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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

Note

this is so beautiful, exactly the kind of love I’m eager for ❤️

Hi Rome! I hope you're well 😊

Would you be able to write something about reader constantly trying to snuggle up with Aaron because they just love how warm and affectionate he is with them? They love that only they get to see this side of him and it makes them feel so so special. And Aaron loves the physical contact and the fact that he's not always the one trying to initiate it. He loves that they want him just as much as he wants them<3.

I think Aaron's love language is definitely physical touch once he's comfortable in a relationship ❤️.

Hi Sweetheart! I am so honoured to write this for you. I love this fic so much now!! Also I can only hope this fills the prompt for you <3

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x gn!reader.

Word Count: 4.7k

Warnings: Aaron is a nervous MESS. This is enough fluff to kill a family of four. Mentions of sad moments in Aaron’s childhood, also, Jack doesn’t exist here. Not well proof-read.

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When the spark lit the fuse.

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Aaron Hotchner had been in love before, he’d had his fair share of dates in high school with one milkshake and two straws, he’s cared for a handful of people enough to watch over them, offer them his jacket when they looked cold. He’s even been married before, he’s loved someone deeply enough to stand up in front of everyone in both of their lives and devote himself to this person, forever. Of course, it turned out their ‘forever’ was cut short. But in any case, Aaron Hotchner swears up and down that he has been in love before, he’s experienced love before, so why does it all feel so different with you?

Looking back on all his years of dating and courtship and marriage, he sees now that those were all a more distant kind of love. Touchless. A game of push and pull with very little actual contact ever made. He had a partner, a lover, but never someone by his side. They always moved in sync, but never in tandem. That’s what’s been different with y/n, he supposes.

It wasn’t an overnight change, for Aaron Hotchner to go from a man who would reach out and hold your hand if the setting was appropriate and you seemed to really need his support. He’s always been shy in showing his affections, particularly in front of those he holds close. Maybe that was his father’s influence, always rousing at him to detach himself from his parents. Even going as far as to send him to boarding school because Aaron was too quick to seek his mother’s comfort for a boy his age. ‘For a man’ As he was so-called. He was fourteen.

In any case, Aaron’s always been all too careful with when and where he shows his affections. He can’t pinpoint exactly when or where you were able to tear down those deep-seated insecurities and shames of his, but you did it.

It all goes back to before you even asked Aaron out. That’s right, you asked him. Yet another reason his journey with you has been in stark difference to the dyssynchronous relationships he’d previously held so close, he wasn’t the only one putting himself out there. He wasn’t the only one taking steps to be closer to you, each step he took, he found that you had taken a great stride to meet him in the middle. He had never had someone match him each time he tried to deepen his relationships, let alone to have someone else taking the steps first.

But, before you asked him out and changed his way of living and loving forever, you were just a bright spark in Aaron’s dark days. You worked the reception desk at Quantico’s FBI field office, you saw the tired, dreary faces of every agent that walked in and out of the building’s doors morning and night. You took your position very seriously, offering each dreary agent a bright smile as you greet them each day. Aaron couldn’t help but notice you, like a moth to a flame, each morning after peeling himself out of his bed, he would run on autopilot, styling his hair, shaving, picking out a tie, packing himself a sandwich he probably won’t touch for lunch. It was all done without so much as a moment’s consideration, until he reached the tall doors at the front of the building. He suddenly becomes all too aware of the fact that he may have coffee breath, and his hair at the crown of his head is sticking out in every direction as he catches his reflection in the glass. He straightens his tie, smooths down the lapels of his collar and tries desperately to remember how exactly one pulls their mouth into a natural looking smile. Dear god, you make him so frazzled he even forgets how to act like a person.

All of his efforts to prepare for his fourteen foot walk to the elevator doors are never enough to stop your warm “Good Morning, Agent Hotchner!” from drawing all the air he was once capable of holding in his lungs - out of his mouth, jaw hanging slack where it once sat tightly drawn. He manages to draw in enough air for a rather strangled “g’morning.” as he presses the elevator button.

He raps his fingers against the handle of his briefcase as he eagerly awaits the metalling pang of his exit strategy arriving. He doesn’t hear you swiftly springing out of your seat and bounding around the desk over to him until he swears he can see the haze of your halo appear in the reflection of the steel doors beside him. He turns to look at you, partly in shock and partly because he really can’t help himself from stealing another look at you at every opportunity.

“Sorry, Agent. You just have, um. Here. Let me get this.” You lay a warm hand on his chest as you take his tie in your other one, using your nail to try to pick off what must be toothpaste off the sleek black fabric. Aaron feels a churning heat rising from his chest up his pulsepoint on his neck and spreading into his cheeks as attention is brought to the burning sensation of your hand against his hammering heart.

That was the first of a hundred small moments the two of you shared, in which your hands found a home against Aaron's body and his whole world became set in motion. Of course, he knew deep down that the Earth had been turning for billions of years before your soft hands barely caressed his skin and set his nerve endings on fire. Rationally, he knows that, but it’s like he’s experienced so much in his lifetime, it isn’t until your body makes contact with his own that he begins to feel the world around him.

It wasn’t long before Aaron began yearning for more of your delicate touches. He still denies to this day that he started planting feathers in his hair or roughing up his tie before setting foot into Quantico each morning. Of course he wouldn’t intentionally smudge some of his morning oatmeal on his lapel so that you would lead him by the arm behind your desk to the sink and dab it out of the fabric for him. The highly regarded, frankly, very busy SSA Aaron Hotchner would never spend time in his parked car scrubbing his rough hands over his own eyebrows, trying to get the long hairs to sit scraggly against his stern brow. That’s just preposterous. Ridiculous. As ridiculous as the way time would come grinding to a halt as you’d set your gaze on the scraggly brows in question, moving your eyes down to look into the swirling pools of chocolate and honey gazing back at you. Aaron would feel the flicker of a thousand nerves lighting up over his scalp as you brush down his angry brows with your thumbs, your other fingertips finding a home on his temples for stability.

When you finally did ask Aaron out, he was so wonderstruck your bottom lip actually darted out in a sort of tearful pout, thinking he was rejecting you or that you had embarrassed yourself and misread all of his lingering stares and increasingly radiant smiles he cast your way each morning. Thinking you had just imagined the regret in his voice each night he said goodbye, you thought he had been sad to leave you. Wanting to say so much more, but his silence now spoke for itself. You’d been wrong.

Aaron felt so frozen in his own body as his every impulse to tell you yes, YES, he would love to go out with you died in his throat, suffocated by the sheer volume of joy coursing through him. As your hand fell from the cuff of his coat you had clung to, and your eyes dart to the ground, turning your head away from him, Aaron manages to regain a skerrick of control over his own body, reaching out a hand to wrap around your bicep, turning you back to him as his cheeks warm and begin migrating towards his ears, making his beloved crows feet appear beside his glistening eyes. Yet again, he denies that there were tears at the notion of someone asking him out, of you asking him out after all this time, but you know what really happened.

“Y/N, nothing would make me happier.” Aaron’s dry mouth finally regains the ability to work normally. You seemed to now be the one standing in a daze, his hold on your clothed arm still sending the same trickles of lightning throughout your body that Aaron had felt through his own before, each time you’d held onto him.

As one date turned into many, and weeks spent together bled into months, Aaron could feel himself changing. Growing. You had come into his life and taken the wool from his eyes, showing him what a love can be like when the two of you want to foster and nurture it, carrying it between the two of you through your lives, even as it changes and evolves. The two of you aren’t carrying separate entities alone, but instead your hands are intertwined around something beautiful burning between you.

Aaron didn’t notice some of the more underlying changes in himself, he knew he could feel and see rays of sunshine warming him from within, he didn’t realize the sun was only able to find him because you had dismantled the walls he had built, that were casting him into darkness all of these years.

Aaron, however, was not the only one to notice these changes. After a rather successful third date, the two of you had planned a fourth. Sadly, a life of chasing serial killers and child abductors and otherwise scummy members of society got in the way, and Aaron had to reschedule you more than a few times before you two lovebirds finally got to go on another date. You were so excited when Friday night finally came around and Aaron had not been called on another case. You wanted desperately to run into the elevator the minute the clock struck five and pull Aaron by his coat out of the office and into the night, but sadly your coworker was running late to relieve you and take over the front desk. Luckily, Aaron was just as eager to meet you, and he felt ten squinting, profiling eyes on his back as he shut his office door at 5:02. He dropped his briefcase between his shoes to pull on his scarf and his coat before his long legs carried him, gliding down the stairs to the bullpen with a hint of a smile gracing his relaxed features.

“Hotch, I must be seeing things. Are you actually leaving this place on time for once? Is your office on fire? Did you accidentally forward your snarky email to Dave to Strauss by mistake?” Emily was the first to retort, leaning back in her seat and not trying at all to hide her amusement.

“No, everything’s fine, Strauss’ contact address in my emails is unmistakable. I learned that lesson years ago. I have some… plans tonight. Can’t be late.” Hotch offered Emily a smirk, quirking his eyebrow up towards his hairline as he ran a hand over his tie. A new tie, Morgan notes.

“Oooooooh no way. Ain’t no way my man has a date tonight! Aight, bossman. Take that fancy new tie of yours and show your friend a good time.” Derek offered a toothy grin, reaching his fist up for Hotch to bump as he breezes past, still not slowing to make conversation.

Hotch accepts Derek’s fistbump, much to the younger agent’s surprise, he expected his comments to get under Aaron’s skin more than anything. Hotch makes it a rule never to encourage prying into his personal life, but maybe he’s content enough with said personal life to allow a little prying these days.

Hotch reaches the elevators, pressing the button for Ground Floor as he offers his bewildered team a wave.

“Goodnight, agents. Please let me find this unit still in one piece on Monday. Remember to lock the doors when you leave, no parties, and no loud music after nine.” Hotch stepped into the open doors with a smile gracing his features and his team was left in what can only be described as shock.

“Okay, tell me I’m not hallucinating. Did Hotch leave this place willingly, of his own accord, on time, with a smile on his face and jokes? He’s got jokes all of a sudden?” Emily was blinking slowly as if to clear her vision, at the others who all appeared equally stunned by their boss’s sudden change of habits.

“He has been in a better mood lately, last week when Penelope kept referring to the previous case notes as ‘the tea’ Hotch made no efforts to correct her. The last time she tried referring to an unsub’s criminal record as their ‘bio’ he looked like he was going to burst a blood vessel trying to stay calm asking her not to call it that.” Spencer chimes in.

“Hold your horses, pretty boy. Go stake out the South windows in the briefing room and see if you can see our happy camper heading out the front door, I gotta go get babygirl to see this. She’ll never believe me otherwise.” Derek bounced away in a jog towards the batcave, retrieving the BAU’s most renowned gossip monger to delight in their boss’s new developments. Meanwhile JJ, Emily and Spencer moved quickly to the window in the round table room.

Derek and Penelope just made it in time, Derek pushing Penelope to take longer steps, her stilettos the only thing preventing her from sprinting to the window. The front doors of Quantico swung open, six floors down, a large arm holding them open as two heads of hair, tightly embraced, floated out of the tall doorway. The hand holding the doors is revealed to be their boss’s, holding onto his briefcase and shouldering a larger sage green bag, presumably belonging to the individual who’s seen leaning their head on Aaron’s free shoulder. His arm tightly snaked around their waist as their own arm disappeared under the shielded warmth of his long coat, wrapping around his back in a sort of walking embrace. Despite the awkward angle the team has of the couple six floors below them, they look to be talking animatedly as they walk, Penelope squeals as Aaron presses his lips to his lover’s temple leaving a warm kiss against their skin.

“How- How?! How long has this been happening? Quick. Profilers, profile! What do we know? Who is this mysterious fallen angel in our midst? Oh my god. We have to go to my lair tonight! I have to track down these star crossed lovers and see how compatible they are and oh! My god-” Garcia is cut off by her own gasp as she sees you and Aaron stop by the car, where he puts your bag in the backseat before bending down on his knee and taking your ankle in his hand, guiding your foot to his thigh where he ties your hanging shoelace. You’re still talking, your hands gesticulating wildly as you recall the events of your day to Aaron, who has long since finished tying your shoe, and is now just watching you talk, still pinned down by your foot, he doesn’t seem to mind one bit. In fact, even from six storeys up, on the opposite side of the carpark, Emily swears she can see a glimmer in her boss’s eyes as he watches his date talking. The lights on the outside of the building behind you, making you look like an angel to him as your ‘halo’ illuminates the signet of the FBI on the face of the building.

“So this is why he’s been religiously applying chapstick lately. I thought he was just becoming really sensitive to the wind.” JJ offers, Penelope jumping up and down and clapping her hands together in a silent celebration before clutching her necklace in front of her heart.

“He also changed his haircut this month. I have seen that man enter this office on the first Monday of every month with the same high and tight crew cut for like, three years now. This month he kept the top longer, damn we should have seen right through that.” Emily sounds almost disappointed that the team failed to see the lover effect in full force.

“Hmm, making it easier to grab onto?” Derek asks with a smirk. “My man.” Penelope’s hand comes up to whack the back of Morgan’s head in retort. Spencer stands, looking bewildered by the comment and by the sudden violence.

“Wait a minute. Do they work in this building? I know that face.” JJ questions.

“Yes! That’s it, they work at the reception desk! They always say good morning even when it’s technically 12:09pm. The worst time, though, they even said good morning to me at 2:35! Must have been having a long day.” Spencer laughs to himself, the rest of the team not finding his exact timekeeping anywhere near as funny as he seems to.

“Oh boy, I will have to ask them what bossman’s like on a date tomorrow when I come in. This is too good an opportunity to resist. Maybe we can bribe ‘em with a latte from down the street, babygirl we gotta find out how they like their coffee.” Derek wraps an arm around the blonde, trying to appeal to her pro-level social media snooping skills for assistance.

“He looks happy, guys, like, lovesick puppy level of happy. Maybe we just leave this alone, let them… come to us when they’re ready?” Garcia offers, sounding surprised at her own voice offering to stay out of someone’s business.

The others all seem to agree with their chirpiest team member that the only way to let Hotch continue being their happy, joking, playful boss is to make sure this person stays in his life, and the best way to do that is by letting them be. Of course, this won’t stop them all from racing towards the South window the next time Hotch leaves work on time, but he can’t exactly punish them for looking, can he?

Things continue in this fashion for a few weeks, and the team marvels each time at the amount of physical affection their boss is comfortably showing in a semi crowded carpark, bustling with agents coming on and off the clock. He’s become less and less shy about letting his arms find home around your waist each time the two of you stroll out of the building. It isn’t until your ninth date was rescheduled for the second time that the team got to see the two of you up close. Aaron’s team was working around the clock to find the source of a classified information leak in a neighboring bureau department.

You got off work, your smile falling when you saw a text from Aaron that he was probably not making it out of the office at 5, let alone before dawn the next morning. So, you set off to the chinese takeout place a street away to fetch his team some fuel. You got an assortment of mains, sides, chopsticks and cutlery, and a bag so full of drinks you thought the handles would break, sending eight cans of carbonated sugar to explode against the pavement, spraying everywhere. Luckily, you were able to double bag the contents and successfully bring it back to Quantico and up to the sixth floor.

The elevator doors opened and it was like setting foot inside a life-sized beehive, agents whizzing past you in all directions, manilla folders being passed around and stacked haphazardly on desks where phones rang and rang with no free hands to answer them.

You manage to weave your way through the hustle and bustle and into the bullpen, where you spin around, looking for any familiar face when you spot Aaron and his team in the conference room, blinds half drawn to occlude the whiteboards from sight through the glass. You knock against the door to the conference room with your knee, not having so much as one finger free to knock on the wood. Your heart is racing with the excitement in the room, though, the agents all seem to be radiating a sort of anxious feeling so potent it feels like the air is thick with TV static. The door swings open, revealing a very wrinkled Aaron standing before you. You feel the sharp, anxious twinkle of the static clearing from before your very eyes like fog meeting sunlight as Aaron looks behind you, looking left and right before he smiles at you and pulls you into the conference room, closing the door.

“Sweetheart, what’s going on? Are you alright?” Aaron asks you, placing a hand on each of your shoulders and looking at you to study your face.

“I’m fine, love! I just thought you guys seem so busy, you could use some dinner.” You raise the bags in each of your hands, seeing Aaron’s frown lines fade and his dimple appear in their absence as he and his whole team smile over at you. Aaron takes the bags from your red hands, surprised to find they’re both so heavy as Morgan clears some space on the roundtable for the food. A wave of ‘thank you’s wash over the room as Dave, Penelope, JJ, Emily, Spencer, Derek and even your Aaron all show you their gratitude at the offering of fresh, hot, food on what was bound to be the longest night they’ve worked in months. Aaron pulled you into his side as the team each introduced themselves to you, shaking your hand excitedly as they all failed miserably to hide the fact that they already knew your name and exactly why you’re here.

You open all the containers of food, explaining all the options you brought and which ones are meat-free for Penelope and offer each agent a drink with a smile, feeling Aaron’s gentle hand resting on the fall of your shoulder as you hand spencer a knife and fork you got specially for him and Aaron asks you if he can get you a plate ready. The team is starstruck, both at your display of kindness and thoughtfulness for every member of his team, and at how comfortably you seem to fit right against your boss. The two of you are practically joined at the hip, each time Hotch asks you a question his hand finds your knee or your arm or your waist to brush over it and get your attention. After a full minute passes of his hands staying away from your body, you move your wheely chair closer to his, looping your hand under and around his bicep, elbow resting on the armrest of his chair as he engages with a conversation with Reid and Dave regarding how exactly the leak of this information stands to gain anything from it.

Once Aaron’s scarfed down his plate of food, his free arm lays over the back of your seat, curling around your far shoulder and rubbing there as he checks in with you if any of the information you’re hearing has upset you at all. He offers to find some place to sit alone with you if you’re uncomfortable for another ten minutes or so before he has to go back to the investigation.

Emily and Penelope are sitting at the opposite side of the table, completely in awe as they watch their boss who’s usually known to move almost like a statue, very calculated and still. If he’s undisturbed long enough he can actually often appear as if he’s not even breathing or blinking when he’s hard at work. But here, he moves so naturally with you. The two of you have a way of reassuring one another without a word that you’re there for the other and you’re okay without so much as making eye contact.

Garcia audibly gasps when you lean in to place your head on the slant of Hotch’s shoulder, your eyes fluttering closed for a moment as most of his team is engaged in a conversation about the possibility of a team of people being responsible for the leak when Hotch looks down at you, a smile of unbridled adoration donning his face and he cranes his neck to kiss you on the crown of your head. In front of everyone. In the middle of a meeting about an emergent situation, her boss found enough joy in his heart to smile widely and kiss you, while you’re nuzzling your own smile further into his neck. She never thought she’d see the day her compartmentalizing, dedicated to a self-destructive degree boss actually found someone that loves him so freely and so openly that he’s actually comfortable enough to do the same.

“Garcia, is everything alright?” Aaron asks, Penelope is ashamed that her audible surprise has dragged the happy couple out of their special moment as both of your eyes are blinking back at her, concerned.

“Everything is just swell, sir. Couldn’t be better, actually.” Penelope smiles, beaming with pride and eyes darting between the two of you.

“For the record, Garcia. I agree.” Hotch offers his own proud smile and a wink as his voice lowered to a whisper, half of the team not registering the interaction as Spencer was rapidly scanning seven files at once with the wave of his hand, looking for the exact time logs from the door to the evidence storage facility on the nights in question.

From that one fateful evening onwards, you became a staple attendee at any and all BAU family functions. The team had loved you from the moment they met you, for you had changed their stoic, slave-to-his-desk boss forever. You had changed him slowly and so kindly that he had seen it happening all around him and still didn’t care to question it.

The whole team, even the young doctor Reid noticed the difference between Aaron and his past partners compared to you. How when you entered the room, Aaron’s hands would start to seek you, and you’d find him, letting him hold onto you. You knew his past experiences had made him paranoid of losing those he loves, and you don’t mind one bit proving to him that you’re still there. They all noticed how whenever you or Aaron laugh at something the group said, your eyes find each other to see the other smiling, feeling free. They all grew to love seeing the two of you moving in the same spaces, your bodies never falling out of step or losing their harmony. No matter how stressful Hotch’s work gets, you can always find a way to soothe his stresses away, with a hand kneading at his shoulders or a gentle thumb grazing against his cheekbone, your hold cradling his face. You made Aaron feel okay with looking possessive, or small and delicate, or just looking like a man in love. You showed him it’s okay to need reassurances and that he’ll never have to be the only one offering them again.

You’ve shown him a love that burns so brightly he doesn’t mind loving you publicly or in private, loudly or whispered in a longing ear. Aaron Hotchner loves you freely, without restraint. He loves you on your quiet mornings just as he loves you from behind a karaoke mic at a crowded bar. His love for you grew too fast and too beautiful for him to contain it anymore. He will tell you he loves you in every language he can. Because from the first time the two of you made contact, like flint on steel, there’s been a spark. He’s glad you were brave enough to reach out and take hold of it, the two of you keeping it safe, because now the heat from that flame keeps you both warm even on the coldest nights.

tagging: @montyfandomlove , @pastanoodles11 , @ssamorganhotchner, @hotchnerbau , @hotchs-babygirl , @ssa-tahlia-obsessions , @p0ssywhippedcream , @14buddy22 , @elenamoncada-ibarra , @supercriminalbean , @ssaspencerreidswife , @levithestripper , @beehive16,

#fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader #aaron hotchner x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

Text

I Know Places: Roadkill

18+ Aaron Hotchner x Fem Reader | Masterlist | AO3 link

Summary: Once again, Aaron puts himself in harm's way. Once again, reader scolds him for it. Bickering like an old married couple in front of the whole team, it becomes glaringly obvious that they're more than just coworkers now.

Warnings: background Moreid, Canon Typical Violence (mentions of possible rape, car accidents, hit and runs, murder) angst with a happy ending, arguing, worrying, makeup sex (first time together) teasing, oral sex (fem receiving), unprotected sex, creampies.

Word count: 14.9k

Not much changes between them at work. They’re still acting as professionally as possible, only now with longing stares all across the country and only one bed during their hotel stays.

In the last few weeks, they’ve had 4 cases. Each has gone by as smoothly as possible, without accidents or escapes or injuries. And Aaron’s stopped obsessing over Foyet, for the most part. He still reads the files when he has free time and he asks Penelope to add new perimeters to her searches, but other than that, he’s taken a bit of the weight off his shoulders to share with the rest of the team when the time comes.

Everyone knows they’ve just not filed the paperwork because it’s a hassle and Strauss, their section Chief would find some way to make it a problem. She’ll find out eventually, but until then, they’re just going with the flow, experiencing life together as a happy couple as long as they can.

He hasn’t told Haley yet, either. Seeing as she doesn’t want to admit that Conrad— her “friend” who’s always over during pick up and drop offs with Jack— is actually her boyfriend, they don’t have to tell her that they’re anything more than friends either. Jack likes Y/N, he holds her hand at the park and always asks if she can stay for a sleepover when he’s spending the night at his dad's. It’s the sweetest thing.

Every morning that they’re in Quantico, they meet at the round table at 10 am to prep new cases. They come in to work together at 8:30, holding hands while carrying coffee in their other. When they get up to Aaron’s office, JJ is in there with a file and an awkward, press-lipped smile on her face.

“What’s up?” He asks, letting go of her hand and walking over to his desk.

“Police in Bend, Oregon have asked for our help… this unsub is running people over with his car, there’s been two victims in the last 12 days,” she explains.

“Okay, I’ll look over the file and we’ll meet in the briefing room early today, tell the others 9:30 at the latest,” Hotch orders.

“Got it,” she picks up her things and starts to leave. She pats Y/N on the arm with a knowing smile, “See you out there.”

“You certainly will,” she smiles back at her. “Actually, I’m going to go help her photocopy everything and get ready, I’ll see you in there?”

“Okay,” Aaron nods. “Save me a seat.”

“Beside me as always,” she teases him one last time before heading out.

She’s so cute, he just shakes his head, watching from the window as she skips down a couple of steps and heads over to her desk. She says hi to Anderson and waves at a few people before following JJ up to the briefing room to make photocopies. He is so in love with her it makes him feel a little crazy. He has work to do, but his mind is stuck on her. He’s happy. At his desk. He's... happy?

For the first time in his life, he’s happy while at work.

And everyone knows it too. He’s staying at work less, still keeping up with his paperwork somehow, coming in a little later in the mornings, and he’s smiling more often. He’s heard the rumours and the mumblings, he knows people think he’s like this cause he’s getting laid again… but the truth is they haven’t.

He sleeps at her house, she sleeps at his, they sleep in the same bed on cases and they’ve come close to it before, but they haven’t had sex yet. Neither one of them has brought it up yet.

The first week they were together, they were busy on a case. The second week they had a pretty gross case and neither one of them was in the mood after it and then he had Jack all weekend. Then last week, she was on her period and he was happy to dote on her and give her a massage and cover her in kisses before sleeping beside her and holding her close but not too tight. He loves her so much, this relationship is so much more than just physical… he’s only had sex with 1 woman in his whole life, and even then, it took them over a year to do it because they were in high school.

This is just what he’s used to. He’ll be ready whenever she asks, he doesn’t need it… does he crave it? A little. She’s beautiful. He has to see her in action with her shirt rolled up and her bulletproof vest on. He sees her manhandle creeps and cuff them, sometimes even fight them a little. He listens to her give orders and put people in their place. Of course, he wants her. But he knows how to wait. He’s a patient man.

He has to shake all the thoughts out of his mind before he cracks open the case file. He takes another sip of his coffee and starts to read over the police report. He looks at the photos, the coroner's report, the witness statements and everything else JJ thought was important to include.

This is a weird one. He’s never seen a serial killer who favours vehicular homicide. Most of them want to do the killing themselves, they want to use their hands and feel the glory. This guy might not even be a guy. It could be a woman, using a vehicle might give her the power she lacks. The way they’ve been hit, backed over and hit again… that’s anger that comes from planning and a desire to kill. It’s unlikely that these are just victims of happenstance, this killer is calculated and these women that died were chosen for a reason.

He gathers all his things and meets the others in the briefing room, Derek, Spencer and Dave have yet to show up but they’ll be in soon. Right now, it’s just the girls.

“And then— oh, sorry, sir,” Penelope stops whatever she was saying as she sees him.

“On, no, it’s okay. You can keep talking… unless you don’t want me to know?” He hesitates to sit down, he’d leave if they needed him to.

“No, it’s fine,” she sighs. “Kevin is interviewing with the NSA for a new job and he can’t even tell me where he’s going if he gets it.”

“I’m sorry,” he feels terrible for her. Long distance sucks. But he sits down, ready to listen, wanting to be there for her and offer some wisdom if she wants it.

“I hate this. I hate not knowing what’s going to happen. What if he never comes home? What if I can’t talk to him? What if he breaks up with me right before he goes and then I never hear from him again? I’m not ready to just lose someone in my life permanently.”

“You’re Penelope Garcia,” he reminds her. “You can easily find out where he’s going… and you can easily stop transfers from going through, remember you held mine up so I could stay here?”

She nods, “I still feel sorry about that, sir, I didn’t mean to start things with you at home.”

“It’s okay, I’m much happier now,” he smiles over to Y/N. “I wouldn’t have my beautiful girlfriend if I still had a wife.”

“Very funny,” Y/N can’t believe he said that. She laughs and shakes her head, she licks her lips and laughs again. “You really just said that?”

“And I mean it,” he teases, reaching over for her hand. He brings it up to his lips and kisses her hand, making the other two women swoon a bit.

“Hotch, I had no idea you were a romantic,” JJ teases him. “Were you always like this?”

He shrugs, “I was a teenager the last time I was in love like this.”

“In love?” They hear Derek's voice as he and Reid come through the door. “What did I miss?”

“Nothing,” Y/N waves it off, trying desperately not to be the centre of attention. “We’re just talking about our relationships, anything you two want to share?”

“no—“ Derek starts but Spencer sits beside her and smiles.

“Derek’s never not been the sharing type and then he started dating me and now he’s like Fort Knox about it all,” Spencer teases.

“Hey,” Derek sits beside him and swats his arm. “It’s because I love you, you’re not some rando who came home with me once.”

“And what an honour that is,” Spencer teases again.

Derek’s just about to say something when they hear the whistling. Dave comes in with his coffee and the remnants of a lipstick stain on his cheek and sits down in the only empty spot left. “What’ve we got today?”

Everyone shares a few looks and knowing smiles, but Aaron answers. “A weird one in Bend, Oregon.”

“An unsub who kills with his car,” Y/N adds.

“They’ve had two victims in the last 12 days,” Hotch explains while they all open their files and have a look.

JJ stands, holding the remote for the projector, She starts to show them their victims. 23-year-old Maria Delgado was stuck while out on a jog and the second, a stranded motorist, Shannon Makely, 43.

“What makes the locals think that they were connected?” Derek asks.

“For one thing, they were both backed over after the initial impact,” JJ explains, showing them the photos again which makes Penelope shield her eyes.

“No accident there,” Dave grumbles, cheerful mood already gone.

“Plus, the treads found at both scenes match. Large vehicle, all-terrain,” Aaron adds but doesn’t cover all of it.

JJ moves to more photos on the screen, the ME report as well, “Wounds also indicate a raised bumper, so they’re thinking a large SUV or a truck.”

“Do they know the model or make?” Spencer asks.

She shakes her head, “Tyres aren’t factory issues. They could be on a number of different vehicles.”

“And no witness at either incident?” Y/N asks, flipping through the file, not finding anything.

“No, just the unlucky people who came across the bodies after it had already happened,” JJ sighs.

“A hit-and-run is loud, usually they draw attention. Somebody usually sees something,” Rossi says, posing the question they’re all thinking. How did no one see it happen?

“Both victims were attacked in secluded areas,” JJ explains further.

“Two tones of metal make a hell of a weapon,” Derek says with a shake of his head, disgusted by the lengths these killers go through.

“Serial killers have been known to become rather attached to their vehicles,” Spencer throws in. “Bittaker and Norris even gave theirs a nickname—

“murder Mack,” Rossi finishes for him.

“Bittaker and Norris were sexual sadists. There’s no sign of torture here,” Hotch reminds them.

“Sounds like a thrill kill?” Y/N proposes. “Opportunistic.”

“Easy targets, randomly selected,” Dave agrees.

“With this type of impact, vehicles shouldn’t be hard to pick out from a lineup,” Derek concludes.

“Yeah, there should be significant front-end damage,” Spencer backs him up.

“Somehow I don’t think this is gonna be that easy,” Dave says, closing his file.

“I contacted the pilot already, the jet is ready whenever we are,” JJ informs them, closing down the screen as they all get ready to go.

“Wheels up in 20.”

—

“I think it's safe to assume this unsub is a male,” Y/N says as soon as the conversation picks back up on the plane.

“I agree with you, given what we know,” Hotch nods, reading over the file again. “At first I thought maybe it could be a woman, using a car to feel powerful but with the amount of road rage and aggression we see in men, it’s less likely it would be a woman doing this.”

“It’s also just too messy,” Spencer adds for good measure.

“Exactly.”

“And men have an unnatural bond with their cars,” Y/N jokingly reminds everyone.

“That is true,” JJ gets it.

“Wait a minute, I don't know about unnatural?” Derek feels offended.

“I once dated a guy who washed his car more than he washed his hair,” JJ stares him down until he gives in.

“A nice car needs love,” Rossi pipes up. Derek points at him cause he gets it.

“And a woman doesn’t?” JJ just blinks, not believing what she’s hearing.

“I’m not qualified to answer that,” Rossi teases, making them all laugh.

“I’m just saying, big car… that’s phallic?” Y/N shrugs, looking at Aaron.

“So he’s compensating?” Aaron poses.

“Or overcompensating,” Spencer corrects.

“Impotent?” Derek suggests.

“Possibly, i-if the unsub sees himself as physically defective the car not only gives him the power and control he otherwise lacks, but it also serves as a shield,” Spencer further explains.

“A way to avoid physical contact?” Hotch asks.

“Power and control,” Y/N starts to put the pieces together out loud. “Female victims… that almost reads like a rape profile.”

“Vehicular rape,” Rossi says, taken aback by the mere thought.

“Rape and thrill kill are two very different profiles,” Derek reminds them.

“What does victimology tell us?” Hotch asks.

“Nothing yet,” JJ shrugs, filling through the pages in her file but coming up short. “Shannon Makely was a white, married, 43-year-old commodities trader and Maria Delgado was a 23-year-old Hispanic graduate student and competitive triathlete.”

“So far gender is our only link,” Hotch agrees. “Hopefully the crime scenes will tell us more… when we get there, Morgan and Rossi you can go to the Makely crime scene. Y/N and I will go to Delgados and then Reid, you and JJ can hit up the ME and then head to the station to set up the boards.”

“Why do you two get to do everything together?” Spencer whines.

“Because you’re the doctor, you need to go and pick out shit the coroner missed and Derek is the best at retracing steps, no offence Rossi,” Y/N answers on Aaron’s behalf.

“None taken. Out of all of you, Derek reminds me the most of what me and Gideon were like in the beginning,” Dave gives him a small smile.

“He was a great teacher,” Derek says. “But it’s fine, we’re still partnered up in the hotels, right?”

“Yep,” JJ tries not to smile. “I’ve got you guys in a room with just one queen, down the hall from the rest of us, too.”

The rest of them smirk too, while Y/N and Aaron haven’t even bothered to get sexual yet, those two weren’t hiding anything. Between strange noises in the middle of the night and the rhythmic knocking of a bed frame on shared walls… it was pretty obvious that the good doctor and Derek Morgan were having a lot of fun together.

—

When they touch down, they separate into 3 SUVs on the tarmac and make their way from the small local airport 3 towns over all the way to Bend. Aaron and Y/N get a call from one of the local cops, Detective Feder, who is going to meet them at the jogging trail and walk them through everything. The main detective, Quinn, is with Rossi and Morgan at the most recent crime scene.

It’ll take them about 45 minutes to get there, though the winding country roads on this side of the country are nice, so it’s no big deal. The trees make for nice shade and the shade brings a cool breeze too, when just one state south they’d be in the disgusting heat of California. They have the windows down, the music on low, Aaron holds her hand as he drives and she looks out the window at the scenery. It’s a nice break from the horrors of their job.

When they arrive, the cop is leaning against his car, arms crossed, waiting. He gives them a tight-lipped smile when they pull up, parking right behind him, they get out at the same time.

“Hey,” the cop waves. “Detective Feder, nice to meet you.”

He shakes Aarons hand first, “Agent Hotchner, this is Agent Y/L/N.”

“Hi,” she smiles while shaking his hand. “Hope you weren’t waiting long?”

“Nah, I just pulled up not 5 minutes ago,” he waves it off. “Follow me,” he says, leading them behind his squad car and towards the trail. “It’s not a very popular jogging area. There aren’t too many people who can take that hill coming up here.”

“Well, she was a triathlete,” Y/N reminds him.

“We figured she jogged in off the main road, headed for the trail up here,” he points to the side. When he gets to the bloody spot on the concrete he stops. “The assailant drove in behind her, and ran her down right here.”

“Uh… a woman jogging alone, no… she would’ve known if someone was tailing her,” Y/N states, speaking from a woman’s point of view, she knows what it's like to be on high alert at all times.

“So maybe he was already here?” Aaron proposes. Looking around, there’s a big red garbage bin that’s been dropped off and what looks to be construction equipment set up behind a fence. “What’s the story with all this equipment?”

“Construction stalled out months ago, no reason for anyone to be up here,” Feder explains.

Aaron keeps walking, behind the garbage bin, “it’s nice and quiet. It's the ideal spot to wait to run somebody down without being seen.”

“A little convenient,” Y/N rolls her eyes.

“Too convenient,” Aaron agrees. “What if it was her? What if she were the reason he was up here?”

“You don’t think this was a random attack?” Y/N’s almost shocked to hear him say that.

He shakes his head and kneels down to look at the dirt, “oil,” he points, pressing his finger into the darkened wet patch and showing them. “He was lying in wait.”

“Shit,” Feder sighs, he can’t believe they missed these signs. “Okay. We should regroup at the station.”

“We’ll call our guys,” Y/N says, going to take out her phone. “On second thought… there’s no service.”

“Yeah most of the county has terrible service,” Feder shrugs. “I’ll radio it in for you, Quinn should get it.”

“Thanks," Aaron gives him a small smile and then motions with his head towards their car to get Y/N to follow.

—

“He may have specifically targeted these women,” Hotch proposes to the others as soon as he sits down at the table.

Y/N and JJ were off talking to family, Derek was on a coffee run, leaving him with the lead detective, Spencer and Dave.

“That takes thrill-kill off the table,” Rossi sits back, wanting to hear everything hotch learned at the first crime scene. Cause that’s how they worked best, going backwards.

“Because the murders were planned in advance?” Quinn asked.

“Yeah,” Spencer hesitates, looking at his board with everything he’s mapped out so far. “This type of stalking behaviour indicates a personal motive. There’s a reason he chose these victims.”

“So you think he knows them?” Quinn follows up, wanting to get a look inside the genius' brain. That’s exactly why he called them in for this with only two murders and not the typical 3 killings that would garner their attention.

“Well, he knew their work schedules, jogging routes, drive patterns,” Hotch points out.

“That would explain how he knew where to strike,” Spencer adds.

“Explains the Delgado girl, she was on a run, but he could’ve known Shannon Makely’s car was gonna break down out there?” Quinn says, having a hard time thinking outside the box, unlike the rest of them.

