I

16 years ago, December

Jonathan Martell stands at the railing of a wide balcony, overlooking the Edison Ballroom. Below him, hundreds of Duke-Sanger employees dine and dance, celebrating a prosperous end to the fiscal year. The place is uncomfortably warm, but up high there is an artificial breeze that cools the sweat prickling across his forehead.

At the center of the hall he catches sight of his wife's vibrant red hair, in amongst a large group of shareholders. Always the fulcrum, Donna, with her intricate gestures and charismatic and theatrical way with words, people flock to her at any event. He'd call her the life of the party if not for his other redhead, radiant as her mother, leading the conga line out on the dance floor.

Donna must feel the weight of Jonathan's gaze, because her entrancing dark eyes flick upward, appraising him. He takes in her slender, gorgeous figure, draped in a dress of ethereal green, the neckline plunging in a way that causes something to stir inside of him – a physical need, as furious and persistent as when they were teenagers. Her red lips lift in a sultry, knowing smile. He clutches his chest, mock struck by her affection. Her smile widens and steals his breath.

"Your wife won't be suspicious," Melanie Zegareli says at Jonathan's back, "with me dragging you away from the party like this?" The tall, blond-haired CEO of Duke-Sanger sits at a couch in the center of the loft, long legs crossed, hands clasped in her lap. The low lighting in the room makes her look appropriately menacing. "She might assume we're having an affair."

"That's a bit ambitious," Jonathan says, turning to her. He leans against the balcony railing and sips his bourbon.

"Ambitious?" The CEO cocks an eyebrow. "I didn't realize you had the disability of an ego, Jonathan."

"I wouldn't call it egotism."

Mel smiles. "Devotion, then? How rare. But of course, every man has his price."

Jonathan envisions his wife, strutting around with that wonderful cleavage and sexy smile. Invaluable. Although…now that he's thinking about it, he can't say when the last time they actually had proper sex was. The kid almost seems to have radar for it. Just when they're about to go at it, Alice is at the door because she can't sleep and of course Dee relents – gleefully almost. Deliriously in love with the child, whenever Alice is present he is pushed out, second rate, the chief spot in his wife's mind stolen from him. He wonders if it's natural to feel jealous of your own kid. Probably not.

"And every woman has her costs," he mutters.

The CEO laughs, rich and genuine. "I've always admired your directness," she says. "It's why, despite your youth, I voted for you. And I must say, you've done well. We've made more profit this year than the last five combined."

"I can hardly take credit for that." Jonathan moves away from the balcony and further into the dark room. "I'm merely a pawn, pushed by our greedy shareholders to sign along their dotted lines."

Mel leans forward, inspecting Jonathan as if deciding whether or not to take offense. "Be that as it may," she says, settling back, "you deserve to be rewarded."

Jonathan unbuttons his suit jacket and collapses into the chair across from her. He waits with a lack of intrigue that would normally cause the business woman a great deal of annoyance. Tonight, however, her self-satisfied smirk doesn't waiver.

At last, she says, "We've decided to promote your wife to COO."

Jonathan's face sets, his stare goes cold. "That's nepotism."

Mel shrugs. "A risk we're willing to take to show Donna the recognition she deserves."

"You say you admire directness, and here you are feeding me bullshit." He places his drink on the table beside him, the gesture, deliberately casual. The threat to his wife unnerves him, but other than the bead of sweat trickling down the side of his face, he gives nothing away. It is stoicism beat into him by the military. Ex-marine turned office boy, he almost craves a good battle. "You want to implicate her."

Mel folds her arms, still smiling. "Can you blame me? As a woman who's been twice divorced, I can say that lovers do like to drag each other in their quarrels. I know you've told her about our friends in India and we can't risk a rat."

"Donna wouldn't—"

"I don't give a shit what Donna would or wouldn't do," she says. "People are inherently unpredictable. A callous, practical man such as yourself must see the necessity here. This is for the good of the company."

"And if she refuses, what then?"

"Then you resign."

He nods. "No sense of morality, I see."

