#cssecretsanta2k19

“We knew this was a possibility when we went,” her mother continues. “We knew the weather might turn. We hoped it wouldn’t, but we had to go anyways. We couldn’t miss this hospital opening, Emma, not when they named it after your grandmother. At the end of the day, we are here to serve our citizens.”

Emma mouths the last words along with her mom, having heard them many times. It’s not quite a catchphrase in their family - that distinction goes to her father’s very sappy “I will always find you”, the one thing that can reliably make both his children gag - but it does get repeated an awful lot. Call it their motto, or something. The lines just get more blurred when your family life and your professional life is so entwined.

“I’ll miss you,” Emma finally says after letting the line sit silent for a moment. That’s what this all comes down to, after all - as much as Emma understands why her parents had to fly across the country, and as much as she knows that they can’t control the weather, it’s Christmas time, and she wants to spend it with her parents.

“We’ll miss you too, sweetheart, and your brother too. Dad and I will be home as soon as we can, okay?” 

“Okay, Mom.” What else is there to say?

“They’re waiting for us, but I’ll talk to you later. Give Leo a kiss for me. I love you, Emma.”

“Love you too. Say hi to Dad for me.”

As comparatively well as Emma holds it together on the phone, that evaporates as soon as the call disconnects and she lets out a screech of frustration. It’s immature. She doesn’t care. She’s allowed to want her family on Christmas… Eve. Eve. 

(It’s technically still the night of the 23rd, but it’s the principle of the thing.)

Barely seconds later, a dark head pops into the room. Killian Jones - her brother’s security officer. Emma wouldn’t say she has a crush on him, but… she kind of has a crush on him. He’s just so goddamn handsome and charming, and she’s only human, even if she is the princess. They don’t cross paths very often - just on summers and school holidays, when Leo was home from boarding school and now from uni - but when they do, Emma can barely tear her eyes away. Damn, can that man wear a suit.

(Mostly, Emma just blushes a lot whenever he’s around, embarrassed by her own lustful thoughts. It’s a miracle no-one has called her on it yet.)

“Everything alright in here?” he asks, craning his neck towards all the corners, as if some kind of assassin might have made it through multiple layers of security at the palace just to crouch in the corner of a private sitting room. Just doing his job, she guesses. “I thought I heard some kind of shriek from the hallway.”

Emma colors a bit at being caught. “Yeah, everything’s fine. I just —” She abruptly cuts off. “Is that an entire tub of cheese puffs?”

It’s Killian’s turn to turn a bit pink. “Aye. Your brother is playing one of his games, and you know how he gets. Likes his junk food.”

“Spoiled rotten, you mean.”

“I’d never say that,” Killian protests.

“Yeah, says the man bringing a tub of cheese balls up from the kitchens when His Spoiled Highness still has working legs!”

“You know, it sounds an awful lot like you’re deflecting, Your Highness,” Killian points out. His eyes still manage to twinkle with restrained laughter, even if his ears are still red.

He’s caught her, too. “Just a bit frustrated, is all. You know the stormfront going through up North?” Killian nods. “Mom and Dad got caught in it. They won’t be home tonight after all, and probably not even tomorrow. So… it’ll just be me and Leo for Christmas Eve, I guess.”

“I’m sorry, lo — ma’am,” Killian says softly. He does that, sometimes - start to say one thing, before quickly course correcting back to propriety. She’s always wondered what he’s trying to say - she’s never quite figured it out. 

"It's not your fault," she shrugs. "Unless you've got some weird weather powers you've been hiding from me." It would just figure that Killian was the one who could control the weather; just one of the many secrets she doesn't know about him. "When are you heading home? You didn't get the Christmas shift, did you?"

Killian scratches behind his ear as just the tip of the cartilage flushes red. She can't imagine what he has to be embarrassed about; regardless, it's kind of cute.

Not that she's watching. That closely. (All the time.)

"I traded shifts with Mulan," he explains, referencing Emma's own security agent. "She's got... something with her girlfriend's family. Kind of a last minute thing."

"Looks like you're stuck with us, then," Emma comments, trying to tamp down the excited little butterflies in her stomach and the voice in her head that screams score! Very dignified.

Killian grins back. "Looks like I am." They smirk at each other for a minute, some camaraderie simmering between them with an undercurrent of something more. "Well, I'd better get the prince his cheese puffs," he finally says, shaking the container for emphasis. "I'll see you around, Your Highness. Let me know if you need anything."

(It would be horribly foolish to tell him you, so she doesn't say anything at all.)

——— 

By the time Emma makes her way down for dinner, the snowstorm has started in earnest - big, fluffy flakes that accumulate as soon as they hit the ground. In the little sitting room overlooking the gardens where her family takes informal meals, the swirling flakes make her feel like she lives in the little house in the middle of a snow globe. As much as she wishes their parents were here with herself and Leo, she's simultaneously glad that they're not out in the middle of this. 

Leo flings himself into a chair with all the grace of a nineteen-year-old boy. Emma tries not to sigh too loudly at the way his limbs fly every which way, banging against the table and rattling the dishes; she's not willing to turn into her grandmother yet, thank you very much. She loves her brother, but somewhere along the line, he's developed an attitude that's hard to live with. Probably something about the independence of university going to his head, making Leo think too highly of himself. Maybe some girl out there will find it attractive - with their mother's hair and eyes and their father's strong jawline, he'd be a catch otherwise.

(She really must be turning into Grandma Ruth, if she's thinking that kind of thing.)

The one thing that's noticeably absent from Leo's little display is Killian. "Where's Lieutenant Jones?" she asks as the kitchen staff bring in plates of chicken and potatoes and asparagus to place in front of the pair of them. 

Her brother shrugs. "I dunno. Probably having dinner somewhere."

That would make sense. It also brings into stark evidence that he's probably doing so alone; around Christmas, the palace always operates with a skeleton crew of staff so that as many people as possible can spend time with their families. There's no reason he couldn't just eat with the two of them. "Did you invite him to join us?"

Leo flushes red and mumbles something at his plate as he reaches for a dinner roll - not really an answer, but at the same time, more than enough of an answer. 

“Leo…”

“I didn’t think of it, alright?” 

Emma sighs heavily, before standing from the table to track down her brother’s security agent. It doesn’t take much searching; Killian is right outside the door, thumbing through his phone. He hurriedly stows the device away when he sees Emma, practically snapping to attention. “What can I do for you, ma’am?”

“Nothing, really,” Emma says. “You can stand down, or… whatever. I just wanted to see if you’d like to join us for dinner.”

“Oh, that’s really unnecessary —” he protests, but Emma’s determined.

“I know, but still. It’s kind of weirdly quiet around here, and there’s more than enough food. You don’t have to, obviously,” she hurries to clarify, “but it’d be nice to have you there. I’d appreciate the Leo buffer, at least,” she even jokes.

“Well when you put it like that…”

He follows. And of course there’s enough food, and of course he’s perfectly charming, and of course he has the presence of mind to suggest watching a Christmas movie after dinner to get them just a little more into the spirit of the season. Killian fits like that - unobtrusive, the way a good agent ought to be, but also charming and seemingly super-aware of how to cut through some of that sibling tension that always inevitably exists between Emma and her brother. 

The movie is an old classic - one with dancing and singing and two reluctant people falling in love. Emma wouldn’t have expected Killian to like this - would have pegged him more for an action movie fan, or something like that - but he smiles and bobs his head along with the music. Leo is a different story altogether - after not even an hour, he’s already deserted the lounge for his room and video games, leaving Killian and Emma alone together. 

“So what would you be doing tonight? If you weren’t here with us.” Emma’s clarification isn’t necessary in the least; however, she’s sitting close enough to touch Killian on the couch, and the thrill of it all is making her babble. 

He’s gracious enough not to mention it, at least. “I’ve got a brother,” he explains, “and he and his wife have a little boy. Max. Really cute kid; let me dig out my phone, I’ve got so many pictures on there.”

The little boy on the screen can’t be more than four, with a wide and silly grin on his face and a dinosaur shirt to complete the picture. He’s just as cute as Killian promised. 

“That was at his birthday last month,” Killian smiles fondly. “Four years old - growing so fast. Anyways, I usually spend my holiday with them. My sister in law has a huge family, and they’re always happy to let me tag along. Too kind, really.” 

“I’m sorry you’re having to miss that,” Emma replies with genuine regret. 

Killian shrugs; Emma has already proven she wouldn’t be nearly as gracious in the same situation. “There will be other years,” he explains. “All things considered, it’s not so bad, spending the holiday with Leo and your lovely self.”

“I think you’re the first and only person happy to be spending Christmas with that ball of teenaged attitude,” Emma jokes. 

“It’s not so bad,” Killian deflects. “I’ll admit, the constant quips and eye rolling can be a bit much some days, but he’s a good kid underneath. Did you know he paid for all his roommate’s books for the coming semester?” 

“No, I didn’t.” Emma shouldn’t be surprised, but she is. She’s gotten so used to the snarky terror her brother acts like around their family that it’s shocking to hear that it’s not always the case.

“Like I said - he’s a better kid than he lets on.” They watch the screen in silence for a few moments; they’re coming up on the finale. Perhaps Emma can convince him to watch a second movie with her afterwards. “I suppose he didn’t tell you about his girlfriend then?” Killian asks with a laugh.

“Leo’s got a girlfriend?”

“He would if he’d just ask her,” Killian snorts. “Her name’s Britta. You’d like her, I think - she doesn’t put up with any of his nonsense. Which, just between you and me,” he says from the side of his mouth like he’s confiding a secret, “he sorely needs sometimes. Anyways, she lives one floor up in their dorm. They have Intro Geology together.”

“He’s really doing alright?” Emma asks softly. Leo is, more often than not, a little shit, but he’s still her little brother. She still just wants the best for him, most of the time.

“He’s really doing alright,” Killian confirms. “Don’t worry - I’m keeping an eye on the boy. For all of us.”

The warm feeling that leaves in Emma’s soul carries her through the rest of the night. 

——— 

Christmas Eve dawns much the same as the evening before - cold and snowing to the point of a whiteout. Emma isn’t particularly pleased about that turn of events, especially since it means that there’s almost no chance in hell of her parents getting home that day.

At least it’s a good opportunity for her to get a lot of work done. Being the crown princess means commitments to various charities and foundations and plenty of reading to come along with them, not to mention the never-ending stream of correspondence. A day just to focus on the things that have been accumulating on her desk will be good for everyone involved.

At least until the power flickers out. 

It’s midafternoon, just when the light is starting to dim, and she’s been working on editing a proposal someone sent her via email. She technically can do it in the dim light, but it’s… not fun. Emma doesn’t particularly enjoy squinting. There’s generators at the palace, of course, but they’re directed towards the most essential functions - security, heating, and minimal kitchen operations. Lighting, for better or worse, isn’t included on that list - nor is wifi signal. She’s stuck.

On a hunch, Emma wanders down to the kitchen, to find Leo and Killian raiding the cabinets for candles and snacks. She should have figured; two young-ish guys, food was obviously going to be the priority.

“This sucks,” Leo gripes. “First, Christmas gets screwed up, and then this. Unbelievable.”

“To be fair, the electric company can’t really help the snow,” Killian points out as he extracts a roll of cookies from a cupboard. “A lot of electrical infrastructure is still above ground. It’s easy to get knocked out.”

Emma shoots Killian a sidelong look before swiping the same cookies. “How do you know so much about this?”

“You pick up a few things when you read, Your Highness,” he winks back. 

“Are you guys done?” Leo interrupts. “Not everyone wants to watch your thirsty asses flirt all night. I’m not that desperate for entertainment.”

“Oh my god, Leo,” Emma groans back. It’s much more fun to watch how Killian turns bright red to match Emma’s own embarrassment. 

“Look, just because the TV is out, doesn’t mean I want to deal with this.”

“Ok, what would you rather do then?” Killian asks in much more measured a tone than Emma would have been able to muster. Probably the benefit of not being related to Leo.

The younger man shrugs. “Scrabble?”

Killian snorts at that, though Emma doesn’t quite understand why. “Are you sure?”

“I like Scrabble,” Leo defends. “I’m going to kick both your asses.”

It’s as good an idea as any to spend a snowed-in afternoon. 

——— 

A couple hours later, Leo is singing a different tune as Killian plays the last of his Scrabble tiles.

“Make sure you mark my latest points, lad,” he prods with a grin. “I want to make sure my lead is really cemented.” Killian has proved to be an invaluable ally in Emma’s personal quest to knock her brother down a peg; unfortunately, Leo is less enamored of the effort. 

“Whatever. This is so lame,” the prince says, pushing back from the filled board. “I’m going back to my room.”

“Oh, c’mon, Leo, it’s just a game —” Emma protests, but her little brother is already out the door. 

“I thought he said he liked Scrabble?” Killian asks, starting to collect the little tiles back into their bag. 

“Oh, he does. He just likes winning, and usually he can beat the rest of us. Finally met his match with your fancy words, I guess,” she jokes, though it kind of falls flat. It’s hard for the punchline to land when its subject has already stormed out of the room.

“Ah. Well, I apologize for that.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Emma excuses. “Though if you don’t mind, I’m not sure I’m up for a rematch - at least not of Scrabble.”

“You got something in mind, Your Highness?” Killian smirks.

“Have you ever played cribbage?”

“Once or twice. I could be persuaded.”

“I’ll get the board then.” Emma stands up, but pauses before actually leaving to do so. “And call me Emma.”

She leaves the room before she can see him react, but barely catches the soft trail of his words as she passes through the door. 

“As you wish… Emma.”

———

It turns out, Killian is lying about having played “a time or two.” Either that, or he’s extraordinarily lucky.

(Cheating isn’t fully off the table, either, but she’s trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. Not that he makes it easy.)

“So that’s fifteen two, fifteen four, fifteen six, fifteen eight, fifteen ten, fifteen twelve, fifteen fourteen, pair is sixteen, and three pair is twenty-two.”

Emma groans as he moves his red peg around the outer curve of the board. They look like such a cliche - Emma in her pajamas, Killian with his tie loosened,  sitting in front of a roaring fire with candles scattered on all the flat surfaces as they play cribbage on the floor. The typical picture of two people caught in a power outage. Touching, really. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Sorry to disappoint, but you’ve got the proof right in front of you. A damned good hand, if I do say so myself. What’ve you got there?”

“Utter shit,” Emma proclaims, tossing her cards down on the carpeting. “Run of three and a fifteen for five, plus a fucking useless ace. Absolutely jackshit.”

“It can’t be that bad, can it?” Killian cranes his neck to see where her cards are strewn on the carpeting. A nine, an eight, a seven, and that stupid ace. Nothing. “Never mind, it really can,” he laughs. “Tough luck, love.”

That little word - just a small endearment - hits her like a brick. That’s what he keeps trying not to say, all these times. Love. It just took a few permissions from her, and several more drinks than either one should have indulged in, for him to let it slip. 

(She just might like it - being called love.)

The real question is what he means by it. It could be a verbal tic; it could be something more. Emma knows how she feels, her persistent crush, but it’s hard to tell how Killian feels behind his unflappable professionalism. Or maybe it’s not professionalism - maybe it’s just how he feels? God, she just can’t tell, and it’s about to drive her crazy.

Emma spends a lot of time studying Killian for the rest of their game. She doesn’t really discover anything new - she already knows the way that he laughs and smiles and teases - but it cements, somehow, that he’s a really good guy. She already knew that, really, but tonight has really driven that home.

The longer she watches him, and the stronger her conviction comes, the more she wants to do something about it. Maybe it’s the rum; maybe it’s the ambiance. Whatever it is, Emma wants to know just how he feels too, and hears herself talk without thinking. 

“Hey, Killian, can I ask you something?”

“Of course, Emma,” he smiles. 

She shouldn’t continue - should just keep her mouth shut and her dignity intact. Drunk Emma doesn’t agree. “I was just wondering —”

By some miracle, a face-splitting yawn interrupts her sentence, saving Emma from herself. Because she was definitely about to say I was just wondering if you, like, like-like me. You know, like middle school.

“I think it might be time for bed there, love,” he laughs, seemingly oblivious to the butterflies he just set swarming in her stomach. Love. God, she’s a sap, and one who reads too much into things at that. “What were you saying?”

“I… can’t remember. I think the yawn knocked it right out of my head,” Emma lies with a laugh. “You’re right, I should get some sleep. You too - you know where there’s a guest bedroom, right? You’re totally welcome to use it.” A stupid thing to say, all things considered, but Emma has progressed to babbling to cover herself. 

“Aye, I do,” he assures her. “Now come on, love, up you get and off to bed you go.”

Love. 

Emma goes to bed floating on a happy cloud made of rum and his endearments, certain the pairing will only bring her the sweetest dreams. 

———

The dreams are sweet. The morning is decidedly… not. The room is too bright where sun seeps through the shades, and her mouth is too dry, and she can already feel the beginnings of a killer headache encroaching behind her eyes. Revenge of the rum, or something. 

A glass of water helps a bit, as do a couple of painkillers, but Emma is still less than pleased to hear the knock on her door. She’d much rather spend the day in bed, Christmas together-ness be damned, but there’s traditions in this family she can’t run away from, and every year since Emma was very young, they’ve passed out holly sprigs and candy canes to the visitors at the gate.

Killian smirks when she opens the door, apparently finding some sick amusement in the death glare Emma shoots in her groggy state. God, it’s just patently unfair that he still looks so attractive while she’s so hungover - even in yesterday’s suit and shirt. He’s not quite all buttoned up yet - still a bit of chest hair peeking out the top and his tie hanging loose - and it only makes him look even more delectable.

