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Her mother never says it. Her father leaves before she even has a tenor of his voice to remember saying anything at all.
The first person to say it to Emily is Ian Doyle. Except she isn’t Emily Prentiss, she’s Lauren Reynolds.
He says it, holding her wrists above her head and taking his pleasure from her. It’s not whispered, not breathed into her skin like a promise. It’s said through gritted teeth with eyes screwed shut as he takes and he takes and he takes.
Lauren Reynolds says it back.
-
The second person is Penelope Garcia.
She’s weaving through the bar, three drinks between her palms on her fourth girls night, her fifth month into work at the BAU. She places the drinks down with a slosh, a little bit tired from the flight and the drain of another case closed and paperwork boxed off. But she’s also a little bit buzzed from the closed case, from knowing she’s doing good work, with good people, taking bad people off of the street without having to rob Peter and pay Paul to do it. She’s a little bit buzzed that these girls nights seem to always involve her now, it’s not a question it’s a demand when Penelope tells her a time and a place. She’s a little bit buzzed when blue eyes flash to hers appreciatively, blazing and happy, a delicate hand already reaching out greedily for her glass.
“Oh, Emily Prentiss, do I love you.”
It’s said so easily, flippantly, not even said to her face. It’s directed into the salt rim and mint leaves. Still it makes her stomach flip.
It comes easy to Penelope. Loving the people she loves.
-
She thinks as she watches blue eyes, hard as steel, staring out of the jet window, that maybe it was when a hand, smaller than Emily’s, smoother than Emily’s, kinder than Emily’s, clasped hers.
The last in a semi-circle of introductions, all sincere but this one warm. “JJ”
“Emily.”
She thinks maybe it was when, “I’m sorry.”
“What?” Emily remembers the confusion, her forehead furrowing further as she'd watched the weight of guilt flash across usually kind, light features. She’d wanted to wipe that feeling away, take it and lump it where she kept hers, far, far away from JJ.
“Earlier. For making you uncomfortable.”
“You didn’t.” Emily had breathed automatically, shaking her head. She had a wild desire to reach out, clasp JJ’s hands in her own and pull her in. Instead she tucked them into her pockets, felt the tingles like pin pricks in her fingertips. JJ had frowned. She'd leaned forward, as though she too wanted to reach out and touch, but she stopped herself and Emily had stopped herself from asking what she'd found in her eyes that made JJ pull away.
She didn’t have the wherewithal to explain to JJ then that there are worse things than having a gun pointed in your face by someone so thoroughly good as JJ.
She thinks that actually maybe, as the turbulence makes the cabin shake, it was late one night in June. Morgan had taken Spencer by the arm with a salute and a promise to deposit him directly into his bed and,
“On his side, yes ma’am.”
Emily had Penelope’s left arm and JJ the right. She hadn’t been sure this was entirely smart and would, to this day, pay good money to view the cctv of them wobbling in tandem down the streets to Penelope’s apartment.
“Oh.” Penelope whined, eyes already closed and halfway to sleep. “I can’t sleep on my side.”
Emily had stood in the door frame, glass of water and painkillers ready to leave by the bedside, and watched as JJ’s hands held Garcia still, pushing hair back from her face and taking the glasses from her face.
“Yes, you can.”
“Nooo.” But Garcia was already losing the fight and her moan dropped off into an undignified snore.
Emily hadn’t realised she’d been smiling until JJ turned around and matched hers, bright like the sun in the darkness. Her had stomach somersaulted and she'd felt that smile warm her right to the core. She'd broken their connection first, walked forward so she could leave the water and the painkillers for whenever Penelope woke up and grasped for them. Blue eyes, dancing with amusement and alcohol and something else, something that made her feel giddy and sick in equal measure, had followed her every step.
“Anyone ever told you you’re really good at handling people.” Emily had joked, grasping for something to crack the tension that cemented to her muscles, pulled back into the gravity of that gaze.
“Hmm.” JJ’s mouth ticked at the corner and Emily watched as her lips formed the next words. “Maybe I should see if there’s a career in that.”
A laugh had bubbled its way out of her lips. A squawk really, that’d made her cheeks flush hot and blue eyes had drooped affectionately as they watched.
She thinks definitely maybe, as the plane straightens out and the tendons in pale, long fingers relax their grip on the arm rest, it was when Hotch handed out keys. Three in total: one to Derek, one to Emily and one he kept for himself. Emily felt the cold metal sting at her fingertips as he explained.
