A/N: So, it was a suck-tastic day on many levels for Criminal Minds. Not only was it a BOTCH episode, but we got news that Paget Brewster will be leaving the show at the end of the season. Considering how poorly CBS has treated her the past two years, I can't say that I blame her, though I will miss her terribly. She was one of the few bright spots in this Sucking Hairy Monkey Balls Trainwreck of a season that Erica Messer conjured up. I wish Paget the best of luck and I will definitely follow her to whatever new project she has (side note! Paget will be on the Talking Dead chat show this Sunday, February 19 on AMC. Check your listings!). As for Criminal Minds, I will continue writing as the muse hits me, and I got a lot of stories to tell. No fair-weather HotLy fan here, I'm a loyalist. However, after this season, I'm done with the show, especially if they continue to let Messer run things. This is just a simple, fluffy, two-shot that's angst free, for the most part. Hope you enjoy.

"Emily!"

Hotch felt a cold hand grip his heart when he heard JJ scream the other woman's name and he pushed himself to run faster up the stairs that led to the roof. He burst through a door, sending it crashing against the wall as he quickly scanned the rooftop, weapon raised and ready.

He could see JJ with their kidnapped victim, Mindy Sparks, clutched in her arms. The blonde's head snapped around when she heard his noisy arrival. Even from where he was, twenty yards away from her, Hotch could see the naked fear in her eyes.

"Hotch!" she cried out, her voice colored with a note of hysteria. "Em-, Emily, she was fighting with the Unsub and they-," JJ swallowed hard. "They went over the side of the roof!"

The cold hand around his heart squeezed even harder and breathing became difficult. He started to run forward, each step becoming heavier and harder to make as the dread of what he was to find sent fear coursing through his body.

They had been pursuing a pedophile who had killed his last three victims and hours earlier had snatched a little girl from a playground. The team had tracked him and his latest victim to this empty office building. As usual, they had split off into two groups with Rossi, Reid and Morgan taking the lower floors, while Hotch, Prentiss and JJ took the upper ones. Systematically, they had searched each of the rooms in the abandoned building. Hotch had been in one room at the far end of a hallway when he had heard Emily's shout. He could hear his two agents set off in hot pursuit of their suspect. He was only seconds behind them, but took the wrong staircase. That had cost him precious time and when he realized his mistake, the women and the suspect had enough of ahead start on him that they were out of his line of sight.

If he had only not taken the wrong staircase, he would have been on the rooftop with them when they caught up to the suspect. Their unsub was a large, muscular man who weighed as much as the two women combined and had at least a half a foot on Emily. While Hotch had every confidence in his female agents, if a man who was a head taller and twice your body size got the upper hand on you and you couldn't use your gun as an equalizer, no matter how skilled you might be, it would be hard to fight him off.

Like now.

JJ was babbling out an explanation of the events as he ran towards the edge. He vaguely heard her comments.

"Emily was just starting to pat him down and then I got distracted by Mindy and he jumped Em! She was struggling with him and they went over the edge."

As Hotch continued to move forward, the cold grip on his heart squeezed tighter and tighter, and breathing became extremely difficult. A kaleidoscope of memories of Emily flooded his brain. The lovely eighteen year old daughter of Ambassador Prentiss whose smile was wide and bright with long, lean legs stretching out from a pair of faded demin shorts as she threw a laughing look at him over her shoulder. Emily walking into his office, with that same smile that he instantly remembered, but tried to pretend he didn't. Emily, as she stared gravely at him and informed him she belonged in the BAU. Emily sacrificing herself to protect him from Strauss' machinations. Emily, bloodied from a blow delivered by an unsub wielding a two by four. Emily's concerned face as she asked if he was okay. Emily's voice telling him, she could take it. Emily lying bleeding and dying before him as he called frantically for paramedics. Emily, pale and unconscious, barely breathing as she waited to be transported and he stood ready to lie to their friends. Emily, walking back into his life, focused on protecting a child. Emily, concerned about Jack and offering him kind and wise counsel. Emily, tears in her eyes telling him she was having a bad day.

Was that the sum of his memories of her? All that they had shared? It couldn't be over. She couldn't be gone because there was so much more. More for him to say to her. More for him to share with her. In those moments it took him to cross that roof top, to steel himself to look over the edge, the fear in Hotch's heart morphed into unbearable regret for the lost opportunities that he hadn't realized we had let slip from his grasp until confronted by these memories.

There were many missing scenes that he knew with each step that brought him closer to edge, he wanted to have. Memories of Emily smiling only at him, of her hand tucked into his. Emily in a white gown as she smiled at him when he slipped a wedding ring onto her finger. Him kissing Emily, making love to her and seeing her, glowing and beautiful with their child growing in her belly. The two of them, old and gray, sitting on the porch of their home as they watched their grown children play with their children. These thoughts flashed through his mind in less than a second and left him with a deep ache of want.

