Disclaimer: I Do Not Own Revenge, I Just Love It

Chapter 5: Before The Calm

I'm still in love with Sarah" he finishes, his voice sounding steady, resolute, as he stands up hoping to be able to escape from her as quickly as possible once her initial reaction is over. Those words give him no satisfaction, but he says it anyway, a serious look in his eyes as he forces himself to look at Emily's face. Surely that will be enough to push her into leaving, to make her hate him.

He watches as her dark brown eyes widen in surprise, but then he casts his eyes away from her, he doesn't want to see the rest of her reaction, her hurt.

He waits, waits for her to say something, anything... and then he hears a sound coming from her lips, is that a whimper? Is Emily Thorne going to break down in front of him? The thought scares him, she never cries, or if she does never in front of him, there was only one time she did. The memory flows back to him only adding more guilt to the crushing feeling he feels inside of him.

There it was again, that sound; stronger, louder, and harsher. Looking up at her in surprise, his brows furrow in confusion when he realizes that it is not a whimper, she is not crying, she is laughing, if he can even call it that. It doesn't sound like Emily's laugh; light, happy, and contagious, that's how he remembers it. When she used to laugh her whole face would light up, her eyes would twinkle, and as he stared at her, his mouth curling up into a smile, which evidently turned into laughter too, afterwards he'd always want to lean into her and kiss her passionately on those lips of hers... often he did.

No, this was not her laugh... it couldn't be, it sounded so cold and hollow, devoid of everything that made her laugh so endearing.

Looking back up at her, his eyes filled with a dooming forlornness, he wanted to whisper sorry, and the moment her eyes had connected with his and subsequently her empty sounding laughter had ended, that urge had only intensified... but he didn't. What would sorry do?

Trying to discern the emotions she had to be feeling through her eyes, Daniel stared into them as if captivated by them, in a way he was. Captivated by the way she managed to conceal it all from him, she was quite skilled at that, she'd always been so hard to read, even without trying to be... or maybe she had tried, maybe that was why they had been drifting apart before the wedding... because he could never figure out how she truly felt.

Daniel was lying and she knew it, Sarah, he couldn't love her, Emily refused to believe that, especially that he loved that brunette more than he loved herself. Whatever, they were now or whatever he felt now, Daniel Grayson had loved her before and deeply, that was a fact...it had to be, she had wholeheartedly felt it from him and she had wholeheartedly loved him back. Anyway you couldn't just go through the relationship they had by faking it, it would just crumble...though thinking about it even with love it had crumbled in the end.

Crumbled, disintegrated and left to the ruin, that was their relationship, though the funny thing was, those feelings from the relationship hadn't just vanished along with it...not completely. She wished they had, it would make it all the easier, especially after the way it all blew up, but no matter how much she willed oblivion to snatch them up and erase them, they still lingered; as fragments, as memories and as holes in her fickle heart.

This had to apply to him too, all those fragments and memories lingering in his mind and his heart. In which case, especially after what he had done to her, he couldn't possibly love Sarah, he wouldn't have the room, not with the array of complicated emotions he must be holding for herself.

It was funny, Daniel was just using Sarah as an escape, from herself. With a satire sense of humour, it was really quite funny, in a melancholy way of course.

"Em's say something" he pleads, the laughter not being the reaction he expects or needs. He needs her to be angry or upset. God at this point he not only needs it, he wants it and desperately.

Because of the twisted, turbulent situation he'd plundered into with her, he needs Emily's anger to relieve him. He knows how screwed up that sounds, and he hates it, he despises it, it shows just how intricately, Emily and himself had managed to completely, for lack of a better word, fuck up their relationship.

It's on the back of his mind always, but he can't think about it right now, he can't dwell on it, he can only think about her anger, her rage and how it will be his saving grace, his impetus for escape from the maze they foolishly locked themselves into.

After the storm comes the calm, isn't that what they say? If the storm's her anger, then maybe the calm is a fresh start, for the both of them.

Maybe after the storm, that parasite inside of him might recede, he doesn't expect it to simply disappear, no that would be too easy, too benevolent on his soul. But he just wants it to recede a little bit, so that he can learn to cope with his guilt and regret for shooting his love. It would probably be easier too since Emily in her amnesiac innocence wouldn't be around him to inadvertently feed more of his flesh to the parasite inside of him.

