AN: As I was uploading this chapter, I notice that its been exactly a year since I posted the first chapter of this story. I would like to thank everyone who had stuck with me and this story as well as everyone who has commented, followed and favorited this story. I appreciate the support as I have worked my way through what was my first story.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
CHAPTER 26
Emily walked into her house, taking in the unusual silence that surrounded her. With having come home early from work, she still had hours until she needed to pick up the kids at Will and JJ's.
It had been three days since she and Dave had learned through DNA results that he was indeed her biological father. Although they had been almost certain what the results were going to be, it was different to have the piece of paper in front of her confirming it.
The talk with JJ later that evening had helped her in sorting her feeling and clearing her head. That had put her in a better headspace when she decided to go into work late the next morning so she and Dave could finish the talk that Donaldson had rudely interrupted the day before with his accusations.
Over the last week, she was unnerved by all of the whispers and pointing that had been following her. First it had been gossip that her and Dave were having an affair. Gossip that persisted even when she knew several people were shutting down hard.
Then over the last couple of days, there were a growing number of people who now found out the truth. She had been enthusiastically greeted numerous times by contemporaries of Dave telling her how excited they were that he had finally found her. These were agents that she barely knew though all of them seemed to know Dave as well as his search for his missing daughter.
When she had arrived at Strauss' office for a meeting early that morning, the stress of all of it was getting to her. After they finished the business part of their meeting, the older woman had led them over to a sofa in her office and asked how she was handling the news.
After challenging Emily on her default 'I'm fine' response, Emily sighed and shared what had been happening around the office. Strauss, who had been planning to get Emily to take time off before she had even walked into the office that morning, strengthen her stance as she heard what Emily was experiencing in the office.
Taking a few minutes to explain the background, Strauss explained that she along with all of the other agents who had worked with Dave in his early years in the FBI, including the current director, had known about his missing daughter. She went on to share how a former director had ordered him to stop looking and how many of them had continued the search without success.
After that Strauss turned serious and told Emily she wanted her to take some time off to give herself some time to adjust to all the changes in her life over the last couple of months. Steeling herself for the expected argument, Strauss was surprisingly pleased when Emily nodded and said that she thought it would be a good idea as well. After that they worked on logistics of who was going to take over all of the aspects of her position.
From how diligent Emily had been when they were planning her maternity leave, Strauss knew the younger woman wouldn't completely agree unless the logistics had been worked out so Strauss already had a plan in mind.
She recommended they have Agent Greene take over the role as first contact for the unit. He had suffered a setback with his knee injury and was still out of the field.
Strauss then suggested one of her training agents, Alvez, was ready and could travel with Cooper's team while Agent Lewis would be continuing her training with one of the other BAU team for the next week as she had already been granted time off over Christmas.
With all of her work duties covered, Emily went back to her office and finished a couple of outstanding items that couldn't wait or be taken over by someone else.
Before she left the BAU, Emily went over to the bullpen to talk to Hotch. Luckily, he was in his office. He shared his support when she told him about the time off as he had been trying to convince her to take some time since the day Dave had come over and told her she was his daughter. He and his team were off rotation for the holidays this year so he only had one more week before he would be home for two weeks.
Slipping off her shoes, Emily climbed the stairs heading towards their home office. Walking into the room, she sat down on her desk chair and looked at the box sitting in front of her. The box Dave had brought over the morning he gave her the shocking news about her parentage.
So far she hadn't opened it since they had left it in her home office that morning. At first she had held off, not feeling right about it until they had the results confirmed. From what he said that morning, it was evident how much this box and its contents meant to him and she just felt wrong about looking at what was in it until she had confirmation that it was indeed her history too.
Since she had received that piece of paper confirming Dave as her father, she had been more focused on the present. Talking to him as they attempt to redefine their relationship. She felt better after talking to JJ about the insecurities she had about the whole situation. She was surprised as they spoke that Dave had some of his own.
But today, home earlier and alone for the next few hours, Emily decided to delve into the box that Dave had held as a treasured item for all these years.
After taking the lid off she carefully started taking the photos out before arranging them across her desk. She was immediately drawn the pictures of Emma. Her mother. Dave hadn't been kidding when he commented how much Emily resembled her.
