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dream-a-little-bigger-x · 7 months

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I Think He Knows | Spencer Reid

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Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Summary: JJ invites her best friend, a linguistics professor, to help out on a couple of cases. When she and Spencer work together, something sparks between them.

Warnings: Your usual Criminal Minds murders and gore, inappropriate thoughts and conversations about coworkers, making out, plot holes (read author's note),

Author's note: I know Season 4, Episode 12 is without JJ, but let's pretend JJ is there anyway and Jordan has never been there, okay? Okay. Thank yew.

Words: 4.3K

“I think he knows.”

JJ’s brows furrowed as she looked at her best friend, back pressed against the shut door of her office. It took her one look at the wide-eyed, worry-filled girl to know just what the hell she was even talking about.

Everything had started when JJ introduced her to the team.

JJ and y/n had been childhood best friends and kept in contact, even when both of them moved away from Pennsylvania. While JJ moved to Washington DC to join the FBI, y/n was making her career as a linguistics professor in New York City. So, when they needed a linguistic expert, y/n was the first one JJ called for her expertise.

“Thank you so much for coming,” JJ said as she embraced her oldest friend.

A smile resided on her face. “Of course, Jayj. Anything for you.”

“Come, meet the team!”

JJ grabbed y/n’s hand and dragged her towards the bullpen. Everyone seemed to be gathered around one particular desk, hunched over a case file.

“Guys, I want you to meet y/n, she’s gonna help us with linguistics,” JJ said, capturing everyone’s attention. “y/n/n, these are Derek Morgan, Emily Prentiss, Aaron Hotchner, David Rossi, Penelope Garcia and Spencer Reid.” She introduced them, pointing at each member of the team as their name was called.

Y/N simply offered all of them an awkward wave, suddenly self-conscious about the attention she was getting. “Luckily, I’m good with names,” she chuckled, which made the others laugh too.

The eight of them filed into the briefing room where JJ explained the case to everyone. Luckily – if you could use that word in this field – it was a local case, meaning y/n could stay with JJ for the time being. The two women were actually quite excited about that.

This one seemed to be a pretty open-and-shut case. An abduction of a politician's daughter with a ransom note that led the team straight to the Unsub. Spencer and y/n worked on the note together, both of them quickly noticing some outstanding quirks of the guy’s personality.

“First and foremost, I can tell you that the guy you’re looking for is actually a guy,” y/n started explaining to the team when they had regrouped. “He uses a lot of articles, prepositions and big words. So, we are looking in the right direction.”

Spencer nodded his head in agreement. “He’s also very precise in his choice of words, so he’s most likely an introvert. He tells us exactly where to be and at what time, something an extrovert wouldn’t do.”

“He’s also using ‘I’ and ‘mine’, which further proves the introverted side of this UnSub. Normally, higher rates of ‘I’ words correspond with feelings of insecurity, threat and defensiveness. Closer inspection of his ‘I’ use in context tends to confirm this,” y/n continued, seamlessly flowing with Spencer in their debrief.

“Not only that, but the number of words such as ‘except’, ‘but’, and ‘however’ changed. These are all ways to encourage dialogue or thinking and indicate higher cognitive processes. They also signify a willingness to tell the truth,” said Spencer.

The two of them glanced at each other and offered a smile before turning to the rest of the team, who were looking at them as though they had just witnessed a talking dog.

“It’s like they’re copy-pasted,” Emily muttered.

Y/N felt her cheeks heat up and when she looked over at her partner-in-solving-linguistics-psyche, his cheeks had a dust of rouge. Before either of them could add anything else, Hotch nodded his head before scraping his chair back.

“We’re ready to give a profile. Let’s head down to the Metropolitan Police Department,” he ordered and everyone quickly followed. Even y/n. With the research she and Spencer had done, they were their best options to go over the profile with the detectives.

It felt great to be doing such important work, especially when her analysis helped catch the guy in the end. Even better when JJ had asked her to come back on another case, needing her language expertise again.

Every time, she and Spencer worked closely together to try and analyze any sort of text that had been brought up during the case. Whether it was newspaper ads, ransom notes or blog posts. Nothing was too hard for the duo.

The fifth time they asked her, it was a bit more of a difficult case.

When she had walked into the BAU that morning of the fifth case, her breath had hitched in her throat. She couldn’t deny that she found the young doctor very attractive, but there was something about him that morning with his hair slicked back and the patterned button-down and his perpetually crooked tie.