“There’s not enough vacancies at the inn so we’re doubling up. Spencer you’re with Morgan. JJ you’re in with Emily. Rossi and I in the last one. Any questions?”
Yes, Emily had wanted to say, a nauseous feeling growing in the pit of her stomach. But she didn’t, she'd nodded and lead the way silently to their shared room. The double bed in the centre seemed to shrink as she opened the door and stepped inside.
JJ strode in behind her, one hand wiping her forehead as she puffed out air.
“No air con.” She noted gruffly, pulling her jacket off. Emily’s eyes mapped the way her shirt came un-tucked at the back, creased from the drive. She lingered over the darker patch at the small of her back, stuck to smooth skin, the light sparkle of sweat on the back of her neck as JJ threw up her hair, darkened tendrils stuck in place.
“Em?”
Emily had blinked, the bead of sweat that had dripped down JJ’s throat, trailing its way across her collarbone in an agonizingly slow journey below her shirt burned onto the back of her eyelids. When she reopened here eyes JJ was looking at her expectantly.
“Sorry, what?”
“Left or right?” Her voice shook with humour as she waved her hand to the bed. Emily followed her hand. “Ladies choice.”
Later, when they’re not really any closer but she could feel it at the tips of her fingers that their unsub was close, she laid on her back. Her eyes had traced the brown water stain in the roof tiles relentlessly but she hadn’t taken it in.
JJ was close enough to hear. She didn’t snore, but she did make a huff on every third breath. Just a release of air and Emily counted them all night long. She’d committed it to memory, that sound, wondering how many people got this close to JJ.
JJ was close enough to smell. She smelled like oranges and faintly of the warmth of the day. She smelled like the shea butter hand cream she’d squeezed in her palm, rubbed over her hands, over each finger delicately as brown eyes watched before,
“Goodnight Emily.” When the lamp went off and she turned on her side, back to Emily’s gaze.
The next night, after another body, after,
“Didn’t sleep?”
Emily had to wait for the yawn to pass, to blink away the force of it, sparkling collar bones and flushed skin still tattooed there, before she could meet watchful eyes and admit, “Not much.”
“I didn’t snore did I?” There was concern then, eyebrows raised with it but Emily was already shaking her head with puff of air every three breaths ringing her ears.
“No.” She smiled half-heartedly. “Just don’t sleep well in new beds.”
After,
“Drink?” Morgan offered, already half turned towards the bar.
“Not tonight.” Emily shook her head, after JJ had already agreed. “Think I’m going to try and catch up on some sleep.”
“Boring.” He’d boomed but let her go with a wink.
She did get some sleep, not much, but the next thing she registered was the door. Was feet tiptoeing into the room, sliding the door shut and locking it with the laboriously slow movements of someone trying not to be detected. She didn’t know then, but she does know now, sat on the plane above the sea as she watches the frown dig deeper into pale skin and fights the urge to reach out and smooth it, to take it all away when she knows she can’t, why she’d pretended to still be asleep but she did.
Her eyes stayed closed. She’d listened to JJ as she padded around the room in the dark. Listened as the bathroom door opened and shut, the toothbrush vibrating through the walls, the sink running, and the door opened and shut again. She listened to the rustle of the covers, felt the dip in the bed, smelt that familiar hand cream. Her eyes had stayed closed.
Even with her eyes closed Emily had known JJ was close enough to touch that night. Close enough that the inches between them felt live with electricity, humming through her skin, she could’ve reached out and touched. Her fingers had tapped with the aching absence against the mattress. She could've reached out and let it all consume her, that night.
JJ’s hand had fell on top of hers and the silence in the room had rung in her ears. The electricity burst through her nerves, sizzling from their skin now pressed together, wave after wave that intensified as JJ slipped her fingers through Emily’s. The weight of her gaze filtered through then, searching for that connection too. She can feel herself being read, even as she fought to remain neutral.
The fingers intertwined with hers squeezed and she knew, somehow, that JJ had retreated, closed her own eyes. “Go back to sleep, Em.”
She thinks, as she watches teeth nibble on blush pink lips illuminated by the dimmed cabin light, probably when rain dropped in sheets, soaked her to the bone. Her gun, up before her and clasped between her hands, shook.
The others would think it was the rain, but Emily knew. She knew with a certainty that made her stomach drop like a lead weight, that those droplets of water making their way down JJ’s cheeks were tears.
