Just about getting this chapter up on Sunday! It's not been beta'd as I'm too unorganised to have got this to Chiroho quick enough, so there will be bags of errors no doubt! However, this chapter flowed a lot more freely than the previous two – something to do with writing Hotch I think!

Thank you for the reviews – please keep them coming and I'm sorry I've not done individual replies this time. The weekend's gone a little fast again.

However, I will endeavour to get another chapter up on Tuesday or Wednesday and then Friday.

Don't forget to get behind Paget Brewster and A.J. Cook in light of the recent CBS news. Twitter is a good place to be to help!

Where the Blue of the Night

"The landscape belongs to the person who looks at it."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Chapter Twenty Four

November 7th

The sweet light of dusk can illuminate a pink foxglove in such a way that beauty is summed up in one glance. A glint of light seeps through a gap in the fence from the setting sun, catching delicate petals painted a hue that no artist could ever muster. But next to that beauty is a shadow, where something unthinkable lies. How can such darkness be found next to something so perfect?

There was no sound from downstairs, his mother having soundproofed the room several years before he left the house in order for them to have more privacy. Sophie was quite comfortable down there, he was sure of that, and that made him feel a little less guilty about what he had done to her. She wasn't to blame for any of this, and if the people who supposedly had her best interests at heart did what they should, she would come to no harm.

He rocked backwards and forwards on the chair, looking out over the garden. It was a beautiful evening; the sky was clear, streaks of red across the navy blue in the distance. Red sky at night, his mother had used to say, shepherds' delight.

A bird called; the sound low and clear across the trees. He could just about make it out, sat on top of the outhouse that used to be used as an ice house, its cellars deep and stony. The perfect place.

The perfect place.

He took out his laptop and switched it on, the warmth of a chiminea and his thick jacket enough fight off the chill of the night. He needed to communicate with the team, to warn them of the consequences of their action, of what stopping him from becoming one of them had resulted in. Of what it had cost.

Dusk's final encore dimmed; the memories of a summer foxglove no more.

The car was cold inside now the engine had stopped running. Agent Boyd had killed the noise about an hour ago, opening his flask of coffee and using that to keep him warm instead. He knew this was futile; common sense told him to tell Aaron Hotchner of his suspicions, but he had a feeling he'd be shot down, dismissed with a 'we'll look into it' and then sent to keep an eye on someone else instead. When he should be here.

He shivered, checking the time on his watch. It was nearly eleven and he should have been back at the safe house, playing crib or poker with the rest of his team that had been seconded. They'd kept a certain distance from the profilers, needing that space in a situation that was more intense that what they'd been used to. None of them knew, neither his team nor Hotch's, where he was right now. They thought he was meeting with Agent Cavendish who had been assigned to Strauss as extra protection, and Cavendish thought he was somewhere else entirely.

It didn't matter. He was safe, as the weapon itching at his waste told him. And besides, the man responsible for all this was currently sat in his study, visible at the window as he sat at his desk with the curtains wide open.

Boyd rubbed his hands together, trying to relieve the numbness that had seeped into his fingers since the flask of coffee had been drained, but there was no warmth to be found. He heard a coyote calling across the silence that had become eerie some time ago, and wondered if he should call it a night. It was at least an hour's drive back to the safe house and tiredness was beginning to creep it now the adrenaline had worn off.

His man wasn't going anywhere tonight. He was probably planning his next move, writing some sick note that would fill another one of his colleagues – Hotch's colleagues – with fear. Boyd figured he could set of now, quietly start the car's engine, and drive to the hospital where Morgan was and look in on him. Then his lengthened absence would have a reason.

His gun twitched in its holster. It would be so easy, so easy, just to knock on the door and enter, accept a coffee in the same way as the night when Mansfield had died, then pull that trigger. But the agent inside him wasn't a murderer yet, and instead of getting out of the car, Boyd started the engine, pulling himself away with difficulty.

She went back a few hours later to make sure that the boy was okay. He was, sat huddled in the duvet she had bought new for him. It wasn't cold inside the house, and as she wasn't paying for the heating she'd made sure it was pleasant enough in the bedroom. He had a bathroom and a lavatory, and she'd left him some snacks so he wouldn't be hungry if she hadn't been able to get back before morning.

"What is the matter, Alfie?" she said, sitting on the bed next to him.

He pulled away, which made her anxious. Previously, by this stage, they'd gotten over their fear and started to realise that she was only going to look after them, to feed them and care for them, but he'd stayed distant and sullen.

"I want mommy," he said, his thumb hovering at the edge of his mouth.

She moved his hand away gently. "You shouldn't suck your thumb, baby. It puts dirt in your mouth. And I've told you before, you're mommy's not a good woman. You didn't even know who your daddy was."

He looked at her wide eyed, and she wondered how much he understood. She knew that children of this age could be coaxed round easily, that they could forget about their previous life and fall into their new one. She hoped Alfie would begin to develop this soon and then they could leave together and start a new life elsewhere. There was a chance this time that she wouldn't have to end things. She had money saved up, money that was hers alone and no one else's. They could go away together, Canada maybe, and be happy.

