. “Still, the payoff, huh? Saving lives. I guess what I’m asking you is, do you really go the distance Helly?”

Helly.

Her father’s nickname for her.

Helena felt the weight of his words — not a question, but an incision.

Her pulse hammered, but her voice was steel. “I always go the distance, Elias.”

She looked back up at him, and for the first time in her career, she realised a suspect wasn’t just trying to hide from her. He was trying to get inside her.

Rossi cut in with another question about his travel records, but Voit’s gaze didn’t waver. He answered Rossi, polite and smooth, yet his eyes stayed on her — like Rossi was background noise, and she was the only game that mattered.

Helena’s fingers dug into her thigh beneath the table, grounding herself. She thought of every victim she’d seen in those containers, every family broken apart. She reminded herself: That’s why I’m here. That’s why I won’t flinch.

And then a smile ghosted Voit’s lips, as if he’d read that thought too. “That’s why I came in,” he said softly. “I can’t hide anything from you.”

The words landed heavier than they should have, not a confession but a challenge.

He slid the laptop and phone across the table with a little flourish, tapping them like bait. “This is my entire life. Go through it. It’ll tell you. I’m not the man you’re looking for.”

Her eyes stayed on him, unblinking. The objects on the desk weren’t an offering. They were a dare.

“So,” Voit leaned back, smirking as if he’d already won, “can I go?”

“Don’t go far,” she said finally, her voice steady but her chest tight.

And Voit smiled, just a little too wide. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

For a moment, neither of them moved — a silent duel across the table, predator and predator circling. Rossi finally broke the moment with a clipped, “We’ll be in touch, Mr. Voit.”

Voit stood smoothly, but before he turned, his eyes lingered on Helena one final beat. There was no mistaking it — not admiration, not curiosity. It was possession.

Helena felt her body hum, like she’d been tuned to his frequency against her will. It unsettled her more than anything. She would never admit it out loud, but she knew: this wasn’t over. It was just the beginning.

“Did Cyrus give you rules?”

Voit leaned back in the driver’s seat, staring at his reflection in the darkened window. Cyrus was supposed to be gone, erased, his rules silenced with a final wheeze of failing lungs. But Helena Bishop…

The way she had looked at him, steady, unflinching — it was the same way Cyrus used to look at him when he was a boy caught breaking one of the rules. Except she didn’t need to raise a fist or bark an order. Just saying his uncle’s name had been enough to strip him bare.

It rattled him.

Even dead, the name had weight — the kind that pressed against his ribs, the kind that whispered of chains he thought he’d broken. He hated that she had said it aloud, hated that the name still carried enough power to tug at something buried inside him.

For years, Voit had believed no one could reach inside him like that anymore. He was Sicarius, hunter, teacher, creator of his own order. Yet across the desk, Helena’s eyes had narrowed with recognition, with understanding. That was worse than judgment.

But he had caught the flicker in her eyes when he had called her by her father’s nickname, Helly. That little flare of unease. Perfect.

When he had slid the laptop and phone across the desk, it wasn’t an offering. It was bait. He knew what she’d find: nothing. Normalcy. A man with a wife, two kids, search histories scrubbed clean. It would frustrate her, eat at her, keep him alive in her thoughts.

But the real satisfaction was the way she had looked at him in that moment. Hatred, yes. But something else. Curiosity. The tiniest sliver of recognition.

And when she had told him not to go far, he nearly laughed. Because he had no intention of going anywhere. Not until he’d pulled her closer. Not until she admitted what he already knew — that she was standing on the same dark ledge he was.

Break her, he told himself. Or let her break me.

The next twenty-four hours blurred together into a haze of bad coffee, glowing monitors, and dead ends. Every lead they pulled on Voit unraveled into nothing. His cellphone records matched his story. GPS, toll booths, travel receipts — all neat, precise, maddeningly clean. He was covering his tracks too well.

The walls of the conference room felt like they were closing in. On the board, pinned in sterile neatness, were the photos of Elias Voit: his driver’s license photo, a shot from his work ID, a grainy still of him in the Seattle office earlier that day. Beside him — Sydney, smiling at some charity event; Holly and Harlow with painted faces at a fair. The image of an ordinary family.

Helena sat slouched in her chair, eyes fixed on those faces, a tightening coil in her chest. Her nails dug crescents into the Styrofoam coffee cup in her hand until the rim buckled.

She’d faced monsters before — her father, Peter Lewis, a hundred predators who thought they were smarter than everyone else. But Elias Voit wasn’t like them.

He wasn’t nervous. He wasn’t scrambling to keep his lies straight. He wasn’t even trying to outwit Rossi — he was studying her.

She could still hear his calm cadence, rehearsed like a sermon, but aimed at her alone. The way he mirrored her posture, adjusted his wedding band just when she looked at it — as if he knew exactly where her eyes would land. Like he was telling her, I see you. I know where you’re weak.

And that word — lonely. It clung to her like smoke. When he’d said it, it felt as though the ground shifted beneath her. Because for one sharp, terrifying second, she’d believed him. Believed that he could see into her, peel her open and name what she buried.

She hated the chill that slid down her spine, hated that his voice echoed louder than Rossi’s steady presence beside her. She hated that she recognised something in him.

But what rattled her most was the moment he slid the laptop and phone across the desk. She’d expected bravado, excuses, anything to protect himself. Instead, he handed them over like a dare. A man so confident in his mask that he invited her to tug at it. A man who wanted her to keep chasing.

And God help her, she wanted to.

Her chest tightened, a bitter taste rising in her throat. This was how her father had trapped people — not with chains, but with gravity. Pulling them closer, until they couldn’t tell where fear ended and fascination began.

“He’s going to fucking walk, Dave,” she muttered.

Rossi approached quietly, sliding into the chair beside her, his own cup steaming. He placed it in front of her — a small, grounding gesture — before leaning forward. “We don’t have enough for an arrest, Helena. That’s the truth.”

She didn’t look at him. Her gaze was still on Voit’s face, frozen mid-smirk on the board. “He sat across from me, Dave. He looked me in the eye and brought up my father. My father. He wanted me to hear it. To feel it. Like he was peeling back my skin just to see how I’d react.”

Rossi’s jaw tightened, but his voice stayed calm, deliberate. “That’s exactly what he wanted. He’s a profiler, just like us. He’s studying you. And you let him under your skin.”

Helena finally turned to Rossi, her eyes sharp, angry — though the anger wasn’t directed at him. “How could I not? He knows things he shouldn’t know. He made it personal. He…” She faltered, the memory of her father’s face bleeding into Voit’s, the words overlapping in her mind. My little Helly.

She shoved the thought away, forcing herself upright. “If we can’t break him, maybe we can break her.” She tapped Sydney’s photo on the board, her finger leaving a faint smudge on the glass. “Sydney. She could be the weak link. Just like I was for my father.”

Rossi frowned, his brow furrowed. “Helena—”

“If I give her a gentle push, she might start talking. She has to see it, Dave. She has to feel it, living under the same roof with him. A woman always knows.”

There was silence between them for a moment, heavy, thick. Finally, Rossi exhaled, the weight of his years in his tone. “…Go.”

That was all she needed. She grabbed her coat and phone, heading for the exit, adrenaline cutting through the exhaustion.

Her phone buzzed. Doug. Again. She ignored it, pressing harder on the elevator button. It buzzed a second time, a third. She clenched her jaw, thumb hovering — and then a voicemail pinged.

Almost on instinct, she opened it. Garcia’s voice chirped into her ear, bubbling with laughter, a teasing giggle. “I was just thinking about you. Don’t call me back, just—”

Helena closed her eyes and shut the phone off, stuffing it into her pocket. That was clearly meant for someone else. Her pulse thudded in her ears. She couldn’t think about Doug or Garcia or anyone else right now. Not when Voit’s voice was still echoing in her skull.

No. She had to focus.

Voit had underestimated her. Sydney Voit was going to give her what she needed.

Sydney Voit’s cart clattered down the fluorescent-lit aisle, half-filled with random cans and boxes, like someone had been shopping in a panic rather than a plan. Her eyes darted over labels without really seeing them, hands trembling as she grabbed supplies she wasn’t even sure she needed.

Elias had spun her a story on how his company had been laundering drug money for some bad people. That their lead programmer went missing after the FBI showed up on his doorstep. How if Agent Helena Bishop were to turn up and try to get them to get into a car with her, they were in trouble. It had been enough to make Sydney doubt trusting the FBI.

Helena spotted her instantly. The frantic movements, the pallor in her face—she’d seen that look before, in wives who had spent years living under lies they were only just beginning to unravel.

Helena walked up beside her. “You seem a little upset, Mrs. Voit.”

Sydney stiffened, one hand clutching the cart. “What do you want from us?”

“You talked to your husband, didn’t you?” Helena pressed, voice low but firm.

Sydney’s eyes flicked away. “…Yeah.”

“He told you a story about who he is,” Helena said. She could feel her own chest tighten—memories of the stories her father had spun, so convincing, so easy to believe if you wanted to. “Maybe about who I am, too.”

Sydney swallowed. “And?”

“Well, I have a different story.” Helena softened her tone, leaning closer. “It’s about a young girl named Sydney. She had a tough childhood—abusive dad, victimised mom. So she swore when she thought about getting married that she’d never make the same mistakes her mom did.”

Sydney froze, her face blanching. “How do you know that?”

Because you’re just like my mother.

“Psychopaths have a type when it comes to wives,” Helena said quietly, her voice cutting through the hum of the supermarket. “He’d never hurt you physically. He doesn’t need to. He manipulates you in a different way. Tell me—what’s the first thing you look for when you meet a man? Even subconsciously.”

Sydney’s lips trembled. “…A wedding ring.”

“Exactly.” Helena’s voice was soft but relentless. “A woman relaxes when she sees one. So do other men. A married man is neutered. He’s not a threat. And that’s why Elias keeps his on when he hunts. You’re the reason he’s the most prolific serial killer I’ve ever seen.”

The words rang in Helena’s chest, not just about Elias but about her own father—how he’d seemed safe, respectable. A doctor. A husband. A father. How wrong that had been.

Sydney shook her head, a flicker of defiance in her fear. “You know, you almost had me… until you said serial killer.”

“Then let me prove it to you.” Helena extended her hand. “Come down to the FBI office. I’ll drive.”

But Sydney’s eyes widened like a trap had just snapped shut. “Oh, my God. He was right.”

She abandoned the cart, cans rattling as they spilled across the tile, and bolted down the aisle.

“Sydney!” Helena shouted, sprinting after her. “Listen to me! Please! You and your kids—” Her voice broke. I couldn’t save them all before, but I can save you. Your family. I have to.

Sydney burst through the automatic doors, shouting, “Elias! You were right—he found us!”

And there he was. Elias Voit, leaning casually against his car in the parking lot, as though he’d been waiting all along.

“Hey,” Voit called, his voice calm, almost mocking. “Are you stalking us?”

“No!” Helena shouted, breath ragged as she caught up. “I was trying to have a conversation with your wife.”

“She followed me into the store.” Sydney cried as she climbed into the passenger seat of their car.

Voit tilted his head, feigning outrage. “Is this what the FBI does now? Arrest innocent men and their wives in supermarkets?”

He pulled out his phone and lifted it, camera aimed squarely at Helena. His voice carried, performative, venom wrapped in false indignation. “I want the world to know that Special Agent Helena Bishop will not leave my family alone. Special Agent Helena Bishop—who is, in fact, the daughter of a famous serial killer. Like father like daughter.”

The words struck her like glass shattering inside her chest.

Helena saw red. Pure, unfiltered rage. Before she could stop herself, she lunged.

The impact slammed them both into the side of his car, metal groaning under the force. Her fists curled instinctively, one hand clawing at his shirtfront, the other swinging for his jaw. Her nails caught his skin, slicing across his neck, leaving four angry red marks that welled with blood almost instantly.

Voit didn’t hit back. He didn’t even raise his arms to block. Instead, he let himself stumble backward with the force of her attack, phone steady in his hand as though he’d rehearsed it a thousand times.

He angled his face toward the camera even as she shoved him, his breath coming in short, theatrical bursts. “See?” he rasped, his voice dripping with false fear. “Look at this! This is the FBI!”

Helena slammed him against the car again, her forearm pressed against his chest, teeth bared. “You son of a—”

His phone caught the tremble in her jaw, the fury in her eyes. He let her scratch again, a shallow rake across his cheek, never once lifting a hand to defend himself.

Two security guards burst in then, shouting, “Ma’am! That’s enough!” Arms like iron clamped around Helena’s shoulders, hauling her back. Her nails scraped against Voit’s collarbone as she was dragged away, leaving a smear of blood.

Voit straightened slowly, like a martyr rising from his own crucifixion. His shirt was rumpled, his cheek streaked with scratches, his throat bleeding in thin lines—but his smile was calm, controlled. He didn’t need to say a word—his eyes told her everything. Got you.

Phone still recording, he held it out toward the guard. “You see that? She attacked me. Special Agent Helena Bishop, daughter of a serial killer. Guess it runs in the family.”

The crowd in the lot had begun to gather—mothers clutching grocery bags, kids wide-eyed, people murmuring as their phones came out too.

Helena strained against the guard, every muscle in her body shaking with fury, but the cold, sinking realisation set in like lead: Voit hadn’t fought back because he hadn’t needed to. He’d won before she’d even thrown the first punch.

She knew, with a sickening drop in her stomach, that she’d played right into his hands.

And the blood on his neck—her scratches—was the proof he wanted.

The walls of the Seattle field office seemed to close in on Helena. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, too harsh, too exposing. She sat stiffly at the conference table, Rossi beside her with his arms crossed, his jaw tight. The speakerphone glowed red in the centre of the table, Doug’s clipped tone filling the room, Prentiss’s sharper edge close behind.

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” Doug’s voice cracked like a whip. “Helena, that footage is everywhere. It’s already hit half a dozen anti-government channels. You assaulted a civilian on camera.”

Helena bristled. “He’s not a civilian—”

“He looks like one!” Prentiss cut her off. “And thanks to you, he looks like a husband trying to defend his wife from an unstable FBI agent.”

Helena’s hands curled into fists against the tabletop. “I almost had him. If you’d just let me talk to Sydney again—”

“No.” Doug’s voice was iron now. “The Attorney General herself just called me. She’s furious. Effective immediately, you’re off this case. She said if you don’t get on a plane and come home, she’ll see to it personally that your badge is revoked.”

The words landed like a hammer blow. Helena’s chest tightened, her pulse roaring in her ears. She turned her head toward Rossi, searching for some flicker of defence, but his silence told her everything—he couldn’t save her from this one.

“Doug—” her voice cracked despite herself. “You don’t understand. I can’t walk away now. He knows who I am. He wanted me to lose control, and I did, but that means he’s afraid. He’s slipping.”

“He’s not slipping,” Doug said, his tone dropping lower, more dangerous. “He’s winning. He wanted you to crack in public, and you gave him exactly what he needed. If you care about this case, if you care about the team, you will get on the jet and come home. Now.”

The silence that followed was unbearable.

Finally, Prentiss spoke, her voice colder than steel. “That’s not a request, Bishop. That’s an order.”

The line clicked off.

Helena sat frozen for a long moment, her reflection staring back at her in the black glass of the phone speaker. She felt the burn of humiliation, of rage, of failure. Her knuckles still stung from where she’d clawed Voit’s throat, and the image of his smug smile replayed in her mind, over and over.

Slowly, she pushed back from the table, her chair scraping against the tile. Rossi leaned forward, trying to catch her eye. “Helena—”

But she was already on her feet, shoving through the door.

She knew what the Attorney General wanted. She knew what Doug wanted. But as she strode down the sterile hallway, chest tight and head high, only one truth mattered:

She wasn’t going home.

Not until Elias Voit was finished.

One way or another.

The next move was hers.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Sixteen

“Helena Bishop…..Meet Sicarius”

“Even chance meetings are the result of karma…. Things in life are fated by our previous lives. That even in the smallest of events there’s no such thing as coincidence” – Haruki Murakami

The wipers thudded against the windshield, swiping away a fine mist of Seattle rain. Helena sat in the passenger seat, head tipped against the glass, watching the blur of grey trees and endless road smear together.

But all she could really see was red.

Red everywhere.

Arthur’s blood, pooling hot through his shirt, encircling his torso as it seeped out across the pavement. It clung to her vision, overlaying everything—the road, the trees, the sky. Red like a memory burned into her: her father, the knife, the way it had felt to plunge steel into flesh. That terrible wet sound. Her hands slick. The horror and the strange, terrible relief twisted together.

There was nothing but red.

She was with him now, kneeling down beside him as the hem of her sleeve became coloured, pressing down on his gaping wound. She watched the blood seeping between her fingers, her hands taunting her. Blood on her hands, blood on her hands. She had caused this.

Too much red.

The colour which was so representative of pain, the colour of fire, which burned and destroyed, destroyed everything it touched.

She wonders what it would be like to not remember, to not know. To be so close to the edge, that crossing over wouldn't be anything momentous.

Rossi’s voice cut through her thoughts. “You okay?”

She blinked hard, the spell shattering. “I really wish everyone would stop asking me that.”

“When did I become ‘everyone’?” he asked, his tone softer than the words.

Her chest tightened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean you.”

Of course it wasn’t Rossi. He wasn’t just anyone. He never had been.

Her mind flicked back—flashing lights, crime scene tape whipping in the night air, her knees threatening to give out as the enormity of what she’d done hit her like a physical blow. And then Rossi’s hand, firm on her shoulder, guiding her past the chaos. His voice steady, low, telling her she wasn’t alone. The night her childhood ended, it had been him who walked her out. Not as an agent. As family.

Her phone buzzed. She glanced at the screen, saw Doug’s name, and couldn’t help the way her lips curved faintly. She answered.

“Hey. We’re making good time. Probably roll in around noon if Rossi doesn’t get us pulled over for speeding.”

Rossi smirked, eyes still on the road.

“I’ll call you later,” she promised, and when he said goodbye, her heart gave a little ache at the quiet “love you” that ended the call.

She hung up and found Rossi watching her in the reflection of the glass.

“So,” he said, casual but not unkind. “How is the good Deputy Director?”

Heat bloomed across her cheeks. She shifted the phone from one hand to the other, suddenly restless. “He’s… good.”

There was a pause. Then, before she could stop herself: “I think he’s going to ask me to marry him.”

Rossi’s brows lifted. “Oh? What makes you think that?”

“I found a ring.” The words felt unreal even as she said them, like she was confessing a secret she hadn’t quite admitted to herself.

Rossi’s grin widened. “Should I be remodelling my backyard for a wedding reception?”

Helena laughed softly, but the sound caught in her throat. “You know I never thought I’d get a chance at… something normal. I thought I’d spend the rest of my life just… trying to remake my childhood every day, only this time with me as the victor.” Her voice dropped, almost to herself. “But I don’t want that to be true. I don’t want to be an adult stuck in some cage I built out of the past.”

Rossi glanced at her, then back to the road. His silence invited honesty.

“What do you want, then?” he asked.

She stared at her hands in her lap. “More.”

“With Doug?”

Her throat tightened. “Yes.”

“Then go after it,” Rossi said simply.

She shook her head. “What if I don’t deserve more?”

“You do,” he said firmly. “Helena, you deserve happiness. Don’t waste time second-guessing it. You always think there’s more time, but there isn’t. Grab it while it’s here.”

She knew what he meant. Knew he was talking about Krystall. About loss. About the way joy slipped through your fingers if you hesitated.

Her chest burned. “Thank you,” she whispered. “For always being there for me. Then and now.”

He reached over, squeezed her hand once. “Always.”

She leaned back in the seat, eyes drifting out to the rain-streaked glass again. For the first time in years, the thought of her future didn’t feel like a sentence—it felt like a possibility. She told herself she’d say yes when Doug asked. That she’d follow her heart. That maybe, finally, she could be more than her past.

And for the first time, she let herself imagine it.

Not the blood. Not the past. The future.

A family. A home. A chance at light.

Maybe her whole life didn’t have to be coloured by something that happened all those years ago to her.

But just beyond the horizon, waiting in shadows she couldn’t see, Sicarius was already there….waiting.

Back in Quantico, Doug sat at his desk, the office dark except for the desk lamp throwing a soft halo of light across his reports. The building had emptied out hours ago, but he hadn’t moved. His jacket was draped over the chair across from him, weight heavy in its pocket — heavy with the ring box he’d tucked there days ago and still hadn’t touched.

He leaned forward, elbows braced on the desk, hands pressed together. He could still feel the phantom slickness of Grace Ryleigh’s blood on his palms, no matter how many times he scrubbed them. He closed his eyes, forcing the memory back, replacing it with another image instead — Helena, hair mussed from sleep, wearing one of his shirts, laughing as she danced about the kitchen with him.

Doug swallowed hard. That laugh had been the first time in months he felt like maybe he could breathe again.

He’d been turning the ring box over in his mind for weeks now. Timing. Place. The right words. He’d gone through speeches in the shower, in the car, even at three in the morning staring at his ceiling. Every version sounded either too stiff or too desperate. He wanted her to know — not just that he loved her, but that he believed in her, in them. That after a lifetime of holding himself apart, he wanted forever with her.

But every time he looked at her — really looked at her — he saw the shadows in her eyes. The way she carried the weight of the Sicarius case, of her past, as if her shoulders alone had been built to bear it. He saw the cracks she thought no one noticed. And he wondered: would asking her now feel like hope… or pressure?

Doug rubbed a hand over his face, his chest aching. He’d never been good at patience, but with her? He’d wait as long as it took. She deserved more than a rushed proposal shoved between manhunts and trauma. She deserved something that felt like peace.

His phone buzzed on the desk — a text from Helena. Making good time. I’ll call you later.

Doug’s lips curved into a smile despite the knot in his chest. He typed back, Stay safe. Call me when you can. I love you.

He stared at the words for a moment, thumb hovering over “send.” Then he hit it.

For a man who had built his career on control, Doug had never felt more out of control than he did with her. And yet, for the first time, he didn’t mind. Because if happiness had a face, it was hers.

He just prayed she’d let herself believe it.

The bunker smelled of damp concrete and fear. Voit sat hunched on the edge of the chair, elbows on his knees, a gun hanging loose in one hand, the other dragging across his jaw. The fluorescent light overhead hummed with a faint, uneven flicker, throwing his shadow long across the wall.

He clenched his jaw. Today should have gone differently. Ramona had played her part perfectly — compliant, terrified, moulded by his hand into exactly what he needed. She was supposed to be leverage. A stand-in for Sydney. A practice run for redemption. And then Arthur. Handing Ramona over to Arthur should have been the perfect solution, tying off one loose end while cementing his control over another disciple.

Instead, the FBI had swooped in. Helena Bishop and her team. Arthur dead, Ramona rescued. A whole day’s careful orchestration gone up in smoke, leaving him here — pacing, restless, gnawing at the inside of his cheek.

He hated it. The mistakes. The interruptions. The way the world refused to bend fully into his hands.

But more than that, he hated the echo of his own failure rattling inside him, louder than the buzzing light.

His phone glowed in the palm of his hand. Sydney’s number pulled up. He hesitated, thumb hovering. Not out of fear of her, but fear of the weight of her voice — of what she would say when she finally let her anger bleed through.

Silence pressed harder against his chest. He tapped the screen.

“Hello?”

Sydney’s voice. Cold, guarded.

“Hey. It’s me.”

The pause on the other end was punishment. Just her breathing. Just distance.

“Aren’t you gonna say anything?” he asked, forcing lightness into his tone.

“No,” she said flatly. “I’m not the one who should be doing the talking right now.”

The words stung, sharper than he expected. He pressed his thumb against the gun, grounding himself. “H… how are the girls?”

Her brittle laugh filled his ear. “Well, it’s been ten days. Ten days since you walked out of this house. No phone call, no text, nothing. You know what I did this weekend? I Googled your name, followed by the word ‘dead.’ And as terrified as I was to find something, at least that would make sense. At least I’d know.”

His stomach twisted. Failure there, too. Always failure.

“It’s not fair, is it? The way I’ve been treating you.”

“No,” Sydney snapped. “It’s not.”

She pushed harder: “Is it over? Because that’s another thing keeping me up at night—thinking you’re just never gonna come home. So… is it? Just say it.”

Voit shut his eyes. “No. No, it’s not over.” The lie is quick and smooth; he feels nothing when he says it, because he has already set the terms of what ‘over’ will mean.

“Then why are you doing this? Who are you?”

The words hit harder than any accusation. Who was he? He pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead, eyes closing, gun tapping against his thigh like a metronome. Who was Elias Voit? Husband. Father. Provider. All masks. Costumes he slipped into so no one could see the thing underneath.

The truth was simple, raw, and ugly: he didn’t know anymore.

He was a killer. That was it. That was the only constant that had ever defined him. Long before Sydney. Long before the girls. Long before he’d built the fiction of a normal life, there had only been Cyrus’s rules, blood, and silence. He’d tried to change, to reinvent, but everything else — the laughter, the family dinners, the bedtime stories — they were flimsy curtains stretched over rot.

A killer was all he’d ever been. A killer was all he’d ever know how to be.

“Honestly,” he admitted, voice low, “I don’t even know anymore. But I do know I have a lot I need to tell you. And I know I can’t keep secrets from you anymore. So can I come home? Please?”

Sydney’s voice softened, breaking. “Elias, I never told you to go.”

And then— knock knock.

“Elias, hang on—there’s someone at the door.”

And then he hears the voice just before Sydney hangs up.

“Hi, I’m Helena Bishop with the FBI, may I ask you a few questions?”

Her voice. Her.

Every muscle in his body went rigid.

Helena Bishop.

The name detonated like a landmine in his chest. Today’s failures suddenly reframed themselves—not endings, but beginnings.

He felt it instantly — the gravity pulling at his chest, a recognition deeper than logic. A daughter forged by blood, shaped by violence, just like him. She wore her mask better, tighter, but he knew. He would know her anywhere.

His mind raced ahead, unspooling futures: Helena chained in this very bunker, forced to see herself in him. Helena not as prey, but as mirror. As heir. As proof that what lived inside him could never be erased.

She could become his greatest triumph—or his perfect ruin.

Either way, she would be his story’s centre.

The game, he thought, had changed. He should have been the one to choose the opening move; instead, someone had knocked at his door.

He breathes out, slow and controlled, and a smile that tastes of iron and old victories crawls up his face.

Good, he thinks. Let it begin.

Helena stood on the Voits’ porch, her badge heavy in her pocket, her instincts buzzing louder than the cicadas in the trees. From the outside, the house looked painfully ordinary — nothing special. Normal driveway. Normal windows. Normal door.

But she knew, bone-deep, that this house would haunt her dreams for the rest of her life.

Inside, her eyes had gone to the first photo on the mantel. Sydney, Elias, and the two little girls grinning wide in matching Christmas sweaters. A family portrait. Innocent. Untouched. Except Helena could feel it — the hollowness behind the smile, the weight of secrets pressing against the glass.

He’s Sicarius. She knew it the same way she had once known her father was a killer. It wasn’t evidence. It was instinct. The sick gravity in her stomach that screamed danger no matter how normal the facade.

“Beautiful family,” she murmured.

Sydney’s polite smile faltered, just a flicker. “Thank you. I’m sorry — what is this about?”

Helena forced calm into her voice, pulling the surveillance still up on her phone. “We’re just following up on a lead. See if anyone recognises this man.” She angled the phone so Sydney could see. “I know the angle’s off. All you can really make out is his jawline. But… a wife would know. Is that your husband?”

Sydney leaned forward, too quickly, stalling with a practiced squint. “Where was that taken?”

“Chattanooga,” Helena said, keeping her tone neutral even as her pulse spiked.

That’s when Sydney’s phone buzzed. She answered. Helena didn’t move, but every sense sharpened as she knew who was on the other end of that call. It’s him. He knows I’m here.

Voit’s tone was low and steady. “Uh, I just got an alert on the app. Who’s at our house?”

“An FBI agent who just showed me footage of you in Chattanooga,” Sydney replied, glancing nervously at Helena. “What were you doing in Chattanooga?”

There was a pause on the line. Then Voit’s voice, calm, composed, but threaded with steel. “Syd, did you check her I.D.?”

“Yes,” Sydney said. “Her name is Agent Helena Bishop.”

“Okay,” Voit said, his tone sharpening with command. “Listen to me very carefully. Are the girls home?”

“No.”

“Good. Good. Have your mother get them and keep them with her. Do not panic. Okay? But this woman is very dangerous.”

Sydney’s voice cracked. “You have to explain this to me right now.”

A sigh, a flicker of weariness on the line. “I didn’t lose my job. I quit. I found out the business was involved in something that could get us in trouble. And now it has.”

“So you need to get this woman out of our house,” Voit continued. “Just look her in the eye and say completely normally, ‘I understand.’”

Sydney turned, eyes wide and desperate, but her voice was steady when she said, “I understand.”

Voit’s approval hummed over the line. “Perfect. Perfect. Now tell her you’re not going to answer any more questions without a lawyer. And keep me on the phone. She won’t hurt you if she knows there’s a witness.”

Sydney straightened, her gaze flicking to Helena like she was both shield and hostage. “I won’t be answering any more questions without my lawyer.”

Helena’s heart thudded, her mouth dry. For a moment she saw her father across the years — the same tug-of-war through someone else’s words, the same battle for control over a terrified woman’s voice.

She forced herself to soften, to release the tension from her shoulders. If she snapped now, if she pushed, he’d win.

“No problem,” she said lightly. “Call me if you change your mind. And please let your husband know I have a few questions for him, too.”

As she turned toward the door, Helena could feel him on the other end of that phone call. Not in the room, but close. Watching. Testing her. He knew her name now. And she knew his face, even if the world didn’t yet.

In the silence of her chest, she promised herself: this is only round one.

When Voit finally hung up, he didn’t move right away. He just sat there in the bunker, his phone still warm in his hand, staring out at nothing while the adrenaline hummed through his veins.

Helena Bishop.

Hearing Sydney say her name aloud, like she was just another visitor at the door, had snapped something awake in him. Helena wasn’t a rumour anymore. She was flesh and blood. She had stood in his house, looked at his wife, at his children, and — judging by the shift in Sydney’s voice — almost torn through the paper-thin veil of his life.

Voit drummed his fingers on the screen of his phone, a small grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. He admired the way she’d handled it. No theatrics, no overreach. She’d backed off clean, letting the silence work for her. A rookie would’ve pressed, but not her. She’d read the room, read him through Sydney.

That was dangerous. And intoxicating.

Because in her eyes — even blurred through distance — he knew she’d seen him. Not just the husband, not just Elias Voit, the family man with the nice lawn and the perfect smile. She’d looked past all of it, straight into the part of him he spent every waking hour burying. And she’d recognised it, the way one predator recognises another.

She wants me. Not in the way Sydney did, or Ramona had when she begged for her life. No — Helena wanted him the way a shadow wanted its source. She wanted the confrontation. The release. And Voit?

Voit wanted her to prove it.

This was the axis point. The turning of the wheel.

The darkness in him had finally met its reflection in the light.

“Round one.” he murmured to himself, the grin stretching wider.

Because this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

The Seattle Bureau’s conference room smelled faintly of burnt coffee and dry-erase marker. The big screen at the far end glowed, the BAU team’s faces patch-worked together through the speakerphone feed.

Prentiss leaned forward, voice steady. “Are you positive Elias Voit is Sicarius? It’ll be a heavy lift to reopen the investigation.”

Helena swallowed hard before answering. “No, I’m not positive. But his wife recognised him from the Chattanooga footage. And she’s the spitting image of his last victim, Ramona Havener.”

On-screen, Garcia’s fingers flew over her keyboard. “Okay, that’s Elias Voit, V-O-I-T, from North Redmond. That’s him, right?”

“That’s the one,” Helena confirmed, forcing calm into her tone. “I need everything we can get on him.”

Tara’s voice came sharp, efficient: “I’ve got his driver’s license, Social Security, work history. He’s a network security analyst. Fired after last Thanksgiving. Cryptography. That’s how he’s stayed ahead of us this whole time.”

“Which he won’t enjoy for long,” Garcia muttered. “Address, travel, phone records—gimme a hot second, I’ll break them wide open.”

JJ leaned closer into frame. “Elias and Sydney Voit have been married for fourteen years. Right before his first documented kill in the container case.”

Rossi’s eyes narrowed. “So he got married… then started hunting. Every business trip, every time he said he needed alone time, he was killing.”

Luke’s voice cut in. “Two daughters. Holly, fourteen. Harlow, ten. Their birthdays line up with the pauses in his murders.”

Tara nodded grimly. “Serial killers sometimes take a break to have kids. Dennis Rader did. So did Green River.”

Helena’s voice slipped out before she could catch it: “And my father.”

The room went silent. The faint hiss of the speaker filled the void, heavier than any words.

Finally Rossi cleared his throat, steady as bedrock. “It’s hard to be a new dad and a psychopath at the same time.”

Prentiss’s eyes hardened. “We need a timeline putting him in the areas of abduction. When we make this arrest, it has to be bulletproof.”

“Which means first,” Doug added, his voice measured but tight, “we go back to the Attorney General and justify reopening this case. Prentiss, you and I will pull every forensic thread we can over the next hour.”

“Move fast,” Helena pressed, leaning into the table. “Voit’s wife tipped him off. He knows we’re close. He’ll try to slip away again.”

“Keep us posted,” Rossi said.

When the call finally disconnected, Helena exhaled slowly, pressing her fingertips against the edge of the table, steadying herself. Rossi was about to speak when the door creaked open and a young field agent stepped inside, awkward at the sudden attention.

“Agent Bishop?”

Helena looked up, brows furrowing. “Yeah?”

“There’s… someone here to see you.”

Her eyes flicked to Rossi, whose expression darkened into wary confusion. He gave the faintest shake of his head, as if to warn her, but Helena’s feet were already moving, her instincts dragging her toward the unknown.

The fluorescent light in the hallway buzzed faintly, the sound amplifying the tension winding through her chest. She pushed the door open and stepped into the waiting area—

And froze.

Elias Voit. stood there, hands in his jacket pockets, as though he had all the time in the world. Calm, composed. His smirk widened when he saw her shock.

“I’m Elias Voit,” he said smoothly, the faintest curl of amusement tugging at his mouth.

For a split second Helena’s brain short-circuited, her stomach dropping so violently it was like missing the last step on a staircase.

Her hand twitched instinctively toward her sidearm, but Voit tilted his head slightly, smirk broadening.

Helena’s throat went dry. Every instinct screamed danger, every nerve ending prickled with recognition — the monster she had been chasing was right here, in the open, baiting her like a spider at the edge of its web.

And yet, for just an instant, she also saw the family photo from his house flash behind her eyes. His daughters. His wife. The perfect mask.

That smile sent a cold jolt down her spine.

“You wanted to talk to me?”

Now the game had truly begun.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Fifteen

“This Can Only End In Blood”

“Nothing ever ends poetically. It ends and we turn it into poetry. All that blood was never once beautiful. It was just red.” – Kait Rokowski

He paced the concrete floor like a man rehearsing a ritual. The bunker swallowed sound — his boots, the faint hiss of the old heater, the low thud of his own pulse — and when he spoke it bounced back at him, distorted, as if the room itself were practicing what he wanted to hear.

“Okay. Look at me,” he said, stopping a pace away from Ramona. The gun gleamed raw and ordinary in his hand, the sort of household object that felt frighteningly domestic in the fluorescent light. He kept his voice soft, practiced, the voice he used when he needed people to believe everything he said. “Look at me like I’m your husband. Okay? I’ve been gone for over a week. I just got home….what do you say to me?”

She blinked at him through her tears, cheeks wet, hair stuck to her forehead. Her voice quavered. “Uh… Honey, I’m so happy you’re home.”

He sighed, rubbing the temple of his forehead with his free hand. “Oh no. No. That’s bullshit.” He moved around her in a slow circle, the gun tracing lazy patterns in the air as if he were a conductor marking time. “You would never talk to me like that. Never. It’s been you and two kids for over a week. What do you say?”

Ramona swallowed audibly. “What do you want me to say?”

