After Emily's death had passed, not everyone on the team felt the same since. Every time Penelope and JJ had their girls' nights out, Penelope would leave an extra glass for Emily, though JJ wouldn't take a single glance at it or even touch it. Sometimes, Spencer would come to her house and she became a shoulder to cry on for him, or she'd watch foreign films with him since Emily wasn't there.

JJ was still processing Emily's death herself, which had led her here, taking her psych evaluation from Hotch. The unit chief watches JJ pace back and forth across the room. She was shaking her head and running her hands through her hair. "JJ, the assessment's routine. The team's required to check in with me, and you're the next for this week."

"Yeah, and what? Is Strauss going to use that against me or something?" JJ scoffs.

"I asked if I could do this instead of her, so this is completely confidential, JJ."

"I don't need any therapy, Hotch. I'm fine. I can do my job."

Hotch shakes his head and decides an ultimatum might get her talking. "I could pull you out of the BAU for a varying period of time, if you don't tell me how you've been functioning in the past month."

JJ stops in her tracks and closes her eyes momentarily. "Fine," she huffs and sits back down.

"I noticed you've been staying up later than usual in the office. Even later than I do," he starts. "You barely come out of your office."

JJ shrugs like it was no big deal. "I'm up late doing reports."

"With a job like this, you need time to de-stress," he offered. "How are you and Henry doing?" This was also one of the more critical questions for JJ, especially because he himself had gone through a child processing the death of a loved one.

"Henry's safe," she mumbles a reply, now playing with her fingers in her lap. "I spend time with him whenever I can. We're all good."

"Has he ever mentioned Emily to you?"

JJ begins to tense at the question. Swallowing the lump down her throat, she gives a little nod. "Yes, a few times. Yeah. But I don't understand how that has anything to do-"

Hotch immediately cuts her off. "You and Emily were close," he notes, seeing JJ shift her eyes downwards and wipe her sweaty palms on her slacks. "The death of someone close to you, especially when they're close to your family, can affect a child. How do you think Henry sees you coping with Prentiss' death?"

The blonde didn't know how to answer that. Truthfully, she still had been avoiding Henry mentioning Emily and had never explained to him about it. It was hard for her to accept it herself, would she want her son to try to process it at two-years-old? She couldn't even process the concept of death when she was 11, did she want the same thing happening to Henry?

JJ chose not to make any eye contact with Hotch and kept her head down. "I don't know. I didn't even tell him what happened. He's still too young, Hotch. It's better that way." She looked down and rested her back against the chair.

Hotch nods in understanding, remembering how he had to approach a similar subject to Jack when Haley died.

"Ok, how about this? Do you know the five stages of grief?"

JJ lets out an exhale and nods. "Yeah. I've been through it before," she answers.

"Examine each one of them, and list what has happened since Emily's death."

"Alright." She sits back in her chair as well, crossing her arms once again. "Denial. I chose not to talk about Emily with anyone, not even with Henry, right? I'm angry that we haven't gotten there on time. I wish I could've done better, so she would still be alive," she lists off and weakly shrugs, mumbling her next words. "I haven't completely gotten over it. Is that it?"

After a moment of silence, Hotch nods to her. "That's it. For today."

A grunt came out of JJ's mouth as she threw punches at Derek, who did his best to dodge her. They decided to go to the gym together about two weeks after Emily's funeral, when JJ asked him to help her with her physical training. It had been two days since her assessment with Hotch and she asked Derek if they could work out again before going to the office.

Gritting her teeth as she focused, JJ threw a few more hard ones at Derek. He tried to move quicker than her aim, which apparently hadn't worked out so well. She punched him right across his headgear from left to right until he backed away from her with his gloves up.

"JJ! JJ, wait! Stop!" He stopped her and swiftly maneuvered behind her, grabbing her by the waist and seeing her punch the air instead. Heavy pants came from the blonde and she limped in his arms, giving up. He led her to the side, so they could take a break.

Derek sighs and shakes his head, taking his headgear and gloves off. "You know, you could've hurt yourself, if you kept doing that."

JJ scoffs, not caring about him helping her with her gloves and headgear. "What if that's the point?"

"JJ-"

"Don't," JJ cut him off with a glare. "Don't you dare try to give me any bullshit about how I should feel."