Happy.

That was all she wanted.

To be happy.

"Do you want me to tell you a story, Alfie?" Martha said, pulling her legs up onto the bed.

Alfie nodded, his thumb in his mouth despite all that she had said.

"That's good, because I know loads of good stories. You like stories about princesses?"

He shook his head.

"What about adventures?"

Alfie nodded, his eye lids looking heavy. She glanced at the drink she'd brought him and saw that it was all gone. There had been a sedative it in, a mild one, one that would just help him sleep, and that would help to keep him docile.

"Okay. Let's see. I know one all about this little boy. And do you know what his name was?"

Alfie shook his head.

"His name was Matthew..."

The trees were thick enough to shield any light from his window and the blackout curtains would have been pointless if that was the only purpose they served. Hotch pulled one back and looked out over the scenery that would have been beautiful if the circumstances had been different, and tonight, more than just the case marred his view.

They'd sat down, eaten, drank some of the wine they'd found in the cellar, then gone through the Alfie Fletcher case. Every single detail had been unturned again and again. They'd been right to make the assumption that the UnSub had been a predatory paedophile, every one of the signs pointed that way and it would have taken a psychic to have said otherwise.

But a lucky break through doing some old fashioned leg work had pointed them in the direction of the Moores, and now it looked as if they were onto something. A pair of officers had been place outside the Moores' house to monitor their movements, although Hotch doubted Martha would think they were onto her. Rossi suspected she was narcissistic; over confident to the extreme that she thought she could get away with anything and Hotch agreed.

Then Kevin had come up with more information, details about Martha Moore's finances each time a child had gone missing. She'd stocked up on food, big bills from Wal-Mart suggesting she'd been buying things other than food. Bigger fuel bills. It all suggested she'd been keeping the child in her home, which would have been possible, given she wasn't married then.

But now she was, and either her husband was complicit, or she had somewhere else she was using.

Hotch closed the curtains, satisfied that only the night time creatures and the trees were outside. He sat on the single bed, having chosen the room knowing a double would have been too much space, and allowed himself a moment to think of Emily.

She had been sat across the table from him, engaging in the discussion with her usual vivacity and vim, her eyes having regained the sparkle she'd lost after the incident with the UnSub in the car. He'd felt something in him give, snap like an elastic band, when she'd caught his eye and he'd looked away.

But right now, at this moment, he couldn't deal with what he felt. She wasn't to be packaged in cotton wool, wrapped away in bubble wrap like a porcelain doll. She was tough and a fighter, not a stay at home wife or girlfriend or mother. Not that he wanted that. It was her fiery independence he admired. The brashness and honesty with which she'd first come into his office had been a memory frozen in his mind, revisited a million times when he'd tried to work out why she'd annoyed him so much at first. It hadn't been her, as such, more the situation, the lack of control in selecting her.

Now he'd selected her for a different reason, and the thing he'd most feared had crept out of the shadows. How could he deal with losing her? The only solution right now was to push her away, so he had control. Anything to keep control.

A knock sounded at his door and he felt his heart skip a beat as it jumped into his throat. Hoping it would be Emily he opened his door, knowing his expression had turned cold when he saw Reid stood there, wearing striped pyjamas that would have reminded most people of concentration camps.

"I know," Reid said. "But there was nothing else that was clean when I packed."

Hotch stood back, letting Reid come into the room. Reid headed for the window and pulled back the curtains.

"Why are you here at this time?" Hotch said. "Is something the matter?"

Reid shook his head, still looking out of the window. "I just thought I'd see how you were."

Hotch said nothing, letting the silence force Reid to explain what he meant.

Reid didn't look at him, the curtain half hiding his head. "You're being distant, you're sleeping alone and you drank three glasses of wine when you usually call it quits after two."

"I don't think this is any of your business, Reid," Hotch said. His tone was cold, and it shouldn't have been he knew. But he didn't want to have this conversation, not now, not with Reid.

"You're right. It's not," Reid turned to look at him. "But I'm glad that you're not lying to me and telling me that everything's okay."

"I don't like to lie," Hotch said.

Reid moved away from the window. "I know. I get what you're doing and why, and I don't think you're wrong."

Hotch felt surprised for a moment, and looked at Reid directly. "Why?"

"Because to go forth with something without consideration is foolish, and you've never been a foolish man," Reid said, opening the door.

Hotch gave a brief nod, and the door closed.

Night time comes in many shades. For some, it is a tapestry of passion, the threads weaving through a myriad of events that contain love in all its forms. For others, it is a time of the dead, when the absence of light and sound saturates hope, leaving an emotionless desert. The night creeps by, the shards of light coming from within, highlighting foxgloves. Digitalis; a plant common to Europe, Asia and Africa, that is as poisonous as it is beautiful.