Grace sat on the edge of her bed. She's been dressed and ready to go downstairs for breakfast for quite some time, but something was stopping her from moving.

She was so conflicted in her heart. The way she'd left things with Oliver the night before did not sit well with her at all. She felt a deep sting of regret when thinking about it. It wasn't like her in the slightest to be so callous towards anyone, let alone someone she loved so much. But her husband had disappointed and worried her too many times these past few weeks and she had found herself becoming more and more closed off to him, if only to prevent herself from being further hurt by his actions and decisions. It was a case of self-preservation.

Still, she felt remorseful for the things she'd said to him before he had retreated to bed. Despite the fact that she didn't agree with him on the arms deal with Britain and their allies, Grace didn't want it to be another thing that put a wedge in their marriage. There were too many other things doing that already.

She didn't hate her husband, not at all. She loved him so much, and still held so much of the admiration she'd always had for him. That was why she'd been left feeling so hurt. He had let her down, time and time again, leaving her feeling so awfully disillusioned by the fact that her hero was in fact, just as human as she was.

She knew he was equally as mad with her because of the lack of support she'd given him over his efforts in Europe. She knew he held complicated but very strong feelings of devotion for his homeland and that there was more than just a sense of loyalty that was driving him to help as much as he could. She did feel a certain amount of guilt for being so unsympathetic towards him and the plight of the people he was trying to assist.

She sighed deeply as she stood up and checked her hair in the mirror of the guest bedroom. She had enough self-worth to know that his lack of attention towards her was not acceptable, but at the same time, she didn't want to lose whatever love he still had left for her. How in the world was she going to handle this?

She decided that apologizing to him for last night's ill-tempered words would be a good start, and then perhaps they could agree to talk things through rationally.

Making her way downstairs, she came up with the right thing to say to appease him yet not to belittle herself. With each step of the grand staircase she battled internally with the desire to pick more of a fight with him and to make amends.

By the time she reached the bottom, she was already mentally exhausted. She took a deep breath in and out before approaching the office.

Although it was technically her office too, and even when she was his personal secretary she had felt free enough to walk in and out at will, for some reason, Grace felt the need to knock on the door before entering.

She heard him clear his throat before murmuring. "Come-come in."

"Oliver?"

The moment he turned around to look at her, Grace felt an incredible aching in her heart. He looked so disheveled and beaten down. Like the weight of the whole world was on his shoulders. His face was marred with worry lines and she could swear his eyes were red from crying.

"Grace", he croaked in response, and Grace's breath caught in her throat. Never in all her years of knowing him had she heard his voice so broken. Not even during The Great Depression. Not even the night they thought they had lost Annie to "The Mudges".

Grace was almost too thrown to speak. "I-I just wanted to come and apologize for what I said to you last night. It was unnecessarily cruel of me. Honestly, I've been dwelling on it all night, and I've been very restless, worrying that I might have hurt you so badly that you might not forgive me, and even though I'm still not happy about the length of time you were away, I want you to know that I…"

She stopped her own well-rehearsed speech as her eye caught the moving pictures on the projector screen behind him and she became quite distracted by what she was seeing. Surely the images displayed there couldn't be real. It looked like something one would only see in a horror film.

"What is this?" She asked Oliver in distress.

She watched the shadow on his face become even darker.

"I was sent this by Suzanne Briet. It arrived yesterday afternoon, but not wanting to distract myself from the dinner with Gordon last night, I decided to leave it until this morning, knowing I was going to become too distressed by it to focus on anything else."

The fact that he had put aside something so important to attend their family dinner with Annie's boyfriend did touch Grace's heart monumentally, but the slides playing on the projector were so unbelievably disturbing that she couldn't shift her mind to think about it even if she wanted to.

"This is happening now? In Europe?" She swallowed thickly.

"Yes. Suzanne has risked her life to film this secretly without anyone noticing her. If the Nazis ever find out she's taken it, she will undoubtedly be killed."

She might have been jealous of the reverence with which Oliver spoke about this woman but Grace was much too awestruck by Madame Briet's courage.

She watched with great difficulty as the film showed people in the streets in terrible conditions, looking gaunt and starved, cold and miserable, some covered in flies, and many on the brink of death. Grace felt tears sting her eyes as she took in the pain and hopelessness in their eyes, but what destroyed Grace the most was the fact that it wasn't just adults being shown there, it was children too - even babies.

"They're dying, aren't they?" She asked somberly.

"Yes, Grace. Since long before this war was announced, the Nazis have been killing people quietly as part of their regime", he snarled the last word.

"They aren't soldiers", Grace cried, pointing to the projector screen.

