#unsub!reader

“Because, I’m— there’s a line—”

“We’ve crossed plenty of lines already.”

“This is different. I’m not doing this—”

“What’s that guy’s name...? The, uh, unsub that you’ve been chasing since September.”

“The Baltimore Strangler?”

“The Baltimore Strangler, that’s it! Do you wanna know where he is?”

“You don’t have that information.”

“Yes, I do.”

…

“Come on. I’m a reliable source, aren’t I? Remember when I helped you out in Minneapolis?”

“That was different. It wasn’t in person.”

“Yeah, well, my rates have changed. If you want to find this guy, then meet me at the hotel. You’re still on your little redemption journey after Amherst, right? I’m sure your team would be thrilled if you cracked this for them—”

“I’m hanging up.”

—

Spencer is choking. Throat swollen shut around the lump of shame that has been lodged in there, rotting, for months. Almost a year. It feels as though its size has been increasing with each passing week. Poison seeps into his bloodstream, infecting him with a putrid disease that is steadily eating him from the inside. Guilt and depravity and all things undesirable, living in the pit of his stomach, the hollow of his chest.

There’s a book in his hands, wrapped in brown paper and topped with a black bow. He found it wedged in the door, keeping it propped open and giving him ease of access to Hell. How considerate.

The hotel room is too big. Too dark. And cold, too. A void that exists separately from his reality, a coffin masquerading as a bedroom.

You said you wouldn’t hurt him—promised it, even—but what good is the word of a serial killer?

And what good is Spencer when he’s standing here, paralysed? How can he have faith in your self-control when he makes such a perfect target? A willing lamb to the slaughter.

He hasn’t unwrapped the book. Isn’t sure he will at all. He’ll probably toss it when—if—he gets out of here. Leave it on the side of the road, maybe, or set it on fire—anything but taking it home with him.

There’s already enough of you defiling his apartment: case files, crime scene photographs, notebooks crammed with pages upon pages of you. Notes on your life, your victims; maps scrawled across double-page spreads, detailing where you’ve been; drawings of you, as he remembers you. Necklace stacks and shiny rings and flowy dresses. All soft smiles and wide, disconcertingly innocent eyes. The snow in your hair.

And now he can see you. Your silhouette, out of the corner of his eye. You’re sitting with patience on the balcony, obscured by sheer curtains. But he isn’t looking at you. Not yet.

His gaze is fixed on the wall before him, on the photographs that he can just about discern through the dark. Photographs of victims, your victims, the ones that Spencer has spent months searching for, displayed in chronological order. There are pictures missing, gaps in your story that you’ve yet to fill him in on, long stretches of empty space that leave him feeling sick. 

He finds the face of Miles Richmond, the man Spencer had to fly out to Cleveland to dig up the bones of last week. There are no more pictures after him, just an expanse of wall that continues, uninterrupted, for several feet. He does not want to, but he can’t help but imagine the rows of faces that will eventually fill that space.

Far from Miles, nearing the bottom of the wall, are the grad students that you killed in Amherst. The final pawns in a decade long series of murders. Pieces of a country-wide puzzle that Spencer had been too blind, too stupid, to recognise when it mattered most. 

“I used those, uh, paint-friendly command strips. The walls’ll be fine.”

Your voice pierces his ears like a crack of thunder. He’s heard you speak hundreds of times, static-laced over the phone, or distorted in his dreams, but this is different. Your words are clear, sharp. Unmistakably and hauntingly real.

“Are you doing this to taunt me?”

Spencer can hardly squeeze the words out around the limp in his throat. They’re uncertain, unsteady, imbued with the rapid pounding of his own heart.

“Just keeping track of your progress,” you say. “I thought you liked visual aids.”

Slowly, he turns toward the balcony. Stares at your silhouette for a moment, frozen, before setting the book aside and taking a tentative step forward. He reaches the open glass doors, feels the icy breeze on his skin, but he doesn’t cross the threshold.

You’re sitting with your back to him. Legs crossed, gazing out at the view of the city.

“Why did you insist on doing this?” he asks. He tries to keep his voice calm. Steady. Tries to pretend that the mere sight of the back of you isn’t enough to give him a head rush. 

You shrug. “I was bored. Wanted to spice things up a little.”

“You were bored,” he repeats in quiet disbelief. “You brought me out here, risked your entire game, your freedom, because you were bored?”

“And I missed you,” you add, like that makes it any better.

“I could have SWAT outside that door—”

“Do you?”

Spencer’s silence speaks well enough for him. Your breath catches in a soft laugh and, shaking your head, you slowly rise to your feet.

“You know, you could—”

Your words are silenced by a click. Quiet, but distinct. You don’t look surprised when you turn to see the revolver in his hand, aimed directly at you. You aren’t fazed at all. In fact, a slight smile seems to cross your face—almost imperceptible, but Spencer swears he sees it.

“…a little happier to see me.”

Your sentence ends on a soft, almost disappointed sigh, like his weapon is little more than an inconvenience in your eyes, and your attention quickly shifts from Spencer’s revolver to Spencer himself. His hair, shorter than it was when you last stood like this; his face, set in this cold, tense stare meant to hide whatever lies bubbling under the surface, barely contained; his eyes, and the slight softness they hold that betrays his entire façade. 

His expression twitches, wavers as you meet his gaze as he has no choice but to see you. Not as you were, but as you are now, eleven months from your first meeting. He compares what he sees with the version of you he’s been holding in his mind for so long, noting the differences in the way you hold yourself, the way you appear sharper, almost. Confident. Cold. 

Those memories of you have grown hazy around the edges. Coated with snow and soft December fog, lit by the dim yellow glow of a dying reading lamp. All of your sharpness, dulled by what he thought you were—what he wanted you to be.

But it’s different now. The crisp light of the moon brings out the edges that he was once blind to, cuts through those softer memories until there’s nothing left to cling to. November looks good on you.

You still aren’t dressed for the winter. You’re still only wearing a dress—black, made of a material so thin he’s sure the wind must be sailing straight through it—under that same knitted shawl, but it isn’t the style he’s used to seeing you in (or imagining you in, it doesn’t really matter—they’re one in the same). The dress is shorter, lighter, made of satin. A slip dress, instead of the flowy empire waist dress that he has come to associate you with. He isn’t sure why that bothers him so much.

You watch with shameless amusement as he takes you in and, when his wandering gaze comes to rest on your face once more, you flash him a smile.

“Hey.”

Spencer’s throat runs dry. A low thrum, misfired electrical pulses, replaces his every thought. Tension seizes him, piling on his chest, grasping his lungs, until he forgets how to breathe.

He doesn’t lower his gun. He doesn’t do anything. He just stares at you, sweat beginning to collect on his forehead despite the cold breeze.

“God, Spencer.” You take a step forward, biting back a grin. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

He curses himself when he takes a step back, his body moving of its own accord, distancing himself before you can get too close. 

“It really has been a while, hasn’t it? Since we were last…” You continue your advance until you’re standing right in front of him, in front of the barrel of his revolver. “…face to face like this. It’s a little rude, though, to pull a gun on an unarmed woman.”

“It’s a safety precaution,” he mutters stiffly.

“Oh, I bet it is.”

The quiet delight in your voice is already making him uneasy, but then you slowly lift your hand. Your fingers dance along the cool metal of his revolver, and you nudge it gently, silently asking— no, telling him to lower it.

And he does so without second thought.

“There we go,” you murmur. “Did you take a look at the book?”

“No,” he says. He feels sick. 

“Hm.” You pout. Cock your head to the side. “No interest in gifts from serial killers?”

Spencer shakes his head. His words fail him. His jaw is cemented shut; feet glued to the ground. He knows where this is going, but he can’t bring himself to stop it.

“That’s…interesting.” You click your tongue, and your gaze drops to his neck. A small, almost curious frown crosses your face as you take that final step forward and reach up. Two fingers slip under the collar of his shirt, and they graze something familiar. 

His hands close around your wrists. “Don’t touch me.”

“Relax,” you mutter.

You pull yourself free and, instead of feeling around under his clothes, you take the liberty of opening his shirt. You only unfasten the top buttons, just enough to reveal the chain of his necklace and watch, proud, as he holds his breath. You can feel the tension radiating off him, see the muscles straining in his neck as your fingers glide along the metal chain until they reach the pendant. The silver cross.

“No interest in gifts,” you murmur, looking up at him through your lashes, “yet you’re wearing one. Is there an explanation for that, or do you just…like it?”

“You told me to wear it.”

“And you said you weren’t going to. In fact, I seem to recall you saying that you would never brand yourself like that—what changed? Did you only put it on today, thinking it would appease me somehow? Or did you put it on the day I left it for you and feign otherwise?”

You watch the way his jaw works, teeth grinding against each other in response to your question, and you smile. That alone is an answer in itself, you don’t need a verbal one—he’d only try to lie, anyway.

Your free hand reaches for your own necklace, fingers grazing the matching pendant as you gaze up at him. “Do you want to kill me, Spencer?” you ask. “Or is the gun just to make yourself feel better?”

“I told you, it’s a safety precaution—”

“And we both know that I pose no threat to you. I couldn’t kill you, doc, even if I wanted to; that would spoil all my fun,” you say. “You could kill me, though. You could do anything. Shoot me, throw me over the balcony…whatever you wanted—I’m in no position to stop you. Of course, that would mean you’d lose out on everything else; the story, the bodies…” you give his necklace a gentle tug. “Quality time with me.”

Spencer’s so close you can feel his breath on your skin, and that isn’t entirely your doing; he’s been leaning in, slowly—so slowly that he hasn’t even noticed. Drawing closer to you like he’s been caught in your gravitational pull.

You tilt your head up, and his nose brushes against yours.

And then he snaps back. His necklace slips from your fingers, and, without another word, he turns away.

He retreats into the hotel room, and you watch as he sets his gun on the desk with an unsteady hand before gripping the wood veneer like it’s the only thing keeping him upright. He lowers his head, closing his eyes as he takes a slow, deep breath.

“The Baltimore strangler,” he says, barely keeping his voice steady, “where is he?”

You waltz into the dimly lit room, smile plastered across your face, feeling as though you’re walking on air. You lean back against the desk and sigh.

“No idea.”

