Author's Note: The next morning.

Week 10

No Guts, No Glory

Emily woke up the next morning to find herself again lying on top of Hotch. This time he was awake, running his fingers through her hair, and looking down at her with a faint amusement.

"Good Morning."

Using one hand on his pillow for leverage, Emily pushed herself up slightly as she looked down at him with a sleepy smile.

"Morning. I'm sorry, I don't know why I keep climbing on top of you when I'm unconscious."

It was kind of weird. She'd never done that with anyone else before. Maybe the bed was too small. Though . . . she quickly took in the dimensions . . . it was at least a double, so that didn't really make sense either.

Hotch's lip quirked up, "it's okay."

It was very okay actually. Aside from his concerns last night about boundaries, what straight, single man protests waking up with a beautiful woman lying on top of him? Granted, it would be even better if they could do something right now besides just say good morning. But hopefully that would come in time.

And noticing then that Emily wasn't yet making any moves to get off of him, Hotch hoped that was a good harbinger that she was seriously considering moving them down the romantic path.

With a yawn, Emily dropped her head back down onto Hotch's shoulder. For a second she just lay there, letting herself enjoy the feeling of actually waking up in the arms of someone who cared about her.

It was a true rarity for her.

But then suddenly she started to feel uncomfortable.

Worrying that maybe she was being a tease.

After all, she did now know that Hotch had feelings for her, so was it wrong to lay here and be close to him, if she wasn't yet sure about the degree of her own romantic attachment? Her affection for him was strong, that wasn't in doubt, but they had things to talk about before she could decide how she wanted to move forward.

Because her concerns here really were serious.

So maybe she was just being a tease by lying in bed with him. And the last thing she wanted to do was be mean to him.

Especially after he'd been so wonderful to her!

And she was about to push herself up and shift over, when she suddenly remembered that he was the one who asked her if she wanted him to stay last night. And if it was going to be too difficult for him to be in close quarters with her then he wouldn't have done that. Especially given how he'd already woken up once with her on top of him.

It wasn't like he hadn't known she cuddled in her sleep.

Her eyes crinkled then as Hotch tipped his head down to hers . . . but apparently she wasn't the only one that liked to cuddle.

Over the years she'd known men who didn't want her within three feet of them in bed unless they were engaged in some kind of sexual activity. Granted, most of these men were not le crème of the genetic crop. The point was though, some men liked to be close only for sex, and others liked to be close just to be close.

Hotch clearly knew he wasn't getting any this morning, so obviously he fell into the latter category.

That was a good thing to learn . . . her fingertips ghosted over the bruise on his neck . . . because cuddling just for closeness was a major point in his favor. Her brow wrinkled . . . maybe she should start making a list.

The Pros and Cons of Becoming Aaron Hotchner's Main Squeeze.

Hearing Emily start to giggle, Hotch's eyes crinkled. Then he rubbed his hand along her back while whispering, "what's so funny?"

They'd gone to bed so early that they'd woken up practically at dawn. Their flight wasn't for almost six hours, so he was more than content to lay there with her for half the morning. Because regardless of the nature of their relationship, he had decided that he could definitely get used to lying around in bed with Emily. Again, warm, soft, beautiful woman.

What's not to like?

Then his brow wrinkled as he tried to think of a way to casually propose occasionally sleeping together, even if she said no to the romantic entanglement.

Yeah . . . he huffed to himself . . . that probably wasn't going to fly.

Emily's giggles tapered off with a snort.

"My brain's just being stupid." Then her fingers fell down to his chest as she sobered up.

"I just wish I could give you an answer," she paused for a second before continuing softly. "I was a little surprised last night," she tipped her head, "okay, I guess I was a lot surprised, but I think that was probably a forest for the trees thing. Things have been going so well, and you've become such a big part of my life, and I've just really been so grateful to have you supporting me in the way that you have, it hadn't occurred to me yet that maybe anything more would happen between us." She sighed, "so perhaps because of that, my feelings right now might not be exactly the same as yours are."

Feeling Hotch begin to tense up . . . clearly waiting for the brush off . . . she quickly rubbed her hand across his chest to reassure him.

