Author's note: Thanks to everyone for the reviews and the PMs! They're such an encouragement.

As JJ took a hot shower in an attempt to rid herself of the stress and tension that wracked her body, her mind wandered not to Will, as she told herself it should, but to Rossi. The man who was in the room next to hers. The man who was bound and determined to make her have a nervous breakdown.

His kiss still burned her lips. It had been full of restrained passion, passion that she was desperate to unleash and experience in every way. He'd given her the sign she'd been waiting for; what did she do now? She could put herself out there for him, but she didn't want him that way. It had to be a mutual coming together ... and she knew that wouldn't happen as long as she was tied to Will. Rossi had morals, for sure, and those morals now seemed to include not cheating. Of all the times for him to decide to become a Boy Scout, she scoffed as she turned off the water and reached for a towel.

When she settled herself in bed, she reached for the Cosmo she'd been reading on the jet and returned to "Why More Chicks Are Now Cheating." Picking up where she left off, she read, "Current culture also fuels the cheating mind-set. Just as we lust after the latest, greatest It handbag, women want to upgrade their relationships .... 'And studies show that if you feel you can do better, you feel more entitled to stray,' says Gary Lewandowski, PhD, associate professor of psychology at Mounmouth University."

Hadn't Rossi just said that? Not the part about feeling entitled, but the part about feeling you can do better? Had he swiped her magazine and read that article while she was sleeping?

Deep down, this is what she had wanted to happen. She couldn't, and wouldn't, deny it, Will or no Will. But what if Rossi kissed her just to shut her up? She wouldn't put it past him to pull a stunt like that. One thing was for certain. She would find out. This was too important to let go.

~*~

They hit the ground running at seven Saturday morning and didn't stop until after ten Saturday evening. Rossi had visited the crime scene and worked on the profile with Hotch and Morgan, and JJ had been on and off the phone with Garcia and dealing with the press. She supposed it was just as well they had both been busy. They had a case that required their complete attention, and they couldn't very well give it that if they were distracted by personal matters.

When they finally had a suspect and the local police out hunting him down, Hotch called it a day. As JJ gathered her things, she checked her voicemail. Will had called five times, but she hadn't been able to answer – not simply because she was indeed busy, but because she didn't want to. He'd left a message after his fifth call: "JJ, honey, I hate to do this over the phone, but I don't know when I'll see you, or when you'll see your way to calling me back .... Anyway, I can't compete, I know that, and honestly, I don't want to. I'm out. I'm finished."

Instead of feeling sad, she felt relieved, like a heavy weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She rode back to the hotel with Morgan and Reid, not ready to be in a confined space with Rossi and unable to tell him that Will had just broken up with her; Hotch and Emily were friends, but they didn't need to witness her impending breakdown – or blow up, however it went down. This could change everything, and she needed to gather her thoughts before she went to him. It was now or never.

~*~

She gave the team thirty minutes to get settled in their rooms before she crept out into the hallway, Blackberry in hand, and knocked softly on Rossi's door. She didn't know what she would say, but trusted the words would come to her. She was good at thinking on her feet. It was what made her so good at her job. "David? Open up. It's me."

Her breath caught in her throat when she saw him clad in only a pair of flannel pajama pants. Her surprise didn't go unnoticed, but he merely smiled and stepped back so she could enter.

One chair held his ready bag, the other held his briefcase and files, so she settled herself on the edge of the bed. "What brings you here?" he asked, sitting next to her.

"I'm not going to throw myself at you, if that's what you're worried about," she replied without thinking. He was so cool, so casual, it infuriated her, and she couldn't resist a cutting remark.

"Don't be sarcastic," he replied in a way that made her feel immediately contrite. "It doesn't suit you."

He was right. Again. "I know, I'm sorry," she sighed, rubbing her forehead. "Will just broke up with me. In a voicemail."

His head snapped up. "What?"

"Listen for yourself," she said as she pressed the button for speakerphone and played Will's message. When it ended, she looked up at Rossi. "He did it for me."

"I'm sorry," he murmured, draping a strong arm across her shoulders and pulling her close to rest his cheek on the top of her head. "He shouldn't have taken the easy way out."

"Like you did last night?"

He took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair. "Jennifer ...."

"What, David?" she cried, stalking to the window to look out at the city below. "I'm so damn sick and tired of you holding back! If you have nothing to say to me, tell me, and I'll leave!"

The ten seconds in which he did not reply felt like an eternity. As she stalked past him on her way to the door, he grabbed her hand, pulling her back. "Don't leave. Please."