"Oh, don't pretend you're any better. I know what you did to secure your position as chairman."

"And still, you voted for me."

"Of course. Power and information are relevant and you showed a full hand of both." She tilts her head, examining him carefully. "Now, Donna has information. Why not power too?"

"This isn't power you're offering, it's a prison sentence."

"Only if we get caught."

"I suppose that's one way to look at it," Jonathan says, standing. "In any case, I think we can agree this meeting serves no further purpose."

Mel's smile falters. He can tell his inability to be cowed makes her uneasy. It wasn't just his directness she voted for, it was the idea that he could be manipulated. She put him into power thinking his desperate need to protect his family would make him weak, when in reality it makes him savage and ruthless.

Mel follows Jonathan to the staircase. At the base of the steps, Alice sits with her back to them, staring out at the dance floor, conga line moving along without her. Jonathan feels a prick of sadness; any normal, healthy six year old would be running wild, yet here his daughter sits, calm and politely restrained. He tells himself she's just tired, but knows she's still too ill to keep up.

"Such a doll," Mel says, eyeing the little redhead. "Is she doing well? I noticed she still has her chemo port - last I heard she was in remission."

"Maintenance therapy."

"Ah." Mel nods. "Well, thank god for our health benefits, right? The out of pocket costs of therapies must be a fortune." Her eyes slide over and fix on him. "As I understand it, your dishonorable discharge makes it so you can't receive government assistance or bank loans - can you imagine how arduous it would be if you weren't employed?"

Jonathan makes a fist, burying his nails into his palm. The anger is a strange sensation. It's not often he lets things get under his skin, but the discharged marine dig is a particularly sore spot.

"Anyway," Mel continues, putting a hand on his upper arm, drawing it down. It's a casual touch, but there's this edge of possessiveness to it that makes his skin crawl. "I hope you will share what we discussed with your wife."

She turns and disappears back into the loft.

Jonathan sets his jaw against the anger coursing through him and descends the steps, worried that if he hesitates another moment he may give into the urge to shove her over the balcony. He stops at the step Alice is perched on and regards the child silently.

Alice looks up at him and smiles. With her red hair and light dusting of freckles, she is the spitting image of her mother. Considering all of Jonathan's flaws, it's hard for him to believe that something this beautiful and innocent could be made up of part of him. It feels wrong being her father, has always felt wrong, from the moment he first held her in his arms the wrongness set in, like his hands were too rough, too corrupt to be touching such soft skin.

Jonathan forces himself to smile back and sits down on the step beside Alice.

"What are you up to?" he asks.

"Forty inches," she says, grinning. The ongoing joke. A few months back, Donna had mentioned over dinner how she wanted more romance out of him – prose about her beauty, Shakespeare quoted to her over morning coffee. Jonathan said he didn't like to speak in a way that transcended literal interpretation and now her and the kid go out of their way to give him a hard time about it.

He must look unamused because she offers quickly, "I'm waiting for Mom. She said she'd be over in a second to watch my cool dance move, but it's been forever. A billion seconds at least."

"I find that hard to believe," Jonathan tells her. "A billion seconds is well over thirty years and you don't look a day over five."

Alice scrunches her nose up, suppressing a smile. "I age good," she says, plucking his pocket square out of his chest pocket. She lays her head against him and unfolds the piece of silk.

Silence falls over them. Jonathan stares at his hands, trying to come up with something to talk to the kid about. He's never been one for casual conversation – words, his father told him, should always serve a purpose, and what use is there speaking to a child?

Thankfully it isn't long until Donna notices the two of them sitting there miserably. She scoops the kid up, who has fallen asleep in Jonathan's sobering silence, and the three of them leave out the back doors in an attempt to dodge the long goodbyes.

Later, inside their bedroom, Jonathan watches Donna take her jewelry off in front of the wardrobe. Normally after a party she'd talk and talk, animating for him, with faces and voices, scenes he'd missed out on, but tonight she's unnaturally quiet.

"Something bugging you?" he asks, sliding out of his suit jacket.

"She's pretty."

