Handling flaws

And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch

- Matthew 15:14

"what makes you think I have?"

Seven words, seven simple to god words, but with those words, she let her emotions go and that was her problem. She started her eyes leaking, her voice wavering and when he stared at her, she felt the urge to run into him. He looked so warm, but she couldn't. she crossed her arms over her chest, she was pulled to him but she was also angry, and that single emotion held her resolve enough to let her stay immobile, simply staring back at him.

"because you're here, confessing your sins," and there he paused, his face showing nothing, but Elle's intuition told her he was gathering up best poker face to say the rest of his speech. " you know I don't have enough evidence and you know how fast I'd arrest you if I did, so the question is, what are we going to do about it?"

She watched him warily, she had revealed more of herself than hotch had ever seen, and she was trying to summon the energy to want it all back. He had never been given this much of her, not even in the late night talks. Because those held the proper restraint, the looks she was giving him now, they didn't. She tried for the willpower again, she could only come up with enough might to say the barest minimum. She also absently wondered what he would do with this new information.

"I don't know, what do you want from me hotch?" she took a step towards him, and he took two to her. But then she stopped, she backed that step up but he just kept walking, getting closer and closer… she distantly registered her back connecting with the large tree behind her.

Yes, she tried to tell herself, it really was him, hotch who was standing toe to toe with her, so close that she only had to lean in just a bit… It really was her rather introverted boss that was effectively pinning her to a tree, the rough bark rubbing against her shirt. She could smell him, see his strong wall of a chest and she could feel him to. Even if just slightly, it was more than she was used to being allowed to feel, his warmth was radiating from his skin, under his heavy black suit, and her soul ran to meet it. It was wrong and bad and taboo to boot, but she wanted it all the same.

"I want you, the real you that you won't let anyone see." his voice was low, but they had emotion and the words themselves showed what he normally kept so far from her reach. Still he was quiet, because he was letting her see his vice, his single wanting sin, she could see it now, he wanted her. That was all fine and good, but what about after she surrendered, what happened then?

"I don't know if I can… Let you in… what if you don't like the real me?" she was fearful, trying her hardest not to say what she wanted so badly too, those words wouldn't do her any good. They would only expose another part of her that she desperately wanted to keep hidden, no matter how much he said he wanted to see it.

In the back of her head, Elle could already hear the warning bells going off, they were screaming at her in a panicked frenzy, telling her to back off, to walk away. As much as it would help her to have him heal that cut on her heart, it wouldn't do any good when he turned around and left a bigger one. But that was the price wasn't it? He was her healer alright, but he was the one who knowingly or not, inflicted a lot of those cuts on her. Saying he had given them all wasn't fair, he didn't do this all himself, but he sure helped a lot with it.

"you're in trouble, I want to help you." she almost laughed. Didn't he notice her enough to know she was always like that? Always in trouble? Well sure it was to a lesser degree but she'd just got shot, and yeah she was more up tight now but once again with the being shot thing… She had her answer before she even got full though the question, of course he didn't, he was hotch.

All interest in her may not have been merely professional, all the times he'd stayed up with her, on the planes, talking about her fears, his advice, his stories, and her's too, might not have been simply to make sure she wasn't off the deep end. To make sure she wasn't going to do something like freak out and let a suspect walk free, and then go kill him, citing self defense, in a way that had him questioning her integrity to boot, but it wasn't all that she could want, or that he could give.

"oh hotch," she said, her voice strangled, her eyes slightly glazed with tears, "I'm always in trouble, it's the way I am, and I can handle it, but you… you I can't handle"

"what?" he was shocked, the emotion was weakened, diluted on his face but she was good at trying to read him by now, she'd had so much practice.

"I. Can't. Handle. You." she breathed, her head dangerously close to laying on his chest. "I… the things you… say, because I fell… for you, they… make me unable to focus the way… I should." she pleaded with him using her eyes. She didn't want him to hate her, she needed him to understand. "I can't do this because I love you hotch, and it would kill me for me to let you in and have you run away." it was hard to say but once it was out she felt better.

Before she even registered what was happening, he was kissing her. One hand on her hip and the other on a patch of the tree next to her head, he pressed his lips hard against hers, and the world exploded. Or at least that's what it felt like to Elle. She put her arms around him, feeling as much of his exhilarating warmth as she could. She pressed her whole self against him. He groaned and the hand over her hip squeezed into her. This was a bad idea, this was wrong.

And at that moment it was exactly what she wanted.

Fin