Unknown- A Criminal Minds Fanfic

Chapter 19- Cats, Kibble, and Cookies

A vehicle was chasing me down the street, spraying up water as it zipped a path through the steady sheet of rain.  I dashed around another corner, splashing through the middle of the dark street, only to have the vehicle careen after me, narrowly missing the curb before it was barreling down again.  I tripped and sprawled flat on my face, letting out a yell of pain from the hard landing and the rough asphalt grating against my skin, even through my soaked clothes.  I slowly pushed myself up on my hands and knees, glancing at the blood streaking across my palms and through the holes torn in both knees of my pants, mingled pink with the rainwater.  A terrifying squeal halted behind me and then I was knocked to the ground again, this time on my back.  No no no, shit, this wasn't happening, the voice in my head screamed, in sync with the unintelligible shrieks of someone in the alley behind me.  I scrambled away from the quickly advancing black form leering through the silver curtain of water in front of me.  The shrieks intensified into one long scream as a squelching thud slammed my chest, the rainwater directly above me turning red, a half-circle of white glowing under the hood as the man's grin danced in front of me.

I bolted upright, clawing at the blanket as my eyes tried to adjust to the dark room around me.  Abruptly I stopped screaming, instead panting to catch my breath as I tried to remember where I was. 

A clatter and a muffled grunt sounded from somewhere over my shoulder, and I whipped my head in that direction, peering over the back of the couch.  The dim light bleeding through the gauzy curtains over the windows illuminated Reid half-doubled over, one hand clutching the wooden chair I had thrown my jacket over, the other reaching for my jacket which he had inadvertently knocked on the floor when he ran into the chair.

"It's just me, calm down.  Are you okay?  I heard you screaming," he said in a low voice, not quite a whisper but not quite speaking normally. 

He straightened up, my jacket in his hand, but with a rustle and a soft flap, some papers fell out and dropped to the floor.

"Yeah, I was just--it was a weird dream.  I was covered in bugs and Hotch was wearing a dress," I lied smoothly, though I'm not exactly sure where that particular lie had come from.

"Sounds genuinely terrifying," he answered sarcastically with a slight laugh, bending down to pick up the papers that had fallen out of my pocket.

The papers--oh, shit!  I threw back the blanket and literally jumped over the arm of the couch in an attempt to grab them before he could, but I froze right in front of him, my arms hanging stiffly at my sides.

Three sentences didn't take long to read, especially with his genius IQ, and he looked up at me, concern etched on his face.

I never realized how young he looked in this light--or lack of it.

"What is this? Is someone threatening you?" he asked, holding up the letter.  He had yet to read the note on flowery stationary.

"Yeah, cause threatening an FBI agent is real smart," I scoffed, resisting the urge to snatch the papers out of his hand.  Kind of hard to convince someone--and a profiler, at that--you're indifferent when you're acting defensive.

"McDowell, seriously.  What is this, some kind of prank?" he asked.

"It's nothing," I replied instead of giving an explanation, not that either explanation I could have given would have been the truth anyways.

I held my hand out for the letter, and he handed it back but incidentally still had Mrs. Mulcahy's note.

"Babies?" Reid questioned upon reading it.

I nodded and answered, "Cats, kibble, and cookies.  Like I said, it's nothing," before taking the note and my jacket from him.  I crammed the two pieces of paper in the pocket and zipped it shut, shifting the chair out of the way and tossing my jacket back over the back.

"If something is going on, you know we can help, right?" he asked quietly.

"Trust me Reid, I can take care of myself.  Now would you mind if we both tried to get a few more hours of sleep?" I asked briskly, waiting for him to turn around and head back to his bedroom before returning to the couch.  I pulled the blanket back over me, rolled over, and tried to fall back asleep even though I knew it probably wouldn't do me much good.

At seven-forty, I was startled from my restless sleep by three steady knocks on the door and an all-too familiar voice calling, "Pretty Boy, are you alive in there?  Hotch says we've got a case, and it's a bad one."

Could the past six hours get any worse?  I groaned and rolled over, but then had to grab onto the couch cushions so I wouldn't fall off.  My attempt failed though and I kept slipping off the couch, so I ended up dropping my feet to the carpeting before standing so I wouldn't crash to the floor.

And I managed to stand up just in time to see Reid come walking through to answer the door, wearing his flannel pajama pants but an unbuttoned dress shirt so I could see his slender stomach and chest.  Man, the kid was a twig, though I have to admit he wasn't a completely hideous one.

"I just got Hotch's text, give me ten minutes," Reid answered the door, but apparently Morgan had looked past Reid and seen me standing there. 

In Reid's living room.  Wearing a pair of Reid's pajama pants that were slipping off my hips, and one of Reid's T-shirts that was falling off my shoulder.

The look of disbelief on his face was followed by a scoff, but before he could even get a word out of his smirking mouth, I took a step forward and threatened, "If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I will make sure you regret it for the rest of your life," stabbing a finger at him.

Morgan held up his palms in mock defense, giving me an I'm-so-innocent look but wisely keeping his mouth shut.

I spun on my heel and stalked across the main room of Reid's apartment, going through the partially open door and heading straight for the bathroom where my clothes were, breezing right past Reid who was still getting dressed without even glancing at him.