(Is that still a way that people describe hot guys they have chemistry with? Truthfully, Emma is a little too foggy to know or care.)

“Well don’t you look festive,” he teases. “Is this what they call high spirits?”

“No, that was last night.”

“Touche, love,” he laughs. “Do you think you’ll be ready to greet the people at 10:30? That should give you and Leo an hour or so for the meet and greet. Your mother’s speech is scheduled for noon - though I suppose you’ll be tackling that if she doesn’t make it back in time?” He phrases it like a question; it’s not.

Emma groans at the prospect. “Don’t remind me. And don’t jinx it!”

“Sorry, sorry.” His eyes crinkle when he smiles at her - an extra little detail Emma hadn’t noticed before, but now can’t stop seeing. “I’m sure you’ll be brilliant.”

“Yeah, well, I’d rather not have to be.” And it’s true; Emma’s perfectly capable of giving a speech, and has done so on multiple occasions, but her mother’s annual televised Christmas address is something else entirely that Emma would rather avoid at all costs and if at all possible. That all depends on her parents being able to make the flight, however. “How’s the weather today? Any better?”

“Have you not even looked out your windows today?” Killian prods gently. Emma isn’t quite sure when they switched to this teasing relationship they’ve apparently established, but she thinks she likes it. 

“I was a little busy trying to avoid all trace of sunlight,” she shoots back.

“Well, it’s a lovely, crisp day,” he promises. “I don’t see why your parents shouldn’t be home for Christmas.”

Just to hear it out loud is a huge relief, even if she has enjoyed their little bonding exercise the past couple of days. No matter how much fun she’s had with Killian, it’s still Christmas, and she still misses her parents. 

“I’ll see you at breakfast?” Emma asks tentatively, hoping he’ll say yes, scared that he’ll say no.

“I’ll have the kitchens whip up something particularly greasy,” he winks back.

———

The morning is cold, but just as clear as Killian had promised. As much as Emma had grumbled this morning, she actually likes this bit of Christmas tradition - shaking hands, giving their visitors well-wishes, making sure to hand out candy to all the children. It feels like the true spirit of the holiday - giving not for the thanks, but for the smiles, and because it’s the right thing to do.

Still. It’s cold, and as much as Emma had appreciated how wide Killian’s eyes had gotten when she had emerged after breakfast in a full-skirted green coat dress, her skirt and hose don’t offer much protection against the weather. Pants would have been a much more practical choice, but there are expectations for days like these, and a skirt is part of that. 

Her relief is palpable when they finally make it back inside. God only knows where Leo gets to - he’s off the hook, at least - but Emma treks back to her mother’s formal office as soon as her winter wear is sorted. As much as Emma hopes it won’t come to that, her mother’s annual Christmas speech is scheduled in twenty minutes, and if Queen Mary is still on the road, Emma will be expected to fill in. It’s not something she’s looking forward to; spontaneity like this never is, though she knows she’ll only have to read from a prompter. 

Killian beats her there, somehow; by the time she arrives in the antechamber outside where television cameras and lights are already set up, he’s crouched under the tree, fiddling with the lights and offering an excellent view of his ass. Nice.

He catches her staring, of course. “Anything I can help you with, Your Highness?” he asks with a smirk.

“Nah, just taking in the view,” she winks back. Any fears she might have had about last night only being a product of the outage and the rum are largely quelled by the way he’s acting today - not quite just like normal, but not in a bad way either. Closer. More intimate. More… something. 

Emma’s face settles into something more contemplative as she reflects on the change - something Killian, of course, doesn’t fail to notice. “What’s on your mind, love?” he asks, tilting his head in concern and curiosity. 

“Nothing, nothing,” Emma hurries to say at first before reconsidering. She still wants to make a move, to see where they stand; more than that, she wants him to know just how much these past few days have meant to her. With that in mind, she takes a deep breath and tries to be a little brave. “I just… I guess I just want to thank you, Killian.” Emma makes sure to look right in his eyes as she says it so he can see how much she means it. “This wasn’t the Christmas I expected to have, obviously, but it’s been… wonderful, really. And you’re a big part of that.”

“Oh, Emma, you don’t need to —”

“Yes, I do,” Emma interrupts. “I know this probably wasn’t how you planned to spend your Christmas - not when you’ve got your brother and his family to spend time with. But it meant a lot that you were here, even if you didn’t want to be.”

By the time Emma finishes, Killian has flushed a brilliant red - even more than just his ears. “About that, love…” he says, tugging at his hair. “It really wasn’t quite as out of my hands as you believe. Please believe me - there’s no reason to thank me.”

“I don’t understand.” He had switched with Mulan, of course - she knew that already, he had told her as such - but that didn’t change that he’d ended up here for much longer than he should have been, thanks to the storm. 

“You know that I switched shifts… but not when.”

“What does that matter?”

“Well, it matters because when I told you that I’d be around, that I’d switched… I hadn’t, actually. I arranged that with Mulan afterwards. There was no conflict with her girlfriend’s family, I just… I wanted to be here.”

As surprised as Emma is by the revelation, she still feels like there’s something she’s missing - whatever would make him want to stay when he could have avoided it. “Why?” She asks softly, taking a step closer into Killian’s space. This feels like the kind of conversation to require close proximity - foster emotional intimacy, or something like it. As Killian proved in scrabble last night, he’s the one with the words.

Emma can see Killian swallow as he stares down into her eyes. “I wanted you to have a nice Christmas, love,” he replies, just as softly. Tenderly, even. “I could tell you were frustrated, and upset, and… I know it was the height of hubris to think that I could make that better, but I wanted to try. If I could help make it a happy Christmas for you, love… I wanted to try.”

“For me,” Emma breathes - more a realization than a question.

“For you.”

It’s impossible to miss the earnestness and truth in his words and gaze. That desire Emma felt last night to kiss the daylights out of him has been simmering on low ever since they parted for separate beds, but it flares up again at his confession. He did that for her, because he wanted to make her happy. Carefully, Emma takes that last step into his space, so close that their bodies nearly touch. Slowly, she trails her hands behind his neck and up into his hair to draw him down, lips mere inches apart —

A commotion in the hallway barely gives them a moment to break apart before Emma’s mother bustles into the room. As much as Emma has spent much of the last three days wishing her parents were here, now feels like the worst possible time.

“Mom, you’re home!” she manages to gasp weakly. Killian discretely steps away again; though Emma understands why, she’d much rather continue what they’d started - without an audience - than watch him retreat back into professionalism. Especially when moments ago, she’d just gotten a preview of what his hands might feel like against her skin.

“I couldn’t miss Christmas, now could I?” her mother asks, hugging Emma tightly. “I didn’t want to leave you to take care of the Christmas speech either; I know that kind of thing isn’t your favorite, and you’ve had no time to prepare besides… but oh! It’s just so good to be home again! Your father went to try and track down your brother…”

The queen keeps rambling as she strips off her gloves, but Emma doesn’t pay much attention. Sometime in the last handful of minutes, Killian slipped out the door altogether, leaving only Emma, her mother, and her mother’s security head. She missed her chance, it appears.

(And after all they’d shared these past days… Emma could just screech with the frustration of it all. It’s becoming kind of a habit.)

——— 

Emma hopes to talk to him after their interruption - tries to talk to him, even, searching for him across rooms. But it’s Christmas, and her parents are finally home, and it’s so easy to lose track of time and get caught up in the hustle and bustle of things. By the time Emma can break away from the festivity for a few minutes, Killian has already slipped out, quietly replaced by Mulan. She knows that he won’t be back for several days - more than earning a vacation and time with his family after giving up most of his Christmas with her and Leo.

She should be able to talk with him once he’s back at work, too; after all, he’s only got three days off (she knows this for a fact - she asked Leo, any hit to her pride be damned). But by the time Killian is back at work, so is Emma, with charity appearances and daily meetings and everything else her usual schedule entails. 

Maybe it’s fate that they don’t meet again until New Year’s Eve. Maybe it’s just fortuitous scheduling. Whatever the case, Emma doesn’t get a chance to speak with Killian until the annual New Year’s Diplomatic Gala, of all places. 

It could be for the best, maybe; Emma can’t deny that she looks fantastic. Her dress tonight is silver and drapes elegantly across her body, creating a kind of vintage aura, topped with pinned waves, a rich burgundy lipstick, and long white gloves. The diamond and sapphire tiara is just the topper of it all, the icing on the cake.

(Emma’s always liked sapphires, but tonight, the stones don’t seem nearly as blue as his eyes, no matter how much they catch the light.)

She sees him across the room the moment she walks in, along the wall in another tailored dark suit, and she could swear that his eyes follow her too. Killian has a dress uniform, she knows - he wore it to the Armed Forces charity ball last year, and looked quite dashing at that - but tonight’s not the time for that. Tonight, the idea is to be as unobtrusive a presence as possible since he’s on duty, not that it’s going well. It’s hard for Killian to blend in with that face and that suit - or maybe Emma’s just attuned to noticing him. 

Regardless, it’s still not the time to talk anyways - she’s still being escorted into dinner on the arm of the Ambassador to Glowerhaven, and there’s still a banquet and dancing to come. Maybe, if she’s lucky, she can steal away later; maybe, with even more luck, she’ll be able to pull Killian along with her.

(They’ve got unfinished business, and Emma still wants to learn how he kisses.)

The garden balcony off the ballroom isn’t exactly an ideal location in late December, but it’s the only place Emma knows she can get a few blessed moments away from the crush of people inside. It’s cold out, nearly trying to snow again; a few rogue flakes drift from the night sky to land on her bare skin. There’s a handful of heat lamps scattered about, but they only do so much, as do Emma’s gloves. This hadn’t been one of her brighter plans, Emma knows, but she and Killian had been making eye contact all night across the room, and she simply couldn’t wait any longer to slip away and hope he follows her.

Just as Emma’s preparing to abandon the plan and head back inside, a warm weight drops on her shoulders - the faux-fur wrap she’d discarded at the dinner table earlier as it got in the way of her eating. Killian smiles at her when she turns her head to meet his gaze.

“I thought you might be cold, love,” he explains. “We can’t have you catching a chill.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think much about the weather when I came out here - I just wanted a little time alone,” Emma admits. “With you.” The last part is added hurriedly when a flash of embarrassment streaks across Killian’s face, and he looks like he might make an utterly unnecessary run for it. 

“We never finished our conversation from Christmas, did we?” Killian almost looks a little bashful about the subject, ducking his head and tugging at the hair behind his ear. It’s adorable, truly, not to mention a little fascinating - the way he shifts back and forth so rapidly and confidently between seeming like a smooth master of seduction and a bashful boy who isn’t quite sure what’s happening, but is happy to be there. Fascinating, in the best of ways.

“Oh, I thought that conversation was plenty finished,” Emma teases. She even sways into his space flirtatiously to underline her point, finding some kind of boldness within her that she wasn’t certain she possessed. It must just be something about Killian that brings it out in her. “If I remember right, we were about to move on to… how would you put it? Much more pleasant exchanges, or something like that?”

“Something like that,” he mumbles back. “If I crossed a line the other day… I’m sorry if I overstepped, Your Highness —”

“It’s still Emma,” she corrects with a smile, reaching out to lay a hand on Killian’s arm. “And you didn’t overstep. I was right there wish you.”

“I’d just hate to think that I pressured you into something —”

“Killian, did you want to kiss me on Christmas?” Emma interrupts.

Killian pauses. Emma wasn’t aware a human person could turn that red. “Yes,” he finally admits - just one simple word that sets her heart a-flutter.

“Well, that’s lucky, because I did too. Still do, honestly.” 

“You do?” Killian looks like he can’t quite believe his luck.

“I mean, yeah. Christmas could have been… honestly, straight up depressing. But you made it better. And I… I like you. I mean, I’ve been attracted to all this —” she waves a demonstrative hand — “for a while, but I like you. It’s New Year’s Eve, and it’s stupidly picturesque, and I want to kiss you at midnight. If you still want that too.”

Killian breaks into a wide smile. “What if I don’t want to wait for midnight?” he asks, moving so close into her space that she can feel his breath on her face. She twines their fingers together where their hands finally meet. “What if I still want to kiss you? Now?”

“Then I’d say…” 

Emma never bothers to finish the sentence, opting instead to lean forward and meet Killian’s lips with her own. Her high heels put her at the perfect height to just barely need to tip her head upwards to find a perfect angle. Killian’s lips are soft against her own - gentle and teasing at first, almost like he’s just trying to learn the shape and feel of them before anything else, but he’s more than happy to deepen the kiss when Emma sinks her hands into his hair to pull him closer. He tastes a little minty, like he just popped a mint before coming out to speak with her - a fact that seems impossibly endearing, even through the pleasurable haze of their kiss. She can feel his hands through the fabric of her dress, firm and warm at her hips, like he’s keeping her safe even now. The kiss is tender, and passionate, and perfect.

(Then Killian tilts her head with calloused fingers at her chin to adjust the angle and sweep his tongue into her mouth, and she gladly stops thinking much of anything at all.)

“That was…” he breathes when they finally separate, breaking apart just far enough to rest his forehead against her own.

“Well worth the wait,” Emma finishes. And then laughs, unable to hold it back. “You’ve been holding out on me, Jones.”

“Call it the magic of Christmas,” he teases back. Fireworks start going off around them; though Emma hazily wonders for a moment if they did that, somehow set off literal fireworks to match the metaphorical ones bursting between them, before she realizes it must be the new year. They completely missed the countdown - not that she cares.

“So how does one go about dating the Crown Princess?” Killian asks, already leaning in for another round of kissing. “I think that just might be my New Year’s Resolution.” 

“Stick around, and you’ll find out.”

He smells like salt today, and there’s a hint of fish from working so close to the cannery, but she doesn’t mind, not when she carefully rests her head on his shoulder and melts into his embrace grabbing onto his prosthetic hand in a gesture of comfort. She’s not sure how much longer she can stay awake, so she’s thankful when the doctor finally comes in with her final advice for recovery.

Emma’s going to be off work for a while, which is going to suck. She’s set for now, but a month is a long time to go without a paycheck. The only bright side is that she works her ass off all year so she can take it easy around Christmas, so she was looking to spend less time chasing after people anyway. 

She’s been here for a couple days staking out this particular mark, so they have to get her packed and checked out of her hotel. They make arrangements with said hotel to leave her car there until Killian and David can come down to get it, and then Killian is bundling her into the passenger side of his vehicle, easing them onto the highway and turning down the volume when Emma inevitably caves and falls asleep after the first five miles.

She doesn’t wake again until they’re pulling up in front of her apartment building. Then it’s a delicate operation getting her out of the truck and into her apartment. The sprain in her wrist isn’t as bad as it could’ve been. Maybe a little more pressure from the fall and she’d be dealing with a fracture instead, but it certainly doesn’t tickle right now. It’s still easy enough to get changed on her own and settled into the bed, accepting the glass of water that Killian hands her after he knocks to make sure she’s decent.

“Try to rest. I’m going to grab us some dinner and come back in a bit, okay?”

Emma’s too tired to even speak, so she nods, nesting down into her bed and letting her body finally rest.

-x-

It’s only after he knows she’s fast asleep that Killian leaves, carefully locking the apartment door behind him when he goes. He heads to the sheriff’s station first, as he knows David needs to hear in person that his adopted “little” sister got the shite kicked out of her at work today.

Getting the call from Emma was terrifying; he probably would’ve panicked if he’d gotten the call about anyone, but with Emma it’s… different. He’s been in love with her for so long now that he can’t even recall when or how it happened. But he’s the person she calls when she’s in trouble, and a devoted best friend. He can’t mess any of that up with feelings that she doesn’t reciprocate.

“Killian? What are you doing out of work so early? I thought you guys were shutting down the spare docks for the season.”

“We were. But I got called away on an emergency so I left this morning before lunch.

“What kind of emergency?” David asks, his voice and face going deadly serious. There are only so many people in this town Killian knows, and David knows which one he would drop everything for without hesitation.

“Don’t worry, it’s all okay,” Killian says first. “Emma called from Portland because she took a bit of a spill. Nothing is broken, but she’s a little bruised.”

Immediately, Killian can see David popping into “overprotective brother” mode and understands that this is exactly why Killian was called to tend to Emma instead of him.

“How bruised?”

“It’s just a sprained wrist and she almost dislocated a rib. Nothing but some standard pain killers involved. She’s already back home and resting. You and I will have to drive down to Portland this weekend and retrieve her vehicle.”

The other man relaxes, even if just slightly, at hearing that nothing is broken and that she’s already home. Killian’s been around long enough that he knows exactly how this all goes.

“I was hoping, however, to enlist your lovely wife to help keep an eye on her. She’s going to have to refrain from work for a little bit but we both know Emma loves to push herself even when she should be resting.”

“Of course. She’s going to do what she wants, in the end, but maybe we can at least keep her entertained enough that she won’t feel the need to go out looking for trouble.”

He’s always thankful for David. Not only is he a friend to Killian, but he’s on similar wavelengths when it comes to how Emma works. They know she’s a woman of her own mind, and that she is not to be directed, so they work to find healthy alternatives.

For all the years that Emma has been in his life, she’s been chasing bail skips. He’s seen it hurt her but he’s also seen how much of a thrill she gets from a victory. It probably feels like vengeance against Neal every time she catches a scumbag that should be in jail, and so he’s happy to support her ventures. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t scare the daylights out of him when she gets injured, though.

One thing is for sure, he will always stand by her decisions, will stand beside her in every way he can, but he’s still allowed to wish she’d take the position David offered her as a deputy for their sleepy little town. He understands why she can’t, but it doesn’t stop him from hoping sometimes.