There were photos starting from when it appeared she was in her early teens through high school and prom. As far as she could tell, the latest picture was one with Emma and Dave with a buzz cut and in his fatigues. As she looked through them she was laughing as well as crying.
This was the first time she(or anyone from the team as far as she knew) had seen pictures of teenage Dave. She had to laugh at his long hair and leather jacket as they were not items that she would associate with the Dave she knew today. Maybe he had his own rebellious past which allowed him to accept hers so readily.
Gently placing the pictures aside, the next item she took out was a bundle of letters. Untying the bundle, she noticed it was letters Emma wrote to Dave while he was deployed.
At first she was uncomfortable having these highly personal letters in front of her, wondering if Dave had realized they were in the box when he gave it to her. To be safe she exchanged text messages with him about if he was sure he was OK with her reading them.
After he replied affirmatively, she sat down and read through each of the letters. With only having one side of conversation it was difficult in places to follow the conversation. There were people and places mentioned, some repeatedly that were unknown to Emily.
However most of what was in the letters was Emma's description of how her pregnancy was progressing as well as her thoughts of wanting Dave to be healthy and safe.
There was an ongoing conversation about baby names. The name for her. From what she read Emma had wanted her first name to be Seraphina but had agreed to go with Dave's top choice of Sophia. She chuckled as she came to the letter where, as Dave had mentioned, Emma insisted on her having Maud as a middle name though she didn't mention why only that it was a compromise to his choice being her first name.
Emma had also mentioned in several of the letters about the news about the war that she had heard as she expressed worry whether he was near any of the battles she was reading about in the newspaper.
After she refolded the last letter in the stack, Emily sat back and wiped the tears from her eyes before she sighed.
She carefully placed all of the items back in the box, knowing that it all needed to go back to Dave. After placing the lids on the box, Emily sat back down in her chair, processing everything that she just read.
Just as she sat down, the doorbell rang.
####
Dave Rossi nervously paced through his house under the guise of checking the Christmas decorations that he had hired a company to install over the last couple of days.
In years past, he had rarely decorated for Christmas. It had always felt wrong to him to celebrate what he had grown up to recognize as a family holiday when his child was lost to him.
But with the recent discovery that his daughter was alive, well and open to building a relationship with him, he had woken up a couple of days earlier suddenly wanting to fully celebrate Christmas this year.
He had asked his housekeeper to make contact with a company she was familiar with to help them with the decorations and lighting. When the owner arrived, Dave explained to him some things he would like along with the fact that anything they did would need to be safe for young children.
While the crew had worked on the approved decorating upstairs, Dave had been down in his rarely used finished basement setting up the part of the toy train set his parents had given him years ago. After setting up the large base piece, he started to unpack to various train parts and scenery items.
Then earlier that morning after hours of careful reconstruction and a bit of swearing, he had the train up and running as he remembered it when he was a kid.
With that done, he had gone upstairs to check on the holidays decorating that his housekeeper had been overseeing. He had viewed the beautiful displace of house lights the previous evening as well as the fairy lights that had been strung over the outside patio. A winter wonderland display had been set up in the yard that the kids could interact with.
Inside he could see everything was as he requested as well as that care had been taken to make sure that everything was child safe.
Except for the living room which had been gated off. In there a snow village had been set up in the center of the room. In the front corner of the room, a Christmas tree with his crystal tree topper and glass balls had been placed by his large front window.
Walking around the rest of the house, he was pleased with how everything was shaping up. His plan was to have the team over the weekend before Christmas and then have Hotch, Emily and the kids over for dinner Christmas day. He had already discussed it with Hotch and Emily and they decided that would work best along with Dave coming over to their house on Christmas Eve.
After receiving Emily text messages, he was somewhat confused as to why she was home during the day since she wasn't scheduled to take off until the following week.
Along with that was the anxiety that she was looking in the box he had left with her. Reading the letters Emma had written to him. Ideally he would have liked to keep them for himself. He had never let anyone else read them.
However he had included them in the box when he took it to Emily because he didn't have anything else from Emma that he could share with her. And from everything she was experiencing and learning after the Ambassador's death along with how well he knew Emily, he wanted to give her something tangible to help her connect with Emma.
But now that she was reading them, he was nervous with anticipation. When an hour past and he hadn't heard anything else from her, he grabbed his jacket and left, heading towards the Hotchner house.
