Hey, so I chose to work on something new--yet again, but I promise to update my stories as soon as occasion permits. I am just so busy lately. This is a peice in a series I am doing, where there will be a prequal and a sequal to them. This is the angst though. Don't shoot me please.

"I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it"--Mae West

JJ didn't know how this happened. it wasn't like she and Hotch had been talking about anything particularly bestial when it began. She blamed it on the conglomerate of confederate forces coming down on them, temptation firing in every which way. The perfect, whole darkness, the peaceful silence, and the perfect solitude of their aloneness had lead to this. This being the catastrophe.

When she saw him leaning in over her shoulder to look at a file late at night, she should have thought nothing of it. She should have turned her head and acted professional. But for once in her life, JJ wasn't doing the tried and true thing, she wasn't following the rules. Instead of acting as she normally did, when she felt his arm rub haphazardly against her back, her breathing began to patter erratically, her pulse began to beat stronger than ever before. Blood rushed from her limbs to her heart, euphoria coursing through her veins. This gave her the courage to turn around and face him. She breathed in deeply before she took the eternal plunge.

This wasn't her. This wasn't JJ. But she was tired and sad and she was feeling alone and Hotch was right there. And for some reason, all of those reasons seemed decent enough for her. She was sick of the dance they were fiddling to, the one where they ignored the unmistakable electricity between them.

She had no idea where the idea popped into her head to lean in and match her lips with his, but she couldn't help but fall victim to the callous rationalizations of her mind. When she first kissed him, he initially acted surprised. She knew he would, even though she was currently not thinking. It had been a while since a woman had made herself available to him, and he had a hard time resisting. If it hadn't been for the fact that JJ's kiss was calm and sweet, yet still carried a fire that he had never before come in contact with with, he would have broken contact. He would have asked JJ what she had been thinking, not accepting the excuse that she hadn't been. But he found himself incapable to do the right thing. So he carried on.

When JJ first felt him nibble back, she was shocked out of her state of asorbtion in what she was doing. She knew that she was going to regret being pinned to the wall by her boss eventually, but she didn't have it in her to have a conscience at the moment.

It carried on past lengths that anyone could have assumed. The fact that they kissed at all was far more scandal than the were used to and now, now they had been kissing for nearly five minutes. JJ didn't know the last time she kissed someone, and only kissed them, for that long. She was sore tempted to go past that point, but she knew she couldn't. This was a matter of chance, it was a one time thing that they could chock up to a mistake, anything further than that, she wouldn't be able to look herself in the mirror the next morning.

She knew it was time to stop, though she regretted it. She slightly pulled away, detatching the previously suction-cupped lips and sighed. "We need to stop."

Hotch made a small groan, his breathing erratic and crazed. "I know, but I don't want to."

JJ nodded, her head still close to his. If she had been anyone else, she would have gone back to it, but she was her. And JJ didn't do things like this. Ever. "What have I done?"

"Whatever it was, I certainly helped." Hotch admitted, forcing himself to let go of her waist that he had been holding.

"What are we going to do?" She asked worriedly. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't apologize." Hotch begged, weighing in his confession. "I'm not going to."

"I've wanted this for a while." JJ confided shyly.

"Me too." Hotch smiled, though it did no good. In any other world, this could be cause for celebration, but not in his. "But it can't happen again."

"Why not?" JJ spat out quietly, though she knew every reason.

"If we were anyone else, this could work out." Hotch hushed in a pained whisper. "If we were any other two members of this team, we would do this despite that we shouldn't. We could be together."

JJ nodded. "But we're us, and we don't break the rules."

"Exactly." Hotch agreed. "If it had been Morgan and Garcia or Rossi and Emily or basically anyone else..."

"There would be no question." JJ finished. "But we aren't them."

"No we aren't." Hotch agreed/

"Why does it have to be us?" JJ moaned. "Why do we have to be the rule abiding ones?"

"Because that's who we are." Hotch smiled mirthlessly. "What makes us perfect for each other, the fact that we are loyal and obedient, also means that we can't be together."

JJ nodded again, and turned to the door. "So does this mean that we are never going to be able to talk about this again?"

"I'm afraid so." Hotch said, sad that he had to watch her go.

"For the record." JJ said finally as she opened the only way out from the situation she had thrown herself into. "I really do like you."

"I like you to." Hotch admitted. "Not that it does any good."

JJ bit her lip in discomfort before walking out, leaving Hotch to deal with the pieces of his fallen world. It was just one more time he had to watch them leave.

He never before wished so badly to be someone else. Someone who could be with JJ. But the truth remained that they were still them, and this was something that they couldn't do.

As he heard the door slam from the front enterance of the unit, he hung is head in despair. It was ironic that the one thing he wanted was the one thing he could never have.

AN/ There are two other oneshots in this series, and those are the happy ones. Just wait for those. As always, I don't own criminal minds.