Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds or any characters. Grace is mine though.

A life-long blessing for children is to fill them with warm memories of times together. Happy memories become treasures in the heart to pull out on the tough days of adulthood.
-Charlotte Davis Kasl

"Yes, Grace, you were abducted when you were three." Charlotte's voice echoed in Grace's ears.

"What happened?" Grace asked after what felt like an eternity.

Charlotte sighed. She had hoped Grace would not want to know the details, but she should have known better. "Aunt Vera took you and Mace to the grocery store and she lost you."

"Lost me?" Grace repeated. "Charlotte, would you ever 'lose' Violet? Never mind, you love her, bad example."

"She thought you'd just wandered off." Charlotte admitted. "Apparently she was a little more preoccupied with your sister. Once she realized you hadn't just wandered off, it was too late."

Grace was paralysed in a state of shock. "How did I get back?"

"Two weeks later they found you in the parking lot of the same grocery store you were abducted in. The abductor-"

"Let me guess, some coked-out, redheaded bitch, right?" Grace interrupted.

"Yeah, how did you know?"

"Lucky guess." Grace replied bitterly. "So did they ever catch her? Why did she take me?"

"She served four years." Charlotte replied. "She was pretty fucked up, but the cops think she took you because for some reason she just wanted a kid. She brought you back when she realized she couldn't take care of you, thank God. No one told you because we were hoping you could repress it and never be affected."

Grace took a deep breath and tried to take all this new, life-shattering information in. She had no idea what to do to herself. How could she have repressed this memory for almost twenty-three years? She felt like a revelation of this proportion should have changed and defined her entire life, but she felt no different, she just felt numb. It was done and over with, she had gone unharmed, why did it matter now?

"Listen, Grace," Charlotte interrupted her cousin's silence, "If you want information, your parents had a storage locker. Chances are there's papers in there that could tell you more than I can. Your mother has the key."

"M-my mother?" Grace choked.

Charlotte sighed as if in pity for her cousin's situation. "I know how you feel, but you could just tell her you know and you want to see the pictures."

"Or I could lie and tell her I want some of Dad's things." Grace said, "Or even better, I could just get Macy to get it for me."

"Grace, I love you, but you need to grow up." Charlotte said bluntly, "What your mother did to you was horrible, but you're almost twenty-six, you need to let go of the pissed off teenager thing."

"Grace? What are you doing out here?" Grace heard Spencer call out behind her.

"I've gotta go, Charlie." Grace cut her cousin off mid-lecture. "I'll call later, tell Dan and Violet I say hi." She quickly ended the call and spun around to face Spencer.

"Charlotte called?" he asked.

Grace nodded in reply.

"Are you alright, Grace?" Spencer asked. "You look..." His voluminous vocabulary failed him as he tried to find a word to describe how Grace looked right now. She did not look upset like he had almost said, in fact, she looked rather blank.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Grace lied, her voice quivering.

Spencer reached out and placed his fingers under Grace's chin, lifting her face up to look him in the eye. Grace began to blink rapidly as she looked into Spencer's beautiful brown eyes, ashamed that she had lied to him.

"I don't want to talk about it right now, Spencer." Grace said weakly.

Spencer took his hand from Grace's chin and placed it on her hip, pulling her closely to him. Grace raised her arms in front of her chest as he embraced her and shook her head.

"I can't talk about it right now because I don't even know how to say it." Grace said. "I don't even know how to feel. The last thing you need with your headaches is more of my crazy drama, Spencer, I'm not dragging you into this. We have a missing girl to find now and I don't even want to think about any of my issues until we find her. When this case is over, I'm going back to Ottawa to see Macy and I have to go alone."

"Is she alright?" Spencer asked.

"Yes, Macy's fine."

"Are we alright?"

Grace fought back tears as Spencer mentioned what was probably the only thing that could evoke an emotional response in her at the moment. Their relationship had become so rocky with his headaches and her depression and addictions and they both feared the worst.