Where would Emily be after the storm he wonders, would she remember? Could she move on? He had hurt her monstrously, that was an unequivocal fact, a nasty truth. Could she ever trust again? Trust enough to find love, to find someone good, ten times better than the man he became, fifty actually. Would that guy love her unconditionally, break down her walls to take away all her pain, make her smile, make her laugh like how she used to? Would he tell her he loved her, hold her close to him in his arms and kiss her tenderly on the lips?

Daniel's only torturing himself thinking about all this but he continues anyway, his self-condemnation driving his own abuse. Would that new love bear her children, children she had always wanted, children she had talked about one night with himself?

He still remembers that night, it had been late midnight and he had lovingly coerced her into staying the night with him, she had obliged, and that night as they lay snuggled against each other underneath the thick warm duvet, they had whispered, talking about things they never really had before; one being children, and he remembered that as he listened to her talk about children and her desire for them...for a family, all in correlation to their future, he had never felt closer to her.

He had ruined that completely though at least for them, but maybe just maybe he didn't ruin that whole dream for her. Though his heart ached thinking about it, maybe after the storm, she could find a new man, a good man, and lay down some roots of her own, maybe she could be happy, god knows it would be a while before he could. A start to healing, that's what he needs to be happy again, and the pain surrounding the both of them to slowly begin to subside. This he knows will take a while, a long while, especially with the deep but self-destructive love they tragically held, but it would be a start, one he doesn't have right now.

But before all that he has to brace the storm, he has to take her pain-induced anger, so that the calm can slowly settle into their lives, and so he watches, feeling chills as her dark eyes penetrate his own, her face having tightened in anger, "Sarah" she spits out as if the name alone is venom, "You've never loved her as much as you do me, not then and not now". She says it slowly, her voice low and callous, trying to cover the pain her voice might betray.

Neither denying nor affirming her claim, he deliberately casts his eyes away, feeling off balanced. The feeling she's emulating off of herself disturbs him, he can't put his finger on it, but he feels as if the anger she is displaying doesn't add up to Sarah, he's almost certain of, there's something more...

"Pure cowardice at its finest, that's all this is, all you are " she adds, her voice dripping with animosity.

He flinches at that word despite himself; he's always hated it and the countless times he's thought it applied to him. She knows that, she's hitting it right where it hurts most.

And so she continues, standing up in her anger as she carries on, her voice like a sharp knife jabbing into his skin at every angry statement, exposed through her low, cold tone."You're a coward who can't lie in the pit you made for yourself, a coward who hides behind his filthy parents, a coward who can't look me in the eyes and tell me the truth..." Her voice inadvertently raises at that last phrase in her anger and disgust, while his face grows inadvertently taut, the colour beginning to drain from his cheeks, especially when he looks into her eyes and sees the pain, they finally reveal.

Did she know? Had she remembered he had shot her... but when? She had just announced to the press that her memory hadn't come back, could she have remembered between that short time of then to now or had she been holding it in all along?... but for how long? And why?

A million questions flooded his mind and with it his panic and guilt, she wasn't suppose to know, he wasn't ready for the confrontation, what could he say to her, what could anyone say to make it right?

He couldn't help believe his naiveté..., he thought she'd never remember, he thought he could get her to leave before it ever came out, he thought he wouldn't have to face the consequence of his actions but here it was staring him right in the face with such a look of animosity. How naive indeed, she knew and knowing Emily Thorne, she'd probably known all along.

Lowering back the tone of her voice, trying not to let her emotions, overwhelm her, Emily reeled in some of her blatant anger, trying not to let it leak out so early in the game, not yet, that would only reveal her pain and in turn her vulnerability. She was stronger than that, she had to be in order to get her revenge as vowed.

Originally she had wanted to drag Daniel along a little longer, it had been immensely satisfying watching his guilt swallow him up as she played innocent... but it didn't feel like enough anymore, not after he had mentioned Sarah. His lie, his denial, his trying to get rid of her, through the mention of his mistress, had struck a nerve with her a bad one, and now she wanted blood.

