forever and always [ spencer reid x reader]

the letter

I'm in my apartment, I sit on the sofa and I open the envelope that the doctor gave me. I didn't have time to open it before after everything that happened.

the sheet was written in pencil, and was badly damaged, the sheet was torn in half.
I start reading.

"dear y/n, I know you'll be the first to read this letter, right now I'm in a cold warehouse far from Virginia I think. I don't know if I'll survive this time, remember when Tobias Hankel kidnapped me? That time I was in a barn but the situation is very similar. In case I die, tell the team I loved them all like family, tell my mom to take care of her too. Morgan and JJ are my closest friends, Garcia and Emily are like sisters to me, Hotch and Rossi are two father figures who have guided me through all these years, a bit like Gideon did. Then..

the letter stops here I turn it around and I find a small print.

"The dude who kidnapped me just ripped the other part, you can find it in the warehouse but I need you to read it." it says.

it's evening, but despite this I'm heading towards that abandoned warehouse in West Virginia, I have time to waste.
I take the car and in less than an hour I'm at the warehouse. The streets were clear by now, I just hope Hotch doesn't call me on a case, and I sure hope I'm not the next case on my team, given the situation I'm in.

I open the large metal door, with my right arm I hold the gun and with the left a torch that illuminates the warehouse.
on the sides I find switches, I press them and some LEDs light up the warehouse, seen in this state it looks like a stable or a barn. it is very messy and has remained as it was last week.

why hadn't we thought of that before?

I turn off the flashlight, the lights are too bright to keep a useless flashlight on. Strange that we hadn't noticed this before when we stumbled around in the dark looking for Reid a week ago.

I start looking everywhere, starting from where Reid was sitting, I check behind the columns or after a few shelves, when I finally find a book, a classic I think, but someone has ripped the cover. Opening it I see that someone has torn out some important pages where the plot and what book it was understood.

there were words highlighted with a pink highlighter, the book is very long but I notice the first word the dude or Reid highlighted is "Reed".

It must be Jane Eyre or something like that, I read it in college many years ago.

after a hundred pages or maybe more there is the word "loves"

I scroll another 200 pages and find another underline in pink: "you".

Reed loves you.

Reed was the surname of the family in which Jane was fostered, it's the same pronunciation as Reid's surname.

I scroll through the remaining pages and see no other underlining just torn pages. Then the missing piece of the letter at the end of the book. I don't know why I really thought finding that piece in there, knowing Elle, she would keep it for her, why did she want me to find it? After all, it was the only book in an abandoned warehouse.

I take the letter from my pocket and put it on the floor, I kneel and put the two pieces together, so that I can read it completely without interruption.

"then there's you, I think part of me has always had feelings for you, and part of me knows you would never reciprocate. We have known each other for more than 6 years and if you are reading this letter I want you to know that I have always loved you.
-Spencer Reid"

now that I think about it they are very similar to the words he said to me a while ago when we were taken hostage, now that I think about it that time I was shot in the back of the neck about two years ago he also said similar things to me.

I stand motionless in front of that piece of paper, I check the time, it's late and I should go to work tomorrow morning assuming they don't call me by some chance at this time. I take the letter and put it carefully in my pocket. I also carry the book with me, despite it being ruined, dirty with some missing pages, I keep it with me and place it on the seat of the car next to me while I start the engine.

I get back to my apartment and it's almost 2am. When the phone rings. It's Hotch.

"Hello?"

"hi it's me, i hope i didn't wake you up but we have a case, again in the middle of the night. I called you earlier because it's in your hometown in the suburbs of Los Angeles; 5 victims in the last week and only 2 these days. The sooner we start working on the case, the sooner we solve it." he says.

"oh, ok Hotch I'll be there in 5 minutes" I reply.

"see you soon" he hangs up.

Before leaving, I leave the letter in the book and put it in my library among all the other books. as soon as I arrive I'm the first of all 8. Hotch arrives two minutes after me and we wait in silence in the conference room.

I'm not very focused right now, I'm thinking about the letter and Reid's words. But no one must know about this letter, not even Morgan and Hotch.

As I think about the letter I also think about the case of Los Angeles. I'm not aware that I'm staring at a random spot under the table, moving my leg up and down in a nervous way, and biting my nails.

"are you ok? You look very nervous" Hotch says tilting his head to look at me better. It's something profilers like us often do to figure out when something is wrong; but the truth is that nothing is revealed by tilting the head and looking at the subject from a different angle.

"yeah I'm fine it's just this case, you know I was born in Los Angeles" I say.

"mhh, yes but why did it only take you 6 minutes to get here? Were you sleeping? Or were you somewhere else?" Hotch asks me doing that thing with his head again.

"no, I was out to clear my head" my answer is apparently convincing enough to convince Hotch.

"now we wait for the others, as soon as they arrive we will talk about the case, don't worry" he gives me a small smile that melts my heart. Hotch never laughs and when he does it's a rare event that makes me laugh too.

"yes y/n don't worry maybe nothing important happened in that Los Angeles suburb"

"maybe"