She wanted to step aside. She wanted to drop her gun, step aside and pull JJ away with her. But the unsub’s voice shook, the knife drew more blood and she refocused.
She did step aside later, as Hotch put the cuffs on and the ambulance moved in to the woman with the cut on her throat. She'd holstered her gun and wrapped a hand around JJ’s elbow. She pulled them both away, blinking through the rain until she could pretend it was just the two of them, huddled behind the car they’d piled out of not 30 minutes before. Emily took a moment, her eyes roving over JJ. Her baby blue shirt was two shades darker, sticking to her arms, her bullet proof vest had droplets running off the velcro, dripping onto her pants. Blonde strands of hair, freed from her ponytail, stuck to her forehead and her skin looked slippery, it sparkled blue and red in the glow of the ambulance.
And then JJ was slipping between her arms, closing the gap between them. Her arms wrapped around Emily’s neck and Emily’s hands slid around JJ’s waist. She felt JJ’s head turn into her neck, felt her sigh tickle her jaw line and felt her arms tighten in response, she wanted to pull JJ into her, closer and closer until they became one, until JJ's shivers became her own.
“You’re cold.” Emily realised, pulling back. She remembers now, watching as JJ’s head shakes with anger in the seat opposite her, that JJ had shook her head then too. Her lips had parted, but Emily had already broken free of her hold and pulled open the passenger door. All trace of anything JJ had had to say had gone by the time she’d turned back with someone’s jacket in her hands.
It was Morgan’s, she’d realised as she pulled it tight over JJ’s shoulders. She couldn’t meet the fire that blazed in blue eyes, that burned her skin and made her heart race. Instead she played with the collar of Morgan’s jacket, pulled it away from irritating JJ’s throat.
She thinks definitely as the fog cleared 12 hours ago. The beeping seeped in slowly, the pain came next, and then finally the memories. She’d blinked sterile walls into view and looked around for that semi circle of people who greeted her all those years ago, but they’re not there. Most of all she'd looked for the last person in that semi circle, for that kind smile, those blazing eyes, she wanted, still wants, to feel those soft hands clasp hers again. She wants to rewind back to before the blue eyes looked at her then, in that hospital bed, in the dark hospital room, sadness and pain and knowing reflected right back at her.
“JJ.” She asks.
“Emily.”
She thinks definitely now as the seatbelt light flashes on, as the Eiffel Tower shines against the night sky in her periphery, as blue eyes finally meet hers since her voice, JJ’s voice, had shook and said:
“Emily Prentiss is dead.”
She’s certain it was every moment together and every moment apart and so, so much more.
She thinks, JJ, I love you.
-
Emily shouldn’t be surprised, it would’ve been stupid to be surprised. But still, her stomach had dropped violently and she felt her muscles spasm, suddenly cold.
“Love you.” Soft southern drawl danced around the corner.
A breathy laugh chased it, giddy and happy and free. The surprise filtered away and the sick green feeling raged into dark jealousy, turbulent and racing. She wanted to feel that laugh against her skin, to hear that laugh beside her ear.
“Love you too.”
The storm dropped and all of a sudden Emily was in a crater at the centre, alone. It rang in her ears like a howling wind had actually left her alone, as sudden as it came, gone. She turned away, not wanting to see more than she had heard and there was Morgan, eyes too knowing and too sad for her to meet properly.
“I’ll bring your coffee.” He took her empty mug with nothing more and disappeared around the corner Emily wasn’t able to round. “Hey love birds. This is a professional environment.”
Emily couldn’t make out the words JJ used but she sounded happy.
-
The words dance around Emily as soon as she lands.
JJ, I love you.
She slots back into the team eventually.
JJ, I love you.
Time passes slowly and all at once and still, JJ, I love you.
Time crawls when she sits on a plastic chair, when hands squeeze her shoulder as they filter in and back out again. Time stops altogether when Will’s sad, kind eyes swim before her.
“She’s asking for you.”
Her feet drag, tonne weights tied to her ankles and she creaks as she stands. Then there she is, sat up in a hospital bed, the air smells sterile and antiseptic and the memory of oranges and shea butter and minty alcohol burns bitterly.
“Emily.”
“JJ.” The door to the room swings shut before Emily can move further, the weights too much and it roots her to the ground.
“Spence said you’ve been out there for hours.” Emily nods and JJ nods too. Blue eyes snap away first, clouding over and swimming, suddenly, with tears that overflow and fall quickly.
