#the dev collective

Killian knew it, too; just for a second his face froze and his jaw muscle throbbed and then he moved his hand to the back of his neck and ran it through his hair. “Aye,” he said. “I suppose we do, at that.” He pulled the door the rest of the way open and Emma stepped over the threshold and grabbed him, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him until both of them were out of breath.

He laughed and it was shaky, he was shaky as she pushed him farther into the room, walking backward until he backed up against the loveseat. Emma pressed on his shoulders and he sat down, obedient, watched her as she pulled at the sleeves of her jacket and let it fall to the floor, watched her as the put her hands to his chest and lowered herself so that she was on the seat with him, her knees bracketing his hops, one of his hands at her thigh and his hook flipping the hair away from her shoulder. She pushed the black bathrobe away from his bare chest, the foreheads touched and when their eyes met again there was a question in them and he kissed her--gently--softly--searching for answers.

When he finally pulled away, Emma touched her lips; her eyes never left his as her hand brushed against her wrist and the corded leather laces she wore there. “When I moved to Storybrooke,” she said, “of course I didn’t believe the stories Henry told, you know, princes and princesses and curses. But I also--I didn’t believe in much of anything. Happy endings. Love. Myself. And there was this guy, he--” Emma took a deep breath “--I think I could have, with him, you know? Felt something. For the first time since Neal left me.”

Killian’s hand moved to her temple as he caressed her cheek and she leaned into him.

“He left me in prison, Killian. Pregnant. And I couldn’t be--I felt like the only thing I could do was give Henry up, give him his best chance. And I was broken. I was broken for a long time after that. When Graham--died--I thought I would just be broken, you know, forever. It’s easier to feel nothing when what you’re feeling just plain sucks. And then I met you.”

His hand lowered.

“I hated you,” she said, and Killian laughed, a small thing that was barely a sound. “You were just so--” Emma made a face.

“You can say it,” he said. “Devilishly handsome.”

“That too,” she muttered. “But I felt something. Right from the start, even though all I could see were the reasons why not until the curse came for us and I knew. I knew I couldn’t lose you. I couldn’t.” She ran her hand through his hair, rested her arm on his shoulder and stroked the back of his neck. “I love you.”

His intake of breath was sharp and audible, his eyes wide, his mouth slightly open.

“I learned something a long time ago,” she continued. “That there’s this feeling you get, like, you just can’t outrun it, and that’s how you know you have a home. When you leave it, you just miss it. That’s how I felt at the town line, Killian. I missed--” the pad of his thumb traced the crease under her eye, chasing a tear “--I missed you.”

His hand lowered slowly, back to her knee. His hook anchored against her hip when he said, “Don’t take this the wrong way, love, but I’m glad to you got your heart broken. That’s how you know it still works. And I knew, Swan--I knew since you left me on that beanstalk that I could--” she cupped his face with her hands “--and I hated you, too. For making me feel. I hadn’t felt anything in a very long time.”

Killian tried to look away, but Emma wouldn’t let him.

“I knew how I felt about you in Neverland,” he said. “Since--”

The Other Kiss.

“Or I thought I did,” he said. “But True Love is the rarest magic of all and I--”

“Shhh,” Emma said, leaning forward until their foreheads were touching again. Because--now, now, they were on the same page.

“Sometimes I still doubt it,” he said. “That you’re here. That we’re here.”

“I know it’s scary,” Emma said. “I’m still scared, too. Every day. But we’re going to find a way.”

This time, when he kissed her, it wasn’t soft or gentle, as his mouth trailed down toward her collarbone, as his hand went to the curve of her breast before tracing a line down the length of her middle, his hook cool and smooth as it slid under the hem of her shirt.

“You believe in me,” she said, a whisper into his skin. An exhalation, a release of tension and fear and doubt, and when she breathed again it was full of him, of the scent of him and the nearness of him.

“And you give me hope,” he said, twisting his body and hers so that she was on her back on the loveseat, their bodies flush from her chest to her knees. Emma closed her eyes, letting the moment fill her, letting everything else disappear--let it all fall away except him. She threaded her fingers through his hair and he said, “How about we try for some real magic?”

