A/N: Thank you! To everyone reading. I'm amazed even at how many people have opened this. It's still astounding. I sincerely hope you enjoy it, I was going to write it either way but it feels so good posting it somewhere. So thank you for the support, especially for the reviews.

P.S. There's a cuss word at the end, I don't want to change the rating because I really don't feel like this story deserves it, but felt like I should warn you. If you don't like bad words... just don't read the last one. :)


New York, NY

Emily had awoken to her phone buzzing and a text from Derek, Chat over coffee this am?

She'd rushed through Elijah's morning routine and told Colin that she needed to go into the office early. She didn't like lying to him, but she knew she couldn't casually drop the I'm going meet someone that I had sex with a couple of days before we had sex and might be our baby's father. She would save that conversation for another time. Maybe.

If they could confirm that Derek wasn't Elijah's father, then she would never have to have that conversation, right? She'd put it off long enough. It would just hurt him at this point. She also knew that wasn't fair to Colin, but she was a big fat chicken.

Walking through the streets of New York's Financial District, Emily carried her young son with her as she carefully navigated the uneven streets whilst scanning the nearby buildings searching for the name of the coffee shop Derek had texted her. She was beginning to understand that being a mom was just carrying your kid and all their crap around while trying to figure out what else you were supposed to be doing.

Finally she spotted a coffee shop across the street from where she stood. She spotted Derek through the window, who was sitting alone at a table with two coffees.

Her breath caught in her throat when she saw him. Damn. He looked good.

"Look Elijah! We found him." She sang to the baby.

Derek looked up at the sound of the door opening, and instinctively rose to his feet upon seeing her. God, she looked as beautiful as ever.

Emily watched Derek take her in as a smile formed on his lips. It wasn't the beaming smile she was used to seeing on him, it was more tentative, nervous.

She returned his smile as she moved towards him. Gesturing to the second coffee sitting across from him, she asked, "Is this for me?"

"What?" he asked, he'd been so lost in his thoughts. "Oh, yeah. Please sit."

She did so, and plopped down the large bag of Elijah's things that'd she'd been carrying as well.

"Sorry, I would have gotten something for him as well, but… well…" he trailed off.

She laughed, genuinely. She knew Morgan didn't know anything about babies, which she found funny mainly because she hadn't known anything about babies a few months ago either. She was still learning, truth be told, but in this situation she was the expert.

She lightly brushed her son's head, which was rested against her sternum, before reaching for the cup in front of her."It's okay Derek, he's not much of a coffee drinker."

She watched a smile spread over his face as he watched her sip her coffee.

"What?" she asked him.

"It's just you. With a baby, Prentiss."

She narrowed her eyes. "What are you saying?"

He put his hands up in mock defeat. "All I'm saying is motherhood looks good on you."

"Okay." She said wearily, but her smile gave her away. She missed Morgan. She had forgotten. While she had been pregnant she'd had a lot of time to think about him. To miss him. To be angry at him. But once the baby had come, she'd been so focused on taking care of Elijah she hadn't really had time to think about Derek much. But sitting in front of him now, it felt like nothing had changed. Even though everything had. She missed him more than ever. It was hurting to just breathe.

Derek cleared his throat, as he too had gotten lost in his thoughts. He loved just being in her presence. He wanted to sit and chit-chat with her, but knew he needed to press her for information.

"Emily," he started, clearing his throat once more, "I want a paternity test."

"Okay." Emily answered.

"Okay? Just like that?" Derek asked. He was surprised she hadn't tried to argue with him. Though he wasn't sure why he'd expected her to. She had told him she didn't know either.

"Okay." She shrugged as she pulled the stand of her hair away from her son who had been tugging on it. "I'll look up a clinic here in New York while we're both still here and have them mail us the results."

"Oh. Alright then." Derek said. He was relieved but also suddenly nervous.

He looked down at Elijah who was now grabbing at the fabric of Emily's blouse in absence of her hair to play with. It was suddenly starting to feel real. Could this be his baby? Sitting in front of him?

"Emily." He said suddenly.

"Yes?"

"Why didn't you tell Colin about me?"

Emily took a deep breath and reached up to stoke her baby's back. It appeared this question was a bit tougher for her.

