Chapt. 35

Picking up the phone, Hotch called a friend of his that was in real-estate. He wanted to find out if he had any houses that were up for sale that had plenty of space. He figured eight bedrooms would do the trick. That would give Oleg his own room. Sasha and Eva could have a room together; Sophie and Emma could share a room, there would be a room to put the new babies in. Hotch and Alecta could have a room of their own (if that is what she wanted), and they would still have a couple of rooms to spare for guests….or she could have her own room. Right now, he'd agree to almost anything to have her near. There would need to be enough rooms for them both to have an office. They could technically share, but he wanted to have the space for two separate offices, if that was what Alecta chose. A large gourmet kitchen…..he knew that when Alecta had time she liked to cook a lot, not to mention when they had team nights and Rossi felt like showing off. Hotch began to think that maybe six bathrooms would be good, perhaps seven; there might be wiggle room on this. A super huge family room would be needed, especially with that many children. He wanted a huge yard; even if he had to pay someone to help them come and take care of it, he wanted a huge yard. The kids needed plenty of space to play and run around.

When he called his friend, Todd, he told him his situation; he was involved with a woman that had her own children, he had his son, and they needed a house with enough space to house the Brady Bunch.

"How many bedrooms and bathrooms are you thinking of? Approximately how much square footage would you like?"

"I need up to eight bedrooms. We would like as many as six or seven bathrooms, but we're flexible on that. We need enough rooms to have two offices; sometimes I bring work home, and she has a few things she's into that might require her to have her own space…..a large family/living room….huge yard. I'm not sure about what square footage we'll need, but I'm thinking that 3,000-4,000 is a decent range. I'd have to see the house and see how the rooms are laid out, etc, to see how it all flows and works together….Oh, and a gourmet kitchen; we like to cook. "

"Ok, let me look at some of my inventory and see what's available. You do know you're at a fairly high price point with this wish list right?"

"She's worth every penny. Just call me back as soon as you think you've come up with something."

"Of course. Well, let me jump on this and I'll let you get back to your work."

"Thanks Todd."

Hotch hung up the phone and sat back in his chair, finally feeling a little relaxed for the first time in weeks. Although, now he was distracted from work for a totally different reason than being consumed with the wracking guilt. Now he was picturing Jack, Sofie, and Emma piled on the sofa with Alecta reading from one of her dusty old books; Alecta and her girls would likely be arm wrestling each other over the last couple of handfuls of M&M's…..they loved those damned things. Jack would be munching on his jelly beans…..Alecta would take one from him if he offered it, even though she hated jelly beans with a passion; if Jack was kind enough to offer, she wouldn't turn him down. Sometimes when he watched Alecta with him…she had this look in her eye as if she would kill anybody that would lay a finger on the boy. And that's exactly what she did, except she kept that monster from getting close to the boy. There were times that her face was so serene…..times like when she would lay her head on Jack's lap and let him read to her from one of the chapters out of 'Hound of the Baskervilles', letting him see how much of it he could read and comprehend for himself…and to feel like a big boy, doing it on his own. She would just sit and listen to him, not correcting him unless he asked for help. Sometimes he would see how sad she would be when Jack was away at school or at his aunt's house; he would catch her glancing at a picture of the baby boy she had lost. He knew the boy would be nearly Jack's age and she was trying to picture what the boy would have been like. Sometimes she'd linger on the photo a bit too long and scramble to put it away as Hotch came into the room. If he tried to tell her that he didn't mind her having it out, she would quickly claim to not be doing anything. As a profiler, he realized that she saw that child as one of her greatest failures; he also realized that she would likely never speak about it again. She would just watch Jack and wonder. But her face rarely ever lost the serene look as she watched the little boy or her own children playing.