You could live in the silence that follows your confession. Strained and dense with electricity, like the air would ignite if you lit a match, and the whole room would go up in flames. 

You’re looking at Spencer, but he’s not looking at you. His gaze is on the table, the gun, your hand dangerously close to his own. You can hear him hear him trying to control his breathing, trying to suppress the reaction that you so desperately want.

“…what?”

He says it through his teeth.

“I don’t know where he is,” you say, shrugging off your shawl. You set it on the desk, right beside his revolver. “I just—”

“You lied to me.” He straightens up, giving you full view of his barely contained frustration. “You manipulated me into—”

You scoff. “I gave you what you wanted.”

“Excuse me?”

“You wouldn’t— couldn’t have let yourself agree to this without some kind of moral justification,” you explain. “You needed a reason that went beyond your own desire—”

“No.”

“—and I gave you a reason. I only brought up the Baltimore strangler to make you feel better about yourself, because you and I both know that the real reason you’re here is because you just want to—”

A hand grabs your jaw, and the next thing you know your back is hitting the wall, hard. A dull pain blooms at the back of your head, trickles down your spine.

Spencer’s leaning over you, one hand braced against the wall as the other keeps tight hold of your face.

“I didn’t want to come here,” he hisses, “I didn’t want any of this, but you—” he shakes his head, trying to dismiss whatever words, whatever confessions, are trying to claw their way out of him. “This is your fault. Your…fucking fault that I— that I’m—"

It’s like watching a dam break. The cracks you left in his foundations, left untreated, festered like infected wounds. And now they’re grown too large, too deep, to fix, and he’s coming apart.

You broke him.

“Don’t you dare try to pin this on me, Love. I didn’t ask for this. I don’t deserve this—”

“You were too stupid to figure me out in Amherst.”

You’re grinning. Baring your teeth as his fingernails dig into your skin.

“You think I don’t know that? You think that I don’t regret that—regret you—every fucking day without your added bullshit?” He tilts your head up, breath hot against your face. “I didn’t ask for you to come back.”

“You wanted it, though.”

“No. I wanted you to leave me alone. You had already ruined everything: my sleep, my relationship with my team, my life— you were already in me. And you coming back, you disrupting my life any fucking further, was the last thing I ever would have wanted.”

“I ruined your life?” You laugh. “I wasn’t there, Spencer. Whatever happened in those six months has nothing to do with me—”

“It has everything to do with you.”

“—and I haven’t done anything to you. Nothing that you didn’t agree to. Nothing that you didn’t want—”

Something cuts your words off. A hand on your throat. His hand. Pressing down on your windpipe, restricting your air—choking you.

“I didn’t want this,” he hisses. “I don’t want you.”

He presses harder, and a noise escapes you. Strangled and high-pitched and weak. Delicate in a way he never thought he’d hear.

You’re clawing at his hand. You don’t mean to; you know he won’t take this too far, he can’t. But even as you tell yourself that, your body still starts to panic. An age-old primal response that you have seen dozens of times in your victims, now igniting in you, pushing you to write and scratch like an animal all while he stands and watches.

“I don’t want you.”

His voice has lowered to a whisper, barely audible over the blood rushing in your ears, and the faint ringing it carries with it. 

He repeats it again, maybe. You can’t be sure. His lips move silently around the words, mouthing them to himself like they may somehow alter his reality.

There’s this look in his eyes. Laser-focused, yet far-off. He’s staring you dead in the eyes, watching the burning tears that threaten to spill, but he isn’t seeing you.

Or maybe he is seeing you. Maybe he’s seeing you, clearly, for the first time.

He releases your throat the same moment his lips come crashing down onto yours, leaving you no choice but to gasp into his mouth. Breathe him in. Rely on him for oxygen. With your brain so scattered, you don’t fully understand what’s happening until you feel his tongue against yours.

He’s kissing you. Not gently, as he had done in Amherst, but ferociously. There’s no thought, no meaning. It’s all primal. All need. You meet the way magnets do, overwhelmed by a force greater than yourselves, helpless against the energy between you.

I can’t see you. That’s what he had said over the phone. Not because he couldn’t trust you, not because of the risks that came with meeting you like this, but because he couldn’t trust himself. Because he knew exactly what would happen the moment he got you alone. 

He’d lose control. You’d let him. You’d ruin each other.

The kiss ends as abruptly as it started. Spencer tears himself away, chest heaving with ragged breaths. His eyes find yours, and he stares down at you with this look that you can’t quite pick apart. Like he’s searching for something. For a sign that you want him to stop, or to carry on—you aren’t sure.

His mouth works, lips giving shape to words that have no sound because whatever he wants to say—if he even knows what it is—gets stuck in his throat. So, instead of speaking, instead of fighting, he just kisses you again.

It’s all he seems to know how to do, and he does it with the certainty, the specificity, of someone who has done it a hundred times over. And he doesn’t falter, not once. His hands grab your cheeks like they belong there, tilting your face up so he can deepen an already dangerous kiss.

It isn’t confidence. Can’t be; his hands are shaking. He’s clearly in two minds about this whole endeavour, and yet he’s doing it anyway. He doesn’t even want this, allegedly, yet he’s on you like he can’t fathom being anywhere else.

Spencer isn’t confident. He’s helpless. It’s evident in his breathing; shallow, erratic, almost panicked. This isn’t something he has control over, and it isn’t as simple as attraction—attraction doesn’t do this.

This is something worse. You aren’t sure what this is.

“You…fuck…”

He can barely allow himself space to say a single word. He whispers them into your mouth with a kind of desperation that makes your stomach flip. His hands are all over you now, never staying in one spot for too long before moving on to the next. Mapping out your body with his palms. Tracing your curves over the thin satin. Making sure you’re real.

Your fingers are in his hair, one hand cradling the back of his head as the other tugs at the collar of his shirt, urging him closer until there’s no space left between you. He slips an arm around your waist, hisses when you nip his bottom lip so hard he tastes blood on his tongue, your tongue. You giggle against his mouth, and whine when he pulls away.

The sight of him like this, red-faced, lip swollen and oozing with fresh blood, stirs something within you. Something vile. You press your thumb to the wound, smear the blood across the bruised plush before pushing it into his mouth. He accepts it without thinking, and you can’t help the whine that escapes you when his tongue circles your thumb, lapping at the metallic fluid like its instinct. Like it’s normal.

Spencer’s hands settle against your ribs, just under your breasts. His thumb sits where the underwire of your bra would be, if you were wearing one. Perhaps he was too caught up in the kiss, in his own need, to notice earlier, because the discovery is evident on his face. You watch the subtle shifts in his expression, the way his gaze trails across your body as he realises the position he has you in. Pinned, back to the wall, held in place by his own bodyweight. You wouldn’t be able to move if you wanted to.

You told him he could do anything he wanted. You handed all the power over to him. Relinquished control—physically, at least.

He’s tugging at your dress before he dares second guess himself. Sliding the thin straps down your arms and guiding the fabric down, leaving you exposed before him.

Time, for Spencer, comes to a screeching halt, and for a moment all he can do is stare. His fingers glide along the curve of your ribs with unexpected gentleness—reminiscent, almost, of how he was all those months ago—before settling on your chest. His palms fit so perfectly to your body you’d think he was made for this. Carved out of marble just to touch you. To feel your heart racing under his fingertips, tantalisingly close yet cruelly inaccessible.

And then he squeezes. Fingers curling into your skin with such force you can’t help but gasp. You pull your thumb from his mouth, try to kiss him, but he dodges. His mouth meets your collarbone, progresses down your chest, and he isn’t kind. 

He leads teeth-first, nipping hard at the sensitive skin before soothing the red marks with his tongue, painting your chest with a trail of slow-drying saliva mixed with his blood.

You’re already a mess by the time his mouth finds your nipple. Maybe it’s the tension, the months of build-up, the heat that persists despite the breeze coming in from the balcony, or just the fact that you’ve been deprived of this kind of attention for so long—whatever it is, it has you soaked through your panties. Clenching your thighs as Spencer ravages your tits like he’s trying to get to your heart. Like he’d rip it straight from your chest, if he could.

It's a high, a familiar one, that you haven’t felt in almost a year. An insatiable burning in your veins, pungent with a discordant need that leaves you nauseated. Sends your head spinning. Pushes you right up to the edge of a cliff, dares you to take the leap, promises catharsis.

It takes possession of you, drives your fingers into his hair. You tear him away, pushing him until his legs meet the edge of the bed, and you force him down and straddle him.

Your hands shake, taught fast-crumbling restraint, as you fumble with the buttons of his shirt. You only make it about halfway before giving up, and then you mouth is on him. Trailing sloppy, bestial kisses down the column of his throat as his hands roam your body. Back, hips, ass. He’s pulling your dress up, exposing bare thighs that he doesn’t hesitate to sink his fingers into.

Your drag your tongue along the chain of his necklace, relishing in the way he shudders beneath you, before your teeth meet his skin. You bite him. Hard. Likely hard enough to have drawn blood if he weren’t so quick to grab a fistful of your hair and pull you off of him.

He shoves you with such force that you actually bounce when your back hits the mattress, and before you can sit up, he’s pinning you down. Hands grasping your wrists. One leg between your thighs, knee pressing against your cunt. The cross dangles from his neck. Touches your chin.

There’s something on the tip of his tongue, you can sense it. An insult, probably. More empty words, declarations of hatred that mean nothing. 

Whatever it is, he can’t bring himself to say it. It’s too difficult when you’re under him like this, dress pulled down past your chest, pushed up to your hips, shifting subtly against his knee, unable to stop yourself from seeking that little bit of friction.

So he just brings his lips down onto yours once more. Releases your wrists, keeps one hand braced beside your head as the other trails down your body.

His fingers slip past the elastic of your panties, circle your clit for a fleeting, electric moment, and slip into you with ease. You moan into his mouth, too drunk on the curl of his fingers, that intoxicating metallic taste on his tongue, to bother keeping it down as you bend your knee, angling your hips so he can thrust his fingers deeper and hit that spot that’s bound to make you come apart. 

Spencer groans against you, fingers working faster as your hand skims over the smooth, warm skin of his chest, his abdomen, before reaching his belt.

“Please,” he whispers, breathless, “tell me you have condoms.”