-x-

When Emma wakes up, it’s to a much darker apartment, but she can smell food. That’s what draws her slowly from her bedroom, taking her time and being extremely cautious with her left side.

She loves her job. She wishes it wouldn’t lead to moments like this, but this is the exception and definitely not the rule. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t think about joining the simple life sometimes.

A while ago, David offered her a position at the station as a deputy. She said “no” without even really thinking about it, but over the last couple months she’s been thinking more and more about what it would mean to take it.

She wouldn’t likely get beaten up anymore, that’s for sure. Storybrooke is more about minor traffic violations, and a yearly dispute, usually between two of the miners that happen to be brothers, and only after they’ve been drinking after work. They deal with petty squabbles and neighborly disagreements, but they’re so simple and easy to solve, and at the end of the day, everyone still loves each other in this town.

Having a job at the station would mean seeing her brother more often, and staying in town. It would mean a dedicated health care plan and like, a 401k. It would pay the bills a little more predictably than her current adventures. And while that’s all really boring stuff at this point, it would feel good not to worry about those things as much as she does right now.

And so she considers telling Killian she’s been thinking about it again. Been thinking about a lot of things, really, but she can’t tell him – not when he looks so devastatingly handsome standing in her kitchen plating up whatever’s been heating in her oven while she’s been sleeping. Because there’s always the chance he doesn’t feel the same way, and taking a job at the station means she can’t just leave if it all goes to shit.

“You’re awake!”

Her attention is brought back to the man in her apartment and Emma shakes off the rest of her thoughts. This right here, having time with her friend, is what matters more than anything.

They settle in and eat dinner, watching a movie when they’re done and everything has been cleaned up (by Killian, of course, because he wouldn’t let her lift a finger). She falls asleep on his shoulder less than halfway through, succumbing to the chaos of the day earlier than she meant to.

When she wakes again, it’s morning, and she’s in her bed.

There’s a note on the fridge telling her to take it easy, and she scoffs at it as she goes to brew coffee. It’s not like she had anything planned for the day, work or otherwise.

She’s not sure if he made the plans for her or if Elsa decided on her own, but it’s just after noon when there’s a knock on her door and the blonde is standing there with a deck of cards and a tray of to-go hot chocolates.

“Did he put you up to this?”

“Nope. Told me what happened but I decided to do this all on my own. Besides, you probably didn’t have plans today anyway.”

Her words are an echo of her previous thoughts, so she shrugs a little and opens the door wide to let Elsa in.

“I was surprised you didn’t call David,” Elsa says after they’re settled in around her coffee table, lounging on cushions and blankets, looking like they’ve nested for the remainder of the winter.

“He would’ve flipped out. And Snow would’ve mothered me to death. Killian panicked, but he at least takes care of me the way I need him to.” She’s staring at the cards in her hand, trying to decide if it’s worth it to keep looking for an ace or to start discarding them from her hand.

Elsa hums at that, and Emma gives her a look. “What’s that noise for?”

“Oh, you know.”

When her friend doesn’t continue, Emma stares harder.

“Oh, come on, Emma. What was it you said to me once about knowing me before you knew me?”

Emma takes her time responding, shuffling her cards and finally discarding the five of diamonds instead of the ace. “I said I knew you because I knew myself. We were both loners, looking out for ourselves, and trying not to hurt anyone else along the way.”

“Exactly. That’s the kind of bond we had when we were still a pinch hostile towards each other when I moved here, and now we’re friends. So imagine how much more I know about you now, and how much you’re avoiding the elephant in the room.”

She stares at Elsa, trying to gauge exactly what she’s talking about. She knows it’s in reference to Killian, but Emma works so hard to keep that secret buried deep. There’s no way Elsa could know how she feels, is there?

“When are you going to tell him how you feel?” Elsa asks, eliminating all questions about what thinly veiled conversation they’re having.

“Never.”

“Emma.”

“He can’t know.”

“Why not?”

“Because he doesn’t need this baggage hanging around him when I could run at any moment.” She blurts it out, surprising even herself with the intensity of the words.

Elsa puts her cards down, completely abandoning the game at hand and reaches over for Emma.

“Has it ever occurred to you that if you ran, he would follow you?”

“I’m not sure he would, actually.”

“That man would follow you to the ends of the earth, or time, if he had to. But if you need proof, please look at the guy that left work in the middle of the day to drive to Portland to pick you up and take care of you because he knows the right way to take care of you. Your words.”

Her little speech is topped off with a raise of one of her perfect eyebrows.

“I’m not saying you need to confess your feelings right now,” she adds, grabbing the cards from Emma’s hand and gathering them all to re-deal. “But think about it. Also you should’ve discarded the ace. I’m doing you a favor.”

Emma shakes her head as she motions for Elsa to continue, taking a moment to sip from her hot chocolate and consider her options. She sets herself a deadline of January 1. Maybe by then she can make up her mind what to do or not do.

-x-

On Saturday, early in the morning, Killian pulls up outside of Emma’s apartment. David is dropping off Snow to spend time with her while they go down to Portland to get Emma’s Bug. 

But before they can get to that part of the plan, they have to make it there first.

Killian and David actually have a fantastic relationship. They bonded over having pains in the ass for brothers, and their friendship with Emma (even if David’s goes a little deeper than his own – being siblings by legal decree does mean a little more than “best friend” after all). But currently, you’d think they were strangers with the way the silence sits heavy between them in David’s SUV.

He tries to think of things to talk about, but nothing comes to mind but how to tell his very good friend that he’s in love with Emma. That’s not a conversation for a car trip where he literally cannot escape if the other man tries to aim his side of the vehicle at a tree.

Finally, he settles on something more mundane, asking what David got Snow for Christmas, and if he had any good ideas for what to get Emma this year.

That, of course, derails the conversation pretty quickly.

“You could get her your honesty about how you feel about her,” David suggests, still driving in the same calm and collected manner he has been the whole time.

“Pardon?’

“You heard me. I think she’s the only person in Storybrooke that doesn’t know how you feel.”

“Aye, well, all the more reason to not tell her. I don’t need to scare her off.”

“Why would that scare her off?” David asks, glancing over at Killian to see the tired look on his face.

“I know Emma. I know how she thinks. And she’s sworn off love for so long that I feel if I admitted my attractions that she would split as soon as she could,” he says in response.

“You never know until you try,” comes the answer to his statement, but Killian isn’t convinced.

“Does she need a new blanket for the living room, do you think?”

“You two are more alike than you think,” is David’s final comment before letting Killian successfully change the subject without returning to it again.

When they get to Portland, Killian stops in at the front desk to let him know he’s back to gather Emma’s car, making sure everything is still squared away with that before he goes out and gives David a thumbs up. The other man still waits until he sees that the Bug is successfully running, and then they both head back on the road to get home.

Killian has to pull into a gas station not long after they start driving, though, after a glance at the gauges tells him that Emma never bothered to fill up after she got here. He checks over the contents of the car quickly, making sure nothing was disturbed as he finds that the passenger door was also unlocked this whole time.

One item in particular draws him up short, however, when he reads the heading and discovers it to be an apartment application for a building not far from the hotel he just left.

When was she planning on telling anyone she was interested in moving down here? By the looks of it, she got two-thirds through the application before it was left on her passenger seat.

His heart sinks looking it over, where she’s even filled out potential move-in dates for right after the holidays are over. He can’t imagine Emma living outside of Storybrooke. She was there when he moved to the US and she’s been there for him ever since, and he never imagined she would leave. Apparently, though, she had other plans that she wasn’t sharing.

Maybe he should invest in some packing materials for Christmas in order to help her, if that’s what she wishes to do.

With every mile he drives closer to home, the more his heart aches. Should he tell her he found the application? Should he try to convince her to stay? No – he’s always claimed he would support her in anything and everything she ever did, and this change in location will be no different.

Instead, what Killian decides to do by the time he gets back, is bury the knowledge of what he’s found. If Emma wants to move, she will tell him - tell all of them - in her own time. 

By the time he makes it back to Storybrooke, he’s worked his own mind into a frenzy. All he wants to do is drop off the keys and get back home. But when he gets to Emma’s door, he can smell the food first, and hear the laughter of their friends beyond the wood. Emma must sense his arrival because she whips open the door right as he’s about to knock.

“We thought you got lost!” she says, smiling wide and yanking on his sleeve to pull him inside. “We made dinner. Come join us.”

Despite his internal turmoil, Killian obliges, kicking off his shoes by the door and hanging his coat where it always hangs. He heads to the kitchen table when he’s settled, doing his best to put on a happy mask and enjoy the time with his loved ones. 

He sets himself into the easy rhythm of traditions, passing the food in the order they always choose, and stacking the plates in a particular way when everyone is done. 

As a group, they initiate cleanup. Emma and Killian fall to their respective roles of washing and drying the plates, while David packs up the food and stores the leftovers away. He and Snow leave shortly after with their own container of food, leaving Emma and Killian by themselves as they finish the dishes. 

A million times, he tells himself to stay quiet, but that doesn’t stop him from blurting it out after five minutes. “So, the Portland Arms is a nice building.”

“It… you saw the application.”

“It was on the seat of your vehicle, so yes, I saw the application,” he says with much more attitude than he meant to. 

“It’s just…”

“Just what, love? Just a couple hours away? Just a change of scenery and nothing else will change?”

“I was going to say ‘just an application’ but you’re right with both of those, too.”

Killian sighs, deflating a bit as he places the last dry dinner plate on the stack. “I’m sorry, Swan, it’s just the thought of you leaving is a lot to take in. But if it’s truly what you want, then just let me know what you need me to do and I’ll be happy to help.”

“Hold your horses,” she tells him, patting him on the arm when her hands are dry. “I’m not going anywhere yet. Like I said, it’s just an application. I don’t know if I want to move in the middle of winter so it may be a while.”

That her obstacle is the middle of winter rather than anything else tells him a lot about her feelings on the matter, so he lets it drop. 

-x-

It feels like there’s something brewing that Emma can’t control. She’s not sure what exactly, but ever since they went down to get her car and Killian found that stupid application that she left on her seat, there’s been some underlying tension that they can’t seem to shake. He’s been moody, but also pretending he isn’t. She’s not sure why she didn’t tell him the truth, but it’s her own damn business, anyway! 

On Christmas Eve, he comes over as he always does in order to decorate her tree. Normally, Emma is fully immersed in the process of picking out, cutting down, and hauling in of her tree. This year, she had to skip the second and third parts of that, only having a hand in picking out the one she wanted while David and Killian were the ones to bring it in. It’s been in the stand for a couple days now just waiting for the trimming part, but they always wait until the day before to do that together. 

While David and Snow are busy decorating theirs and getting their little family home ready for the holiday, Killian comes to her apartment. He doesn’t put up a tree of his own because he spends so much of his time at Emma’s place. 

He doesn’t do a lot of holiday decorating for that same reason, and Emma gets why he might be upset with the idea of her moving to Portland because all of his traditions that have been formed over the years will be moving with her. 

Clearly, she didn’t consider how hard he might take it if she actually moved away. 

But as she carefully sits there unwrapping and adding ornaments to the tree, she can’t imagine doing this without him. They have assigned parts in this play: they pick the tree together, and Killian puts on the lights while she fetches the skirt and the ornaments, then he’s in charge of the garland and Emma tops the whole thing with the star. 

This year they had to make some concessions to make sure Emma doesn’t hurt herself, but she’s still taking care of the ornaments while Killian struggles to get the beaded garland untangled. He’s muttering to himself, saying how he meant to wrap them around something last year when they packed it all up, but it’s all a diatribe to himself and she just listens and tries her best not to laugh. 

He’s helpless. Adorable and helpless. And she doesn’t really realize what she’s doing until she’s already moving towards him - the small swan ornament she’d been holding is abandoned back in the box and she’s grabbing the collar of his shirt and pulling him towards her.

There’s a look of shock on his face as she tugs him down, and then she’s not thinking about how there was no warning leading up to this but how right it feels to be kissing him. Killian’s surprise wears off quickly and then he’s kissing her back, wrapping his arms around her waist. She can feel the beads of the garland digging into her side where he clearly didn’t drop the strand but she doesn’t care, especially when her hand buries into his hair and she’s not sure she ever wants to surface from this again. 

He sighs out her name as they break apart at one point, and that’s when reality comes crashing down on her. What is she doing? And what is he doing kissing her back like that?

“I’m - I’m sorry. I’ll be right back,” Emma stutters out, making a dash for the bathroom. She takes her time, pressing a cool washcloth to her face and running the faucet for far too long before she exits again. 

When she comes back, the living room is empty. The garland is neatly strung around the tree, but the coat rack reveals no extras and it’s clear that he’s made a swift exit while she tried to collect herself. 

There’s a note by the tree, hastily scrawled but still more beautiful than most handwriting she’s ever seen. In it, Killian explains that he’s had a rather long day and he’s headed home to get some sleep, but that he’ll see her in the morning when they all exchange gifts. With a sigh, she turns back to her ornaments, adding the last few she had left before.

It takes her that long to realize that Killian has already added the star to the top of the tree, probably foreseeing that she can’t stretch like that on her own right now. She doesn’t even plug it in to see it all completed, instead flipping off the rest of the lights and making sure the door is locked before going to bed.

She knows why she kissed Killian - she wanted to. She wanted… wants him. She just doesn’t know why he kissed her back like a man on a mission and then bolted while she tried to make heads and tails of the situation. 

Her dreams are fraught with weird scenarios, one of which has her tangled in strands of lights and garland, trapped in a Christmas prison. She calls out for help repeatedly, but never gets an answer. Then she calls out Killian’s name and she can immediately hear a response for her to hold on, that he’s on his way.

In the morning, she wakes with that dream fresh in her mind and her heart still aches a little at the message. In all situations, great and small, she knows without a doubt that Killian will be there to help her. So what’s holding her back from telling him how she feels? 

The whole day feels different. Killian is usually the first one at her door in the morning but he’s not there when David and Snow show up. They’re the ones helping Emma put together brunch, just waiting for the oven timer to ding when Killian finally walks through the door looking like he slept about as roughly as Emma did. 

“Sorry I’m late,” he tells her as she helps him out of his coat. “Had to take care of some things at home.”

It’s a lie. She’s not sure she’s ever heard him lie to her this blatantly before. He’s lied to her about small things before, but this is the first time she’s heard him outright lie this bad since they drove down to Boston one summer and he claimed he wasn’t lost. When they ended up in New Hampshire, he finally admitted his wrongdoing. 

But when she looks a little harder at him, he averts his eyes, moving instead to remove his boots and wander over to where Snow and David have already made themselves comfortable in the living room. 

That’s the way it is all through brunch and the cleanup from their meal, and even most of the way through presents. He only really looks at her again when he thanks her for his gift. His eyes say volumes about how he’s feeling, so while the words were quiet, he’s practically screaming his gratitude in looks alone. 

When she opens the gift from him, her heart almost stops. Nestled in the small box is a swan pendant, vastly different than the last one she owned when she was younger, and already holding a lot more meaning than the little keychain some asshole once lifted from a gas station for her. She kept the old pendant for the longest time as a reminder not to trust anyone. It was Killian that helped her finally get rid of that necklace, patiently sitting with her as she took her time, made peace with all the bad memories, and then chucked it into the ocean from the boat he’d taken her out on that day.

“I hoped it would have slightly better memories than the last one,” Killian says, and she didn’t even notice him move closer until she realizes how near his voice is. “May I?”

She nods, watching in silence as he lifts the necklace from the box, taking his time to grasp the clasp between his fingers and pinching it open while holding the other side with his prosthetic. She holds her hair up and out of the way as he latches the necklace behind her, his fingers lingering just a bit before he abruptly stands. 

“If you’ll excuse me, I’ve some work to attend to,” he says, looking regretfully at Emma before he heads for the door. He makes sure to gather his gifts, thanking David and Snow before slipping from the apartment as quickly as he showed up. 

It takes some acting, but she plays off his departure as nothing major. It’s clear he’s never mentioned the apartment application to David and Snow or else one of them would’ve blurted out an objection already. So she plays along and smiles through the rest of their time together. 

Just after they eat dinner, Snow excuses herself. “I’m going home for a moment, and I’ll be back with more cookies,” she tells them. 

Another lie, Emma can tell, but she lets her friend go, realizing pretty quickly this is a case of Divide and Conquer between the married couple. 

“I’m going to make you more hot chocolate. And when it’s done, we’re going to have a talk,” David says when the door has shut behind his wife, confirming her suspicions. 

Emma bites back the smile the best she can and follows him into the kitchen.

-x-

It’s snowing and cold but Killian doesn’t really notice any of it. His hand is shoved into his pocket and his prosthetic is resting on the wooden railing overlooking the docks. 

“I would be lost without you,” he repeats to himself. It’s the inscription she put on the inside of the compass, a beautiful rosewood piece that he would normally be so excited to display in his home until it was time to bring his own boat out of winter storage. 

Now, after everything that’s happened the last couple weeks, he can’t tell its intended meaning. She’s talking about moving, and then she kisses him, and then runs away, and then gives him this particular gift with this particular message? 

He watches his breath fog out in front of him, noticing that even that looks sad and aggravated.

“Thought I might find you out here,” comes a voice from behind him.  He turns to find Snow standing there, bundled against the cold and holding a hot mug that she hands to him.

The tea is one of his favorites, and he sighs in the comfort of the gesture.

“You two have been keeping secrets from us,” Snow says. “You don’t need to tell me everything, since I’m sure it means more to you and Emma than it does to me or David. There’s some things that I do know. It’s that you don’t get a happy ending without working for it, and that everyone deserves love. I can tell you have feelings for Emma that go beyond best friends. And though she’d never admit it, I’m pretty sure Emma feels the same way.”