“You know what I want you to say! That’s why I picked you.” His words were clean, clipped, each one hammered flat. She sobbed harder, the sound small and animal. He sighed, a sound close to disappointment, then let the gun rise and tap the metal cold to her temple. “Last chance.”

Her gasp was sharp. “Oh God—”

“Honey, I’m home,’” he prompted once, the voice low, making the phrase sound both ridiculous and absolutely demanded.

She screamed then, the word jagged and hateful. “Fucking son of a bitch! Why are you doing this to me? I would never treat you this way! I would never treat anyone this way!”

“Thank you.” He sounded almost grateful. “Thank you. Now we’re finally getting somewhere.” He crouched so he was level with her, and the grin he allowed himself then was small and private, like the reward at the bottom of a long day. “So — honey — I have to tell you something. I have to tell you the truth. I’m not the man you fell in love with. I never was.”

His thumb stroked the gun’s barrel, an idly affectionate movement, as if it were a pet he’d taught to sit. “I thought I could keep it a secret,” he said, voice raw in a way that was meant to sound humble. He tapped his temple with the butt of the gun in a ridiculous pantomime of broken wiring. “But my brain… there’s something wrong with me.”

She sobbed into the ties, knuckles white around the rope, eyes huge and frantic. “What’s wrong with you?” she asked, voice small as the last light in a room about to die.

He smiled at her confusion, his face softening into an expression he’d practiced in a thousand lies. “I’ve hurt people,” he told her plainly. “I’ve killed people. I’ve tortured them.” He paused, letting her knuckles whiten some more. “And I liked it.”

The confession landed like a stone. She convulsed, a sound that might have been a laugh or might have been a part of her breaking. “Oh God. Oh God.” Her sobs were thin, frightened wails. He watched them as if he were watching someone read a passage from a book he had already memorised.

“The cops,” he went on, placid now, “the FBI — they’re onto me. They don’t know who I am, but they know what I’ve done, and they’re hunting me.” He spread his hands a little like an actor delivering a rueful aside. “But I think I can change. I really, really think I can. But only if I have you and the girls.”

Her breath hitched. “Would you hurt my babies?” The question came out hollow, the kind of small, frantic thing someone asks when they hope the answer will be reasonable and the world will put itself back together.

He barked a laugh that snapped like a dry twig. “Babies?” He hesitated, for a fraction of a second — the first flicker of something like truth — and then smoothed it over. “I don’t — I don’t know. I don’t want to.” The sentence was both unsteady and absolute. He wanted it to sound repentant. He wanted her to see that he hungered for a second chance the way other men might hunger for a drink.

She clawed at his shirt with damp, desperate hands. “Do you remember in the delivery room? I was so scared—” Her words tumbled rough.

He let her memory land like a soft, private proof. “I sang to you,” he said, leaning in close enough that she could see the small vein at his temple stand out. “Yes. You did. You got me through it.”

She stared back at him, searching his face for the man who had sung, for a sign of the husband she might have known. “So if you mean it, if you really want to change, then… yes. I’ll stay.”

The answer loosened something in him, and for an instant — an absolute, vulnerable breath — he felt recognised. She would stay. The image of his family shored up. He could taste it like sugar. “You wouldn’t leave me?” he asked, almost pleading, which was a lie he was comfortable telling because it had a ring of truth: he would not let them leave him.

“I’m not saying no strings attached,” she rushed on, the words spilling now in a cadence that suggested rehearsal and the danger of something that had not been practiced enough. “If you want me to trust you again… you’ll have to earn it. You and I both know I’m your better half.”

He spun her slowly in the chair to face him so he could see her eyes clearly, to catalogue the panic, the flash of pleading. The motion — casual, controlling — brought something into his peripheral vision that stopped him cold.

For a split second, he didn’t see Ramona or even Sydney.

It was Helena.

The jolt in his chest was so violent he nearly staggered back. His breath caught, and his pulse slammed against his ribs, wild and uneven. His grip tightened reflexively on Ramona’s chair until his knuckles cracked, the veins on the back of his hand standing out like cords.

And suddenly, Voit’s chest tightened.

He imagined her in this chair — not a victim, not trembling, but glaring at him with the same fire he’d first noticed in her. Her defiance burned hotter than the gun in his hand. She wouldn’t plead. She wouldn’t cry. She’d dare him. That was what fascinated him. Everyone else collapsed into tears or bargains. She wouldn’t. She’d fight. And that made him want to break her all the more.

His thoughts twisted as he stared at Ramona, but saw Helena. She understands.

A shiver rattled down his spine, hot and cold at once, and his teeth clenched until his jaw ached. His breath came ragged, and he had to look away for a moment, dragging the barrel of the gun down, grounding himself.

His hand trembled slightly as he raised the gun again, not from weakness but from the sudden rush of want — the need to test her, to see if she could survive him, if she could meet the darkness and not flinch.

And when her face lingered in his vision, superimposed over the sobbing real estate agent, it brought him a dizzying blend of rage and recognition. He wanted to break her just to prove he could. He wanted her beside him, just to prove she belonged.

“Just like her,” he muttered, though not to Ramona. His pulse pounded, heat rising in his throat. “You’re just like her.”

The others — Sydney, Ramona, his victims — none of them ever really saw him. They saw what he wanted them to see. But Helena? He could feel it, the way she looked at him like she knew every corner of the dark he came from. Like she’d read the same rulebook written in fists and fear, the one Cyrus had beaten into him.

She was born of it, just as he was.

Helena Bishop.

She wasn’t his prey. She was his reflection.

The thought set his teeth on edge and steadied him all at once, a reminder that somewhere out there was someone who might finally understand what it meant to be made into a monster.

And he wondered — was she chasing him, or was she running with him, whether she admitted it yet or not?

The oven timer buzzed, sharp in the cozy stillness of Doug’s apartment. Helena tugged on an oven mitt, sliding the tray out onto the counter. Steam curled upward, carrying a smell that was… difficult to place.

Doug leaned against the kitchen island, sleeves rolled up, watching her with a crooked brow. “What… exactly am I looking at?”

Helena set the tray down with a small flourish. “They’re supposed to be taquitos.” She plucked one up, squinting at its uneven shape. “But they kind of look like cannolis.”

She took a cautious bite, chewing slowly. Her expression twisted. “Okay… correction. They taste like egg rolls.”

Doug laughed, the sound warm and unguarded, filling the kitchen more easily than the oven’s steam. “Well, in that case…” He tapped the fridge with a knuckle. “The takeout menu’s right there.”

She rolled her eyes, smirking. “You’re not even going to try one?”

“Not if I want to live,” he teased, and before she could swat him, he stepped forward, slipping an arm around her waist. His mouth found hers, hungry and unhesitating.

The taste of him erased the sharp salt of disappointment from her failed attempt at dinner. His kiss was grounding, yet electrifying, pulling her closer until her back brushed against the counter. In one smooth motion, he lifted her, setting her on the edge, the cool granite against her legs as he pressed in. She deepened the kiss, hands curling at his shoulders, pulling him closer still.

Then his phone buzzed. Once. Twice. Relentless.

Doug pulled back, breath unsteady, looking pained as he checked the screen. “It’s the Director,” he muttered, voice already sobering. He brushed his thumb along her cheek in apology before slipping into the living room to take the call.

Helena exhaled, sliding off the counter with a small thump. Her lips still tingled, but her pulse slowly settled. She reached for the takeout menu, shaking her head at herself, and began tidying absentmindedly — folding the dishtowel, stacking plates, gathering the jacket Doug had tossed carelessly over the back of a chair.

When she lifted it, something slipped from the inner pocket and hit the floor with a soft thud.

A small box.

Her breath caught. She crouched, fingers closing around it before she could stop herself. The velvet brushed against her skin like a live wire.

No.

She shouldn’t. She knew she shouldn’t. But her hand opened anyway, the hinge creaking like a secret spilling itself.

Inside, nestled in white satin, was a ring.

Not just any ring. An engagement ring.

Helena’s stomach lurched. The kitchen seemed to tilt, the fluorescent lights suddenly too sharp. A rush of nausea clawed up her throat as her heart thrashed. The sight of it — that small, glittering circle of permanence — turned her inside out.

Her father’s words echoed unbidden: “I love you, we’re the same.” Always after blood. Always after pain.

Her chest ached with something tangled — fear, guilt, longing. All her life, permanence had meant control, violence, betrayal. A father who said “I love you” only after leaving blood. A mother who drowned her truths in wine. Love wasn’t supposed to last. Love was a knife with a smile.

And yet, Doug.

The way he touched her — gentle, reverent. The way he steadied her when her darkness rose too high. The way he looked at her as if she wasn’t her father’s daughter, as if she was simply… Helena.

She closed her eyes, pressing her fists against the counter until her knuckles whitened, whispering to the silence:

I want it.

Her throat ached with the admission. She wanted the ring. The life it promised. The future it carried.

But the next breath came jagged, breaking the moment.

I don’t deserve it.

The thought was a cruel truth she couldn’t shake. She was her father’s daughter. She carried his rage, his violence. She carried every scar and memory of the bodies he left behind.

She thought of the darkness that haunted her dreams, how it always beckoned like a tide. A complete, endless black that consumed, enveloped, promised silence. But silence never came—her father’s victims screamed through it, their voices jagged in her skull.

Now Sicarius’s victims joined them. Robert Sesper choking as spiders swarmed down his throat, clawing at a death stretched over days. Alison Green, her terror radiating across years, a ghost Helena couldn’t soothe.

Still — for just a heartbeat — she let herself imagine it: slipping the ring on her finger, Doug’s face alight with relief, a home not haunted by ghosts.

She swallowed hard, snapping the box shut. For a second, her hands shook. She shoved the box back into the jacket pocket, her breath unsteady.

Doug returned then, his voice still clipped from the call, but softening as his eyes landed on her. “Hey,” he said gently, “you okay? You look… a little pale.”

Helena forced her shoulders back, nodding quickly. “Yeah. Just—tired. Long day.” She glanced down at the crumpled menu in her hand and thrust it up like a shield. “So… Thai?”

He studied her a moment longer, searching, then nodded, a smile tugging faintly at his mouth. “Thai sounds perfect.”

But even as he reached for her hand, she couldn’t stop the flicker of panic still coiled tight in her chest — as if the ring had opened a door inside her she wasn’t sure she could ever step into. A future she wasn’t sure she deserved.

But deep down she knew the truth.

She wanted it more than anything.

And that terrified her most of all.

The illusion broke as suddenly as it had come. Helena’s face dissolved into Ramona’s again — wet cheeks, trembling lips, desperate eyes. The disappointment was sharp, almost nauseating. Voit clenched his jaw, teeth grinding as he shoved the phantom image away. He hated how fleeting it had been, how easily reality stole her from him.

Ramona whimpered something — a plea, he couldn’t even hear the words. They sounded thin, pathetic. He snapped his head toward her, voice like a whip.

“Shut up. Don’t waste my time with that.”

She flinched, choking back a sob, and Voit drew a long breath through his nose, recalibrating. He had to be careful — no chaos, no slips. Order. Control. Rules. Cyrus’s voice echoed in his head: Don’t let them see you unravel.

Voit steadied himself, gun tapping against his thigh as he paced in front of her. Then, softly, almost conversational:

“I’m gonna tell you how this works.”

Ramona froze.

“I put an app on your phone,” he said, holding it up between two fingers, admiring the glowing screen like it was a trophy. “So they can’t trace this call. Now… if you really want to, you can make this difficult. You can describe me. You can tell them everything you know.”

Her head shook furiously. “I won’t do that.”

“I know.” His smile was thin, almost tender. “I know you won’t. Because the bottom line is this…”

He crouched so they were eye level, voice low and intimate.

“No matter what happens, it isn’t you who should be afraid. It’s your husband, Gerald. It’s Andrew. It’s Arianna. Because if it’s not me, it’ll be someone else who comes to hurt them. Do you understand?”

Ramona’s chest heaved. She whispered: “I understand.”

Voit’s thumb tapped the call button. He pressed the phone into her shaking hand. “Then prove it.”

The line clicked alive.

“Ramona?” Gerald’s voice cracked on the other end, a mixture of relief and fear. “W… what’s going on? Me and the kids are so worried.”

Ramona squeezed her eyes shut. Her lips trembled. “I’m fine, honey. Just calm down.”

“Tell me where you are,” Gerald begged. “I’ll let the police know and they’ll come and get you.”

Voit’s eyes narrowed. His hand rested lightly on the back of Ramona’s chair, fingers flexing. She could feel the weight of him there, the threat.

“No, Gerald,” she said quickly. “You have to call the police back. Tell them I’m not in any danger.”

On the other end of the line, Gerald faltered. “Okay, this doesn’t make any sense, ’Mona. You… you don’t even sound like yourself.”

Ramona forced steadiness into her voice. “It’s me. I’m safe. How are Andy and Ari?”

“They’re worried. Like me. Please—just tell me what’s going on.”

Tears slid hot down Ramona’s face. She looked at Voit, and he raised a finger, his eyes cold, commanding.

“I just needed a break,” she whispered.

Gerald’s breath caught. “A… a break? From… from what?”

“From our marriage.”

Voit watched her deliver the line like a director admiring an actor finally hitting the right note. His chest swelled — not with pride, but with satisfaction. She was following his script, keeping his illusion intact.

Gerald’s voice cracked again. “Okay. But… but for how long?”

Voit’s finger hovered, steady. He lifted one.

“One more day,” Ramona said, nearly choking on it. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? You promise?”

“Yes.”

“Trust me.”

The line clicked dead.

Silence wrapped the room. Voit plucked the phone from her limp hand, his thumb brushing the screen. Then, with a tilted head, he studied her face.

“Tell me something,” he said softly. “Honestly. Would you give your life in exchange for your husband’s?”

Ramona’s head jerked side to side, instinctive. “No.”

“But for your children?” His voice hardened.

Her eyes lifted, wide, unblinking, tears clinging to her lashes. “Without a doubt.”

Voit’s lips curved into something between a smile and a snarl. His thoughts thrummed with electric heat. There it is. The truth. The currency. The sacrifice.

He leaned closer, his breath warm against her temple.

“I guess,” he whispered, “we shall see.”

And as he stepped back, the shadow of Helena flickered again in his mind — a child once willing to kill her own father to survive. The parallel wasn’t lost on him. It left a shiver of excitement crawling through his veins.

Now there was nothing left to do apart from tie up loose ends and hand Ramona over to one his loyal followers – Arthur Kiel.

The roundtable room was dim except for the glow of the monitor as Garcia clicked the remote. Her bright clothes and jittery energy were at sharp odds with the grim images on the screen. Indio PD had been in touch with a kidnapping that matched Sicarius’s MO.

“Ramona Havener,” Garcia said, her voice tighter than usual. “Real estate agent, Indio, California. Office located on—wait for it—Second Street.”

The photo of a smiling woman filled the screen, her realtor’s headshot sharp and polished, an image meant to inspire trust.

“She told her assistant she was meeting a man named Lee for a private walk-through at a condo. She hasn’t been seen since.”

Luke leaned forward, tension settling in his jaw. “Mother of two. Second Street. She fits Sicarius’ victimology to a T.”

Rossi’s brow furrowed as he scribbled into his ever-present notebook. “And Indio was one of the sites where a kill kit went missing. If that was meant for one of Sicarius’ disciples, maybe he decided to claim it for himself.”

Prentiss exhaled, looking from the screen to Doug. “There’s just one problem,” she said, her tone heavy. “This case is officially closed.”

The silence in the room sharpened like a blade. Every eye turned to Doug.

“Your call,” Prentiss pressed.

Doug straightened, shoulders set though Helena noticed the flicker of weight in his eyes. He sighed, long and resigned, then said, “Prentiss and I will run interference with the Attorney General. Buy us time, if we can.”

Prentiss nodded, already thinking ahead. “JJ, stay behind. Lewis, Alvez, Rossi, Bishop—wheels up. We’ve got no time to waste.”

Chairs scraped against the floor as the team moved into action. Helena swung her go-bag over her shoulder, her pulse already quickening with the shift into mission mode. But as she passed Doug, his hand brushed hers, barely a whisper of touch—fleeting, secretive.

“Stay safe,” he murmured, so low only she could hear.

Her chest tightened. She let her fingers curl against his briefly, just enough to press her answer into his palm. “I will,” she whispered back, and gave the faintest squeeze before pulling away.

The look in his eyes lingered with her even as she followed Rossi and Luke out of the room, the unspoken connection threading through the chaos to come.

By the time the BAU touched down in Indio the local PD had already waved the case off as a domestic dispute after Ramona’s husband, Gerald, downplayed that frantic call to the desk; the sheriff’s office closed the file and put the neighbourhood to bed. The team didn’t. Tara and Luke swept the scene even while techs cursed at a signal jammer that had blacked out the street cameras; Rossi and Helena pushed Gerald until a chance incident where he blanked his mother in law’s phone call snapped into place a missing piece of the puzzle — Sicarius had been blanking a call from his wife in the hardware store in Chattanooga. JJ and Prentiss investigated the two remaining missing kill kits and chased every breadcrumb on the dark boards; one handle lit up the room like a match: ‘Forget Me Knots’ — an incel leading unsub who talked openly about his deep compulsion to squeeze the life out of any woman. The alias narrowed to Arthur Kiel. That’s where it ended and began again: Helena and Luke on foot, the hunt turning physical.

They ran like there was nothing else in the world but the man in front of them. The neighbourhood blurred into blocks of bricks and dry lawns; sprinklers hissed and a dog barked in the distance as they cut down a side street. Helena ran hard, boots hammering against the sidewalk in a rhythm that reverberated up her legs. Each impact sent a dull ache through her calves, but she forced her muscles to push harder, stretching for every inch of speed.

“Split,” Luke breathed a half-second before he peeled left; Helena went right, tracking the shape of him like a shadow that might tear open. Arthur sprinted for a low backyard wall and vaulted it with the clumsy grace of a man who hadn’t trained for an arrest — only for escape. Helena hit the fence on his heels, hands scraping splinters as she hauled herself up and over. She landed and rolled, gun up as she pivoted on her feet, the street a strobe of houses and hedges and the thin blue line of the sky.

Sweat rolled down her temple, stinging her eyes. Her chest ached with the pull of air, muscles screaming for reprieve, but she only leaned forward harder, chasing the swing of his elbows, the frantic jerk of his shoulders as he ran.

Rossi’s sedan materialised at the corner like a steel barricade, easing forward to box Arthur in against a mailbox and a parked SUV.

“Arthur!” Helena barked, voice clean, trained. “Drop the gun.”

Arthur whipped around, his hand trembling as he raised the pistol he’d been clutching. Sweat dripped from his brow into his eyes, his chest heaving, pupils blown wide with panic.

Helena planted her feet, weapon up, her scarred palm pressed hard against the grip. “We can get you help. Sicarius wants you to kill yourself — don’t be his puppet. You’re smarter than that.” Her words were a lifeline thrown at a man hurtling toward a cliff. She meant them. She wanted to believe they would work.

Arthur’s breath hitched, his gun wavering. His eyes flicked from her to Rossi, back to her. For a suspended heartbeat he hesitated. The gun wavered. She saw the calculation flip across his features — fear, the memory of promises made to anonymous men on dark forums, the weight of what he thought ending would deliver. He looked up at her like a drowning man begging for a hand. His hand trembled lower—just enough for hope to spark.

“That’s it,” Helena said, her voice softening, threading calm through command. “Drop the gun.”

Arthur’s lip quivered. His shoulders sagged. For a second, it looked like he would let go.

Then his fingers tightened.

His arm rose.

The gun levelled at her chest.

Time fractured.

Helena’s instincts took over. Her finger tightened on the trigger, recoil slamming back into her palms. The report of the gunshot cracked like thunder, echoing down the neighbourhood block.

Arthur jerked violently as the round tore into him. His eyes went wide, mouth open in a silent shock. The pistol slipped from his hand, clattering onto the pavement.

He staggered back, then collapsed hard onto the asphalt, blood blooming dark and fast beneath him.

Helena kept her weapon trained, breath harsh in her ears, but as Arthur’s body hit the ground, the image distorted.

It wasn’t Arthur lying there anymore.

It was her father, his chest heaving, eyes glassy, mouth opening to say something she couldn’t hear.

Then the face shifted again—blurred, warped, an outline she didn’t recognise but felt. Sicarius. Her mind conjured a shadowed figure, bleeding out in front of her, blood bubbling at his lips.

Helena’s breath hitched. For the briefest, terrifying moment, she felt a wave of satisfaction roll through her chest.

She blinked hard, and it was Arthur again. Lifeless.

Her arms trembled as she lowered her Glock, the echo of the shot still ringing in her bones.

Rossi was out of the car now, moving carefully toward her. But Helena couldn’t take her eyes off Arthur’s body—off the phantom images still flickering in her mind.

“Helena, you okay?”

She realised she wasn’t. The world bent and heaviness poured into her limbs like concrete. Arthur lay dead and the siren’s scream was still a distance away and for that sliver of time she could not tell who she had just stopped — a recruit, a patsy, a man steeped in someone else’s evil, or a mirror of the darkness she feared lived in her. The answer refused to come.

Helena felt everything around her recede into a tunnel of noise. She knew, with the cold, steady certainty that had never failed her in the field, that she had done what had to be done. She had stopped him. She had no choice. But another truth unfurled next to it like a shadow: the face in the gutter had already become an accusation in her head, a question she could not answer.

Why when she pictured Sicarius, did it feel like something inside her had enjoyed killing him?

And what did that make her now?

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Fourteen

“Know Yourself, Know Your Enemy”

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people” - Carl Jung

Helena woke with a jolt, her hand shooting out to the cold space beside her. For a heartbeat her chest squeezed tight, panic clawing up her throat. He left. He’s gone.

Her eyes darted across the unfamiliar shadows of Doug’s bedroom until she spotted movement from the half-open door. The faint sound of humming drifted in, followed by the sizzle of something on a pan.

Relief hit so hard it almost hurt. She grabbed the first thing at hand — one of his crisp button-down shirts from the floor — and slipped it over her, the fabric smelling faintly of him, sandalwood and vanilla. Barefoot, she padded out to the kitchen.

Doug stood at the stove, sleeves rolled up, spatula in one hand, softly singing along to some old rock song playing from his phone. His voice was low, warm, unguarded — so unlike the Doug Bailey everyone knew at Quantico.

She couldn’t help it; she laughed. The sound made him whip around, startled, spatula half-raised like a weapon. When he saw her — messy hair, swallowed by his shirt — his whole face broke into a smile.

“You’re not out running?” he teased. “I thought by now you’d have clocked six miles.”

“Not today.” Helena hopped up onto the counter, legs dangling, watching him with an expression that softened her sharp edges. She looped her arms around his neck when he came closer, pulling him between her knees. “That was the best I’ve slept in years.”

Doug’s hands slid instinctively to her waist, his thumb brushing bare skin beneath the shirt. The distance between them evaporated.

“It feels different.” she murmured, resting her forehead against his.

They kissed — slow at first, then deeper, hungrier, a collision of want and relief. The spatula clattered to the floor as Doug cupped the back of her head, kissing her like he was afraid she’d vanish if he stopped.

She broke away with a breathless laugh, nodding toward the stove. “The bacon’s burning.”

He glanced over, smoke curling from the pan, then back at her — eyes dark, jaw tight with something primal.

“Fuck the bacon,” he said, voice rough as he reached over to turn off the stove. In one swift motion he lifted her off the counter, her legs wrapping around his waist.

She gasped, then buried her face against his neck as he carried her back toward the bedroom, both of them laughing and kissing like they were twenty years younger, like the world wasn’t waiting just outside the door.

For once, Helena let herself be carried.

Doug nudged the door open with his shoulder, Helena clinging to him, still kissing, her laughter breaking against his mouth. He set her down on the bed, the mattress dipping under her weight, but his hands never left her. They slid up her thighs, under the hem of his shirt, tracing the bare skin like he was memorising her.

She tugged him down with her, their mouths colliding again, this time desperate, open, tasting. The kiss turned messy in the best way — teeth catching, tongues sliding, a rhythm they found instinctively.

Her hands fisted in his hair, pulling him closer as his lips left hers and trailed along her jaw, down the line of her throat. Every kiss he left behind was equal parts devotion and hunger, and it made her arch into him.

Doug murmured against her skin, voice raw, almost breaking, “God, Helena…” His words caught as if he couldn’t decide whether to worship her or devour her.

She hooked her legs around his waist, pulling him down, grounding herself in the solid weight of him, the reality of his body. Her breath hitched when his hands slid beneath the shirt completely, pushing it higher, revealing more of her to him piece by piece.

The world beyond the four walls didn’t exist anymore — not Sicarius, not her father’s ghost, not the darkness that chased her every night. It was just his touch, his warmth, the sound of his breath hitching as she touched him back, sliding her hands over his chest, down his sides.

“Helena,” Doug whispered again, pulling back just enough to look at her. His eyes were blown wide, every guard stripped away. “You’re all I think about.”

Her heart clenched — not in panic this time, but in something dangerously close to hope. She answered him the only way she knew how: by pulling him down again, kissing him until there was nothing left to say.

Clothes gave way to skin, the shirt slipping from her shoulders as he kissed across her collarbone, down her chest. Their movements were frantic, needy, the kind of urgency that came from days and weeks of holding back, from knowing that every stolen second could be the last.

When he finally moved against her, it was slow at first, tender, almost reverent. But the tension broke fast, giving way to something hotter, faster, each of them chasing release like they’d been starving for it. She clung to him, nails digging into his back, gasping his name like it was both a plea and a promise.

And when it was over, when their bodies stilled and they were both trembling from the intensity, he pulled the blanket up over them, gathering her against his chest.

Helena let her eyes close, letting his heartbeat lull her. For once, she didn’t think about running — not from him, not from the way this felt. She just let herself belong there, in his arms.

As Doug’s breathing evened beside her, Helena lay wide awake, her cheek pressed to his chest. His arms were still wrapped around her, warm and steady, like he had no intention of letting her go.

She stared into the dim light of the room, every nerve still alive with the memory of his touch, his words. You’re all I think about.

It terrified her — not in the way her father’s shadow terrified her, not like Sicarius or the cases that kept her awake at night. This was different. This was a fear that came from how good it felt, how right. From the realisation that if she let herself fall any further, she wouldn’t know how to stop.

And yet… she didn’t want to stop.

For the first time in years, maybe ever, the idea of being vulnerable didn’t feel like weakness. It felt like possibility. Like colour seeping into the black-and-white world she’d forced herself to live in.

The morning light was harsher in the Voit household. Elias sat at the edge of the couch, elbows on his knees, hands clasped so tight his knuckles blanched. Sydney stood by the kitchen counter with her arms folded, watching him like she’d already lost her patience but was still waiting for him to prove her wrong.

“So I’ve come up with a plan,” Voit said, his voice low, practiced. He couldn’t look at her too long. “I just need to take off for a few days. Clear my head. When I come back, I’ll be the husband you deserve.”

Sydney’s laugh was sharp. “That’s always your solution, Elias. Run away. But don’t you dare put this on me. The husband I need is the father our children deserve. So before you go off on your little walkabout, you’re going to explain yourself to them.”

The words stung more than he let show. He hated how she could reduce him to a coward with one sentence. He hated more that she was right.

When Harlow and Holly came down the stairs, still rumpled with sleep, Voit felt his chest tighten. Their faces lit up when they saw him, and for a second he thought about what it would be like to live in that light forever, to just be this man — their dad, steady and safe.

“Is this our fault?” Harlow sobbed, as Voit broke the news to them that he was leaving.

“No, no, no, no…,” he tried to reassure them, forcing a smile. His throat felt tight, like he was speaking through a chokehold. “I just need some time to go figure some things out.”

Voit crouched down, brushing a stray strand of hair from her face. “But when I get back, everything will be just like it used to be. Okay? Until then I need you both to look after your mom.” He forced himself to sound warm, reassuring, even as a part of him recoiled from the lie.

Inside, his thoughts were darker. They can’t find out. Not the girls, not Sydney, not the FBI. Nobody. If I can just get a few days, I can salvage this. I can fix everything. I have to.

He hugged them both tightly, inhaling the scent of their shampoo, the small sounds of their breathing. For a split second, he almost let himself believe this was real — that he was just a dad, saying goodbye before a business trip.

But when he stood, his stomach twisted with dread. Because he knew the truth: he wasn’t leaving to come back better. He was leaving to make sure the mask stayed on.

And God help him if it ever slipped.

The tech room hummed with low mechanical noise and the steady rhythm of Garcia’s fingers flying over the keyboard. Rossi hovered just behind her, leaning forward with that restless intensity that meant he’d already been at this too long.

Helena slipped into the room quietly, a file tucked under her arm. She hadn’t planned on being noticed, but Garcia’s gaze flicked to her immediately. For a second the tech’s bright expression softened.

“Magnify,” Rossi said, curt but controlled.

Garcia’s nails clicked against the keys. “Dave, that’s not how pixels work.”

“More,” he insisted.

She rolled her eyes but did it anyway. The grainy still from the CCTV feed grew bigger, though no clearer. A man in a ball cap, head dipped low, the tip of the cap shadowing the figure’s face.

“There. Congratulations. A blurrier blur,” Garcia said, folding her arms.

“Look I’m sorry we have to do this. I know you didn’t get any sleep last night,” Rossi grunted..

Garcia frowned. “That is…..how do you know that?”

“You drink a third cup of tea when you’re had a bad night’s sleep” he replied, finally looking away from her screen. “Work stress?”

“Yes,” Garcia said quickly, brightly—too brightly. Helena caught the speed of it, the little deflection, and tilted her head. Garcia smirked, then pivoted, eyes landing squarely on Helena instead. “And you,” she said, mock-scandalised, “are still in the same clothes as yesterday. Oh please tell me you made up with Mr Double Boss?”

Heat rose instantly in Helena’s face. She opened her mouth, found nothing to say, then muttered, “I uh…I overslept this morning .”

Garcia’s grin turned sly. “Mhm. Overslept.”

Garcia smirked, but Rossi didn’t press. He gestured toward the screen. “C’mon guys, focus. Sicarius is right there, and we still can’t identify him.”

Helena stepped closer, focusing on the still. The man had already paid, yet his hand slid toward his back pocket.

“He’s not reaching for a wallet,” Rossi said slowly. “He’s done it twice now.”

Helena leaned in, her brows knitting. “So what the hell is he reaching for?”

The room fell quiet, each of them staring at the frozen image, chasing answers in a shadowed outline—three minds trying to crack the intent of a ghost.

Indio, CA

The street was quiet, the kind of quiet Voit had learned to love—where a man could hide in plain sight if he just stood still long enough. From the shadows of the alley, he watched Ramona slip the keys from her handbag, her heels clicking against the pavement as she stepped into her office. Her hair gleamed under the winter sun, bright and ordinary. Perfectly ordinary.

He reached for his phone and dialled the number he knew by heart.

“Good day. This is Ramona.”

His voice shifted into the one he kept for people like her—warm, easy. “Hey, Ramona. It’s Lee.”

A soft lift in her tone. “Hey there, Lee. I missed you at the open house on Bexel.”

“Yeah, that’s actually what I was calling about. I was hoping you might have some time for a… a walk-through this afternoon, maybe?”

“You’re in luck,” she said, flipping through her calendar, the scratch of her pen faint through the receiver. “I am free. What time were you thinking?”

“Whatever works for you.”

“Uh, okay. Let’s say 2.30?”

“Perfect.” His smile stretched though she couldn’t see it. “I really appreciate it.”

“No problem. I’ll see you there.”

“Yeah. See you there.”

He hung up.

For a moment, Voit stayed frozen, listening to his own breath in the dark. An hour. That was all the time he needed.

He pictured Sydney’s face—tight with doubt, lips pressed into that line she wore when she thought he was lying. He pictured the girls, their voices rising like needles in his skull. And then he pictured Ramona. A stranger. A vessel.

This was the woman who was going to save his marriage. Not because she was special, but because she was expendable. Because in the careful staging of his life—the mask of husband, father, provider—someone had to carry the weight of his rage, his hunger, his rules. Ramona was perfect for that role.

She would buy him time. Time to convince Sydney he was still the man she married. Time to preserve the illusion that he could be normal.

Normal. The word tasted almost sweet. Almost.

Voit slipped deeper into the shadows, already rehearsing the smile he’d wear when Ramona opened that door.

The conference room was unusually quiet for the BAU, the hum of the overhead lights loud in the silence between voices. Prentiss brought up the photos and files on the screen, her tone clipped, professional, but Helena could see the tension in her jaw as she spoke.

“Captain Ballard of the North Carolina Bureau has been in touch. They’ve been looking at a Cyrus LeBrun. Died last week—apparent kidney failure. Lived out in the woods by himself near Falls Lake. Body wasn’t actually found until he missed a couple of doctor’s appointments. Anyway, when the sheriff got out there, he said the place gave him the creeps, so he called in the local bureau. CSU say the living room lit up like the Fourth of July.”

Rossi leaned forward, fingers steepled. “DNA?”

Prentiss nodded grimly. “They ID’d at least four victims. One of them Maria Jones. The victim in the Sylvio Herrera case.”

Luke blew out a low whistle. “Is this Sicarius?”

Tara shook her head, cautious. “I guess, but… the victimology doesn’t match.”

JJ picked up where she left off. “Yeah, his male victims are older, affluent. His female victims younger, disenfranchised. Two very different sets of targets.”

“Okay,” Rossi said slowly, “so he’s exerting dominance by killing powerful men, and then satisfying some kind of sexual sadism with the women.”

Helena sat back, arms crossed, her voice sharper than intended. “Neither of which speaks to our profile of Sicarius.”

Prentiss met her eyes. “It doesn’t. But Maria Jones is what ties the two together.”

Tara nodded. “Yeah, it’s not a coincidence. There has to be some relationship there.”

The door burst open and Garcia swept in, all colour and kinetic energy, a file clutched to her chest. “Oh, my dark little darlings, you are not going to believe what I dug up. Mr. LeBrun kept his life tight to his creepy vest, but there are always moments the internet preserves.” She flicked her tablet toward the monitor, pulling up a grainy scanned document. “Family court, Philadelphia, circa 1994. Cyrus took custody of his nephew, Lee Duval, after the child’s parents were killed in an apartment fire. On—get this—Second Street.”

Luke sat forward. “Lee. Isn’t that the alias Sicarius used with Alison Green?”

JJ’s eyes narrowed. “It is.”

A strange stillness passed over Helena. Her throat tightened as she spoke softly. “That’s… that’s strange, isn’t it?”

JJ looked at her. “What?”

“Given everything we know about Cyrus LeBrun, he doesn’t seem like the kind of man who’d want responsibility for a child. Much less his sister’s kid. Um…” Helena forced herself to look back to Garcia. “Is this all you could find?”

Garcia was already typing furiously, eyes scanning like a machine. “One second my lovely. While I dive into Child Protective Services records. Okay, apparently Lee Duval goes to live with Uncle Creepy in Falls Lake, and then according to the state, he was home-schooled.”

Rossi muttered, “So Cyrus got a state stipend to raise his nephew.”

“Until he was eighteen,” Garcia added.

Rossi frowned. “And then what?”

Garcia looked up, eyes somber. “There’s no record of Lee Duval after his eighteenth birthday. None. As far as the state’s concerned, this kid fell off the face of the planet.”

Luke leaned back in his chair. “How do we know he’s not one of Cyrus’s victims?”

Helena’s voice cut in before she could stop herself, too fast, too sure. “He could’ve been. But do you know how his parents died in that fire? Take a look at the marshal’s report.”

Luke skimmed it aloud. “‘Portable electric heating unit in child’s bedroom compromised.’ Investigators concluded accidental wear-and-tear.”

Helena pressed on, her pulse drumming in her ears. “Okay, but—‘the six-year-old survivor was initially thought to have perished in the blaze and was later recovered at a nearby park.’”

The words landed with a thud. Silence stretched.

She felt their eyes shift toward her but she didn’t stop, couldn’t stop. “I know I’m saying this without much to go on, but it would explain Cyrus’s bond with his nephew if…” Her voice faltered, barely above a whisper. “If he knew the boy killed his own parents.”

