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It was really starting to bother him, he knew he shouldn’t be petty, she didn’t know. However it was the worst kept secret in the BAU, hell, even Strauss knew about it, she just didn’t say anything as long as the unit was functioning well and she looked good. But Jordan Todd wasn’t BAU; she was Counter Terrorism, covering for JJ while she was on maternity leave. And she seemed to be oblivious to the disbelieving looks of other team members as they watched her stare at the well-defined and toned body of Derek Morgan as he sat at the station desk, going through reports in full sight of Spencer, his boyfriend of three years.
Spencer was not a jealous person, and most of the time was anything but confrontational, but even he had his limit, and he felt himself reaching it as the beautiful woman walked over to his boyfriend and leant over the desk with one hand on his back and spoke softly to him. His fists and jaw clenched tightly and his eyes narrowed as she leant in a way that gave Derek a full view of her chest. Her fitted shirt that was just the right mixture of alluring and elegant while accentuating her natural assets. Derek took no real notice of her flirting until then, but how could you blame a red blooded man when they were as good as thrown in his face like that, and Spencer knew he would not act on it, Derek cherished their relationship too much to risk it all for a floozy fling with some woman. It was that knowledge that kept Spencer from going over and calling the female agent up on her actions. He knew the only reason Derek had said nothing was so not to make a scene, but his body language declared his discomfort for all to see, further relaxing Spencer’s anxiety.
Thankfully the team were as astute to the situation as Spencer was and insured the beautiful, accomplished female agent did not get a chance to corner Derek alone. When he offered to go visit the families of the victims, he forgot that it would be Jordan that would have to accompany him due to her being the Communications Liaison for them, and rather than cause any awkwardness within his team, Hotch immediately offered to go with them, leaving Prentiss, Rossi and Spencer with the geographical profile, ME reports, lab reports and witness statements to go through.
The team divided and went to complete their allocated tasks and the three agents remaining at the station got coffees from the break room before setting out to do them.
“Can I just say Reid; I have had to add another attribute to the never ending list of notable traits about you. Restraint.” Emily commented before taking a sip of her coffee.
“I don’t know what you mean.” Spencer decided to play dumb.
“Kid, don’t try and kid us. What Prentiss is saying is most men would have snapped by now and went over and torn her a new one and/or as good as pissed on Morgan as a sign of possessiveness.” Rossi expanded somewhat crudely, Spencer grimaced at the reference.
“But I’m not a possessive person.” Explained the youngest member. “Besides, Derek is showing no interest in her and I am not going to risk the team dynamic and effectiveness to call her up on it. Besides if it were to become a scene, it bodes badly on the bureau and we all know that that would bring Strauss down on us.” Spencer explained.
“Not only are you a genius, you’re also extremely wise.” Prentiss smiled. Rossi agreed and Spencer stood with his head slightly tilted in bewilderment at the woman’s statement.
They worked away at the tasks at hand. Each of them conferring with the others at the discovery of any new information, or if they just needed a different perspective. It was how the team was so successful, their ability to work alone and to their own personal strengths and then almost seamlessly join together to work as a whole. Spencer cursed the unknowing agent putting it all at risk with her flirtatious behaviour.
After two hours the three other team members returned and Hotch appeared to be seething. He showed no outward signs of it, forever keeping the stoic appearance of professionalism, but his team knew him better than anyone else in the world, his family, his ex-wife, anyone. Derek, though he said nothing, had his eyebrows almost scrunched together, his eyes showed a murderous glare and his lips narrowed. Spencer knew immediately his lover was not merely annoyed, but angry. He and the other two agents looked at each other for a moment, wondering what could have caused such a reaction out of the two men when Agent Todd entered the room, eyes firmly to the floor and a forced smile that resembled more of a grimace on her face.
Spencer looked at her for a moment, wondering had she finally made a move and the two men had called her on it. He was going to go to Derek and see what he could get the older man to reveal, when Rossi beat him to the punch and followed Hotch. Prentiss headed to the bathroom without noticing that it now left Spencer alone in the room with Jordan.
“Everything alright?” he asked meekly. If he was going to get anything out of her he would have to appear non-threatening. Something he was adept at being.
