Emily was moving into a new apartment and had dragged JJ and Penelope into helping her pack up her things into boxes. There were two piles dividing the apartment; what to keep and what to throw out, although the keep pile was definitely larger; everything had a memory attached to it. Luckily, through the bribery of pizza and wine they had worked hard and it had only taken two days for the whole apartment to be nearly entirely packed up. They were currently in Emily's attic, where all of the usual junk resided, most of the items she hadn't seen in years since putting them there.
Emily pulled over the next box to sort through. It was labelled 'Ambassador crap'. The other two giggled at its title.
"Very mature, Em." JJ pointed out.
"My box, my label. It's just stuff from back when I lived with her, we probably don't need to open it, if I wanted to bin the stuff I would have done it years ago, this stuff is for keeps." She said trying to move that particular box away.
"Oh no no, I want to see the details of the early years of Emily Prentiss." Garcia squealed gleefully, yanking the box back to the middle of them.
"Fine, but I'm warning you now, you will gain nothing by going through it." Emily said resignedly, there was nothing to stop Pen once she wanted something.
After rummaging thoroughly among items that Emily had collected from foreign countries over the years; an ornament here, a painting there, trinkets of sentimental value and old photographs. It was the photos that the two blondes took a liking to, Emily as a child in those awful frilly dresses, Emily being posed with high powered men and women, and ones taken at the balls and galas that the embassy held all the time. For an outsider, it looked like a charmed life, but on the inside it was hollow and lonely, that's how Emily felt about it anyway.
"The guy in this picture looks an awful lot like Hotch."JJ mused out loud, she was squinting at one of the pictures from a summer ball at the embassy from over twenty years ago. It was a photo taken as Ambassador Prentiss and her entire entourage entered the building; they did look a formidable bunch.
"Um, that would be because it is Hotch." Emily said trying to sound neutral, like their supervisor being in her old photos wasn't a big deal. JJ choked on her soda while Pen grabbed the stack of photos to see for herself.
"Okay, so why is Hotch in these pictures?"
"He worked for my mother. He started a few months before I left for college." Still trying to sound casual.
"You two have known each other for years? When you were both fresh faced and untouched by the BAU horror. I can't believe this, how did we not know this?" Pen was astounded that all of her technological digging hadn't found this out before, she was sure that she had read Hotch's resume.
"It never came up in conversation I guess."
"So what was young Aaron Hotchner like?" Pen leant forward expectantly, gossip was as welcome as oxygen in her world.
"He was happy, ambitious and charming. Dedicated to his job but had a liking for bending the rules. He's changed a lot since then."
"Charming, you say."
"Uh, yeah. Anyway, it was a long time ago, I was still a teenager and he had yet to grow out of shoulder length hair. I don't think he even remembers that we knew each other. It has been over twenty years."
"Still, you called him charming." Pen giggled while Emily blushed.
"Oh shut up." Emily said, throwing a cushion at her friends.
"I'm sure he does remember, you know." JJ said quietly so that Pen wouldn't hear from the next room. Any hint of gossip and she would be relentless, it was just second nature to her.
"I don't think so. It was a long time ago and I was only his employer's daughter, besides, he's never really said anything. My first day in his office, it was like he had never met me before."Emily said sadly as she hurried away to go and continue sorting boxes.
"Hmm, we shall see." JJ said to herself, whilst picking up one of the infamous photos and putting it in her back pocket.
JJ arrived at the office earlier than usual the next day; she had a need to use the copier machine. She now had several copies of the old photo, and a pair of scissors which she had confiscated from Spencer when she caught him using them to cut his hair.
She cut up one of the copies into uneven pieces, making it into a make-shift jigsaw puzzle. The idea had come to her last night while she watched Henry playing; she was losing her touch if she now needed her toddler to come up with plots for her.
She shuffled the pieces and selected five at random and went and placed them on Hotch's desk. JJ was grateful that it wasn't Morgan that Emily was in love with; Hotch had an office to hide these activities from everyone else.
JJ then went to her office, keeping a safe distance away while watching Hotch's office like a hawk.
Half an hour later, Hotch finally arrived at work, grabbed a cup of coffee and went to his office. Two minutes later he came back out of his office and looked around the BAU suspiciously. As far as he could see, there was no one else in yet. JJ had had the foresight to not open her door or blinds, so he would assume she wasn't in yet.
Seeing there was no one else around, he went back into his office and sat down at his desk, examining the pieces of paper on it. They didn't look threatening; there didn't appear to be a threatening note on them, so he could hold off on making it into an investigation or taking out his gun and shooting the pieces into oblivion.
From what he could see, they seemed to make up a picture, or more specifically, a photograph. There were quite a lot of people in the broken images, dressed in formal evening wear. Relief washed over him, as the photos he usually sees like this are of poor victims in basements, but this appeared to be a happy occasion.
While examining the images, Hotch had a curious feeling of recognition, he could have sworn that he recognised some of the faces but couldn't quite place where he had seen them before. The FBI had never held an event that was up to the high standards as seen here, so they weren't fellow agents. The only time he had even seen an event like this was years ago when he had worked for Ambassador Prentiss, Emily's mother.
That was impossible though, why would someone have put cut up pieces of a photo of an embassy ball on his desk? Was it a threat against Emily? If it was, why would they send him the pictures? He shook his head, he had already ruled out that this was a threat of some kind.
After staring at the pieces, together and individually for forty minutes, he gave up. There was no way he could figure out whatever he was supposedly figuring out with just these five pieces. He put the pieces to one side of his desk and pulled out a case file to work on.