The weight of her own words crashed over her like a tidal wave.

Killed his own parents.

The idea hung there, thick as smoke.

And inside, Helena couldn’t breathe.

Her mind reeled with the parallel. Her father, smiling in the doorway with blood on his hands. The knife in her grip the night she stabbed him. The moment she’d wondered if she was capable of becoming like him. If violence was her inheritance.

Now, the same darkness whispered through this “Lee.” Another child. Another legacy of blood.

Her chest ached. Her stomach turned. What if Sicarius killed his own parents? What if that’s the line that binds us?

The thought gnawed at her, sinking teeth into the marrow of who she was. The uncanny reflection made her skin crawl. She stared down at the table, afraid they’d all see what she was thinking, afraid that one day they might look at her and see the same darkness staring back.

The house Ramona showed him was clean and forgettable—staged to look lived in but hollow at the edges, like a smile that never reached the eyes. As she walked him through the kitchen, pointing out the granite countertops and “modern appliances,” Voit barely heard her. He was focused on the cadence of her voice, the soft lilt that reminded him of Sydney when she still believed in him, when she still thought he could be the man he pretended to be.

Ramona turned to him with her professional smile, tablet in hand. “So, Lee, did a client refer you?”

“No,” Voit said, careful to keep his voice light, conversational. “Actually, I saw an ad of yours online. You seemed like the right choice for me.”

Her smile brightened, oblivious. “Well, I guess it’s my lucky day then.”

If only she knew.

They moved into the living room. Sunlight filtered weakly through the blinds, striping her face in alternating bars of light and shadow. She looked soft in that light, kind. Normal.

“So you’re married?” she asked, conversational.

Voit nodded. “Mm-hmm. Two daughters. Here.” He slipped out his phone and showed her the lock screen—a picture of Sydney and the girls. Perfect props in his perfect little act.

“Aw, lovely,” she cooed.

“Do you have kids?”

“I do. A boy and a girl,” she said, warmth in her tone. “One is in the midst of adolescence agony.” She chuckled. “But that’s part of the deal, right?”

“Yeah,” Voit said, though his mind flickered elsewhere—Harlow and Holly’s wide eyes, Sydney’s disappointed sighs. His jaw flexed.

They kept walking. Ramona pointed out a small office space, then a guest room. He feigned interest, asked about square footage, about views. He even let his voice soften when he mentioned, “Honestly, I’m kind of hoping a change of scenery will be good for me and the family. But I don’t think this is the place. It feels a little small.”

She nodded, all business. “So you’re thinking another bedroom?”

“Yeah. And maybe, uh, a workspace. And—” He hesitated, as though shy about wanting something special. “I don’t know if this is even possible, but I know my wife would just love a view of the mountains.”

Ramona’s face lit up. “Okay, yes. I know exactly the place you’re looking for. It’s over on Wind Ridge. I can show it to you now.”

“Right now?”

“Absolutely,” she said, already tucking her tablet away.

“I, uh, took a ride share over here, so just give me the address—”

She shook her head firmly. “No, no. I’ll take you there. Seriously, that’s what I do.” She smiled brightly. “Come on. You’re going to love this one. I promise.”

He held the door open for her, the door that would lead her out to her car and eventually his bunker. “After you.”

Sydney was just like this, he thought. Blind. Hopeful. Trusting enough to follow me into the dark.

Ramona’s eyes fluttered open to darkness. The air was damp and close, smelling faintly of earth and iron. Her wrists ached where they were bound, her throat burned from the bitter chemical he’d injected into her.

Her first breath came ragged. “Please. I don’t have any money. I don’t have anything.”

Voit crouched in front of her, his shadow long against the bunker wall. “I disagree with that.” His voice was steady, even gentle, but his eyes glittered with a feverish intensity as he showed her a picture of her children. “You’d do anything to keep them safe, yeah?”

She began to sob, desperate. “Yes. Yes.”

He tilted his head. “Yeah. Of course you would. You’re just like her.”

Her voice broke. “Her? Who? I don’t understand.”

Voit leaned closer, his breath brushing her cheek. “I know this is really scary for you, but I need you to understand what I’m capable of. I’ve killed 61 people.”

She shook violently, the sound of her sobbing filling the cold air.

“Ramona. Hey.” He snapped his fingers sharply. “Pay attention. We haven’t even gotten to the important part yet.”

Her wide eyes locked on him. “You’re showing me your face.” Her breath hitched into a scream. “Oh God, I know what that means. You’re showing me your face. I don’t want to die.”

Voit sighed, almost pitying. “Nobody does. Nobody does.” He softened his tone, leaning back on his heels. “So you want a chance to live?”

“Yes.” She gasped between sobs. “Yes, I do.”

“Okay. Good.” He smiled faintly, calm as a preacher. “Then you need to help me.”

Her head jerked in confusion. “Help you?”

“I need you to help me save my marriage,” Voit said, voice low, steady, lethal. “And then I’ll spare your life.”

Helena hadn’t realised how late it had gotten until she heard Doug’s key in the door. She was perched at the edge of his couch, files spread like fallen leaves across the coffee table, her fork pushing lazily at a carton of noodles. When he walked in, suit jacket already off, tie half undone, he gave her that look — equal parts exasperated and tender.

“You turned my apartment into Quantico again,” he teased, dropping his briefcase by the door.

She gave him a sheepish smile. “I bribed myself with Chinese. Seemed fair.”

Doug loosened his tie the rest of the way and joined her, stealing a bite from her carton before settling into the couch beside her. His thigh brushed against hers, warm, steady, grounding.

“You regret it?” he asked after a quiet beat.

Helena blinked, confused. “Regret what?”

“Disclosing our relationship to the bureau. Telling me about your past,” he said softly. “About… your father. About you.” His voice was careful, almost reverent, like the question itself was fragile.

She set the carton down and shook her head. “No. I don’t regret it.” She let out a sigh. “I just… I can’t stop thinking about Sicarius.”

Doug tilted his head, watching her. She could see the flicker of worry in his eyes, but he didn’t interrupt.

“We found out today that Cyrus LeBrun — the guy in North Carolina — he took in his nephew. Lee. The kid’s parents died in a fire. And there’s this… possibility that he set it. That he killed them. Accidentally or not, I don’t know. But I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Doug frowned. “Helena, that doesn’t mean anything. A heating unit failed. That doesn’t make him a monster.”

She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, her hair falling in her face. “But don’t you see? He survived. He lived with a killer. He grew up under Cyrus. And now he’s Sicarius.” Her voice trembled despite her best effort to keep it steady. “I can’t help but notice the parallels. Him and me.”

Doug reached for her hand, threading his fingers through hers. His grip was firm, steady, pulling her back from the spiral she always threatened to tumble into.

“I grew up with a monster too, Doug.” Her voice was raw, stripped bare. “And every time I read something about Sicarius, it feels like I’m reading about myself in some other timeline. Like if I’d taken one wrong turn, I could’ve ended up just like him.”

Doug shook his head, squeezing her hand. “No. No, Helena. You’re not him. You never will be.”

She met his eyes, desperate. “The profile says Sicarius is a father. Which means… somewhere out there, there’s a little kid like me. Scared. Alone. Living in that shadow, not knowing what’s in the next room. Wondering if tonight’s the night everything shatters.” Her throat tightened. “And I can’t stop thinking… eventually, he’ll kill them. Just like my father would’ve killed me.”

Doug didn’t answer right away. Instead, he pulled her toward him, guiding her head against his chest. She resisted for half a second, then let herself collapse into him, breathing in the familiar scent of him — soap, coffee, paper, and something uniquely Doug. His hand stroked slow circles along her back, patient, steady.

“Helena,” he said finally, voice low, close to her ear. “You’re not defined by him. Not by your father, not by Sicarius. You’ve spent your whole life fighting to be the opposite. And you are. You’re the one who stops monsters, not becomes them.”

His words settled over her like a blanket, but they didn’t erase the ache. She tilted her head, looking up at him, her chest tightening at how fiercely he was watching her — as if he could anchor her to something solid by will alone.

“I don’t know how to stop it, Doug,” she admitted, her voice barely audible. “The way this case is inside me. It feels personal. Too personal. And it scares me.”

He brushed a strand of hair from her face, his thumb lingering at her temple. “Then let me carry some of it with you.” His gaze softened. “You don’t have to do this alone anymore.”

The vulnerability in his words broke something open in her. Without thinking, she leaned up and kissed him — not the frantic, desperate kind they’d shared before, but slow, searching, aching.

When they finally pulled back, breath mingling in the quiet, she rested her forehead against his. For the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt something loosen in her chest.

He drew her down with him onto the couch, tucking her against his chest as he pulled the blanket around them both. His fingers traced absent circles on her arm, his lips brushing her temple.

“You’re safe with me,” he whispered.

She didn’t know if Sicarius would kill his family. She didn’t know if another little girl was out there reliving her nightmare. But she knew she wasn’t alone tonight. And for now, that was enough.

She closed her eyes, her body curling into his warmth, her breath finally slowing. Somewhere between exhaustion and trust, she drifted off. Doug lay awake a little longer, his hand still stroking her hair, watching her as if she were something precious.

He kissed her forehead one last time, then whispered to the quiet room, words she didn’t hear:

“I’m not going anywhere.”

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Twelve

“Deny Thy Father”

"I think hell is something you carry around with you, not somewhere you go."

— Neil Gaiman

Helena paused in the doorway. Doug was standing by his desk, files spread in meticulous stacks, but his hands betrayed him. They trembled as he smoothed the papers, as if pressing down on them could keep the nerves from showing. His jaw was tight, his breath shallow, the kind of tension she only saw in people about to step into combat.

She stepped closer, soft enough that he startled when he finally looked up.

“You look like you’re about to be sick,” she said quietly.

Doug gave a short, humourless laugh, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “I’ve given presentations before. But not to the, uh, top law enforcement officer in this country, concerning the highest profile case the Bureau has right now, in which we need to convince her that, one, we deserve a second chance to catch Sicarius, and, two, we are not, in fact, poster children for FBI incompetence in both left and right wing media. Oh, my God. I…I’m gonna throw up.” He shook his head, pressing the palm of his hand to his chest.

Helena reached across the space between them and caught his hand before he could retreat. She laced her fingers with his, steady and deliberate, holding tight as if to anchor him in place.

Doug froze, then slowly turned back to face her. His eyes locked on hers, searching, almost afraid to hope.

For a moment, they didn’t speak. Just stood there, hand in hand, the silence loud with everything unsaid. She could feel the tremor in his palm, the warmth of his skin against hers. She could feel how much he needed this.

Her chest tightened. “You’re going to be fine,” she whispered. Her thumb brushed against his knuckles, firm, grounding. “I believe in you.”

The words seemed to sink into him, soften the hard lines of his face. His shoulders dropped a fraction, his breath unsteady but calmer.

Doug’s gaze didn’t leave hers. His eyes were glassy now, like he wanted to tell her something but couldn’t risk it. Instead, he gave her hand a small squeeze. “I know how much this case means to you,” he said softly. “To the team. But especially you. And I’m carrying that into that room too, Helena. You have to know that.”

Helena blinked at him, startled by the weight of his sincerity. Her heart kicked hard against her ribs. She wanted to look away, to retreat into sarcasm or distance, but she couldn’t. Not with his hand warm in hers, not with him staring at her like she was both his undoing and his anchor.

For a fleeting second, she let herself imagine what it would be like to always have this—his steadiness, his conviction, his hand in hers.

Then the moment broke. Someone called his name down the hall, sharp and official. Doug straightened, but his fingers lingered against hers until the very last second.

Helena’s hand tingled with the ghost of his touch long after he was gone.

Helena and JJ fell into step, their pace quick against the echo of their shoes on the polished floor.

“I’m glad Will got the all-clear,” Helena said, briefly patting JJ’s shoulder.

JJ exhaled, shoulders finally loose for the first time in weeks. “Yeah. Just an inflamed thyroid. Nothing more. Still scared the hell out of us.”

Helena nodded, lips pressing thin. “Scared me too. For you.”

“So….” JJ began, her tone casual but her eyes glinting, “patched things up with Doug yet?”

Helena’s brow arched. “You don’t waste time, do you?”

JJ shrugged, smiling coyly. “I notice things. And I noticed you sneaking off to his office the minute we got back from Georgia.”

Helena exhaled through her nose, shifting the file in her hands. “It’s… complicated.”

“That’s code for ‘messy but still alive,’” JJ teased lightly. Then her expression softened. “You know, apparently he went to bat for us with the Attorney General.”

Helena glanced at her. “What?”

“Prentiss threatened to hand in her badge,” JJ explained. “Word is, Doug backed her.”

Before Helena could respond, they caught up to Rossi and Prentiss just ahead.

“…the problem is, we’re under the microscope now,” Prentiss was saying. Her voice carried the weariness of too many battles fought on too many fronts.

Rossi made a low sound, not quite agreement, not quite resignation. “I put Tara on a separate assignment, but it means we’re short-handed.”

Prentiss stopped just long enough to answer, “Actually, we’re not.”

Helena and JJ exchanged a look as the four of them walked through the doors to the round table.

Doug was already inside, waiting, a neat stack of files in front of him.

“Agent Rossi,” he said formally, “I’ve spoken to the rest of the team. Thank you for welcoming me.”

“I didn’t,” Rossi muttered without missing a beat.

Helena shot her leg out under the table, giving Rossi a sharp kick. He gave her a look that said he’d felt it and didn’t regret a word.

Luke leaned back in his chair, folding his arms with a smirk. “You’re all gonna appreciate the irony of this, because Bailey here—his job now depends on us doing ours.”

Doug gave the barest of smiles. “Yes, well, since our fates are tied together on this case, I took the liberty of preparing a briefing.”

Rossi gestured, bone-dry. “Okay, then. Wow us.”

Doug opened his folder, his delivery brisk, professional. “Our sole victim is Terry O’Brien, teaching assistant at Camdale College in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. He went missing last week, discovered on campus by faculty after an alumni event.” He flicked back a page in his notes, brow creasing. “Alumni event? Yes—alumni event. Cause of death was exsanguination from several surprisingly deep lacerations all over his body.”

He let that hang a moment before continuing. “But here’s why the BAU has been invited in: two days ago, Grace Ryleigh also went missing.”

“How do we know these cases are connected?” Doug asked rhetorically—

“Grace attended Terry’s class,” Helena said before he could answer.

Doug blinked, then smiled faintly. “Because Grace attended Terry… Yes. What Agent Bishop just said.”

Luke leaned forward. “Could be a romantic connection between the two.”

“Or,” Helena countered evenly, “they’re just victims of opportunity who happened to be in the same class.”

Prentiss tapped her pen against the table. “Figuring out what ties them together is our first job when we land. Wheels up.”

Doug cleared his throat. “Yes. About the jet.”

Luke groaned. “No. Come on. We just got it back.”

Doug winced. “While the BAU is under review, you no longer have access to it. But Terry’s parents are already on their way in.”

Prentiss adjusted without missing a beat. “Helena, JJ, prep for that interview. Luke, Dave, head to the M.E.’s office to examine Terry’s body.”

Doug lingered. “And what should I do?”

The team began to shuffle their files, rising from their seats.

Doug sighed. “Got it. I’ll do that.” His voice dropped, tinged with disappointment.

Helena turned back before leaving. “This unsub has abducted twice in two weeks. You should keep tabs on further missing-persons reports.”

Doug looked at her across the table, their eyes locking. He mouthed thank you.

Helena allowed herself the smallest smile in return. For one beat, the rest of the team was background noise. It was just them, staring across the table, tethered by something Helena could not say aloud.

The hiss of the skillet filled the silence, yolks sizzling in a slow dance of butter and heat. Elias cracked another egg with practiced ease, careful not to let the shell splinter into the pan. He stood there, spatula in hand, the perfect image of a husband making breakfast.

Sydney padded in behind him, barefoot, hair tied up. She inhaled theatrically. “What is that amazing smell?”

“I’m just making eggs for the girls before they wake up,” Elias shrugged.

She laughed, moving toward the counter. “You make eggs maybe once a month and suddenly the girls think you’re chef of the year.”

Elias forced a smile, but his mind was far away. The scent of eggs and butter blurred, folding into the rasp of Cyrus’s voice echoing in his skull.

I could’ve had a chance. I could’ve been different.

He gripped the spatula tighter. His knuckles whitened.

No, you couldn’t. Our vice is in our blood.

Cyrus’s sneer, his tone—mocking, absolute.

Need I remind you of the real reason you came into my custody?

The words wormed deeper, pressing against his skull.

Sydney’s sharp gasp cut through the haze. “Elias!”

He blinked. The dish towel hanging beside the pan had caught fire, flames licking greedily at the fabric.

“Shit.” Elias snatched the tongs, clamped down on the towel, and shoved it under the faucet. Steam hissed violently as the fire died.

But the smoke—thick, grey, curling into his nose—dragged him backward in time.

He was a boy again, crouched in the corner of a room devoured by fire. The wallpaper blistering, peeling in molten strips. Flames raced like living veins across the ceiling beams, showering sparks down onto the floorboards. The air was thick, choking. It clawed down his throat until every cough tasted like ash.

Shadows warped in the blaze—his mother’s face, his father’s silhouette swallowed whole. Their screams punctured the roar for an instant and then vanished, leaving only the inferno.

The boy he had been stared at the flames, knowing, this is my fault. Or maybe not knowing—maybe just feeling.

You’ve always been this. Even then.

Darkness. Even as a child, was it already there?

His chest rose and fell sharply. The fire might be gone, but its heat was still inside him, coiled in his muscles like a spark waiting to catch.

“Elias?” Sydney’s voice floated behind him. Concerned, uncertain.

He turned. She was watching him, hands resting on the counter, the ordinary domesticity of her stance almost laughable against the images burning in his head.

“Are you okay?”

“I—uh….” He wanted to say yes. He wanted to stay in that kitchen, in that fragile version of normal. But his gaze slid sideways—toward the knife resting on the cutting board.

The blade gleamed in the morning light, stainless steel catching the reflection of the flame still dancing in his imagination.

And suddenly he could see it. His hand closing around the handle. The smooth weight of it in his palm. One swift movement, silver flashing through the air. A red arc spraying against the countertop. Sydney staggering, her eyes wide, her voice broken.

The fantasy was as quick and vivid as a match flare, and it warmed him.

His heart thudded—not in fear, but in recognition. The mask is slipping. He could feel it.

The words throbbed inside his skull. The longer he played husband, the more the fire pushed against its cage, demanding release.

Cyrus’s voice slid back in, low, smug, inescapable: Family’s what gets you killed.

And for one terrifying beat, Elias thought maybe Cyrus was right. Maybe it would be easier to end it here—burn this whole false life to the ground—than let it collapse on its own.

Elias blinked hard and stepped back, forcing the image away. He muttered, “I was in the road all night. I just need to get some rest,” his voice ragged.

He brushed past Sydney, leaving her puzzled in the smoke-filled kitchen. The eggs hissed in the skillet, yolks scorching black, the smell of charred protein curling into the air like an omen.

Doug handed Prentiss the photo, a teenage girl, bright smile, long hair, sorority sweatshirt.

“Another girl has gone missing,” he said grimly. “Ashley Limina. Her sorority said she didn’t come home last night.”

Helena leaned forward, looking at the girl’s photo in Emily’s hands. “It might not be connected, but the geography’s too close to ignore.”

Garcia swooped in with a thick file, breathless as always. “Hello, hello—boss, JJ, Helena, double boss. So, I dug into the victims. I found zilch indicating any relationship between Terry and Grace, aside from him being her T.A. However—” she paused for effect, “Terry O’Brien was arrested. Once. And somehow, that arrest has been scrubbed clean by the local PD.”

Prentiss frowned. “How did that happen?”

“College towns,” JJ shrugged, “they make misdemeanour-level offences disappear so the crime stats don’t scare off potential students.”

Prentiss exhaled sharply. “Terry’s parents just arrived. Maybe they’ll share what warranted that arrest. That record is our only lead right now, and with the Attorney General’s eyes on us, we can’t afford to miss anything. Helena, you run point. I’ll observe.”

Helena nodded, steady. “Mm-hmm. Got it.”

“I’d like to sit in,” Doug interjected suddenly.

The room stilled. Prentiss blinked. “I don’t mind, but what do you—”

“Appreciate it,” Doug cut in quickly, already moving for the door.

Helena raised her brows. “I’ll… I’ll sit on him.” She slipped out after him.

“Doug,” she called, catching up. Her heels clicked fast against the tiles until she was shoulder to shoulder with him. “Why do you want to sit in? You’ve never done that before.”

His pace slowed, jaw tight. “I just want to help.”

She searched his face, trying to read him. “Help? Or hover?”

That landed. His eyes snapped to hers, sharp but wounded. “You don’t think I can handle it, do you?”

Helena blinked. The sudden flash of vulnerability behind his irritation caught her off guard. “That’s not what I said.”

“It’s what you meant.” His voice was low, controlled, but she could hear the fracture line beneath it. “Every time I try to step in, it’s like I’m overstepping. Like you’re waiting for me to trip. I know I’m not Rossi or Prentiss, I haven’t spent decades at that table, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have instincts. Doesn’t mean I can’t contribute.”

Helena stopped him in the corridor, pressing a hand gently to his sleeve. “Doug. You’ve never done this before. Of course I’m surprised. That’s all.”

He looked down at her hand, then back into her eyes. The storm in his expression softened, but only just. “Sometimes I wonder if you have any faith in me at all.”

“I have more than a little faith in you,” she whispered. And she meant it. She did.

Eventually, she looked away, smoothing the sleeve of her jacket. “Let’s just get through this interview,” she murmured.

For just a moment longer, his gaze lingered, a silent plea she couldn’t bring herself to answer. Then he nodded, straightening his tie and pushing open the door to the interview room, holding it for her like it was nothing, like the moment in the hallway hadn’t even happened.

Helena sat across from Mr. and Mrs. O’Brien, her notebook open on the table, though she hadn’t written a single word. Their grief hung so thick in the air it felt like a living thing pressing down on all of them.

“Mr. and Mrs. O'Brien, I know this is painful to talk about.” Helena leaned forward, her voice soft but steady, the kind of tone she’d trained for but always hated needing. “All we want to do is find the man who did this. If Terry's arrest plays a role in that, it could help.”

Mr. O’Brien’s jaw tightened, his knuckles white on the armrest of his chair. “Agent, we don't want to cause a fight here. We don't think the FBI can solve this at all.”

Helena blinked. “You… you don’t?”

Mrs. O’Brien’s eyes brimmed. “After the past few years? This agency has lost this country’s trust. The only reason we're here is to collect Terry's body for a proper burial.”

The words landed heavy in Helena’s chest, a weight she carried already—that endless tug-of-war between justice and the FBI’s reputation. Before she could respond, Doug slid a photo across the table.

“Your son wore this necklace,” Doug said, pointing to the chain around Terry’s neck. “My dad gave me one just like it when I was younger. It’s a Gadsden snake, right? With the motto Don’t tread on me’ ‘?”

Helena’s head whipped toward him. Doug? She reached out instinctively, placing her hand gently on his forearm, trying to stop him from straying into dangerous territory. “Deputy Director, maybe this isn’t—”

But Doug didn’t look at her. He pressed on, voice calm, deliberate. “My dad lives by that quote. That and the one from Ronald Reagan: ‘Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is the problem.’”

Helena froze, finally removing her hand from his arm. What? Her mind reeled. She’d imagined Doug’s father as a buttoned-up federal loyalist, maybe even the kind of man who framed old Bureau commendations on the wall. Not this.

Doug gave the faintest smile, one that didn’t reach his eyes. “Sometimes I think me taking this job was my delayed teenage rebellion, proving to him that government could still work.”

Mr. O’Brien let out a sharp scoff. “Well, how’s that working out for ya?”

Doug chuckled, a disarming sound. “Honestly? Not great. Sometimes I think… holy cow, the old man was right.”

Helena stared at him, her pulse thudding in her ears. He wasn’t just improvising. This wasn’t code-switching or Bureau polish. This was raw. Real.

Mrs. O’Brien sniffled, softening. “We appreciate you saying that. We want justice for Terry. We just can’t trust you to mete it out.”

Doug leaned in, his tone shifting, heavy with conviction. “Then let me tell you what I tell my dad on Thanksgiving. The Behavioral Analysis Unit has one job—to stop killers. And it’s critical that we stop this one. Because whoever did this to your son…” He slid two photos across the table, the missing girls staring back at them. “…he has two more.”

Mrs. O’Brien broke, sobbing into her hands.

Doug’s voice gentled. “Now, if Terry’s arrest had nothing to do with this, then we believe you. But if it did, we need to know.”

Mrs. O’Brien finally whispered, “Terry sold her drugs.”

Helena’s pen nearly slipped from her hand. “I… I’m sorry. What exactly?”

Mrs. O’Brien wiped her eyes. “He had an OxyContin prescription for his knee. He sold what was left of the bottle to Grace. Somebody told the police. But he swore to us and to the school that it was a one-time thing, and it was.”

Mr. O’Brien added, gruff, “That make a difference?”

Helena nodded slowly, jotting the words even though her mind was spinning. “Maybe. We’ll add it to our profile.”

Doug’s voice softened again. “And when we make an arrest, is it okay if I call you to tell you?”

Mr. O’Brien met his eyes. “Agents… find this guy.”

They stepped out, JJ and Prentiss waiting.

“Very impressive, Deputy Director,” Prentiss remarked. She tilted her head, eyes sharp. “That story about your dad—was that true?”

Doug’s laugh was smooth, almost careless. “Hmm? Oh, no, no. He’s an old hippie up in Woodstock. But you don’t get to be Deputy Director without knowing how to code-switch politically.”

JJ smiled politely, but Helena felt her stomach tighten. She knew it. She knew. That story hadn’t been spin. It had been truth, raw and unfiltered. And now he was covering it up. For her? For himself? For them?

Doug pressed on as if nothing had shifted. “So, if Terry and Grace have a connection through OxyContin, does that speak to the UnSub’s motivation?”

JJ nodded. “Probably. If Alvez is right, his message is Old Testament fire and brimstone.”

“So he’s punishing.” Doug tapped his pen against the folder. “Why punish Ashley, too?”

Prentiss folded her arms. “That’s where we need to dig next. These three victims have a connection we’re still missing.”

Helena glanced up at Doug. Just then, he flicked his eyes at her, the barest quick look—but she caught it. A glance loaded with something unspoken, something that sat heavy in her chest.

She swallowed hard, torn with the ache of knowing she’d glimpsed the real Doug Bailey for the first time.

The dark sedan hummed beneath them, the Virginia countryside flickering past the windows in muted streaks of green and grey. Doug’s hands rested steady at ten and two, his posture clipped in that regulation-Bureau way, but his jaw was relaxed for once. Helena sat angled toward him, her shoulder brushing the door, the thin folder of notes balanced on her lap.

The UnSub's pattern had came into focus. Terry was a drug dealer and Grace a drug user. And then there was Ashley, an enabler, earlier that year, she was cited for covering up a sorority sister's overdose. The UnSub tied them all together, through a sin he couldn’t forgive. Rossi, Luke and JJ delivered the profile to Virgina law enforcement while Doug had suggested they also talk to campus faculty staff. However the campus faculty were less than cooperative, citing it a liability nightmare. That was until Doug talked them round.

The words still echoed in her head—what he’d told the faculty.

"You can either protect the people you serve, or protect your ass. But right now, you can’t do both."

She glanced sideways, catching the faint shadow of a smile on his face. “What FBI agent told you that line?” she asked, the tease light but laced with genuine curiosity.

Doug’s mouth ticked up. “Some reckless, stubborn one I know,” he said, eyes still on the road.

She laughed softly, shaking her head. “She sounds like a pain in the ass.”

“Oh, believe me,” he countered, his tone warm. “But she’s usually right.”

That surprised her—his easy compliment, the way it wasn’t wrapped in condescension or challenge. Just truth. She let it sit between them, the hum of the tires filling the quiet.

“It’s nice,” she said after a moment.

“What is?”

“This. Us working together,” Helena admitted. “When we’re on the same side.”

Doug’s grip tightened just slightly on the wheel, his eyes flicking to hers before returning to the road. “Helena, I’ve never not been on your side.”

Her breath caught, chest tightening. She wanted to ask about his father—the truth he’d hidden, the truth she’d seen in that interview room—but she didn’t. Not yet. Instead, the question that tumbled out was different, sharp in its intimacy.

“Do you believe in God?”

Doug’s eyes darted toward her, brows lifting. “"We’re supposed to be chasing an unsub, not having theological debates about religion.”

Helena turned her gaze out the passenger window, watching the blur of passing trees. “God. Who needs God? Only the wicked and the nostalgic throw that word around like it means anything.”

There had been a ghost of a smile at her words, the sort of look that Doug kept reserved for her — and only her — one that conveyed amusement and intrigue by her rapid train of thought.

“I don’t believe in it. I think I did once—”. Her voice was soft, almost wistful.

When her breath hitched and she paused, he didn’t need an explanation. He understood why her lip twisted at the mention of God. He knew it made her think of her past, of her father. For a while, only the road spoke, the faint click of the blinker as he switched lanes.

She swallowed. “But I can understand why people need to believe in something. Some choose religion, others dedicate their lives to justice, to order, to family, to love…”

Doug’s hand left the wheel briefly, reaching across the console. His fingers brushed hers, then settled, warm and solid, wrapping around her hand. “Sometimes people need to believe that there’s more than this.”

Her throat tightened. She kept her eyes on their joined hands. “When I die,” she whispered, “I want it to mean something. I just want to be remembered for the good. If there is any good.”

“Of course there’s good,” Doug said firmly, no hesitation in his voice. His thumb brushed the ridge of her knuckles, steadying her.

The contact sent a shiver through her—not fear, but something she almost didn’t recognise: hope.

Helena’s mind spun. Her whole life, she’d lived in shades of light and dark, caught between her father’s bloodstained legacy and her own hunger for justice. She’d always believed not every human was capable of good, but all were capable of evil. And maybe she was no exception.

But sitting here—his hand folded over hers, his voice grounding her—she felt the faintest spark of something else. A possibility.

For the first time, she thought: I don’t want to keep living in shades of light and dark. I want to live in colour.

With him.

She tightened her grip on his hand, letting the thought linger in the silence, heavy and electric.

Doug glanced over, his eyes soft, searching her face like he wanted to speak but didn’t dare.

The car ate up the miles, but inside it felt like they were suspended in a different space entirely.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Thirteen

"The Past Is Outside, The Future Is Here"

"I hope that real love and truth are stronger in the end than any evil or misfortune in the world" – Charles Dickens

The garage smelled of oil and bleach, the sharp tang of his hidden life. Voit sat hunched over his phone, the glow of the encrypted search screen reflected in his narrowed eyes.

Benjamin Reeves.

The headline was sterile, clinical: Lead suspect in senator's murder dies in apparent murder-suicide.

Voit smirked. Perfect patsy. Playing his part even after death.

He typed again, fingers tapping quick and sharp. Cyrus Lebrun.

Nothing. Not even a whisper. No police reports. No headlines. No legacy.

And just like that, Cyrus came roaring back in his mind—Maria's screams echoing in the basement, her nails raking his arm as she lunged, the wet, meat-sound of Cyrus's knife plunging into her. Her blood spraying his face like baptism. Cyrus standing over her corpse, laughing, the smell of death filling Voit's lungs until it became part of him.

He blinked, heart hammering. His thumb hovered over the phone screen before he forced himself to type Maria Jones.

The first headline hit him like a hammer: Silvio Herrera Freed. Police Re-Open Jones Investigation.

The phone rattled as he slammed it down on the workbench, jaw clenched so tight his teeth ached. From the next room, muffled voices bled through—the sharp, high whine of his daughters arguing.

Already strung taut, he stormed out, shoving the door open with enough force it hit the wall.

"What the hell is going on in here?" His voice cracked like a whip.

Sydney, standing at the counter with crossed arms, gave him the look. The one that made him feel ten years old again. "They're revolting because I asked them to put their phones down for dinner."

"Girls, listen to your mother" he snapped in annoyance.

Harlow, bold as ever, grinned. "You should have to, too. I know you were on yours in the garage."

Voit felt heat crawling up his neck. "Yeah, well, I'm the dad. Rules are different."

Sydney's voice was cool but sharp as glass. "She's right. You are literally always on your phone, Elias. Always."

And then it snapped. His mask slipped. He felt the words leave his mouth before he could pull them back:

"I cannot take this fucking family anymore."

The room went silent. Even the girls froze, forks clutched mid-air.

And then, in a flash of fantasy, he saw it—his hand pulling a gun from his waistband, the cold steel weight familiar and comforting. The way the barrel would look aimed at Sydney first, her eyes wide with betrayal. One shot. Then Harlow. Then Holly. The recoil snapping his wrist back each time. Their heads jerking, the red blooming like flowers against the pale walls. Silence after. Peace.

He blinked, chest heaving. The images dissolved, leaving only the horrified faces of his family staring at him.

"You do not talk to this family like that," Sydney snapped, fury burning in her eyes.

Voit swallowed hard, feeling the crack in the mask, the embarrassment prickling his skin. "I'm—" His voice broke. He cleared his throat, softer. "I'm under a lot of stress, Syd. Work's... it's been nonstop."

He didn't wait for her reply. He turned and walked out, his pulse pounding, his mind replaying both her anger and his fantasy in equal measure.

The basketball thudded off the backboard and rolled across the driveway into Sydney's hands. Voit wiped the sweat from his brow, jaw still tight from earlier.

"You promised me, Elias," Sydney snapped, her voice trembling with both anger and hurt. "You promised you'd never treat me the way my dad treated my mom. That you'd never keep secrets from me."

Voit's stomach knotted. His first instinct was to sneer, to push her words back down her throat. Instead, he bit out, "What are you talking about?"

Her eyes flashed. "Don't play dumb. I know the truth. About everything."

The words hit like a body blow. His palms went damp, and for a split second, he felt the garage behind him like a refuge, the kill kit inside like oxygen. "You know why I'm acting like this?" he pressed, voice low, dangerous. "Then say it. Say exactly what you think you know. Because I'm not in the mood for this shit, Syd."

She hurled the basketball back at him with more force than he expected. It smacked into his chest, stinging, before bouncing to the asphalt. "Don't walk away from me, Elias!"

But he did. He turned his back, stalking into the garage where the air was heavy with oil and secrets. His hand slid into the kill kit, fingers curling around the grip of the gun hidden inside like it was the only steady thing in his world.

Sydney's footsteps followed, sharp and relentless. "Do you think I'm stupid, huh?"

He spun, eyes dark. "What do you think you know?"

Her arms crossed, chin trembling but resolute. "I know you lost your job. I called Kelly to see if Mike was going through the same thing, and she told me you were fired. Months ago. So every time you told me you were traveling for work, what were you really doing?"

The suffocation tightened around his throat. His lies, his masks, his neat compartments—collapsing.

Sydney's voice cracked. "Were you gambling?"

"No."

"Drugs?"

"No."

Her eyes searched his, terrified. "Are you seeing someone else?"

"No!" His shout echoed through the garage, bouncing off the walls like a shot. For one horrifying second, he wondered if the neighbours heard.

He forced himself to soften, to let the mask slide back on. "I was interviewing for other jobs. I didn't want to tell you until I had one. I didn't want to scare you."

Her shoulders sagged, but the fury remained. "Well, congratulations. That didn't work. I need to know what your plan is, Elias. Because this? The silent treatment, the random outbursts?" Her hands shook. "It's not working."

Voit swallowed, but it felt like glass shredding his throat. She was circling closer. The FBI. The job. The lies. His family. Every piece of his life pressing in until he could hardly breathe.

He looked at Sydney and felt the itch in his hands—the urge to end the suffocation the way he knew how. To silence the threat. To take back control.

But all he did was clench the gun tighter inside the kill kit, his knuckles white.

Inside, though, the thought screamed: The net's closing. Too many eyes. Too many cracks. And family? Family will get you killed.

Their break came the next morning.

Frank Scelsa.

The superintendent at Camdale.

