Workplace Drama: My Ex is in Charge

Part 10 Crossroads of the Heart

After leaving the restaurant, Emma said goodbye to Sam, but she wasn't quite ready to head home just yet.

She found a stairwell and made her way down to the underground parking garage, taking each step slowly, deliberately.
As she walked, she wondered—where could she go besides her apartment?
A bar? No way.
What if she ran into someone like last time? She didn't have the energy to teach someone how to behave today.
The movies? There wasn't anything she wanted to watch. Besides, going to a movie alone felt a bit too pathetic right now.
Visit Grace? Forget it!
She wasn't even sure what she was feeling anymore. Her emotions were all tangled up, hard to unravel.

But seeing Ami and Owen standing together earlier had stirred up old wounds—memories of being hurt, betrayed, abandoned—all rushing back at once, threatening to drown her.
She was older now, tougher. She shouldn't be afraid anymore.
But those memories, on this early spring night, felt like a bucket of cold water dumped over her, chilling her to the bone.

It wasn't a holiday, and rush hour was long over, so the streets were mostly empty.
Emma didn't know where she was headed. She just followed the flow of traffic, letting her instincts guide her.
About half an hour later, she pulled over to the side of the road, hoping to get a grip on her emotions.
It was only when she looked around that she realized, with a shock, why this place felt so familiar.
She had parked right outside Owen's apartment complex.

Her heart started racing.
She didn't know why, but something inside her was spiraling out of control, growing wild.
She needed to stop it. Right now.
No, she couldn't be alone any longer.
She had to go see Grace.

But to her surprise, Grace wasn't home.
And even more unexpectedly, she found herself, once again, face-to-face with the person who had caused all this turmoil in the first place.
Fate had a funny way of trapping her in the same room as Owen—again.

The tension was at an all-time high. Just as the elevator doors were about to close, Owen reached out and pressed the "open" button. He gave a brief nod to Ami and Lee as a greeting before stepping out.
His expression remained calm, his eyes free of any curiosity or gossip, as he made his way to his car and pulled out his phone.
Whoever he was calling wasn't picking up right away; the line rang several times, the faint beeping barely audible through the closed doors of the car, which muted the noise from the parking garage. The only sign of Owen's impatience was the way his fingers lightly tapped the steering wheel.

Leo's phone, which had somehow ended up in the corner of the couch, was finally found by someone else, who handed it to him. He weaved through a crowd of people, banging his knee on the coffee table in the process, wincing in pain as he stepped out of the room.

"Hey, bro," Leo answered, still rubbing his knee.

"What's going on with Emma and Ami?" Owen asked, getting straight to the point.

Leo, still bent over in pain, frowned in confusion. "Who?"

"Ami," Owen repeated.

Leo was about to say he didn't know who Owen was talking about when it suddenly clicked.
"Oh, her? That chick made my sister cry more than once!"

"If I didn't have a rule about not fighting girls—"

Owen's voice dropped a few degrees, cutting him off. "What exactly happened?"

Leo hesitated. "Honestly, I don't know all the details."

Owen: "..."

Leo continued, "But about six months after you left, they had a huge fight. My sister cried a lot, and they haven't spoken since."