A/N: In exchange for proofreading a 26.5-page paper for me a while ago, I told SussiRay I'd write her a oneshot. Her prompt was "pity sex." Enjoy!

"A date?" Hotch asked, his heart sinking like a rock at Emily's words.

"What, I'm not allowed to date?" Emily asked, giving Hotch a look of disbelief.

"What? Of course you're allowed to date. I'm not your father." Hotch got back to a pile of reports that needed his John Hancock.

"Okay, well—" Emily took a seat in one of Hotch's visitors' chairs on the other side of his desk. "—I was wondering if it wouldn't be too weird if I asked for your advice." It clearly pained Emily to say this.

She had Hotch's attention again, as he put down his pen. "Advice?"

"Yeah." Emily crossed her legs and grasped her top knee with both hands.

"On…dating?"

"Okay, I knew it was too weird. Sorry."

"Wait—" Hotch held up a hand as Emily got up from her chair. "I don't know if I'm the best person to get advice from on that subject. That's all I'm saying."

Emily shocked Hotch when she sat right back down, no longer shy. "But you'll listen and maybe give me your two cents anyway?"

"Of course."

"Okay, so, it's this guy at my gym. We always come in at the same time and leave at the same time. He always picks a treadmill two away from mine, always, and the other morning he finally asked me out. I kind of saw it coming, but I was hoping it wouldn't happen."

"Why?"

"Because he's…" Emily cringed. "…I don't know, kind of creepy. And not really my physical type."

"How is he creepy?"

"I'm pretty sure that the last couple times we've walked in together, he's been waiting in his car for me to get there. So it's not just some cute coincidence."

"Okay, understandable…And he's not your physical type? Which is…?"

"Tall, dark, and handsome. He's only two inches taller than I am, he's got blonde hair, which, by the way, he never seems to cut, and he's pretty plain looking."

Hotch tuned Emily out after the "tall, dark, and handsome" comment. He knew he was tall. He knew he had dark hair and features. Those were objective criteria. He wasn't sure if he was what Emily would consider handsome, but he'd heard the descriptor used on him before from other people. He gulped and then realized that Emily was waiting for some input from him.

"So if he makes you feel uncomfortable, and you're not attracted to him, why did you agree to go on a date with him?"

Emily shrugged. "I have a really hard time turning guys down. Not to say I'm desperate, no, that's not what I mean. I just feel bad."

"You might have a legitimate stalker and you're worried about hurting his feelings?" Hotch asked with a grin, relieved beyond words that Emily's problem had nothing to do with what she should wear on her date, or being nervous about impressing her suitor.

"Do not say the word stalker, please," Emily said with dramatically wide eyes. "That's the last thing I need. I think he's just a good old-fashioned creeper."

"Sorry," Hotch said with a soft chuckle. "So what exactly do you need my advice about, then? Am I a good old-fashioned creeper too, and you want to know how to deal with guys like me?"

Emily mentally smacked herself. This was not her plan. Not at all. "That's not what I meant, I swear. I just…I don't know, if you asked a woman out on a date and you really liked her, but you felt like she probably wasn't really interested but said yes anyway, how would you hope she'd handle the situation?"

"I suppose the right answer would be that I'd hope she'd just be honest."

"But you know that's not really what you would want, right?" Emily asked.

"Of course not. No one likes being rejected."

"So should I just be nice to him for one date and when he asks for another, tell him I'm not interested? Or does that fall under the honesty category?"

"Well, technically, it does fall under the honesty category, but it's not as bad as agreeing to go out with him and then calling him up to cancel because you're not really interested. I think."

"So the least I could do is go out with him just once, right? That'll hurt him less than telling him right now?"

"Prentiss, this is why I don't give good advice. I haven't dated in over a decade. I'm more than happy to listen, but I just really don't know if I'm the best person to ask. Morgan or Garcia might be more your go-to for this kind of situation."

"Yeah, I guess you're right," Emily said resignedly. So much for that, she thought. "Sorry for bugging you."

"No need to apologize. I hope everything works out all right, and if it doesn't, I hope you can find a good deal at a new gym." They exchanged amused smirks before Emily left the office.

Three Days Later

"Prentiss," Hotch greeted Emily as coolly as he could. "Something the matter?" She looked bothered.

"Okay, umm, I'm really not comfortable asking Morgan this kind of stuff anymore, to be honest, so—"

"The dating stuff? What about Garcia?"

"I tried Garcia," Emily lied, sitting in front of Hotch's desk. "And all she did was tell me how amazing I am and how creepers and non-creepers alike can all see that…it didn't really help. So…can I just tell you how it went and you give me your two cents again? It'd really help."

