Twisted Hearts

My nerves were off the chart as I followed Director Strauss through the halls of the FBI building. When I put in my application, I thought the process would take longer. But here I am, about to walk through the doors of the BAU. All eyes were on us as Strauss led me up the stairs to Agent Hotchner's office.

"Good afternoon Aaron."

"Director." He barely looked up at us. "What can I do for you?"

"This is SSA Y/L/N. She's just joined the bureau and I think she would make an excellent addition to the BAU." That got his attention.

"I take it that's an order?" She smiled, patted my back, and made her way towards the door.

"She's a good one Aaron."

He kept writing as I stood there in silence. "This is not how I go about hiring new team members."

"I understand sir. Honestly, I didn't think this was how my hiring was going to go."

"Obviously the director has some faith in you."

"Cards on the table sir...I've actually never met Director Strauss before today. On one of my last missions I apparently saved a family member who was an agent. She must have just seen my application."

He sighed. "That might be a problem for the rest of the team. What agency were you with?"

"SHIELD sir." His pen stoped moving on his notepad and he looked up at me.

"SHIELD as in the Avengers SHIELD?"

"Yes sir."

"Why did you leave?"

I sighed, I knew I wouldn't be able to get out of answering that. "A mission went sideways. We received faulty intel and what was supposed to be a simple data retrieval turned into a fire fight. I was captured and held hostage."

"That's unfortunate, I'm sorry. How long?"

"A little over three weeks sir."

"If that caused you to leave, are you sure you can handle field work?"

My face reddened. "That's not the only reason I left. It was a personal decision sir." He hummed, I could tell I was losing him. "Just one case, that's all I ask. See if you like how I work. If it doesn't go well, I'll go to Strauss myself and tell her this unit isn't for me. I just...I want to help people, make a difference. The BAU has a stellar reputation, and I don't want to hinder that. One chance."

"I hope you have a go bag." He stood and handed me a file. "Take this. We are meeting in the conference room to discuss a new case." I followed him out his office door towards the conference room. "Team, we have case. Let's go."

I took a seat as the other walked in. "Before we begin, I want to introduce SSA Y/L/N. She's going to be working with us on this case and possibly others." He went around the table and introduced Reid, Morgan, Rossi, Garcia, Prentiss, and Jareau. "Garcia."

"Right, okay. We have three victims so far. All girls in their early 20s. Here's the weird. Besides those three victims, there are also nine other reported missing persons. And guess what, all girls all early 20s."

"Garcia, I want you to go over last known places of all the victims. Also, see if there's any crossover. Morgan and Prentiss, hit the morgue. Reid, Rossi, and I will go to the police station to see what they have. JJ, take Y/L/N and hit the dump sites. Wheels up in twenty."

When we landed in Bismarck, North Dakota the team separated into their assignments. JJ was driving us to the most recent dump site. "I don't know if it's better or worse that none of these girls look alike. I mean sure they are all in their early 20s, but they are a mix of blondes, brunettes, and red heads."

"They are all attractive, maybe there is something there." She was right, all the girls were nice looking. "So, how long have you been with the FBI?"

"It's my first day."

She turned to look at me so fast I was worried she'd give herself whiplash. "What? What do you mean it's your first day?"

Sighing, I closed the case file I was reading. "Strauss saw my application and pushed me through."

"I'm sure Hotch loved that." I couldn't help but smile while she laughed. She was very beautiful.

"Definitely not happy. But, I told him if he didn't think I fit in I would leave on my own accord." JJ smiled at me again.

"What did you do before this?"

"I worked for SHIELD. And before you ask, yes. SHIELD as in Avengers SHIELD." Her eyes were wide in disbelief making me chuckle. She bit her lip, as if trying to hold back from asking me something. "Ask me."

"Did you work with the Avengers?"

That's what it always came down too. People always wanted to know if I knew the famous Avengers. The ones whose actions were constantly reported on news programs. I never blamed people for wondering, I mean they were the Avengers. "I did actually. The higher ups at SHIELD took notice of me and thought I could bring something to their team, especially since Barton had one foot out the door. So they paired me up with his partner on missions."

