JJ's POV

Garcia snapped her laptop shut as Doctor Amelia Greyling ran through the waiting area toward the nurses' station, her thick blonde hair falling to her waist as she pulled a colourful surgical cap from her head. She wore a dark green wrap-around dress, and flat, black pumps with tiny bows on them. Her pressed, white doctor's jacket billowed around her tiny frame as she came to an abrupt stop at the desk. She was a lot shorter than expected, and most certainly a lot shorter than Spencer, I noted. Thankfully, the waiting room was almost empty, so we could hear every word she said in her much more expected, unmistakeably British, accent.

"I'm Amelia Greyling. I'm so sorry, I had a neonatal surgery, I only just got your page. Tell me everything...no wait...can I have his file and chart?" her voice, as well as her outstretched hands, shook. Whether that was from adrenaline or nerves, I could not tell. Lily located and handed her the folders with a reassuring smile, to which Doctor Greyling replied her thanks before walking much more slowly to a set of soft chairs, across from our small gathering. We watched intently as she sank into the worn fabric, reading intently. She quickly began tapping her foot and biting at the nail on her left index finger. Definitely nervous or rather, terrified.

"What do we do?" Derek leaned in to ask me. I shrugged in response, not entirely sure myself.

Suddenly, after a few minutes of scanning Spence's files, Doctor Greyling pulled out her phone and dialled quickly. "Good evening Martha, please could you do me a massive favour - are you anywhere near the OR floor? ...OK, awesome, please can you go to the gallery of OR 5 and get me an update on Doctor Spencer Reid... Thank you." As she patiently waited for a couple of minutes, I felt us collectively lean toward her nest of chairs. "That's great, so no complications so far, just straightforward repair?...Thank you so much, you're a star... Yes, I'll see you on rounds...OK...goodbye." She exhaled heavily as she ended the call, her free hand falling from her temple to rest on her stomach.

Thank God, I thought. Catching each other's eyes, we smiled, altogether more relaxed.

"Doctor Greyling?" Lily leaned down to present her with a clipboard, "please could you fill out some paperwork? It's just generic information." She hastily dropped into a crouch, but despite her efforts, I could still hear her attempt at a whisper, "there's a part about meds you will need to confirm. As I'm sure you're aware, Doctor Reid sustained significant trauma and we would usually recommend a strict regimen of pain medication following surgery but it is indicated that this is not what he wants?"

Interestingly, while Lily appeared confused, Doctor Greyling simply nodded. "I understand your concern, but I can confirm his choice. His pain management programme must not include opioid meds. He has always been clear on that."

That she obviously knew of Spence's struggles following his kidnapping and torture at the hands of Tobias Hankel, did not immediately come as shock to me. It only led me to further believe that he had been hiding somebody close to him from us and presumably, the rest of the world. I just could not fathom why. Garcia, Emily and Derek's expressions indicated their own confusion. How could somebody so unfamiliar to us, she could have been anybody on any street, anywhere in the world, come to be so important to a person we all considered family?

"Ok, thank you," Lily scribbled on her notepad, "could you fill out the rest of his details, please? Anything you don't know, just leave blank and we'll do some digging," the nurse smiled reassuringly.

"Of course -" she smiled as looked for the nurse's badge, "Lily - sorry I didn't catch your name earlier. Of course, that's no problem. Also, I've just spoken to one of my residents and Doctor Reid's surgery is going well. If anyone is waiting to hear any news, please could you let them know."

Both Garcia and I tensed as Lily looked up to meet our transfixed eyes. "U-u-um, maybe you could tell them yourself?" Lily gestured to us before scurrying back to the nurses' station, earning a quizzical look from Doctor Greyling before she turned and took in Garcia, Emily, Derek, Rossi, Tara and myself staring at her.

We all abruptly looked down. Emily fiddled with her hands. Derek re-arranged his legs. Tara cleared her throat.

As the awkwardness started to intensify, I heard her small footsteps creep toward us. "I'm sorry, I had no idea you were all waiting for news. Everything is going well as far as I...or rather my informant, can tell." I met her gaze as she finished speaking. "I'm Amelia, I-I... h-hello," she stammered.

"No, please forgive us, we didn't want to interrupt. Thank you for your help, Amelia." Rossi stood to shake her hand, which she accepted gratefully, with a smile. "I'm Dave Rossi, this is Tara Lewis, Penelope Garcia, Jennifer Jareau, Emily Prentiss and Derek Morgan," he gestured to each of us in turn. She smiled and waved to all of us as he finished.

"It's really lovely to meet you all, " she spoke clearly but a hint of sheepishness undercut her tone, as if she was holding something back.

Derek, obviously having detected this too, leaned forwards as he spoke, "Again, please forgive me, but you seem to have us at a disadvantage. We have no idea who you are, but, and correct me if I'm barking up the wrong tree here, you don't appear to have just been confronted with a bunch of total strangers. You know who we are?"

Amelia smoothed her dress as she sat down adjacent to Garcia. She opened her mouth twice to speak but said nothing, clearly struggling with our inquisitive expressions. She stared down at her restless fingers for a moment before starting, "I do; I-I know of all of you. I can appreciate how completely bizarre that is. I-I know and I'm sorry. I wish we could have had this conversation under more fortunate circumstances," she looked at each us as she spoke. "Spencer and I, we-we're...we're" as she faltered, I trusted my instincts.

"You're together, right?" I asked softly.

