Hello! I apologize for the delayed update, oh my gosh it's been a while. School has seriously been INSANE these past few weeks. I had four tests this month in one of my classes. Four. And two paper due in another! Yikes! Anyway, I finally had a minute to write and publish this. I hope it's okay. Only a few more weeks and classes will be over and I'll *hopefully* be able to write more and publish in a timely manner. I hope you like this chapter! It's crazy, not going to lie. Be prepared!

Survival was my only hope, success my only revenge

-Patricia Cornwell

...

"Oh Agent Rossi? I have something I think you'll want to hear." William mused from the interrogation cell, the same sly smile plastered on his face.

Hotch and Rossi were standing outside the room, the clear glass gave them an advantage over the man in the chains. "Go." Hotch said. "I'm going to give the officers on the force an update. It's time we bring everyone in."

Dave smiled and pulled the handle of the door leading him to William. "What can you say that would possibly interest me?"

William chuckled, leaning back as far as he could with the cuffs that connected him to the table. "Trust me. You wanna know."

Rossi took a seat across from the man, never breaking the intense gaze that connected them. "Spill."

"There's a cabin. Deep in the woods." He said, pausing as he studied the profilers face. "It's James' cabin. That's where he'd be."

The agent quickly exited the room, briefly telling the officer to get William back to his cell before searching for the unit chief. He stripped through the small department before he found Hotch talking to the officers.

"Aaron."

Hotch quickly looked at him, not ignoring the serious features of the older man's face. Whatever he had to say, it couldn't wait. He excused himself from the officers and approached his colleague.

"He has a cabin."

Emily still hadn't let the team visit her as a whole, and while they understood, they just wanted to be together again. As a family. But they knew she'd tell them when she was ready. Derek had decided that the reason was because she hadn't been around more than three other people at a time for almost a year. That messes with someone, he knew it would. He was just grateful she hadn't refused to see him. He had helped her get through the withdrawal and now he would help her heal. He'd be there when she needed him. He would be damned if he let her do this alone. She was finally getting better medically and physically, the doctors had even discussed discharging her a few days earlier. Now, it was the mental healing that could begin. Mental healing would be the hardest.

He was in the middle of telling her one of his childhood stories, the first genuine smile had crept onto her face, when he got the call from the unit chief.

"A cabin? Do we have an address yet?"

"Garcia found it, she sent it to our phones." Hotch said and Derek checked his messages, seeing the address at the top.

"I'll meet you there." Derek said.

"No, stay with Emily. We've got this."

Morgan stepped a little farther away from Emily. "Hotch, I've gotta come. I'll call Garcia to stay with Emily. Please."

Hotch felt conflicted. On one hand he needed the extra agent. Not to mention he understood where the young agent came from. They all wanted to be apart of James Brooks' downfall. But Morgan had a history of anger. Hotch knew that if Morgan got his hands on James, the police chief wouldn't live to see another day.

"Okay." He finally said and the two hung up. Morgan texted Garcia and she said she'd be there soon.

Derek sat back down, his leg bouncing up and down in anticipation. The action didn't go unnoticed by Emily. "Derek, go. I'll be fine until Garcia gets here."

He shook his head. "No, I'll wait."

She raised her eyebrows at him. Did he really think she couldn't handle sitting in a bed alone for a few minutes? "Derek, I'm a big girl. Please, go get 'em."

Derek studied her face, trying to get a sense of what she was really thinking. If he was honest, he feared the worst. That'd she'd find some way to hurt herself. In their line of work, they saw that response to trauma quite often, which only made him even more paranoid.

"Garcia's on her way." He said, to her or to comfort himself, she wasn't exactly sure.

"Derek, go." She said firmly.

He nodded. "I'll be back soon. We'll get 'em."

She nodded and watched him reluctantly leave her in the room. She knew exactly what he feared, and his fears weren't unreasonable, to an extent. She wasn't going to do anything to hurt herself, she wanted to get better. It would take time, and lots of it, but she was going to get there. She turned onto her side and relaxed into the bed, closing her eyes to get a little rest before the chirpy analyst arrived.

Just as she was settling in, she heard the door open and could sense a figure moving closer. "You couldn't leave me alone for three seconds?" She joked as she turned over to face the dark agent.