“What the hell is his problem?” the woman ranted angrily, all signs of her former demeanour gone.
“Who’s?”
“Agent Hotchner’s. I got the information we needed, that’s all that matters, so I told a little white lie, the family weren’t going to talk to us otherwise, we need to save these girls.” She waved her arms around as she spoke.
“What do you mean a ‘little white lie’?” Spencer asked cautiously.
“I pretended to have a sister to say that I would come forward were it my case.” She explained.
Spencer’s eyebrows shot up and his eyes widened. She had said such a lie, with Hotch present. He knew then that Hotch would have called her on it as soon as they were out of earshot of the family.
“So he tells me off for that and then goes on about how I should act more professional on the team. I mean all I did was ask Agent Morgan for some hand to hand combat training.” Spencer bit his lips together. He could only imagine her way of asking Derek for the training to say that Hotch would have involved himself in the equation. “I am not working in the BAU long term so if I were to flirt with Morgan, where’s the harm in that? I asked him had he a girlfriend and he said no, so it’s not like he’d be cheating on anyone.”
Spencer had reached his limit, though not in anger, but in hilarity. He couldn’t hold back the small laugh as he looked at the now bemused woman.
“What’s so funny?” she asked sharply.
He pulled himself together and spoke seriously. “Well firstly we can’t lie to people, it looks bad on us, even if it’s a means to an end, a lot of people don’t trust the FBI as it is, we don’t need to feed that.” He used an explanatory tone rather than an authoritative one, like he was sure the Unit Chief had used.
“Back off alright.” The woman snapped. “You don’t have to be an expert on everything you know. I get it you’re annoyed I am here and not your ‘BFF’ JJ, but trust me, this only temporary and I will be glad to see the back of you too.”
Spencer stared at her for a moment, completely astounded by her vicious outburst at him when even with everything concerning Derek; he never was rude or impolite to the visiting agent, just not very talkative. He realised his mouth was open and popped it closed again, remaining calm as he looked at the irate agent. “There’s no need to be so catty.” He said quietly.
“That’s all you have to say, I was expecting some form of a witty comment at least.” She retorted wickedly.
“I am able to hold my own; I just choose my situations wisely.” He replied non-chalantly. And with that Spencer said no more and went back to his geographical profile. He could rip her to shreds using his adept mind and vicious tongue if he wanted, but as he had said previously, he did not want to make a scene and he knew that the woman was only looking to vent off the frustration of being scolded by Hotch for her unprofessional behaviour and she thought the teams shy and quiet genius would be the perfect target.
He could hear her suck in another breath to continue her verbal assault when the door opened again and the team walked into the room. Sensing the tension immediately they looked between the two agents. Like he had learnt from Hotch, Rossi and Gideon, Spencer cleared his face of any major emotion and made it neutral.
Hotch seemed concerned the two had been left alone together and it was obvious something happened, but in order to do the job, he needed to brush aside everything personal for a moment and focus on the case. He then split the team again, taking Derek and Prentiss with him to scope out a pick up class run by a man known as Viper. Leaving Rossi to work with an overly studious Reid and a somewhat furious Todd.
The three worked nearly silently, Todd walking out every so often to make a call with regards the press. On one of those occasions Rossi asked Spencer did he know why the other two men were angry, and he responded appropriately. Much to the Italian’s disappointment, he was unable to get to the bottom of the confrontation between Reid and Todd as the latter returned to the room once more.
After another while the three other agents returned, noting the still palpable atmosphere. The exchanged all their gathered knowledge and agreed they had enough to give a profile. Hotch asked Todd to gather the LEO’s in the main room of the station, she obliged solemnly.
“He used to choose prostitutes, but changed to more low risk targets as a result of a personal change.” Rossi started.
“He is picking these women up in bars uses specific techniques he learned in a class by a man known as the Viper.” Prentiss added, unable to prevent herself tossing her eyes up as she spoke.
“He puts women in direct competition with their friends by complementing them.” Spencer turned and stared Todd in the eye. “Those are beautiful earrings.” He said in a genuine tone. Jordan acknowledged the comment. “Then he adds an additional negative one.” He spoke to the room before once more turning to Jordan. “My grandmother liked to wear fake jewellery too.”