"Who?"

"Melanie."

Jonathan folds the jacket in half and drops it on the bed. "Is she?"

"Very much so."

He meets Donna's gaze through the mirror. "Is this your subtle way of asking me if I'm sleeping with her?"

"Are you?"

"No."

She casts her eyes down and fixes them on the dresser. "I know it's petty. It's just…I wouldn't blame you, I guess."

"Where's this coming from."

"I've neglected you."

Jonathan sighs. "Donna…"

"I should have made more time for us."

"And I should have sat longer at Alice's bedside or took her to at least one of those infusion treatments. We did what we did, honey."

He goes to her. He gently takes the earrings she's grasping and sets them on the dresser, then helps her unzip her dress, pushing it off her shoulders. It falls to the floor in a heap.

He tips her chin up and looks into her eyes.

"There is no other woman," he says softly. "There will never be another woman. You're it for me."

She smiles at him, almost shyly, and god, all these years together and his stomach still flips. He grabs her by the waist and lifts her onto the dresser. She hooks her hand around his neck and pulls him into a kiss, slow and deep. His palms ride up her thighs, all the way to the crease between her legs. His thumb strokes gently over the already damp cotton.

He pulls away and fixes her with a look.

"Oh, for god's sake. You're in bespoke Brioni - how could I not be turned on?"

Jonathan grins, thumb rubbing a little firmer. She closes her eyes and bites her bottom lip, fingers digging into his shoulders.

"What did you think of my speech?" he murmurs, breath tickling the skin just below her ear.

"Empowering." She leans back to look at him, suddenly serious. "I'm always proud to be your wife, but tonight especially."

The words stab into him. His fingers freeze. He can only stare at her.

"Jonathan…" She says, sounding concerned. "What is it?"

He sighs and reluctantly lets go of her. "Mel—"

"It's okay," she cuts in. "You're right. We did what we did. Let's just focus on rebuilding."

"No, Jesus. Dee, listen. Mel wants to promote you to COO."

"I…what?" Donna looks at him with a frown, as if she thinks she hasn't heard him correctly.

"They're assuming I told you about the investment we've made in India. You're a liability to the company. Promoting you to COO incriminates you—"

"And keeps me from talking," she says quietly.

He slumps down on the bed across from her. "I have to resign. There's no other choice. We'll go back to Connecticut—"

"And then what?" She looks down at him, face firm – perched half-naked on a dresser and still his wife somehow exudes control. "We've been down this road, Johnny. Even if you could get a job with your record, Alice's doctors are here. Her school is here. I can't…" She shakes her head. "I won't do to her what my parents did to me – uproot her and force her into another life. It wouldn't be fair."

"Life is hardly fair, Donna."

"Don't you think she knows that better than anyone?" She slides off the dresser to stand in front of him. "I won't put her through anymore hardship, Jonathan. I won't."

"And both her parents winding up in prison, what do you think that'll do to her?"

"Do you have any idea how long it takes to secure a conviction in a federal prosecution? Discovery alone could take years, then there's impartiality challenges, technical errors, appeals, extenuating circumstances. Alice could be eighteen by the time we're charged with anything, and that's if the SEC is quick to find us out."

Suddenly it hits him, she knew this was coming. Her sleepless nights have been spent planning their next tragedy, preparing for the hit while aiming her next swing.

Donna crosses the room, pacing, eyes bright, color high, full of nervous energy. Jonathan watches with amazement, finding himself feeling foolish for wanting to protect her. His wife is not some timid, fragile damsel. She is fiery, tough as a soldier and infuriatingly stubborn.

And of course, this is what he loves most about her.

"Okay," he says.

She lifts a mildly surprised eyebrow. "Okay?"

"Okay." He grabs her by the hips and pulls her into his lap. "No point in fighting about it. I'll announce your promotion on Monday."

Her dark eyes bore into his, searching for something, hesitation maybe. Like she expects him to take it back. "COO…" she whispers.

He smirks at her. She grins back.

God help them.

