"I trust him," JJ folded her arms, stifling the tears from falling from her cerulean orbs. "He must have some explanation. The man I sleep next to every night is not a serial killer."
"Do you know where he is right now?" Garcia bit down. She hated seeing JJ like this. She was trying hard not to cry herself.
"He's at home with Henry."
"Are you sure?" Emily asked, leaning on Garcia's elongated desk. Emily spoke softly.
"God damn it, Emily, yes I'm sure!" JJ exclaimed, shaking her head in denial. "And you don't have to fucking whisper in here! Garcia's doors are bolted. You want to say something? Say it. Nothing can ever be worse than this."
Emily was dumbfounded. She wasn't surprised though. As if almost losing Henry and Will last week wasn't enough.
"Jayje," Garcia muttered, taking JJ's hands. "It could just be a coincidence. We don't even know for certain. The profile Hotch gave me just listed that our Unsub could have had problems with his maternal figure; I couldn't filter that all out. Will wouldn't-"
"Will's never been close to his mother." JJ remarked, barely giving anyone eye contact. The more she dug, the more perfidious Will appeared. It kept getting worse- spiralling into something actually tangible, which was what Emily and Garcia were so worried about.
"But Will's out of the age range for our profile."
"He's only two years older than I am." JJ muttered. She was on the verge of throwing up. "He fits the stupid profile."
"I mean- so do nineteen other people. We only have one Unsub. It doesn't mean-" Emily spoke.
"I wish you guys hadn't told me."
"Jayje, we couldn't hide it from you, and we didn't want you to come in to work and see Will's name up there on the screen. We haven't told Hotch." Garcia said, squeezing JJ's hands. It was almost the same way that Will used to squeeze JJ's.
"Yet. You haven't told Hotch yet." JJ sniffled as tears spun in her sockets. "If you guys aren't taking his name off the list, then you might as well just tell him."
"What are you going to do with Will?" Garcia stopped JJ from standing up.
"I'm going to uh- call him." JJ mumbled.
"Are you sure you want to do that right now?" Emily asked with concern. She was in no state to reason, and Emily knew it damn well.
"Well, I can't just go home and pretend that nothing has happened, Emily!" JJ bellowed, throwing both hands in the air. Then there was silence. The tension in the air was impeccable. Garcia shed a tear, and Emily looked away. JJ had enough of being interrogated like an Unsub, and she wasn't planning on letting Will go through it unless she knew for certain.
"Will," JJ choked as she heard his voice on the other side of the line. "Where are you?"
"At work. I swapped shifts with uh- Johnson, remember?" Will replied. It almost sounded truthful.
"And Henry?" JJ looked away, staring at one of Garcia's cat figures. The soft pink pallor of the room never made her feel colder.
"With Monica." Will's voice echoed in her mind. JJ didn't know what to believe anymore. "I told you I'd handle it."
"Yeah, you did." JJ sniffled as tears began rolling down her cheeks.
"Anything wrong?" Will asked. He seemed viscerally concerned, but it wasn't convincing enough to have shaken JJ.
"No." JJ replied firmly. "Nothing is wrong at all."
"Well then- I have to get back to work, babe."
"Go." JJ nodded, wiping her tears away. She hung up without another thought. "Give Hotch the list." JJ said affirmatively, an acrid taste resonating from inside her mouth. Now she really wanted to throw up. Emily and Garcia glanced at one another. It was all in their eyes. They had the same thoughts.
"JJ, are you sure?" Emily said with a small gasp as she unfolded her arms to steady herself against the sturdy table. "We can't take it back."
"Yeah, Emily, I'm sure Hotch wouldn't consider Will as a suspect anyway." Garcia nodded, gripping the ends of her pivoting armchair.
"It doesn't matter." JJ's hands clung onto her knees as she took a deep breath. "Will's been lying over and over again, and I've just been too stupid and blind to see any of it."
"JJ-" Emily said in response. JJ's eyes had begun to swell from the tears; her eyes had turned a ruddy shade. Emily had never truly seen her cry before.
"Stop it, Em." JJ shrugged. "I'm going to go check in on my babysitter and make sure Henry's all right. You guys can give Hotch the list. It's done."
Garcia and Emily shared another look. Both acquiesced JJ's request; standing up to exit the room. Emily patted JJ's back softly. She didn't really know how else to show her support.
The door swerved shut. JJ spun her phone around on the smooth table top in the quiet. She unlocked her phone, trying her best to ignore the photo that Kevin took of her, Henry and Will at the wedding just days ago. It was falling apart so quickly- it was as if she was freefalling from cloud nine right into hell. She broke down, sobbing as her eyes trailed the familiar contours of Will's face. She married a liar, and now, she was turning into one too.
"I could go in and tell Hotch, Emily." Garcia whispered, breaking the silence as the duo approached the familiar office overlooking the hustle of the bullpen. Emily nodded, gesturing to Garcia as she made a halt outside the office. Emily watched intently as Garcia entered the room with her usual manila file. It looked like any other file from any other case, but it was embedded with JJ's future, as well as the team's. The door slammed shut, and Emily stood by her solitude on the elongated catwalk. Slowly, she rested the weight of her tired, sore back on the concrete blue wall, and exhaled sharply. The job was just repeatedly taking tolls on her. It only made her feel like her decision to leave the unit was a wise one. Of course, she wished she was convinced otherwise, but in reality, she really wasn't. She felt selfish and asinine to even wish that this case would've happen after she was gone, because she couldn't just leave JJ and the team like this, even if the case were to be closed.