His daughter Kelly had overdosed after buying drugs from a fellow student. Everyone involved with her death had either been arrested or expelled. He couldn't punish them directly so he was punishing surrogates instead.

Rossi and Luke were dispatched to his home, Prentiss and JJ were headed to talk to his ex wife, and Helena and Doug were preparing to check out his workplace.

The tactical gear room was dimly lit, fluorescent bulbs buzzing faintly above rows of lockers and racks of kevlar vests. The smell of gun oil and worn leather clung to the air. Helena pulled her vest tight across her ribs, the bruises from the blast still aching, and glanced sideways at Doug.

He was fumbling with his belt, his holster sitting crooked, jaw tight as he yanked at the strap like the equipment itself had turned against him. His fingers weren't clumsy — they were anxious, betraying nerves he was trying to choke down.

"Been a while?" she asked softly, letting the tease lighten the tension.

He blew out a laugh, low and embarrassed. "Not since training."

She arched an eyebrow. "You ever do Hogan's Alley?"

Doug shook his head, tugging again at his gear.

Helena chuckled, the memory warm despite everything. "It was loads of fun. A whole fake town, course designed to force failure. And then the instructors screaming at you—" she deepened her voice in mock imitation— "'You've betrayed your oath to your country!'"

Doug barked a laugh in spite of himself, his nerves flickering into something human and boyish.

She tilted her head, studying him. "We should let your dad run it, huh?"

The smile on his face froze, just for a fraction of a second. He gave a small, strained laugh. "Oh, yeah. He would love that."

Her gut tugged. She'd been profiling long enough to notice the crack in the mask.

"What you said to Terry's parents..." she pressed, her voice quiet, careful. "That was the truth, wasn't it?"

Doug's hands stilled on his belt. He met her eyes. For once, there was no spin, no politician's polish. Just raw honesty.

"Yeah," he admitted.

Helena swallowed. "So, what is he? Three Percenter? Minuteman?"

Doug shook his head quickly. "No, no, he's... just a Libertarian who owns so many guns. For when the government comes to take them away." He let out a humourless chuckle. "He'd disown me if he saw me right now." His hand tapped the vest, the badge clipped to his belt. "So let's keep this between us, okay?"

The words slipped out before she thought about them. "I will not tell a soul." She let the corner of her mouth curve. "Maybe Rossi."

Doug smirked, rolling his eyes. "Oh, well, duh. I need more men my dad's age I can disappoint."

That broke them both into laughter, the sound bouncing strangely off the steel lockers. He looked at her then—really looked—and for a split second she felt the heat of it under her skin. His eyes held hers, steady and intent, the kind of look that made the air between them feel thinner.

And that's when it hit her.

Everyone has ghosts. Everyone has scars.

She wasn't the only one carrying a father-shaped wound that never healed right. Doug too was shadowed, haunted by the weight of a parent's expectations, by the question of whether he'd ever be enough. His way of coping wasn't so different from hers — he built walls, controlled what he could, tried to wrestle chaos into order.

Her chest tightened with the realisation. Maybe, for all their differences, they were more alike than she'd ever dared to think.

For once, she didn't feel like the only broken one in the room. And in the glow of his laugh, in the way he held her eyes a fraction too long, she felt the pull of a truth she couldn't ignore—maybe she didn't have to be.

The elevator hummed as they descended. Doug fidgeted with the strap on his vest, pale as if the walls were closing in.

"You okay?" Helena asked, watching him out of the corner of her eye.

"Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm." His voice was clipped, too quick, and his Adam's apple bobbed like he was trying to swallow nausea. He looked like he might actually throw up.

Helena tilted her head. "You know, the first time I was out in the field, I threw up."

His head jerked toward her, surprise cracking through the nerves. "Really?"

She let the silence hang just long enough before the corner of her mouth curved. "No. I was just trying to make you feel better."

Doug laughed. It was soft, genuine, and it pulled something loose inside her chest.

She pounced on the moment, teasing again. "So if Dad's a Libertarian, that means Mom is..."

"A lady who lunches?" he finished dryly.

Helena smirked. "Guess we have that in common."

The smile faltered, though, when he asked, "You still speak to her?"

"Uh... not so much." Helena's voice thinned, the edges going brittle. "She's, uh... a bit of a disaster."

"In what way?"

Helena's gaze dropped to the floor. "She drinks. A lot. I guess that's what being married to a serial killer does to you." Her laugh was short, humourless. "She's... part of this tacky nouveau riche Upper East Side crowd. Everyone knows she drinks. But it doesn't matter, because Eleanor's so much fun. Her parties are fabulous."

Her voice faded, her mind sliding unbidden back to those years after her father's arrest—her mother, red wine spilling down the front of her silk blouse, drunk and smiling too wide. You're his daughter right enough, Helena. The words had stung like broken glass.

Helena blinked, dragging herself back to the present. She turned it on him instead. "What about your brother?"

Doug's expression shuttered. He shrugged. "You're either super tight, or you drive each other crazy."

"What's he up to now?" she pressed.

Doug's jaw ticked, his gaze flicking toward the elevator doors. "UnSub's name is Scelsa?" he asked quickly.

Helena stilled. She recognised the pivot. A classic Doug deflection. But this time, she let him have it. "Yeah. Frank Scelsa."

The elevator bell chimed, breaking the moment like glass. The doors slid open.

"Let's go to work," she said, forcing her voice steady.

But as they stepped out side by side, Helena couldn't shake the aftertaste of their conversation—the ghosts of her mother's voice, the weight of Doug's unfinished words. And under it all, the electricity still hummed, dangerous and tempting, waiting to spark again.

The phone call from Rossi still rang in Helena's ears as Doug pulled the car to a stop.

The old campus power plant loomed in the distance, rusted pipes snaking like bones, windows blackened. The place looked like it had been forgotten by time, but it thrummed with something alive—something wrong.

"Helena, he's not here. JJ and Prentiss didn't have any luck with the ex either. But we did find diagrams of the old campus power plant. Looks like he retrofitted it to hold prisoners."

"Copy that," Helena told Rossi. "We'll wait until back-up arrives." She clicked off the phone, her eyes scanning the skeletal silhouette of the plant.

Then came the scream.

High-pitched. Raw. Terrified. It sliced through the night air like a blade.

Helena and Doug exchanged a look—his face pale, her chest tightening. "We're going in now," she said, already reaching for her weapon.

Doug's jaw clenched. He followed her out of the car, yanking his gun free, falling in step. As they descended the stairs to the basement-level door, Helena moved to the handle, but Doug's hand shot out.

"Wait," he hissed, pulling her back against the wall. His body angled in front of hers like a shield.

For a moment, she froze—not at the danger, but at the way his instinct wasn't for himself, but for her.

Doug shoved the door open with a sharp kick, his voice echoing into the darkness: "FBI!"

The sound ricocheted through the hollow corridors, bouncing off the metal pipes and brick walls. The air was thick—dust, oil, and something sharper, coppery. Blood.

They moved slow. Calculated. Guns raised, beams of their flashlights cutting swathes of light through the gloom. Each step echoed, each shadow a threat. Helena's heartbeat thudded in her ears, syncing with the measured breaths she forced herself to take.

They cleared the first side room: empty. Then the second: only rusting machinery, jagged and skeletal.

Suddenly, movement—a figure barrelled out of the third room. Doug stiffened but caught her, arms wrapping around the sobbing girl who practically collapsed against his chest.

"It's okay," he said quickly, his voice rough but gentle. "We're the FBI. You're safe."

Helena lowered her weapon slightly, scanning the girl's panicked face. "Ashley Limina?"

Ashley nodded frantically through her tears. "You have to hurry—he has Grace!"

Helena's stomach dropped. She met Doug's eyes, the panic there, the grip he still had on Ashley's trembling shoulders. "Stay with her," she ordered firmly. "She needs you."

Before he could argue, Helena was moving, flashlight sweeping across the darkened hall. Her boots splashed through puddles, every sound magnified. She forced herself forward, gun up, pulse hammering.

At the far end of the hall, a door stood ajar. She pushed through—and froze.

Grace Ryleigh was slumped on the floor, a blade pressed to her throat. Behind her, holding the weapon, was Frank Scelsa. His eyes were wide, fever-bright. His lips moved, whispering something to himself, a prayer or a curse.

"Drop the weapon, Frank," Helena said steadily, aiming her gun. "Or I'll shoot."

Frank sneered. "Then shoot. I've made my peace with God. Someone has to pay."

Grace whimpered, the knife digging closer. Helena's chest clenched.

"She didn't hurt your daughter," Helena said, her voice low, calm. "Grace isn't guilty of that."

"She's not innocent either," Frank spat. His voice cracked. "None of them are."

Helena drew in a breath, steadying herself. Her eyes flicked to Grace, then back to Frank. Slowly, deliberately, she lowered her weapon. "We'll make a deal. You let her go, and I'll let you walk out of here."

Frank faltered.

Helena's voice softened, steady. "Remember Genesis? Lot's wife? Whoever looks back is lost. Don't look back, Frank. Let her go."

His hand trembled. Then, with a guttural sound, he shoved Grace forward, the blade clattering to the ground. He spun, bolting for the door—

And froze.

Because Doug stood in the doorway, his gun raised, both hands steady despite the tremor in his jaw. His voice rang, harder than Helena had ever heard it. "Hands in the air. Now."

Frank's shoulders slumped, his hands rising slowly.

Helena moved in, cuffing him swiftly, pressing him into the wall. "Frank Scelsa, you're under arrest." As she marched him out the room she turned back to look at Doug. "Grace needs you."

She handed Scelsa off to the backup officers flooding in, then turned back toward the paramedics rushing to Grace.

Doug was crouched beside her, blood streaking his hands from where he'd torn his jacket to staunch the wound on her chest. His face was pale, his eyes locked on the crimson staining his skin.

Helena walked over, holstering her gun. For a moment, she just looked at him—Doug Bailey, Deputy Director, the man who liked control, the man who carried himself like he was untouchable—staring at blood like it had broken him.

Gently, she set her hand on his shoulder. Solid. Reassuring.

Helena's hand lingered on Doug's shoulder longer than it should have. His polo shirt was damp with sweat under her palm, his muscles taut. He wasn't the polished Deputy Director, the smooth talker who could bend politicians to his will. He was just a man kneeling in the dark, his hands shaking with blood that wasn't his own.

He looked up at her, eyes haunted, and for the first time, she saw not the man who wanted to control everything, but the man terrified of losing it.

"You're okay," she said quietly. "She's okay. You did good."

Doug nodded, swallowing hard, but his gaze held hers for a heartbeat too long before he turned back to the girl.

Helena stepped back, fighting the burn in her chest. It wasn't the time, but her heart kept pounding, torn between the warmth that made her ache and the fear that reminded her she didn't deserve it.

Not from him. Not from anyone.

And that scared her more than Frank Scelsa ever could.

The hallway outside the Attorney General's office was hushed, the kind of silence that carried weight. Helena saw Doug step out first, his tie loosened, his posture rigid as though bracing against a blow. The AG followed, gave him a curt nod, and disappeared down the corridor with her aides in tow.

Helena approached slowly. "Did you call Terry's parents? Tell them we got him?"

Doug smoothed a hand down his tie, an old reflex, before meeting her eyes. "I did. They were very appreciative. So was Grace Ryleigh's family."

"Good," Helena said.

But she saw it. The flicker in his eyes—disappointment he couldn't mask.

Her stomach tightened. "The AG denied our request, didn't she?"

Doug's shoulders sagged just a fraction, but his voice stayed even. "She did. The Sicarius case is officially closed." A pause, and then, softer, almost like it cost him something: "I'm sorry, Helena. I know how much this case meant to you."

For a moment she just studied him. The exhaustion in his face. The fight gone from his voice. She wanted to bridge the gap, to give him something after everything he'd carried for her and the team. "Do you... want to get dinner?" she asked quietly, surprising herself with how tentative it sounded.

Doug shook his head, a faint, rueful smile tugging at his mouth. "I'm beat. Just going to head home tonight."

And just like that, he was walking away, his broad frame retreating down the hallway until he was swallowed by the shadows. Helena's chest ached, disappointment settling heavy.

"Rough night?"

She turned to find Rossi catching up, a file tucked under his arm.

He glanced after Doug, then back at her. "Tara got a lead on the RFID chip from the container. Traced it to a hardware store in Chattanooga. Possible contact with Sicarius. I was thinking an all-nighter, reviewing footage."

Helena looked back down the corridor where Doug had vanished. The echo of his absence lingered. She turned back to Rossi, forced a thin smile. "I can't. There's somewhere I need to be tonight."

Rossi raised an eyebrow, but didn't press. He just gave her a look that said he'd been there before—choices between duty and something more personal. Then he nodded and kept walking.

Helena stood alone in the hall, her pulse uneven, her mind chasing after two different futures.

Helena sat in her car in the darkness, staring forlornly at the front door of the apartment block she was parked in front of, her fingers drumming nervously against the steering wheel of her car. She glanced at the clock on the dashboard for what must have been the tenth time in just a couple of minutes: 11.36pm.

This was insane. It was far too late to just turn up to his home unannounced. Reaching for the ignition key, Helena decided that she would just go home and talk to him about this later. There was no sense in making a bad situation worse and maybe some space would do them both good - or at least help them to put things into perspective. As her hands connected with the cool metal, however, Helena found that she couldn't make herself turn the key to actually start the car. As much as her hands were shaking with nerves at the idea of seeing him and as desperately as she wanted to run away and spend the rest of her days hiding away, something else was making her stay.

Something bigger. The need to see him - to explain herself to him - overrode every other instinct currently coursing through her. With a sigh, she pulled the key roughly from the ignition and leaned back in her seat in an attempt to compose herself before she made the journey from her car to his door.

Doug's apartment was quiet when Helena knocked, the hallway dim, her pulse hammering harder than it should have been. She shifted the pizza box in her hands, suddenly nervous.

The door opened. Doug stood there, in sweatpants and a T-shirt, hair damp from a shower, surprise etched across his face. "Helena?"

She lifted the box between them. "I, uh... thought I'd bring you dinner."

He stepped aside to let her in.

"I needed to see how you were doing." She chose the word 'need' specifically. She hoped he understood what she meant by it, understood that it was like a weight on her chest not knowing how he was doing.

His expression softened—relief, warmth—but she noticed his hands as he reached for the box. The knuckles were raw, red, as though he'd been scrubbing until skin gave way.

Her chest tightened. "Doug..." she touched his wrist gently. "Your hands."

He glanced down quickly, tried to wave it off. "It's nothing. Just—cleaning up."

"Don't." Her voice was firmer than she expected. "I know what that is."

He frowned.

"When I stabbed my father," she whispered, "I spent days scrubbing mine. Hot water. Soap. Bleach. Anything. As if I could erase it. But I couldn't. It just... stayed."

Doug's throat bobbed. For a moment his eyes looked glassy. "I can still feel Grace's blood on mine," he admitted, voice raw. "Every time I close my eyes I can see her."

Her heart twisted at his vulnerability. "What can I do?" she asked softly.

He looked at her then—really looked—his defences stripped bare. "Make me forget."

Something cracked open in her chest. She crossed the room in two strides, dropped the pizza on the counter, and flung her arms around his neck. Her mouth found his, urgent, hungry. He groaned against her lips as she pushed him back onto the couch. They tumbled together, a tangle of limbs, kissing like they couldn't get close enough.

Her hands slid under his shirt, fingers tracing the solid plane of his chest. His hands grasped her hips, pulling her closer, anchoring himself in her as if she were the only thing keeping him steady. Their kisses turned desperate, teeth and tongues, the room filling with the sound of harsh breaths and the low thud of the couch shifting beneath them.

It wasn't gentle—it was release. His grief, her fear, all of it poured into the heat between them. Passion edged with something rawer: need. By the time it slowed, they were tangled under a blanket, her head pillowed on his chest, his arms wrapped protectively around her.

Doug's fingers stroked through her hair, slow and reverent. "Thank you," he murmured, bending to press a kiss against her forehead. "For helping me tonight."

Her throat burned. She pushed herself up to sit, pulling the blanket around her shoulders. The words tumbled out before she could stop them. "I lied to you earlier today."

He looked confused.

"When I told you I didn't throw up on my first time in the field. It was a lie." She swallowed. "I mean I didn't actually throw up but I was terrified. Rossi pulled me out from the academy to help with this case—closed community, serial killer operating inside. I charged in without backup, thought I could handle it. He had me pinned to the wall by my throat. I thought... I thought I was going to die. Until Rossi and Hotch burst in."

Doug reached for her hand. "Helena it's been a long day, you don't have to....."

She shook her head, cutting him off before he could continue. "Please let me finish. I've never been this honest with anyone before. I don't even think I know how to be."

Her voice cracked, tears spilling despite herself. "I never learned how to do relationships. Intimacy. Saying what I feel. In my house... you couldn't. Growing up, 'I love you' always came after something bad. A dead body. Being drugged. Being lied to." She choked out a bitter laugh. "I don't know, maybe he did love me. But it didn't matter. Because a day later, a week later... he didn't love me enough to stop killing all those people."

Her tears fell harder. She pressed a hand to her chest as if to steady the ache. "So every time I hear 'I love you,' I'm just waiting for the punch. For the pain that comes afterwards."

She looked at him, broken open. "And I'm scared. Scared I'm like him. He seemed so normal, and then there was this dark side. What if I'm the same?"

Doug's hands framed her face, firm and steady. His thumbs brushed her tears away. "Helena. Look at me."

She did, broken and raw.

"I don't care how dark it feels inside you. You're not him. You're nothing like him." His voice was quiet but unyielding. "You care too much. You fight too hard for people you don't even know. That is not who he was. That's you."

Her breath shuddered.

"I don't know how to do this Doug," she whispered, her lips trembling. "But I want to. I want to be with you so badly. I want to be better. I don't want to run anymore."

She wanted nothing but him and it was fucking terrifying.

He leaned forward, his forehead against hers, steadying her. "Then we'll figure it out. Together." His voice was sure, steady in a way hers wasn't. "Because I want to be with you too."

Something fragile inside her loosened. She melted into his embrace, clutching him tightly, his heartbeat steady beneath her ear. For the first time in years, maybe ever, she allowed herself to believe that maybe she didn't have to carry it all alone. That maybe — someone could hold her in all her brokenness and not let go.

Helena's tears slowed, her breathing syncing with the rhythm of Doug's chest rising and falling beneath her cheek. His hand never left her hair, combing gently through the strands as if memorising the shape of her. For the first time in years, she didn't feel like she had to brace for what came next.

Exhaustion tugged at her, heavy and insistent. As her eyes fluttered shut, her mind wandered back—brief flashes of her father's face, the weight of his shadow. But the images that had always come jagged and sharp felt... muted now, blurred at the edges, softened by the warmth surrounding her.

Doug's arms tightened around her, steady and protective. His lips brushed her temple, a kiss so light it felt like a promise.

She let herself sink into it, into him. Into the thought—fragile, terrifying, intoxicating—that maybe she didn't have to live only in darkness and light anymore.

Maybe, finally, she could start to live in colour.

And with that thought, Helena Bishop drifted into sleep in Doug Bailey's arms.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Eleven

“All In The Family”

“Child prodigy is a curse because you've got all those terrible possibilities.” - Itzhak Perlman

The elevator doors opened, and before Helena could step out fully, Garcia was there, arms thrown wide.

“My fine, furry friends!” she cried, pulling both Helena and JJ into a hug so tight it nearly knocked the wind out of them. “Do you have any idea how many prayers, spells, and candlelight vigils I have thrown into the universe for you in the last twelve hours?!”

JJ laughed softly, hugging her back. “We’re okay, Pen.”

Garcia pulled away, wiping the corner of her eye with a flourish. “Not okay—alive! And that is good enough for me.”

Helena smiled faintly, squeezing Garcia’s hand, then quietly slipped away down the corridor. Her steps carried her straight toward Doug’s office before she could talk herself out of it.

The door was half-open. He was standing by the window, phone in his hand, shoulders taut. When he turned and saw her, the phone clattered onto his desk.

“Helena.”

In three strides he was across the room, pulling her into a tight embrace. She gasped, ribs flaring with pain. “Ow,” she hissed, trying to laugh it off.

Doug immediately pulled back, his hands hovering like he was afraid to hurt her again. His eyes scanned her face, the bruises on her jaw, the way she held herself stiffly. “You’re hurt.” His voice broke low, almost angry at himself. “How bad?”

“Just bruised,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’ll live.”

But his fingers still brushed her arm, gentle, like she might shatter.

'Can I see?' he asked, and Helena took a second to search his face before nodding. Doug’s fingers search for the edge of her sweater, and take their time peeling the fabric away from her skin. She shivered slightly as the cool air of the room hit her skin and she held herself still as Doug examined the ugly bruise across the front and side of her ribs, He ran his fingers gently over the bruise, soft enough that it didn’t hurt. “Do you know how worried I was?”

Something in her chest tightened, the walls she usually held up wobbling. “I know.”

His eyes searched hers, the tension in his shoulders easing just slightly. Then he pulled her into his arms again, this time carefully, mindful of her bruises. She could feel his heartbeat against her cheek, quick and uneven.

“I thought I lost you,” he murmured.

Helena let herself lean into him, her breath shaky. For the first time since the blast, since the wall with her face on it, since Rossi’s words about kindred spirits, she let herself break just a little—safe in the circle of his arms. “When it went off—I thought that was it. And all I could think about was you.”

He pulled back just enough to look at her, his hands still steadying her arms. “Helena…”

She shook her head quickly, pressing a hand to his chest as if to keep him from pushing. Her voice cracked, but she didn’t look away. “That’s what kept me fighting.”

Doug’s expression softened into something almost reverent. He brushed his thumb gently over the bruise along her jaw, as though even touching her hurt him. “That’s all I needed to hear.”

Helena swallowed hard, blinking against the sting in her eyes. Her chest ached, not just from the bruises but from the pull of everything she kept trying to suppress. “Once this case is over… I’m going to take a few days off. And we can really talk. About us. About everything.”

Doug nodded, but he didn’t let her go. Instead, he held her tighter, his lips brushing the top of her hair as he whispered, “Just don’t wait too long. Please.”

Helena let her eyes close, letting herself lean fully into him. And for a moment, she just let herself exist in his arms, fragile but safe.

Falls Lake, NC

Voit shut off the engine, the gas station lights shrinking into the distance behind him. He stepped out of the car, the cool air biting at his skin, and instinctively reached behind him, pressing his palm to the faint ridge of scar tissue across his back.

The ache was old, but the memory was fresh. It always was.

He was seventeen again.

The cabin was cloaked in silence, except for the rasp of pages turning. Lee sat hunched over a battered copy of The Anatomy of Evil by David Rossi. The book smelled faintly of damp paper, its margins smudged with fingerprints.

He devoured every word. Rossi didn’t write like a cop—he wrote like someone who understood. Who could trace the shape of darkness and map it across the human soul.

One chapter in particular made him linger, his eyes widening as he read about the Surgeon. A man who kept his victims alive for days, exploring anatomy not with a scalpel for healing, but for control. The detail was clinical but tinged with horror, and Elias’s heart raced as he read. This wasn’t just cruelty—it was discipline, ritual. Rossi called it “the slow violence of curiosity.”

Cyrus’s orders had been clear: watch her. Don’t let her scream.

But Maria—Maria with the wide, terrified eyes—whispered his name.

“Lee?” she had cried, her voice raw.

The whisper cut through his trance. Elias looked up. Maria was there, shackled but alive, eyes wet and desperate.

“Your dad calls you Lee, right?”

He hesitated. “…He’s my uncle.”

Her voice broke. “Sorry. Okay. Your uncle. Please. Lee? Let me go. I promise I won’t tell anybody what happened.”

She was crying. Her whole body trembled.

“What’s your name?” he asked, like maybe names could change the rules.

“Maria.”

She whispered it like it mattered. Like saying it aloud could keep her alive.

“He’s going to kill me,” she said, desperation spilling over.

“I don’t want him to be mad at me.” he admitted as he tried to turn his attention back to his book.

“God, Lee, please. He hurt me so bad. But I won’t tell anybody, I swear. Please. I don’t want to die.”

Something inside him twisted. For one fragile second, he wanted to believe he could be different. That he could open the door, let her run, pretend Cyrus wouldn’t find her again.

“Okay,” he whispered. “But you have to be so quiet, okay?”

“Yes. Yes, I will.”

But in an instant, hope snapped into violence.

His breath caught as Maria lunged, the hidden blade slashing hot into his side. Pain flared, white and searing. He stumbled back, blood blooming through his shirt.

Maria used the moment to scramble toward the door, wrists rattling against the chain. But she didn’t get more than two steps before Cyrus’s hand clamped around her arm.

“You stupid bitch,” he growled, hauling her back like she weighed nothing. He flung her down hard—her body hit the floor with a sickening crack, air bursting from her lungs in a wheeze. She kicked, scrambled, her nails clawing at the wood as she tried to crawl away.

Cyrus straddled her, pinning her down with a knee across her chest. The knife came down once, sharp and fast. Her scream ripped the air. He plunged it again, and again with brutal force, until her voice broke into choking sobs. Blood sprayed up his forearm, flecking his face.

Lee stood frozen, watching as her struggles slowed, then faltered. Her legs twitched once, twice, and then went slack. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. Not from the blood. Not from Cyrus’s grin. Not from the terrible, intoxicating power in the act.

Cyrus yanked the blade free, his chest heaving with exertion, his teeth bared in a bloody grin. The metallic stench filled the room, thick and suffocating.

Elias staggered, clutching his wound, horror and fascination warring inside him. He barely registered Cyrus turning—until the older man’s fist slammed into the side of his head.

Elias crashed to the floor, his ears ringing.

Cyrus loomed over him, knife still dripping, eyes blazing with fury. He kicked Elias once in the ribs, hard enough to knock the air from his lungs.

“I should’ve let her kill you,” Cyrus spat, voice low and venomous.

Now, in the present, Voit’s fingers dug into the scar until it hurt. He could still feel the heat of her breath when she’d begged him.

He whispered into the night, almost without realising it:

That’s what happens when you forget the rules.

But he hadn’t. And Cyrus had been right—he had never forgotten the rules again.

The table was covered in photos, missing-person posters, and ME reports spread like a grim mosaic. Helena rubbed her temple, eyes scanning victim after victim, trying not to feel the weight of all those faces staring back at her.

“There are too many victims,” JJ murmured, shaking her head. “I can’t keep track of all this horribleness.”

Helena studied the board for a minute for a moment, her gaze caught on one of the autopsy reports. “Here.” She pushed the paper across the table. “One of the victims from the second container — Louise Murphy of Brentwood, Tennessee. She had crab spiders poured down her throat. She survived for days before organ failure.” Her voice dipped, heavy. “But in container one, Robert Sesper had Sicarius spiders poured down his throat, he died within hours.”

“So you think that in the second container he’s deliberately prolonging their pain?” Rossi asked.

“Escalation,” JJ said, nodding. “The second container wasn’t just storage—it was refinement. What’s to say he just stopped at two containers?”

Rossi leaned back in his chair, arms folded, voice gravelly but steady. “I think we are starting to find a pattern here. The first container was filled with victims living very high-risk lifestyles—people who wouldn’t be missed. And then container number two…those were filled with low-risk victims. Well connected. Stable jobs. Deep ties to their communities. Their families.”

Helena frowned, scanning the images again. “And they were all reported missing. Every single one.”

Rossi leaned forward, his eyes scanning the photos. “I see your low-risk and raise you a parent.”

Helena blinked. “What?”

Rossi tapped the faces one by one. “So far, every single victim we’ve identified in container two had children. Every one. Including Tyler Green’s sister.”

The air stilled around the table as that detail sank in.

Helena felt a chill snake down her spine, an old instinct whispering that there was meaning here, something personal to Sicarius. Parents. Children. A lineage of pain.

Falls Lake, NC

Voit stood in the gravel drive, staring up at the warped siding of the old house. The air smelled of wet pine and rust, the kind of smell that never left his bones. His hand hovered near the scar on his back, but another memory clawed its way forward—the night he got away.

The floorboards creaked as he edged toward the front door. His legs were shaking, but he forced them forward. This time I’m leaving. This time I’m done.

Behind him, Cyrus’s voice cut through the dark.

“The hell you think you’re going?”

Lee froze.

Cyrus stepped out of the shadows, his smile too wide, his eyes glinting. “To talk to the cops again?”

Lee spun, anger and fear a tangled knot. “I didn’t say anything to anyone. How could I? You never let me go anywhere without you.”

“That’s right,” Cyrus growled, stepping closer. “You can’t go nowhere without me.”

Something inside Lee snapped. His voice cracked, but it carried. “I don’t need you anymore. I’m out.”

Cyrus’s laugh rasped through the stale air, cruel and taunting. “Over my dead body.”

Lee’s rage snapped like a live wire. He lunged, his hands clamping around Cyrus’s throat.

The skin was loose, leathery, but the feeling of it—the tendons straining beneath his palms, the sudden panic in the old man’s eyes—sent a jolt through him. Cyrus’s breath wheezed, cut off by Voit’s grip, his mouth opening and closing like a fish hauled onto dry land.

For a moment, Voit savoured it. The power. The reversal. The boy who used to cower in cupboards, who used to beg for scraps, now towering over the monster who’d taught him fear. His thumbs dug into the hollow of Cyrus’s throat, feeling the frantic pulse weaken beneath the pressure.

Cyrus’s hands clawed at his arms, but his strength was gone. His body bucked once, twice. Voit leaned closer, breathing hard, his lips curling in something between a smile and a snarl.

This is it, he thought. This is how it ends. I finally get to kill him with my own hands.

But then—the voice of his own rules, clear and sharp in his head. No bodies that can be traced. No mistakes. No ties.

If Cyrus’s body was found strangled, if anyone connected them…

Voit froze, his grip trembling. For a long, taut second, he thought about ignoring the rules. About squeezing just a little harder until there was nothing left.

Then he shoved himself back, releasing his uncle with a violent gasp. Cyrus slumped in the chair, hacking and coughing, his throat mottled red and purple.

“That’s the smartest thing you’ve ever done, boy,” Cyrus croaked between coughs. “You kill me now, the sheriff will know it was you.”

Voit stood there, chest heaving, hands flexing like they didn’t want to let go. His pulse thundered with the unfinished act. Power had flooded him, and then drained away, leaving a hollow ache.

Cyrus wheezed a laugh, eyes glinting with spite. “Maybe you have been listening. You’ll be back. I’m all you got.”

Voit turned without a word, slamming the car door behind him as he left.

Outside, the air hit him cold and sharp. For the first time in years, he wasn’t locked inside this house, wasn’t trapped by the cupboard or the shadows. He was free.

But the freedom didn’t feel clean. It was jagged, poisoned. Because he hadn’t finished it. He hadn’t taken what was his.

And the emptiness inside him only deepened.

Voit slammed his car door shut, snapping the memory in half. The echo of his younger self still rang in his ears.

Cyrus was right. He had came back.

But tonight, things were different.

He wasn’t that boy anymore. He wasn’t trapped.

He was Sicarius.

And as he walked toward the house, every step was steady, certain.

The board was already covered with photos and maps when Prentiss stepped in, a thin stack of files in her hands. Her voice was even but hard, eyes sweeping the team.

“We’ve established Silvio Herrera lied about killing Maria Jones. He confessed to cover up the fact that he was in a relationship with another man. The name that keeps surfacing is an arms dealer called Cyrus who blackmailed him into taking the blame. Bailey’s agreed to let us take this to the Attorney General. Please—somebody—give me good news from that shipping container.”

Rossi cleared his throat, standing to gesture at the maps he’d tacked up. “Alright. I’ve been building a geo-profile. A fraction of victims from his Yakima County container were reported missing. You go to Whitfield County, and the victim type shifts drastically. They’re all parents. The kind of people that get search parties and news stories.”

“So they’re a challenge for him?” Prentiss asked.

Helena’s eyes traced the lines across the maps, the pattern falling into place. “That’s why he leaves them in Georgia. Far away from where he lives. He wouldn’t want to risk authorities conducting a search anywhere near his backyard.”

Prentiss nodded, fingers tapping the folder in her hand. “We know he revisits the victims, so the first container was likely close to where he actually lives.”

The door banged open.

“Hey! Hey!” Garcia burst in, breathless and wide-eyed, nearly tripping over her heels. “Forgive me, I know this is not my area of expertise but—listen—I think I have something.” She darted toward the table, snatching a pen out of JJ’s hand to start scribbling. “Okay, all of the identified victims, no exceptions, have a connection to the name of a single location: Second Street.”

Prentiss frowned. “I’m not quite following.”

Garcia spun the whiteboard around, her eyes flashing. “I looked at every single victim’s bio and it’s bananas. Every time, whether it was where they worked, where they hung out, where they were last seen—each and every one crossed a Second Street before they went missing.”

Luke leaned forward, skeptical. “Alison Green wouldn’t fit that pattern. There’s nothing here that says—”

“Yes there is!” Garcia stabbed the board with her marker. “Alison Green worked at Delilah’s, which still exists on Oak Street. But in 2003, Oak Street was an extension of Second Street.”

JJ glanced at the records, her eyes narrowing. “She’s right. Basically, in whatever city Sicarius finds himself, Second Street is his preferred hunting ground.”

Garcia’s voice softened, for once almost hopeful. “And maybe it’s wishful thinking because Second Street is, like, the most common name in the United States, but maybe it means something to him.”

Rossi leaned back, arms folded. “It’s not a coincidence. Where he hunts is rooted in something deeply personal to him. And who he hunts is a form of transference.”

Prentiss turned toward him. “Transference? Meaning you think Sicarius is a father?”

Rossi nodded. “I do. Because as a parent… it might explain why there are so many gaps between kills. The cooling-off periods could line up with his children’s births. Father by day, serial killer by night. That’s why he’s so disciplined.”

Helena exhaled sharply, her hands curling into fists against the table. “But that’s how we’re gonna catch this son of a bitch. Through his family.”

Her voice was steady, but inside her chest was a storm. She thought about her own father, about the way his downfall hadn’t been a badge or a bullet—it had been her. His daughter. The one thing he hadn’t accounted for.

She had stopped him.

And now, she would stop Sicarius.

Father by day, serial killer by night.

Her father had hidden in plain sight, too—playing the role of mentor, of caretaker, of family man. She thought of the basement, the blood, the chloroform, the knife that had cut into her palm.

And now Sicarius. Another man using family as camouflage.

Helena’s chest ached with the familiar weight: the fear that she carried that same darkness inside her. But no matter how hard the case pressed on her, she whispered one truth to herself.

I stopped him. And I’ll stop this one, too.

Falls Lake, NC

The door creaked open under Voit’s hand, the smell hitting him like a fist: dust, mildew, a tang of iron in the air. For a moment, it was like walking back through time, every shadow holding the shape of his younger self.

He stepped inside. The floorboards groaned under his weight, just like they had when he was a boy sneaking toward the door only to be dragged back by Cyrus’s hand in his collar. The wallpaper was the same, peeling at the edges, the same faded photographs of long-dead kin glaring from their frames.

But he wasn’t that scared kid anymore.

He was Sicarius.

“Well, well.” Cyrus’s rasp carried from the sitting room, mocking even now. “The prodigal son returns. Took you long enough.”

Voit’s jaw tightened. “Yeah. Sometimes when I close my eyes, it’s like I never left.”

Cyrus wheezed a laugh. “That what you been doing the last twenty years? Just thinking about this place?”

“Yeah.” Voit’s voice was flat. “Even after I went to school. After I fell in love, got married, had two daughters. I can’t get this place out of my head.”

Cyrus coughed, his laugh broken but cruel. “After everything I taught you, you still think you can be normal.”

Voit leaned closer, his voice taut, almost pleading, as if he couldn’t understand why Cyrus refused to see it. “No. I’m still what you made me.”

Why don’t you get that?”

“Oh? Is that why you came back, huh? To blame me?”

Voit’s hands curled into fists at his sides. “I could’ve had a chance. I could have been normal.”

Cyrus’s ragged laugh turned into a cough, flecks of blood staining his lips. “No, you couldn’t. Our vice is in our blood. Need I remind you of the real reason you came into my custody?”