When he touched her and Emma felt the magic there, white-hot silver in her veins, she let it envelop her, envelop them; opened her eyes and felt his chuckle as he reached for her, helping her pull off her shirt as the weight of him, of them, sank into the mattress. His arms wrapped around her and he was insatiable, all of the hunger of that first burning kiss blazing back to life in the darkness as if he could swallow her whole. Emma pulled off her tank top and his eyes glittered, a wicked gleam as he watched her, followed her hands as she unbuttoned her jeans and slid out of them.

They were together, completely, and with the friction between them Emma could feel the last knot of loneliness releasing, coming loose as he watched her; he fucked her with his hand and his mouth and his eyes, watched her and called for her until she shattered and came and came and came and his name was on her hips as he made love to her and whispered in her ear, “I love you.”

And it was just--so easy.

Like home.

--

“For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation. I hold this to be the highest task for a bond between two people: that each protects the solitude of the other. This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess.”

“Seriously, Emma?”

No.

Emma didn’t--she didn’t do feelings, or at least, she didn’t like expressing them, and this--this was Neal’s fault. But Killian, he just--he knew her, open book or whatever he wanted to call it, and he didn’t question it, or question her. She remembered how they met--she’ll never fucking forget it--and the beanstalk and the look in his eyes, the look you get when you’ve been left alone and how even then, there was something. Maybe it hadn’t started off great but now it was--

It was--

When I win your heart, Emma--

So.

Yes.

“Yes, okay?” Emma practically shouted. “Not like I need your permission, Mr. I-Was-Engaged-To-Someone-Who-Shot-Me. Six days ago. Six days, Neal, after eleven years of you being gone and then you were dead and I had to deal with that.”

“In six days?” He was angry, too. Practically shouting. Emma hoped Henry wasn’t listening.

“A lot happened in six days,” Emma said, suddenly tired. The bean. Her father, her kid. The kiss--the Other Kiss, the one that should have been a warning because she had felt it, felt him, as if she could fly and that--

That was probably magic, too.

Emma snorted a laugh that was maybe a hair away from being a cry. “I love you,” she said. To Neal. She was saying it to Neal who didn’t deserve to hear it but his father died today and she needed to get this shit off of her chest and out of her life and be in a place where she could look at the father of her kid without wanting to throw up or throw things or laugh-cry. “I loved you. And you left. And that is never going to be okay. I am never going to be okay with that. I was a kid, Neal. You took advantage of my love, and my trust, and I literally have not been able to trust another person since then.”

Until Hook. Killian.

“Killian came back,” she said.

“He didn’t come back for you,” Neal snapped, and if this was supposed to be his parting shot, his killing blow, wow, did that backfire because--

“I know,” she said, and that’s when she smiled. “He came back for Henry. To help. Because Henry is your kid. Because he wanted to do the right fucking thing. Be a part of something, for once, instead of running away.”

“You’re a runner too, Em,” Neal said. “You know it, and I know it.”

“Maybe I am,” Emma said. “But maybe this time I want to be a part of something.”

She did. She did, and it wasn’t this conversation. Emma turned and scanned the room, looking for Hook. For Killian. But he was--

Gone.

And Emma’s heart, it did something painful, contracting or maybe exploding until she saw Granny, saw the old woman’s wink and the way she tilted her head toward the back and the sign that said RESTROOMS.

Very romantic.

But Emma gathered it up inside herself, pulled together the yes and the when I win your heart and the be a part of something and the magic she could maybe sort of still feel tingling in her lips and took a deep breath and went to find him.

Killian. She went to find Killian.

So.

Here’s what didn’t happen:

There was no gentle, reassuring kiss. No smiles, no hand-holding, no words of any kind and certainly none of the ones Emma preferred to keep locked away.

True. Love’s. Kiss.

There was no moment of exquisite pining and connection as they leaned against the wall, him in the restroom and her in the hallway, their hands lined up, their postures mirrored, as they felt Feelings.

Instead, there was rum proffered and accepted; a long, slow pull and a long, even gaze. The windows of his eyes were open again as he watched her, hungry. Another pull--and that time, she watched him, watched his tongue as it traced his bottom lip, as she reached for him and let her finger follow its path.

