Hi, hello, it's been, uh, a while. Oops. I have no excuses, I hope that everyone is still here with this story. Going to be very slowly trucking along, but I promise I haven't forgotten about it. Well, here it is, Chapter 4, after a very long time. Hope you enjoy.
"He's been in there for 3 hours." Garcia whispered to Morgan as they stare at their Unit Chief pace back and forth in front of an evidence board. "It's 10 o'clock. We should be getting to the hotel for the night."
"I'm not going in there, baby girl." Their eyes travel to the next person standing in their huddle.
"Uh, uh. Don't look at me. I value my life." Reid says, putting his hands up in surrender before quickly backing away before the two could plot a way to get him into the conference room.
"Where's gumdrop when you need her?" Garcia wistfully says, her eyes trailing back to the usually stoic man getting more and more frazzled.
"Poor girl looked like she was gonna faint, good thing JJ took her to the hotel. Aaron didn't even notice that his wife was almost sleeping on her file. Someone really needs to snap him out of this." Rossi walks up to the two, adding in his thoughts as they all continued to stare through the window.
Morgan claps Rossi on the back. "Thanks for volunteering man. We'll be waiting by the car." Before Rossi could even come up with a rebuttal, Morgan grabs Garcia and Reid before leaving out the stations front doors.
"Why is it always me." Rossi mutters before opening the see-through door. The sound of movement didn't even jar Hotch out of his intense staring contest with the white board. "Aaron. Take a break. The rest of the team is heading back to the hotel for the night."
"Dave, you guys go. I'm sure something is going to pop out at me." Hotch waved off the older profiler.
"No, Aaron. Dammit! Look at me." Rossi lightly tugged at Hotch's shoulder, finally breaking the staring contest that, unsurprisingly, the Unit Chief was losing. Hotch huffs out a groan, leveling his oldest friend with a hard glare.
"What Rossi? What do you want me to say?"
"Something that is not dealing with this case. You've been staring at that board for hours. This isn't healthy. You need to distance yourself or else you're going to get sucked in and you'll push everyone away. I should know. Gideon and I are both prime examples. Go back to the hotel. Cuddle with your pregnant wife. Shut off your brain from this case, because then maybe something will jump out."
Hotch opened his mouth to speak, but Rossi held up his hand. "We don't even know if the Reaper is still out there. Nothing has happened since the passing of Shaunessy. Maybe nothing will happen. All that is going to happen right now is you giving yourself a migraine from how hard you are glaring at that board in front of you."
"He's still out there, I can feel it." Hotch grits his teeth, balling his hands up at his side.
Rossi lets out a sigh. "Well then, how much use will you be in catching him if you keel over from exhaustion?" Raising an eyebrow he adds. "You didn't even notice that your wife was nearly passed out on her open file at this table 2 hours ago. You need to step away for a minute. Regroup, we'll come back early in the morning and go from there, but don't obsess."
Hotch nods his head once in understanding before packing up some files from the table to put into his briefcase. Zipping the bag closed, he remembers one of the things Rossi told him. "Wait a minute, Dave. How'd you know Emily's pregnant?"
"Aaron, Aaron, Aaron. We've known each other how long and you still ask some dumb questions? I know all." Rossi opens the door for the younger man before turning the lights off in the cramped room.
"Let me guess, she tipped you off when she refused a glass of wine on the weekend lunch you had?" Hotch asked knowingly as they made their way out of the precinct to the car where Morgan, Reid and Garcia were cramped into the backseat of.
"Actually, she told me about the kitty litter commercial." Rossi chuckles before tossing Hotch the keys.
Hotch quietly opens the door to the hotel room that he is sharing with his wife. He catches the door before it could slam shut as to not wake up the sleeping woman in the bed. He rubs his eyes with his hands as he tip toes around the darkened room. What he didn't account for was the go bag sitting in the middle of the entry way, tripping over it and bringing the desk chair down with him as he tried to catch his fall.
Emily startles awake, sitting up straight in bed with her hair askew, looking confused.
"Aaron?" She asks with a sleepy rasp to her voice as she leans over to turn on the bedside light.
"Go back to sleep, it's just me." He grunts out as he picks himself up from the heap on the floor.
"Are you okay?" Emily leaves the light on, but reclines back in the bed, the adrenaline leaving her body as soon as it came in.
"Yeah."
"Had a little argument with the desk chair?" She smirks to herself as she makes herself comfortable on the bed, stretching out her aching bones.
"Actually, your go bag. Why is it in the middle of the floor?" Finally standing back up, he scoots the chair back to the desk and shoves the bag against the far wall.
"Ask JJ. She kinda dumped me into bed. I don't remember." She snuggles deeper under the covers. Hotch makes his way to her side of the bed, kissing her forehead before reaching to turn off the light again.
"Mmm, no leave it on." She grabs his hand before he could hit the switch.
"Sweetheart, you should be sleeping."
"And I will be, but I won't be able to sleep if you can't see your way around the room and keep bumping into things or falling. We can turn it off once you're in bed, okay?" She kisses his palm before letting his hand go and shutting her eyes.
"Okay." He whispers, bending down to kiss her forehead once more before moving to the chair across the room to place down his go bag.
Emily was dozing off right as the light turned off and the bed dipped down as Aaron slid in behind her. Rolling over, she presses a kiss to his shoulder before tucking herself into him.
"Why didn't you tell me you were feeling out of it?" He asks as he leans his head down to rest at the top of hers, inhaling the sweet smell of her shampoo.
"We did. None of us could break your concentration from the board." She whispers back. They lay in complete silence, and Emily was sure that Aaron fell asleep before she felt something wet hit the top of her head.
"Aaron?" She whispers in the dark, blinking her eyes open slowly. Turning her head, she catches his eyes before his face scrunches into a deep silent sob. "Oh honey." She cradles his head against her chest, like she would with Jack, and gently starts running her fingers through his hair.
After a couple minutes, his sobs started to subside, and Emily felt rather than heard his whisper.
"What was that?" She gently tilts his head up so their eyes could meet.
"I'm sorry." He whispers again, still with a sob caught in his throat.
Emily immediately felt tears well up in her eyes. "Oh Aaron. You have nothing to be sorry for. You didn't take the deal. You didn't know. There was nothing you could have done to change this situation."
"No. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't paying attention to you. I'm sorry I didn't see you pass out on your files. I'm sorry, I got lost." He scrunches up his eyes as more tears start to fall.
Emily laughs a bit, that comes out more like a choked sob. "You're okay. I repeat, you have nothing to be sorry for." She kisses the top of his head, wiping away his tears with the pads of her thumbs. Aaron tilts his head up more, capturing her lips with his.
"I love you." He whispers against her soaked lips.
"I love you more."
"Impossible." He murmurs before sealing their lips together again.
Kinda short, I know, but it's the best I could do right now, and I apologize. This has been sitting finished for a while, it took me a while to get around to edit it. Hope you liked it, I hope you're all still reading and out there. I hope I'm not going to be gone for too long for the next chapter. I will try to make sure it's not too long, but no guarantees. Love you all.