The words stung like they always did, but Voit didn’t flinch. Cyrus blinked, then recognition spread across his face, cruel delight lighting his eyes.

“It’s you. The one they’re all talking about. Sicarius.”

Voit nodded. Cyrus always could see straight through him.

“Did you come here to kill me?”

Voit’s voice was calm, almost gentle. “I already killed you an hour ago. Slipped some naproxen in your IV. I just came here to watch an old man die.”

Cyrus wheezed a laugh, his breath shallow. “I see. You dumb son of a bitch. If I die, they’ll connect me to you.”

“No, they won’t.” Voit’s expression hardened, his voice low and steady. “They’ll just find a lonely old man who died of kidney failure. Nothing more.”

Cyrus’s laughter turned into a rattle, his chest hitching. His voice scraped out one last warning. “I always knew it. Family’s what gets you killed. You’ll find that out soon enough. And that little family of yours?” His grin cracked, blood flecking his lips. “Yeah. They’ll find out, too.”

Voit watched as the light drained from his uncle’s eyes, the body that had tormented him reduced to stillness. He had imagined this moment for years, thought it would taste like triumph, like release.

But as the silence deepened, all he felt was the hollow weight pressing harder against his ribs.

It should have brought relief. It didn’t.

The house smelled the same. The shadows were the same. And deep inside, a voice whispered the same truth it always had— no matter how far he ran, he could never escape what was carved into him.

Voit’s hand curled into a fist. He turned away from the bed, his face a mask of control.

I’m not that boy anymore, he told himself.

But the emptiness followed him out the door.

The night was heavy with humidity, clinging to his skin as he slid behind the wheel. The leather was hot against his back, the faint reek of old coffee and gasoline filling the cabin.

Voit gripped the steering wheel so hard his knuckles blanched, staring through the windshield at the dark stretch of trees. His chest still heaved, like Cyrus’s last ragged breaths had been absorbed into him, choking him.

He thought he’d feel free. That watching Cyrus die would peel away the last layer of control the old man had over him. But it hadn’t. Cyrus’s voice still rang in his skull, sharp and poisonous: Family’s what gets you killed.

Voit drummed his fingers on the wheel, a staccato rhythm that betrayed the itch under his skin. For years he’d tried—really tried—to be normal. Sydney. The girls. The suburban house with its paint-chipped porch. Little league games, school projects, family dinners. He had built the performance brick by brick.

But normal had always felt borrowed. A costume he wore too well, until the seams started to itch. Tonight proved it. The moment Cyrus taunted him, the moment the weight of the past pressed close—he knew he hadn’t escaped anything.

He swallowed, his mouth dry, and his thoughts shifted. Not to Sydney. Not to his daughters.

To her.

Helena Bishop.

She knew what it meant to be shaped by a monster. She wasn’t just another FBI agent. She wasn’t even just another adversary. She was proof of what he’d always known: that family makes you, breaks you, and marks you for life. She had been moulded by her father’s darkness, just as he had been moulded by Cyrus’s cruelty.

Voit leaned back, closing his eyes for a brief moment, letting the vision of her face flicker through his mind. Not from photographs. From his own imagination—seeing her in the woods, hunted, fighting back, blood on her hands.

The thought settled in him like fire, warming the cold void Cyrus had left behind.

He opened his eyes, a small, sharp smile tugging at his mouth.

He imagined her gripping that knife, the blade slipping, the blood slicking her skin as she drove it into her father to save herself. He wondered if she felt it—that spark, that rush, that first taste of power.

Voit’s pulse quickened.

Other people couldn’t understand. But he could. He always could.

The corners of his mouth twitched again, this time into something darker. Cyrus had been wrong about a lot of things—but not about family.

Family would kill you.

Or, if you were lucky, it would make you into something else entirely.

And Helena Bishop? She was going to understand him better than anyone else ever could.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Ten

“Flashes Before Your Eyes”

“Memory is the diary that we all carry about with us." – Oscar Wilde

Whitfield County, GA

When you’re in a job that constantly puts you in danger, you’re going to lose count of how many life-threatening situations you’re put in. She and JJ have joked about it, referred to their ‘kidnapping quotas’ more than a few times — jokes made possible by the healing they’ve both gone through together and separately — so in theory Helena should have some sort of schema for how this goes, some sort of recognition of which stage of a new life-threatening traumatic event she’s in.

It’s never fun, but she knows to expect that it won’t be.

It’s everything that comes after that makes it so much different.

Well during too, because Helena hadn’t added ‘survived a bomb explosion’ to her resume yet.

There's a lot of things about it anyone would be able to guess if they've seen any sort of TV— the dust, the confusion, the goddamn ringing in her ears.

But what she wasn't prepared for is the way any single trace of her breath vanishes from her lungs and doesn’t seem like it's coming back.

She lands on her back, somehow taking all of the impact in her chest, so much that she can't even remember that there’s any other parts to her body, let alone feel them — not with the fire in her chest and the panic gripping her heart when she can't move it to breathe.

They say your whole life flashes before your eyes, and Helena has always found that to be true, both every time before and now.

Memories poured through her like a floodgate wrenched open.

She is nine years old. The basement was colder than the rest of the house, the concrete floor damp underneath her socked feet. She’d gone down looking for a book she’d left during a study session with her father. Instead, she found a smear of dark red, dried into the grooves of the floor. It smelled sharp, coppery. Her tiny hands trembled as she touched it, pulling back her fingers slick with rust-coloured flakes. Blood.

She is eleven years old. She crept down again, heart hammering. This time she saw a box pushed against the far wall. Something moved inside it. She swore she saw fingers curling out of the gap, pale and frantic. A muffled cry. But her father’s hand came down heavy on her shoulder, the sickly sweet scent of chloroform filling her nose. When she woke in her bed, she didn’t know if it had been real or a nightmare.

She is fourteen years old. She hears whispers at school. News on the TV about missing women. Patterns only she could see. The way her father disappeared on certain weekends, the way he came home calmer, almost… lighter. Her stomach knotted with the realisation. Her father wasn’t just strange. He was a killer.

She is fifteen years old. Running through the woods. Being hunted. By him. His face twisted with rage as she ran. The knife flashing in his hand. Her fingers wrapped so tight around the blade that when she plunged it into him, she carved a scar into her own palm. His scream. Her scream. The moment her life cleaved in two: before him, after him..

She is sixteen years old. There is prison visitation glass between them. She stares at him, voice trembling but determined. “Why did you try to kill me? Why all those people?” His smile was calm, almost pitying. “Because you’re mine.” She left shaking, his words embedding in her bones like shrapnel. “Because we’re the same.”

She is seventeen years old. She returned anyway. Notebook in hand, questions written down. “What does it feel like? To murder? What’s the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath?” His eyes glittered, proud, indulgent. She told herself it was research. Preparation. Deep down, she wondered if it was inheritance.

She is eighteen years old. She stands outside the prison gates, knowing it will be the last time. “I can’t come back anymore,” she whispered to the wind, though part of her ached with the loss. Every visit had been like plugging into a live wire, him filling her with his darkness. Like he could see something inside of her that she didn’t even know was there. She walked away. But the question remained, ‘What if I’m like him?’

She is nineteen years old. She feels the rot creeping in. Consuming her. She didn’t understand it, but she does now. Her mother lies sprawled out on the couch. Drunk again. “Well, you are your father’s daughter.” Eleanor hisses as Helena snatches the bottle of martini from her hands. She is her father’s daughter after all. How many times did her mother say that as she grew up? You are your father’s daughter.

She is twenty one years old. She stands outside a house. A mother’s house. A door she can’t bring herself to knock on. Inside lives Patricia Jenkins, a woman whose daughter her father had butchered – Ashley Jenkins. Helena knows all her father victims. Their names, their families, their stories. Anything to try and makes sense of something in which there was none. Helena wants to fall to her knees and say she’s sorry. But she doesn’t have the courage. She carries that guilt instead, tucking it in her chest like a thorn she could never pull out. Guilt is going to follow her around her entire life.

She is twenty three years old. In training at Quantico. Agents Hotch and Rossi approach her. The BAU. They need her for a case, her unique insight, her scars turned into tools. Rossi especially—his steady voice, his quiet belief—makes her feel, for the first time, like she could be something more than her father’s legacy. That maybe she could use the darkness without being consumed by it. Redemption.

She is twenty four years old. The hours following a case was always give or take. It could go one way or another; you either go home feeling like you accomplished something, or you go home with a hole in your chest — there's rarely an in between to that. But for now, she's finding more and more that the hole in her chest never goes away. Instead, it lingers. It's there and she tries to ignore it, because she wants so badly to pretend it's not there, but .. no such luck. It has grown bigger the past few years, demanding it gets her attention, and she resents it for leaving her feeling so empty all the time. “The question is, how different are we? Us and them?" Prentiss asks from the seat next to her on the jet. She hates the question, hates the way it settles in her stomach with the weight of a boulder. She's right of course, they spend their lives thinking like the people they hunt. And she’s spent her whole life thinking like her father.

She is twenty six years old. It's not the first time a shot she has fired has ended a man's life. It's just the first time she doesn't know how to deal with her own reaction to it. She takes a sip of her Scotch and makes a face as the liquid burns its way down her throat, much stronger than the wine she's accustomed to. Guilt. She feels it, yes, but not for the right reasons. She's not asking herself whether she could have aimed somewhere else, if maybe one shot less might have been enough to stop the man in a non-fatal way. Those are the questions that would normally be plaguing her after a shooting, but this time they're not. For the record, she reminds herself dully as she takes another sip of her drink, the answer to both of those questions would be 'no'. It all happened so fast. Billy Flynn had his gun trained on two civilians he was holding hostage. Given the circumstances, her use of force had been well within reason. The problem is, she's not even interested in asking those questions. She doesn't particularly care whether her use of force had been within reason or not. The man is dead and she can't even bring herself to regret it. And therein lies the guilt. Not in killing a man, but in not even caring that she did. "Am I a bad person?". Rossi looks over at her from across the jet and shakes his head. "Of course not kid." "Then why don't I feel bad for shooting someone?". “Because he wasn't worth feeling bad for." It sounds so simple when Rossi says it, so reasonable. So why doesn’t she believe him?

She is twenty nine years old. Peter Lewis is holding her captive. Drugged, hallucinating. Her father’s ghost looming as Lewis urged her to kill. “He’s coming through that door, Helena. Kill him before he kills you.” Her hand tightened on the gun. She wanted it. God, she wanted to. Only later did she realise it wouldn’t have been her father—it would have been her team. The truth chilled her more than anything: she had been ready.

She is thirty six years old. At dinner. With Doug. His eyes warm, earnest. “You’re the most amazing, smart, beautiful woman I’ve ever met. I love you.” Her chest had locked. Her throat closed. She couldn’t say it back. Couldn’t believe she deserved it. Yet his voice haunted her now, gentler than her father’s, but just as consuming: You gave my life colour.

They say your life flashes before your eyes and that’s true. But apparently, your future flashes before your eyes too.

Visions of everything she hadn’t lived through yet.

The weekend trip she and Doug take to Vermont.

The day she and Doug unpack the last box in their new house.

The day Doug bends down on one knee and gives her the ring he’s been not so secretly hiding for months.

The future she wants, but doesn’t think she deserves.

The thought of missing any one of those almost hurt worse than the radiating pain in her chest, a paralysing kind of ache that lingers even when she can finally breathe again.

The ringing in her ears grew sharper, piercing. Helena gasped, dragging air into her lungs at last. Her body screamed in pain, but she was still alive. Barely.

And Sicarius knew who she was.

The Surgeon’s daughter.

The one he wanted to break.

“Helena!”

The voice cut through the haze, ragged but alive. She blinked hard, grit scratching her eyes, and through the drifting smoke saw JJ staggering toward her. JJ’s hair was matted with ash, a streak of blood down her temple, her vest scorched but intact.

Helena tried to push herself up, her arms trembling under the weight of her own body. Pain radiated down her ribs, every movement setting off sharp detonations inside her.

JJ dropped to her knees beside her, hands running quickly over Helena’s arms, her shoulders. “You’re okay, you’re okay—just stay with me.” Her voice shook, but her grip was steady.

Helena opened her mouth, but only a rasp came out. Her ears still buzzed with the phantom roar of the explosion, but JJ’s touch anchored her back in the present. Back from the bloodstained basements, the prison glass, the ghosts of her father.

They weren’t gone. They’d never be gone. But JJ was here. Alive. Breathing.

Helena forced the words out, a whisper through cracked lips: “We need… to move.”

JJ glanced over her shoulder at the fire eating through the container, the twisted metal glowing like a furnace. Sirens were starting to wail faint in the distance.

She gripped Helena’s wrist, hauling her up with a strength that belied her size. “Then we move, together.”

The two of them staggered away, smoke trailing behind them, the echo of what they’d seen—what Helena had seen on that wall—burned into her memory deeper than any scar.

Elias Voit sat in the driver’s seat of his SUV, headlights off, the glow of fire flickering in his rearview mirror. Smoke mushroomed into the sky where the container used to be. The blast had rattled the trees, sent birds shrieking into the night.

His lips curled faintly. Helena Bishop had made it out. He knew she would. He’d timed the detonation just right—long enough to give her a fighting chance, long enough to remind her that her story wasn’t finished.

It would’ve been such a waste to kill her so soon.

Benjamin Reeves, though—perfect patsy. His legacy would burn alongside the wreckage, his name tarred forever with blood and fire.

Voit reached for his phone, thumb hovering over a familiar number. He pressed call and leaned back as the line rang out. Voicemail picked up, and his voice softened, practiced smooth.

“Hey, Syd. It turns out this job’s a little more complicated than I thought. Gonna have to stay out here a couple more days. But don’t worry—there’s a big Christmas bonus waiting for us when it’s done.”

He ended the call before the weight in his chest could push through his voice.

For a moment, he just stared at the Lock Screen: Sydney and the girls, frozen in summer sunlight, smiling wide like the world was safe. He traced the edge of the image with his thumb, his expression unreadable.

Family.

His smile faded as he slid the phone aside and reached for his iPad. With a few swipes, he pulled up a map and searched: Falls Lake, NC.

Because if there was anyone else who ever resembled family—anyone who shaped him into what he was—it was Cyrus.

And it was time to pay him a visit.

The fire in his rearview mirror dwindled into smoke, but Elias Voit didn’t move. He sat in the quiet dark, staring at his own reflection in the glass.

Family.

The word split him open, dragging him backward through time like barbed wire ripping at skin.

He was a child again. Running barefoot through the woods, lungs burning, feet torn by roots and rocks. He thought if he just kept moving, he’d get away. But the woods weren’t freedom. They were a cage.

Cyrus came out of nowhere, a shadow made flesh, his fist swinging with perfect precision. One brutal strike cracked across Elias’s temple, and then—nothing.

He woke in the dark.

The cupboard was so small he couldn’t sit up, the air sour and hot. His fingers brushed against fur, and then the slick, cold skin beneath it. A carcass. The smell of rotting meat invaded his nostrils, settled on his tongue.

He screamed. Beat at the door until his hands were raw. Begged for release, for mercy, for anything but the suffocating dark and the dead thing pressed against him.

Cyrus only opened the door to shove in a chipped plate with scraps—meagre food he had to gulp down before the door slammed again, plunging him back into blackness. Elias cried until his body gave out.

Days blurred. Hunger gnawed him into obedience. Until finally, one morning, Cyrus let him out.

He remembered the relief of lying in a real bed again. A pillow beneath his head. He thought maybe he had been forgiven.

Then Cyrus sat on the edge of the mattress, speaking with that cool, clinical tone that turned Elias’s stomach even as a boy.

He told him about he’d read about experiments on dogs. How they yelped at the shocks, jumped and fought, but eventually they stopped. They gave up.

“That’s learned helplessness,” Cyrus said. “And now you’ve learned it too. Your mom and dad are dead. I’m your only family. So—you follow my rules. Are you going to be a good boy?”

Elias nodded, because nodding meant survival. Cyrus gave him a hot plate of food—his first real meal in weeks. And so the rules began.

Sitting now in his car, Voit’s hands tightened on the steering wheel until the leather creaked.

That cupboard. That carcass. That darkness.

The helplessness had eaten him alive as a boy. He had vowed never again to be powerless, never again to cry in the dark while someone else made the rules.

And yet—even now—it still lingered. A ghost inside him.

He hated it. He hated Cyrus. He hated the child who had once been weak enough to break.

But he also knew there was one person who could understand it. Not Sydney. Not anyone else.

Helena Bishop.

The Surgeon’s daughter. The girl who’d survived her own monster by stabbing him through the chest.

She carried her father inside her the way he carried Cyrus.

She’d know what it meant to be forged by horror. She’d know the rules.

And that made her his.

Paramedics moved quickly, flashlights cutting across the smoky clearing as they patched scrapes, checked pupils, pressed stethoscopes to chests. Helena winced as antiseptic stung the cut along her cheek. JJ sat beside her, a bandage already wrapped around her wrist.

Boots crunched over debris. Prentiss, Rossi, Tara, and Luke appeared through the haze, relief plain on their faces.

Emily didn’t hesitate; she pulled both JJ and Helena into a rough, fierce hug. “You scared the hell out of us,” she muttered, voice sharp but threaded with warmth.

Rossi crouched beside Helena, eyes scanning her face with the steady concern of a father. “How are you holding up kids?”

Helena drew a shaky breath. Her body ached like hell, her ears still rang, but her voice was steady. “I’m ready to catch this son of a bitch.”

Tara crossed her arms, gaze sweeping the charred wreckage behind them. “You’re lucky. Locals say gasoline was the accelerant. That blast should’ve killed you both.”

JJ shook her head, firm. “Luck had nothing to do with it. He called twice. He was warning us. He wanted us out.”

Emily’s expression tightened, the weight of that sinking in. Then she glanced down at her phone, thumb hovering over the screen before she pressed it into Helena’s hand.

“Speaking of calling… ring him,” Emily said softly. “Let him know you’re okay. Or I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Helena froze, throat tight, then nodded once. She stepped away from the others, into the edge of the tree-line. She leaned against the rough bark of a tree, phone pressed tight to her ear. Her whole body ached, but it was nothing compared to the hollow ache in her chest that finally eased when Doug’s voice filled the line.

The line clicked. “Helena?” Doug’s voice rushed out, tight with worry.

She closed her eyes, pressing a hand against her ribs. Just hearing him nearly undid her. “Yeah. It’s me.”

He exhaled hard, almost a laugh, almost a sob. “Jesus. I thought—” He cut himself off, swallowing the words. “Are you okay? Did the medics clear you? You didn’t hit your head? You’re not concussed?”

She almost smiled, hearing the panic underneath his rapid-fire questions. “Doug… I’m okay.” Her voice cracked on the last word. “Banged up, but okay.”

He went quiet for a beat, and when he spoke again his voice was softer, trembling with everything he couldn’t say in front of anyone else. “I don’t care what they tell you—you get yourself to a hospital. Please. I need to know you’re really okay.”

Her throat tightened. “It’s really good to hear your voice,” she admitted, the words slipping out before she could catch them.

Doug let out a long breath, almost like he’d been waiting for that. “It’s really good to hear yours too. Better than you’ll ever know.”

She closed her eyes. The image of the explosion replayed in her head, the deafening roar, the white-hot fire. “I thought I was going to die,” she whispered. Tears pricked her eyes, hot and sharp, but she bit them back, swallowing hard against the knot in her throat. She didn’t want him to hear her break. “And all I could think about was you.”

But Doug knew. He always knew. “I thought about you too,” he said, voice rough, unguarded. “The whole time. My heart stopped when I saw the explosion on screen. Just—don’t do that to me again. Please.”

Helena pressed her lips together, eyes burning. For once, she had no walls, no arguments, just the raw truth of almost losing everything

“I’m coming home,” she said softly, like a promise.

“I’ll be waiting,” Doug answered.

She clutched the phone for a beat longer after the call ended, forehead resting against the tree, letting the quiet between them linger in her bones like a balm.

For the first time since the explosion, she let herself cry.

Gas Station, North Carolina

Voit sat parked beneath the buzzing sodium lights, the hiss of the pump filling his tank. The radio hummed with low country rock, his fingers drumming absently against the steering wheel, keeping time. His eyes, though, were far away.

The smell of gasoline and asphalt carried him backward, into another memory.

“Lee turn that music off.”

Lee.

Lee Duval.

That was who he was before Elias Voit.

“What’d you see on your way out here?” Cyrus asked.

Lee shook his head as he jumped down from the back of the truck. “Nothing.”

“Exactly. No road signs, no mile markers. That’s why I picked this place. I know precisely where we are. I know how long it takes to get here. I know how many cars we passed headed in the same direction, and I know when those cars stop being frequent.”

Cyrus hauled a bundle of plastic and tarp from the truck and threw it into the ready made hole in the ground.

Another body to dispose of.

As a young child Lee was always full of questions. Always willing to learn. Always willing to please. A good pupil. “What’s that?”

“Lye.” Cyrus answered as he poured a large bucket of solution over the body. “It’s used for soaps and candles, but it’s got other uses.”

And Cyrus was always the willing teacher.

“Now cover him up.”

Sweat stung Lee’s eyes. His small hands blistered around the wood handle, but he dug harder, faster, desperate to please. He shovelled soil over the shape, heart hammering, lungs burning with the effort. He worked until the earth was smooth, until the surface looked untouched.

When he finished, he turned to Cyrus, waiting for approval.

“Good,” Cyrus said finally, and the word lit Lee up like a match. He smiled, desperate for more. “Who was he?” Lee asked, his voice small but curious.

Cyrus grinned, broad and wolfish. “I don’t remember.” He clapped a hand on the young boy’s shoulder, squeezing until it hurt. “Does it matter?”

The laugh that followed was cold, but Lee felt it as warmth. He had impressed Cyrus. He had made him smile. That was what mattered.

Back in the present, Voit blinked, dragged out of the memory by the pump clicking off. He replaced the nozzle and sat there for a moment, fingers still drumming against the wheel, a small smile tugging at his lips.

He had been an eager pupil. Cyrus had been his teacher.

Now, Elias thought, glancing at the road ahead, he was the master.

The jet thrummed beneath them, smooth and steady as it cut through the night sky. For a brief moment, it almost felt normal—coming home from a consult, weary but alive.

Luke leaned back in his seat, stretching his legs out. “Smells new,” he quipped, glancing around at the fresh leather and polished trim. “Nice job getting our wings back.”

JJ smirked across the aisle. “Emily, did you have to arm wrestle Bailey for this?”

Prentiss rolled her eyes, but her lips twitched. “Honestly, I think we only got it because of Helena.”

The team chuckled softly, but the levity didn’t last long.

“Believe it or not, Bailey is not the problem. Politics are. Benjamin Reeves murdered a sitting US senator, the DOJ need him to be Sicarius. We have one shot of keeping this case open before the Attorney General tries to shut us down.”

Helena shifted in her seat. “There’s no way Benjamin Reeves is Sicarius. And there’s no way he killed himself either. Sicarius staged it. He was the perfect fall guy.”

“So what have we got from the shipping container?” Prentiss asked.

“Alison Green’s DNA was confirmed inside,” JJ spoke sadly. “Tyler’s sister. Penelope broke the news to him.”

Tara pulled up the photos from the case on her tablet, her face somber as she began the rundown. “A dozen stalker photos survived the explosion inside a Haeberlin case.” She paused, tapping the screen. “But one photo in particular stands out. Her name is Maria Jones. Now, her DNA was not recovered inside the container. Penelope had to identify her using facial recognition because her body was found over twenty years ago outside Raleigh, North Carolina.”

JJ nodded. “Her boyfriend, Silvio Herrera, was convicted of killing her. He confessed. He’s been sitting on death row ever since.”

Luke frowned. “Then why the hell was her photo in Sicarius’s container? That can’t be coincidence.”

He zoomed in on a photo, pointing to a glowing clock in the background. “Bank clock reads one twenty four. Prosecutors claimed Maria was abducted before midnight.”

“Maybe Maria was an early victim.” Helena shrugged. “Before Sicarius refined his methods. Before he committed to ‘no body, no crime.’ Before he buried the shipping containers.”

Luke folded his arms, thinking. “Okay if that’s true, then somehow he persuaded Silvio to confess. I know he’s a master manipulator but that would be on hell of a hold on Herrera’s psyche.”

Prentiss added grimly, “Herrera’s execution is scheduled within hours. Pandemic moratorium’s ended. I can assert the BAU’s prerogative to interview death row inmates, have him transferred to Quantico. Luke, Tara, you’ll take point.”

Rossi had been quiet until then, staring out the cabin window. Finally, he spoke, his voice low. “I still can’t get over it. Sicarius blowing up that container—twenty years’ worth of trophies, destroyed in a heartbeat. That’s not impulsive. That’s discipline. Someone—or something—taught him that.”

The words pressed heavy in the silence. Helena felt it like a stone in her chest. Her fingers curled tightly against her knees. She couldn’t keep it in any longer.

“There was something else,” she said quietly.

All eyes turned to her.

“In the container… before it went off. I saw my picture. On the wall. Articles about my father.” Her voice cracked slightly but steadied. “He knows who I am.”

The silence sharpened. Tara’s brow furrowed. “Are you saying you’re a target?”

Helena forced herself to meet her eyes. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

Rossi leaned forward, his gaze heavy with both worry and certainty. “Or maybe he doesn’t see you as a target. Maybe he sees you as a kindred spirit. If someone’s been teaching him, shaping him—he might think you’re just like him.”

Helena’s stomach turned, but she stayed still, swallowing the bile of fear that threatened to rise.

The hum of the jet seemed louder, heavier, as the weight of Rossi’s words settled over the cabin.

The others drifted back into quiet conversation—JJ comparing notes with Prentiss, Luke and Tara preparing for the Herrera interview—but Helena stayed still in her seat, staring at nothing.

Kindred spirit.

Rossi’s words clung to her like smoke from the blast site, seeping into her lungs, poisoning every breath.

She closed her eyes, but all she saw was the wall in the container—the photographs, the clippings about her father, and her own face pinned there like prey. Or maybe… not prey at all. Maybe something worse.

Her father’s voice slid in uninvited, oily and warm: Remember, Helena. We’re the same.

Her stomach knotted. Rossi had been the one to pull her out of that basement as a child, the one who told her she wasn’t doomed to carry her father’s shadow. And now, years later, he’d said aloud the very thing she feared in the quietest parts of herself.

What if Sicarius was right to see her? To recognise something in her that she spent her whole life burying?

She pressed her nails into her palms until it hurt, until she was sure she was still here, still in control. The others trusted her. JJ nearly died beside her tonight. Doug—she swallowed hard at the thought—Doug still worried about her more than anyone had a right to.

And here she was, wondering if she was just a reflection of the monsters she hunted.

She turned toward the window, the stars glittering cold above the wing. Her own reflection stared back: tired, pale, her eyes too sharp.

Helena Bishop. BAU agent. The Surgeon’s daughter.

Maybe Rossi was wrong. Maybe Sicarius was wrong.

But maybe they weren’t.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Nine

“Men Plan, God Laughs”

“Every morning I jump out of bed and step on a landmine. The landmine is me. After the explosion, I spend the rest of the day putting the pieces together.” ― Ray Bradbury

The team had spent hours combing through the crime scene photos.

No human bite could match the pattern of the wounds. The impressions were too deep, too precise, too deliberate. They theorised the unsub was using some kind of dental appliance—another layer to his ritual.

After visiting the ME, Tara and Luke came back with another grim update: the unsub wasn’t just repeating, he was escalating. Helena and JJ dug into prior cases, pulling files late into the night.

They found one: Jessica Sayer. She had survived. Barely.

But when JJ and Helena visited her, Jessica refused to talk. The terror still clung to her, years later. She confessed only one thing—that when she finally made it to the hospital, the unsub’s assistant was already there, waiting. Fifty grand in cash. One demand: silence.

Helena’s stomach turned at the thought.

Back at Quantico, as the team dispersed to chase down leads, JJ lingered. She caught Helena just outside the conference room, her hand on her arm.

“Hey,” JJ said softly. “You holding up?”

Helena forced a shrug. “Same as always.”

JJ tilted her head, unconvinced. “You know, you don’t have to give me the canned profiler answer. I can see when something’s eating at you.”

Helena let out a quiet huff of breath, half a laugh, half a deflection. “Yeah, maybe old habits die hard.”

They stood in the corridor for a beat, the hum of voices and footsteps fading. JJ’s expression softened.

“Helena… follow your heart,” JJ said, almost out of nowhere. “Don’t overthink it. Don’t—don’t talk yourself out of something good because you’re afraid of where it might go. You deserve to be happy.”

Helena blinked, caught off guard. “Where is this coming from?”

They stood in silence a moment, just the hum of the building filling the space. JJ shifted, almost like she was debating with herself, then finally spoke.

“Can I tell you something? Something I haven’t told anyone here yet?”

Helena’s brows furrowed. “Of course.”

JJ drew in a steadying breath. “Will’s been having tests run. The doctors found something. They don’t know if it’s cancer yet.” Her voice caught slightly. “We’re still waiting for answers.”

Helena froze, the words slamming into her. She’d faced death in crime scenes, in nightmares, in her own bloodstained past—but this was different. This was family, love, fragile in a way she almost couldn’t comprehend.

“JJ…” Helena started, her throat tight. “I—I’m so sorry.”

JJ nodded, blinking quickly, her composure trembling just for a heartbeat. “That’s what I mean about following your heart. Because time… it isn’t guaranteed. Not for any of us.”

Helena looked at her, the weight of the words pressing hard against her chest.

And for the first time, she wondered if she’d already made a mistake she couldn’t undo.

JJ led Helena back into the conference room where the rest of the team had gathered around the evidence board. The air was thick with the smell of coffee and the faint buzz of fluorescent lights, the table cluttered with files and photos.

Tara held up a rough mock-up of a dental device, her expression grim. “There’s no way any licensed dentist would ever make this.”

Prentiss nodded, folding her arms. “If our unsub’s on Beltway Elite, he’s connected. Maybe connected enough to get someone to build it off the books for him.”

Luke stepped forward, holding a folder. “Tox screens are back. Both victims had GHB in their systems. He’s drugging them first.” He flipped to the next page. “And he’s using more than just bleach on the bodies. Forensics found a peroxide-alkaline compound in their hair. It’s what caused the whitening.”

Prentiss frowned, staring at the photo of one victim’s pale hair taped to the board. “The bite marks. The whitening. This isn’t just disposal. This is compulsive.”

Helena’s voice broke through, steady but low. “He’s remaking them. Post-mortem. Breaking them down to build them back in the image of someone from his life. A mother maybe. Or a grandmother. Whoever shaped him most.”

Luke whistled under his breath. “If it’s his mother, that’s some serious Oedipal territory.”

Tara stepped closer, her profiler cadence precise. “It might be deeper than that. He could’ve never outgrown the oral phase of toddler development, and that fixation crossed into his love map. As a pre-teen, he would’ve craved his mother’s affection. When she didn’t give it to him, those latent psychopathic impulses had nowhere to go. Now, as an adult, he kills these women to turn them into her. To finally get the attention he was denied.”

The room was quiet for a moment, the weight of the profile sinking in. The pictures on the board—bite-marked, pale-haired victims—suddenly looked like puzzle pieces fitting into a much darker whole.

Helena stared at them, her chest tight, JJ’s earlier words still echoing: Follow your heart. Time isn’t guaranteed.

The morning was already heavy. Another body had turned up overnight, the crime scene photos still tacked fresh on the board.

Luke had ran a geographical survey of every dump site. All of them—every single one—fell within a fifteen-mile radius of properties owned by the same person: Senator Martha Reeves of Virginia.

“Could this be politically motivated?” Doug asked as Prentiss, Helena and Tara presented the evidence to him.

Tara’s voice was steady, but her eyes gave away the weight of it. “No. But who does fit the profile — her son. Benjamin Reeves. Multiple arrests for possession and assault as a teenager. Including one for attacking his mother’s third husband—on their wedding night.”

The room fell silent, the implication hanging there.

Then Doug spoke, his voice clipped and final. “Stop. I don’t care what the profile says. We are not arresting a sitting senator’s son based on theory.”

Prentiss didn’t flinch. “Then let us prove it. Give us approval to put him under surveillance.”

Doug shook his head, already moving toward the door. “No. Absolutely not.”

Helena’s pulse spiked. She shot out of her chair, chasing after him into the hallway.

“Doug—stop.”

He turned, eyes sharp but wary.

Her voice dropped low, urgent. “Do you want to catch Claire Durham’s killer or not?”

His jaw tightened, just like she knew it would. “Don’t do that,” he said, low and strained. “You have to think about the political ramifications.”

“Political ramifications?” Helena stepped closer, fire in her chest. “What if it was me, Doug? What if I’d been the one in that shallow grave—would you still be worried about optics?”

His expression flickered, just for a second, the answer plain in his eyes even before he said it. “That’s not fair.”

“No,” she pressed, her voice sharp with anger and something deeper. “What’s not fair is letting women keep dying because you’re too busy worrying about the optics . You can’t have it both ways. You can either protect the people you serve, or you can protect your ass, but you can’t do both.”

For a long moment, they just stared at each other, the weight of unspoken history thick between them. Doug’s shoulders rose and fell with a heavy breath, the fight bleeding out of him.

Finally, he exhaled. “My answer is still no.”

Helena’s heart sank.

But then he added, softer: “Senators have staffs. So do their children. Start there. Work the people around him. If you’re right, it’ll surface.”

It wasn’t the victory she wanted—but it was a crack in the door.

A slow smile tugged at Helena’s mouth. “That’s all I needed.”

And despite himself, Doug’s lips curved in return. Just for a moment, the tension between them gave way to something else—something that reminded her of all those mornings and rainstorms and inside jokes.

Then it was gone, the weight of the case pressing back in.

It unfolded almost too neatly.

As if by fate, Benjamin Reeves’s assistant, Mitch, appeared on the team’s radar. He came forward, nervous but rehearsed, claiming full responsibility for the gruesome murders. JJ and Luke pressed him hard, testing every corner of his story. When they turned up the dental appliance in his car—fitted with the same grotesque precision as the bite marks—they exchanged looks.

It fits. Too well.

Helena paced behind the glass, restless. “He’s feeding us what we want to hear,” she muttered. “This isn’t confession—it’s choreography.”

And then it hit them all at once.

“This is a distraction,” JJ said grimly. “While we’re locked on him, Benjamin makes his move.”

“Jessica,” Helena breathed.

With Garcia’s quick hands flying across her keyboard, they tracked Jessica Sayer’s phone. The signal jumped, moving fast.

Sirens cut the parking garage as JJ and Helena flanked Jessica’s vehicle. Benjamin was in the back seat, a gun pressed to his thigh, his eyes sharp with the cold detachment of someone ready to finish what he started.

“FBI!” Helena’s voice cracked like a whip. “Hands where I can see them!”

Jessica’s terrified eyes flicked up in the rearview mirror.

Benjamin smirked, almost like he’d been waiting for them.

The takedown was fast—JJ yanking the car door open, Helena pressing the muzzle of her Glock to his temple. In seconds, he was cuffed, disarmed, shoved against the trunk.

But as the team regrouped, breathless relief shifting into controlled adrenaline, none of them knew what Benjamin had already set in motion.

From the confines of Jessica’s car, he’d sent a 911 call through the Beltway Elite app—coded, targeted, devastating.

A cry for help to Sicarius.

And that single call would change everything.

Behind the two-way glass, Luke sat across from Benjamin Reeves, tossing questions like bait. Reeves leaned back in his chair, cuffed but smug, lips curling with that entitled calm only narcissists carried.

Prentiss stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Helena, watching.

Then the door slammed open. Doug stormed in, eyes sharp, his voice a hissed bark. “Goddammit. You arrested him?”

Prentiss didn’t flinch. “He was in a car with Jessica Sayer. Armed. What exactly were we supposed to do —wave him off with a parking ticket?”

Doug’s glare flicked to the glass, then back. “Does the senator know?”

“No,” Prentiss said coolly. “And he hasn’t invoked counsel either. Textbook narcissism. He thinks he can talk his way out of anything.”