"I'm not. I'm just worried about you. We all are," he softened. "Look, if you want to talk about it-"

"I don't," she sharply cuts him off again. "I'm fine."

He shrugs in surrender before sitting down next to her, wiping his neck with a towel. "We just want to help, JJ."

"I don't need any help. I'm perfectly fine, never been better," JJ sarcastically said, opening her water bottle and taking gulps of it.

"That's what Emily said."

JJ puffed out some air, making her bangs flop back to her forehead as she did. "I don't want to hear what she said to you. After all, it's not like you had anything nice to say about her before," she mutters and crosses her arms.

"I was upset. She kept a secret that huge from us, and we were supposed to just guess where she was?" he explained with a sigh. "I'm sorry, just- I hate being kept a secret like that, especially when it's from someone I care about."

JJ looked down with a small frown, her arms still crossed over her chest as she thought about his words. If that was true, he probably wouldn't like a secret she had kept from him either, or from the rest of the team, for that matter.

"Hey, you were about to tell me Emily told you about it," he recalls their conversation at the hospital. "What did you mean by that?"

"I didn't say she told me what happened exactly." She sighs and uncrosses her arms to grab her towel. "All I remember was she stopped talking to me right before we knew about Doyle. That's when I should've realized there was more going on. I mean, it's Emily we're talking about. It was hard to try and read her. And look, I get it. It's because I'm not a profiler like you, Morgan. You don't have to tell me that," she rolls her eyes and folds her hands together, her elbows sitting on her lap.

Derek shakes his head and quietly replies, "I wasn't going to. Like I said before, we didn't know what was going to happen."

He gave her some time to think and gather all her thoughts and emotions, giving himself time, as well. If he were to go back in time, he wished that he'd apologize to Emily and understand her better, too, instead of acting like a jerk the entire time they were searching for her and Doyle.

JJ, on the other hand, was taking in his words to her. Emily didn't tell the rest of them, so of course, they couldn't predict what was going to happen. "You know what, you're right," she conceded. "I'm sorry for snapping at you, Morgan."

Derek nods and pulls her into a hug. "It's ok. I know how you feel."

"Hotch, I don't understand why I'm back here again," JJ said. This was the second time Hotch had called JJ back in for her evaluation, and he figured it was much needed after a couple of incidents had happened on duty.

"It's required," he answers, picking up his folder on the table and opening it in his lap. JJ chose not to say anything and waited for him to continue.

"This week, you resuscitated a victim from drowning underwater," Hotch recalls, looking at his report and back at her. "You volunteered to do it yourself, or rather, insisted on doing it yourself."

JJ crosses her arms defensively and shrugs. "And?"

Hotch only stares at her for a second before going back to his report. "Last week, you chased down an unsub, surrendered your gun and chose not to wait for back-up until Morgan shot him."

JJ bit the inside of her cheek and her jaw became tense. She had gotten reprimanded from Derek from that case already. She attempted to negotiate with the unsub and handled the rest from there, not giving a second thought about the consequences of her safety.

Hotch closed his folder and placed it on the table. "JJ, I admire your ability as an agent, but lately, you've been putting yourself in the line of danger at the most inappropriate times. I might have to ask you to take a leave of absence for a little while until you get better. And it won't be permanent."

"Hotch, I can do my job just fine," JJ said, attempting to convince him to keep her in the unit.

Hotch nods before fixing himself in a slightly hunched over position and folding his hands together. "You have been going against protocol in the last few cases. You find your way around questions when we do assessments."

"Hotch, I haven't-"

"You've been compensating for Emily's death. You're trying to correct what you think you've done wrong when it hadn't been your fault," he infers.

JJ's jaw clenched and she shook her head, her hands already turning into fists by her sides. "Don't you start profiling me, Aaron," she points with a warning finger towards him.

"Not only has your office desk been filled with recent cases, you've kept the files on Doyle." Hotch finally concludes, "You haven't been fine, JJ. Your grief is affecting your work, and I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to take a leave of absence. Take some time off. I can't risk you being in any more danger right now."

JJ's eyes widened in shock. She thought she was doing alright, she wasn't expecting that. Blinking, she looked at him and quietly said, "Hotch, you can't do that."

"I can," Hotch gives a firm nod. "You need to get your mind away from this place for a while."