“Did you look at her car?” Rossi asks.

“Guys at impound said that it was a water pump that blew, said it’s a common enough problem,” Quinn explains.

“Maybe we should take a closer look?” Rossi suggests.

“Why don’t you head over there?” Aaron agrees, sending the best man for that job. Dave was a car guy, he had fixed up countless classics, and he’d know how to talk shop better than the rest of them. “Let me know what you find.”

Right as Dave starts to stand up, Y/N comes rushing over to the table, “Shannon Makely’s husband is here.”

Hotch had requested to talk to him when he arrived, he had questions to ask and hearing them from another man might make it go by easier. Whereas the mother of Maria Delgado would’ve done better with the girls, that’s why he had them speak to her first.

“Okay, thanks,” he starts to stand, “you want to join us?” He asks Detective Quinn.

He nods, standing with him. They all head into an office, Mr. Makely is already in there waiting for them, his eyes puffy and red, he’s been crying. Probably a lot. That was a given. Aaron’s not sure how he’d react if his wife— ex-wife died. Even after everything they’ve been through, he’d probably be devastated too.

“I just want it to make sense,” Mr. Makely cries. “But this…” he doesn’t know what to say.

“We may be able to make some sense of this with your help,” Y/N offers, her kindest voice on display. She hands him a photo of Maria Delgado. “Do you recognize that woman?”

He stares for a mere second and shakes his head. Gripping his water bottle like his life depended on it, “No. Should I?”

“She was the first victim,” Y/N explains. “We’re trying to determine if she was connected to your wife in some way.”

“Connected?” He asks, having a hard time processing everything.

“We think he may have been following them. Gathering information,” Aaron adds. “Did Shannon ever mention or notice anyone?”

“No…” his brows furrow as he thinks back as far as he can but his mind is clearly shadowed by grief.

“Did you ever notice anyone out of the ordinary in your neighbourhood?” She asks, watching him shake his head. “Maybe someone who was walking or driving by the house repeatedly?”

He keeps shaking his head, he really doesn’t think so.

“What about a truck? Or a large SUV?” Hotch asks.

His brows narrow then, his eyes wander back and forth as he puts some pieces together, “Thursday, I was expecting a package, I kept checking the street and there was a truck parked a couple of houses down. I didn’t recognize it.”

“Could you see anyone inside?” Aaron asks.

He shakes his head again, kicking himself, “I couldn’t tell, the windows were blacked out.”

“Tinted?” Aaron repeats in a different phrasing, looking to Y/N and then back to him.

“Yeah, only all the way around, like you see with limousines,” he explains better. He rubs his mouth then, trying his hardest to think back, he visibly hates himself for not remembering more.

Aaron gives him a moment and then asks one last question. “Do you think that you would recognize the truck if you saw it again?”

He sniffles and then clears his throat, pulling himself together, he nods, “Mhm, maybe?”

And so they get him pictures of trucks, makes and models, they print off so many pictures they have to bring in more paper. This is the most this department's printer has ever gone off, as it would seem.

Dave was back from the mechanic pretty soon thereafter, they were behind on things and asked him to come back in a few hours, meaning Aaron could go with him this time.

The mechanic working on the little red car pops the hood and brings them around to look, “we figured it was the water pump because it was pretty much melted but what we didn’t figure out on this—“ he pulls forward a piece of rubber tubing with a slit cut through it.

“This car's pretty new, that wouldn’t be normal wear and tear, would it?” Aaron asks.

“No, the rest of the lines in good condition,” he explains. “Someone punctured it. You can tell from the smooth edge.”

Aaron leans in to get a better look, “How did they do it?”

“Probably reached the blade right through the grill. Penknife, something like that,” he hypothesizes.

“Wouldn’t’ve even had to pop the hood,” Rossi tisks, shaking his head. Theres nothing he hasn’t seen. “And then she drove away without water in the radiator, it explains the overheating.”

“It explains the pump, too,” The mechanic adds.

“Could someone possibly gauge how far she could’ve travelled with a car in this condition?” Hotch asks one last question to chase his theory.

He presses his lips together and shrugs, “Someone who knows cars could make an educated guess, I suppose.”

“Thank you,” Aaron reaches over to shake his hand, that’s everything he needed.

Dave does the same thing, shaking the man's hand before the two of them head off back towards their own car. “Sabotage. This guys more focused than we thought. Well organized, highly motivated.”

“By what though?” Aaron asks, still stuck on that part. “What do these women have in common?”

“Different ages, appearance, social status. He’s not hunting a specific type,” Dave recounts.

“Their only connection is the unsub. There has to have been contact before the attacks,” Hotch says, going back on what they’ve profiled before.

Rossi picks that us, “but we profiled a guy who would be afraid of contact? The trucks a shield.”

“Maybe the contacts are incidental. There’s something he perceives in their exchange. Something about his perception triggers his fixation,” Hotch explains. “Could be the way she looks at him, something she says, or even something as trivial as what she’s wearing… whatever it is, the victims have no idea what they’ve set in motion.”

—

Visiting the crime scenes, and talking with loved ones and the mechanic was really all they could do that day. The team goes out for dinner together around 6 and by 8 they’re all in their hotel rooms with nothing to do for 12 hours— or when another kill comes in.

Y/N and Aaron have a room with two beds, like always, one to sleep in together and one for all their bags to sit on. They change, they get into bed together and by 9pm they’re cuddled into each other and absolutely exhausted. It’s midnight back home, they’d normally still be up at this time but still, all the travel and the emotional toll of talking to victim's families has them pretty wiped out.

He loves this time of night, the way they cuddle and how she fits next to him like she’s the other half of his puzzle. They talk a little, about the case and also about nothing serious at all. He loves this part of the night, when they’re tucked away in some random bed in a random town in America… he never thought he’d have this.

He never imagined one day he wouldn’t be with Haley, and even if he did, he never thought he’d be happy without her. So much of his marriage with her was good, he loved coming home to a cuddle and a good night's sleep. But on the other end, he spent a lot of nights completely alone. He would cuddle his pillow and have terrible sleep only to wake up grumpy and keep searching for another psychopath.

Now, he gets to sleep beside his girlfriend whom he loves so much every single night, no matter where he is. Dating someone on his team was not something he thought would ever happen. He had no idea the joy that dating someone at work could bring him.

“I love you,” he whispers before kissing the back of her neck.

“I love you,” she replies, he can hear the smile on her face.

He holds her a bit tighter, snuggling in against her more, “This is so nice to get to sleep beside you on nights like this.”

“Oh, Aaron,” she has her hand over his, and she squeezes him lovingly.

“I mean it… after talking to Shannon Makely’s husband today, I’m just, I’m really glad I have you.”

She wiggles out of his grip and for a moment he fears that she doesn’t feel the same, instead, she turns to face him. Even in the dark, he can make out her features. He holds her close once more, chest to chest this time, and she smiles. She cups his face and leans in for a quick kiss.

“I feel the same… but I have a question?”

“Okay?”

“If something happened to you, would you want me to talk to Haley?” She asks. “And I’m not talking if you die, I mean, if you’re stabbed or shot or taken hostage, do you want me to talk to her or should that conversation come from Rossi or Strauss?”

“Oh,” he’s never thought about that. “I’d want you to tell her. I mean, she knows we're close so she probably expects it to be you… but if I ever do die on the job, I definitely want it to be you who talks to her. I want you to be the one to give them access to my apartment and make sure Jack gets all my things and that my funeral goes smoothly.”

She doesn’t say anything, but her breathing picks up and he can tell she’s trying hard not to cry. “Okay.”

He simply pulls her in closer and rests his cheek off the top of her head, “but that’s not going to happen.”

“I know.”

“And if it’s ever the other way around if it’s Haley who dies before me, I want you to be with me if I have to go through that. If Jack is still young enough to need to move in with me full-time, I’d want you to be around for that too. I know I’d be a mess if I lost her, and if Jack lost his mom, and that’s not because I’m still in love with her… I mean, I do love her. But I’m not in love with her. If I lost her it would be hard on us, but I’d want you to be there with me when things get hard.”

“Of course, I’d be there for you,” she assures him. “The same way I’d want you to come home with me if my parents passed away. She’s family. I know that. I’m never going to be jealous of her. I’d want to be there for Jack too. I can’t imagine what it’s like to lose your mom as a kid, and I hope he never has to go through that. I’m praying that his mom is in his life for as long as possible and that maybe one day me and haley could even become friends. I want us to be a family, as unconventional as that may be, I love you enough to love everyone in your family, too.”

He wants to cry now too. When he got divorced he never ever, ever thought that he’d find someone who loves him and his family this way. He never thought his girlfriend would want to be close to his ex-wife. He never imagined a world where his son would have two strong and wonderful women to look up to but that’s what he found.

“I love you,” Aaron says before kissing the top of her head. “I love you so much.”

She kisses his neck where her head is tucked in, holding him as close as possible. “Sometimes I can’t believe this happened. Like, I thought you were cute when I started working with you and I knew you were married and I thought all Jack's photos on your desk were so sweet. I really just wanted to be your friend after the divorce. I never had a lot of girlfriends, I’m not super close to JJ or Penelope, so getting to know you was the first time I had a good friend in a long time.”

“Finding friends as an adult is hard,” he sympathizes. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without our phone calls… I spent the first few months completely silent in my apartment all alone and then you filled my nights with laughter and smiles and I woke up the next morning excited to go to work. I didn’t even realize I was in love with you until it was almost too late.”

She smiles, “I only figured it out cause I got jealous in New York.”

“God, this last year has been absolutely insane,” he shakes his head. He got divorced, he fell in love and the only other woman he’s ever slept with in his life died. In his arms, too. It’s been such a traumatic year but Y/N made it liveable. She made it okay.

“Yeah, but I wouldn’t have wanted to do it with anyone else.”

—

They’re up and ready by 7, unable to sleep in that long when their body clock was off.

They all leave at different times, JJ left with Rossi just before Y/N and Aaron were done getting ready and texted that they left. Derek and Spencer were running a little late but that was usual. They had just enough time to get coffee at a local family-owned diner and they even get some breakfast sandwiches too, which were on the house as the owners were thankful the FBI was in town to help. It put an extra pep in their step that morning.

When they arrived at the station, Mr. Makely was already there, still looking through photos of vehicles from the day before but in a new outfit. He went home, didn’t sleep but came back changed to give the illusion that he did. He smelled like booze and the bags under his eyes were the same purple as the tie Aaron had on yesterday. So Arron heads over to the coffee maker, pours the man a cup and sets it down beside him with a smile.

This was going to be a long day.

By the time Derek and Spencer get in, Y/N and JJ have already gone through a box of information gathered on the first two victims. Where they grew up, who they went to school with, their family members, hospital records, speeding tickets, you name it and they’ve seen it. Nothing has added up yet.

Derek takes a seat by Mr. Makely, asking him how he’s doing and questioning him on what he’s able to remember thus far and Marley takes a couple images and lays them out. “These ones stick out.”

“All Ford models, similar grills like you described yesterday,” Derek nods along.

“I guess, they just didn’t have that emblem,” he points. “There was no hood ornament, nothing like that.”

“I understand how hard this must be, but it’ll really help us to know what the truck looks like,” Derek sympathizes. “Our tech girl can put in all these specifications into the system and narrow down who drives this model, she can even go further and track down who’s bought grills and had them shipped to Bend recently.”

“I’ll keep looking,” he assures Derek with a smile.

Derek pats his shoulder and then joins the team at the round table. “How’s it going?” Aaron asks.

“Well, we're down to an older model, black, American-made. Sounds like he de-badged the trucks so nobody could ID him,” Derek explains.

“I can start a list from the DMV matching what we know?” Quinn offers.

“That’s gonna kill a lot of trees up in these parts,” Derek makes a joke, even in times like these he still found a way.

“The trucks only gonna get us so far,” Hotch agrees. “What we need to do is build on the profile.”

“Well he’s mechanically inclined,” Reid throws in. “He certainly knows his way around an engine block.”

“And he can pull a dent too,” Y/N suggests. “If he’s fixing the body damage to his truck himself.”

“Both victims were killed during prime office hours which means he has a flexible work schedule,” Aaron adds.

“Or he might not be working at all? Uh, stalking someone, getting to know their schedule that’s some pretty serious time commitment,” Reid reminds them all.

“8% of the states out of work,” Quinn shares.

“Job loss is a classic stressor,” Derek says for good measure.

“It’s a start,” Hotch sighs. “Look for men who are employed as mechanics, body shops, and look for those with criminal records. Reckless driving, assault…”

“Two murders in 2 weeks, that’s not much of a cooling-off period,” Y/N says.

“He’s not going to wait for another opportunity to present itself,” Hotch agrees.

“No, he’ll create one,” Reid adds, knowing the odds.

—

The call comes in just after 5 p.m., in the middle of shift change. There was another murder, in the parking garage of the local hospital this time. Aaron heads out with Y/N Rossi and Reid, leaving Derek with Mr. Makely and JJ to contact the family once they know more.

When they get there it's a gruesome sight. He was hit in front of the elevator, almost pancaked between the grill of the truck and the metal doors.

“Impact nearly cut him in two,” Quinn says, closing back up the body bag that the coroner had placed the victim in. “His name is Victor Costella. Pediatrist. He works in the building.”

“A male victim?” Y/N can’t believe it.

“There goes the vehicular rape theory,” Rossi says with a sigh, this case was starting to piss him off.

“He ran down from the level above trying to get away,” Quinn explains.

“So the initial collision was up there?” Rossi points. Quinn nods, “Let's go see it.”

They leave the victim where he is and walk up the roundabout ramp towards where he was originally parked. A few cars got caught in the scuffle, and crime scene detectives are already up there taking photos and documenting everything.

“That’s the victims car?” Reid points at the red coop.

“Yeah, why?” Quinn asks, not seeing why it’s important.

“Hold on just a moment,” Reid says, taking his phone from his pocket. “Garcia, I need you to look into something.”

They all knew what that meant. They were about to have a crack in this case and hopefully one big enough to blow it wide open.

“It’s a reserved spot,” Aaron points at the wall, the sign is screwed into the concrete wall with Dr. Costella written on it. Rusty and faded, he’s been at this practice a long time.

“The unsub knew where he was going to park, must’ve gotten here early and picked a spot right across from him,” Rossi explains, turning to look at the other parking spots.

“Somebody might’ve seen him waiting,” Y/N says, hopeful to talk to an eyewitness.

“Somebody did,” Detective Feder says, showing up from the lower level and surprising them with his presence. “I talked to an X-ray tech on the third floor, she noticed the truck when she arrived.

“And he was inside it?” Y/N asks.

“Yeah but she couldn’t see him because of the tint,” he explains.

“So how did she know he was inside the truck?” Aaron asks.

“She said the window was cracked, the occupant was smoking,” he explains further.

Rossi perks right up, “I don’t suppose your people found any cigarette butts?”

Feder looks as though he didn’t even think to look, causing Rossi to head over to the vacant spot across from Costella’s and start to look. “What time did the tech get in?” Rossi asks.

“10 am,” Feder answers.

“7 hours… a proper addict could kill a while pack in that time,” Rossi mutters to himself, squatting down with his pen in hand, he pushes around a couple balled up, yellow, pieces of paper. “Did you ever smoke?” He asks the group.

“I used to do a lot of things,” Y/N answers, honestly.

“I bet you never did this,” he taps the ground.

“He field stripped it,” Aaron notices.

“What is that?” Y/N asks, having not heard the term before, or at least not remembering what it meant.

“Something they teach soldiers to avoid leaving traces in the field,” Quinn explains.

“They squeeze out the filter and then ball up the surrounding paper,” Rossi gives a more detailed explanation.

“Okay so our guy could be ex-military?” Y/N proposes.

Feder takes out some tweezers and an evidence bag, “I’ll get some DNA on this. Maybe we’ll get lucky and he’s in our system.”

“If he’s military, why would he choose a truck as his weapon?” Quinn asks.

“Maybe he drove a tank?” Feder shrugs.

“That’s a good question,” Rossi assures Quinn, ignoring Feder. “Using a vehicle on the open road is one thing, but this is close quarters.”

“Yeah, the truck is loud and draws attention. Plus he risked rendering in inoperable,” Y/N adds.

“That doesn’t make any sense?” Quinn is a ball of confusion now. Shaking his head, he just wants this to be over with. He wants answers now. He’s not used to the chase in a small town like this.

“It makes sense to him. He needs to kill this way,” Aaron says and then takes a deep breath, dropping his shoulders, he places his hand on Quinn's arm. “We’ll figure out why.”

Reid comes running up the ramp then. Rounding the corner, he’s out of breath already but he has news. “Guys!” They all turn to him. “I think I figured out what connects these victims.”

He explains it once on their walk back to the SUV and then again at the station, filling in JJ and Derek this time as well. “All the victims drove red, two-door coupes.”

“Don’t you think that could be a coincidence?” Quinn asked, not fully sold.

“It’s statistically significant,” Spencer says, sassy as ever in his own Spencer way.

“We haven’t been able to find any other common denominators,” JJ adds.

“if the unsub is targeting people because of their cars, then his initial contact with them would’ve been on the road,” Hotch explains in a way Quinn would better understand.

“Exactly,” Spencer nods, giving him a small smile to say thank you.

“I spoke to the families about the victim's daily car travel— how they got to work, the gym,” JJ points to the board, showing the different coloured pins for the different victims and the routes they took.

“There’s one road all the victims had in common,” Spencer points out.

Three pins are along one highway. The same highway Shannon Makely was murdered on.

“Route seven.” Quinn knows all too well what that road is like and they can tell by the look on his face.

“That means something to you?” Hotch asks, staring him down, he’s talked to the man enough to know whatever he was about to say wasn’t good news.

“Maybe we should take a drive.”

—

It doesn’t take long to drive out there, maybe 20 minutes? Quinn pulls over onto the side of the road and puts his safety blinkers on. They get out together and he walks them over to the side of the cliff. There’s about a 200-meter drop from where they are standing down to a clearing of trees.

Spencer gets close to the edge, looking down while Aaron stays back further. He’s not terrified of heights but he knew what was good for him.

“Anyone living outside bend who commutes toward Eugene, uses Route 7. It’s the most dangerous stretch of highway in the state,” Quinn explains. “They call it suicide seven.”

Along the roadside there are white crosses, the kind you see on the side of the road in the middle of no where to mark where an accident took place. Either drunk driving or mechanical trouble, swerving into the wrong lane after not enough sleep or black ice in the middle of winter that sends you spinning out… there’s way too many in this little section of highway for them not to find it suspicious.

“These crosses represent accidents?” Spencer asks, filling in the blanks in his building theory.

“Fatalities. The fire chief put them up to remind drivers to be careful,” Quinn explains, monotoned and expressionless.

Aaron could tell he hated this part of the job. He would too.

“Two lanes, no dividers, I’m assuming there’s a lot of head-on collisions?”

“Either that or they go off the side,” Quinn says, letting out a deep breath and walking away from the edge.

“Reid you mentioned the possibility of a physical limitation, something that kept the unsub from attacking in a traditional way?” Aaron asks him.

“I was talking about impotence but we ruled out sexual motivation,” he reminds him.

“What if he’d been involved in a crash?”

“On this road…” Spencer starts to nod, putting more pieces together, Aaron could tell it was starting to make sense to not just himself now. “If the unsub is disabled it explains why he uses a truck— it gives him power, mobility…”

“But what?” Aaron asks, wanting him to explain everything going on inside his genius mind.

“The idea that he’s avenging his own physical suffering speaks to a victim mentality that’s inconsistent with the profile,” Spencer explains, puzzled by this piece.

He thinks back to the conversation he had last night with Y/N. How he’d want her by his side if someone important to him died. He didn’t bring it up then, but if he ever lost her. If Y/N ever died… he’d never be okay again. He never once understood why these men were able to kill so easily and then he fell in love again. Harder than ever before. He would kill for her if he had to.

“Then maybe it’s not just about his own suffering,” Aaron hypothesizes. “What if he got hurt in an accident that took a loved one? His wife or child, or both?”

“We’ve had a few cases like that on this highway,” Quinn nods, “I can get the guys back at the station to start pulling files of men who survived while their family didn’t.”

“Broaden that to women and children who died with husbands who weren’t in the car,” Spencer asks. “He could also have been disabled in combat and come home to his family dead, I doubt it but it's still good to add to the search.”

“Good idea,” Aaron agrees.

When they get in the car this time, he feels a little less easy. Turning around, doing a U-turn on this scary patch of road, it made his stomach uneasy. He was never good at being in the car when someone else was driving. He’s old enough now to know a life of having his licence longer than being without it. He hated giving that control away, unless it was with Y/N or Dave and even Derek.

—

When they get back they have just an hour to prep the final profile and before they get in front of the station and local reporters, Aaron pulls Y/N aside. He steals a hug and a kiss from her.

“What was that for?”

“Cause I can,” he says, just holding her closer. He rubs his hand up and down her back. “I love you.”

“You can love me all you want once we catch this guy,” she teases as she pulls away. “Come on, we’ve got a profile to give.”

He knows she’s right, he shouldn’t be doing this here, in a random back corner of the office where no one can see them. He should be prepping with the others, but he couldn’t help it.

He follows her back towards the others, his smile fades and he puts his stern and serious look back on. It was hard being happy and in love while around such horrible things all the time, but he found a way to make it work. When they get back to the table, the whole station has gathered and a few reporters from the next town over are there too, waiting and ready for the team to start talking.

“As we speak, this profile and a description of the unsubs truck are being released to state and national media,” Aaron explains, standing with the others in front of the crowd.

“In addition to what we already know, we believe the unsub is ex-military, most likely army or marines,” Spencer speaks next.

Y/N takes a half step forward, “We also believe he’s physically handicapped.”

“Form combat?” One of the officers asks.

Aaron shakes his head, “most likely from an automobile accident.”

“An accident that may have occurred along route 7, where the unsub finds his victims,” Y/N adds.

“And that has something to do with why he’s going after red coupes,” Quinn says, sitting with the rest of his station but still in the loop more than the others.

“We believe that he holds the driver of a comparable vehicle responsible for his accident,” Spencer explains further.

“And this person is the object of his rage, but unable to confront them, he’s taking revenge against a surrogate,” Aaron makes it absolutely clear that these victims didn’t hurt the unsub first, they just remind him of the person who did.

“These boxes contain accident reports uh, from a strip of route 7 between Bend and Eugene. There’s about 5 years worth, we’re going to need everyone you can spare to comb through them,” Y/N says, taking the lid off of one of the boxes.

“We’ve also compiled a list of local rehabilitation facilities where the unsub may have gone to recover. Use the profile as you canvas these places,” Spencer adds.

“Remember we’re looking for a white male in his early 40s, former military who may have sustained serious injury in a car accident,” Aaron makes the final summary and then disburse.

He reaches for the TV remote and then, turns it up to hear JJ on the local news giving the same report.

“Though only owners of red coupes have been targeted, at this point, we’re asking all the driving public to be vigilant on the road. If you know anyone who fits this description please contact the Bend Police Department immediately. Thank you.”

While JJ is on the news, Derek and Dave have split off two canvases a few different facilities and ask questions. Y/N is about to leave to hit up a few more with Agent Feder, which leaves Aaron with Spencer to go over everything else and wait for calls. So far nothing serious has come from the lines, mainly people saying they’ve seen reckless red coupes on that road or saying their neighbour has that kind of car, but nothing substantial.

When JJ comes back she weeds through the emails from the news station, some people have contacted the news instead of the police because they want their 5 seconds of fame if they got the suspect right. So far almost everyone just knows someone with a black truck, nothing about a disabled man or even licence plate numbers to back their theories up.

And then they get a walk-in.

“Hotch,” JJ comes over to hear him. “This guy walked in, his name is Gil Bonner.”

“What’s his story?” He asks.

“It’s about the unsubs accident he says it’s his fault,” she says, scratching the back of her head and looking as though she doesn’t know if she can believe him or not.

Aaron stands right up and follows her over to the man with Spencer in tow, he shakes his hand and introduces himself as the head of the investigation, making him follow them into another room to talk privately. “Tell us the story from the beginning.”

He sits down and stares at the wall for a moment. “It was late and I had spent all day in Eugene with my mom, she’d been sick… I should’ve been driving, but I just wanted to get home to see my little girl. And it was darker than usual. I remember the moon, it was just a sliver. Right outside the Cascades, my phone started vibrating. When I went to reach for it, I knocked it off the far side of the seat and it fell down by the door and I thought I could reach.”

He gets teary-eyed explaining it all, he can’t meet their eyes for worry they’d look at him like a monster. He’s so filled with shame, he’s been holding this story in for such a long time that recalls it like a folktale.

“You took your eyes off the road,” JJ says in the most sympathetic tone, talking to him like a teacher or a friend. Trying to make sure he can trust them.

“It could’ve been for more than a few seconds, but when I looked back up there were lights and this horn was blaring and I swerved at the last second and I just… kept on going,” he explains. “Without a scratch?”

“You’d gone into the oncoming lane?” Hotch asks, trying to better understand.

The man just nods.

“What happened to the other vehicle?” Spencer asks.

“That’s the thing,” he whispers, brows furrowed, he’s trying his hardest to think back to the exact things that happened that night but the sleep deprivation from that night and the time that’s passed make it hard. “It was in my rearview mirror and then it was gone. Vanished!”

“Why didn’t you stop?” Aaron asks, there is no way he wouldn’t stop if this was him.

“It didn’t seem real,” he explains, still not able to look at him.

“You’re saying you just pretended it didn’t happen?” JJ asks.

“I guess if you tell yourself something for long enough… You can make anything true,” he says, trying his best not to break down. The guilt is eating him alive.

“Well you’re here now,” Aaron assures him that it’ll be okay. “Tell us about the other vehicle.”

“It was the truck you’re looking for.”

“How do you know that?” Aaron needs him to be as sure as possible.

“When I saw the news… it all made sense,” he explains. “It’s come back for revenge.”

They all look at each other, concerned for this man. He’s speaking as if the truck is a ghost and it’s looking for him not that there's a killer out there using this accident as a reason to kill.

“When did the accident happen?” JJ asks, bringing him back to the real issue.

“December ’07,” he spits right back, knowing it exactly. “The second Saturday.”

Spencer quickly reads over the report in his hand, “There were no accidents reported in December of 2007.”

“No,” he whispers, shaking his head. “Thats— no??”

“Maybe you have your dates wrong?” Aaron sympathizes, it was a long time ago and he was under stress. Dates blur in times like these.

“Could’ve been November?”

“Uh, memories are kinda like puzzle pieces,” Spencer explains. “And it’s-it’s quite possible that in suppressing these for so long, you’ve sort of rearranged things?”

He breaks down then, shaking his head.

“How long was your mother sick?” Aaron asks, maybe this will get them closer to the real date.

“5 months,” he knows that for a fact. When it comes to sick relatives, to losing a loved one, you don’t forget that. “She… she died in January. That much I know.”

They let him stay in the room to calm down as long as he needs to but Aaron and Spencer leave. They head back to the table silently and then they both sigh as they take their seats.

“I feel bad for the guy,” Spencer shares.

Aaron nods, “I remember when my mother died, she was sick for a few years before. I remember it like it was yesterday… hopefully JJ and Garcia can pull some hospital records and we can pinpoint when the moon was like that in the later months of 2007.”

“Maybe the others will come back with something from the rehab facilities that we can cross references with him,” Spencer agrees.

“I hope they come back soon,” Aaron says with his small voice.

“It’s strange you know? We’ve been a team for years and I’ve been beside Derek almost every day since the start and now when he’s partnered off doing something without me, it feels like I haven’t seen him in ages,” Spencer sympathizes with him.

“It is weird,” Aaron agrees. “But it’s also nice loving someone so much that a few minutes apart makes you miss them.”

He nods, trying not to smile too big, “I’m glad she finally told you, I’ve been waiting for you guys to get together for a year.”

“I’ve been expecting you and Morgan to get together since 2005,” he teases back.

“Why?”

“Because he’s always been into you, from the moment you started he was fascinated in you and you just never picked up on it because his flirting comes off as teasing,” Aaron explains. “Y/N was telling me that when we went to Chicago to help him after he was arrested, you were at his mother's house and she said he always talked about you to them. He’s been in love with you a lot longer than you think.”

“Oh,” Spencer softens. “I had no idea.”

He laughs, “we know.”

“I knew Y/N was into you when we were at the cemetery, right after New York,” he explains. “I have never seen someone yell at you like that.”

“I know,” he just shakes his head with a smile. “It was a shock for me too.”

JJ comes rushing from the room then, “Hey, I called Y/N and told her about the crash happening between September ’07 and January ’08, she’s with Derek right now at one of the facilities. Feder got called to another issue somewhere else, but they think they found someone who fits the profile. They’re on their way back now.”

“Sounds good.”

—

When Y/N and Derek get back they take a seat at the table beside their partners and get Penelope on the line. She’s able to send them over details on this guy from the rehab centre, Ian Coakley and Reid pulls the information about said crash from one of the boxes Y/N brought out earlier that day.

“Ian and Sheila Coakley crashed while driving home from Napa Valley, going eastbound on Route 7 around midnight. It appeared their car was run off the road, and flipped numerous times. No witnesses,” Spencer recounts before laying the file on the table for the others to see.

“His wife was riding in the passenger seat, she died at the scene,” Y/N adds, heartbroken for them.

“Coakley survived,” Aaron read from the file. “Paramedics indicated spinal cord injury.”

“He fractured his T6 and T7 vertebrae,” Morgan says with a sigh, crossing his arms and sitting back in his seat.

“Paraplegic,” Aaron nods along.

“That’s not all, he’s a former light-wheel mechanic in the Army National Guard,” Spencer adds.

“Did it say anything about a red car?” Quinn asks.

“No. It says Coakley suffered memory loss after the accident,” Aaron reads from the file.

“Short-term retrograde amnesia is common after a serious accident,” Spencer confirms.

“I think it’s safe to say he remembers now,” Rossi shakes his head.

“Do we have an address?” Aaron asks, wanting to go forward with an arrest.

“I’m working on it,” Penelope says from the office phone which has been on speaker the whole time. “Okay, the house Coakley and his wife bought was foreclosed on 10 months after the accident.”

“Well, there’s gotta be a paper trail then?” Spencer jumps the gun.

“Yeah and that trail leads to a land called nowhere,” Penelope spits back. Typing away. “He cashed some insurance cheques during his stay at Adelman's house but after he left... Zilch."

“Any relatives he could be staying with?” Aaron asks.

“No, I tried that,” Garcia explains. “There’s no family in the area. My exquisitely educated guess is he’s either squatting or subletting with cash.”

“What about his truck?” Rossi asks.

“He owns a ’79 Dodge D100, he bought it used 10 years ago,” she explains.

“he’s had to rebuild it several times now, parts can’t be easy to find for a truck that old,” Rossi reminds her. She’s found more people with less before.

“I smell what you’re cooking agent… Checking auto suppliers in Bend… yeah! Rossi gets a fruit cup with lunch. He’s having the parts drop-shipped through Sid’s Auto and sent directly to an address in southwest Bend,” Penelope explains in her ever-Penelope way.

“Send us the exact address, let’s gear up,” Hotch says as he starts to stand up. “We’ve got two options, either he’s there or he’s out stalking his next victim, I want the crime scene to be there to search the house regardless of if he’s there and if he isn’t I need unmarked cars canvassed in the surrounding areas so he doesn’t get spooked if he comes back and sees sirens and officers. We’re getting this guy. Today.”

“I’ve sent it to your phones and the fax machine there at the station,” Penelope explains. “I’ve also emailed the information to the local judge, we should have a warrant ready in the next half hour.”

“You’re a godsend, Penelope,” Derek reminds her.

“I know. Be safe, come home to me!”

“We always do!” Y/N smiles before hitting the end call button and joining the others in getting ready.

—

Derek is the first one inside, like always, he’s followed by Rossi, then Hotch, Quinn and finally Y/N and a few cops. They clear each room, his garage and his backyard, he’s not there. Just like Aaron suspected.

“His truck is gone,” Derek says as he comes back in from the garage.

“Get all the vehicles off the street and start a perimeter,” Rossi orders to the other officers. “If he comes back this way we’ll want to be ready for him.”

“On it,” they all scatter like flies, leaving the house just as the crime scene unit comes in with Reid and JJ.

“Rossi,” Derek gets his attention, “you’re gonna want to see this.”

Rossi follows him out into the garage leaving Y/N and Aaron in Coakley’s kitchen. “I want you guys to search everything, find me any clues as to who he’s going to be getting next, Quinn and I are going to be driving around Route 7 and the reservoir looking for him. Radios work better than phones up here,” he hands Y/N a walkie and then another to JJ and Reid. “Give this one to Dave and Morgan, Call me if you hear anything.”

“You bet,” JJ gives him a smile and starts getting to work.

“Hey,” Y/N stops him before he heads out. “Be careful.”

“I always am.”

They head out then, Hotch drives this time with Quinn in the driver's seat. He’s a quiet man, he doesn’t speak unless spoken to and he could do without small talk. Aaron liked that about him. So far they’ve only talked about the case and similar ones like it, he’s asked questions about if they’ve seen anything like this before and about the other team members but that’s about it.

So needless to say, he’s shocked when he brings up Y/N.

“You two been together long?” He asks.

“Hm? Oh, me and Agent Y/L/N? A while now, yeah,” he tries not to smile.

“She’s nice, smart too,” he compliments.

Aaron just nods, “She’s amazing.”

They’re quiet again for a while, the radio on low and Quinn hums along. He looks out the window and points out every black truck they see but none of them have the License plate they’re looking for, but they know he’s out there.

They get a radio in from Morgan about 15 minutes into the drive, Coakley had photos of previous vics and one man they haven’t seen before. Garcia traced his licence plate and Derek took Y/N over to the guy's house to ask where he is. He’s on a bike ride, headed towards the reservoir. They have this man's bike path mapped out and are chasing him.

“Hotch, we’re on Route 26 heading towards the reservoir, I think we’re about halfway around the loop. So far, no sign of him,” Y/N radios through.

“Copy that. We’re headed southbound on 20. Hopefully, we can hit route 26 before they fly by,” Aaron radios back.

He speeds up, zooming along the old country roads, dust flying behind his tires. He’s careful around the edges, hyper-vigilant that this is a scary road and he’s not the only one on it.

The next radio in is from JJ. “Hotch, you know how Coakley was driving his wife’s car on the night of the accident?”

“I remember.”

“It was a red coupe,” she explains.

“Are you sure?” He can’t believe it.

“We have pictures,” she says, completely positive.

Hotch looks at Quinn carefully and then back to the road, Quinn holds his own radio to his mouth, “What does it mean?” He asks.

“Maybe there was no other car on the road?” JJ hypothesizes.

“Think about it, the make and model of his target car keeps changing,” Y/N chirps in from her end.

“Like he knows they aren’t right,” Hotch adds.

“And his doctor at the rehab facility called it fluid memory but what if it was more than that?”

“So if it’s a single car accident—

“It was Coakley's fault,” Y/N cuts off Quinn. “He was driving back from Napa Valley that night. That’s a long drive.”

“Fell asleep at the wheel,” Quinn can fill in the blanks himself. He’s heard it all before. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“The guilt of that would be overwhelming. The truth, almost impossible to take,” Y/N adds.

“So he’s projecting blame?” Aaron asks, corroborating his theory.

“A red coupe did cause the accident, and he was driving it,” Y/N assures him he’s right.

They reach route 26 then, tyres squeal as he takes a turn and then he gets right back up to speed. Aaron follows the winding path and from his elevation, he can see the truck chasing a group of bikers as they come up the hill. There’s an intersection coming up, the bikers are already heading through it as Aaron goes even faster, hitting 120mph now, he’s going to meet Coakley at the intersection.

“HANG ON!”

Aaron smacks right into the front end of Coakley’s truck as the bikers get away without a scratch. The airbags deployed, they get ditched and the ringing in his ears comes back. He can’t move from his seat, he can barely open both eyes, and he knows he’ll be diagnosed with a concussion as soon as he’s seen by someone but he doesn’t care.

By the time he’s able to get out of the vehicle, it’s too late. The truck has backed up and he’s about to head off after the bikers once more. But Quinn draws his weapon and starts to talk to him anyway.

“You can’t blame other people for what you’ve done Coakley!”

That’s not going to work.

“Detective!” Aaron yells from his seat.

“You know the truth! No one else needs to die,” he continues.

“It’s not going to help!” Aaron tries to get him to stop.

“There was no other red car, was there?” He finally says, making Coakley snap back into reality.

These cases end in 1 of two ways. Either kill themselves or get the cops to do it for them.

Aaron unclips his seatbelt and starts trying to get out but there’s too much damage to the front end of the SUV. His door won’t budge. Coakley is starting his truck back up and he’s about to get away so he pushes harder on the door. It pops open just as Coakely speeds off.

Y/N, riding with Derek, sees Aaron leaning against the SUV and the blood on his face. She jumps out of the car before it even comes to a halt while Aaron shouts, “Go! Go!!” Making Derek keep chasing him.

“Aaron Hotchner!” She scolds him, “What the fuck was that?”

“Oh, don’t start with me,” he waves her off, heading back to the crashed SUV to talk to Detective Quinn.

“You do this all the time!” She yells at him, following him over. “You put yourself in harm's way and you get hurt and then you get pissy that you can’t go back to work right away. Maybe if you stopped putting yourself in the middle of shit—

He turns back to her in the middle of her rant, “I get it! I’m an idiot! But at least those bikers are still alive!”

“Thank god for that!” She yells right back. “It's not like we need you to stay alive too.”