It must show on your face, the brief flash of poorly concealed disappointment, because Spencer’s expression sours instantly. 

He starts pulling back. You whine, grab his arm, and he pulls back harder, taking his fingers with him.

You huff in defeat, head falling back against the mattress. “There should be some in the bathroom,” you mutter. “Complimentary.”

Spencer sits back on his knees, gives you a stiff nod, and then he’s gone. He vanishes into the bathroom. You hear the faucet running. Stopping. Starting again.

And he doesn’t come back.

He doesn’t come back, but he doesn’t lock the door, either. So, really, it’s just an invitation for you to follow him.

You give him a few minutes—one minute, if you’re being honest—before sitting up. You scan the dark room for any sign of his phone, and you find nothing.

…okay. One hell of an oversight on your part. Cool. 

You fix your dress, pulling the fabric back into place as you scramble to your feet. Smooth out your hair, lick the blood from your lips, make yourself look pretty in a normal way, not in a serial killer way, before sauntering into the bathroom.

His phone sits face-up on the counter, next to a bloody tissue. Fingers grip the porcelain as he leans over the sink. He can see you—your reflection—behind him in the mirror, lingering in the doorway, watching the rise and fall of his shoulders.

“We can’t do this.”

You lean against the doorframe. Arms crossed, voice light. “We can.”

“I can’t let us do this.”

The faucet is leaking. Counting the beats that pass after his words. Measuring the silence.

“You can,” you say.

“I can’t.”

Either he didn’t shut it off all the way, or this hotel has shitty plumbing. It’s more likely the latter; Spencer isn’t the type to leave a job half-done, or a girl half-fucked. 

A text half-sent, though, might be a different story—you hope it’s a different story.

He’ll snap at you if your next words are you can. He knows he can; that isn’t what he’s saying.

But you don’t know what he is saying.

He could be having a moral dilemma, grappling with the reality that his mouth, his fingers, are now soiled with you.

Or he could be stalling. Buying time for feds, snipers, SWAT—whatever cavalry come out of the woodwork when an agent pushes the “I’m in a hotel with a serial killer, send help!” button.

“Why not?” you ask.

Spencer scoffs. “Are you serious?”

“Are you?”

He turns to face you, back pressed to the sink. He licks his still-bleeding lip. Presses his teeth to the wound. Subtly. Like he’s hoping you won’t notice.

He looks exhausted. You’re only just starting to realise how rough he looks. Eye bags. Neglected stubble. A dullness in his once-bright eyes.

But he doesn’t look anxious. He doesn’t steal a glance at his phone. Doesn’t tap his fingers against the porcelain. Doesn’t leave the wound alone; makes it worse.

“Are you serious, Spencer?”

Did you snitch, Spencer?

“This isn’t right,” he mutters, defeated.

“Nothing about this is right,” you say, watching him closely. “Forgive me for thinking that was the whole point.”

“For you.”

“Not for you?”

“I’m only here…” He sighs, rakes his fingers through his hair. “So I can get closer to putting you away.”

“You could call your team right now,” you say, “there’s nothing stopping you.”

Spencer nods, but his gaze drops to the tile floor. His shoulders droop, and he purses his lips for a moment before saying, “you know I can’t do that.”

The smile that lights your face is a genuine one, full of relief. Spencer didn’t snitch. He may have thought about it—definitely thought about it—but he refrained.

“Aww.” You tilt your head to the side, grinning. “Because you care about me?”

“Because I care about the families of the people you killed,” he corrects, tone turning icy, “they deserve closure.”

“Right…” You nod slowly. “And that’s why you kissed me, is it?”

“I’m not doing this.”

He storms out of the bathroom, leaves his phone on the counter. 

You deflate as he walks past you, but you only let him stray a few steps before you speak up again.

“Isn’t this what you’ve been dreaming about?”

You don’t have to turn to watch his reaction. You can see him in the mirror. He freezes a little ways beyond the doorway, footsteps halting as your question pierces straight through him.

You can see yourself, too. Your smudged make up, your still-flushed face, the marks on your chest that are already starting to darken into bruises. The rings of dried blood that encircle each one.

You think, for a moment, that he might keep walking. That he might storm straight out of the hotel, abandon his belongings, and refuse to meet with you like this ever again. But he doesn’t, of course. He can’t.

“…what?”

He turns to you, slowly, and you look over your shoulder with a smile.

“You thought I couldn’t tell? I’m a smart girl, doc, I know when—”

“Don’t.”

A warning. Soft-spoken and desperate.

Not a warning. A plea.

And you ignore it.

“It makes sense, really,” you continue, facing him fully, “the brain latches onto things it deems unfinished—”

“Stop it.”

“It’s a natural response, Spencer. You had a crush on me, I fucked you over—”

He walks away, back into the bedroom.

“—and now you’ve been fucking me, haven’t you? Every night. For how long?”

He’s shaking his head, dragging his fingers through his mussed hair, tugging at the strands like it might wake him up. Like this might just be another dream.

Sighing, you follow him into the bedroom.

“You said I ruined your life, right? Is this why? Because you’ve been tormented by sex dreams?” you ask. “Because I just have that much power over you? Because you don’t recognise yourself anymore?”

“You…” He lets out a shuddering breath. One that seems to shake his entire being. “…have no idea what this has been like. This year,” he mutters, pressing his palms to his eyes, “You— you have no idea what you’ve…done to me. What you—"

He spins around, ready to raise his voice, but the sight he is met with silences him instantly.

You’re holding his revolver. Flexing your fingers around the grip like it’s a toy.

“I didn’t…do anything to you, Spencer,” you say, voice calm—thoughtful, almost—as you inspect the chamber. Six bullets. “As much as I wish I could torment you like that, your dreams are, unfortunately, beyond my control.”

It’s a pretty gun. Old school. Reliable. The metal is cool to the touch. You wonder how hot it gets when it fires.

“And as for power— I’m not gonna hurt you, Spence, come here,” you gently grab his arm as he tries to back away, and you pull him closer, speaking slowly, clearly, giving your voice an almost seductive edge as you press the gun into his hand. “The only power that I have here…is power that you have given me…”

Spencer’s hand trembles under your own as you carefully guide the gun to your chest, aligning the barrel with the pendant of your necklace. He flinches when you cock back the hammer, and the chamber locks into place.

You move slowly, dragging the gun up the column of your throat before pressing it firmly to the underside of your jaw. To your jugular vein. And you flash him a smile.

“…you can take it back.”

His lip is still bleeding. Swollen. He’s staring at you like you aren’t human. Something beyond comprehension. 

If only he knew how wet you are right now. Your life, his hands. The fact that he could—should—but won’t. You’d take his hand, if you were a little more daring, making feel just how much you’re enjoying this. Make him finger you with a loaded gun to your neck. That would be one hell of a way to die.

“…what the fuck is wrong with you?”

He’s so close. Closer than he should be. You can feel his breath on your face. Smell his blood.

His tone is harsh. Words spoken in a whisper, laced with volatility, disbelief, the slightest bit of fear.

Your smile widens. Grows sharper. “You’re the profiler, you tell me.”

Maybe it’s more than a bit of fear. Spencer’s shaking his head, just barely—an unconscious movement, one he probably isn’t even aware of. Whatever façade he’s trying to maintain is offset by his pretty eyes, wide with fright. Discomfort. Concern. 

“You’re sick.”

You gasp, mock surprise flooding your expression as you ask, “really?”

Spencer doesn’t appreciate your humour. The tension in his jaw seems enough to crack his teeth, chock with frustration—and restraint. 

“Come on, doc, what’ll it be?” you pose, innocently batting your lashes at him. “Fuck me, or kill me?”

Two options. Each requiring a betrayal of Spencer’s self: his morals, or his desires.

There is, of course, a third option: he could just leave. Get out of here before he damns himself any further—but where’s the fun in that?

He brushes a strand of hair from your face, fingers grazing your skin. His face betrays nothing. His gun remains pressed to your neck.

A hand settles on your cheek, thumb tracing slow, soothing circles. You can hardly think for the sound of your own heartbeat. You can feel it in your throat, hammering against the barrel of the gun. You don’t realise you’re holding your breath until you start feeling lightheaded. Adrenaline sits stagnant in your veins, and it burns.

Spencer leans in like he’s about to kiss you, but doesn’t. His lips ghost over yours, and you can practically feel his resolve crumbling in the seconds before he speaks.

“Get back on the bed.”

And he lowers his gun. Steps back.

Relief manifests itself as laughter. Breathless, slightly manic. “Fuck,” you breathe, “you had me worried for a—”

“Now.”

His voice is sharp, cuts through your laughter with such a brusque certainty it’s clear that killing you is, in fact, not off the table just yet. In all the months you’ve spent tormenting him, you’ve never heard him use that tone before.

It’s just a single word, but it carries with it an unmistakable air of control.

You purse your lips, suppressing a smile as you step back. “As you wish.”

Spencer lowers his head as you turn away. You hear him set his revolver on the desk, carefully, as you make your way back over to the bed.

You take the liberty of removing your dress—or you try to, but Spencer catches your arm. He spins you around so fast you almost lose balance, and his mouth is on yours without warning. 

Your hands grasp the collar of his open shirt to steady yourself as his dip down to your mid-thigh, where the lace hem of your dress sits. He breaks the kiss briefly, just enough to tear it off over your head, and then he’s back on you. Hands on your waist, pulling you flush against him as his thumbs press against your stomach.

Quickly, you finish what you started earlier; unbuttoning his shirt until you can slip it off of his shoulders and have it fall to the floor. You’re scratching him before he can stop you, dragging your nails down his chest and relishing in the groan it elicits.

A shove, and your back hits the mattress. Spencer’s crawling on top of you, lips reuniting with yours in another fervent kiss as he kneels between your legs. You grasp his hand as he reaches for your tits, and you instead guide it down to your cunt, pressing his fingers to the sodden fabric of your panties. You’re soaked, more than you had been earlier, and his reaction to it is visible. Audible. A hitch in his breath. A shudder. A quiet groan. One that you echo as his fingers brush against your clit.

“Is this what your dreams are like?” you murmur between kisses, grinning. “Pinning me down? Having your way with me?”

He responds by kissing you harder, like forcing his tongue into your mouth might succeed in shutting you up. You grab his jaw, push him away a little to break the kiss, get a better look at him.

