A/N - Thank you for your patience! This chapter took me longer than planned. Please review :)
It started after the pig farm, after Hotch was stabbed and Reid was shot and Emily couldn't shake the feeling that everything was spiraling out of control. She'd replayed the day in her mind a thousand time, analyzing every moment, every decision she could have made differently. She barely ate, couldn't sleep.
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Reid was released from the hospital after three days with a surgically reconstructed knee and a prescription for Oxycodone that he had no intention of filling. The doctor had strongly recommended that he take at least two weeks off of work while the post-surgery swelling went down and he began physical therapy. Reid had nodded along, but then told the team that he'd be back, albeit on crutches, the following Monday.
Morgan drove him home, helped him navigate the stairs up to his apartment, and offered to stay, but Reid declined the offer. Emily knew this because Morgan had called her from his car on his way home and asked her to check in on Reid over the next day or two. Yeah, yeah, he knew that Reid was an adult, but the kid's fridge was empty, save two cartons of leftover Thai and a half gallon of expired milk, and he wasn't going to get far on crutches. How was he supposed to recover if he couldn't even feed himself?
Though she'd kept her tone even, Emily was worried. She wasn't surprised that Reid had declined Morgan's company. After three days in the hospital, being poked and prodded by nurses and doctors, he was probably desperate for time alone in his own home surrounded by his books. That knowledge that he was likely relishing the peace and quiet was the only thing that kept her from heading over to his place immediately. Instead, Emily forced herself to go to the gym, shower, redress, and head to the grocery store before calling Reid to ask if he was up for company.
She phrased it like a question, but they both knew that she'd already made up her mind; the phone call was more of a courtesy heads up that she was already on her way.
She let herself into his apartment with the spare key she'd acquired at some point in their friendship when it made more sense for her to have it than to wait outside for him to buzz her in. Reid never seemed to sleep more than a few hours a night, so when Emily suffered bouts of insomnia, she'd begun showing up at his apartment ; on those nights, they ate too much popcorn (extra butter) and took turns picking movies.
"I come bearing groceries," she announced, setting two heavy bags down on his kitchen counter, and kicking off her shoes. "How's the knee, handsome?"
Reid was lying on the couch, leg propped up on a small stack of pillows with an ice pack balanced precariously on his knee. He was dressed in a CalTech t-shirt and loose fitting gray sweatpants, the change of clothes she'd brought him in the hospital when she realized that none of his slim cut corduroys would accommodate a heavily bandaged knee. She'd been surprised to learn that he even owned sweatpants; it just didn't seem very Reid-like.
"Contrary to popular belief, I am capable of feeding myself," Reid replied as Emily unloaded the bags and dumped the spoiled milk down the sink. "But thank you."
"Yeah, yeah, I know. Now stop dodging my question about your knee."
"The surgery was successful," he replied.
"Reid, I know that the surgery was successful. And you know that's not what I meant," she chided him, folding the paper grocery bags and tucking them under the sink.
"I'm fine." He tried to smile up at her when she walked over to join him in the living room, but it came out as a grimace.
"Reid..." she warned.
"Doctor Schuler wrote me a prescription for Oxycodone," he offered.
Emily started at him skeptically and, after a moment, he broke.
"I've been taking Ibuprofen."He admitted, gesturing to a pill bottle on the coffee table. "Which isn't helping as much as I hoped it would. Mostly I'm just trying to keep my mind off of it."
"Yeah, and how's that working for you?"
"Not as well as I'd hoped."
Standing over him in that moment, desperately wishing that she could help shoulder the burden of his recovery, a terrible, awful, no-good-can -possibly-come-of-this idea occurred to Emily. At its core, she reasoned, her solution was a win-win. She could, however temporarily, help take Reid's mind off of the pain and simultaneously fulfill her own deep seated need to help put her friend back together again.
"Reid," she began, words forming on her lips before she could second guess herself. "Are you seeing anyone?"
His eyebrows knit together in confusion and propped himself up on his elbows.
"You know I'm not."
Emily sat gently next to him on the couch and let her eyes wander over his face, take in the stubble on his jaw and the unruly hair nearly brushing his shoulders. She'd always known, logically, that Reid was physically attractive, but she'd never let herself dwell on it. Letting yourself daydream about screwing co-workers, Rossi had once informed her, was the first step down a path that led directly to HR. And while the man didn't seem to let that knowledge guide his own decision making, Emily knew that it was true. Now though, sitting in Reid's apartment with the very-bad-no-good idea taking root, she felt heat pooling in her belly and decided that HR could go to hell.
"Let me help... with the pain. I can help." She rested her hand on his stomach. His t-shirt was thin and she felt the muscles his quiver. This was new territory for them.
"Emily..." His voice was cautious, but he didn't shrink away from her touch. She shifted her hand slightly lower, letting it rest just inches above his waistband.
"Tell me to stop and we can pretend this never happened."
She watched him weigh the options in his mind and analyze the ways this definitely-not-a-good-idea might play out. She saw him realize that the risks probably outweighed the rewards. But for once logic -didn't win and Emily found herself face-to-face not with the BAU's resident genius, but with a man whose needs matched her own.
"I need to know that this won't change anything between us," he said determinedly, even as his pupils dilated and his breath hitched.
"We're friends first, no matter what. If this complicates anything, then we stop," Emily agreed.
That must have been enough because he slid one hand behind her head, tangled long fingers into her hair, and captured her lips with his own.
Their first time was careful and gentle and sometimes awkward, but somehow still better than it had any right to be.
There was a point when Emily venture naked down the hall and into Reid's bedroom to retrieve a condom from the bedside table. She left him groaning in frustration, shirtless and with an erection straining against his sweatpants, on the couch because, as she quipped, it was easier than hauling his gimp ass to the bedroom. It was fine, he called after her huskily, because he was more than happy to watch her walk away.
Reid, despite his condition, was a vocal and engaged partner. Though his mobility was limited and they both took care not to jostle his injured knee, he took great care to please the woman on top of him. By the time they needed the condom, she was ridiculously wet and thoroughly convinced that this was the best idea she'd ever had.
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Later, when they were spent, Emily laid alongside him on the couch, head resting on his shoulder.
"You know, this place is a death trap for someone on crutches. You probably need someone to stop by once in a while to make sure you haven't broken a hip."
"Someone like a nurse?"
"Someone like a friend."
"I think that's probably a good idea."
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"It wasn't hard to hide at first, especially since he wasn't cleared to travel with the team," Emily explained. "But that was a tough year and we eventually started... relying on each other... more than we should have."
As Emily pulled on her jacket, Morgan dropped a few dollars on the table for the waitress , and they headed back up the street.
"I noticed that you two had gotten closer, but I never put two and two together," Morgan admitted as they walked. "It must have been hard to walk away from that."
"It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, but Doyle was watching me, watching the entire team. I told myself that it was worth it if it meant keeping him, keeping all of you, safe from my mistakes."
"Let me talk to him, Emily. I can't fix this, but I know a thing or two about forgiving you. Maybe I can get him to listen."