Penelope just wanted to go home.
She dragged her feet as the team entered the Quantico complex and unloaded ready bags from the plane. She smiled at Derek as he lifted hers without question, slinging the shoulder strap over his head and still carrying his own 2 black duffels. She walked with him, but didn’t say anything during the walk into the building and up to the BAU floor. She jolted when Derek grabbed her hand on her way to drop off the computer equipment she’d taken with her for the case.
“What are you doing tonight, Mama?”
Penelope sighed, the most dejected she’d been in a long time. It wasn’t, by far, the first time she’d gone on a case with the rest of the team, but it was only the second one where her teammates had been in serious danger. “A nice long bath and a bottle of wine, handsome. Why do you ask?”
“Come over,” he said, voice quietly pleading. “I’ll cook.”
“Derek, I really just want to unwind.” She almost groaned when he flashed her his killer smile. He could get her to do anything with that particular grin.
For his part, Derek didn’t want to be alone, nor did he want her alone, not after her very best friend had had a killer’s arm firmly enough around her neck to leave a bruise. “You’re turning down a home-cooked meal?”
Penelope gave him a tired smile. “I’m sorry.”
Derek tilted his head to the side, taking her in. If there was anyone she reacted the strongest to, his own gorgeous self aside, it was JJ. Derek knew JJ was the closest thing his baby girl had to a sister and he’d seen their connection after JJ had been forced to shoot Battle in the head. He cupped her elbow. “Okay, gorgeous, now I know something’s wrong and I’m not taking ‘no’ for an answer.”
Usually, this was about the time Penelope gave up arguing with Derek, but she knew she was too raw for any sort of companionship. They all had their own ways of dealing with cases, and though those ways had shifted with the alterations in the relationships of the team, Penelope hadn’t been that lucky. “That’s the only answer you’re getting, Hot Stuff.”
Derek arched an eyebrow. It wasn’t often that Penelope turned him down flat. He knew she loved spending time with him as much as he loved spending time with her. And he really needed the companionship. “You’re not going home alone tonight.”
Penelope gave him a small smile. “I’ll be okay,” she said, her voice less convincing than she wanted it to be. It showed in the arched eyebrow she received.
“I promise to have you home by curfew,” he teased. He was gauging her mood, trying to decipher how much of her optimism had been temporarily injured.
“Derek, really.”
That told him more than she’d probably ever realize. Derek looked up at Hotch’s office, noticing the man standing there, watching Emily unpack things from her bag. They were mostly folders and he had a feeling he knew exactly what both of them were going to do upon their decision to leave. Hotch met his gaze, darting it to Penelope with a raised eyebrow. Derek nodded.
Penelope almost blanched when Derek grasped her elbow, his fingers jolting her more than she’d like to admit. She wanted his companionship tonight, but that want was something that worried her. She’d planned to cuddle into bed with a classic romance novel, trying to force herself to remember that good things were out there. She didn’t want to burden Derek any more than she knew she had.
“You, me, and something from Mama Morgan’s recipe book.”
“Morgan, no.”
He was completely shocked by her use of his last name. She hadn’t specifically called him by his last name in virtually ages and it bothered him. “Penelope, please.”
Penelope looked at him in slight surprise. It was so incredibly odd to have Derek sounding like he was pleading with her. He was so close to her, his eyes showing her what he never showed anyone else. Derek Morgan never showed weakness. This was worse than any kind of puppy-dog eyes he could have pulled.
Derek knew he had her by the way her eyes softened. “I promise you can leave whenever you want, so long as it’s after dinner.”
A smile tilted the corners of her mouth. “Don’t say I never gave you anything.”
It turned out they ended up at her place.
Derek didn’t care, so long as he was with her. It was cases like these, where the victims could have easily been one of them, where one of their own could have lost their lives, that he found himself invariably turning to her. And she’d never seemed to have a problem with it. In fact, it almost seemed like she deliberately kept herself open in the 24 hours following a case should this need for him to share arise.
And he never talked about it. It was something that baffled him even more. He never said a word to her about the case, never gave her insight into what he was feeling, but she seemed to instinctually know that he just needed to be with her. He needed her to reorient himself in the world. Which was part of what worried him now. Penelope had never turned down a night with him, especially after cases she knew would affect him. It was just in her nature, as it was in his to drop things for a friend in need.
The fact that she’d actually argued with him, insisted that she needed the time to herself, shocked him in a way she hadn’t in a long time. Now he was even more worried than he had been. Maybe this had affected her on a much deeper level than he’d originally anticipated. He had no idea how to deal with that.
It wasn’t until much later, when they were wrapped up together on the couch, that he even dared broach the subject with her. “Hey Princess?”
“Hmm?” She was focusing on the mindless sitcom, trying to rid her mind of watching on TV as someone she loved was held at gunpoint.
“Is everything alright in that pretty little head of yours?”
Her eyes flickered away from the television for a split second, her entire body tensing up against his. She wiggled in his arms, keeping her eyes averted. “Fine.”
He stayed silent, his fingers absently trailing up her side. She was pressed right against his chest, sitting between his legs, the blanket draped over them both. His hands were looped about her waist, her head tucked under his chin.
Penelope hated the silence. “I saw him.” His hand only froze for a fraction of a second, but she felt it nonetheless, the abrupt cessation of tingling heat. “Dell, I mean. Before he grabbed Jayje.”
Derek exhaled loudly. His eyes had been on the rest of the reporters, not on the blond behind him. The cameras had probably caught their unsub approaching from behind.
“I couldn’t call. It would have been too late anyway. I had to sit there and watch as he came up behind her with the gun and…” She had to trail off, to compose herself.
“Did you see Hotch?”
Penelope shook her head. “He was a blur. And then I heard the gunshot and no one was talking…”
He hadn’t even thought about that. It had never occurred to him that in that station she could hear everything that went on, could see what the video cameras caught.
“All I could think about was ‘what if’? What if Hotch hadn’t been there? What if Dell had been stronger?”
“You can think about the ‘what if’s,” Derek told her sombrely. It was something he had learned early on in the game. What if’s led to ‘maybe’s which invariably turned into nightmares that haunted you. “We did what we could. We had one miscalculation.” It could have cost JJ or Hotch their life.
But he wasn’t about to say that.
Penelope craned her head, looking back at him. “I can’t lose my superheroes.”
She sounded so small that Derek’s heart broke. He stroked her hair, kissing her forehead softly. “We take care of our own,” he promised her. “We would have found a way to save JJ, even if Hotch hadn’t.” In fact, if he remembered right, Shaw had done a pretty good job at trying to negotiate with Dell.
“Derek?” she asked softly.
“Yeah?”
“Make me forget.”
Looking down at her, softness and compassion, eyes brimming with moisture, Derek did the only thing his brain was telling him would truly help.
He leaned down and kissed her.
Penelope woke slowly, her arm subconsciously reaching out for the person who had been there just hours before. But the bed was empty, the sheets cold. It effectively startled her awake. She felt tears choke her throat and the brutal sting of his apparent regret made her feel sick to her stomach.
After spending one excruciatingly passionate night with her, Derek Morgan was gone.
And Penelope burst into tears.