Author's Note: This story takes place before the events of episode 1.14: Perception

Nolan wasn't sure when it happened, exactly.

Though Amanda had agreed to ride away with him that first day, she had disappeared only a few weeks after he'd delivered David's legacy to her outside the gates of Allenwood. Those few weeks had been very telling, and Nolan had gotten into the habit of watching her closely. As the last living remnant of David Clarke, he'd watched the girl, hoping to see something left of her father.

Aside from her intelligence, Amanda had been a huge disappointment to him. There had been no trace of David's kindness or humor in her, or, if they were still within her, they were too deeply buried under a decade's worth of bitter fury.

Still, in the weeks they'd spent together – or more accurately, in the few weeks Amanda had stayed in Nolan's house, holed up in a spare bedroom and rarely interacting with him - he'd seen the change come over her as she began to believe the truth in her father's words. He'd seen it, the seed of vindication planted in her heart by the written pleas of forgiveness from her dead father. He hadn't known her blossoming idea at the time, of course, or foreseen how far she would take her war with the Graysons.

At the time, Nolan had only seen a girl with no one in the world.

The man had tried to soften her attitude toward him with gifts of new clothing, electronics and invitations out to dinner, but Amanda generally ignored him. He recalled one incident when he'd found her in the kitchen putting together a lunch for herself; no sooner had the words "What do you say to a night out to the movies?" left his mouth before Amanda had shoved her way past him and returned to her room, slamming the door behind her and turning up her obnoxious, pounding rock music. Buying her the big Bose speakers and a few Nine Inch Nails CDs had seemed like a great idea at the time but he quickly came to regret those gifts. He still couldn't hear anything from The Fragile without grinding his teeth.

But fragile was not the word he would use to describe Amanda. Not by a long shot.

Damaged, certaintly. Betrayed, most definitely. And above all, the girl was so angry and so hurt.

Amanda had been through hell. Nolan was sure that he would never know the whole story of what she'd been through in those institutions and foster homes, even with his connections. The things he did know were enough to keep him awake most nights. Everything she'd been through had twisted her mind. Her lack of trust in people had made either manipulation or violence her first instincts. She was cunning, disrespectful, greedy and cold.

Still...

Nolan liked the girl despite the fact that she'd made it perfectly clear how annoyed she was by his presence.

And then one day, she was gone.

Until that bright Memorial Day.

Nolan had been smugly reviewing his footage of the Graysons' party, a few stolen moments of debutante-on-frat boy clumsiness, and then the world had stopped. He'd seen her – not the angry, confused girl he'd met outside the gates of Allenwood - this woman caught by his lens was dressed in such elegance, she was so perfectly charming…and such a bright, buttery blonde. He'd watched the footage over and over again, but he was sure.

She certainly looked the part of a new Hamptonite, but it took more than a dye job and a new dress to trick Nolan Ross.

Stupidly, he hadn't been able to contain his excitement and hadn't given a second thought to tracking her back to her new home. She'd attacked him, threatened to crush his windpipe, and his only route of escape had been to mention her father - the dead man who still bound them.

That man had been more than a simple investor, more than a business partner. David Clarke had been his mentor and a true friend. Perhaps the only friend he'd had in years. And Nolan's hands had been tied. David had begged him to bury their connection and stay away from the investigation and then the trial. Nolan had been forced to watch as those animals tore him apart. He'd tried to visit David while he was in prison, but the man had refused to see him every time, save for one.

To this day, Nolan still shuddered at the memory. David had lost weight, his posture had been tense and his face bore the evidence of violence from the other inmates and, Nolan was sure, the guards who no doubt had lost family or friends on flight 197.

"My daughter," David had said. "I haven't seen her since that night the house was raided, but I know she'll be up for release soon from the Allenwood facility."

This had surprised Nolan. "Your daughter's in juvie? What did she do to got locked up there?"

"She was born with my last name." David said miserably. "I've done what I could to keep tabs on her, but once she's out of the system I don't know where she'll go."

"I'm sorry." Nolan sighed, feeling that he'd failed his friend. "I tried to find her after the raid but you never named a guardian and since I'm not family-"

"I know you would have tried to take her in, but that would have brought attention to our connection."

Nolan didn't bother to hide his anger when he finally demanded from David the question that had been on his mind for the past decade. "Why didn't you let me help you?"