“What is your problem? I’m clearly alive right now?!”

“This time.” That’s all she says. She turns around and starts walking away, up the hill and towards where Derek and all the cops drove.

She makes him feel bad, but at the same time, he’d do it again. His job isn’t to protect and serve, it’s to profile and track down killers. That’s it. He should know that by now… but it doesn’t stick. He’s never been just a normal cop, Derek has, so his instincts aren’t always questioned. It’s ingrained in him. The team brushes it off and sometimes Aaron has to give him a talk.

No one ever gives Aaron the talk. Except Strauss, sometimes she gets on his ass but it’s never got a good reason.

Having someone he loves so much, who loves Him so much, yell at him… that’s new. And he doesn’t like it.

—

Y/N has her own room key, she leaves the precinct before the others and heads to their room so that she doesn’t have to talk to Aaron or see him anymore. She’s still so mad at him. He knows it too.

He arrives at the hotel later on, slowly but surely, he shows up after she’s already changed and sitting in the middle of her own bed. Making it clear to him that he can have the other. She’s in the one furthest from the door, on what is usually his side so that she’s extra far away from him when he gets in.

“Hey,” he says with his safest voice, watching as she simply raises her brows to acknowledge him and then goes back to her book. She sighs, a huff of air leaves her nose and she’s biting her tongue, She clearly wants to say something but doesn’t.

He drops his bags on the floor, kicks off his shoes, tosses his suit jacket onto the free bed and slowly makes his way over to her bed, sitting on the edge with his ankle locked under his other knee. He cocks his head to the side and stares softly. “I’m sorry.”

“Okay.”

“I mean it. I just get so caught up with these guys that I forget that you’re right behind me and you’re watching and everything I do has consequences that you have to deal with, too,” he explains, trying to be as genuine as humanly possible. He wants her to believe him.

“Did you at least get it checked out?” She asks, softening a bit.

He nods and points to the bandage on his forehead, “No concussion and my ear is okay. My chest might bruise up from the seatbelt and this little cut will heal in a day or two, but other than that, I’m okay.”

She nods then too, getting a little choked up. “I can’t lose you. I just got you. I never thought it would happen, Aaron. I thought you loved your ex-wife still and my little crush would end up suffocating me until I moved units. I didn’t think you’d ever love me back and to see you get hurt again after everything we’ve gone through just triggered me a little.”

“It’s okay,” he quickly gets up and sits closer to her, pulling her in for a hug. He rubs her back and kisses the top of her head. “I love you so much I’m never going anywhere. I’m not saying I won’t get hurt again, I can’t see the future, but I’m going to try and stop putting myself in the middle of things.”

“You promise?” She whispers, tossing the blanket away so she can crawl into his lap. She cups his face as she sits down on him. “Please?”

He nods, “I promise, sweetheart. I’m not going to put myself in the middle of this shit anymore.”

“So we won’t have screaming matches in the middle of the woods anymore?” She teases.

He smirks, “Not unless you want to.”

She manages to laugh, dragging her hands down to his tie, she starts to undo it. “I mean… it was pretty hot. I like when you’re angry, every time I’ve seen you put someone in their place I get a little hot and bothered, so it was strange having you yell at me for a change.”

“When you yelled at me that first time, in the cemetery,” he whispers, staring at her lips. “I had to go back to the car because being a little high and in pain… and then getting yelled at like that…”

“Seriously?” Her jaw drops and she looks at him like she’s starving.

He nods again, “You’re hot when you’re in charge.”

She just smirks, pulling his tie off, and she keeps unbuttoning his shirt. She pulls it out of his suit pants, finishes off the buttons, and then runs her hands over his chest. Through the sprinkling of chest hair, she feels him up, “I thought our first time would be more slow and sweet and cute… but now I want to get all bossy and make you fuck the shit out of me.”

“Make me?” He chuckles, “Really?”

“Yeah,” she teases. She leans in and kisses his cheek, “I think,” and then his jaw, “You should,” and down his neck, “fuck me,” her kisses go lower, “‘n show me how sorry you are.”

Her hands now roaming around to his back, over his hips and over his bulge. He basks in it, already getting hard underneath her from just the memory of her wrath. She keeps kissing down his chest until he cups her face and brings her in to kiss her on the lips. He’s kissed her a million times by now but it’s still so exciting. The way she melts against him, the feeling of her tongue against his, the way she slightly whines when his hand starts to move down to her neck and his thumb caress her jaw.

“Mm,” she mumbles as she pulls away. “Can we—“ he steals another few kisses. “Too many—“ more kisses. “Clothes. Need you.”

He lets her pull back enough just to look at him, both catching their breaths, “You have me.”

She reaches for the hem of her shirt and he stops her, taking it in his grip instead he begins to lift it over her head. Arms in the air, he gets it up as much as he can from this sitting position and they laugh when she gets trapped inside her shirt and has to help him pull it all the way off. She tosses it to the side and then rests her hands back on his chest, gently running her fingertips down to his belly button, she starts to unbuckle his belt and pull it through the loops.

He kisses her again and again and again until she starts to grind against him, wanting more. He cradles her body and carefully starts to sit up on his knees, laying her back down against the mattress. He hovers over her and kisses her jaw and down her neck, trailing his hands down her sides until he reaches her shorts and he pulls back just so he can get them off her.

She helps him get them off and sits up on her own knees to kiss him while she pushes his shirt off his shoulders. He blindly flings it to the floor and she reaches down to unbutton his suit pants and reach her hand in there. Between his pants and his boxers, she cups his length and starts to rub. His hands land on her shoulders, smoothing down the warm skin of her back he pulls her in flush against him and slightly moans into her mouth. Her free hand comes up to grip the hair at the nape of his neck, holding him as close as possible.

She smiles into the kiss, he simply bites her lip as he pulls away. He takes a peak between their bodies to see her boobs pressed against his chest, “you gonna let me go so I can take these pants off?”

She leans in and steals another kiss, “Mmm, maybe,” she kisses him again and again. “Just hurry up about it.”

He’s quick to get off the bed and push both his pants and his underwear off, he even pulls off his socks and leaves them all behind in the pile of discarded things. She’s sat there, leaning back with her hands flat on the mattress, she looks him up and down and then her eyes stay fixed on his cock.

“Like what you see?” He teases her, he grips her ankles and tugs her to the edge of the bed.

She’s a bit shocked, laughing it off, she grips his sides and stares up at him, “As a matter of fact, I do.”

He hauls her to her feet, cups her cheeks and he smiles. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she smiles back. “Are you nervous?”

He nods, “Just a little. It’s been almost 2 years since I’ve had sex…”

“We’ll its been a lot longer than that for me and I’m almost positive that sex hasn’t changed that much in that time,” she teases. “I love you and I trust you, so I know it’ll be good.”

He kisses her once quickly, “just good?” He kisses her again, the side of her mouth this time. He starts to kiss down her neck, over her collarbones and he cups her boobs so he can smother them in kisses too. Eventually starts to kneel, taking his kisses lower, he starts to take her panties off, kissing her lower stomach and then he looks up at her. “Sit down, let me show you how good I can be.”

She sits on the edge of the bed, he spreads her legs and kisses from her left knee all the way down her thigh and then her lower lips. He spreads them with his fingers and licks a stripe over her cunt, making her gasp as she reaches out to grip his hair at the root.

She holds back her pretty little noises, and as much as he wants to tell her to go wild, he knows JJ is just past that wall in her own room. From all the teasing Derek and Spencer get, she wasn’t going to be loud enough to be added to the relentless jokes her coworkers make.

He teases her hole with his middle finger, feeling how wet she already is, he circles around the opening a few times before plunging his finger inside.

“Fuck,” he groans against her, flicking his tongue back and forth, sucking at her skin and fingering her cunt all at the same time. “You taste like heaven.”

She grinds against his face, barely sitting on the edge of the bed anymore as he wraps his arm around her legs and holds her impossibly close to his mouth. The sound of him eating her out is disgustingly euphoric, he’s so deep it’s like he’s eating her out in search of her soul.

She’s trembling as she gets closer and closer when he stops fingering her, sucking the wetness from her and bringing it back up with his tongue before he sucks on her clit again. That does it, she cums instantly with a shout, covering her mouth and hoping he doesn’t let her hit the floor as she grinds and thrashes through her orgasm. And he doesn’t stop, tongue fucking her to taste the best part.

Her feet touch the floor, and her back is the only part of her still on the bed as she rides his face through it. He pulls back and lets her drop down to the floor and sit in his lap but his "old man" knees are starting to hurt like this, she goes to kiss him and he lets her get a few kisses in before he holds her closer and starts to stand with her. He pulls away just enough to turn her around and push her against the mattress, he kisses her spine and folds himself over her. He moves her hair off her back and kisses her neck. Again, right under her ear, “Are you ready?”

“Please, please,” she begs. “I need you.”

“I might have a condom in my—

“Don’t need it, I’m on birth control, it’s okay,” she assures him.

“Are you—

“Aaron, fuck me, please,” she begs, sticking her ass out even more, taunting him.

He stands up straighter and grips his leaking cock, tapping it on her ass a few times before guiding it between her folds. Teasing her, he grinds the head against her clit a few times before aligning with her hole and starting to push in, inch by inch, she gasps at the feeling and sucks in a sharp breath the deeper he gets.

He folds over her as soon as he bottoms out, kissing her shoulder gently as he reaches out for her hand on the mattress. He interlocks their fingers, holding her hand above her head, he’s as close to her as humanly possible and yet he wants to be closer. He wants to live in her, settle in right beside her soul and never leave.

When he starts to thrust, he goes slowly at first, she reaches back behind herself and rests her hand on his side. Her nails dig into his skin and she whines, “Oh my god, Aaron.”

He kisses her neck and right under her ear, “Can you feel how sorry I am now?” He slightly pulls out and snaps his hips against her then, fucking her quick and dirty.

“Yes, yes! Oh my god, we should get mad at each other more often,” she all but screams, slightly muffled by her face against the mattress.

He pulls away, letting go of her hand so he can rest his on her lower back as he fucks her harder. She brings her one leg up onto the mattress, opening herself up so he can get a little deeper. He grips her leg under the knee and keeps going, harder and more frequent thrusts, making her gasp and moan into the mattress to try and stay quiet but she can’t. It feels too good for her.

For him, it’s even better. The way she sucks him in, how warm she is, how wet she is… she’s even better than he ever imagined and he never wants it to end. But he misses her face. He wants to embrace her and hold her close and make love to her, not just fuck her. So he pulls out.

“wha—

“Roll over. Move up,” he instructs her, kneeling on the bed, he watches her do just that and gets between her legs. He hovers over her, leaning in for a kiss as she reaches between them and guides him back inside.

Kissing her as he trusts, their lips move together and their tongues clash through breathy moans and whispers of “I love you.” Her legs wrapped around him, her arms around his middle, her nails dug into his back as she kneaded at his skin.

He reaches between them, his hand on her pelvis and his thumb starts to circle around her clit. He wants her to be as close as he is, he wants them to cum together. He wants her to enjoy this as much as he was, and from the way she clenches around him and the cute little noises she makes, he knows she is.

“Oh, Aaron,” she whines, tossing her head back.

He kisses her cheek and buries his head in the crease of her neck as he drives into her over and over. He starts to smile to himself, thinking about how she said sex hasn’t changed that much since the last time he had it… But he’s never had sex as good as this. It was never this passionate, never this needy, never this euphoric.

He bites her gently, grazing his teeth along her skin, making her gasp. He wants to suck at her neck, cover her in marks, and let everyone in the world know he’s been there and she belongs to him. He feels so possessive. He knows he can’t. They have to sit on the jet in front of their friends for most of their morning and well into the afternoon tomorrow and if they’re unlucky, start another case right after. He can’t mark her the way he wants. But he can make her his in another way…

“You close?” He asks, prepared to hold back if she isn’t.

But she nods enthusiastically, “god, yeah.”

Through bated breath he asks, just to make sure, “Are you still okay with me finish—

“Yes, yes, please, cum in me?” She begs. “I need it, Aar, please?”

“I got you,” he assures her. “Let go, sweet girl, whenever you’re ready.”

His trusts stay steady and even, his thumb circles her clit, and he kisses just under her ear. She grips him so tight, wrapped around him like her life depended on it and her breathing changes. He knows she’s right there and he’s going to be right after. He wants to feel the way her orgasm sucks him in deeper, the way she pulsates around him, the way her body goes limp and quakes and the beautiful sounds she’ll make before he gives in. He already got a taste of that earlier, but now he wants to memorize it with his cock deep inside of her.

She starts to quake then, her thighs rumble against him. Her back starts to arch, pushing her core closer to him instinctually like this is what she was made for. Her orgasm is right there, bubbling to the top and about to spill. He gives her one last piece of motivation.

“Come on, cum for me,” he whispers. “Be a good girl and— oh, there it is!” He teases as she releases.

He was right. She clenches around him, pulling him in even deeper. He moves his hand away from her clit, wraps them around her back and starts to fuck her even harder, making her cry out over and over, completely disregarding the fact that her coworker is in the next room. He’s so close, right there, he moves to kiss her on the mouth again and she cups his face as he does so. Breathing while kissing her, his hot breath on her face as their lips and tongues meet once more.

His body heats up, his stomach starts to feel like a swarm of butterflies and then it erupts through his bloodstream. He cums with a deep groan, dropping his forehead against hers, he fucks into her once more and stays there as rope after rope of cum releases inside of her.

“I love you,” he pants, collapsing on top of her, holding her back just as close as she’s holding him. “I love you so much.”

—

On the jet in the morning, everyone sat down with their coffee and quiet. Dave has a manuscript for his new book to proofread. Derek has his music. Spencer has some medical journals he finds interesting and JJ has a big smile on her face. “You guys will never guess how long the couple in the room beside me was fucking last night.”

He watches as Y/N’s eyes widen and the colour leaves her face. He just bites his tongue, pressing his lips together he flips through a file, pretending not to hear her.

“How long?” Derek asks.

Just as she goes to answer Spencer speaks up, “Weren’t you beside Y/N and Hotch…”

“I hate you guys, I hate you so much,” Y/N finally bursts out. She shook her head, mortified. “I can’t believe you. I can’t. Seriously?”

They all laugh, Spencer and Derek are relieved that they’re not the only ones to get embarrassed now and JJ is just happy she’s the one to get to start the teasing this time after a year and a bit of being teased about Will.

“I can write you all up, remember?” Aaron reminds them, trying so hard not to smirk but he fails. He knows he’s blushing, but he doesn’t care. He had the best sex of his life last night, he’s allowed to glow a bit.

They shut up after that but Spencer does reach his hand over, palm facing Y/N, and she gives him a reluctant high five.

General Taglist

@ncsls0515 @stevesmunsons @reidsbookclub @sweetyyhippyy @manuosorioh @mrs-dr-reid @k-k0129 @squishyturtle @katsukis1wife @babybisexual @marsmunson86 @buckleyhans

IKP

@southernraven @alluringshawn @lambsheepsheeping @lmg-stilinski24 @louderfortheback @deludedfruitcake @kleff03 @mrs-ssa-hotch @maxinehufflepuffprincess @lokifanfic2021 @art-and-thoughts @forkswabutnoforks4me @no-1martinipolice @panhoeofmanyfandoms

#fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

Note

Im the one who asked about requests lol, I just have this Hotch thought and I can't stop thinking about it 🫂😭

Imagine Garcia "screaming" about a video, telling the whole team about it (except Hotch and Reader), and that video is on tiktok. When they spill something about the video, Hotch and Reader ask which video they're referring to, not knowing it's from a tiktok account where the person makes videos on Hotch x Reader (like edits taken from some interview where they look at each other, slightly touches and things like that) and it's a whole profile with a lot of videos like that! So the whole team teases them and they obviously like eachother!!

Feel free to change anything!!

Gone Viral, Gone Wrong

Thank you to this anon for submitting my first request! I might have written it (and especially Hotch) be a little (way) too sappy, but I love your idea so much and I hope I did it some type of justice! WC: 3.3K

GIF by ssa-aaron-hotch-hotchner

There must be something on your face. Toothpaste, maybe, or coffee on your shirt, or a tear in your trousers. Something to explain the numerous pairs of eyes following you as you dash for the elevator, just as you always do.

This morning’s been one for the books. Between a text from your highschool ex-boyfriend, congratulating you on your ‘newfound fame’ — whatever he means by that, you don’t know — and the incomprehensibly slurred voicemails you woke up to from your sister, you aren’t quite sure what to do with yourself.

You tell yourself you’re probably imagining it. But Anderson doesn’t say a word to you as you both make your way to the BAU, just casts you sidelong glances between the rapid texts he’s sending. You hope to God it’s not you, that he's just having an awful morning, then scold yourself for it. If you’re not off to a good start, at least somebody should be.

It’s the silence in the bullpen that confirms your suspicions. Emily, JJ, and Garcia sit huddled around Emily’s computer, squeezed onto two chairs they’ve pulled together. Morgan leans over them to look at the screen. He’s in the middle of laughing at something Garcia’s said when you walk in.

You don’t even need Reid’s not-so-subtle hiss of “Guys–” to know you’re not going crazy. The smirks that drop from their faces, the giggles that extinguish themselves as you enter through the double doors, are more than enough.

Four profilers and a technical analyst, as it turns out, can be rather terrifying when the force of their stares are directed at you.

A sheepish grin tugs at your lips as you hold up your peace offering: a tray of coffee. “Hi?”

You’ve come to know how the team works. You know exactly how they react when ambushed, how they spring to action like a well-oiled machine.

There’s something a little mechanical to them now, bared in their responses to your arrival. After giving you one of his usual tight-lipped smiles, Reid flips open a random file on his desk and begins to read. JJ grabs the computer mouse, clicks a few times, and turns away from the monitor to greet you. Morgan clocks the drinks in your hands and conjures a grin just a little wider than normal.

“Morning, sunshine,” he says as he plucks the tray from your hands, thanking you with a squeeze to your forearm.

Garcia, eyeing the gesture, nearly chokes on the end of the pen she’s chewing. She stands to usher you over to your desk, her chirpy voice a balm attempting to smooth over what has been a very odd start to your working day.

“What were you guys looking at?” You ask her, eyebrows raised. If anyone’s going to tell you what’s going on, Penelope is, without a doubt, most likely to spill.

You’re disappointed – and even more confused – when she stands her ground. Through her ramble, you just about make out the words “cat” and “spa” before she’s kissing your cheek and speeding away to your lair.

You sigh as you switch on your own computer. One thing is clear. The team doesn’t like to be ambushed. And, somehow, that is exactly what you have done.

—

After finishing off one of your consults, you suffer through a morning briefing that ends up being far more complicated than it needs to be. It’s only a paperwork day, by the looks of things. In theory, this is the ‘easiest’ your job gets; if you’re not called out on an emergency, you can bank on a day of case reports and shitty coffee.

Nothing is ever easy at the BAU, not even now. Everything is out of order. There’s none of the usual idle chatter that precedes a briefing, just a fragile silence. Rossi moves from his normal position to take your place between Reid and JJ. He mutters something about the chair being uncomfortable and shoos you away from your seat. Though you can’t resist the opportunity to call him an old man for his pedantics, you acquiesce and take his spot instead. You find nothing wrong with it.

Then Hotch walks in to start the briefing, and you find about a hundred reasons to curse David Rossi. He’s wearing the gray suit, again, the one he likes pairing with his red tie. That should be a crime in itself. When he takes the only seat available — his usual seat, the one now next to you — you’re almost sure you hear JJ snort. Emily pats her on the back as she conceals it with a very unconvincing cough.

Hotch frowns in your direction, probably mulling over the change in seating plan, then turns his attention to JJ. “Are you alright?”

The blonde clears her throat. “Fine. Thanks, Hotch,” she says.

Garcia rests her elbows on the table, her mouth concealed by the palm of her hand.

Hotch nods, casting another short glance your way. “Good.”

Then he launches into the briefing, and you can almost convince yourself things are perfectly normal, that your face isn’t alight with heat and you’re not avoiding looking at him, that everything is fine. When you’re dismissed, you scurry towards the door fast enough you almost miss it.

“Garcia?” His voice is quiet, his tone soft with something disapproving hiding beneath it. “My office, please.”

Everything is decidedly not fine.

—

By noon, you can’t take it anymore. “Emily Prentiss, what the fuck are you doing?”

The question comes out louder and more harshly than you’d intended. In your peripheral vision, you see Reid’s eyes widen at the desk next to yours. Emily, halfway through a sandwich, freezes.

“I’m sorry?”

The grin fades from her face.

You huff. “You’ve been looking between me and your computer for the last half-hour. What is it? Is there something on my face?” Morgan laughs from the other side of the bullpen, and you raise your voice a little in desperation. “Seriously. Have I done something wrong?”

JJ must have heard the commotion, because she pokes her head out of her office door. She takes one look at you and sighs. “Probably best to get it over with, Em.”

When Emily hesitates, your eyes narrow. “Get what over with?”

She stands and beckons you over to her desk, firing up her computer screen as you settle into her chair. JJ comes down the stairs to join you. Though they don’t move, you can practically feel Morgan and Reid staring at the three of you from across the room.

What you see projected on Emily’s screen doesn’t make things any clearer.

“That’s—” you pause, dumbfounded. “Why are you looking at me and Hotch?”

The picture is easy to place. It must have been taken a few days ago, during a small-town case. Hotch had asked you to deliver a profile to the media when JJ was working on something else. It was far from the first time you’d faced the press head-on during your time at the Bureau, but Hotch had stood by your side anyway.

You’re not sure why she’s chosen this photo, if any, to look at. The wind’s blowing your hair into your face, and you’re midway through changing expressions so it almost looks like you’re in pain.

“Just watch,” Emily says. She presses the spacebar and the picture bursts into action.

—

“—If you believe you have any information that may relate to this case, we’d appreciate you calling the following number…” you say. You proceed to rattle off the number for the tip line JJ’s set up, but only get halfway through before everything derails.

“How do we know this isn’t all just bullshit?”

The voice overpowering yours is weathered, and so is the man who pushes through the crowd of journalists to get close to you and Hotch, whose posture you see straighten in an instant. You watch as the reporters from the city turn to look at the interloper, pens out and waiting, no doubt, for either you or your boss to slip up.

For a long moment, Hotch watches the man, his face twisted in irritation. He merely restates the tip line number and your request for any potential witnesses to come forward.

But the skeptic doesn’t let up. “This guy’s an outsider. Not one of us. Everyone here knows each other, they have done for years—”

“We’re not trying to cause a panic,” you say, your tone even, “We don’t want you all to turn on each other. But the man we’re looking for knows this town. He’s confident finding his way around the forest, even the areas that haven’t been mapped out yet. He knows the shortcuts, which roads are quiet and which are too risky to take. We’re asking you to exercise caution, and to report anything suspicious if you see it.”

“So what? A few pins on a map and you’re convinced it’s one of us?”

Hotch’s jaw tightens. This case has been harder on him than most, and you can sense that he’s on the verge of responding in a way he’ll regret later. You put a hand on his forearm as he raises it to retort, squeezing it gently in the hopes he’ll get the signal you really don’t have the seniority to be sending him: stand down. He takes a deep breath, and you let your hand slide down to meet his wrist, guiding it just a fraction backwards to rest by his side. The contact lasts only a second, maybe two, before you let him be.

When he finally speaks, his voice is measured, his eyes slow to drag themselves from your face. “We’re not here to defend the science behind criminal profiling. Our priorities remain finding the person responsible for these crimes and the safety of this community until we do. If you have any information at all, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We appreciate your cooperation.”

Even the most amateur journalist would know he’s done answering questions. Hotch gives a brief nod, turns and leads you out of the Georgia heat and back into shelter of the precinct. All the time, his hand hovers over your back, his gaze searching for any potential disruptions.

Then there’s his voice, deep and almost inaudible. You feel his breath brush your earlobe. “Thank you.”

—

Oh.

Now you’re looking at it from an outsider’s perspective, you do look a little…cozy with Hotch. Not enough to walk the line of unprofessionalism, but enough for you to notice it.

Emily folds her arms, leans back in her chair. “What’s that about?”

Avoiding her eyes, you shrug. “What’s what about?”

“The canoodling,” JJ says with a smirk, and you slap her arm.

You’re a profiler. You should know your little attempt at denial isn’t going to work, but it doesn’t stop you from trying. “Canoodling? Seriously, Jen? I don’t think anyone under the age of eighty has ever said the word ‘canoodling’.”

You hear Penelope’s kitten heels clacking against the floorboards before you see her. “Doesn’t mean you’re not doing it,” she sings. Her arms wrap around your shoulders from behind.

You groan. “Penny, you know I love you, but what are you doing here?”

“I got lonely,” she says, and her expression is so genuine that you can’t even bring yourself to be upset with her. “Just wait…”

Leaning over you to press the escape button, she exits out of full screen mode and points to the corner of the screen. When you read the number she’s showing you, your breakfast threatens to make a reappearance.

“Would you look at that?” Emily laughs. “It’s gone up.”

You blink. Once, twice, three times. And once more, for good measure. “Six-hundred-and-fifty thousand people have seen that?”

It all starts to make sense. The texts, the calls, the stares, the team’s behavior…you don’t know whether to be relieved or horrified. On the bright side, you’ve done nothing wrong, nothing that could get you fired. But more than half a million people have seen you practically mooning over your boss.

Emily makes a noncommittal noise. “Half of them were probably Garcia. And a good twenty-five or so were us, if that helps.”

“It doesn’t,” You resist the urge to slam your head against the desk. You’ll have to settle for burying it in your hands instead. “Six hundred and…fuck. And they all think–?”

“—That you’re in love with our boss? And that he’s in love with you? Yes.”

“Oh, fuck.” “They think that, too,” says JJ, sounding sympathetic. If it weren’t for the frankly dastardly smile on her face, you’d think she was on your side.

Picturing the general population witnessing you make an idiot of yourself is bad enough. How do you even conceptualize that many people? How many stadiums could you fill solely with people who have seen you head over heels for your boss? Even worse is the thought of Anderson, or your parents, or – God forbid – even Strauss having seen it. You’ll be suspended. Fired. Or, even worse, be called into a mediated meeting with Hotch and HR, where they’ll ask him if you’ve been making him feel uncomfortable.

Emily’s voice pulls you from your shame spiral. “And there’s more, too.”

This world hates you. You’re certain of that as she opens Twitter, putting “FBI agents” into the search bar and bombarding you with hundreds, maybe thousands, of tweets with your image attached. Some are disturbingly sweet. Others poke fun at how obvious you are, and even more disturbingly, seem to think your feelings are reciprocated. That’s not a mental path you can allow yourself to go down.

“So…” You say after a long ten minutes. “What do we do?”

Footsteps, then Rossi appears at the stop of the stairs. “You go back to work. Your break’s over.”

He’s lucky you’re so fond of him. Had it been anyone else (save maybe one person) to disrupt your shame spiral, you’d have been furious. More than furious. You’re still a little irritated now.

There was nothing wrong with his fucking chair.

—

Your mission is simple. Avoid. Deny. Deflect. The rest of your afternoon drags along in a blur of paperwork and teasing comments you choose to ignore (mostly courtesy of Morgan — JJ and Emily have decided you’re nearing your breaking point and vow to leave you alone).

Five o’clock can’t come soon enough. Even when it does, there’s no reprieve. Reid turns out to be the one to betray you as everyone else packs up to leave, their files in his hand. “Sorry,” he whispers. To his credit, he looks like he means it.

“Judas,” you hiss back, but you stand and take the reports from him anyway.

Morgan raises an eyebrow at you. “Going somewhere special?”

You flip him off, muttering something under your breath that sounds just a little like “your funeral”.

The stairs to Hotch’s office feel much longer and much steeper than usual. At every step you reconsider. Reid’s probably still heading for the elevator now. If you catch him, you can guilt him into doing this instead. But your thoughts carry you close enough for Hotch to spot your approach through the blinds. He rises from his desk, opening the door before you can even reach for the handle.

You can’t even look him in the eyes. “Hi.”

Stepping aside to let you inside, he says your name, and it sounds so warm coming from his mouth. You wonder if he knows about your newfound fame, too. He seems to be focusing his stare directly between your eyebrows.

“I just came to drop these off.”

As if your words aren’t explanation enough, you hold up the files for him to see.

“Thank you.” Hotch reaches out to take them, and you feel his fingers brush yours as he does. He stops before the exchange is over. “Are you alright? You seem distracted.”

It won’t be long now before the sun sets. It’s making its final play for glory now, golden light filtering through the window and settling over Hotch’s face. Hints of amber tones surface in his eyes, usually so dark and unreadable, making him appear much softer than usual. Safer.

You sigh. “I think some people got a little more out of that press release in Georgia than we intended them to.”

“Oh. Yes.”

“You know about that?”

You wouldn’t half mind if a wormhole opened up, right there in his office, and transported you to another universe where you don’t even have to think about this moment ever again.

“I do.” He winces. “Garcia’s computer system is the most secure in the FBI, but she doesn’t have an inside voice.”

The dry comment shocks a laugh out of you. “No, she doesn’t. But…it’ll die down, right? No one is actually going to believe that. Us being together would be—”

“Unprofessional,” Hotch supplies after a beat. “Very unprofessional.”

He reaches backwards to put the files you’ve given him on his desk, somehow managing to do so without actually taking a step away from you. If anything, he gets a little closer.

“Exactly. Strauss would kill us if we even thought about it,” you say, “Not that we would, I’m just…”

Now he looks down at you, straight into your eyes. You swear his pupils are dilated, that he slips for just a half-second and lets his attention drift down to your lips. “There’d be a lot of paperwork.”

You nod. “Too much, really. You’ve got enough already. It’d also be…”

“…Nice.”

Hotch stops breathing, lips downturned in a frown. You’re sure you’ve heard him wrong. But half a minute passes, and he doesn’t retract his statement, though he looks as if he’s close to doing so.

“I’m sorry?” Your voice is barely above a whisper. He’s close enough you catch a hint of his cologne, and the woody scent of it makes your head spin.

“I can say it again,” he says through a long exhale, searching your face for any sign of discomfort as he takes another step closer. His breath ghosts your neck. “Or we can forget this ever happened.”

Your answer is almost immediate. “Let’s not do that.”

Hotch tilts your chin up so you’re forced to look at him. You lean upwards to meet him halfway in a kiss that is soft and tentative, the sort that promises everything and asks for nothing in return. One of your hands cups his jaw, and both of his find their way home to your waist, rubbing circles into your skin through your shirt. You smile against his lips. He leans forward as if to chase yours when you pull away. It hits you, now, that this is really happening. The months you've been agonizing over this - whether to make a move or to shut the part of you that cares for him away - have led you here. There's much you've got to think over: what this means for both of your careers, the risk to the team's dynamic, whether it'll even work in the long run, if Hotch wants that too. You know he's thinking the same thing; his face adopts the same mask of concentration it always does when he's considering something. You take a deep breath. It might be hard, but does that stop it from being worth a shot? In the end, you don't think it does.

“I think I’m gonna order takeout tonight,” you say quietly. “There’s a really good Thai place down the street from me.”

Hotch clears his throat. “That sounds nice.”

Shaking your head, you rest both hands on his shoulders, laugh at him. “That was my way of asking you if you wanted to join me.”

“Oh.”

His brow furrows. For a terrible moment, you think he’s about to say no. And then, “Haley has Jack tonight. I…I’d like that.”

You beam, pull back, and head towards his desk to find a pen and a scrap bit of paper. “Here’s my address.” A quick glance down into the bullpen, which is thankfully empty. “Give it ten minutes, then follow me?”

“Okay,” Hotch says. Even you can tell he’s grinning like an idiot, and you make a note of the rare expression. “Okay. I’ll see you soon?”

Squeezing his hand, you kiss his cheek and walk towards the door. “Soon.”

You feel his eyes on you until you reach the elevator.

If you got this far, thank you for reading! I've watched a lot more Dharma and Greg than CM, lately, so I have a feeling that my version of soft!Hotch is currently just a grownup version of Greg Montmgomery????

#fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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Drive Me Home (2/2)

Part 1 Content Warnings: Creep at the Bar™, Soft Hotch WC: 2.5K

。。+゜゜。。+゜゜。。+゜゜。。 “Come on. Just one more!” Emily begs you, her voice loud over the constant chatter. She reaches over the unsettlingly sticky tabletop to grab your forearm, then, sensing your vacancy, searches for another target. “Garcia? JJ?”

Two margaritas and four vodka shots is all it takes to unravel whatever illusion of dignity you’ve managed to scrounge together since joining the BAU. Two margaritas and four shots has you giggling at anything said, funny or not, and struggling to keep your eyes open. Now, if Emily has her way — and you’ve come to learn that she often does when the team unwinds at the bar — a tequila shot is in the cards for you too.

“I’m out.” JJ says with a shake of her head, “Any more and I won’t be alive to see tomorrow morning, let alone Monday.”

“That’s the whole point,” says a now-pouting Emily as she spins in her seat to hound Garcia into agreeing to another round. The first to Morgan’s at the bar making friends, as he puts it. Watching him with a smile pulling at his lips is Reid, who nurses a soda and regales the rest of you every so often with numerical predictions of his chances for success.

Your head is spinning, and it’s got everything to do with the alcohol flooding your veins, not the unfortunate reality of your boss sitting at the head of the table, with those two top buttons open, exposing just a glimpse of his throat. He’s been checking his watch as often as is socially acceptable. Somewhere deep in the haze of your mind, you suspect Rossi, who's long gone, bullied him into coming. Now he nods along with Reid’s tangents, inserts a comment or two whenever the younger profiler takes a breath.

Emily calls your name once more, pinning her hopes onto you. It’s a rookie mistake you make when you nod, having not processed her question properly. By the time you realize what you’ve agreed to, it’s too late to back out. Suppressing a groan, you grab your card and slide out of the booth. You try not to think about squeezing past Hotch as you do it, try ignoring the warmth that spreads into you when your forearm brushes his shoulder.

You fail. Sweet as ever, Garcia offers to join you, but you shake her offer off with a smile, standing on only-slightly-unsteady legs and making the short walk to the bar.

As you slot yourself into the crowd waiting for their drinks, you debate whether Emily will notice you taking a water shot instead of the tequila you’ll buy for her and Garcia. You’re about to take the risk and order one when an unfamiliar hand settles itself on your lower back. Brow furrowing, you whirl around, hoping to see Prentiss or Morgan behind you.

Those hopes are dashed pretty quickly. A stranger presses in close to your side. His fingers curl around your waist in a manner so confident it’d make you laugh, were you sober enough to react with more certainty. Instead, you shiver. And of course he takes that to be a sign, his grin cheshire-cat-wide.

“I’m sorry. Do I know you?” you take a moment to respond as you cover his hand with your own, moving it away from you.

He’s tall, blonde, what many people would deem attractive. But his smile is too quick to appear and just lopsided enough to look practiced. “Not yet,” he says. “What are you drinking?”

“Nothing more now. Just water.”

Your tone is clipped, impersonal, and you hope he gets the message.

If he does, he chooses to ignore it and steps even closer, reaching the same hand across your body and resting it against the bar, boxing you in against it. The proximity has your stomach sinking.

Stephen — really, you’ve no idea what his name is, but he looks like a Stephen, and the type to spell it with a ‘ph’ over a ‘v’, just for the status of the extra letter — raises an eyebrow at you. “Just water? Come on, honey. What do you want? It’s on me.”

The pet name sounds wrong on his lips. You’re an FBI agent. You’ve dealt with the sickest people humanity has to offer, seen more in your short time with the team than most people see in their lives. You’re an excellent shot, giving even Morgan a run for his money. You should be more than capable of dealing with a freak who gets a little too close at the bar, for fuck’s sake.

But you’re tired and a little dizzy, and the scent of his cologne makes your head spin in the wrong kind of way. Emily wouldn’t hesitate to shove him hard, and JJ wouldn’t get herself into this situation in the first place. You’re not Emily or JJ though. You’re just you.

“Thank you, but I’m really not—”

The bartender cuts you off to ask for your order, and you try to forget Stephen’s eyes on you as you rattle it off, opting for an extra glass of water just to spite him.

He isn’t pleased, though his face says otherwise. “You don’t really want that. No strings, I promise. Just let me buy you a drink. Just one.”

You’ve had enough. “I’m not interested.”

Now the smile drops from his face, leaving it a blank mockery of neutrality that makes you sure ‘no strings’ is an empty promise. He leans in even closer, and you suppress a wince at the sensation of his breath against your skin. “You know, you don’t have to play hard to get.” Stephen’s tone is rougher now, all of its artificial sweetness abandoned. He looks you up and down, eyes the neckline of your shirt with a frown. “It’s obvious what you’re looking for.”

Your throat constricts. The air is hot. Too hot. It’s all you can do to keep your hand steady as you pay for your drinks. “I told you, I’m not looking for anything. Or anyone.”

When the bartender slides your drinks across the bar, you rush to grab them, nearly spilling them in your haste to leave. You’re not that lucky. Stephen’s arm is still in your way. You don’t like how your breathing speeds up, chest heaving just a little despite your attempts to remain unfazed, but it’s all too much.

Stephen opens his mouth to retort again.

He doesn’t get far.

“Move.”

A new hand settles itself on your back, and its fingers curve ever so slightly around your hip. If you wanted to back away, there’d be more than enough room. But you don’t.

Turning slightly in Hotch’s hold, you’re not surprised to see him issuing Stephen with the full force of his glare. The creep’s hand retreats, though he stays put otherwise.

