The moment I get the call about the complaint, I know Emily is taking this too hard. She needs to talk to someone about it before this gets out of hand. I decide to meet her, Reid, and Morgan at the elevator.

"What happened?" I ask as they step out.

"I think there may be a third victim." Reid says softly.

"Is that what you think?" I ask Morgan.

He glances at Emily before speaking. "I don't know," he answers honestly.

"Uh, we have ligature marks, the Spain connection, and scuff marks under the bed." Emily jumps to the defense of the case that we might not even have.

"Hotch, it's weird, definitely. But there's no way to physically connect dehydration, a heart attack, and an aneurysm."

"What's goin' on?" Reid asks.

"Well, we've had a complaint. JJ's trying to smooth it over with the DC Police, but we haven't been invited in on the case." I start to walk away so I can go talk to Garcia, but as I do I hear Emily's harsh voice echo across the hallway towards Morgan.

"Hey, that's how you have my back?"

"Prentiss, I'm trying to protect you."

"I don't need protection." Emily's anger spills out of her.

"Hotch just said he got a complaint, and he didn't come down on you. You realize that? You just dodged a bullet. We have to approach this just like we do any other case." Morgan's voice is softer than Emily's but I can still make out what he's saying to her as I get farther away from them.

"Meaning what?" Emily

"Grief can make us wanna believe there's a reason for things when there's not."

"That woman couldn't even use Patrick's name. She could only say, "my fiancé," because she's convinced something else died in that room that night." It's the last I hear out of either of them, so Emily must have walked away after arguing her last point. It is a very valid point to the behavior of the fiance, but part of me knows I need to keep a bit of distance from the case since it seems Emily is having a hard time distancing herself.

Once I check in with Garcia, I make my way back to my office so I can keep an eye on Emily. I'm worried about her and I know the team is too. She's always been one of the strongest members of the team, able to compartmentalize almost anything, but this case is hitting her hard. The stress is laced into her shoulders and her eyes are angry. I want to do more for her but without the invitation from the police there isn't much more we can do. From my window I see one of our security guards, Hank, show a man to Emily's desk. She seems to recognize him and it makes me wonder who he is. Could he be another person from my girlfriend's past?

"As far as the police are concerned, there is no open murder investigation. We have no reason to be investigating if they're not." JJ says as she walks through my open door.

"Well, they're right." I step away from the window, giving Emily space, metaphorically, and move to sit at my own desk. "All we have are three men who died in three very different natural deaths."

"So we just drop it?" Dave asks from where he sits across from me.

"Dave, do you really believe we're dealing with someone trying to exorcise demons?"

"It doesn't matter what I believe. Possession, mental illness? Exorcist, unsub? Who cares what's true? People are dying. This isn't about religion. It's about evil. We attack it with analysis and diligence. For this unsub, it's a fight to the death." As Dave finishes his rant, Garcia knocks on the door, hopefully with the information I asked her to look for.

"All hail the mistress of information." She announces as she walks in.

"You got somethin'?" JJ asks.

"You know I do." Garcia holds out a folder to JJ. "It's a posting from a web bulletin board by Matthew Benton to create a support group for people who felt betrayed by their faith." JJ passes it my way.

"Well, that helps explain how these three men came together." I say as I glance over the document.

"It gets better. The week the three of them were in Spain, the services At Santiago de Compostela were canceled when the priest there died." Garcia explains.

"Died how?" Rossi looks up at her, with a questioning look plastered across his face.

"Heart attack." It seems Garcia always manages to find more than just what we ask her for. She continues. "But if you listen to the conspiracy chatter, there is a strong belief he was killed to interrupt services during the height of the pilgrimage."

"How?" JJ asks, not completely convinced.

"Well, their best guess is some kind of gas, Sarin or VX, something that wouldn't show up in an autopsy. But it could be anything that would induce stress, cause a heart attack."

"Then we have a motive." JJ points out.

"And a potential MO. An eye for an eye." Dave tacks on.

"Without an invitation from the police, I cannot authorize an investigation." I glance out the window to where Emily is standing talking to the mysterious stranger. I have to do this for her. "This has to be kept quiet." JJ and Garcia leave my office first to continue working on the case, "Dave, a moment."

"Does this have something to do with your girlfriend that you keep looking at?"

"Something along the lines of that yes. What do I do about her?"

"What do you mean?"

"She's losing it but she won't talk to anyone about how she's dealing with this. She's convinced that Benton was murdered. She was belligerent to the fiance of the third victim because of how sure she is of it. She even got on Morgan about not having her back."

"This may seem like a new concept, but have you tried talking to her?"

"I tried last night, but all she wanted to do was stare at the case files until she knew them forward and backwards. I'm still not even sure how she and Benton knew each other. I've tried to show her I'm here for her, but she seems to want to be distracted by anything that will keep her from having to talk to me."

"Well how about you take her for a cup of coffee? I'll hold down the fort for a bit."

"If Strauss finds out-"

"I'll tell her the two of you are out running a lead. On a possible case." He tacks on at the last minute, "Plus if you go ask her now, maybe she'll introduce you to the mystery man you keep glancing at."

"I don't keep glancing at him."

"So it's her you keep glancing at then. What don't trust her being around another man?"

