"Are you sure that it's her?" "Yes, I am sure. The information you gave me verified that." "How old is she?" "She's roughly four or five. Are you sure that you want to do this? She seems happy were she is and they're all comfortable." "I don't give a damn about their comfort. She belongs with me and that's where she will be." "Okay. let's get started then."
Weeks passed by and the Prentiss-Hotchner family were as busy as bees. Things between their respective families seemed to work themselves out. Sean, Aaron, Jackson, and Sloan were all spending their free time bonding. Elizabeth, Diem, Lindsey, Jordana, and Penelope were all simultaneously driving Emily crazy with the wedding and baby shower planning. They had dragged her into a million baby stores demanding that she be registered in each one. Her sisters were driving her crazy with the nursery planning and giving ideas for baby names. Her two mothers and future mother-in-law were constantly trying to pick out her wedding dress. They about had a heart attack when she said that she wasn't going to wear white. Making them angry was the only fun that Emily was having. She found solace in going over the case reports for the BAU. She couldn't lie—she missed it so bad. Emily also had to think about the reasoning behind her leaving. She had far too many close calls on the job and didn't want to run the risk of not coming home to her family. Today, she'd foolishly had the idea for a cookout, hoping that all the wedding, baby shower, and nursery talk would stop. No such luck. Between all the yammering from everybody, Emily started to get a headache. She was caught in the middle of an argument about wedding floral arrangements between Jordana and Garcia. She took tiny steps backwards until they didn't notice her and she made her retreat into the house.
Being inside the house didn't save her from anything at all. Her sisters were arguing over baby names in the living room. They seemed to be dead serious based off the fact that they had a dry erase board and markers. "Put Danger back up there" Ashlynn whined. "Are you kidding me? This is a baby not an adjective" Payson fired back. "What about Baby?" she offered. Scarlet scoffed, "This is not Dirty Dancing. That's a horrible name." "Gotham?" "Um no Batman. Gotham is out." "Melanomia?" "Why would you name a child after cancer?" Apple?" "It's a baby not a fruit." Emily laughed to herself at the bickering and tiptoed past them until she reached the front door. She breathed a breath of fresh air as she walked out onto her stoop. She looked down and saw JJ sitting there with her knees pulled to her chest. Although both women were nearly the same length of time along in their pregnancy, neither one was showing all that much. Emily still worked out and JJ refused to give into any of her cravings. She sat down next to her blonde friend and nudged her shoulder a little. "What's wrong?" "Just thinking." "About the baby?" "About life after the baby. The job, how will I be as a mother, the living situation. There's just so much." JJ said with a loud exhale. Emily rubbed her hand up and down JJ's back as the blonde sat hunched over. "The job will always be there regardless of what you chose to do after you have the baby. You will be a great mother JJ. Motherhood is all about instinct and making mistakes. Trust me, I make plenty of mistakes dealing with Lee. You will be just fine. As far as the living situation, you have to do what you're most comfortable with. That's the most important conversation to have right now." Emily wasn't prepared for JJ to recoil the way she did. "I'm not you Emily! You're the best agent, a perfect mother, and the future wife that every man wants. I can't be you. My life won't turn out the way yours has." JJ looked at Emily, seeing the hurt expression, and immediately softened her tone. "I'm sorry for lashing out at you. I'm just I don't know overwhelmed. Everything is just too much and I feel like I'm going to lose my mind."
Emily just sat there for a moment, silent, before finding her next words. "I am by no means perfect, not even close. You are a better agent than I am. There's no way that I could wrangle the press the way you do and manage to keep Strauss away from us and Hotch on a leash when he needs it. Again, I am not the perfect mother. I second guess everything that I do. I feel that I'm always doing something wrong. There are times that I feel like I show her more attention than this baby and vice versa. The future wife thing is not all it's cracked up to be. The reason that Sean and I work is because we're both flawed and have spent years helping each other fix those flaws. I love him enough to deal with and help him through a lot just as he would for me. We lost a child. Most people don't survive losing a pregnancy let alone a toddler. It takes work and a lot of it. As far as being overwhelmed, have you been inside? I've got three mothers fighting to pick the designer of my dress. I have Pen and Jordana arguing over flowers and centerpieces. I have my sisters fighting over one ridiculous baby name after the other, and I have the men attempting to pick out our honeymoon. I am the definition of overwhelmed, not to mention that I'm freaking out because pretty soon I will have another child and be starting all over." "I'm sorry Emily. You really do have a lot going on and I'm just making my problem bigger than what it actually is." "JJ I'm not trying to downplay your situation, I'm just being honest. We are both overwhelmed and have a lot of decisions to make before and after these babies are born." "Do you know what you're having?" "No. I kind of just wanted to stay in the dark about that one. You?"
JJ started biting her lip and avoiding Emily's gaze. Emily smiled to herself and blew out a long breath. "You're having a boy, aren't you?" "Yeah", JJ mumbled. "I'm having a boy." "You're going to teach him soccer, aren't you?" JJ laughed and shook her head. "Yeah I am." Just then the front door opened and Leona came outside and wrapped her arms around her mother's neck. Emily reached and grabbed her small hands before kissing it. "Yes, my love." "Daddy wants you and Miss Jen to come inside. He said pregnant woman shouldn't be out in the sun." Emily and JJ shared a laugh and helped each other to stand. "Your dad is really bossy Leona", JJ said in a teasing manner. "Mommy's the boss. Daddy is just the sidekick." Emily laughed loudly and she closed the front door behind them. "That's my girl."
