Chapter 26

Spencer Reid's apartment
Washington DC
"Proof"

"Willow Wood Ranch."

"May I speak to Kate please?"

"Hold on a moment."

A moment later, "Hey, Roo."

"Hey, Kanga," Spencer paced back and forth around his apartment, trying to drive off the energy, no the anger, that was very nearly about to pop. Not that he thought that popping was a bad idea, but he was hoping for at least a controlled explosion. And he was hoping that Kate could help with that. "I'm sorry I haven't had much time to call lately."

"That's all right, dear, I know work comes first and all. You still don't sound right."

"I'm not. They lied, Kanga. They up and lied to me. And I thought I knew why they did it and I was wrong and now I'm just…I'm so damned angry with them right now."

She was quiet a long moment. "Talk to me, Roo."

"I spent nearly every night from the time I left the Ranch until the day Emily arrived at the BAU on JJ's couch, mourning. I admit it; I was still…bawling my eyes out just like I was with you, every dammed night. And you know why I was there instead of crying my eyes out in private? Because I wanted to get high, I wanted to make the pain of losing someone else go away. And I figured that if I stayed there I wouldn't because there is no way in hell that I would ever do that in front of Henry. Ever."

"All right," she said, carefully.

"Then I found out they'd lied. JJ knew the entire time that Emily was alive. The entire time I was sitting there sobbing she knew. But if Emily was in Witness Protection then they couldn't tell me, right? I'm too much of an interrogation risk now. All Doyle would have to do was shoot me up, get me hooked again and within twelve hours I would give up anything just to make the withdrawal pains stop. So I figured they did what they had to do and I had no one to blame but myself."

"Roo…"

"Only that didn't figure into it at all. See, I found out that JJ was in contact with Emily the entire time. Today Emily had the nerve to tell me that she lost six friends to my one that day. Only then later she said she would meet JJ online for Scrabble again at some point, and I remembered that JJ had been playing online the entire time. Emily didn't lose anyone, she wasn't in real Witness Protection, and she didn't cut all ties. And then I found out that they forgot that I had ever had a problem! It never even crossed JJ's mind! She didn't even have the excuse of protecting Emily from my failure because she wasn't protecting Emily at all and she forgot that I failed! So why did they leave me miserable? Why did they put me and Morgan and Garcia and Rossi through all that hell?"

"I don't know, Roo." Kate said calmly after a long pause. "I really don't."

"So what do I do now, Kanga? What do I do?"

"Do you want to leave the team?"

Spencer stopped. Yelling into the phone, spelling out the situation and his feelings, had the cathartic effect he had been hoping for. A rather controlled popping of his cork that helped clear the emotions so he could think. "I don't…I don't…"

"Let me ask you something. Where was Will in all this?"

Well that question came out of left field. "What?"

"While you were on JJ's couch, crying on her shoulder every night, where was Will?"

"Um, he was there…."

And how was he acting, Dr. Reid? Think back."

Spencer mentally reviewed Will's behavior, his body language and word choices over the summer, how they had changed. "All right at first, but he grew progressively more annoyed over time."

"Mmm-hmm, based on his behavior and hers, could he have been masking his feelings with courtesy while perhaps expressing them honestly to JJ in private?"

Spencer reviewed again, remembering all the looks, the murmured comments in corners, the rising tension. "I obviously can't answer that with any certainty, but that is definitely possible. Although I don't know why, it's not like we were…."

"Having an affair? It depends on how you define 'affair', for one. Now I'm not saying you were, I know you better than that, and I doubt she was either. But what would matter in the case was Will's take, and most men do not take kindly to another man soaking up all of their woman's time and emotional energy."

"But then why didn't JJ say anything?"

"Well that is the question, isn't it? Obviously it wasn't because she was concerned that you might relapse, or be at greater risk for interrogation because she completely forgot about your problem. And I doubt she was using you to get to Will, from what you've told me about her over the years she's not the manipulative type. So what is the other option, Dr. Reid?"

He was quiet a long moment. "She didn't say anything because…at that time my feelings mattered more than Will's."

"Mmm-hmm, now I'm not saying that was the best way to handle the matter, and I'm not saying that mistakes weren't made. But from here it looks like she risked her relationship with the father of her child to see you through a difficult, needful situation. So, given that variable, what do you plan to do now, Roo?"

Funny, he didn't have to think long at all. "I'm going to go change and go over to Rossi's. He's teaching us to make Pasta Carbonara tonight. If I leave in ten minutes I'll only be five minutes late."

Kate laughed. "Send me the recipe Roo."

"I will Kanga. Oh, and thank you."

"Anytime Roo, anytime."