Chapter 2

Work let out early that day. The team didn't have a case and paperwork seemed to become almost optional the hotter the days became around this time of year. Today, it was sweltering and most of the team left before 4 o'clock. As Garcia left the BAU, however, she realized, to her chagrin, that she didn't have a car, completely dashing her hopes of getting to the mall in time to do any reasonable amount of baby shopping (the only thing on her mind at the since that morning). Hailing a cab would be useless this time of day, and by the time she got home to her car and drove out to the shopping centre there'd hardly be a point in doing so at all. Crushed, she looked around for a ride, finding only Hotch in the garage.

"Captain!" she called out, waving her blue purse in the air to get his attention as she jogged over. "In which direction are you headed, Captain?"

"I'm going up to Northgate Mall," said Hotch, a little confused as Garcia's eyes widened in excitement. "I need to pick up something for my son."

"Sir, is there any way I could catch a ride with you? I drove in with JJ this morning, not knowing that I'd need my car to get out to the mall."

Hotch didn't seem enthusiastic, but then when did he ever? "Sure. Get in, Garcia."

Garcia beamed.

"So how is your little guy, sir?" she asked, by way of conversation, as they pulled out of the garage. "Still cute as ever?"

"If by 'Cute as ever' you mean 'As cute as he was when you saw him two days ago', then yes, he is," Hotch replied, and a quick flash of a smile that Garcia almost missed told her that he had just made a joke. She was awed into silence by the revelation.

A little while later she asked him, "So what are you getting for the adorable little bubba at the mall, huh, daddy?"

Hotch's hesitation told her that even he wasn't entirely sure. "Uh, some sort of toy…" he said vaguely. "Haley rang me earlier and said that he'd accidently torn an arm off his favourite rabbit today and could I go in and find him something to cheer him up, since she hasn't had time to sew it yet."

"What sort of toys does he like?" asked Garcia, causing Hotch to squirm a little. "Sir?"

"…I don't know," Hotch admitted. Then he attempted to change the subject. "What do you need at the mall?"

"Not exactly sure," said Garcia, grinning. "But I could help you find a toy for your boy. I'll be in the kiddy section anyway, trying to find something suitable for my friends' baby. Well baby-to-be." She stopped suddenly, wondering if she'd said too much, then realized that Hotch had absolutely no reason to suspect it was even someone from work.

"What's the sex?" asked Hotch, ignoring her offer of help for now.

"No idea," Garcia admitted. "But babies don't really care about that, do they? I mean if you give a baby boy a pink toy he'll just think 'What a lovely change from all that blue…' Or something like that!" She grinned. "I haven't really got a plan. I'm just so excited for them that I needed to get into it right away. It's a good way to channel my excitement, especially considering that I can't tell anyone…" Feeling the need to explain as Hotch raised an eyebrow at her, she continued. "They aren't telling anyone until they know it's healthy. Next week they're going to the doctors, they'll check it out, and if all goes well, they'll break the news."

"And they told you because…?"

"Sir, I'm nothing if not omniscient," Garcia laughed. He almost smiled in reply.

"Another word for nosy…" he mentioned, as they pulled into the parking lot, and Garcia agreed.

"You could say that."

By the time they had reached the baby department of the shopping centre, it occurred to Hotch that he wasn't going to get rid of Garcia anytime soon, and so he decided to use her female instincts to his advantage.

"How about this?" he asked, grabbing the first toy he saw off a shelf and holding it up for her to see.

"Well it depends on why you chose it, sir," Garcia deliberated uncertainly.

Not in the mood for half-answers, Hotch shook his head. "What do you mean?"

"Well, it's your baby. I don't know what he likes," she told him, as though it were obvious. "If you picked it up because it's similar to the sorts of things that he usually likes to play with then it's great, but if you just picked it up because it was conveniently placed near the entrance to the store, try again."

Hotch put it back silently and they kept browsing. After a few minutes of silence, Garcia spoke up.

"You said you didn't know what sort of toy your son liked, sir," she mentioned, flinching at the look her gave her. "But have you seen this rabbit thing? If he's really cut up about breaking it, maybe he'd like something similar."

