Lies - Criminal Minds || Spencer Reid Fanfiction

17. Déjà Vu

"The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends." ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

The Lover

We'd only been back at the office for a few minutes before I began to feel claustrophobic. 

There was something about being in Melanie's office - knowing what we'd done here - while rooting through her things without her that drove me kind of insane.

I could hear her voice laughing at the memories in the photographs as I observed them while Morgan took the hardest job of pawing through her desk. 

I tried to be gentle but my palms were sweating and my chest felt the tightest it had ever felt.

"Reid, you okay?" Morgan asked as Hotch turned from the shelves and I carefully tried to right the overturned photo-frame on the desk.

"I-I'm going to go check on the others..." I mumbled hurriedly before fleeing from the room.

I didn't know how to tell them that the reason there was no desk lamp was because I'd stood on the neck and broken it on my way to the sofa to have sex with the woman who was now missing.

I burst out into the - partially - fresh air and gulped for dear life, panting insanely as I tried to fill my lungs and dismiss the aching in my chest.

"Reid!" Prentiss' voice sounded panicked and worried despite the small tinge of relief to her tone. "Are you okay?" She asked, jogging up to me to put a hand on my back as I arched over, dry heaving.

"Y-yeah I'm fine," I stuttered, straightening my back, subsequently causing her hand to drop down by her side again. 

"I just needed some air. It's too uh, stuffy up there." I lied and she nodded understandingly. 

"I found Melanie, she was admitted to a hospital nine miles away in New Scotland." My mouth fell open and my eyes flew wide.

"She's okay?!" I gushed.

"She's with the doctors just now but she's okay." She said with a relieved smile.

"Okay, I'll go, you tell Hotch and Morgan and call the others, get Garcia to send me the location," I gushed as I took the keys from her hand and hurried to the nearest SUV. 

"Get everyone and meet me there ASAP." I called as I hurried off.

"But Reid!" She shouted after me but I wasn't listening. I wasn't even thinking. I was just believing that I had to get to Melanie as soon as possible.

She was alive.

She was okay.

She was close.

I had to get to her.

*

It took thirty minutes for me to get to the hospital and a further ten to get to the correct part of the building, and then a further five before I was allowed to see her. 

"Doctor Reid if you'll please just be patient, the doctors-"

"Have been with her now for over thirty minutes. You're telling me she's okay, but if she was she wouldn't need to be with them for so long."

"Doctor Reid please, we're trying to ascertain what has happened to Agent Hotchner."

"It's Chief, Agent Hotchner, actually." The nurse looked pointedly at me and took a deep breath.

"My apologies. Chief Agent Hotchner has clearly been through an ordeal. The doctors have had to clear her wound-" 

"Wait, wound?"