"No, they most certainly aren't." Oliver's tone was solemn. "You see, there's another part to this war, Grace. A part without choice or glory. As if war isn't wrong enough in itself. The things going on over there, not in the battlefields but in the towns, in the makeshift prisons, is what can only be described as pure evil."

"But the children…how could they be doing those things to children?" She wailed and collapsed against her husband, sobbing into the crook of his neck. "I'm so sorry. I should have listened better, I should have tried to understand. Oh Oliver, the horrors you must have witnessed."

He sighed deeply, trying to shut out the unstoppable and traumatic images that came to his mind, having his wife finally in his arms doing a great deal to combat his dreadful thoughts . "I saw some truly awful things, but that's all the more reason for me to have been more appreciative of the wonderful things I have here. I should have turned to you more, I should have been more open with you and more grateful for the support you did give and more loving towards you. I was away far too long and I've been so preoccupied, and you've been so patient. I'm sorry, Grace."

She hugged him a little tighter, conveying both sorrow and forgiveness.

After several long moments, they separated again and Grace turned her head to look at the screen once more. She watched with a pit in her stomach for only a short time before she could look no more. She turned to her husband with a pained expression and said with a trembling voice, "We've got to do something about this."

"I know Grace. I'm trying", he replied delicately, not wanting to sound like he was saying "I told you so."

Grace closed her eyes for a moment. "Oliver, I feel I should explain why I was so strongly opposed to the idea of signing an arms deal."

"Grace, I understand if you want no involvement. I don't blame you at all."

"I know you don't, but please just listen to what I have to say."

Oliver closed his mouth and nodded.

"My Father left home to fight in The Great War when I was 13 years old. He managed to write to us once a month for the first six months of his time away from home, but then the letters stopped. Two years went by before we finally heard from a member of his battalion who informed us that my Father had died from his wounds on a ridge in Cambrai. By that time, my Mother had already died from her grief."

Oliver's heart seized over his wife's pain. He knew her Father had died during the Great War and that her Mother had died shortly after but he had never known the full story.

"Of course, it was my Uncle who took me in and…well, you know what happened with him."

Oliver's fists automatically clenched at the mention of Grace's abusive Uncle. If he'd still been alive when they had married and Grace had told him all about her past, he would have had the man assassinated - actually, he'd mused on several occasions, he most likely would have taken the pleasure for himself.

"So you see, weapons didn't just kill my Father. They killed my Mother too. They destroyed my whole family and put me into an abusive situation, one which will stay with me for the rest of my life, and I just thought I couldn't, in good conscience, potentially put someone else through that."

Oliver was about to tell her, again, that he understood. Reassure her that if their company produced artillery, their purpose and the deaths and injuries that would be caused by them would never be on her head. But the grief and sadness for herself faded from her eyes just then, leaving a steely determination.

"But this….", she shook her head. "This can't go on. It mustn't. There is nothing about this that is in good conscience. These people have lost their minds, or been brainwashed or tricked or something, and I know that we have to do all that we can to stop it."

She placed her hands on his arms, emphatically and he could feel her shaking. "I'm still so afraid of what our armament will do to people, to soldiers and their families, but doing nothing terrifies me so much more."

"So, does this mean you're willing to co-sign whatever agreements I make with the British in terms of an arms deal?"

With some difficulty, and with tears streaming down her face, Grace nodded her head. "I have to. I don't want to but I know now that I have to. Oh God, Oliver, how can this be happening again?" She collapsed against him, her whole body wracked by sobs.

Oliver sighed, long and deep, holding his wife close. "I don't know, my darling. Through people's ignorance and greed, I can only fathom. Not that I can really fathom anything about all this."

It took a long time before Grace had become calm enough to talk through plans for the new production lines in their factories. Although it was a perilous and terrible situation, Oliver had to confess, even just silently to himself that he was glad to have his partner back on board with him. Even though war was ramping up on the other side of the world, it seemed the war at home was finally coming to an end.

After phoning the factories in Gary and Pittsburgh, Oliver and Grace decided they needed a break after such an emotionally taxing morning. They decided to have a cup of tea out on the patio. It was the first time they had spent any down time together in months.

"There you are, Sir, Ma'am", Mrs. Pugh smiled cheerfully. She was very happy to see that the couple were getting on again. "Will Miss Annie be home for lunch?" She enquired.

"Oh my Lord, I haven't even thought about Annie this morning."

"I don't think so, Mrs. Pugh. Annie's spending the day with Gordon."

"How nice", Mrs. Pugh smiled before returning back inside.

"So she and Gordon are still on good terms, then?" Oliver asked Grace out of intrigue and a bit of surprise but not meaning any malice.

"Yes, not that that's in thanks to your behavior last night."

"I behaved very badly, didn't I?" He pondered regretfully.