“Here, sweetheart,” Hotch takes the tray from you, not even bothering to look at your ‘admirer’ again. His focus is on you, now, and his eyes are soft, one corner of his mouth curving up. ��Thought you could use a hand. I think Prentiss might kill you if you drop another of her drinks.”

You manage to pull yourself together enough to roll your eyes. Of course he picks now to bring that up. “That was one time, Aaron. I don’t think she even remembers it.”

Now Stephen turns and walks to the other end of the bar, and you feel your shoulders loosen at the distance.

Hotch notices, because of course he does. Instead of walking you back to your booth, he stays put and searches your face. “You okay?”

You nod. “Fine. I don’t know why I didn’t…”

Trailing off, you scan the bar. Garcia is laughing at something Prentiss says (some kind of story, based on the gestures she’s making). Reid watches them with fondness in his features, Morgan back and sitting by his side.

“You shouldn’t have had to do anything,” Hotch says quietly. His arm rests by his side now. “I think I’m going to head back. You want to go home?”

“Yeah. I’m gonna call a cab.”

He tilts his head, echoing your words from months ago with just a hint of a smirk playing at his lips. “Everyone and their mother is calling a cab. I’m driving you.”

“Hotch…” you sigh. You can’t trust yourself, now, not to say the wrong thing, not to comment on the something that’s changed between the two of you since you gave him a ride home, not to wonder if he’s noticed it too.

“Let me do this for you. Please.”

His insistence is too gentle to argue with.

“Okay.”

Hotch takes the tray of drinks, leading you back towards the rest of the team.

“You’re an angel, honey,” Garcia tells you. She squeezes your hand in thanks as Hotch sets down the shots and hands you your water. If anyone noticed anything wrong, they don’t mention it, and you’re grateful for that small mercy.

“I think we’re going to head out now,” says Hotch. His hand hovers just above your back, almost touching you, as he goes on to explain that you aren’t feeling well and shouldn’t chance a cab.

You’re not too drunk to miss the communal grin passing through the group like the flu, so you file it away for later and hug the rest of the team one by one, giving Reid a tired smile and a wave goodbye.

Hotch leads you out of the bar and out into the cold in search of his car. You feel yourself take a real breath for the first time in a while.

“Are you alright?”

“Fine. Thank you,” you say, and mean it. The chill in the air helps to clear your head some. At the very least, you don’t feel nearly as drunk as you did inside.

Hotch hums, unlocking the car. Climbing into the passenger seat, you can’t help but laugh.

“What?”

You look over at him, groan quietly. “You’re a liar, Aaron Hotchner. Your car is so much cleaner than mine.”

It really is. You glance over the interior in search of a coffee stain or a loose wrapper, but come up empty handed.

“Guilty,” he shrugs. “And it’ll stay that way, if you behave.”

You’re pretty sure your brain short circuits when he puts his hand on the back of your headrest to reverse out of the parking spot. It takes you longer to respond than usual to his gentle taunting. When you do, it’s a little half-hearted. Maybe you aren’t as sober as you thought.

“Please, Hotch. I’m not about to throw up in your car. I’m not that far gone.”

“No. You’re not,” he pauses, opening the window anyway. “We’re back to ‘Hotch’, now? What happened to Aaron?”

You give him the most innocent look you can manage and plug your address into his satnav. “You’re right there.”

You’re pretty sure the look he gives you now is reserved for murderers. And clearly, on some occasions, you.

Eventually, he relents. “You called me ‘Aaron’, earlier.”

“You called me ‘sweetheart’,” you blurt out before you can stop yourself. Resting your chin on your hand, you turn your head to look out of the window. You don’t want to see the smug expression you’ve come to recognise over the past few weeks, reserved almost exclusively for you. You know he wears it now.

“Did I?”

You don’t answer. Your fingers move to cover your lips, as if that’ll stop you from making more of an idiot of yourself than you already have.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you register his sigh. “Look in the side pocket,” he says, his voice quiet.

“What?”

“In the compartment in the door. Take a look.”

You follow his instructions, finding a few CDs tucked away there. You’re about to tease Hotch for his taste in kids’ audiobooks when you spot it, and feel your breath hitch.

“Hotch…” You say, turning over the copy of Carole King’s Tapestry in your hands. It’s still wrapped in plastic, still new. Taking the disc out of its case, you look to him for permission before sliding it into the player. “When did you…?”

“Indiana. I saw it a few weeks ago, and it made me think.”

You press play, and I Feel The Earth Move floods the car. “You really didn’t have to—”

“—I wanted to,” he frowns as he says it, determination etched into his face. “I don’t have much of a collection, but it’ll get there.”

A comfortable layer of quiet settles between you as you watch the world move outside, late-night stragglers heading from offices with briefcases in hand, or stumbling out of nearby bars, arm-in-arm and laughing. It’s been a long while since you took that first journey alone with Hotch, since your determination not to think about him in any non-professional way wavered and cracked. Now, weeks later, you take turns to bring each other coffee in the morning. You ask him about Jack and revel in how content he is to talk about his son. You look at him and wonder if this slow, tentative thing you’ve built, this easy friendship, is all you’ll ever share.

If it is, you can’t bring yourself to be upset. But you glance at him now, his hair falling over his forehead, and think to yourself that it might not be.

Three songs or so later, Hotch turns into your street. You point out your apartment and wait for him to turn the engine off, but he doesn’t.

“Thank you for tonight,” you say, simply to have something to say that isn’t an admittal of something you really shouldn’t be confessing to.

He hesitates. The car stays running. “You’ve got nothing to thank me for.”

You nod towards the CD player, pressing pause. Silence. “Thank you for this, then.”

“It was your idea,” Hotch says, “You’re a lot more thoughtful than you give yourself credit for.”

It’s sweet. Too sweet.

You laugh at him. “God, you sound like a fortune cookie.”

“I’d make an excellent fortune teller.”

There’s that tone again. It’s flat, but with something exasperated lingering beneath it, something fond.

“Go on, then. What’s in my future?”

He sighs. “A nasty hangover. And a text or two hundred from Garcia, complaining about hers.”

You snort in acknowledgement. “And what do you see in yours?”

Now he turns the engine off, leaning back against the headrest and turns to study you. His eyes trace from yours down to the curve of your lips, and to where your hands lay intertwined in your lap. For a long moment, he says nothing. Your breath is starting to turn the windscreen foggy. Then, with a gentle grip, he takes your hand and brings it to his lips, kisses the tender skin on the inside of your wrist.

“If you’ll have me? Another very uncomfortable conversation with Strauss.”

Your soft, tired smile is answer enough. He leads you to your front door, kisses your forehead, and sees you inside. When that conversation is over, he promises, he’ll be driving you home much more often.

It isn’t very long before he makes good on it, and Reid is a little richer.

#fic rec #fic reblog #aaron hotchner x reader #hotch x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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currently watching Chicago Hope thanks to this fluffy beautiful hair

#he’s my weak spot i can’t take it 😭🤚🤚🤚#chicago hope #thomas gibson

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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ALWAYS pretty ALWAYS!

Hotch in his early 30s. That would have been when he was working at the Seattle field office, shortly before being recruited into the BAU. No wonder there are fics and headcanons about him being the pretty boy of the BAU and the eye candy at FBI functions.

#thomas gibson #criminal minds #aaron hotchner #danny nyland #chicago hope

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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Arrest me please agent HOTchner 🧎‍♀️

Heeey ! I have a Hotch request 😄

Context: she’s one of his first case, some young girl who hacked the Pentagone to make a point to a teacher that you don’t have to be good in class to be a genius in something. They try to arrest her but she didn’t did anything just enter their server and disconnect. But all the way into interrogation she flirts with him. They let her go and he sees her a couple years later?

I don’t know how to end this, but yeah just a thing I got in my head for a while 🥹

hey! i loved writing this one and, again, i want a part two of it, so maybe you should expect one haha. i hope you like it, anon <3

Requests are open!

1991

"I'll plead the fifth in this one..." you smirked up at Agent Hotchner, batting your eyes seductively — or as seductively as you believed you could be — as you observed him through your eyelashes, "And I'm very good at pleading, just so you know".

Aaron didn't react visibly, even though the urge to roll his eyes was definitely there. After a few minutes of interrogation (probably ten, but he wasn't sure, since you were a delight to hear — ironically speaking), Aaron had lost count of how many flirtatious comments you had thrown at him, the situation way more annoying considering that his boss, SSA Gideon, was sitting by his side, observing everything with as neutral as an expression he could have, clearly as unamused as Aaron.

"Oh, come on!" you groaned, clearly unpleased with Aaron's lack of response to your flirt, "You can laugh, right? There's nowhere on your contract saying 'FBI Agents have to be stiff and serious, even the hot ones'!".

"I don't usually laugh when interrogating someone" Aaron replied, opening up the file he had in front of him to read your name out loud, "Much less when they invade the Pentagon's system".

You tried to bit back the proud smile that showed up on your face at the acknowledgment of what you've done — you highly doubted one of those Agents would clap their hands at your achievement, and still you'd rather face them than your parents, that were probably fuming on their way to the Bureau.

If SSA Hotchner and Gideon's faces were the last things you'd see for the rest of your life (that probably wouldn't be as long as you once thought it would), you might as well fall in style.

"That was impressive, wasn't it?" you asked, your voice clearly smug as you leaned against your chair, "I'm really good at that!".

"Not that much" SSA Gideon intervened, "I can name a few hackers that can do the same".

You raised one brow in defiance, trying to mask the way his words had evidently hurt your ego, "I didn't say I'm unique, I said I'm impressive. There's a difference" you pointed in a matter-of-factly way, before turning back at Agent Hotchner, "From now on, I'm only answering your questions, pretty boy".

"It's Agent Hotchner".

You chuckled, "Okay" you nodded curtly, "Pretty Agent Hotchner boy".

That time you saw the way he reacted, his body language denouncing you was starting to frustrate him. If you didn't know it was overstepping — more than you've already overstepped — you probably would make a joke about how you could help him with his frustration, but you weren't really into going to jail over harassment.

Trying to exhaust his patience was one thing. Crossing the line between amusement and crime was something you didn't want to do.

Oh, yeah. You had hacked into the Pentagon.

"Okay, look..." you started, straightening your pose on your chair, grimacing when the metal of the cuffs (an unnecessary accessory, if you will) skimmed on your skin, a clear indicative that you'd soon have a new bruise at that spot, "I've hacked into the Pentagon, true" she directed a pointed look at Gideon, rolling her eyes, "Yes, I'm aware there are a lot of other hackers that can pull that out, but I had a point to make!".

"Which was?" Aaron questioned, his eyes still trained on you. With a quick look to his hand, you noticed he was wearing a wedding band — golden, brilliant; he was probably freshly married. You questioned if he looked at his wife in that intimidating way, or if it was reserved to people like you, or that he judged to be like you.

You took a deep breath, leaning against your chair, "I'm graduating on MIT" you started explaining, even if you knew they could find that information on your file, and that they probably already knew that, considering you'd been smart enough to hack into the Pentagon from your college's computer, but not enough to hide your tracks, "And I was unlucky enough not to get good grades at this specific subject, and my teacher made a point to humiliate me in front of everyone. So I made a point in showing her that while she's theoretically smart, I'm technically smart".

The single raise of Agent Hotchner's brow was enough to reveal what he was thinking about you after your explanation — that you were a spoiled child, that you couldn't have things any other way except for yours, that he could have you arrested solely by how bad your reasoning had been.

"Yeah, pretty Agent Hotchner boy..." you crossed your arms in front of your body, "Not everyone is born with everything on a silver plate, y'know? My attention is not as good as it was supposed to be".

Aaron switched a quick glance with Gideon, his demeanor betraying nothing as they kept their eyes locked for a few minutes, expectation suddenly building on your body along with the urge to pick at your nails, an anxious behavior you had.

"Let her go" Agent Gideon finally said, standing up from his chair, turning his back on you both to walk out of the interrogation room.

"What?" you squealed in confusion, placing the palms of your hands on top of the metallic desk you had between Agent Hotchner and you, "That's all?".

Aaron hummed in agreement, standing up to grab the cuff keys' in his pockets, his hands brushing with yours for a second, and you could swear there was a sudden electricity on that touch, causing you to push your hand away.

He looked up at you with one brow raised again, his voice a bit more humored now, "What? You want to be arrested?".

"You arrested me, pretty Agent Hotchner boy" you reminded, shaking your cuffed hands, "And while I think being cuffed is sexy, I can't wait to remove those. They're hurting my pulse".

"You should've told us, we'd lose it a bit" he shrugged, opening the lock expertly, before sitting on the desk, "You only logged into the system and turned it off. We can't arrest you for turning the computers off, so you're free to go".

You faced him for a while more, trying to find something to say, maybe a snarky remark — a joke? But nothing came to mind. So you only nodded, standing up from the chair with a smile.

"So off I go" you told him, massaging your pulses, "Guess we won't see each other again, pretty Agent Hotchner boy".

Aaron shook his head, crossing his arms, "I hope not".

"Ouch" you put your hand over your chest dramatically, "You wound me, honey. Hope you don't miss me too much".

Aaron finally allowed himself to roll his eyes, standing up from the desk to walk toward the door, "It won't be a problem".

...

2011

You were honestly — and positively — surprised when the message arrived in your inbox, the (a rather last minute) white invitation warming your heart in a way you didn't think it would.

JJ and Will were getting married.

It was a surprise not because you thought you wouldn't be invited, but because you didn't think it would happen at all; the last time you and JJ talked (only a year prior to that date), the woman had been pretty straightforward about not being ready to get married, even if Will clearly was. You were surprised to know that he supported her and it wasn't an issue, even though JJ sometimes complained about how they ended up fighting over the topic.

You were happy they finally got to an agreement. And even happier that their agreement gave her an excuse to leave her house, even for only a few hours.

"You look beautiful!" you stated once you spotted JJ on the dancefloor, bringing her for a hug when she finally recognized you.

"I can't believe you're here!" JJ held you against her body happily, and you could feel her smile on your shoulder as she rocked you from side to side, "I thought you were in Paris!".

You nodded when she pulled back, allowing you to move and embrace Will, that had a similar smile on his face, "I was. But the Pentagon called me back and I was forced to come back. Which is a loss, because I was starting to get used with the accent. And the paycheck".

Will shook his head, laughing at your last comment, "I'm sure Interpol will be missing a great Agent".

"That they will" you nodded eagerly, playfully throwing your hair over your shoulder, "I was their jewel, and now they have nothing. But I'm happy to be back home. Will be even happier when I find a good house for me, since I've sold my old house".

"Oh, that's your lucky day!" JJ commented, immediately taking your hand in hers, already guiding you through the dancefloor to a table where a few people were gathered, laughing at something one of them had said, "My friends' neighbor just passed away, and their old apartment is vacant. Maybe you can rent it".

You smiled, ready to give JJ an answer when you looked at the table again, your eyes widening at the sight of one man in the middle of the group. You froze in your place when you recognized him, your jaw slightly dropped when your eyes met, recognition clearly passing through his eyes as well.

You heard JJ saying your name, and you were fairly aware that she was introducing you to the group, though the only name you managed to hear was, "This is Aaron Hotchner, my boss, and friend".

Boss. It was curious — last time you've seen Agent Hotchner (or pretty Agent Hotchner boy, as you once called him), he was an Agent working under Jason Gideon's supervision.

Ten years had gone by, though. A lot had changed. You, to begin with.

"Oh, huh... hi!" you waved at the group, trying to pretend you had gathered any of their names, "JJ was telling me that one of you had a neighbor who had passed and may have an apartment free for me?".

Aaron — who seemed to be on a trance just as you'd been in the past few seconds — cleared his throat at your question, trying to brush away the embarrassment of how you kept looking at each other. If someone in his group noticed, though, none of them made a comment about it.

"That would be me" he stated, and you held the urge to mutter an 'of course that is', "Maybe we can talk—".

"On the dancefloor" the old man beside him suggested, nudging Aaron slightly with a mischievous smirk on his lips as he took a sip of his drink (whiskey, you deduced), "Do you like to dance?".

"Very much" you nodded, directing your response at the man who asked the question, but your eyes were focused on Aaron, "That's one of my technical skills".

If there was any doubt to Aaron that you remembered him, this doubt fade away at that exact moment — and you noticed it by the way his body language immediately changed, going from an almost nervous one to a more relaxed one.

"I guess you can show me, then" Aaron offered his hand to you, a smile appearing on his face when you immediately accepted it, guiding you back to the dancefloor, "Let's just try and not be arrested tonight, okay?".

You snorted, patting on his shoulder when the song turned into a slower one, and your eyes met one more time before you replied, "I won't make any promises".

Thank you for your request ✨

#fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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imagine grow up that beautiful

Thomas Gibson as Dr. Daniel Nyland Chicago Hope 1995

@redwithjoon, @callm3c0nfus3d, @reidsbookclub

I'm sorry, I know it's not Hotch but I can't get over this cute (and brooding) puppy look

»»——— JOIN MY TAGLIST ———««

»— Screencaps Masterlist link in my bio —«

#he never had a weird phase how dare he #thomas gibson #chicago hope

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

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I Know Places: Mayhem

18+ Aaron Hotchner x Fem Reader | Masterlist | AO3 link

Summary: After Aaron is hurt during a terrorism case in New York City, reader is faced with the undeniable truth that she is falling in love with her boss. While ensuring that he doesn't lose his hearing, she nurses him back to health despite her coworkers' knowing looks and comments. Navigating through her crush, knowing he's still in love with his ex-wife is going to be rough.

Warnings: Canon Typical Violence (mentions of rape and murder), hurt/comfort, Drug use tw as well as drug addiction mentions, unrequited love (so she thinks), There's only one bed

Word count: 15,088

From the moment Aaron was served divorce papers in the office, something about him changed. He was angry, which was to be expected. He was unpredictable as if he was ever predictable before… He was hot-headed, willing to jump down someone's throat at the drop of a hat, but he was also quiet. Withdrawn. He looked lonely.

She watched on from the sidelines, she brought him coffee on days where it seemed worse and sometimes even a baked good just to get him to smile. She offered to partner with him at the precincts, share hotel rooms, and drive with him just for the chance to get him to talk.

Keeping it inside wasn’t helping.

And at first, he didn’t say anything. Little by little, as he realized she wasn’t going to share his feelings with everyone on the team, he began to tell her things.

She stayed back to help him with paperwork, he picked her up in the mornings so they could get coffee and treats together, and he even called her on days off just because he wanted to. They’d stay up for hours, in their own beds, sharing little stories about growing up and failed relationships and sometimes they would say absolutely nothing… it was nice just to know the other was there. Her favourite moments, however, were when he’d put on the same show she had on in the background just so they could talk about it.

She went from wishing he had someone to talk to, to being his friend and keeping all his secrets. It was nice…

And then they went to New York.

Kate Joyner, the lead agent on this case, was a spitting image of his ex-wife, Haley. It was almost scary how much they looked alike, and of course, Aaron has known her for years. He met her at Scotland Yard and they “Liaised” whatever the fuck that meant. Everyone was skeptical of her at first, even the beat cops on the task force… for them, it was the way she acted more important than she was, her posh accent and the overall misogyny of hating successful women.

For Y/N, it was the way Aaron looked at her. The way he doted on her and agreed with her every move. The way he’s sticking to her side like a lost puppy and how he doesn’t see anything wrong with his new behaviour.

It was at this moment that she realized her boss wasn’t just her friend. Not even her best friend. She had a crush on him and the mere idea of him liking someone else was sending her into a tizzy.

She found herself agreeing with Derek Morgan more than ever before on this case, not because she knew he was right (he was) but because it meant she could go against Agent Joyner. She was argumentative for a very petty reason, but at the end of the day, Derek was right. Kate was on her high horse, she wanted to stay in the good graces of the FBI and keep her job. And that cost her another life.

This case is unlike anything she’s seen yet. Unlike the others, she hasn’t been on the team long enough to have seen one of everything. Morgan, however, has been. From being a Chicago cop, on the bomb squad and 3rd in command at the BAU, he’s seen almost everything.

When they touched down in NYC, there had been 5 victims already, the local FBI was on the scene as it was protocol, but the BAU was a last-ditch effort to crack this case. Each victim had been shot, point blank in the head and the unsub was able to flee each time without being seen. Those who did get a glimpse only saw a black hoodie. Nothing more. There was nothing to tie the victims together, each killed in a different neighbourhood, no common victimology, no sexual component, no robbery and no geographical connection. It was as if they were random. Like the unsub didn’t care who he killed, he just wanted the thrill of killing.

He’s killing roughly every two days which doesn’t give the investigation team much time to come up with theories or ways to catch him in the act, between kills. The press is having a field day, the civilians of New York are terrified and the police are stumped. It hasn’t been this bad since the Son of Sam in ’76.

When they arrived, Agent Reid was quick to get a geographical profile up and running to asses the unsub's comfort zone. Hells Kitchen, Murray Hill, Lower East Side, Chinatown and East Harlem were all marked on the board. Using anti-geographical profiling, they note that the unsub is organized, he strikes at the same time of day he knows where the cameras are placed and that all means he’s doing his own surveillance. These spots aren’t random. They mean something to him. And because of how calculated he is, they know he’s a need-based killer. He’s killing outside of his comfort zone… meaning every other neighbourhood in the city has a reason to be terrified.

The 6th victim is killed while holding a pretzel, hailing a cab. By the time the public registers that there has been a gunshot and taken cover for themselves, the unsub has faded into the crowd once again. Not before leaving a tarot card, this time.

Death.

It’s the same card the D.C sniper left at the scene of one of his scenes. Either this unsub has no idea its spiritual meaning of rebirth and transformation… or he has a deep understanding of Behavioural Profiling and he’s toying with them. They’re going with the latter theory.

They also brought along their technical analyst this time. Penelope Garcia. She’s been looking over all of the surveillance footage from each crime scene, including the most recent. With her physically there with them, she’s able to run her own software and programming through the old-ass NYPD tech and she’s figured out something huge. There isn’t just 1 unsub. There are two.

They’re not killing together, which is weird. From previous killing teams, they know it’s highly unusual for them to do things apart from one another, which leads them to suspect they might be dealing with a gang. There could be more than 2 unsubs and until they know more, Derek wants them out on the streets so they can be even more hyper-vigilant.

Kate, however, didn’t like that suggestion.

“These guys hit at midday,” he reminded her and ranted until Hotch cut him off. “We could target ingress and egress to particular neighbourhoods, position us near express stops. 14th, 42nd, 59th—

“Morgan, Morgan stop. It’s not your call.”

Instead of taking Morgan's great advice. They went back to their hotels for the night.

Aaron had noticed that Y/N was being strange. He could sense her distaste for Kate and thus, he distanced himself from her for the case. He had his own hotel room, so did their other leader, David Rossi, and almost everyone else shared. Reid went with Morgan and she was supposed to room with JJ, only JJ’s boyfriend showed up… she’s pregnant and he couldn’t stand the thought of not being with her during a case like this.

It just drove home to her even more just how alone she was.

In the morning, Aaron stayed with Kate at the precinct and Y/N huffed about it. Instead, she stuck herself to Spencer’s side as they gave their profile that morning, to the news, the police and the rest of the FBI agents at 26 Federal Plaza.

Just as they finish their talks, the unsub hits their 7th target. At 59th and Lex. Right where Morgan predicted they’d hit next. Thus causing the two men to shout at each other in front of everyone in the building.

“I said to put us at express stops, 14th, 42nd, 59th,” his voice gets louder with each number. “And that’s exactly where they hit!”

“It’s not your place to have this discussion!” Hotch shouts back.

“My place?”

“You need to back off,” Hotch warns.

“We’ve got seven bodies, man!”

“Which is exactly why we need to stay focused.”

“Focused?” Derek all but laughs in his face. He drops his voice, steps in closer to Aaron and looks past him to Kate before continuing. “‘Cause from where I’m standing, all you seem to be focused on is her.”

“Take a walk. Now,” Aaron matches his tone and then turns away from him.

The whole office is quiet. Not a single sound is heard. It was true. Aaron’s been uncharacteristically following this woman’s lead since the moment they got there… even before when he talked her up on the jet over.

Y/N catches his eye, silently relaying that she agrees with Derek… he’s not wrong. Even Hotch knows it.

This 7th kill brings forth the knowledge that there is a 3rd shooter. You see, one of the programs Penelope has takes the height of the unsubs on the camera, across the 7 videos there are 3 different heights. They’re definitely working with a team but not a gang. They haven’t reached out to the police, the media or given any clue as to what their mission is yet, either.

—

The next morning, Y/N is sent out onto the streets, partnered up with one of NYPD’s finest. Detective Cooper. He’s respectful, loyal and kind. They get along like a house on fire. He’s one hell of a flirt, but he doesn’t mean anything he says because he’s happily married. He’s funny, too, making her laugh as they walk through the streets, patrolling 14th Street, downtown and Brooklyn, baby.

There’s a gunshot which makes their heads turn in the direction from which they heard it. It takes seconds for them to start moving towards it, and even quicker for Y/N to press the button inside her jacket sleeve to talk with Penelope in the surveillance booth. “Garcia?”

“I’m on it, I’m on it,” she rushes through the speaker in Y/N’s ear. Searching hundreds of cameras for the unsub. “16th and Broadway! He’s running east on 16th!”

“He’s headed our way,” she says, tapping Cooper's arm and taking off with him down the block.

The unsub sees them and starts running the other way, they both draw their weapons and sprint even faster after him. Cooper is quick on his feet, he must’ve been a runner in his high school days as he’s leaps and bounds in front of her.

The unsub darts down an ally, runs halfway and waits for Cooper to turn the corner and bang. He shoots Cooper in the chest. Having seen it happen, Y/N rounds the corner with her finger on the trigger and pulls it, twice, as soon as her sights are on the unsub. He goes down before he can even get a second shot out.

She takes his weapon from him, makes sure he’s going to stay down and rushes back to Cooper. “Cooper!! Garcia, we’ve got an officer down on 16th west of union square!” She shouts into her mic.

“let me see,” she instructs Cooper to lay back and let her look at the wound. It’s on his left shoulder, bleeding like a son of a bitch. “Okay. You’re okay it’s going to be okay.”

“Garcia, can you see us?” She shouts into the mic again. “We have an officer down!”

She presses down on his wound, “Cooper stays with me, It’s going to be okay.” She assures him. Keeping her eyes on his until they hear sirens approaching. “See, it’s all good, you’re going to be fine.”

The ambulance arrives first, one paramedic attends Cooper, and the other attends the unsub. Not long after, Morgan, Rossi, Reid and JJ are arriving on the scene together. Cooper lost a lot of blood but they think he’ll make it. He’s loaded up and taken to the hospital as a second ambulance arrives purely for the unsub. He’s not going to make it. All the answers to the questions they had, died with him.

“I should’ve had to shoot him,” she says to herself mostly. Trying to rationalize what just happened.

“he shot a cop, Y/N you did what you had to do,” Derek reminds her.

“I know… I just mean, he was ahead of us. He could’ve gotten away but he stopped. He waited for Cooper to round that corner. He shot him on purpose.”

“Tell me about his behaviour, was he panicked? Was he winded?”

“His hands were steady,” she recounts. “His eyes were dead calm. I mean, these guys have been hyper-vigilant. Organized! They do pre-surveillance. I mean, what are the odds they would shoot someone only two blocks from where me and Cooper are standing?”

“You mean he deliberately caught someone where he could be caught?” JJ asks.

“What if he did? What if he chose this spot because we were here?”

“What are you thinking?” Derek asks, wanting to know where she could possibly take this.

“He had no ID on him. He waited until we caught up to him, he was strangely calm, I-I-I, it, it was like suicide by cop!” She sums it all up with a stutter.

“Why? Why would he do that?” Derek asks.

“I don’t know? Maybe to make us think everything was finished?” She hypothesizes. “What if they don’t know we know there are 3 of them and this was their way of getting us to think we did it. We got the bad guy. We can go home now. What if they want us to back down so they can do something worse?”

“We need to go back through the profile and figure out what we missed,” Derek announces, agreeing with her that something is off.

Hotch and Kate show up mere seconds later, dipping under the crime scene tape and rushing over to their little group. Rossi and Reid, who were standing over the body of the unsub, make their way over too. It's a team huddle.

“We think we might have a serious problem,” Rossi announces.

“What is it?” Hotch asks.

“We have multiple unsubs, they’re disciplined, they’re using counter-surveillance. They know the FBI movements, there’s a hierarchy. What does that usually equal?” He poses it back to Hotch.

“Terrorism,” he answers.

They get off the streets then, regrouping back at Federal Plaza to go over the newest findings and re-profile the unsubs. Reid explains that these murders simulate a bombing. They station someone to watch the scene and gauge police response time, at which point they know when to bring in a second bomb. Their ideal situation is to take out a first round of civilians and a second round of first responders. they’ve seen this before, just never like this.

Something bigger is coming. How soon? They don’t know.

“I think they’re targeting points of entry,” reid points out, referring to his map. “Each murder has taken place at a bridge or tunnel.”

Y/N steps up closer to the board. “Holland tunnel, midtown tunnel, Manhattan bridge.”

“If a bomb went off, the emergency response would shut down any ability in or out of the city,” JJ reminds them. “It’s like people would be trapped on the island.”

“Keep in mind it’s still a theory, like any profile,” Aaron says, calming their nerves before they all panic.

Just then, Garcia calls Morgan's phone. “We’ve got a problem. I went ahead and checked all 4,468 cameras and they’ve hacked into the surveillance system. They’ve got footage of every crime scene. They’ve been watching since the beginning.”

“How could we not have caught this?” Hotch asks.

“They were smart. They hacked in one camera at a time, it wasn’t system-wide, I had to check each camera one at a time.”

“And this is from every crime scene?” Y/N asks, making sure she has it right in her mind.

“I’m afraid so… they hacked into 1 camera at every scene. The one with the best angle, we only caught it because Lisa here, my number 2, was checking the days after each murder and noticed the shots were different. The angles changed so minutely that you wouldn’t notice a difference unless you were zoned in on that camera 24/7.”

“Thanks, Garcia,” Derek says. “Call us if you find anything else.”

“So much for theory,” Dave retorts.

“We need to hit the ground running,” Kate stands, visibly anxious about what this means to her job.

She’s so close to being fired and replaced, she’s been warned they want to replace her with Derek Morgan. It’s why the two of them have been butting heads. She wants to get ahead of his before all of New York City is up in flames and her head is on the chopping block.

“Reid,” Hotch calls his attention as they enter the room. “Take Y/N go brief Port Authority police.”

“Yes sir,” they both agree at the same time.

“JJ I want you on the phone running point with the Governor, Dave will you go talk to the commissioner? And Morgan, I want you to brief Homeland Security. Kate and I will meet with the Mayor.”

Everyone starts to get up and get going, “We’ll meet back here as soon as possible. Stay alert, stay vigilant. With them knowing were here, we could become a target.”

She lets Reid drive, throwing him the keys as they walk to the elevators. They’re the first to leave. They make it 6 blocks from the plaza when they hear the news over the radio. 10-80. That’s cop talk for an explosion. They slow down, reid pulls them to the side of the road and they listen closely. “Please note that 10-80 was a car bomb.”

Reid flips on the sirens, all the traffic on the road comes to a halt and he u-turns out of there faster than she’s ever seen him move a vehicle. With their lights and sirens going, they run every red light, they make it back to Federal Plaza and rush up to see the rest of the team. The whole time, she’s on the phone, trying to get at least 1 member of the team but there’s no service. “New York of all places should have service!” She shouts, slamming her flip phone shut again.

“we’re here,” Reid announces, throwing the car in park.

They rush back upstairs, it’s just Rossi that’s left in the building. “A car bomb?” Y/N says as she makes it to Rossi’s side. “Did they say where?”

He shakes his head. “No, and the cell towers are down. This is what we’ve been waiting for. We’re looking at 8 suicide bombers that are about to hit each and every location of the murders. Reid, I need you to make a list and get it to homeland security and quick. Tell them to pour troops into all those sites. This isn’t a false alarm. This is terrorism.”

“Actually, if we’re correct, it’ll be 16 suicide bombers,” he reminds Rossi. “One for the civilians. One for the first responders.”

“Fuck,” Rossi mumbles under his breath. Referring to the TV for a moment as the first news reporters have arrived on the scene.

The woman on screen holds her hand to her ear, listening to what information she has. “I’m hearing that the explosion was a car bomb. The car in question was a black SUV just outside 26 Federal Plaza.”

They all know what that means. Hotch was right.

Rossi presses the quick dial button for the CCTV command post, getting in touch with Penelope as she returns to the computers. “Can you see anything?”

“I literally just sat down sir, give me one moment,” she says as they hear furious typing. “Where am I looking?”

“they said the explosion was a Black SUV just outside Federal Plaza—

“Oh no, you don’t think—

“I need you to look, Penelope,” he pushes her back to the main focus. “Can you see anything yet?”

“Hold on I have 300 camera angles and— have you heard from anyone?”

“I’m here with Reid and Y/L/N, but we haven’t heard from anyone else.”

“Oh no, oh no no no,” she chants to herself as she keeps looking. “Sir, I’ll call you when I know more I cannot multi task like this.”

“Thank you, Garcia.”

Until then they just have to sit and wait… just not in this building.

A Critical incident command centre is set up at 700 Hudson, they’re rushed out of 26 fed, down the back stairwell and out the door. A shuttle bus comes to pick them all up in waves, and a bomb sniffer dog is there too, checking the shuttle busses before they leave, they even check Reid and Y/N’s SUV before they head out themselves. They stare out the windows, trying to get any look they can at the scene but they don’t pass it. They’re completely in the dark as to what is going on.

When they make it to the command centre, JJ is pulling up right behind them.

“oh my god, JJ,” Y/N wraps her up in a hug. “Have you heard from the others?”

“My phone isn’t working,” she complains. “Come on, let's head inside. I’m sure there’s a news helicopter out by now and live footage from the scene.”

Upstairs, the phone is ringing like crazy, Dave rushes to it and hits the speaker. “Hello?”

“Rossi, open the computer I have live footage from the blast!”

At the same moment, Y/N turns on the TV then to see helicopter live footage of the scene. It shows Aaron and Kates SUV in flames, Kate on the ground and Aaron covered in blood hovering over him.

She almost loses her mind thinking he’s hurt. She starts to leave, grabbing her things and searching for the keys in Reid's bag but it’s not there. “What are you doing?” He stops her.

“Aar—Hotch, he—he needs us? Shouldn’t we go to him?”

“We profiled that the first attack was to garner a response from the police, if the police and ambulance show up there will be a second bomb taking out all the first responders, we can’t go,” he reminds her.

“But he’s hurt and bleeding? Shouldn’t someone go to him? Let me go to him!”

“Y/N… we can’t,” Spencer looks her dead in the eyes, all the compassion in his soul seeping out through his own, he knows why she wants to run to him. But he can’t let her.

“Hey, hey look,” JJ calls their attention back to the TV to show Derek running up to him. “Look, Dereks there, he’s going to help him until we know it’s safe to bring in the emergency services.”

She quickly makes her way back to the TV, watching with a hand over her mouth, she’s beyond worried. Anxious doesn’t even begin to cover the sinking feeling in her chest. Kate’s dying. He has to watch a second woman who looks like his wife leave him in just a few short months. This is going to kill him if another bomb doesn’t.

Penelope has eyes on the crime scene, she calls both JJ and Derek, allowing the team to have some form of communication altogether. She goes back on the security footage, and she notices the bomber place the bomb and sit around and watch it go off… and then he returns to the scene.

He was the same kid currently “helping” Hotch.

He even called 911 for him… the next thing they see on the TV is Derek take off after the unsub and a single ambulance pulls onto the scene.

“Can I go now?” Y/N asks the rest of them.

“Yeah, you can” Rossi agrees. “Penelope you find out what hospital they’re going to through the dispatch system and Y/L/N’ll meet them there.”

“Got it, sir… but I’m not seeing anyone dispatched to Hotch’s location?” She explains. “There’s a strict order not to go… they must’ve gone of their own volition.”

“Okay… can you follow the ambulance on the cameras?” JJ suggests, “Find out what way they’re going and cross that with the nearest hospital.”

“I can do that,” she says, furiously typing away. “Yeah, I can do that…. Okay, they’re headed uptown…”

She wants to run. She feels like she could chase down the ambulance and meet Aaron there in a matter of seconds, that’s how much adrenaline is rushing through her veins.

“Saint Barclays!” Penelope shouts once she has it. “Go, go now!”

“Spence, keys!” Y/N shouts to him and he throws the keys her way. She catches them and then she’s off. She doesn’t even take the elevator, she runs down 6 flights of stairs, pushes open the fire exit doors and books it for their SUV.

Once inside she has the car on, her seatbelt fastened and her lights and sirens on. She speeds down the street, whipping the SUV around corners, she haphazardly comes to a halt in the emergency parking lot and throws the car in park. She leaves her door open and runs inside the emergency room.

She stops the first nurse she sees, “Hi, hi, I’m looking for agent Hotchner? He just came in he— oh my god,” she notices him. “Is he okay?”

“So far we’ve diagnosed him with acute acoustic trauma in his right ear and the doctor is working on pulling shrapnel from his left leg. But he’s going to be okay. He passed out shortly after arriving, my guess is that the adrenaline didn’t allow him to realize how hurt he was and so the blood loss and the equilibrium challenges from his ear injury all caught up to him all at once.”

“Okay,” she calms down a bit. “And the agent he brought in?”

“She’s in surgery,” the nurse explains. A solum look on her face. This won’t end well.

“Can I sit in there with him?” She asks, pointing to Aaron’s little corner of the ER.

