Above all things, never be afraid. The enemy who forces you to retreat is himself afraid of you at that very moment.
-Andre Maurois
"You are a liar," Samuel said, running the barrel of his gun from the back of Angie's head down to the small of her back. She trembled, the frying pan still held in midair. "I bring you home." He cut off. "Turn around. I want to look at you before I kill you."
"W-why would you kill me?"
"You're not Virginia. She would never do that to me. She would never fight me."
Angie inhaled sharply, her lungs burning. She messed up and she knew it. If only she had waited for a better time, she could have gotten away without all of this happening.
She turned slowly, the pan clutched protectively to her chest. His eyes were wild and furious, his lips twisted into the most terrifying grimace she had ever seen. Blood stained his white shirt, though she wasn't sure if it was hers or his.
Samuel stuck the gun into his belt, his other hand pulling something black from his pocket. With a swift movement, a blade covered in dried blood sprung out. Angie's eyes settled on it, the world melting away. Her palms almost dropped the pan from shaking.
Something clicked in Angie's head. Everything flashed by, everything she'd be leaving behind if she won. She looked back on college, on El Paso, on joining NCIS. Everything she had ever done would be for nothing, and that was more terrifying than any man with a bloody knife.
She did not speak as she jabbed her heel into his foot, grabbing his gun while he was distracted. The pain did not distract him for long, but the sight of his own gun in his face stopped him in his tracks. Her hands were steadier than they had ever been with her own gun. Adrenaline pulsed through her veins, her breath deep and concentrated. "Listen to me," she said evenly, trying her hardest not to pull the trigger right then. The image of her making out with Spencer popped into her head, followed by her waking up in a strange home. She watched him hit her again in her head, the memories only fueling her anger. She was still scared out of her wits, but she wasn't going to let him win. Gibbs wouldn't let him win. "Either you back away from me and drop the knife, or I pull the trigger.
Whether it was because he was delusional, or because he was so stupid, Samuel began to move forward, the knife out. Without hesitation she shot him, hitting him squarely between the eyes. He fell to the ground, most of the bathroom sprayed with blood and brain matter. Angie dropped the gun, falling to her knees. He was dead. She was okay. Her nose was probably broken, and she would need stitches, but she was alive. Relief should have flooded through her, but it didn't. She simply burst into tears, her entire body quaking from the force of her sobs. The pictures of all those women he killed were so fresh in her mind, and she had almost become one of them. She had almost become another case file, another number on a manila folder. It was all so overwhelming and scary.
A loud noise from somewhere in the house startled her out of her weeping. "FBI," a man's voice called, followed by the shuffle of several feet.
Angie pushed herself off the floor and scrambled out of the room, calling out to Morgan's voice. He was not, however, the first she saw bursting through the kitchen door. Spencer entered frantically, gun out. When he saw her, covered in blood and bruises, he put it back in his holster and ran to her, wrapping his arms around her. She shuddered in his arms, screaming about what had happened and how she had somehow found the courage to kill him. She cried about how she thought she was going to die, and how she was afraid of never seeing her family again.
&&&&
"I'm really sorry about leaving you," Spencer said for the umpteenth time, perched in a chair beside Angie's hospital bed. "I shouldn't have. This is my fault."
"No it's not. I wasn't cautious. I wasn't thinking." Her face was swollen and bruised, and her nose several times its normal size, even beneath bandages. She looked terrible, and she knew it. She wanted to hide beneath the covers and wait until everything went away.
She had been in the hospital for about a day. Though her injuries were not critical in any way, the doctors wanted to keep her overnight to make sure she was okay "in every way." It was obvious they wanted to make sure she didn't have some emotional breakdown.
Spencer had not left her side since they arrived at the house. Even in the ambulance, he stayed there. Neither of them was sure if he didn't leave out of guilt, or because he really cared. Either way, Angie was grateful. It touched her that he cared so much, and it was nice having somebody there to hold her hand every time she lost it.
"God, I feel so pathetic," she said, pressing the good side of her face into Spencer's chest. "I was so weak and helpless. Now it's all over, and I still…" She cut off, biting down on her lip.
"You're not." He ran his fingers through her hair, his other hand stroking her arm. "I know what you feel."
Angie thought back to a conversation she'd had with Tony soon after they had been teamed up with the BAU. He said he'd heard about this team from a friend of his. She knew all about Spencer being held by a lunatic, just as she had been. On their way to the hospital, Spencer tried to tell her bits of the story in hopes of calming her down, though all it managed to do was freak her out more. He eventually quit, realizing just how bad he was at comforting women.
"God," she moaned, tightening her arms around him. "God."
There was a knock at her door, followed by Tony carrying a foam cup of coffee. "They don't have the best coffee here, but I got you a cup anyway. I know you like it super sweet."
She managed to get up a smile and thanked him for the cup. The steaming liquid burned the wound on her upper lip, but not enough that she couldn't appreciate some caffeine. She needed something in her system other than painkillers and emptiness.
"So how are you doing?" He and Gibbs had been at the house, but Gibbs sent him to the hotel to pick up a change of clothes for her.
"As good as I can be. Everybody came by to see how I'm doing, but they left back to the… the… there. To do their jobs."
Tony smiled and dropped a backpack on a chair. "I was supposed to grab you a change of clothes, but I wasn't sure what you'd want, so I just emptied your hotel drawer into your bag. Figured you'd be better at picking out your clothing than me."
"Haha. Thanks, Tony."
The older NCIS agent stood there awkwardly for a moment, his eyes traveling between the pair in front of him, before he decided to make his leave. His excuse was that he had to get back to helping Gibbs, but he wasn't fooling anybody. Angie was kind of happy for it, too. She really didn't want to be around anybody but Spencer.