"Honestly Derek. When I found out I was pregnant, I was terrified. You know me; I didn't know the first thing about babies. Then Colin stepped up. He was there. And I hated to admit it, but I needed him. I needed someone and I was so afraid that if I told Colin that he may not be his father that he'd leave me. Then I would have to figure it out. Alone. God Derek, I felt so alone."

She had choked on that last part, but quickly pulled herself back together. Emily was not one to break down in a public location.

Derek felt his heart pounding in his chest. She'd said she'd needed someone. He wanted to tell her he would have been there. If she had told him that she was pregnant he would have come for her. But he never even knew.

"So why didn't you tell me when you found out you were pregnant?" He asked uneasily. It was still so strange to him that Emily Prentiss had been pregnant in the first place. He was sad he'd missed seeing that. Even if it wasn't his baby.

"Seriously Derek?!" she spat back with ferocity that surprised him.

Derek's head jerked back and he blinked a couple of times. She felt Elijah curl into her, having also been startled. And the heads of a few patrons were now turned in their direction.

She lowered her voice, but the pent up anger she'd been suppressing for the last year laced her words. "Derek, I tried. For months." She stressed. "I called, I texted. Nothing. You never responded. I knew you were angry, but damnit Derek. It really hurt."

"Emily- I – if I had known… if I had even suspected, I would you have called you back." He pleaded.

She shrugged.

"Em, I would have." He said more firmly this time.

"It doesn't matter." She lied.

"Emily. I'm sorry." And he was. He imagined Emily, pregnant, alone, on the other end of his unanswered phone calls while he was probably out getting drunk with his buddies. Which he had done a lot of after returning from London. He felt the guilt pull at his gut when he thought about her going through an entire pregnancy, and childbirth, and caring for a newborn all the while he'd been too selfish, wearing his hurt like a child instead of manning up and calling her back.

She finally brought her eyes up to meet his. The hurt and anger still in her eyes, but when she saw how tormented he looked. She softened.

London, UK

Emily's Flat

11 months earlier

Emily's alarm clock went off for what felt like the hundredth time. And just like each time before she reached over and slapped at the snooze button until it silenced.

She was supposed to leave for work 10 minutes ago. Yet, she was still in bed, fighting off the nausea that plagued her for the last two weeks. She shut her eyes tight, willing it to subside but knowing that it would not. It was now the fiercest it's been since she'd discovered the cause just two days ago.

Two days. It reverberated in her mind ... Two days ago everything had changed.

She had suspected, of course, before then. Her period had been late. But that happened sometimes. Another week had gone by and the nausea had started. She'd attributed all of these symptoms to stress though. She had just moved continents, started a new job, was now responsible for her team's lives and sending them on assignments, she'd stopped talking to Derek - or rather he'd stopped talking to her, and she'd started a casual fling with a rather attractive substitute for her previous partner.

It was a heavy list of stressful things, that last item on the list had actually been on short list of not stressful things in her new life, until two days ago. Now Colin made the list. And, as of two days ago, there was one more thing that made it on her list of stressors, leap frogging its way right to the top of the list. She was pregnant.

She had taken the test two days ago and now that her head knew what her body had been trying to tell her, the mind and body had joined forces to ensure she knew how present every symptom was. Her hips ached, her boobs throbbed, and her limbs felt heavy with exhaustion.

Laying in bed and late work for the second day in a row, she was keenly aware of the bile rising in her esophagus. She knew it was only a matter of minutes now before it would come all the way up and she would spring out of bed running for the bathroom. But she was determined to stay in bed as long as she could.

Unable to stop herself from thinking back to the last time she'd been pregnant, she fleetingly wondered if the symptoms hadn't been as bad because she'd been 15 and her body was able to handle the hormone changes better, or because it was around this stage that it was over.

She knew she would have it this time though. She knew as soon as the strip turned pink. As long as her body cooperated, she would have this baby knowing it may be her last chance. Knowing she wasn't that scared 15 year old girl, with no money, no resources and no clue about how to care for a baby. She was now an adult woman with a good job and a savings account. Maybe she still didn't have a clue as to what to do with a baby but she had the resources now to figure it out. She wanted this. She was ready. With or without a man.

Emily focused on breathing in through her nose, out through her mouth. She had things she needed to do. First, she'd need to call her assistant and tell her she would not be coming in today. She would not have a repeat of yesterday. Yesterday, she'd gone in when she'd thought the latest bout had passed.