"Wait, are you saying you were partners with THE Black Widow?"

It took everything in me to mask my emotions. I knew what profilers were capable of, so I didn't need JJ reading into things. "Yeah, we were partners for close to a year."

Of everything I was expecting, silence was not one of them. Maybe I wasn't masking my emotions as well as I thought. "You don't like talking about them." I shrugged and reopened the file in my lap. This was really not something I ever wanted to get into, especially on my first day. "I'm sorry. I really don't mean to pry. It's just that, well they are the Avengers."

"It's okay, I get it. Trust me I'm used to that reaction. Well, that or people not believing me. Being around people that are constantly in the public eye takes some getting used to." She nodded, understanding I didn't want to talk about it anymore.

After three dump sites we had nothing new to go on, so we returned to the precinct to meet up with the others. Hopefully one of them had found something. We were all sitting around a table going over victimology again when Garcia called in. "Hello my courageous crime stoppers. I have some tea for you guys! In this case tea would technically be alcohol because guess what, more than half of the victims were last seen at a bar in the area. It's call La Vina. Owned and operated by this lovely gentleman."

His mugshot popped up on the screen. It screamed trouble maker. "This is Dimitri Volkov. He's a real charmer. He's been arrested dozens of times, but nothing seems to stick." My face cringed at the thought, and Hotch noticed.

"What are you thinking Y/L/N?"

"In my experience, Russians with deep pockets and missing girls are never a good combination. Add to the equation that they are all young and beautiful, my money is on trafficking. The victims found either didn't make the cut or they put up too much of a fight."

"The victimology fits. Sex trafficking is the most common type here in the US and 54% of that involves women and young girls." The casual way Reid knew that specific statistic had me reeling. Morgan chuckled and slapped my back.

"You get used to that. Pretty boy over there has an eidetic memory and is filled with fun facts."

"As long as he doesn't have as big of an ego as the last brainiac I worked worth, it's fine." JJ laughed, knowing I meant Tony Stark. With that information, Hotch sent Emily and Morgan to pick up the unsub and bring him in for questioning. They were currently striking out with the guy in the interrogation room.

I knew how people like him operated. I had enough run ins with angry Russians to know how to deal with this guy. "Hey Hotch, mind if I give it a go?" He knocked on the two way glass to let Emily and Morgan know to come out.

Dimitri was smirking as I made my way in and sat in the chair across from him. "What, the bad cops get nothing so they send Barbie in as my eye candy?"

I laughed. "ya doprashival muzhchin postrashneye, chem ty." (I've interrogated scarier men than you) He smirked at my Russian. "voobshche-to, ya uveren, chto nekotoryye iz nikh budut vyzyvat' u tebya koshmary. Vam znakomo imya Drekov?" (In fact I'm sure some of them would give you nightmares. Does the name Drekov ring any bells?)

He instantly paled. "Look, I don't know anything. They gave me a phone and told me to send a text with a picture whenever a pretty girl showed up. That's all I did, send pictures." I held my hand out and he instantly produced the phone. "The lock code is 1111."

"That's a terrible code."

"I promise, that's all I know." I got up and made my way to the door. "Wait. I'm okay right?"

"vremya pokazhet." (Only time will tell) I closed the door, smiling and messing with the phone. "I'm gonna call Garcia, see if she can do her magic on this guys phone." No one was saying anything, so I looked up. Hotch, Morgan, and Emily were standing there in shock.

"How in the hell did you get that guy to talk so fast newbie?" Before I could answer Morgan, Emily questioned me.

"Better question, who is Drekov? Obviously this guy knew him." Crap. She speaks Russian. What could I say that wouldn't give too much away?

"He's like a Russian boogie man. Bring him up and guys usually crumble." They looked at me like they didn't believe me, and I couldn't blame them. I was talking out of my ass.