“You’d get along with my brother,” Killian says, managing a smile. It doesn’t last, though. “And I don’t know if she truly does.”

“You won’t know until you talk to her.” Snow reaches out and clasps his arm. “Look, Emma has waited a long time for someone to come into her life that she trusts enough to give her heart to. And I think she so badly wants it to be you, but she’s too scared to make a move without knowing for sure how you feel.”

It’s sound advice, to maybe even make things a little more obvious to her. Handing her a necklace doesn’t explain his reasoning behind it - that he not only bought it because he thought of the way she’d smile when she saw it, but also because she deserves to replace every last memory from the last man she trusted that broke her heart. 

Snow shivers, bringing him back to the present and he’s finally aware of the snow falling heavier now than it was before. “It’s cold out here. Go home,” she tells him. “And Merry Christmas!” With a quick peck on his cheek, Snow turns and walks up the path back towards where she can see David waiting in his truck to pick her up. 

He turns back towards the water, staring out at the darkness beyond his vision. 

His friend is right. He needs to tell Emma how he feels, and he needs to do it before it’s too late. Liam always tells him that a man unwilling to fight for what he wants deserves what he gets. With one more look out to the water, he turns to head back to Emma’s apartment, but she’s already there.

She’s a couple meters away, shivering slightly despite her warm weather gear, and it’s only once Killian turns that she seems to come back to herself. 

“What are you doing out here, love? It’s freezing.”

“Says the man out here without a scarf or a glove or a hat?”

“I wasn’t really planning on staying out long. It just sort of… happened.” 

“Killian.”

“No wait, there’s something I need to say before we go any further.” He braces himself quickly, moving towards her slowly as he starts to speak. “When I met you, I was a broken man. I'd lost what I thought was the love of my life. After that first Christmas I spent with you, I felt like maybe my heart could move on one day. You invited me to join your family and your traditions, and for the first time in a long time I felt that hope that I'd find love again. And by the next Christmas, I wanted to find that love with you.”

He stops when he’s close enough to see the way the snowflakes catch on her eyelashes, and the way she keeps brushing them out of her hair. 

“I was always afraid to say anything for fear that you’d go running from me, since I’d heard all the stories you’d told me about the men you’d been with. I figured if you kept repeating ‘I’m never dating again’ enough in my presence that I should probably heed that warning.”

Emma chuckles under her breath at that, inching her way closer to him as he does the same to her. 

“Snow told me you’ve waited a long time to find a man to give your heart to. I’m truly hoping if you’d be lost without me that it means I may be the one you’re ready to try again with?”

“I know the engraving was cheesy but it fits too well, and it’s absolutely true. I would be lost without you.” The words come out quietly, and his breath catches in his throat as her fingers find the pirate’s luck necklace she bought him a few years ago. “I know I didn’t make it easy for you to tell me the truth, but I want you to know I feel the same way. What do you say, should we make this official? Kiss again and not have either of us go running for the hills afterward?” She means for it to lighten the mood, but he can’t help but be perfectly honest with his next words. 

“Your heart’s desire, Swan. That’s all I want.”

Her responding smile is bright and she leans forward just as he does. For a moment, all they do is touch their foreheads together, savoring this moment and breathing the other in - this closeness feels different than all the other times in their shared lives. When her fingers link with his, that’s when Killian moves again, angling his head and pressing his lips to hers. 

This time is sweeter, with much more meaning behind it.

“Does this mean you aren’t moving to Portland?”

“Killian. I was never moving to Portland. My skip worked in the housing office at that building and I needed the application as a cover to get to him.”

“And you couldn’t have just told me that when I brought it up?”

“I got defensive! It’s a knee-jerk reaction.”

“You got the ‘jerk’ part right, at least.”

She points a finger at him, a wordless warning that he’s been on the receiving end of multiple times. 

“Let’s go home,” she tells him, smiling as he lifts one of her gloved hands to press his lips against it. 

It’s later when she kisses him goodnight when she tells him she took the job at the station, and he feels like this may be the best Christmas he’s ever had. 

-x-

The next Christmas, the box she unwraps is engraved, and the contents inside of it make her tear up. 

“Where you lead,” he whispers, “will you let me be by your side?”

Her response of ‘yes’ is quickly lost in the way that they kiss, and they inform David and Snow to make it Christmas dinner instead of brunch, just so they have time to get their celebrating out of the way before they tell everyone else.

“Emma, come on, there's no need for being dramatic.”

His condescending tone sets her off even more than anything else that has happened over the past two days – dealing with his snot-nosed parents, the stiff atmosphere in their pristine house, or finding out that he cheated on her with his secretary, cliché alert.

Furiously, Emma Swan slams the hood of her old yellow bug shut, thanking the fates that she had to stay back for work one day longer than Walsh while he already drove home to his rich mommy and daddy. That way, she has her own means of transportation now, even if it might not be too comfortable in the unforgiving Maine winter.

He has the audacity to try and grab her arm when she climbs into the driver's seat. “Emma, don't be ridic–”

“Fuck. Off.” she hisses and wriggles her arm free from his grip, and he knows better than to insist any further as she closes the door forcefully and starts the engine.

“You're gonna freeze to death out there!” he calls after her, and she thrusts her right fist in the air to give him the middle finger salute as she drives off.

She grasps the wheel so hard her knuckles turn white. Really, she should have followed her guts in the first place and refused to accompany him to his parents' home over the holidays; deep down, she knew already two months ago that thins thing wasn't ging to work out in the long run. But Walsh insisted, poked, and cajoled her into it... and also, as he remarked so insensitively, “You've nowhere else to go for the holidays.” Where was the lie?

Truth is, she doesn't have a place to go, or people to go to, for all that matters. But truth is also, being alone in her ugly little flat in Boston beats being in that snakepit of arrogant pricks any time, so that's exactly where she's heading, no matter how long it takes, how many toes she'll lose to frostbite, and how many gallons of caffeine she'll have to consume.

It was in the middle of twilight time when she left Portland, and now she's been driving through the dark for hours, a darkness eerily illuminated by the heavy snow that seems to be everywhere. Maybe at nine she stops for a fill of gas and shortly contemplates to ask the attendant to point her to a motel for the night, but then decides against it. She still feels fresh and full of adrenaline and wants to drive on through the night, wants to put as many miles as possible between her and what she left behind – another shitty relationship she never should have allowed to come that far, another illusion of a perfect life she would never have. But seriously, fuck this shit. Nobody needs that.

She throws a merely fleeting glance at the only partly green sign indicating that she is leaving Storyb– whatever the rest of the little town's name reads is covered in snow. The flurry is getting thicker and thicker, and seriously, fuck winter in Maine. For a moment she considers turning around and driving back to Storyb–, but the snow is heavy, and she can't really see the confines of the not-too large road, and she really doesn't want to risk slipping off the road and ending up with her car stuck in the roadside ditch.

Damn, she should have flown to Portland, but money was a bit tight after having to replace the washing machine, and she sure as hell wasn't going to allow her boyfriend to buy her a ticket. Ex-boyfriend. She huffs, asking herself whatever she saw in him, and she can't even remember. Great, another ruined Christmas in her long history of not-so-great Christmases... well, for someone who spent her childhood and half of her teenage years in the forster system, and the other half of her teenage years on the streets, it's really not a surprise that this doesn't even qualify as her worst Christmas ever. The thought makes her laugh almost hysterically, and for a second she's distracted. A shadow suddenly pops up on the road in front of the hood of her car, and she jerks the wheel violently to the right. The moment she feels the wheel thrum in her hands, she knows she's fucked, and one second later she loses control over the car.

For the blink of an eye she's afraid the car is going to overturn, but luckily, at least that doesn't happen; much to her luck, it doesn't end up in the roadside ditch either, and after a loud clonk! the car comes to a halt in a weird angle at the very edge of the road. The engine dies a quiet death.

“Fuck!” she gasps and lets out her breath in a long huff as everything else goes silent.

“Okay,” she whispers to herself, to reassure herself. Calmly, very carefully, she closes her fingers around the key, presses her left foot down on the clutch pedal and shifts into the first gear, her right foot on the brake, and slowly turns the key. The engine sputters a bit, then it starts. Thank God. Gently, she lets go of the brake and steps on the gas pedal, easing off the clutch. A shiver seems to run through the car, but otherwise, it doesn't move. More gas, until the engine starts to protest loudly... and it still doesn't move.

“Shit,” Emma presses through clenched teeth and steps down harder, but that's a mistake. The old car makes a rattling sound, and the engine dies. “Shit, shit, shit.” She turns the key again, trying to will the engine to start, but it's useless.

She hits the wheel with her fist and a filthy curse and snatches her phone from the passenger seat. But the display shows no signal. Seriously, fuck rural Maine. Fuck everything. With a groan, she leans her forehead against the wheel and tries to come up with a solution that does not involve her leaving her car, wearing just an – at least padded – leather jacket and thin, albeit knee-high, leather boots over her jeans and sweater. But there is no other solution – she can't stay here in the car without engine in the middle of the night and wait for who knows how many hours until someone drives by; for all she knows, it's perfectly possible that won't happen for days. She has to leave the car and try to find help – her best shot walking back in the direction of Storyb–, whatever the fucking name is, and maybe she'll pass by a farmhouse or something like that earlier and doesn't have to go all the way back.

Every fiber of her being, every instinct protests against leaving the relative safety and warmth of the car – but she knows staying inside is not an option, as that warmth is already fading with the engine shut off, she can already feel it. With a deep sigh, she grabs her beanie, gloves, and scarf from the passenger seat and bundles up as good as she can, shoves her useless phone in the backpocket of her jeans, and opens the door to climb out of the car.

The cold is not as bad as she expected, it doesn't feel biting, it's more... soft, for the lack of a better word. And the snow doesn't blow in her face, it falls calmly – but steadily – and covers everything, seems to muffle even the sound of her own breathing. Then she starts walking. It seems surprisingly easy, and she gains ground faster than she thought. At least something.

Five minutes later, she can barely feel her feet anymore, and the snowflakes melting on her face do leave a bit of a sting. A slight worry starts to creep up in Emma's mind, but then she sees something from the corner of her eyes, maybe a few hundred yards away... lights. There must be a house, and she knows it might be risky to bang at unknown people's doors in the middle of the night, but she also knows that she's never going to make it back to Storyb– by foot in this weather, so she definitely has to try her luck with these potential axe murderers. She pulls out her phone and uses the flashlight to look for a path leading towards the lights, but she doesn't really see anything; if there is a path or driveway, it's all covered and hidden underneath the snow. She's going to have to make her way cutting across country.

With a deep breath, she hunches her shoulders to brace herself a little more against the cold, and turns to the left, making her way towards the lights. Her third step goes right into the void of a small pit hidden underneath the snow. She gasps in shock and waves her arms around as she stumbles, a sharp pain shooting through her left ankle, and for a moment it looks like she can manage to steady herself... but her numb feet are too clumsy; then she's falling, a dull thud echoes through her head, and everything fades to black.

***

“Bloody hell, Smee, you scurvy beast, come here!”

A distant yelp is the only answer, and he groans in frustration.

“Should've let you rot in that trap,” he growls and trudges through the snow in the direction of the sound. Whatever might that bloody useless dog be up to now? He was supposed to just do his deed before retiring for the night, but the moment he let him out, the stubborn animal darted away in the direction of the road, as fast as the snow and his three-legged clumsiness would allow. Except for a dull reflection of the moonlight on the snow it's pitch dark, and Killian Jones switches his flashlight on and calls again for his dog.

After a few yards he quickens his step – as much as it's possible with all the snow – because an uneasy feeling is prickling at the nape of his neck. As stubborn as his dog is, tonight he seems particularly insistent on not following his master's voice, and that's not typical.

“Smee? Where are you, m'boy?” The annoyance in his tone is replaced by concern.

The dog replies with another howl, more urgent this time. He doesn't sound like he's in pain, but he very obviously wants his master to hurry. Something must be wrong. Killian has almost reached the edge of the road now, and there's still no sign of the dog, but he can see the animal's weirdly shaped track in the snow. Three steps later, it becomes clear why Smee has been hidden from his sight: the dog is crouching in the snow-filled roadside ditch beside an almost completely snow-covered heap that must be the remnants of some big dead animal.

“What did you find? Smee, what's that?”

The dog whimpers and nudges his plump muzzle against the heap, brushing the snow away. What looks like the blood of a fresh roadkill at first, on second look turns out to be red leather, and after narrowing his eyes to see better in the blazing light cone, Killian realizes that he's looking at the body of an unconscious woman lying in the ditch, almost completely covered by snow.

“Oh, bloody buggering hell!”

He jumps into the ditch and drops to his knees beside the motionless figure. Smee jumps to his three feet and wags his tail, firmly whimpering. A quick scan tells Killian that the woman is breathing, and there's no blood or any injury to be seen save for a bruise on her forehead. But her lips have a faint blueish tint, and when he pulls off his glove and touches her cheek, her skin is ice cold; who knows how long she's been lying here already – long enough to be covered with a soft, deadly sheet of snow.

Killian doesn't waste any time pondering over what happened to her or how she ended up here, his priority is to get her out of the unforgiving cold. He takes his flashlight between his teeth, pulls on his glove again and pulls the unconscious woman into a sitting position. Smee jumps out of the ditch and barks encouragingly.

“Aye, good boy, Smee, good boy. Oh, fuck.”

He's lean, but strong enough, yet lifting an unconscious body from the floor and rise to one's feet and climb out of a ditch is no easy task, even for someone who's used to hard physical work. But eventually, he manages, and once he's secured the body over his shoulder, groaning under the weight, he walks across the snowy meadow towards the lone farmhouse, with his dog hopping excitedly around him.

Finally inside the house, he crosses the large living room with the mighty fireplace in the middle and the large bed in one corner. He lets the body glide from his shoulder and deposits her on the bed in a sitting position, pulling down the zipper of her red leather jacket that's almost frozen stiff and ridiculously inadequate for winter. He makes equally quick work of her soaked boots and socks, scarf, beanie and gloves, before he lets her drop on her back and drops to his knees to examine her feet. The skin is pale and ice cold, but it doesn't look like there's frostbite yet. He also checks her hands, ears and the tip of her nose, and when he doesn't find any signs of frostbite there either, he starts to quickly remove her damp clothes, places her in the middle of the bed and heaps every available blanket on her body. Then he puts on a kettle with water and quickly gets rid of his own boots and jacket.

When the water is ready, he fills all of his three hot water bottles and places them under the blankets against her feet, on her thighs and her stomach, folding her hands above it.

Smee whimpers and makes a move to jump on the bed, apparently feeling responsible for his find, but Killian calls him out in a sharp voice.

“Hey! Nice try.” He shakes his head and clicks his tongue at the dog's disappointed yelp. “You know bloody well the bed's off limits.” He scratches behind the flappy dog ears. “Come on, let's heat up some soup. Come on.” He slaps on his thigh, and the dog follows with one last reproachful whimper. “Stop complaining, you've already caused enough trouble.”

Passing by the fireplace, he puts on an extra log, making the flames blaze, and hangs her wet clothes on a leather chair near the fire. He throws one last glance over his shoulder before heading for the kitchen. Aye, trouble. He can already feel it in his bones.

“Bloody hell,” he huffs.

In the kitchen, he sets a pot on the stove and takes a container with the remnants of the chicken broth he made the day before, as if he knew it would come in handy. Smee is watching him intently as Killian grumpily stirs the yellowish liquid.

“Just what I needed,” he murmurs. There's just one thing Killian Jones hates more than an interruption of his quiet routine: surprises. Like the one currently huddled in his bed under all of his blankets.

The dog tilts his head in an almost apologetic gesture. Just like his master, Smee has a habit of attracting trouble and misfortune like a magnet, which is of course what brought them together in the first place.

Killian Jones had been living in the old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere for a few years, content with the fact that he saw people only about twice a month, when he drove into the next town to buy the supplies he needed and to deliver his wooden work pieces. Nobody asked him questions, nobody knew or cared about his backstory, and he liked it like that. The one exception was his only friend David Nolan, the veterinarian, for whom he'd once made a sycamore medicine cabinet. He and his wife Mary Margaret were his only social contacts, and once they'd given up trying to lure him further out of his self-chosen shell, they shared a tentative friendship.

One day, when he roamed the woods around his farmhouse to find the perfect tree branch for a coat rack, he stumbled over the miserable figure of a shaggy dog, more dead than alive and even to weak to whimper, its left hind leg stuck in a leghold trap. Even if it seemed useless, he struggled to free the poor dying creature from the vicious device which earned him a feeble tail wag – and rusty iron claws plunging into the flesh of his left palm, crushing the metacarpal bones.

Surprisingly enough, when he arrived in town, the dog was still breathing, and he left him in Dave's capable hands. In the hospital, his own wounds were tended to, but the rusty iron and the bacteria of the dog's rotting flesh had already done their infective work, and even though the doctors did their best, they couldn't save his hand. So he became a one-handed carpenter. Why not. It fit with the bloody luck he'd had so far in his life.

Ten days later, when he left the hospital, he passed by the vet's office to see if the stray dog had made it. The shaggy animal had to be one tough bastard, however, because not only was he alive, he literally jumped to his feet – his three feet – when he saw him and wagged his tail tentatively, as if he recognized the human who saved his life.

“Nobody looking for him?” Killian asked, and David Nolan shook his head.

“No dog tag either, even if he must have belonged to someone once.” He showed him a dirty red leather collar with faded black letters inside that looked like written with a sharpie, forming the word Smee.

“I'll take him,” Killian said curtly.

David frowned. “Do you really think that's a good idea?”