Hotch sighed. "All right."

"Thanks. So he took me to dinner somewhere so expensive I'd never eat there unless it was on someone else's dime. Then, surprise! He has tickets to the symphony. I mean, seriously? This is an anniversary-quality date, not a first-date-quality-date. And he was so…normal the entire time. And then he called me last night and asked if he could take me out again," Emily said with a grimace.

"And you told him you weren't interested, like you planned to?"

"How on earth could I? The guy dropped a couple hundred bucks on me! If I turned him down I'd've looked like I was using him."

"So you're going to continue letting him waste his money on you."

"I resent that comment. I am never a waste of money," Emily deadpanned. "But what am I supposed to say?"

"Tell him the truth, Prentiss. I shouldn't have advised you against being honest."

Emily groaned and held her head in her hands. "The first time you said you were bad at this kind of stuff, I should have listened."

"You're right. You should have. Can I get back to work now?"

"Yeah, sorry again," Emily mumbled.

Five Days Later

Emily was waiting on Hotch's office couch when he arrived in the morning. No one else was in yet. He didn't startle easily, and she'd pulled the same stunt when she'd first joined the team, but he almost jumped out of his skin this time. "Prentiss. What are you doing in here?" he asked, setting his briefcase down by his desk.

"I slept with him," Emily squeaked.

Hotch stopped in his tracks and curled and uncurled his fists at his sides "This again?"

"I know, I know, it's not your problem, and it's not your area of expertise, but I just needed someone to talk to. I'm such an awful person."

"You're not an awful person."

"Yes, I am."

"Well, since you insist on involving me in this subject matter, why did you sleep with him?"

"I…felt bad for him. He was trying so hard. The second date was even more expensive and he even went and got a haircut beforehand, and he was so sweet…"

"Do you remember Deputy Battle, Garcia's really sweet, charming, normal date?" Hotch asked with a nasty grin.

"Oh, don't," Emily hissed. "Garcia's not a profiler. I am. This guy is really a good guy. I'm still not interested, but he's not a creep. He's just a bit down on his luck and I thought—"

"That you'd sleep with him so he didn't feel bad about himself?" Hotch asked, shutting his office door, given the nature of the conversation. He would rather be talking about anything else with Emily, but she clearly needed someone to talk her through this, and he couldn't say no to her. He never really could.

"Yeah. Oh my God, Hotch. I've never had pity sex with someone before. I'm a skank."

"Don't say that." Hotch took a visitors' chair and pulled it up in front of the couch, sitting down a couple of feet away from Emily.

"I am. I'm a skank."

"A charitable one," Hotch noted.

Emily laughed and shook her head. "I really need to end this."

"Then call him. Don't wait until you're together again, if you think you're just going to chicken out of telling the truth again."

"I can't break up with someone over the phone."

"It's not a relationship, is it?"

Emily scrunched up her nose. "No, but still. That just feels like a low blow."

"Then ask him to meet up at a neutral location, one where you can't possibly end up in bed together, maybe at a coffee shop, and tell him that you're sorry, but you're not interested."

"Yeah…" Emily ran her hands down her face. "I can't let this go any further. You're right."

"Also, you might want to spring for the coffee this time. I heard women are allowed to pay now that it's the twenty-first century."

Six Months Later

Hotch was just about to strip down for bed in his hotel room in Cedar Park, Texas, when three light knocks sounded at his door. He continued undoing his tie and glanced through the peephole. Emily stood there, glancing up and down the hall as if she didn't want to be seen.

"Hey," he said when he opened up. "Come on in."

"Thanks."

"What's up?" Hotch led the way into the room, slipping the knot on his tie loose and rolling it around a finger.

"Just wanted to see how you were doing." Emily gazed into Hotch's eyes, but not for the sake of making eye contact. Earlier that day, Hotch had gotten into a tussle with a drunken, angry suspect in the investigation of the murders of three children. They'd found out after the fact that the suspect had a solid alibi, but their lack of rigor in their investigation now left Hotch sporting two soon-to-be-black eyes, a large bruise on his cheek, a cut on his lip, and an unsub still on the loose.

"I'm fine," Hotch said stoically.

"You've never gotten this bruised up on a case before. Not even…" They both knew that Emily wanted to say that his fight to the finish with Foyet was not even an exception, but she stopped there.

"I'll live," Hotch said.

"You can't work tomorrow looking like you were in a bar fight."

"I was in a bar fight, technically," Hotch said.

