Safe Passage [FanFic]
Title: Safe Passage
Author: Tooks
Pairing: Hotch, Emily, Reid, some Foyet, Garcia, and Morgan too
Rating: FRT
Summary: Reid finds not even a drive is safe in this city thanks to the cops.
Notes: This is the third piece in the Noir AU which I'm calling "Living For the Night" (I'll start retagging the others later) thanks to let_it_linger21. Again, first person (this time from Reid's POV), dark, gritty. I had to write this little bit to intro Foyet and Morgan and move the plot which means it's seemingly pointless and more like a toss-off ficlet, haha...now I'll probably backtrack and follow Foyet for a piece (so ya'll know where he fits in the AU and intro others) and then pick up where this leaves off with Morgan as narrator.
“So why come to me?” Hotch asks as he drives, speeds, through the streets towards Ms. Prentiss’s place and I sit in the back just praying the man doesn’t stop short and send me flying through the windshield.
“What do you mean?” the woman asks as she relaxes in the passenger seat, cigarette in hand, in a way even I know allows the driver a glimpse under her jacket with the turn of the head….which only serves to impress me at how stubbornly Hotch’s head refuses to move in her general direction.
“Why not the police?”
The woman’s lips curl enough that I can see them as she turns to look at Hotch, “You ever tried going to the police for help, Mr. Hotchner?” her head turns back towards the side window, “Might as well go ask Rossi to silence me now. Take the next right.”
Something about what she says causes Hotch to make the next turn with such aggression I find myself skidding across the backseat into the door. “What the hell?” I blurt out more than a touch agitated.
I’m ignored however as my new boss straightens the car and continues to drive. “What does Rossi have to do with your roommate’s disappearance?”
The Prentiss woman shrugs, “Maybe nothing, maybe everything.”
Her answer seems to just serve in pissing the guy off more and the car’s speedometer rolls it’s way to the right. Now I have to ask, “Who’s Rossi?”
The woman flicks her cigarette out the window then turns her body to face me giving me a view of enough of her skin that I damn near blush as I try to focus on her face, her lips as they move, and not the black lace bra she’s flashing me. “You new in town?”
“Yes, actually.”
She nods as a wry smile forms, “Let’s just say he’s a very powerful businessman in town.”
“He’s a mobster.” I’m not an idiot.
Ms. Prentiss nods, “It’s the next house up,” she addresses Hotch but stays focused on me. “So how long have you been in the city, Reid?”
I go to answer but when I open my mouth the car gives a screech that prevents my answer and causes the smell of burnt rubber to fill the immediate area as the car skids to a halt. As Ms. Prentiss turns around to sit properly in her seat I lean forward to see what caused Hotch to slam the breaks. …A cop car. “I thought you said you didn’t go to the police?”
“I didn’t,” the woman’s voice comes from the front seat almost blankly.
“Can you think of anyone who might’ve?” Hotch asks through gritted teeth.
The woman shrugs, “Someone at the club we work at, maybe. I have no idea.”
Hotch says nothing, in fact there’s almost no perceptible movement from him at all save for the continual whitening of his knuckles as they grip the wheel and an officer approaches.
The officer knocks on the window and Hotch lowers it without even moving his head until the cop’s near grinning face is at the level we can all see. “Private Investigator Aaron Hotchner,” the man announces as if we all weren’t aware already, “now you wouldn’t be here about the missing girl, would you?”
The question seems rhetorical to me, the officer’s face implying he already knows the answer anyway, but Hotch replies, “I’m just dropping off a woman at her house, Foyet.”
“Officer Foyet,” the policeman corrects with an even bigger smile before setting his oddly cold gaze on me, “And what about Buddy Holly buddy here?” I know better than to answer. “You running a taxi service in your off time, Aaron?”
“Where’s Derek?” Hotch asks, getting Officer Foyet’s attention off me and back onto him.
“You mean Officer Morgan?”
“Your partner.”
“Officer Morgan,” Foyet repeats with a nod before sighing some, “I’m afraid he’s not here at the moment, but I’m not alone if that’s what you’re asking.”
“It wasn’t,” Hotch states.
The tension between them is palpable; in fact it’s thick, seeming to suffocate me in the car. I decide to distract them from one another, “Excuse me, Officer,” the icy eyes of Foyet dart back to me, “did you say there was a missing girl?”
