After everything that had happened in his life in the past six months or so, Sonny Kiriakis didn't think he could still be surprised - unpleasantly - by his husband. He was wrong.

When Sonny had to go back into the club because their barista was having trouble with the computer, he wasn't thrilled about leaving Will and Paul alone with each other outside. With the rapidly rising tension between the two, it seemed more than likely that violence would eventually erupt. That, Sonny wouldn't have been surprised by, which was why he prepared himself for having to break a fight as he made his way back outside to see what was going on. What ended up happpening - what he ended up hearing - was, however, something Sonny had never expected. Although, in retrospect, he probably should've known better after all of his husband's previous antics.

"Then you blackmailed my mother, and tried and get me out of town, so that I wouldn't find out about my father?"

Paul's voice hit Sonny like a ton of bricks, and he froze at the doorway. Will did what?

For a beat, Sonny was in such shock that none of the words being spoken by Will and Paul even registered with him. His hearing resumed just in time to hear Paul finish with, "... and if you keep lying and pushing me, I swear to God, I will tell Sonny about the blackmail too."

As Paul turned to leave, Will pleaded, "Paul, wait...", and the truth hit Sonny even harder. If there was any possibility in Sonny's mind, for a few seconds, that Paul had misunderstood things and wrongly believed Will to have blackmailed his mother, it vanished once he heard Will's response. That kind of desperation could only be found in someone who knew full well he was guilty of something, and was terrified of being caught.

But whatever Will was going to say to try to persuade Paul to keep his dirty little secret, Sonny never learned, because a random sideways glance finally alerted the blonde to his presence.

"Sonny," was all Will could blurt out. His eyes widened as he clearly realized what had just been revealed to his husband, and if he had looked scared before, he was in full-blown panic mode now.

"You. Blackmailed. Paul's. Mom?" Sonny repeated in a kind of emotionless drone, clearly enunciating every syllable as if making sure there wasn't some kind of inaccuracy in his question/statement.

Will evidently couldn't even bring himself to utter a verbal response, nor to meet the look in Sonny's eyes - which was the kind that could freeze the sun. He cast his own eyes downward in shame, and nodded.

After absorbing this, Sonny slowly swiveled his head around to look at his ex-boyfriend, who looked like there was nowhere else he wouldn't prefer to be at the moment. He wanted to know what the hell this meant, but he couldn't ask Will. There was no point in pretending otherwise: whatever he asked Will, he couldn't trust the answer. Not anymore. Whatever flaws Paul had, he, by comparison, at least paid Sonny the courtesy of nearly always being honest, no matter how hard the truth might have been to hear.

"Paul, how did he blackmail her?" Sonny demanded to know, talking about Will like he wasn't even there. He dreaded the answer, but he had to have it. There was a need inside of him, an unexplainably self-cruel one, to know exactly what had happened, in all of its brutal detail.

"Sonny, I really don't want to get in the middle of - " Paul replied hastily, gesticulating somewhat helplessly to indicate his discomfort with the situation, but Sonny didn't care. He took another couple of steps towards Paul.

"What happened?" he said sharply, in a tone that would brook no dissent.

Paul sighed and rubbed his temple, looking for the right words to say. Sonny did wonder, for a moment, why the former baseball star was feeling so bad for Will and being reluctant to "give up the goods", as it were, on Will's schemes; God knows Will hadn't done anything to earn any good will from Paul. But it was hardly Sonny's concern at the moment. Finally, Paul spoke.

"When Will found out that my mother was in Salem before I was born, and the time frame meant that she had to have already been pregnant with me before she left, he thought that I must've been a DiMera... that she had an affair with one of them."

Sonny remembered the article Will had planned to write about Paul, revealing his parentage to the world. He nodded at Paul and coolly prompted him to continue. "And?"

Paul chewed his bottom lip, looking anxious, and glanced over at Will. Sonny thought his husband must be freaking out completely right now, but didn't avert his gaze from Paul in order to find out, determined to retain his focus. He felt a vague sense of surprise at how little he cared about Will's distress at the moment.

"Will approached my mother," Paul continued, "And told her about the article he was going to write. He warned her that unless she got me to leave Salem, he would publish it... then I would know that she lied to me about how my father died before I was born and how she'd never been in Salem, and everyone would know I was a DiMera, supposedly."

A thick silence hung in the air as Sonny took everything in. Tori Narita's skittish, uncomfortable demeanor every time Sonny had seen her made even more sense now. She didn't just fear that John or Marlena would figure out the truth with her in town. She feared that Will would make good on his threat to deliberately expose the truth. Sonny's husband had been threatening a woman, trying to bully her into removing what he perceived as an obstacle to his marriage from the equation, in a desperate attempt to hold on to said marriage. This was the man that Sonny was married to, a fact he had been in denial about for months now.

Sonny finally levelled his gaze at Will, who had not said a word since Sonny had come back out of the club save for initially uttering his name. He didn't even know what he was feeling right now, or what the appropriate reaction was. Scream his head off at Will (again)? Curl into a ball and start crying hysterically? He was somehow beyond those things now. He was just feeling cold and empty, with an overwhelming realization settling over him like a frightening specter. The truth that finally presented itself was far more vast, shocking, and painful than Will's blackmail of Tori. Sonny felt like he would get sick if he continued standing there and looking at Will, so he turned on his heel and began walking away.

At this, Will finally broke his silence. "Sonny," he begged, following him quickly, "Please, just let me exp - "

Sonny spun around so fast that this simple action nearly made him light-headed, and made Will, who was about to grab Sonny as he was inclined to do in these types of situations, stop dead in his tracks. He lifted his index figure in a gesture of warning and hissed, "Don't," his dark eyes so harsh and unforgiving that Will couldn't help wincing (and didn't dare say another word).

He turned around once more and marched away from the club, as quickly as he could without actually running, catching merely a glimpse of Paul's concerned face as he went. He walked through the park, through the square, past Salem Inn (a twinge of old fury briefly rose inside him again) and Brady's pub. If it was up to him, he wouldn't stop when he crossed the town or even the state line. Maybe he could keep walking forever... maybe then he'd never have to think, or feel, again.

TBC...