Hotch knew he wanted those memories to actually be real and he wondered if it was now too late. What would he find when he peered over the edge? Would all he see be Emily's body, shattered, with the beautiful light in her eyes gone and with it, all the chances and possibilities that he suddenly realized he wanted to have with her?

He finally reached the edge and taking a deep breath, he braced his hands onto the concrete ledge and peered over.

Two feet below him, clutching one of the small decorative dragon's heads that adorned the building, Emily Prentiss was clinging on for dear life. His shadow hit her and she looked up.

"Hotch! For God's sakes! Pull me up!" she shrieked at him in a very much alive voice.

He gaped at her for half a second before he was nearly lunging over the building to haul her back up. He reached down and she let one of hers loose from the death grip she had on the dragon to clasp his.

He could feel her warm, alive flesh and the icy feeling in his body immediately fled with the contact. Hotch easily began to haul her up, and with a push and a pull, Emily was safely back on the roof, wrapped in Hotch's arms.

She was so shaken from the experience otherwise she would have been surprised and feeling awkward finding herself in Hotch's embrace. But right now, all Emily felt was utter relief. She sagged weakly against him, her head fitting comfortably under his chin and her body curving against his. She took a deep breath, filling her lungs with his Hotch scent as he held her tightly, even as she shivered from the adrenaline coursing through her body.

"Emily!" JJ called out.

The blonde's relieved voice broke the spell for Emily and she pushed back from Hotch, who was reluctant to let her go. He kept his arms wrapped loosely around her and he saw the small wrinkle of confusion between her brows as she looked up at him. JJ called out again and Emily turned to look at her friend, waving her hand to indicate she was alright.

"Thank you," Emily said as she turned back to Hotch. "I sure didn't want to end up like our unsub."

"Any time," he replied softly. Her mention of their suspect brought his attention back to where they were. "Where did Miller go?"

Emily inclined her head in the direction of the side, but made no move towards the edge of the roof. She had already seen what happened to the man as she clung to the outcropping.

He didn't want to break all physical contact with her, so with a hand placed gently on her back, Hotch took a step forward and leaned over the edge of the roof again. This time he could see the body splayed out on another roof about forty feet below them. The building had multiple levels and a few seconds later, he could see Morgan, Reid and Rossi rush out from the side he was on, probably after hearing the suspect's body make contact below. He saw Rossi glance upwards and Hotch raised a hand to acknowledge the other man and let him know all was well up there. They too had no doubt heard JJ's scream over their comm. units.

He turned back to look at Emily who was regaining some color in her face. JJ was still tending to their young victim and quietly moving towards the staircase with her. Hotch looked back at Emily.

"You okay?" he asked quietly.

She gave him a quick smile. "I am now. A minute ago? Not so good." She straightened up and squared her shoulders. She shook her head in disgust. "I can't believe the creep got the jump on me like that."

"Hey, the important thing is that we got to the victim in time and you weren't hurt," Hotch murmured. He would need to get further details later, but right now, both he and Emily just needed a moment to celebrate her continued existence on this planet, unscathed.

She gave him a small smile and then cast one more glance at the edge of the roof. She shivered, causing Hotch to move closer to her and slip his arm around her shoulders.

"Come on, let's get you downstairs," he murmured quietly as he began to steer her towards the staircase.

Despite her protests, he insisted the paramedics check her over. Aside from a few scrapes and sore muscles, Emily was fine and managed to avoid a trip to the hospital. JJ accompanied their young victim and the rest of the team headed back to the police station to finalize their reports and pack up their things.

Hotch watched as Emily joked with Reid and Morgan as they assembled their paperwork and photos into the banker boxes the station house had provided them. He hadn't realized he was staring at his brunette agent until he heard Rossi almost speak directly into his ear.

"She's fine, Aaron."

Hotch merely grunted if only to acknowledge Rossi's existence.

The older man rolled his eyes slightly. "You stare at her any harder and she'll have scorch marks. She's okay, Aaron. We got the douchebag, granted he had to be poured into a body bag and that means extra paperwork, but we saved that little girl. And Emily wasn't hurt."

"I should have been there, Dave," Hotch said in a heavy voice. "Instead I took the wrong staircase. That cost me too much time."

"Emily and JJ are two highly trained, extremely competent agents," Rossi argued. "You don't and can't be with them every second."

"If I was there, Emily wouldn't have nearly died," Hotch whirled on his friend fiercely. Rossi looked at him in startled surprise, the pain and guilt clearly written on his old friend's face, plus something else. "How many times have I not been there for her, Dave? How many times has she been hurt or nearly killed because I've been somewhere else and too late to get to her?"