“Morning,” Spencer greeted with a beautiful smile that had her knees buckle.

She grimaced, trying to keep herself composed, but it was proving to be a lot more difficult that day. “Good morning,” she greeted back. Her brain decided she needed him to feel the same way she did. “You look good this morning, Doc.”

When the resident genius blushed furiously, she knew she had succeeded. He awkwardly coughed whilst his lips quirked up into a shy smile. “Th-thank you, y/n. So–so do you.”

“Thanks.” Her eyes stayed glued on his, something unspoken passing between the two when the rest of the team entered the bullpen.

JJ, being y/n’s best friend, immediately caught onto what was happening between the two. But, with the task at hand, she decided not to say anything. Yet.

Though y/n knew that she knew.

JJ always knew.

For this case, the team flew to Sarasota in Florida and y/n was allowed to come along. Once everyone was briefed about the case, they all piled onto the jet where y/n took her trusty spot next to JJ. While she was reading over the case file again, she couldn’t help but sneak glances at Spencer, who was sitting on the other side of the plane.

Sometimes, their gazes would meet and they’d turn away quickly, like two teenagers who were crushing on one another.

“Okay, what’s going on between you two?” JJ asked softly, not wanting the coworker in question to hear her.

Y/N furrowed her brows, barely taking her eyes off the file, even though they involuntarily flitted back towards the youngest on the team. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Jayj.”

“You and Spence. You can’t lie to me, y/n/n. You’re acting the exact same way you did when you had that crush on Landon during our senior year.”

A soft gasp left y/n’s mouth. “I forgot about Landon,” she whispered, giggling at the memory of her constant gushing over the boy. It took her a good four months of swooning over him before he finally asked her out.

JJ’s eyebrows rose in question, impatiently so.

“Okay, I’m not gonna lie that I find him attractive,” y/n admitted, but it wasn’t enough for her best friend. “Fine,” she grumbled, then sighed, admitting defeat. “I–” but before she got go off on a tirade, Penelope appeared on the laptop screen, wanting to let them know what she had found.

“This is not over,” JJ warned as the team descended the jet afterwards.

The Sarasota Police Department had a suspect in custody, but not enough evidence to keep him for more than forty-eight hours, so they were on a clock. The team worked tirelessly, trying to piece together the evidence. While the others went to the crime scenes, the suspect’s house or the ME, Garcia had found a blog post on the guy’s computer, which Spencer and y/n were now decoding together.

“Look,” y/n said, pointing to a paragraph on the printed copy of the blog post. “He switches between the words ‘soda’ and ‘pop’.”

His shoulder brushed against hers as he leaned over to look at the paper she was pointing at. The feeling of his body being so close to hers caused her to heat up from the inside out. Her bodily reaction told her she wanted more of him. She wanted him to be this close at all times.

“This is not just one person,” he mumbled, then pointed to another paragraph. “Not one person ever uses dashes and ellipses in the same text, right?”

Y/N nodded. “Yeah, you’re right,” she said. “Ellipses and dashes are not interchangeable, but the misuse of either and both is common. A dash is a highlighter. An ellipsis takes the place of missing words. Not one person ever uses both in texts.”

“Hey, lovebirds,” Morgan’s voice interrupted them, even startling y/n a little.

She had been too wrapped up in her own world, she hadn’t even noticed Morgan and Rossi walking in with the Sheriff by their side.

“You found anything?” asked Rossi, unable to hide the smirk underneath his mustache.

Spencer nodded his head before taking a step back from y/n. “Garcia’s been digging through William’s computer. She found an encrypted link to a web page.”

“Where’d it take you?” Derek questioned.

Y/N put the lid back on her red Sharpie before sticking it in her ponytail, wedging it between the hairband and the crown of her head. “An unsearchable, untraceable blog with tons of journal entries. It’s like some sort of diary.”

“You find anything incriminating?” Rossi asked.

“We were able to differentiate between two distinct voices. Two authors,” Spencer started explaining and y/n couldn’t but gawk at him, intrigued by what he was saying even though she already knew. “We found various idiosyncratic words, phrases, punctuation and orthography within the blog entries, consistent with each separate person.”

“Words like “soda” and “pop”,” y/n added.

