nina cried power [SPENCER REID]

eleven.

"If you can confirm that he isn't being watched, call for backup and we'll bring him in," adds Hotch.

Anderson is dismissed, Prentiss and Morgan following. They all watch the three of them disappear from their line of sight, and Spencer really does feel like a stone's lodged in his throat -- and it's all thanks to Nina. Nina, Nina, Nina. Maybe he finally understands the metaphor of her signature.

❖ ❖ ❖

"How long has it been?"

The question comes from Garcia, who's marching over with her familiar clicking heels to join Reid, JJ and Rossi by their desks, where they each are waiting with baited breath.

"Five hours and seventeen minutes since the elevator left," Reid answers, glancing up at her uneasily.

It doesn't need to be said aloud how unusually long that is for simple surveillance, especially when all they'd been sent to do was to decipher if Huxley's being watched. The last call had been to Prentiss, four hours prior, announcing that there didn't seem to be anybody on the street watching Huxley's every move. That left it to Anderson to check the apartment; and once it hit the three hour mark of them being gone, all of the team had started to get uneasy.

"It's not gonna be easy," Rossi comments, maybe trying to be reassuring. "There's a lot of things to check in that apartment when you're looking for wires or cameras. Under beds, in lamps, in pillow-cases."

"He's covering as a repair-man, Rossi," says Spencer, swallowing thickly even though his throat refuses to close. "He doesn't have a lot of time in that apartment that can be explained away with an excuse."

"I almost don't want there to be a mic in his apartment," says JJ. "Imagine the implications if there is. How many eyes does this Edelstein guy have? He must be able to see all over the place."

"And if we can't bring him in, it's another dead end," adds Hotch, arriving behind them. Spencer glances up at him, and Hotch sends him a secure nod, much less curt than the last; relief sweeps through him at the minuscule sign that his earlier moment of fury is forgiven. "You know we can't go after the entire system -- the employers -- but Huxley's almost the only thing we have on Nina Scott."

"Is Strauss still on your ass?" asks Rossi.

JJ and Reid share a look; clearly, JJ knows as little as Spencer does about Strauss getting involved, and such an anal-retentive bureaucrat is the last thing they need nagging at them. Clearly, this is something that's been itching at Hotch in private.

"Yeah," Hotch says slowly, "she just wants results, but when it comes to our methods she isn't always so understanding. Let's just say, when it comes to this part of the case," he must mean the investigation of Huxley, "what Strauss doesn't know, can't hurt her."

"Aaron--" Rossi goes to say, but at that moment the elevator let's out a chirpy Ding! of promise and excitement, and all of them twist around to look, their hearts leaping collectively.

First is Prentiss, half smiling and slightly breathless as she picks up her pace when she enters the bullpen through the open class doors; she's followed closely by Anderson, still in his 'costume'; then, finally, finally, Morgan arrives, hand wrapped around the arm of a white man -- who is, no doubt, James Huxley.