II

Rachel apprehensively looks over Mike's research, flipping past page after page of meeting minutes, memorandums, and contracts with foreign corporate clients, all signed by Chief Operating Officer, Donna Martell.

First a mother, now this? She feels dizzy – her best friend for years and somehow these colossal details have slipped through the cracks.

"It can't be a coincidence," Mike says from his desk. "The district attorney must've had something on her – damning evidence, probably – and she used Harvey to get a foot in so she could bury it."

Rachel's mouth falls open at the accusation. She shakes her head. "Mike, this is Donna. She wouldn't do that."

"Are you sure?" Mike pins her with his eyes. Rachel fights the urge to step back, feeling like a shoddy witness on the stands. "We clearly have no idea who Donna even is, least of all what she's capable of."

"How can you say that?" Rachel glares at him, outraged. "If there's one thing about Donna we can be certain about, it's her loyalty to Harvey."

Mike nods. "Sure – but why is she so loyal?"

The question puts Rachel off guard. "Because…" Because… Because…

"Because she's guilty," he concludes, standing. "C'mon Rach, you have to admit it makes sense. What else could justify blind loyalty other than a guilty conscience?"

"Love," she argues, feeling stubborn.

"I think," Mike says slowly, "that if she loved him that much she wouldn't have kept so many secrets from him."

Mike steps around his desk and Rachel moves to block his exit.

"Mike, please," she begs.

Her fiancé's eyes soften, and she doesn't have to finish her statement because he knows what she's asking. Please, don't go to Harvey.

"I told you, I can't—" Mike freezes.

Rachel peeks cautiously over her shoulder. There is a man standing in the door, tall in an imposing sort of way, with dark hair and almost colorless gray eyes. He is statuesquely handsome – strong jaw, high cheekbones, full lips – but there is something about him, a dark brooding intensity maybe, or perhaps it's those eyes, how they seem to look through Rachel, giving her the eerie sense of blindness.

She steps back, crashing into Mike.

"Hate to interrupt," the man says. "But I need to speak to Harvey. Do you mind fetching him for me?"

"Couldn't have called?" Mike says, his voice oddly clipped.

"I wasn't aware you boys knew how to use a phone, considering how often you show up to places uninvited."

Mike snorts. "Funny, wasn't it you knocking at my door at three in the morning?"

Finally, it clicks. Jonathan Martell.

Donna's ex-husband.

"It was two as I recall. But I'm not the one with an eidetic memory, am I?"

Jonathan steps further into the office. Stiff-backed and commanding, he has an air of authority about him that has Rachel instinctively stepping out of his way.

Mike watches him carefully, rigid, as if the man is a wild animal idly stalking him. "What do you want?"

"I believe I already answered this question," Jonathan says mildly.

"Harvey's busy."

Jonathan narrows his eyes, irritated, but the expression is brief and gone within an instant. "As he should be," he says. "Managing partner of such a prestigious law firm. Was that Matt O'Brien I ran into in the elevator? Said Harvey invited him to renegotiate his contract and then stood him up. What tact. Then you've got that Litt fellow, screaming in the face of those poor associates in the hall. The very definition of professionalism. I am humbled to be here. Truly."

"You don't have to be so modest," Mike says, smiling derisively. "With Duke-Sanger's ninety-six counts of fraud, money laundering, insider trading, and conspiracy, your leadership as board chairman is the stuff of legend."

Jonathan shakes his head – angry? amused? – and doesn't say anything, just stares with that opaque, detached look in his eyes.

Then something catches his attention. His stiff expression softens into something like vague curiosity.

Rachel and Mike both turn and there, standing in the doorway, looking surprisingly composed is Donna. Behind her, the opposite of calm, comes Harvey, his eyes intent on Jonathan. Furious like Rachel's never seen him.

Mike reaches out quickly and pulls Rachel behind him.