Nodding, Spencer added with a smile, “One guy uses dashes while the other uses ellipses.” The giggle at the end of his sentence made y/n’s stomach flutter.

Spencer being so interested in the English language had to have been the cutest thing she had ever seen. It made her heart skip a beat and her spine tingle all the way to her toes. “That was hot,” she muttered, her eyes widening upon realizing the words didn’t stay in her mind.

Luckily, Spencer had already returned to the board and Rossi was too busy talking to the Sheriff to have heard it. The only person, much to y/n’s dismay, that did hear it, was Derek Morgan. With that devilish smirk of his plastered on his face he was looking down at her.

She coughed and turned back to the rest of the team. “One side of the discourse made reference to the “devil’s strip”,” she explained before Derek could start his relentless teasing.

“What the hell’s that?” asked the Sheriff.

At that moment, Spencer turned around again, not realizing y/n had moved and nearly bumped into her. Instead of stepping back, though, he remained in his spot with his chest pressed against her back. It sent yet another shiver down her spine, which required y/n to breathe in deep before she lost control and jumped his bones then and there.

“It’s a small patch of grass that separates the sidewalk from the street. Now, that term is only used in central Ohio. William lived in Atlanta for twenty years, but he grew up in Columbus,” Spencer explained.

In agreement, y/n hummed. “The other guy uses words like “turnpike” and “filling the gas tank”, both specific regionalisms for Florida,” she continued just as one of the deputies passed by with William in handcuffs.

Derek looked back at the suspect before turning to the linguistics duo. “Kid, you sure about this?” he asked Spencer, which merely earned him a slight tilt of the head and a deadpanned glare that said ‘seriously?’.

Of course Spencer and y/n were sure about this and Derek knew better than to doubt that.

While Morgan and Rossi went to question William about what they found, Spencer and y/n continued working on the blog. After a good hour, y/n decided to go and get them both some coffee, needing the pick-me-up to keep herself going.

“Here,” she muttered, handing the cup to him. “With three spoonfuls of sugar.” She then pouted, “They didn’t have almond milk.”

Spencer chuckled before reaching in his satchel and handing her a carton of almond milk. Surprised, y/n added a cloud of the milk into her coffee, ignoring how her heart was soaring.

She smiled a thankful smile and took a sip of the hot beverage as the two of them turned back to the splayed out blog posts on the board in front of them.

“Wait,” he then mumbled with his brows furrowed. “Where’s the–” he stopped in his tracks when his eyes fell on the item he was looking for.

Gazing up at him, y/n’s heart quickened when he reached for her head and fished the red Sharpie out of her hair. “Right, sorry,” she whispered, nearly swooning at the soft smile on his face.

She watched as Spencer started adding lines and annotating a paragraph of the blog post. As she followed what he was doing, her brain started to form theories and analytics. “Faith should never be broken,” she read aloud, then wiggled her nose in thought. “The longer they got away with it, the stronger their relationship,” she pointed out.

Within the next few hours, Derek came to check on the two of them, wanting to know if they had gotten any further into finding out who William’s partner was. Then, later, the whole team had gathered again to brief one another on their findings.

“Connie Mayers described an Anger Excitation Rapist, just like William,” Emily told them.

“So, we’re looking at two dominant personalities?” asked Derek.

Y/N nodded her head as the words registered in her brain. “That makes sense,” she said. “They have a similar discourse.” Spencer nodded his head as well, agreeingly.

“They’re equally well-written,” he added.

“That’s a big deal?” the Sheriff wanted to know.

Spencer’s eyes skidded from the Sheriff to y/n and back as he said, “It’s rare in criminal partnerships.”

“If their personalities are the same, their lives probably mirror one another’s as well,” Emily clarified.

As the Sheriff spoke, y/n went to sit on the desk in front of Spencer, needing to give her feet a rest. “Harris goes to church, on the board of the PTA, coaches his daughter’s soccer team, rarely drinks.”

“Sounds like a saint,” JJ commented with a roll of her eyes.

“With a dark side,” Hotch offered. “It’s what he connected to in the partner.” He then nodded to Emily. “Prentiss and I will go talk to the family, see if they know who it might be.” Hotch and Emily exited the precinct, leaving the rest of the team to their own projects.

Derek sighed as he moved closer towards the board. “Two alpha males won’t be easy to break,” he pointed out.

“The partner is definitely following the investigation,” JJ added with a determined nod.