“What happened, wasn't his fault.” He held up his stump that was still bandaged. “If we don't match, I don't know who does,” he replied dryly and motioned to the dog's rear with the mutilated left leg. “Besides,” he went on, “who's gonna want him?”

David looked from the dog to his friend. “How are you holding up?”

Killian shrugged. “I've been much worse.”

David knew it was a lie, but he kept his mouth shut when he saw how Killian looked at the dog.

“Smee, eh?” The dog wagged his tail again, more fervently this time. Killian slapped his thigh in a beckoning gesture. “Come on, let's go home.”

When he drove off in his old jeep, Mary Margaret Nolan joined her husband at the window and sighed compassionately.

“Do you really think that's a good idea?” she asked.

David nodded thoughtfully. “I think it's a very good idea.”

That was three years ago, and from that very day, Smee never left Killian's side, obviously determined to repay the favor with undying loyalty and fierce affection. Nobody ever came looking for him, and nobody ever found out where he'd come from. Perhaps, David Nolan thought sometimes, he was just meant to be at the right place at the right time.

With infallible instinct, he found every injured animal in the range of a few miles, and dragged them home. Tonight, it seems, his instinct struck again.

When the soup is ready, Killian turns the stove low and returns to the living room to look after Smee's newest find. Much to his relief, the figure of the woman is stirring under the heap of blankets, and when he takes a closer look at her, he sees the color of her face has changed; the worrisome paleness of her cheeks has turned into a more healthier tone, and her blueish lips are rosier now.

He sighs and fetches a few clothes for her to put on when she wakes up, which will undoubtedly happen soon. Oh, the fun. He sighs again.

***

Slowly, very slowly Emma drifts back into a sort of semi-onsciousness, and the first thing she notices is a tickling pain in her feet... but that's gotta be a good thing, because the last thing she remembers is the thump on her head, and that she couldn't feel her feet anymore. But now she can feel them, even if they're hurting and stinging, and also her hands, and she can even ball them into fists, and she's engulfed by warmth and softness and a soothing, pleasant smell. It gives her the urge to bury herself deeper into the nest she's in and just go back to sleep.

But her instinct scrapes at her consciousness, demanding of her to wake up and check out her surroundings and situation. She stirs and struggles to open her eyes, and it's surprisingly difficult. The blood is rushing in her ears, and then she clearly hears a voice through the haze swirling around her. The voice is low and accented and somehow fits well with the warm and cozy feeling.

“Lass? Are you awake?”

But it's a stranger's voice, a man's no less, and she has no idea what's happening to her. Her survival instinct kicks in, and with great willpower and effort she opens her eyes, blinking rapidly to clear her sight. She notices that she's inside a room and that she's lying on her back stuffed under what seems a lot of blankets that seemed cozy just a moment ago, but now seem to suffocate and threaten her. She struggles to sit up, and there's the voice again.

“Whoa, careful,” he warns, “you got a bruise on your head.”

That would explain the dull throb and maybe she dizziness, and she struggles even more. She has to see the owner of this voice and somehow make sure she isn't in danger. She notices with dread that underneath the indefinite number of blankets she's wearing only her underwear. A hint of panic brushes over her spine, and she's careful to hold the blankets in place around her body as she finally manages to sit up and fix her eyes on the man standing only a few feet away from the bed she's been placed in.

He's wearing normal clothes, she notices. A plaid shirt over a grey henley, well-worn jeans. Dark hair, a little too long, a tuft of it falling over his forehead. It almost touches his thick eyebrows that are currently raised above very blue eyes scrutinizing her closely. A slight stubble is peppering his jaw and cheeks, shimmering reddish in the dim light of the room. He doesn't look dangerous, and absurdly enough, her instincts tell her that he isn't, but she could be terribly wrong, and she's alone with him, in a bed, stripped down to her freaking underwear.

“What happened?” she demands to know. “Where am I? Who the fuck are you?”

He shakes his head slowly. “I have no bloody idea of what happened, lass. Smee found you in the roadside ditch, passed out and already half covered in snow, and insisted we take you in.”

“Smee?” she echoes and looks around suspiciously, a fresh hint of panic making her toes curl. “Is there someone else?”

“Smee's a dog,” the stranger replies calmly, patiently. “You're at my house, thirty miles outside Storybrooke, Maine, and my name is Killian Jones. I'm living alone.” He tilts his head in what appears to be slight mockery. ”Anything else I can be of service with?”

“Did you take off my clothes?” she snaps.

“Of course I did, they were bloody frozen,” he explains pointedly, a slight annoyance creeping into his voice now. “Did you miss the part where I said you were half covered in snow?” He nods his head sharply in her direction and adds, “You were bloody frozen.”

Emma huffs. “Oh, right, and to warm me up you had to put me in your bed, with–”

He holds up a hand. “Listen, darling,” he cuts her off, clearly angry now, “this is no bloody Hallmark movie. I put you in my bed, the one close to the fireplace, with three hot water bottles to warm you up as fast as possible, because hypothermia is fucking dangerous!” He motions his hand vaguely to the side. “I hung up your damn clothes at the firesite, and they're still damp, if you don't believe me.” A quick look confirms that her jeans, shirt, and jacket are indeed draped over the armrests and back of a huge leather chair standing close to a cozily burning fire in an open firesite. “But let me tell you,” he continues, “you're pretty rude for someone whose life I just saved.” He gives an annoyed flick of his wrist in her direction. “What were you even doing out there, in these clothes no less?”

She's momentarily disarmed by his little tirade, and she knows she should probably apologize, but her head is still dizzy, and she blinks rapidly to clear her mind and tries to recall what happened that made her end up in the roadside ditch where her life-saver apparently found her.

“My car... must have driven over a small rock or something,” she murmurs and touches the bruise on her forehead absentmindedly, flinching a little. “I think I had a flat tire.”

His eyebrows rise high. “So you decided walking was a good idea?”

“Better than waiting in an old car to be frozen to death!” she replies defiantly.

He tilts his head. “You do have a point.”

She draws a deep breath. “Do you have a phone?” she asks firmly.

He nods his head once, slowly, but Emma has a feeling that it's not a good sign. “Yes.” For a moment, she's relieved until he adds, “But the landline's dead. Happens when the snowing gets heavy.” He gestures in the direction of the firesite where there's a table with an old-fashioned looking phone and suggests pointedly, “Check for yourself if you don't believe me.”

Her instinct tells her he's not lying; and so far, her instinct has never failed her. She ignores his remark and raises her chin. “Mobile?”

“I have one, but it's never charged.” He tilts his head again. “No connection here.”

She lets her shoulders sag. “And what now?”

“I'm afraid you're not going anywhere tonight, lass,” he says and raises a hand in defense. “Believe me, I don't like this one tad better than you, but for tonight you'll have to stay here. Tomorrow we'll look for your car.”

She groans in frustration, feeling pretty deflated now. “Do you... do you maybe have something for me to put on?” she asks reluctantly, and he just motions wordlessly to the foot of the bed. Neatly folded, she finds what looks like a flannel shirt, faded grey sweat pants, and red socks with a christmas-y pattern. When she looks up agin, she sees he's retreating from the bed.

“I'm going to fix something to eat while you put that on.” He gestures across the room. “Bathroom's down the hall, fresh towels are in the closet.”

Emma combs her hair behind her ears with both hands and notices that they tremble a little when the shock of what happened settles in and she realizes that this grumpy stranger and his dog most probably saved her life. She shivers, and not from the temperature. Before she can say something, all she sees of him is a glimpse of his back as he closes the door to what's most probably the kitchen behind him, giving her the privacy to get dressed.

Reluctantly, because the bed is warm and cozy and smells good (and where did that thought even come from?), she folds back the blankets and puts the hot water bottles aside that were placed on her   nearly strategically. She slips into the clothes provided for her and carefully gets up on her feet; like she expected, her legs are slightly wobbly. After a few tentative first steps, she shuffles through the large quaint room on socked feet, almost magnetically drawn to the cackling fire. When she brushes her fingertips over her jeans that are draped over the backrest of the huge leather chair, she can feel the dampness and shivers again. She would be frozen to death by now, two days before Christmas. Not that anybody would care or miss her, mind you.

After using the bathroom and splashing cool water into her face, the dizziness in her head seems to have lightened a bit. In the bathroom mirror, she examines her face and finds the bruise on her forehead is not as bad as she feared, which allows her to believe she probably doesn't have a concussion. Fuck, she was really lucky.

When she opens the bathroom door, immediately the smell of chicken soup fills her nostrils, and suddenly she becomes aware of the roaring hunger in her stomach. The large wooden table near the fireplace is set with soup bowls, glasses, and a large, steaming pot. The door to the kitchen opens, and her savior appears with a bottle of water. A plump dog of middle size comes over to her, moving in a weird, clumsy way, and it takes Emma a few seconds to realize it's because he has only three legs: the left hind leg is missing. The dog bumps her leg eagerly with his shoulder and wags his tail.

“Smee, easy!” his master calls sternly and puts the bottle on the table, but Emma waves him off.

“No, it's okay.” She hunkers down and scratches him behind his flappy ears, obviously to the dog's delight. “Thank you, thank you so much!” she tells him in her talking-to-a-good-boy voice, and he wags his tail so hard that his whole rear end shakes. She pats his thighs and looks at his missing leg. “What happened to you, Smee?” she asks. “Did you have an accident?”

“Aye, with a leghold trap,” his owner – Jones? – replies, and Emma is shocked.

“With a what? That's fucked up!”

“Must have been some old relic from twenty years ago.” His remarkable jawline tightens. “Was half dead when I found him.”

Smee seems to notice they're talking about him, because he looks to and fro between them eagerly. Emma pats him again and shakes her head with disgust. “Terrible. You could have been hurt as well!”

“Well, about that...” He tilts his head and lifts his left hand – except, she realizes with dismay, there's no hand where his forearm ends; his wrist – or what must be left of it – is hidden under a soft cover made of cotton or some similar fabric. His grim expression looks almost challenging, as if he expects her to react repulsed. As if that's a reaction he's used to, and that thought makes her unexpectedly sad.

“Oh fuck, that sucks,” she blurts out.

He's startled. “What, losing a hand?”

“Doing something good and being screwed over.”

“Well.” He shrugs and scrutinizes her for a moment, a curious look in his eyes now, and scratches behind his ear in what seems to be a nervous gesture.

Emma turns her attention to the friendly dog again and palpates a little along his spine and hips. “He could use a little massage,” she says, “his muscles are a little tense.”

He huffs. “What are you, a vet?”

She raises her chin. “Actually, yes.” She is, even if she hasn't felt like a true veterinarian in some time, as she's been tending mostly to rich brats' handbag dogs in the posh Boston veterinary practice she's working.

“Oh.” He runs his hand through his hair and says a little stiffly, “My apologies. Don't worry, though. I'll have you know Smee's special needs are regularly taken care of.”

“I'm sure they are.”

He motions to the table in an inviting gesture. “Come on, the soup will warm you up from inside.”

She sits down gratefully, and he fills her bowl with soup, pushing it towards her and sits down opposite her. Smee finds his place under the table between their feet.

“Thank you...?” she says and raises her eyebrows in question, having forgotten the name he told her.

“Killian,” he helps out, “Killian Jones.”

“Thank you, Killian. I'm Emma, Emma Swan.” He just nods to that, and she adds, “And I'm sorry for my reaction. It was just a shock to wake up to...” She lets her voice trail off, not really knowing what to say, and makes an all-encompassing move.

“You were right to be wary,” he replies to her surprise. “For all you know, I could be an axe murderer.”

She huffs a little laugh. “You know, I guess I'm just not used to people... being nice.”

He tilts his head. “That's because they're not.”

“Well, you are nice,” she remarks.

“Oh no,” he contradicts dryly, “I'm not nice.” There's not much humor in his voice, and the self-deprecation she senses touches a string inside her, urging her to convince her grumpy savior that he is, indeed, a good person for what he did.

“Come on! You saved my life?”

He waves her off. “That's not being nice. That's... basic humanity.”

Emma shrugs and picks up her spoon; she has enough of burden to carry on her own, she can't cast away everyone's shadows. “If you say so...”

Quickly, he changes the subject. “What were you even doing in this neck of the woods?” he asks, “you're not from here, right?”

“I came from Portland,” she explains vaguely and dives into her chicken soup. “I was on my way back to Boston.”

He raises his eyebrows in disbelief. “You're from Boston and don't know how to dress appropriately for this weather?”

“I'm not from Boston, I just live there at the moment,” she points out in a defensive tone, “and I–I left Portland in a hurry.”

He tilts his head. “And ended up in this godforsaken nowhere.” Emma snorts, and he frowns. “What?”

“You realize you're talking about your home?” she deadpans.

He looks intently into his soup bowl. “This is not my home. I just live here,” he replies, and Emma is startled that he chose almost the exact same words as she did. “It's as good a place as any, and I've nowhere else to go,” he adds.

She feels like punched in the gut by those words, because that – I have nowhere else to go – has been her own rough-and-ready replacement for a home during her whole life, and to hear the exact same from this total stranger under these absurd circumstances just makes it feel so weirdly...  predestined that he was the one to save her life.

Emma stares at him, but if he feels something similar, he doesn't show it. After a few moments, he looks up at her blankly and then motions to her soup bowl. “Anything wrong with that?”

She swallows and shakes her head. “No, it's very good. Thanks.” Then she lowers her head and eats her soup without another word, and it starts to warm her up inside more than she'd ever have expected.

Killian watches her while she's meticulously emptying her bowl, that stranger the snow storm literally swept in front of his feet. When he looked up and found her eyes resting on him after him saying he'd nowhere else to go, he recognized an odd sort of understanding in her features, like she knew exactly what he was talking about. Now, she seems to avoid looking at him, and honestly, he's grateful for that.

It's absurd that he feels that sort of instant connection to that complete stranger, and it's not useful at all, because they will go separate ways again tomorrow anyway. Plus, so far it's never done any good for people if he had any connection to them; all of those who he was really close with, are dead: his mother, his brother, his first love. That's also why he keeps David Nolan and Mary Margaret always at arm's length, even though he considers them friends – he seems just no good to be with, and he knows he's really not worth the trouble. No, it's convenient that the stranger he rescued – Emma Swan, he recalls – seems to be similarly closed off and doesn't push any further.

Briefly, he shakes his head to clear the cobwebs from his mind and then finishes his soup quickly – he isn't hungry anyway – before he gets up to clear the table when Emma's bowl is empty, too. She looks at him questioningly.

“It's late,” he says and heads for the kitchen balancing the two empty bowls atop the pot, and she gets to her feet as well.

“Of course,” she replies. “Can I help? Where can I–”

“I suggest you go back to bed,” he interrupts and motions his head over his shoulder, “I'll sleep on the couch. For one night it'll do.”

“But I can take the couch!” she protests. “I wouldn't want to–”

“It's fine,” he cuts her off curtly and turns towards the kitchen again, “you need the extra warmth.”

When he has deposited the dishes and comes back to the living room, she's standing in front of the fireplace, and the light makes her face look like it's glowing. Smee is standing close to her, his tail slightly wagging. Killian frowns without noticing. With his sweatpants, worn plaid shirt, and the Christmas socks Mary Margaret knitted for him last winter, she looks incredibly cozy – and like she belongs exactly there, next to his dog, in front of his fireplace, and the thought startles and annoys him. He clears his throat, and she whirls around.

“I don't think you had a concussion,” he says, “but the bruise might still give you a bit of a headache. I have aspirin in the bathroom cupboard, if you need it.”

“Okay.” She nods. “Thank you again.”

He waves her off. “Try to get some sleep, you'll want to be well-rested tomorrow. You've still got a long way to go to Boston.”

She frowns. “Boston?” Then she huffs and takes a step towards the bed, the dog trotting after her. “Oh yeah, right. Okay. Then... good night, I guess.”

“Good night.” He clicks his tongue at the dog. “Smee, you know the rules. Not on the bed,” he warns.

His eyes follow her as she shuffles over to his bed and crawls under the covers again, and he quickly looks away when, again, the inexplicable feelings creeps up on him that she belongs exactly there, because why the bloody hell would he think that?

Suddenly it seems like he isn't in control of his feelings, of the situation anymore, and if Killian Jones hates something fervently, then it's the feeling of being under external control. It's ridiculous, of course – just a fleeting hint of connection, attraction maybe, and it will be gone tomorrow. She will be gone tomorrow, not more than a faint memory of blonde locks, green eyes, and a soft voice.

Abruptly, he turns around and heads for the bathroom to brush his teeth and get into his sleeping clothes. He has a feeling that his sleep will be a little troubled tonight, and he's right.

When Emma wakes up the next morning, her host is already dressed, and the smell of coffee wafts through the entire room. She sits up and notices that he's nowhere to be seen, but she can hear him rummage about in the kitchen, obviously preparing breakfast.

Absurdly enough, she's had a deeper and more relaxing sleep than in a long time, which probably explains her odd reluctance to leave the bed; the feeling is disturbing.

“Don't be ridiculous,” she murmurs to herself and swings her legs out of bed. Passing by the leather chair, she picks up her clothes that are dry by now and heads for the bathroom to get dressed. When she returns to the living room, the breakfast table's set with coffee, bread, butter, honey, and scrambled eggs with bacon. Her stomach reacts with a loud growl.

“Good morning,” Killian greets her, “Slept well?”

She nods with a tentative smile. “Yes, thank you.”

“I hope Smee didn't bother you?”

“Not at all.”

“Fine. Then,” – he motions invitingly to the table, and she notices that he's wearing a prosthesis in the place of his missing hand – “you should get some breakfast into you before going on the road again.”