She opened her eyes and her heart fell into her stomach. She couldn't move.

Scream! Get up and get the hell away! DO SOMETHING!

Her mind screamed at her, desperately, yet she couldn't take her eyes off the man standing in front of her. Why aren't you listening? Fucking MOVE!

She was paralyzed.

James smiled. "Hello Emily." She could see the glistening blade in his right hand. "It's good to see I still control you." A sadistic smile washed over his face as he walked towards her. "Those eight months were fun."

They had the cabin surrounded, Chief Brooks' entire force was with them, trying to take down their own superior. Hotch had a team in the back and Derek and Rossi were at the front of the small, log home. Rossi knew he was paired with the younger agent to make sure he didn't cross the line when it came to taking Brooks down, but Rossi couldn't lie. He didn't know if he'd pull Morgan off the bastard overly quickly. He'd gladly watch Derek beat the living daylights of the man, he might even make some popcorn and take a seat on the couch.

Hotch's voice crackled through the radio. "Everyone in position?"

Each group 'leader' responded and Hotch gave them the go ahead.

Derek kicked down the door, just as he had almost a month earlier to save Emily. "James Brooks! FBI!"

The cabin was completely dark and silent until Derek heard Hotch's team breaking in through the back, along with the echoing voices. Hotch and his team made their way towards Derek and Rossi, clearing each closet and room. The house was empty.

"Where else would he go?" Morgan asked, the adrenaline was still pumping through his veins. "He has nowhere else to go! His face is all over the news."

Rossi pulled out his cell phone, dialing their technical analyst's number. "Penelope? Brooks' house is empty. We need you to see if Brody or William have a property we don't know about."

Garcia closed her car door, locked in and began walking into the hospital. "Sir, I've already dug through all three of their lives. Brooks' cabin never even came up because it's under his step-brother's name."

All three agent's sighed. Where were they supposed to go now? Their only lead turned up empty.

"Garcia, we'll call you back." Hotch said. "We need to tear this place apart. Maybe there's something here that'l tell us where he'd go."

Morgan could feel the adrenaline winding down, his thoughts becoming clearer and his minds running through each possibility. "Why would Parks give us the cabin?"

The two older profilers stared at him. "A trap." Hotch said blankly as he looked around.

"Emily…" Derek breathed.

Rossi's head shot over to look at the man. "What about her?"

"I…I left her alone." He said. "Garcia's on her way, but…"

"Garcia?" Hotch said into the phone. "Where are you?"

"I'm walking into her room now." Garcia said. "What's going on?"

"Penelope, listen to me." Garcia's blood ran cold at the use of her first name. Hotch never called her Penelope. "Get inside that room and lock the door."

Confused, but determined to keep her friend safe, Garcia locked the door behind her, leaning her back against it. "Okay, okay. What now?"

"Baby girl, do not leave that room until we get there, okay? We're on our way." Derek added in as the men simultaneously began running to the SUV. They were about an hour away from the hospital.

Garcia looked at her friend on the bed and realized she looked much worse than she had in the previous days. She then registered the slight whimpering coming from the bed. "Hey, Em? What's going on?"

Derek gripped the steering wheel tighter at the sentence. "Penelope, what's going on?"

Completely ignoring the men's voices on the phone line, Penelope walked to the side of the bed and looked into her friend's eyes, which were a mix of fear and pain. She had a sheen of sweat above her eyebrows and her arms were twitching slightly. Her lips were a sickly blue shade. "Emily?"

The brunette took an uneven breath, struggling to pull the air into her constricting lungs. "J-Jam-James…"

Penelope's heart stopped. "James? Was he here?" She asked. She went to grab Emily's hand when she noticed the monitors were unclipped from their assigned spots on Emily's chest, and the pulse-ox was removed from her finger.

"My…my stom.." Emily struggled to relay the information to the only person who could help her. "Stomach…" She tried again.

Garcia looked down at the woman's stomach and peeled the white blanket away from her body. "Oh, Emily!" She cried.

"Garcia, what's going on?" Garcia could hear a level of panic and despair in the Unit Chief's voice, something she seldom heard.

"Hotch, she's bleeding!" Her frantic eyes scanned back up to Emily, who had tears rolling down her cheeks. "I think he stabbed her."