She shakes her head, “Not until the doctor is done. When he wakes up he might be a little scared and confused, I wouldn’t want you getting hurt as well.”

“Okay…” she understands, so she waits there, resting against the nurses station and watching over him from afar.

Morgan comes rushing in not long after. She’s too busy listening to him talk to the nurses to notice that Aaron is up, he’s confused and yelling from his ear injury. He rips off his vital cords, and there’s an elongated beep ringing through the ER as the nurses try to get him to sit down.

“Agent Hotchner—

“Aaron,” she cuts the doctor off and rushes in front of him. Places her hands on his chest and looks up into his eyes, “Hey, it’s okay. You’re okay. Calm down… you’re at the hospital. Kate is in surgery, Derek is here too.”

“I need my clothes,” he says in a softer tone. “Where are my clothes?”

“We’ll get you your go bag, just calm down a second,” she ushers him back to his bed and makes him sit down.

“Has anything happened since the bomb went off?” He asks, looking past her to Derek.

He shakes his head. “No.”

“And Sam?” He asks.

“He’s dead.”

That must be the kid who detonated the bomb and stayed back to pretend to help… he just wanted to see the results of his destruction.

“The team needs to be here, we need to discuss this together… I don’t understand why they’d just set off one bomb and in a place none of the other attacks happened?” He says, trying his best to rationalize it but he can’t figure it out.

“I’ll call the others… Y/N?”

“I’ve got him,” she smiles over to Derek. “Go.”

She turns back to Aaron with a small smile, she looks to his ear which is packed with cotton and the dried blood that dripped down his neck. “Excuse me?” She grabs the attention of one of the nurses. “Can I have some antibacterial wipes, I just want to clean the blood off him?”

“Sure,” the nurse says before disappearing for a moment. “Here,” she hands her a few things to get him all cleaned up.

“Thank you,” she smiles.

“Thanks,” Aaron adds. Feeling sorry for reacting the way he did moments ago. “You don’t have—

“Well, I’m going to,” she cuts him off. She peels open one of the little packets and unfolds the wet wipe inside of it. “I’m sorry if this stings at all.”

She wipes the blood off his ear and neck, she tilts his head back a bit and she starts on the marks on his forehead and cheeks, her heart aches for him. He reaches out and holds her around her hips, letting his shoulders drop as he relaxes a bit… and then he rests his head against her chest and hugs her.

She rubs his back, “You’re okay…” She rests her cheek on the top of his head for a moment. Resisting the urge to kiss his head, instead, she waits for him to pull back and then she smiles at him. “I’m so glad you’re okay. I don’t know who I’d talk to anymore if I lose you.”

“You’d need something a lot stronger than a bomb to get rid of me,” he teases, finding his humour again.

She manages to laugh. “Okay, big guy, I’m glad to see your humour is still intact… how’s your leg?”

He looks down at it, his hospital gown rests at his thigh, and he can see the bandages on his calf. “Okay, I didn’t realize I hurt it?”

“Shrapnel,” she explains. “They got it all.”

“That’s good.”

Derek comes back around the corner then. “The teams on the… way? You two wanna tell me something?” He teases.

“Oh hush,” Y/N waves him off. “I’d worry if it was you or Reid or JJ too.”

“Not Rossi?”

“He barely ever steps into the way of danger,” she reminds them. “He’s too old for this shit.”

She takes a step back from Aaron, his hands fall back to rest on his own legs, and he sighs. “Any news?”

Derek shakes his head. “None. Homeland security is about to call everyone off, they think this was all a false alarm.”

“They’d be stupid to do that,” Aaron remarks.

“I know… it doesn’t make any sense?”

“Who did that Sam kid keep calling? Garcia said that there weren’t any ambulances dispatched to his area, how’d they know to get there?” Y/N asks.

“I don’t know… let me call Garcia,” Derek suggested, stepping out of the room again.

“The hospital's on a bypass,” Aaron looks up at her with horrified eyes. “The secret service is here, they didn’t want to let us in but… oh, god, I drove the bomb right in here.”

“We don’t know that,” she tries to push his worries away.

“We do. We do know that. They knew we’d catch on to them, they knew we’d stop all first responders from actually responding or run the risk of having the first wave taken out as well. This was their way to get to a presidential target.”

The team comes rushing in then, JJ has his go bag in her hands, “are you okay?”

“I’m fine, I’ll change, Y/N tell them what I told you,” he orders, ushering her out of the room and closing the curtain on himself so he can change.

She repeats Aaron's thoughts, and Derek supports his theory by explaining that Sam never called 911. He called the same number 9 times, a disposable phone, that was destroyed around the same time Sam died. They planned this. This is their end game. They had to get moving.

Derek, JJ and Rossi head down to the garage while Y/N Hotch and Reid head up to the operating floor to warn the secret service. The hospital begins evacuations, Derek finds a bomb in the ambulance and Penelope puts a jammer on the cell phone signal so it can’t go off while they think of the next steps… then Derek gets the brave idea to drive the ambulance out of there, towards a clearing, all by himself.

It’s stupid, it’s reckless… but it works.

They find the unsub, the paramedic that Hotch drove in with, sitting down in the ambulance bay, knife to his throat and phone detonator in his hand. He’s waiting for a reconnection. One that will come in 10 seconds. But they’re already onto him… he has no choice but to end his life or go to prison. So he picks up a blade and slits his own throat.

The case ends with 8 dead civilians, an injured cop, 3 dead suspects and the death of Kate Joyner.

Aaron leaves with a broken heart and ringing in his ear that doesn’t seem to be stopping any time soon.

The majority of the team heads home. JJ leaves as soon as she can, newly pregnant and with the love of her life. Derek, Reid and Rossi all head back in the bureaus jet… Y/N offers to drive Aaron home. The pressure in the air would hurt him in her flight and taking the train home alone would be sad, so she drives him.

They drive in silence most of the way. He has a few naps, waking up only to drink some water and take more medicine. She expected to be bored, but keeping him safe, making sure he gets home okay, that’s more than worth it.

—

Back at Quantico, Aaron’s placed on a medical leave of absence while he recovers from his ear injury. He’s not happy about it. Not at all. He isn’t allowed to join them on cases, and he’s not even supposed to come into the office until he has a doctor sign off that he’s good to go back into the field… but that doesn’t stop him.

He needs something to do. He’s so bored in his bland little apartment that he comes into the office just to hang out with Anderson and help with paperwork.

He has a couple MRI’s lined up in a week to check the damage to his ear, it still hasn’t stopped ringing which he doesn’t quite mind… it’s the pain that bothers him. He’s been given a prescription for T3s, which worry Y/N just a little. They worry Reid a lot.

Everyone in the office stays up to date with Hotch’s condition, they all talk about it like he’s their father in a nursing home, prescribed something new. It’s sweet how much they care, but Aaron hates being doted on. He hates that people see him as weak even if it’s just for a little while. It sucks not being the leader they’ve come to know and love. But the thing about love is that it doesn’t stop once you get hurt, it just gets bigger.

They’re talking on the phone again too, he holds the receiver to his good ear and he turns on subtitles for their shows so he can still follow along. Every now and then he has her repeat something, and he scolds himself, saying he feels like he’s 85 and senile but she loves it.

“Hey, it just means you actually care about what I have to say.”

“I do care,” he reminds her. “And I appreciate how much you care about me too… I almost forgot what it’s like to have someone care about me so much.”

“Has she reached out at all since the accident?” She pries.

“She brought Jack over the other day for a few hours, he just wanted to cuddle and show me his toys which was nice… Haley sat in the corner and read a magazine the whole time. She didn’t even ask about it.”

“I’m sorry, Aaron,” her heart breaks for him. She knew that the divorce wasn’t his idea, not even the slightest… he still loved her. He probably always would.

He brushes it off, asking her about their latest case instead. She told him everything, from the time they gathered in the briefing room until the flight back home, she recounted it all. He just hummed along, letting her know he was following, he didn’t ask many questions, seemingly because he knew if he just listened longer they’d be answered.

It becomes a habit after that. He calls at the end of a case just to ask her how it went. He knew he could read about it in the paperwork later, but it was more rewarding this way.

He has 1 week left until his ear is healed completely, he’s convinced the doctor to let him go back to work if he takes it easy, which means once they get back from their current case, he’ll be back out there.

He calls her at 11pm Virginia time, knowing she’s just an hour behind him in Illinois. They’re done with the case but staying 1 more night just to sleep it off. He expects her to be in her own hotel room, away from the others, able to take his call… she isn’t. She’s sharing with JJ.

She sees his name on her caller ID and takes her phone with her to the door, “I’m just going to take this I’ll be right back,” she assures JJ.

“Do you have your room key cause I don’t want to get up and let you back in, I’m exhausted,” JJ asks.

“Yeah, yeah I do,” she rushes out as she leaves the room. “Hello?”

“Hey, sorry were you asleep?”

“No, I’m sharing with JJ tonight, we were talking,” she shares.

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, how are you? How’s the ear?”

“Good… I can go back to work tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” She repeats, concerned as all hell. “Aaron, you still have a tear in your ear, if you’re not careful you’ll lose hearing forever. It’s not a joke. Don’t you want to be able to hear? We can catch a few more bad guys without you. It’s okay?”

“I need to come back to work before I lose my mind,” he responds with a bit of an attitude. “If I have to sit in my tiny ass apartment and stare at these white walls any longer, I will go crazy.”

“I rather you mad than deaf,” she explains, trying to keep herself together. “If you come back to work you’re taking it easy. I’m going to stick to your side like glue, you hear me? I’m not letting this get worse.”

“Fine, mom,” he teases her. “Whatever you wish.”

“I thought you liked that I cared?” She teases back. “You’re my best friend, who else am I going to talk to if you can’t hear me?”

“You can’t get rid of me that easy,” he assures her. “It’ll be fine.”

—

The Angel Maker case is one she studied at the academy. Victims were beaten with the assailants' bare hands until they were dead. Post-mortem stab wounds were found in each victim's torso, made by a screwdriver, each victim's wounds in a different pattern. Some with more holes than the others, as if he was experiencing different amounts of rage with each woman. There were also signs of sexual assault. He completely abused these poor women after death. It was a good thing they caught him.

He died a year ago yesterday, by lethal injection at the prison in Lower Cannon, Ohio. They thought they were done with him as soon as he was lowered into the ground…

Their newest victim, Delilah Grennan, was bludgeoned to death with what is assumed to be a hammer. She too, was stabbed in the chest with a screwdriver. She was also raped. Only the weird part was the semen left at the crime belonged to Cortland Bryce Ryan. The Angel Maker himself.

“So this unsub is a weaker guy?” Derek proposes. “Or at least someone who perceives themself as weak?”

“He brought along the hammer to make sure the job was done,” Y/N adds, staring across the table at Aaron, watching him blink slowly. He’s in pain as if someone smacked him upside the head with a hammer and he’s keeping it to himself.

She almost misses Rossi’s hilarious joke about the elephant in the room… the dead man's seamen at the crime scene, that elephant, all because she’s staring at Hotch. “It’s obvious someone planted the DNA at the scene,” Aaron adds, his voice small yet powerful at the same time.

“In the victim…” Derek reminds him.

“That’s one theory,” Spencer mumbles.

“There's another theory?” JJ asks, leaning over the back of his seat, wondering what’s going on inside that genius head of his.

“Think about who shares the exact DNA profile as another person,” he hypothesizes.

“Reid, you’re not seriously floating around the idea of an evil twin?” Morgan groans, knowing Reid all too well.

“No, I’m not. I’m floating around the idea of an Eviler Twin,” he raises his brows, proud of himself for that one. No one else finds it funny. “Traditionally the concept is a good twin and an evil twin. But in this case, it’s evil twin, Eviler twin.” He says it with more suspense this time.

No one says anything. Y/N just shakes her head, trying not to smile cause it was funny… and then Aaron grips his forehead and hunches forward, something is making his head hurt.

“JJ get him some water,” Y/N suggests right away, keeping her voice down. “Hey, where are your pills?”

He points to his bag over on the other side of the aisle and she’s quick to pull his bag over and start looking for them. She takes two from the little orange medication bottle and slides them across the table just as JJ brings him a glass of water.

“Were you actually cleared to fly?” Morgan asks in a similarly low tone.

Aaron swallows down his medicine and nods, he doesn’t say anything, he just rests his head back against the headrest and keeps his eyes closed. Everyone turns to Y/N instead, asking questions with their eyes. She shrugs, she doesn’t know what to say. Other than she knew this would happen.

—

It happens again when they’re digging up the original unsubs grave. The sound of the metal grinding as the front-end loader hauls the coffin out of the dirt, it’s way too loud for Aaron. He covers both of his ears and starts walking away, cowering from it all. She pats Reid's shoulder so he stays there and watches everything go down with the Sheriff and then she follows Hotch through the cemetery towards a tree that he’s leaned himself against.

She carefully runs her hand over his side, inside his suit jacket, “hey,” she whispers, getting him to look at her. He’s almost crying with how bad it hurts.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he whispers back.

“How am I supposed to look at you?” She argues, raising her voice a little. “You said you were cleared for duty. This isn’t what being cleared looks like. You’re going to go deaf if you don’t take it easy.”

“I’m going to go deaf if you keep yelling at me like I’m 4,” he spits back. Reaching into his pocket for more pills, she takes the bottle from him.

“Uh-uh, no. You had two 3 hours ago. It’s not time for more. Stop putting yourself in harm's way and relying on these,” she scolds him. She steps in even closer to him so it’s just them to hear. “I care about you. I’m not letting you ruin your life because you can’t find the patience to actually heal properly.”

She has her finger pressed into his chest as she stares him down, asserting her own dominance over him. “I’ll be administering these to you from here on out, got it?”

He nods. “Yes ma’am.”

“Good, now the noise has stopped over there, go look in the casket and then I’m driving us back to the precinct,” she says as she steps away from him and marches away.

Reid and the sheriff were the first to see that the casket was empty. Someone stole his body and god knows how long ago. Aaron takes once glance at the empty box and heads back towards the SUV, getting in the passenger side with a huff.

“What’s going on with him?”

“He’s not better. He wasn’t cleared because he’s healed. He was cleared because he’s a sweet talker and the doctor believed his bullshit,” she rants. “He’s taking his meds like candy, he’s not taking care of himself… so I let him have it. I’m going to drive us back, I’m administering his meds from now on. He’s going to actually heal whether he likes it or not.”

Reid follows her to the car, and as soon as they’re out of earshot of the local cops, he asks it. The question she’s been dreading hearing.

“You love him, don’t you?”

“What?” She turns to him with a faux look of confusion. “I mean, yeah? We all do. He’s our boss?”

“No. If this was just you protecting a co-worker, you would’ve done the same thing for me after Tobias Hankel…”

“Spencer,” her heart breaks for him. “I wanted to help you, we all did, but we didn’t know how.”

“You just did to him what you should’ve done for me,” he almost cries. “You should’ve reached into my bag and taken the drugs away from me… but you didn’t. Because I’m just a co-worker to you. Admit it. You love him.”

“I can’t,” she gives in. “He still loves Haley. I’ll never be her.”

“No, you can’t… but maybe he doesn’t want you to be,” Reid simplifies it. “maybe he needs you to be everything she wasn’t.”

“I don’t know,” she sighs, “but we’ve gotta go… I’m sorry, by the way.”

“It’s okay,” he places his hand on her arm and they keep walking. “I’m not jealous or anything, I just sometimes get mad that it happened to me at all.”

“You can talk to me about it whenever,” she makes sure he knows that. “I’m always here for you.”

“Thanks,” he smiles at her, knowing she means it.

—

Turns out, they had difficulties putting Ryan to death. The whole town had a conspiracy that he never actually died… so finding his empty casket rocked the whole police station. Even in his last words, he said he’d come back to life to finish what he started. Putting the town at ease was their number one priority, aside from catching the new killer. Because a town in panic causes more crime, and more death than a single killer could even imagine.

Hotch proposes that the person who took Ryan's body is the same person doing these copycat killings. They had to’ve had help from inside the prison… probably the same person who was getting all his memorabilia and… fluids, out of the prison.

Yesterday, before they found the empty grave, Derek interviewed a guard at the prison, Guard Rutledge. Weird guy. Sketchy, Derek called him.

So, what are the odds that when Garcia— the ever-incredible computer genius who leaves no stone unturned— searches the web for Angel Maker memorabilia, the most common seller is a man by the name of Sid Rutledge? Slim pickings, but of course, our girl Garcia figured him out.

Morgan is tasked with repaying Rutledge another visit, this time, at his house. He takes Y/N along with him for backup and the two of them make it to his house just after nightfall.

They knock on his door, making their presence known, “Sid!! FBI Open up… come on, man, I just want to talk.”

She peers through his windows, there’s no movement in the main room and all his lights are still on. “I’m not seeing anything?”

Derek twists the doorknob, testing if he can get in before he breaks a door down (he’s good at that) and the door pushes wide open.

“That’s weird,” Y/N remarks. “Guys got two deadbolts and doesn’t bother to lock either?”

“Sid?” Derek calls out once more, unholstering his weapon and raising it. “Sid, we’re coming in.”

Y/N follows his lead, holding her weapon, her finger on the safety, she doubts she’ll have to use it but just in case… they search around his main living room, clear the kitchen and then head off towards the bedroom, down the hall. From the doorway Derek can see the man’s feet, he’s laying in bed.

“Wakey-wakey, my man,” he shouts as he pops into the room and finds something they didn’t expect.

Rutledge, laying in his bed with his pants off, in just his shirt and boxers, dead. Shot in the head and in the groin.

“That’s personal,” Derek says under his breath.

They put their guns away, Y/N pulls rubber gloves out of her back pocket and starts to put them on. In her other back pocket, a wad of evidence bags.

“Well yeah, he was selling the unsub memorabilia… Rutledge knew his face.”

“Now the unsub’s covering his tracks,” Derek says with a sigh. Putting his own gloves on before taking out his cell phone. “Hey, Hotch… we’re gonna need crime scene and the coroner at Rutledge's place… yeah. Shot twice, I’d say he’s been dead for at least an hour, maybe two. Yeah. See you back at the precinct soon. Bye.”

“You think he contacted the unsub after you visited him at the prison? Maybe he wanted them to get their stories straight?”

“That or he threatened him… he might’ve wanted the glory of catching a killer?” Derek proposes.

She looks around his room for a moment, nothing sticks out, so she heads to the bathroom. “God, it stinks in here… muggy and thick, too much old spice.”

“Really? He strikes me as an aqua velva kinda guy,” Derek teases.

In the bathroom, what does she find on the first shelf? That exact cologne. “you're good!”

“I’ve been at this longer than you, kid,” he teases. “Anything good in there?”

On the counter, there’s a bottle of pills. She suspects antidepressants or even allergy meds, nope. She reads the bottle and laughs, “No shit… Viagra.”

She makes her way back out into the room and holds the bottle up, “I think we’ve got this unsub all wrong.”

“Why?”

“He was taking Viagra. You only leave the door open and take this when you’re expecting someone. There doesn’t look to be a struggle in here either, his pants came off willingly… either Sid’s gay or our unsub is a woman.”

They bring their findings back to the police station, most of the crew has gone home for the night and the minimal, small-town, night shift has clocked on. Y/N and Derek walk in on JJ and Reid sitting together at the table, Hotch pouring himself more coffee and Dave on the phone in the back room.

“we’ve got news,” Derek announces.

“He was taking Viagra,” Y/N places the evidence bag on the table. “I sent the crime scene photos we took to the computer, you’ll see on there that there wasn’t a struggle. He was shot in the head and in the junk… he was expecting the unsub for sex.”

“I knew it!” Reid lets out a cheer, almost too loud for their little bubble. “When you were gone I was suggesting that. There’s an abnormally high amount of female fans of serial killers, the way they love these killers is fascinating, there are endless lengths that these women will go to, to feel closer to the killers. Buying his sperm, continuing his killings… to a psychopath, in her mind, doing those things would bring her closer to him. A woman in love, no matter how her brain works, would do anything for the man she loves.”

Y/N just looks at reid with wide eyes, feeling called out in a sense. Of course, he’d come to that conclusion after their talk and what he’s seen. She just hopes Aaron doesn’t realize it too. She’s not ready to lose a friend because of her stupid crush on him.

—

On their 3rd day in Ohio, they finally give the profile. They fill the cops in on their theory and in doing so, they calm the nerves of the town thinking a ghost is on the loose, killing these women. It takes up an hour of their morning, they answer every question available and then start narrowing down suspects.

JJ gets a list of women who visited Ryan in prison before he was put to death and Reid goes back through his fan mail to ascertain a pattern that would lead them to the unsub. Alongside that list of women who visited Ryan, they also found out that Sid Rutledge worked at a woman’s prison. He had a history of smuggling things in and out for sexual favours. Ie. they found the reason why he was shot in the dick.

They have two main suspect pools, insane fans and wronged women. Finding the cross over… that would be where the unsub is.

Y/N and Rossi are sent out on the road, their job is to interview the woman who visited Rutledge and wrote him. Most of them were crazy, basically harmless and not worth the time. Their last interview of the day, however, she— she was different.

Shara Carlino, she visited the angel maker 70 times and even bought herself a home overlooking the prison. She’s quite beautiful, you’d never know she’s fucked in the head… within those 70 visits, she was subject to their rigorous strip searches and 3-hour wait times just to see him for 10 minutes.

“That’s Two hundred and 10 hours of waiting and just 11 hours of face-to-face time with the love of her life?” Y/N does the quick math in her head and then shakes it.

“Would you endure that for a man?” Rossi teases.

“No… I’m more into catching the killers than fucking them.”

“Amen, sister,” Rossi jokes, knocking on Shara’s door.

“Hello?” She answers, just as pretty as her photo. Red hair, pleasant smile. She’s dressed up like she’s ready to go out… “can I help you?”

They hold their badges up, “Hi, yes, we’re with the FBI we’re looking into the recent copycat murders and we’d like to speak to you about Cortland Ryan.”

She invites them in, and offers them tea or coffee but neither of them takes a cup. They sit down at her kitchen table and Y/N opens a file. “According to the logs, you were the angel maker's number one fan?”

“His name was Cortland and I wasn’t a fan,” she spits back. Sensitive as ever.

“How would you categorize your relationship?” Y/N asks.

“We were lovers.”

“Last time I checked, they didn’t allow conjugal visits on death row?” Rossi makes a joke out of her comment.

“It wasn’t about physical interaction. When you take away the flesh, all that’s left is the soul,” she says with a mystical expression. Truly believing the words that leave her mouth. “Everything was understood between us. We had no secrets. Cortland made me feel alive in a way no free man ever could.”

Gross, she thinks… but pushes it away to ask her most pressing question: “Where were you on the 16th of this month?”

“Why?”

“We have reason to believe that this copycat killing was done by one of his female fans,” Rossi explains. “Someone who knew Cortland very well.”

“I was out of town with the company I work for, ask anyone there,” she states her alibi and stands by it, visibly hurt by the fact anyone else could be close to Ryan.

“Do you know another woman—

“there were no others,” she cuts Rossi off. Sure of herself.

“I can show you logs and fan mail,” Y/N starts sifting through her evidence folder. “I have photocopies of the letters, women who sent Cortland their photos and even their panties…”

“They didn’t mean anything to him.”

“But… whatever connection you had with Cortland died with him,” Y/N looks at her through her lashes, faking sympathy and driving the wedge in deeper. “Not the copycats. She believes that every time she kills for him, every time she repeats his ritual, their connection gets stronger and will keep getting stronger until she completes his mission.”

“That is of course, unless you help us stop her,” Rossi adds.

That breaks her. she’s visibly distraught by the thought that someone is closer to him than she was. They see it in her eyes that the psychopathic logic makes sense to her… “there was something… he sent me a letter a few months before his— his passing. I knew it wasn’t meant for me. It was addressed to “my dove.” He never called me that.”

“Do you have the letter?” Y/N asks, so close to the finish line she could taste it.

“No. I burned it.”

“Did the text reveal anything about the woman?” Rossi asks.

“The text was a joke,” she spits back. “Usually his prose was beautiful, seamless.. as if he didn’t even have to try. But this— this letter was pedestrian. Crude.”

“You never asked him who this Dove was?” Y/N pries further.

She shakes her head, staying quiet in her hurt.

“I thought there were no secrets between you?”

She laughs, looking Y/N up and down, “You’ve never been in love, have you.”

Y/N smirks, wanting to laugh at the assumption because oh, if she only knew…

Back in the car, she scribbles down some thoughts as Rossi drives. It’s quiet, the radio is on volume 4 and they barely hear it over the sound of their tires bumping down the old, crumbling paved road of this small town. She shakes her head, thinking to herself, how was it that Reid, someone who’s never had a deeply romantic love in his life could guess her feelings so fast and this woman, this deeply troubled yet deeply in love woman couldn’t see it.

She would go to the ends of the earth for Aaron. She’d kill for him if she had to. She wanted to cradle his head and kiss his hair, she wanted to make him lunches for work and dinner when they got home. She would have his babies for crying out—

“oh my god,” she speaks into the silence of their car. “Why else would she buy the sperm if not to just plant it at the scenes?”

“Cause she’s insane?” Rossi laughs.

“She wants his babies!” She makes herself more clear. “She wanted to make a mini Cortland… holy shit.”

She picks up her phone and calls Garcia, “Hey, weird question but are you able to access all obstetrics and gynecology records in this country, by any chance?”

“I can, why?” She asks.

“I think the unsub might’ve tried to get pregnant with the unsubs sperm… she might’ve had checkups, gone to the hospital because of a loss or even had the baby and it died, can you run all the records and cross it with women who visited Cortland and or went to the prison that Rutledge worked at?”

“I sure can try,” Penelope assures. “I’ll call you when I know more.”

—

On the morning of their 4th day, they have another victim. Same bludgeoned skull, same rape, same torso wounds. The house is just like the others too. No sign of forced entry and every single window in the joint was opened too.

Y/N, Hotch and Derek head to the crime scene, Reid, Rossi and JJ stay behind to look through the fan mail a 3rd time with their eyes open for “dove.”

Once the coroner is done with the body, they head back to see her for themselves. With her gloves on, Y/N moves the woman's shirt up to see her torso marks. She was the only one to see the first victim when they arrived, she knew of the findings and how there was paper in the wounds… she takes out her notepad and starts to draw out the marks, ripping off the page to then hold it over her.

“Aaron,” she calls him back over. “Look, Ryan knew what he was doing, he had it all memorized when he made his marks, this unsub needs a stencil, that’s why they found paper in the wounds of the first vic… and I think I know what they’re trying to make out.”

She takes out her phone again, calls Reid and puts him on speaker, “hey, whatcha got?” He answers.

“I think the unsubs were marking out constellations on the victim's stomach… but I don’t think it’s the zodiac?”

“I just found a secret code inside all the letters to Dove that I’m trying to crack… you know, there is a dove constellation, it’s part of the heavenly waters?”

“Reid,” Hotch makes his presence known. “Can you have JJ pull the images of every single victim, this case and the original, and match them to the constellations in that family?”

“I sure can… you know, it also makes sense why all the windows are open at the crime scenes now, he wanted their souls to escape back to heaven, he was quite literally making angels,” Reid explains.

“Sick… well, we’ll be back at the precinct in 30, nice work,” Y/N smiles as she hangs up.

—

When they arrive, JJ has all the torso pictures on the board with printed-off photos of the constellations. “There are 9 main constellations,” she explains once they’re close enough. “Ryan did 6 and our unsub has done two more, the only one she hasn’t done is the dove… either we’ll have a new body tonight or she’s going to do it to herself.”

“So she knew about the real meaning of the stomach marks but we didn’t?” Derek can’t believe it.

“They were a lot closer than we realized,” Rossi adds.

“More than that,” Reid pipes up, scribbling on his own whiteboard. “They were in love.”

“You cracked it already?” Y/N can’t believe it. It’s been not even an hour since their phone call.

He nods, “I profiled the author, Cortland Ryan. He was on death row with several high-ranking members of the Aryan brotherhood… either they taught it to him or he read a lot of 16th-century literature. The Aryans like to use a cypher based on a 400-year-old code written by Sir Francis Bacon…”

“So it’s a binary code,” Derek says with a sigh, always amazed at how Spencer’s mind works.

“Bacon used a 21-letter alphabet, this one is 24. Each letter is assigned a string of 5 binary digits. This combination yields 32 possible encodings. Normally, you’d use a computer to run all these combinations but it was quicker just to do it long-hand until I found the right one.”

Y/N wraps her arms around him and holds him close, “Oh, I love your brain, you beautiful genius, you!”

He blushes, and wiggles out of her grip, making his way to the table with all the letters. “Thanks… now, we don’t have a complete record of their correspondence, but I was able to make a chronology. The woman he calls “Dove” established contact right after the trial.

They all read through the letters, disgusted by what these two people called love. “Ew, okay here she said ‘Take heart, my love. I will bring a part of you back into this world… you will watch over us from the stars.’ Us. she was definitely pregnant when she wrote that.”

“Agent Hotchner!” The sheriff comes running to the room. “We just got reports of a woman attacked in her home by a female assailant.”

“Y/N, we’ll head to the scene, you 4, call Penelope, and tell her to make it her priority to cross-reference birth records with the women on our lists!” He calls as they all head towards the door. “I don’t care if you have to physically head to the local hospital and read through records and interview staff, I want a name!”

She follows Aaron out of the station and he searches his pockets for his keys, “you can drive, right?” She asks.

He nods, “I haven’t had any medicine at all today. I’m feeling better…”

“Okay, good,” she gets into the passenger seat beside him.

They buckle up their seatbelts and Aaron places his hand on her headrest, looking behind them, “Hold on.” He backs up and spins the SUV around, following the sheriff to the scene in his police cruiser.

Reckless driving shouldn’t be so hot… but she swoons anyway.

When they get to the scene of the crime, it’s so totally different from what they’ve seen 2 times before. The assailant pretended to break down and walked up to the victim in her driveway, asked to call a towing service and they tried to attack the victim. She screamed for help so loud the rest of the neighbourhood heard it, left their homes and beat the assailant into submission, subduing her until police could come make an arrest.

“Are you kidding me?” Y/N can’t believe who she sees in the back seat of the police cruiser… “That’s Shara. Shara Carlino. Rossi and I interviewed her the other day. Her alibi is solid.” She walks over to the cruiser and opens the door, Hotch in tow behind her. “What the hell, Shara?”

“It worked for her, why couldn’t it work for me!” She cries, bloody and bruised.

Y/N just shakes her head, “Because he’s dead. He’s a psychopath who never fucking loved you, he never could. You ruined your life for him, and for what? You don’t even look that good in orange.” She slams the door closed and scoffs. “And she accused me of never having been in love before.”

“Have you?” Aaron asks.

She wasn’t expecting that, she stands a little taller and shrugs, “I mean… yeah? Once or twice.”

“Third times the charm,” he teases, patting her shoulder and then walking back towards the SUV. They weren’t needed here.

—

They’re all sitting at the table when Penelope calls again.

“So there were 463 children born in Lower Cannon between 2006 and 2008,” Garcia recounts over the phone. “If you want me to find baby angel maker, I’m gonna have to narrow this down.”

“I have a letter here, there’s a quote from Cortland that says, ‘I knew even before you told me that the future had taken root,’” Y/N reads. “That must mean she did get pregnant… that letter was written January 7th, 2007.”

“Cool so fast forward 9 months—

“Ten, actually,” JJ corrects her. “There are 40 weeks of pregnancy, so it’s actually closer to 10 months.”

“Seriously?” Penelope had no idea.

“it was news to me too,” JJ rolls her eyes. “I’m going to be pregnant almost all year.”

“Damn, well, with that new math… I’m looking at August to September 2007… single mothers only, cause you know, you don’t want to brag— oh your baby daddies a 3rd-grade teacher? Mine likes to poke people in the tummy with tools… I have 9 names.”

They all laugh at Penelope's strange sense of humour. “Cross-reference them with women from the female Prison Rutledge was at,” Derek suggests.

“Chloe Kelcher,” Penelope announces.

“Wait,” Reid stands up and starts looking through his papers. He pulls a file from a box and places a piece of paper on the table. “She was on the jury…”

“She was exposed to the case evidence,” Derek adds. “That’s how she knew about the stomach wounds.”

“She fell in love with him sitting across from him in the courtroom,” Hotch says with a shake of his head. “She heard everything, she saw what he was capable of, and she wanted him anyway.”

“What happened to the baby, Garcia?” Y/N asks.

“He died at the hospital—

“Microvesicular Steatosis,” Reid finishes. “Microvesicular steatosis is characterized by small intracytoplasmic fat vacuoles— liposomes— which accumulate within hepatocytes. Most common causes are tetracyclines- or acute fatty liver of pregnancy, Reye's syndrome, and hepatitis C.”

“Okay… so the only way to stay close to him after the death of both him and her baby, was to keep killing. Two questions, how did she pick her victims and how do we figure out the last one before it’s too late?” Hotch asks.

“Look at the type of women she was killing, as opposed to Ryan going after women who sexually excited him, she needed a way to get close to them. Delilah made jewelry and sold it from her home, Maxine ran a daycare out of her house. This would give Chloe an opportunity to make an appointment with them and gain access to their homes… and then she could go to the bathroom, crack a window and hope it was still open when she returned in the middle of the night,” Y/N proposes.

“Okay, let’s get suited up, Garcia, send us her address and search her internet history, see if she’s booked a time to meet with anyone today,” Hotch orders and then hangs up the phone.

At her house, she’s nowhere to be found. What they do find, however, is a kid's bedroom covered in glow-in-the-dark stars and the decomposing body of Cortland Ryan in a treasure box near what would’ve been her baby crib. It’s disgusting… they call the coroner to pick him up and keep searching the house.

The Sheriff finds her Filofax filled with dates off appointments and people she knows… she had visits with both Delilah and Maxine the day before their murders, but no tools. No Rape kit, either.

“She had an appointment this morning,” Dave announces, reading the book back. “Faye Landreaux, 126 North Red—

“Red River Drive,” The Sheriff finishes the address off. “She’s a CPA, she does my taxes.”

“Does she work out of her house?” Aaron asks.

“Yep.”

“Let’s go.”

—

At the scene, they find Chloe’s car parked on the road. The windows are closed, that’s a good sign that nothing has happened yet… but they need a plan. They need a way to make sure this ends without another death.

It was Y/N’s job to draw the suspect's attention away from her next victim, speaking to her through a bullhorn while Derek snuck into the house and got the victim to safety. She makes Aaron stand away from the bullhorn, his good ear closest to her so that she doesn’t ruin his hearing further as she talks the suspect away from the bedroom.

She taunts her, reading letters Cortland wrote to other women, making her question the love they had for one another. “He wasn’t capable of loving you. He was a narcissist, Chloe. He was lying to you. He wrote countless women the same words.”

Reid quickly recalls the letters from memory, rushing the words down on paper and holding them up to her.

“Possessions matter not to a condemned man but I cannot leave this world without seeing your face one last time,” Y/N reads over the bullhorn. “It isn’t your fault that he made you feel these things, trust me. It isn’t your fault your baby died.

Just then, Derek returns with the victim. While what Y/N was saying made her upset, losing a victim just made her furious.

It was her last chance to complete the love of her life mission and be joined together forever in the afterlife… another crazy conclusion made in the mind of a psychopath.

“It’s over Chloe, we have Faye,” she says through the bullhorn. They hear her destroying things inside, so she adds. “You have nowhere to go.”

“I think we have some teargas ready to go,” the sheriff adds.

“We’re not going to need it, she doesn’t have any place to go,” Aaron assures him.

“Maybe she’ll do us all a favour and put herself down?” He suggests.

“No, she won’t do that either. She’s not done,” Aaron knows her too well.

After a few moments of silence, Chloe starts to come out of the house. Everyone draws their weapons and points them at her as she wields a small revolver. Rossi asks her to put it down but she doesn’t back away.

“Go stand back there,” Y/N suggests to Aaron, motioning behind the car with her head while she keeps her gun locked on Chloe. “If we shoot you’re going to be in pain again, go. Now, Aaron.”

Surprisingly, he listens. He makes his way away from them just in time for Chloe to raise her weapon and the sheriff pulls the trigger, knocking her to the ground. He and Y/N rush to Chloe, taking her weapon from her before they check on her… she’s gone. This is what she wanted. It’s then that Y/N notices what she’s done. Made herself the last victim, completing what the angel maker set out to do a decade ago.

She really was his dove.

When she looks back, Aaron is holding his head and leaning forward, even at a distance it still made his ear ring. She walks over to him and holsters her gun, “you okay?”

“I’m good, I’m good… thank you for making me move,” he says in a hushed tone.

“You’re welcome,” she says but she doesn’t feel good about it. He’s still hurting. He was going to keep hurting until he was fully healed.

—

They spend the night in a hotel, partnered off to save money when they know the price of keeping the jet in a hangar for another night is already ridiculous.

Rossi pays for his own room on nights like this, leaving 1 person lucky enough to also have their own room… so they give it to JJ. Now that she’s pregnant she deserves something nice.

Derek is with Reid, leaving Y/N with Hotch. The way she wanted it.

They change separately in the bathroom, he goes first and then they switch. By the time she’s done and coming back out, Aaron is sitting in his bed, reading through a case file.

She puts her bag down by her bed and takes a chance. She sits on the edge of Aaron's bed and he looks at her softly, smiles even, “Thank you for being hard on me this week.”

“I was just about to apologize,” she admits. “I don’t like raising my voice at you, but someone has to take care of you.”

“You were right, though… I wasn’t fully cleared, I lied and said I’d stick to light duty but I threw myself into this case thinking it would be fine.”