Emily was just getting comfortable when the doorbell rang. "Sean, did you invite somebody else over?" she asked. Her question fell on deaf ears because he was too busy cracking jokes with the guys. Emily opened the door and came face-to-face with two women who looked like tax accountants. "May I help you?" "Are you Emily Hotchner?" the older one asked. Emily folded her arms across her chest, "Depends on who's asking." "I'm Ming Chen with the Department of Children Services and this is Holly Stall." "Can I see identification?" Emily tapped her foot as she waited for the women to show some ID. Sean came inside and kissed the top of Leona's head as she watched her aunts come up with ridiculous baby names. "Where's mommy?" "She went to answer the door." Sean nodded and walked in the direction of the open door. Emily was just handing both women their IDs back when she felt Sean's hands on her. "What's going on?" "This is Ming Chen from DCS and Holly Stall. They were just getting ready to tell me why they're here. You aren't our case worker so why are you here?" "We're here to talk to you about the little girl you took in." Emily felt Sean stiffen behind her, "That little girl is our daughter" he said. "No she's not." Holly spoke up. Emily had fire in her eyes. "Excuse me? What did you just say?" "She's not your daughter. She's my niece." Emily's jaw dropped as she felt her heart stop momentarily. "No no that can't be. We were told that there was no family. We were told that she was all alone and that her mother was dead. She's not your niece because she's my daughter." "I'm sorry. She's not your daughter. Legally, the two of you are her guardians but she is my blood. My sister, her mother, stopped talking to me when she let that piece of scum into her life. We didn't talk for 9 years. She let him control her every move, her every decision. She went to prison because she took the rap for him. I have spent the last 7 years searching for my sister. Only to find out that she's dead and that she had a little girl. I have spent the last four years thinking that she was dead. I have spent nearly every dime that I have trying to find her and now that I have, I want her to be with me." Emily felt like she was going to pass out and gripped the side of the doorframe. "You can't take her. She's ours. No. You can't do that" Emily said through tears. Leona heard her mother crying and got off the couch. Emily's sisters were just about to ask her something when they saw her walking towards the front door. The sudden movement of the group of women caused JJ, Jordana, Penelope, Aaron and Sean and Emily's parents to come inside and figure out what was going on.
Emily kept shaking her head no, "You can't take her. She is my daughter. We're a family." Holly had very little sympathy and simply said, "No she is my family. She is my blood, not yours. She is the only part of my sister that I have left. I can't just sit back and watch someone else raise her. She doesn't belong with you. She belongs with me and I'm not leaving here without her." Sean patience ran out in that instant. "You are not taking our daughter." Leona appeared behind Emily. "Mommy what's wrong? Why are you crying?" Sean watched as two police officers made their way towards the house. He felt Emily's body run cold as he held her. "No no no. Sean they can't take her." By this time everyone was behind Emily and Sean in the doorway listening. The DCS worker presented a folded-up document to Emily and Sean. "A judge says that we can. This gives us the right to take Shelby into her aunt's custody." "Her name is Leona" Emily hissed out. "My sister always wanted a daughter named Shelby. Her name is Shelby Stall." "No! Her name is Leona Hotchner and she's staying here." The DCS worker tried to intervene, "Let's not make this any harder on Le—the child—I am sorry Mr. and Mrs. Hotchner but you don't have much of a choice. She is coming with us. Please don't make this harder for her."
Holly reached for Leona but she pulled away and hid behind her mother's leg. She tried again with the same result. "She's coming with me. You have a baby on the way so what difference does it make anyways?" "She is ours." "Not anymore. Come here Shelby. I'm your aunt and you're coming home with me." Leona started to cry and buried her face in the back of her mother's thighs. "My name is Leona. Mommy, Daddy please don't make me go. Please. I want to stay here with my family." It was hard for everyone not to cry as they watched the scene unfold. Intervening wasn't going to help because they had legal paperwork to back up their reason for coming by. Emily's sisters and friends couldn't watch it anymore and dissolved into tears in the living room. Holly kept reaching for Leona and her cries only got worse. "Can you tell her that she has to come with me?"
As much as Emily hated Holly right now, she knew that she had to be strong for Leona. She kneeled down and held Leona as close to her as possible. "I love you more than life itself. I don't want you to ever forget that. Right now, you have to go with this woman." "But why? Don't you want me to stay?" she asked before her tear-filled sobs took over. "I want you to stay more than anything in this world. I will always be here for you, don't ever forget that. I will never ever stop loving you. I will fight for you with everything that I have in me until I have nothing left. You are my baby girl no matter what. I love you so much my little marshmallow. I will always love you." Leona was downright bawling now. Sean kneeled down and hug her tightly. "We will always love you. You will always have a place with us. Right now, we have to handle some grown-up stuff so that we can get you back. We will never stop trying to get you back. I am so sorry that we have to let you go with these ladies but we have to. Don't think for a second that we love you any less because we don't." Emily, Sean and Leona were all crying and everyone seemed uncomfortable and emotional, even the officers and the DCS worker—everyone except Holly. Sean wiped away Emily and Leona's tears as he hugged the both of them tightly and as if his life depended on it. Leona wouldn't let Holly touch her but she eventually grabbed one of the officer's hands. As they slowly walked away, Leona looked back once more and Emily felt her heart break. "She's gone. Oh my God! My daughter's gone!"