"But that's not to say that I don't see you that way Hotch," she quickly hastened to reassure him, "because I do. You've actually become one of my favorite people, and I really love spending time with you. You're sweet and kind, and even though everyone thinks you're a humorless bastard," he huffed as she finished, "you make me laugh. And if I didn't have Baby to consider, I think I'd say yes, let's give it a shot and see what happens. But . . . I do have Baby to consider."

As much as Hotch thought that he had prepared himself for the no, he was surprised to find that it did still really hurt. And when he felt that stab in his heart he realized that he had subconsciously been hoping that she'd take longer to think about it. Because then he could continue to live in his foolish little fantasy world where she might say yes.

But apparently that wasn't going to happen.

He cleared his throat then as he gently patted her on the back, "it's okay, I underst . . ."

"No," Emily cut him off both verbally, and with a firm shake of her head, "no, I don't think that you do."

She wanted to see his face as she said the next part, but because of what she wanted to say, she didn't want to lose physical contact with him either. So she pushed herself up, shifting so that she was straddling his stomach.

When his hands slid up to rest on her hips, she looked down to see the confusion on his face. She gave him a sad smile.

"What I'm trying to say, is that if I make the wrong decision, it's not just my life that I'm messing up anymore. And you need to know that I genuinely suck at relationships. That's the reason I'm so worried about what could happen. I mean we could talk for days about all of the bad men that have gone through my life. I'm a bum magnet."

Now that Hotch could see what Emily's issues were, he started to have a glimmer of hope again.

She was afraid of screwing things up. And that was something they could talk about.

So he gently interjected, "do you think that's because of the rape?"

Though they had never discussed what had happened before, he knew her, and he knew that she wouldn't appreciate him using some euphemism for the violation that she'd suffered.

Her eyes burned as she looked down at him.

"Not completely. I suppose it didn't help. I mean obviously, I wasn't you know, looking to bare my soul to anyone for quite some time after that. But my long term issues weren't really with trust, they were with self confidence," she blinked some of the tears back, "but that's a longer conversation. I guess my point is . . ."

Then she stopped, closing her eyes for a moment . . . God this was so embarrassing. To have to tell anyone the stupid mistakes you've made always sucked. But he did deserve to know what he was dealing with here.

So with a sigh she started again.

"My point is, I've always picked men that ended up cheating on me, or stealing my money, or just generally treated me like crap. And of course I'm smart enough to know better, and yet still I never saw any of it coming. Granted when I was young I was probably just kind of naïve. But hell, now I'm trained to read behavior and I continue to pick the loser in the crowd," her eyes dropped down, "I don't know, maybe I should have stayed in therapy longer. I might have found out why I make the same mistakes over and over."

"Self esteem."

Emily tilted her head quizzically and Hotch slid his hands up to encircle her waist. He cleared his throat.

"If you weren't so close to the situation," he continued softly, "then I'm sure you'd see this yourself. Or maybe you have already. But if you say that you've always had issues with self esteem, and you also always have subconsciously picked men that treat you badly, then that's maybe because you don't think you deserve better."

She huffed.

"Psych 101."

That had of course occurred to her once or twice, but you never want to think that you're that person. One of the masochists who secretly want to have their face shoved into the dirt over and over. She always liked to think of self as being strong.

But does a strong person allow these things to happen?

And then Hotch gave her a sad smile.

"It is Psych 101. And I'm not saying that's all it is, because obviously you know your life better than I do. But I can tell you that for whatever reason you've made these choices, you do deserve better, Emily. You deserve somebody who will love you for you. Somebody who will treat you well, and take care of you and the baby."

Seeing her tears starting to pool as one of her hands came over to grasp his, Hotch bit his lip before he continued.

"Not that I don't think that you can take care of yourself and Baby on your own. I know that you can," his eyes crinkled, "you can do anything. But I just want you to know," he squeezed her fingers, "that you don't have to do it alone."

Obviously he wasn't trying to push her, but if their major obstacle really was Emily's deep rooted fear that she wasn't deserving of love and respect, then that was something they definitely needed to start working on now. Actually they needed to start working on that now regardless of whether or not they pursued this relationship. Because it was absolute bullshit that someone as kind and intelligent as Emily Prentiss would think, on ANY level, that she didn't deserve to be happy and loved. Of course if she had any kind of predisposition to that because of something from her childhood or teen years, survivor's guilt over her sister's death wouldn't have helped at all. Nor, of course, would the gruesome violation she'd suffered her rookie year. It wasn't just the one thing.

