March 2016
Emily awoke to gentle kisses on her back. She was naked, laying on her stomach in a bed at a ski resort outside of Montreal. It took her a moment to remember that.
She'd flown in the night before, and, like the last trip, Derek was there waiting for her in the airport. They were instantly braver in a different country, at a conference where there wasn't a single person they could possibly know.
He'd rented a car, and they hadn't even made it out of the parking garage at first. They made out like teenagers in that car with the heat blasting to combat the chill in the air. There were few words spoken that night. They'd made it to their hotel rooms and Derek didn't even bother going into his. He'd followed her with his suitcase right into hers.
After a few months living with her reality, Emily hadn't had the hesitation she'd had back in October. Whatever was going on with Derek, it was working for her, at least for now. Her marriage with Brian was better, and overall she was happier. She'd stopped feeling so wholly guilty, even though she still knew it was wrong.
She came back to the moment in that bed. Emily felt Derek press a kiss on her lower back and blinked open her eyes and smiled.
"Are you awake now?" he asked her.
"Yes," she whispered, so happy to hear his voice the first thing in the morning.
"Good. Get dressed. We don't have to present until after lunch and I have a surprise for you."
Emily rolled over to look at him. Get dressed? She raised one eyebrow. He laughed and said, "Trust me. Dress warmly."
"Can I shower first?" she asked.
He shook his head, his eyes gleaming and a smile on his lips. "We'll shower after. Come on."
Emily bundled herself up in her casual clothing and Derek produced a black knit hat that he pulled over her head gently. He kissed her and said, "You're going to need this."
"What are we doing?"
He took her hand and pulled her out of the hotel room. "Having fun, Emily."
She followed him to the elevators that they rode down to the ground level. He turned her down a long hallway. She saw an area for ski and snowboard rentals, but he passed those, going right out the sliding doors and around the back of the resort.
She saw them then, a line of snowmobiles. Derek produced a ticket from his pocket and handed it to an attendant who nodded.
He tossed a smile over his shoulder at her. "You ever ridden one of these?"
She laughed. "Can't say I have."
"Well, come on." Derek walked confidently over to one of the mobiles and sat down. He reached behind him and patted the space there. "Hop on."
A rush of metaphors swirled in her head. Hang in there, Emily. Hop on.
She walked over in her snow boots and sat behind him in the seat. She wrapped her arms around him. "Hold on tightly," he said to her.
Hang in there, Emily. Hop on. Hold on tightly.
Derek started the engine and at first he moved slowly away from the resort. But then they hit a path and he took off, and she could feel the rush of cold air around her. There were twists and turns and she had to clench her arms and legs to hang on. It was exhilarating. The wind whipped around them and Derek swerved through the path like he always did this. He took them farther and farther down the path, and she laughed as he moved faster and trees whipped around the side of her vision.
Derek seemed to grow more bold the farther they went, and his speed increased. She clasped her arms around him more tightly and enjoyed the ride. But after a few minutes, he hit a turn too sharply, and then there was a bump that sent her flying off the back of the seat. She landed on her back in a pile of snow, stunned. And the metaphors swirled in her head. This is probably going to be exactly how this goes. It's going to be a thrilling, fun ride until I'm thrown off.
She heard the engine of the snowmobile cut off and his feet running quickly through the snow. "Emily!" he shouted.
His face was above hers and she didn't tell him what was on her mind. Instead she laughed, because it was all so insane and crazy and wonderful in the moment.
He breathed out a sigh of relief. "You're okay?" he asked.
"I'm fine." And she laughed again. "You're great in a car chase, but not so much driving a snowmobile, Derek Morgan."
Derek huffed out a laugh and reached a gloved hand towards her face, gently touching her cheek. "You're beautiful," he whispered.
Her eyes met his. This was a line they hadn't crossed before. Sex, yes. Lots of sex consolidated into short encounters. And they talked relatively freely with each other, but not directly about their relationships. As far as feelings went, about how the other looked or felt, or how they felt about each other, they didn't say real words at all. And Emily loved it and hated it, him telling her she was beautiful.
"Don't," she whispered to him.
He raised his eyebrows at her in confusion, and she answered the unspoken questions in his mind. "Things like that will make it so much harder when this ends," she said.
And he silently acknowledged that statement with a story told with his eyes. Eventually this was going to end, maybe not soon, but sometime. Or they were going to have to start talking about the alternative, and Emily wasn't ready for that in the moment. She'd just barely celebrated her first anniversary with Brian. It was easier to pretend she wasn't a terrible person if she and Derek didn't talk about their feelings.
She didn't know who she was anymore, if she stepped back and stared down at herself. She had her months with Brian, and then a few short days with Derek, and she could only look at them in separate categories, a narrowed picture instead of an overall view, or she would go insane. Bringing spoken feelings into her relationship with Derek was going to blur into a bigger mess than she was in now, and she couldn't handle it.
