Flashback: Morning of Emily's testimony, shortly after Nolan has left.
The cold, running, sink water that Emily is using to wash out her coffee mug almost drowns out the subtle click of her front door. She turns, apprehensive and tense, realizing she can't see the intruder from her position. She shifts to the stairs, pulling out her gun and aiming it, even getting out a stern warning,
"Nolan, if that's you I will shoot you for sneaking up on me like that," before seeing a pair of dark hands held up in the air in surrender.
"Oh trust me, Ms. Thorne, I wouldn't want to find myself in the path of your gun." She lowers her weapon, replacing her heiress look.
"Mr. Brooks. I'm sorry, I thought you were someone else." She chuckles, sliding the gun smoothly back into its place.
"Ah yes, your friend Nolan. Partners in crime, aren't you?" She plasters on her smile, her eyes dark as she avoids his question.
"What can I do for you, Mr. Brooks?" He steps closer, but his stance is confrontational, the look on his face too smug for Emily's liking.
"Nothing much. All I need from you is an agreement."
"On what?"
"On saving your fiance." Her brows crinkle, a suspicious kind of anger, stewing beneath the blonde's calm surface. "And I have just the thing to help convince you."
Brooks tosses a thick file onto the glass table in front of her. Ice runs down her spine as she barely spares it a second glance. She knows that file much better than she wants to. "Come now, Ms. Clarke. How long did you think you could keep your identity a secret in the Hamptons?" The ice in her veins spreads to her temple, making it throb. She is completely caught off guard, vulnerable, but she'll be damned if she shows it to this man, who now has the power to destroy everything she's so carefully built. Fury burns in her eyes, a contrast to her frozen body. Her rage is partially directed at herself, at her incompetence in hiding absolutely everything that ever connected her to the name Amanda Clarke.
"What do you want?" She doesn't bother asking where Brooks got it, refusing to betray even the slightest of weakness in front of this man. She avoids his eyes with the question, much like when she offered Frank any sum of money to keep his mouth shut about his suspicions. The lawyer shrugs, a shark if there ever was one.
"To win my case." She scoffs and points at the manila folder, disgusted.
"You don't need that to win your case."
"True. The kind of lawyer I am, there are certainly other ways." She glares at him.
"I have one idea right now." She snaps coldly. A lighthearted chuckle escapes his mouth, as if the woman's life and her father's legacy is nothing more than a game. And to him, it is little more. A way to win his case. He doesn't care about exposing her; he is not like those in the Hamptons, who strive to cut down everyone in their path. But if he can use it as leverage, then you can bet he will.
"Oh, I'm sure you do. I'm sure you have a million ways to save your fiance and your childhood sweetheart." The mention of Jack ignites something inside Emily. She steps threateningly close.
"If you go after him, I will have you disbarred, humiliated, and discredited across this entire nation." He doesn't so much as flinch under a gaze that has broken men stronger than him before.
"Like your father was?" She refuses to betray emotion, especially if he's read the damn papers, if he knows what being taken away from her father did to her.
"Tell me how you know."
"Ryan Huntley and I have long traveled in the same legal circles." He paces around Emily as if to illustrate his point. Her unforgiving eyes follow him until he's back where he started. "I know David's lawyer well. Unfortunately, even our combined legal aptitude could not have kept your father safe from the clutches of Conrad Grayson." Her breath hitches in her throat at his name.
"So if you know the truth, why are you helping the Graysons?"
"I'm getting paid." She laughs, a cold, hollow sound reverberating from the house.
"That's it? You have no conscience?" His eyebrows raise; the man is rather amused.
"The same could be said of you." He sighs as her lips purse tightly, a heated anger running through every vein in her body. "Look. I am not a policeman, Ms. Clarke. I will do whatever my clients ask. Besides, your fiance, my client, wasn't even around at the time David Clarke was framed. Which is why I assume you're sparing him while you go about wrecking others' lives?" He raises an eyebrow. She was truly a fascinating woman, disturbed. It had shocked him to find her true identity, and he hadn't been shocked in almost 20 years.
"Does Daniel know?" Brooks faces her, smugness coloring his dark features. "Was he a part of this?" Her questions are straightforward, not laced with any sense of betrayal. She will be hurt, she admits, if it was Daniel's idea, but she will not be broken. She will not be like her father.
"Don't worry, Ms. Clarke. You can continue your little affair with the young Grayson. He is none the wiser about your true identity and deception. Though he is wary of a certain bartender whose place you frequent." Heat begins rising to her cheeks but a schoolgirl blush is the last thing she needs right now if she wants to uphold her power. "In fact," Brooks continues, "it was his idea." Her face betrays no surprise. But he can see the fear lacing her forehead with lines, the panic at her plan unraveling. "Fear not. It was only a reaction to his jealousy. He is only aware that I am informing you of your role in the trial. He doesn't know exactly how I will convince you."
"So why don't you turn me in?" The question is rhetorical. She knows that any effort he makes will be quickly crushed. They seem to be on the same page in that regard.
"As I said, I am not a cop. But I am a man of the law. Which means I cannot condone whatever illegal and desperate measures you may want to take to free both of your men."
"Oh like blackmailing me isn't?" She isn't backing down, she will carry out her plan of framing Lee, Victoria's "mini-Frank."
"I think we can both agree it's not an option for you to have this information out in the world." She fixes him with her eyes, so stark and furious that he almost takes a step back. But Benjamin Brooks has dealt with the harshest and most intimidating judge in the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. He is not frightened by the lithe blond woman.
"You would do anything for your fiance, correct?" She fixes him with a glare. "And I imagine he would not be too pleased to find you have been putting another man's safety above his." She opens her mouth to protest, but he holds up a hand. "You can save them both. But not yourself. Your choice." She doesn't respond. He doesn't care. "You're a smart woman, Ms. Clarke. I have no doubt in your ability to make the right one."
With that, he turns to the door, but pauses halfway there. Without turning to face her, he tears her last resort to pieces.
"By the way, I thought you might want to take a look at this. It might help you speed up your decision making process."
He slips a plastic bag into the folder; he's won and he knows it as he saunters our the door. She refuses to crumble at the encounter she's just had, and cautiously approaches the folder. Picking up the clear plastic bag, her frozen heart sinks. Pictures and DNA samples, labeled, processed, and ready for submission in court lay behind the plastic, all depicting one thing: Jack's bloody hoodie. She slams down the bag in frustration, her choice made. If there's one thing Emily Thorne hates more than anything, it's being manipulated.
Then Emily slowly walks to the fireplace and tosses in her file, watching in silence as the paper burn, turning into smoke.