Every time that Hotch had left his office for one reason or another JJ had slipped in and placed another few pieces of the copied photo onto his desk and ran out again. Watching him getting more and more confused was actually a funny thing to see. It was nearly quitting time and she had finally used up all of the pieces of the image. It was entirely up to him now, what he would do with said photo. Her work was done.
Aaron Hotchner was confused. He didn't like this feeling; it wasn't one he had much experience with. All day the small bits of paper had kept coming; when put together they formed a photograph, a very old photograph, and one he didn't know existed. Every time that more pieces had appeared, he had scanned the room trying to find the culprit, but they seemed to give nothing away, just mild concern at his odd behaviour.
Once he recognised what the photo was of and from when, he became even more confused. Who had put it there? From the contents of the photo, Emily would be the only person who would even know it existed.
It was a nice photo, he thought, she looked beautiful. He looked at her through his office window and corrected himself, she still is.
However, Emily didn't look like she knew anything about the photo on his desk, she had been with him practically all day so she wouldn't have the time to do it. Garcia became a possibility, her hacking skills meant that any image or file, no matter how hard you hide it, she will find it. Had Garcia found it and printed it? He shook his head, Garcia hadn't been to the bull pen all day, let alone his office. Dave? He had been encouraging Hotch to ask Emily out for months. No, he is far too direct for something as obscure as this. Morgan and Reid definitely had no hand in this, if they even knew of Hotch's feelings for Emily, they still wouldn't dare to do anything about it. That left JJ. She had been looking highly amused at something all day. Of course it was JJ, this is exactly her style of meddling. If she hadn't already left for the night he would have demanded an explanation. Seeing as she was gone however, he was left to figure out her reasoning by himself. He could ask her tomorrow, but he was an impatient man. He could phone her, but the idea of having to ask, he knew his pride would take a hit.
He sat back down at his desk, preparing for a long night of trying to understand the mind of Jennifer Jareau.
Was the photo a clue? A message? The image of himself and Emily, who happened to be side by side in this particular picture, dressed in formal wear, all looking twenty years younger was now emblazoned on his brain, even when he shut his eyes he could still see it. It was a nice picture. They looked good together. No, you can't think like that Hotchner, he thought trying to push those thoughts from his mind. Subordinate, she is a subordinate, the rules don't allow it. How he wished they did. Besides, even if he said something would she accept? They are friends, yes, but he was a total workaholic, he was far too serious to point of it being inhuman, he comes with a son and a lifetime of guilt over what had happened to Haley. He shook his head at his thoughts, there was no way any sane woman would even consider dating him, let alone Emily Prentiss. She was light where he was dark. It would be a lie to say that he had never thought about her in that way, he had, often, but she was something he could never have.
So why the photo? He continued to stare at it, hoping that an answer would just jump out at him. It was a message. Saying what? Damn you Jareau, he thought.
There was no way he was figuring out anything by himself. He packed up his stuff and left the office, taking the photo with him that he has sellotaped back together.
He got to his car and found another copy of the photo taped to his windscreen. This one was different, it was intact and had the words 'you found each other again for a reason' written across it in pen. Well at least now she was spelling it out for him.
Hotch had never really believed in fate and destiny, things just happened, but now that he thought about it, there was definitely something going on; it was not just a coincidence that they met time and time again when they did, the way that things happened so that they always ended up together, partnered together, taking care of each other even just standing next to each other, it was like gravity.
Was JJ suggesting that Emily had feelings for him too? That she wanted it too? He certainly hoped so.
He drove to Emily's place, breaking several speeding laws in the process, he would have to get Garcia to erase them from the database later he thought; he had wasted enough time living without Emily and he didn't want to wait any longer.
Emily opened the door and was surprised at who she found on the other side. He didn't say anything, just walked into her apartment as she followed behind confused. They were on satnd down, so this wasn't a professional visit.
"Why are you packing? You aren't leaving are you?" He looked genuinely worried.
"No, I'm just moving apartments. I found one that has bullet proof windows." She joked trying to lighten the intense mood that Hotch had brought with him.
He finally turned to look at her and held out the photo that he had brought from his office to her. She looked at it and sighed. She decided that she would kill JJ later.
"JJ." She explained.
"I know. She has been leaving pieces of this in my office all day. No idea why. Do you know why?"
"She must have taken it when she and Garcia came to help me pack up my apartment. I'm sorry if it has inconvenienced you, I know that the team were unaware that we knew each other before I came to the BAU."
"Why is that?" His question caught her off guard. Emily had thought that he didn't want his personal life widely known, and the two of them only mentioned it in private and very rarely. She had guessed he didn't want it mentioned, so she had never even told JJ and Pen.
"I'm not sure. I didn't think you'd want me discussing your life with the team. Besides, I didn't want to encourage the idea that I was on the team due to my connections even more. I guess I thought it wasn't an important fact to you; you had met me before, so what?"
"Not important? Emily how could you think you aren't important to me? I don't broadcast my life story, but I never mentioned it because I always kind of liked the fact that we had a shared history, like a little secret between us that no one else knew about." He admitted sheepishly.
She smiled at him. "Yeah, I do like that part too." He returned her smile.
"You are just as beautiful as you were that night Emily." He was feeling a little braver than when he had first showed up.
"Thank you Aaron." She blushed.
He stepped towards her and kissed her gently on the lips, which she returned happily, putting her arms around his neck to keep him there.
"JJ isn't going to do anything else with that picture is she?" Hotch joked, making Emily smile.
"I doubt it. I think it has served its purpose." She said sweetly before they starting kissing again.