"Morgan, take the phone and get with Garcia. Prentiss, take the new information back to the team. See if anyone has any new ideas." When they left Hotch just stood there and stared at me. This man was seriously intimidating. "I'm not sure how they do things at SHIELD, but we don't threaten unsubs."

"I didn't threaten him." Silence. He so did not believe me. "I didn't! All I said was that I've interrogated more intimidating people than him."

"Who's Drekov?"

"Classified." He scoffed.

"If you want in on this team you are going to have to be more transparent."

I sighed. "Fine. What do you know of the Black Widows background?" He confirmed the basic knowledge that most people had. Russian spy turned SHIELD agent turned Avenger. "She grew up in a place called the Red Room. They basically groomed young girls into assassins. It was run by a man named Drekov. Any Russian involved in trafficking knows his story. I helped Romanoff and a few others take him out and bring down the Red Room. Anyways, the story gets around. So now every trafficker is afraid of the Widow and her American friends who took out Russias most notorious trafficker."

Hotch seemed to think for a minute. "Your background and contacts would probably be very useful to us. Keep up the work like you did today and there may be a place for you yet."

"Thank you sir." The team ended up heading to the hotel for some rest. We were waiting for Garcia to work her magic and find whatever information she could from the phone. I was the last one to get my room key. Everyone else had already taken off. Since we were an odd number, I had a single room.

I was changed and lounging in bed when I heard it. The moaning coming from the room next to mine was crazy. At least someone was getting some action tonight. Fuck, I was horny. It had been way too long since I've gotten any. To say that my night was rough was an understatement. The people next door went at all night. After the little bit of sleep I got, I went for a run. Besides clearing my head, it also helped with the frustration I was feeling thanks to my neighbors.

After a quick shower, I got dressed and was leaving my room. Right as I was closing my door, the door next to mine opened. My jaw nearly dropped when I saw who it was. "Oh, good morning Y/N."

"Morning JJ." Before I turned to the elevator I heard rustling behind her. Holy shit. "Uh morning Emily." She grumbled causing both JJ and I to laugh.

"Don't mind her, she's not a morning person. Want to get some coffee with us?" Emily looked confused when I said I had already gotten some after my run. "You went running already? It's 745am."

"I couldn't get out of my head last night and had trouble sleeping. Running helps me clear it."

"Looks likes you have a new running buddy Jayje. This one loves running too. I on the other hand prefer wine and a good book. That clears my head plenty." We chatted some more on the way to the lobby where we met up with Hotch who was getting ready to call us all.

The next part of this case was a total shit show. Garcia found a location for our unsub. It was this huge old warehouse. The whole team went in, but we got separated. In all the confusion, JJ was taken. When we got back to the station we all tried to pull together to try and find her. Emily was both pissed and beside herself. Morgan did everything he could to comfort her, but it wasn't helping.

An hour later we were splitting up. Garcia found out the unsub had three properties in his name. Hotch and Rossi went to one location, Morgan and Emily went to another, and Reid and I went to last one.

One by one the team was cursing because JJ wasn't at their location. Reid and I were the last to arrive at our location. It was a rundown cabin on the edge of town. "Well, this is homey. I'll take point, watch my six Reid." The cabin was easy enough to clear. All that was left was the garage. I made my way in while Reid kept the perimeter. As soon as I stepped inside I cursed.

JJ was tied to a chair. The bad part though, was what she was wearing. "Reid, I need you to stay outside." He was confused, but agreed. Slowly, I made my way over to her. She had some blood on her forehead and was crying. "Hey JJ, decided to take some time off work?" She scoffed, not appreciating my joke. "Just stay calm okay."

"Guys, I found her. Garcia, I'm going to need you to call in the calvary."

"Who do you need cupcake? Medics? Police?" I sighed.

"Bomb squad."

The team burst into commotion, but my main focus was JJ. "Don't worry Jayje. Can I call you Jayje? I heard Emily say it." She nodded and I continued some small talk, trying to reassure her while I studied the device.

