Full time, full throttle back to work had taken much less time than Garcia had expected. Her relationship with Morgan on the other hand, was still teetering on the edge of something secure and concrete. In fact, she was feeling a little lonely. She’d noticed how he was spending less and less time with her, less and less time at her place, unlike what had been the norm during her recovery. For a man who wanted to be in a relationship with her, he seemed to be working towards the opposite.
And it was starting to get frustrating.
So she started fighting back through the little things. She called Reid or Emily with her results, interchanged greetings but kept any sexual innuendoes to a minimum and ensured that she also kept her smartass remarks to a minimum when talking with him.
“Hey Baby Girl.”
Garcia spun in surprise. “You aren’t due back for an hour,” she blurted.
Morgan grinned and chuckled as he closed the door behind him. “We took off early. I’m surprised you, with your ever-knowing weapons, did not know.”
She stuck out her tongue, helpless to respond to the teasing tone of his voice. “Even all-knowing supreme genius has it’s bad days.” Her heart jumped at the concern that immediately washed over his face. Maybe she had reason to hope after all.
“Everything okay?” he asked, almost unnecessarily. “The question was written all over his face. It was a testament to the shift that had happened between them.
“I’ve had better days,” she answered vaguely.
He ran a hand over his head. “I told Hotch he shouldn’t have had you go though those tapes frame by frame.”
She’d expected him to ask about her injury, for that was what he had attributed her bad days to in the past. Really, he was right, but she pasted on a smile anyway. “Nothing a good bath and glass of wine won’t fix, Sugar.”
He raised an eyebrow. He’d been privy to hearing some of the original recordings of the screams. Their unsub had been twisted enough to describe, in detail, what he was doing to his victims while he was doing it. Garcia had been asked to isolate background noise. “No offence, Princess, but I doubt that.”
She was tired, she was anxious, she was frustrated with the ping-pong game he seemed to be playing. So, her eyebrow raised as she regarded him from her chair. “You doubt that?”
Morgan blinked, not prepared for such a hostile response. “Even Hotch is going to be up late with the images, the sounds,” he replied slowly.
“And you don’t think I can handle them.”
He narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “I know you can’t handle them. No one can.”
“I’ll be just fine,” she snapped, and spun back to her computers.
Morgan wasn’t going to just let her off, not after she had spent the last 6 months calling him when the nightmares haunted her eyelids. “What’s going on? I thought we were past the point of being strong before each other, that there was no reason to hide.”
“That’s what we said,” she affirmed, typing away, her back still to him.
Like any good profiler, Morgan caught the emphasis. “Mama, work with me here. What am I hiding?”
Garcia had to shrug off the hands that rested on her shoulders, all masculine heat and gentle touch. There was no way she was going to be able to stay mad at him if he kept touching her. “If you don’t know, why should I tell you?” Her tone was on the haughty side, but she justified it with her anger.
He forcefully spun her chair to face him, balancing himself on the padded arms. “Because if we’re going to make anything work between us, I need you to talk to me.”
“Anything work implies there’s something to make work.” She closed her eyes immediately after the words came out, berating herself for telling him. They flew open again when she heard his low chuckle.
He leaned closer, very much inside her personal bubble. “You think I changed my mind,” he accused, his grin still in place.
“You’re mocking me,” she challenged.
“I’m trying to figure out where you got the idea that I changed my mind,” he countered, eyes darting all over her face in concern. “I hope not from me.”
Garcia took a deep breath. “It’s been six months, Derek,” she began softly.
“It has,” he agreed, spinning both of them so he could lean against her desk. “And that’s a problem?”
“Why am I upset?”
Morgan sighed. “Pen, listen to me. Your recovery was topmost in my mind or I would have swept you out on a proper date the moment you were cleared for desk duty.”
“I’m not sure that makes sense,” she said honestly.
“I wanted to make sure two things didn’t happen. One, I wanted to keep the pressure of a relationship off of your shoulders until you were recovered. And two, most importantly, I didn’t want either of us to think it was out of guilt,” he explained. “But don’t doubt that I want this.”
Garcia looked a little flustered and a little embarrassed. He’d brought up a very good point. She definitely wouldn’t want Morgan in a relationship with her because he felt guilty for her being shot. “Okay, the second part… I’ll give you, but the first part? You mean to tell me that I’ve been waiting six months for you to stop being paranoid that I’m going to break? I think I’m insulted.”
Morgan chuckled as he braced himself on the arms of her chair once again. “If you were really that impatient you could have done something yourself, Sweetness.”
Her brain was starting to lose its focus, her senses overwhelmed with his proximity and scent. “You’re playing dirty,” she accused, her voice lowering to a murmur as her gaze darted between his smirking mouth and his eyes.
“Am I?” His face was all innocence but the sparkle in his eyes gave him away.
She managed to retain enough brain power to fight dirty with dirty. Leaning closer, she whispered against his lips, “Oh yeah and it’s…” she took in a deep breath, sighing it out overdramatically. “Tantalizing.” She pulled back, leaving just a sliver of space between them.
A sliver of space Morgan closed not more than half a second later when he kissed her.