Chapter Text
The little music blared from your phone at eight in the morning, making you groan as your head pounded with a hangover so powerful you felt like you were in college again. Drunk you must be much much more responsible than you had ever given her credit for in the past. At least, when it came to setting an alarm and putting a glass of water next to you for when you woke up. Glancing to the right of you, you saw the outline of another body in the sheets next to you, but their head was under a pillow so you couldn’t tell who it was. You were wearing a bra and panties though, so you were almost positive that you didn’t sleep with them. Maybe Morgan or Reid had crashed in your bed after your long night hanging at the casino.
Vegas was not your friend. After a long case in Carson City, NV, the team decided to take a long weekend and go to Vegas together just for fun. Penelope hopped on a last-minute flight to join everyone, and even Will flew out to surprise JJ. It all started as a great, wholesome weekend. Until last night. Your memory refused to budge and tell you anything about what happened past about four p.m. last night, and you racked your brains for a run-down of the day.
During the day on Saturday, you had spent a relaxing time at the pool with the girls while the boys went off and did god knows what on the Vegas strip. Emily had convinced all the girls to go in on bottomless margaritas, so by two in the afternoon you were already pretty buzzed. And much like anytime you girls were together and drinking, the topic turned to sex and relationships.
“Of the team,” Emily started, pouring Penelope another glass. “If you had to, who would you sleep with.”
“I think you all know my feelings on this,” Penelope laughed. “And it would be the most magical night of my life.”
“And his,” You giggled. Penelope grinned at you, lowering her sunglasses to throw you a big wink.
“Well,” JJ started. “Considering my husband is on this trip, I don’t know how I feel answering this question.”
“Hotch?”
“Yeah, and I don’t know why,” You all laughed, though you felt a flare of jealousy in your stomach that you tried your hardest to ignore. “Prentiss, out with it.”
“If you think I’d say no to any single member of this team,” She grinned. “You’re crazy.”
“Ms. (y/l/n),” Penelope said, nudging you with her foot. “Speak or be spoken for.”
“You know, I’ve never thought about it,” You laughed over the sounds of them sputtering out their disbelief and claims that you were a liar. “Okay, okay, fine. I guess Hotch if I had to choose.”
If you were being honest, as much as you were attempting to sound like you had made the choice begrudgingly, you would jump at the chance for a roll in the hay with your boss. He was handsome, kind, and from the few times, you’d shared a room with him on cases and seen what he looked like in just his boxers you knew he was hiding a smoke show under that suit.
The conversation continued to flow, and so did the drinks. By the time you all met back up with the boys down in the casino restaurant everyone was just a hair past buzzed; whatever the boys had been up to during the day clearly involved alcohol. Rossi had called ahead to the restaurant and got a table for everyone and the food at Caesers Palace was heavenly. You were pretty sure you could pick up and move here and you’d be happy for the rest of your life. As talk turned to after-dinner plans, it became obvious that you and Emily were dying for a night of crazy fun and Will and Rossi wanted a more chill night, so it was decided that the boys would trade Rossi and Will for you and Emily. A night on the town for you and Emily, and a night gambling in the casino for the other girls and Rossi and Will.
That’s where things started to get a little hazy. You remembered leaving the casino with Morgan, Reid, Hotch, and Emily, but you couldn’t remember anything after that. There were bits and pieces of being in clubs and laughing with your friends, you were pretty sure you ended up hugging someone dressed as Elvis at some point, but nothing solid stuck in your throbbing brain. Maybe Emily would remember more about what happened. Just as you picked up the phone to call her, the body next to you started moving, and when he sat up and looked over at you with those beautiful dark eyes and full red lips stained with your lipstick you could have screamed from the shock of finding Hotch in your bed. Shirtless.
“What the hell happened last night?” He asked groggily, rubbing his eyes with the backs of his hands. You had to ignore how adorable he looked doing that and focus on the present situation.
“I have no idea,” You breathed, running a hand through your forehead. When his eyes dipped below your chin and widened at the sight of you in only your bra, you gasped and pulled the covers up to hide your breasts spilling out of the material.
“W-we didn’t – uh, have sex did we?”
“I would hope that if we did I would be a little more memorable to you,” You chuckled. “But no I don’t think we did.”
“Oh,” He sighed in what seemed like relief. You weren’t sure if you should be offended or not yet. “I remember Morgan taking us to that club on the strip, and that cocktail waitress gave us those fizzy shots, but after that I’m blank.”
“Well,” You said, leaning your head back against the headboard. “You have more than me. The last thing I can seem to remember is leaving the casino.”
“(Y/n), you don’t think we did anything crazy last night, right?” Hotch asked. “I mean, like Hangover style crazy.”
“I don’t think so Hotch,” You chuckled, trying to imagine this stoic man ever watching the movie The Hangover. “I mean I think we would remember if we did something totally insane.”
You both knew you were just trying to make each other feel better by reassuring the other that nothing stupid had happened, but in the back of your mind you couldn’t help but feel like you were missing some piece of the puzzle. Hotch threw a pillow at you to make you cover your eyes as he ran to the bathroom to hop in the shower.
Finally checking your phone, you saw you had eight missed calls from Emily, three from Morgan, and two from Reid from last night. Anxiety clenched your stomach. Which was only tripled when you opened your camera roll and found a bunch of pictures of you and Hotch from last night. When you stopped on the last one your heart dropped into your stomach and you gasped louder than you had ever gasped in your life.
Not caring that you were in underwear, or that Hotch was naked in the shower, you jumped out of the bed and burst into the bathroom, on the verge of a panic attack. You smacked your elbow on the doorframe to the bathroom and cursed in pain as you banged the door open.