She sank back down on the bed and looked at him. She saw sincerity in his eyes, but honestly, she wasn't sure what else. She felt so mixed up. "Tell me ... have I just imagined how close we've become since you've been back? Imagined how important we are to each other? Imagined that you look at me with something more than friendship? Imagined the little touches that linger just a second too long? Imagined that kiss?"

His back was to the wall, and though his natural instinct was to come out fighting, he couldn't. He couldn't fight her any more than he could sprout wings and fly. And, in fact, he didn't want to. "Hear me out, okay?" he pleaded, shifting them both so they could face each other.

She nodded and squeezed his hand. "As long as you'll be honest with me."

"It's high time I was," he admitted. "I fell in love with you when I rejoined the team, when I stepped on your toes in Texas. You were just so full of piss and vinegar ... God, it was such a turn-on. But I got to know you as a professional and as a woman, and I saw that you were the complete package – beauty, intellect, sensitivity, wit, honesty, good sense ... everything I'd been searching for but never found in one woman. When you hooked up with Will, I told myself it was for the best, that I was too old, too bitter, too jaded ... decided that you needed someone completely different."

She raised her free hand to his cheek. "David ... I am perfectly capable of making my own decisions about how I want to be with. You should've said something."

He chuckled. "And risk damaging what we did have? As hard as it was, I decided I'd rather have you as a friend than not have you at all. And I wasn't trying to put you off when I said I didn't go chasing women who were unavailable."

"But I'm not unavailable now," she pointed out, leaning ever so slightly forward.

"I know," he whispered as he leaned forward too, drawn to her like a magnet, close enough to get a whiff of the perfume he had come to think of as hers and hers alone, his eyes darting back and forth between her mouth and her eyes.

"Kiss me, David," she demanded, the desire she felt for him evident in her voice. "Kiss me like you mean it."

"With pleasure," he murmured as he lowered his lips to hers and pulled her to him.

The kiss they shared left no doubt that they both meant it. Aware of every inch of JJ's body, and her quickened breathing and soft moans, Rossi gently pushed her back on the bed and stretched out over top of her.

As she ran her hands over his solid upper body in an attempt to get closer, closer, closer, to him, he unbuttoned her silk shirt and pushed it aside, then quickly divested her of her simple yet sexy bra. He heard and felt her gasp when his warm, wet mouth found one breast, and his hands found the zipper of her skirt.

Her physical response told him she wanted this, but he had to hear it from her; he'd never forgive himself if he took her when she was so vulnerable. "Jennifer," he whispered urgently, "tell me. Tell me you want this as much as I do."

She laughed quietly as she pushed his pajama pants, along with his briefs, from his hips. "Oh, I want it, David – but I don't want it to be a one-night stand."

He smiled as he stroked her cheeks with his thumbs. "Me neither. I want you for as long as you'll have me."

Time seemed to stand still from that point on. He slipped off her skirt and panties, and when they were at long last skin-on-skin, it was his turn to groan with pleasure. "So good, Jennifer ... the way you smell, the way you sound, the way you taste, the way you feel ... so good, honey ...."

Those were her sentiments exactly about his body, but the pleasure he was giving and taking had robbed her of her ability to speak. She heard him telling her to let go, to let him take care of her, but somewhere in her mind, she knew that wouldn't be enough. As he kissed his way back up her lithe body from his leisurely detour south, she managed to convey with broken speech and demonstrative gestures that she wanted him. Needed him. All of him. Now.

Wrapping her legs around his waist, she sat up so she could nibble at his neck and whisper words of love. At one time in his life, a woman talking to him like that in a situation like this would've stopped him cold, but not now. It made the fire burn hotter.

With one slow, sweet, excruciating thrust, he entered her, causing her to arch her hips and gasp his name. "Did I hurt you?" he asked, searching her face for any sign of discomfort.

"No," she giggled, "but if you don't get going, I may hurt you."

They moved against each other, with each other, all the way to the peak of pleasure. "I love you," he whispered with the final thrust that sent them both over the edge.

"I love you too," she breathed as she tangled her fingers in his hair and kissed his sweaty shoulder. "Thank you."

"For what?" he chuckled as she flopped on his back, JJ following his movements by resting her head on his chest and throwing one leg in between his.

"Well, for what we just did now, obviously," she grinned, "but for not tempting me, before, when I was with Will," she added seriously.

"Honey," he said, meeting her gaze, "I've done things in my life that I'm not proud of, and of all those things, I'd have to say that cheating is at the top of the list. I knew if I felt bad about it, you would feel ten times worse."

"I know. I got that last night. I was mad, but deep down, I understood."

He dropped a kiss on her nose and squeezed her hip. "I can promise you, right here, right now, that you'll never have to worry about me stepping out on you. I'm a changed man, remember?"

"I remember," she murmured, thinking that the article was right – there was hope for long-term love.