Chapter 3: Blood

Lina's POV

We finally arrive at the police station so Reid and I are getting ready to drive over to the Miller's house—the most recent crime scene. As we are leaving, I hear Prentiss' voice behind us.

"Hey, guys. Hotch asked me to check into a hotel so I can take your bags there first," she states.

Reid grabs the car keys. "Okay great. Thanks, Prentiss."

"Umm... that's okay. I'll bring mine along with me," I quickly say.

Prentiss looks at me confused. "Is there something you need that's in there?"

I shake my head. "No, I just like to have my personal things with me."

"Oh, well that's okay I guess. You can keep it in the trunk. See you guys later." She smiles politely and leaves.

The truth is—I don't trust Prentiss with my things. But it's not because I don't like her, but because I have trust issues.

"You drive or I drive?" Reid spins the keys around his finger.

I grin at him. "You can drive." He nods and quickly walks out the front door, making it hard to catch up to him with his long legs. "Hey, Reid! Wait up!" I yell after him.

"Sorry, I'm a fast walker. Also, you can call me Spencer."

"Well, my legs aren't as long as yours, Spencer." I punch his arm playfully. "And you can call me Lina."

He nods and looks thoughtful. "Lina.... In Greek, your name actually means 'sunlight'. And in Persian—it means 'light', ' a ray of sunlight', or..." he trails off.

I tilt my head and grin at him. "Or what?"

"A beautiful girl." He blushes and smiles sweetly at me.

My face starts getting hot and I look down at my shoes. "O-oh." A small smile escapes my lips.

Spencer chuckles. "C'mon, let's go." We get into the car and drive to the crime scene.

Upon arriving, an officer comes and greets us, sticking his hand out to us for a handshake. "Hi, I'm Officer Kenneth Hughes. You guys are from the FBI, right?"

Spencer doesn't return his handshake. "Yes, that's right. I'm Dr. Spencer Reid and this is agent Lina Yang."

"Nice to meet you," I say, shaking hands with Hughes.

"Well forensics are just leaving so you guys can go in now," states Hughes.

"Great, thank you," Spencer replies.

When we first walk in, I notice that the house hardly looks like a place a family would live in—it just doesn't feel "home-y". After walking around a bit, we head upstairs into the master bedroom where the murders happened.

When we enter, I gasp and quickly hide behind Spencer. There is blood everywhere. I realize what I did and embarrassment floods over me. "Sorry, got scared for a second."

"It's okay, this is your first time." He smiles kindly at me.

"This is probably nothing compared to the stuff you guys have seen before," I say solemnly.

Spencer sighs. "Unfortunately, that is the case."

On the carpet there are two pools of blood where the parents were shot. I feel my stomach lurch. It is one thing to look at pictures of crime scenes, but it's another when you're actually standing there. "Where was the daughter killed?" I ask, trying to think about something else.

Spencer points to the closet. "Her body was found in the closet. But it's possible that the UnSub injected the potassium somewhere else, and then dragged her in here since carpet burns were found on her skin."

"Hm." I think and rub my chin thoughtfully. "How did the UnSub get in here?"

"There was no evidence of forced entry."

"Are you sure?" I question suspiciously.

He looks at me with confusion. "Yeah, I already checked."

I don't believe him, so I go downstairs and check all the doors and windows again myself. But he's right—nothing is broken into or looked out of place so I head back upstairs. "Ummm...." I look up at him embarrassedly.

"So is there?" Spencer asks, looking slightly offended.

"No. I'm sorry, I should've trusted you," I apologize. "After all, you have much more experience at this than me."

He grins and waves it off. "No worries, it's good that you double check."

I smile back at him. "So then either the Smiths knew the UnSub, or was tricked with a ruse," I conclude as we walk back downstairs into the living room. I step in and look around me. "From the looks of it the parents didn't care much for their daughter. The walls are bare of family photos and there aren't any toys for the daughter to play with. But their furniture is expensive and the closet upstairs has at least 20 pairs of shoes that belonged to the mother."

"26 pairs to be exact."

"You and your eidetic memory," I tease.

He grins at me. "The father also has two Rolexes on the nightstand."

I nod my head in agreement. "I'm gonna go back upstairs to take a look at the daughter's room."

"I'll come with you." Spencer follows me closely.

As I walk up the stairs I accidentally step on my untied shoelaces and I trip, falling backwards. "Oh!" I gasp.

"I got you!" Spencer quickly catches me by the waist and supports me while I regain my balance. His face is right next to mine and I turn my head to look at him, our faces barely an inch apart. His breath fans over my face and it smells like minty gum. We lock eyes with each other for a few seconds before we look away and I step back.

I watch him rub the back of his neck in embarrassment. "Thanks," I say, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.

"No problem at all, I'll always have your back." He blushes a bit and winks at me, making me turn a bright shade of red.

Oh, my God. I think to myself. His wink was absolutely adorable and I feel my heart rate speed up. "T-that's good to know."

"And by the way," says Spencer, "nice shoes." We both glance down at our matching beat-up Converse and laugh. After checking the daughter's room, Spencer and I head back to the police station.

During the car ride back, he shares with me his experience of being a 12-year-old senior in high school. Turns out he also has an IQ of 187. When he asks me about my life as a student I feel skeptical at first. I rarely trust anyone enough to open up about my life. But with Spencer, I feel myself involuntarily letting my guard down. There was something about him that made me want to share my life, and that I can trust him. So I tell him how I hated high school since there was so much drama.

I'm about to share with him about my abduction experience but I quickly stop myself and put my guard up again. He doesn't need to know what happened to you.

About ten minutes later, we arrive at the station and I hop out of the car while listening to Spencer talk about random facts.

"You know, the average 5 kilometers running time per mile for men is 11 minutes and 22 seconds. As for women, it's 13 minutes and 21 seconds. Which results in the average finish time of 35 minutes, 20 seconds—and 41 minutes, 30 seconds respectively," he states matter-of-factly.

I chuckle and nudge him in the arm. "Well then race you inside, genius!" I take off sprinting. When I don't hear his footsteps behind me, I look back. But then giggle when I see him running after me.

Even though I was the best track runner back in high school, he still catches up to me with his long legs. Within a few strides he is ahead of me so I pick up my pace. A few seconds later, we are neck and neck so I put in a last burst of power. But somehow, he still manages to reach the door first and goes in, with me a few steps behind him. I cling onto his arm to stop my momentum and we both laugh.

"That's not fair, you have longer legs!" I gasp, trying to catch my breath.

"Actually, shorter legs are better for turnover—meaning you can take more steps than I do which makes up for the difference in our leg lengths," he pants.

I roll my eyes at him and we walk into the office together. I don't even realize that I'm still clinging onto his arm, until I see the rest of the team staring at us.

"Looks like you two had fun," Morgan teases and I blush, quickly letting go of Spencer's arm.

Prentiss raises an eyebrow and smirks. "Why is Yang hugging your arm?"

"Yeah, I thought you were a germaphobe and don't like it when people touch you," JJ adds with humour in her eyes.

I look up at Spencer and see that he's blushing. Ohhh, so that's why he flinched when I shook his hand this morning.

Spencer rubs the back of his neck in embarrassment. "I don't know, I guess.... I guess I've changed?"

"In just a day?" Rossi scoffs. "I saw you wash your hands for 4 minutes after shaking hands with the detective on our last case."

"I saw him cough into his hand, and the average scrubbing time before performing a surgical operation is 3 to 5 minutes," Spencer states. "It's the best way to wash your hands."

Everyone laughs and shakes their heads at his endearing quirk.

Hotch smirks. "Alright guys, let's meet together so we can talk about what we found."