She had gotten up, gotten dressed, and headed into the office, only to throw up as soon as she'd walked into the office heading strait for the restroom. She'd had to leave the room in the middle of her AM briefing and two additional meetings throughout the day. No. She was not doing that again.

Uh oh. She needed to go. Now.

She flung herself out of bed and raced across the room barely in time. She landed on her knees as she vomited into the toilet.

Once she had finished heaving the contents of her stomach into the bowl, she flushed the toilet and then laid the side of her face on the cool plastic of the seat. She knew it was gross, but honestly, it just felt so good against her skin.

Feeling another wave of nausea pass through her, but too tired and weak to sit up again, she just spat some of the thick saliva in her mouth into the empty bowl. "Ugh." She groaned.

She dropped one hand into her lap and pressed it ever so lightly against her sensitive stomach. "Baby, why are you doing this to me?" She whined aloud to the empty room.

"Ugh," she groaned again pathetically. If there was one thing she truly hated it was being nauseous.

She sighed. "I'm being punished." She told her unborn baby. "I'm being punished because I slept with two different men just days apart and now I don't know who your daddy is."

She did feel dumb talking to her unborn baby, a baby, who was probably still just a bunch of cells and probably didn't even have ears yet. But it made her feel just a little less alone in this situation. She didn't have any friends here yet, not that she could burden with her baby daddy drama. She settled for talking to a fetus, at least that's what it was in the beginning, right? God, she knew nothing about babies and pregnancy. She made a mental note to do some research. If she could ever get up off this floor.

She closed her eyes and fought the urge to fall asleep right where she was. She really needed to get up. She needed to make some phone calls and then she would allow herself to get back in bed.

Taking a deep breath, she slowly pushed herself up off the floor, making sure to ease herself slowly so as not to test her uneasy stomach. She breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth once more. She swallowed and decided she was probably done throwing up, for now.

She slowly walked back into her bedroom and felt under her pillow for her phone. She already had unread emails, mostly incident notifications, and made a mental note to put on an out of office.

One more deep breath and she dialed a familiar number.

Four rings, which was two more than normal, before the receiver practically yelled into the phone, "Hello!"

"Hello Bethany." Emily stated to her assistant.

"Oh my god! Prentiss! I'm just getting in, I was trying to set my things down-"

"It's okay." Emily reassured her.

"Uh, what can I do for you?"

"I'm sorry to do this to you," she told Bethany sincerely, "but I need you to reschedule all of my in-person meetings today. I'm still feeling under the weather and I really shouldn't be coming into the office today."

"Oh no! I'm sorry you're still feeling sick. Do you think you caught the bug that's been going round?"

"Um, yeah. Probably." Emily lied. "Anyhow, I'll try to stay on top of as many emails as I can today, so please continue to send me over the reports. Also, please apologize for the team today in my absence and ask Sam if can attend my AM briefing when he arrives?"

"Of course." Bethany said as she scribbled on the closest Post-It she could find.

"Beth, I sincerely appreciate it." Emily told her.

"Oh, thank you." Bethany breathed; she was just feeling like she was getting into a swing her boss and she was ever-so-grateful.

Emily ended the call. One down. One to go. Then back to bed. That would be her reward.

She started scrolling through her phone contacts, continuing to swipe until she found the one that she was looking for. She took one more deep breath and hit dial.

Three rings.

"Hello, you've reached Dr. McLaughlin, OBGYN's, office. Cynthia speaking. How can I help you today?"

"Yes, hi Cynthia. My name is Emily Prentiss, I'm a new patient of Dr. McLaughlin's and um, I took a home pregnancy test and it, well, it said that it was positive. So… I guess I need to make an appointment."

"Ah." Said Cynthia, obviously having done this before. "Congrats, Miss Prentiss, I'll pull up Dr. McLaughlin's schedule… It looks like the next prenatal appointment she has is this Thursday at 10:45. Does that work for you?"

"Yes, I'll take it."

"Great! We'll see you then." She told Emily.

"Of course." Emily reassured her. "I'll be sure to do so."

Emily banged the end button one her phone. She rolled her eyes at herself for getting into this situation to begin with.

Collapsing onto the bed, she pulled a pillow into her face so she could yell without alerting the neighbors. "Fuuuuuuuck!"