“JJ.” Emily breathes and suddenly she’s surging forward, closing the distance, her hands reaching to feel pale skin for herself. She wants to pull JJ aside again, hold her in the rain and promise everything will be ok.
“Emily.” Is sobbed against her neck. “Emily.” And Emily holds tighter and tighter, lets JJ’s nails leave semicircles in the skin of her shoulders where she grips right back, through her tremors and her sobs.
JJ, I love you.
She doesn’t say it then, but she does breathe it into the way she smooths blonde hair, stroking the back of the head that pushes into her neck. She does send it to the finger tips that splay on JJ’s back, pulling her closer and closer until there is no more space between their bodies. She does feel it tingle with every kiss she drops on the crown of blonde hair.
She doesn’t say it weeks later as footsteps echo, unmistakable, from the elevator doors. She turns and breathes for the first time in weeks and days and hours and minutes and seconds. Or when coffee cups are pressed into cold hands, when gazes meet across crowded rooms, when hands skim along backs, secret and all theirs.
She feels the words dance on her tongue later still when their thighs touch, from knee to hip. Side by side on the couch on the jet, there’s room either of them to move, create some space between them, but JJ’s gravitational pull holds Emily right where she is, blood pumping and skin prickling in the dimmed lights of the cabin.
She’s not reading the book in her hands, couldn’t even tell you the name of it as she flips pages every few minutes. She can feel blue eyes boring into the side of her face and if only she knew what they were searching for she would give it.
“Will and I are separating.”
“Jayj.” Emily gasps. She drops her book, pretence forgotten, but JJ's eyes snap away. She nods sadly, lips pursing, looking down as her fingers twist around each other in her own lap.
Her head drops heavily onto Emily’s shoulder and Emily reaches over, grabbing her hands. Their fingers intertwine together as an Emily rests her head on top of JJ’s, content to absorb every inch of JJ's stillness.
The words escape her, “JJ, I love you”, later, on their first two day weekend since Paris and the rest of it.
Penelope had declared it a girls night, declared it was exactly what JJ needed, had dragged them both out, dragged Emily along with a promise it would make her feel better too, had shouted,
“Oh, mojito’s how I love you.”
She staggered home with Emily taking JJ’s right arm and Penelope the left.
Emily carried the weight of JJ against her side when Penelope staggered off to get water and pills and a garbled hand waved towards the guest room.
She guided them both gently through Penelope’s apartment, though the floors tilted and turned before her. They crashed through the door less than gracefully as JJ wobbled and flopped back on to the guest bed heavily, a gust of air escaping her, she laughed loudly, winded.
Emily dropped to her knees and JJ followed her, leaning up onto her elbows to watch as Emily bent to grab one foot then the other and placed her shoes beside the bed. JJ had stilled above her and Emily looked up from between her legs, finding watchful, heavy eyes gazing down at her. There was heat high on JJ’s cheeks, lips parted, and her chest rose and fell quickly.
Emily’s hand tightened on the ankle still in her hand, felt her own breathing come quicker, shallower as her heart raced. Their eyes locked, and a million things seemed to pass between them, years of knowing each other at their worst, at their best. The words escape her and she slices through the silence in the room.
“JJ, I love you.”
There’s a second where she can feel the words settle heavily between them, she can see recognition filter through blue eyes and she can’t look away as pale pink lips part.
“Right.” Garcia’s voice punches through the air. “Water. Pills. Blanket for the sofa. I’m going to be sick.”
She’s come and gone without even a side glance to Emily, frozen on the floor wiht panicked eyes that watch her burst in and out, to JJ never once looking away from Emily during the intrusion. A beat, and now that the connection is broken Emily can’t bring herself to reconnect their gazes. She stands, hand dropping away from cool skin, and grabs the blanket dropped by their host.
“Goodnight, Jayj.” She clears her throat as she stands.
“Emily.” Her name is said like a demand and her eyes flash immediately to blue, spinning in that pull. “Stay.” Emily licks her lips, watches as JJ sits up properly and her hand reaches out. “Stay.”
“Ok.” Emily nods, she drops the blanket back to the floor and lets JJ’s hand grasp her own, lets JJ pull her down to the bed. She lays on her back, eyes locked on JJ’s movements.