III

13 years ago, February

The last witness is sworn in. Hand over bible, and still the man lies beautifully – not that it matters, because Jonathan Martell has ensured the jury will vote accordingly. It almost seems a shame because the prosecutor, Donna's white knight and Cameron Dennis' cocky ADA, Harvey Spector, is good. It's likely he would have won the case without all the jury and witness tampering, but Jonathan couldn't risk it. Not with his wife's sanity on the line; if Brandon Russo doesn't end up in prison, he's worried Donna might snap and gun the guy down.

If she ever leaves the house, that is.

Jonathan's phone buzzes in his pocket. He gets up and leaves the courtroom. He sees his mother-in-law's name on the caller ID and lets out a heavy sigh.

He picks up. "Yes?"

He expects a refined voice, polite with a hint of disdainful superiority, but is greeted by something high and helpless. "Jonathan. Where's Donna?"

"Donna? She's at home."

"With you?"

"No, I'm –" He pauses. Something is wrong, he can feel it, and he's already running out of the courthouse. "Sandra, what's going on?"

"She called me, Johnny. She called me and she was saying all of these things. Talking about how she never felt closer to me than when we lived in the apartment in Wethersfield, and…Jesus, I don't know. It just…it made me worried."

"The therapist changed one of her antidepressants recently. Maybe sentimentalism is a side effect."

"She told me she loves me, that she should have said it more, that she's sorry for being mad at me for divorcing Jim." And this of all things, her ex-husbands name, sets her to crying. "This is not her being sentimental, Jonathan. She's unstable."

He can't argue with her reasoning. Sandra is one of those born rich, married rich types. After Donna's father lost all of the family's money, she callously divorced him, but didn't quite factor in the fact she'd have to support herself. Donna picked up the slack, got a job, paid the bills, became the responsible adult, and because of this there's always been this air of bitterness between them.

Donna wouldn't just phone up her mother out of the blue and start apologizing for her teenage behaviors.

An undefined panic beginning to set in. "I'll go check on her," he says.

He doesn't wait for his mother-in-law to respond. He hangs up, rushes into the intersection and runs down the first cab he sees.

He calls Donna four times on the way. She doesn't answer. And the traffic crawls. The heavy snowfall has caused gridlocked backups. He sits at the same light for four rotations before jumping out of the taxi and jogging the rest of the way. Lower Manhattan to Tribeca, fifteen blocks in a snow storm, his old sergeant would be proud.

By the time he reaches the flat he is winded and soaking wet. He thinks of what Donna will say when he gets in, how she'll chastise him for ruining his suit, but still help him out of it. He'll apologize, he decides, straight away, he'll tell her how sorry he is for being so hard on her this morning. He'll tell her she never has to leave the house if that's not what she wants. He won't push her anymore. He'll respect her grief.

But when he opens the door the flat is dark and quiet, and Molly is waiting by the entry as if no one's home.

Jonathan runs up the stairs shouting Donna's name and gets no response. He turns for their bedroom, but notices Alice's door is open at the end of the hall. She hasn't gone in there, not since the kid died. She said she couldn't stomach it...

He creeps to the open door. "Donna?" he says, barely above a whisper. His heart is hammering like mad. He finds himself wondering how he's going to find her. Hanging from the closet? Overdosed on the bed? Wrists slit in the tub? He swallows down the panic, the grotesque images, and steps inside the room.

Empty.

And their bedroom is empty, as is the living room and the kitchen.

Numb, Jonathan sinks down onto the couch, pulls out his phone and calls the police.

IV

Never has Jonathan's composure been more of an effort than the moment he sees her. Donna, standing right in front of him. Within reaching distance.

Thirteen years.

She is the same. Tall, amber hair, captivating dark eyes…stunning. It's surreal. The equivalent of his daughter strutting through the doorway. He all but buried this woman, yet here she is, living this completely separate life as if he and Alice never existed.

A new Donna, who has tricked herself into believing that the past could never touch her here. He can read it in her face, the paleness, the inward concentration. This is down the rabbit hole, and he thinks for a moment she might crack—

Then she steps forward.

The gap closes. Audaciously she treads passed years of separation and estrangement, conquering the immense mountain of resentment stacked between them by simply crossing the office.