“I know,” she sympathizes with him. “You’re going through a lot. Your job is really all you have left and when you can’t go to work, what else are you going to do?”

“Go crazy,” he laughs. “I’m not going to fly home tomorrow. I’m going to drive back.”

“That’s a long drive, like 7 hours back to Quantico?” She worries. “Do you want me to come with you?”

“No, no… not unless you want to?” He looks at her with puppy dog eyes. He’d never ask, but he’d let her if it was her idea.

“We can make it a whole thing, I mean tomorrow is Friday, we have the weekend off, we don’t need to be back in Virginia till Monday,” she suggests. “We could have some fun?”

“That sounds nice,” he agrees. “Would it… would it be weird to hug you?”

“Not at all,” she doesn’t mind in the slightest, she simply moves in closer and opens her arms.

She holds him there, resting her chin on his shoulder, she closes her eyes and makes it last. He’s so warm, his strong arms feel so comforting and he smells good, too. It’s perfect. She didn’t realize how badly she craved his touch until he was pulling away and it felt like it was over too soon.

“Any time you need a hug, let me know,” she offers. Leaving it at that.

—

They take the long way home.

It only takes an hour for them to get out of Ohio, they make it to West Virginia around lunchtime and pick a random small town to go get some food. The diner they pick is so cute, old-time-y and pink, the waitresses are on rollerblades, it feels like they’ve been sent back in time.

They go further back in time, however, when they decide to stop at the little antique shop just down the road.

Most of the stuff is junk… that’s to be expected. But there’s a box near the counter, “photos ¢25 each” and they’re almost all in black and white, some sepia and faded, but all old. That’s for sure.

She digs through the pile while Aaron looks around at a few things and she finds a few that just break her heart. A 30’s bride, smiling wide with the biggest bouquet of flowers she’s ever seen, just excited to marry the love of her life… and a couple sitting on the porch of their first house, he has his arm around her and she’s got her hands on her pregnant belly. they’re starting a life together. There are school photos and family pictures, all worn with time and left to collect dust in someone else’s shop.

The saying is “A picture is worth a thousand words” but each photo here is worth a thousand years. Most of the people in these photos are dead now, their love only exists here, in this shop, in her hands. These people who fell in love and lived to the best of their abilities and died surrounded by family, they had no idea where these photos would end up… so she buys a bunch of them, to keep their memories alive longer.

One of them she buys not just for that reason… but because the couple in the photo looks a little bit like her and Aaron. Part of her thinks that she was always meant to find these, Aaron was meant to get hurt, they were meant to go on this drive and her photos were supposed to come back to her. Her whole heart is so sure that she’s loved Aaron before, that she’ll love him again too, she’ll love him in every lifetime until the world dies too.

She keeps the photos that she wants to buy in her hands as she makes her way around the store. Aaron’s in the back, looking through stacks of old newspapers and letters. He looks up at her and smiles, “look at this,” he hands her a handful of letters. “These are from 1944, a couple sent them back and forth to each other during the war… look how in love they were.”

She reads through the letter with tears in her eyes. Stories of this couple's missed anniversary, their oldest child was starting to learn how to play baseball, their youngest had just started to walk… she ends every letter the same. “I pray to god every night you make it home to me, I know he’s working on it for us.”

She holds her hand over her heart and tries so hard not to let out the sob, “Oh my god?”

“I know,” he smiles, glossy-eyed and blushing. “What did you find?”

“Photos,” she hands them to him. “Doesn’t this guy look like you?”

“Oh, wow…” he honestly can’t believe it. He runs his pointer finger over the woman who looks like her and his shoulders drop. “I guess we’ve been here before.”

“I think we have,” she agrees. “How weird is it that out of all the places we could’ve gone, out of everything that could’ve ever happened, you got hurt just in time for us to have to drive through West Virginia?”

He shrugs, “I don’t know… you know my mother's family used to live here in 1745, they were coal miners.”

“So you might actually be related to this guy?” She holds the picture up again.

He nods, “that or I’m a vampire,” he jokes. “I’ve been living here for hundreds of years.”

She shoves him, “You’re so funny.”

They wander around some more, Aaron finds a painting he likes and she picks up a cute set of dishware and when they go up to pay, the owner smiles at them. “Together or separate?”

“Together,” Aaron answers over Y/N saying “separate.”

“You don’t have to,” she worries but he takes the plates and her photos from her hands and puts them on the counter.

“I want to,” he assures her with a smug smile.

“First date?” The lady asks, so sure she’s got it right.

They shake their heads, “Co-workers, we had some business to attend in Ohio and thought we’d take the long way home…”

“Oh,” she smiles to herself, knowing there’s something else there… she can feel it. “Well, I’m glad you stopped here, these things were in need of a nice home to go back to.”

“Aaron here has a new apartment that is very boring,” Y/N teases. “This painting will be perfect for the wall in his kitchen.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Aaron muses.

She gives them a total, Aaron pays in cash and she wishes them well on their journey home. “I hope to see you back here one day.”

“Us too,” Y/N answers, giving her a smile and a wave.

—

They keep driving east, thinking they could probably make it back to D.C. around 3 in the morning if they didn’t stop. Instead, they pick out a cute little bed & breakfast with the hopes of staying there for the night.

The little bell on the door rings as Aaron holds it open for her, there’s a little old lady sitting behind the counter crocheting, she looks up when she hears the noise. “Oh, hold on, my daughter just ran to the back to get more receipt paper, she’ll check you in in a moment.” She has a posh English accent and a sweet smile.

“Thank you,” Aaron gives her a smile back.

They don’t have to wait long, a middle-aged woman comes out from the back room and stops dead in her tracks when she sees there are people. “Oh, I’m sorry to keep you waiting, did you have a reservation?”

“No, we’re just driving though and wondered if you have a couple rooms we could book?” Aaron asks.

She clicks her tongue off the roof of her mouth, “Uh… oh, no, we only have 1 room left—

“Does it happen to have two beds?” Y/N cuts her off, scared to have to share.

“No, I’m sorry, we have just the one queen left,” she explains. “I can call the inn 30 miles down the way and see if they have two rooms left?”

“No, no it’s okay,” Y/N brushes it off, “I don’t mind sharing…”

“As long as you’re okay with it,” Aaron agrees.

“We’ll take it,” Y/N decides, giving the lady a soft smile.

As the woman starts to write up their receipt and mark her books that the room is taken, Y/N asks about breakfast. “What time is breakfast tomorrow?”

“We can bring it to your room between 7 and 11,” the elderly lady explains, going into detail about the meal options they have.

“You’re in room 6,” she explains, “it’s going to be $173 for the one night and the breakfast in the morning…”

Y/N beats him to the punch this time, taking her credit card out and setting it on the table, “you bought everything earlier, it’s my turn.”

“Fine,” Aaron lets her do it. “But I’m getting lunch or dinner tomorrow.”

“You can try,” she teases, punching in her information and running her card through the machine.

“And I just need you to both sign the guest book,” the keeper explains, pushing the book toward them. “You know, in case you go missing and the police need to recount your steps,” she says with a laugh. Thinking it could never happen.

“We are the police,” Y/N teases.

“FBI actually,” Aaron adds. “It’s a good thing you keep these, I can’t tell you how many times we’ve reached a dead end because people don’t update their books.”

“Oh, well, thank you,” the woman stands a bit taller, feeling proud of her little business.

They get their key after that, they head back to the car to get their bags and head to their room… they’re quiet at first. She heads into the bathroom to change and hype herself up for what’s about to happen. She has to share a bed with the love of her life knowing he doesn’t feel the same about her. She doesn’t know if he’s going to make a pillow wall between them or sleep with his own blanket so they don’t have to touch. She’s so nervous she doesn’t know what to do.

She slips into her work pyjamas, just a simple pair of shorts and an old college t-shirt, she brushes her teeth and adds a bit more deodorant because the last thing she wants is for him to not like her AND think she smells.

She’s honestly just a ball of anxiety.

When she comes out, he’s already changed. In his boxers and a white shirt, sitting on top of the covers with his phone pressed to his good ear. It’s barely 8pm, she can tell by the smile on his face that he called Jack.

“I love you too, buddy, have a good sleep,” he says with a whispered tone. “Bye.”

She puts her bag down by the night table on what will be her side of the bed tonight. “How is he?”

“He’s good… He’s starting school next week. I can’t believe how big he’s getting,” he explains, shaking his head. He hates that he’s missing it too.

She takes a seat on the bed, facing him, her one leg curled under the other, “are you going to drop him off?”

He nods, “I’m going to try my best to be there that first morning, I want to get some pictures of him walking in and wearing his big backpack.”

“That’s going to be so cute,” she swoons. “Oh, I wish I could see it.”

“Come with me?” He asks, “I can pick you up on the way to work, you’re close to his new school anyway.”

“That wouldn’t be weird?”

He shakes his head, “No… I mean, Haley might even have her new boyfriend there.”

“You’re kidding?”

He shrugs, “At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Her heart breaks for him. “I’m sorry…”

“Don’t be, I mean, it happens. Not many kids who meet in high school stay married for life,” he rationalizes it. “And the ones who do aren’t happy about it.”

“Still, I hate knowing she hurt you,” Y/N sympathizes. “You’re a good man. You shouldn’t have to choose between your job and your family. She knew this was your job when she got pregnant. I don’t know what she was expecting.”

“Me either,” he sighs, he puts his phone on the night table and leans back against the pillows. “Can I have some more medicine now?”

She laughs, he sounds like a kid when he asks. “Yeah, let me get it.”

She grabs a complimentary bottle of water off the dresser and gets his pills from her purse, she hands him two and watches him take them. “You know why I stepped in, right?”

He nods, taking both his pills before he speaks again. “I appreciate it, too. I wasn’t using them as instructed, it could’ve gotten bad.”

“We almost lost Spencer and no one stepped in,” she whispers, ashamed that they all knew and did nothing. “I couldn’t let that happen to you.”

He puts the bottle of water back down on his night table he takes her hand and pulls her closer and wraps her up in a hug, resting his chin on her shoulder. “I appreciate you more than you know.”

She hugs him back, her second hug in 2 days. She closes her eyes and bathes in his strength, “you’re my best friend.”

“You’re mine,” he assures her. “Come get in bed?” He asks as she pulls back.

“Okay,” she nods, walking around to her side, he scoots under the covers and she pulls the covers down to get in herself. The lights are still on, but they lay on their sides and face each other, “this isn’t weird?”

He shakes his head, “I don’t think so… do you?”

“If I cuddle you in the middle of the night I’m sorry,” she says, feeling a bashful wave fills her cheeks with heat.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had someone to cuddle into… If anything, I just do it due to muscle memory,” he admits. “I’ll move away if—

“No, no you don’t have to,” she cuts him off. “Honestly, I might be nice?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, smiling softly.

He’s smiled so much today that it makes her heart so happy.

She nervously moves in closer to him, he lays back against the pillow and she cuddles into his side. He rests his arm on her back, she keeps her hand on his stomach and he holds it with his free hand. “I’ve had a lot of fun today.”

“Me too,” she swoons. She settles against him, she expected him to be hard… he looks so big and strong she didn’t expect him to be so soft and cuddly.

She could get used to this. However, this is not her life. Playing pretend is fun for a while but sooner or later she’s going to have to wake up and face the consequences. He doesn’t love her back, he simply misses having a wife.

She can play that role. She’s just not ready for the director to yell cut.

General Taglist

@ncsls0515 @stevesmunsons @reidsbookclub @sweetyyhippyy @manuosorioh @mrs-dr-reid @k-k0129 @squishyturtle @katsukis1wife @babybisexual @marsmunson86 @buckleyhans

IKP taglist

@southernraven @alluringshawn @lambsheepsheeping @lmg-stilinski24 @louderfortheback @deludedfruitcake

#fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader #aaron hotchner x reader

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

Text

they are my favorite duo ❤️❤️❤️❤️

The idea of Thomas, a 6'2" (187cm) tall man walking Hazel, a little Chihuahua, has always been extremely adorable to me.

And then i remembered that Hazel was once a puppy and wasnt much bigger than his hand 🥺 imagine him walking tiny puppy Hazel

#so cute it hurts 🥹🤏#thomas and hazel #thomas gibson #cm cast

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lemon--squeezy · 1 year ago

Text

For my AO3 readers, you'll get the "real" version in a few days. Tumblr will, too. Just watch me repost.

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Fem!BAU!Reader

Is this full of cheap tropes, you ask? Why, yes. It is.

-> You know that trope where two people love each other, and it's obvious to everyone around them how they feel, but then these two idiots are oblivious? Yes. EXACTLY THAT.

Told from both POVs 👀 (each section is clearly delimited)

Word count: ~23k

Tags: case fic, canon typical violence, tooth-rotting fluff, friends to lovers, only one bed trope, idiots in love, mutual pining, smut, unprotected sex (they talk about it first), oral sex (f&m receiving), showers, feelings, semi-public sex, hints of sub!hotch, etc. (lmk if I missed any)

A/N: This has been "proofread" to the best of my ability, however, it's very long for a one-shot, and English isn't my first language. My lovely beta readers aren't done helping me with it, but I just wanted to share the "raw" version on here because you have been waiting long enough. Stay tuned for the "real" version in the upcoming days. You can wait for it or read my unedited awesomeness.

@criminalskies This one is for you, Rome. Thank you for being my greatest fan 💖

As much as people considered him an adrenaline junkie for always looking for his next fix with the way he loved and lived for his job and the next case, Aaron had become more thrilled about the trip rather than the prospect of chasing down unsubs in the past year.

He had attributed this to the fact that he wasn’t getting any younger, but truthfully, he wasn’t sure he believed it himself.

He loved his job and everything it entailed, but somewhere along the way, saying “wheels up” had started to mean that a familiar warmth settled in his chest, and the longer the flight, the longer that warmth remained.

Aaron wasn’t sure when he had started to love flying out hundreds of miles away because he had never been one to appreciate being away from Jack, but recently, he had learned to cherish the hours he spent in your company before the electrifying and thrumming energy in his veins would keep him alert and focused for days, and the hours after that energy subsided when exhaustion sank deep inside his bones, when the only thing he could feel was gratitude for your presence.

While getting notified that the team had been called away for a case on a Friday night was a downer, Aaron looked forward to the long flight to Alaska.

Jack wasn’t home this weekend, and he wouldn’t be home for the rest of the week because he was with Jessica visiting Roy, but Aaron still let Jessica know he would be gone for a few days so they could set aside times for him to talk to Jack.

Aaron changed into a clean suit and he made his way to the tarmac, happy to find your car already parked there. He was smiling to himself as he approached you while you seemed deep in conversation with the pilot.

He was a bit worried that you hadn’t had time to go home at all after leaving Quantico, but he was relieved to see you had changed into warmer clothes.

The pilot motioned he had to go just in time for you to notice your boss, and Aaron felt a bit relieved he wouldn’t have to fight anyone for your attention.

“Funny how the world always needs us when I’m about to read a good book,” you laughed.

The sound never failed to make his lips curl into a small smile.

“What were you about to read this time?”

Aaron always asked because he had come to learn that your taste in books was flawless. He often read what you read so he could discuss it with you. At first, he read the same books so he’d have an excuse to talk to you, but he actually enjoyed what you “suggested”. He wasn’t sure whether you did it on purpose, but he figured it couldn’t hurt to talk about literature with you.

The people on his team were all brilliant, and they all had a specific skillset, but Aaron loved how all-around intelligent you were. It was like you had lived a hundred different lives, always able to talk about anything with anyone, having a profound knowledge for different topics and wonderful additions to any discussions. Most of all, you could keep up with Reid, and that had amazed him, and the rest of the team, from the start.

Yet, you never flaunted your brilliance in anyone’s face. You clearly opted to remain quiet from time to time, and that was the true mark of someone’s intelligence in his eyes. Choosing not to show off, not to claim your IQ was above average in a room, well, it still caught him off guard how truly fantastic you were.

“Fifty Shades of Grey,” you conceded.

Aaron couldn’t control his reaction quickly enough, staring at you with wide eyes, probably a bit slack-jawed. Normally, he would hide his contempt for some literary choices, but he didn’t manage to conceal his consternation early enough.

Fortunately, you cackled when you seemed to notice his shocked expression, and Aaron sighed in relief.

“You’re messing with me,” he remarked.

“Of course I am. I prefer my knowledge of BDSM material to remain strictly professional… Well, most of the time,” you specified with a cheeky grin.

Aaron wasn’t sure if you were still messing with him, but he was doing mental gymnastics trying to keep up with all the information you were throwing his way.

You looked way too smug to have startled him into silence, opening your bag and proferring a book. “Hotch, please don’t have a heart attack,” you started, “I was just about to read The Great Gatsby. I saw it in your living room the other day when I helped Jack pick up his LEGOs, and I’ve never read it.”

Aaron noticed it was his own worn-out copy of the book. “How’d you sneak out with my book? You thief,” he accused, his tone gentle and far from accusatory.

“What are you going to do? Arrest me?” you goaded with a smile and an attitude that should come with a height you didn’t have. As endearing as it was, he always feared you’d use it on the wrong person someday. “I just borrowed it. I figured this time, I should read something you suggested.”

Had he suggested it and…

No. He hadn’t.

“But I didn’t–”

You just grinned, and Aaron heard the familiar sound of engines rolling behind him.

The rest of the team was arriving.

Your nose crinkled adorably, and you put the book back in your bag. “Just hush. I’ll give it back.”

He shook his head, his hand smoothing down his tie to remind himself he had a job to do as he noticed a familiar, comforting warmth settling in his chest.

Everyone eventually gathered and made their way onto the jet, sitting and preparing for takeoff.

He was reminded once again that flying out was one of his favorite things about the job when he looked over at you beaming at something outside the window.

Aaron loved seeing how bright your eyes got at any time of the day or night when you were on the jet. It was one of the things that melted his cold exterior into nothingness.

Unlike everyone else on the team, remarkably, you had never complained about the lack of sleep the BAU allowed. Instead, you had seemed to choose to be inhabited by endless amounts of sunshine; to be a burning beacon of hope in the darkest nights.

He had asked you why you loved planes so much when he got over himself and decided he could talk to you like a member of his team rather than a plant Strauss had put on his team without permission. The reason behind your amazement with the whole sky still made his stomach flutter when he saw you light up as you watched fields of clouds or the ground thousands of feet below you. When you had answered him earnestly with a dazzling smile that made your gaze sparkle with youth, he had started to shed his unnecessary defenses.

He had realized then that your delightful nature wasn’t an elaborate plan Strauss had come up with to spy on him and the team. The truth had thus started to blind him each time his eyes landed on you from afar; you were just immaculately pure, and he couldn’t help staring at your authentic perfection, mesmerized by your ability to glow even through the more gloomy and dreadful parts of the job.

Your passion for planes had opened the door to many friendly discussions, and much to his enjoyment, to many private screenings of Top Gun with a seven-year-old who clutched the F-14 and the F-18 toys you’d gotten him for Christmas in each hand.

Aaron felt your eyes on him as the team settled on the jet, but he almost never indulged or bathed in your attention when he was in work mode. He needed to be centered, and as much as you could be the center of his world when it was just you and Jack around him, as he watched how your eyes sparkled when you beamed at fighter planes instead of Maverick in Top Gun, he wasn’t sure he could even begin to admit how much you meant to him outside of work, and even less so when he had to focus on gruesome details outlined in the files splayed out in front of him.

Nevertheless, he remembered how you had talked his ear off about your undying love for aircrafts late one night, over a model plane he’d bought for Jack but ended up building with you, nursing a glass of scotch. He fondly remembered you telling him that the jet was one of your favorite things about working with the BAU, that there was something eerily magical about looking out the small windows and see day turn into night before it turned into day again.

But what had taken his breath away was learning that your dad had trained as an army pilot, and even if he had been a commercial pilot most of his life, he had taken you all around the world and taught you all about planes, making you appreciate them for the miracle that they were. Aaron often thought about what you had said that night, something about how seeing the world had left you with a profound admiration for the journey rather than the destination, solidifying his own belief that home was a person rather than a place.

He hadn’t been that surprised to learn that you had managed to get licensed to pilot smaller planes and helicopters considering your love for flying, but he was still happy that criminology had won over everything else because you were a wonderful addition to his team.

Your license had come in handy a few times when the team needed to get somewhere on short notice, especially in remote areas where cars weren’t necessarily the fastest way to get around.

Aaron realized belatedly that he had been staring at the empty seat next to you, and he was finally able to focus entirely on the case details when Dave shot him a knowing look.

“You look too giddy for a triple murder,” Emily declared, teasing you as she often did when you looked too happy to be flying somewhere.

“Alaska is one of the only places on Earth I haven’t been to yet,” you explained.

You shrugged, an attempt to calm the restless energy that coursed through your veins. It wasn’t appropriate to grin from ear to ear when your weekend plans to curl up with a good book had been cut short by Hotch calling and informing you that the BAU was requested to help with a triple murder in Anchorage. By all means, smiling wasn’t the expected reaction. But it was Alaska.

“Really?” Derek crooned.

You bit your lip, averting your gaze. “I’ve been everywhere but here.”

“Well, you’ll see it’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” David interrupted.

Sure, but you’ve been here countless times before.

You wrapped your arms around yourself to refrain from fidgeting.

“I just always wanted to see the Northern Lights,” you confided.

Hotch tilted his head and furrowed his brow, but before you could wonder what the look behind his eyes meant, Spencer chimed in with his own added insight.

“You’re in luck. They usually occur from late August through April.”

“We’re right in the middle of it,” JJ pointed out.

You weren’t ready to admit you had googled it before you had even put on a new pair of pants as you got ready to join the team on the jet.

“When the sky is dark and clear, you should be able to witness the skies light up on an average of four out of five nights in Anchorage,” Spencer added.

“Great. Thanks, Spence!”

You smiled at Spencer’s enthusiastic nature as he proffered more information. He loved sharing random information he had stored away somewhere at any given moment. However, as much as you admired his brain, you didn’t know how to make him stop talking once he started.

“Let’s focus on this case first,” Hotch declared curtly.

You and Hotch were friends outside of work, you knew how kind he was, but it was still commendable how he shifted from sweet and warm to assertive and detached like a seasoned actor.

Hotch knew you better than the rest of the team, and it was obvious he had gathered from the way you scrunched your nose that you didn’t want Spencer to bury you in facts.

You mouthed a “thank you” in his direction and a lopsided grin appeared on his face before it disappeared again.

Hotch put his laptop in the middle of the table, and Penelope’s face showed up on the screen seconds later. “Garcia, present the case, please.”

“We have a triple murder in Anchorage. Locals reported seeing a tall man fleeing the scene in the early hours of the morning,” she began.

You noticed Emily looking at the crime scene photos. “The bodies aren’t displayed. Remorse, maybe?”

“It’s possible,” David observed.

“Do we think he acted alone?” JJ inquired.

“Were the victims killed at the same time or in short succession?” you asked. “Are we dealing with more than one killer?”

Hotch shook his head. “As far as we know, the victims died promptly one after the other. There doesn’t seem to be torture involved but they were tied up.”

“Do we know if sexual gratification was obtained from the chains? They’re oddly specific,” Spencer mused.

“No traces of semen or saliva at the scene,” Hotch clarified.

“And no torture,” Derek added.

“So he’s probably not a sadist,” Emily concluded.

“The bodies are partially covered up, the corpses weren’t desecrated in any way… And look at their hands,” Spencer remarked.

The hands were crossed over the bodies, much like you’d expect to see someone’s hands if they were displayed in a coffin at a funeral home.

“And there are flowers at their feet. There’s definitely remorse,” JJ noted.

“Not a cold-blooded killer then,” you reported.

“Most of the killers we encounter aren’t cold-blooded. They’re just very hot-blooded,” Derek asserted.

“What could be his stressor?” David prodded.

“That’s what we’ll have to find out,” Hotch denoted.

Spencer continued, “The victimology is all over the place, so he may not be looking for surrogates.”

“If this is a spree killer, it won’t end well,” Emily explained.

Hotch furrowed his brow deeper as he gave her a curt nod. “Be on the lookout if this ends up in a confrontation. Suicide by cop is probably going to be his way out.”

“We should split up,” Derek proposed.

Hotch straightened his spine, his boss mode kicked into gear. “JJ and Prentiss, go see the local law enforcement. Gather what they have so far– Reid, start a geographical profile. Try to find anything that ties the victim together. And Morgan and Rossi, go see the M.E. We need to make sure torture wasn’t involved, and we need to know if there was any sexual component to these crimes.”

“What about me, Hotch?” you queried, aware he hadn’t mentioned your name.

His eyes were set and heavy, as they often were on a case. “You’re with me, we’ll go talk to the rangers before we head to the precinct.”

You nodded.

He narrowed his eyes on you, but he addressed the team. “Try to get some rest before we get there.”

It didn’t take long for the team to scatter on the jet, some worked, some slept, but whenever you were on a plane, excitation kept you awake. It was usually a good thing, you could put your restless energy to good use as you took in every last detail about the current case, and even if you got to distant locations more tired than you should, you were ready and eager to help.

You looked out the window, seeing beautiful sights and shades of blue below you.

You chanced a glance at Hotch, finding him absorbed in case files. He didn’t look up or acknowledge you, but you knew what he was like when he was working. He wasn’t dismissive on purpose, he was just dedicated.

You closed your eyes for a few minutes, your headphones silencing the world around you. You wanted to make it look like you had tried to get some rest, at the very least.

The rangers turned out to be too deep into the national park for you and Aaron to reach them on foot, so he opted to go back to the precinct, sharing a comfortable silence on the way back.

It took a few hours before Aaron watched you yawn at the data in front of you, and a warmth in his chest gave him a momentary reprieve from the gruesome case before his conscious reminded him he had no right finding you this attractive when a spree killer was on the loose.

“You’re staring again,” Dave sniggered.

Aaron shook his head and turned away to pour himself some coffee from the communal pot. He decided to pour you one too.

He was aware that you never slept on the jet. You always looked out the window and as much as he found you adorable whenever you were mesmerized by the scenery below you, he worried about you not getting enough sleep. There was nothing he could do about it though, so he brought you coffee when he himself needed one, since you slept about as much as he did.

“When are you going to man up and tell her you like her?” Dave asked.

It wasn’t accusatory. And Aaron had learned not to deny it to Dave because he wasn’t exactly subtle about it when he was caught staring from afar.

“She doesn’t–”

“You’re blind, Aaron.”

“Thanks, Dave.”

Aaron managed to get your coffee the right shade of drinkable for you, and he made his way to you, ignoring Dave’s remarks.

“Thank you, dear,” you said mindlessly as he put down the mug in front of you.

He smiled at you before he focused on the things in front of him again.

Hotch disappeared at some point in the afternoon to go talk to the police chief and you were left gazing at his empty seat, missing his quiet but calming presence.

“You know you’re obvious,” Emily commented.

Not again.

“I don’t know what you mean,” you denied with a sputter, aware it wouldn’t work out that well for you.

“Sure you don’t.”

“Emily–” you warned.

“You should tell him.”

You shook your head at the absurdity of her comment.

“He’s my boss, Em.”

“And he’s smitten, too,” she clarified with a huge smirk.

“Sure–” you started.

“He is. You should see the way he looks at you when you’re not looking,” JJ added.

“Stop it. I can’t start believing that. Delusional isn’t an adjective I want to add to my profile.”

JJ shrugged. “Fine. All we’re saying is, you should tell him. You might be surprised.”

“Surprises aren’t always a good thing, JJ.”

“Maybe. But this one could be.”

You nodded, if nothing but to keep them from adding to it. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“That’s all we ask,” Emily added.

Hotch came back with food in hand and after a while, it became obvious you wouldn’t get the break in the case you had hoped for tonight. It was nearing midnight when Hotch called it and told everyone to go get some rest at the hotel.

Aaron called Garcia in the car to find out where she had made arrangements.

“You’re staying at the Alyeska Resort,” Garcia quipped, too chippy for this time of day in Quantico.

Aaron knew enough about Anchorage, Alaska, and about traveling in general, to know that if a hotel name ended with the word ‘resort’, it wasn’t cheap and thus it meant something not good for the BAU’s budget.

“Garcia–”

“Local LE put you there. I have nothing to do with the booking.”

He did not respond.

“I swear!” she tried to insist. “They just asked me how many rooms you’d need.”

Aaron knew that she was lying when her voice got all high and squeaky. But he also knew she knew he knew she was lying and that she would have to answer his questions later, thus it meant she was doing this for a good reason.

“We’ll talk about this later,” he declared as he hung up.

His fellow team members in the SUV with him seemed entirely too content to be staying at a luxury resort rather than a small-town motel, and if he wasn’t preoccupied with the budget meeting next week, Aaron would admit he loved the prospect of sleeping in a comfortable bed a lot more than the too small double bed that would have been waiting for him otherwise. He looked forward to a warm shower as well. The humidity and the cold air in Alaska had a way of creeping into the clothes he had brought with him.

“We’ll go back to Chugach State Park tomorrow first thing,” he announced.

You always stayed behind with him and took the last rooms once the others were all set and on their way up. He loved that you never really left him alone. He felt much more like a team member rather than a boss since you had joined.

Unfortunately, your good heart also meant unwelcome surprises.

Apparently, there was a mix up and only one room was left, and since the others had already left the lobby with their key cards, you didn’t have much of a choice when it came to whom you’d end up sharing a room with.

Aaron didn’t mind sharing a room with you, heck, he was used to having you around and he would never turn down the opportunity for some alone time with you, but this was work and he had to maintain a façade of professionalism.

He ended up talking to the manager at this ungodly hour only to be told Garcia had booked this number of rooms precisely, and that there wasn’t anything else available tonight.

Garcia, an eternal night owl, also didn’t pick up the phone even after he called a few times. It was earlier in Quantico. She wasn’t asleep, so she was clearly ignoring his calls.

As if you sensed his growing despair, you patted his arm, silencing the entire world for a few seconds.

“It’s fine, Hotch. We can share a room.”

He knew it was fine, that didn’t mean he had to go down without a fight. Why was Garcia even doing this?

“I’m tired. Let’s go to bed,” you added.

He wouldn’t get in the way of you sleeping, that was for sure.

He walked behind you until you opened the door to the room, and as luxurious as it was, only one bed stood in the middle of the room.

Just great.

The floor didn’t sound better than the too small double bed he could have gotten now.

The silence was heavy, and as much as he loved sharing companionable silences with you, this one unsettled him.

“I’ll take the floor,” he clarified, mostly to clear the air.

You turned towards him, raised eyebrows as if to defy him to add to it. “You will do no such thing, Hotch. You will put that lovely head of raven hair right there on the pillow next to mine. The bed is huge, and I will not take no for an answer.”

Lovely head?

He shook that thought away as soon as it emerged. You were tired. You clearly hadn’t meant to call him lovely.

As much as he knew how kind and sweet you were, he also knew he couldn’t say no to you, and he surely wouldn’t try and fight you on this one because he was bone-tired, and he’d give just about anything for a few hours of decent sleep in a real bed.

“Yes, ma’am.”

You beamed at him, a huge grin that made his heart leap in his chest.

“Besides you’re too old for the floor.”

He scoffed. You often made jokes like this, and if anything, it made him feel younger to be around you.

“Well, that just means you’re young enough for it,” he quipped.

You nodded, your grin as present as ever. “I am. But I said we’re sharing.”

“That you did.”

He got around to showering even though he was dead on his feet, and when he walked back into the room, you were frowning and crinkling your nose at something on your phone.

“Everything okay?”

He brought you out of your trance with his question as he exited the bathroom, your phone discarded as you picked up your go-bag.

“Yes. My turn?”

He nodded.

He was reading something in bed by the time you got out of the shower, and if you had packed pajamas that wouldn’t keep you warm, you didn’t mention it and neither did he.

You noticed he was holding his copy of The Great Gatsby, smirking at you as you approached the bed.

“Are you up for a bedtime story?” he drawled, his voice betraying he was as tired as you were.

You carefully got into bed with him, keeping an arm’s length of distance between you as you watched him propped up against the headboard, his eyes navigating sentences in the book.

He looked so different when he was technically off the clock. As much as you could tell he was stressed out, he was just at ease around you when you weren’t surrounded by colleagues or an entire precinct of police officers.

“See, I know you’re joking but I like your voice,” you shared.

In the soft glow of lamplight that stood beside him, Hotch cradled his book in his hands, his slight frown softening as he looked at you lying on your side beside him.

“Do you really want me to?”

You nodded, biting your lip nervously. “Maybe a few pages?”

With a gentle smile playing on his lips, he cleared his throat, and as he began to read, his voice, deep and resonant, filled the room, transporting you to the vivid world of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece. His voice eventually painted a vivid picture of Jay Gatsby, a man driven by dreams and unrequited love. The words, like brushstrokes on a canvas, drew a believable portrait of the roaring 1920s, a world brimming with both opulence and sorrow.

You yawned, hiding your face into the plushy pillow.

“We should probably get some rest,” he commented, his gaze filled with a tenderness you only saw directed at Jack.

He was about to put the book away, but you stopped him with a firm hand on his arm. “Just read me your favorite part?”

Hotch shook his head, but you knew he was unable to say no to you when it was just you two.

He just looked at you, the book open on his large hands. He went through a few pages, stopping around the middle, and he didn’t lose a beat once he found what he was looking for. “Every extravagant party, every shimmering light in this mansion, pales in comparison to the beauty that radiates from within you. Your presence, my dear, turns this mansion into a home.”

As he concluded the sentence, he closed the book gently, his gaze never leaving yours. It was a beautiful passage. You could see why he had chosen it.

The room seemed to hold its breath as well, helping you bask in the lingering emotions evoked by the passage he had just read.

You knew how you felt about him. It was incredibly hard to forget you were irrevocably in love with your boss on any given day, especially since he was your best friend on top of that.

You had fallen for him somewhere along the way, and now you didn’t know how not to love him. It was just so easy to love him, it was as easy as breathing, and it was as natural, too.

“Let’s get some rest,” he whispered.

You inhaled shakily, about to comment on the book itself rather than feeding him another compliment when he shut off the light beside him, rendering the room dark.

You were nervous about spending the night close to him. You were scared your sleeping form would do or say something.

But hopefully, exhaustion would make that nearly impossible, and at any rate, he would be sleeping, too.

“Goodnight, Hotch,” you muttered sleepily.

“Goodnight.”

Aaron wasn’t sure if your soft snores had woken him, but he realized he could hear them so distinctly because he was tangled around you.

He immediately shifted away, appalled he had done this to you, but you followed, seeking warmth in your sleep. He knew when he saw you come out of the shower that you’d be freezing, and who was he to deny you warmth?

But was it selfish and inappropriate to let you cuddle into his chest when you didn’t approve or consent to this at all?

He allowed himself to hold you for a few minutes, right until his conscience screamed at him to let you go.

He got up and draped the covers over you, picking up his phone and realizing it would wake him in about 45 minutes anyway.

Sharing a bed with you, sharing his warmth with you, he longed for it. He wanted it. But he would never have it. You were his subordinate. This couldn’t happen, and it shouldn’t.

You were undoubtedly his best friend, and that would have to be enough.

As perfect as you were for him, he had to be a good man and keep a lid on his feelings for you.

You deserved better than having your boss admit to having a crush on you, to having an older widower with a son pledge his love for you.

And as much as he wanted to shield you from the world, as much as he always would, he knew you could do better.

He couldn’t believe this might happen, as much as he wanted it to.

You mumbled his name in your sleep, and as much as he longed to stay put and wrap his arms around you again, he needed to do be a good man for you. He needed to be better than this.

He put on his suit, reminding himself he was here to work, and he went for a walk, hoping it would help clear his head.

But the thing was, the more he walked, the more he realized he couldn’t escape thoughts of you.

He saw a bench overlooking the mountains, and instantly, he longed to show it to you. He longed to pick up his old copy of The Great Gatsby, and to read to you while your head fell on his shoulder, absorbed by the magic of Fitzgerald’s words and the beauty of Alaska.

He thought about you stealing his shirts instead of his books, and somehow, even if he knew it could never happen, imagining you wearing his shirt left him happy enough to face the day ahead. He walked back towards the hotel, seeing the coffee shop down the street and immediately opting to bring you coffee if it meant he’d have a chance to hear you call him “dear” again.

Unfortunately, you woke up to an empty room, and as troubled as you were that he wasn’t still holding you when your eyes opened, you understood him better than he understood himself at times.

He cared for you in his own way, and you knew how problematic it was, not only for him, but for your work situation.

He probably woke up in a panic, unable to comprehend why you were voluntarily scooped up into his arms, trying to warm up. You had felt him move and you had followed, hopeful his doubts would leave him alone but they never left him alone long enough for him to indulge. After all, you knew he liked hugs and physical proximity, but maybe he didn’t crave them from you.

Still, you had felt what it was like to be held by him, and as saddened as you were that he hadn’t stayed, you knew Hotch. You knew he processed things like a turtle shuffling towards the sea.

The door of the room opened before you could gather your own thoughts, and he walked in, offering you a cup of coffee from the coffee shop you had seen down the street last night.

“Thanks, dear,” you smiled at him.

He furrowed his brow, averting his gaze, but you saw a slight color taint his cheeks.

“Another body just turned up.”

You nodded and he left again, surely his presence was required somewhere else.

You tasted the coffee, feeling it turning on your brain cells one by one as you realized how perfect it was. Hotch always nailed your order. He might not know how to approach this thing that seemed to simmer between you, maybe you didn’t either, but he cared, in his own way, and that was all that mattered.