Foyet’s smile becomes a smirk, “Smart boy, aren’t you? Yes, a waitress from The Stallion. Ever been there?”
I shake my head some, intentionally move to push my glasses up the bridge of my nose a little adding the image I know this man has of me…nerd. “I’m new in town, I haven’t really been anywhere.” Foyet snorts out a laugh, but I press on, “So, uh, how, uh…how do you know that, uh, she didn’t just, you know, leave town…the missing girl, I mean.”
This time the cop doesn’t answer right away; instead he eyes me carefully as if trying to look past my eyes right into my brain, searching my thought-processes for a motive behind my continued questioning. “I don’t,” he states, this time without the smile. Clearly I’ve ceased to be a source of amusement for the man and his attention turns to Ms. Prentiss, “And who might you be?”
“I might be on my way home,” she replies, shifting her arms to flash all three of us her bra. Foyet stares freely, I try not to, and Hotch’s eyes I see dart in the rearview mirror just a moment before going back to Foyet.
The cop gives an appreciative laugh, “Aren’t you a pistol?” he chuckles a bit more before smiling, “Care to have a police escort back home, Beautiful?”
“I’m taking her home,” Hotch asserts with a near growl.
Foyet’s smile leaves his face making his eyes all the colder, “See you still have that inflated ego. Wonder if this one will die as a result of it too,” a smirk appeared that instinctually had me moving my seat to the opposite side of the car of the man, “or maybe fate’ll smile on you, though I doubt it. Good luck.” The wishes sound more like a threat as the cop stands and gives the roof of the car two slaps indicating for us to drive along.
I watch out the window as we pass the cruiser and the other cop, a great big thug of a man, standing outside it. I note the nameplate on his chest: “Perrota”. The tension in the car is still as palpable even with Officer Foyet gone and I wonder if Hotch isn’t going to slam the car into reverse and confront, or even kill, the guy. It seems he won’t as he takes a sharp turn off the street and just keeps driving.
“Do you have any place you can stay?” Hotch speaks suddenly, directing the question to Ms. Prentiss.
“You mean other than my place?”
“Your place isn’t an option anymore,” Hotch states, “like you said, if the cops know it probably means Rossi knows and he’ll be after you. Now, do you have a place to stay? Somewhere you won’t be found?”
The woman stays quiet. She pulls a cigarette and lighter out of her suit jacket pocket, lights up, taking a long drag before letting the smoke seep out between her lips, and then looks over towards our manically yet still controlled, driver, “No.”
‘We’ll find you one.”
***
Garcia’s got as big a smile as ever when we return to the offices, though the confusion shows through in her eyes. “You’re back early.”
“The cops were already there,” Hotch replies simply as he shrugs out of his coat, “I need you to find Prentiss a safe place to stay.”
“Sure thing,” Garcia nods.
“Make it somewhere close to the offices.”
“No problemo,” Garcia quips before jumping in before Hotch gets a chance to continue, “Speaking of cops, the handsomest detective that ever existed is in your office.”
“I thought I was the handsomest detective that ever existed.” Hotch’s lips barely move, yet I can almost guess that he’d just made a joke. Didn’t even know it was possible for the man.
The secretary laughs some, “Not to me.”
Hotch simply nods and his smile seems to fade back into his straight-laced expression, “Did he say why he’s here?”
“No.”
The answer doesn’t seem to affect Hotch at all, “Okay then. Could you please look up a place for Prentiss to stay,” he then turned to the woman in the black suit, “you should stay out here, help Garcia pick a suitable, safe, place.”
“And work?” the woman asks.
“At the moment they only seem to be staking out your home and, since you avoided giving the police your name, you might be okay returning to work,” I jump in, “but that being said if your work is connected to either, uh, Rossi or, uh, law enforcement you might want to, maybe, call in sick or something to that effect.”
Prentiss nods, seemingly satisfied, and I turn to see what my boss’s reaction is. He merely nods, “Reid, you come into the office with me to talk to Morgan.”
“Morgan? Isn’t he a police officer?” It’s odd that our goal seems to be to avoid cops and now we’re to embrace one.
“And a friend," Hotch adds before heading into his personal office, leaving me to follow.
