Outsider

i will love you any way you choose-15

Unfortunately, good things never seem to last for me, and three days later I'm standing in the kitchen at the BAU, listening to Spencer ramble to Morgan about my girlfriend. It immediately sours my mood, and it's somewhat obvious as I sit my cup down harder than normal. Morgan turns to glance at me and I ignore him, making my coffee.

I'm not a jealous person. Truly, I'm not. I have full confidence in Elle's feelings for me and our relationship. I don't worry because Spencer has a chance. I worry because Spencer doesn't have a chance. He'd been cold to me at the start, and the value of his trust was immeasurable. Despite our initial issues, I didn't want to see him hurt. Him finding out about Elle and me would certainly do that.

Stupidly enough, I hadn't told Elle about it yet. She was thrilled to have me back in the field, but had picked up on the stress I was bearing. Adding this burden of unrequited love from Spencer would hurt both of us. At least, that was my rationale.

"Conference room." Gideon announces, striding through. It pulls me out of my thoughts and I ignore Morgan's pointed stares as we make our way to the round table.

"William and Helen Demarco. Retired, no kids, found dead in their home in Baltimore." JJ begins, flashing to another slide. The lasting nausea grows as I look at the grisly scene on the board. Elle picks up on it and her hand slides onto my knee under the table.

"Any witnesses?" Spencer asks.

"One. Neighbor reported a white male 20-40 years old fleeing the scene, said he seemed to be on drugs." JJ explains the rest of the case. Despite the appearance of a double homicide, it's very obvious overkill. Making it our problem.

"We told Baltimore PD we'd be there by noon. Wheels up in an hour."

"A whole hour..." Morgan says dramatically. "Hmm, whatever shall we do with it?" He turns and wiggles his eyebrows at me.

"I don't know. Go flirt with Garcia or something." My response comes out harsher than I intend to, but I don't bother with an apology, pushing out of my chair. Morgan says something as I stalk out, trying to appear as calm as possible. As soon as I reach the bathroom, it's the same as the past few days.

And like the past few days, Elle's there, holding my hair and rubbing my back.

"Okay, Sawyer. You have got to tell me what's going on." She says firmly as I wash my hands.

"It's gotta be the medicine." The lie brings more nausea, but I ignore it.

"Don't lie to me."

"I'm not-"

"You've been lying to me for days. You didn't eat something bad, it's not your pain meds." Her hands fall on my hips and she turns me to face her.

"Not to mention you've been really...tense lately." I mentally curse myself for surrounding myself with some of the most adept people at picking up on lies and small cues.

"If you're sick, that's okay. But if something else is going on and it's affecting you like this, it's a problem." She says, her thumb rubbing small circles on my hip.

"Elle..."

"Please, angel." She says and I close my eyes, taking a long breath. On the exhale, I open my eyes, met with her dark brown eyes.

"Spencer and I talked." I start. "We apologized. He explained."

"That's good...right?"

"Yeah, yeah. But, Elle, part of it..." I pause, looping my fingers through her belt loop to ground myself. "He's into you. Like, really, really, into you. And I had to just let him say it, because the team doesn't know, and I wasn't very well going to tell him, and I feel like shit about it because I'm lying to him, and now I lied to you, and-"

"Hey." She says, stopping my tirade. "Sawyer." She forgoes speaking, drawing me into a hug. I melt into her embrace, burying my head in her neck.

"I'm really sorry, Elle."

"It's okay. You don't have to be sorry."

"I don't want to hurt him." I whisper.

"We can tell the team if you like."

"You know the rules on relationships."

"We can go to Strauss. Formally disclose it."

"You know what they do when people get in relationships." I say and she sighs heavily. Both of us know it, that if people admit a relationship, one of them suddenly gets mysteriously reassigned to another unit or office.

"I'm not letting that happen." She says, pulling back to look me in the eye. "I love you, Sawyer Vanderbilt, and Strauss or anyone can't do anything about that." Tears well up in my eyes.

"I love you." I mumble, and she kisses me.

"Elle. I don't think we should tell them." I eventually say, breaking the kiss. "I think it would do more harm than good. Don't get me wrong, I want nothing more than to be able to love you in public, but Strauss would try her best to move one of us, Hotch would be pissed, Spencer would be hurt. We can't."

"I know." She sighs. "Soy, I will love you any way you choose. It is completely your decision."

"You really have got to stop saying sappy things. I'm going to cry again."

"Hmm, none of that." She says, smiling. She kisses me lightly and I hum.

"Can't wait for the day when we finally can tell everyone. I'm gonna spill all of your closeted sentimentality."

"You wouldn't." She fake gasps and grins when it elicits a laugh from me.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you." I say softly.

"Sawyer, it's okay. I'm not upset at all. I was just worried, okay?"

"You shouldn't worry so much about me."

"I'll always worry about you, angel." She says and I smile, stealing another kiss before turning back to the mirror to fix the smudged mascara.

"I love you." I say as I swipe at the blackened circle under my eye.

"I love you more."

okay, okay, so maybe this chapter was entirely dialogue. but it needed to happen. i promise the next one will be longer!! also, i want to make it clear that i do love spencer, and the angst with him is completely for the sake of the plot

as always, thank you for the stars and comments, and thank you for reading!! -sasha<3