"Yes", Grace answered honestly and his eyes flicked to hers quickly. "I'm sorry."

"It's Annie who needs to hear that, Oliver."

"Yes, I know. I will tell her as soon as she gets home. I was alright with Gordon until I found out what his career aspects were."

"Well, what's to say he can't follow his dreams of becoming a nurse while Annie runs a business anyway?"

"You really think that's sustainable?"

"Oh, so you do want Gordon to stick around?"

"I think he's a fine match for Annie as a person, but what kind of provider will he be?"

"Why would he feel the need to provide if Annie's the owner of a billion-dollar company? Why shouldn't he be allowed to chase his passions? I think it's admirable that he wants to help people.

"Well so do I, but not if it means he'll be financially dependent on Annie. A man should have prospects of his own."

"But it's alright for a woman to rely on her husband for financial stability?" Grace challenged him with a raised eyebrow.

Oliver immediately shut his mouth, not wanting to get himself any deeper into hot water.

Grace picked up her glass of lemonade, sitting back in her chair. "Anyway, this shouldn't be our decision to make. If they do manage to make their relationship work then surely it'll be up to them to figure things out for themselves."

"Yes, but at this stage in her life, she still needs our guidance. I'm only trying to help her grow into what she has the potential to be."

"Annie is not a business plan, Oliver. You can't rest all of your hopes for your empire on her shoulders. If she wants to take over the company and is as passionate about it as we are, then great, but you can't expect that of her."

"I don't, but I do expect her to do well in life, whatever she chooses to do. We've given her every opportunity, I just don't want her to waste them."

"And what if she chooses to be married to a male nurse? Would you consider that a waste?"

Oliver closed his eyes, Grace was pushing him again, but knowing she was back on side with him over bigger issues made him quell his burgeoning temper. "As long as she's happy, I will support her."

He saw his wife crack a smile and part of him felt frustrated while the other part of him felt amused.

"Well, I look forward to you telling her that."

"Grace…", he growled and her smile merely grew. She reached over and placed her hand atop of his. "When you're ready", she added calmly.

Suddenly, his heart did a somersault as she looked into his eyes, gazing affectionately at him for what felt like the first time in forever. He reached up with his other hand and touched her cheek. "You know what's frightened me the most these past few weeks? It wasn't the threat of being captured and imprisoned or killed, or even the thought of my birth county being demolished. It was the thought that I might be losing you."

Grace lowered her eyes, guilt for her thoughts of giving up on him weighing heavy on her mind. She didn't know about his conversation with Mrs. Pugh, where it had been revealed to Oliver that she had been making comments to that effect.

"I know I haven't been as open with you about what I've been experiencing. It's mostly because I've wanted to spare you from the immense heartache I know someone as compassionate as you would feel over it. But it's also because, well, truthfully, I've found it very hard to talk about."

"You're doing pretty well right now", she told him warmly.

The gentle touch of her thumb stroking the top of his hand encouraged him. "I do want to try being more open with you, Grace. I swear, I do. I know, logically, that I can trust you with my emotions, but it's still so ingrained in me to have to do things alone."

She squeezed his hand gently. "I can only be your partner in business and in life if you let me in on what's going on with you. I can't help you, otherwise."

"As you know, for a long time, my life consisted only of work, but things are different now, for the better, for so much the better."

Grace smiled softly at him.

"In my position of responsibility and power, I was only allowed to show strength. With those closest to me - you and Annie, in my capacity as a father and a husband, I must be vulnerable. I'm not so used to that and I'm still learning how. I ask for your patience while I still figure it out."

For as hard as it had been for her to be without him for so long, and for as many times a day as they sometimes misunderstood each other, Grace knew that she could never be without him. For better or worse, he was part of her very soul, and she was so proud of him and so thankful that he was starting to finally let her into his.

"Whatever happens, Oliver. Whatever changes you make, however monumental or miniscule they may be, I promised you my life and I stand by that promise."

He smiled at her, full of gratitude and relief. He was beginning to realize that by giving Grace the opportunity to understand what was going on with him - the good, the bad and the ugly, he was making her feel important and respected. To trust her with his deepest desires and his deepest fears, meant to show her that he loved her.

Leaning across the table between them, Grace met Oliver for a long-awaited kiss. Softer and more adoring than she'd ever known him to be, Oliver whispered against her lips. "We're going to get through all of this, come what may, and I promise you we're going to do it together."

She smiled tearfully and pecked him gently again. "I love you, Mr. Warbucks."

He huffed in amusement at the moniker she still playfully gave him from time to time after they were first married. "I love you, Grace, and I'm going to do a better job at making sure that you know that."

...

A/N: Wow, got this one out in record time! It's amazing what a day off work can do for productivity - and I was just busting to get this chapter written!