Hotch shook his head. "It was just a rabbit. It didn't do anything. I mean, it was small, with big floppy ears… it might have squeaked when you pressed its stomach or something."

Garca nodded, grinning. "Come over here," she said, and she led him over to a range of similarly useless toys. "Try one of these."

Hotch grabbed the one closest to him, but put it back when Garcia started tsking at him. Stepping back a bit, he surveyed the mountain of stuffed animals, racking his brain for anything his wife might have said. For almost twenty minutes he paced around the display, picking one up, putting it back, picking one up, putting it back… and then he found it. It was perfect. Smiling wider than she'd ever seen him, Hotch held up the stuffed lion for her to see. This time he got two thumbs up.

Satisfied with his purchase, and grateful for Garcia's help, he decided to repay her by sticking around to help her choose a gift and take her home. It hadn't been a part of the deal, but he felt obliged to nonetheless. He understood that he could never have made such an appropriate choice without her help. As they searched he began to ask awkward questions about her 'friends', by way of polite conversation.

"Is this their first child?" he asked, as she shuffled through the different colours and styles of newborn clothing before her. Not looking at him, she nodded. "And you don't know the sex?" This time she shook her head. Hotch nodded thoughtfully.

"What is it?" she asked, as he started walking in the opposite direction.

"When Haley and I had Jack, we'd already got all of the obvious things: clothes, bibs, little shoes, a cot… but the room was empty of everything else. We didn't have anywhere to put his toys when he wasn't playing with them, so eventually all of the toys we got as gifts from the team and our friends just piled up in his crib until we had to move them into a closet. We had two bottles, but we didn't account for how many he would drop on the ground, so we hadn't got enough of those replaceable lids and we had to keep disinfecting them, which Jack didn't like… Those sorts of things. We also have trouble getting him to sleep, so a CD player for his—"

"Boom!" said Garcia suddenly. "I've got it!!"

Hotch found himself grinning almost imperceptibly as she led him across the shop, over to where the cribs were. "A mobile!" she exclaimed brightly. "It's unisex, it's adorable, and it'll help baby get to sleep so— so 'my friends' can have some alone time!"

Hotch nodded appreciatively and they spent the next half hour or so walking around the floor testing out each and every mobile…

By the time she got home, she was in a brilliant mood, and she could tell he was too. Maybe this was one night his wife would actually appreciate his efforts…

-

When Garcia reached the door, she was surprised to find a note taped there with her name scrawled across it. Eying it up suspiciously, she took it down and inside to read, only to be scared out of her skin when Morgan grabbed her from behind.

Dropping the letter and the box with the mobile, she glared up at him, false anger masking her terror. "Derek Morgan, how dare you try to scare me in my own house!" she chastised him, finger waggling between them.

Morgan smiled and all but ignored her as he bent down to pick up the envelope. "What's this?" he asked, waving it with an air of friendly suspicion as she shifted the box out of the doorway.

"You mean you didn't leave it on the door to distract me while you jumped me?" asked Garcia, eyebrows furrowing slightly.

"Nope, not me," he said. "It wasn't there when I came in either." He made to open it but she grabbed it off him, ignoring his raised eyebrow.

"It might be personal," she told him, as though it were obvious, and she commanded him to go and make her some tea so that she could read it in private. As he walked into the kitchen, she sat down on the couch. A quick scan of the bottom line revealed the letter to be from JJ.

Dear Penelope,

It was Emily's idea not to reveal too much in this letter, as Morgan may well be reading over your shoulder…

"Smart move, chick-a-dee…"

…but we'd like to invite you, all of you, to a party we're having at Em's on Saturday evening for you-know-what-reason. If all goes well, good news. If not, bad news, but news all the same. Dress code is ambiguous but leaning toward the formal end of the spectrum. Come expecting that champagne you've been craving since this morning!

Lots of love,

JJ

Garcia grinned widely as she put the letter down and floated a suspicious look at Morgan as he placed a glass of wine in front of her in place of the tea she'd asked him for. "What's this?" she asked coyly. "Don't tell me you're trying to get me drunk already? Don't think you can handle me sober?"