It was never just the one thing.

And honestly, as much as he'd respected the ambassador in the past, he was really starting to hate her now. Because he could clearly see a line of sight with Emily's profound issues with guilt and self confidence, going back to whatever ideas her mother had planted in her head when she was a kid. And what the hell kind of parent allows her child to spend almost two decades of her life blaming herself for her sister's death in a car accident?

Yeah . . . his jaw twitched once . . . he was definitely starting to hate her.

The tears started running down Emily's face as she looked down at Hotch.

"You see," she sniffled, "you say things like that, and I think that I'm absolutely crazy to not just say yes right now! But," her voice cracked, "I'm really afraid that I'm too screwed up to have a healthy long lasting relationship. And not only do I not want to hurt you, but I can't hurt Baby. What if a year from now I self destruct," she started to cry harder, "and then you're attached to Baby and Baby's attached to you, but we can't be together anymore," her voice broke completely, "what then?!"

This was the second conversation in a row she'd had with Hotch that had ended in sobs. But right now he just seemed so perfect, and she felt so inadequate in comparison. Perhaps things weren't quite that unbalanced, but at the moment it felt that way.

Not to mention these damn hormones were killing her!

Feeling his own eyes burning in sympathy, Hotch reached for her.

"Come here," he murmured while pulling her down to his chest. It was clear that she was trying to stop crying, but she wasn't having much luck. And after a moment he rolled her beneath him, and looked into her eyes.

"Emily," he continued softly, "you know that there aren't any guarantees. Haley and I were married for sixteen years before we decided we were in the right place to have children. Jack wasn't a last ditch effort to save our marriage. I thought we were happy. It never occurred to me that I would be divorced less than two years later, and only able to see my child for a few hours a week."

Emily looked up at him, the tears were still trickling from her eyes.

"So all happiness is an illusion?"

He shook his head sadly.

"No, that's not true at all. We were happy. We were happy for a long time, but . . ."

And he paused, realizing then that he was going to have to open up again. It was the only way she would understand. He took a deep breath before he continued, hoping he wasn't just walking out on this limb alone.

"Things changed with my job. In the early years, I was at the DOJ working as a prosecutor, and she didn't approve of me joining the Bureau. That became a sticking point. A minor one that would eventually become a huge one," he tucked Emily's hair back, "we both made mistakes in our relationship. The divorce was probably more my fault than hers, but in my defense, she never told me how unhappy she was until it was too late to fix anything."

Emily had finally stopped crying and she was looking up at him now with focused attention. He brushed her tears off her face as he continued quietly.

"But you and I have things in common that Haley and I didn't. Work being a huge one. She never understood why we choose to live in this world. But you do," his face darkened slightly, "there are also some things in my past, not the same as yours but . . . bad enough." His gaze shifted slightly . . . he definitely wasn't talking about that today. So he looked back down at her.

"And as to what went wrong with my marriage, I've learned things. I know where I screwed up before and I don't think I'll make those same mistakes," his eyes crinkled slightly as he touched her cheek, "we can make new ones. And we can fight, and we can make up. And it could be good Emily . . . it could be really good."

For a moment he stared at her, seeing that he was reaching her, and wondering how much farther he should go. But he didn't want to inadvertently talk her into something that she wasn't ready for, or flat out just didn't want.

That would be disastrous.

Not to mention, manipulative and self serving. Which was probably what every crappy boyfriend she'd ever had, had done at one point or another. The most recent one included. And he might have his faults, but he did know that he was a better man than her ex-boyfriend.

And they'd come so far since last night, he'd probably opened up about his feelings as much with her in the past twenty four hours as he'd had with Haley in the last six months of their life together. But opening up and sharing what was on his mind, was one of the lessons learned from the smoldering wreckage of his marriage.

So given how much he'd said, it was probably best to stop now and just let her think.

He rolled them onto their sides, wrapped his arms around her tightly, and pulled her in close. Because no matter what happened, he wanted her to know that he would be there for her.

She was safe.

After Emily tucked her head under Hotch's chin, she clutched her fingers into his t-shirt. She was trying to come to a decision. A grown up, rational, logical decision.

About love.

It was a fool's debate.