She doesn't understand the absurd hint of disappointment she's feeling at the thought of continuing her trip to Boston and never seeing Killian Jones and his dog again. When she steals a glance at him now, in broad daylight, she realizes that he's actually really handsome, in a very down-to-earth way, and she wonders how his smile would look.

What's wrong with you, she calls herself to order, who cares how his smile looks, for fuck's sake. Eat your eggs, and then you're out of here.

Killian, too, doesn't seem very eager to extend her stay longer than necessary. The breakfast is a short, silent thing, and when they're done, they get dressed, and she bundles up as much as she can, before they finally head out.

This time, they're not going across the uneven meadow, they use the driveway from the farmhouse to the road. It's stopped snowing, but the snow is quite high – much to Smee's obvious delight.

“Bloody hell, this doesn't look good,” he murmurs when they reach the road. “So, in which direction is your car?”

“That way. I was heading back to the town when I saw the lights from your house.”

“It's thirty miles to Storybrooke!”

Emma rolls her eyes. “As I said, it was my best shot. Freezing to death in a car didn't seem appealing either.”

He nods somewhat grumpily. “Alright, point taken.”

They turn in the direction Emma has pointed, and the farther they walk, the darker Killian's mood seems to get, and he keeps murmuring and huffing and grumbling to himself. When they reach Emma's car after maybe seven minutes of walking, she's shocked to see that it's well-covered in snow; a lot of snow.

“Bloody buggering hell,” Killian blurts out, “I knew it!”

“You knew what?”

“This!” He gestures angrily towards the little, half-buried car, and then towards the road. “Even if we could get it fixed – and to do that we'd have to practically shovel it free – there's no way you could drive on that road.”

“But it's stopped snowing, won't the snow plow truck pass soon?”

He snorts. “This is not a highway. It might take days before it's cleared.”

Emma closes her eyes. Fuck rural Maine indeed. Then the meaning of his words seeps in. Before she can say anything, his angry voice cuts through the white silence.

“Grab your stuff already!” He gestures vaguely around. “I'm not going to get frostbite here.”

“My... stuff?” she echoes.

“Your clothes,” he replies impatiently. “I do have enough sweatpants and shirts to clothe you, but you might want a change of underwear during the next few days, until the bloody road is cleared.”

“Do you mean–”

“I mean,” he interrupts pointedly, “you're going to have to stay at my house for the next days. Unless of course,” he sways his arm out in the direction of where the town is, “you want to try your luck again and hike to Storybrooke.” He tilts his head in a sarcastic shrug. “At least it's not dark, you could even get there alive.”

“Very funny,” she shoots back and opens the trunk of her bug with some effort and snatches her duffel bag.

“That is all?” he asks doubtfully.

“Yes, that's all,” Emma replies, anger bubbling up in her about his constant rudeness. Okay, to drive through heavy snow in an old Volkswagen bug without winter tires might not be a really smart idea, but she barely had any choice, and the weather wasn't her fault. “I don't need much stuff. Or do I strike you as the princessly type?”

Wordlessly, he turns around and proceeds to trudge back to the farmhouse, with Smee delightedly hopping through the deep snow on his three sturdy legs, and Emma following as fast as she can, trying to process what's going on – and what to feel about it. So, apparently she's stranded here for the next few days, in the middle of this snowy nowhere, with a gruff, handsome stranger she's instantly felt an odd connection to. Well, it's not like she has anything better to do or anywhere else to go – or anyone.

When they get back to the house again and are inside, Killian tries the phone right away, but apparently, the landline is still dead.

“Bloody hell,” he curses under his breath and then turns to her. “No connection. Looks like you're stuck here.” He scratches behind his ear. “I do have a pickup, but you've seen the road.”

“I'm sorry I'm ruining your Christmas,” Emma says tentatively, but she can't shake off the feeling that he wasn't in a very festive mood anyway even before she showed up.

“Christmas?” He frowns and shakes his head once. “I don't care about Christmas.”

“Yeah, I can see that,” she murmurs. Meanwhile, she hasn't failed to notice that not only there is no tree in his living room or anywhere visible, there is no other piece of decoration either, no holly, no candy cane, no nothing. Emma herself isn't very much of a Christmas person either, but even she puts up the occasional candle or holly.

At first it seems like he wants to say something, but then he turns around and heads for the door again. “I'm going to work.”

“Work? Where?”

“In my workshop in the barn. I'm a carpenter.” He tilts his head. “And before you ask, yes, that's possible with one hand. It takes a bit of creativity, but it's possible.”

“I wasn't going to ask,” Emma replies indignantly.

He leaves the house without any further word.

She spends the day wandering around the house, resting in the afternoon, and reading in front of the fireplace, after she found a shelf full of books in one corner of the huge living room. She also checks the phone from time to time, but never gets a signal. Killian comes back only around noon for a small lunch of bread and cheese and waves her off when she asks if she can do anything around the house or prepare something for dinner (honestly, she's relieved when he tells her that he has already a stew in the fridge ready to be heated, because cooking isn't one of her prominent skills). He disappears after a rather short break, and it's almost like he's avoiding her presence. Not that she can blame him – she's basically an intruder into his routine, and even if he apparently doesn't do Christmas, she's still a stranger in his house and in his life. Absurdly enough, she can't help but feel a bit disappointed that he doesn't ask her if she wants to take a look at his workshop; she hoped to find out a little more about the man who saved her life, but apparently he's even more of a recluse than she is.

When the sunlight outside is fading, he comes back again and heads right to the bathroom for a shower, not before making sure she's okay though, with no headache, dizziness, or further signs of a concussion, and with no signs of a cold either.

“Landline still dead?” he asks when he puts the pot with the stew on the table; she has set it this time with plates and glasses, spoons and bread.

“Yeah, I've tried a few times.”

“Hmm... someone's going to be worried about you.”

She huffs. “No one, trust me.”

He throws her a sideways glance, but doesn't reply to that, and she decides to try her luck and simply asks, “You're not from here, right?”

Killian shakes his head. “No, I was born in England.” He pauses, but she's looking at him expectantly, and so he goes on, “My mother died when I was very young, fourteen, and my father already wasn't in the picture anymore.” Briefly, a sadness flickers over his face, like a long-healed wound that still throbs from time to time. She studies his expression intently as he continues. “I had an older brother, Liam. He was already of age, and luckily, the authorities let me stay with him. He trained as a carpenter and worked very hard to build his own business, and then I trained with him. One day, he had a fatal accident with the disk saw.” Emma's eyes widen, but she stays quiet. “He died. I sold everything and left the country. I just couldn't...” He falls silent, and a muscle in his jaw ticks.

She nods. “It didn't feel like home anymore.”

He gives her an odd glance. Even though he doesn't reply, she knows instinctively she's right, and it startles her once more how connected she feels to him.

“I came here for a fresh start,” he continues his tale, “settled down in Portland, met a woman. She was married to a rich and powerful man. We were planning to run away together, but she never showed up.”

“She changed her mind?” Emma asks sympathetically, but he shakes his head.

“She was hit by a car,” he tells her, and she gasps. “On Christmas Eve,” he adds soberly.

“Fuck.”

“Aye.” He tilts his head and drops his spoon into his empty plate with a dissonant clang. “You'll understand why I'm not overly fond of Christmas.”

She tries to process everything he just told her, the tragic summary of his life in five sentences, and she understands what's behind his pain – it's not only about the losses he experienced, but that he blames them on himself. She knows he does, even if he hasn't explicitly said so. Just as she, as a child, knew it had to be her fault, every time a foster family sent her away again. Just as she, a teenager in a juvenile detention home, knew it was her fault what happened to her child.

“Yes, of course,” she says hastily, “I'm sorry I–”

“It's not your fault,” he cuts her off and pushes back his chair.

She understands the clear signal that the conversation is over, and she doesn't blame him for not wanting to elaborate any further on his misery... and yet, she feels a strange longing, something she hasn't felt in a long time. The longing for a person to share one's burden with, a person who won't judge you, because they'll understand. She feels that longing, because she has caught a glimpse of that person in Killian Jones. But it's obvious that he's not up for that.

She helps him clear the table, and then asks if he has a spare room for her to sleep in, so that he can sleep in his own bed again, but he shakes his head.

“It's not worth the trouble of preparing it and heating it up properly for another day or two,” he tells her, “and I don't mind the couch. Unless, of course, you mind.”

“No, no,” she replies quickly, “I don't.”

“Fine.” He nods. “Then, you'll excuse me for not keeping you company, but I have some paperwork to do. Comes with the business.”

“Of course. I won't disturb you.”

He spends the evening at the huge wooden table, buried in papers and sipping his tea, not saying another word to her, and Emma settles on the couch with a book and Smee at her side, but she can't really concentrate on what she's reading and keeps glancing over at him. The tuft of his too-long hair falls over his forehead again, hiding his eyes from her view, and the glow of the fire makes auburn highlights dance in it. For the life of her Emma doesn't understand why she feels the strong pull to go over to him and comb her fingers through it. It's absurd. She doesn't know this man. Except, she has the feeling that she does.

He really doesn't know why he blurted out his whole miserable backstory to this blonde intruder into his boring, conveniently numbing routine. Killian Jones normally doesn't share personal things from his past if he doesn't have to – not even David Nolan knows every detail about his personal history, and he's probably the person who knows him best. Then why did he feel the push to open up to his involuntary guest? Apparently, the instant connection he felt towards her isn't as fleeting as he thought, that feeling of mutual understanding – as if she knows exactly who he is, and he knows who she is – it's still there. Which is odd, since he doesn't really know much about her save snippets here and there – that she doesn't really have a place she calls home at the moment, that she's a veterinarian, and that she apparently is a loner. Very much like him. He doesn't understand it, and it makes him uneasy. It reminds him of the long forgotten desire to have someone who he could be himself with. Except, it's useless because this woman is someone who will disappear from his life as suddenly as she's stumbled into it.

He buries his nose in his paperwork, but it's a useless endeavor tonight. He feels her presence almost physically, the occasional looks she gives him when she looks up from her book, and they make him nervous. They make him question his self-chosen aloneness in an uncomfortable way he's not ready to deal with.

After two hours, he gives up and closes his books, shoves his papers aside and finishes the last of his now cold tea. As if on cue, she clears the couch for him and moves over to the bed, telling him quietly good-night to which he responds with a hesitant murmur.

Again, it's a night of restless sleep interrupted by periods of lying awake and listening to the even breathing coming from his own bed – and trying to ignore the dreadful feeling that soon enough this somehow soothing sound will be gone again, replaced by the silence he's been used to for years and which suddenly seems so little appealing now. So, he really hopes that soon enough is close, so he won't have a chance to get too used to the feeling of not being alone – and enjoying it. And being crushed when it inevitably ends.

The next morning, Emma is woken up early again by the smell of coffee and bacon – contrary to her, her reluctant host seems to be an early riser. See, we've got really not much in common, she tells herself as she shuffles into the bathroom.

When she comes back fifteen minutes later, Killian is just putting the plates with the scrambled eggs and the bacon on the table and nods a curt good morning.

“Landline's still dead,” he informs her grumpily, and Emma wants to slap her forehead that she hasn't even thought of checking that first thing when she got up.

“Oh,” she replies, not knowing what else to say.

“Well, I suppose we'll survive another bit.”

For a while, they eat in silence, then she asks, “Can I do something more today? Do you have anything special planned for dinner?”

He raises an eyebrow. “There's some leftover stew from yesterday?”

Right. He doesn't care about Christmas, so no special dinner plans for Christmas Eve. If she's honest with herself, she's the same. Her Christmases usually consist of Chinese takeout or frozen pizza, bad mood, and Die Hard. She just thought that this year, maybe, could be a little different for both of them, given the weird circumstances they have been thrown into. Something like making the best of an unexpected situation, maybe making it even better than it normally would have been. But apparently, he isn't interested in anything like that, so she's going to roll with that.

“Sure,” she replies hastily, “that's fine. I just thought... nevermind. I just wanted to do something to make up for...” she motions vaguely around, an all-encompassing move mainly apologizing for her presence, “messing up your life.”

“I told you already, it's fine.” He gets up from the table. “If I could leave the dishes for you? I have some work to finish that's due soon.” He gestures towards the door.

“Yeah, of course. Go to your work, I've got this.” She pushes back her chair. “Anything to get ready for lunch?”

“Just some bread and cheese.”

He fills a thermosflask with the rest of his breakfast tea and pulls on a heavy sweater before he calls out for Smee, but the dog just woofs and flops down in front of the fire. Killian huffs and leaves the house for his carpentry.

The day goes by just like the one before, Emma watches the fire and puts on more logs when it grows smaller, and checks the phone from time to time. What irritates her is the odd relief she feels every time it becomes clear that the landline is not working yet, because why even?? She should be looking forward to finally getting away from here. But she pushes these thoughts aside. For noon, she sets the table with bread and cheese and makes some fresh tea. The sight of the ready table seems to make Killian even more grumpy, though, and she's gettong more and more annoyed by his monosyllabic behavior. Really, what's wrong with this man? He keeps telling her that he doesn't care about Christmas and that she's not really disturbing him, yet he acts like she's the most inconvenient nuisance ever, even though she's trying her best to make things pleasant for him. How she ever could think there was a connection between them, is beyond her. He's nothing but a misanthropic hermit who probably already regrets saving her life. Ass.

When Killian comes back for lunch and finds everything ready, even the tea made just how he likes it and the bread freshly toasted, he's almost offended. And it gets worse: when he comes back in the evening, the table is set for dinner, she even found a nice tablecloth and a candle somewhere, and the stew is already heating up on the oven. He doesn't need – and doesn't want – these frills. He can take care of himself, has done so for all of his life and will have to do so again once she'll be gone, and he has no interest in being cared for now. Has no interest in getting used to the uncomfortably pleasant feeling of someone... just being there when he comes home.

Even Smee is obviously falling for that feeling, refusing today to go to the barn with him, as he does every day. The stupid dog preferred the company of their guest. Well, he's going to be disappointed soon enough. It's a cruel jest of fate showing them how things could be if he weren't such a... failure of a human being. Especially at this time of the year when the memory of his last great failure comes back hitting him with all might.

It's been eight years now since that fatal accident that took Milah from him – eight years in which the pain of losing her has dulled and faded, but the feeling of guilt, of being nothing but a failure, has remained.

The dinner is spent in an almost oppressive silence, and he ignores – to the point of being rude – Emma's attempts to start a conversation. At some point, she presses her lips together and pushes away her plate, wordlessly getting up from her chair and starting to clear the table. He lets her do it without helping this time, and when the table is cleared completely, he gets up and fetches his bottle of rum and a glass from the cupboard beside the table.

By the time she has finished rummaging and clattering in the kitchen, he's already on his third rum, staring with contempt at the thin black leather glove covering his prosthesis. Another proof of him being a royal failure. She leaves the kitchen, and he hopes that she'll retire to the couch with a book again, like the day before, and leave him be, but of course he has no such luck.

“You think you're the only one who has lost something?” she snarls, and when he looks up at her wearily, he's surprised about her aggressive stance – feet firmly planted on the floor, hands at her hips, and chin raised as she motions her head to his prosthesis.

His eyes follow her movement to his fake hand. “Oh, the hand is only the last thing in a long, boring row,” he tells her. He's in no mood for defending himself for feeling like horseshit, he's entitled to wallow in a litle self-pity, isn't he? “After my mother, my brother, and the woman I loved,” he adds and asks provokingly, “What have you lost?”

She shrugs. “Everything,” is her simple answer. “My parents, when I was a few hours old and they dumped me on the stairs of a hospital. Three failed adoptions.” That gets her his full and prompt attention. “My first boyfriend at seventeen, when he betrayed me,” she goes on, “and I went to jail for a deed he'd done.” He clenches his jaw unconsciously, a wave of anger at the cowardly son of a bitch washing over him that ruined a young girl's life that already had been getting the short end of the straw since she'd been born. No wonder she has no one in her life who cares for her – probably she's used to not letting anyone come closer, and why would she? Everyone has fucked her over so far. But her tale isn't over. “In jail I found out I was pregnant,” she continues, and a cold hand grips his heart, “Lost the baby, too.” She shrugs and adds soberly, “Was probably better for the both of us.”

He studies her face in shock during the following pause, and he sees the faint pain that's still there... looking very similar to what he feels when he thinks of Milah. Because of course she'd blame herself for losing the baby. He wants to say something, anything, to assure her that no, it isn't her fault, but the right words won't come to him.

“Whenever I have something, a job, friends, a scrap of happiness, I lose it.” She huffs. “I don't even know why I'm telling you all of this, I haven't spoken to anyone about all this crap.”

Killian gets up wordlessly, turns to the cupboard and fetches a tumbler, then he pours a respectable amount of liquor into the glass and puts it on the table, motioning for her to sit.

She sits.

“I haven't told anyone the story of my miserable past either,” he says, “but you.” He tilts his head. “And Smee. But I highly doubt he counts.” The dog, still relaxing in front of the fire, wags his tail when he hears his name.

Emma huffs again, a little laugh this time. “You're better than me. I don't even have a pet to open up to.”

For a moment, their eyes lock, and he feels their connection stronger than ever, then he swallows and raises his glass. “To sharing shitty backstories.”

She clinks her glass to his. “To failures.”

“You're not a failure,” he contradicts, “You've just been screwed over by life. None of it was your fault.”

She takes a sip of her drink and coughs a bit. “Maybe not,” she finally replies, “but I haven't done anything to improve.”

“Horseshit,” he growls. “You have made something of yourself, you've built a life.”

She snorts. “I have no roots and no place where I belong.”

“But that can change.”

Her eyes fix on him with a disturbing intensity. “How?”

