Well... nobody hurt me. That's all I have to say haha.
Disclaimer: I do not own CM
-kbrewster.
Emily sat on the bed, Gabby still in her lap as she tried to process what Jack had said. How did Reid even know she was still alive? How did he know she was back? Her mind flooded with questions she wasn't sure she was ready to hear be answered. Jack handed her the phone he was holding in his hand, and she brought it to her ear, shifting Gabby in her lap so she could do so. She sat with her mouth agape for a few seconds, what was she supposed to say after ten years? What was an appropriate greeting for something like that?
"R-Reid?" she stuttered slightly, deciding that was the simplest thing she could say.
"So it is true," she heard the familiar voice on the end of the line. She couldn't tell if his tone was one of anger or just plain sadness.
"Reid," Emily said, her voice cracking. "We were going to tell you, it's just been… it's been crazy," she decided on saying, not wanting to say anything more while Gabby was still present.
"Morgan called me awhile ago to tell me, but I didn't want to believe him," Reid said. "I didn't want to believe that I was lead to believe, for ten years, that you were gone. I had to grieve for you, Emily,"
"I know," Emily said, her voice barely above a whisper, as she bit on her bottom lip to keep her tears at bay. "I never wanted it to be like this, you know that right?"
"Nobody did,"
"Are you angry with me?" Emily asked timidly, feeling more like a child than she had in years. She took the silence that followed as a yes. Emily didn't know what to say, so instead she allowed the tears she had been trying to contain fall freely, wishing she had a third hand to wipe them away with.
Hotch gently took the phone from Emily's hand, turning away to talk to Reid. Emily wiped the tears away, not even hearing whatever Hotch was saying into the phone.
She turned her attention down to Gabby, wishing she wasn't crying.
"Are you okay?" The girl asked softly, avoiding looking Emily in the eye.
"I'm fine," Emily half-lied. "Reid is just an old friend of mine..." she trailed off, but Gabby picked right up.
"You mean from.. from before?"
"Yes, sweetheart," Emily confirmed. Gabby frowned slightly. "He shouldn't be mad at you, you're still here," she reasoned. Emily wished they could all have the resilience and mindset as Gabby. She gave the girl a small smile.
"Its not that simple," Emily told her.
"Well, it should be," Gabby said quietly. Though Emily said nothing, she agreed.
A few moments later, Emily heard Hotch hang up the phone. She had willed herself not to listen in for any of Hotch's side of the conversation, fearing for the worse.
"Before you ask," Hotch began. "He doesn't hate you. He wants you to know that. He's a little angry, but not necessarily at you. More towards JJ and I," he continued. "He's processing, and I think he really does understand why it had to turn out like it did, but when I asked if he wanted to visit, he said he no. He'll come around, though," Hotch encouraged.
"I guess that's a little better that I was expecting," Emily admitted. She sighed before adding, "Should we tell Rossi?"
"If you want, Dave is the only one who doesn't know," Hotch reminded her gently.
"Can you do it now? Before I chicken out?" Emily asked.
"You bet," Hotch said as he instantly started scrolling through his contacts on his phone, locating the desired number. As Emily heard Hotch begin to talk, she again opted to not actually listen in. She distracted herself by asking Gabby what she wanted for dinner, then by asking her if she'd like to help.
After a few moments of silence between them, Emily asked yet another question, this one more serious that the previous ones.
"Are you alright?" Emily asked. "You can be honest," She added quickly, knowing that Gabby was still shaken up, considering she hadn't expressed the slightest desire to get up out of Emily's lap.
Gabby nodded her head. "It was just...scary,"
"I know," Emily said, pulling Gabby a little closer. "But you're safe now,"
"I know," Gabby said, mirroring her mother's previous tone when she had used that exact phrase. "I promise I'm alright, Mama," Gabby said more seriously.
Emily smiled, knowing that even if Gabby didn't feel that way right now, that she would soon.
"Well," Hotch said, breaking the silence that had since occurred after he'd hung up the phone. "He's not mad. Not at all. Do you know what he said to me?"
"What?" Emily asked, letting out a breath she wasn't even aware she had been holding.
"He said he, and I quote, 'had an inkling all along,'" Hotch said, laughing lightly.
"Seriously?" Emily asked, finding herself laughing ever so softly as well. "You should...we should have him over soon, where's he living now?"
"Everywhere," Hotch said coolly. "Seriously. The man's got property everywhere,"
"Well, then, next time he's in this vicinity, we're having him over. That okay, Smarty Pants?" Emily asked.
"That's fine, Sarcasm Queen, "
"Weirdos," they heard Jack mutter jokingly from the door frame he'd been leaning on.