There was no logic or rational debate when it came to the human heart. And Hotch was right. There would never be any guarantees. Maybe they would get together, fall madly in love, and fifty years from now they'd be sitting in their rockers on the front porch watching their grandkids. Or maybe three months from now they'd decide they really didn't have anything in common and it would be best to go back to just being friends.

And there were a million different variations in between.

But here was a man, a good, kind, honest man, who wanted to be with her. A man who would be a good role model for her child. A man who . . . if things went that far . . . would be a good father to her child. There was nothing wrong with him. He wasn't a loser, he wasn't a bum, he wasn't going to come home drunk and mistake her for a punching bag. That had happened once or twice in her younger years. Always just the one time, though. Because her response was quick . . . and violent.

They were the ones that ended up in the hospital, not her. But she knew, Hotch would never hurt her. He would protect her and Baby.

And she knew . . . if they fell in love, that there wouldn't be anything that he wouldn't do for her.

Hotch was the kind of man that she'd been hoping to find for the past two decades. And now he was here and he'd made his feelings clear. And she didn't think of him like she did Derek or Spencer. They were like brothers. But Hotch, things had always been different between them. Maybe because it had taken so much longer for them to bond. But she knew two things for sure . . . she was physically attracted to him, and he was one of the sweetest men she'd ever met.

That would be more than enough for most women.

So she had to decide, was she going to be someone who hid herself away because she was too afraid to try? Or was she going to be someone who recognizes when an opportunity to possibly find happiness has presented itself?

Her eyes started to burn again.

She didn't want to be a coward . . . or a masochist . . . she really did want to be happy. She was tired of being alone. That's how she'd lived most of her life. Since Melanie had died she'd been trying to find something to fill that void. And Baby was coming, and she was so happy about that, but as Hotch had said about his own child, it wasn't fair to try to build your entire life on such small shoulders.

She needed more.

So she took a breath before whispering into his t-shirt.

"I think . . . I think, maybe . . . yes."

Feeling an explosion of joy in his chest, Hotch looked down at her hopefully, "really?"

This was a bit of a rollercoaster morning!

Her eyes crinkled as she looked up at him.

"Really. But, we'd have to go slow. Like, majorly slow. My worries about screwing this up are very real, but," she touched his cheek, "I don't want to throw away an opportunity that I might not get again. So maybe if we just take it really slow and see how it goes," her nose wrinkled, "but that means no sex, is that going to be a problem?"

For probably ninety-five percent of the men she'd ever dated that would be a deal breaker, so Hotch's response here would be pretty telling.

He smiled softly, "of course not." Then a thought came to him and he looked at her worriedly, "not forever though, right?"

Whatever she needed him to do to feel comfortable moving forward was fine. Hell, he'd only had sex twice since he'd gotten divorced so he could certainly wait. But he really didn't think a life of complete celibacy was something that was going to work for him in the long run.

Emily chuckled at his look of concern.

"No, not forever," she whispered, "just for now," then she sighed, "I know that sometimes I confuse sex and love. And I don't want to do that with you. If we're going to do this then I want to be sure whatever feelings we have are real. So maybe a few months of, I don't know what the word is," she shrugged, "platonic dating, just while we get to know each other that way."

He nodded his agreement.

"That's a good idea actually. I don't want us to go too fast either because this is a big change. But I have a question," his brow furrowed, "does platonic mean completely platonic? What about kissing?"

Because no kissing, unlike no sex, actually was going to be difficult for him. Basically he wanted to kiss her all the damn time!

Her eyes crinkled, "I can guarantee you that kissing will definitely be put on the table in short order. How about we just play it by ear on that one, okay?"

Given she now had free license to kiss this absolutely gorgeous man whenever she wanted to, she definitely didn't think she'd be able to resist that one for long. She just wanted to see how things went first. Right now her feelings for him were a little mixed up, and they needed to be unraveled. See what was friendship, and what was more. That's what she was hoping would happen over the coming weeks and months.

Beyond that though, she was trying to be considerate of his feelings. At this moment, for him a kiss would mean so much more emotionally than it would mean for her. So she wanted to wait until it would mean as much to both of them.

If this relationship was actually meant to go anywhere, then she figured that it shouldn't take long for her to reach that point.

He gave her a full dimpled grin, "very okay."

Kissing in short order. That was the best news he'd had in a year!