He tilts his head, avoiding her gaze. “You can belong anywhere, you just have to decide you want to.”

"You're the one to talk,” she replies pointedly, “hiding out here from the world, behind your fake hand and your anger!”

Killian is taken aback at her words, because... he isn't hiding, is he? He's doing the world a favor by keeping it at arm's length. “The world doesn't like me.”

Emma shakes her head. “No, it's you,” she tells him and points her index finger at him. “You don't like the world, and you don't like yourself.”  

He looks at her with wide eyes, frozen, at an actual loss for words. “There's really not much to like,” he finally says after a long pause and is shocked to see her smile, and understanding sadness hidden somewhere between the laugh lines around her eyes.

“Why are you so stubborn?” she asks softly.

***

Emma wakes up with the strange feeling of her neck being a little stiff, but the rest of her feeling extremely cozy and at home. She stirs and realizes that she's not in the bed she slept in for the last two nights, and she blinks her eyes open with some effort.

She's looking directly at the fireplace which means she's on the leather couch, and when she turns her head to the right she sees she's snuggled up to Killian Jones's side, her head on his chest, and his arm around her. His head has sunk on the backrest, and he's still asleep. A blanket is draped over her and across his lap.

There's a moment of panic as she tries to recall what happened that brought them here, and she thinks it must have happened some time between her tale of how she went on shoplifting sprees with Neal, her first boyfriend, before he let her go to jail for him, and his tale of how his brother Liam was distracted for a second by telling him to be more careful with the wood plane, and thus ended up hurting himself so badly in the disk saw that he bled to death. They moved from the dining table to the leather couch, leaving the rum behind, and Killian put another log on the fire to banish the cold and dark with warmth and light.

They talked and listened, carefully approaching each other, exploring limits, lowering defenses, and examining scars. Emma isn't sure how it happened or what it was that made them open up to each other, and she doesn't remember when they cuddled so close together that she ended up falling asleep in Killian's arm, but she does know she feels more free and safe and lighter than she has in years. Like she has shared a burden that's been weighing her down, and now it feels only half as heavy.

She manoeuvers herself in a sitting position so that she can have a better look at Killian's handsome sleeping features, for once relaxed, but her movement wakes him from his sleep and he's apparently startled by the position they're in, but can't move away any farther, being already in the corner of the couch.

She smiles. “Hi.”

“Good morning,” he replies in an almost questioning voice and looks nervously at his arm, the left one with the prosthesis attached to it, that's still resting on her back. “I... I apologize if I...” He falls silent, not really knowing what to say, and she shakes her head.

“I'm glad we talked,” she says firmly. “I feel so... relieved.”

He shifts himself into a more upright position and lifts his hand very carefully, tentatively, as if she might shy away from it; she doesn't. “So do I,” he admits in a rough voice and smooths a strand of hair from her face.

Emma studies his features, his look so serious and sober, but also full of warmth and questions and hope, and she throws all caution to the wind and moves closer to him, approaching his face with hers, and he mirrors her gesture. After one last glance at his slightly parted lips she closes her eyes.

A shrill ring, deafeningly cutting into their fragile, tender silence, makes them jump apart.

For a second, they look at each other and around the room, confused and shocked, and then a shadow falls over Killian's face as the telephone rings again.

“The landline,” he says and jumps up from the couch, making Emma feel almost physically hurt at the loss of contact, the loss of warmth.

“Hello,” he answers the phone in a voice bare of any emotion, not showing disappointment, annoyance, or any feeling at all. “Oh, Dave. No, I'm fine, thank you for checking. Yeah, I've noticed. Really? That's a relief. Thank you. Okay, in a few days. Goodbye.”

He hangs up and looks at her with the same empty expression she just heard in his voice. “That was a friend from Storybrooke. The snow plow truck just left town and is clearing the road outside right now. I suggest,” he picks up the phone again, “I call the Storybrooke garage and tell them to send out their towing vehicle as soon as the road is passable again. They should be here in two hours at the latest.”

Emma feels like punched in the guts. Numbly, she rises from the couch.

“Sure,” she replies tonelessly.

The next hour passes by in a haze. Emma hears him on the phone, obviously talking to a mechanic, explaining the situation and telling the man to knock at the door once he's got the vehicle, so he can pick up her, too. She busies herself getting dressed and packing up her stuff while Killian fixes them breakfast. Smee is alternating between following her and Killian, whining reproachfully.

It takes barely ninety minutes until there's a heavy knock at the door.

Killian opens, and she's already prepared, dressed in her boots and red leather jacket, like when he found her, her duffel bag slung over her shoulder. He looks at her as the mechanic is waiting outside, and she draws a deep breath and steps nearer.

She's searching his gaze, waiting for him to say something, anything. He averts his eyes and reaches into the pocket of his jeans, then he hands her something on his open palm.

She looks at him questioningly, and he tilts his head in a barely perceptible, encouraging nod. She reaches for the thing in his hand, an object about the size and form of a kiwi fruit, and when her fingertips brush his palm, sparks shoot right up to her elbow. It's cool and smooth, made of wood, and she recognizes the features of a slightly stumpy, three-legged dog.

“Smee?” she whispers, tears stinging in the corners of her eyes. “Did you... did you make it for me?”

He swallows, and a muscle in his jaw ticks. “I thought you'd like to have a souvenir of your savior.”

The man waiting outside clears his throat. “Ma'am?”

Emma huffs a laugh. “Thank you. For everything.” Then she raises on her tiptoes and leans a little forward to brush a kiss on Killian's scruffy cheek, his stubble prickling her lips. “Merry Christmas, Killian.”

Then she leaves the house and walks away. When she turns around to look back, she finds the door already closed, and all she can think is that she never even got to see his smile.

“Oh, shut up, Smee,” Killian growls as the dog whines and scratches at the door. “This is what was going to happen, all the time. This is how it's supposed to be. It's better this way.”

The dog whines again, and Killian scoffs at him, turning away from the door and proceeding to make all signs of the presence of another person disappear. He clears the breakfast table and folds the blanket they've slept under, involuntarily recalling how it felt to wake up with her in his arms, snuggled against his side, her head resting on his chest. The intimacy of sharing a blanket, the warmth their bodies created, and most of all the emotional intimacy of sharing their pain and anger, both having lots of it locked away in them.

It felt... right. Like how it was supposed to be.

The looks they shared, open and raw and understanding, knowing. Longing. The tender touch of his fingertips on the silky strand of her hair, even though his skin is roughened from working with wood everyday, he could feel the smoothness through and through, like a promise. The almost shy expression in her captivating green eyes, turning to something vulnerable and courageous when she swayed closer, her lips full and soft and waiting for his.

And yet, it was not supposed to be. She had her life and her job in Boston, even if she didn't feel at home there. She was going to leave anyway.

He's glad it happened today, before they kissed and he could fall even more for her – because aye, he realizes now, absurd as it sounds, that's exactly what has happened in these mere two days and three nights spent in her company, as much as he's tried to avoid it. It's true: he started to fall for Emma Swan, to fall in love with her. So it's good that she left now, before he was in way too deep, so deep that losing her again could devastate him. Like ripping off a band aid.

An hour later, the bloody phone rings again, and he contemplates for a moment not answering; he's really not in the mood for people, and the only people who really matter (and care about him) know he's alive and well. But then he thinks it could always be David again, and he doesn't want to snub the only friend he has, so he picks up the phone.

“Hello?”

“Killian? It's Emma.”

That hits him unexpectedly, and for a moment his tongue is tied, and her voice reaches him again through the landline. “Killian?”

He clears his throat. “I'm here.”

“Ah. Okay. I... I just wanted to let you know that I've arrived in Storybrooke. Turns out my spare tire is damaged, so a new tire has to be ordered.” She pauses for a moment, before she goes on, “Looks like I'll be around for another few days. I'm staying at the bed and breakfast here.”

“Granny's,” he says automatically, trying to process her words.

“Yes,” she replies. “I thought you... we...” She starts to stumble over her own words, and he closes her eyes. Don't say it, he thinks, just don't. “I tought if you came to town the next few days, we could have dinner together or something. I... I'd like to thank you properly for, you know, saving my life.”

“I... well, that's not...” He licks his lips and starts again. “You know, that's really not necessary.”

“I know, but...” He hears her draw a deep breath, and it sounds shaky. “Anyway, if you come to town, just drop me a call, okay?”

“If I come to town, I will, Swan,” he replies reluctanty, fully well knowing he's going to avoid Storybrooke for at least ten more days.

***

The next four weeks come and go in a haze, and it's surprisingly easy to fall back into his old, boring routine. He crafts his works, he drives to town to sell them, he buys his groceries and other supplies he needs, and he retires to his hermitage.

Then, in the first week of February the time has come for Smee to get his annual shots, so he takes him to his friend's office. Just when he's about to enter the house where David Nolan sees his patients downstairs and lives upstairs with his wife Mary Margaret, the door is opened and David almost bumps into him on his way out, obviously in a hurry.

“Killian! Good to see you again!” he exclaims, then frowns. “Something wrong with Smee?”

“No, he's fine, he just needs his shots.” The dog confirms his good health with a friendly woof.

“Ah, damn, I'm heading out to an emergency,” David says, gesturing to his pick up parked in front of the house, not after giving his favorite patient a hearty pat.

“Oh...” Killian scratches behind his ear. “Okay, no problem, I'll come back tomorrow, and–”

“No, no,” David cuts him off and gestures towards the house as he's opening the driver's door and throws his veterinary kit inside, “just go inside, he'll be taken care of.” He starts the engine and calls out of the window, “Wait for me, we'll have a beer later!”

Killian is startled as he watches hin friend speed off, but then he shrugs and enters the house as David has told him. The waiting room is empty, and he calls tentatively, “Hello?”

“Come in!” comes the answer from a bright, female voice, and the voice hits him like lightning, right in the guts and in the heart, and Smee's ears perk up and he lets out an excited bark.

Then the door to the treatment room is opened, and they find themselves face to face with the person Killian has never expected to see again. She's wearing white scrubs, a messy ponytail, and she's never looked more beautiful.

“Swan?” he gasps. Her eyes widen in only mild surprise, and she smiles, and it's his downfall. “How... I mean, why... are you here?”

Smee doesn't care about these vain details, he's all over her in the blink of an eye, and she crouches down so he doesn't have to jump up on her on his one hind leg, and greets him properly. Then she rises to her full height again.

She shrugs, a girlish gesture that makes her look incredibly young. “David had a job to offer, and I needed a change of scenery.”

“Oh.”

A change of scenery?  What does that mean? It sounds like a fleeting thing. He doesn't know what to say.

Emma licks her lips and draws a deep breath. “Killian... I–I was waiting for you, to show up for that thank you dinner.” She fixes her eyes on him. “Why did you never call?”

“Oh, well, you know...” He runs his hand through his hair and averts his eyes, shame filling him at the sound of hurt in her voice. “I thought you would be leaving soon anyway, and I didn't want to... I was afraid I...” he shakes his head helplessly and looks at her again, hoping she understands from his eyes what his words cannot express. And she does.

“I'm here now,” she says simply, her gaze holding his, and nods in affirmation.

“What about your life in Boston?” he asks.

She shakes her head. “I never really liked what I had there,” she tries to explain. “But I like it here. I might even grow some roots.”

“Here, in the middle of nowhere?” he scoffs.

She tilts her head to the side, an almost playful gesture. “You know, someone told me, I can do that anywhere I want to. And,” she points her index finger at him, “that someone also told me, here's as good a place as any, and...” She shrugs again. “I've nowhere else to go.”

He just looks at her like an idiot and nods, really and completely at a loss for words now, even more like an idiot. He's grasping for words in his mind, or even a coherent thought would be nice, but he can't find either, not before he's managed to wrap his mind around the meaning of what she just told him.

So, like an idiot, he gestures towards the dog. “Smee needs his shots.”

Emma buries her hands in the pockets of her scrubs. “Then let's get it over with.”

Between them, no more words are spoken, Emma gets to business with the dog, Smee taking his shots stoically as always, because what are a few pricks when you've had your leg bitten off by rusty iron jaws, right?

When she's done, she gives the dog a few treats and looks at Killian again, somehow expectantly, and he knows, he just knows it's his turn now to say something useful.

He clears his throat. “Then I suppose I... see you around?”

She nods with a smile, but she can't fool him – he notices the slight disappointment in her voice, and he hates himself for it. “Sure,” she replies lightly.

Emma's hands are buried in the pockets of her scrubs again as she watches Killian from the window driving away in his pickup. She supposes he just needs a bit more time to really understand what she told him, that she's not planning to leave again so soon. But anyway, even if he doesn't realize it anytime soon – as crazy as it sounds, she can already feel the first roots sprout into the ground.

It did seem like fate had its hands in it: the delivery of her new tire being delayed for days and days, her stumbling over the friendliest woman she ever met while buying some hygiene products, that woman turning out to be the wife of the local veterinarian who told her her husband was suffocating with work but couldn't find anyone wanting to help him out.

And then, completely out of the blue, Walsh showing up one day, wanting to make amends and becoming nasty when she just shook her head.

“You're ridiculous, Emma,” he spat. “What do you want here, in the middle of nowhere? Your best shot is with me. You don't belong here, you don't belong with anyone.”

“I like it here,” she just replied calmly and rose to her full height, because he really wasn't worth the adrenaline. “And to be honest, anywhere is better than with you.” And she turned around and let him stand there, at the curb where he belonged.

She knew eventually she'd run into Killian, and she was nervous about it, asking herself if the time in between might have made him close off again. To be honest, even now, after meeting him, she isn't sure.

Two days later, to her surprise, he's standing in the waiting room again.

“Killian! Is something wrong with Smee?” she asks, eyes scanning the dog, but he seems to be his normal, carefree self, greeting her with a bump of his wet nose and appropriate tail wagging. “Did he react badly to his shots?”

Killian frowns. “What? Oh.” He shakes his head. “No, no. Smee is fine.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Then what... what can I do for you?”

He draws a deep breath and scratches behind his ear before he looks her directly in the eyes, determination in his gaze. “I'm here to... to ask you out,” he finally says in a rough voice. “To dinner or something.”

Time seems to be frozen for a moment as she lets the meaning of his words sink in. Then she exhales carefully. “Shouldn't I be the one taking you out?” she asks and shrugs, trying to play it light. “I mean, I still owe you that thank you dinner, remember?”

But he shakes his head, not accepting the easy way out. Apparently, he needs to get something off his chest. “You don't owe me anything,” he contradicts. “I owe you an apology. For being rude and.. and...” His voice trails off as he's searching for the right word.

“Afraid?” she offers.

He draws deep breath and tilts his head in a fatalistic nod. “Aye,” he admits. “You know, someone... fate, the gods...” he hesitates and then raises his hand to brush a strand of hair from her face that somehow escaped her ponytail, and the tender gesture makes her heart swell. “Someone sent me the best Christmas gift one could ever stumble across in a snowy roadside ditch,” he says softly, “and I was just too much of a coward to accept it.”

She huffs a little laugh and revels in the warmth spreading all through her veins. “And now?”

He tilts his head again. “If you can decide to grow roots, I can bloody well decide to stop being angry.”

Emma smiles and takes a step nearer, standing only a hand's breadth away from him now, and she can see the fine skin around his eyes crinkle. And she thinks, yep, that's a smile. Finally. Without further hesitation, because why the fuck, she raises on her tiptoes, and the moment she leans in she feels Killian's hand at the back of her neck, pulling her to him the last bit. She closes her eyes when she finally feels his lips on hers and sighs into the kiss. He wraps his other arm around her waist and molds her into him, deepening the kiss, and it's everything she's imagined since they were interrupted on Christmas morning – everything and more. When they reluctantly separate again because they both need some air, they lean their foreheads together, both smiling with sparkling eyes, and she thinks she'll probably never get enough of his smile.

“I like it when you're not angry,” she breathes.

“You know, if you want it, you have it,” he replies in a low voice, a little cryptically.

“I have what?” she asks and licks her lips.

They reached Sacramento a bit later than expected, but with the roads full of snow it was better to go slowly rather than dying trying to keep up with the schedule.

After a quick lunch that consisted in grilled cheese for Emma and cheeseburger for Killian, and after Emma had raided the desserts in the diner so she could eat in the car, they hit the road once again.

Driving the pick-up wasn’t as good as driving the Bug, but it was ten times safer. Besides, since it was her car, she could eat without having to worry about crumbs.

«You want something?» she said around a mouthful of donut, arm extended to the side. Not feeling him reaching into the paper bag she was handing him, she shook it slightly, adding: «They don’t bite.»

Killian probably suffocated the huff bubbling up inside him but complied. Once he’d made his choice, he thanked her. To say that she was surprised would’ve been an understatement.

After that, they stayed silent. Well, Killian did, since Emma hummed along the melody of whichever song came on the radio, which was 90% Christmas tunes and the other 10% something that made her ears bleed.

Emma didn’t exactly adore Christmas, but she didn’t hate it either. It was a well balanced love. Besides, one could dislike the music as much as they wanted, but to dislike the food? Hell no.

Fortunately, on the last stretch to Lake Tahoe, the snow stopped to fall, but Emma knew from experience that it didn’t mean the roads to the chalet were in good condition or that it wouldn’t start to snow again.

Grumbling under her breath, Emma reached into the bag to pull out whatever pastry she’d left only to discover it was the last one. Heat rose to her cheeks. Although she did have a sweet tooth, one thing was to be teased about it, another was to wolf down several pastries in front of the guy you had a crush on and who would inevitably judge you.

Clearing her voice, she asked: «Last chance to eat before we reach the chalet.»

