Chapter 4: Hotch
Aaron Hotchner's POV
I was the last member of the team to board the plane before we headed home to Virginia. Keeping my stoic mask firmly in place, I looked around at my team before taking my seat in the middle of the plane. It had been a hellish week, and every one of us was having trouble dealing with the gruesome images we'd seen and the horrible things we'd witnessed. Cases involving children always had the worst effect on myself and JJ, since we had children ourselves.
Morgan and Reid both had problems dealing with cases involving child abuse and kidnappings. Dave had problems when the cases involve children, of course, but the older profiler seemed able to deal with it a bit better than the rest of us. Our personal and professional histories had everything to do with how we handle cases. Since this case dealt with the kidnapping, sexual abuse, and killing of little boys, the entire team felt the pressure.
As I settled into my seat and set all my things down beside me, I realized that all I wanted to do was speak to Jack. Talking with my son never failed to brighten my day, no matter how horrifying that day had been. Looking at my watch, I mentally crossed my fingers in the hopes that Haley would wake Jack up to let me speak to him when I got back to Quantico. I wasn't due for a visit with my son for a few days, so until then, I'd have to deal with simply being able to hear his voice for a few minutes every day.
I busied myself with paperwork, shutting out all thoughts and sounds from around me and in my head aside from the ones I needed to complete the arduous task in front of me. When my phone rang a few minutes later, I quickly grabbed it from my belt and held it to my ear. "Hotchner," I said in a brisk, business-like tone without ever looking at the incoming number.
"Daddy?"
I closed my eyes and dropped the pen to the table in front of me.
The sweetest voice I'd ever heard called out again when I didn't answer. "Daddy? Hewwo?"
"Hi, buddy! How are you, son?"
I could hear my ex-wife in the background, prompting Jack to answer. She obviously had the phone on speaker so she could help direct the conversation.
"Daddy, you coming home? I wanna see you, Daddy."
My heart clenched tight inside my chest. "I'm coming home, Jack. I want to see you, too. Just a few more days, and then we'll go to the zoo together like I promised, okay?"
"Daddy, I wanna see you 'morrow! Please, Daddy?"
I smiled, thinking that I'd like nothing more than to get my boy a few days earlier than scheduled.
"I'll talk to Mommy, kiddo, okay? If she says it's okay, then I'll pick you up tomorrow, and we can start our weekend early. What'd you do today? Did you and Mommy go to the park?" Haley had mentioned when I talked to her the night before that as long as it didn't rain, she'd planned to take him today.
"Yeah, the park! Ducks liked bread! They chaseded me and tried to bite me, but Mommy made 'em run 'way." Jack had become fairly chatty the last few months as his vocabulary picked up, but sometimes his words still made me smile.
"Wow, the ducks chased you and tried to bite you, huh? Mommy is definitely good at making the ducks go away and not letting them bite you! Did you swing and ride the merry-go-round, too?" Jack's favorite activity at the park had to be the swings. He and I had spent many hours simply doing nothing but him swinging and me behind him pushing him gently.
"Momma swinged me high. I spinned on the merry round wif' Momma, too, Daddy!...Dora! Bye, Daddy!"
I laughed as I heard the phone drop and Jack's little feet running away to the other room, where I could faintly hear Dora the Explorer coming from the TV. I waited a second and then heard a click before Haley's voice came onto the phone.
"Hi, Aaron. Sorry you've been abandoned for Dora," she said, laughing softly.
I chuckled. "It's okay. I'm used to it by now. Dora, The Wiggles, Bob the Builder... His poor old dad can't hold a candle to them, I've learned. Thanks for helping him call, Hales." Sighing, I said, "I needed to hear his voice more than I thought, apparently."
"Penelope thought you might," she answered. "I'm glad to hear it ended well enough. I don't know any details other than that and that it was a bad one, and I don't want to know." The details of my job were part of what had driven us apart, so that didn't come as a surprise to me at all. "Do you have time off now?"
"Yes, I'm giving the entire team a few days off, telling everyone not to come back in until next Monday. Do you mind if I spend a few extra days with him? I can pick him up from preschool tomorrow and bring him home Sunday evening as planned." I realized I sounded a bit desperate, but wasn't surprised to realize that I didn't give a damn.
"That's fine," she said quietly. "I told him that if you could, that's what you would do. He's very excited that he gets to see you tomorrow. I think he'd pick you up at the airport if he could." We laughed a bit at that thought. "I told him you had to finish some work tonight, though, since I figured you'd have paperwork you needed to finish and that you'd probably want to decompress some before seeing him, as well."
Sometimes my ex-wife was smarter than I ever gave her credit for. "Tomorrow after school sounds perfect," I told her. "Give him a hug and kiss for me, and let him know I'll pick him up at noon tomorrow. We'll go out and get a special lunch after school."
"Will do. Good night, Aaron," she said.
"Good night, Haley. Thank you," I said quietly before closing my phone and setting it on the table. "Thank you," I whispered again, feeling more of the weight from the burden of this last case being lifted from my shoulders.