“Or am I on top?” You raise an eyebrow, fingers pressing into his skin. “Am I calling the shots? Bossing you around? Am I—”

“Stop talking.”

He pulls free from your grasp, swats your hand away before diving into you again. His hand cups the pack of your neck, pulling you closer and giving you no choice but to let him kiss you.

Whining, you wrap your legs around his waist. His cock presses up against your cunt through the layers of fabric, and his hips instinctively buck against yours.

Your fingers are lost in his hair, curling into the soft strands as he moves his hips—consciously, now. Laboured breaths fill the space between kisses, accompanied by the occasional soft moan as he ruts against you.

“Fuck…” Spencer breaks the kiss to drag his lips along your jaw, moistening the skin with his saliva before attacking your neck.

You’re not one to turn down an opportunity when it presents itself to you, so you’re quick to sink your teeth into his shoulder with a force that you hadn’t bothered to calculate in advance. Spencer yelps—almost squeaks—and jerks back. Your teeth scrape against his skin, and when you finally let him go, he’s pinning you by your neck, holding you down like you’re some wild animal.

“Spencer,” you whine, writhing as his hips stop moving, “come on—”

“Stop biting me.”

“Oh, you’re fine,” you mutter, as if his shoulder isn’t starting to bleed. “I can’t help it.”

“You can’t help it,” he repeats, unamused.

“It’s instinct.”

“Yeah?”

He’s tugging your panties off, peeling the soaked fabric from your aching cunt.

“You want to bite something?”

His hand grabs your face, parts your lips. He balls up your panties and pushes them into your open mouth.

Something in your brain slips out of place. Goes quiet. Dormant. 

You moan when the fabric touches your tongue. The taste—the smell—of your own arousal fills your senses, drowns out whatever rational thoughts dare remain until you’ve nothing left to give but pathetic whines as you nudge his belt with your foot. Begging, almost. Because you’re beginning to think you might die, or succumb to some arousal-driven madness, if he doesn’t fuck you.

He seems to get the message, because he pulls one of the hotel condoms from his pocket and sets it on the bed. You try to reach for it, but he grabs your wrist, holding it firm as he unfastens his belt, then his slacks.

And then he’s standing up, taking the condom with him as he strips down to his underwear—a plain pair of purple boxers, with a rather pronounced wet patch at the crotch. You sit up, looking about ready to pounce on him if he takes any longer, already clenching at the mere sight of him like this.

He takes his boxers off, and all you can do is stare, slack jawed, at the view you’ve been blessed with.

You’ve pictured Spencer Reid naked thousands of times, daydreamed about him for eleven months, but all of your fantasies pale in comparison to the real thing. Because he’s perfect. Gorgeous in ways you hadn’t even considered. A work of art.

Your panties fall from your mouth, land in the crevice between your clenched thighs. Spencer lifts your chin and gently stuffs them back into your mouth.

“Bite down.”

And you bite down.

Spencer purses his lips when you follow his instruction without hesitation, and the slight twitch of his cock is all you need to know that this is having the exact same effect on him as it is on you. 

Him in control. You, submitting. Positions neither of you are used to. A dynamic flipped on its head. It’s maddening.

He keeps hold of your chin for longer than he should, studying you with an expression that you can’t quite decipher. His dark eyes bore holes into you, saturated with emotions that he himself likely doesn’t understand.

When he does eventually let you go, he moves fast. He tears open the condom, fumbles with it for a short, uncoordinated moment, and rolls it on before grabbing your legs and pulling you to the edge of the mattress. He grabs a pillow, positions it under your hips quickly. Mechanically, almost; like he’s trying real hard not to think too much about what he’s doing, what he’s going to do.

And you aren’t thinking at all. You stopped doing that as soon as he took his pants off. Your act shattered and need took hold, loud and feverish and so desperate. The game doesn’t matter, none of it does. Spencer could do anything, and you would let him. You had meant that before, and you mean it even more now.

He’s leaning over you, one hand braced against the mattress and the other gripping the back of your thigh, lifting it. You raise your hips, and he takes that as permission.

He straightens up, steadying his cock with one hand as he lines it up with your entrance. He takes your leg, hooks it over his shoulder, and nudges your cunt with his tip, watching the way you clench for him, the way you’re dripping for him, before taking that deep breath.

A push, a gasp, an arch of a back, and he’s inside of you. Your teeth dig into the fabric of your panties as your body yields to his length, and you take him to the hilt in one slow, deep thrust.

Spencer’s cursing under his breath, hissing about how tight you are as he tries to adjust, to acclimate to the feel of you, before he comes undone. His fingers dig into the plush of your thigh as he eases himself out almost all the way before slamming back into you, eliciting a moan—or a cry, you can’t be sure—that your panties do very little to muffle.

He quickly finds his rhythm, and with every rock of his hips you feel yourself break that little bit more. With his free hand, he tears your panties from your mouth and cups the back of your head as he leans down.

“Is this what you wanted?” he hisses, voice strained. “Is this why you called me here?”

You struggle, for a moment, to regain your grasp on language—on reality. But when you do, you look him dead in the eye and bare your teeth in a crazed grin. “Is this why you came?”

Spencer grabs your jaw, forces your head back against the mattress as his pace shifts into something brutal. Hips slamming into yours until you can do nothing but moan as you cling to him, fingers tangling in his hair, nails digging into his scalp.

And then he’s grabbing your other leg, throwing it over his shoulder, folding you in half and fucking you like it’s his purpose. Like he was made for you—or you for him. When you start slipping, he pulls you back into position, hips atop the pillow, making sure to hit that perfect angle over and over until you’re too fucked to think.

You don’t realise you’re speaking until he’s telling you to shut up. Broken strings of pleases and yeses have been tumbling, unrestrained, from your lips for God knows how long, breathy and feverish and shamelessly needy. This, apparently, is something he doesn’t like, though you aren’t sure you believe him given that, every time you speak, his grip grows tighter, his breathing heavier, and when you say his name—when you beg him not to stop—he fucking moans.

And when you keep babbling, when you tell him that you’re close, he pulls back. Straightens up. Gets a real good look at you; your tear-streaked makeup, your swollen lips, the cross necklace that’s gotten tangled in your hair. He slows his pace, retrieves it, and you think for a brief, uncertain moment that he’s going to break it, pull it from your neck, snap the chain, but he doesn’t.

He gives it a small tug, pulling you up as he continues rolling his hips. The metal cuts into the back of your neck, embeds in your skin.

“Touch yourself.”

“Spence—”

“Please.”

He pulls harder on your necklace, but your hand is already moving. Fingers skimming over sweat slick skin until they find your clit. He releases you, lets you fall back onto the mattress, and he fixes your necklace. Positions the pendant, carefully, on your chest. Between your tits.

Spencer’s hips gradually return to their almost brutal pace, spurred on by the sight of you working your clit beneath him. His fingers twitch against your thighs as your walls hug his cock, tensing as the pressure builds and you bring yourself closer and closer to release. 

He doesn’t take his eyes off you for a second; back arched, drunk on his cock, touching yourself for him—you’re perfect. Dreadfully, beautifully perfect.

And once he allows that thought into his mind, he comes undone. He ruts into you, pushing you over that edge, and he follows close behind.

His hips sputter as he finishes. Legs and arms tremble with fast-fading adrenaline, with exhaustion, and with the immediate, suffocating weight of what he’s just done.

He stays leaning over you for as long as it takes him to catch his breath, and then he’s forcing himself to move. He pulls out, ignoring the latent sparks of desire it ignites, ignoring the way you whimper helplessly, and immediately gets to work on cleaning himself up.

Shaking hands remove the condom, tie it off, and toss it in the trash before he begins gathering his clothes. All while you lie back, looking disgustingly pretty, as you try to reorient yourself.

He’s about halfway through getting dressed when you speak up, voice soft and mellow.

“The Baltimore strangler,” you murmur, watching with tired amusement as he rushes about the dark hotel room, “he owns a bar in Fells Point…Lancaster Street, I think.”

Spencer pauses, shirt crumpled up in his hands. “I thought you didn’t know anything.”

“You, uh…” You press your lips into a smug little smile. “Jogged my memory.”

He stares at you for a long moment, jaw working as he chews on every response that crosses his mind, none of which are at all pleasant. But, ultimately, he keeps his mouth shut, pivots away from you, and slips his shirt on before holstering his gun.

“Can you at least open my gift?” you ask, suppressing a yawn. “It could be important, you know.”

Huffing, Spencer picks up the book and quickly tears away the brown paper, letting the scraps fall to the floor as he inspects the cover.

"De mon esprit humilié, faire ton lit en ton domaine…"

Baudelaire. Les Fleurs du Mal.

"…infâme à qui je suis lié comme le forçat à la chaîne."

You’re grinning, he can hear it in your voice. His fingers tremble against the cover of the book and, for a moment, he finds himself utterly seized by the urge to throw it in your face. To grab you, flip you over, and—

God, he feels sick.

“We’re not doing this again.”

The tremble reaches his voice, taints his words. Makes him sound as small as he feels.

“Of course not,” you say, smiling. “I’m not crazy.”

He’d probably laugh, if he didn’t feel as though he were choking. He can’t breathe. Can’t think with you in the room, with you all over him—in him. Your bruises. Your bite marks. Your DNA embedded in his skin. He needs to shower. Clean his wounds. Nurse his pride. Update his tetanus. 

He needs to leave, before you pull him back in. Before he loses any more of himself to you, to this. 

So, he gathers the last of his belongings, tucks the cursed book under his arm, and he walks out, head held as high as he can manage with the shame piling on his shoulders.

“I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

And your voice is the last thing he hears as he closes the door behind him.

BASED ON THIS SONG (it got so stuck in my head that I had to write something that correlated):

──── autistic spencer (it’s not explored that much, but it’s always gonna be present in my oneshots), evil evil reader (im not being dramatic this time. she’s literally a serial killer. like her ‘body count’ is copious. but idk, she’s kinda sweet. if u squint and ignore the bodies). They were in love ur honour !!! they’re still in love ur honour !!!! She pays him a visit two years after he found out about her homicidal tendencies (they miss each other, Spencer might also hate her a little but it’s okay, don’t worry about that).