Derek bent forward and kissed her. Then he took her hands in his and pulled her to a standing position. "Let's head back."
There was something different about his voice; like he understood where she was coming from, but didn't know what to do with it.
She sat behind him again and held on and he drove them much more slowly back to the resort. He was silent and slow on the walk back to her hotel room. Once they were inside with the door closed, he pulled of his own gloves and then hers.
She searched his face, but couldn't find what he was thinking about. He pulled her hat off and kissed her forehead.
"I'm sorry I said anything," she whispered, feeling insecure.
He shook his head at her. "Don't be. You're right."
It didn't feel right to her. Something had shifted and she didn't know whether she liked it or not as he stripped himself and then her of her outerwear and clothing. He linked his fingers with hers when they were naked and walked her to the bathroom. He started the water in the shower and kissed her neck and face while it warmed up.
Things were slower. She didn't know if that was perception or reality. But before that moment everything with them that involved sex seemed spontaneous, fast and unbelievable. It had never been slow before. She didn't know if it was better or worse; he was silent and yet it felt like a novel that spilled loving words over her body, without him saying anything at all.
She let him guide her into the warm water and he turned her so she was receiving most of the warm spray. His hands moved slowly across her body with soap. He turned her around and pulled her back against his chest and rubbed shampoo in her hair, then turned her again so she could rinse it off. He repeated the process with conditioner. And when he turned her again, to rinse that out of her hair, she looked him in the eyes. She reached her hand to touch his cheek and in her mind she acknowledged this was no better, the silent, slow communication with their bodies. They might as well have been declaring how they felt about each other to every person they ever knew or met. Still, without words, there was room for questioning and doubt, which was awful, but felt safer.
The words were right on the tip of her tongue. I could come back to DC. She didn't speak them, though. She knew she could say those things there, in that hotel room that felt like a different world, but putting the reality of those words into motion wasn't something she felt like she could honestly pull off, without a guarantee. And there were no guarantees here. She took what she knew about Derek and trusted it as fact: If he thought there was a viable, true option for them, he'd tell her.
Instead she followed his arm with her eyes as it turned off the water. She let him dry off her body and then his. She grasped his fingers as he walked her out of the shower to the bed. She let him help guide her down on the bed and then she pulled him towards her. Her skin wasn't totally dry and the fingers of his right hand started at her lips and trailed down her body. He pushed one finger inside her and then another and she threw her head back and felt him kiss the underside of the chin.
"Touch yourself," he whispered.
She moved her head again so her eyes could find his, and she felt a blush creep across her cheeks. They'd gone many places together in bed, but not there yet. Still, she landed on those eyes she trusted and she reached her hand down to touch herself while his fingers moved inside her. She tried to hold onto his gaze as long as possible, keeping up that silent dance of beauty and wonder and love without words, but eventually she had to close her eyes as what she was feeling became too much.
His fingers left her then. She felt his hand on her wrist, pulling it away from her and to her side. His fingers linked with hers and he shifted his hips so he was in the right position. Her legs automatically went around him and he entered her.
It was all so slow - his lips on her face and neck, his hands when they touched her body, but it still wasn't too long before he shifted slightly so he was hitting her at exactly the right spot that he already knew made her fall apart. They came together, quietly, but before she could fully catch her breath, he whispered in her ear, "I can't."
She found his eyes again and stared at him. "Can't what?"
"I can't not tell you you're beautiful. I can't not tell you I love you. I can't not tell you this is what I want, but I don't know how to make it happen because it's all such a mess, and we created that mess."
With those words out there, there was no going back to a safely compartmentalized space. She blinked back tears. It was what she wanted and everything that scared that hell out of her all at once. She reached her hand out to touch his face and breached every wall she'd built around her emotions in order to make their affair work for her. "I love you," she whispered.
Things changed after that in a way she didn't predict that further blurred the lines between their affair and their primary relationships - They started talking about Savannah and Brian. They kept those conversations out of the hotel room, but when they were in the resort eating or having drinks, they stopped pretending that Brian and Savannah didn't exist. Emily couldn't figure out if they were trying to help each other figure out a way to leave them or stay with them; they were conversations were filled with drastically competing interests.
"How long does it take you, when you go home, to feel like things are normal with you and Brian?"
"It took longer after the first time, in New York. Four or five days. After Los Angeles, it only took a couple of days, I think because I already knew I'd see you this weekend."
"That's pretty much how it is for me, too."
"What does Savannah think about these conferences?"
"It's the only traveling I do now, so she's fine with it. They're planned well in advance, and she understands my reasoning, which is that this is good PR for the FBI. She doesn't know that the FBI could probably give a shit if I did these or not."
Emily laughed a little at that. "Same. Although Interpol does actually give a shit; they like that I'm doing this."
"Sometimes I feel so beaten down, Emily."
"What do you mean?"
"There's always an edge around our house that makes me feel like Savannah sees her career as more important than mine. I feel like I carry more of the emotional burden to make sure I'm available because she sees her career as vital and mine as optional."