"And when the cops, when they assigned a whole army to stop [him], what'd he do? He made 'em partners." ~ Henry Hill, Goodfellas
Next Section:
The Big Scare
Previous Sections:
Nightgale's Welcome Me
On Dangerous Ground
Author: Tooks
Pairing: Hotch, Emily, Reid, some Foyet, Garcia, and Morgan too
Rating: FRT
Summary: Reid finds not even a drive is safe in this city thanks to the cops.
Notes: This is the third piece in the Noir AU which I'm calling "Living For the Night" (I'll start retagging the others later) thanks to let_it_linger21. Again, first person (this time from Reid's POV), dark, gritty. I had to write this little bit to intro Foyet and Morgan and move the plot which means it's seemingly pointless and more like a toss-off ficlet, haha...now I'll probably backtrack and follow Foyet for a piece (so ya'll know where he fits in the AU and intro others) and then pick up where this leaves off with Morgan as narrator.
“So why come to me?” Hotch asks as he drives, speeds, through the streets towards Ms. Prentiss’s place and I sit in the back just praying the man doesn’t stop short and send me flying through the windshield.
“What do you mean?” the woman asks as she relaxes in the passenger seat, cigarette in hand, in a way even I know allows the driver a glimpse under her jacket with the turn of the head….which only serves to impress me at how stubbornly Hotch’s head refuses to move in her general direction.
“Why not the police?”
The woman’s lips curl enough that I can see them as she turns to look at Hotch, “You ever tried going to the police for help, Mr. Hotchner?” her head turns back towards the side window, “Might as well go ask Rossi to silence me now. Take the next right.”
Something about what she says causes Hotch to make the next turn with such aggression I find myself skidding across the backseat into the door. “What the hell?” I blurt out more than a touch agitated.
I’m ignored however as my new boss straightens the car and continues to drive. “What does Rossi have to do with your roommate’s disappearance?”
The Prentiss woman shrugs, “Maybe nothing, maybe everything.”
Her answer seems to just serve in pissing the guy off more and the car’s speedometer rolls it’s way to the right. Now I have to ask, “Who’s Rossi?”
The woman flicks her cigarette out the window then turns her body to face me giving me a view of enough of her skin that I damn near blush as I try to focus on her face, her lips as they move, and not the black lace bra she’s flashing me. “You new in town?”
“Yes, actually.”
She nods as a wry smile forms, “Let’s just say he’s a very powerful businessman in town.”
“He’s a mobster.” I’m not an idiot.
Ms. Prentiss nods, “It’s the next house up,” she addresses Hotch but stays focused on me. “So how long have you been in the city, Reid?”
I go to answer but when I open my mouth the car gives a screech that prevents my answer and causes the smell of burnt rubber to fill the immediate area as the car skids to a halt. As Ms. Prentiss turns around to sit properly in her seat I lean forward to see what caused Hotch to slam the breaks. …A cop car. “I thought you said you didn’t go to the police?”
“I didn’t,” the woman’s voice comes from the front seat almost blankly.
“Can you think of anyone who might’ve?” Hotch asks through gritted teeth.
The woman shrugs, “Someone at the club we work at, maybe. I have no idea.”
Hotch says nothing, in fact there’s almost no perceptible movement from him at all save for the continual whitening of his knuckles as they grip the wheel and an officer approaches.
The officer knocks on the window and Hotch lowers it without even moving his head until the cop’s near grinning face is at the level we can all see. “Private Investigator Aaron Hotchner,” the man announces as if we all weren’t aware already, “now you wouldn’t be here about the missing girl, would you?”
The question seems rhetorical to me, the officer’s face implying he already knows the answer anyway, but Hotch replies, “I’m just dropping off a woman at her house, Foyet.”
“Officer Foyet,” the policeman corrects with an even bigger smile before setting his oddly cold gaze on me, “And what about Buddy Holly buddy here?” I know better than to answer. “You running a taxi service in your off time, Aaron?”
“Where’s Derek?” Hotch asks, getting Officer Foyet’s attention off me and back onto him.
“You mean Officer Morgan?”
“Your partner.”
“Officer Morgan,” Foyet repeats with a nod before sighing some, “I’m afraid he’s not here at the moment, but I’m not alone if that’s what you’re asking.”
“It wasn’t,” Hotch states.
The tension between them is palpable; in fact it’s thick, seeming to suffocate me in the car. I decide to distract them from one another, “Excuse me, Officer,” the icy eyes of Foyet dart back to me, “did you say there was a missing girl?”