She does not hesitate. She reaches out, reaches into Jonathan's personal space and then fiercely beyond it. Her body collides against his, pulling him into a tight embrace, and he is shocked by how impossibly real she feels, as if instead of skin and bone he'd expected a ghostly fog. He succumbs to it, wraps his arms around her, lets her warmth saturate him and momentarily fill the echoing hollowness being without her has instilled within him.

"It's good to see you," she whispers.

God, he's missed her voice. He didn't even realize how much until now.

He nods slowly at the statement– not an adequate response but, for the moment, the most he can manage – and forces himself to let go of her. "Are you holding up okay?" he asks, stepping away. Probably further away than necessary, probably far enough to be awkward, but keeping firm is his only defense and he can't do that with her so close.

She takes in a deep breath and exhales with a shrug of her shoulders. "I've held up through worse," she says.

"That's not an answer."

"It's the best I can give." She tries to smile, but her eyes…makeup can't hide the exhaustion. She hasn't been sleeping.

Someone clears their throat. Mike, Jonathan thinks, but his eyes go to Harvey. The attorney stands darkening the doorway with the width and immensity of a boxer, his scowl infiltrating the very air, filling it with an atmospheric heaviness like that which comes before a storm. His brown eyes lock on Jonathan's, practically gleaming with hatred. "What are you doing here?" he asks.

Arrogant twat. Jonathan would love nothing more than to punch him in the face, god knows he's spent years dreaming about it, but the man looks unwell – pale, tired, his tailored Tom Ford a little too large like he's lost weight. It wouldn't feel like a fair fight.

Moved by his own gallantry, Jonathan concedes. "Anita Gibb's witness," he says. "It's Melanie Zegareli."

Donna lets out a small gasp. Clearly this wasn't news she was expecting.

"And what exactly makes this woman a threat?" Harvey asks.

Jonathan sighs. "Have you even looked at Donna's case?"

The attorney glares off the remark, and his young partner offers in his stead: "She's the CEO of Duke-Sanger."

"Good," Jonathan says. "At least one of you is doing your job."

"I get that," Harvey snaps. "What I don't understand is the risk she poses to Donna. This woman can't pin her with anything substantial. Donna had no real power as a secretary, even if she was your wife. Withholding information, destroying evidence, conspiracy – Ms. Zegareli faces the burden of proof and unless she has any actual evidence, we'll argue it's all hearsay."

Poor fool. Jonathan meets Donna's eyes. Her face is white, and as she stares at him she begins nervously fidgeting her hands. She thinks he's going to spill her secrets, and maybe part of her wishes he would, if only to spare herself the agony of it, but that's not his place.

Donna lets out a long, shaking breath. "Harvey, I wasn't…" She trails off, closes her eyes for a moment, distracted by the shame she must feel. Then she fixes her stare on the attorney, sets her face against the pain, and says it: "I was Duke-Sanger's COO."

Harvey goes very, very still. Jonathan can almost see the implications running through the man's head – that slap on the wrist he was already anxious about defending has become a guillotine.

"I know I lied," Donna says, hesitantly stepping toward him. "But how could I explain going from that to this? You would have asked questions and I would have had to –"

"Actually tell the truth?" Harvey cuts in, his voice painfully furious. "Because god forbid you're fucking honest with me."

"Harvey, please," she whispers. "Just calm down –"

"Calm down?" He yells. "Do you have any idea how much trouble you're in?"

"Yes," she says, holding firm against Harvey's blazing gaze. "I know exactly how much trouble I'm in. I did this. And I'll gladly sit in prison for the next five years knowing my crimes gave my daughter the best chance she had."

Harvey continues to glare at her, but there is a tenderness beginning to set in around his eyes and mouth – in love and hate, the man is practically splitting down the middle. It strange to feel sympathy for the person who stole your wife, Jonathan thinks, but the sympathy is there.

"I'm not asking you to defend me," Donna continues.

Harvey sighs. "No," he says, "but you know I will," and with that the man turns and stalks out. Humiliated.