####
When Emily checked the peephole on the door, she was not completely surprised to see Dave standing outside the door. Opening the door, she invited him in out of the cold. As he took his jacket off and hung it by the door, she said, "Everything OK?"
Dave turned and looked at her and although she had worked to clean up the damage to her makeup from crying he could see the slightly bloodshot eyes as well as could hear it in her voice.
Before he could say anything, Emily asked if he wanted a drink as she was going to get herself a glass of water. Dave responded likewise and at Emily's gesture he followed her to the kitchen as they continued their conversation.
Standing in the kitchen as Emily filled their glasses, Dave said, "after your message earlier about the letters, I just wanted to check on you. See if you had any questions after reading them."
Emily handed him his glass and nodded as she said, "I had just finished placing everything back in your box when the doorbell rang."
After she said that, she led them into the family room. As they were walking, Dave remembered part of his confusion as Emily generally didn't take time off unless there was a reason and asked worriedly, "what are you doing home in the middle of the day? Are the kids sick?"
Emily shook her head as she said, "no they are both doing well and hopefully taking a nap right now. I'm taking some extra time off starting today. The office has just been weird the last few days. Today after my meeting with Strauss, she asked how I was doing and convinced me to take the rest of the week extra. I think she was conspiring with Aaron because he has been trying to get me to take some extra time off and Strauss already had a plan in mind to cover my team."
Dave chuckled before sobering as he asked, "weird how?" as they both sat down.
Emily took a deep breath before answering, "well first there are still those rumors that we were having an affair." Emily paused and rolled her eyes at that before continuing, "though that rumor has diminished over the last couple of days. Then over the last couple of days, I've had several agents who had apparently heard the news and couldn't find you that have come to see me. Along with that is just the curious looks everytime I leave my office. I haven't been getting much done anyway so when Strauss asked today, I just agreed."
Dave looked down as she spoke before he said, "I'm sorry. You shouldn't have been left to deal with the attention all by yourself." He didn't regret hitting Donaldson for the comments he had made that day to Emily. However hearing what she just said, he was regretting that it had taken him out of the office so she had been left to deal with the aftermath by herself.
Emily shook her head before she said, "it's fine. Aaron's been after me too about taking the days. By the time we go back, everyone will have hopefully moved on to something else to gossip about. But having the time today with an empty house, I decided to look at your box."
Dave nodded and asked, "Anything you want to ask me about?"
At first Emily shook her head before stopping and looking up at him with a mischievous smirk as she asked, "so do you still have the leather jacket? And what was the deal with the long hair?"
Dave paused before laughing out loud at her questions. It wasn't at all one of the things he expected her to ask about though knowing Emily, he should have expected the comment.
Shaking his head, he said, "yes I still have the jacket, along with some other items, in my closet. And the hair, it was cool when I was in high school and Emma loved it. And besides young lady, you have no room to talk about hairstyles. I've seen your senior picture."
Dave smirked as Emily gasped at his comment. Emily frowned and sighed. She should have known Garcia had shown that picture the entire team.
Dave noticing that Emily was starting to shut down on him said, "can we just chalk it up to that both of us had some questionable hair and attire in our teens that we would never wear today."
Emily looked over and saw the look of sincerity and nodded as she said, "agreed but I would still like to see the leather jacket at some point."
Dave smiled as he said, "done, just let me know when."
They were quiet for a few minutes before Emily said quietly, "thank you for letting me read your letters. They were really personal and the last contact you had with her."
Dave nodded before he said, "you're welcome. That is all true but they are all I had to offer you. I can tell you a lot about Emma. How she felt about her pregnancy and you. But I also thought it would help to read something that she herself wrote."
"It did. She really loved you." Emily said quietly as she pushed tears away from her eyes.
Dave stood up and walked over and sat down right next to Emily. These deep emotions are what he thought would happen when she read the letters. He was relieved that he had listened to his instincts and came over as he didn't want Emily having to process this part by herself.
He put his arm around shoulder as she leaned into him before he said, "and I loved her very much as well. Still do to be honest with you."
They sat together quietly for a few minutes until Emily said in slightly louder than a whisper, "I wish I had gotten the chance to know her."
Dave sighed as he nodded when he said, "Me too, honey. Me too. She would be so proud of you. Just like I am."