"Do you know she really feels that way, or is that a guess?"
"She's never actually said that out loud, but I can sense it, every time I have to work late."
Emily had to choose her words carefully; she didn't want to talk badly about a person she'd never met. "I'm sorry. That doesn't sound pleasant. It's better without the traveling, though, right?"
"Marginally. But I feel like I made a huge career change to appease her and it hasn't made it better enough."
"I got married because I was lonely and Brian was a safe option," Emily blurted out on Sunday afternoon as they walked around the snowy paths near the resort.
"Do you love him?" Derek asked.
"Yes," she said quietly. "I didn't think it was possible to ever love two people at once. I never thought it would be possible to cheat on someone I cared about, to be totally honest. And we're still assholes, Derek, but I do love you."
"I love you, too, Emily."
"And you love Savannah," she said quietly. It was a statement that she meant to come out as a question, but she already knew the answer. If he didn't love her, he wouldn't have moved in with her or left the BAU.
"Yes," he confirmed.
"What a fucked up mess," said Emily.
"It is. But it doesn't feel so messy when I'm with you."
Emily only nodded at that. It was true, but also so glaringly wrong with the words now out there. "Maybe we should skip the conference in New York this June," she said while blinking back tears. "Give each other a little more time apart to figure out what we want."
"Then we wouldn't see each other again until October. That's a long time."
"It is, but we can't keep doing this indefinitely, Derek. It is possible to love two people at once, but eventually we're going have to make a choice."
Derek looked around and saw there wasn't anyone else near them. He backed her against a tree and kissed her. "But we show up in October no matter what. Even if it's to tell each other goodbye."
Emily let a tear fall then. "Deal."
He kissed the tear on her cheek and then both of her eyes. He kissed her lips again and that felt like a seal on a promise they might not be able to keep, because in seven months, everything could change for both of them.
Without saying anything, they went back to their compartmentalized world again after that conversation. It was their last night in Canada, their last night together for several long months, and they wanted to enjoy it.
After dinner, Emily stood from the table and said, "Come on."
"Where are we going?" he asked.
"My idea of fun."
Emily lead them to the elevators and up to the top floor of the resort. She walked them into the resort's spa and up to the desk. "Eight o'clock appointment for Prentiss," she told the woman at the desk.
The woman smiled at her and Derek as she stood. "Right this way."
She lead them down several hallways and into a room. Emily glanced at Derek and smiled as he surveyed the room where there were two massage tables. The woman opened the glass door of the steam room and flipped a switch. The room started filling with steam.
"Enjoy. The massage therapists will be in in about forty-five minutes," she said before leaving the room.
"Couple's massage," said Emily with a grin. "You ever done this?"
Derek grinned. "Can't say I have."
"I have, but not with someone else." Emily reached to pull her sweater and shirt off and smiled at him. "What on earth are we going to do in a steam room for forty-five minutes?"
The room was so full of steam that she could barely see him. She laid a towel on a wide, deep bench and reached for his hand. She sat him down and then sat on his lap, straddling his thighs with her knees on the bench.
The air was thick with steam and their bodies were slick with the moisture. She kissed him and he came into her view, but when she pulled her head back, he was just a blur, a barely visible mirage through a cloud of steam. His hands slid easily over her damp skin. She saw him briefly as he bent forward and kissed her shoulder and then her chest. She raised herself up on her knees and his hands found her hips while his mouth found her nipple.
Emily sighed in satisfaction. She could barely breath through the heat and humidity in that room and it brought an edge to this that she'd never felt before. She reached her hand down and stroked him and felt him moan around her breast.
She reached her other hand behind him and pushed on his back, urging him to scoot forward on the bench a bit. He did and she adjusted her position and she sank down on him. They both made satisfied sounds and then his lips found hers again and she started moving up and down on him.
It couldn't possibly be this good always, she thought. But in the back of her mind, she acknowledged that maybe with him it could be.
They didn't rush. She wrapped her arms behind his neck and she felt his hands slide up behind her back, and she set a rhythmic pace, tossing her head back and feeling him kiss her body, any place he could reach. She tried to keep breathing in the stifling air and just let the sensations course through her body.
He kissed her goodbye in the hotel room on Monday morning, and kissed her again in the rental car before they turned it in at the airport. He hugged her and pressed a kiss on her forehead before she headed off through security to her gate.
"I love you, Emily Prentiss. You remember that," he said softly and reverently.
"I love you, too," she responded with a heavy heart.
On that flight home, she didn't drink and she didn't cry. She felt too completely raw to either try to obliterate her memories or cry about them. She closed her eyes before the plane even pulled onto the tarmac. She visualized his face and remembered his voice as he told her he loved her and that she was beautiful.
She held on to a fragile promise of October.
A/N - This story is killing me, people! However, yesterday was my last day at work. I'm off for three weeks before I start my new job. So I should have plenty of time for this story and Half the Sky.