The woman’s eyes almost blazed with anger as she removed her hand from the gold plated earring, glaring at the genius as he and the rest of the team continued to give the profile, every other team member looking occasionally between the glowering woman and the smug man. When the profile was concluded the different team members discussed the plan of action, it was decided from her previous encounter with the Viper, that Prentiss would go to the club the creep frequented and be the bait for him, bringing Todd with her as a companion in hopes he’d reveal more of his method while the men scoured the area and leafleted the crowd.
The following morning was as uneventful, though Derek was enjoying joking with Spencer about the flirtatious barmaid from the previous night who requested the lithe genius’ number. In the afternoon the team got the break they needed and that night they were able to bring Robert C. Parker down, saving the barmaid from the night before in the process. The Gulf Jet would not be back for them until the following morning so the team elected for a round of early nights after dinner.
Spencer and Derek met in Spencer’s room as it gave them more privacy, being the furthest away from the others. The case was technically over and they were staying in the hotel as regular patrons, and not the FBI, so both men decided that they would stay the night together, though they would not partake in anything too raunchy, as it was unfair on the rest of their team if they heard. They ordered The Amazing Spiderman on the pay-per-view and agreed to get showered before they settled down for the evening. Spencer had his and smiled as Derek kissed him before heading in for his.
After a few minutes there was a knock on the bedroom door. Spencer was still wrapped in his towel as he walked over to see who it was. He was shocked to see Jordan Todd’s contorted image through the small spy hole. Thinking it was an emergency, he opened the door with only the towel on.
Even with her richly coloured skin, Agent Todd was visibly blushing at the lithe but toned man in front of her, with his long hair dripping onto his pale body. “Agent Todd is there a problem with the case?” he asked worriedly.
“No actually I just wanted to, um, talk to you for a sec.” she stated as she avoided eye contact with the man’s face and body.
“Eh, sure.” He answered and before he could ask her to wait until he had put on something more than a towel the woman brushed passed him and into the small room.
“I just want to apologise for yesterday. I was just annoyed at Agent Hotchner and I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”
“It’s okay, I get it, I am seen as the weakest team member, the easiest to go after.” There was no bitterness in his voice, he knew it was true. He had accepted it a long time ago.
“Okay, that makes me feel even worse.” The beautiful woman admitted. “I really am sorry Dr. Reid.”
“Thank you. And I’m sorry for being malicious when we were giving the profile. I can defend myself; I just can get nasty when doing it.”
“I wouldn’t have noticed.” Her smile was friendly, but still somewhat forced. “Anyway, I’ll let you back to your shower.” She looked to the closed bathroom door and the sound of running water.
“Hopefully we can work towards being nicer to one another now.” Spencer nodded.
“Yeah, about that. Can I ask what have I done to make you so indifferent to me?”
As though to answer her question, the two agents heard the shower being turned off. Spencer ended up just smiling widely as the baffled woman stared at him with her finger pointing to the bathroom door. After a moment the door opened to reveal Derek wearing only a pair of boxers.
“Baby Boy, I hope your in bed and ready for me…” Derek froze when he saw that they were not alone in the room. Jordan stared at the delectable body of Derek Morgan, before turning her head to Spencer who was now laughing to himself. Her mouth open as she attempted and failed miserably to utter a single syllable.
“The reason I have been slightly standoffish towards you Todd is because I am not in the habit of finding pleasure in witnessing people flirt with my boyfriend.” He chuckled. Jordan’s eyes widened more than the man ever thought possible as she began to compute what had just been said to her.
She stared at the two men who were wearing identical wolfish grins before whispering “Oh. My. God.” And turning on her heels and walking out the door without another word.
When the door closed both men laughed as Derek walked over to his younger lover, wrapping his arm around him and kissing him gently. “I think we may have broken our temporary Communications Liaison.”
“Either that, or made her night.” Spencer replied, putting his arms around his strong lover’s neck and kissing him again. Derek raised his eyebrows at the uncharacteristically blunt sexual comment off the other man.
“I think I am a bad influence on you Spencer Reid.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”