"What's going on right now has nothing to do with our relationship, Spencer, I can promise you that." Grace assured him, "I'm not going to lie, I'm worried about us, but I'm going to fight as hard as I can for you, for us. This is something that I need to do on my own. I'll tell you about it when I can come to terms with it. I'm just confused right now and I don't know how to feel."

Spencer nodded and kissed the top of Grace's head. He was relieved that she was not relapsing as he had feared, the reason he had gotten so worried when he realized Grace had slipped out the door and into the alley. He was worried about whatever was going on with her, but the way she was handling it calmed him. Grace was never this calm about anything, this had to be a sign that therapy was working. Whatever it was that Grace would not tell him, he'd be there the second she needed him.

Grace breathed in the warm, familiar scent of Spencer's shirt as they held their embrace. She knew he was probably freaking out inside his genius brain right now, but she was thankful that she had him here. If it wasn't for the strength he gave her, she doubted that she would even attempt to handle this bombshell on her own.

Grace and Spencer's cell phones both rang simultaneously, interrupting their moment together. Both received texts from Hotch with a location to meet with the team as soon as possible.

"He's taken another girl." Hotch informed the team as they all stood at a new crime scene in the parking lot of another gas station.

"What about Samantha?" Prentiss asked. "They haven't found a body, he can't get far with two girls, can he?"

Prentiss realized the answer to her question before she had even finished speaking. The team all looked at eachother, all knowing the horrible answer that no one wanted to saw. Samantha's remains were probably being digested by an alligator as they stood there.

"How does this sick bastard keep getting kids?" Morgan asked, frustrated. "You'd think people would be keep a better eye on their kids, knowing there's an offender like this out there."

"Not to mention he's going through them faster each time." Dave added.

"Wait, wait, wait!" Grace spoke up. "Morgan, what you just said about people not keep an eye on their kids?"

"Yeah?"

"What if that's part of the profile?" Grace suggested enthusiastically.

The team looked at her intently now, waiting for her to elaborate.

"None of the parents really noticed their kids get grabbed, they were paying attention to other things." Grace continued. "He's taking kids from neglectful parents as some kind of punishment."

"Good theory." Hotch said. "But why?"

"Maybe he lost his own child to Child Protective Services?" JJ suggested.

"We have seen this before." Morgan added, referring to their case in Las Vegas where a mother was abducting young boys to replace the infant that had been taken from her.

"But why is he feeding them to alligators?" Prentiss speculated.

"That's not a typical act of remorse." Dave said.

The team paused to think, ready to dismiss Grace's hypothesis when Spencer spoke up.

"Shame." he said. "He doesn't feel remorse for what he's done, at least not enough to overpower the shame he feels that he's let another child die. He's so self-absorbed that he cares more about what will happen to him than what he's done to the girls so he disposes of the bodies in a way that will destroy all the evidence that he failed to take care of the child."

The profilers took a moment to consider this theory. It seemed plausible to them and it was more than what they had on the unsub so far.

"Someone call Garcia and get her to look up single fathers in the Keys who have had daughters around the age of four taken by CPS in the last year." Hotch ordered and walked off to discuss their theory with the sheriff.

"Hey, Baby Girl," Morgan spoke into his cell phone, "I need you to work some magic for me."

"So, uh... just out of curiosity," Spencer said, placing his hand on the small of Grace's back, "Where did that hypothesis come from?"

Grace shrugged. "Just a guess." she replied, "Where did that bit about shame come from?"

"Did you ever break something when you were a kid and didn't want your parents to find out?" Spencer asked.

Grace nodded.

"What did you do?"

"I hid the pieces of the vase under the sofa."

"You hid the evidence because you were ashamed of what you did." Spencer concluded.

Grace smiled. "Nice work, genius."

"We've got a list of names." Morgan interrupted. "You guys wanna check em out?"

"The chance to bust some child abusing creep?" Grace clarified. "Damn right I do."

Spencer shot Morgan a look that would hold him responsible if Grace were to lose control and actually kill anyone on their list and followed Grace to the vehicle they had arrived at the crime scene in.