Emily laughed as she ran her hands over his face, "it's so nice to see your dimples!"

Seeing the blush then immediately start to climb his cheeks, she made a mental note that was a topic which embarrassed him, and she quickly changed the subject.

"I do have a good one for you. Well, if you want, it's a good one. If you don't then we can wait on that too."

Wrinkling his brow, he looked over at her in confusion, "what is it?"

"This," she rubbed his chest, "sleeping together. That would be okay with me if you want to sleep over sometimes," she looked at him guiltily, "but I understand with the no sex thing that it might be a little awkward. So whatever you want."

God knew she'd love to be able to have a warm bed a few times a week, but he might think that was a weird idea.

His eyes widened, "are you kidding me? You think I'm going to turn down sleeping with you because we're not going to get to have sex? Obviously you've never been married, because I've spent half of my life sleeping with a woman that I couldn't have sex with!"

She burst out laughing. "Okay then!" she smiled, "it looks like we have a little plan," she huffed, "it's a good thing we woke up so early or we wouldn't have had time to talk again."

Hotch's eyes crinkled, "I agree, this is probably the only time I've ever been happy about waking up at dawn."

Emily curled back into his side with a happy sigh, "now when do we have to get up for real?"

"Hmm," he murmured while glancing at the clock as he wrapped his arms around her, "well, the flight isn't until 12:15 and it's only a little after 6. So I guess, if you shower quickly, we can sleep for another hour and a half."

This would definitely be one day where he wished he was just a regular person with a regular job. Then they could call in sick and just stay in bed all day. Even if they weren't doing anything but cuddling, outside of his time with Jack, this was the best he'd felt in months.

He didn't feel lonely anymore.

And it wasn't an illusion now, because they had a plan. It was a good plan too. It gave them time to figure things out. And who knew really what would happen down the road. All he did know was that he too old to screw around if he'd found somebody who might make him happy.

He was pretty sure Emily was that person.

Also, he had no worries that he'd talked her into anything, because her rules made sense. They showed that she hadn't just tossed all of her own concerns out the window just because he'd made a good argument. He didn't want to have that much influence over her, and he was actually really relieved to see that he didn't.

Whatever had driven her to make bad decisions when it came to relationships in the past, she clearly was starting to think now like a parent. And she was trying to do what was best for her child. He respected that. She was being a good mom. If anything it was just one more reason that he wanted to be with her. And she was also right that they should wait until they were both ready before they moved on to any physical exchanges of affection.

Well . . . he ran his fingers gently down her back . . . beyond what they were doing now. But this was more bonding than anything else.

Emily's eyes started to close again, but then her expression suddenly changed to one of concern and her head popped up, "oh, how's your shoulder?"

For God's sake . . . she mentally berated herself . . . he got stabbed yesterday Em! You really should have asked him that when we first woke up!

His nose wrinkled, "a little stiff and achy but not bad." Then he gave her the same look back, "any morning sickness?"

Feeling relieved that he wasn't in any pain, she looked down for a second thinking about his question back to her.

"It's funny," she said, "but I'm so used to waking up queasy that I didn't even really notice it. But yeah," she looked back up, "I probably should eat my crackers before it gets worse."

That's when she moved to get up, and but Hotch squeezed her arm.

"You stay, I'll get them."

He could clearly see them sitting on the desk behind the pizza box.

Her eyes crinkled as they disentangled, "thanks."

Actually . . . he pushed himself off the bed . . . some cold pizza sounded really good. He was frigging starving, but that made sense given how he'd hardly eaten anything yesterday.

Starving or not though, first, Hotch got Emily her crackers and ginger ale before he then went back down and devoured one slice of pizza, and then grabbed up another one. And seeing Emily watching him chew the second piece, he paused, concerned, "is the smell bothering you?"

After swallowing her bite of cracker, she smiled. "Is it bothering me in the sense that it smells really good and I'd like some too? Then yes, yes it is bothering me."

It could possibly make her throw up, but she was willing to risk it.

Hotch's eyes crinkled as he turned to grab her a slice and a napkin. Then he went back down and climbed into the bed. They traded then, he took a drink of her ginger ale and she took a bite out of the pizza. After a moment, she looked up at him with a little grin.

"You let me have pizza two days in a row!"

With a wrinkle of his brow, he leaned back against the headboard.

