I'm really trying to find out if anyone's reading my fanfic. Please review and let me know what you think. Should I continue? Am I portraying the characters accurately so far? Also, I just can't get used to calling Hotch "Aaron". It just doesn't flow…to me, anyway. Let me know what you think.

As Hotch and Prentiss sat close together on the sofa that night, drinking the beer slowly. Neither one was saying very much, but they didn't really need to.

After a while, Emily spoke. "Do you ever feel like you wish we'd gotten these cases earlier? Do you ever wonder why someone didn't see the patterns earlier so we could have saved more lives?"

"Every day," Hotch replied simply. "But it's the nature of our job. We're called in when things become desperate and hopeless. We are a last resort."

Emily shook her head. Something inside her felt ripped apart. She needed Hotch more than ever right now after seeing what had happened to those couples. What the husbands had been forced to watch as their wives were raped.

Slowly, several tears rolled down her cheeks, smearing her eye makeup a little. "I hate coming in at the last minute," she whispered. "Sometimes I ask myself why I do it? Why I endure the horror?" She looked down at the beer bottle in her hands. "I never come up with an answer that works for me."

"You should get some rest," Hotch told her, kissing the top of her head and squeezing her close. "I'll stay in the guest room tonight."

It was close to three in the morning when Aaron was awakened by sobbing in the room next to his. It took him a minute or two to fully wake up and realize what was going on. The noise was coming from Emily's bedroom.

Alarmed and worried, he jumped out of his bed and hurried across the hall and into Emily's bedroom. The moonlight was shining in her window and he could see her lying beneath the covers, crying pitifully. She was having a nightmare and it was obviously scaring her something awful.

Hotch turned on a light and tapped her softly on the arm. She woke up with a start and gasped loudly. Her pajamas were soaked in cold sweat and her pillow was drenched from tears.

"You're safe," he assured her, pulling her close. "It was just a dream."

"It was us," she sobbed. "He—he had us in the motel and he was…and he was making you watch and there wasn't anything you could do to help me. My gun was so—so close but I just couldn't quite reach it!"

"Emily, it's okay. I'm right here. No one is going to hurt you. I'm not going to let anyone hurt you ever again. I promise." For the rest of the night, Hotch stayed with her, his arms tight around her and her back against his chest.

In the morning, when Emily woke up, she was lying alone on her pillow. One look in the bathroom mirror told her that she needed more rest, but it was time to get ready for work. Hotch was in the kitchen making coffee when she got out of the shower.

"You okay?" he asked, genuinely concerned.

"I'll be all right soon," she assured him, getting a container of yogurt out of the fridge. "This wasn't the first time I've had nightmares about a case." She gave him a brave smile. "But it was the first time I've had you there to hold me."

Hotch kissed her forehead softly and then her mouth. "I'll see you at work."