Warnings: sub spencer (aaaaaaalways), maybe perhaps some vague, very faint mentions of switch!spencer but idk i blacked out writing this, choking, mentions of death and general behaviour that would get you a life sentence, praise more than degradation surprisingly, coming untouched, crying (you’d think that was a kink or something?), she fucks the good out of him, hopeful ending (eh, kinda), mentions of dante’s inferno, copious amounts of religious imagery, greek mythology references, this isn’t dead dove at all i promise.

w.c: 5k

────────────

Spencer would consider himself a good person, by default. It’s reasonable: a renowned member of the BAU, with intellect he’s weaponized for morality. The blood etched onto his hands is justified. Necessary evil for greater cause. He’s willing to blemish his skin for the virtue, for the lives of others.

He remembers naivety. He remembers being so fragile he could easily crack into fragmented pieces of wasted innocence. Maybe that’s been stolen from him now, maybe the ruins of his sacrifices are too sharp to touch upon still, but he’s good. He knows he will always be good.

And yet, there’s a bruise. Something ugly and distorted that stains his skin. Something that has the ability to crawl deep into his bones and leave behind a mess of pain. Something bad. Festering and tainted, it haunts him with every breath.

You.

You, who came into his life as an abundance of sunlight. Helios personified. Pretty and warm, and everything he needed. He wanted to kiss you: the moment he stumbled into the coffee shop, tousled hair, overworked and raw from a burdening case. When you took his order, marking constellations onto the styrofoam cup. Andromeda, Ursa Major, Cassiopeia. Later, much later, then when you became an indomitable presence to his apartment.

But for all the good he’s preserved, Spencer knows he’s not allowed to receive it.

“You shouldn’t be here,” is the first thing he says when he finds you waiting for him. He always knew you would come back; you’re bound to follow him indefinitely. Like his shadow, his guilty consciousness, his cracked past of addiction and pre-pubescent torment.

He let you go. When the act was over, the curtain drawn, when he saw you. Homicidal, the perpetrator of the case he was working on, malevolence packed into the frame of perfection, oh even still, he let you go. Free to continue the cycle of death, he was left to scramble in the mess of his own misguided heart.

There’s risk in reward, and reward in risk. You’re meticulous, hedonistic to the last detail. But Spencer? Well, he will always be the one loose end you could never quite force yourself to clean up. The thread that kept untangling, even as time passed. Cut it off, you should be rational, wash every bleeding trace of him from your skin.

But there’s irrationality in love.

Blood adorns your features; there’s no need to touch up your appearance, to return to the domesticated facade you once used on him. No, he’s been exposed to the ugly now. There can be no do overs, no back-tracking, game over try again doesn’t exist in real time.

“What are you going to do about it?” you ask, and god, hes just as beautiful as the day you left him. So perfectly real, with dragging exhaustion and pretty brown eyes to ease the sting of his tight-faced, troubled expression.

You didn’t cut the phone lines, nor move the gun he keeps stashed in his cabinet drawer. Down the hall, to the left. You know he won’t make any abrupt actions. Know, in an intuitive way, telepathic communication between past lovers.

“It was a gamble coming here, aren’t you pleased to see me pretty boy?”

Spencer has to fight every urge he has, every moral he believes in to not lunge at you; to not strangle your slender neck, crack you in half, destroy you the way you’ve destroyed his sanity.

Two years, 8 months, 11 days since you cataclysmically uprooted his routined life. He fell in love with softness, not the jagged edge of a blade.

“I let you go. Wasn’t that enough?” it feels too natural, fighting in his apartment, some sort of twisted lovers quarrel. There’s a definite list of everything he should do in this moment, and despite all logic, he just blanks at the sight of you.

“You had to come back. Rub salt in the wound. Do you get off on this?” a sigh falls from his pretty lips, “Actually, don’t— don’t answer that. We both know the answer.”

“I get off on you,” you correct.

It’s true. If he was to analyse you, profile your warped brain like his other unsubs, he’d find nothing but unyielding loyalty to him. For all the damage you’ve done, there’s always been one anomaly to your detachment.

He stands right before you.

And, sure, maybe you’ve got a leg up in this situation. Perhaps the distorted memory of you holds him back: lazy nights and tangled sheets, his body pressed up against yours. The way he’d talk, quantum physics, philosophy, rambles that dissolved into open admissions of feelings. There’s a lot that was fake, but to be a good liar, you have to add subsidiary details of truth.

God, he wishes the world would be cruel—a cosmic alignment of karmic righteousness that would grant him relief: some kind of justification for what he must do. But the universe is indifferent, nothing but a distant star, a fleeting speck of dust in the grand scheme of life. There’s no such thing as good or bad, only consequences.

Consequences. Consequences for his actions. Butterfly effect. He can comprehend it. But, there were many things he adored about you, while the illusion of love was tangible. The way your hair would curl just above your shoulders, your skin in the morning light. The way you’d laugh at one of his obscure Star Trek references, better yet his criticism on modern, inaccurate horror. He could stare at you for eons, as though he was trying to make out the secrets of the universe in the constellation lines of your scars.

The illusion of love, as it was. He sees you now with the clarity of reality, the same way a mirage fades away as you approach; a distortion of perception.

“And you get off on me. Even now. Don’t you?” you say, shifting forward to close gravitational space.

There’s no way to disregard this morbid connection. No psychological justification he can exploit to demean your feelings. You’re not a psychopath, nor anything that relates to a lack of empathy. You feel— you feel empathy for all of your victims, the line of bodies that mark your path. But it goes deeper than that. There was reasoning for your actions, just as there was for his.

“Say it,” you goad. And there’s satisfaction here, sure. Something mean and condescending. But there’s also hurt, because he was supposed to be a means to an end, and now, he might very well be your end.

“Say you miss me. C’mon boy genius, a few little words and i’ll have enough content to satisfy me for years. Don’t be mean— you know I hate being edged.”

He does miss you, every day that he wakes up, his bones too hollow and cold to leave his bed. The ache in his chest where his heart was supposed to be, too empty to function. No amount of caffeine can fill the void in his skull where thoughts of you used to reside. The longing, the desire for the past to rewrite itself.

“You’re sick,” he tries. But he’s not good at this. Not when the love remained after the inevitable fall out, not when the darkest parts of him still clung to want, even after he realised the truth.

“You’re sick, and..” he tries again, “and I hate how much I miss you. There? Is that enough? Are you happy? Got what you wanted?”

You let out an exasperated sigh, “No. If I ‘got what I wanted’, I would still have you.”

Spencer dies. Metaphorically, literally, what does it even matter? He dies, respawns, and then kisses the admittance from your lips.

Instinctively, just like the past, your hands tangle through his hair, and perhaps there’s a sense of ownership to the gesture. The knowledge that he will always be yours. Scarred from your touch, returning to your lips like a dog with a bird. There’s a mindless attempt at anger on his part, biting lips and rough teeth, but just like always, he quickly melts.

He melts, and you catch him. Because for all it’s worth, lies and deceit aside, you’ve always loved him.

There’s something powerful to the gesture; knowing you have someone wrapped around your finger. Even after you’ve bared the worst of you, the ugliness of man-kind. There’s someone out there that will wipe the blood from your cheek, and kiss you through it.

“Oh, even better,” you mutter against his lips, “Much, much better. C’mon Spence, show me just how much you’ve missed me.”

Two years, 8 months, 11 days since he felt like he could breathe.

It hurts, it hurts so much, because there’s a sense of coming home to the kiss, and he just wants you to stay. To ruin him forever. To leave behind a deformed version of him, something unrecognisable and equally scarring.

You’re too loyal and he’s too susceptible to any form of attention. Because you want him, and it’s easy to fall into a cyclical cycle of self-destruction when you’re the catalyst.

“I did miss you.” he admits again. “You— crazy, homicidal excuse of a person.”

Spencer’s hand comes up to touch your cheek, the rough texture of skin meeting something soft. His thumb traces down the curvature of your jawline, a silent hello that doesn’t linger long, too soon to be replaced with his lips.

You push him back against the wall, a painful groan escaping your lips when you feel his hips canting forward, searching aimlessly for a friction you’ve both been denied. Two years. His body still aches for you. It’s primal, something perverted and tainted and so very good.

You knew this would happen. There was not a doubt in your clouded mind that he would deny you. What you do to me, I do to you.

“There’s my boy.” you mutter when you grip said hips, fingers finding their natural, fated position against divine bone. When he begins to find a stable pace, bucking up to meet you with every kiss that you press to his lips.

He whimpers when you touch him, soft sounds of need slipping past his parted lips into the confines of his empty apartment. He’s trying so hard to maintain composure, but he can’t find it in him to fight the inevitable. The ache of separation between himself and you. So he lets it happen, like he always does.

My boy, the possession goes straight to his head. One simple phrase and he’s untangling, breaking to pieces because yes, he is yours. And yes, he will forever want to be reminded.

“Mhm, mhm. Oh— oh, fuck.” he’s so hard, clothed cock pushing up against you with every movement. He could get off on less of you. He has. Every night.

And yes, it certainly feels like home. It’s only the thing your body has been aimlessly yearning for, day in and day out. It’s not fair, not fair to you, that you’ve allowed your resolve to crumble, your strategic, one-track mind, for the fleeting body of a past lover.

But then again, demeaning him to a past lover doesn’t even begin to articulate this.

You’re fairly certain he was put on this earth, just to torment you.

And you’re fairly certain you’ll always let him.

“God, you’re such a slut for me.” you say, drawing back from the friction just to prove your point. The disintegrating whimpers that bleed out of his mouth in response are enough alone to confirm.

His head falls back against the wall, baring that lovely length of his neck and its pretty bruises. He wants you to kiss him there, to leave one last mark before he says ‘I won’t see you again’ and means it this time.

“Don’t— don’t stop—” even as he speaks, a mess of jumbled words and breathless sentences, you’re still teasing him. He hates how much it works, how much he’d rather fall into the pleasure of your hands.

“Fine. Whatever. Yes. What do you want to hear? That it’s whorish the way I want you. That you’re able to just… corrupt me with all these dirty words, even though I have an extensive vocabulary. Even though i’m supposed to be—“

He’s not even sure what he’s supposed to be anymore.

“You know the extent of my devotion.” he concedes.