“Let’s do the talking for them,” Rossi suggested.

“You want me to put this out in the public?” asked the blonde.

Rossi held up the bundle of papers that contained the blog posts. “We’ve got something better.”

“Why would he read it?” the Sheriff wanted to know. “He knows William won’t be writing.”

“These men are addicted to each other,” Derek argued. “Right now, he needs a fix, and the words they’ve shared are all he has to cling to.”

Y/N climbed off the desk again as an idea popped into her head. “His partner wrote “Faith should never be broken”. A betrayal could devastate him.”

“All we have to say is that William’s cooperating, and then hope he takes the bait,” Derek said.

Nodding their heads in agreement, Spencer and y/n gathered in front of the laptop. “You should do the typing,” he said. “You’re probably our best shot at tricking him.”

With a smile, y/n took a seat. “Why, thank you, gentleman,” she cooed, earning those flustered rosy cheeks from him. Together, the two of them came up with a pretty convincing blog post that would get the UnSub to reach out.

“What do we got so far?” Derek asked.

“We were surprised that you injected yourself into the investigation. You risked a lot in order to help William.” Y/N and Spencer read it aloud at the same time, their voices mixing together smoothly like a perfect harmony in a song.

Deciding not to comment on how blatantly obvious the two had been, Derek turned back to the task at hand. “And killing Missy tells us how close you really are.” Y/N quickly typed it up into the computer. “It must be devastating to learn that William is here with us.”

“He’s not gonna like that, it sounds like William is cooperating,” Spencer mumbled as he placed one hand on the desk, the other on the back of y/n’s chair to lean in closer to read the words on screen.

Y/N’s breath hitched in her throat as she felt his breath fan against her cheek. “Well,” she coughed to try and keep her composure. “That’s exactly what we want him to believe, so he’ll doubt their alliance.”

Once the blog post was sent, all the team could do was wait for the partner’s response. While they did that, Morgan, Spencer and y/n continued working to try and find something else, just in case their first plan fell through.

It took them a while. A lot of back and forth between Morgan and William, a lot of trying to decipher the blog posts. But in the end, the entire team managed to find William’s partner and save Andrea from her neighbor’s claws. Once they had both of them arrested, the BAU could finally breathe again.

Spencer and y/n were cleaning up the mess they had made with analyzing the blog entries. The both of them kept to themselves in silence, trying to calm their overheated brains. Out of the five cases she assisted on, this one had to have been the hardest.

As y/n absentmindedly reached for a pile of paper, Spencer did the same, causing their hands to bump. “Oh,” y/n giggled, a chuckle rolling off Spencer's lips as well. “Sorry,” they both apologized before he retracted his hand, allowing her to grab the pile.

“I, uh, I enjoyed working with you – a-again,” he stammered nervously.

A smile curved her lips. “As did I with you, Spence.”

The smile he gave her made her knees buckle. Anything this man did would make her weak. She had all these feelings bubbling up inside her the second she merely looked at him and it was driving her absolutely nuts.

But there was nothing she could do about it. After this case, she’d be going back to New York City without even knowing when she’d be seeing the Behavioral Analysis Unit again. For all she knew, she was never going to see Dr. Spencer Reid again.

“Penelope?” y/n knocked on the tech’s door when she was back at Quantico. There was a file she needed to grab to complete her after-action report Hotch made her write. She was part of the team for that case after all.

“Come in, girly pop!” Penelope exclaimed as she opened the door, her ever-chirpy attitude beaming off the walls as soon as she appeared in front of her. “I’ve got the file right here…” she trailed off whilst walking over to her desk to retrieve said file. When y/n reached for the manila folder, the blonde held it just out of reach.

“Pen–”

“First, you gotta tell me what’s going on between you and Reid,” she almost sounded threatening. As soon as y/n opened her mouth to lie, Penelope cut her off. “And don’t lie to me!”

She could feel her heart overflowing, needing to spill her deepest, darkest thoughts she had been locking inside. With a sigh, y/n plopped down on Garcia’s chair. Sensing the upcoming spilling-of-beans, Penelope perked herself on the corner of her desk.

“He’s got my heart… skipping down sixteenth Avenue,” she started, earning a gasp from the blonde. “H-he’s got that…” she moaned out a sound that had to resemble how she was feeling, “I mean… I just wanna see what’s under all that intelligence, you know?”

