You're Mine

chapter 25

Owen felt so helpless, watching the love of his life fall apart in front of him. But when her sobs turned into laughter, he found himself rather confused. What was this about and which stage of grief was she in?

"That bastard!", Amelia laughed through her tears, looking at her friend. "This was his back-up plan for when I'd make it out of that fucking house. It wasn't enough to get me pregnant with his offspring, no. He needed to make sure to remind me of his presence in my life by putting that shitty ring in there. You know what? I'm done!", she realized, kind of talking to herself as she got back up and started walking towards the wall with pictures.

"Amelia, wait!", the redhead begged, standing up as well, but he was too late, she had already grabbed the first picture of her and James and thrown it on the floor. Besides being absolutely shocked, by now he had at least figured out which stage of grief she was in. Anger.

"Wait for what, Owen?", the brunette questioned harshly once she had finished her task of destroying all the picture frames. "Don't you get it? He's the reason I can't let myself fall in love with you!"

"Let me clean this up and then we can talk, alright?", the trauma surgeon suggested softly. His counterpart shrugged at first but chose to agree by nodding a few seconds later. "So, what did you mean when you said he's the reason you can't let yourself fall in love with me?", he carefully wondered, taking his colleague's hands into his as he waited for her to start explaining. They were sitting on the bed, looking into each other's eyes.

"I am scared. Of what you will do to me if we get together and you realize that you can't have anyone else look at me or talk to me. I am afraid of getting kidnapped by the person I love, and I know this is unfair to you because you probably wouldn't do something like that, but I also never expected James to go crazy and he did.", the neurosurgeon sniffled again.

"Okay, I will let you continue and when you've finished telling me everything that bothers you, I am going to reply. Let it all out, honey!", her friend ordered sweetly, stroking the back of her hand with his thumb.

"I am also scared that you lied to me. That you just said you don't want to look at my phone but one day you secretly do. I am not keeping anything from you but again, I didn't do so when I was with James either and still, he monitored my every move.", Amelia shared, sniffling again. "I am afraid that if we have sex in bed, you decide to hold my hands over my head because this will remind me of the chain and handcuffs.", she kept going. That's when he realized they haven't had sex in their bed yet but always in the bathroom or the one time at the event. "And I am scared to remember sleeping with him in that house because by now I am not sure if...if he always accepted my wishes or if he manipulated me into thinking he did."

"Amelia...", Owen began quietly but when she stared down at their hands, he noticed she wasn't done and therefore fell silent again to give her the time she needed.

"I meant it when I said that I love our little family but whenever I feel good around you and try to make myself enjoy the time we have together to the fullest, I can't. Because I am so scared of the other shoe to drop and this prevents me from falling for you and from letting myself be happy. I hate all of that so much. I used to love him and God, I miss him, but...I am glad he's dead. I am relieved he is dead and at the same time, I hate him for leaving like this, for not accepting the same treatment in prison that he gave me in that glass cage. And above all, I have to see his terrible parents when they come pick up those boxes. Now I also get to hand them this fucking ring and I can already hear his mother blame me for what happened. I...I don't know how to get through this and how to breathe and I just...all I want is to be happy with my family and to be in love with you, but I can't.", the brunette opened up to him. "The only thing I currently have to offer is unconditional love for my children and being your friend with benefits, but I need to have more than this. I think I deserve more than this. I deserve to do this every day.", she said, crawling into her colleague's arms to straddle him before she gave him a passionate kiss. "And you deserve to be spared of the mess that my life is and to be loved and to not be told that you're someone's rebound because you are not. You will turn out to be the love of my life. And now I feel better."

"I hear you and I promise you that I will never hurt you. At the same time, I will remember every word you said to make sure that nothing I do triggers you. You deserve the world, Amelia! And you get to take all the time you need to let yourself fall in love with me, because I for one am so madly in love with you.", the redhead answered. "And I am here for you, day or night, for better or for worse.", he added, leaning in, so their foreheads could touch as they enjoyed being together in that moment with closed eyes.

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a/n: I know this is shorter than usually, but I wanted to upload something since I will take some time off from Saturday on until January. I might get another chapter ready until then but that's not a promise lol. Hope you enjoyed this one despite the length. =)