Disclaimer: Criminal Minds doth not belong to myself.

Sorry it's been a few days since I updated it with that sad chapter. A lot of people asked about having a scene where Derek has a chat with Tala regarding Buford and how he relates to Keith. So because y'all suggested it, I decided to give the people what they want and write a scene between Derek and his daughter about how time can help heal wounds, but they always leave scars.

Derek knocked softly on his daughter's door on Saturday afternoon. All day, she'd been asleep, not coming down for anything. Penelope had gone in and checked on her, but she had done nothing but mutter that she wanted to be left alone.

He didn't hear her answer, so he entered the room and found her curled up on her bed in a fetal position, sound asleep and breathing softly. His expression grew tender and he went in and sat down on the edge of her beed. He put a hand on her shoulder and gently shook her awake. He had plans for taking her out. There was a certain chat he had to have with her. A very important conversation. His daughters had no idea he had been molested as a teenager. But he was going to tell Tala now. She had to know that what she was experiencing with Keith Richards haunting her, was the same way Carl Buford still haunted him.

Maybe it would open her up to him. She was talking to Penelope and the therapist, but said very little to him. If she knew she wasn't alone, maybe it would help him get her talking.

Tala's eyes fluttered open and she looked up at him, her eyes glazed over with sleep. She blinked several times and murmured sleepily, "What time is it, Dad?"

He rubbed her shoulder comfortingly and said, "It's two in the afternoon, Baby Doll. And I need to show you something. You up for going to the beach?"

"Dad, it's grey skies outside," she muttered, looking out the window briefly. "Why would we go to the beach?"

"We're going there because you and I are going to spend a little time together," he said. He saw her panicked face and added, "The other thing is that we will likely have complete privacy. As you pointed out, it's a somewhat grey day."

She groaned. "Do we have to?"

He nodded. "Yes," he said, kissing the top of her head. "We have to. So be ready to go in ten minutes. 'Kay?" He looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

Tala stared at him blankly, but nodded. "I'll be down in a few," she grumbled.

Derek went downstairs and found Penelope sitting on the couch, French braiding Lindy's hair. Soraya was sitting on the floor, coloring in one of her coloring books. He smiled at them. They were all quietly going about their Saturday, all three of them spending as much time together as they could.

"Mama," Soraya asked, "when will you do my hair?" She looked up at Penelope and grinned toothily. "I want you to braid it just like that girl in that one movie that Tala and her friends went to see last year. The one she couldn't stop talking about. The one that was about those books she couldn't stop reading."

Lindy rolled her eyes. "You're thinking of Katniss, Raya. The girl from the Hunger Games series," she said. "And you just have to wait your turn."

Penelope nodded, finishing her work on Lindy's hair. "I'm all done," she murmured, kissing the top of Lindy's head. "And you look beautiful, Lindy baby."

Turning around, she smiled and nodded. "Thanks Mom," she said. Glancing down at her baby sister, she added, "Your turn, Raya."

Soraya jumped to her feet and plopped down in front of Penelope. "I want my hair done like Katniss!" she said with a huge grin on her face.

"What do you say?" Derek reminded, coming up and planting a kiss on top of Soraya's head.

She sighed and put her hands on her hips. "Please?" she asked over dramatically. "Please, will you do my hair like Katniss?"

Penelope looked up at Derek and winked. "Yes," she said to Soraya. "I will absolutely do your hair like Katniss." She picked up the hair brush and started running it through Soraya's dark mahogany hair. "Are you and Tala going out to have that little chat?"

Derek caressed Penelope's cheek and nodded. "Yeah, we're leaving as soon as she gets her butt down here. We're going to the beach." He watched as Lindy raised her brows and opened her mouth to say something, but he laughed before she could tell him how it was illogical to go to the beach on a day without sunshine. "And yes, my silly intellect of a daughter, I am well aware that it is not sunny outside."

Lindy frowned at him and seemed to question his motives with her eyes, but then sighed, deeming it hopeless to try and figure out his planning. She simply rolled her eyes and opened her book, this time a copy of Mansfield Park.

Penelope turned her face so that she could kiss the palm of Derek's hand. "You two stay safe," she murmured. She noticed Tala coming down the stairs, dressed in a pair of dark jeans and huge black sweatshirt. "Hey sweetheart," she called to her. "You going to get out with Dad?"

Tala nodded and shoved her hands in her pockets. "Yeah," she mumbled. She looked at Penelope with desperate eyes, as if she wanted her to come instead of Derek. Seeing that she wasn't making a move to come with her, she sighed and looked at Derek. "Ready to go, Dad."