“Y/N! You dirty dog!” Penelope giggled, hitting the girl in front of her with the manila folder.

Y/N couldn’t help but laugh too, but then sighed. “But there’s nothing going to happen there. I’ll be off to New York later tonight and then who knows when I’ll see all of you again. It’s better that nothing happened.” She shrugged and got up from the chair, grabbing the file from Penelope’s hands.

As Penelope protested, y/n turned around towards the door, only halting with widening eyes when she saw who was standing in the doorway. Her mind raised, trying to think of what he could’ve heard and debating whether or not he had heard it. Before she could embarrass herself even more, she quickly bid her goodbyes and sneaked past him, rushing towards JJ’s office.

She hid inside, shutting the door behind her before leaning her back against it. Her eyes were still widened as they landed on JJ in a panic. “I think he knows,” she told her best friend.

“What do you mean?” JJ asked, chuckling, dropping the file she was working on.

Y/N took a seat in one of the chairs in front of JJ’s desk. “I was talking to Penelope about how–” she sighed. “About how I wanted to see what was under that intelligence…”

“Y/N!” JJ scolded, though her lips curled up in a bemused smirk.

“Worst of all is, when I got up to leave, he was standing in the doorway…”

JJ’s jaw dropped. “Do you think he heard?”

“I don’t know! I was too embarrassed to stay and ask, I just left!” Her voice came out squeaky from embarrassment alone. She didn’t quite know what to do with herself. She was hoping her best friend would know what to do.

“I think you should go talk to him,” JJ suggested the one thing she didn’t want to do.

Shaking her head, y/n protested. “Nuh-uh, Jayj, I’m leaving for New York tonight. Who knows if I’ll ever see him again!”

“I do,” JJ told her. “You’re my best friend, I might hope you come and visit me often,” she joked and y/n did laugh, but it was a half-hearted one. The dilemma seemed to be eating her alive. “Go talk to him.” The order was so sweet, yet stern enough that y/n obeyed and exited the office.

In the breakroom, she found the one she was looking for. He was making himself a cup of tea to keep him awake enough to finish his report. As he blew on the hot beverage, he glanced over the mug towards y/n, shooting a bolt of lightning through her heart with the intensity of his gaze.

“Hi,” she greeted awkwardly.

Spencer offered her a smile. “Hi.”

“You, uh…” Her brain almost short-circuited, not knowing what to say. “You wanna get out of here? Go for a walk to clear our heads before continuing on our reports?” She needed the fresh air. Maybe that would clear the fog that clouded her judgment.

“Sure,” he agreed and set his mug down before following after her.

As soon as they stepped outside, Spencer turned to y/n. “I heard you, by the way–” Her eyes shut tight. “I-I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, I just needed to ask Penelope about something and then I heard you and–”

“It’s fine, Spence. I-I shouldn’t have–” She cut herself short, noticing the look on Spencer’s face. His eyes sparkled in the dim streetlight, his smile almost lyrical. “What?”

He shook his head with a giggle. “I’ve had a crush on you ever since we were going back-and-forth about that first ransom note.”

Y/N’s heart was nearly beating out of her chest at his confession. This had to be a dream.

“And when I noticed how flustered you were when Emily insisted we were copy-pasted, I was a goner. It sounds so weird, but I’ve never met someone who met my level of intelligence.”

“Barely,” y/n scoffed, but Spencer either ignored her quip or he didn’t hear it.

“I love how your eyes light up whenever you deduct how someone’s been using ‘I’ instead of ‘we’ or when the intent of the sentence dawns on you. I love how you stick your pens in your ponytail when you don’t have your hands free and how you wiggle your nose when you’re thinking. I love how you know my coffee order and how you’d get upset when no one has almond milk for yours.”

She was absolutely soaring. Her heart was skipping, her eyes nearly tearing up at the sweetest of words rolling off his lips.

Before he could add anything that would send her into hysterical sobbing, she leaned in and kissed his lips sweetly. It was a quick kiss, more like a peck. Just to gauge his reaction. When his hands came up to cup her face, a soft smile landed on her lips before he kissed it away.

This time around, it was deep and passionate; like he had been waiting to do this for the past five weeks, the same way she had been waiting to do this. She reeled at the feeling of his warm tongue slipping past her tingling lips.

All of it reminded her of being seventeen again, no one understanding what she was feeling.

But he understood.

He knew.

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