Donna runs a hand through her hair, frazzled, watching the attorney's retreating figure. The dark haired girl standing quietly behind Mike Ross runs over to her and touches her shoulder gently. Donna recoils and shakes her head.

"Can Donna and I have a moment in private?" Jonathan asks.

The two attorneys share discomforted stares, then glance at Donna, who nods in silent approval.

Mike walks out, sending Jonathan a threatening look: don't you dare try anything, but the young woman lingers, hovering beside Donna, as if she fears leaving her friend alone.

"It's okay," Donna tells her softly. "I'll be okay."

The girl nods reluctantly and follows in Mike's wake, shutting the office door behind her as she goes.

With her hand still gripping her hair, Donna stares down at the carpet. She shuts her eyes, takes in a deep, therapeutic breath and straightens, composure momentarily restored.

She walks over to the chair Jonathan stands beside and settles down. Her dark gaze shifts upward in slow appraisal, taking him in from his wingtip brogues to his loose comb-over. She meets his eyes, the stare unexpectedly soft and concludes with a good-natured tsk, "You need a haircut."

Jonathan frowns. "What are you, my mother?"

"I thought it bothered you being long."

"It bothers me more having some stranger with scissors so near my throat. It's why I always had you cut it."

"I was more likely to slit your throat than a random hair dresser," she says mildly. "I think you're just cheap."

"Look at you, already the bitter ex-wife." Jonathan leans against the glass desk at his back. "A woman scorned. It suits you."

"Most things do."

He grins at her.

She tilts her head, studying him. "Is that an actual smile on your face, Jonathan? Christ, you have dimples. Eight years of marriage and I had no idea."

Jonathan rolls his eyes, but he can't deny the emotion feeling strange on his face. It's been a long time since he last smiled. "Still an insufferable smart-ass, I see."

She hums. "I had to keep hold of some of the old charm."

He nods to that and a few seconds of silence pass.

Donna crosses her legs. Her high-heeled foot bounces nervously. "So Melanie," she says. "Are they offering her immunity?"

"A lesser sentence, I suspect."

"She's going to throw me to the wolves, isn't she?"

"It seems the most sensible strategy."

Donna nods slowly. "That's it, then," she says. "I'm going to prison."

Jonathan folds his arms, irritated by her resignation. "You will if you don't start being honest with your attorney."

"I'd rather not involve him," she says stubbornly.

"Why? You're afraid he won't love you when he finds out you're not the all-knowing saint you pretend to be?"

She glares up at him. "It's not about me."

"Isn't it?"

"Johnny, I had my hand dipped into an underworld half the time I was working with him – I mean, Jesus, we blackmailed Cameron into giving him Russo, we tampered with the jury, coerced confessions..." She shakes her head, looking horrified by the weight of her own admissions. "Forget the fact that he won't want to defend me when he finds all this out, but he'll second guess every case he's ever won. It will cripple him."

"The only thing that's crippling him is you," he tells her. "You think you're protecting him from the truth, but really you're robbing the man of his dignity."

"Preserving his dignity."

"I think your definition of dignity is skewed." He stares down at her severely. "Did it even occur to you that he was the only one in the room surprised by you being COO? He trusts you, Donna – blind, hopeless, desperate trust like I've never seen it. Now stop taking advantage of it and let him in."

Her lips part, but no reply comes. Jonathan walks to the window and looks out at the cityscape, giving her a moment to consider his words.

He didn't understand before, what compelled her to leave him for a purely professional relationship with another man, but he thinks he gets it now. Being Harvey's secretary gives her purpose. The years of devoting herself to Alice's needs stripped away her own wants and desires; it took her sense of self, and instead of trying to rediscover who she is, she's fallen into this supporting role. She is a woman of war, who's grown strong and resilient, but nobody taught her after the years and years of constant threats and psychological destruction how to rebuild and find peace.

Drained, Jonathan turns back around, and finds Donna crying.

The sight stuns him. She tries to cover it up, turning away and casting her eyes to the floor, but the crying continues on, breath after breath.