There will always be sadistic pleasure in reducing him to such an ignominious version of himself. You’ve seen it before, back when you were trapped in an artificial, yet domesticated, haze of bliss. But to hear it now? Even after everything has been said and done?

That’s a new type of pleasure.

You know he still holds onto the facade of you, aimlessly reaching for something intangible, something that never truly existed. “You want me to be good for you, huh? Just pack up my shit, leave it all behind, get better? Think about it. White picket fence. Coffee every morning. God— it would be insufferable. Coming home to feed the dogs, talking every night over the phone, begging you to be safe on a case, or or—“

Spencer breaks. Silencing your words with a pained whimper.

Usually, he doesn’t allow himself to think about that fantastical hypothetic. He can’t afford to. Months after he let you go, when the truth had been exposed to his naive eyes, he’d spend hours in a mess of aching limbs, dreaming up alternative realities where your hands weren’t stained from blood, and the most despicable thing you could do was make his coffee bitter.

So when you force him to open old wounds, to rehash past hopes, he falls apart. A whine escapes his lips, hips bucking, once, twice and then he’s coming untouched. Making a mess out of himself— and it’s sick, so very sick to get off on the thought of you permanent, the epitome of good.

Something he could hold onto without slicing open skin.

It’s not a good orgasm, it never is without your direct help, but at least it’s some form of release. In the aftermath, he blinks away tears, vaguely aware of the cum staining his boxers, creating damp spots through fabric.

There’s something painful, cutting to your gaze when you look at him. At the debauched sight, corrupted from just a few words.

Give it all up? For what? Him?

All things considered, it’s tempting.

“Spencer,” you mutter in the serrated moments between. When he’s still nebulous, caught in the aftershocks of abrupt pleasure. When he’s just gotten off, untouched, on the notion of a domesticated life with you.

He’s struggling to breathe. He’s spent nights gasping for you, reduced to the most debasing version of himself. So out of touch, you drove a blade through his back, catching his heart on the way.

“Why are you— doing this?” he asks, but before you can even answer, provide him with an explanation that will devastate, he’s lunging forward, kissing the lies that cling to your lips. Kissing you because his mouth hurts when it’s not attached to yours.

“One last time.” he says; he’s too intelligent, too intellectually adept, to allow this swallowing cycle of humiliation to continue.

But, underneath it all, he’s also inherently selfish for you. He’s fairly certain you were engrained into his skin, long before he fell into your barbed trap, teeth and penetrative ruin.

“Then you leave. You actually leave, never contact me again. No showing up at my apartment unprovoked. I have a good life without you. Understood?”

You scoff. He presses forward, “Understood?”

You don’t protest when he elucidates his life as good. Even if it’s quite the contrary. Even if he has to bare witness to depravity every single day, scrutinise his way through the minds of the most perverse. Perhaps this is a social experiment to him, perhaps you are the guinea pig, Laika sentenced to space. You know he loved you once, but it’s hard to comprehend the feelings remained unscarred, it’s hard to imagine you’re anything but a test subject now.

You look at him. Look at that pretty face. Your undoing. He could be your achilles heel, hamartia in its rawest form, or maybe you willingly chose to do this. Maybe fate, and divine intervention played no part in your attachment to him. Maybe it’s just chemicals. The logics explanation. Imbalanced, skewed chemicals.

“Don’t worry, boy genius.” you respond, “You won’t get anything, not even a postcard, from me. It’ll be like I never even existed.” no trace. D.C has always been a monotone cesspit of nothing anyway.

It’s cruel. Because if you leave, truly leave. And he never hears from you again, never catches you in his kitchen, drinking coffee with an unadulterated smile, then he will begin to forget.

The curve of your spine, the scars beneath your chest, the way your fingers fit into his own. The way he was able to memorise your body until he could draw it in the dark, when your body was pressed to his, when there was nothing but a false establishment of safety.

He knows he can’t forget. Not technically. But it’ll grow distant, it’ll be replaced with new normals and routines. That, that, he can’t compute.

“Good,” he says, kissing you again, kissing you because this is it.

Spencer wants you. In every sense of the word, he wants you so badly it’s killing him.

His bedroom still holds traces of you. That, itself, is a crime. But he just falls into you. The way lovers do. Your hands against his skin— his hair threaded through your fingers, your lips at the base of his neck. He lets you leave another bruise, a mark, a confirmation of possession, because even if this is the last time, he is, and always will be yours.

“Still the prettiest person i’ve ever seen,” you admit when he’s flushed naked beneath you.

There’s something in those doe-eyes, brown irises blown out of proportion, that hooked you. Even at the worst, it was still soft with him.

Slender frame, slightly arched, you want to bite into his hips, mark every inch of him as yours. It’s greedy, gluttonous, his messy hair, fanning out like a halo, the tangled curls he never bothers to properly care for.

“God, fucking look at you,” you grip his jaw, tilt his head back to bare that blemished neck of his. To have and to own. He’s so inexplicably different to you, so good it runs down to the bone. And maybe you’ve always been insatiable for what you’ve lacked.

He can’t take this. He can’t, not again. The past, the future will have to dissolve with this moment, because there will never be another again.

You will never get this close to him. It’s a terrifying thought, that this’ll be the standard of intimacy, of love - because he knows it isn’t. But he can’t risk the reality he’s faced with, the reality of living without this. Of living without you.

Your words only make it worse. He wants to beg you to stop. To cease the torture.

“Shut up.” He kisses you, as if to remind you that your mouth is made for kissing, for his lips, for a litany of dirty words that he can’t bear to hear. Those words are for someone else. For someone similar. Not him. Never him.

Defying fate. He gets off on being something bad beneath the surface. No one would ever expect it; boyish maladroit Spencer, the youngest of the team, willingly allowing, condoning, a killer to sink into his skin.

“Don’t tell me to shut up,” you respond, muffled against his lips. “If this is the last time, i’m going to enjoy it. Going to enjoy the sight of you, all desperate for me alone.”

“You assume i’ve ever been desperate for anyone else—“ he counters.

“Oh, that’s it. Keep talking dirty to me.”

“It’s not dirty. It’s a factual statement.”

You pull away, a trail of saliva bridging the space between your mouths. If there is higher power at play here, you want to curse, to spite your creator. Because if ‘things’ had been different, if you had been born from the same rib, this could’ve ended differently.

Or for that matter, never ended at all.

“Sit there and watch me.” you say, and Spencer hates the way he obliges. Pushing himself up against the headboard, he stares at you, at the way you position yourself, standing by the foot of the bed.

“Do you even know what you do to me? Do you even understand the gravity your existence has on me?” you continue, unfastening the lace corset that clings to your frame. When it drops to the floor, breasts exposed, you run your hands across them, catching pierced nipples for a vindictive moment of pleasure.

“I— uh,” Spencer is admittedly a little distracted. Sex had always been something ruinous between you two. Something that conflicted his lack of experience, forced him to adapt.

He always wondered how someone so soft, the epitome of light, could be this obscene. Now he understands.

“Lost your words? Come on, pretty boy. I thought you had an ‘extensive vocabulary?’ Hm?”

He wants to touch himself, to ease the pulsing throb that centres in his cock. But he doesn’t, because despite the time that has passed, he still knows your rules. “Don’t use my words against me. I’m being tortured.”

“Tortured, huh?” your hands fumble over buttons until you’re reduced to a pair of panties, soaked throughly, leaving scarce to the imagination.

“So so tortured. Oh my god, who are you? Can I please have my soul back?” he’s joking, but not really.

“Well maybe if you beg for it,” your words fade into a mess of moans, fingers slipping beneath fabric to graze your clit. Spencer’s head spills back against the wall; he looks more affected by the movements than you.

It’s easy to fall back into old habits. Relapse.

“Come here, come here, i’m having an existential crisis.” he says, watching as you slip one finger, then two inside you, struggling to stand now. It’s strange how pleasure can reduce the most antagonising minds to vulnerability.

“Please— oh fuck, please. Please. Don’t make me watch, I can’t. Need you. Need you so bad.”

He thought he found the core of torture in you touching yourself, but he was wrong. Because when you crawl closer, when you slot yourself between his thighs, lips finding skin that only you have ever touched, he sees the root of evil in his brain. The ninth circle of hell.

It’s justified, he supposes. For all the good he’s done, he has betrayed. Himself, his friends, family, existence itself. There is not one thing he wouldn’t ruin, just to feel you. It’s incriminating, so yes, he deserves to freeze in Cocytus. He’ll willingly plead guilty, accept his entrapment in the ring of Caina.

“Poor baby, look at you.” you say, kissing his tip, catching the pre-cum on your tongue. Spencer responds: fisting bedsheets, fighting the restraint to buck forward, to find misplaced solace in the warmth of your mouth. He’s sprawled out across sheets now, lying back in a tangled heap of want. “Shh, it’s okay,” you continue, “I like my men desperate.”

“Desperate? Ah—,” he fights the urge to shut his eyes, too aware that this is the last memory he will ever retain of you.

You, painted into his mind. The final evidence left in the fire: mouth sinking down his length, taking him to the hilt, watery eyes and leaking mascara.

“This isn’t even desperation. You’re killing me. Just, oh oh— please, don’t. ‘M gonna cum. Gonna cum—“

Is it sick that he doesn’t want to? If only to prolong this transitory moment of destruction? Like the lotus eaters, he will always be mindless in the pursuit of more, more, more of you.

You draw back from his cock, only to press a soft kiss against the tip. The gesture alone has him reeling, has him begging to be saved, to atone for every sin he found in the comfort of your divinely crafted lips.

“Gonna let me sit on that pretty cock of yours, hm? Let me use you one last time? Promise i’ll be good,” a lie, “So so good.”

“God, yes. Yes, please. That would—“ You take him deep, deep enough that everything aches. He only feels alive when you’re wrapped around him, when there’s not an ounce of distance between your bodies, when he can touch the insides of you. Pry open the raw, unfiltered version of you.

He only feels alive when he’s sunk inside the harbinger of death. He’d laugh if it didn’t hurt.

You’ve got one hand tangled in your hair, the other pressed flat against his waist, supporting you through each bump of movement. Eyes like marbles, Spencer looks up, and wonders why this will never be enough for you.

