Spencer avoids Rossi's attempts at checking on how he's doing in the morning. He's fairly certain Rossi heard him screaming in his sleep last night, but thankfully he doesn't press about it. Spencer slowly traces the marks on his chest, which still stings when touched. The team is getting ready to leave for a case, so Garcia will be around to check on him and keep him company.
The team finishes the briefing and gets ready to head to the jet when JJ stops to talk to Garcia.
"How's Spence doing?" she asks, unsuccessfully hiding her sadness and guilt.
"He's getting better. He should be able to go back home soon and his stutter is almost gone," Garcia tells her as cheerily as she can.
"That's good…" JJ says as she begins to leave.
"He misses you , you know?"
"He does?" JJ asks, feeling a bit of hope glimmer.
"Absolutely Jayje. He misses you and being able to talk to you, but he's just not ready yet. But I'm sure he'll be soon," Garcia adds, to try and brighten the mood.
"Thanks Pen," JJ tells her, fighting off a few tears before Garcia wraps her in a tight hug.
"Of course. Now catch a bad guy my sweet," Garcia says, which brings a smile to JJ's face as she leaves.
The team gets through the case after a few days and are flying back when Rossi sits across from Hotch.
"So the kid's going home in a few days. Should be back to work in a week," Rossi says, with a look that says there's more to this than just that.
"Yes I know. He's gotten much better. I've heard his stutter is pretty much gone," Hotch replies.
"That's right. He'll still be out of the field for at least another month, and he wasn't very happy to hear that, although him just starting to use a cane instead of crutches was something I made very clear," Rossi says, and they both laugh.
"Do you know why I'm bringing this up Aaron?" Rossi asks, and he nods.
"Good. You need to come talk to him soon, preferably before he goes back to work. We both know he's not going to initiate the conversation you need to have so you need to do it."
"I want to. But what can I tell him that hasn't already been said? He's suffered enough and I don't want to take the risk of making it worse," Hotch says.
"Aaron he's going to be fine, but you're his friend and his family. He needs to be able to get past this and so do you. Believe me, out of the three conversations he needs to have, this is going to be the easiest one," Rossi says and Hotch nods in agreement.
"Fine, I'll be there tomorrow."
"Good, I'll be waiting," Rossi says with a smile.
The following morning Spencer is sitting in Rossi's library reading.
"Lovely day for reading, isn't Doctor Reid?" Doyle asks, and Spencer looks up to see him sitting in a chair a few feet away.
"Ya know, I was reading such a great book earlier about some serial killers and what they did to their victims. If only I'd read it sooner, we could've had such a better time together."
Spencer tries to focus on the book currently in his hand, but can't. Doyle's present in his everyday life just as much as in his dreams now and he's probably not helping it by his lack of much sleep since everything happened. Even before he got tortured, he still was barely sleeping because he only dreamt of Emily and everything that happened to her. His thoughts are interrupted by footsteps coming through the library.
"See you soon Doctor," Doyle says, as Spencer looks up to see Hotch walking over.
"Hey Hotch," Spencer says, trying to look relaxed.
"Hi Reid. How're you feeling?" Hotch asks.
"Good. Leg still hurts but everything else has pretty much healed. I'm really ready to get back to work," he replies with a laugh.
"Yeah I figured that. Team's not the same without you. And Morgan has yet to start giving us all the facts like you," Hotch says and they both laugh.
"Reid," Hotch starts in a serious tone that gets Spencer's attention,"I need you to know how sorry I am for everything that happened. Truly. I know that's probably not what you want to hear because it doesn't change anything or make it better, but I never would've lied or let it get that far if I had known this had any chance of happening."
"Hotch I-" Spencer starts before Hotch stops him.
"Please let me finish this first," he says and Spencer nods before he continues,"We knew Doyle was on his own after everything with Emily. So we assumed he would go into hiding, which he did, and search for Emily if he didn't believe she was dead. We didn't expect him to go to such lengths to get her, especially early on like he did. It was a bad move on my part to do this in the first place and to keep it a secret. I thought if he came after anyone it would be JJ or, hopefully, me. And as soon as we found out you were missing we worked as quickly as we could to find out what had happened and where you were. I know that doesn't change what happened during that time, but I just want you to know that you were always our biggest priority. I know this isn't the best explanation and apology, but I hope you understand that nothing we did was because of you or to hurt you in any way."
Spencer nods silently, and Hotch can see that he's processing everything.
"Okay," Spencer finally says with another nod.
"I don't expect you to forgive me right away either, just wanted to make sure I could explain this to you before you came back," Hotch says.
"I know. Thank you," Spencer says and Hotch nods before getting up to leave.
"I'll see you in a few days then. It'll be good to have you back," Hotch tells him as he leaves, leaving Spencer to sit and think about everything.
*Sorry for taking so long to update! I've been really busy with classes and just haven't been motivated to sit and write. Thank you to all the reviews, they helped motivate me to come back to this, so please keep leaving reviews! I'll be updating more often again I think! Thanks for reading!*