Ok so this was supposed to be a one-shot, but I watched 2x02, "Resurrection" and inspiration struck! Enjoy and please R&R, I really love reading your guys' feedback!
She wakes up with a hand on her shoulder. She doesn't think, simply reacting with years worth of training, her hand lashing out at her attacker. It isn't until she hears the choked gasp that her eyes fly open. Nolan hovers above her, one hand clutching hers on his throat, the other pressed against the couch as he manages to wheeze out,
"Bad. Dream.." Emily pulls back her hand and sits up, releasing an exasperated sigh as he gasps for air, bracing himself against the couch. He sinks down next to her, warning her against the dangers of watching horror films with Victoria Grayson as she stretches, shaking off the soreness in her limbs from spending the night on the couch. Her hand still feels warm from his touch: comforting her, bringing her out of the dark abyss of tortured memories in her dreams. She shakes her head at the memory of two nights ago, sleeping in the guest room with him. Not alone. Weak, Emily. She berates. As if you didn't just spend the last eight weeks with Takeda, regaining your skills. Focus. You can't get weak again. You won't. Her resolve is unshakeable.
He tries and miserably fails to keep his eyes off her bared shoulders as she slips on a jacket and starts crafting her next scheme, alert as ever. His gaze follows the set line of her jaw, the determined crossing of her arms as she meets his eyes and without a trace of regret, declares that she'll be taking Charlotte away from Victoria. Tit for tat. He doesn't react, he's used to it by now: her cold indifference, the way she turns away at the mention of her sister, refuses to listen to his protests against throwing the young Grayson into the crossfire.
Hours later he's alone, shock growing on his face as he watches Victoria reject her daughter, as cold-hearted as she's ever been, more despicable than he's ever seen his blond Batgirl get. Nolan finds himself unable to resist the urge to narrate the poor queen's fate, when he's interrupted by Padma, his, as she smugly points out, accounting analyst. He's annoyed at her attitude and yet strangely fascinated by it. She wants a CFO? Well, he has the perfect one in mind. He shuts the lid of the laptop with a dazzling smile, deciding that maybe it's time to give Victoria a rest and tend to his baby (Nolcorp) for the afternoon.
By the time business is taken care of, he realizes he's been gone too long. Victoria works fast, and the plan she's masterminded this time is truly diabolical. He's just putting together the pieces of the puzzle when Emily storms in, clearly stressed and angry at being caught off guard. That said, he's sure she already has her counterattack, has already thought of something to deal with the latest curveball the queen has thrown their way. He's apologizing before she has a chance to yell at him, but the glare she throws his way snaps something inside the fragile billionaire. Before he notices, he's switched from apology to indignation, his annoyance at being treated as a convenient sidekick coming out.
"It's like you just expect me to do this for you." He's prepared for an argument, but his heart clenches as he awaits her response. Nolan's mind is reeling, already flashing back to their first fight, his pain at her betrayal of leaking his and Tyler's video to the filthy , snake-like eyes of Conrad Grayson. He's relieved and surprised when she sighs, her voice soft and understanding. In a way it makes him uneasy, this soft side of her he's uncovered. He wonders if her vulnerability the other night was more than just a fluke.
"You're right," she relents. It catches him off guard and he's a little afraid that it might have worked, that he might have actually won. "You need your own life, your own place." She holds his eyes for a moment, and she sees the shock in them, she sees the resignation too, like he's been expecting her to kick him out. He's been afraid ever since he got home and realized that his presence monitoring Victoria had been necessary. He figured Ems would throw him out due to annoyance at him, at his unavailability. But this...this freeing him from her revengenda, this was not what he expected. It's not what he wanted. Before he can protest, she's already starting towards the stairs, her voice having regained its hard edge.
"I don't care what you do tonight, but you can't stay here." It's that quick, her crushing of him. The stings hurts, so much so that she's halfway up before he finds his voice.
"I don't think you should be alone." He doesn't like to think about her in her father's house, the scared little girl whose world was torn apart. In his eyes, no matter how many lives she crushes or death glares she sends his way, he knows that broken child is still there.
She turns, her body angled away from him; the plea in his voice making her avert his gaze.
