Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds
'Get me out of here.' Penelope pleaded as the week length stay rounded off and was still bed ridden because of her leg. 'He had to go and break my leg didn't he?' She muttered her tone beyond frustrated, from the state of her leg they knew that Penelope would be cast bound more than the usual type of break.
Having Lynch step on her leg had not only snapped the bone but caused multiple other snapped, fractured and splintered pieces of bone. He was really out to immobilise her. 'Thank God he only trod on one leg.' Penelope sighed as she sank back down into the pillows behind her, she knew Kevin was near her, in the one building, on the same floor but she was never alone long enough to worry about him, he was in her past and that she was protected from by her family.
'You don't seem to be getting into a better mood lately Pen.' Derek said as he sat on the bed next to her, he was worrying about her, she was still her but her mood was lightening any and it didn't help him get out what he wanted to. Not only that but he didn't have a free moment with he; he didn't have the time to just talk to her.
'We're going to go get food.' Hotch said knowing that the team had stuck around because of the need they wanted to see Penelope. He'd tried several times to get them to leave; even Reid who used the 'need to rest' card every time, in the end Derek had told him to give up. Now they all agreed and left and Hotch shot Derek a quick glimpse and a nod.
'What's up?'
'Nothing.'
'Yeah, course I'm gonna buy that one right?'
'Well maybe you should.' She snapped at him and immediately felt bad. 'I'm sorry; I guess I'm not processing everything how I usually do and it's just bothering me.'
'Wanna offload?'
'I don't know.'
'Okay, I'll be here when you're ready.' He said and slipped off the bed and onto the chair but as his hand slipped off Penelope grabbed it. 'Baby girl?' He asked as he looked at her and saw her eyes turn glassy; he resumed his spot and took her hand in his. 'Come on...'
'How pathetic do I sound? I kept Kevin, all the time I knew what he was up to.' Derek rubbed a circle into her hand as he listened. 'I could've ratted him out but all the time I didn't because I didn't want to be alone.'
'Aw sweetness, that's not true, you've never been alone.'
'I've felt lonely since you took the position of acting unit chief.' She confessed. 'I hated you for taking away everything that made us Morgan and Garcia, I actually forgot that you were in a job that required nothing but professional behaviour and I hated you for cutting me out but Kevin was still playing his act so we just continued to live in the world of charades because I thought that after nearly 3 years he truly did love me.'
'He had to, to stick in it for so long baby.' He said and wiped away the stray tear as it made a line down her face. 'But maybe it's time you know something.' Penelope's head cocked at him at that point, what more was there to say? 'I was happy with the job because it distracted me from you, just like Tamara did; she was a distraction, something to make you jealous of.'
'Well that you did.'
'Oh I know and I'm not impressed with myself for handling it like that but I could've had you from the word go but that's how I handle every woman that come into my life, I suck them in with the charm and when I'm satisfied I throw them out, but you, you came along and I charmed you but I didn't suck you in and you're the first woman to get through my defences and truly touch my heart.
You're the only woman that breaks my walls, the walls might I say I work long and hard to build up, but you come along and crack them all and they shatter and I'm me, Derek Morgan, the man with a past but the man that's been in love with his best friend.'
Penelope pushed herself up then the best she could, taking her hand out of his, separating their bodies, confusion filling her. 'I might not have successfully sucked you in on our first moment but you sure as hell had me sucked in and I ran from that feeling, and I still was until you were shot, then I hit a realisation but Lynch came along and then this happened and I got a second realisation, the wind taken from me at the thought of losing you.'
'What are you trying to say Derek?' Penelope asked evidently stunned by what he was talking about.
'What I'm trying to say is that I'm in love you Pen, I'm in love with my baby girl.'
'Oh God.' Penelope said as more tears marred her freshly dried cheeks, she didn't know how to process anything right now. Things were just bouncing off one another and this, this made the biggest of elephants that had always been around when this topic ever enter her mind grow to a suffocating size. She'd kind of resigned herself to make her love of Derek a taboo subject, one that she'd avoid because of how he was with women.
'What?' Derek asked panicking. 'What's wrong?'
'You love me?'
'Stupidly enough to have gotten this.' He said and pulled it back out, empty handed, he knew she knew from her face.
'I can't even run from this.' Penelope muttered her wildest dream was just coming true.
'Run? If you don't feel the same then I understand and I'll never mention it again, even let you move on.'
'No! I can't run from this now, I need to stop doing that.' Penelope said, almost too fast. 'I love you too, in love with you even.' She blurted out and sunk down onto her chair.
'I've got something to show you and I really am just going to say crazy.'
'Well come on my Adonis, bring it on.' With a deep inhalation Derek reached for his pocket and pulled the ring out and put it towards her. 'Is...' She paused as she inspected the ring from afar. 'That's an engagement ring!' She proclaimed as her eyes set dead certain on it. 'Derek...'
'With my first realisation came the want for you to be mine, so I bought it. 3 years.' He said and put the ring to his eye level and twiddled with it. 'When you met Kevin, I threw it in a box and tried to forget about but I couldn't.'
'That was for me?'
'Always will be.' He commented.
'You really did mean it.' Penelope stated as her eyes blurred and the tears began to fall. 'Fuck my life.' She said frustrated and hit down on the bed only to start a vibration of pain from her chest, she bit down and pressed into the bed and Derek shot up.
'Pen... what's wrong?'
'My chest, shit, I shouldn't have done that.' She said as the pain settled and she looked at him. 'I'm so sorry.'
'For what?'
'You won't ever believe that I love you now.'
'Course I will, why would you think that?'
'One person, Kevin Lynch is why.'
'Tell me again Baby.' He told her calmly and rubbed her arm with his hand, the ring in visibility of her, as though it was a prompter.
'I'm...' She gulped. 'In love with you handsome, always have been and Christ bound to always be and nothing and no one's going to change that fact.' She watched him smile. 'Everything about you makes me want you more and more and I don't care what people think, I just need you to know that I love you.'
'We could've been married by now Goddess.'
'Shame.' She said almost remorsefully if not entirely regretful. 'I like that vision Hot Stuff.'
'Me too.' He told her and slipped the ring on her finger. 'So what do you say... be my wife? Let me love you how no man ever will. Forever.'
'Derek...' She started, it was sudden, they hadn't dated, they hadn't long professed undying love but as she looked into Derek's eyes and all she saw was truth and honesty and desire sitting with lust she realised that in all the years she'd know Derek, she'd dated him several times. The meals and cinema trips, the holding of hands, the cuddling on film nights, it was all there in the making, so she took a deep breath. 'Yes.'