JJ returns the favour, helping her toe off her own shoes and she places them together, beside her own at the side of the bed. And then there JJ is, closing the gap between them, laying the length of her body against the length of Emily’s. Her head coming to rest on Emily’s chest and fingers interlacing together, she rests them against Emily’s ribs, just under her heart, and her leg lays possessively over one of Emily’s. Emily knows JJ can feel the way her heart thumps in her chest, thinks she can feel the way JJ’s pumps to match it, and she wraps her other arm around JJ, settling her hand on her waist, holding her tight.
-
JJ brings her coffee at 11:15 nearly every day, she doesn’t say anything. JJ sits beside her on the jet, she doesn’t say anything. JJ smiles at her, takes her hand, follows her with worried eyes as they split up in the field, squeezes her tighter every time they separate and come back together. She doesn’t say anything.
Emily knows JJ remembers and she thinks JJ knows that Emily knows that. But she thinks she can feel it and that’s enough for them. She takes all of the looks and all of the touches, secret and blazing and only for her.
It's enough for JJ as they sit on the back steps of the ambulance, shoulders pressed together. JJ's hands hold Emily's delicately, the pads of her fingertips tiny pinpricks of pressure as Emily watches her head bowed, the determined set of her forehead. There's a cold, antiseptic smell as JJ makes small work of the blood that's dried on her hands. It's enough for Emily too, she thinks, as JJ scrubs her clean. It's enough. It's enough.
It is enough until there’s overcast skies and a pop followed by searing, bruising pain that flares out from the center of Emily's chest. The floor hits her back and she's faintly aware of pandemonium around her, a shower of bullets, deafening shouts of her name. JJ swims before her, stars surrounding her panic stricken face. She wants to reach out, tell her it's ok, don't worry, but her vision begins to blacken at the edges and she just about register's a shaking hand stroking her hair back from her face.
“Go home.” Hotch tells them later, as the plane skids along the tarmac. “I’ll see you in a week.” He directs to Emily and she nods, leaving the bullet proof vest determinedly behind.
She goes home and she feels sorry for herself with a glass of wine and she changes, laboriously slowly around the bullet shaped bruise on her ribs. She thinks it’s not actually enough, to know and not have, and then there’s a knock on her door.
She breathless by the time she gets there, and when she pulls open the door there’s JJ, chest heaving, eyes wild.
“Jayj-“ Emily panics.
“Say it again.” She demands, breathless.
For a second Emily blinks, confused in the face of JJ’s desperation. She steps aside and JJ strides past Emily into the apartment and spins when Emily shuts the door behind her. Emily stops, about to follow the blonde and finding herself pinned by blue eyes, her back to her own front door.
She gets it now, looking at JJ’s flushed cheeks, at the way her chest still heaves. Her hair is a mess, tangled into a messy ponytail with tendrils that escape, fly away and tickling her neck.
Emily stays rooted to her spot, stalled in the gravity of JJ's pull.
“JJ, I love you.”
Long legs close the distance in a matter of seconds and Emily finds her back pushed against her own front door. One hand grips her hip and the other cups her cheek and then suddenly lips are pressed against hers. Soft and delicate at first, testing the feel of it, of the weight of it as it settles. A low pulse begins to beat within Emily, radiating from every point of contact with JJ, directly to her center and Emily gasps. She pulls JJ in by the belt loops of her pants, leans back against the door until she is sandwiched and all she can feel is JJ and all she can smell is JJ and all she can taste is JJ. She moans and JJ swallows it, her tongue following the sound, desperate to taste it again.
It’s with a low pop that JJ pulls back to look at her. Dark eyes watching her as she blinks back into reality.
“I love you.” Emily whispers again when JJ’s hand leaves her hip and cups the other side of her face.
“Emily, I love you too.” Her thumbs swipe gently across Emily’s cheek bones. “I have loved you for years.”
Emily laughs wetly, wincing when her ribs pinch at the movement and she protests “No”, hands tightening in the belt loops when JJ moves to pull away in worry. "Stay."
She lets JJ's thumbs swipe away tears as her eyes overflow, let's JJ guide them backwards through her own flat. Her eyes never once leave Emily's as they navigate all the way to Emily’s bedroom. They step over the discarded clothes, and JJ lays Emily down on her back, coming to sit above her, resting on Emily's hips. She leans down, and their breath mixes intoxicatingly between them until Emily reaches up to close the gap.
“I love you, Emily.” She kisses Emily’s pulse point.
“I love you.” She breathes as she strips away their clothes.
“I love you.” As their skin touches, as her lips descend, as her fingers dance and curl.
“I love you.” Emily swallows JJ's words like a promise as she crests and falls and JJ catches her.