The final chapter...

"Hey Hotch." Emily heard Morgan's greeting as she stood outside the meeting room. She swallowed, trying to ease the dryness in her throat. Her palms were sweating and she could feel the fast thumping of her heart. What were they going to think when they see her. Would they be shocked, angry, hurt, happy? All of the above?

"What's the reason for the meeting? JJ says that she's not aware of a case and we just had a team meeting yesterday." Emily could picture the questioning look that Morgan would currently be sporting.

"I didn't ask you all to come in here for a meeting. There's something I need to tell you. There's no easy way to say this, but Emily's alive."

There was a stunned silence in the room.

Hotch continued. "I know, I was as surprised as you are now when I found out, but it's true."

"What..."

"How..."

Suddenly there was a loud chorus of voices. There was silence again after a moment and Emily could picture Hotch lifting his hand for quiet. "We'll explain everything later, but right now Emily's waiting to see you."

That was her cue. Emily took a deep breath and walked through the door.

"Dear, sweet Lord," she heard Penelope whisper.

"Emily?" Reid looked stunned.

"I can't believe it." Rossi.

With the exception of JJ and Hotch, her ex-teammates stared at her with varying degrees of shock.

"Hi guys." Emily had a speech all planned out, but upon seeing the faces of her dear friends, her family, she couldn't remember a single word of it. Luckily, before she could think about saying anything else, she was enveloped in Penelope's arms. Emily hugged her back just as tightly.

Penelope finally drew back. "Emily, I...I...can't believe you're alive! How, what, why..."

Emily smiled weakly. "It's a long story."

"Welcome back," interrupted Dave, giving her a warm hug.

"Thanks Dave." Emily felt tears sting her eyes as she looked over at JJ.

JJ came over and as they embraced, Emily whispered, "Thanks so much for everything."

She looked over JJ's shoulder to see Reid standing awkwardly to her right, a mixture of emotions on his face. Shock, hurt and joy all battling for precedence. When JJ released her, Emily walked over to him. "Can I have a hug?" She smiled at him, lips trembling.

Reid was so overcome that he couldn't answer, but he swallowed hard, then nodded. When his arms came around her, Emily closed her eyes and held him tight. "I'm so sorry for hurting you, Reid."

They drew apart and Emily looked at all her of them. "I am so very sorry for not telling you the truth. I never meant to hurt any of you. I just couldn't risk putting any of you in danger. I know you're probably angry with me now and I understand, but you need to know if I could go back in time, I'd still do everything exactly the same."

"You're so right we're angry with you," scolded Penelope, brows furrowed. "You're our family, we could've protected you."

"Thanks Penn, but I was beyond your help, really. I just had to go." The whole time Emily could feel Morgan's eyes focused on her and she was intensely aware that he didn't step forward to hug her as the others had. She finally lifted her eyes to meet his and drew a breath at the anger that blazed there.

"Derek..." she started to apologise again to him, but he gave an angry shake of his head and stormed out the door.

"Sorry, guys, I just have to..." she gestured after Morgan and quickly followed him out of the room. He had been such a good friend to her. She had to talk to him, make him understand why she did what she did.

She found Morgan standing at his desk, hands braced on the surface. "Go away Emily," he gritted out, not turning his head.

"I'm not going away, not ever again." She paused waiting for him to say something, but he was silent.

"Derek, it was the hardest thing I've ever had to do, running away when I knew that you all thought I was dead. Even my parents thought I was dead. Do you know how hard it is to live knowing you couldn't contact anyone you love because if you did, they could die, all because of you? I love you all so much, you're my family. Even if you don't agree with what I did, surely you have to understand why I did what I had to."

Morgan slowly straightened up, but he still didn't turn to face her. "Do you know what Reid said when we realised you had gone after Doyle? He said, 'why didn't she ask us for help, we're her family'. You just said we were your family, but you didn't trust us to help you."

Emily felt a wave of despair rushing over her at the anger in his voice which he didn't bother to conceal. "That's not true. I trusted you, maybe too much. I knew you would all go after Doyle if I had told you the truth. I knew Doyle and he would have done anything to get at me, not just hurt you, but your families as well. Would you really have forgiven me if something had happened to your sisters, or your mother?"