"Spencer, what the hell?" Grace said as they left the home of the fifth suspect on their list, "You look like you're more upset than I am. That never happens."

"I just can't believe these people!" Spencer exclaimed. "They get one child taken away from neglect, so they just have more? Why? Who lets that happen?"

Grace sighed as she shifted the SUV into drive.

"Why aren't you upset about this?" Spencer asked, growing more concerned for Grace's mental state.

"I am." Grace said flatly. "I just can't even express how awful it makes me feel. I'd have a nervous breakdown-"

"Major depressive episode." Spencer corrected her.

"I'd have a major depressive episode." Grace said, rolling her eyes. "I'd never come back from it, Spencer." she added feebly.

"I'm sorry, Grace." Spencer apologized, "I should have-"

"No, it's fine." Grace said. "It's not just about what happened to me, I've seen worse things done to other kids. Much worse."

Spencer nodded, knowing that they saw things in this job that no normal human being would ever want to see. Sometimes it was best to make yourself numb to it than to lose your mind over it. What got them through the day was knowing that they could stop some of the freaks out there and save a couple of lives.

"We've got two more to do," Grace reminded Spencer, "And I doubt we'll have any luck. Something doesn't seem right about the way we're approaching this."

Spencer nodded.

"Hold on..." Grace said, gripping the steering wheel tighter as she gathered her thoughts. "If he's disposing of these girls' bodies, who's to say he didn't do the same to his daughter?"

"He's reenacting her death." Spencer speculated, "The guilt just keeps making him try to redeem himself over and over."

"How are we going to find him now if he's just disposed of his daughter's body?" Grace sighed in frustration. "There'd be no death record."

"We could check out people who fit the profile who've been visited by Child Protective Services?" Spencer suggested.

"That leaves us with a bigger list than we have now." Grace said. "Wait! If CPS had visited, they'd notice she was gone. How would he explain that?"

"Missing persons report." Spencer concluded. "I'll call Garcia."

"Dwayne Connors." Garcia said when she returned the call to Grace and Spencer. "Numerous drug and assault convictions, girlfriend died a year and a half ago from a meth overdose. He was left with custody of their 4-year-old daughter Hannah. CPS visited them fifteen times in the ten months he had her. He reported her missing eight months ago. She was never found."

"Address?" Grace asked, listening as Spencer had Garcia on speaker phone.

"Sending coordinates to your GPS as we speak." Garcia replied. "I'm contacting the rest of the team too.

"Thanks, Pen, you're amazing!" Grace said as they ended the call.

"Hotch, can I talk to you?" Grace asked as the BAU cleared out of the Monroe County Police Department.

"Right now?" The team was currently heading out to bust Connors and save Samantha.

Grace nodded. "Don't send me in there." she said bluntly.

"Why not?" Hotch asked. "I thought you wanted a shot at this guy."

"I do." Grace replied. "I'm just afraid that I'll slip up and do something wrong. I've caused us enough trouble. I don't want the team to have to cover for me every time I mess up."

"Alright. You can standby as backup." Hotch agreed.

"Thank you."

The two agents got into separate vehicles and Grace wished she could have given Hotch more of an explanation. Grace was not doubting her ability in the field. She had screwed up before, acting on impulses that could have gotten victims or her team killed. This time she saw it coming. This was more than an impulse, Grace knew she would throw all the rules out the door and rip this scumbag apart when she saw him.

"Clear!" Morgan yelled. "Hotch, the house is empty!"

"Same with all the outbuildings." Hotch confirmed.

Prentiss entered the empty room of Connors' house that the rest of the team stood in. "We have evidence Samantha was here though." she said, holding up Samantha's shoe that she had found in another room.

The team and the local police quickly cleared out of the house.

"His vehicle is here." Reid noted. "He couldn't have gotten very far, not with a child."

"This property touches the swamp." the local sheriff informed the team.

The agents all exchanged worried glances and began to run towards the swamp.

"Wait, where's Grace?" Prentiss asked.

Grace, who had been waiting in one of the SUVs and should have joined the team when they discovered the house was clear was nowhere to be seen.