"But you weren't late this time, Hotch," Rossi commented softly. "You saved her. And you saved her from Doyle."

"After she nearly died both times," he spat out bitterly as his eyes turned back towards his beautiful agent. "If anything happened to Emily, I-" Hotch's voice trailed off and another look came over his face. A look of puzzlement and confusion. His brow furrowed and suddenly something seemed to dawn on him and he looked sharply at Prentiss again.

Rossi watched the myriad of emotions play over the younger man's face. His shrewd eyes missed nothing and when asked later, he could pinpoint the exact moment it happened.

Aaron Hotchner just realized he was in love with Emily Prentiss.

Hotch stared at Emily from across the room with a dumbfounded expression on his face. He loved her. That was it. On the rooftop, he had felt regrets when he thought he would never see her again, regrets that there was so much more to share with this woman, but he hadn't had time to really think or analyze the jumble of emotions he was feeling. But now, with the danger passed, and the adrenaline wearing off, in the quiet moment as he watched her, Hotch knew: he loved Emily.

At that moment, she turned and saw him looking at her. She raised an eyebrow in inquiry, but when he didn't move or change his expression, he saw her frown at him in concern. She started to make her way over towards him.

He felt his heart give a small lurch as she came towards him, taking in each sway of her hips, the way the fluorescent lights above her hit her hair and picked up the subtle reddish highlights. How smooth and perfect her face looked even if it was marred by a concerned look.

Oh God, he was completely in love with Emily and he simply did not know what to do about it.

She stopped two feet from him and looked up at him with her large doe eyes. He had noticed how much smaller she had seemed to be on the roof top and his eyes dropped down, registering for the first time that she wore flat heeled boots instead of ones with some sort of higher heel. That explained why he had been able to tuck her so easily under his chin, why she had fit so perfectly and snugly against his body.

"Hotch?" she asked with a slight tilt of her head as she examined him closely. "Are you okay?" She had never seen him look so, well, she didn't know how to describe it. Stunned? Dumbstruck?

"He's fine, just realizing he's dying of hunger," Rossi interject smoothly. "Actually, we all are. How about this, it's late so why don't we stay the night and I'll treat us all to a nice dinner." He looked at Hotch and Emily expectantly.

"Well, I'm not one to turn down a free meal from Dave Rossi because I know you're not talking McDonalds," Emily laughed. She shot Hotch a concerned look. "Are you sure everything is okay, Hotch?"

The younger man found his tongue. "Uhm, yeah. Just had a moment there were everything hit and kind of blanked out for a second."

"Huh," Emily replied as she peered closely at him. "Okay, we'll I'll let the others know."

"Know what?" JJ and Garcia asked as they walked up to them. The tech analyst had made one of her rare forays out into the field with them.

"I am buying everyone dinner tonight because Hotch has decided we can stay an extra night before we go back. And I'm taking us somewhere nice." He looked pointedly at the women. "There's some time for you to do some shopping."

JJ scowled at him. "What's wrong with our work clothes?"

"They're work clothes," Rossi replied. "Where I'm thinking of people dress for dinner. Men will have to wear jackets and ties."

"Well, then you'll probably have to take Morgan and Reid shopping too," Garcia interjected. "I don't think my boy genius has a tie with him and I'm pretty sure Chocolate Adonis doesn't either."

"They can get something at the hotel gift shop," Rossi replied as he opened his arms wide and started shepherding the women towards the exit. Prentiss gave him a strange look and then glanced over her shoulder where Hotch had remained uncharacteristically quiet the entire time. "Now we'll finish up here. I'll make the arrangements and text the location of the restaurant to you ladies. Say seven o'clock for dinner?"

"Wait, you're offering to pay for a fancy dinner plus finish up packing?" Emily said in a suspicious voice. "What's going on?"

"What? I can't offer to pick up the tab now and then? And you've had a hard day, both you and JJ. You guys caught the bad guy, so the least we can do is pack," Rossi replied smoothly. "Take advantage when you can, I don't make these offers often."

"That's for sure," JJ snorted. She grabbed Emily's hand. "Come on, if they want to pack up the files, that's fine with me."

"I can use some retail therapy myself," Garcia added. "This was not a pretty case."

"None of them are," Emily sighed. She stole one more glance over at Hotch. "You okay with this?"

He nodded and gave her a thin smile. "We got Mindy Sparks back alive. It was a good win for us. Good reason to celebrate."

Emily seemed to consider his words and came to some sort of conclusion. She nodded her head once and with the other two women, left the station house.

Hotch turned towards Rossi with a frown on his face. "What was all that about?"

Dave grinned at his friend and clapped his shoulder with one meaty hand. "Tonight, Aaron, your fairy godfather will be helping you get your princess."

A/N 2: We can all use a Fairy God Rossi.