Chapter 10 - Plans, Plans, and More Plans

Garcia carefully went over what Rossi had outlined to her.

It was a simple enough plan…but the timing on it had to be perfect, or else both of them would suspect something.

Garcia was simply going to tell Prentiss that she needed to bring up the idea for a girls' night out, which would mean that she would have to bring Emily in on the plan and swear her to secrecy. Once Emily suggested the night out, both she and Garcia would do everything in their power to guarantee that she could make it.

Rossi had the flip side of things.

He was going to tell Morgan to suggest a guys' night out, which, of course, meant bringing him in on the plan as well.

The only person not in the loop would be Reid…but it was probably for the best.

Garcia grinned as she remembered what Rossi had said to her when she'd asked him why Derek had to be the one to suggest the guys' night out…

"Wait…why does Derek have to be the one to ask? You're Hotch's best friend; you should be the one doing the asking!"

"Because, Penelope…. If I were the one to suggest it, he'd know that I have something planned. Aaron knows me too well and knows that I won't let anything go, which means it has to come from someone else, and it certainly can't be Reid."

He said this part pointedly and she nodded, suddenly understanding.

"Ohh…I get it."

She began the first part of the plan…the very first part of it. She quickly hacked into JJ's online day planner and checked to see what she was doing on that Friday night…nothing! Perfect, that meant they could corral her into going.

She then hacked Hotch's planner… Do these two just not have lives?, she thought to herself as she saw his mostly empty schedule and mentally compared it with JJ's similar one.

Well, at least they knew that they could easily get the two of them in one place.

With that confirmed, she quickly wrote Rossi a text message.

Clear skies. Fri eight? She then paused, and thought of the perfect place and finished the text. Lao Tzu's? She hit send and waited.

Perfect. C u then.

Garcia smiled at seeing that Rossi was using shorthand. She had been teaching him so that he didn't constantly run out of room when he tried to write his texts. Now…here was the hard part. Bringing two agents in on the plan.

But the tricky part about it was the fact that neither of them knew that anyone else was involved.

Prentiss would only know Garcia was involved, and Morgan would only know that Rossi was involved.

That way, when they saw each other, there would be genuine surprise instead of the two of them both trying to suppress grins, as both Garcia and Rossi knew would happen if they let them know about the other.

Also, that prevented Hotch and JJ from finding out about their plan.

And having Reid kept in the dark about everything, guaranteed three genuine reactions, hopefully distracting from Garcia and Rossi.

Quickly, Garcia stood up and walked out of her office and down into the bullpen, glad to see Emily all alone…but slightly suspicious.

"Emily!"

Prentiss looked up and smiled at seeing her favorite tech analyst. "Hey, Garcia…what are you doing so far from your temple?"

The blonde, sometimes redhead, quirked a faint smile and motioned for the dark-haired profiler to follow her. Emily slowly rose from her desk, obviously confused, but it was obvious that she trusted her because she followed her back to her "temple", as Emily had called it, and only gave a faint look of interest as Garcia shut her door and then motioned for her to sit down.

"So," said Prentiss, drawing out the single syllable as she carefully sat down. "What's this about?"

Garcia sat down across from her in her own chair and gave a slight grin.

"How would you like to help me in setting JJ up with a great guy?"

Prentiss' eyebrows rose at that question, and she suddenly looked towards the door, as though reassuring herself that it was closed, and then said, "You mean Hotch?"

Garcia pouted at her surprise being ruined.

"How did you know? You know, that is totally not fair, you know, that everyone else already knows about them but I didn't until today!"

Prentiss' look turned from curious to accusing in an instant at hearing her friend's words.

"Everyone else? Who all knows?"

Garcia winced, suddenly realizing her fatal use of words. How could she get out of this one? Could she get out of this one? She thought about it for a moment, and then finally found some wiggle room in her unfortunate wording.

"Well, you know, Rossi suspects something, and maybe accidentally mentioned so to me, so if Rossi does of course everyone else knows!"

Prentiss gave her a reassuring smile.

"Rossi never said a word to me…JJ told me herself, Penelope. I was just surprised that you knew about their dates, already."

At that, Garcia's eyebrows shot up to her hairline in an instant, her eyes widening at what she'd just heard one of her best friends say.

"What dates?"

At this, she watched as Emily winced this time, and then bit the inside of her lip. She was beating herself up at the moment, as she had promised JJ that she wouldn't say a word, but Garcia had said that she'd just found out today…and then Emily had assumed that that meant everything.

"Uhh, nothing, Garcia…forget I said anything."

"Oh no, no, no, no…this is the juiciest gossip that I've heard in months…JJ and Hotch are dating? Like, seriously?"

Prentiss shook her head, suddenly finding herself preaching exactly what JJ had preached to her.

"Not really dates, just two friends getting to know each other a bit more." And then she paused, remembering her question to JJ about a certain man in her life, and then a look crossed over Garcia's face and Emily realized that the same question that had occurred to her had just occurred to their beloved tech analyst as well.

"Emily…" Garcia said, her tone slightly breathless. "What about Will?"

Part 10/?