"They would have brought you down if they knew, and I couldn't let that happen. You were the last one to believe me. You're the only one, because I know they got to Amanda." David had rubbed his temple, then. "I need your help, Nolan."

"Now, after all this time?"

"There's something I need you to get to her. Nolan, please."

That day still haunted him. The regret clawed through him, what he should have done for the man, the things he could have done differently.

And now, here they both were, years later.

Perhaps Nolan had jumped to the conclusion that she would welcome him into the life she'd made for herself. Perhaps he'd been too hopeful when he'd offered his services, claiming his own desire to see the Hamptonites – those entitled jackals with their bleached white fangs and their obscenely splashed wealth – get what was coming to them.

What those people had done to his friend, what they'd done to her was unforgivable.

In his excitement that first night, Nolan had given Emily - as she insisted on calling herself - everything she needed. In their exchange at her beach cottage, she had seen his immediate loyalty to her, his arrogance, and most tellingly, his loneliness.

Money couldn't buy happiness, even if Nolan could buy the Hamptons ten times over.

The man wanted a true friend, desperately. And it was his desperation for truth that kept him as something of an outcast among the elite. He had no trouble gaining invitations to parties or propositions from pretty young things, but he wasn't stupid; the only thing anyone in the higher circles cared about was his money.

Perhaps that was why he'd sought out Emily from the moment he recognized her; she was his near equal in wealth but more than that, she never hid her annoyance of him behind a polite hostess's smile. She could be honest with him, if not always kind.

Kindness might be something she had forgotten, but her vow to avenge her father certainly wasn't. He'd seen it in her eyes - the Graysons would pay, and if he wasn't willing to help as he'd claimed on that first night then he needed to stay out of her way. Emily had a funny way of getting her point across, and in time he'd come to find out that she was willing to accept casualties in her quiet crusade.

The passing summer found Emily and Nolan acting as allies in calculated take-downs of scheming socialites, a corrupt therapist, a politician and even the Graysons' own guard dog. That last one had upset him, but on thinking things over, Nolan found he was more fond of his kneecaps than the idea of Frank carrying a grudge along with his gun.

Nolan pictured Emily as a beautiful blonde snake, weaving her way through the Hampton garden parties and poisoning those who had earned her bite.

And him?

Well.

If Emily was a snake, Nolan thought of himself as something of a spider. He did his work through the Web and was generally content to remain in the shadows of her grand scheme.

Fine.

He would be the spider, laughing at the downfall of Hampton royalty from the safety of his nest on the beach.

Emily might be uneasy having him know her secrets, but he'd made it clear that he wouldn't hesitate to reveal everything if she didn't let him in on her plans. He would never do it, of course, but he had to let her know that she wasn't the only one with sharp fangs.

Maybe when it was all over, they could finally relax and enjoy a few drinks together by his pool without the constant talk of revenge underlying their every word. It was something he was looking forward to, though he wasn't fool enough to voice this thought to her.

For her part, Emily found him both an annoyance and a source of support. They had butted heads over her plans several times, the most recent being the collateral damage that had come in the form of Jack Porter – a man Nolan had come to think of as a friend and one whom Emily had had to force from her thoughts more often than she cared to admit.

But that was before.

"What're you doing back here?"

Emily turned around at the voice, finding that she'd wandered onto his beach again. She shouldn't be surprised – truly, Nolan was the only one she could talk to about this. What were neighbors for?

And there he was, lounging on a beach chair planted firmly in the sand, looking up at her for an answer.

Sometimes he came out to watch the waves when he couldn't sleep; since linking himself with Emily, his guilty conscience and a recurring nightmare of Tyler and Frank teaming against him had kept him plenty restless. Emily narrowed her eyes at him, turning her face toward the ocean. At night, the water was an inky black mass. She took the empty beach chair beside him. "I'm marrying Daniel."

He frowned at her. "I thought you wanted to cool it with him."

"He knows Charlotte isn't Conrad's daughter."

This had his attention. "What? How did he find out?"

"It was Victoria. She told Daniel that Charlotte wasn't his full sister but she didn't tell him the truth."

"Has she ever?" He groused.

"That woman…she told Daniel that my father raped her."