She watched from her peripheral vision as Hotch drew his shades again: a second time this week, and the second time in the year. Sorting it out was going to take some time. A fair bit of time.
"What's going on?" His croaky, medium-pitched voice rang from her left side. Emily was slightly startled as she was snapped out of her congesting thoughts.
"Hmm?" She replied dazedly. He came out from nowhere. She was on her way to the bathroom to freshen up.
"Come on, Emily. Whatever's going on is serious, and I can tell, no matter how much you try to keep me out of it. I'm not five, and you can't just keep doing this over and over again. I demand to know!" Reid yelled, pulling Emily aside. His sudden initiated contact sent shivers up her spine. Reid had never liked contact, and he was never the one to instigate it for that matter.
Emily yanked her hand out of his grip instinctively. "Woah!" She replied, finally reminding herself to keep her volume down. The last thing she would want to do for JJ was to spread the word to the entire office. It was a federal office, but oh, the agents really could gossip about anything.
"I'm so sorry," Reid sighed, acknowledging his lack of restraint. "Emily, I really need to know." Emily looked around at the meandering endless stream of agents buzzing around the long corridor. Without another word, she opened the door to one of the numerous file rooms scattered around the building, and pulled him inside it with her. She made sure that the shades were down too. She flipped the light switch on. A miniscule light bulb in the center of the room illuminated the narrow closet with a yellow tint. The room smelled stale; somewhat of sweat and ageing paper. Emily could only imagine the unethical things that had occurred in the room prior.
"Emily?" Reid mumbled, as Emily leaned on the grey metal table right beneath the light bulb. Reid had never been there before. She took a few moments to gather her thoughts.
"I feel like you should have the right to know what's going on." Emily said, hands akimbo to her slender waist. Reid leaned against the cupboard, looking right at Emily. "Look, Garcia spent all afternoon narrowing a list of potential Unsubs down for us."
"And?" Reid gulped, his throat getting dry. He wasn't quite sure if it was the room, or his nerves, or just being alone with Emily that made his hair stand on end.
"And- Garcia got hits on twenty people in town."
"Great, a uh- short list." Reid nodded. He knew there had to be more to it. "What's the catch?"
"Will is on that list." Emily said, deadpan. She didn't know how else she could say it. The crammed room suddenly felt hollow.
"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" Reid murmured; his tone had changed. It almost sounded sympathetic.
"Well, Garcia and I spent an hour in her room just trying to reason with JJ. None of us can believe it. We just found out."
"Did you take Will's name off the list then?"
"No." Emily shook her head, looking away. It felt like she was being wallowed alive- consumed by her guilt. Then again, she couldn't have done anything else about it. "We couldn't."
"I mean- JJ and Will just got married after so long."
"Which doesn't make any of this easier." Emily added, almost defensively. There was a long pause. Emily could feel her heart pounding aloud.
"There's something else you're not telling me." Reid's brows twitched slightly as Emily struggled to find the right words. She opened her mouth, but no sound emerged from her throat, as if she was rendered useless instantaneously.
"This really isn't the time." She pinched her lips together.
"Really? It's just the both of us here in this what- despondent room. When is the time then? What can you not tell me in here, Emily?"
"I-" Emily paused, taking a deep breath. She had stopped even thinking about the repulsive, pungent smell of the room.
"You two," Morgan interrupted, opening the door with an intrepid amount of force. It almost looked as if he could have torn the door apart from its hinge. "Woah, uh, Hotch needs us urgently… If I'm not interrupting anything."
"No, we were just talking." Reid replied, with a lugubrious smile as he made his way out of the room. "Nothing really important." Reid sniffled is disbelief.
"Good, because I have a feeling what Hotch is going to talk about is." Morgan remarked perfervidly.
He approached the familiar door with hesitance. The hall was barely illuminated for one to navigate themselves around the desolate building. He knew she was in there; traces of the light emerging from the room bursting through the cracks in the door. His free hand quickly found the doorknob. He twisted it and pushed through; the actions of which only reminded him of how Izzy had manipulated him. The thought of it all never ceased to taunt him.
"Will?" She said, aghast. "You're here."
"Yeah, Susan." Will replied, barely showing teeth as he mumbled.
"How are you- feeling? All right?" She asked, rising slowly from her seat.
"Angry." He replied, drawing a sharp, reflective object from his turgid duffel bag- the one he brought back from the precinct earlier that day.
"Will-" Susan's hands shot up mid-waist; her open, empty palms for him to see.
"I feel really angry, Susan." His jaw twitched, as he propped the bag on the floor behind him.
Author's note: Hey everyone, thank you for all the cool reviews for the previous chapter! I'm trying to commit myself to posting an update or two a week, so stay tuned! Thank you for reading, and I hope you don't hate me for leaving the chapter like that!