"Huh, I guess I did," then he gave her a mock scowl, "that's it for awhile though."

She chuckled as she took another bite, "technically I think this is just a continuation of last night," she swallowed, "if we hadn't both passed out like we'd been drugged then we probably would have eaten a proper dinner and finished it up then. As it is we still have what? Two slices left."

Hotch tipped his head, "true," then a thought came to him and he looked over worriedly, "it doesn't bother you, does it? You know that I've been kind of bossy about trying to get you to eat healthier."

That had just occurred to him. It was one thing when they were strictly boss/agent working a on personal friendship and he was just worried about her health. But now the whole point here was to see if they could build a mutually supportive, healthy, romantic relationship.

The odds of that weren't too great if she secretly thought he was a controlling bastard.

As she swallowed her last bite Emily scowled slightly as she shook her head, "no, of course not," she huffed, "that's just you being you. If it bothered me, then we wouldn't even have been able to become friends." Her eyes crinkled, "and it's actually nice to know that somebody cares enough to get mad at me for clogging my arteries."

He gave her a relieved smile.

"Good, because you know that's the kind of thing I want you to tell me. If I'm being too . . . well . . . me," his eyes dropped down for a moment before he looked back up at her, "you know you're right about going really slow here, because we do have established boundaries in our work relationship, and that's what's being rewritten. So I'll apologize now if I fall into that pattern off duty of being a little too, uh . . . alpha. And please tell me right away if it starts happening."

"I promise," she answered with a nod and a little smile.

Although he smiled back, his brain continued to worry. If he was going to choose an "easy" relationship, this would not have been it. But as Emily put her head back down on his chest, and he felt a warmth spread through his body, he was reminded again that you don't always get to choose these things. Hell, you hardly ever do. And there was no way, given how attached he was becoming, that he was going to stop and worry about the work rules now.

That would be ridiculous.

They were going slow, and of course they'd be professional and discreet when on duty. And before they knew it, Emily would be going out on maternity leave. Then by the time she was ready to come back, ideally, if things went well, they'd have been involved in some capacity, for almost a year.

Certainly enough time to figure out whether or not they were in this for the long haul. And if they were, then, and only then, would he have the conversation with Strauss and figure out what to do.

Cart before the horse and all that crap.

Emily slowly rubbed her hand across Hotch's stomach.

Funny the things she was allowed to do today that she wasn't allowed to do yesterday. And as she felt those taut muscles beneath her palm, she moved her other hand over to the small bump of her own stomach. She looked up at him in concern.

"Are you sure about this, Hotch? Really? I mean, you are asking for me AND Baby. That's a lot to take on."

Really, what man in his right mind wants to get involved with a pregnant woman carrying the amount of baggage she had?

Perhaps Hotch did have a flaw . . . he was nuts.

But then Hotch tucked her hair back as his eyes crinkled.

"Well, you're getting me and Jack," his lip quirked up, "I'm sure we can be a handful too. And speaking as one single parent to another, I have to tell you, people our age very often come with kids. Sometimes older, sometimes younger. Sometimes part time, sometimes full time," he huffed slightly, "we're just a variation on the statistics."

She stared at him for a moment, processing what he'd said, and then nodded slowly, "yeah, I suppose that's true," then she brightened considerably as she gave him a hopeful look, "does this mean that you'd maybe want to go to the doctor with me sometime? It was really nice having you there last night for the ultrasound."

That was a bonus which hadn't occurred to her yet . . . she'd actually have a partner like all of the other pregnant women in the doctor's office. Just because Hotch wasn't the father, didn't mean that he couldn't still keep her company sometimes.

If he wanted.

"Yeah," Hotch smiled sadly, "yeah, that sounds like fun," then his voice got a little husky, "I uh, I missed a lot of Haley's appointments," his gaze shifted, "work always seemed to take precedence."

Though he wasn't much for holding onto regret, but if he had it to do over again, that was one thing he would change. He would have been there for all of it. Jack was the only child he was probably ever going to have, and he'd missed so much. Hell, if he hadn't gotten up so damn early to get into the office he probably would have missed the morning sickness too.

That was probably the only thing he really had been there for all the way through.

Emily bit her lip as she looked up at him.

Poor thing. She couldn't imagine being in that position, trying to run a Unit like theirs, having such a demanding . . . important . . . job, while also trying to be a fulltime spouse and parent.