Morgan was silent, but after a long while she saw the tension slowly drain out of his shoulders. He slowly turned around and looked at her. Although he didn't look happy, she was immensely relieved to see that he no longer looked at her with anger in his eyes. "I don't know if I can forgive you yet for hiding the truth from us and then pretending you were dead when you weren't. But I guess I can understand your reasons for doing what you did," he said quietly.

"I don't expect you to," she said softly, "and your understanding is enough for now."

They looked at each other for a long moment and then Morgan walked up and put his arms around her. "I'm really glad you're back, princess."

Emily bit her lip to hold back her tears. "I'm so glad to be back."

That night, they gathered at Emily's favourite Italian restaurant to celebrate her return. The mood was jovial and Emily was amazed and relieved to see that they had all adjusted so well to her unexpected return. She had spent all afternoon explaining her actions and telling them what she had been doing since she had been gone, but she left out the bit about meeting Hotch. She was still unsure how they were going to break the news to the team, which was why she was not currently wearing her engagement ring. That would have led to too many questions.

She smiled at Rossi as he topped up her wine. She almost couldn't believe that she was back among the team. They were the closest to a family she ever had. She was finally home again and it felt wonderful. Reid's voice interrupted her thoughts.

"Hey Emily, where are you staying?" Reid reached over to grab a piece of garlic bread.

"Oh, umm..." Emily froze, wine glass halfway to her lips. She looked over to Hotch, who happened to be sitting to her left, for help, then groaned inwardly when she realised what she had done. How the hell could she have forgotten that she was sitting with a group of profilers? Stupid, Emily, stupid.

She saw Hotch's mouth twitch and looked around to see that everyone's conversation had come to a halt when they saw her reaction. Dave's eyebrows were raised as he looked between her and Hotch and she saw JJ hiding a smile as she took a sip of her wine spritzer. Everyone else's eyes were fixed on her.

"Why are you looking at Hotch, Emily?" Reid asked innocently, or rather, faking innocence, thought Emily, narrowing her eyes at him. "Don't you know where you're staying?"

Hotch finally chuckled. To Emily's shock, he reached over and took her left hand in his right. "You're probably going to figure it out soon enough so we might as well tell you now." Oh wow, he was going to tell everyone now? Trust Hotch not to bother consulting her. She was so going to have to do something about this alpha male personality of his, at least when it came to their relationship.

Now it was Hotch who had everyone's rapt attention. Penelope's eyes and mouth were already hanging open in shock from Hotch's hand clasping Emily's.

"Remember that trip to Paris three months ago? I came back and all of you were joking that I was in a foul mood because I must have had a brief love affair with a French woman and then had to leave her?"

What? Emily looked up at Hotch. She didn't know which to be more amused about. Hotch being in a foul mood or the team teasing him about it. Okay, she wasn't amused that he had been in a foul mood, she hadn't dealt with his absence all that well herself. His teasing by the team though, that was pretty funny.

She looked to the team and they were all nodding emphatically. Morgan caught her eye. "Babe, you have no idea. You think you've seen him mad before, this was like off the scale. Strauss was so scared of him that she avoided him like the plague." He rolled his eyes as everyone chimed in their agreement. Emily tried to suppress a smile.

"As I was saying," interrupted Hotch, shaking his head in exasperation, "that was actually half true because it was Emily I met on my first day there. I only found out then that she was alive. I didn't know before that. Like all of you I thought she had died. We didn't plan on it but we spent the next few days together and we fell in love." He paused, looking down at Emily.

Everyone was completely silent and staring at them in awe. But she didn't notice. All she saw all the love and tenderness in his face that was evident for all to see. Stoic, impassive, emotions-always-hidden Hotch was actually showing everyone what he felt for her. She tightened her hold on his hand, trying to show him how she felt.

Hotch smiled warmly, not taking his eyes away from hers. "So last night, I proposed to Emily and she accepted."

They looked into each others' eyes and for just a moment, before all the hugs and tears and congratulations, there was only the two of them, no one else.

I love you so much, said his eyes. I love you too, hers shone in reply.

La fin

I have loved writing this piece so much and sharing this with all of you. Thank you with all my heart for following this through to the end and for all your kind reviews. As always, please do review if you can. A reminder that reviewer number 200 gets a one-shot from me :)