"Just drink, woman," he replied humorously as he flicked on the TV and switched the source to 'DVD player'. Using a second remote from the coffee table in front of him he dimmed the lights in the room.

"What are we watching?" asked Garcia, smiling up at him and noting his evident romanticism appreciatively.

"Titanic," he replied slowly. Then, just to spoil the moment he added, "Chicks seem to dig it, God knows why. The way you all look at Leonardo di Caprio… this movie is practically foreplay."

Garcia hit him on the arm playfully, and then snuggled into his side. "Yes, it is…" she mused to herself, a little grin playing on her face as the opening theme began to play.

"Just enjoy it while it lasts, baby girl. Next time, we're watching a guy movie," he stated seriously. "With monster trucks, boobs, blood, guts and hookers..."

Garcia's lip curled a little, but she said nothing. That was what he thought!

"You're not pissed off are you?" he asked at her silence, and she merely shook her head. Frowning, he placed a hand on her chin and tipped it up, forcing her to look at him. "I was joking you know," he told her honestly, then all of a sudden she started glaring at him, and that was when he realized... She was pissed off because he was distracting her from Leonardo di Caprio.

Pfft!

Women.

-

"Do you think it's premature of us to announce a party? I mean, what if something goes wrong, and the scan shows it on Saturday? I don't want to come home and party if that's the case," Emily said nervously, a hand over her stomach as she watched JJ pen and pocket the last invitation, Reid's.

"I know, but they're your friends, sweetie," JJ replied sympathetically, "And good or bad, they're going to want to share in what you're feeling. Don't forget, as we already know well enough: the longer we wait, the harder it will be to tell them."

"How do you think they'll react?" asked Emily quietly, causing JJ to laugh.

"If their reaction is anything like Penelope's we have absolutely nothing to worry about!" she replied, and Emily had to agree.

"She said that it was 'no surprise' to her that we're together," said Emily. "Do you think the others have noticed anything? Are we that obvious?"

"I don't know," JJ replied thoughtfully. "This is Garcia, don't forget. She's more perceptive than most."

"She has to be," said Emily. "She doesn't hear the half of what happens on cases, not the personal stuff. She has to realize for herself when someone is more upset than usual and go in with no information at all… God, Jayj, tell me you'll speak to me when you're away and I'm at home on maternity leave? Don't let me be like Pen and have to guess when something's up with my girl!"

JJ walked over behind Emily's chair to embrace her wife, planting a soft kiss on her head peacefully. "Of course I will," she told her. "You don't have to worry about a thing."

Emily turned her head and smiled up at her gratefully. "I'm so lucky to have you," she said honestly, causing JJ to smirk.

"Yes, you are," she agreed. "Wanna take a walk?"

"…Sure."

-

The second to know was Hotch.

If he'd thought his carefully, lovingly chosen toy would be enough to sate his wife's fury at his having taken so long to pick it and get home the evening before, he was wrong. Jack may have loved the toy, but not as much as Haley had been irritated by the wait. Therefore, the next day he was taxed with another baby-related task, this one to be completed in his lunch break, so that he arrived home on time. Thus, back to the baby store he went, this time in search of a new blanket, as Jack had taken to chewing his lately and it had been reduced to rags by his antics.

When he saw JJ and Emily in the shop on their lunch break, his first thought was that they must have followed him, but just as he was about to confront them, another thought struck him. What were the chances of seeing Garcia, JJ and Emily shopping for a baby in the same store in the past two days? Perhaps Garcia's 'friends' were mutual acquaintances? He then wondered if it might be someone he knew too, and he racked his brains for a pair of possible parents, starting with his team.

Briefly, he considered whether or not it was reasonable to suppose that Garcia and Morgan had yet achieved the sexual relationship they had always joked about, because he was sure that neither would consider children with anyone else. Somehow he doubted it, though, for as much as they did joke about it, with innuendos and double entendres, he guessed that they never actually talked about it and were effectively trapped in the game they were playing. Without warning, he found himself feeling sorry for them, and in order to evade the feeling, he moved on to the next of his team members.