You glanced around the room, your eyes stopping on the book. You picked it up from the bedside table, skimming over a few pages and smelling it, finding comfort in the fact that it smelled old.

You put it back, and you swiftly got dressed and ready to head to the precinct.

As you walked across the lobby, Derek, Emily and JJ were waiting for you, and you joined them, hoping to tag along with them to go to the precinct since Hotch had clearly already left.

“Well, someone was up early and got coffee, but she didn’t think about her beautiful coworkers,” Emily teased.

You realized you still held the cup of coffee in your hands, not finished with it yet.

If you mentioned Hotch had brought it to you, you’d never hear the end of it. You already had to deal with JJ and Emily telling you Hotch was smitten, you didn’t need Derek to add to it.

“We can probably stop on the way to the precinct. The coffee from the communal pot almost made me gag yesterday,” you clarified.

“It’s your treat, though, mama,” Derek noted, a shit-eating grin plastered on his face.

“Fine,” you conceded, aware you needed to get to the precinct sooner rather than later. You also didn’t have enough fight in you to argue about whose turn it was to pay for coffee.

With the geographical profile that Reid provided, the team eventually deduced that the unsub was a ranger as well, and the remaining rangers explained that Peter Tipps was probably located near the river deep inside the park where he had a cabin, and that the only way to get there was by helicopter or with ATVs.

It had taken less than 48 hours for the team to make a connection between the victims, and for Reid to have a geographical profile ready.

It took Aaron less than two hours to get a warrant.

Really, the hardest part of this whole thing seemed to be convincing the oldest ranger with his impressive Tom Selleck mustache, the captain of the other rangers, to allow the team into the park to make the arrest.

“The only ranger I have who can fly this thing is in his Florida, and the other one is Tipps,” the mustache explained again, seemingly decided not to let anyone touch his helicopter while a spree killer roamed free.

“And as I’ve told you, repeatedly I might add, I can fly it,” you interrupted.

Aaron gestured for you to show the ranger your license in hopes of speeding up the process.

Aaron stared at the captain, waiting for him to come up with another half-assed excuse when he had a perfectly capable pilot right in front of him.

The mustache finally nodded as he looked at your license carefully, way more carefully than he had probably ever looked at anything else in his entire life.

Aaron added, “We have reason to believe he could be killing them near Knik River. The M.E. found traces of the river’s microorganisms in the victims’ lungs. How close is the cabin to the river?”

“Maybe a hundred meters or so. But like I said to sweetheart here,” the captain looked at you with a smile, “the only way to get to Peter’s cabin is by helicopter or with our ATVs.”

Aaron knew what you looked like when you were trying to breathe through your frustration. He also knew that the ranger was pushing your buttons.

Aaron wanted to intervene because that man was clearly intent on getting on your last nerve today, but you just smiled as he reluctantly proffered the keys to the chopper.

Aaron admired how you kept a level head under most circumstances. He knew it wasn’t easy to be a woman in law enforcement, and it certainly wasn’t easy to be a woman in the FBI.

He loved that you showed men like him you were better than them every chance you got, though. You were truly one of the best agents he had ever seen, and he considered himself lucky to get a chance to witness the shocked expressions on some men’s faces when you demonstrated just how capable you were. Truthfully though, he hoped one day all women in law enforcement would not need to demonstrate they belonged there just as much as the men. The greatest agents Aaron had had the privilege of working with had been majoritarily women, and they still were.

The captain explained how to get to Peter’s cabin with the chopper, a detailed map of the park in hand to serve as visual support, and it was agreed that Aaron would go with you and the mustache while the others took the ATVs.

Aaron took you aside to check how you were doing while the rangers coordinated with the rest of the team, knowing the mustache probably hadn’t gotten to you, but it was his job to make sure you were okay.

“All good?” he asked.

“My dear knight in tight-fitting pants, you know I don’t care that Whiskers here is an accomplished jackass.”

Aaron fought the urge to laugh. He had been somewhat certain that the ranger hadn’t gotten to you, but the nickname you had just invented for him confirmed Aaron’s hunch.

You always came up with nicknames for people around you, especially for those who insulted you in any way, and Aaron wondered if you had ever given him one when you first started working for him. He had to give it to you though, you came up with the most amusing nicknames he’d ever heard, and he lived with a seven-year-old. Nonetheless, at some point, you had become his friend, and his protectiveness over you had even awarded him the title of “knight”, whatever other words it was buried with. He was incredibly proud to have earned that title.

You landed near the site of the cabin, aware that the sounds of the chopper would alert the unsub of your presence, but fortunately, Peter was probably used to the rangers coming and going on his land, so he might believe the roaring sounds to be his colleagues rather than law enforcement coming to arrest him.

Hotch gestured towards the pier, and you saw what looked like an unmoving body. The captain canvassed the perimeter around the cabin while you and Hotch headed towards the pier.

You walked up to the body while Hotch covered your six, and you noticed rigor mortis had already set in when you put your hand on the woman’s neck.

That was when you dramatically heard branches cracking near you, and you turned towards the line of trees, finding Peter coming out of the woods with bloody tools.

You didn’t notice he was pointing a gun at you before the ranger rejoined you, and as much as you had figured Peter Tipps out at the precinct, confrontations like these usually didn’t end well because spree killers weren't often desperate.

“My boy, it doesn’t have to end like this. Think about your mama.”

Wow. That ranger really didn’t know when to shut up. Not only had he infantilized the unsub, Hotch had been very clear that the talking should be left to you or him.

“I’m doing this for my mama!” Tipps howled.

You held your hands up, mostly to show you weren’t carrying your weapon right now, to convey that you weren’t a threat. “I know you are, Peter. People wronged her, and you want her to get justice before it’s too late, right?”

You had uncovered along with JJ that the women who were killed in the past days were all women who had wronged his mother.

Peter simply nodded, defeat evident on his features.

You looked over at Hotch, aware he got your plan to humanize Peter with just a look.

You had to relate to Peter, you had to make him think he wasn’t a monster.

You gestured towards Hotch to let him know that you were ready.

Hotch always figured what you wanted to say with very little, and you were sure this was why he so often paired himself with you. You made a great team.

You subtly drew your weapon, keeping it as concealed as you could.

“But you’re not a killer, Peter,” Hotch clarified.

“Yeah, are you sure about that?” Peter seethed.

You nodded as you started to approach him. “I am. It’s eating at you. The guilt, the remorse… you want to do right by your mom and that’s honorable. But this isn’t the way.”

The team all knew time was of the essence, Penelope had called earlier to let you know that Peter’s mom was circling the drain.

“Come on, if we leave now, you’ll still get to say goodbye,” Hotch reminded him. It was talking down a suspect 101, hoping that talking would get to appeal to someone's humanity, and in this case, to Peter's love for his mom.

Hotch was now closer to Peter than you were, and within a split second, you knew how problematic that was when Peter’s finger hovered close to the trigger.

Hotch had read the situation as well and he ducked, but Peter had managed to shoot at Hotch. You had no choice but to shoot Peter, successfully hitting him in the knee, hoping you weren’t too late reacting for Hotch.

You saw Hotch move and get up, and he seemed unscathed apart from being winded by the bullet hitting his vest.

Peter was wailing in pain and his screams echoed around the surface of the river, resonating loudly enough to make you wince.

You had probably hit him right in the kneecap. You so rarely missed your target.

Peter dove into the river next to him before you could run to him to cuff him, and this time of year, the water wasn’t only cold but very agitated. It would take a great swimmer to survive this if the cold didn’t numb his senses as he went in, and if you hadn’t shot his leg and rendered it mostly unusable.

You saw Hotch run towards where Peter had gone in, and you yelled at him to not be stupid about this. You tried to reach for his arm to hold him back, but Hotch was out of reach and he dove in right after Peter, ignoring your loud protests and screams not to be reckless.

Your heart was in your throat as you hoped for Hotch to resurface, ready to dive in right after him with the ranger looking at you.

You ran towards the river but Whiskers held you back right before you could dive after both of them.

“Sure hope your man is a good swimmer,” he added.

Wow. He really didn’t know when to shut up. How you hated his guts.

You couldn’t even breathe as you waited for Hotch to come back up. You felt your heart beating out of your chest, your own heartbeat loud in your ears as you clenched your fists and prayed to any deity that would listen to make sure that Hotch would be okay.

But Hotch knew how to swim. He was a triathlon athlete. He could do this. If anyone could pull this off, it was him.

You saw him resurface and cough up enough water to fill a glass, holding on to an unconscious Peter. He brought him towards the edge of the pier, and the ranger let you run towards them. You brought them both out with the ranger’s help, realizing just how cold the water was as you held Hotch’s shoulders.

The ranger tried to revive Peter, but you could only focus on Hotch.

You helped him out of his vest, seeing him wince and hiss as he moved. You knew what it felt like to get hit with a vest, and you knew he was putting on a brave face for you.

Aaron knew that not shaking from the cold wasn’t a good sign. He had to warm up, and fast.

“Hotch! Are you okay?”

“Mm’ okay. Just cold,” he replied, the shivers finally overtaking his body, and he sighed in relief. Feeling the cold was good. It meant he was cold, but not cold enough to be in danger.

You tried to warm him up, but he needed to take off the wet clothes before he froze to death.

He watched you yell orders at the ranger as you heard the ATVs approach, and while you didn’t have authority or power here, when the ranger met Aaron’s troubled gaze, he actually listened to you without a single protest.

“Let’s take the chopper and bring you back to warmth.”

Aaron hopped into the chopper, and you tried to put the heating as high as it could go but he knew that helicopters like these weren’t equipped with proper ventilation systems like cars. Still, it warmed up enough to make him feel his toes again, and you clearly didn't care if you were sweating through your eyeballs.

Aaron watched you pilot the helicopter back to the helipad at the entrance of the park and he was once more overwhelmed by how amazing you were. He watched you through a daze as you gripped the joystick and led him towards warmth, his chest already fuzzy with feelings for you. He noticed how you frowned at everything around you when you were nervous, and he knew how quiet you got when you were determined to do something right. The sun started to set, and it painted beautiful hues across your face, just in time for him to watch a bit of sweat glisten on your forehead. He wasn’t nearly as warm as you were right now, but you clearly didn’t care that sweat was about to cloud your vision as the helicopter slowed.

He felt you put the chopper down and before he knew it, he was running with you towards one of the SUVs appointed to the team, not letting him get a word in about driving. You ordered him to lie down in the backseat, and he just obeyed without a single word, grateful for the blanket being draped over him before the door closed.

Aaron listened to you ramble on and on in the car, knowing you were nervous and trying to distract yourself. Last night when you had mentioned you liked his voice, he had been too much of a coward to tell you just the same.

He noticed your shaky hand put the heating as high as it could go, and when you parked the car near the hotel, Aaron’s teeth had stopped chattering together.

He let you lead the way as you brought him up to the room, and he shut up when you brought him into the bathroom and turned the shower on for him.

He looked down at himself, realizing he had to discard his wet suit. He frowned at his pants, seeing your point about them being tight-fitting now more than ever.

“I need to remove my clothes,” he stammered, his voice still unsteady because of the cold seeping through his bones.

You nodded as if it was your cue to leave, as much as he wanted you to stay.

“I’ll be right here,” you mentioned, pointing towards the room.

Aaron wasn’t used to someone caring about him, even less so this way. You always cared. You cared enough to ask him to eat, to ask him to take a break, to ask him to get some sleep. You always showed him you cared.

He loved that about you.

He nodded, and told you to tell the team about what had happened and why you had left in a hurry, hoping he made enough sense because his mind was frighteningly numb.

The hot water scalded him as he felt the spray on his skin, but he appreciated the fact that he could feel every extremity and limb within minutes of standing under it.

He took his time showering, careful to avoid the forming purple bruise on his ribcage.

He wasn’t sure if Peter had made it, but he chose not to think about the case. The team’s work was done as far as he knew, and he needed not to think about anything for a while.

He needed not to be reminded of the fact that he had woken up with you in his arms, and the fact that he wanted nothing more than for that to happen again.

You called the team to let them know everything that had happened, they informed you that Peter was alive and that local LE would take care of the rest, you all agreed that everyone would meet back at the hotel to get dinner together after a record-time arrest in just over two days.

You changed into more comfortable clothes while Hotch showered, and you picked up the book again from the bedside table. You waited a few minutes to make sure you didn’t hear a distinct thump signaling he had fallen, and eventually, you texted him that you were going down to the lobby.

Fortunately, his phone had remained in the helicopter when everything went down, so it hadn’t been ruined by water damage. You heard his phone buzz on the other side of the door, now aware your message had gone through.

You made your way down to the lobby with the book in hand, determined to read that passage he had read to you last night.

You also weren’t equipped to see him come out of the shower all wet and warm, and since you hadn’t given him his bag before he went in the shower, you wanted to spare him from having to walk around the room in just a towel.

Not that you didn’t want to see him, but you figured he deserved a bit of privacy considering he already had to share a room with you.

You wanted to ask if his ribs were okay, but you decided to wait until he was out of the room to do so.

You sat down in the lobby with his book minutes later, picking up where you had left off last night. You much preferred having him read to you, but you couldn’t say you weren’t excited to get to his favorite part.

You couldn’t tell how long you had been reading when you finally finished the book, but you were completely taken aback by its beauty when JJ sat down next to you, Emily not far in tow.

“How’s Hotch?” JJ asked.

“Fine,” you replied.

You put the book down, your thoughts all over the place before meeting their watchful gazes, seeing how both of them looked too smug for your own taste.

“You know, the mustache man said you were awfully worried about your boyfriend,” Emily teased with quirked eyebrows and a huge smirk.

“Let’s not do this, please,” you gently warned.

You could stomach the teasing, the jokes and all. But Hotch had been hurt today, and worried or not, you didn’t want to think about what could have happened.

The upside of working with profilers is that they knew when to let things go.

“Are you okay? Pen said today was–” JJ started.

You still missed your dad dearly. You knew today’s date by heart, always dreading it for a week before and crying over it for a week after.

You nodded. “Sometimes I just can’t believe it’s been two years already.”

“I promise, it’ll get easier,” JJ reassured.

Logically, you knew she was right. But that didn’t mean you didn’t miss your dad.

Aaron found the room empty after his shower, missing your presence acutely. He knew whenever you weren’t around because it was such a huge contrast to having you around. He was aware you had probably left the room to spare him from having to walk around in just a towel, and he smiled to himself because that’s how thoughtful you were.

He looked at his texts, seeing yours before he saw those back and forth with Garcia, then he let his thumb over the call button for Garcia. He needed to know why she had done this for the team and to him. Surely something had escaped him.

He pressed the call button.

He heard the line click.

“I spoke with the park rangers, Garcia,” he immediately announced.

He heard nervous energy ruffling papers and furiously clicking on keys.

“Sorry, sir. But the poor soul won’t tell anyone she lost her dad two years ago.”

Oh. Right. You lost your dad two years ago. You were still grieving when you joined the team. He remembered that. Why didn’t you tell him about today?

He was your friend. He even had the audacity to assume he was your best friend.

Maybe it was his fault, he should have remembered.

He should have known when he figured out that Garcia wanted to do something nice for you.

“Oh.”

“I am appealing to your humanity, Hotch. Please–”

He sighed, far from mad. “Just two things: How did you pull this off and how did we end up in the same room?”

“It’s best if I don’t tell you, and for the other part, ask your other coworkers. I’m not the one who wanted to meddle here–”

Dave. It had to be. He had been making comments for months, giving him looks for longer than that, and he was a true Italian mom, always putting his paws in other people’s plates.

“Noted.” He paused, knowing better than to question her kindness and her methods. “Oh, and Garcia?”

“Yes, sir?”

He didn’t know how she pulled the last part off, but he knew she hadn’t done it alone. She didn’t know you were the last ones to head up when the team reached the hotel. Someone told her, and someone else meddled.

“Thank you,” he said softly.

If anything, Garcia might have just salvaged his friendship with you. He felt like a fool for not remembering the anniversary of your dad’s death.

Aaron hung up and sent you a text that he was on his way down.

The second he saw you standing alone in the hallway near the elevator, he hugged you. He didn’t initiate hugs nearly enough in your friendship, but hugs were meant to be comforting and you deserved comfort if he could provide it, especially when you needed it but wouldn’t ask for it. His bruised rib protested a little, but he attributed it to the fact that the book you held was biting his skin.

You finally hugged him back, your arms wrapping around his waist, and he breathed a little easier.

“Penny told me she blabbed to you all that it’s been two years since my dad passed.”

He leaned back enough to look into your eyes, but he pulled you back in within seconds. “I’m sorry.”

His arms wrapped more tightly around your shoulders, he could feel your heartbeat strong and steady against him, and as worried as you had been earlier, he was here and he was alive because of you and your quick thinking.

He settled his jaw on your crown, and he felt you shake a little as you drew in a full breath.

He felt warm puffs of air hit his chest, and he realized again how his body was perfect against yours. As tall as he was compared to you, his chest was perfect for your cheek to rest on, his chin was at home on top of your head, and his arms had been molded to accommodate your frame.

It occurred to him in that moment that he didn’t initiate nearly enough hugs because he didn’t know how to let go.

He moved back to look into your beautiful eyes again. “I asked the concierge this morning, and we should be able to see the Northern Lights tonight.”

“Gosh, I really hope so.”

“Why do you want to see the Northern Lights? If I may ask.”

His hands were still on your shoulders, not that you seemed to mind the comforting touch.

You smiled as you surely remembered a fond memory. “My dad loved North to Alaska by Johnny Horton. He sang it to me all the time as a kid. And he promised me he’d bring me here one day so we could look at the Northern Lights and say hello to my mom… but then, you know… Life happened.”

He recalled something you had shared with him not so long ago.

“Your mom is from around here, right?”

“Yeah.”

He gave you a small smile, gently caressing the length of your arms. “Thank you for telling me.”

“Thank you for asking.”

He saw the rest of the team gathered not far away in the lobby, and he was grateful the hallway had shielded you both from sharing this intimate moment with them. Not that he would have cared much. You were his friend, the team knew that.

He saw your eyes linger on his lips, and he was too absorbed in what it could mean to form a coherent sentence.

Your hand patted his chest gently, and he was too stunned to do anything but stare at your hand on him.

“I’ll just go freshen up and put the book back. See you in five down here?” you offered.

Aaron nodded, completely lost on the feeling of your hand on his thundering heart.

He was left standing there, instantly missing you as he watched you disappear into the elevator.

While normally everyone would be cranky because of the jetlag on the first few nights, the team was in a good mood. Enough so to go out together and eat at the hotel restaurant.

Even Hotch was in a good mood and drinking with the team. He drank from time to time with the team, but this time, he had more than one drink which was unusual for him.

The food the waiters brought to your table was delicious, and each time you listened to the team ramble about one thing or another, you found yourself looking at Hotch to see if he laughed.

“So, Hotch. Anyone new in your life since Beth?” Derek asked, waggling his eyebrows at his boss as if it was normal for him to ask about his private life.

“No,” he replied.

Hotch never shared much of himself with the team, and no one knew the details of what led him to break up with her. He mentioned that Beth went to work in Hong Kong, but you had seen Beth a few months later in the grocery store. Surely, her contract hadn’t been that long, or long enough not to warrant trying to make it work long distance.

If you were honest with yourself, you were relieved not to have to see him love another woman. You wanted him to be happy, but you wished he could be happy without it hurting you.

You were somewhat relieved he wasn’t dating anyone, although Hotch being Hotch, he could just be denying it in front of the team until he was ready to come out and say it, but you had a feeling he was telling the truth because you spent a lot of time with him outside of work, and as his best friend, you hoped he would have told you if he was dating someone.

You looked up at him and offered him a small smile. He gave you one back.

Derek narrowed his eyes at you. “What about you, honey?”

“I’m—No.”

You tried not to flush, but you didn’t like sharing details regarding your private life, especially around the team, and especially around Hotch.

You couldn’t date most of the time because of your job, but in the past months, it was mostly due to the fact that Hotch was the only person on your mind. While you could technically go for a knock-off version and have the team comment on their striking resemblance to Hotch, you were more than happy to have the real thing in front of you, even if you never got to have him the way you wanted.

Derek instantly started teasing Spencer about something when he seemed to notice your reluctance to discuss this, so you sipped on your drink, finding it empty already.

You walked away to get yourself another drink, knowing it would be your last for the night.

The bartender was cute enough, and if he was pouring more gin than he was supposed to in your drink, you weren’t about to report him for it.

You turned and looked back at Hotch, and as much as he seemed absorbed in a conversation with Rossi, his eyes narrowed on you for a few seconds.

Even from this distance, you found him absolutely gorgeous. He was gracefully imposing, and if that was only the first thing you noticed, now you knew he had a heart of gold as well. It truly baffled you that women weren’t falling at his feet every time he walked into a room. The man was absolutely flawless. He could be displayed in a museum for passersby to gawk at him, and you’d be prepared to pay good money to stare at him all day long.

“I get off at 11,” the bartender suggested with a smile as he placed your drink in front of you.

Had you been in the mood and not overly in love with your boss, he could have been your type. But only one man mattered to you, and he didn’t even know you were in love with him in the first place.

Aaron witnessed the bartender getting too close for his taste from afar, and unfortunately, Dave saw it, too. Aaron wasn’t one to show much on his face, but he couldn’t help clenching his jaw and his fists when he saw the bartender flirt with you.

“Please go talk to her or I will,” Dave said, clearly an attempt to goad him into acting on it.

Aaron didn’t question everything for once in his life, and he just reached you in a few strides.

“You aren’t allowed to flirt with customers,” he bit at the bartender.

Aaron cornered you against the counter, towering over you.

“Are you okay?’’ he asked, concerned.

“Yes. Are you?’’

“I am,’’ he replied. He was breathing easier now that he had silently told the bartender to keep his distance with a warning look. “Do you want to go for a walk?”

You nodded and followed him out.

The team was so used to you two disappearing together that no one questioned it when you announced you were going for a walk.

If Dave waggled his eyebrows and smirked at you both, Aaron purposely ignored him.

“Thanks for getting me out of what would have been a very awkward conversation,” you muttered.

Aaron gave you a tight-lipped smile. “People hit on you all the time. You didn’t need me.”

“I always need you,” you admitted.

Aaron ignored the flutters in his chest at your revelation.

It wasn’t dark enough for the Northern Lights yet, but he sure hoped they’d show up before you left in the morning. He really wanted you to see them.

“This place is so beautiful,” you whispered into the night.

“Yeah,” he agreed, looking down at you with a soft smile. “Beautiful.”

He walked around the resort with you, and he loved sharing silence with you because you never felt the need to fill it with talk.

You started yawning the longer you walked, and Aaron chuckled next to you, finding your exhaustion endearing.

As much as he wanted to stay and enjoy walking with you, he knew you were tired. He was, too.

“We should catch some sleep.”

“Yeah,” you agreed reluctantly.

He saw you look up one last time, a bit saddened himself that you wouldn’t get to see the Northern Lights like you wanted.

“Let’s go back to our room.”

Aaron knew you could make it up there even if you were tired, but he wouldn’t have you falling on his conscience if he could help it. His hand on your lower back, he guided you towards the lobby and the elevator.

“You know I can get there safely, right?”

You didn’t look as though you minded his hand, you usually never did anyway.

He gave you a small smirk. “I know. I just like knowing you’re safe.”

“My knight in tight-fitting pants!” you teased again.

It had become a running joke by now. You had teased him about his tight pants for months, but not once he had had the courage to change his wardrobe because he had caught you staring.

He scoffed but he still kept his hand firmly in place.

The silence was heavy as he let you both in, and he realized he really wanted to hug you again.

Usually, when you hugged him, it wasn’t necessarily spontaneous. You hugged him on special occasions, like the Christmas party at Dave’s, the New Year’s Eve party at Garcia’s, or any of the birthdays and holidays the BAU celebrated. Sometimes, you hugged him after leaving a dinner party with him and Jack. Or after one of your many private screenings of Top Gun. But those were different.

Now, he wanted to hug you. He wanted to initiate it.

Sometimes you had hugged him for comfort, but you always asked first. You were always careful not to overstep the boundaries of your friendship, and Aaron didn’t know if he could ask right now.

He wanted to hug you for other reasons than comfort. It was selfishly motivated, just wanting to feel you close.

Aaron tried not to think about how your clothes hugged your silhouette flawlessly as he trailed after you into the room. It was dangerous to let himself think of you, with or without clothes on. Whether you wore a magnificent dress on a night out with the team, slacks and blouses at work, even hoodies with jeans in less official settings… You were always a sight.

He let you get the first shower, and he debated calling Jack, but it was too late for him to do so even with the few hours of difference, so instead he sent a text to Jessica to tell her to give Jack a kiss for him.

Aaron looked outside minutes later and he realized one of your wishes could come true tonight, and he really wanted to be the one to share it with you. Selfish motives or not, you were still his friend and he wanted to get to see your face the first time you saw the Northern Lights.

He picked up the warm blanket he brought everywhere from his go-bag, and he waited for you to come out of the bathroom.

He was too giddy to care about optics when you emerged from the bathroom smelling delicious and wet, and he just beamed at you and grabbed your hand.

“Come on. I want to show you something.”

He saw you notice the blanket stored under his arm, and you clearly wondered what was happening. You weren’t reluctant as much as you were confused, at least, that was how he saw the shocked expression on your face as your eyes lingered on his hand in yours.

“Do you trust me?” he asked.

“Of course, I do.”

“Then come with me.”

Within minutes you were outside and all bundled up, and Hotch brought you towards a small bench overlooking the mountains and he smiled as he saw you tear up at the sky above you.

“Oh, Hotch! Oh, they’re so beautiful!”

Dancing waves of color and light pulsated through the skies in vibrant hues of green, yellow, blue, pink, and violet. Each color looked even more beautiful as they were reflected on the mountains.

You felt Hotch’s eyes on you, and as uncomfortable as you should have been for tearing up right now, you weren’t. You were always comfortable around him, even if you were crying at the beautiful and surreal spectacle Mother Nature was giving you.

You turned to look at him, completely taken aback by how beautiful he looked right now.

The silver sheen of the moon glowed on his features, and the many lights of the skies swam around in his hazel eyes. He was always gorgeous, but he was simply breathtaking right now.

You turned back towards the Northern Lights before you blurted out that he was magnificent, and your heartbeat slowed as you took in the sight of the colorful lights dancing ethereally in the sky.

“Beautiful,” he added after a while.

You agreed.

You shivered after a while, too taken by the lights above you to care about the humid cold seeping through your clothes.

“Here—” he said, offering his warmth. You slid next to him, engulfed by heat as he laid the blanket over you.

You did your best not to melt into his side, but Hotch just clasped your shoulder and brought you even closer to him.

You ended up putting your legs on top of his, slotting them between his. He held you so close that you could feel his warm breath as his nose brushed your temple.

It didn’t take long for you to be warm and comfortable.

Hotch offered to go back the more you shivered, but you wanted to stay a little while longer.

“Can we stay a little bit longer?”

“We can stay as long as you want.”

After a while, it occurred to you this was very domestic and you wanted to thank him, but nothing came to mind except a compulsion to hug him.

“Can I hug you?’’

Every time you had asked him, he had smiled and agreed. But you still always asked because he was your superior, and you never wanted to make him uncomfortable.

“Of course you can. You don’t have to ask every time.’’

You moved to straddle his lap, and he brought the blanket around you both. It shielded you from the cold wind.

You put your head on his shoulder, breathing in his scent as you nuzzled your nose into his neck. His hands roamed gently over your back, warming you with his touch. His body was warm, and the blanket around you was enough to make you stop shivering. At least, you weren’t shivering because of the cold anymore.

After a while, you made a move to pull back, but he held onto you firmly.

You looked at him, puzzled.

“Not yet– Just, please… Not yet.”

You didn’t know what this was about, but you’d never deny him a longer hug.

You nodded and remained firmly in place against him, your bodies melting into one. You put your arms around his neck, your gaze meeting his. His eyes were full of affection for you, warm and kind, his brow softening the longer he looked at you.

You seemed suspended in time in your little cocoon. You traced his face with featherlight touches and fingertips, and when he closed his eyes to breathe in slowly, you smiled to yourself.

You put your forehead against his as you caressed his nape and the bottom of his hair, and when your hands gently grazed his neck, he took a few deeper breaths.

You were too far gone to pull back now.

This was months in the making, if you were totally honest with yourself.

The blossoming friendship after he had finally warmed up to you, the quiet nights in with Jack, the model planes, the many screenings of Top Gun, the inside jokes, the playful banter, the lingering hugs, and the book last night? The interrupted cuddles in bed this morning?

You had managed to go through the entire book earlier, and his favorite line was nowhere to be found, as if he had created it out of thin air, as if he had been inspired to share his own poetry within the confines of the Roaring Twenties and Gatsby himself. Hotch must have known you’d eventually notice it wasn’t in the book, and then what?

And then this?

Bringing you to an isolated bench like he had scouted the place for the best spot to watch the Northern Lights…

You cradled his face, and his breath hitched.

How long had it been since someone had touched him like this? How long had it been since someone offered him the tenderness he deserved?

Hotch’s eyes opened and they were locked on yours. His gaze darted down to your lips, you opted to lean down as a smile grazed his features.

There wasn’t a fire or a blaze of glory. Your lips met quietly, silently, and yet, the heat that radiated through your entire body burned every one of your extremities. You needed him. You had to touch him, you had to cherish him.

The kiss picked up as his lips parted for yours, and when his tongue shyly met yours, you shuddered because, with just this, you knew you’d never want to kiss anyone else ever again.

The kiss was gentle, tentative, shy… But it was also smooth sailing amid the chaotic ocean that your mind was swimming in. The thoughts and voices in your head were loud, but his lips on you were louder.

“I know it’s against Bureau policy, but what if we used that bed of ours, not to sleep, for the rest of the night?”

“Are you sure?”

I’ve never been surer.

“Yes.”

Hotch nodded and he brought you to your feet. He brought you inside and if his hand was firmly clasped with yours in the elevator, you chose not to wonder what it meant.

For once, you wouldn’t question anything. You would allow yourself to be in the moment, you would allow yourself to feel and to be with him fully.

He opened the door quietly, bringing you inside by the waist.

He pulled you closer, cradling your face as if you were precious. His gaze was soft, and knowing him, he was looking for any sign that you would back out or run away from him, but you were certain. His hands and arms on you were all you needed to know you were meant to be right here.

The earlier kiss was enough to know his lips were perfect on yours, and every breath he had shared with you had given you a new outlook on life.

You needed him like you needed air.

“You’re beautiful,” you uttered low as your hands came to rest on his chest, pulling on his lapels to get him ever closer even if your bodies were almost draped on top of each other already.

He chuckled and looked down, so you smoothed your hand up and down his chest, carefully not to press down so you wouldn’t hurt him.

He looked up again, a fond expression behind his eyes.

“You are breathtaking,” he whispered, his eyes darting in quick succession between yours.

A small smile ghosted over his lips before he ran his thumb over your lips.

“Kiss me,” you pleaded gently.

Apparently, he didn’t have to be told twice.

He leaned down and his knees buckled the second his lips were on yours. You tried to hold him up, but you walked him back towards the bed before you both fell.

The back of his knees met the edge of the bed and he sat, bringing you down with him. You straddled his lap and ran your fingers over his forehead before smoothing his hair back and letting your fingers graze his scalp.

He shivered under you, still smiling up at you as his hands roamed over your back gently, stroking it and pulling you in. You grinned as his eyes met yours, the pale hazel now dark brown.

Hotch picked you up and shifted you both, laying you down and hovering above you as his hands trailed up and down your body length.

He rested his weight on his elbow next to you, just looking at you with sparkling eyes and a dazzling smile.

He positioned himself halfway between your legs and he brought your leg around his waist, his touch warm at the back of your knee.

You could feel all of him pressing against you, but it wasn’t enough. You needed more. You needed to touch him. You needed to know how warm his skin was, how smooth his skin was, how rough the shadow of stubble growing on his cheeks was, and how beautiful he looked when he wore nothing but you on top of him.

You helped him shed his jacket as he helped you remove yours, and you let your fingers rest around his waist, tentatively moving his shirt out of his pants before you unbuttoned it.

He let you and when you traced his scars with gentle fingers, he closed his eyes. He reopened them only when you started kissing them one by one, taking your time to savor them.

“You are beautiful,” you repeated as your lips met each scar and raised edge of him. You saw the angry purple bruise on his rib, and you kissed that one even more gently.

You would worship him if he let you.

He removed your shirt and your chests met in the dark, the warmth of your combined bodies was enough to make your head spin.

He kissed you again until you couldn’t breathe, until the only air you would ever want again was the one he was pouring into your lungs himself.

“We don’t have to do anything.”

“Aaron—”

He smirked, a playful grin on his lips.

“What?” you asked.

“You never call me ‘Aaron’.”

“What if I start?”

You knew what this meant, both to you and to him. It was silently acknowledging that in this moment, and whenever you would call him ‘Aaron’, he wouldn’t be your boss or your coworker. He would just be ‘Aaron’.

He just beamed at you, and you knew you had made him happy with something small.

You fondly caressed his cheek, and you looked deep into his eyes. “Do you want this?”

“Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea.”

He didn’t know precisely when something had shifted in his brain earlier, but he knew that he couldn’t stop himself from wanting this and you now that he had had a taste.

Aaron unbuttoned your jeans and removed them with your adamant nods to do so, and when he stared at your lace panties, he could have sworn he felt himself twitch in his pants.

He kissed his way down your belly, and up again. He kissed every inch of skin he could find, and every sound you made became his new favorite from now on. Every time you rocked up against him, you made him stir in his pants.

He was kissing you again and this time, he unclasped your bra.

“Is this okay?’’ he asked between soft kisses.

“More than.”

He used one of his legs to part yours, making you encircle his waist with your legs resting around him. His hand traveled up and down your leg, making him thrust his hips into you instinctively each time your lips and tongues fought together. He trailed your thigh with his fingertips before grabbing the back of your knee to pull you closer against him, thrusting again.

You were positively thrashing for more friction under him, and he was drunk on how it felt to have you like this, to have you desperate for him the way he had so often imagined.

He moved to kiss your neck, leaving a trail of soft kisses before he sucked on your pulse point. Your moans echoed around in his head, making him harder than he had ever been before. He kissed every part of your neck, from the spot below your ears to the column of your throat. He gave gentle kisses before he sucked and bit your velvety skin, trying to fight the urge to mark you as his.

He purred when you grabbed his head and smoothed your fingers into his hair, and he moaned inside your mouth as his clothed erection met your clothed warmth.

The more he moved against you, the more your hand massaged his scalp before your nails started grazing his skull, the more he kissed your delicious skin, the more he tasted your lips on his, the more he felt his balls tighten and threaten to make this embarrassing.

Aaron knew coming in his pants wouldn’t make a good first impression. He stilled his movements, trying to breathe through everything that he felt.

“Everything okay?” your gentle voice calmed him instantly.

He nodded. “Just very– You’re very–”

Oh, perfect, Aaron. Make a fool of yourself.

“Well, so are you.” You smiled at him, and when you rutted your core against his erection, he had to bite his lip to refrain from getting too excited.

“I’m too close,” he admitted, averting his gaze. He was embarrassed, but he couldn’t help it. You were so perfect, and so–

Your eyes sparkled with affection, and he wasn’t sure if he had voiced what he needed to voice correctly because you stared at him with nothing but adoration.

Your hand came to caress his cheek, tender and delicate. “Let’s slow down and just kiss for a while, then. What do you say? Want to make out?”

He smiled at the proposition, more than willing to just kiss you for a few minutes.

Your lips were on his again within seconds, this time less hungry and more tentative, exploring and savoring.

The pleasure centers in his brain didn’t let up, but a few minutes of gentle kissing was enough to calm down.

“I’m sorry,” he finally muttered against your lips, burying his face in the crook of your neck.

Your hand was in his hair before he knew it, stroking his head with soothing patterns. “You have nothing to be sorry about, Aaron. It would have been incredibly hot if you had spilled because of this, but I’m glad because I’d rather have you come a bit later. And somewhere else.”

Oh.

He was in for a treat. You would be the one to tell him when and where to come. He knew you were the kind of person who led others, well, he didn’t know. But he had thought about it.

“What do you want?” he pondered.

“Take off your pants,” you indicated.

Aaron shed his pants, standing in his boxers before you, watching you wearing only a pair of lace panties which would haunt his fantasies for days to come.

He wanted to palm himself to relieve some pressure, but he was in a trance where only your voice would get him to do anything.

“Now, come here,” you gestured.

He draped himself over you again, his lips finding yours instinctively.

“You are so perfect,” he croaked.

Aaron made it a point to kiss every part of you with the utmost love and adoration he had for you.

“Beautiful,” he muttered against every inch of your bare skin.

He left a trail of goosebumps everywhere he touched you, everywhere he kissed you, and if you shivered again, he knew it wasn’t because you were cold.

Aaron looked at you like a work of art made to be worshipped and appreciated, and he wouldn’t let an inch go to waste.

“Fuck. You’re so perfect,” he whispered.

He dove in to capture a nipple between his lips, and he rolled his tongue on it, making you buck upwards for more.

He smiled when he saw how responsive you were and he got to work, kissing and suckling on your breasts before coming back up to your mouth. He kissed you so well you couldn’t help but arch up into every touch, into every flick of his tongue as it met yours.

Aaron wanted nothing more but to ease the throbbing he felt, but above all, he wanted to see you squirm under him some more.

He normally would let you get your way from start to finish, but he felt like he had something to prove this time, and he would prove it. But not without your explicit consent to do so.