She seemed grateful for my having said the words, "Yes. We met when I was a surgical resident here, over two years ago now-"

"Two years?!" Garcia interrupted, articulating our mute disbelief, "how has he kept you a secret for this long?! Why?!"

"There were a few points when he almost told you, but something always happened which led him to decide against it..." she stopped, staring at her hands again. "He was worried about me getting tangled up in your work; that someone might try to hurt me. I didn't totally agree with him, but I was happy to wait until he was ready. It wasn't my place to interfere."

"Oh, Spencer," Rossi rubbed his temple.

Both Tara and Derek appeared truly stunned; Garcia gawked, clearly lost for words. Emily mirrored my expression once again; we were not totally surprised given what we had discovered beforehand.

Ultimately, Spencer wasn't wrong, our job was dangerous and our loved ones had been thrown in harms way on more than one occasion as a direct result. I thought about Haley, Will, Maeve, Savannah, Hotch and Jack. Spence had been trying to protect Amelia and within that, his heart. While it was undoubtedly difficult for us to hear that he had been hiding her for such a long time, I could appreciate his reasons.

Importantly, this was not Amelia's fault and she had to know that. "Thank you for telling us," I tried to reassure her that we were not angry with her, "this is just a lot to take in on top of everything else."

Tara reinforced my words by reaching across the chair to her left and taking Amelia's hand, "Please don't worry yourself. You're important to Spencer so you're important to us now. We have to stick together."

Obviously having regained composure, Derek chimed in, "Tara and JJ are right. This is a shock. It's not you, we're happy Spencer has you. My God, I've hoped that he'd find somebody for so long, he's brilliant but he's missed out on so much. I know that, now."

Amelia smiled, "Thank you, Derek. I'm certainly happy to have him, too." I noticed we all grinned at that. "And yes, congratulations on your marriage and baby boy, that must have been lovely-" she frowned, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't prattle on about your lives when you know nothing about me."

"Don't worry. It's quite alright, and thank you, it's really amazing," Derek reassured her kindly.

"Would it help if I told you a little about me?" she offered, before adding "unless you've already looked me up?" she smiled, glancing at Garcia.

"Guilty as charged," our tech-analyst held up her hands, giggling. "Only basic stuff though. I'm so happy you're British, I love England. You're smart too, that's good, you'd never be able to keep up with Reid if you were out of your wits. You're a paediatrician right? That must be so cute!" Garcia babbled, earning a laugh from Amelia.

"I work with a lot of children, yes. They are indeed, very sweet!"

"Do you want kids? ...oh my gosh, sorry, that's too much." Garcia gushed before clapping her hands over her mouth and staring at the floor, mortified. Amelia didn't look too phased, though I imagined as a surgeon, she had to have good control over her facial expressions.

"On that note, I'm going in search of coffee." Emily got up, laughing to herself.

"I'll join you." Derek and Rossi said in unison, following.

"I'm so sorry, I have no filter. I'm sure you know that too. I'm just overwhelmed with sad and happy news. Reid is undergoing life-saving surgery, but his girlfirend, who until five minutes ago, we never knew existed, is sat right here." She put her hands to her temples, "it's all so overwhelming!"

The word 'girlfriend' momentarily threw me; it was appropriate but indeed, quite overwhelming to place such a label on Amelia. After all this time, Spence had decided to share his life with someone. I was happy for him, but I wished I could speak to him about it all and how he arrived at the decision to keep her a secret.

Avoiding the topic until we knew more, I added, "speaking of, how much longer do you think he'll be in surgery?"

"I'm not sure. One of my interns is in the gallery watching and she said that things look good so far. The Head of General Surgery and one of our best trauma surgeons are working on him, so he's in excellent hands." I felt confident in her words, especially as she would know a lot more about what was going on than we could ever hope to. "I'll call down again in a while. I would go down myself, but they would never let me in!" she laughed morbidly.

"We're really glad you're here with us." Tara said kindly, pausing before leaning back, "so Garcia informed us you're a psychologist as well as a surgeon? That's pretty impressive!" I settled into my chair, grateful for Tara's interjection and interested to hear more about Doctor Amelia Greyling.

Amelia relaxed slightly, "yes my first degree and PhD was in psychology. I investigated the impact of trauma in children and their families, specifically looking at the interactions between demographic variables."

"That sounds amazing. Are you still active?"

"Somewhat. My medical training threw a spanner in the works a bit, and I'm currently working on another PhD in children's literature. I'm still really interested in childhood trauma so I've been writing short stories as part of a rehabilitative programme to aid their treatment. Alongside my work here, I don't have that much time for my research anymore!" Amelia relaxed in her chair as she spoke, more comfortable with the change in conversation.

"That would be your third doctorate, right? Looking to match our resident genius?" Garcia laughed, completely taken by the beautiful British lady.

Amelia grinned a wide, toothy smile. "I'm pretty sure that even with a lifetime of study and research, I could never match Spencer. I've never encountered anybody like him," she looked pensive, suddenly.

"You and the rest of the world," I smiled. "We would be lost without him."

A/N:

Thank you all for reading! I really wanted this chapter to shed a bit more light on Amelia and I hope I achieved that. The next few chapters will include more of her and Spencer's POV but given the nature of the story, I thought it would be better starting off with a member of the BAU. There's so much more, including a few more big surprises, to come! I hope you all stay with me :)

Thank you so much for all the views, follows and favourites! Reviewers, thank you for such positive feedback on my first chapter - I hugely appreciate it!

Stay tuned for the next chapter...

Best,

Em