"I won't be." She has a scheme in the works, and more than comforting her now, curiosity drives him to want to stay, to see what her brilliant mind has cooked up. But she doesn't give him the chance and he knows by now not to expect it from her. He slips quietly past her to the guest bedroom to pack.
She watches him walk up and her breath tightens in her throat. She watches him slowly pack all of his things, leaving the clam cam and the laptop on the kitchen island as he slinks towards the door. His posture is defeated, his shoulders low; he is not the man who seemed so solid a presence in her home, refusing to let her wallow in the memories that were necessary to fuel her fire of vengeance. She won't let herself show remorse or pity for him. She won't let herself call his name and stop him, invite him to the kitchen for a drink and to continue their spying. She has to let him go. It wasn't a lie when she said she wouldn't be alone; what she has planned could endanger his life and she won't let that happen again. This is what she will tell him if he ever asks, which he won't, because it's a line he wishes didn't even exist. She won't tell him how she felt after their night together. She won't tell him about the anger and confusion and longing that arose when she was forced to turn away from him.
Flashback:
She snuggled against him, comfortable, relishing the warmth he offered, caught somewhere between the oblivion of sleep and the alert state of consciousness. Her eyes fully opened, blinking rapidly; she was momentarily dazed before shooting straight up in bed as Nolan rolled over on his side, facing away from her. Her eyes followed the line of his spine underneath his thin t-shirt to the shape of his shoulders, almost mesmerized as a hand reached out to touch him. She snapped it back like a rubber band at the last second, shocked at herself. Quickly she scrambled out of the warm, queen sized bed and stumbled down the stairs, feeling almost like a drunk. She braced herself carefully against the stairwell, glancing back up to make sure she was alone. Alone. Like I should be.She was trained to be someone for whom companionship was a nuisance; her life had taught her that it only led to betrayal. Her body still radiated the warmth she must have absorbed from her sheets and from him. He'd offered comfort and she hoped she'd done the same for him. A part of her that was growing in strength told her to budge a little, to let Nolan fully in, as a partner and as a friend. Living together, they had developed a different sort of camaraderie, and having him there, as a friend to come home to, had been a feeling she wanted to keep. She shook her head again, but the physical movement did nothing to remove the very real, emotional thoughts pulsing through her mind, almost giving her a headache. Deciding coffee would be better, she walked into the kitchen, pausing as a white envelope greeted her. Miss Emily Thorne. It spelled out in black script. It could have only come from one person and contained only one thing: a phone number. She tore it to bits and tossed it in the trash, the number already ingrained in her mind. Her phone was pressed to her ear in a second; the biting anger was already fighting its way to the surface. He answered on the first ring.
"What the hell do you think you're doing sneaking into my house?"
"Takeda wanted me to get a message to you." His smooth British voice once brought her comfort; now it made her grind her teeth.
"What is it, Aiden?"
"Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer." She snorted.
"Really? I didn't think Seinsei was that cliché."
"He was talking about Nolan." Her body stiffened. She didn't put it past her revenge schoolmate to spy on her home, but she or Nolan would have noticed that by now.
"Are you watching me?"
"I don't have to. Takeda said never to lose sight of the true person you must get close to: your enemy, your end goal. Do not let emotions guide you-"
"-or I will fail. I'm aware."
"Then apply it, damn it! The only person you're hurting is yourself."
"I told you I don't need you to save me! Don't pretend like you have my best interests at heart."
"Always have, Amanda." She slammed the phone shut in anger, heat rising in her body. Emily knew Aiden was right, Takeda was right; they'd spend eight weeks drilling it into her again. She'd lost control, she'd gotten emotionally involved and it'd ended with Tyler dead, her fiance almost in prison for life, and the white-haired man using Nolan to draw her to him. She couldn't have let him die in that man's clutches. It was more than his technical brilliance, more than his loyalty, it was the man himself. And that was precisely the problem. Emily knew all this, she knew what had to be done. Little, broken Amanda was the one who hated it, the one who needed other people, the one who wanted to fight Emily on it. The woman glanced back up the stairs and made her way slowly to the guest bedroom, where Nolan still lay asleep. She stood in the doorway and whispered, "Goodbye, Nolan." She wouldn't leave him as a partner, he was useful and she needed him in that way. But he needed to go from the house, let her become her icy self again. Anything else besides partners in crime...she put the thought from her mind when she went to sleep on the couch, alone.