"Get a doctor, but Garcia? Do not leave her alone with anyone, you hear me? Nobody."

Garcia was already half way to the door by the time Hotch finished. "I need a doctor in here!" She cried before rushing back to Emily's side. "You're going to be okay…the doctor is coming."

Tears were now streaming down the brunettes face as she struggled to remain conscious and to simply breathe.

Doctor Nelson quickly rushed in along with two nurses. "What seems to be the problem?" He grabbed his stethoscope and put it up to Emily's chest.

"She's—she's bleeding." Garcia pointed to the crimson liquid now seeping through Emily's gown and the sheets. "I think…I think James…"

Doctor Nelson nodded, shining his flashlight into Emily's eyes. "Emily? Can you hear me? Tell me what happened." He placed an oxygen mask over Emily's nose and mouth.

"J…James…"

"Alright, everything's going to be fine." He told her. "Sarah, prep an OR, we need to get in there asap!"

The nurse ran out of the room as Dr Nelson began unhooking Emily's IV from the wall and onto a portable pole. "Penelope, I'm going to need you to wait outside, okay?"

Garcia shook her head violently. "No, no I need to stay with her, I—I can't leave her, Hotch said to—"

"Penelope!" Nelson yelled a bit louder. "We need to save her life. You cannot come into the OR with us." Suddenly the room was filled with what felt like hundreds of hospital personnel rushed into the room, each yelling out commands as they prepped Emily to move.

Dr Nelson stepped away from Emily's side as the team was ready to move the bed. "We've got her, alright? I promise you, she's safe with us." He saw the uncertainty in the woman's eyes. "I won't let anything happen to her."

Penelope hesitantly nodded and they were off. They rushed Emily out of the room and Garcia made her way to the side. She grabbed Emily's hand and ran a hand over her forehead. "You're going to be okay." Emily's eyes were wide and filled with fear, tearing Penelope's insides apart.

"Ma'am, you can't come any farther, I'm sorry." A nurse said, gently grabbed her arm.

She did the only thing she could do in that moment. She let the tears fall from her face as the team of doctors rushed the gurney through the swinging doors and she stood there until they were no longer visible.

"Miss Garcia, there's a waiting room you can wait if you'd like."

Unable to find her voice, Penelope nodded and the nurse guided her into an empty room. Garcia took a seat towards the back of the room so she was facing the door. The nurse gave her a small, but encouraging smile. "I'll update you as soon as I can." She said as she left.

Left alone to herself, her mind began racing. How in the world did James get into Emily's room and past the security guard? Why didn't Emily's monitors start beeping?

"Babygirl, what the hell happened? You hung up on us—"

Garcia looked up at the three men now standing just feet away from her. "I don't know how he got in, it doesn't make sense—"

"Penelope," Rossi said as he sat down in front of the frazzled analyst, "take a deep breath."

She inhaled and exhaled with Rossi a few times and felt herself calming down. "Now, tell us what happened." Rossi said soothingly.

She took another deep breath. "I went into her room, that's when I was still talking to you guys," she nodded unconsciously, "then I heard her crying."

Derek closed his eyes briefly, his fists clenching. The younger agent was always considered the 'hot head' of the group, especially when it involved his team—family—getting hurt.

"She kept saying 'James' and 'stomach' and then I saw the blood." Her gaze was fixated in front of her, a glaze over her eyes. "There was so much blood—"

Rossi noticed the woman was getting off track, her mind was definitely throwing her back to that moment. "What happened after you saw the blood?"

"Uh… I—I called for a doctor and Dr. Nelson came. He started moving all her stuff and then like millions of more doctors and nurses came in. They were all yelling and running around, I—I could hear what they were saying."

"Then they took her into surgery?" Derek asked.

Penelope nodded.

"Okay, then Emily's room is a crime scene. I just had the head of security put the hospital on lockdown. If he's still here he won't get out." Hotch folded his arms. "I'm assuming you have your laptop?"

She nodded again.

"I need you to pull the security camera footage from Emily's hall. We need to figure out how he got to her. You two," he motioned to Derek and Rossi, "talk to that damn security guard. Figure out what the hell happened."

I hope you enjoyed! Again, I apologize for the delayed update. Only 3 weeks left until I'm free!