"Talk to me newbie, what do you see?" I told Morgan as much as I could without alarming JJ. I was just happy she couldn't see the timer on the phone that was attached to the vest.

"What's the ETA on the bomb squad?" Twenty minutes. And the rest of the team was fifteen minutes out. I sighed, why couldn't there be more than ten minutes left on the timer? "Okay JJ, I'm going to need you to stay still for me."

"What are you doing newbie?"

"Y/N, listen to Morgan he has experience!"

"Don't touch anything, that's an order."

All the chatter was not helping my concentration. I yanked my earpiece out, I'd deal with those consequences later. "Man, they sure are chatty. I'm so not used to that. Guess that's the perks of being trained as a spy." All she did was nod. I knew she was scared.

"Okay, bomb has a backup trigger wired into the vest, so I can't cut it out. The backup is attached to the vest, but it's not wired through the cell phone. Which means it's on a separate signal. I need to find the source of the backup and try and disrupt it."

"Yo...you sound like you've done this before."

"SHIELD does like to cross train its agents." I found what I was looking for and began to carefully remove the outer case. JJ was starting to shake. "Tell me about Emily." She looked up at me confused. Good, I needed her distracted. "Are you guys together or is it a friends with benefits type thing?"

"How did you know?"

"The hotel has thin walls." She groaned and I kept working. "Ok, signal disrupted. But, it's still armed. I need to detach the detonator from the explosives. Black wire is ground." Using my pocket knife, I carefully separated the wires and grabbed the black one. Inhaling deeply, I cut it.

The timer stoped, the bomb was disarmed. "You know what would be an awesome thank you...not being so loud when we share walls on other cases." She looked up at me and I put my earpiece back in. "Guys, bomb has been disarmed."

There was some chaos when the team, local authorities, and bomb squad showed up. The vest was safely removed from JJ and she was outside getting checked out by paramedics, Emily right by her side. By sheer luck, the unsub was at the location Hotch and Rossi raided and was taken into custody.

Our paperwork was done and Hotch was sending us back to the hotel since the jet wouldn't leave till the morning. "I need a moment agent Y/L/N." Crap, this wasn't going to be good. "You seem to have a problem following orders. I'm surprised you made it at SHIELD much less with the Avengers." Ouch, that hurt.

"Sir, if I may. If I didn't step in to dismantle that bomb, Agent Jareau wouldn't be here. There was only ten minutes left on the timer when I arrived. Both the team and the bomb squad were too far out. It's also not the first bomb I've disabled. The Avengers and SHIELD like to blow up their enemies. Therefore, they train us in assembling and disassembling explosives."

Hotch stood there, stoically, trying to decide my fate. "I understand you have certain skills. And so far, they have proven useful. You need to learn to be a team player if you want to stay. There was time for you to let us know what you were doing. With all that said, we appreciate what you did for JJ. So, you're on the team. A probationary period though." I thanked him and he sent me on my way.

When I got to the hotel, most of the team was at the lobby bar. Morgan spotted me first. "There she is! Get over here newbie. First, you talk down a guy in Russian. Then, you totally dismantle a bomb. Is there anything you can't do?"

"Wouldn't you like to know." We talked for a while until people slowly started to disperse. After I said goodnight to Morgan, Emily was next to me offering me another beer. "Oh, thanks."

"Please. It's the least I can do for what you did for JJ. I know I was short with you on comms. She told me you had to pull it out of your ear."

"Just needed to concentrate is all. Besides, I get it. You love her." Shock was a look on Emily Prentiss I will never forget.

"Did...did she tell you?" She started to blush after I relayed the earlier conversation I had with JJ about thin walls. "We just try to not make a big deal about it at work."

"Hey, I get it. Workplace romance can be messy. Trust me, I know." Luckily she didn't press me on the matter. I would need something stronger than beer for that conversation. "I think I'm gonna head up to my room. You two have a good night. Well, not that good of a night. I need sleep." Emily smacked my arm and then JJ gave me a big hug before I headed up. I think I was going to be okay here.