Foyet’s smile becomes a smirk, “Smart boy, aren’t you? Yes, a waitress from The Stallion. Ever been there?”
I shake my head some, intentionally move to push my glasses up the bridge of my nose a little adding the image I know this man has of me…nerd. “I’m new in town, I haven’t really been anywhere.” Foyet snorts out a laugh, but I press on, “So, uh, how, uh…how do you know that, uh, she didn’t just, you know, leave town…the missing girl, I mean.”
This time the cop doesn’t answer right away; instead he eyes me carefully as if trying to look past my eyes right into my brain, searching my thought-processes for a motive behind my continued questioning. “I don’t,” he states, this time without the smile. Clearly I’ve ceased to be a source of amusement for the man and his attention turns to Ms. Prentiss, “And who might you be?”
“I might be on my way home,” she replies, shifting her arms to flash all three of us her bra. Foyet stares freely, I try not to, and Hotch’s eyes I see dart in the rearview mirror just a moment before going back to Foyet.
The cop gives an appreciative laugh, “Aren’t you a pistol?” he chuckles a bit more before smiling, “Care to have a police escort back home, Beautiful?”
“I’m taking her home,” Hotch asserts with a near growl.
Foyet’s smile leaves his face making his eyes all the colder, “See you still have that inflated ego. Wonder if this one will die as a result of it too,” a smirk appeared that instinctually had me moving my seat to the opposite side of the car of the man, “or maybe fate’ll smile on you, though I doubt it. Good luck.” The wishes sound more like a threat as the cop stands and gives the roof of the car two slaps indicating for us to drive along.
I watch out the window as we pass the cruiser and the other cop, a great big thug of a man, standing outside it. I note the nameplate on his chest: “Perrota”. The tension in the car is still as palpable even with Officer Foyet gone and I wonder if Hotch isn’t going to slam the car into reverse and confront, or even kill, the guy. It seems he won’t as he takes a sharp turn off the street and just keeps driving.
“Do you have any place you can stay?” Hotch speaks suddenly, directing the question to Ms. Prentiss.
“You mean other than my place?”
“Your place isn’t an option anymore,” Hotch states, “like you said, if the cops know it probably means Rossi knows and he’ll be after you. Now, do you have a place to stay? Somewhere you won’t be found?”
The woman stays quiet. She pulls a cigarette and lighter out of her suit jacket pocket, lights up, taking a long drag before letting the smoke seep out between her lips, and then looks over towards our manically yet still controlled, driver, “No.”
‘We’ll find you one.”
***
Garcia’s got as big a smile as ever when we return to the offices, though the confusion shows through in her eyes. “You’re back early.”
“The cops were already there,” Hotch replies simply as he shrugs out of his coat, “I need you to find Prentiss a safe place to stay.”
“Sure thing,” Garcia nods.
“Make it somewhere close to the offices.”
“No problemo,” Garcia quips before jumping in before Hotch gets a chance to continue, “Speaking of cops, the handsomest detective that ever existed is in your office.”
“I thought I was the handsomest detective that ever existed.” Hotch’s lips barely move, yet I can almost guess that he’d just made a joke. Didn’t even know it was possible for the man.
The secretary laughs some, “Not to me.”
Hotch simply nods and his smile seems to fade back into his straight-laced expression, “Did he say why he’s here?”
“No.”
The answer doesn’t seem to affect Hotch at all, “Okay then. Could you please look up a place for Prentiss to stay,” he then turned to the woman in the black suit, “you should stay out here, help Garcia pick a suitable, safe, place.”
“And work?” the woman asks.
“At the moment they only seem to be staking out your home and, since you avoided giving the police your name, you might be okay returning to work,” I jump in, “but that being said if your work is connected to either, uh, Rossi or, uh, law enforcement you might want to, maybe, call in sick or something to that effect.”
Prentiss nods, seemingly satisfied, and I turn to see what my boss’s reaction is. He merely nods, “Reid, you come into the office with me to talk to Morgan.”
“Morgan? Isn’t he a police officer?” It’s odd that our goal seems to be to avoid cops and now we’re to embrace one.
“And a friend," Hotch adds before heading into his personal office, leaving me to follow.
"And when the cops, when they assigned a whole army to stop [him], what'd he do? He made 'em partners." ~ Henry Hill, Goodfellas
Next Section:
The Big Scare
Previous Sections:
Nightgale's Welcome Me
On Dangerous Ground