As practical and as good a worker as she was, Hotch could hardly imagine JJ a mother. That police detective, LaMontagne had showed interest in her only months ago, but she had hardly noticed his advances, painfully obvious as they were. He had gathered from this that she was uninterested in romance at the present time, and children hardly followed from that.

As his mind fell on Reid, Hotch found himself shaking his head incredulously. The idea that Reid had impregnated a woman was unfathomable to him in the same way that one could not imagine the sexual escapades of one's son or daughter, especially when one's son or daughter was, well… Reid.

That left only Emily Prentiss, or Rossi, though he felt sure that Rossi's playboy days were coming to a necessary end. It was true that he had noticed a distinct upwards shift in Emily's demeanor recently, but he had just thought that this was natural as she began to feel more and more a part of the BAU team. He considered now that it really could be attributed to a new partner, and subsequently the conception of a child, but if he were truthful with himself, he doubted it. Secretly, he had always suspected that Emily was just a little bit gay, anyway…

Outside of the team Hotch had few mutual acquaintances with his team members and eventually he decided that speculating any further would get him nowhere, resolving to confront them instead. It was he who had the obvious and legitimate reason to be in that shop, after all!

Discrediting the theory that they had followed him, both Emily and JJ looked manifestly startled to see him there.

"Hotch!" JJ was first to exclaim, and he gathered that it seemed to be less of a greeting and more of a warning to Emily, who was engrossed in filing through pairs of kiddy pajamas beside her.

Emily's neck snapped up to look at him, eyes wide in surprise. "Sir, what are you doing here?" she asked. Shoving the pajamas she had just picked up back on the rack and pushing them away from her dissociatively. "Shopping for little Jack?"

"I might ask you the same," Hotch mentioned. "First Garcia and now you two? Who's having a baby that I don't know about?"

Though it was phrased like a joke, both Emily and JJ were keenly aware that what Hotch was really doing was requesting an explanation, and he wouldn't leave until he got one either. The two women glanced at each other awkwardly. Sure, they could lie and say that a friend was having a baby, but then in less than a week when they told the team what was going on he would know and remember that they had lied to him, if he didn't already suspect it… In the end they were saved from answering by Hotch, who had just reached a conclusion in his mind.

"Does this have anything to do with the ambiguously phrased note Haley received yesterday afternoon about dinner on Saturday?" he asked, and, glancing back at JJ for confirmation of her intentions, Emily nodded, floating a hand to her stomach and smiling guiltily.

"We were going to tell you," she promised, taking JJ's hand in hers and holding it up for Hotch to see. "I'm pregnant and, uh, JJ is my wife."

To his credit, Hotch's reaction was extremely mild. Then again, Emily couldn't help but compare it to the empty sort of look he got in briefings when gruesome murders were described to him— one of the fallbacks of have a boss unable, or unwilling, to express emotion. Eventually, though, he spelled it out for them.

"As your friend," he said slowly, "I'm nothing but happy for you. Of course, as your boss, I can't approve of my subordinates fraternizing, indeed starting a family, beyond my notice."

JJ resisted the urge to glance over and see how Emily was taking this, instead staring straight ahead at her superior. "Yes, sir. We understand," she said, giving her spouse's hand a little squeeze of encouragement.

A few moments passed in silence, then Hotch cracked a smile. "As it has been, as I said, happening beyond my notice, however, I can't see any harm in it… as long as Section Chief Strauss doesn't come to hear about my saying so. Emily, you'll have to file for maternity leave at some point. In the mean time, try to avoid unnecessary risks."

JJ looked at Emily now as she responded in the affirmative. She was beaming.

"Thanks, Hotch," she said gratefully. "It means a lot to us that you approve!"

JJ confirmed this but Hotch merely nodded humbly, and after some more light conversation, as they parted, he couldn't help but wonder, considering the dynamics between Morgan and Garcia, and now JJ and Emily, whether or not there was something in the cop coffee after all…