You look back, meet his gaze, as if you’re Orpheus, predestined to turn around, to always return. Even if it’s just for one last second. Even if the fall-out is so much worse than pushing forward blindly.

Oh, hes certain you’re carving a hole inside him, something that will only grow and expand, imploring to be filled by it’s inventor. It’ll hurt, for the rest of time, he supposes.

When he finds your hand around his neck, he isn’t startled. Neither, when your thumb presses against his throat, applying pressure until the world cracks and fades, distorting his refined mind to the here and now. He floats, feeling transient in the curse of your touch.

“That’s it. Just let go. I’ve got you.”

He is a sacrificial lamb. The priests favourite. He will take the knife every time, and thank you for it after.

You release the tension, hand taking his instead. For all the cruelty you possess, you’d never think to harm him. Not physically at least. The emotional damage, however, finds you both. There can be no happiness in either of your worlds, not when the memory of each other festers. “Good boy— taking it so well. God, no one is ever gonna compare.”

He cries at the words. Pretty tears streaming down his face, because the reciprocation to his undying piety will forever trigger the warped chemicals in his brain. Will forever reduce him to something saccharine.

“Love you. Love you so much. Don’t go. Please,” he fractures, “please don’t go.” he begs, besmirched words he’ll regret in the wake of his pleasure. They don’t count, and yet, he knows, in the most depraved sections of his mind, they’re true.

You ride him harder. Back curved, finding god in the washed-out body of someone fatally destroyed. “Not going anywhere— fuck, fuckfuckfuck. That feels so good. You’re so good,” maybe it’s a kink to ruin something so perfectly spotless.

Maybe it’s a kink that he wants it.

“Say it. God, just say it. This once.” for old times sake, he almost adds. But that wouldn’t be objectively correct. For all the intimacy you shared, you never once articulated those three words. Perhaps it was to save your dignity, to hold pieces of yourself in the lies you beautifully crafted.

His thumb runs over your clit, and in the tangle of your orgasm, he almost thinks you forget about his demand. But after, when you’re still taking him, when you’re still clenching, unclenching, clenching around his cock, when you know you own every part of him, you answer.

“I love you.”

He falls apart. Hips canting, body squirming, whimper after whimper escaping his bruised lips as he releases inside of you. Pushed deep, defiled to the limit. For a moment, everything is okay, everything will be alright, because there’s pleasure, and it’s you. It’s always you.

How can he justify falling in love with you again? How can he, when he still clings onto the artificial love of the past? He’s not sure his heart can handle one set of feelings, nevermind two.

He takes you again, well… mostly you take him again. In ways that have him polluted with the remnants of your teeth. Canine marks, etched deep enough to bleed. He hopes the swelling leaves behind perennial scars, anything to remind him. Anything to hold onto when you’re gone and it’s cold.

After, when you lie together, he presses his forehead against yours and wishes he was in any other universe. One where you’re happy. Where everything is pure and simple, clean from sin.

There was always truth in what we shared before, you admit. Lazy nights spent draped over the couch, kissing him to silence convoluted rambles. Your presence in the morning, bathed in holy glow, sunlight bleeding over the pretty sight of you. The first night he touched you and saw god. And then the following night, when he ascended all over again.

He wakes to find no body. He wakes to find nothing. It feels like self-sabotage, the promise that you would leave, even if it’s quite the contrary.

In the absence, abstinence of your presence, he discovers traces of you in everything he sees, all of it, everything consumed, returning to the simple thought of you you you.

When the first postcard comes, Portland, dreary weather— beaches and ports, there’s no anger. No exasperation that you broke your word.

You love him, it’s morbid, but for someone like him, it overrules everything. Sanity, dignity, his own stable existence.

           Your pulse quickened, but you refused to show it. You turned your head just enough to meet his gaze from the corner of your eye, your smirk never faltering. "And what is that, Agent Hotchner?"

           "Fear," he said, his voice steady, his eyes searching yours. "You're terrified. That’s why you keep pushing, keep running, keep killing."

           You straightened in your seat, your composure cracking for just a moment before you masked it again with a cold laugh. "You don’t know anything about me."

           Hotch moved around to the front of the table, placing his hands on its surface as he leaned in closer, his face inches from yours. "I know you better than you think," he said softly, his eyes narrowing. "You wanted me to catch you, didn’t you?"

           Your smirk faded, replaced by something darker, something rawer. The truth of his words hung in the air between you, and for the first time, you felt the weight of the game you’d been playing. But you wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing you break. Not yet.

           "You really think this is over?" you asked, your voice barely above a whisper.

           Hotch’s eyes hardened, his jaw tightening. "It’s over."

           But even as he said the words, there was an unspoken understanding between you, a pull that neither of you could ignore. Enemies. Opposites. Yet, somehow, connected by something far deeper than either of you was willing to admit.

           Hotch stood still, watching you for any sign of weakness, any crack in the armor you wore so expertly. But there was something in your gaze, something he couldn’t place. He had chased you for months, relentlessly unraveling the puzzle you’d left behind, but now, sitting across from you, he felt it - the undeniable pull that shouldn’t exist between foes.

           You leaned back in the chair, your posture relaxed but your eyes burning with an intensity that made his stomach twist. "You say it’s over," you repeated softly, "but is it? Really?"

           Hotch didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. Instead, he sat down across from you, his eyes narrowing as he studied your every move. There was a strange calmness in the air, a stillness that shouldn’t exist between hunter and prey, but here it was. And Hotch hated it. He hated how you affected him, how, even now, with your wrists bound in cuffs, you still had power over him.

           "You wanted this," he said quietly, his voice a low growl as if he was trying to convince himself that he was right. "You wanted me to find you."

           You raised an eyebrow, a smirk tugging at the corner of your lips. "Maybe I did," you admitted, your voice was like silk. "Maybe I’ve been playing you all along."

           He should be angry. Furious. But instead, there was something else simmering beneath the surface - something that had been growing since the first time your paths crossed. Something that blurred the line between hate and fascination.

           Hotch leaned in, his eyes locked on yours, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Why?" he demanded. "What do you want from me?"

           You held his gaze, the challenge in your eyes unwavering. "Maybe I wanted to see if you could catch me. Maybe I wanted to know if you were as good as everyone said you were."

           He shook his head, not buying into your game. "That’s not it," he said firmly. "You’re too smart for that."

           You let out a soft laugh, leaning forward slightly, closing the distance between you. "Maybe I just wanted to see you up close, Aaron."

           Hearing his first name fall from your lips made his blood run cold and hot all at once. He had heard it a thousand times from friends, colleagues, and family, but from you, it felt… intimate, wrong even.

           "You don’t get to call me that," he said, his voice strained.

           "Why not?" you asked, your voice almost playful. "You’ve been chasing me for months. You know me better than anyone."

           "You’re a killer," Hotch said, his tone sharp.

           "And yet, here we are," you whispered, your eyes darkened, daring him to admit the connection neither of you wanted to face. "Maybe you’re not as different from me as you think."

           Hotch’s jaw clenched. He wanted to refute your words, to tell you that you were nothing alike, but something stopped him. Deep down, beneath the layers of righteousness and duty, he felt it too. The same darkness that fueled you had touched him as well, shaped him in ways he didn’t want to acknowledge.

           He stood abruptly, pushing his chair back as if to create distance, both physically and emotionally. "This ends here," he said, his voice hard, though it trembled slightly.

           You smiled, slow and taunting, as you watched him struggle with the truth he didn’t want to face. "We both know that’s a lie, Aaron."

           He turned on his heel, refusing to look at you as he headed for the door, but your words lingered in the air, heavy and unshakable. This wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

           Hotch stopped just shy of the door, his hand hovering over the handle as your words echoed in his mind. The venomous sweetness in the way you said his name, the way you pushed, prodded at parts of him he kept buried deep - he hated that you could get under his skin so easily.

           "I know you feel it too," you called softly from behind him, your voice echoing in the stark interrogation room. "That pull… it's what kept you chasing me."

           He hesitated, fingers tightening around the cold handle. His body was rigid, but every nerve in him was taut, strained to the breaking point. "You don’t know anything about me," he growled, though the words lacked conviction.

           You smirked, leaning back in your chair with a confidence that set his teeth on edge. "Don’t I? You’ve been playing the hero for so long, trying to separate yourself from the darkness. But it’s always there, Aaron, lurking beneath the surface."

           He turned slowly, his expression hard but his eyes betraying the inner turmoil. The room felt smaller now, suffocating under the weight of what was left unsaid. The way you watched him, the way you spoke as if you knew him inside and out, it crawled under his skin in a way that felt wrong. But even more than that, it felt familiar.

           You leaned forward, your shackles rattling softly as you rested your arms on the table. "We’re not different, you and I," you whispered, eyes gleaming with a dangerous allure. "You spend your life catching people like me. But tell me, Aaron - how much of yourself do you see in us?"

           Hotch clenched his fists, fighting the urge to lash out, to shut you up, but it wasn’t just anger that drove him - it was fear. Fear that maybe, just maybe, there was a certain truth in your words.

           He stepped closer, slow and deliberate, his gaze locked onto yours with a cold intensity. "You and I are nothing alike," he said, his voice low and controlled. "I don’t get off on causing pain. I don’t manipulate and kill innocent people."

           "No," you agreed, your eyes narrowing as you tilted your head slightly. "But how many lives have you ruined, Aaron? How many times have you had to make the hard choice? The one that keeps you awake at night?"

           For a brief moment, a flash of something passed through his eyes - regret, maybe. But he buried it quickly. "I do what I have to," he said, his voice a little too quiet, a little too tired. "To protect people."

           You studied him, a small smile curling at your lips as you sat back once more. "Keep telling yourself that."

           The silence that followed was deafening. It stretched between you like a loaded wire, ready to snap at any moment. Hotch couldn’t bring himself to move, couldn’t turn his back on you again. You were still dangerous, still a killer, but beneath it all, there was something else. Something more complicated.

           And maybe that’s what scared him most of all.

           "You don’t win," he said, more to himself than to you. "You’re going to spend the rest of your life in a cell."

           Your laugh was soft but chilling, echoing through the empty room. "Win? I already have. You may lock me away, but I’m in here," you tapped your temple with a finger, your gaze never leaving his. "I’ll always be in here."

