Protective
Summary: Hotch jumps in front of a bullet for you. The pieces fall together.
Warnings: Mild violence, language, Spencer Reid being sweet, smut—fingering, PiV, praise kink, daddy kink (pretty mild). WC—+8.3k
A/N: And here we have it, another oneshot that reveals my desire for men twice my age. Sigh.
You told yourself it was a quirk—like Reid with his obsession with Dr. Who or Penelope with her love of steamy romance novels. You just loved a good high-stakes raid; sure, if it could be avoided you weren’t bothered, but if it was necessary—well, the rush of adrenaline during the preparation, the intense focus that settled over you when you climbed out of the SUV, you were a sucker for it all.
When you first joined the BAU it was the quickest way for you to prove yourself to your new teammates, impressing even Derek Morgan when you wrangled a man twice your size to the ground and had him in cuffs before your colleagues could assist. Once you had established trust with the team, you were able to fill your role more effectively as the expert on tracking and capturing suspects. Drawing up unique plans for each case once the person was identified and then working with your boss, Aaron Hotchner, to ensure they were organized and followed.
You had been in this role for just over two years now and the BAU was basically your family; Spencer was your best friend—you spent most of your social time outside of work with him, usually at his place or the bookstore nearby. You did girls’ nights with JJ, Emily and Penelope, some of which got so wonderfully out of hand that Spencer would pick you up, then tease you endlessly for the next few days as you suffered through a hangover. You liked training with Derek because he pushed you, made sure you worked your ass off whether it was for recertification or just a workout, and he had a calm way of talking about life, often giving you wise advice like whether you should invest in a condo as a rental unit (you did and it worked out amazingly), or if you should give in to JJ’s desire to set you up with a cop friend of Will’s.
That advice you...had not taken. He told you to go for it, that saying yes to a date one time didn’t mean you were obligated to do more than that even if the date went well. The problem was—and you’d never admit this to Derek—that you were already sort of head over heels for someone. The idea of going on a date when you just knew you’d be spending the entire time imagining, wishing it were, a different person across the table from you just didn’t feel right or fair.
So you’d told JJ no thank you. That had been over a year ago and you were in no different of a place in your life, still pining for a man you couldn’t have and whining about it over Ben and Jerry’s during movie nights at Spencer’s, the only person who knew your secret. He was such a good friend that he never stopped you from the inevitable venting that happened every month, usually after a case that had you working closely with the man in question for a few days too long. After being holed up together in a conference room planning and theorizing and then always, always pairing together in the field. You made it up to Spencer by making sure he was never interrupted while in the middle of a ramble unless he got too far off-topic.
Being in love with Aaron Hotchner was no way to live, yet you simply couldn’t help yourself. You didn’t care about the age gap, nor did you mind that he had a child; you adored Jack. But you knew that those would be barriers for Hotch, and you’d seen the last two women he’d dated. They were nearer to his age, soft and sweet and nothing like you at all. It didn’t matter that his relationships didn’t last long, you still gleaned enough information from their brief existence to understand that he wasn’t looking to date another agent, let alone his own, younger, subordinate.
When you had first started with the team, you had wondered if Hotch disliked you. You often found yourself going to Rossi; the warm veteran Profiler always had his door open for you and made sure your onboarding and first few months with the team were smooth and comfortable. It wasn’t that Hotch was rude or cold, it was more like he was wary of you—he would only make brief eye contact, take measured steps away if you happened to be standing near him, and a few times he’d seen the empty seat next to you on the jet and ended up spinning on the spot to take the lone seat at the rear of the cabin, then stand awkwardly if he needed to address the team at any point during the flight.
You tried not to read into it too much but made the mistake of mentioning it to Spencer one movie night. He’d nodded vigorously as you’d spoken and then agreed, saying he’d noticed the odd behaviour as well.
Things were like that until a case in Texas where you saved Hotch’s life.