"Give her to me, Connors!" the agents heard a voice yell in the distance.

Instantly they ran to the source of the noise and found Grace with her gun pointed at Dwayne Connors who was standing on the bank, holding Samantha above the murky water where several alligators waited below.

"She doesn't have to die!" Grace yelled.

Hotch stepped forward to take over the negotiation for Grace, knowing she was not trained well enough to negotiate with an unsub and could be risking the victim's life. Morgan pushed him back though, giving him a look that told him to wait and see how Grace did before intervening.

"Yes, she does!" Connors yelled back, distraught. "I failed! I couldn't keep her alive!"

"Dwayne, look at her, she's still alive." Grace reasoned. "You haven't failed. What happened to your daughter, you don't have to be ashamed. You can redeem yourself if you give Samantha to me. She doesn't have to die, Dwayne."

Dwayne Connors was silent. The distraught expression on his face melted into an expression of near calmness, his red face paled and his breathing slowed. Grace watched as he slowly released his young hostage. She kept her gun on Connors as Samantha ran to her. Prentiss stepped forward and took the girl while Morgan stepped in front of her and aimed his own gun at Connors.

Slowly Connors began to turn around, the expression of utter calm remaining on his face. The agents of the BAU began to shout things at him, but he did not hear them. Connors looked skyward then dove into the water.

Morgan dashed to the edge of the bank and began to shoot at the alligators in the water. His teammates soon followed. Grace did not though. Grace turned around and fell to her knees. She did not cry, she did not know if she should. She did not know what to feel except relief that they had saved the missing girl, that was all that mattered right now.

Grace had no idea how long time had passed when Prentiss helped her up and lead her back through Connor's property to the SUV. Behind them was the rest of the BAU, the local police and a couple EMTs with Connors on a stretcher. Grace did not look to see if he was dead or alive.

"They say he's going to make it." Spencer said, taking a seat beside Grace as she waited for her flight.

"Good." Grace smirked. "I hope his cellmate finds out he's a child killer. I give him a week."

Spencer bit his lip and looked at his girlfriend. Whatever was going on with Grace she still had not told him. He began to fear once again that Grace would relapse. They had disposed of the heroine Grace had gotten back at her sister's apartment, but Spencer knew that she could easily find more if she wanted to. In fact, Grace would probably run into an old friend who still used.

"I'm going to see my mother." Grace said, filling the silence and answered Spencer's unspoken question. "I don't want you to worry about me."

"You know I will." Spencer couldn't help but grin as he wrapped his arm around Grace's bare shoulders and kissed her cheek.

Grace smiled and kissed Spencer back.

"If you need me, just call. I'll be on the soonest flight." he promised. "Why are you going to see your mother anyway?"

"I have something I need to ask her." Grace answered vaguely.

"Grace, don't hurt yourself like this."

Grace shook her head. "It's not like that. I really need an answer. I wish I could tell you, but I can't right now."

Spencer sighed and held her close. He wanted nothing more than to keep Grace with him, or at least go with her in case she needed him. There was no changing Grace's mind when it was set on something though. He would be calling Macy and Ty constantly to check on Grace.

Grace's flight began boarding and she stood up reluctantly. Spencer stood as well and held her in his arms for as long as he possibly could. They kissed passionately, neither of them wanting to separate.

"Goodbye, Grace." Spencer said. "I love you."

"I love you too, Spence." Grace said, not wanting him to let her go. "I'll call you when I land."

The couple waved goodbye and Grace ran to catch her plane. She trembled in fear as the plane took off. She was afraid of confronting her mother, but she knew it had to be done. Maybe if she unravelled this mystery of her past her future would look brighter.

A/N: There you go, an update! Sorry it wasn't on time, it's been a rough week of problem drinking, partying, studying, finals, hospital trips and spending time with my insane housemates before going home for Christmas.

I won't be online for a few days because I will be staying with my grandmother so I would love to see some reviews when I get back online.

Thanks for reading! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays (if I don't publish a new chapter before then).

-ceegeeayy