She crossed her arms. “I’m going to have to thread the needle just right to get a confession.”

Doug’s jaw clenched. “You can’t go in there. If you do, if you cross that line, we’re all done. Fired.”

Prentiss turned her head just enough to look at him. “Tell me about Claire Durham.”

Doug froze. His eyes darted to Helena for the briefest moment—uncomfortable, sheepish.

“Why?” he asked, voice low.

Prentiss stepped closer, her tone even. “Because when we pulled Reeves’ phone, we found out he wasn’t just on Beltway Elite. He helped create it. That app was his hunting ground. He built it to lure women like Claire. That means you’re the closest person we can talk to to get a sense of his victimology. What was she like?”

Doug exhaled, defeated. “Young. Aggressive.”

“Like the Senator?”

Doug sighed. “No, just….determined.”

“Good relationship with her mother?”

“Yeah. She got on with her whole family actually”

Prentiss was already unbuttoning her blouse, tugging her blazer off, fingers mussing her hair.

Doug blinked. “What the fu— What are you doing?”

Prentiss shot him a flat look. “Giving him what he wants. Mommy.”

“Prentiss—” Doug stammered, hand half-raised as if he could physically stop her. “Don’t do this. This is insane—”

But she was already pushing through the door, striding into the interrogation room like she owned it. The door shut behind her, leaving Doug and Helena in the observation room together.

The silence pressed tight.

Helena didn’t look at him right away. Her eyes stayed on Reeves and Prentiss through the glass. Her voice, when it came, was sharp around the edges. “So just how many women did you date off that app?”

Doug turned, stung. “None. Just Claire. Very briefly. Before you.”

Helena finally looked at him, her eyes steady, unreadable. “Well she sounded like the kind of woman you should actually be with. Perfect on paper. Ambitious. Family girl. No baggage.”

For a second, Doug just stared at her, jaw tight. Then his expression softened, a quiet conviction breaking through.

“You ever see The Wizard of Oz?”

The question threw her off-balance. “What?”

He leaned closer, voice low. “The girl, Dorothy, you know she starts out on the farm in Kansas, in boring black and white. Then she goes on this amazing adventure that’s all in glorious technicolour, right? That’s what it was like for me. Before you, I thought I knew exactly where my life was headed. No surprises. Then you walked in, Helena, and I saw a completely different future for myself. A future in colour.”

Helena’s breath caught. His words pressed into her chest, raw and startling, knocking down walls she’d built so carefully.

She wanted to speak, to deflect, to armour up—but she couldn’t. She was blown apart by the weight of it, by the fact that he meant every word.

The door behind them burst open. Luke leaned in, urgency cutting the moment like glass. “She’s getting to him. Come on, you’ll want to see this.”

Doug straightened quickly, mask sliding back into place. Helena stayed frozen a second longer, her heart hammering, before she forced herself to move.

But Doug’s words lingered, burning, impossible to push away.

Prentiss leaned casually against the table, hair tousled, blouse loose, her eyes fixed on Benjamin Reeves like a scalpel. “What are you going to be remembered for, besides a footnote in your mother’s obituary?”

Reeves smirked, leaning back in his chair. “Well they’ll remember Derrick Sesper. That’s who I used the Sicarius spiders on.”

Behind the glass, Helena winced, her stomach knotting. That name. One of the preserved bodies from the shipping container. One she’d stared at for hours, catalogued and studied until the image branded itself into her nightmares.

His lips curled wider, relishing the game. “Carmen Gomez from 2007. John Harris. He was a wimp.”

Reeves’s eyes glittered as he went on, casually dropping more names. Names that were never made public. Names only Sicarius—or someone with access to him—could know.

Doug frowned, looking from Reeves and Prentiss to Helena. “What the hell is he talking about?”

Helena’s voice was tight. “He’s naming victims from the Sicarius container. None of those names are in the press.”

Prentiss didn’t flinch, though Helena saw the flicker of realisation cross her face.

“Okay so you’re connected.” Prentiss shrugged. “Someone could have leaked those names to you. If you want to impress me, tell me something I don’t know.”

Reeves chuckled, smug, his eyes sliding to the two-way glass as if he knew exactly who was watching. “Whitfield County, Georgia.”

Prentiss stiffened, folding her arms. “What’s out there?”

Reeves leaned forward, his smirk razor-sharp. “More buried treasure.”

The room behind the glass went heavy with silence.

Then Doug’s phone buzzed, the sharp tone cutting through the tension. He glanced down, cursed under his breath. “Damn it.”

“What?” Helena demanded.

Doug lifted his head, face grim. “They’ve found us.”

The observation door swung open, and there stood Senator Martha Reeves, her lawyer at her side, their presence radiating power and fury.

Helena’s pulse hammered, bile rising. This wasn’t just a case anymore—it was a collision course between politics, power, and the truth.

Rossi stood at the head of the table, voice low but steady as he laid out what they’d finally pulled from Tyler Green.

“Benjamin Reeves wasn’t just playing at being a predator. He was a benefactor to Sicarius’s network. He put up money, resources—bought himself a seat at the table. And in return, Sicarius gave him what he craved: the instruction manual. How to kill. He got special privileges, access to private forums the rest of the psychos out there could only dream of finding.”

Helena felt the words crawl over her skin, bile rising. Sicarius didn’t just feed killers—he groomed them. Elevated them.

Across the room, Rossi’s gaze cut to Tyler Green through the glass of the holding cell. “He still owes us something. And if he wants even a shred of redemption, he’s going to grovel to Garcia and make it count. Because she’s the only one who can crack this forum wide open.”

Garcia looked like she wanted to throw her coffee in Rossi’s face—but after a long, dramatic sigh, she sat down at her laptop. “Fine. But I’m putting this on the record: if I have to play nice with Tyler freaking Green, someone owes me a lifetime supply of Soothe massages.”

Prentiss gave her a faint smirk before turning back to Helena and JJ. “Georgia. Whitfield County. Reeves said there was more buried treasure there, and I believe him. You two are on it. I want you there by nightfall.”

Helena nodded, her gut tightening. She’d chased monsters before, but this felt different. The closer she got, the more personal it felt. Like every step was dragging her into Sicarius’s orbit.

What she didn’t know—what none of them knew—was that Whitfield County wouldn’t just put her on his trail.

It would put her on a crash course with Sicarius himself.

Elias Voit padded down the grand staircase, gun loose but steady in his hand. His steps were deliberate, each one echoing against polished wood and marble like a countdown.

The minute he’d seen the 911 ping on the Beltway Elite app, he was on the next flight east. Sydney had asked questions, but he’d smoothed it over with the same calm excuse: a work emergency. She didn’t need to know this was the emergency. The one he’d been planning for. Every contingency, every escape route, every mask—it was all about to come into play.

At the foot of the stairs, Martha Reeves froze, eyes wide, a trembling hand clutching the banister. “Who… who are you?”

From behind her, Benjamin lifted his head. Recognition cut through his voice like a jagged edge. “It’s you.”

Voit smiled faintly, almost like a proud teacher correcting a slow student. He lifted the gun just slightly toward Martha. “When your son texts me, I come running.”

Martha’s face collapsed, disbelief unraveling into terror. “Benjamin,” she pleaded, “please—call him off. I love you.”

Benjamin’s jaw twitched, his eyes burning. “Now you love me? Now?”

Voit leaned against the railing, savouring the tension, the twisted theatre of it. He tilted his head toward Benjamin. “I’ll give you five minutes with her.”

Benjamin’s breath hitched. “The police took my teeth.”

Voit’s grin widened. He mimed snapping jaws, the sound almost playful. “You don’t need them. She’s your mom. Chomp, chomp.”

Benjamin’s eyes glistened as he turned toward Martha, the mask of the entitled son slipping into something much darker.

Voit watched, delight sparking in his chest as the scene unfolded. The fear, the desperation, the grotesque intimacy of predator and prey masquerading as family.

For Elias Voit, this was better than killing. This was orchestration.

Whitfield County, GA

The car rattled along the dark country road, headlights carving narrow tunnels through the trees. The smell of blood and bile hung thick.

Benjamin Reeves leaned out the passenger window and vomited, his whole body shaking. The sound echoed in the quiet night.

Voit kept his hands steady on the wheel, the corners of his mouth curling faintly. “It’s normal to throw up. You finally killed the person you always wanted to kill.”

Benjamin slumped back in his seat, sweating. “We need to get out. I can get us somewhere safe. A country without extradition. I’ve got connections.”

Voit chuckled low, eyes on the road. “All in good time.”

Because Benjamin didn’t know. He didn’t see the strings. He was already dancing as Voit’s perfect puppet. The patsy who would take the fall, who would wear every atrocity like a crown of thorns while Voit walked away clean.

Benjamin turned to him, desperation bleeding into bravado. “What happens now?”

Voit’s smile sharpened, almost gentle. “Now? You’ll want to see what happens next.”

His eyes flicked to the rearview mirror, but he wasn’t looking at the road. He was picturing Helena. He knew she’d come. She always would.

But he was already one step ahead.

The ground was soft with pine needles, the air thick and damp. JJ and Helena moved carefully through the trees until they reached the clearing.

On the satellite feed, it had looked almost innocuous—two rectangles barely visible against the earth. But up close, the steel doors jutted from the ground like scars, soil packed tight around the edges. Another container.

Helena’s chest tightened. Deja vu. The same dread she’d felt peeling back the doors in Yakima flooded her veins. Another tomb. Another monster’s trophy case.

JJ crouched low, her flashlight cutting across the rusted handle. “I don’t really feel like waiting for backup.”

Helena glanced at her, lips tight, then clipped her body cam into place. “Agreed.”

JJ paused, pulling out her phone. “Give me thirty seconds—I need to call Will.” Her voice softened as she stepped aside, murmuring into the line.

Helena’s hand hovered over her phone, tempted—just for a heartbeat—to send Doug a message. Something small. Going in. If this goes sideways… But she shoved the thought down and tightened her grip on her gun.

“On three?” JJ whispered.

Helena nodded. “One. Two—three.”

Together they heaved. Metal shrieked, hinges groaning as the earth gave way. A hot, stale gust of air escaped upward, carrying rot and chemical sting, like bleach and something spoiled.

Helena’s stomach turned. JJ wrinkled her nose, jaw set.

The mouth of the cellar gaped black, steep concrete stairs vanishing into the dark. Helena’s light barely reached the bottom.

JJ shot her a look. “Ready?”

Helena nodded. “Let’s do it.”

They descended slowly, boots thudding against the heavy steps, every sound magnified in the silence. Helena swept her light across concrete walls streaked with damp. Cobwebs clung to the corners, and the smell grew sharper with each step, making her throat itch.

At the bottom, JJ raised her free hand, easing open the warped door. The hinges moaned. For a moment both women froze, tense, waiting for something to leap at them from the shadows.

Nothing. Just silence, oppressive and heavy.

Their torches cut across the interior—rows of shelves lined with ropes, duct tape, anatomy books splayed open, restraints hanging like forgotten tools. The air was colder here, stiller, as though the walls themselves had been holding their breath.

“Jesus,” JJ whispered.

Helena’s voice caught. “It’s just like the other container.”

Her beam of light landed on the far wall—and her breath froze in her lungs.

Pinned dead centre was a photo of herself, staring back at her. Younger, FBI badge sharp against her blazer. Around it, news clippings yellowed with time: THE SURGEON’S DAUGHTER. CHILD OF A KILLER JOINS BAU. Her father’s mugshot glared out from beneath the headlines, eyes flat and accusing.

Her breath hitched. Her knees almost buckled. He knows me. He’s been watching me.

A noise snapped through the silence—a mechanical whine, low and rising.

Prentiss’s voice tore through her earpiece: “Bishop, JJ—get out of there. NOW.”

JJ’s torch jerked toward Helena, panic cutting through her voice. “Helena—it’s a bomb! RUN!”

But Helena couldn’t move. Not yet. Her flashlight still lingered on the collage of herself, her father’s shadow leering at her from the wall. For a single heartbeat, she felt caught in the jaws of fate.

JJ’s voice snapped her free. “RUN!”

Helena bolted, boots pounding against the stairs, lungs straining as fear clawed every nerve raw. They burst into the night air, but the blast came fast—heat, fire, light swallowing the clearing.

The shockwave punched her off her feet. Dirt and fire swallowed her, the world tilting sideways. She hit the ground hard, the breath torn from her chest, ears ringing, heart hammering like it was trying to break free.

For a long, terrifying moment, all Helena could hear was the thrum of her own fear—and the echo of Sicarius’s message, carved into the flames behind her: I know who you are.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Eight

“Loving Him Was Red”

"You can't go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending." – C.S. Lewis

One Year Ago

The echo of Helena’s heels rang down the corridor as she sprinted toward the elevator. “Hold the doors!” she shouted, voice sharp with frustration.

The chrome doors slid shut just as she reached them. She smacked her palm against the metal, teeth clenched. “Thanks a lot, asswipe!”

There was a beat of silence. Then, with a polite ping, the doors slid open again.

Doug Bailey stood there, tall and composed, one brow arched in faint amusement. His expression was somewhere between curious and entertained, like he’d just stumbled into his own private comedy show.

Helena froze, the heat of embarrassment crawling up her neck. She hadn’t expected the doors to actually reopen, let alone to reveal someone like him. Her mouth opened, then shut.

“Asswipe, huh?” Doug said at last, his voice dry, his smirk maddeningly self-assured.

Her cheeks burned. “I… uh… yeah. Sorry. Long morning.” She straightened her jacket with a sharp tug and pushed her hair back with a hand, suddenly conscious of whether she looked halfway decent. Why did it matter?

“I haven’t seen you before,” she added quickly, trying to reclaim some ground. “You one of the new tech guys? Here to replace Garcia?”

His smirk widened just a touch as he shook his head. “No. Not exactly.”

The elevator slowed, the doors opening on the next floor. Doug stepped out smoothly, buttoning his jacket. He half-turned back toward her, catching her eyes with that calm, confident gaze.

“Just the new Deputy Director.” His smirk was sharper now, tinged with mischief. “See you around, Agent.”

Helena stood rooted as the doors slid shut again, staring at the reflection of her own startled face in the mirrored steel. Handsome. Smug. Infuriating. And already under her skin.

Present Day

Garcia had both hands on her hips, her voice rising in staccato protest. “No. No, no, no, no, no. Nope. Absolutely not. Did I mention no?”

Prentiss sat on the other side of Rossi’s desk, arms crossed, calm in the face of Garcia’s theatrics. “Tyler Green spoke with Sicarius online. That’s direct evidence. We need your help processing it.”

“He forced me back into the FBI,” Garcia snapped, pointing toward the ceiling like the universe was a co-conspirator. “I am still very mad about that, FYI, he’s the problem. I’m a delight. A little dramatic, but a delight nonetheless. And he said he doesn’t want my help, so—voilà. Case closed.”

Rossi leaned forward, hands folded, eyes steady on her. “I’ll take care of Tyler. What I need to know is—Penelope, can you play nice?”

Garcia threw her arms up. “Play nice? I could win an Oscar for nice. But could I maybe not help with this new case instead?”

Prentiss arched an eyebrow. “Trust me. You don’t want this one.”

Garcia’s shoulders slumped dramatically. “Fine. But when this is over, I deserve at least one gift certificate to Soothe, preferably with a hot stone upgrade.”

Rossi smirked. “Add it to the budget.”

Before Garcia could fire back, Prentiss glanced toward the glass windows, her expression sharpening. “What the hell?”

Helena followed her gaze. Across the corridor in the round table room stood Doug Bailey, posture stiff, eyes already sweeping over towards them.

By the time they entered, JJ, Luke, and Tara were filtering in through the opposite door. Doug was already planted at the head of the table.

“Deputy Director—what are you—” Prentiss started.

Doug cut her off. “I was asked to oversee this case. Proceed like I’m not here.”

“I was not notified,” Prentiss replied, her tone flat steel.

“It just came up,” Doug said briskly. “Need-to-know basis. Now you all know.”

His eyes flicked, just for a second, to Helena as she took her seat. The movement was small, but she caught it—caught the tension in his shoulders, the nervous edge in his jaw. They hadn’t spoken in over a week, and every inch of the air between them carried it.

Prentiss started the briefing, her voice cutting through the taut silence. “We have two victims. Sandra Hart and Claire Durham.”

Doug exhaled sharply, almost imperceptibly. Helena’s eyes snapped to him. His jaw clenched hard as Claire’s photo appeared on the screen.

“Claire worked at the Department of Education. Sandra was a congressional page,” Prentiss continued. “Both lived in the District, but their bodies were dumped across state lines in Virginia.”

JJ noted, “So he crosses state lines. Over a hundred miles. It takes a lot of effort to hide these bodies.”

Luke leaned back. “He’s got a type. Young, beautiful, just getting their careers in public service just starting.”

Helena’s gaze cut sideways. Doug’s face was still tight, his shoulders rigid.

Tara spoke next. “And he convinces them to turn off their phones. That doesn’t happen with Gen Z. Not career-minded ones in D.C.”

Luke grimaced. “And his ritual’s brutal. Cause of death is strangulation, but pre- and post-mortem? He bites them.”

On the screen, photos flashed: bite marks, raw and ugly against pale flesh. Doug flinched visibly, his eyes darting down, his jaw twitching hard.

Helena catalogued it all, her profiler’s brain spinning, but this wasn’t profiling—it was personal. Each reaction of his sank claws into her chest.

And suddenly, Helena knew.

He knew her. He knew Claire.

She tried to keep her face neutral, but inside, jealousy and rage twisted together. She thought of one of their first dates . When Doug took her to a tucked-away jazz bar in D.C., the kind of place Helena would never have chosen herself. The lights were low, the music lush. She teased him all night about being predictable—“Deputy Director by day, smooth jazz by night?”—but by the time the saxophone slipped into something slow and aching, she let him pull her close. She was stunned by how safe it felt, swaying in his arms. She thought of Sunday breakfasts, of him pressing her back against the counter to kiss her neck like she was the only woman in the world. Was that what Claire got, too? Was she just another placeholder in a long line of women?

Her voice snapped before she could stop herself. “Let’s just cut to the chase, Doug. You weren’t asked to oversee this case. You need us to do it. You had a personal connection to one of these women.” Her eyes drilled into his. “It was Claire, wasn’t it?”

The room went silent. Every eye shifted between them.

Doug blinked, startled that she’d pieced it together. His voice was careful, measured. “Yes. Ms. Durham and I dated briefly. It was perfectly above board, but after a few months, we decided—together—that it wasn’t working out.”

Helena’s chest burned, jealousy lancing through her. The way he said it, so clinical, so detached. She felt the heat rising in her chest, bile in her throat. So that’s all she was. Just another line in his history. Another notch. And what am I? The same?

The words flew before she could swallow them. “Bullshit. She broke your heart.”

Doug’s eyes widened. Shock, then something sharper. He hesitated only a beat before answering, his voice quieter but cutting like glass.

“No. Only one woman has ever broken my heart, Helena.” His gaze locked on her, unwavering. “And that’s you.”

The silence that followed was absolute. The whole room froze, breath held, as if no one dared move.

Helena’s pulse thundered in her ears. She wanted to disappear, to rewind, to breathe—but Doug’s words sat between them like a live wire, sparking, uncontainable.

The silence was suffocating now. JJ glanced between them, Luke’s eyebrows arched high, Tara’s eyes were wide saucers. Rossi sat very still, unreadable.

Prentiss was the one to break it. She stood, her expression unreadable but firm. “Deputy Director, Helena. A word please. Now.”

The door shut behind them, leaving the air thick and tight.

Prentiss crossed her arms. “How long has this been going on between the two of you?”

Helena’s mask snapped into place. “Not that long,” she said quickly.

Doug, at the same moment, said flatly, “Eight months.”

The silence that followed was blistering. Helena’s stomach dropped.

Prentiss’s eyes flicked between them, eyebrows lifting. “Glad we cleared that up.”

Doug turned on Helena, his voice taut. “How the hell did you even guess about Claire?”

Helena met his gaze, unflinching despite the heat rising in her chest. “Because you tighten your jaw when you’re trying to hide something. It’s your classic tell.”

Doug shook his head. “I do not have a tell.”

“Yes, you do,” Helena shot back. “And it’s so obvious.”

Prentiss held up a hand, cutting them both off. “Enough. What else do I need to know?”

Doug exhaled, then said, “Have you ever heard of an app called The Beltway Elite?”

Prentiss frowned. “I know it was on both victims’ phones.”

Doug’s gaze didn’t waver. “It’s on mine too.”

Helena’s voice came out steady, though her chest hammered. “And mine. It’s how we met.”

The words hung in the air: It’s how we met.

Prentiss stared at them both, her jaw tight. She let the silence stretch long enough to make them both squirm before speaking. “You’ve got to be kidding me.” But instead of anger, her voice carried a dry amusement.

Doug straightened, tone crisp. “It’s an exclusive dating app for government employees. Discreet matches, no paper trail. All photos and chats are deleted at the end of every session.”

Prentiss arched an eyebrow. “So basically, it’s a Raya for D.C. wonks. And also a perfect hunting ground for a serial killer.”

Helena shifted uncomfortably, but Prentiss didn’t press further.

Doug’s voice softened, urgent. “Prentiss—I’m begging you, please. Keep my name, Helena’s name, away from this. If it gets out, it blows back on both of us.”

Prentiss smirked faintly. “Begging is worthless. What I want is action. Hands off the BAU. We solve this case, you leave us alone.”

Doug blinked, caught off guard. “Of course.”

Prentiss narrowed her eyes. “I mean it.”

“I said of course,” he repeated, his jaw tightening reflexively.

Prentiss’s smirk widened. She glanced at Helena. “Yeh but you tightened your mouth when you said it.”

For the first time since walking into the room, Helena felt the corner of her mouth twitch upward. Just for a moment, the tension cracked, replaced by a shared flicker of amusement at Doug’s expense.

Prentiss pushed off the table, already moving for the door. “Now. Let’s get back before the rest of the team invents their own soap opera about you two.”

Doug stood frozen, still a little stunned. Helena rose too, her expression smoothing back into neutrality, but inside she was turning over every word.

Helena re-entered the room to all eyes firmly placed on her.

“I knew you were seeing someone,” JJ said with a half-smile, but her tone was gentle.

Luke leaned back in his chair, arms crossed. “But really? Bailey? Come on, Bishop. The guy’s a douchebag.”

Tara tilted her head, more curious than judgmental. “I mean I get it, it is hard to meet people in this town. But how did it even happen?”

Helena opened her mouth, then closed it again, at a loss. For a second, the images from the past eight months flashed behind her eyes: bourbon at the bar, Fleetwood Mac on her couch, her terrible attempts at trying to cook dinner for them. And Doug, watching her on a Sunday morning like she was something worth keeping.

She forced her voice steady. “I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I guess I just… needed something outside of this place. For once.”

Tara continued to study her. “And now?”

Helena shook her head, jaw tightening. “Now it doesn’t matter.”

She pushed her chair back, standing before they could press further. “We’ve got work to do.”

But as she walked toward the glass doors, her pulse still raced with the weight of memory—the beginning, the middle, the things she’d thrown away.

And even if she wouldn’t admit it to them, she wasn’t sure if she’d broken Doug’s heart… or her own.

Eight Months Ago

Helena sat at the bar, one hand wrapped around her glass, the other tugging restlessly at the hem of her dress. What the hell am I doing here, she thought. She never did this. Dating apps weren’t her thing.

But she really needed a social life. Or maybe just a release from work. Her entire life was her work; it kept her up all hours of the day, ensured she had very few friends outside of the bureau and had screwed up her eating schedule potentially beyond repair. So when she overheard someone in the field office joking about The Beltway Elite, the exclusive app for government employees, she downloaded it on a whim. Just to see.

And then she matched.

She almost didn’t show. But curiosity had a way of getting the better of her.

She was scrolling through her phone when she heard the voice. “Agent Bishop.”

Her head snapped up, and her stomach dropped. Standing there, in slacks and a crisp button-down instead of his suit, was Doug Bailey.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Helena muttered. “You?”

Doug raised both hands, palms out, a half-smile tugging at his mouth. “Believe me, I’m just as surprised.”

“Surprised,” she said dryly, “or disappointed?”

He laughed, low and warmer than she expected. “Well since we’re both here, can I at least buy you a drink?”

She considered leaving, every instinct screaming this was a bad idea. But something in the way he said it—not the Deputy Director, but just Doug—made her stay. “Fine. One drink.”

He slid onto the stool beside her, signalled to the bartender and ordered two bourbons.

Two glasses of bourbon turned into sharing a bottle and the easy laughter that comes when expectations are somewhere down around your ankles.

The bar is unsurprisingly packed, and they end up shoulder to shoulder on one side of a long table. Her elbow against his forearm every time she lifts her glass.

They started with small talk—safe ground. Movies. Music. She teased him mercilessly when he admitted he hadn’t seen The Godfather.

“Are you serious?” she said, smirking. “You work for the FBI and haven’t seen The Godfather? That should be illegal.”

“What’s illegal is the fact you haven’t seen Casablanca,” he shot back, laughing. “Now that is a classic.”

She snorted into her glass.

The conversation stretched, surprisingly easy. He liked Springsteen. She confessed to a guilty love of Fleetwood Mac. He admitted he had a soft spot for bad ‘90s action movies, which made her laugh until she was doubled over.

Out of the office, he seemed…different. Less polished, more human.

“You know,” Helena said, pointing at him, “you’re a lot less of a hard-ass outside Quantico.”

“That’s because you only ever see me in meetings,” he said. “Meetings are soul -crushing.”

“Finally,” she said, raising her glass. “Something we agree on.”

By the time she talked him into tequila shots, his tie was gone and his laugh had grown looser.

“You’re a bad influence,” he said, salt still on his hand.

“Me?” She leaned in, her smile teasing as she steals the lime he’s just bitten into and runs her tongue along the length of the rind. “You don’t even know the half of it.”

His eyes lingered on hers longer than they should have. “Maybe I’d like to.”

Something in her chest shifted then, dangerous and exciting.

It was as if she could read his mind, making the first move and settling her hand lightly against his knee. Her fingertips were a warm pressure through the fabric of his trousers.

Her eyes were dark as she looked up and met his steady gaze. He reached forward and brushed a stray strand of hair back from her cheek to behind her ear. He hesitated, then asked softly, “Can I kiss you?”

Her heart stuttered. She wasn’t used to men asking. She wasn’t used to wanting to say yes. But she did.

So she nodded.

They were so close that it only took the smallest of movements for Doug to press his lips against hers. She smiled into it, her fingertips rising to catch the nape of his neck.

He took control of the kiss quickly, nipping at her bottom lip until she parted them for him. Bruising and desperate as he tasted her.

Helena whimpered when he licked into her mouth, she could feel her whole body going weak.

It was good.

It was so damn good.

She couldn’t remember the last time she had been kissed like this, if she ever had been at all. She could drown in his kiss. She wanted to.

This is what she needed.

When they finally broke apart, breathless, he murmured, “Do you want to get out of here?”

“Yes,” she said without hesitation.

As he tells the uber driver his address, he slowly slides his hand on top of Helena’s thigh and squeezes. It has a gratifying affect, he can see the flush on her cheeks and the way her breath hitches just a little bit quicker. It’s a short journey but they barely made it through his apartment door before they were on each other again. Her back hit the wall, his hands braced beside her head. Their mouths crashed together, urgent, impatient, hours of restraint dissolving into pure want.

Clothes fell away clumsily, laughter caught between kisses, his breath hot against her neck as her fingers fumbled with his shirt. Every touch was fast, messy, desperate—the kind of connection neither of them saw coming but both of them craved.

When they finally made it to his bedroom, the rest of the world disappeared.

It was only supposed to be that one night, but the fear that had clung to her back for so long had started to dissipate, and for the first time in a very long time, Helena felt relief.

And soon, it became their routine.

A stolen glance from across the office. A text simply reading "Get here soon." Doug meeting Helena at the door with a hungry look in his eyes, tearing at her clothes before she had barely passed the threshold. Lips searing against skin, rough hands roaming over sweaty bodies. Lying spent and breathless on crumpled sheets. Purely physical and primal and cathartic.

They shared a secret, just between them. Mutual desire and release. An instinctual grasp at solace and comfort.

And before long, they weren't just rolling over and falling asleep afterward, but laying in bed talking late into the night, tangled under blankets. Discussing the good and the bad. Their aspirations. Favourite foods. Their ideas of what makes a perfect Sunday. Doug’s hands on her hips, firm and steady, pulling her close as if he could anchor her. The way he kissed her—never tentative, never rushed, but with a quiet hunger, like he’d been waiting his whole life to get it right. He had a habit of brushing his thumb along her jaw, of pausing just long enough for her to feel his breath before his mouth claimed hers.

She saw herself in his kitchen one night, perched on the counter in one of his shirts, legs looped around his waist. He’d been half-distracted by chopping vegetables until she tugged him closer, laughing when the knife clattered onto the cutting board. He’d scooped her up effortlessly, settling her onto his lap in the chair instead, murmuring into her hair: You’re trouble, Bishop. Beautiful trouble.

Another night, rain drummed against his bedroom windows, soft and steady. They were tangled together under the sheets, her cheek pressed to his chest as the storm rumbled low outside. He’d said it then, his voice almost sheepish: “When I was a kid, I wanted to be an astronaut.”

She tilted her head up, smirking. “You? I can’t picture you in spaceship.”

He chuckled, the sound vibrating through her. “That’s the point. I thought things would be easier up there in space.” He kissed the crown of her head.

And then there were the little things: his hand finding hers across the console while he drove; the way he leaned back in movie theatres, whispering commentary just to make her laugh; Sunday mornings when they argued about pancakes versus waffles while still tangled in bed, neither moving to get up.

And, perhaps her favourite thing of all, him singing in the shower, mostly classic rock though he mixes in some Taylor Swift every so often.

She’s standing in front of his bathroom mirror, fixing her hair while he showers behind a flimsy shower curtain that doesn't buffer the sound of his crooning at all.

"Oh yeah, all right," he sings -- and his voice is terrible, but he obviously doesn't care at all, belting out the words loud enough for them to echo off the tiles. "It’s me…hi…I’m the problem, it’s me…..”

"Don't quit your day job," she laughed.

He jerks back the curtain, his shoulders glistening in the fluorescent light, and frowns - but only for a minute because then the corners of his mouth lift in a sly, little smile and he slants his hand through the shower stream beside him so it sprays across the room and splatters across her shirt.

And so Helena found herself unexpectedly tumbling toward him. Counting down the hours until she could get home and reunite with him. Tired and worn out from long days, relaxing together on the couch watching old movies. Casablanca. Gone With The Wind. Take-out spread out on the coffee table in front of them and hands held under the shared throw. It became comfortable. Easy.

Beneath it all, the walls she’d built for years began to crack. Doug saw pieces of her no one else did. He was careful with them. Too careful.

There was something exciting about it all. The sneaking around, the secret glances, the acute knowledge that the two of them were the only people in on it.

For Helena, every moment with him felt like standing on the edge of something vast—half terrified, half longing to fall. She knew she had to tread carefully. That she couldn't allow herself to consider the arrangement anything more than casual. A passing romance.

"No one needs to know." She whispered to him one morning in bed.

Five simple words.

But she knew that Doug wanted more. He told her as much. He was restless and wanted to be open.

And if Helena was being honest with herself, a part of her wanted it too. But anytime the thought struck her, she pushed it down. There were too many complications.

She’d told herself at the time it was nothing serious, just a distraction. But the truth bled through in the details—how her body remembered his warmth, how her mind replayed his smile in the quiet moments. And when she thought back on it later, she realised: the rules had never really mattered. From that first drink at the bar, she’d already broken them.

Present Day

Helena slipped away from the others, out into the corridor where the hum of fluorescent lights pressed down. She leaned against the wall, dragging in a breath that didn’t settle.

She’d thought about that first night more than she cared to admit. About laughter over bourbon, his hand on her hip in the doorway, mornings where he’d looked at her like she was more than just what her father had made her.

And she’d told herself ending it was the only way to keep him safe—from her, from the darkness that clung like a second skin.

But sitting across from JJ, Luke, and Tara just there, the weight of it all clawed up again. It doesn’t matter, she’d said. A lie she couldn’t afford to stop telling.

Her scarred palm itched. She pressed it hard against the cool glass, grounding herself. Work, she reminded herself. Focus. Sicarius doesn’t care about your mess. Get your head on straight.

And yet, even as she shoved the memories down, Doug’s face from the round table lingered—jaw tight, eyes wounded—and it cut deeper than she wanted to admit.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Seven

“Expectation Is The Root Of All Heartache”

“ Love and loss, he said, are like a ship and the sea. They rise together. The more we love, the more we have to lose. But the only way to avoid loss is to avoid love. And what a sad world that would be” – V.E. Schwab

Whitfield County, GA

The bleach burned his nostrils, sharp and acrid. Elias Voit knelt on the steel floor, rubber gloves slick, sponge heavy with red. He pressed it down into the pool, swirling the blood into watery spirals that smeared across the ridged metal.

There was so much of it. Even with tarps, even with preparation, blood always had a way of finding the cracks.

He splashed more bleach across the floor, the liquid hissing as it hit the stains. And that was when he saw it—his reflection, warped in the thin sheen of red and chemical.

Not his own.

Cyrus.

Uncle Cyrus.

Voit jerked back like he’d been burned, his breath catching in his throat. The face was gone in an instant, but the sensation stayed—like Cyrus was standing behind him, close enough that he could almost feel the heat of his breath against his ear.

“Your next-door neighbour,” Cyrus’s voice drawled, low and mocking, “is one lucky son of a bitch.”

Voit froze, bleach bottle tight in his grip.

“Do I need to remind you of the rules?”

“I know my own rules,” Voit snapped, throwing bleach down so hard it splattered his sleeves.

Cyrus laughed, cruel and amused. “My rules. Don’t you forget.”

The phantom of his voice lingered even as the floor hissed and bubbled.

Frustration boiled up in Voit’s chest, his jaw tight as he scrubbed harder, faster. The bleach bit at his gloves, his skin itching with irritation and anger.

From the corner, Moose began barking wildly, claws scratching at the cage as the diluted blood trickled beneath him. The dog’s panic only ratcheted Voit’s fury higher.

“Goddamn it,” Voit muttered. He dropped the sponge, storming to a nearby cabinet and yanking it open. His hands found the vial, the syringe—his sedatives.

He drew the liquid quickly, tapping the glass with sharp flicks, the bark echoing in his ears. Everything lately was noise, chaos, failure. Robert Harris. Tyler Green. The FBI closing in. Doug Bailey at his podium. Helena Bishop invading his thoughts.

“Quiet,” he hissed, kneeling at the cage with the syringe in hand. “Just… quiet.”

Moose snarled and pawed, but Voit slid the needle in anyway, steady, clinical, his frustration spilling into the act.

The barking slowed, softened, until silence filled the container again.

Voit exhaled, eyes drifting back to the bleach-stained floor. For a moment, in the sheen of chemical and blood, he swore he saw Cyrus’s smile again—wide, knowing, patient.

He shut his eyes and scrubbed harder.

Helena thrashed against the cushions of Rossi’s leather chair, sweat dampening her collar. The room around her was quiet, but inside her head the woods came alive again—the snap of twigs underfoot, the frantic pound of her heartbeat, the knife flashing in her palm.

Branches tore at her arms as she stumbled, her father’s voice chasing her through the trees.

We’re the same, Helena.

She tripped, hit the ground, breath knocked out of her. Hands—his hands—clamped around her throat, squeezing until her vision blurred. She clawed at them, desperate, the smell of chloroform thick in her nose. And just before the dark swallowed her, the voice hissed:

I love you. We’re the same.

“Helena.”

Helena startled awake, her head jerking up from where she’d slumped sideways in Rossi’s chair, eyes darting around the office before reality came back into focus. A blanket had slipped from her shoulders; she hadn’t even noticed someone had draped it over her in the night.

Rossi stood over her, coffee in hand, brows knit but voice dry as ever.

“This is my office,” he said wryly. “Only I get to fall asleep in it.”

