It was small, but it was something, and that was an encouragement, squeezing her hand lightly as he smiled back. As she talked, he stayed quiet, letting the words wash over him, her concerns and fears about the circumstance that she found herself in, and he couldn't help the way his featured softened, eased, at the concern that they saw him as a reformed psychopath. He shook his head gently, gaze shifting downward as he smiled, a slightly self-deprecating look before he turned his gaze back up to her.
"We've all explained things badly, I think," Ward said. "Or at least I have. There were things that I worked through here, yes. But they don't see me like that. Well, Skye does. But I gave up on reaching her a long time ago. She'll never see me as anything but what she remembers last," He said, pausing and shaking his head to clear away the thoughts before he looked up at her. "I've been here a long time, Kara. Before SHIELD fell, before any of what happened with HYDRA did. Long, long before I realized what Garrett had done to me. When everyone found out about HYDRA here, I was still loyal to him, mind, body, soul. Those first few weeks Clint worked with me... It was to get me to realize what Garrett had done, exactly what kind of situation he'd put me into, what kind of person he was. I still thought I owed him everything, up to and including my own life, and without Clint, I would still think that. It took me months to get to where you are right now, where both of you were back home, and it took me months more after that to get past it because there's only so much anger and hatred that you can hold onto until it starts to eat you up. I know what kind of man I am, Kara. I promise you. I'm damaged. I'm warped. I'm marked. But without all that, I wouldn't be me. Take away the history, and you lose the man. And even if I still have my moments, I like who I am."
He paused, squeezing her hand again before his expression shifted once more, a quiet concern bleeding into his features as he looked up at her. She didn't like it, but she would do it anyway. She didn't agree, but she didn't feel it was her place to argue. It was a quiet sinking feeling, the same one he'd gotten when he'd watched the show, a slow and unnerving realization that maybe he really had done more damage than he had good.
"Kara, what I want.... What I want is you to be comfortable telling me no," Ward said, the unease translating into his posture even as he tightened his grip on her hand. There had to be a better way to do this, a way to get her to realize for herself, more than just him saying so, that revenge wasn't the way to go. "Explain to me why you want to do what you want to do, why you think it's the only way. Forget about everything else right now. Tell me what you want."