"I trust her completely." I state quickly, because it's the truth.

"Then go see where she's at." Dave and I step out of my office, but we part ways. He heads to his office and I head down towards where my girlfriend is.

"You're gonna have to give me some time here." Emily says to the man she's standing with before she notices me walking over. "Uh, Aaron Hotchner, this is John Cooley. He was also a friend of Matthew's." I offer him my hand.

"I'm sorry. You saw him recently?"

"Yeah." He nods ever so slightly.

"Is there anyone he associated with out of the usual? Anyone overtly religious?"

"Not that I'm aware of. I've been doin' my best to retrace his steps, But I still haven't come up with anything." Emily listens in to what Cooley says but then I turn to her.

"Buy you a cup of coffee?" Her eyes catch mine and I can see a second of hesitation before she answers.

"Uh..yeah." She turns to Cooley. "I- I will call you if I hear anything." She grabs her coat from her desk as he says

"Yeah." Cooley says before following us out of the bullpen with his eyes. I swing by the Java Shack to pick up our normal coffee orders before stopping at the place that I think will make the most sense for us to talk. I pull up next to the now vacant lot and park the car. Emily looks at the lot with some hesitation, but follows me out of the car and into the lot that is muddy from last nights rain.

"There are, uh, nicer places to take a girl for coffee." Emily says as she holds her cup in her hand. "But seeing as you picked a less nice one I take it this is a meeting with my boss and not a date with my boyfriend." I don't comment on her second sentence and instead comment on where we are.

"Did you ever see the Exorcist?"

"Yeah." Knowing the Em is a horror fan, this doesn't surprise me.

"The real case started right here." I point down to the lot we're standing in. "The fire department actually burned down the house themselves. The authorities referred to the boy as Robbie Doe. He's still in the DC area today."

"Why did you bring me here?" She kicks at the ground with the toe of her high heeled boots.

"Whole lot of effort went into destroying the house of a kid who probably had onset schizophrenia or Tourette's syndrome."

"I'm not following you." Emily's eyes search mine for the answers I haven't given her.

"You're sure he was murdered. So what's the story?" A sigh escapes her mouth and I think for a moment she will tell me she doesn't want to tell me. She even turns around and starts to walk away. Is she going to walk back to the car and just shut me out? "If you, uh, don't wanna explain, that's fine, but if you do, I'm all in Em. I'm always all in." She turns back around and I see her take her bottom lip in between her teeth as she tries to figure out what she's going to do.

"Matthew knew the bible inside and out, and he started to question everything."

"Why?" She pauses and her eyes almost plead with mine not to force her to say whatever is going to come next. They drop down to the ground. But suddenly I see her drop her shoulders, lift her head, and her eyes stare into mine as she continues.

"We moved around a lot when I was a kid, because of my mom's postings." Her lips purse before she says, "It was hard to get accepted, and when you're fifteen, that's all you want. You'll do almost anything." Her head drops down to stare at the ground again and I can hear the words she's not saying.

"You got pregnant." They came out softly, but I saw how they affected her.

"Yeah." Emily's eyes meet mine for a split second and then drop back down to stare at the ground.

"Was Matthew the father?" I ask.

"No. I didn't know what to do. You've met my family. I couldn't tell my mom. So Matthew suggested I talk with our priest."

"And what did he say?"

"He said that if I had an abortion, I wasn't welcome in his congregation." Emily steps towards me as she says this, like she wants to be comforted.

"So what'd you do?"

"Matthew found a doctor. He took me there. He stayed with me. That Sunday when we got back to Rome, he held my hand and walked me into the church. Father Gamino actually stopped his sermon, but Matthew told me to hold my head up, and we walked to the front pew." Emily stares off as she says this, as if she is living that moment all over again as she says it.

"What did the priest do?"

"He and Matthew just stared at each other. It was like a battle of wills, and- and then suddenly Father Gamino went back to his sermon." Suddenly she blinks back into the present. "Matthew saved my life. He made me feel like I was worthy of love and friendship."

"But that's when his anger and questioning started."

"Yeah. He started doing drugs. And when that melded with his religious questioning, you could understand why his parents were afraid he was possessed by something evil. It's my fault that Matthew's life unraveled."

"Garcia uncovered some information. It's possible Matthew and the others killed someone in Spain."

"No. I don't believe that." She scoffs and backs up ever so slightly.

"I'm just saying If we keep pushing, You have to be prepared for what we might discover."

"I need Matthew to rest in peace. I owe him that."

"Then let's go give a profile."

"The-the police haven't invited us in."

"I know. The police aren't gonna do us any good on this one, anyway." I answer honestly. "That's why I'm going to have you, Dave and Reid go and give a profile to some priest to see if you can fit it to someone they may know."

"Ok."

"Emily. If this becomes too much-"

"No." She shakes her head. "I need to do it for Matthew. Being pulled from the case won't do anything."

"Ok, but promise you'll at least come talk to me if it becomes too much?"

"I promise."

Author's Note: I borrowed dialogue from Season 4 Episode 17. However I did tweak it so that the conversation could happen between Emily and Aaron instead of her and Rossi. It fits the story line better in this case Let me know what you think.

-Lizzy