“What the hell, (y/n)?” Hotch exclaimed when he heard you break in. “What’s going on?”
“I took a picture last night,” You panted, shoving your phone in his face. “Do you know what’s happening in this picture?”
“Well, that’s us and a guy dressed like Elvis, and he’s –” Now it was his turn to gasp. “Oh my god, he’s marrying us. We’re – we got married last night. Oh, I remember it now, we ended up at the chapel at two in the morning and they were having a special on early-bird weddings. We thought it was too good an offer to pass up.”
The only sound in the bathroom was the spray of the shower as you stared at your husband in shock. God, you felt like such a cliché, getting drunk and married in Vegas. Who did you think you were, season five Ross and Rachel? And, of course, the man you married was none other than your stoic, hard-ass of a boss whose smiles you had seen you could count on one hand. Your phone ringing with a call from Emily was the only thing that pulled you away from his eyes.
“I should – I should take this,” You said. Hotch nodded, running a hand through his wet hair, the movement drawing your eyes to the lean muscle of his arms. Shaking your head to snap yourself out of the trance you were in at his wet body, you picked up the call, shutting the bathroom door behind you as you did.
“Where the hell did you get off to last night?” Emily demanded as soon as you picked up the phone. “We have been out of our minds looking for you.”
“Did you even check my hotel room?” You asked.
“That’s where we are now!”
“Then, where the hell am – oh,” You said looking around the room, that you now realized was not yours. “I’m in Hotch’s room.”
“Wait, what?” You could hear the shock in her voice. “Is Hotch with you?”
“He’s in the shower.”
“Really?” She leered.
“Oh, shut up, nothing happened,” You sighed. “Nothing like that anyway. Look, I need to find a change of clothes, but we’ll meet you guys downstairs in like twenty, okay?” You hung up before Emily could even get a word in edgewise.
With a sigh, you picked up the shirt you had been wearing last night to find it wet with what smelled like tequila. Looking over your shoulder to make sure the bathroom door was still closed, you rummaged around in Hotch’s suitcase looking for a t-shirt you could borrow. It was incredibly invasive of you to go through his stuff, you were well aware of that, but you were pretty sure he’d prefer that to the alternative of you walking back to your room in just your undies.
“What are you doing?” Hotch asked, coming out of the bathroom.
“Oh, my shirt is soaked in alcohol, and I just thought – wow,” You said, turning around to see him covered only in a towel that was wrapped low around his hips. Water droplets slid down his gorgeous torso, getting lost in the fibers of the towel.
“(Y/n)?”
“Right,” You said, looking back up at his face. “I just needed to borrow a t-shirt, at least until I can get back to my room and my suitcase.”
“Oh, yeah, sure,” Hotch said, walking towards you. He smelled like an Irish-spring, which you knew was the type of soap the hotel used because on a regular day Hotch smelled like a candy cane. You ignored the fact that you knew what he smelled like on a daily basis. “Here.” He tossed you a Van Halen t-shirt that was soft from over-use.
Your jeans from last night were dry at least, so you pulled Hotch’s shirt over your head and tucked the hem into your jeans, feeling much better since you were no longer naked in front of your boss. Guilt roiled in your stomach as you glanced at your new husband. All he’d wanted from this weekend was some fun with a group of adults, he’d only even agreed to come because Jack was spending the weekend at a friend’s house for their birthday extravaganza, and now he was shackled to you. In holy matrimony.
“Uh – look, Hotch, about us being married –”
“Yeah,” He sighed, pulling a black polo over his chest. You were relieved to see that he had already put pants on while you weren’t looking, because if you had seen those legs bare you probably would have had a stroke right then and there. “About that.”
“I don’t think we should tell the rest of the team,” You said. “At least not until we can figure out what happened and where we go from here.”
“I’ll call my lawyer when we get back to Quantico and ask him what our options are,” Hotch said. “But, yeah, I agree it’s probably best that we don’t tell the others just yet.”
“I’m sorry,” You said quietly, feeling tears prick your eyes. Hotch’s eyes widened and he moved closer to you, gripping your upper arms until you looked up at him.
“You have nothing to be sorry about,” Hotch said. “We both made this stupid mistake, and besides, they should not let people get married when they’re as drunk as we were.” You nodded, blinking quickly to make the tears stay inside. “Come on, let’s go get your back and get the hell out of here.”
After collecting the random things you had scattered around Hotch’s room, he escorted you to your own down the hall and called Jessica to check on Jack while you threw your stuff into your suitcase. When you were finally hauling your bag out of the room, Hotch grabbed it from your hand and plopped in on top of his own rolling case.
“Well, look at that, my husband’s a gentleman,” You winced at the grimace he gave your words.
In the lobby, the rest of the team was waiting with varying levels of impatience for you and Hotch to join them. Reid looked hungover and miserable, while Morgan looked like he did every day, and Emily just looked annoyed.
“So,” She said when you reached her. “What happened last night?”
“No clue,” You shrugged, avoiding Hotch’s eyes. “Sometime after you abandoned us on the Vegas strip, Hotch and I found our way back to the hotel and crashed in his room.” Lying was too easy, especially lying to your friend, but it was necessary.
“Let’s go home,” Reid groaned.
“Baby boy here is hungover,” Morgan grinned.
“I think we all are,” Hotch mumbled.
Getting to the airport and going through security was easy enough, and when you finally settled into your seat on the plane you tried to comb through the last three hours since waking up in Hotch’s bed. You’d had a few hushed conversations in the airport, and Hotch seemed to think that his lawyer would be able to get the annulment taken care of in a couple of weeks tops, which was a relief, you already felt so guilty about the whole situation. Still, as you glanced to your right and saw your husband scowling down at the book in his hand, you couldn’t help the little smile that curled your lips.