           Hotch’s face tightened, and without another word, he turned and pushed through the door. The cold, sterile air of the hallway hit him like a punch to the gut, but it wasn’t enough to shake off the weight of your words.

           As the door clicked shut behind him, your maniacal laughter faint behind the steel door enclosing you, Hotch realized something unsettling: the chase was over, but the game had just begun. And whether he liked it or not, you were right.

           You were under his skin.

-when cases went quiet you started to search relentlessly for him online. you forced yourself to ingest every thesis paper he’s ever written and watch any lecture that was posted. he drew you in with the wave of his hands or how he would ramble then bring himself back to the topic at hand. how you wanted to pick his brain, just sit and listen to him for hours taking about anything he’s stored away.

-it’s been a year since that case. you miss him, you want him in your grasp. maybe you should put that business card to use and just call it, that’d be a lot easier. so you mustered up the courage, pulling the card from your wallet and dialing his number you breathed slowly and pressed call. the line rang three times before it picked up and you heard his voice, “dr. reid, how can i help?”

“uh, this is y/n…” he said he’d remember you so you just gave your name for recognition. the line was quiet for three seconds and you could hear some faint chatter on his end before he responded, “i’m sorry, i- i don’t seem to-“ and you hung up the call before he could break your heart further. he lied.

-it was like you just went through a breakup for a relationship that wasn’t even real. your bleeding heart completely cracked and spilled like fire through your veins. spencer reid is going to regret ever forgetting you and his promise. so you started to do some studying, researching past cases with the bau involved, looking for inspiration from convicted killers

-you find some that were unique but still easy to accomplish with your own physic in play. most of these killers were men, stronger and taller than you. you start to craft your calling cards, poems and roses, anything symbolic to a relationship and heartbreak. you’re nervous your first night on the hunt. you decide to go a bar and wait for someone to make their way into your web.

-you’d dance on them and kiss them, closing your eyes shut and imagining this it what spencer would taste like, how his hands trailing over your curves would release butterflies in your belly. his breath ghosting along your pulse before sucking a bruise into your skin. “wanna get out of here?” seductive eyes watching your toy nod and drag you behind him out the club, heading to his place.

-the make out session was hot and getting steamy, pushing him in the direction of his bedroom. you played the kinky card, “gonna tie you up and gag you, be a good boy.” left in nothing but his boxers he was bond and gagged. playing a teasing game you left him alone while looking for some type of weapon. pulling a pair of black gloves from your clutch and the pointiest knife from a drawer you dragged yourself back to his bed, straddling him at the waist, keeping your hands behind your back. “you’ve made this night very special. wanna know why?” playing coy while pulling the gag down from a second.

the toy cocked a brow with a shit eating smirk, “of course, doll face.” his eyes dropping to your chest and it caused you to grimace. “you’re the first victim of many.” whispered as you slid the fabric back into his mouth

“wait wh-“ muffled when you stabbed him with an angered forced into his heart. his screams were still loud but with music playing in the background and his mouth full, no one would be the wiser.

-you called in sick for the next few days, needing to be consistent for the bau to be called in. you’d go to clubs or even strip clubs, any place that’d have willing men bring you home preying on you while you were the pretender. you kept the killings pretty simple, just stabs to the heart and letting them bleed out, you started to draw heart on their walls from their blood, the red turning black when drying. and finally before leaving a folded note with a poem or a piece of your soul written out was safety pinned to their skin.

-the news started to call you ‘the heartbreak killer’ stupid, but they always wanted to give killers case names. adding a new flare to your lastest kill, you’ve scattered red and white rose petals over their body and a ruby red kiss to their cheek. your fifth victim in a week period. you had a hunger for it now, killing gave you an adrenaline rush that was better than any rollercoaster or scary movie, you vibrate with excitement each night. you started dressing more bolder, wearing wigs even, making sure you stood out for anyone that was connected to your toy of the night.

- “we’ve called in the fbi behavior analysis unit to help us find this serial killer. with them here we plan to catch them before there is another victim.” goosebumps scattered over your forearms hearing the sheriff’s announcement. finally, he’s here. your spencer reid came for you. “in do time, my love. we’ll be reunited properly.”

-you took a sixth life the night they arrived, wanting them to know your usual stalking grounds. it would be easier to ‘accidentally’ bump into spencer, rather than actively search him out. so the next day you dressed down, wanting to look more normal, become a wallflower. you were nursing a drink in a shaded corner with watching eyes surveying the crowed hoping to see the tall dr. reid. “uh, excuse me, miss.” your heart skipped a beat, it recognized his voice even over the thumping music rattling your skull.

you turned his way casually and said, “you’re very pretty,” sipping on the black straw of your soda. spencer smiled hesitantly and floundered for a response, “uh tha- thank you. i’m dr. spencer reid i work with the fbi-“ he flashed his badge and you caught a glimpse of a younger photo, “there’s been a series of murders in the area and we suspect the killer visits here. have you seen anything suspicious lately?”

your nostrils flared, he still didn’t remember you not even face to face. “well all men are suspicious in clubs,” dulled chuckles at your retort. you saw spencer’s eyebrows quirked, “are- are you by yourself?” he sounded concerned for a stranger, but you weren’t a stranger. “yeah, my friends left me a few hours ago but i just didn’t want to go home yet.” shrugging him off.

he licked his lips, “well i’d suggest not visiting his establishment for the time being.” “but all her victims are men, so i’m safe. but thanks for the concern, nice to meet you doctor.” and you left the crowded bar with a smirk knowing you gave him a hint.

-you went to work the following day, just telling your coworkers you came down with food poisoning and needed and extra day to recover. they cooed over you but you knew most of them didn’t care, its fine you weren’t planning to stay here forever like most. you were cleaning tables and fixing displays when there was a tap to your shoulder. brittany, a coworker, pointed over her shoulder and said, “there’s a spencer reid here to see you. says he’s with the fbi.” you had to repress your smile.

“dr. reid, pleasure to see you again.” a welcoming smile and open posture. he cocked his head, “i- i remember you. from last year…” it’s like you could see his gears turning and clicking things into place. you didn’t bother denying anything just saying, “wow, what a great memory you have.”

his round eyes stared into your soul, “eidetic memory. you called me a month ago…” now you showed confusion, “no i didn’t. sadly lost your card, but i’m safe. we should have dinner while you’re here.” being bold.

spencer nodded his head, “that sounds nice. tomorrow night works for me, i could meet you here.” he seemed excited to have a romantic date with you. your heart raced, “it’s a date.” and you headed back to your work.

-you changed into date appropriate clothing once you clocked out and waited five minutes outside before you saw the tall spencer reid walking up to your side. he had a sweater vest over a button up with a tie around his neck, his gun wasn’t holstered to his hip for the night and his hair was a bit wind swept. you could eat him up.

“bet you have a bunch of girls after you while away on cases.” walking beside him when he suggested an chinese restaurant just down the block. he chuckled, oh your heart stuttered at the melody, “not really. most people don’t like my… personality.” sneaking a glance at you.

“well they’re missing out, but happy since i’m the lucky girl at your side.” looping an arm through his and pulling his close so you could lean your head onto his bicep. “i’ve dreamed of this since you left.” sighing into the air then pressing a kiss to his fabric covered skin, later you’ll get to taste him.

- “i have a question for you.” it’s been an hour into your date, stomach filled with delicious food and effortless conversation. you nodded at spencer to go forward. “at the bar you said the unsub was a women, what made you think that? no sex has been mentioned in the news yet.”

you pursed your lips in thought, “well, stabs to the heart seems emotionally personal. and the hearts in blood and rose petals, along with her leaving love poems. only a hopeless romantic that was horribly heartbroken would do this art.” slurping noodles into your mouth for punctuation. you weren’t trying to hide your truth, “it was the only way to get your attention.”

- “my attention?” spencer questioned. “well, i’ve missed you and when i tried calling-“ “so that was you.” “and you lied about remembering me!” slamming a fist onto the tabletop forcing it to shake. you leaned in close, “i thought we had something special. you didn’t bother trying to reach me in anyway and i’ve stayed updated with your career.”

“i- im sorry, y/n. my job is just very demanding. i would’ve reached out. i- i didn’t think you felt the way i did.” spencer stretched a hand over the table and rested it atop yours, his long fingers curling along your wrist.

“oh baby, the spark when we first met was instant. i was devoted to you the moment our eyes met, i’d do anything for you.” allowing your other hand to creep up spencer’s arm. “i’d kill myself for you if you asked, i’ve killed for you. would you do the same for me?” doeing your eyes and pouting your lips.

spencer leaned forward, his eyes dropping to your lips then back to your eyes, “anything for you, my love.” whispered just between the two of you. you smiled wickedly, “wanna head to my place?”

-once your door was unlocked and open you pounced onto spencer, hands holding his cheeks so you could press your lips onto his. his palms gripped at your hips and pulled your flush to his chest as his mouth devoured yours, moans ripped from your throat.

“fbi! hands in the air!” heavy footsteps and loud shouts broke the air. you didn’t bother acknowledging them, just submerging yourself into spencer until his arms twisted you around and held you in a tight hug. “don’t fight them. stay alive for me.” spencer whispered in your ear before pressing a kiss to your temple.

-six months. you’ve been institutionalized for six months since your lawyer pleaded insanity to the court. said you did everything because you started to stalk and become obsessive with doctor spencer reid. you didn’t bother mentioning that the killings made you feel stable. you’ve been sentenced for twenty five years to life, chances of parole after fifteen years. your family rarely visited you, you didn’t care. you only enjoyed visitation when he was there.

“the doctor is here.” an officer pulled you from the library to bring you into the visitation center. nervously you fiddled with your hair, straightening your beige uniform, wanting to appear put together for your boyfriend. he wasn’t your actual boyfriend, but he allowed you to call him that.

“hi baby.” sidling into your seat across from him, a gigantic smile hurting your cheeks. he wore his standard outfit, sweater vest over a long sleeve button up, no tie today and his collarbones were on display for you along with his forearms. “you look very sexy today.”

“and you look quite pretty today.” spencer visits you once a week at most, sometimes twice if he’s already in the state for a case. you heard it was cause your psychiatrist told him that your symptoms were worse if he was gone for long periods at a time causing you to act out and harm yourself or others. but you know it’s cause he loves you.