For a moment, it seemed that the wind and the waves went quiet in their shock at her words. Nolan clenched his jaw. "She said that. I want to be surprised, but after everything she's done…well, this is just the icing on the cake."

Finally, she looked at him. "Do you have anything to drink?"

"Sorry, I'm all out of herbal tea."

She closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. "After tonight, I think I'd prefer something stronger."

"I have just the thing."

Nolan invited her to taste a new bottle of bourbon and Emily allowed herself a sip. Then two. Then several more. He put on some music and brought her into a lazy, swaying dance in his living room. She leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. Even those driven to mortal vindication needed a breather every now and again, he supposed.

Nolan allowed her this time, this reprieve from her constant stream of lies, her paranoia and her bittersweet memories. His hands rested on her back, and he could feel the tension, the strain from keeping up the façade. She had lost weight from the enormous stress of it all, he could feel that too. He would offer to make her something to eat in a minute or two. Just after this song came to an end.

Sometimes, Nolan pictured her there in her beach cottage, her situation room, plotting the downfall of all the people David had trusted, ruining them publicly, financially and privately – they deserved no less for what had been done to her father. And now, no one deserved Emily's wrath more than Victoria Grayson.

Perhaps it was time for him to stop his waffling and commit to her vengeance. As ugly a thing as it was, it would be fitting that the two people who knew the truth about David Clarke would be the ones to execute those who had brought the world down upon him.

As the slow seconds ticked by, Nolan realized that he wasn't immune to the effect of the liquor and the jazz and his own loneliness. The man held her, swaying in lazy circles; he couldn't help himself. She was so warm, and she fit so well against him. He pulled her in closer and nuzzled her neck, breathing in the scent of sweet papaya shampoo.

Emily didn't lash out and break his nose, she didn't shove him back and twist to snap his wrist. It was bizarre, this lack of resistance. She tipped her head back and tightened her grip on him. Silent encouragement.

It had been months since Nolan had been with a woman – but Emily wasn't the typical brainless girl he could bring home from the beach. He brought his lips to her skin, letting her feel the moist graze of his tongue, the soft suction of his lips.

She said nothing, she did not pull away.

Even when she opened her eyes and saw that it was him – awkward, weak, gangly Nolan Ross, not her convenient fiancé or an imagined man from her past – she made no move to leave. She offered him her mouth and he took it, eagerly.

For the first time since childhood, Emily surrendered control.

Nolan knew the stakes now; he had to take the control that Emily had given up, he had to serve her a distraction from the vendetta that had swallowed her life. He had to please her. Funny how things between them could change so quickly. One moment they could be thick as thieves, in the next they could be facing off as enemies.

And now?

Nolan pushed her back to sit on the sofa, his hands roamed her back, searching for the tiny zipper to her dress. Deft fingers found it and made quick work of stripping her, and then himself.

Through it all, Emily responded though she still remained submissive to him. It was a thrill to have this power; he moved her beneath him, parting her with an expert knee. Fingertips teased her to awareness. Lips and teeth played up and down her throat. She was his for this night as he moved against her, within her, atop her. Somehow they had found rhythm and routine with each other. He crushed his lips against hers, hands skimming the subtle curves of hips and breasts. Her fingers had speared into his hair, holding him close.

Not that she was worried; she knew Nolan would never leave her.

He felt her body tense beneath him, he heard the hitch in her breath and the quiet moan of her pleasure. He let himself go then, spilling into her tight heat. He breathed heavily against the crook of her neck and did not allow himself to sink into sleep – that mistake would be deadly, he knew.

The man shifted onto his side and watched her flushed face. She was beautiful and deep; intelligent, calculating and she carried an amazing capacity for deception. He understood, and he wondered how things might have been if her life hadn't been torn apart by the Graysons. Certainly, they wouldn't be in this position – panting and naked on his sofa.

But if things had been different…they might have been true friends rather than convenient allies.

Nolan laid his hand in the dipped space between her breasts, and she allowed this.

"Why?" The word was out before he could stop himself.

Chocolate eyes looked to him for just a moment, then shifted away, focused contently at a spot on his ceiling. "I don't have to hide when I'm with you."

It was a simple answer. Nolan expected nothing less, he certainly didn't expect any grand claim of love or genuine affection from her.