"Yeah, but only in self-defense. You weren't drunk. Here." She held up a small, shiny, red bag that Hotch hadn't noticed. "Sit down." Hotch gave her a questioning look, as if to say her request was so unbelievable that it didn't even deserve a verbal response. "I'm going to try and cover up the bruises for you. Trial run tonight, and we can fix them again tomorrow morning before we go back to the precinct."

"Ah. No, I'm not wearing makeup. Thank you, though. I appreciate the sentiment."

Emily smiled and rolled her eyes. "You're so predictable. Seriously, sit down. If it looks like you're wearing makeup, then you don't have to wear it. But I'll try my best to make it look natural."

"So, only everyone on the team will know I'm wearing makeup," Hotch said sarcastically, but he sat down on the end of his bed anyway. "And everyone at the police department who heard about the brawl."

"Just tell anyone who wasn't actually there that you didn't bruise."

"What about Morgan? He was there with you and me. He knows."

Emily was digging through her makeup bag and pulling out concealer sticks, powder, and a bottle of liquid makeup. "Your insecurity is charming." She sat down next to Hotch, her entire body turned toward him. Without any further request for his permission, she opened up a stick of concealer and dabbed at one of his eyes. He winced in pain. "Ooh, I'm sorry. I'll be gentler."

"It's fine. Just took me by surprise," Hotch said huskily.

"Okay, so your complexion is a little darker than mine, so I'll have to do some experimenting with some other stuff, but it should work."

"You're experimenting on me with makeup."

"Problem?"

Hotch sighed. "No, no problem at all. I was hoping all day that my night might end with a female colleague using me as a cosmetology guinea pig."

"Well, animal testing is wrong," Emily said with a grin.

"Boss testing is, too."

"You are so full of it," Emily said. She put away the concealer, then poured a tiny dab of liquid foundation on the back of her hand. She took out some dark beige eye shadow, brushed some into the liquid, and swirled the colors together. Hotch watched curiously. "So how many hits did you get in?" she asked as she took her finger to his eye again. The nature of her work meant that they were making quite a bit of eye contact, which Emily didn't mind much.

"On the suspect?"

"Yeah. It looked like you were winning."

Hotch chuckled. "Well, he did get cuffed and thrown into the back seat of a cruiser, so I guess you can say I won."

"How many hits? I didn't see a single mark on him."

"Lost count."

Emily giggled until she snorted. "You're worse than Morgan. He would've at least given me a number."

"Maybe his phone number," Hotch cracked.

"Oh, God. You know, I wouldn't put it past him."

"What, hitting on you?"

"Oh, he's hit on me before. Never asked me out or anything, or tried any pickup lines in earnest, but you know him, he's a hound dog. He'll flirt with anything with some T and A." Emily's brow furrowed as she tried to focus in on her task. "You have some awful bags under your eyes."

"Thanks, I've never noticed before. So you're not…into Morgan?"

A smile spread across Emily's face and she stopped what she was doing so she could catch Hotch's eye. "You are so shameless."

"What?"

"You're jealous."

"Jealous of whom?"

"Morgan."

"I'm not jealous. As the leader of this team, I just need to be aware of the interpersonal dynamics."

"Yeah, whatever," Emily droned, going back to work. She saw Hotch's lip twitching when she took a cursory glance of his entire face. "Liar," she muttered.

"Innocent."

"Lawyer."

"Touché."

"Seriously, though, you don't have a thing to worry about," Emily said, finishing up Hotch's second eye already. "I don't make a habit of fooling around with coworkers."

"Probably a good idea."

Emily moved to the bruise on Hotch's cheek. "I have thought about breaking that rule, though. Because let's face it, I spend my entire life at work. It's not really fair. I don't have time to get me some."

Hotch swallowed, hoping Emily wouldn't see his Adam's apple bobbing up and down. "Just out of curiosity, who would be your exception?"

"Do you remember pity sex guy from a while back?"

"Yeah, but I thought he was a guy at your gym, not a colleague."

"I didn't say he was my colleague."

"Then I'm lost," Hotch admitted.

"Pity sex guy was a guy at my gym."

"Okay…"

"And by the way, I stopped talking to you about him, but I did break it off after the sex. Wasn't anything to write home about anyway."

"Good to know. So how does this tie into romantic relationships with coworkers?"

Emily sighed softly, but still with patience. "I'm in your hotel room putting makeup on you, talking to you about my take on dating guys I work with, and I work with you. And you seriously have to ask me who I'm interested in?" She saw the realization set in in Hotch's eyes as she wiped her finger clean with a tissue.

"Me?"

"About time," she muttered.