Helena scrubbed her hand over her face, trying to wipe the nightmare away. “Sorry. I must’ve…”

“Accidentally passed out on federal property,” Rossi finished for her, setting the coffee down. “You look like hell, kiddo.”

“I’m fine,” she muttered, automatic.

“You’re not,” he said simply. “You’re burning yourself out on this case. And if I had to guess, it’s stirring up some memories you’d rather leave buried.”

Helena stilled, the words landing heavier than she expected.

She thought of his face that day when she was a kid, the calm authority in his voice as he led her past the flashing lights and yellow tape. The years after, when he’d call just to check in, not as a profiler, but like something closer to family. He’d been more of a father to her than the man who raised her ever could have been.

Her throat tightened. “I’m not a kid anymore, you don’t have to worry about me.”

Rossi’s mouth curved faintly. “And yet, I still do.”

Before she could answer, there was a soft knock on the door.

“God, you two really are alike. Falling asleep in offices, living on caffeine, and snapping at anyone who tells you to take care of yourselves.” Prentiss stood in the doorway, arms full of a bouquet so large it looked like it belonged in a wedding. Roses, lilies, even sprays of wildflowers—carefully chosen, expensive, excessive.

“Guess who’s got a mystery admirer?” Prentiss teased, stepping inside. She set the vase down on Rossi’s desk with a thud. “There wasn’t a note.”

Helena’s stomach tightened. She didn’t need a note. She knew who they were from. Doug.

Rossi sniffed at the flowers. “Those aren’t cheap. Usually a bouquet like that? That’s an apology.” He shot Prentiss a look. “And believe me, I’d know.”

Prentiss smirked. “Because you’ve given them or because you’ve received them?”

“No comment,” Rossi deadpanned. “But maybe I owe you flowers Emily.”

Helena blinked. “Why?”

Prentiss shot Rossi a look before answering. “Because Bailey relieved him of his role as BAU team leader.”

“What?” Helena sat up straighter, shock cutting through her fatigue.

Rossi gave a little shrug, like it didn’t matter. “It’s true. Emily’s got enough on her plate as section chief, but she took the bullet for me yesterday.”

Prentiss grinned crookedly. “Please. I only did it to get my old office back.”

Helena barely registered their banter. Her mind was still caught on the revelation. Doug had replaced Rossi. Another betrayal she hadn’t known about. Once again, he’d made moves in the dark, carving up her world without warning.

Prentiss turned back to her, studying her expression. “Speaking of Bailey—everything okay between you two?”

Helena’s throat tightened. She knows. “Why?”

“Tara mentioned she saw him having a go at you after the press conference,” Prentiss said simply. “Just wanted to check in.”

Helena forced her voice even. “He was angry at me for undermining DT command. That’s all.”

“You want me to talk to him?” Prentiss asked.

Helena shook her head quickly. “No. It’s fine.”

Prentiss tilted her head but let it go. “Briefing on Tyler Green in five.” She gestured toward the bouquet. “And hey, if those are an apology, Rossi’s right. Don’t waste a good one.”

She swept out, Rossi trailing after her.

The door shut, leaving Helena alone with the flowers. They filled the room with their cloying perfume, too bright, too beautiful, like they’d been sent to the wrong woman.

Her phone buzzed against her thigh. Doug’s name glowed on the screen.

Her thumb hovered, then she pressed Decline.

Leaning back into Rossi’s chair, she pressed the phone against her chest, breathing ragged, heart pounding in her ears.

It was the right thing to do, she told herself again. Break it off before she ruined him completely.

Funny, how every time she’d ever said that—she lost people.

Her eyes slipped shut, shoulders trembling as she dragged in two deep breaths. For the first time that morning, she didn’t fight the tears. She held them back.

Barely.

Case files and printouts were scattered across the round table, the latest forensics laid out in front of them. JJ tapped a report with one finger.

“Forensics came back on the incendiaries from the kill kit. No prints. No DNA. Nothing we can use.”

Luke sighed, flipping his own copy closed. “Figures.”

Tara leaned in. “But the pH in a soil deposit shows the footlocker was buried for roughly five years.”

Rossi gave a humourless chuckle. “Hmm. Another paintbrush.”

JJ continued. “And the CCTV footage Green hacked into? It revealed no other persons of interest in the area at the time of his arrest.”

“Which doesn’t mean Sicarius wasn’t there,” Rossi countered. “It means he might’ve figured out how to avoid the cameras.”

Helena, arms folded, leaned forward. “It still doesn’t make sense to me.”

Rossi glanced at her. “Go on.”

“What if he deliberately set up Green to be taken down by the cops?” she asked, her tone sharp, insistent. “This unsub has been selecting both his victims and his followers with the precision of a profiler. He’s too careful. Too controlled.”

Tara frowned. “So you don’t think he’s the kind of guy to walk straight into an ambush set by Green?”

Helena shook her head firmly. “No, I don’t. I think he knew Green was a mole inside his network, and this was his way of rooting him out. He let him burn.”

Prentiss arched a brow. “That’s brilliant speculation, Bishop. But Tyler Green still refuses to talk.”

Rossi’s mouth pulled tight. “I thought maybe he’d open up to Garcia. But no.”

Garcia crossed her arms, bristling. “He doesn’t get to sit there and scowl at me like I’m the enemy. He reached out to me. He forced me back into the FBI. I am very angry.”

Prentiss raised her hand, cutting through the tension. “There’s been a home invasion in Maryland—one of the locations of the two remaining missing kill kits. We need to divide and conquer. Rossi, JJ, Lewis, Alvez—you’re on that.”

The four nodded, already reaching for their files.

Helena blinked. “Wait, what about me?”

Prentiss’s eyes landed on her. “You’re staying here. You’re going to talk to Green.”

Helena’s stomach tightened. “Me?”

Prentiss nodded. “Garcia had an excellent idea. A cognitive interview. Try to get Green to access suppressed memories about his sister. He’s stonewalling us in traditional interrogation, so we need a different approach.”

Helena hesitated, wary. “Why me?”

Prentiss’s gaze lingered on her, measured but warm. “Because sometimes it takes someone who knows what it’s like to live in the shadow of a ghost.”

Silence hung over the table. Helena looked away, the weight of the assignment pressing down on her.

The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, the hum low and grating. Helena stood outside the door, staring at the reinforced glass where Tyler Green sat chained to the table. He hadn’t moved much—just sat there with that soldier’s posture, his stare hard, his silence louder than any words. She stared at the case file in her hands. His photo glared back at her.

She flipped past his military record, the arrest reports, the notes on his sister. Missing. Presumed dead. A ghost that had driven him straight into Sicarius’s network.

Her hand hovered over the photo of the girl, fingertips brushing the edges. She looked so young. Bright-eyed, hopeful.

Helena shut her eyes and inhaled deeply. For a moment, it wasn’t Tyler’s sister she saw—it was the girl she’d found years ago in her father’s basement, half-starved and terrified. The duct tape, the ropes, the pliers lined up like surgical tools. The memory slammed into her with the weight of a blade.

You can do this. You’ve lived with ghosts before.

Her hand brushed absently across her scarred palm, grounding herself.

Helena closed the file with a snap. She pushed the memory of her father down, layered it under the mask she wore so well, and stood.

“Hey.”

Helena turned. Garcia stood there, clutching a tablet to her chest like a shield. Her usual kaleidoscope of colour seemed dulled today, her eyes tight with concern.

“You don’t have to do this alone,” Garcia said softly.

“I’ll be fine.” Helena’s voice was clipped, automatic.

Garcia tilted her head, unconvinced. “You say that like Rossi says he’s going to cut back on scotch—convincing to exactly no one.”

Helena exhaled, a faint smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth despite herself. “You thought of this interview, remember?”

“Yes,” Garcia said, stepping closer, her tone gentler now. “And I did because if anyone can reach him, it’s you. You know what it’s like to live with something dark and unbearable shadowing your life. That’s not weakness, Helena—it’s your way in.”

Helena’s throat tightened. She looked away, back to the glass.

Garcia softened even more, her voice low. “Just… be careful. Not with him. With yourself.”

Helena nodded once, jaw tight. “Thanks, Penelope.”

Garcia gave her a small, sad smile, then slipped away down the hall, leaving Helena with only the hum of the lights and Tyler’s unmoving silhouette behind the glass.

With one last steadying breath, she squared her shoulders, pushed the door open, and stepped inside.

The door shut with a heavy click behind her. Helena stood for a beat, letting her eyes adjust to the harsh fluorescent lights. Tyler Green sat at the table, cuffed, shoulders squared like he was still on a battlefield. His jaw was set, his eyes locked on the far wall instead of her.

Helena crossed to the chair opposite him and sat down slowly, setting her file aside without opening it. She folded her hands on the table, posture steady, deliberate.

The silence stretched.

Tyler’s gaze never moved from the wall.

Helena leaned back, watching him, matching his stillness. She didn’t rush. She’d been here before—with victims, with suspects, with ghosts of her own making. Sometimes the silence was its own language.

“You’re not even going to look at me?” she said finally, voice low, even.

No answer. His eyes flicked once in her direction, then back to the wall.

“You’ve made your point,” Helena continued. “You don’t want to talk. But that doesn’t mean you don’t want something.”

She studied him—his clenched jaw, the muscle ticking in his cheek, the way his cuffed hands flexed against the table like he wanted to break free.

The silence pressed heavier.

“Tyler,” she said, voice softer now, more personal. “I know what it’s like to want revenge. To spend every day with that weight pressing down on you, knowing the world doesn’t care about answers half as much as you do.”

Because she does understand. She understands that kind of fury, the helplessness of it all and the size of it. She knows that it has a life of its own, it has claws and teeth and tears at you, bleeding into you until everything in your life is coloured by it.

His eyes shifted at that. A crack in the armour.

Helena leaned forward, steady, patient. “So, maybe we don’t start with Sicarius. Maybe we start with her.”

She slid the photo of his sister across the table, turning it so it faced him. The corner caught the light, glinting as it stopped in front of him.

For the first time, Tyler’s eyes dropped to the picture. His hands tightened against the cuffs. He nodded.

Helena’s voice was calm, measured. “Tyler. I want you to picture your sister’s face.”

His jaw clenched, but his eyes continued to focus on the photo on the table.

“I want to go back to the last time you saw her,” Helena continued softly.

Tyler’s breath hitched. His eyes shut.

Tyler! Tyler! Tyler! The echo of his name tore from his memory. He gasped, shoulders jerking, his breathing ragged.

“That’s good,” Helena said quickly, steadying him. “Stay there. How does the air feel on your skin?”

“It’s… muggy.” His voice trembled. “The air conditioner in Alison’s apartment was busted.”

“And what does the air in Alison’s apartment smell like?”

He squeezed his eyes tighter. “Diapers. Dirty diapers. She’d called me to babysit.”

“Your nephew. Blake?”

“Yeah.” He swallowed. “She had a new boyfriend. They were gonna go out on a date.”

The memory replayed behind his lids, Alison’s voice cutting through: Tyler, promise me you’ll stay off that stupid computer. Pay attention to the baby while I’m gone.

Helena pressed gently, “But you told police you didn’t end up babysitting. Why?”

“Because Alison got into a fight with her boyfriend.”

Helena leaned in. “What was the fight about?”

“Me.” His eyes opened, bloodshot and angry. “He didn’t want me there.”

The voice in his head snarled: What’s he doing here? Next time, you tell me who’s gonna be here.

“Was his name Louis? Or Lee?” Helena asked.

“Lee,” Tyler confirmed. His voice shook.

“What did Lee look like?”

Tyler’s hands flexed against the cuffs. “I don’t know. She… she made me wait outside. She said—” He stammered, his voice cracking. “She said she wanted me to meet him. Asked me to have dinner with them at Delilah’s. Told me to call Mom to come watch Blake.”

“Did you go?”

He shook his head, shame flickering across his face. “No. I ditched. Went to hang with friends. I thought… I thought it didn’t matter.”

His voice dropped to a whisper. “Later that night, I got a call from Alison. Pocket dial. I answered, but… she didn’t say anything.”

His chest heaved, shallow. “That was the last time. Nobody could find Lee. Two days later, Mom filed the report.”

Helena’s voice cut through gently. “Tyler. Breathe. How are you feeling right now?”

He slammed his eyes shut again. “He was right there. But I couldn’t see his face.”

“Lee?”

“Yes.” His head snapped up, eyes burning. “He’s the one you’re looking for. He’s Sicarius.”

Helena steadied her tone. “Tyler, slow down—”

“You don’t understand!” His chair rattled as he surged against the cuffs. “I’ve been hunting this bastard for years. And then—during the pandemic—I found his network. Learned his game. His language. And pretty soon, I was talking directly to him. And he loves sharing his war stories.”

His voice cracked into fury. “Bragging about his experiments. One of them was this girl, from DC. He tells me her name. Alison. My sister.”

Helena’s breath caught.

Tyler’s hands shook, rattling the cuffs. “Then he tells me, I wonder how badly her brother managed to fuck up her kid.” His voice broke into a sob.

Helena leaned forward, urgent but calm. “Tyler, if you can tell us everything the two of you talked about—”

“Stop!” His whole body trembled. “Stop. She promised me this would make it better, but it’s worse. It’s so much worse.”

“Tyler—”

“No.” He slumped back, shaking his head violently. “Lock me up. Throw away the key.”

The silence that followed was thick, his sobs echoing against the steel walls. Helena sat perfectly still, the photo of Alison glinting faintly on the table between them.

The door to the interrogation room shut with a dull, final click. Helena stood just outside, her back pressed against the cool cinderblock wall. Through the glass, Tyler sat slumped, cuffs clinking faintly as he hung his head.

Her pulse hadn’t slowed since the moment he said Alison’s name. Since he spat out the words about promises, about a brother failing his sister. About making things worse.

Helena’s scarred palm burned. She pressed it against her thigh, grounding herself, but the weight in her chest only grew heavier.

Tyler’s grief clung to her like smoke—raw, jagged, and far too familiar.

She thought of all the names of the people she was too late to save. Her fathers victims. It’s not as though she’d ever forgotten them, not at all. If she sat down and took a breath, their names and stories would come rushing back in a whirlwind so overwhelming that it would make her feel like she was drowning. It’s for that reason that she doesn’t stop and take a breath. If she lets herself start to sink, she’s not sure anyone would be able to pull her back out from underneath the grief.

Helena’s sure that everyone is right and it would be much healthier for her to find someone to talk to or at least some kind of therapeutic output, but something about it still feels like opening a door to darkness that Helena isn’t ready to touch. Talking wasn’t the problem. Okay, talking to strangers was a little bit of a problem. But it wasn’t the main problem. The problem was each cry she heard, conjured up by her mind, was a cold reminder of a life lost, birthdays never reached, dreams never fulfilled, and loved ones’ lives forever darkened by the pain of loss. It didn’t matter whether any of that was Helena’s fault or not because every single one comes with hours of overthinking, wondering if she could have done something different to stop any of that happening.

Her throat tightened. You promised me this would make it better… but it’s worse. The words rang in her ears, echoing her own doubts.

She closed her eyes, inhaled once, sharp and shallow. For a split second, she felt twelve years old again, the chloroform stinging her nose, her father’s shadow blotting out the light.

Her eyes snapped open. She forced her breathing into rhythm, one hand flattening against the wall until the tremor in her fingers stilled.

When she finally pushed off the wall and straightened her jacket, the mask was back in place. By the time she turned toward the round table, her expression was all steel.

But inside, the ghosts rattled louder than ever.

Helena had barely stepped out of the briefing room when she heard her name.

“Helena—wait.”

Doug’s voice echoed down the hall, sharper than usual. She stopped, shoulders stiffening, before turning as he caught up to her.

His eyes searched hers, restless. “Did you get the flowers?”

”Doug….”

“And the voicemails? They were an apology,” he pressed, voice low but urgent. “All of it was an apology.”

“Doug.” Helena’s voice was low but hard-edged. “Keep your voice down. This isn’t an appropriate place to have this conversation. We’re at work.”

“Then when is an appropriate time Helena?” His frustration slipped out, raw. “Because you keep ignoring my calls, you keep hanging up, you keep—” He stopped, breathing hard. “All I am trying to do is tell you how genuinely sorry I am.”

Helena’s throat tightened. For a fleeting moment, the ache in his voice almost undid her. She wanted to let herself sink into him, to believe she could. But deep down she knew—he deserved better than the darkness she carried.

“Sorry for what, exactly? For comparing me to my father? For not telling me you were trying to disband the BAU? Or maybe you’re sorry the way you treated Rossi.”

“Rossi doesn’t matter—”

“He does to me,” Helena snapped, louder than she meant. A passing analyst glanced over; she lowered her voice. “You practically fired him.”

“I didn’t fire him,” Doug shot back. “I knew Rebecca Wilson got her hands on Green’s after-action reports from the DOJ. Rossi made that call. He had to fall on his sword. That wasn’t me pulling strings—that was politics, Helena. Politics I’m trying to protect you from.”

Helena’s chest burned, her scarred hand curling into a fist at her side. “By keeping me in the dark. By deciding what I should and shouldn’t know. That’s not protecting me, Doug—that’s controlling me.”

His eyes widened like she’d slapped him. “No. That’s not what this is. I—” He exhaled, pained. “I’m trying to hold onto you, Helena. You’re all I think about. Morning to night. Do you understand that? You—”

She cut him off, voice breaking. “Then why does it feel like every time I look up, you’re pulling another string behind my back? You don’t trust me enough to tell me what’s going on, and then you expect me to just… what? Pretend it doesn’t matter?”

“I didn’t want you caught in it,” Doug said, voice cracking. “You’ve been carrying the weight of this case, your nightmares, your history. I can’t stand to watch this place eat you alive. And yeah—maybe I’ve made mistakes, maybe I’ve been clumsy—but the reason I did any of it was for you.”

Helena froze. For a beat, the hall felt too small, the air too thin.

He stepped closer, eyes pleading. “Please. Just tell me what I need to do. Tell me what I can do to fix this.”

Helena faltered. The urge to close the space between them nearly broke her resolve. She wanted to believe him. Wanted to believe there was a version of her that could be loved that much.

But there wasn’t.

Helena swallowed hard, her pulse hammering.

“You can’t,” she whispered.

Doug’s voice broke as he stepped closer. “You do care about me. I can see it all over you. So why—why won’t you let yourself say it?”

For a moment Helena’s resolve buckled.

Her mind flickered to everything they’d shared—her terrible pancakes on Sunday mornings, the way his laugh filled the apartment, his hand absently stroking her back when she drifted back to sleep beside him. For a heartbeat, she wanted to give in. To say I love you too. To believe they could have that future.

But then the ghosts closed in again, suffocating. Her father’s voice. The blood on her palm. The memory of everything she’d already ruined.

Because pain is a lot of things. It’s gun shot wounds and car explosions. Missed phone calls and vague texts. Lies and sudden frustrations. Ghosts and nightmares. It’s watching the person you love suffer because of choices you have made. And, worse than that, it’s watching them still love you even when you don’t think you deserve it.

Her voice came out sharp, final. “Because I don’t love you.”

The words came out sharp and she knew they would cut deep, trivialising the moments they had shared over the last few months.

In fact she had counted on it.

Every early morning together, Helena’s head tucked under Doug’s chin, warm under the covers as the bedroom slowly filled with light. Every kiss on the forehead, fingers interfacing as they found comfort in each other. Every conversation held deep into the night, laughing and learning and discovering.

All if it undone with five words.

And even though it wasn’t what Helena wanted, she knew it was necessary.

Inside, she was screaming with all the things she couldn’t let herself say: I do love you. I want the life you’re offering. But I’ll break it. I’ll break you.

Doug swallowed hard, trying to hold himself together. The silence stretched, raw and unbearable. And then—like something snapped—his eyes darkened.

“Maybe you’re right,” he said, voice sharp and brittle. “Maybe you are just like him. Too damaged to let anyone in without destroying them.”

The words sliced through her like a knife. Her breath caught, her body locking in place for half a second before she forced herself to move.

She turned and walked away, shoulders stiff, fighting the tremor in her hands.

Behind her, Doug stood rooted to the spot, the cruelty of his own words hitting him almost instantly. He shut his eyes, exhaling like a man who’d just gutted himself.

But Helena didn’t look back.

She couldn’t.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Six

“The Me You Can’t See”

“Even the things that look broken beyond repair have a chance at being whole again.” - Natasha Preston

Helena sat hunched at the round table, laptop screen casting a pale glow over her face. The Sicarius forum filled the monitor, endless threads of killers-in-waiting boasting, scheming, writing like their words would earn them immortality. She scrolled, eyes dry, fingers tense on the keyboard.

But she wasn’t really seeing the words.

I’m trying to give you an out before this place eats you alive and you turn into your—

Doug’s unfinished sentence rang in her head like a struck bell. She’d stormed out before he could finish it, but she knew where it was going.

Before you turn into your father.

Her jaw tightened. She hated that he’d said it. Hated more that she feared he was right.

“Please tell me you didn’t spend the whole night here.”

Helena blinked, snapping out of the spiral. JJ came in carrying two coffees, Garcia behind her with a box of donuts covered in sprinkles.

JJ set a cup down in front of Helena, eyes narrowing just slightly. “You’ve been at this all night, haven’t you?”

Helena straightened. “Not all night. Just… needed to stay on top of this.”

Garcia plopped into the nearest chair with a theatrical sigh. “Oh my god, you’re turning into Rossi. Next thing you know, you’ll be sleeping in his office, muttering about behavioral markers while the rest of us remember what sunlight looks like.”

JJ pulled out a chair and sat beside her, her tone gentler than her expression. “I know you want to keep momentum, but you don’t have to carry this by yourself. Let us take some of it.”

Helena hesitated, lips pressing together, but she didn’t argue.

Garcia broke the tension with a gasp as she opened the donut box. “See? JJ brings caffeine, I bring sugar. Between the two of us, you have zero excuse to collapse at your desk now.”

Despite herself, Helena smirked faintly, plucking one out.

Garcia wagged a finger. “Good. Eat, mortal.”

Helena lowered her gaze, hiding behind the rim of her coffee cup, grateful when Garcia spun her laptop around and launched into the forum findings.

An hour passed in steady, heavy silence as they picked through the digital wreckage.

Lines of text scrolled endlessly, usernames and timestamps stacked like hieroglyphs of a language only monsters understood.

JJ leaned over Garcia’s shoulder, her brow furrowed. “It’s like he’s a celebrity to them. Every post, every comment—it’s all about getting Sicarius’s attention.”

Helena sat on the edge of the desk, arms crossed tight, eyes locked on the glowing screen. “They’re performing for him. Competing.”

Garcia made a face, pressing a hand to her stomach. “Ugh—well, one of these fanboys gets an A for enthusiasm. Listen to this: ‘Hydrochloric acid eats through bone just as easily as flesh. A gallon per forty pounds of body weight.’” She dropped her voice into a mocking sing-song. “ ‘Signed, Your Friendly Neighbourhood Chemistry Major.’”

She shuddered and clicked the post closed. “It’s like Reddit for sociopaths. I may never eat Jell-O again.”

JJ exhaled. “What about the ones we already know about? Harris, Gilchrist?”

“I pulled their user histories,” Garcia said, bringing up the highlighted threads. “Robert Harris—our paralysing pervert—wrote a manifesto about freezing the world one spine at a time. Rory Gilchrist, wrote this thing about defeating a security system and taking out a family.”

JJ’s jaw tightened. “And Sicarius rewarded them with kill kits.”

“Not just rewarded,” Helena said slowly, her mind working as she stared at the posts. “He matched them.”

JJ glanced at her. “Matched?”

Helena pushed off the desk and moved toward the evidence board, eyes scanning the pinned photos of recovered kits. “Look at it. Harris dreamed of paralysis—he got a paralytic off the dark web and tools to sever a spine. Gilchrist wanted to dismantle security—he got a signal jammer. Each kit wasn’t random. It was curated.”

Garcia blinked. “Like a murder subscription box.”

“He’s not handing out toys,” Helena pressed. “He’s picking candidates based on kill kits he already buried. Tailoring the fantasy to the recruit.”

JJ’s gaze narrowed as the pieces clicked into place. “Which means the kits we haven’t seen yet—those are the ones he’s saving for someone else.”

Helena nodded. “Exactly. And if we cross-reference what’s in the container with what’s already been used…”

Garcia was already typing, pulling up side-by-side lists: recovered kill kits on one screen, photographed contents of the Seattle shipping container on another.

“There.” Helena jabbed a finger at the list. “Every kit recovered so far corresponds to a method in the container. Except three.”

JJ followed her gaze. “Acid. Strangulation. Fire.”

The room fell quiet, the weight of inevitability pressing in.

Helena’s stomach knotted. “Those are the ones he hasn’t played yet.”

JJ straightened, her voice steady. “Then those are the kills he’s planning next.”

Voit sat hunched on the edge of the bed, elbows digging into his thighs, head heavy in his hands. The day pressed on him like a weight—fired, humiliated, once again cornered by Hal and his smug smile. He could still see Hal’s throat, the pulse there, how easy it would be to crush it. How much better the day would have ended if he had.

From the bathroom, the sound of running water stopped. Sydney’s voice floated through the door, light but edged with knowing.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she called. “You want to punch Hal in the face, right? But that’s not going to solve anything. He’ll still be our neighbour tomorrow.”

Voit let out a dark laugh under his breath. Not if I do it right.

“The guy’s an asshole,” he muttered loud enough for her to hear, even as his mind painted the image again—Hal crumpled at his feet, blood pooling on the asphalt, silence where smugness used to be.

The bathroom door opened. Sydney emerged, the steam curling around her, her silk gown loose over new lingerie. She paused in the doorway, arching a brow, letting him drink her in.

“Maybe,” she teased, her voice softening as she let the robe slide from her shoulders, “you just need a distraction.”

She crossed the room, hips swaying, and perched on the bed beside him. She leaned close, trailing her fingers over his arm, the scent of her perfume curling into the air between them.

Voit stared at her touch, but it barely registered. The itch under his skin didn’t fade. It only grew.

Sydney smiled, lips brushing his ear. “Let me take your mind off things.”

But instead of pulling her close, Voit stood abruptly, her hand slipping from his arm. He moved toward the door, jaw tight, heart racing—not with desire for her, but with the gnawing pull of something darker.

As he stepped into the hallway, he could still feel the heat of her eyes on his back. But all he could think of—what pulsed through his veins like fire—was Helena Bishop.

Her scarred palm. Her haunted eyes.

Sydney’s lingerie meant nothing. He wanted Helena in his lap instead.

The night air was sharp against his skin, cooling the sweat already prickling at the back of his neck. Voit stepped onto the driveway, basketball under one arm, and fired a lazy shot toward the hoop. The ball smacked the backboard, clanged off the rim, and rolled away into the shadows. He didn’t bother chasing it.

Instead, he pulled out his phone.

The glow lit his face in the dark, and there they were again—her words. Helena Bishop’s messages, tucked away in the old chat logs with Doug Bailey.

He scrolled slowly, reading them one at a time.

Doug’s overconfident jokes. Helena’s guarded replies. A photo she’d sent—casual, a little intimate, but still personal. Still hers.

Voit’s pulse picked up. He could see it so clearly, all the strands of his hunger weaving together: Hal crumpled on the concrete, skull caved in under the weight of a rock. Helena pressed against him instead of Doug, her scarred hand gripping, her eyes wide with the same darkness that lived inside him. Blood, sweat, heat, silence—the chaos and the release, all tangled into one.

He licked his lips, thumb hovering over the next message.

A ping.

The secure app flashed with a new alert.

Benjamin: Deposit made. Check your account.

Another ping.

User011051: Thanks for the package. Instructions were clear. When?

Voit’s lips curved. His thumbs tapped fast, decisive.

4pm tomorrow. You have your target.

He stared at the words a moment longer, then locked the phone, slipping it back into his pocket.

The itch under his skin quieted—not gone, never gone, but soothed. For now.

Because tomorrow, someone else would bleed for him.

The pieces of the puzzle came together and the team uncovered a lead for a missing kill kit – fire. Username ‘Notorious’. Rossi correctly theorised that their lead was former military, most likely suffering from PTSD. And with some help from Rebecca to access military after action reports from the DOJ they finally had a name.

The round table glowed with the maps and files scattered across it, everyone’s focus drilled in on the latest lead. Tyler Green’s name and photo stared up at them, bolded across Garcia’s printouts: Army Vet. Explosives Experience. Potential IED.

Doug leaned forward, voice calm but cutting. “We’re talking about a disgruntled veteran, potentially armed with an IED, operating in the nation’s capital. If that doesn’t qualify as domestic terrorism, you’re going to have to tell me what does.”

Prentiss held his gaze, jaw set.

Doug glanced at her, then to the team. “When you brought me this case, Emily, you told me it wasn’t political. But it sure as hell looks political now.”

Across the table, Rossi scoffed and shoved his chair back slightly. “This is typical bureaucratic bullshit. While the BAU is doing all the real work, you try starving us to death, and now that we’re on the five-yard line, you show up to take credit for the touchdown.”

The room went still. Doug didn’t flinch. He folded his hands neatly on the table, voice smooth, unshaken.

“Emily, it’s your call,” he said. “But know this—if you don’t bring in Domestic Terrorism, and this goes sideways? I don’t know how much longer I can protect any of you.”

His eyes landed on Helena.

She kept her gaze fixed on the file in front of her, refusing to look up, refusing to let him see the flicker of betrayal tightening her chest.

Prentiss exhaled, then gave a curt nod. “The BAU built this case from the ground up. Can we make it a joint operation?”

Rossi shook his head, disgust carved into every line of his face. “Emily.”

“I don’t have a choice,” Prentiss said firmly, shutting down further argument.

Garcia’s fingers flew over her keyboard, breaking the tension with her usual brightness muted. “I’ve got a hit on Green’s cell phone.”

Rossi stood, his authority sharp. “Luke, Helena—you’re on him. Go bring this guy in.”

Luke was already halfway to the door. Helena gathered her leather jacket, finally lifting her head.

Doug was still watching her, eyes steady, unreadable.

This time, she met them—just for a moment.

And then she turned and followed Luke out, the weight of his gaze pressing between her shoulder blades.

The park was alive with the hum of families, joggers, and cyclists, the late-afternoon sun throwing long golden streaks across the grass. But the moment Helena stepped out of the SUV, her stomach tightened.

Across the lawn, the Domestic Terrorism task force had set up a perimeter—rows of agents in tactical gear, armoured vans lining the road, radios crackling. It looked like a war zone waiting to happen.

Helena strode toward the DT commander, Luke at her side. “You can’t do this,” she snapped, low enough to avoid drawing public attention but sharp enough to cut through the commander’s detached calm. “You march your men out there in full riot gear, he’s going to see you coming a mile away.”

“Agent Bishop, we’ll take that under advisement,” he said curtly before pivoting away, shouting into his radio.

Helena’s blood boiled as the commander barked clipped orders. She stalked after him, voice sharp. “With respect, sir, this guy has military training. If he gets into the park, those people in there are sitting ducks. We need to move now.”

The commander didn’t break stride. “That’s not your call, Agent. You and your colleague are here as observers.”

Observers. The word landed like a slap.

A crackle over the DT radios pulled her attention.

“The target does not appear to have a detonator, but Sir—if he goes through the park gate, we’re gonna have trouble getting a clear shot.”

Helena’s head snapped toward the operator. “Whoa—what the hell are you guys doing? You’ve got a sniper on him?”

No answer.

Helena turned to Luke, heat burning under her skin. “I’m not losing another one. Let’s go.”

Luke gave her a tight nod, understanding written in his eyes. Together, they peeled off from the staging ground and slipped deeper into the park, cutting past clusters of benches and the leafy shade of oaks. The air shifted instantly—quieter, heavier, punctuated only by the distant laughter of joggers and couples who had no idea they were steps away from disaster.

Helena’s eyes swept benches, lampposts, trees. Every shadow felt too deep, every passerby a possible target. Her hand hovered near her holster, scarred palm itching with tension.

Her phone buzzed.

Doug: What the hell are you doing walking into the kill zone?

Helena silenced the screen, shoving it back into her pocket.

It buzzed again, insistent.

Doug: Pull back. That’s an order.

Her jaw clenched. She didn’t even look at it this time.

Then she saw him.

Tyler Green.

He stood casually, almost too casually, shoulders slouched, eyes fixed on the glow of his phone. No visible detonator. No urgency. Just waiting.

Helena slowed her pace, masking her breathing, her instincts snapping into place. “That’s him,” she whispered.

Luke’s jaw tightened.

Helena adjusted her stride, forcing her shoulders to relax. She slipped her phone into her hand, angling it like she was a tourist. When she drew close enough, her voice was light, practiced. “Excuse me—I think I’m lost. I’m trying to get to the Lincoln Memorial…..”

Tyler looked up, startled, his eyes darting over her shoulder. And that’s when Luke moved—slamming into him from behind, knocking him to the ground and pinning him to the grass in one clean motion.

“FBI!” Helena barked, weapon out, trained on Tyler’s hands.

Tyler grunted, struggling, eyes wild. But there was no detonator, no switch. Just dirt and rage smeared across his face.

Helena’s chest heaved, her pulse still pounding as Luke snapped the cuffs into place. Around them, civilians stopped and stared, confused but safe—for now.

Helena holstered her weapon slowly, her gaze never leaving Tyler. She couldn’t shake the thought clawing at her: we got lucky.

And as the DT team came rushing in, she felt the heat of eyes on her from somewhere else, far away—watching.

She didn’t see him.

On the far side of the park, behind the wrought-iron railings, Elias Voit watched her. Calm, still, the faintest smile on his lips.

His eyes lingered on her like a mark he’d already claimed.

Beautiful, he thought. Not for her face or her body—though he could admit both were striking—but for the darkness threaded through her movements. She’d risked everything to get her unsub alive. That wasn’t just Bureau training. That was compulsion. A mirror.

As the DT team shoved Tyler Green into a waiting van, Helena turned her head slightly, scanning the crowd. For a moment her gaze swept the railings, eyes narrowing.

Voit smiled faintly and slipped back into the throng, vanishing into the noise of sirens and applause.

Doug stood at the podium, the seal of the Bureau gleaming at his back. Cameras flashed as he delivered the soundbite, crisp and polished: “There is nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, where the long arm of justice won’t catch you.”

Helena watched from the wings, jaw tight. It wasn’t the BAU’s victory anymore. The DT banner was stamped across it, Doug’s name attached.

The reporters had barely cleared the conference room when Helena felt his presence at her back.

“Helena.”

Doug’s voice was tight, clipped, carrying just enough authority to make her stop. She turned, finding him striding toward her in his pressed suit, the gleam of cameras gone but the judgment in his eyes still sharp.

He caught her arm as the last agents filtered out, dragging her into a quiet side room. His grip wasn’t rough, but it was insistent, his eyes locked on hers with barely contained fury.

“What the hell were you thinking earlier?” he demanded, keeping his voice low but his anger barely leashed. “Charging into a kill zone? Ignoring my texts?”

Helena’s jaw clenched. “I wasn’t going to lose the best lead to Sicarius.”

“Don’t dismiss this.” Doug stepped closer, lowering his voice. “This isn’t about some abstract case file. This is your life. You can’t keep crossing lines like you’re invincible.”

Her eyes flicked to him, cool and detached. “Then why don’t you tell me what this is really about, Doug?”

“I’m asking if you’re going to keep shutting me out while you jeopardise your job? Because that’s what it looked like.”

She let out a scoff, almost a laugh, though nothing about it was amused. “So that’s what this is about. My job.”

“Yeah, your job,” he said, incredulous. “The one you keep gambling with. The one you’re burning yourself out for. You think I’m just going to stand by while you spin out?”

She let out a short, bitter laugh. “Spinning out? You think I’m spinning out?”

He exhaled hard, rubbing the back of his neck. “Are you going to tell me that you’re not? Because I see what this case is doing to you. The night terrors, the way you wake up gasping, clawing at your throat, shaking so hard I can barely hold you. Something’s wrong and you never—never—let me in. You won’t tell me what you feel so I can help you.”

“Help me?”