Still…

Minutes later he watched as Emily pulled herself back together. The undergarments from La Perla, the breezy Chanel dress, the dainty Blahnik sandals on her feet and the Louis Vuitton bag tucked under her arm. Hair smoothed, lipstick reapplied, perfume spritzed. Like it never happened. Perhaps to her, it hadn't.

The cool veneer that masked the inconsolable rage festering in her heart was firmly back in place. Nolan knew better, what her response would be, but he believed that he was owed the truth spoken out loud. "You're going back now, aren't you? To him."

Emily turned from the mirror and fixed him in her dark gaze. "Don't tell me you're jealous."

He shook his head and leaned back into the sofa, spreading his arms along its back, shameless in his nudity. He had nothing to be ashamed of.

"Jealous?" He scoffed. "In your dreams, Em. Whatever this was tonight, whatever we are to each other, at least what we have is real."

There was a change in her eyes at his words. A small look of regret, perhaps wounded pride. "Nolan, I do want this to be over."

He rose from the sofa and took her face into the cup of his hands. "Then end it," he said earnestly. "Your father didn't deserve what those animals did to him but he never would have wanted this for you. You know that."

"What do you want me to do?" She asked.

Nolan speared frustrated fingers through his hair. "Make some excuse why you can't marry Daniel, why you have to leave the Hamptons. You need to get away from these people and what they've driven you to." He tugged on his pants and moved to the wet bar to pour another drink for himself, thinking, thinking of a way to get her to abandon her plan because he was sure that if she kept on for much longer, she would go too far. Nolan didn't want to see her with more blood on her hands, or worse, see her plan backfire and destroy what remained of her. "I have a house in Paris – you could go there and get some peace."

"Alone?"

He looked up. A moment passed between them, and he knew what she was asking, what she was accusing him of.

Nolan shook his head. "I know you don't want me." He said, and she did not correct him. "Say the word and I'll make the call, I'll have a car take you to the airport. My jet will be waiting for you there. Whatever it takes, this has to end Amanda-"

At that, she pulled away from him. Amanda. She was Amanda Clarke, the daughter of a man hated by the world for crimes he did not commit. The man who had been betrayed by the woman he loved, by those he worked with, by those he called his friends. And she had been ripped away from her father, her mind twisted into believing that he was the monster the Graysons had branded him, shuffled to foster homes and and institutions and juvenile facilities, a decade lost to abuse and bitter anger.

It had been Nolan who'd delivered the truth of her father's innocence and the wealth he had left behind for her. Her father had wanted her to forgive, to build a happy life for herself far from everything that had happened to tear them apart. A happy start to a new life, a tidy end of forgiveness for everyone.

But David Clarke had not counted on the things that had been done to her, the violence and manipulation that had shaped her life, and how they had opened a capacity for cruelty in her that would have left her unrecognizable in her father's eyes if he were yet living.

Emily swiped a tear off her cheek and turned away from the window, back to face him. The icy mask had fallen back into place.

"Don't call me that again. I told you the night you found me, Amanda Clarke no longer exists. They ruined everything, they…I can't stop now, Nolan. Not after what Victoria said he did to her. I can't stop now. I won't."

Her words rang with a finality that was disturbing. The gloves were off, things were set to escalate now.

Emily wasn't just set on her course for revenge, she was a queen determined to make war on a long-hated enemy, and Nolan was not enough of a reason for her to stop. He had hoped to convince her away from all this, reminding her of her father and the danger she'd already brought on her friends.

Nolan absorbed her words, the truth he felt in what she said. He wanted to see the jackals pay, but Emily was stronger than him in this. She could take on an army and never blink. She was a valkyrie made flesh.

Nothing would stop her now, he knew it down to his bones.

The Graysons would go down in flames, and he would be Emily's Nero, playing his iPad fiddle app as the Hamptons burned.

Nolan poured himself yet another drink and took it in one swift swallow. He had a hundred arguments against her course that he could launch to her ears, but Emily would be deaf to them all, just as she was blind to forgiveness. No. She really wasn't going to stop until she reached the end.

Well.

He couldn't let her continue on alone now. Not after tonight, no, he couldn't.

He had to wonder if that had been part of her master plan as well.

Despite it all, Nolan found himself smiling. Something about laughing into the face of Death...

"So what's next, Em?"

Nolan tried not to let himself notice the satisfaction in Emily's eyes that he was, once again, on her side.