But she was much too calculatingly, too manipulating, to simply release her unquenched anger, no, she had more control than that, she'd been brewing over what he did to her for weeks, hiding it; holding in the rage, disgust and pain that filled her heart every time she looked at him or even thought of him. In return, channeling it into resentment, a much more constructive weapon; cutting, cold and cruel.

"You're disgusting" Emily continued, her onslaught clearly not over as she spitefully said, "hiding behind Sarah, thinking that you can start new, thinking that if you put your love into it, then you can forget about me, isn't that right Daniel? Isn't that why you went back to her because she's your escape, your door marked exit? It's not because you love her but because you loved me too much and now don't know how to deal with your guilt and your pain? You're just running away...cowardice at its finest"

A malicious and cutting analysis that even Daniel can't deny for its accuracy in all her scrutiny is correct.

"I-I" he faltered, not knowing what to say, what could he say? He was disgusting, "I'm sorry" he uttered, his voice low, like he already knew the weakness of his words despite his pure honesty.

"Sorry" she repeats bitterly, her voice cold and sharp and the expression on her face no warmer nor softer, "You of all people should know that sorry means nothing Daniel... I mean why would it? It clearly meant nothing to you the night you shot me."

Daniel's face completely whitens, as the words he's been fearing, are brought to life, while the satisfaction Emily feels from saying it aloud, is unrivaled to anything she's felt for weeks. 'The night you shot me, he'd been hiding that fact, ignoring what he did to her, so it did feel nice to let out, nice indeed, in a sad, bitter, desolate kind of way.

Staring him down, her eyes locked onto his with such a raw sense of intensity, she almost felt like smiling, a sly little smile, one that would make the insides of his stomach twist up in fear and regret. But she didn't, she wasn't done yet, she still had more to say, more to get off her chest, "We were standing there on the deck together and I uttered sorry and I-I meant it with every bone in my body" Her voice raises at this part, her voice emphasizing the words, 'every bone in my body' and he wonders whether purposely or inadvertently. He guesses the latter, for some reason, she seems to be trying to cloak the passion behind her emotions, as if she was only a bystander to his cruelty and not the victim, as if she was only vaguely affected. He can sense the rage, the anger, the mistrust, the disdain... the pain but she doesn't want to let it show, not an uncontrollable sense of anger and definitely not her pain.

However, it's not completely working, she is only human after all, she can't cleanly separate her anger from her pain or her actions from her emotions, and so she struggles. Especially with what she says last, she realizes this herself, as her voice fluctuates with the emotions even she can't hide, and so she gives up, letting the pain and anger come out in all its rawness "but you still shot me Daniel, you shot me twice, watched as I fell into the ocean and then you left me to die alone, in the cold, vast ocean on the night of our wedding!"

There it was fully out in the open, like an exposed wound, painful, scary and bloody hard to stomach.

He felt a lump begin to form in his throat and he swallowed, not that it helped, his throat still felt constricted probably from the guilt, piling up inside of him. It felt dry too, scorched; he needed a drink, something with some spice, something to help drown his dread, his guilt, his cowardice as she put it, he wouldn't mind the sting, in fact he'd love it, that burning sensation, sliding down his throat, and settling into his stomach, it could be his payment, his little underground deal, for that dangerous liquid to haze his mind into a state where things were different, obscure.

But it was dangerous the stronger part of his mind, reminded him, it corroded his judgement, it contributed to him, hurting Emily Thorne...even though they were married he couldn't even say wife, from hurting his wife, it felt wrong after what he'd done, to bestow her of the loving title wife and himself husband. How could he when he'd lifted a gun towards her chest and shot?

Those words rung in his head again haunting him, "but you still shot me Daniel, you shot me twice, watched as I fell into the ocean and then left me to die alone, in the cold, vast ocean on the night of our wedding."

Needless to say, all hope of the calm, coming after the storm, dissipated, as those words flew out her mouth, confirming his fear. Even if this storm passed, the wreckage it would leave behind would dispel all chances of calm.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter, there's the second half of this to come next chapter.

It's been a while, but I'm glad I finally managed to get this chapter out, comments are appreciated =D