He pressed on, desperation threading through his voice. “Yes, help you. I don’t know if Sicarius reminds you of your father, or if it’s something else, but I need you to talk to me so I can help you. Tell me what I’m doing wrong. Or what I’m not doing. Or what I’m doing too much of. Just… tell me what I can do.”

Her laugh came brittle, hollow. “What do you want to know, Doug? Why I’m crossing lines for this case? Why I’m fine with it? Why I shut you out? Why I froze up the other night at dinner?”

“That’s not it,” Doug said quickly. “But this is what you do. You shut me out every time I try to get close.”

Her eyes gleamed with anger, but underneath it something more fragile. “Then why don’t you just ask the real question? What’s wrong with me? Just how screwed up am I? And at what point do you cut your losses and run? Because that’s what you want to know, isn’t it?”

He opened his mouth, but she didn’t let him speak.

“I’ll save you the trouble,” she said, digging into her pocket and pulling out the key to his apartment. The key was cold in her hand, heavier than it should’ve been. Helena set it down on the table between them, the metallic clink cutting through the suffocating silence. For a beat, neither of them breathed.

Doug stared at it, at her, his throat working like he was choking back words.

Helena looked at him one last time, her face unreadable, and then she turned and walked away.

Behind her, the sudden crash made her flinch. She didn’t have to look to know Doug had swept everything from the table—files, pens, his phone—onto the floor. The sharp clatter echoed through the room.

Her footsteps carried her out, each one heavier than the last, leaving him in the wreckage of the argument and herself with nothing but the darkness she couldn’t outrun.

Whitfield County, GA

The steel walls groaned faintly in the Georgia heat, the air inside thick with rust and old blood. Elias Voit stood in the centre of the container, rolling his shoulders, shaking the stiffness out of his hands. The man chained to the ceiling before him looked enough like Hal to scratch the itch—same build, same thinning hair, same anxious lines carved into his face.

Voit tilted his head, studying him with clinical detachment. “Epic fuck-ups,” he muttered under his breath, pacing in a slow circle. “Why is it so hard for people to follow just a few simple rules?”

He stopped, replaying the press conference he had watched earlier in his mind. Doug Bailey at the podium, voice dripping smug authority as he declared: There is nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, where the long arm of justice won’t catch you.

He glanced toward the corner where Moose’s cage waited, the dog’s low growl already vibrating in the air. “I wonder what Helena sees in him.”

At the thought of her, his pulse quickened. Seeing her in the park—sharp, fierce, scarred—had made his chest tighten in a way he hadn’t felt in years. He pictured her here, imagined her eyes locked on his, imagined what he’d do with her, what he could make her become.

He turned back to his prisoner. “You know, there was a time I would’ve gotten a real rush out of this,” he said conversationally. “Breaking out of the benign minutia of everyday life—with the exhilaration of murder.”

He leaned back on his heels, voice softening. “Now? Now it just keeps me… level. Balanced. Especially when people let me down. I thought I could let other people do it for me, but apparently, people cannot follow instructions. Can’t obey simple rules. You tell them not to leave a body, they go ahead and make a whole scene. You tell them not to kill anyone that can be linked to them, they murder a former lover. I don’t understand what is so difficult about following a few simple rules. I mean, it’s not hard, I did it…with you. Didn’t I Hal?”

The man trembled, shaking his head. “Please, I’m not who you think I am. I’m not Hal.”

Voit chuckled, low and humourless. “Tonight, you’re Hal. That’s all that matters.”

The man’s voice cracked. “Why?”

Voit laughed outright this time. “Why? Because you can’t be linked to me. Jesus Christ, haven’t you been paying attention?”

He crossed to Moose’s cage, sliding the latch with deliberate slowness. The German Shepherd snapped to attention, ears pricked, a low growl building into a frenzy as Voit tapped the speaker on his phone. A swell of classical music filled the container, strings sharp and manic. Moose barked, teeth gnashing, body straining against the cage.

“Also because Moose here will not leave a body. But mostly because you look a lot like my next door neighbour Hal, who’s an asshole. Clearly, I can’t go and kill him because that would be breaking way too many rules.”

Voit smiled, wide and genuine, as he swung the cage door open.

The man screamed when Moose lunged, the sound muffled almost instantly by snarls and the wet crunch of teeth breaking skin. Blood splattered across the steel floor in violent arcs.

Voit watched, breath catching in his throat, a warmth spreading through his chest. It wasn’t the lightning jolt it used to be—it was steadier, deeper, like a heartbeat syncing back into rhythm. Balance. Control.

He closed his eyes, savouring the symphony of it: the music, the dog’s frenzied barks, the shrieks dissolving into gurgles.

When he opened them again, he felt calm. Centred. Alive.

The music swelled, strings climbing higher and higher, manic and triumphant. The man’s screams tore through the air as Moose attacked, teeth tearing, the wet crunch of bone snapping under his jaws.

Voit closed his eyes, savouring the sound. The shrieks weren’t just noise—they were a symphony. Each cry perfectly timed with the crescendo, the rhythm of life ending and power asserting itself. It was harmony.

He tilted his head back, breathing it in, gooseflesh prickling across his arms.

And for just a moment, he wished Helena Bishop was standing there beside him. Watching. Listening. Understanding. He imagined her eyes darkening as the blood sprayed, imagined her feeling the same thrill he did as the dog devoured flesh.

She’d pretend to recoil at first, but he knew—he knew—that part of her would recognise the exhilaration, the freedom. She was born of it, forged in it.

When the man’s screams cracked into gurgles and the violins peaked in violent triumph, Voit smiled, wide and blissful.

Helena walked fast down the corridor, her chest tight, Doug’s voice still echoing in her head. She kept her eyes fixed straight ahead, jaw clenched, willing herself not to crack. She could feel the scar in her palm throbbing as if it wanted to remind her of everything she’d done, everything she was afraid of still becoming. She thought about how much easier it was to run, to bury herself in cases and monsters, than to face the possibility that Doug might be right—that she didn’t know how to live outside the darkness.

Her eyes stung, but she blinked hard, forcing the tears back, locking it all down again.

“Hey.”

Helena blinked and looked up. JJ was standing in front of her, brows furrowed as she took in Helena’s face.

“You okay?” JJ asked, softer now, like she already knew the answer. “You look… upset.”

Helena swallowed hard, trying to smooth the jagged edges of her voice. “I’m fine.”

JJ didn’t press, but she tilted her head slightly, eyes sharp.

“Then you should know—the device Green was carrying? It was fake. Completely inert.”

Helena stopped, blinking. “Why would a serial killer carry a fake device?”

JJ shrugged, eyes narrowing. “We don’t know. And he’s refusing to talk.”

Helena felt her pulse spike. Fake. He wasn’t trying to kill anyone. Then what the hell was he doing?

“Come on,” JJ said. “The others are waiting.”

Rossi, Garcia, and Tara were already seated when Helena and JJ walked in. Case files littered the table, Tyler Green’s mugshot glaring up at them.

JJ slid into her seat. “CST went over the kill kit we recovered. The volatile components were neutralised—completely useless.”

Garcia frowned. “Then what was the point?”

JJ continued, “And Green had tapped into the security cameras monitoring the park entrances.”

Rossi leaned forward. “To record what? There wasn’t going to be an explosion.”

Tara’s brow furrowed, her voice quiet but certain. “Not what. Who.” She pushed Green’s file toward them. “He used to be a spotter in the army. That’s what he was doing in the park—setting up angles, waiting for his target. Trying to lure Sicarius into the open.”

Helena’s stomach turned. The pieces clicked, cold and sharp. “To get into that park, Sicarius would’ve had to walk through one of those gates. Which means Green would’ve caught him on camera. But we moved too early.”

Her fists tightened, nails biting her scarred palm. Anger flushed her chest hot.

“Now, hold on,” Rossi said, voice steady. “First—we did what we thought was right. And second, can you prove it?”

Tara stood, gathering the photos. “Let me try him again.”

The unsub sat cuffed to the table in the interrogation room, eyes defiant, jaw set. Tara slid a photo across to him.

“You know who this is,” she said evenly.

Green’s gaze flickered.

“Your sister,” Tara continued. “She went missing years ago. Your records show you searched for her for years… and then stopped. I think you worked out who killed her.” She leaned in, her voice low. “You didn’t join Sicarius’s network. You infiltrated it. To find him.”

For the first time, Green’s composure cracked. His voice was low, shaking with fury. “You people ruined everything. I had him. And now—” His jaw locked. “I’m done talking.”

On the other side of the glass, Garcia wrung her hands, eyes wide. “Okay, but explain this to me: how did Green get closer to Sicarius than we did?”

JJ’s voice was grim. “Because he had help. From us.” She passed a small folder over to her. “Penelope, they found this on him when he was arrested.”

Garcia unfolded the page. Her mouth dropped open. “These are… the coordinates. For the kill kits.” Her eyes darted around the table, horrified. “Oh, my God. He’s my informant.”

Silence blanketed the room, heavy and suffocating.

Helena’s pulse hammered in her ears.

Doug.

Her father.

Sicarius.

Now Tyler Green.

Everything was colliding, one storm bleeding into another.

She felt it all pressing down on her chest, the weight of it suffocating.

And for the first time since she’d walked out of that room, she wished she’d kept his key in her pocket.

It Leads Me To You

Chapter Five

“No One Can Run From Themselves”

“But I knew better: No matter where you go, the past floods back. You can try like the dickens, but you can't escape fate.” - Michael Lee West

Branches slapped at Helena’s arms as she tore through the woods, lungs burning, the mud sucking at her boots. Up ahead, Luke’s voice cut through the thicket—“He’s moving east!”—and she pushed harder, adrenaline drowning out everything else.

The unsub was fast, his black duffel clutched tight against his side. A kill kit. Another goddamn kill kit.

“Stop!” JJ’s voice rang out behind her, sharp, commanding.

The unsub whirled, fired. The shot cracked through the trees, so close Helena felt the heat of the bullet cut past her shoulder. She dropped low, instinct taking over, heart hammering as bark exploded from the trunk beside her.

She scrambled back to her feet, chasing harder, refusing to let him vanish into the woods. Not again.

Ahead, the trees broke. An access road stretched like a thin grey scar through the forest, and parked just off the shoulder was a car, engine running. The unsub sprinted toward it, hauling the duffel into the passenger seat.

“Don’t let him go!” Luke yelled, bursting out of the tree line just behind Helena.

Two local squad cars screeched in from opposite ends of the road, boxing the getaway vehicle in before it could pull away. JJ emerged seconds later, shouting over the chaos: “No—don’t box him in! We need him alive!”

Too late.

The unsub raised his weapon, and before the officers could react, the shot rang out. His body slumped forward against the wheel, crimson blooming against the windshield.

The woods fell silent except for the wail of sirens winding down.

Helena froze at the edge of the access road, chest heaving, her eyes locked on the duffel. Another kit. Another piece of a puzzle they were chasing blind.

Her pulse thudded in her ears as she stared at it. She could still feel the near miss of the bullet, still hear the echo of JJ’s desperate command. And over it all, like a second heartbeat, was Doug’s voice from days earlier: I love you. I want a life with you.

But that life, his promises, the warmth of him in bed—none of it fit against this. Against blood on the road, against kill kits and corpses, against betrayal dressed up as protection.

Helena’s throat tightened. She bent down, staring at the bag as if it might open its mouth and speak the truth. But all it did was sit there, mute and heavy, daring her to imagine what fresh horrors it contained.

She wasn’t just haunted by the man they’d lost today. She was haunted by the one still out there—the shadow network’s architect. And by the gnawing, jagged fact that the one person she trusted most had already stabbed her in the back.

Seattle, WA

The laptop screen glared back at Elias Voit, the red numbers almost taunting him.

-$1243.47. Overdrawn.

He stared at it, jaw tight, irritation buzzing under his skin. He hated the weakness of it, the smallness. Predators didn’t get overdrawn. Predators didn’t count pennies.

A knock rattled the front door.

He slammed the laptop shut, smoothed his face into something neighbourly, and opened it to find Hal standing there, his son Chad hovering with a stack of glossy brochures.

“Sorry to bother you, Mr Voit” Chad mumbled nervously through his clearly rehearsed speech. “Uh, but the lacrosse team is doing their annual fundraiser for this year’s training trip, and I was wondering if you might need any magazine subscriptions?”

Voit shook his head. “You know, we actually get most of our news online nowadays. So I think we’re good.”

“Uh, thanks anyway” Chad stammered as he turned to walk away.

“Oh, for Christ’s sake” Hal interrupted as he clapped a heavy hand on his son’s shoulder. “We talked about this son. You gotta assert yourself. Come on, Voit. It’s for the kids. Where’s your team spirit?”

Team spirit.

Voit’s smile stayed in place, but his mind was elsewhere. This morning, he’d tried. He really had. He’d been “Dad.” He’d helped Harlow adjust her grip on the basketball, his hands guiding hers until she landed her shot. He’d listened as Holly tried to outtalk her way around the vaping accusation, her teenage bravado masking fear. For a moment, he almost believed he could play the part. That normal was possible.

“Let me take a look,” Voit sighed as he flicked through the bundle of brochures Chad handed him.

Hal rolled his eyes and laughed. “What are you looking for, Good Housekeeping? Just pick the one with the football phone and move on”

But now, with Hal standing there—so smug, so pushy—all Voit could picture was a rock in his hand. The dull, satisfying crunch as it connected with Hal’s skull. Blood spraying across the porch. Hal collapsing like a sack of meat while Chad’s wide, horrified eyes reflected Voit’s triumph.

The images came vivid, graphic, alive: the wet sound of bone splitting, the desperate last gasp, the sudden, godlike silence after.

Power. Thrill. Worship of himself as the arbiter of life and death.

This is who I am.

He closed the door as Hal and Chad left his driveway, the click of the lock sharp and final.

His pulse was racing. His skin buzzed. He needed to feed the itch.

He moved into the garage, the smell of oil and dust greeting him like an old friend. Fishing under the workbench, he pulled out the kill kit, opened it, and lifted the secret phone from its hiding place.

With a few practiced taps, the screen came alive, connecting to the video feed.

There was Moose, the stolen dog, chained inside one of the containers. The camera picked up the animal’s nervous pacing.

Voit queued up a piece of classical music—strings, elegant and deliberate. He turned up the volume.

The dog’s ears flattened. The growl started low, bubbling up into sharp, frantic barking. Moose lunged at the chain, teeth snapping, froth collecting at the corners of his mouth.

Voit smiled. The project was working. The music was the trigger, the leash around the dog’s brain.

Soon, he thought.

Soon, he’d have a weapon of his own making.

The elevator hummed, its slow ascent matching the steady rhythm of Helena’s pulse. She leaned back against the mirrored wall, arms crossed, the reflection staring back at her with hollow eyes.

Her mind refused to quiet. The unsub in the woods. The duffel. Another kit that proved the nightmare was bigger than they thought. She’d stared at it, at the weight of what it meant, and all she could think was how it would never end.

She’d never had comfort. Not really. Just control, just order, just walls she’d stacked around herself, brick by brick, since childhood. But somehow Doug had slipped through—his voice, his hands, the way he looked at her like she was someone worth loving. He had made her believe, just for a moment, that she could be normal.

And then she learned the truth.

The elevator chimed, the doors sliding open. Helena stepped out, eyes forward, focused, already trying to shove her feelings back into the box where she kept everything else.

“Excuse me—”

Helena stopped. A woman in her mid fifties was standing near the hallway, clutching a frayed leather purse to her chest. Her eyes were red, rimmed from crying, but burning with desperate hope.

“Are you the agent? The one who found the container in Seattle? The one on the Sicarius case?”

Helena froze, her voice low and careful. “Uh, I’m sorry, who are you?”

The woman stepped closer, words tumbling out. “Have you identified the bodies yet? Please. My daughter—she went missing in 2007. If she’s in there—if she’s one of them—I need to know.”

“I’m sorry,” Helena whispered, her voice catching. “You need to wait in the family room. Someone will update you as soon as they can.”

The woman gestured towards the packed family room at the end of the corridor. “I have been waiting in the family room with all these people for hours now”

The words hit Helena like a blade slipping between her ribs.

For a split second, the hallway tilted. Her vision blurred, not with tears but with memory—faces, so many faces, all flickering past her like the pages of a grotesque photo album. Her father’s victims. The girl in the box. The blood in the basement. Names and screams pressed into her mind, ghostly fingerprints she would never scrub clean.

She should have stopped him sooner. She should have said something. She should have done anything.

The woman’s face crumpled. Helena turned quickly, her chest tightening as if iron bands were closing around her ribs. The guilt gnawed with familiar teeth.

Every family.

Every victim.

Every silence she had swallowed as a child.

Every missed chance to stop her father sooner.

She carried those ghosts into the hallway, her pulse thrumming, when Doug’s voice cracked through her spiralling thoughts:

“Helena!”

He strode toward her, his expression etched with concern. “I heard what happened in the field—the unsub fired at you?”

Helena stopped, turned slightly, but her face was cool, unreadable. “Something like that.”

He frowned, closing the distance, stopping just short of grabbing her by the arms. “Don’t do that with me. Don’t minimise it. A bullet missed you by inches. You could’ve been killed.”

Helena’s arms folded almost reflexively. “I wasn’t.”

Doug searched her eyes, his worry plain, but she couldn’t meet it. Not when her chest still burned with betrayal. Not when she remembered him standing at a table, calling the BAU wasteful, undermining everything she lived for.

He thought she didn’t know. He thought she hadn’t put the pieces together. But she had. And every time she looked at him now, all she saw was the deception under the softness.

“Helena,” he said quietly, almost pleading, “If something had happened to you…” He let the sentence trail off, his gaze sharp with unspoken fear.

She shifted her weight, forcing a polite, professional smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I’ve got a briefing to get to.”

And she walked past him before he could say anything more.

Doug stood there, staring after her, confusion and frustration mingling in his features.

Helena didn’t look back.

Inside, though, the ache throbbed like a wound that wouldn’t close.

The round table hummed with the low whir of laptops and the stale smell of too much coffee clinging to the air. Helena sat rigid, her notebook open but untouched, her mind still replaying the woods, the flash of the bullet, Doug’s voice in the hall.

The door swung open.

“Well, well, well,” Garcia announced, sweeping in with her usual flare. “It is so nice to see my fine, furry friends again.” She set her laptop down, her bangles jingling as she added with a grin, “Did I ever tell you about the time the hot dog filter went haywire during a SoAR meeting?”

Her laugh hung in the air.

Silence.

“Ohhh,” Garcia said softly, her smile faltering. “Right. We can only talk about sad things in here.”

Rossi leaned forward, his voice dry, cutting. “What have you got on this fuckhead?”

“By fuckhead,” Helena said quietly, “He means Sicarius.”

Rossi shook his head. “I’m not giving this jag off the satisfaction of a name.”

Garcia cleared her throat, clicking her mouse. “Okay, well. I was able to uncover a hidden messaging app on each of the unsubs’ phones—the suicides. That, in turn, helped me trace them to a discussion platform Sicarius has been using to coordinate. This is how they’re talking to each other. How they’re moving in sync.”

“How does he even find them?” Rossi asked.

“Considering the pandemic,” Tara said, folding her arms, “He shifted from actively killing to finding others who would. Most of the recruitment likely happened online.”

Luke frowned. “But getting serial killers to kill themselves? That’s… not nothing. A suicide pact takes leverage. He’d need something intimate. Something to make them fold.”

JJ nodded. “We’ve seen how isolation and fear can radicalise people. Push them into extremes. He’s tapping into that same vulnerability.”

Helena’s pen hovered over the page. Her voice came low, almost reluctant. “He’s a profiler. That’s what he’s doing. He profiles his victims… and now he profiles his followers.”

Luke glanced at her. “So what are we looking at? A cult leader?”

“Maybe,” Rossi said, his gaze sharp, thoughtful. “Or maybe he thinks he’s an artist. The kill kits are his paintbrushes. He’s teaching the next generation how to paint with blood.”

Helena’s stomach turned.

The word teaching snapped her back—years folding in on themselves, the smell of antiseptic and old books. She was small again, perched at the edge of her father’s study as he traced lines across a human anatomy book.

“The cleanest incisions,” he murmured, guiding her finger along the page. “Precision, Helena. It’s all about precision.”

He’d sent her upstairs after, told her to brush her teeth and get into bed. But instead she’d padded down the basement stairs, heart racing, the shadows heavy with secrets.

Blood stained the floor. Tools glittered under a single dangling bulb. Her small hand reached for a pair of pliers, curiosity a thin tremor in her chest—

Then the chemical-soaked cloth covered her mouth. The sickly sweet sting filled her lungs as her father’s hand pressed down, darkness rushing in to take her….

“How do we shut him down?”

JJ’s voice snapped her back. She blinked, the fluorescent lights of the BAU flooding her vision.

Tara leaned forward. “Luke and I will start with the kill kits. Whoever manufactured them, wherever they’re sourced—that could give us a thread. A profile of the supply chain might tell us where the network will strike next.”

“Then let’s get on it,” Rossi said, firm.

But Luke raised a hand. “Hold up. Elephant in the room—this is bigger than anything we’ve touched in years. And we all know it. Which means we’ve all got a target painted on our backs. Deputy Director Bailey wants this guy.”

Rossi’s jaw hardened. “We’re not going anywhere yet.”

Around the table, eyes flicked between one another, the tension sharp, unspoken.

Helena sat quietly, her pen unmoving. Every part of her life—her past, her father, her lover, this case—was bleeding together, staining everything it touched.

And she couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began.

The meeting broke, chairs scraping against the floor, the team filing out with assignments and tension etched into their faces. Helena gathered her notebook, but didn’t move. She waited until the room emptied, until even the hum of Garcia’s voice down the hall faded, before finally standing.

The corridors of Quantico stretched long and quiet, her footsteps soft against the tile. She slipped into an empty office—dark except for the morning light bleeding through the closed blinds.

Finally, silence.

Helena dropped into the chair and pressed her palms into her eyes. Behind her lids came the flicker of the video—the kill kits, the recruitments, Sicarius pulling strings like some phantom puppeteer. But layered over it, uninvited, came her father. His voice. His steady hands guiding her small ones over anatomy diagrams. His breath against her hair as the chloroform stole her consciousness.

Precision, Helena. It’s all about precision.

Her stomach twisted. She’d thought she’d buried those lessons years ago. But here she was, an adult, an FBI agent, circling another monster teaching others how to kill. The same pattern, repeating. Her father’s shadow stretching across her life no matter how far she ran.

And Doug—God, Doug. She clenched her fists. He’d looked at her in that hallway with genuine concern, fear even, but all she could taste was betrayal. He was positioning himself while she bled for this work. Smiling at her in bed while playing politics against her unit. Against her.

Her right palm ached suddenly, phantom pain radiating from the old scar where the blade had cut deep as she killed her father to save herself. She rubbed at it, hard, as if she could erase both the scar and the man who put it there.

She whispered to the dark, her voice low, raw: “I’m not him. I’m not him.”

But doubt lingered, curling like smoke in her chest.

Helena sat back, staring at the ceiling, the silence pressing heavy. Every part of her life felt contaminated—her work, her love, even her memories. She’d joined the BAU to fight men like her father, but the further she dug, the more she wondered if she was still trying to fight herself.

Her phone buzzed on the desk, Doug’s name lighting up the screen.

She let it ring out.

Voit sat at the kitchen table, the overhead light casting a sterile glow across the laminate. His coffee had gone cold, untouched. He scrolled absently through his phone, half his mind on encrypted messages, half on the restless itch under his skin.

The front door swung open, footsteps tumbling into the house. Sydney’s laugh echoed as the girls charged in.

“Hey, how did the game go?” Voit said, forcing warmth into his tone.

Harlow tossed her school bag onto the counter. “We won. But that’s not ‘the news’.”

“Dad!” Holly called, bounding over to him, grinning from ear to ear. “I got in! Daddy, I got in!”

Voit blinked. “Got in…?”

She threw her arms around his neck, hugging tight. “Braxton Academy! They sent the letter today!”

He froze for half a beat, confusion flashing before he pasted on a smile. “Braxton Academy,” he repeated, like tasting unfamiliar words.

Sydney stepped into the kitchen, setting her keys on the counter. “You remember—we applied last spring? She’s been waiting for months.”

Holly pulled back, beaming. “They send twenty percent of their students straight to the Ivy League, Dad.”

Voit’s mouth went dry. He forced out a laugh, stammering. “That’s—uh—wow. Congratulations.”

She squealed, darting off with Harlow, the two of them immediately dissolving into their usual bickering.

Sydney lingered by the counter, watching him.

He exhaled, the smile slipping. “Private school’s expensive.”

“We promised her,” Sydney reminded him gently. “If she got the grades and the acceptance, we’d make it happen.”

Voit pinched the bridge of his nose. “Lockdown burned through most of our savings.”

“We’ll figure it out.” She offered him a small, determined smile, then followed the girls down the hall.

Left alone, Voit sat heavily at the table, his hand tightening around the coffee mug until the ceramic bit into his palm.

Pressure.

It pressed in on him from all sides: the bills, the image of perfect husband and father, the itch that normal life could never satisfy. And now, the spectre of tuition.

He stared at the dark reflection in the mug, his jaw clenching.

The only time he ever felt free—ever felt like himself—wasn’t here in this kitchen. It wasn’t under Sydney’s gaze or in the laughter of his daughters.

It was in the hunt.

In the kill.

And now the walls of normalcy were closing tighter, demanding more from him, squeezing until something had to give.

The tech room was dim except for the glow of Garcia’s screens, a kaleidoscope of windows and code reflecting in her oversized glasses. Helena sat forward in her chair, elbows braced against her knees, JJ leaning beside her with arms crossed.

“Okay, so,” Garcia began, spinning in her chair with a flourish. “Robert Harris’s phone was like a digital nesting doll. Surface level? Pretty boring—calendar, grocery lists, the usual password-protected selfies. But hidden under a weather app—bam! Secret portal to the underworld.”

JJ raised a brow. “How hidden are we talking?”

“Buried six layers deep, my love. Think Russian dolls, but evil.” Garcia tapped a key and a chat window filled the largest monitor. Black background, scrolling text, usernames that meant nothing until they did.

Helena leaned closer. “This is what they used to communicate?”

“Yup.” Garcia nodded. “And here’s the kicker—our three dearly departed unsubs? Rory Gilchrist, Robert Harris, Sam Pollard? They all chatted with one user in particular. User 45125.”

The room went quiet except for the hum of the servers.

Helena’s voice was steady, but low. “Is this Sicarius?”

Garcia tapped a key, highlighting the user’s handle in red. “If it’s not, then he’s some sort of terrible Yoda for serial killers. Every conversation, every breadcrumb, they circle back to him. He’s not just lurking. He’s guiding.”

JJ studied the screen, her jaw tight. “He’s grooming them. Building trust, pushing them further down the path until they’re too deep to back out.”

Helena’s pen clicked in her hand. She thought of her father. His calm voice. The way he’d guided her, too, until she couldn’t tell where his intentions ended and hers began.

“He profiles them,” Helena said softly. “Not just their fantasies, but their weaknesses. He knows exactly what string to pull. Exactly how to break them down and build them back up.”

Garcia tilted her head, watching her. “You sound like you’ve met him.”

Helena blinked, realising too late the rawness in her tone. She straightened in her chair. “No. Just… I know the type.”

JJ cut in before Garcia could press. “So, how do we trace 45125?”

Garcia spread her hands. “Easier said than done. He’s slippery. VPN chains, encrypted messages, the digital equivalent of twenty fake moustaches. But…” She smirked. “You know me. I love a challenge.”

Helena kept her gaze fixed on the scrolling screen. The red-highlighted 45125 pulsed like a heartbeat.

If this was Sicarius, then this was her father’s shadow all over again. A teacher. A manipulator. Someone who knew how to reach inside and twist a person until they bent to his will.

And Helena knew, deep down, that he wouldn’t stop until he got to her, too.

The day had bled him dry.

First the boss’s tight-lipped dismissal—downsizing, cutbacks, your role is redundant. Then another tense run-in with Hal out by the curb. The neighbour had that smug, infuriating grin plastered across his face, acting like he was the king of the cul-de-sac. Voit had smiled back, polite, measured, while every nerve in his body screamed to pick up a rock and smash Hal’s skull until it caved in like wet plaster.

He carried that fantasy into the house, each step heavier than the last. Fired. Undercut. Disrespected. And all the while the itch under his skin kept building.

By the time he slumped at the desk in his garage, the urge was unbearable. He pulled out his phone and opened the encrypted line.

“Benjamin,” he muttered.

The reply came in seconds, the voice distorted but eager. “That suicide in Virginia. The guy in the woods. Was he one of ours?”

“Yes,” Voit said flatly.

“Good. That means it’s my turn next.”

“No.”

“No?” Benjamin’s voice sharpened. “You promised. You said if I paid you, I could cut the line, jump ahead.”

Voit’s fingers drummed on the desk. “We’ve had a setback.”

“I know. I saw the news. First the Feds dig up your little treasure chest, then they find your transponders. That’s not my problem.”

“It is your problem,” Voit snapped. “Because the more they uncover, the more these amateurs stop following the rules. And the more loose ends I have to tie up.”

A long pause, then Benjamin chuckled low. “Then I hope you’ve got a good exit strategy.”

Voit’s lips curled. “I do. By the time the FBI figure out anything, this network will be ashes. Erased. Like it never existed.”

Benjamin let that sit, then shifted. “Speaking of the FBI… there’s something you should see.”

A file appeared in the secure chat. Voit opened it—and froze.

A dating profile. Beltway Elite. Helena Bishop.

He scrolled, scanning her profile photo, the polished language—professional, guarded, but vulnerable in its own way. Then the messages. Long exchanges with Doug Bailey. Doug joking, confident, all bureaucratic charm. Helena’s replies more clipped, careful, but still… warm.

Voit’s grip on the phone tightened.

Doug Bailey.

Deputy Director.

Her boyfriend.

Something hot and acidic curled in his gut. Jealousy. Irritation. A pulse of possessiveness he hadn’t expected.

This was supposed to be his game. His discovery. Helena wasn’t meant to be tangled up with some smug bureaucrat who saw her as just another rung on his ladder.

He doesn’t see it. Doesn’t see her. Doesn’t see what she is.

Voit leaned back, staring at the screen, his breath slow, deliberate. Bailey saw a woman he could tame. A bedfellow. A prize.

Voit saw the truth.

The scar on her palm. The father who carved her childhood into a horror story. The darkness she carried like a second skin.

She was like him.

And the idea of Doug Bailey having her—holding her—ignited something cold and sharp in Voit’s chest.

No. Bailey didn’t deserve her.

But Voit would.

Voit’s thumb hovered over the messages, scrolling slowly, deliberately, like each word carried weight.

Yes, Helena was beautiful. The photos made that obvious—the kind of sharp, arresting beauty that turned heads in a crowd. But beauty alone had never interested him. He could buy beauty in a glossy magazine, or pass it on the street a dozen times a day. Beauty was skin-deep, fleeting.

No, what gripped him about Helena Bishop was what lay beneath.

He studied her eyes in the profile photo, the slight tension in her smile. The way her messages with Bailey seemed careful, deliberate, as though every word was measured, rationed out. She was always holding something back.

Of course she was.

Because inside, she carried rot. Darkness. A childhood steeped in blood and chloroform. She wasn’t normal, not really—not after being forced to stab her own father to survive. How could anyone return from that intact?

Voit leaned back in his chair, the phone burning hot in his hand.

That was the attraction. Not the surface, not the FBI badge or the sharp jawline. It was the damage. The way she had been twisted by violence yet somehow held herself upright. A mirror image—different paths, same shadow.

Doug Bailey thought she was some delicate thing to be protected, polished into a wife-shaped accessory. That was laughable. Bailey was blind to what really mattered.

Voit saw her clearly.

And what he saw was someone not unlike himself. Someone who’d tasted darkness early, someone who had killed, someone who couldn’t escape what she was.

Beautiful, yes. But that was incidental. The real beauty was the monster curled deep inside her, waiting.

The bullpen was silent, the overhead fluorescents dimmed to half-power. Screens glowed with data, the Sicarius forum still open where Garcia had left it. JJ had tapped Helena’s shoulder on the way out, muttering “Don’t stay too late,” and Garcia had waved, but Helena barely noticed.

She sat alone at the round table now, laptop open, case files spread around her like a fortress. Her eyes burned from hours of scanning, but she couldn’t stop. She didn’t dare.

The door creaked. Footsteps.

“Still here?” Doug’s voice cut through the silence. He stood in the doorway, jacket slung over one shoulder, tie loosened.

Helena didn’t look up. “Still here.”

He crossed to the table, glancing over the mess of files. “Are you ready to leave? I can meet you downstairs in the parking lot.”

“I’m going to work on.” Her tone was clipped.

Doug’s brow furrowed. “It’s past midnight. That’s ridiculous, Helena. You’re not going to catch this Sicarius in the next hour. Pulling an all-nighter isn’t going to help.”

She finally looked up, her eyes cold. “And this obsession of yours with budgets and optics is healthy?”

He stiffened. “That’s not fair. I’m worried about you. This case—”

“When were you planning to tell me?” she cut in.

Doug brow furrowed. “Tell you what?”

“That you’re trying to reassign me to Domestic Terrorism.”

The pause was short, but she saw it — the flicker in his eyes, the faint stiffening in his shoulders before the calm settled back over his face.

“Helena—”

“Don’t,” she cut in. “Don’t tell me it’s not true. I know about the memo. I know about the plan to gut the BAU, and I know exactly where I fit into that plan.”

He dragged a hand through his hair, frustration bleeding through. “I was going to tell you. I just… wanted to do it the right way.”

Her laugh was brittle. “The right way would have been telling me the minute you knew.”

Doug leaned on the table, lowering his voice. “I’m doing this for you. This job, chasing people like your father—it’s not a healthy outlet. I’ve seen what it does to people. And with your history—”

“My history,” she snapped, rising to her feet, “is exactly why I’m good at this job. You don’t get to decide what’s healthy for me.”

He met her glare, his own voice rising. “I think I get to care about you. I think I get to look at the way you throw yourself into every case, this one especially, like you’re trying to exorcise something and wonder how long before this job breaks you?”

Her jaw clenched. “It’s not your decision.”

“I’m not trying to make it for you.” His voice cracked now, desperation leaking through. “I’m trying to give you an out before this place eats you alive and you turn into your—”

He stopped dead, the word hanging between them like a noose.

Her stomach dropped, blood rushing in her ears. “Go on,” she whispered. “Say it. Before I turn into my father.”

Doug’s face collapsed with regret, but it was too late. She saw it in his eyes—the thought had already been there.

For a moment the silence felt like it might shatter both of them.

The silence pressed in, heavy as lead. Doug’s mouth opened, like he wanted to take it back, to say something softer—but the damage was already done.

Helena’s chair scraped sharply against the floor as she shoved it back. She grabbed her jacket from the table and shrugged into it with jerky movements.

“Helena—” Doug’s voice was low, pained.

She rounded on him, eyes like steel. “Don’t. You don't get to use him as your excuse. You don't get to decide what I can and can't handle because you're afraid of what's in my DNA."

“Helena, that’s not what I—”

But she was already striding for the door. “Save it.”

The door banged shut behind her, the echo cutting through the quiet like a gunshot.

Helena’s boots hit the corridor floor hard, every step rattling up her spine. Her chest felt tight, like there wasn’t enough air in the whole damn building.

Turn into him.

The words clawed at her, pulling up memories she’d spent her whole adult life trying to bury. Her father’s voice in her ear. You’re my daughter. You’re just like me. The weight of the knife in her hand. The scar seared across her palm.

She pressed that scar against her thigh as she walked, as if the pain could ground her, could keep her from splintering apart.

The part that stuck wasn't the fight. It was the way Doug had said it - before you turn into... — like he'd caught himself too late. Like he'd been thinking it for longer than he wanted to admit.

By the time she reached the elevator, her throat burned and her eyes stung, but no tears came. She swallowed hard, forcing herself back into the mask, into the armour.

The elevator doors slid shut, sealing her in with her ghosts.

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