Feeling calmer than they had in the past few hours, they all headed into the kitchen, where Emily and Hotch worked together to make dinner, while Gabby decided to take it upon herself to teach Jack French in the living room. The two adults found themselves giggling to each other when they heard Gabby scolding Jack for mispronouncing a word, or not using the proper accent.
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The next three days went by smoothly, and now it was the middle of the week. Emily had been concerned about Gabby on Sunday, as the little girl had seemed to grow clingy and wasn't fond of the idea of Emily not being in her line of sight. However, by now, Gabby was back to her old self.
Emily was teaching Gabby, something she had taken upon herself to do every day since their return to the states. Gabby loved to learn, so Emily made sure despite her lack of public school attendance, she taught Gabby something new everyday. Currently, Emily was quizzing Gabby on her knowledge of her multiplication tables and spelling abilities.
Hotch had been going through paint samples all morning in his Study, picking out colors he thought Gabby might like. The room she had claimed as hers had previously been a guest room, so it was painted white, the colors of the room much too bland for a spunky girl like Gabby. He decided he wanted to let her pick out a color and get it painted the following weekend, hoping Emily would then take over the decorating portion as he wasn't so great at that.
He was so absorbed in what he was doing, he almost didn't hear his phone ringing on the desk next to him. He picked it up quickly, recognizing the number as Jack's school's number.
"Hello?" he answered, utterly confused as to why the school would be calling him in the middle of the day on a Wednesday.
The man on the other end of the line said he was from Jack's school, and that Jack was sick and needed a way home, since they didn't allow any sick students to drive home. Hotch was wary at first, Jack had seemed fine this morning, but the number was definitely Jack's school, so he quickly hung up the phone and relayed the message to Emily.
He had to admit, he was hesitant to leave Emily and Gabby alone, but Emily insisted they would be fine for the time being, so Hotch left for Jack's school.
"Can we be done now Mama?" Gabby asked, slouching down in her seat at the kitchen table where Emily had been teaching her.
Emily smiled, closing the laptop they had been using. "We can stop for now, you did great today," Emily said, ruffling Gabby's hair lightly as she went to go put away the laptop.
She returned from the Study, to find Gabby sitting upside down on the couch, her legs up against the backrest and her head hanging off the seat, absorbed in a book. Emily laughed to herself. So, her daughter had wanted to stop her schooling for the day just to sit on the couch and read. She truly was her mother's daughter.
Just as Emily was about to sit next to Gabby, there was a knock at the door. Emily tensed up a bit, slowly and quietly making her way to the front door. She held her finger up to her lips when Gabby met her eye, signaling for the girl to stay quiet.
Emily looked in the peephole, thankful Hotch had one installed. She was horrified at the figure she saw standing at the door.
"Gabby, go upstairs to your room," Emily instructed, her voice just above a whisper.
"Why? Who is it?" Gabby questioned, closing her book and doing a back flip off the couch, landing right on her feet, something Emily would have ordinarily scolded her for doing.
"Gabby, just go, please," Emily said a bit more harshly than she meant to.
"I know you're in there, Love," she heard through the door. Her entire body froze, and a queasy feeling hit her instantly.
She turned towards Gabby, ushering her up the stairs quickly.
"Go to your room, baby. Don't come out until I come get you," Emily said, trying to stay calm and keep Gabby distracted. However Gabby was too perceptive, and knew right away who was there.
"He found us," Gabby whispered, obviously terrified.
"Let me handle it, okay? Go on," Emily said, leading the girl into her bedroom quickly, planting a kiss on her forehead before closing and locking the door behind her. The last thing she wanted to do was leave Gabby alone, but she had no other option. She had to get rid of Doyle.
She quietly crept down the stairs, though Ian was still knocking on the door, much more forcefully than he had done previously.
"Are you going to let me in, Love?" Ian said harshly. "Or are you going to make me come in there myself?"
Emily refused to speak back to him, it was a long shot she knew, but maybe she could really convince him they weren't at home.
The brunette was quietly searching around for the phone- she needed to call 911. She wished more more than ever that she was still an FBI Agent- she wouldn't need the help of 911.
Just as Emily found the house phone, somehow buried under the couch cushions even though the phone was hardly ever used anymore, she heard the sound of the door being broken down.
With shaking hands, she tried dialing the three simple numbers, but before she could, a hand wrapped around her wrist, twisting her arm behind her. The phone that had been in Emily's hand was thrown across the room, well out of Emily's reach.
"Hello, Love," Ian said lowly, directed in Emily's ear. Emily quickly wriggled her way out of Ian's graps, spinning around to face him.