"I—"

"You're my boss, I know. It wouldn't work. I was just kind of sick of hiding it, and don't ask me how you knowing about it could be any better, because I have no idea. I guess when you have your eyes on someone for so long and he wouldn't know a hint if it kicked him in the ass, it gets kind of frustrating. All done with your face. Here." She handed him a compact mirror.

"Pity sex guy was a hint?"

"Well, whatever you call it when you tell someone about a guy you're dating, expecting to get a reaction."

"I'd call that manipulation, not a hint." Emily heard enough amusement in Hotch's voice to quell her nerves a little. If he were preparing to reject her, he wouldn't have sounded upbeat at all. He would have closed her off or gone cold, and he wasn't doing that.

"Tomato, to-mah-to," she said with a shrug.

"You didn't sense my reaction, then?"

"To what? Pity sex guy?"

"Why do you think I kept trying to get you to stop talking about him?" Hotch asked, tossing the mirror aside and locking eyes with Emily.

"Because you're my boss and it was an inappropriate thing to talk about."

"Then you're just as dense as I am."

Emily licked her full, red lips and let her darkly framed eyes widened. "So this…isn't just me?"

"Emily, for over three years now, I've kept an eye on you, hoping almost every Monday that you wouldn't stroll into the office with news of some new guy in your life."

"That long?" Emily would admit later that it had been just as long for her, if not longer, but she didn't feel like it now.

Hotch picked up the compact mirror and opened it, checking out his new face. "You know, this actually looks really good," he lied through his teeth. "But it's missing something."

Emily arched an eyebrow. "What?"

"Lipstick."

"Lipstick?"

Hotch had already left a soft kiss on her lips before Emily knew what hit her. And before she could process the first kiss, Hotch was closing in for another. And another. And another, by which point his hands were roaming through her hair at the nape of her neck, numbing her entire body temporarily. When she parted her lips to make way for his needy but patient tongue to pass between them, his hands went to her waist instead. When Emily tried to get a little more interactive, too, cupping the back of Hotch's head, he hissed in pain. "Oh, I'm sorry," she said softly, backing away from him, quite reluctantly, even though she knew he was hurting. "What did I do?"

Hotch licked his lips and shook his head. "It's okay. I knocked my head into the corner of the bar when I almost fell. It's still a little sore."

Emily slung her hands over Hotch's shoulders and touched the corner of his lips with hers. "Sorry."

Hotch's heart raced when Emily took his lips captive again, deepening the kiss as if they hadn't even stopped. After a moment, she swept all of her makeup, open bag included, from the bed to the floor. "Let me make you feel better," she whispered.

One Year Later

"Sweetie, it's only one grey hair," Emily purred as she scooted closer to Hotch in bed. She'd found it on the back of his head when she'd given him a special anniversary back massage (among other things) that morning before work. He'd been in a sour mood all day as a result.

"I was just hoping I could make it another year or two," Hotch said solemnly, flipping through a golf magazine, dreaming about actually having time to golf again someday.

"I know what might make you feel better." Emily plucked the magazine from Hotch's hand and tossed it to the floor before climbing on top of him and lowering her chest down to his.

"Is this pity sex?" Hotch asked as he helped Emily peel off her thin white t-shirt.

"Well, it's our anniversary, so it's anniversary sex, too, but there is a hint of pity mixed in."

"So it's pity sex." Hotch sounded disappointed, but that didn't stop him from grabbing two healthy handfuls of ass and pulling Emily's hips down against his. "What is it with you and pity sex?"

"It's my way of showing compassion," Emily said majestically. She reached behind her and scooted up onto Hotch's stomach, her breasts hanging over his face and her hand floating up his thigh and to his groin. "For the socially unfortunate, for the elderly, for the injured—"

It was then that Hotch remembered. "Hang on."

Emily sighed. "What? Pity sex is still sex, honey. It's like crappy pizza. It's still pizza. And everyone still wants some."

"Emily, our first time together…That was pity sex, wasn't it?"

"Not entirely…Are you forgetting about how I'd had my eyes on you since I started at the BAU? I know I didn't say it that night, but it was true. It wasn't just because I felt sorry for you for getting beat up."

"It was still pity sex."

"And it was still sex. Are you saying it wasn't good sex?"

Hotch sighed and let his face loll to the side while Emily tickled his throat with her tongue. "It was amazing sex. But if you hadn't felt sorry for me…"

"Then I eventually would have found another way to get in your pants," Emily said firmly. "Now relax…do you have any aches and pains I should know about?"

A/N: So I know the title didn't fit the entire story, but it was too good to pass up ;)

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