A quick glance in Killian’s direction told her he’d cocked an eyebrow. Then, he shook his head. «Nay, Nolan, I’m good.»

This time, it was Emma who arched her eyebrows. «Aren’t you a gentleman,» she muttered, wanting to slap herself as soon as the words were out of her mouth.

«I’m always a gentleman, love.»

It took Emma all sanity she’d left not to hit the brakes and stare absolutely dumbfounded at Killian. He’d cracked a joke. In front of her. And he’d called her love! Surely, it was a mistake.

Nevertheless, that didn’t stop her from eating the last bear claw. Or from smiling slightly all the way to the chalet.

 -/-

 They reached their destination almost forty-five minutes after the estimate time of arrival, meaning her brain was going two hundred miles per hour in the attempt of having everything done before David arrived. Not only she had to decorate the main rooms of the chalet, but she had had the crazies idea of baking, mostly to show off to her brother’s girlfriend.

Mary Margaret, Emma tried to remind herself, biting back a huff. Of course, never having met her, she had no reason to hate or even just despise the woman, but she had at least to give her a hard time, like sisters did. And I get to be the overprotective sister, this time.

Grinning smugly to herself, she hopped off the car. «So, Jones, ready to live the experience of a lifetime?»

His low chuckle startled her, and not in a bad way. In fact, her insides warmed at the sound.

«Does that usually work for you?»

Emma arched her eyebrow. «Judgmental much, Jones?» she snapped with a tight smile, not wanting him to talk to her as if she was the worst woman in the entire world. Definitely not something new for her, but an insult nonetheless. Especially since he’d been known to have his fair of one-night-stands as well.

He shrugged. «Merely curious,» he grumbled, unloading the food supplies.

Emma narrowed her eyes, wondering what else was going on in his mind. However, she knew that pushing wouldn’t take her anywhere, not with Jones. So much alike, she thought to herself as she took a few bags herself before hurrying to unlock the front door.

Thanks to the housekeeper’s visit, everything smelled fresh, like pine and rosemary and, if possible, cold. It probably was not possible to put a sensation into words or for a smell to be described as such. Soon, however, soon there’d be the scent of cinnamon and spices. Emma hummed in delight, almost wanting to ditch the decorations on to Killian and just start baking. Now, that was a clever idea.

«Alright, do you want to unpack? Take a shower? A nap?» she called out as she made her way to the kitchen. At least they didn’t need to bring the decorations as well, since those were already up in the attic and a tree had been delivered to the house. That particular, the fact that none had gone to a tree farm to pick it, bothered Emma, but at least they had one to decorate.

Upon seeing it in the family room, a bittersweet feeling seeped through her heart, making her remember how Christmases were when there was a family of five instead of of four.

«Nolan?»

Emma whirled around at the sound of Killian’s voice, and what she found in his baby blues surprised her. He truly was concerned.

Wearing the best smile she could muster, she nodded. «Everything’s fine.» Technically, it wasn’t a lie, yet nothing was alright either. All Emma needed was her mind full and with no chance to think about what would never come back to her. «So, have you decided what you want to do first?»

After a moment in which he kept searching her eyes, Killian nodded. The corners of his mouth twitched, as if he was fighting a smile - or, knowing him, a smirk, one she definitely did not want to kiss off his face. «Let me take a shower and then I’ll be ready for you to order me around.»

Eyes widening, Emma sucked in a breath at Killian’s blunt words. She didn’t recall him ever being so… flirty, not since when they’d first worked on a project together for one of their classes. «W-well, if that’s what you’d like-» She had to bit her tongue to keep herself from stuttering and vomit words she did not mean and that would make the situation even more embarrassing.

«Yeah, uhm, same room?» Killian asked, the tip of his ears as red and bright as lit-up Christmas lights. He was scratching that spot behind his neck, and something told Emma his nails were about to bite into the skin.

All she could do was nod, not waiting for him to make his way upstairs before turning around to focus on the decorations.

The sound of his boots hitting the hardwood floor followed behind him, and once that, too, disappeared, Emma hung her head.

I’m so fucked.

She almost yelled at the voice that told her she definitely was not.

 -/-

 Much better.

Emma’s smile was so wide her cheeks hurt as she lit up the last candle. Soon, the air would smell like citruses and different types of wood without being suffocating. In fact, she found it relaxing.

Unlike Killian, of course, who was grumbling under his breath as he tried to work out the lights.

Looking over her shoulder, Emma stifled a laugh. It was embarrassing, and if she’d been a bit closer to him than she was, she might have even snapped a photo or two. The actual sight of him struggling with something so simple when he was a machine when it came to numbers was ironic and, well, dare she say, cute.

«You need a hand with that?» she asked, forcing herself to swallow the laugh that threatened to bubble up her throat as he spun around and around, dragging the string of lights with him. It was like looking at a Disney princess looking down at the new gown the good sidekick had magically produced for her.

It was this fleeting thought that had her lose her battle, sending her down a spiral of giggles and tears pooling at the corners of her eyes. At one point, her legs couldn’t even hold her up anymore, making her collapse on one of the couches.

Despite the laughter, Emma was aware of his eyes on her, but she couldn’t stop not even if she wanted to. It went on indefinitely, for seconds, minutes, though definitely not hours, but she couldn’t care less. It was liberating, all the stress leaving her boneless eagle-spread on the couch, her stomach hurting in a good way.

«I-» she tried to say between laboured breaths, fingers wiping away the tears. «I’m sorry.»

Not hearing a reply or even just a sound of acknowledgement, Emma dared look at him. Her breath caught in her throat - again.

Confusion had Killian frowning, his eyes clearly laughing behind a curtain of reprimand. How strange, he seemed to want to laugh at her, instead, it was as if he was seeing her for the first time.

Which we know is not true since he’s known you for years, works with you and has seen you in a bikini.

Averting her gaze at the memory, Emma sighed deeply. Back to square one. It didn’t matter how much she tried, Killian never seemed to want to even breathe the same air as she, how could she even think it all could change in less than twenty-four hours? Clearly, there was something more there, some other reason why he kept shutting her out, not even giving her the smallest smile. Approval for a job well done? Totally, but that was always out of politeness, never because he believed in her.

Tightening her lips in a thin line, she lifted herself from the couch and went to him, taking the bundle of lights and helping him out of that mess. After all the times Granny had asked her to undo the messy balls of wool, Emma could consider herself an expert on how to deal with knotted strings.

She worked silently, noticing how he tensed whenever she inched a tad too close. In all honesty, Emma wanted to scream, to yell at him questions about why he kept treating her like that, but alas, she was a bit of a coward. That is, if you could consider willingly  walking on that thin ice cowardice.

«Here,» she muttered, her eyes lowered on her hands. She thrust the lights in Killian’s hands, before tucking a few strands of hair behind her ears. «Have you finished with the ornaments?»

Not waiting for a response, she peered inside a box and saw some balls still scattered around the bottom. She picked up some, keeping them close to her chest, and proceeded to circle the tree, trying to find the perfect spot for each one.

Her trained eye saw immediately how organized the ornaments were, all neatly arranged to create the perfect view, making the tree looking like one of those in those cheesy movies. Truthfully, Emma wouldn’t have expected less given how meticulous he always was when it came to his works.

«There,» she said, smiling widely at how the tree still maintained its beauty even with the few adjustments she’d made.

Only one ornament was left, the one she treasured the most and kept in its old box. It was hers, a swan made of crystal James had gifted her on Christmas when she was eighteen with the first pay check from his first actual job. Despite his bad boy act, James hadn’t been a bad man, and she missed him so much.

«Why a swan?»

The question came suddenly from behind her, a bit too closer than she’d expected. It wasn’t Killian’s proximity that startled her, it was the actual curiosity in his voice, because he wanted to learn more about her.

Memories flooded her, and she couldn’t help but chuckle. «It’s silly and sweet at the same time, really. When we were little, James kept referring to me as “duckling”, it was his pet name for his little sister.» Emma turned around, facing a very interested Killian. For a moment, every thought left her mind; the eagerness in his blue eyes surprising her. It had been years since she’d last seen him looking at her as if she was a normal person and not a hydra. «He never stopped calling me that, not even after he gifted this ornament to me, but in the note he’d quoted the Swan Princess’ song, claiming I’d become a swan.» She looked down at the swan cradled in her hands. «It was the last Christmas we spent together.»

Killian nodded slowly, eyes trained on the ornament as well. «I’m sorry,» he murmured, and Emma knew he meant both for her brother and inquiring about her past. At least he wasn’t regretting his question because it brought them a bit closer.

Emma knew about Killian’s mother’s death, how she’d been all he’d had aside from Liam, who had to step into the adult shoes too soon. Both she and Killian had known loss, felt lost still at times, but they had to put up a brave façade and deal with every day’s problems.

She shook her head, curling her fingers into a fist before she did something stupid like reaching out to brush the inky strands of hair from his face. «No need to worry, Jones. It’s a happy memory, albeit bittersweet.»

He nodded, understanding what she meant. «Better to have them instead of having nothing at all, isn’t that right?»

The grin that spread on Emma’s face could probably light up the whole house, but what could make the lightbulbs pop was the shy, wide smile Killian was giving her. Emma’s heart fluttered in her chest at the sight; if she didn’t have a crush on him already, she would’ve fallen for him in this instant.

Cheeks aflame, Emma turned to hang the ornament, making sure it wouldn’t fall. What was important to her, was that it was on the tree, not that people could see it; all what mattered was that she knew it was there.

«Come on,» she faced Killian again, holding out her hand, «I’ll help you with the lights. Then, you’ll help me make biscuits.»

She had to bite her tongue not to laugh at Killian’s melodramatic groan, only patting him on the shoulder in a way she wouldn’t have ever dared to before.

Well, ‘tis the season, isn’t it?

 -/-

 «I can’t believe you!»

Emma had to battle another fit of giggles as she kept staring at Killian, focused on the gingerbread house he was building, a pencil tucked behind his ear and the tip of his tongue poking out of his mouth. He was deep in concentration, a sheet of paper and a calculator next to him, demonstrating once again that one should never engage an architect when building gingerbread houses unless they wanted to die laughing at their antics.

Even after she’d become an architect herself, Emma had never used math to build her own gingerbread house; she should’ve known Killian would.

Right now, she was elbows deep into the second batch of dough for cookies, flour in her hair and smeared on her face along with sprinkles, yet she couldn’t stop looking at him. It was the most ridiculous and sweet sight at the same time, especially since Killian, too, had more white hair than black at this point, and it was decorated with colourful jimmies and nonpareils after their not so peaceful argument over style versus quantity when it came to cookies decorating. In the end, the only defeated party had been the poor kitchen.

«Do not mock me, Swan,» he muttered, carefully applying the icing on the roof. He’d even made tiles out of gingerbread. The design was amazing, and even more so was the fact that he was actually building what he’d drawn. Yet, it wasn’t his accomplishment that had Emma’s knees tremble and knocked the wind out of her.

«What did you call me?»

Her voice was a whisper, barely audible over the radio, but Killian must’ve heard her because he gulped, and looked away from his project, fingers twisting one of the edible tiles around.

«My apologies, I wasn’t thinking.»

Emma shook her head, trying to swallow the lump in her throat. It had been years since she’d last been called so, and whilst the nickname was old, the warmth spreading inside her was new, albeit not much different from the feeling she had every time she looked at him. «There’s no need to apologize, Killian,» she murmured, his name foreign on her lips, «you just caught me by surprise is all.»

It’s not all, the voice inside her head protested as if Emma didn’t know that already.

Finally, Killian looked up at her from beneath his eyelashes, taking her breath away - again. «Is it weird if I think it fits better than Nolan?» he asked sheepishly. It took Emma all her self control not to ask him where actually was Jones and what he’d done with him.

So she asked him the other burning question she’d carried within herself for years, one she’d never thought she would ask. «Why do you hate me so much?»

Killian paled visibly and a faint snapping sound reached her ears; he’d broken the biscuit he was fidgeting with. Uneasiness marred Killian’s face, the expression marring his gentle features as he looked away from her, gulping audibly. It was as if she’d just thrown him back inside the frozen lake he’d been buried in until today.

«I don’t hate you-»

Emma couldn’t help but snort. «Pft, please. At least have the decency not to lie to me.» Something had snapped inside of her, probably the need to understand what was going on in Killian’s mind: how could he be cold one moment and then call her Swan out of the blue, as if he actually cared about her. Good grief, the man was infuriating.

When his eyes snapped back to hers, she was surprised to find a similar fire animate his irises. «I’m not lying to you, Nolan,» he spit out her surname, and after the way he’d called her Swan, she couldn’t help the ache spreading in her chest. «I just wonder how can you act so sweetly when you told your friends I was handsy and only tried to get in your panties so I would add a notch on my bedpost. I keep wondering how David didn’t kill me, though perhaps he doesn’t kno-»

«Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.» Emma rushed to his side, forcing herself to a halt when she was mere inches from him, still unsure whether to be more indignant or angry at him. «What are you talking about?»

«Don’t play games with me, Emma,» he growled, irritation showing on his face, «I’m talking about our college project, the one you didn’t seem so eager to participate in. Before one of our last meetings, I heard you talking to the phone with someone and complaining about me touching you when we both know nothing ever happened.»

Emma blinked at his statement, staring up at him in disbelief. She remembered very well the project, how could she not? It was the most important one between the two she had to submit, worthy extra points that would affect her final grade and therefore her future. Not only that, it had allowed her to spend time with Killian, and things seemed to be going well between the two of them before he started to act cold and distant, unlike-

«Fucking Neal.»

Killian’s eyebrows rose high on his forehead. «I beg your pardon?»

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

They were so stupid.

«We are so stupid.»

Killian bristled, opening his mouth to say something he would probably regret later, but Emma beat him to it. «I was talking about Cassidy. He was my partner on the other project and he was a total nuisance, always trying to get me to agree to go on a date with him, and when he saw it wasn’t working, he became… handsy.» She looked down at her flour-coated hands, worrying her lower lip between her teeth. «I was probably complaining to Ruby, she was the only one to know and suggested I went to professor Gold, who dismissed my concerns until I threatened to go to the dean. After that, Neal stopped pestering me.»

In the background, the music was almost deafening in the pregnant silence stretching between them.

«There, you now have the reason why I was complaining about my partner. It doesn’t explain how you never confronted me about what you heard, though. If you were so made about me saying those things then why the hell are you here? Don’t get me wrong, I like having you here and having you around in general, but I just don’t understand you.» Emma snapped her mouth shut, having basically admitted she liked him and Killian was intelligent enough to understand she didn’t mean just as a friend - since they weren’t even that.

Flustered, Killian brought his hand up to scratch behind his neck. «I assume telling you I’m sorry and that I’ve been an arse won’t be enough. I was a complete, utter idiot, but I couldn’t explain to you what I’ve overheard without admitting that I fancied you, making a complete fool of myself, so I just pretended I didn’t hear any of that and tried to stop thinking about you.»

To say that she was stunned, speechless and completely overwhelmed would mean Emma actually had had the time to sort out the feelings swirling inside her when all she could think of was a tiny, probably yet not quite insignificant part of Killian’s explanation.

«You fancied me?»

His hand stopped the scratching, only to resume it when he cast her a fleeting glance. «Aye, I did.» He bit his lower lip, eyes boring into hers with such intensity Emma felt anchored to the world just by it. Not that she minded.

In fact, her brain was pretty much useless now that she’d heard those words, which was why she didn’t realize her hands had fisted the front of Killian’s sweatshirt and had tugged him down towards her.

His lips were so soft against her own, perfectly balancing the way his scruff scratched her in the most delicious way.

Awkward at first, the kiss turned into a passionate exchange as Emma buried one of her hands in the hair at the nape of Killian’s neck while he circled her waist with his arms, pulling her closer.

Emma couldn’t believe she was finally kissing Killian Jones or that he tasted suspiciously like gingerbread. She smiled against his mouth, relishing in the way he moaned low in his throat when her teeth found his lower lip and tugged at it.

The sensation of Killian’s tongue brushing against hers sent shivers running all through her body and heat coiled in her belly; she didn’t want that moment to end, knowing he would either reject her or kiss her again, and though he was kissing her back, it didn’t mean he wouldn’t resent her.

But Killian surprised her, pressing her against the kitchen island, pulling away only to breathe in deeply before kissing her again, hands holding her hips close to his.

Emma sighed into Killian’s mouth, rising on her tiptoes and letting out a yelp when she was suddenly lift onto the counter.

With a bashful yet devilishly handsome grin, Killian settled between her splayed knees before suddenly turning serious. «It didn’t matter how many times I tried to talk myself out of it, I’ve always fancied you, especially when you weren’t yelling at me.»

Her green eyes lit up, fuelled not by the excitement still running through her veins, but by hope that he wasn’t mad at her. «So you still fancy me?»

It was silly, and Emma wasn’t a silly person by any means, but it was also true that she’d never felt like this for any of the boys she’d dated in the past, so sue her for feeling like a teenager in front of her first, most important crush.

Killian leaned closer, just a breath away from her lips. «Aye, Swan, that I do.»

Emma licked her lips, nodding her head slowly. «Good,» she said, before closing the distance between them and kissing Killian again. And again, and again, and some more, until they both lost count and their clothes along the way.

(Suffice to say, the first tray of cookies had to be thrown away.)

(While Emma might have had the satisfaction of warning Mary Margaret that if she hurt David she would face the blonde’s ire, David was too smug for his own good when his turn to warn Killian came, after the shock of his little sister being in a relationship with one of his best friends wore off, of course.)

(In retaliation, they never actually told David what had happened on the couch he loved so much. He didn’t deserve to have a heart attack.)