"No, Ian, I'm not your love. You need to leave now," she said, trying to remain calm as she inched her way over to the phone.
"Not so fast," Ian said, beating her to her desired destination, taking the phone and putting it in the pocket of his jacket.
"Where is she?" He asked bitterly, his blue eyes burning with anger.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Emily said, mentally planning her moves to get the precious phone back from the man standing in front of her.
"The girl," Ian spat. "I know you have a daughter. You took my son from me, so I'm going to take her from you,"
Emily could only feel anger, she could no longer think rationally about anything. All she thought about was the dark-haired, brown-eyed, terrified little girl upstairs all by herself. Emily lunged at Doyle, determined to take him down, just long enough for her to call for help.
She grabbed onto his jacket, trying to get her hand into his pocket, but he pushed her away with enough force to send her falling backwards to the ground.
In the midst of it all, Emily and Ian both heard the sound of a soft, fearful cry. Everything inside Emily went numb when she glanced upwards towards the staircase, and saw Gabby sitting atop the stairs, her knees pulled up to her chest.
Emily pushed herself up off the ground and past Ian before the man even had a chance to make a move towards Gabby. Before she made it up the stairs, she felt her ankle being pulled. Ian had grabbed hold of her ankle and pulled her backwards down the stairs. She crawled up the stairs, knowing she didn't have enough time to stand herself upright. She wrapped her arms around Ian's neck and pulled him down, trying to get him as far away from her daughter as she possibly could.
Though both Ian and Emily were ten years older now, neither of them seemed to have lost their strength, making it an almost equal fight. Ian flung Emily off of him, sending her falling down the stairs for a second time.
The next thing Emily knew, she was hit in the head with something. She didn't see what, all she knew was it hurt, the force of the hit had sent her face planting onto the ground. Everything was beginning to get blurry. She slowly brought her hand to her head, she felt blood. She tried with every bit of strength she had left to pull herself up, she still had to get to Gabby. But she couldn't, she simply couldn't get up. She heard Gabby calling for her, she heard her crying.
"Gabby..." Emily called softly, unable to project her voice. Her eyes were fluttering, threatening to close, but she fought it. She made out the outline of Ian, Gabby in his hands. She could hear Gabby continuing to scream and cry for her, but she simply couldn't do anything.
"No, no!" Emily said weakly, trying to push herself up with her hands, but failing. "No!" she said again, before her eyes simply couldn't stay open any longer, and she fell victim to the darkness.
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Gabby was terrified. The man who had tried to take her at the Aquarium, had her now. He'd hurt her mom, and she had no idea where she was going. Gabby had tried to run and hide, but the man found her. She hid under her bed, and tried to be as quiet as she could, but he still found her. He picked her up and took her out to his car. She had tried calling for her mom, growing even more terrified when she saw her mom was hurt, too hurt to get up and stop the man from taking her.
When she'd been sat in the back of the car, he told her to keep quiet. Gabby closed her eyes, and started making a list of everything she loved. It was something Emily had taught Gabby to do at a young age when she would get upset, and since Emily couldn't be there now, Gabby tried to do it herself, instead of verbally expressing them to Emily, she kept the list in her head.
The whole time they were in the car, the man never spoke. He just drove, and kept looking in his rear view mirror, like he was waiting for something, or making sure nobody was following him. It made Gabby even more nervous than she already was. She just wanted to go home, back to her parents, back to Jack.
She wanted to know where they were going, they'd been driving for a pretty long time it felt like. She wondered if her mom was okay, she wondered if her dad was back home yet. She wondered if they were looking for her.
Suddenly, she felt the car come to a stop. She glanced up to see the man turned around looking right at her. She sank back as far as she could into the seat just to put a little more distance between them.
"We're going on a trip," the man said. "You're going to act like you're my daughter. If you start screaming and crying like you did back at the house, you'll be very, very sorry. Do I make myself clear?" he asked quietly, in a tone that made Gabby's heart pound faster than it already was. She was too scared to say anything, so she quickly nodded her head. He opened his car door, and opened Gabby's for her, motioning for her to come out. She hesitantly climbed out of the car, waiting as the man closed both car doors. She flinched, only slightly but enough to earn a stern glare from the man, when he reached down to grab her hand.
She looked around, realizing they were in an airport. The only time Gabby had been on a plane was when she was coming from France to America. So, she reasoned, if the man was taking her on a plane, they must be going somewhere far away. Gabby wanted to cry, and she felt like she might throw up.