Jonathan begins to wish he were somewhere else. Almost anywhere else. He rather sit in prison for forty years, go back to the bunkers, IDF alarms blaring, have mortars and rockets shot at him, than have to endure these soft sobs.

"He's going to fire me," she whispers. "And then what will I do? Thirteen years. Thirteen years and this is all I've been. A secretary."

"Then is being fired such a bad thing?" he asks in a subdued voice. "I don't know what you're looking for in life, or what you should be doing, but playing secretary for Harvey Specter for the next fifty years isn't it, surely?"

She looks at him and considers. A glint of reflexive anger sharpens her features. Then she relaxes and concludes, "No, I guess not. This was supposed to be temporary, a couple years, until Harvey went corporate, but it just…"

"Felt safe."

She nods. "Like a rock I get to hide under."

"Now here I am kicking it up. It must be hard for you, having to see me here." He told himself he wouldn't be bitter, but he can't seem to stop the hostility from oozing out of him.

"It is," she says, unbowed. Jonathan notices a stray tear streaming down her cheek and hands her his pocket square. She nods in thanks and dabs beneath her eyes before continuing. "You know me better than anyone, and there's a morbid sort of honesty in that, in being seen, that I haven't had to face in a very long time."

This is what he is to her then, a grotesque symbol, a reminder of that darker version of herself. It saddens him that after everything they've been through, all the sacrifices they made together, that this is what he boils down to in her mind.

He shakes it off, and changes the subject back to the task at hand. "Melanie is going to use you as a scapegoat. There's a meeting, one which the accountants presented a detailed structure of our investments in Cyderkon. Mel was conveniently absent and you signed in her stead."

"Are you saying she planned this?"

"It's too brutally ingenious for it not to be premeditative. Think about it, Dee. I'm chairman, you're acting CEO, and together we give the go ahead to invest in a shady company overseas. And let's not forget our motive, the dying daughter. If this goes to trial, the jury will eat it up – we'll be seen as guilty simply for the drama of it."

Donna sags, looking suddenly exhausted. "I'm so sorry, Jonathan. If I hadn't –"

"Let's not dwell." He begins to inch toward the door. "Please, talk to Harvey. He's the best chance you have, but he can't defend you if he doesn't have all of the facts."

Her lips tighten and he thinks she's going to start arguing this again, but she nods instead.

He makes to leave, but stops at the door, a question burning just beneath the surface, a question he's asked himself over and over again for thirteen years and here she is, available to answer it.

Don't confront it. He tells himself. Just walk away. Let it go.

Jonathan turns back around and meets Donna's eyes. "How come you left the way you did?"

She regards him for an extended, tense moment. The silence is like a third presence, haunting. Then finally, she says, "How can you ask me that?"

"Because I have to see you here," Jonathan says, hating himself. "I have to look around and see you living this other life and after this, I'll have to go home, walk across that hideous thirty thousand dollar rug you had to have, feed Alice's dog, stare at our family portraits, all the while wondering what the hell happened to us."

It takes a long time for her to reply. "I just couldn't do it anymore," she whispers. "It was too hard."

"So you fought like hell for Alice, but couldn't lift a finger for our marriage?"

"Jonathan…"

"Am I wrong?"

"I was grieving my daughter, how could I –"

"Our daughter," he snaps. "Ours. How fucking selfish can you be that you won't even acknowledge my loss?"

"I understand how it must have been –"

"No, Donna, you don't understand," he says coldly. "Because while you were out playing secretary with Harvey Specter, I was sitting at home waiting for the police to call and tell me they found your body in the Hudson. I thought you were dead. For two days all I could think about was how I just buried my daughter and now I have to bury my fucking wife. So don't you dare sit there and tell me you understand, because you don't."

"That's enough," a voice says at Jonathan's back.

Jonathan whirls around and finds Harvey staring him down, not with same hatred as before but a sad sort of distaste.

It is shocking then, the stark disgust Jonathan feels toward himself. It is all the shame of losing control, but none of the satisfaction.

He pushes past Harvey, almost hearing the firm's collective sigh as he makes his exit.