There was the countertop for the sink, which had the right height and the right angle as he--

Well, it was better than the back of a Volkswagen.

It was quick and dirty and hot, something secret, something forbidden, and how had they never done this in Neverland when it had been there simmering between them since the Other Kiss, since the beanstalk, since the handkerchief and the swordfight--when I jab you with my sword you’ll feel it--and god, god, did she feel it.. A fuck-your-Feelings kind of fuck, a get-it-out-of-our-systems kind of fuck, a holy-shit-what-the-fuck-just-happened kind of fuck.

It was messy. Clumsy.

It was perfect: every touch a promise.

And then--

“Hook,” she whispered. “Killian--”

Something flickered. Something broke.

The windows closed.

“Swan. Emma--” he stopped. “I--”

“Seriously?”

“Apologies,” he said. “For my rudeness.”

He left. She watched.

Yeah. That happened.

--

Emma gulped again. Looked at her mother’s hand wrapped around her own and what the hell, try something new, darling and all of that, so:

Emma told her. About the car. About the cons, the hotel rooms. Tallahassee and the watches. About giving birth chained to a bed in a prison hospital ward. The story spilled out--all the things about herself that Emma always let her mother assume but never know, because she still wanted her parents to be proud of her, to see the best of her, to want her. To not see the mess she had made of her life, to not think that maybe they’d been better off without her. Because she was still angry at them for the choices they’d made. She’d trusted Neal because she’d wanted someone to trust her, to love her, to put her first and it had ended badly and she’d looked into Killian’s eyes on that first day by the beanstalk and felt Feelings and saw all of it happening all over again.

Just another person she shouldn’t trust.

Just another person who would betray her.

Emma was the only person who would put herself first and she couldn’t take the chance she was wrong about that.

When she finished, Mary Margaret was crying. Both of them were, Mary Margaret still clutching her hand and Emma had her hand on top of her mother’s and it was, for the first time, a Moment. A mother-daughter moment. The coffee was cold and gross but Emma took a sip anyway as her mother wiped her eyes and straightened up.

“So what now?” Mary Margaret asked.

True. Love’s. Kiss.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Emma said. “Neal and I are over--”

“Obviously.”

“--and Hook and I, well, you saw what happened. Everyone saw.” Only Emma hoped everyone hadn’t seen what had happened in the restroom. That was--

“You and dad, like, literally walked off into the sunset and got married. After.”

True. Love’s. Kiss.

--that was complicated.

Apologies.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Mary Margaret said, making a noise. It was--it was like a mom noise. Like an I’m not mad I’m disappointed kind of thing. “That’s not what happened and you know it. Our road after the curse was almost as bumpy as the one that led to it. And I think I know you well enough--I hope I do--to know that’s not what you want. Not yet. Maybe not ever?”

Emma looked up at her mother, her eyebrows raised, and shrugged.

“What did Killian say?”

“We haven’t, um, talked,” Emma said.

“But last night you--” Mary Margaret paused. “Oh.”

Emma tried to hide her blush and--well, she failed. Totally, if Mary Margaret’s pink cheeks and shy smile were anything to go by, like Snow-freaking-White just wanted her baby girl--her princess--to live happily ever after with the pirate, married or unmarried or fucking in the restrooms of the diner for all eternity.

Just be happy, whatever that meant.

But then--

Emma’s smile faded; Mary Margaret’s expression shifted, slowly, comprehension coloring her features.

Mary Margaret took a breath and exhaled it, slowly. “Emma, you know how you have those--”

Yes, for fuck’s sake. She knew. She knew, okay? WALLS. She had them.

“Seriously? You think I don’t know that? I literally just finished explaining to you--”

“Let me finish.” Mary Margaret made the noise again, the mom noise. “You have these walls, but everyone in Storybrooke has lost something. Not just you.”

Ouch. Thanks, mom. Could have gotten that from Regina, but, whatever. Okay.

“Neal--”

“I’m not talking about Neal,” Mary Margaret said. “You need to make peace with him. We all do--though I’m not looking forward to having this conversation with your father.”

Emma snorted.

“I’m talking about Hook. About Killian. Obviously.”

