Ch 6
The tears began to fall down Emily's face. Slowly and silently at first then they quickly turned into giant sobs. She pulled her feet up onto the bed as she cured herself into the fetal position. She desperately wanted to roll into a tight ball and block out the world. Unfortunately the sharp continuous pain from her ribs prevented her from doing so. The position was a defense mechanism a fairly primitive one to stop the pain but it wasn't working which only caused Emily to become more frustrated.
She hated the fact that the Unsub had laced back up her corset it felt too tight. She felt trapped as though it was still suffocating her. She desperately wanted to rip if off and the fact that she couldn't even get it off if she wanted to made her cry harder.
She was no longer Agent Prentiss FBI she was being reduced to a stupid helpless damsel in distress from one of those stupid stories. Agent Prentiss hated to cry and Agent Prentiss beat people up and shot threatening Unsubs. Agent Prentiss was tough and great at compartmentalizing. But Agent Prentiss was gone and all that was left was Emily and Emily cried when she was scared and in pain, Emily was emotional and Emily needed to be rescued.
She couldn't reason with this guy, he was too smart, too organized and too goal oriented. He would do and risk everything to finish his plan he would never stop until he was killed or arrested. She hoped that would happen before he killed her.
The thought of being placed in a glass box and left to suffocate scared the hell out of her. She has just experienced what it would be like—her lungs still burned from it—it was a terrifying death. The thought of it alone was enough to make her freak out and she desperately tried to get air. In the back of her brain she knew was being trusted into a panic attack. But just like everything else she was powerless to stop it. She couldn't breathe, couldn't relax and couldn't stop crying.
Emily was not one to cry often, she was very good at compartmentalizing everything she saw during her working hours. There were days when she would come home from a really bad case and just cry but she almost never cried in front of people, especially in front of the team, that wasn't how she operated, a lesson taught to her by her mother. But now stuck in the den of this monster the lesson was gone along with her ability to compartmentalizing. She couldn't wear her mast of indifference any more this was far to personal.
When she had been held captive and beaten by Cyrus he had inflicted bruised that were meant to look bad but didn't leave much lasting marks. She had meant it when she told Reid that the bruises looked worse than they were. Cyrus had only bruised her ribs which hurt like hell, but this guy broke some ribs, the pain was ten times worse; it was a sharp searing and continuous pain. Logically she knew that have the corset on was preventing her from moving and actually lessening the pain she could be in but that didn't mean she wanted it on, it was a means of torture and she wanted nothing more then to remove it and prevent it from ever hurting her again.
If it had just been the pain she could have taken it, but there was a much bigger psychological element at work. He told her he was going to kill her, told her how he was going to do it and he just showed her how it was going to feel and she knew he wasn't bluffing. She had spent days helping the police try and catch this man and they had come up with nothing. And in her mind she couldn't help but feel that there was no chance of anyone finding her and no chance of escape.
To psychologically control a captive one only needs to appear to hold all the cards but every once in a while the captor really is holding all the cards and this was one of those times. He was in control, he decided when he would hurt her, how he would hurt her and there was no way out. He chose when she lived and when she died and he chose to make –what could possibly be her last days of Earth—a living hell filled with fear and pain.
As much as she didn't want to she couldn't help but feel like a captive princess who disparately needed a prince to save her. The man she wanted to save her was not a prince he was one of the finest FBI agents she knew and she would rather have her life in his hand over a prince any day. These thoughts didn't surprise her but she didn't expect how strong her desires where.
Crying from her place on the bed all she wanted was for Aaron Hotchner to open that door sweep her off the bed into his arms and carry her out of there. These fairy tales were seeping into her consciousness and she knew it was a reaction to being held hostage. Still all she wanted was for Hotch to tear the corset off her tell her the guy was dead and take her away to a waiting ambulance. She wouldn't even argue with the EMT she would go willingly. Not the most romantic thought but there wasn't much romance or glamorous about being tortured and killed. But it was Aaron she wanted to get her out of here.
She had slowly been falling in love with her boss, she wanted to say that this has started when he nearly got blow up in New York but if she was honest these feelings probably started about six months after she joined the BAU. The feelings had grown so slowly it was unnoticeable for a very long time. She should have realized there were some feeling there when was willing to give up her dream job to protect him, but she didn't.
She became a close friend over the years and then came Foyet. She knew something was wrong when he didn't show up for the case, he always has his phone on, she knew that but she kept telling herself it was nothing. But as the time passed and he didn't show she became desperate to know what was wrong and later desperate to find him. Then when she saw him in that hospital bed it was a relief but she has also been filled with dread. He could have died, if he had died the important parts of her would have died too. Afterwards she just wanted to make sure he was recovering and healing, especially after Haley's death eight months ago.
She had begun to think of him as Aaron in her head over the last year but she never called him that out loud, she was always very careful only Dave called him Aaron. Part of her had wanted to tell him how she felt but it was never the right time. A romantic relationship could ruin both their friendship and careers. Then one night about two months ago after Jack had gone to bed they were sitting on the couch talking about nothing of any great importance. Emily was in the middle of telling some story when out of the blue Hotch kissed her. She was shocked at first and then over joyed at the prospect that he had similar feeling for her. Yet as soon as he had finished kissing her he began apologizing.
"Emily I am so sorry"
"No Hotch I like it."
"I know but I can't, I'm your boss and I know that sounds pathetic but if I was going to ask you to risk your job, your heart, and our friendship I would want to give you some sort of guarantee. And right now I can't guarantee anything, I don't know if I even have a heart to give you. But I like spending time with you and talking with you, I feel better after talking with you. I know it is a lot to ask but will you stick around no promises except the promise of good company and good conversations?"
She agreed freely, "I will take you anyway I can' get you, I will always be here for you and Jack, no promises needed."
They sat in silence for the rest of the night with the TV on in hushed tones until she began to doze on his shoulder. They never talked about that night again, they continued on talking and keeping each other company as they had done before the kiss. Yet despite what she said to him that night Emily couldn't help but want more and she would sometimes catch herself day dreaming of the day when he could make promises.
But she also knew that as long as Aaron and his son were alive and well and she got to spend time with both of them than she could live keeping her feelings to herself. But now she was going to die and her only regret was going to be never telling him that she wanted more, never getting to kiss him again. God she didn't want to die.
She had been able to regulate her breathing a bit as she though of Aaron though the tears refused to stop. But the thought of never getting to see Hotch or any of the others again caused her panic to grow. She wanted to get out, she didn't want the unsub to hurt her again and she didn't want to be locked in this room by herself anymore. A new round of gut wrenching sobs over took her, they came so fast that she was barely able to breath.
The panic attack began to take complete control over her and all she could see was Hotch's face and that only made the attack worse. The more she thought about Aaron the harder she cried and the more she began to panic and the harder it became to breath. And it wasn't getting better anymore it was getting worse.
Emily couldn't control the tears or her breathing anymore. She was finally caught in a full blown panic attack and unsurprisingly she began to hyperventilate. "Aaron" Emily gasped softly; she couldn't stop herself as his name escaped along with a moan. Soon she was barelyg getting any air into her lungs between the sobs and the world rapidly began to go dark as Emily fell into a blissful unconsciousness.
