Fight The Fear

"Hey, silly girl, I love you. You know that, right?"

"I love you too."

For every moment since he got the call that she was in the hospital Derek Morgan had wanted to say the words he just told Penelope Garcia. The fear she would not know how much she meant to him had him shaking, just as much as the fear that she would die and the fear of this unknown man who had hurt her and could come back to do it again.

Fear. He was consumed by it.

There was a relief in hearing that she loved him back. But the fear didn't die in that second. All that painful and stifling fear that he would never be what she really needed. That he couldn't be good enough, clean enough, whole enough, there enough, everything she needed in a man.

Maybe he never would be perfect enough to deserve her love but he didn't want to keep going on with the doubt and questions between them. Their words saying one thing and their actions another.

Derek wanted to be clear about where his heart was, with her always and forever, no matter what went down tomorrow. Even if they made a mess out of this and it fell apart, he didn't ever want her to think again that he hadn't fallen for her with all he had. That she didn't own his heart.

Because she did.

Derek slowly walked closer to Penelope. Raising his hands slowly he cupped her face and then bent down, going very slow as his nerves were making him feel dizzy and still so unsure she wanted him this way, and then his mouth gently pressed to hers. The moment she returned the kiss his heart soared.

Breaking their kiss, he leaned his forehead against hers and whispered "Go to bed."

Penelope gave him a very short kiss and when she spoke her voice cracked "Kissing you was so worth the mega long wait you put me through."

A small grin curved his lips as he watched her move back and into her bedroom. Derek kept his eyes on her as she got in bed before finally turning away. His body was exhausted, as the last four days finally caught up with him and the adrenaline of all that happened finally seeped from his bones. All he wanted to do was pass out on her couch but first he went to double check the door and peek out the window.

Then he lay down and prayed to God that his baby girl would be safe till morning.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

His eyes locked on her as she stood across the bullpen talking to JJ and some tech guy from another unit, who had been taken hostage by Battle tonight. Though Battle was dead on the floor nearby Derek still didn't feel like he could take his eyes off Penelope for a second- like if he did maybe something bad would happen.

He wondered how he would stay sane when he had to go back to work. Luckily Hotch gave the whole team a week off and Derek as much time as he needed after that, basically until Garcia could come back to work too and be safe inside the walls of Quantico. Hotch new that if he tried to make Derek focus on anything but Penelope right now it would be a disaster.

Rossi had just asked Derek how his faith was going and Derek answered "Day by day," which was more true than he could even put in words. Each day he fought to get back the feeling that his feet were on solid ground. That Penelope was safe and healing and would not be ripped from his life any time soon. That the crisis was over. That God had answered his prayers this time and let Derek keep his baby girl, his angel on earth, here to love for many more years to come.

Derek could laugh at how stupid he had been by being afraid he wasn't ready to settle down and couldn't give her enough to make her happy. That maybe in the future, one distant and murky day years from now, he could be who she deserved. Thinking that way had cost him four years when he could have been making love to her and he wasn't going to be an idiot for another four or forty years. He wasn't going to let fear keep him away from the only woman who really lit up his world.

Hotch told Morgan "Take good care of her."

"I intend to," Morgan said as he walked back across the bullpen and up to Penelope.

She was shaking hands with the tech guy. Her eyes caught Derek's and she smiled warmly. "Hey, handsome, meet Kevin Lynch, proof that tech geeks can be heroes too."

Kevin blushed. "I didn't do anything."

Penelope said "It was genius to send me the feed of what was happening here. You helped to save the day. Thank you."

Morgan shook his hand. "Thank you for helping to make this be over. You okay?"

"A little shook up but I'll be fine. Thank you. I should get back to my unit now. I have to write up a report about what happened here tonight and I'd like to do it while it is fresh in my mind. It was good to meet you both."

After Kevin walked off Morgan placed a hand on Penelope's arm. "Lets get you home, my sweet lady."

"You know that Lynch wasn't the only hero today. What would have happened if you weren't there when he came to my place?"