XXXXX

An hour later, Derek and Tala were strolling down on the abandoned beach, neither of them saying anything for a long time. Derek watched as his daughter stared at the dark navy waves in front of them. Her eyes were dead and blank. She just kept her hands in her pockets and gazed the the gray and dark blue scene in front of her. Derek put a hand on her shoulder and she jumped under his touch. He couldn't help but feel slightly hurt that she was having a hard time trusting even him. But the more he thought about it, the more it made sense. She had been hurt in a deeply emotional way that compared to his experience with Buford. Her trauma she experienced at the hands of Keith Richards was the equivalent of his trauma experienced at the hands of Carl Buford. He had never truly recovered from the abuse; he knew that she would never truly recover from her own abuse.

"Let's sit," he said softly.

Hesitantly, she nodded. "Okay."

Both of them sat in the soft sand and were quiet another few minutes. Derek cleared his throat and started speaking. "You know, Baby Doll," he said, "I know what you're going through."

She snorted. "Oh, really?" she said dryly. "And how would you know anything about how I'm feeling? And don't tell me that you know from seeing victims' reactions. There's no way you can know unless you've felt it. Unless you've felt that dark that does nothing but cover who you were before, you can't possibly know what this is like!" Her fists were clenched and her eyes were on fire with shame and anger. "I feel dirty all the time. All the fucking time!"

Derek was quiet for another moment, letting her cool down before he delivered the news the he did in fact know how that dark felt. "You know, I've never told you girls," he began. "Not many people know about it. Just your mom and the BAU team. But the thing is, I do know how you feel. I know about that dark you're talking about. I've felt it."

"What happened?" she asked. She was cautiously curious now.

He took a deep breath. "When I was a kid, after your grandpa died, I was spending at the community center, learning how to play football, keeping myself busy. The man who ran the center was named Carl Buford. He was the one who taught me how to play football. Started grooming me to be the star on his team." The feelings of when he was younger started to crawl back into his brain and it was weighing down heavily on him. Darkness started coming back to him, coating him a layer of dirt that he had worked so hard to scrub off. Eventually, he had gotten control of it and would be able to take care of it later. Whenever he had a nightmare about it, Penelope was always there to hold him and get him through it. It would be many years before Tala would be able to get to where he was, but she could do it.

She was his daughter, after all.

"Carl Buford...he got me to trust him and treated me better than any of the other boys," he continued. "And he locked onto me. By locking onto me, he took me to his cabin by the lake. He made me drink something he called 'Jesus Juice' and then afterwards...he would - he would molest me." He clenched his eyes shut and gritted his teeth. This was harder than he thought it would be. "And I knew there was something wrong, but there was nothing I could do. He told me to 'look up to the sky' each and every time. It made it almost impossible for me to trust anyone." He turned his head to look at Tala. When he met her gaze, he saw tears in them, misty and floating on the surface of her replica of Penelope's eyes. Her lips were parted slightly and she choked on a lump in her throat.

"Dad..." she murmured. "I had no idea. Why did you never tell me?"

"I wanted to keep you safe from anything that had to do with our jobs," he explained gently. "This isn't anything I wanted you to experience in any way. I'm so sorry that you had this happen to you, Baby Doll. That dark you're talking about, I know exactly what that is. I felt filthy and it took me years to feel like I was getting better. And Buford never really left me. Sometimes I still feel him under my skin. But you know what made it better, better to the point it's so deep that I forget about it most days?"

"What?" she asked tearfully.

He smiled and tilted her chin up. "Your mom brought me back. And then we got married, and we had you. The day I found out she was pregnant with you was the happiest day of my life. You, your mother, and your sisters are the most important people on the planet to me. You bring me back to life. And one day, you'll meet someone who brings out the best in you as well. You'll have children of your own, and the feeling of Keith's hands will dull until you shove it to the back of your mind. You might have moments where you feel the darkness creeping back up, but it'll fade until it's dim and there's only a small flicker left." He wiped her tears with his thumb. "You're so strong, Tala. You'll make it through this, no matter how hard it is at certain points."

She moved closer to him and let him pull her into his arms. Crying against his chest, she sniffled, "I'm so sorry, Dad. I had no idea this happened to you. You never should have had that happen to you."

Kissing the top of her head, he said, "It shouldn't happen to anyone." He stroked her hair back. "I love you, Tala. Don't you ever forget it."

"I won't," she murmured, holding him tightly around the waist.

I changed the summary because I felt the other one wasn't fitting with the story. Tala was definitely mentionable in it as she's one of the three most important characters. So, I included OC in the characters section and fixed the summary to fit her in.