#this is actually a flash back explaining why Elle in the present suddenly pops in and gives Spencer an alibi

[starlight-storytime]

ok so blame it on the dead guy has to be the danny phantom or dc wip right

surprisingly not! "Alright, blame it on the dead guy" is actually my unsub!Spencer Reid fic bc it is CRIMINAL how few plot-driven fics with serial killer Spence assigned his own case are out there

like?? he has SO much potential but I've never come across an Unsub Reid fic that interested me so I decided to write one myself 🥸 1k snippet under the cut!

Spencer volunteered to go first, shifty and nervous. “We—ah, well, we might as well get this out of the way.”

They didn't think to take her out of the viewing room—or, still trusted her enough not to—because they let Elle stay in the corner to watch that stupid, sweet boy get through an interrogation with Hotch. The reality, the potential, hadn't really set in. The team were still scoffing and disbelieving about the mere idea that Elle was a suspect, let alone actually considering she could have killed someone and should be kept aside in a waiting room.

She didn't know whether their trust was heartwarming, or if it hurt to know she was betraying it. That she was making Spencer betray it.

“Where were you last night?” Hotch asked bluntly, diving right to the thick of it.

“890 Glendale Avenue, Queen’s Motel, room 128.” Spencer answered immediately, staring at his shirt cuff as he picked at it.

“A motel?" Hotch raised a brow. "Why weren't you at home?”

“I was, um, visiting Elle. Like I said, this case got us both really heated, and I thought as—as her friend, I should comfort her, y'know?” Spencer looked up as if asking for Hotch's approval, before realizing where he was, and looking back down at his hands awkwardly.

“How long were you at the motel?”

“From 7:23pm to 6:51am.”

“All night?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And what room was Elle staying in?”

“128.”

“So then—wait.” Hotch visibly double taked. “What room did you stay in?”

“128. Sir.”

Spencer was turning a shade of delicate rose, those honey amber doe eyes burning a hole into the ground as he very determinedly stared down at the table, lips slightly twisted.

“How many beds were in the—”

“We slept together!” Spencer burst out, hands over his face as if he couldn't bare to be seen and his ears a burning flame. “They only have queens at Queen’s Motel, which is why they're mostly popular for discreet hookups, affairs, and young couples for privacy. There's no cameras on premise for that exact reason but I can guarantee that we were preoccupied for the entire night and didn't have time to go kill anyone.”

Spencer looked up at his boss beseechingly, and his every move screamed earnest innocence. Hotch was briefly stunned silent by the outburst.

The viewing room, on the other hand, is hooting and hollering, gasping and grinning and exchanging promises to pay back bets they had apparently made.

"That's why he's so nervous, that sly dog!” Morgan crowed.

Elle stared at the picture of embarrassed, inexperienced young coworker spilling about an unlikely office romance in front of her, and now understood exactly why Spencer had said what he did on the car ride over

“I have a tattoo of four dice on my left hip, in the order 1, 3, 1, 2. I got it for twenty bucks at a Halloween flash sale in Vegas, when I was 16.”

Elle was so overwhelmed by everything going on after hiding a body and disposing of evidence, she can barely process the spontaneous fun fact Spencer shared.

“Is that your worst secret or something? Trying to make it even now that you— have mine?” Elle weakly joked. It seemed so Spencer that the worst thing he ever did was get an underage tattoo.

Spencer glanced at her briefly before turning back to the dark road he was speeding down, headlights off. “Just remember it. It's on my left hip, an inch above the bone.”

The entire viewing room was staring at Elle now, any ideas of her involvement with the murder last night swept out the door. She can only confidently manage a secretive tilt of her head before she's looking away, towards the sight of her best friend saving her from a charge of second degree murder.

“You and Elle…slept in the same bed the entire night, then?” Spencer nodded behind his hands. “Alright. Sure. She never got up to use the bathroom, get a drink, anything like that?” Hotch's attempts to keep up professionalism were crumbling, with Spencer looking exactly like an embarrassed teen who desperately didn't want to talk about girls with his father.

“We were occupied until roughly 11pm, and slept in the same bed the entire night. We never left the room, she never left my line of sight, please just hurry this up.” Spencer says directly into his hands, not even pretending to not be hiding from eye contact anymore.

Hotch grimaced, as much as the man ever showed weakness. “You say she never left your line of sight, rather than she never left the bed.”

“The only time we got out of bed was to take a shower and replace the sheets, but those all came in the suite. We did them all together, barely an arms length away from when I entered the hotel room to when I got into this interrogation room. We fell asleep cuddling and woke up the same way. I'm a light enough sleeper that she couldn't have moved me without drugging me, and I didn't take anything unsealed last night. ” Spencer peeked out from between his fingers, and the skin that can be seen is an impressively tomato red. “Please, Hotch.”

Hotch sighed, kneading his brow for a long moment before picking his papers up and motioning for Spencer to leave. The boy practically sprints, going straight out the door and into the viewing room with such an apologetic face Elle can almost believe they did have this night he implied, rather than the one that really happened.

"I'm really, really sorry about having to talk about this with the whole team, Elle." Spencer apologized, even as Morgan was shaking his shoulders like the kid had scored the winning play of the season.

He didn't even lie when he said we spent the whole night together, an arms length away. Elle realized incredulously, filled with exhilarated relief at the fact that they were actually going to get a way with it. We did sleep in that queen bed together, even if nothing happened.

Hotch put his head in reluctantly. "This will be brief, but for the sake of protocol..."

Elle put on her best swagger and a smile for Hotch. "Of course, boss." She blew a kiss behind her on a whim, and the team burst into another round of whispers and gossip as the door shut.

Elle reclined in the metal chair, half nervous and half amused. The look in Hotch’s eyes is so tired dad that she can fool herself into thinking this is a meet-the-parents scenario.

“Did you know he has a tattoo?" Elle said idly, picking at her cuticle. "On his hip, the left one. You'll never guess the story behind it.”

The tired look he gave her aged him ten years, and Elle laughs so hard she almost cries.

She dramatically goes over the tattoo story she heard in the car, and then proceeds to make up one of the best nights of her life, using unnecessarily raunchy detail until it's all too much. Too much in general outside of an erotic romance novel, but way too much for her boss to hear about from a coworker he has to look in the eyes. (And, the boy she can tell he's starting to consider like a son.)

Elle doesn't get arrested for murder that day. The least she can do is cover for Spencer now, when he's being blamed for a string of murders he didn't even do.