Author's Note: This one-shot is quite a heavy one and there are brief themes of abuse, so I thought I would put this as a little trigger warning. If you decide to read, I hope you enjoy.

She sits in the plush armchair near the window, her legs tucked underneath her, and holds her dressing gown closed as the tears trickle down her cheeks. She feels like a complete idiot and, with her mascara no doubt smeared across her face, she probably has an appearance to match.

She hadn't intended for this to happen.

When her husband had started kissing her out in the passage – when he had reached a hand behind her and unlocked the door, walking her backwards into their suite – she had been a more than willing participant. Even when they had tumbled onto the sofa together and their kisses had deepened, she had ben absolutely fine. It was when his focus had turned to the buttons that ran down the back of her dress that she had panicked, lowering a hand to his chest and pushing him away to create some distance between them. His look of confusion and concern had made it impossible for her to think of a good enough explanation to offer him and so, silently, she had left him sitting alone on the sofa and made her way into their bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

He either thinks her fleeing is his fault or he wants to give her some space because she's been sat here for nearly an hour now and he's still not come to check on her. She doesn't blame him though. If he had been fine one minute, kissing her without a care in the world, and then pushed her away and walked out on her without so much as an explanation as to why, she would be hurt as well. Yes, she had been scared, but she should never have treated him in such a way. He loves her, she knows that, and he would have understood that she had been scared and self-conscious, so she has no idea why her first instinct was to run away rather than open up to him about it all and let him support her.

Perhaps she hasn't embraced her scars as much as she once thought she had.

Perhaps what her uncle did to her as a child affected her more than she actually realised.

She isn't entirely sure of the reason.

All she knows is that, when Georg started unbuttoning her dress, she felt sick to her stomach and her only thought was that she couldn't let him see her scars. Her head told her that he wasn't ready to know about them, not yet, but on reflection she's realised that it has nothing to do with him. She's the one who isn't ready for him to see her scars. For him to know about the ugliness she keeps hidden under her clothes.

For the moment, she is still the most beautiful woman he has ever met and, in his opinion, she doesn't have any flaws and she isn't ready for that to change. When he learns about her scars – when he sees the twisted silvery lines that cover her body – she knows he'll never be able to look at her the same way again. One look at her will remind him of them and the abuse she was made to live through all those years ago. Ever since her uncle abandoned her at the age of seventeen, she's tried her hardest to get rid of the victim label he left her with, but that's all Georg is going to see her as when she lets him see the proof of what he did to her and she can't bear the thought of it. She doesn't want to be someone to be pitied, especially not to him, but she supposes that – deep down – that's exactly what she is and she'll have to live with it.

She doesn't look up when the bedroom door creaks open, not even when her husband walks into the room and closes it quietly behind him, but her nerves start playing up when she hears him sigh. She can feel him staring at her from where he stands. She can sense him drumming his fingers against the outside of his leg, a sign he feels uncomfortable and has no idea how to proceed. Seconds pass by and neither of them move or make an attempt to communicate, but then she hears the faint rustle of clothing and glances at her husband out of the corner of her eye to see him untucking his shirt. Curious, she turns her head in his direction and watches him through blurred vision as he starts undoing the buttons. "What are you doing?" She asks as she brushes the fallen tears from her cheeks, her voice soft and quite nasally from her crying.

"Getting ready for bed. That train journey wiped me out." He explains before he walks over to the full-length mirror near the ensuite.

He turns his back to her, looking at his reflection in the mirror as he undoes the last three buttons, and she clasps a hand over her mouth as her breath hitches when he removes his shirt to reveal the scarring on his back. He is absolutely covered in them, some tiny and some much more prominent, and thinking about the agony he must have been in when he received some of the injuries is enough to break her heart. He must have heard or seen her response because he turns around to face her again, nothing but love for her in his eyes, and a lone tear trickles down her cheek when he approaches her before he kneels down in front of her chair and takes her hand in his. "It took me some time, but I think I worked out why you pushed me away," He says, brushing his thumb against the back of her palm. "You don't want me to see them."