No wonder he was so stressed when she came on board. He wasn't quite so bad now, but he really never did seem happy. And given what he had told her last night about how lonely he was, she now knew why. Also, she could tell from the sadness in his expression that he was remembering the old days. The things he had done wrong.

It bothered her to see him in pain.

Then it suddenly occurred to her . . . she had a new role here. She was the, well, girlfriend.

Hotch's girlfriend.

God . . . her brow wrinkled slightly . . . that just sounded weird! Almost as weird as 'main squeeze.' But regardless of her title, either one meant that not only was it now her job to cheer him up, she had many more options at her disposal to do that than when they were just friends.

Although . . . she rolled her eyes slightly as she shifted around . . . if she hadn't just put all those rules in place, she would have had way better ways to cheer him up. Still, as she climbed into his lap, she was pretty sure that she had a good one that would at least distract him.

Hopefully.

Feeling Emily's weight unexpectedly pressing down on his lap, Hotch's gaze shifted over to look up at her. She smiled softly and pressed a kiss to his forehead before pulling his head to her breast.

Feeling the warmth breath of Hotch's sigh against her throat as he wrapped his arms around her waist, Emily realized that maybe it wouldn't take so long to sort out her feelings. Because this, sitting in his lap with his arms wrapped around her, this was really nice. It made her chest feel warm.

And this was not a friend thing to do!

But then she remembered that she wasn't trying to make herself feel better . . . this was about him. So she leaned back slightly and took one of his hands off her waist to bring it around to her stomach.

As Hotch's palm covered that small bump where Emily's child was growing, he felt the melancholy over his past mistakes begin to fade. Because this was a new life. New opportunities were here.

Literally . . . he put his other hand on Emily's hip . . . they had fallen into his lap.

And there was no point in dwelling on the things he had done wrong before. As he'd told Emily earlier, he wouldn't make those mistakes again. And if he wanted Emily . . . which he did . . . then he got Baby as a package deal. It was a good deal.

Although he was still a bit worried about becoming too attached to this little life.

If things didn't work out between them, he wasn't sure if his heart would be able to survive losing another child. Because babies were easy to fall in love with. Too easy. And if he and Emily got together for real, and then broke up later, he wouldn't even be allowed to have visitation with this one.

Still, he knew that he needed to get past that worry. Because he couldn't even begin to build any kind of meaningful relationship with a woman, if he didn't embrace her child too.

Not to mention, if he was already planning for failure then that would be a self fulfilling prophecy.

Of course what he'd told her about Jack was correct as well. It wasn't as though he could ever become involved with a woman who didn't care about his son too. But Emily was kind and loving, and he wasn't worried about the two of them getting along. No . . . this was about him.

Him and Baby.

Emily was trying to move beyond her fears, so he needed to move beyond his. So he lifted the bottom of her t-shirt and placed his hand on her bare stomach. Then he looked up . . . and smiled.

"Thank you."

Emily's eyes filled with tears as she looked back at Hotch with a watery smile. They might not have been able to go all the way today.

But . . . she placed her hand on top of his . . . maybe they'd gone just far enough.

A/N 2: They needed to have that conversation the next morning. If she wasn't ready to give him an answer she should at least have told him what her concerns were. Which is what happened and then, yada yada yada, she's his main squeeze.

Of course it would have also been unrealistically stupid to have them start making permanent declarations. A decision to be together is going to have major ramifications, and they shouldn't rush it. This way we'll get some nice coupley stuff, but not so much with the hot and heavy. So Mirror will continue on like an 'old fashioned' romance. You know, like Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn, but Kate's knocked up :)

I'm not trying to make Emily more of a mess than what we see in canon. But I don't actually think I am because we have little of her teen self from canon in Demonology and clearly, that was a messy time! But the idea of just making her history a bit more depressing than I have before, and overall with a lot of regrets, came from a scene that kept flashing in my head. It's her and Rossi in the Roadkill episode (I think) and they're in a parking garage and they're looking at these cigarette butts and he asks her if she ever smoked. And her expression darkened and she said something like, she used to do a lot of things. It was a pretty light question that got a fairly dark answer, and it just struck me. That's why I've been working this angle here with her.

Now, next, finally we can go home and see our good buddy Dave! Woot!