Spencer pulled her closer, resting his chin on the top of her head. She liked being held by somebody, something she had not encountered for quite some time. She had dumped her previous man before moving to DC, and never really had the time to go out looking for another one. There was just something special about Spencer. She had never had that connection with anybody before.
&&&&
Gibbs had all but forced her to take a vacation after returning from the case-gone-wrong, but Angie didn't want to. Sitting at home with nothing to do wasn't exactly her idea of getting better. The only way she was going to move on was if she had things to occupy her time.
About a month or so passed before she started feeling a little normal. She still jumped if someone walked up behind her unexpectedly, and she was still seeing things out of the corner of her eyes, but the nightmares had stopped. Angie had always been a resilient person, so it didn't surprise her or her family to know she was recovering nicely.
She found herself spending a lot of time with Abby down in the lab, watching and learning from the master. At first it wasn't her choice, as Gibbs deliberately gave her assignments that required her to stay in the office while the other team members went to the crime scenes, but she didn't really mind all that much. Plus Abby was a lot of fun to hang around with.
Outside of work, Angie wasn't able to see Spencer as often as she would have liked. She knew from experience that it was probably a good idea, as too much of one person too soon can and usually will lead to a very short relationship. Both of them worked often, and Spencer spent much of the time packed up and gone with the BAU. Angie's cases were generally in DC, and even if her team had to leave, she stayed behind to do whatever was needed at the office.
&&&&
Angie awoke with a start, finding her face pressed into the cushion of her couch. Groggy from her unexpected nap, she stood to answer the annoying phone that had disturbed her much-needed slumber. "Hello?" She answered, unable to hide the exhaustion from her voice.
"Angie!" The voice of her mother propelled itself through the phone. Angie was never sure what caused her mother to speak so loudly into the phone, but it was something her mother had always done. Angie enjoyed teasing her mother about it, saying the reason Mrs. Martinez raised her voice so much was to make sure the person on the other end could hear her without the use of a telephone.
"Hi mom," Angie responded, falling back onto the couch. The front of her robe fell open slightly, but she could care less. It wasn't like anybody else was there to see.
"What are you up to?"
"Watching TV. Got out of the shower not too long ago." She checked the clock to see what time it was. If her memory was right, she had only been asleep for fifteen minutes. No wonder she felt so horribly tired.
"That's nice. Are you going to call your father tomorrow?"
"Yes, yes, I will. I do remember his birthday every now and then."
"Well good."
"Is that all you called about?"
Her mother paused. "No, no. I just wanted to let you know we're having a family reunion in Juarez next month. Your grandmother is ill, and she wants to see everyone."
It was not news to Angie that her abuela was sick, as the old woman had been suffering from breast cancer for over a year. Still, it was disheartening to hear that her grandmother was calling everyone together so abruptly. It meant she knew she didn't have much longer left.
"Have Dad e-mail me everything so I can make arrangements."
Angie ended the conversation with her mother, suddenly very much awake, but just as exhausted as she had been before. Her hair was still wet enough to cling to her back. She got up and grabbed a bottle of lotion out of her bedroom, distracting herself by applying it to her arms and legs. It was a nightly ritual, though every now and then she forgot.
It seemed like she wasn't going to get much alone-time that night when the doorbell rang. Irritated and in a very anti-human mood, Angie stood and went to answer the door. On the other side was no other than Spencer. Quickly she realized she was wearing nothing but a short robe, pulling it tightly around her body. Her cheeks flushed red. "Spencer! What are you doing here?"
"I just, uh, just wanted to stop by and see how you were doing. We haven't spoken much lately."
"I know, I'm sorry." She stepped back and gestured for him to enter. She was beginning to feel extremely self-conscious. He had felt more of her than he was seeing right then, but back at the police station she had been caught up in the moment. Modesty rules didn't apply.
Spencer was feeling just as awkward. A robe shouldn't have been a big deal, but every second or so he had to remind himself not to stare at her legs, and that breasts, even those concealed by cotton fabric, were meant to feed babies, not to be ogled by awkward geniuses.
"So how have you been?" Spencer fidgeted with the strap on his brown bag, his eyes unable to meet hers.
"Good, I guess. Better than a lot of people would be, I guess."
"Awesome, awesome…"
Angie wanted to kick herself for being so hesitant. It was like ever since they got back, they couldn't just be themselves. She wondered if DC had some sort of curse over her so that she couldn't meet a guy and keep him, too. Looking back over their stay in Chesapeake, she mused over what she had done differently that she could do again.
There was always the physical aspect of things, which sounded nice. Or she could just go into the other room and change into something decent, come back out and talk to him like humans, not animals hunting for a mate. She almost laughed at the memory of something Ziva had said regarding the subject of animal mating and humans.
Spencer was really only there because Morgan had all but handcuffed him and forced him to go. It wasn't that he didn't want to see Angie, because he did. He just hated that he was almost as awkward then as the day he had met her, despite everything that had happened in the short time they had known each other. And just when he felt he could be comfortable again, thoughts of their heated make-out session crept back into his head and his shyness returned.
Angie had always been a bit of a romantic daredevil, often pushing her luck in situations with men. Generally they ended well, but there was always that risk that she'd get rejected and labeled the "pushy" or "crazy" woman. Whatever her odds were, she felt that whatever damage could be done had been done, and pretending nothing ever happened was a bad idea.
She summoned up all the courage she had in her and stepped close to Spencer, his eyes widening as she did so. She pushed him gently onto the couch, his lips stammering to create words that he lost as soon as they came to him. Despite his confusion, his brain kicked in and he forgot that he really wasn't all that experienced with women. Thoughtlessly, one hand reached out and pulled the cotton belt from around her waist.