"Shhhh. I was there. And happy to be there too. I hope to score a lot more invitations to your place in the not so distant future, hot mama."

She smiled. "That could be arranged but I should warn you that I'm very likely to require you lose your shirt at the door before you are allowed to enter my lair."

He chuckled. "You're crazy."

"About you, Hot Stuff."

Their eyes held for a long moment, then he placed his hand on her back, and murmured against her ear "Time to go home, baby girl. And don't you dare think about kicking me off your couch because I'm staying right there with you till a doctor tells me that you're 100 percent healthy again or else you get so sick of me you start chucking things at my head."

"That's not gonna work for me, handsome," she said, as they walked toward the elevators.

He raised an eyebrow.

She said, in a sexy purr, "Do you really think I'd leave such a gorgeous man sleeping on my couch for long when the bed is so nearby and made for two?"

Derek grinned. "You need to focus on getting better and not getting some."

"I can multi task."

Once they were in the elevator he pulled her against his side, with his hand around her waist, and when he put her in his truck, in the parking lot, he gave her a soft and tender kiss before he went around to his side of the vehicle.

They had a long way to go but Derek wasn't scared to be on this road with her. He was just scared to remember the moment when he heard Hotch's voice in his ear saying "Something has happened to Garcia...." and how close Derek came to losing this chance forever.

He reached over, from the driver's seat, and took her hand, intertwining their fingers, raised it slightly, because she couldn't lift it that high and then bent over and brushed his lips to the back of her hand. "I love you, sweetheart, and I thank God for my girl."

She was silent and he could feel the tension in her. His eyes rose. The look on her face was filled with bittersweet sadness. "I love you too."

"What's wrong?" Fear shot through him.

"Nothing. I'm just tired. Start this chariot and take your princess back to her castle."

"Garcia, talk to me. What's the matter? Is it all hitting you? What happened tonight?"

She bit her bottom lip. "I just feel so many emotions and I know I will for a long time to come. I don't want to be consumed by this. I want to be past this....because its not fair to let him have even one more minute of my life....but when this all wears off...."

"What, babe?"

"I just don't want you to regret anything you've said or done because it was done in guilt."

He gave her a confused look.

She went on "Don't get me wrong, please. You've said and done all the right things but is it for all the right reasons? I don't think you could know that tonight, not in the middle of coming down from all this stress and pain, and either could I. So I'm just worried and I just want you to know that I get it if you change your mind later. I don't expect anything."

"You should. You should expect everything from your man. To keep you safe, baby girl, and keep you happy and keep getting it through your hard head that I am where I wanna be....on your lumpy couch or in bed with my gorgeous Goddess or just on the other end of the phone from you. Hey," he said as his voice grew tender "haven't I always shown you how special you are to me since the second time I called you baby girl? The time when it really meant something."

"Yeah," she whispered, her voice breaking, "but you also said you couldn't give me more than you were and I believed you, even if I thought you sucked for wimping out on something so special. I understood. I really did. You couldn't see us as more than friends. It makes sense. I felt lucky for what we had and only occasionally wanted to rant at you for not making it more. I just can't let you make it more just because I was shot. That's not right and it won't last and when it doesn't the pain will be so much worse than this bullet is causing me.....yet I want you to come to my place and stay, even though I know that we'll cross all the lines if you do. Handsome, I want all your offering and yet I don't think I can take it."

"You're the one who told me that everything happens for a reason. I hate that this is what it took for me to tell you how I feel but now that I have I'm not backsliding into the past. And I'll be damned if I let you do that to us, hard head." He squeezed her hand and then choked out "I'm in love with you, baby girl. Just have faith in that."

Though it would be a struggle to convince her that he loved her before the moment he heard she was shot over the weeks and months to come Derek was able to do just that. And by the next fall there was a diamond ring sitting on her finger and no chance in hell she'd ever say yes to a date with any other guy.

Why would she? She had her smoking hot Hot Stuff at home and he kept her naked more than half the time they were there. She was way too happy and tired to even look at another man.

And that is what Derek Morgan called a happy ending.

THE END