“I need to hear you say it.” It was implied that you both knew what ‘it’ meant.

You just smiled at him, and he was helpless to do anything but smile back.

“I want this, and I want you. Now stop messing around and remove my panties.”

He chuckled at your decisiveness. “Yes, ma’am.”

He hooked his fingers into the waistband, gently pulling them down and letting his gaze linger on you.

“You can stare all you want once you remove your boxers, Aaron,” you expressed with undertones of teasing and affection.

He shed his boxers, baring himself to you. He saw your eyes go wide and your body tense up as you took in the sight of him, but you relaxed as he resumed kissing you, his soft kisses trailing your neck sloppily.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. I’ll make it fit,” he said cheekily as he breathed against the column of your throat, feeling your breath hitch next to his cheek.

Your fingernails grazed his back, and his entire plan ran out the window, his shudder short-circuiting his brain.

“Please–” you moaned.

Aaron wasn’t sure what you were asking for, but he was done questioning his instincts.

He moved down until he was face-to-face with your pussy, and he smiled up at you, watching how your breath hitched again, how your inner thighs seemed to be trembling, how your pussy wanted to clench around something, and he started kissing your legs. He dragged his fingers on your thighs, making you thrash and try to find some friction. He was drooling and aching to taste you, overwhelmed by the urge to lap at you and feel you flutter on his tongue. He wanted to nestle his nose in your cunt and never forget the scent. He wanted you to use his face to make yourself come.

He wanted to flick his tongue over your clit until you mewled his name for everyone to hear.

He wanted you to shove your cunt in his face, asking for more and he wanted to growl as you tried to put your legs around his face.

The thoughts made it hard for him to not touch himself for some relief, but it was easy to focus on you.

He delivered a gentle kiss on top of your pussy. “Beautiful. Perfect.”

“Aaron–” you hummed, a gentle reminder or a warning, he didn’t know.

He hooked his arms under your thighs, bringing you ever closer to getting what you wanted.

“Will you let me find out how sweet you are?” he asked, ready to dive in.

You moaned loudly as your eyes met, and you nodded, signaling him your consent again.

“Tell me,” he urged you, refraining from shoving his face into you.

“Taste me. Make me come on your tongue.”

Aaron groaned but he didn’t lose a beat. He dove right in, lapping at you the second his tongue was on you.

He grunted loudly as he tasted your juices.

“So delicious. I knew you would be.”

You shuddered and arched your back, your pussy shoved into his face, but Aaron managed to keep your hips firmly in place after a few tries. He was tasting you everywhere his tongue could reach, and when he finally swirled his tongue around your clit, he smiled against your cunt because you couldn’t control your hips thrashing any more than he could.

Aaron vowed to remember every sound you made because he wasn’t sure music would ever compare to the melody you were composing for him right now.

He started moving his face along with his tongue, his nose teasing you. He sucked on your clit before he lapped at you again, alternating flicking his tongue over you, sucking your clit and shoving his tongue as deep as he could inside you, his nose buried in your intoxicating scent.

One day, if you let him, he would have you sit on his face. He would have you sit there until the only sounds you’d make were whines and pleads to stop.

He looked up at you as he sucked particularly hard on your clit, your hand pulling at tht roots of his hair and making him thrust his hips into the mattress. He watched you grab a pillow and bite into it, and he had to stop altogether.

A needy whine escaped your throat, and his cock twitched at the sound.

He picked up the pillow, pulling it away from your beautiful face.

“Let me hear you.”

“The team–” you started.

He shook his head. He didn’t have a care in the world right now. Not if you were agreeing to be his tonight.

“I need to hear you if– I need to hear you.”

You nodded, and Aaron went back to it.

It didn’t take long for you to moan incoherently, and to thrash against his face violently. How he loved feeling your legs trying to strangle him, feeling your fingers pull his hair to get more friction on his face.

“What do you need, sweet girl?” he asked, his voice a bit muffled by your cunt.

“Your mouth. Your tongue. Like this. But maybe a finger?”

Aaron did as he was told, and you were so worked up as he started moving his finger in and out of you that he didn’t care if the entire hotel was hearing you moan and cry out his name. He didn’t even care if there was a noise complaint.

After chanting his name like a cheerleader for a few seconds, Aaron growled against your clit as he shoved his hips into the mattress repeatedly, the tension not easing. He felt himself throb in need, surely almost purple and the vein on the side of his shaft protruding.

He was so turned on by what he was doing to you that he couldn’t help trying to find some relief himself.

He arched his finger inside you and combined with his tongue on your clit, you were shaking from head to toe. He knew he was about to be rewarded for his efforts.

“I’m so close.”

Aaron doubled down and spat on you, making you even wetter.

He sucked on your clit once more and this time, you incoherently mumbled his name as your hips shot up the bed, your cunt fluttering on his tongue as you fell over the edge.

Aaron almost came as he heard you mewl out his name, and if the team was able to know this had happened, he couldn’t find it in himself to care, not when you were so delicious and perfect.

He moved to lie down next to you, ghosting his fingers over your burning skin as you rode your orgasm. He watched the goosebumps he conjured with his touch, and he watched how your nipples hardened under his caress. He held you with one arm and let the other dance on you, carefully letting you know you weren’t alone.

He kissed your cheek after a little while, and if he was leaking pre-cum onto your stomach, you didn’t seem to mind.

You watched him through hooded eyes, and it occurred to him that it was supposed to be like this. He didn’t want to be sentimental right now, there would be time for that. But he was certain this was meant to happen.

You swiped your thumb on his chin, removing traces of you from there. You had drenched his face, but he loved knowing you were all over him. He leaned down to kiss you and as you were about to wipe your hand on the sheets, he caught it and brought it up to his mouth.

He put his mouth around your fingers, sucking down the juices you had gathered from his face. Your breath hitched and when he moved your hand towards your mouth, you only opened up like you were stuck in the same trance as he was.

You sucked on your own fingers, the sound making him hiss. He replaced your hand with his, your tongue delightful on his digits, the feeling absolutely marvelous and making him twitch violently.

“You’re so delicious. We shouldn’t let this go to waste.”

He was ready to curse your name when you made a move to reach for his pulsing cock. It was painful to be this hard, but he swatted your hand away just as you were about to wrap your hand around him.

He wanted to prove you’d always be his first priority. He wanted you to remember tonight as him showing you you came first.

“I’m giving you another before I let you touch me.”

“Please– Just a little,” you pleaded with the cutest pout he had ever witnessed.

The thing was, he wasn’t sure he could say no to you in any setting.

He nodded and grabbed your hand, bringing it onto his cock. You were gentle and slow, moving it on him just enough to make him close his eyes and make him hiss as you relieved some of the tension there. How often he had imagined your hand on him like this, but it had never come close to the real thing.

He put his hand on top of yours and he opened his eyes again, his eyes locked on yours as your combined hands made him shudder in delight.

Your thumb gently roamed over the tip and Aaron hummed, stopping your movements.

“Too close.”

You brought his face close to yours, and he followed. He would always follow your lead. He would follow you anywhere. He kissed you tenderly, the flutters in his chest violent compared to the throbbing in his balls.

“You’re perfect, Aaron.”

If your hand had still been on him, he would have spilled right into it as you voiced that. He was grateful he had stopped you before.

He let his hand wander down to your core, decided to bring you over the edge again before he did anything else.

“What do you want?” he breathed.

“Just this. Hold me. Use your fingers.”

Aaron nodded and kept his eyes locked on your face. He let his index move over your clit, rubbing it in circles and from side to side, finding what pattern made you moan louder. He alternated between this and thrusting it inside you, coating you in your own juices and making the rubbing smoother. He loved how you clenched around his digit when he gently thrusted it inside you. He brought it back up, playing with your clit how he had figured you like as he read how your body tensed, and how your moans graced his ears, and when you were left moaning and panting, trying desperately to cling to him more than you were already, he gathered you’d like his next move, planting a small smack on your clit with his palm.

Your eyes rolled back inside your head as you screamed, and Aaron figured he had read you correctly. You certainly liked mixing pleasure and pain a little.

Aaron was transfixed by how incredibly beautiful and perfect you were, and he couldn’t help but want to capture your sounds with his mouth. He kissed you with everything he felt for you, and he felt your legs thrash on the bed just as you tried to catch his hand between your legs. He felt you throb on his finger right as you shouted his name into his mouth, right as you fluttered on his digit, and he was dangerously close to coming on your stomach right then and there as he held you through the waves of your orgasm.

“Breathtaking,” he uttered low against your lips.

Aaron kissed you gently, and you kissed him lazily as the gears in your head slowly came back online, and the second your gaze was clearer, you reached for him again.

“Please… I need you now.”

He chuckled, but there was no mocking involved.

“Me too, sweetheart. You have no idea. You have no idea what you do to me.”

Aaron always kept condoms in his go-bag, but he wasn’t sure they weren’t past their expiration date. He never used them. Too tired during cases to try and find someone, and sex to him meant too much to try and get it on with a stranger. The only ones used in that box had been with Beth, and she had been gone for many months, not to mention their last moments weren’t particularly intimate. He still wasn’t sure why he kept some in his bag to this day, but he would have to find out whether they were still good now.

He gestured to get up, but you held him back with force. He was often impressed by how strong you could prove to be. He remained firmly in place, holding you close.

“What are you doing?”

“Condoms,” he explained.

“Oh. I’m clean. Only ever been with two other men, and yeah… I got tested recently as part of our annual physical. As you know.”

Aaron nodded.

Right.

He was clean, too. He had been tested as recently as you.

But surely you didn’t want to do this without protection so early on in your–

Your what?

He didn’t want to think about whether you only wanted this once.

“I’m clean, too,” he clarified.

“I trust you. And I don’t want anything between us. But if you want to wear a condom, I understand, and I’ll respect that.”

“No, I– I only ever did this with Haley without protection, and bringing up my dead ex-wife right now is surely a dick move, but–”

You just smiled as you patted his chest.

“Say no more, Aaron. Where are your condoms?”

Aaron loved how considerate and thoughtful you were. He loved everything about you, and even if he wasn’t good at saying things, he could say a lot with his mouth.

He kissed you passionately, bringing you close to his body to make sure nothing got between you.

He didn’t let you catch your breath for a little while, pouring his affection for you into the kiss.

He eventually moved away, cradling your cheek as his eyes met yours again. “What I meant was, I’m clean. We don’t need–”

“I’m on birth control, too,” you added.

His erection had started to waver, but your hand wandered on his thighs, and when you started pumping him, he hummed low in his throat as he hardened fully once more within seconds.

“Will you let me feel you?”

Aaron nodded and positioned himself between your legs. You put your legs around his waist, granting him access and he grabbed his dick to align it with your entrance.

He breached you with just the tip, making you curse because of how large he was. He gently caressed your leg with one hand, holding himself up with the other and he slowly sank in, inch by inch.

He allowed you to breathe through it until he was fully sheathed.

You knew you were clenching and fluttering around him, and you were trying to remain sane as he met the deepest parts of you. You had no doubt that you had been made for him, in every sense of the word.

“You feel so good,” he groaned.

“Oh, fuck, I love–” you paused, catching your feelings in time. You were no expert but declarations of love during your first time having sex with someone weren’t really supposed to happen. “Your dick,” you added.

“You’re so perfect,” he added breathlessly.

“Move, please.”

Aaron didn’t have to be told twice. He started moving in and out gently, letting you adjust to his size while still giving you a pleasurable mix of pain and elation.

You made him lean down more, his weight now almost resting on top of you, not letting an inch between you.

He thrusted in and out of you with more speed, punctuating his thrusts with kisses.

He was frantic, his movements uncoordinated and unrehearsed, his groans filling the room around your moans.

You knew he was close, and you were certain he was about to explode.

You wanted to look at his face, and the way it contorted with pleasure. You clenched around him the more he prodded a deep and soft spot within you, making your body shudder and your legs tremble each time he hit it.

You felt the coil in your stomach tighten the more he hit that spot, and he was hitting it repeatedly. No one had ever reached it like this before.

Your nails raked the length of his back, spurring him on to thrust his hips into you faster.

You closed your eyes to revel in how marvelous everything felt when you heard him hiss.

“Keep your eyes on me.”

You opened them again, and his free hand found yours, your fingers intertwining and linking your bodies in another place. There was something special about feeling pinned under him.

He kissed you again, his tongue unforgiving as it clashed with yours.

He groaned loudly and you heard him growl as his hips stuttered. He was losing his rhythm, but you were losing it, too.

“Let go, Aaron. I’m right there with you.’’

He snaked a hand between your bodies, and it was the only thing that could get in the way that you would allow.

He put a finger on your clit and his finger circled it even faster than earlier, and his desperate hand between your bodies trying to get you there before he exploded was enough to send you over the edge again.

You felt him let go as you had told him to. He went slack-jawed as a long drawn-out moan escaped his lips. You felt him paint your inner walls with copious amounts of his seed, shot after shot, groan after groan, burying himself inside you delightfully.

The second he would pull out, there would be a huge mess. It was obvious. You heard the wet sounds squelching, his slow thrusts slapping your pussy and almost as if he wanted to make sure his seed was deep inside you as he milked his own orgasm with your clenching walls until his hips stilled.

He rested his whole body weight on top of you.

You were gently grazing his back, caressing it soothingly. He shuddered against you, clearly loving every single gentle touch you were giving him as he came down from his high.

He softened inside you enough to pull out, but you wanted him to remain inside you a little longer.

He grabbed you and picked you up before you could even think straight again, remaining inside you as he brought you towards the bathroom. The motions made parts of your mixed juices drip out on him, but you were glad evidence of you two was on him, not just inside you.

He turned on the shower as you kissed him tenderly, unable to stop clinging to him, and if you had your way, you would hold him all night.

He brought you inside the shower before he let you down on shaky legs, making sure to hold you up against him, for which you were grateful since your legs seemed to be stuck in subspace with half your cognitive faculties.

“I don’t want you to sleep in a wet spot,” he whispered next to your temple.

You nodded as you caressed his cheek, loving how considerate and thoughtful he was with you.

You held each other under the spray until Aaron started cleaning you up with gentle hands. He clearly wasn’t trying to make it sexual or trying to indulge in feeling you up, but you loved sharing a comfortable intimacy with him so early on in your–

Fuck.

Your what?

Relationship?

You didn’t want to ruin this by thinking about what it meant. Not just yet.

“Would you let me wash your hair?” you asked sheepishly, wanting to do something nice for him, wanting to care for him as well as he cared for you.

You were so caring and loving that he had a hard time believing you thought about this as a one-time thing, but he wouldn’t assume.

He dropped to his knees without further thought to allow you to wash his hair, and feeling your fingers massage his scalp had no right feeling this good. If he wasn’t truly spent, he would be getting hard again for sure.

He closed his eyes as you worked on his hair, choosing not to be in his head too much and to enjoy this. He refrained from touching you the way he wanted to. You wanted to do this for him so he would let you.

Once you were done, you motioned for him to get to his feet, and as soon as his eyes met yours, you asked him to kiss you because clearly it had already been too long since his lips had been on yours.

He kissed your lips, your shoulders, your nose, your cheeks, your head, and he would kiss every inch of your body again if you wanted. He would make sure you knew how beautiful he found, how much he loved every part of you.

Bringing you back to bed after showering with you felt as intimate as the shower itself, and when he put on a pair of boxers and offered you a t-shirt, he didn’t stop to think about how he wanted to see you wear every last shirt he owned.

You’d talk later. Right now it didn’t matter.

You immediately cuddled into his side as you got into bed, and Aaron liked the weight of your head on his chest. It centered him and it made the incessant questions in his head finally stop.

“You smell like me,” he declared to the room.

You hugged his waist more firmly, nodding as he planted a kiss at the top of your head.

You yawned a few times, and he chuckled as he watched you try to fight sleep. You would fall asleep in his arms in no time, and he would definitely not let go this time.

You started to move away, but he held you back before you could even reach your pillow.

He would be your pillow tonight. He longed to watch you fall asleep on his chest.

He wouldn’t let you move away again anyway, not tonight and not ever if you wanted him the way he wanted you. “Please—just—”

“Aaron, if we cuddle, this means something.”

“I want it to mean something,” he replied sincerely.

How he wanted it to mean something. He wanted it to mean everything.

You nuzzled your nose into his chest, firmly gripping his waist until your hold went lax and soft snores filled the room. He smiled, watching your precious form find rest on top of him.

Exhaustion and jet lag probably took over because he was out like a light in no time.

You woke disorientated a few hours later. Surely, you had been so worn out that a dreamless sleep had found you. But as the gears in your brain started turning again, you remembered him and you tried to reach for him but he wasn’t in bed next to you.

He was up and looking out the window, but he didn’t look panicked or like he regretted anything that had transpired tonight. His shoulders didn’t look tense and from what you could gather, his brow wasn’t furrowed. He did look deep in thought, and you wanted him to know he didn’t have to face the unkind thoughts alone, knowing full well his mind was his worst enemy.

You approached him quietly so as to not startle him, and you put your arms around his waist, planting a kiss in the middle of his bare back. He relaxed as soon as you wrapped yourself around him more firmly, and he let out a big breath.

“How beautiful is this?’’ he whispered, focusing on something out the window.

You could see the Northern Lights still dancing on the horizon, right on top of the mountains, and the way Aaron looked completely mesmerized was enough to make you agree to anything he might say.

“I could see myself living here when I retire,’’ you confessed.

Aaron turned around in your embrace, and a kiss grazed your forehead.

“Would I be included in those plans?’’

Your arms still around his waist, you looked up into his eyes, smiling at him. “If you want to be.’’

He cradled your face then, his expression softening. “There’s absolutely nothing I wouldn’t want with you.’’

You were relieved to hear it. It seemed obvious Aaron wasn’t the kind of man to do one-night stands, especially with his coworkers, but somehow, hearing him say he wanted some kind of life with you in not so many words settled your stomach.

“You’re going to retire first, though.”

“And I want you to be there when I do.”

“Really?” you double-checked.

“Listen, I know it’s scary to talk about the future like this. We just– But you…” he paused, kissing your cheek, “feel right.” He moved to the other cheek, your hold on his waist tightening. “This– It feels right.”

You rested a hand in the middle of his chest, feeling his heartbeat calm and strong in the palm of your hand.

“It feels perfect. And it’s not scary. Maybe it should be, but I’m really calm.”

You grabbed one of his hands, putting it in the middle of your chest so he could feel your heartbeat as well.

Stuck in this little moment, feeling each other’s heartbeats, he leaned down to kiss you again, and when your hand found its way into his hair, he shuddered against you.

You felt him twitch in his boxers and you smirked at him. You hadn’t realized he was hard again, but you had started to gather that your hand in his hair proved to be a reliable method to make his knees buckle, or at the very least, make him shiver in delight.

“May I?” you asked, reaching for his erection.

“We don’t have to–”

“Hush.” You palmed him through his boxers, his eyes rolling back inside his head as he groaned. “I want to. Do you want me to?”

“Yes.”

You brought him towards the edge of the bed, and you kneeled in front of him as you gently took off his boxers.

“I’m going to make you feel good.”

He nodded.

You caressed his legs, kissing his inner thighs before you spat on his cock, making him hiss. It twitched, and you decided to wet his length with your tongue, tracing the side of his cock with it before you licked the throbbing vein with gusto.

You could tell he was having a hard time staying still, and when you sucked him down into your mouth with your hand accommodating what you couldn’t take in in one go, he moaned so loudly you thought you would never hear such a lovely sound again.

You moved up and down, stretching out your mouth with his width and length, trying to make this a memorable experience for him.

You flicked your tongue over the tip as you bobbed your head, stroking his dick covered in spit with your hand, his hips gently pushing off the bed.

His hand came to rest on your head, but he removed it as soon as you choked a little around him. You grabbed it, put it back on your head, and you looked up at him through your eyelashes, giving him permission to let loose.

His soft expression was all you needed to work harder.

You buried your nose in his pubic hair soon after, the tip gently grazing his pubic bone, and you swallowed around him to wet his length more and make it easier for the back of your throat to accommodate him. It had been a while since you had done this, but the stretch felt good, better than you remembered.

You moved your hand up and down as you licked him up and down again, letting your lips kiss his cock and his vein, and you took him in your mouth again, sucking him harder and faster, immediately making him thrust into your mouth involuntarily.

“Oh god,” he groaned.

You didn’t let up. His hand in your hair tightened as you sucked harder, and it only spurred you on.

“So close–”

You hummed around him to signal your approval.

It didn’t take long for his thighs to quiver, but he pulled on your hair gently to make you stop.

“I’d much rather have you again,” he said hoarsely.

You smiled up at him from under your lashes and he swiped the tears on your cheeks away. You had teared up as he hit the back of your throat, but it had felt so good to feel him harden and pulse in your mouth.

“I’m on top this time.”

Aaron nodded and moved to sit with his back to the headboard. You straddled his lap and sank down on him without losing a beat. You put your hands on each side of his shoulders, gripping the headboard as you adjusted to his size.

He gritted his teeth when you started moving.

“You’re so perfect–”

You shut him up with a searing kiss, making him moan into your mouth as your tongue met his and you knew he could taste himself on your tongue.

He started rubbing your clit with his thumb, his eyes sparkling with affection for you.

“You’re good with your fingers, god–” you muttered.

“Sweetheart–”

He started thrusting up to meet your movements when you lost your pace to the sensations he brought you. He hit a particular spot inside you as you rocked your hips, and as you moaned loudly, unable to be quiet and not really wanting to since he had asked to hear you earlier, he seemed to realize he had hit that sweet spot.

“Right there,” you whined, chasing your peak on him as you tried to move your hips so he’d graze it again.

“Hmm…”

He hit it again with a forceful thrust.

“Oh fuck, right there, Aaron.”

“Let go, sweetheart.”

Hearing Aaron call you sweetheart repeatedly was enough to make you lose it, apparently. The coil in your stomach tightened dangerously before it was ripped loose, and you started shaking as wave after wave of pleasure overtook your entire frame.

His hands were lazily stroking your back as you slowly came back down from your high.

His shallow thrusts upwards were messy and uncoordinated, he was clearly close from feeling you come around him, the tip of him still grazing your g-spot deliciously.

You felt him twitch more violently as you rolled your hips, his hands gripping your waist tightly.

“Can I–”

You stopped moving altogether.

“Not yet. Hold it a bit longer.”

You slowly rolled your hips on top of him again, his length pulsing the more you moved. He was close, but you wanted to make this last.

You were slow on purpose, and he followed your lead, his thrusts delicate but deep.

“Please sweetheart–” he whined.

You knew he was close even before you slowed it down, and you felt his thighs quiver under you.

“Let go, Aaron.”

You felt him pulsate and shoot up inside you, trying to clench around him to suck every last drop inside you and keep it there. You fluttered around him, and Aaron smiled lazily at you as his mind slipped into subspace. You kissed his sweaty brow, and his hands caressed your back gently, pulling you closer to hug you against his chest.

“Told you I’d make you feel good.”

He hummed, still inside you, and you loved feeling him this close, to know you had rendered him shaky from head to toe. You looked forward to edging him again in the future, although for way longer than this. Edging and orgasm denial could be so delicious if you knew how to do it just right, and you had a feeling Aaron would figure that out with you.

“We should probably shower again so we don’t make a mess here.”

You smiled at him, and this time, you kissed him everywhere in the shower like he had done for you earlier, showing him that love, care, and affection didn’t have to be one-sided.

It wasn’t long before you were back in bed, and in no time Aaron fell asleep with his head on your stomach as your fingers gently caressed his hair, his soft moans becoming long sleepy breaths.

He woke up to you draped over him, and saw that you’d both have to get up and get ready to go back home shortly.

He lazily traced your face to make sure he could almost paint it from memory once you left the confines of this room, his legs still entangled with yours, your limbs warm and heavy from sleep within his.

He loved this. He wanted this every morning from now on.

You softly woke up, hiding your face in his chest as he kissed your temple, and his hands roamed over your back, keeping you close.

He leaned down to kiss you, and as your morning breaths mingled, it became clear to you that he’d never want to share this with anyone else.

You were it.

He looked at the time again, and he realized you had to go before the others woke up and realized you weren’t already down for breakfast, especially since you were the early birds of the group after all.

But you indulged in more lazy kisses, so he did too. Kissing you was a privilege he would never take for granted.

He kissed you without stopping, almost preventing you from leaving the room altogether as the kiss got heated.

“We have to go down,” you mentioned between kisses.

Aaron nodded but he held on to you firmly, his lips still too hungry for yours.

After some time, you got up and put on your clothes, and he let you, aware he had to leave the room at some point, too.

Aaron pouted as you put your clothes on, mostly because he really loved seeing you without them, and he pouted as he put his own clothes on, too. He was strangely protective of what had transpired last night, and putting on his suit again saddened him because he knew you wouldn’t get him out of it for a few hours.

You made to exit the room with him in tow, but he pulled you back and he hugged you firmly against his chest, unable to let go quite yet.

He knew he was being clingy, but he couldn’t let you go. He didn’t want to. He was scared that stepping out of this room would mean the magic was over. That you’d realize you deserved better than him, that you’d realize this was–

“I know who Jack gets his pout and puppy eyes from,” you tutted.

He smirked. You loved his son. He knew that. But each time you mentioned him, each time you spared a thought for him, it made something flutter in his chest.

“You give him what he wants when he uses them.”

“And what do you want?” you asked.

He waggled his eyebrows. “Just one more kiss.”

You nodded and you kissed him gently, but you didn’t allow him to let him pull you too close, and he understood, because if he had his way, you’d never leave the room in time to go unnoticed by the others.

“We’ll be together on the jet in less than an hour,’’ you added between pecks on his cheeks.

“But I won’t get to do this on the jet,” he pouted again.

“I mean, you could. But you’d be risking giving Rossi a heart attack.’’

Then, he was hit by an idea. A promise to not let the magic be over quite yet.

“Come over tonight.’’

You looked surprised by his offer. “Sorry?’’

“Come over tonight. And bring a bag with enough clothes in it to stay for a few days.’’

“What about Jack?’’

“Jack is with Jessica for the rest of the week. They’re visiting family.’’

A hand clasped your mouth. “Shit… What are we going to tell Jack?’’

Jack loved you as much as you loved him. This would be the easiest thing. He would just have to tell Jack you’d stay over sometimes, that you were more than just his friend. Jack wouldn’t have a problem with it. Aaron knew it for a fact because Jack had already asked if you were his girlfriend, and that he’d love to have you around more.

“The truth. When you’re ready,” he replied, confident.

“And what is the truth?” you asked with a smirk and quirked eyebrows.

How adorable you looked, how perfect you were…

He gathered his courage, he inhaled, and he smiled at you. “Will you be my girlfriend?”

It sounded corny to his own ears, and thankfully, you laughed it off.

“You’re so corny.”

He shrugged. “I’m just old-fashioned.”

He was waiting for your answer and while his heart was in his throat, he was sure you weren’t making him wait to torture him.

“Of course, I’ll be your girlfriend, Aaron.”

“I know we’ll have to figure a few things out, but–”

You cradled his face fondly, your care for him evident. “Look, I’m in this and you have me, any way you want me. But let’s not talk about this now. Let’s keep Alaska magical.”

This was the easiest thing he would ever agree to. Keeping this experience completely untainted by normal life, by your reality outside of here. Keeping Alaska magical was something he could do.

He nodded. “Later.”

“Later.”

Once on the jet, you tried to avoid looking anyone directly into the eye since they would probably be able to tell you didn’t sleep much last night if they saw your face, and they really didn’t have to know why you hadn’t slept.

“Did you see the Northern Lights last night after all, dear?’’ Rossi inquired.

“I did.’’

“And?’’

You beamed at the memories still fresh and imprinted on your brain. “Magical. Almost stayed up all night to watch them.’’

Derek frowned at that.

“Why do you look so pissy, Derek?” Emily asked.

“The couple next door went at it last night,” he declared to the team.

You were somewhat relieved he was saying the ‘couple next door’ because that could be anyone. It was a big hotel, and it didn’t mean anyone had heard you and Aaron, or that they had figured out you and Aaron were next door to Derek. Especially since you weren’t particularly subtle about it last night when Aaron had told you he wanted to hear you.

Emily smirked as her eyes narrowed on you, caught red-handed as you admired Aaron.

Fuck.

“Wait, weren’t you both in the room next to Derek?” Emily asked.

Shit.

She knew. You’d told her. You always texted each other room numbers. As women on cases in remote areas, you always did this. And you had mentioned in passing that you were sharing with the boss because Emily knew about your ongoing crush on him.

Aaron sat with his back to the team and looked at you with a silly smile, proud rather than embarrassed.

Rossi smirked knowingly. “Why are you beet red, honey?”

You looked at Aaron, opting not to let him get out of it so easily. “You should ask Aaron.”

“Aaron, is it?” JJ teased.

If Emily knew, JJ knew. It was a known rule among the BAU members.

You tilted your head to the side. “I think they want an explanation, boss.”

Aaron flushed and furrowed his brow, but he didn’t look angry you had thrown him under the bus. You were both in this after all.

He still had a small lopsided smile partially hidden, and his eyes glistened with adoration for you.

“The Alaska atmosphere and the Northern Lights really have a way of showing people there’s magic happening right in front of them,” he added with a grin, his eyes never leaving yours.

The girls gushed as Derek chuckled. David clasped Aaron’s shoulder in pride.

Spencer frowned. “Actually–”

“Shut up, pretty boy,” Derek interrupted. “Sure sounded magical last night,” he added, waggling his eyebrows at you.

Aaron was bright red, and you knew this wouldn’t be too good for his blood pressure. You moved to sit with him now that the cat was out of the bag.

The team all asked questions before you took off and ultimately, after their curiosity had been satisfied and it sizzled out, they left you alone.

You vowed to remember Alaska fondly, its magic not lost on you, not now and not ever. Rossi could say whatever he wanted; Alaska would always be dear to you.

Aaron knew how much you loved looking out the window when flying, offering you his own seat next to the window, but you shook your head.

“If you sit there, you won’t see out the window as well.”

“It’s fine. The view’s perfect from here,” you replied with a smile as you continued to look at him.

He smiled back. You wondered what you had ever done to deserve someone like him.

You silently wondered when saying “I love you” would be considered too soon. You thought about googling it right until you decided you were done wondering, and you pulled him to his feet to bring him towards the back of the jet.

You started kissing him the second the curtain was closed, and he kissed you back, but you both kept the kissing PG-13 because the team was only a few feet away.

You felt how much he cared for you in every gentle touch, and you felt it overwhelm your senses because he felt things for you as much as you felt things for him.

“Sorry. Couldn’t wait until Virginia,” you explained.

At the same time, he blurted out, “I love you.”

You brought him towards your face by his tie, his forehead resting against yours just like last night, right before your lips had met for the first time. “I brought you back here to say it first.”

He smirked widely. “Okay. I take it back.”

You tutted. “You’re not allowed to take it back.”

He kissed your nose at that, his smile so wide and beautiful, you almost wanted to take a picture to make sure it would last, to ensure nothing would ever get in the way of seeing him this happy again. But truthfully, picture or not, you would remember this moment forever.

“Good, because I’m never going to.”

“I love you,” you whispered.

He kissed you with gentle lips, not letting it deepen too much but still making his case when it came to the heavy yet soothing declarations you had both made seconds before.

“I want to do so much more than just kiss you,” he groaned.

“Thoughts on joining the mile-high club?” you suggested with a smirk, running your hand up and down his tie.

He looked at the curtain, his brow furrowing for a second. “We should wait until everyone’s asleep.”

Wait, what?

“I thought you’d say no,” you replied, laughing nervously.

“I think you underestimate what you do to me.”

“Do I?”

He picked you up and sat you on the counter, your legs coming around his waist instinctively. He moved closer into the space, and you felt him stretch the seam of his trousers as his core met yours.

“That–” he paused, gently thrusting so you’d know he was hard, “is just a small token of my appreciation for you.”

You scoffed, a giggle escaping your throat. “Small? You’re kidding, right?”

He scoffed in return.

“Can’t you just order the team to sleep?” you suggested.

“I can ask Reid to explain 19th-century medical practices to everyone?”

Brilliant man.

Derek would be the first one to put his headphones on and shut his eyes.

Then Emily.

Then JJ.

Rossi wouldn’t listen anyway. He just tuned Spencer out if he wasn’t already asleep.

Spencer would tire himself out rambling after a while. He would kip on the sofa.

It would leave you and Aaron. The only two people who almost never slept on the plane.

“Oh, you’re a brilliant man.”

With a plan, you went back to the team, but no one gave you a second glance, surely because no funny noises had been heard from behind the curtain.

The plan was put in motion and if someone suspected it was a ruse, no one said anything about it.

Aaron brought you into the bathroom the second everyone was asleep, and immediately put his lips on yours like he’d never get the chance again. To be fair, there wasn’t a second to lose. When you unzipped his pants and moved him out of his boxers to pump him, spitting on your hand to stroke him gently, his eyes rolled back inside his head and he let you take the lead.

You brought him close quickly, your strokes careful and calculated.

He snaked a hand into your panties, and you were proud of yourself for wearing a skirt today. He slid down your panties and pocketed them before he let his hand rub your cunt gently.

“Fuck, you’re so wet already,” he said as his finger breached you.

You smiled at him, trying hard to remain silent. He didn’t lose a second with foreplay at your request, moving to align his cock with your entrance. He picked you up in the small space, and you slowly sank down on him as he held his cock for you to slide down on.

He trembled as your walls fluttered around him, and he gasped into your mouth once he was fully sheathed inside you.

Aaron held you up as best as he could, and he put a hand on the wall behind your head and the other under your ass to thrust into you while still holding you up. He gained a nice rhythm, but you could tell he was close and that he wouldn’t last long from how erratic his thrusts already were.

“Touch yourself, I’m close,” he whispered through gritted teeth.

You put your hand between your bodies to bring yourself closer to the edge, feeling him throb and pulsate, his dick’s movements echoing around your walls.

The second you started touching yourself, you were shaking violently, and you had to muffle your moans into his mouth as you came with overwhelming shudders, using your lips to silence his groans as he shook from the sheer pleasure of burying his seed inside you once more. You felt him twitch and shoot up inside you, and the thought that he was so deep inside made your heart beat faster, and combined with the risky aspect of it all, you felt like you were riding a very long wave of pleasure after pleasure.

He carefully pulled out and picked up toilet paper to clean what was seeping out of you before he cleaned himself up rudimentarily, his touch gentle as he wiped your inner thighs.

“Thank you.”

He just smiled at you, discarding the soiled toilet paper and flushing it down the toilet.

You made sure his pants were holding up as he put himself away, you watched him gave himself one last look in the mirror before he moved to exit the bathroom first since he was closer to the door.

You held him back by the elbow. He was forgetting something.

“My panties, Aaron.”

He smirked. “I’m just making sure you come get them back tonight.”

“You’re still dripping out of me. Literally.”

He just grinned. “You’d better keep your legs close together then.”

Oh.

You thought you had sensed it last night.

He would follow your lead when you were in bed, you were sure of it. But this? Asking for it? Submitting himself to you and your treatment of him if he–

Oh.

He really was your perfect match.

“You’re gonna pay for that,” you declared.

“Oh, sweetheart… You probably know I look forward to it.”

You shook your head in disbelief.

You’d have fun. You’d never be bored. It was obvious.

“Besides, you still have to give me my book back,” he added, his grin plastered on his face.

“About that…” you started, playing with his tie.

His smile faded for a second, his brow tightening but his body didn’t tense up. “You know, don’t you?”

You nodded. “And believe me, I looked for that one line.”

“I did a character study on Jay Gatsby when I took elective literature courses in college. I wrote it down in my analysis, well– I wrote how someone’s presence can make any place feel like home, and how Daisy was his home. I may have paraphrased my essay when I said it to you so you’d think it came from the book, but–”

You cradled his face gently, your thumbs rubbing his cheeks. “How long have you been trying to tell me without actually telling me?”

“I don’t know for sure when I– but uh– I knew for sure how I felt when I saw you covered in mud, running with Jack under the rain across the soggy soccerfield with the model airplanes we had spent hours building together.”

You remembered that fondly. He had falsely scolded you for ruining the model airplanes before he had showed up to work the next day with a huge smile as he presented you a cup of coffee from your favorite coffee shop close to Quantico, only offering it to give it to you if you promised to help him build new ones for Jack.

You had ordered new model airplanes to assemble with him by lunch, and by dinner, you had sent him a screenshot of your order.

Maybe you had been trying to tell him without actually telling him for a while, too.

Aaron exited the bathroom and he walked back to his seat, relieved to see that everyone was still asleep on the jet.

You joined him moments later, waddling like a penguin to keep your legs shut. He was aware you had probably peed to avoid getting an infection, but that didn’t mean deeper substances weren’t threatening to drip out of you. How he loved knowing he was inside you.

Aaron got to work, and while you never slept on the jet, too mesmerized by the outside world to get some shut-eye, this time, you actually seemed tired.

You rested your head on his shoulder, and Aaron looked at you trying to scuffle closer. He dropped his paperwork to put his arms around you, and he kissed the top of your head as you nuzzled your nose into his shirt. He grinned widely as he realized you were well and truly his, Alaska magic or not.

You’d still have to talk, but he wasn’t worried in the least. He’d make sure this would work.

He held you close, letting the paperwork wait, and for the first time in years, he allowed himself to close his eyes as he held your sleeping form. He allowed himself to rest on the jet because he knew for sure he’d wake up to a reality far better than what his dreams could ever offer.

#minors stay away #fic rec #fic reblog #hotch x reader #aaron hotchner x reader

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