Obviously.

“You did leave him, Emma. You had your reasons, and a lot has changed since then.”

True. Love’s. Kiss.

“I’m just saying that you’re not the only one who might have, um, reservations.” Her mother shrugged, eloquently. It was the gesture of a Queen explaining something that should be obvious. (There was that word again.) Gently-laid breadcrumbs for a populace--or a daughter--who did not want to have things explained to them. All of that was fine and dandy except that Emma really, really did not like having her mother explain things, whether it was ogres or giants or pixie dust or Feelings. Especially when she was right--and she was, she was--and when it was obvious, all of the times she’d seen it spilling out of him, reflected in the windows of his eyes: the pain. The hesitation. The fear--of not being enough, not worth helping, not worth trusting.

Until--

Be a part of something.

The fear of being not worth even a goodbye but then she’d looked at him on the town line as he waited, as he said nothing even though they might never have seen each other again and she was the one who’d been afraid. Who’d missed him, even though he wasn’t gone yet.

When I win your heart, Emma--

And he had.

“Mom!” Henry called to her as Emma stood in the sunlight on Main Street, blinking, needing to wash away the leftover cold coffee still lingering in her mouth. They walked into the diner as Emma tried to ignore Granny and her lascivious grin--wait, how good was a werewolf’s hearing, exactly?--but she couldn’t ignore Hook sitting on a stool at the edge of the counter, especially when the bell rang over the door and she looked forward and he looked up and their eyes met. There was a beat but then he smiled, softly, tentatively.

Emma waved. Tentatively.

Henry, who was much smarter than an eleven-year-old had any right to be, looked from Emma to Hook and back again and said, “Why don’t we invite Killian to eat with us?”

“What?” Emma looked down at him and his serious face and it wasn’t what she expected, to have her kid trying to set her up with Captain Hook. Shit, maybe he had heard her and Neal fighting last night, or maybe he just wanted her to be happy. “Sure you’re okay with that, kid?”

Henry smiled. “I just want you to be happy,” he said.

Huh.

Emma’s eyes were back on him--on Killian--and she cocked her head and crooked her finger at him, her smile widening as she did it. There was a dirty joke in there and she knew it and he definitely knew it because she saw his jaw muscle twitch and his eyes light up before his smile grew, wide and bright and less hesitant as he slid from the stool and walked toward Emma and Henry.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hello,” he said.

That was it, nothing else, and they just--they stared at each other for a couple of seconds, grinning stupidly, Emma could feel it on her face and she was almost sure she heard Granny start swearing as she watched them until Ho--Killian cleared his throat and said to Henry, “I trust you’re feeling well, lad?”

Henry shrugged, like having his heart pulled out of his body and getting his soul transposed with a demon’s was all in a day’s work or whatever, and all of that was before The Curse and the Breaking Of The Curse. “I’m okay,” he said. “Can I have chocolate milk with my cereal?”

Emma laughed. “How about some lunch? Maybe some protein?”

Henry just deadeyed her because he totally knew she was going to order grilled cheese so she said, “Fine, kid. Whatever you want. Just don’t tell Regina, okay?”

“What are you going to have?” she asked H--Killian, and his entire face did this thing where it softened and some of the tension he was still carrying in his shoulders dissipated because she hadn’t--because she wasn't mad at him, or something.

They’d spent months as adversaries because of her, because she’d left him and couldn’t trust herself and then--six days--six days where everything shifted underneath their feet, constantly, and an epic fuck wasn’t going to fix or undo all of that in spite of True Love’s Kiss and Emma needed to take a goddamn breath and just--yeah. She watched his fist clench and unclench under the table and as she reached for his arm--as she let herself reach for his arm, trailed her hand down to his wrist and wrapped her fingers around the cool metal of his hook. He stiffened all over and then exhaled, not taking his eyes off Henry but his leg shifted just so until their toes were almost touching and she could feel the heat of him along her thigh and her shin and she knew.

When I win your heart, Emma--and I will win it--

If she let Killian Jones into her life, he would never leave her. She had a choice; she could choose to see the best in him.

It will be because you want me.

She could let him see the best in her.

And then the fun could begin.

--