He'd catch her watching Sasha, Eva, and Oleg and she'd have mixed emotions on her face. Sadness was for all the years that she was separated from them, not being able to watch them grow up and watch so many major life moments that other parents take for granted. Happiness was for when she realized that they were super kids really. Sasha and Eva, the tsarinas…the Empresses. They had no problem being the typical 17 year old girls; talking about boys, new music, what movie they wanted to see. But they were just as comfortable speaking to anyone about any subject. They were at least as strong as their mother; they were trained to a degree in some self-defense. He'd seen them sparring at the gym once. Hotch felt bad for anyone that went against them. The door was wide open for them to seriously maim someone for life. And, Oleg, her darling prince; that boy was going to be at least as big as his father, and as strong. That same day at the gym, Oleg had been going through some practice rounds with his sisters as well as a few of the grown men that patronized the gym. Though, it was likely he let his sisters win (ever the gentleman), he had no mercy on his other opponents.

"I'm not a mercy kind of guy,' he had once told Hotch. 'I'm not a mercy kind of girl,' Alecta had once said to him.

Hotch shook his head at the memory, trying to dig back into his paperwork.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~CM~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At a small café in St. Petersburg, Russia there was a large man sitting at a table, sipping his coffee. A second man, dressed in a rumpled suit and drab shirt sat down across the table from him.

With his thick accent the second stranger spoke first, 'Yuri, I presume."

"Yes. Who's asking?"

"We have mutual interests in common. Come with me and I will tell you all you need to know about getting close enough to get rid of her."

"What makes you think I need your help?

"That is a fair question. The only answer that I have is, look at what happened to your brother."

"What do you have in mind?"

"Go after her friends."

"She doesn't have too many of those."

"There are a few though that she is terribly attached to. You took care of two problems already. Running Istvan over with that car was a stroke of genius. It's only too bad that he will recover. You should have backed up and done it again. And that old man, Impatiev…..what you did to him was even better. He never saw it coming. Now, listen to me boy and together we will take everything she loves from her."

"Keep talking."

"Well there's her mother, she only recently came back into Alecta's life. There's the old man…..she holds him dear to her heart because of the fact he never let her be forgotten. The blonde with the glasses…..she is very much like a sister. The other two women would be as they say, collateral. The darker skinned man, just because of his close link to the 'sister'; if something happens to her, you'll get him as a bonus. The thin man, her boss…..He loves her blindly, and she is beginning to feel the same for him. But his son, the boy Jack…..he is the lynch pin in the whole thing. If you want to really go for the heart, go after that boy. After losing her own children, especially her own still born son, she would do anything to protect him. If something were to happen to him, she would burn the world down to get him back."

"You speak as though you know her."

"I know her better than anyone else alive. We have…..history. I just know that she will burn the world down to save the boy….and she is one of the few people I know that could actually do it. I want her to suffer as badly, if not worse than you do."

"What makes you think that you want this worse than me? What did she ever do to you?"

The foreign man raised his hands to his shirt collar, moving it aside a bit, revealing the scar around his neck.

"I was in love with her once. Not only did she spurn me…..but in the end she was the one that had been sent to kill me; she cut my head off. My body was buried in some God forsaken corner of the world. My head was sent to the Sultan as a prize. I would have laughed at the irony myself if I had not been so perversely angry. If I can't have her, I will kill everything she loves. I want it all destroyed, but I need your help."

"Wait, if she….Then how are you….?"

"Another story for another day. Just prepare yourself. I will contact you soon."

The stranger stood up and walked away, he left a scrap of paper behind that had an address scribbled on it with a name:

Langham Apartments. Apartment 121. Aaron Hotchner.

Yuri grabbed the paper and threw the remainder of his drink away; he stood up slinging his jacket over his arm and walked in the opposite direction, a smile on his face. His lovely wife was going to get what she had coming to her. Turning the corner he snickered to himself, his luck was unbelievable.

Post AN: So, I think that's going to be chapter 35, it isn't as long as my usual chapters; don't know if that's good or bad. But I do know that it pretty much wrote itself.