"This… this has affected you! You, you killed that woman, Ross!" Emily was pacing her apartment kitchen.

"She would have killed you." He said evenly, eyes darkening.

"You… would have…before…. You would have shot her in the leg… or something…"

"Not necessarily. Look, I can handle myself and my decisions. You don't have to think everything is about you." It had come out a lot nastier than he meant it to be, but the effect was the same.

Shock covering her face, she went to the door and pulled it open. "Just leave. This was a mistake, Rossi."

"Not by me, it wasn't." he grabbed his jacket and walked deliberately out the door. Fuck if he was going to try and reason with her. I don't negotiate with women. The stubborn, bachelor side of him was getting the better right now. He was fuming and he wanted her to know it.

Kick me out. Fine. See if I don't happily leave. I'm not gonna beg for any woman. I need a strong drink. Punching the elevator button in her building he prepared himself for a long night at the pub.

It had been a long, disastrous week back at the BAU. Strauss had him put through three psych evaluations, taken his credentials and gun on temporary suspension until further notice and now he was being required by the department policies to undergo twice weekly therapy sessions with a beaky little man who wore terrible sweaters and horn rimmed glasses like he was somebody of moral importance. Rossi had profiled him the moment he had walked into the doctors office. Considers himself some sort of undefined moral judge…

Doctor Glenns had asked the typical, bullshit questions about how he felt about firing his gun and taking a life and blah blah.

"Your body language tells me you don't want to be here."

"I'm here because my job requires it. I want to keep my job." Rossi leveled eyes with the doctor.

Unphased, he replied. "Let's talk about the event that brings you here."

"I shot and killed an out of control, schizophrenic serial killer who was about to take the life of one of my team mates. That 'event'?" Rossi was making no effort to hide the ice in his voice.

"You fired your firearm, and you took a life, yes- that event."

"Sounds almost bad when you say it like that." Rossi allowed a sarcastic smile.

"You don't think taking life is bad?"

"Obviously not, I've only made it my life's purpose to bring justice to the scum that take life." He was being smart, and sarcastic, and the doctor was having a hard time keeping himself controlled. This man was deliberately baiting him.

"Do you feel any remorse for taking the life of…" he looked down at his notes. "Loyda Johnson?"

"I feel remorse for the pain her mother is going through, for what her brother, a United States Marine, must be feeling. But for protecting my team mate and eliminating a dangerous criminal, no, I feel no remorse. I did my job. A job, no less, that the government has commissioned me to do while equipping me with the training and weaponry to do so."

Personal righteousness is the most impossible to break down… there must be another angle. The doctors job is to find out if the agent is suitable to go back to work. If he is a danger to anyone or to himself. And anyone who shoots and kills another human being is a danger. He just has to find a way to prove it. I don't like this man. The doctor had thought angrily.

"I see." He eyed him for a long second before writing some notes on his tablet.

A wanna be techy. Googley eyed little bastard… I don't like him. He's phishing for something. Fucker. He won't get anything from me. Nothing about Emily.

A small fear was in him, at the thought of her. That's what he's looking for. A reason to keep me suspended and if he can figure out me and Emily he may just do that…

"Johnny Walker blue label, three fingers, and keep 'em coming." Rossi threw down a twenty on the mahogany bar table at McLeary's.

"You got it boss." The bar tender, he hadn't really noticed before, was a woman. Blonde hair, blue eyes. Pretty. She was smiling at him, that certain smile. He knew that it meant he could have her tonight if he merely smiled back. But he didn't. She IS pretty, but she isn't Emily. The thought caught him off guard. Since when is Emily something different than pretty? Pretty is what you'd call a sister… Emily is what you'd call… stunning. Breath-taking? As the bartender placed a drink in front of him, he was disgusted with the new avenue his thoughts had taken. Wasn't he here to drink away his anger at her right now?

The smell of the whiskey in his hand didn't appeal to him at all, he wanted nothing more than leave the pub now.

And go where? You can't go back to her apartment. She's angry with you. Thinks you're affected on the job or some shit. Maybe she thinks you're just a bag full of bad decisions? Sleeping with a subordinate coworker and then killing an unsub who could've just as easily been wounded and given a fair trial?

SHE WOULD HAVE KILLED EMILY.

I just wanted you to be safe, Em… Em…

He downed his drink in one long swig, didn't grab the change from the twenty and left the bar.

Emily laid on her couch and covered her face.

What is happening! Why did I tell him to leave? He was protecting me…

He was too protective. He isn't your parent, Em.

He is my partner and team mate, we always protect each other.

He didn't have to kill her. That was over the top.

You would have done the same.

At this, her eyes flew open and she jumped up from her twenty minute long internal debate.

Grabbing her phone, she dialed his cell.

This looks desperately 'I was so wrong, please come back.' Her inner ego argued. I WAS so wrong…I need him here… how did we go from that one perfect night in his room to this?

The phone was ringing, one…two…three rings…

Maybe that was all it was supposed to be? One perfect night? It's not like he tried to stay when you asked him to leave, maybe he was just waiting for an out…

Four rings…

Voicemail.

Looking down at his phone, seeing Emily's phone number, his heart ached.

"I'll double the fare if you step on it." He tossed another bill at the cabby.

Answering automatically, and abandoning all caution to the wind, she thought, Emily flung open her apartment door to see the most tortured looking David Rossi she'd ever seen in her life.

You came back, you came back…

"I was an ass." He was out of breath.

Did he run up six flights of stairs instead of waiting for the elevator!

"I am an ass." He corrected. "I'm sorry, Emily. I'm so sorry. I was so scared… Em… she had a gun ready to blow your head off, I didn't have another choice at that moment. I can't… I can't loose you… I just found you." It all came rushing out so fast.

With a rushing hug, her hands were in his hair and he had both arms wrapped around her torso, slightly picking her up and burying his defeated face between her cheek bone and shoulder, in the tiny angle of her neck.

"You came back." The tiny squeak of words were infused with almost-tears as she held onto him with everything she had.

"I should never have left, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"I shouldn't have told you to leave." She pulled him inside the long hallway of her apartment foyer. "I know you were protecting me. I know you would do it again."

"Emmy." The low growl in his voice spoke volumes. "I love you…." Rubbing his lips against her jaw line, he allowed himself to be bold, nipping her ear, kissing her throat, holding her close to him.

Ross… why can't it just always be this way? Emily's mouth found his and when she started to all but consume him, it was like all the air was sucked out of the room. She pushed him against the wall and put the full weight of her body on his.

Rossi started to think of all of the words he would could describe where his heart was at the moment, and all of them were deeply broken. Undone, abandoned, shattered, complete.

She'll be the death of you, David Rossi. His logical side screamed warning after warning about love and all of his past marriages.

I'm already dead. Dead to anything but her. Undone, abandoned…

Glad I was drunk last weekend near her house and needed a midnight snack last week. He thought amusedly. Picking her up gingerly, he took her to the bedroom.