Ian led her through the airport, and before long they found themselves seated on a plane. He still hadn't mentioned where they were going. Gabby sat next to the window, leaning as far back into the seat as she could, kicking her legs back and forth out of nervousness. She glanced to her right, and took in a breath.
She built up the courage to ask, ever so quietly, "Where are we going?"
"I'll show you when we get there," he said.
Gabby had about a thousand more questions, but she didn't want to ask anymore, so instead she turned her attention elsewhere, looking out the window. The last time she had flown in an airplane, it had only been Gabby, her mom, and Anthony. This time, the plane was pull of other passengers. Gabby didn't like it, and really wished her mom was with her now, instead of Ian. Before long, the plane took off and they were in the air. Gabby tried sleeping like she had last time, but she couldn't bring herself to relax enough for that.
What felt like ten years and sixteen different planes later, Ian finally told her they had arrived. He took Gabby by the hand again, leading her off the plane and getting into a black car that seemed to be waiting for them. Ian and the man driving the car began speaking in another language. It wasn't French, so Gabby couldn't understand what they were saying.
Though Gabby was so tired she could hardly keep her eyes open, she rested her head against the window of the car, looking out at all the buildings and scenery before her. Wherever they were, it was busy. There was a lot of people, too. Slowly, the masses of people and buildings seemed to get fewer and farther in between. Gabby's eyes widened when she saw the car was pulling into the driveway of a house- possibly the biggest house she had ever seen. It was white, and the roof was brown. It looked like it had at least three floors. The windows were huge. There was a big tree that shaded the back end of the house. Though magnificently large, Gabby had to admit the outside of the house wasn't very pretty at all. It looked old- like maybe no one had lived there in a long time. The grass was too tall. There was what looked like a garden towards the side of the house, but everything was overgrown, brown, and wilted.
The car had stopped in the driveway, and Ian opened the back door for Gabby, motioning for her to get out of the car. With shaky hands, Gabby unbuckled her seat belt and got out of the car, trailing a few feet behind Ian. He unlocked the door to the house, and once they were both inside, he locked it back. He lead Gabby up the stairs, into a bedroom. The walls were painted white, just like Gabby's walls at home. She felt her throat clench when she thought about how Hotch had told her she could paint them this weekend. The bed was huge- much bigger than any bed Gabby had seen before besides the one in what was now her parent's bedroom. The bedspread was a light yellow.
There was a dresser at the opposite end of the room, with a large, round mirror in the middle. Attached to the room was a bathroom, with its own shower and everything. Gabby took in the room's appearance before skeptically glancing upward in Ian's direction.
"This is where you'll stay," he said. He wasn't mean about it, but Gabby knew he wasn't happy either. "I've got somebody bringing the both of us clothes and things," he added.
He went on to explain that she could go anywhere in the house she wanted- except for Ian's Study. She was never allowed to go in there for any reason whatsoever. She also wasn't allowed to go outside. It reminded Gabby a little bit of the movie Beauty and the Beast. Only, she was pretty sure Ian wasn't a real beast, and that there was no enchanted spell on his house that could easily pass for a castle.
Once Ian made sure Gabby understood the rules, he turned and left her alone, closing the bedroom door behind her. Gabby climbed up on the bed, and got under the covers, wrapping them all the way around her so nothing was showing except her face. She was tired, hungry, and just wanted to go home. She hoped she wouldn't be at this place long, and she really hoped Emily was okay and that they were looking for her.
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Ian closed the door to Gabby's new bedroom, stunned that he had actually managed to pull it off. Of course he'd had every intention of being successful when he figured out how to tap into Jack's school's telephone lines, making a call and posing as someone from there. With Hotch and Jack both out of the house, Ian knew it increased his chances of getting Gabby from Emily. He knew Emily would put up a fight, she always did. However, he called it luck when she'd fallen down the stairs a second time. He took her brief moment down as an opportunity to grab a picture frame off the wall. He hit her in the head with it, and it gave him the perfect opportunity to take Gabby and run. Then, they got on the plane, and they headed for his old villa in Italy, a place he hadn't been in nearly twenty years.
The villa needed some serious clean-up and renovation. But luckily, over the years Ian had maintained a few very close, very reliable sources. By the end of the week, the villa would look completely different from the outside. He had someone bringing necessary items for Gabby and himself, as well as things to restock the bare refrigerator. He had someone coming to clean up the landscape, making the outside look as radiant as it once had before.
He knew they couldn't stay here forever. Ian knew Emily was smart and strong-willed. He knew that eventually, she would piece everything together, she would find out where Ian had taken Gabby. He also knew she would take it upon herself to come to him, she always did. And he would be good and ready for her when she came, too.