"You're right, I don't want you to see them. I can't stand them," She whispers, losing his gaze, her bottom lip trembling slightly as she fights back tears while looking out over Paris. "I remember when I was about thirteen, fourteen, I snuck downstairs in the night once and I looked for anything I could use to either cover them up or just get rid of them because the thought of someone seeing them made me feel ill. I…I used anything I could get my hands on, hoping at least one of them would do what I wanted, but all that got me was a very long stay in hospital. It was a relief, in a way, because my uncle had no power over me while I was there and I had a break from him and the things he would do to me, but they sent me right back to him when I was well enough to be discharged and things were worse than ever before because of that."

Georg has to stare at the ceiling to keep the tears that spring to his eyes from falling, his hold on her hand tightening as he clears his throat when he feels her run her free hand over his hair before he looks at her again and sighs. "You have no reason to feel ashamed of your scars."

"But all they are is a reminder of the things he did to me and how weak I was back then. I never stood up to him." She shakes her head.

He looks at her in silence for a moment before he gets to his feet and pulls gently on her hand, a silent request for her to go with him, and he has to admit it relieves him when she gets up and lets him walk her across the bedroom. Positioning her between him and the mirror, he reaches around her and takes hold of the end of one of the ties holding her dressing gown closed. "Do you trust me, my love?" He mumbles in her ear, his gaze finding hers in the mirror before she gives him a nod. He pulls on the end of the tie then, making the garment fall open, and he removes it while grazing the hair at the nape of her neck with his nose. Sensing that she still feels rather tense, he rests his hands on her shoulders and runs them across them and down her arms and he smiles when she takes a deep breath and finally lets her shoulders drop.

"Georg…"

"If you need me to stop, tell me and I'll stop." He sooths.

She thinks for a minute. "No, I…I think I'm okay."

Pleased with her response, he hooks his fingers beneath the spaghetti straps of her negligee and slips them down her arms, allowing it to fall to the floor and pool at her feet. A lump comes to his throat, rage burning deep inside him, as his eyes move over the scars on her arms, her chest, her stomach, her legs, the backs of her thighs and her back. Most of them are caused by a belt buckle, he knows that from experience, but there are plenty others and what may have caused them doesn't even bear thinking about. She was so little when she was handed over to her uncle, not even a year older than Gretl, and thinking about how small and vulnerable she was makes him despise him and all those who had an involvement in her case all the more. She was let down by the system. Everyone who should have protected her failed her horrifically.

He traces a particularly long one on her upper back with his fingertips, blinking back tears, and her breath shudders as she closes her eyes at the contact. He can't imagine how hard this must be for her, letting him see her like this, but she is so strong and he adores her for trusting him so much. Resting his hands on her waist just above her underwear, he takes a step closer to her and presses his lips to a smaller scar on the back of her shoulder, kissing it warmly. "You are the strongest, bravest, most determined woman I have ever met." With every word, he kisses another scar of hers.

"Do you mean that?" Her voice is so small and there are tears rolling down her cheeks when he lifts his gaze back to her.

Letting his hands fall from his waist and moving around her, he waits for her to turn to him before taking her chin on his finger and tracing her bottom lip with his thumb. "Never in this lifetime have I meant anything more…" He assures her as he pulls her close with the hand on her waist while the other comes to rest on the side of her neck, his thumb easing her head back before he stoops to capture her lips with his. He feels her lift her hand and touch his chest tentatively as they sink into the kiss and he smiles, knowing she had been studying all his scars while he had been studying hers just now. How else would she know where each and every one of them are? Moving his hand to the back of her head, he presses three more kisses onto her lips before drawing back and letting his hands roam over her back as he looks her in the eye.

"We all have scars, my darling," He reminds her. "Each and every one of us, but they don't make us weak. All they are is proof of our strength."

"I guess so." She hums.

"I know so," He smirks, touching his forehead to hers. "And you, I know without a shred of doubt, are the strongest woman living…"

Author's Note: Thank you so much for taking the time to read and I hope you liked it. Please let me know what you thought with a review and I'll see you soon!