"You know, you wear more jewelry than I do."
Startled, he looks up from the map of Storybrooke they're studying in an attempt to uncover the hidden glade Regina felt might prove useful in their efforts to run their current quarry to ground. "Sorry?"
Sliding her elbows forward on the smooth surface of her mother's kitchen table, Emma reaches out her hand to touch his, her fingertips dancing over the rings he's worn for longer than he cares to remember. "Between all these and that shiny earring of yours, I'm starting to feel like a peahen."
'You've no need to worry, love." He looks down to where she's toying with the silver ring on his thumb, then lifts his gaze to her face. It's been two days since the night he almost lost her to an icy grave, and the simple touch of her hand on his still makes his heartbeat quicken almost painfully. "Haven't you ever heard the expression gilding the lily, Swan?" She shrugs, and he takes a certain quiet delight in enlightening her. "It means to unnecessarily adorn something that is already beautiful."
The colour rises in her cheeks as she opens her mouth, then shuts it again without speaking, as if she's thought better of her planned riposte. Pulling her gaze from his, she takes his hand and commences running her fingers along the length of his, smoothing her thumb over his knuckles before lazily caressing the garnet and silver ring on his fourth finger. If she'd wanted to score the next point in this endless skirmish of theirs, he thinks as he shifts awkward in his chair, she's doing a fine job. "Where did you get this one?"
He has to think for a moment. It has, after all, been a very long time. "Tortuga."
Her sea-green eyes widen, and he can see she's stifling a smile. "Seriously?"
He's not quite sure why his answer has amused her so much. "I agree, it was quite a lowly destination for a captain of my stature, but portals can be unpredictable beasts at best."
A smile plays about her lips as she murmurs something about showing him a DVD of her lad's sometime, then she catches the ring in question between her thumb and forefinger, looking up at him with hopeful eyes. "Can I look at them?"
He hesitates – he can't remember the last time he went without them, and he's uncertain as to whether they will even slide off his fingers – but as always, he can refuse her nothing. "Of course."
To his surprise, she doesn't bother with the mundane task of wrestling the rings over his knuckle. She merely twirls her other hand through the air, her brow furrowed in concentration, and an odd heat tickles his skin from wrist to fingernails. When he looks down, his fingers and thumb are bare, and Emma Swan is in possession of a proud smile and a handful of his jewellery. "An attraction to such trinkets is more fitting to a magpie rather than a swan, I must say." His hand is still tingling, but it's not unpleasant. "If you ever wish to change careers, though, you'd make a tidy trade in pickpocketing."
"Been there, done that." She gives him an arch look (his admiration knows no bounds, truly) as she turns her attention to her bounty, lifting the ornate silver and garnet ring to look at it in the light of the bulb overhead. "This stone is beautiful."
His hand feels bare, almost naked, but the sight of her toying with some of his most personal possessions has him frozen in place. He'd forgotten such intimacy existed, and his heartbeat quickens anew. "I've always thought so."
Flashing him an impish grin, she slips it onto her finger, and his heartbeat stutters and catches, his chest tightening at the sight of his ring adorning her left hand. She holds her hand to admire the gleaming semi-precious stone, its dark red gleam aglow against the pale skin of her slender fingers. He sees the very instant that realisation hit her, when she is struck by the same memory that's playing on a loop in his own head, that of her father beaming at her mother as he retells an oft-told tale of love and discovery.
It wasn't until I saw my mother's ring on her finger that I knew that she was the only woman I'd ever love.
There is a sudden silence between them, thick and tangible and all too fragile, then she breaks free from the spell that has fallen over them. "Too big," she tells him briskly, the colour rising in her cheeks, and strips the ring from her finger with a jerky motion.
She drops them into his waiting palm without ceremony, and he takes them from her without comment. He no longer has his own mother's ring, of course. It's lost forever, just like the hand on which he used to wear it, lost the day the Crocodile stole another shining gem from his life.
"It's no doubt just as well. Your lovely hands have no need of such gaudy trinkets, lass." His heart is filled with too many words and the knowledge that now is not the right time to say any of them. (He would pillage the seas to shower her with the finest rubies and emeralds if that is what she desired, and that he knows she desires nothing of the sort only makes him treasure her all the more.) She watches him from beneath lowered lashes as he slides the rings back onto his fingers and thumb, and he's gracious enough to pretend he doesn't notice. "A princess such as yourself deserves the real thing."
"Not on a sheriff's salary," she shoots back with her usual zest, but an odd uncertainty lingers in her eyes, and he silently rebukes himself for letting his mouth run away from him.
"Perhaps we should rejoin the others." He wants nothing more than to stay here in the quiet loft with her, but that's not a luxury they can afford today, not with a rogue witch with a fondness for creating human icicles on the loose. "Your father will be wondering why it's taking so long to consult a simple map."
She looks at him then, her gaze soft, almost wistful. "You know, you'd look good without those trinkets too."
His mouth goes dry, and he has to swallow before he can speak. "Ah, but once a pirate, always a pirate, love."
She gives him a knowing smile that tells him she's quite aware that he's sidestepped the issue. "So you keep telling me." Pushing back her chair, she rises to her feet, then folds the map neatly. "Come on then, Captain Peacock. Let's go."
It's not hard to inject a dose of outrage into his tone. "Peacock?"
"Think of it as a term of endearment." The warmth of her answering smile goes a long way to soothing his wounded pride, then mischief flashes in her eyes. "Mind you, I haven't even started on that earring yet."
He puts his hand flat on the front door as she goes to pull it open, trapping her between his body and the wooden panels. Dipping his head, he touches his lips to her earlobe, letting his teeth scrape against the small gold hoop she wears there. The scent of her makes his head swim, and the shiver that ripples through her at his touch makes him want to push her back against that bloody door and simply take her, snow witch be damned. "Any time you want a closer look at any of my other trinkets, Swan," he murmurs against her throat, tasting the gooseflesh that rises up on her skin, "you merely have to ask."
The corner of her mouth lifts in a smile of pure challenge as she looks at him with glittering green eyes, then she slips her hand between them, her fingers curling around the charms hanging from his neck. She tugs him forward and he willingly goes, letting her take his mouth in a brief, bruising kiss that sends his blood hurtling southwards, leaving him dizzy with want. "Remind me later, okay?" She releases her grip on his necklace, and he has to catch himself before he staggers against the door like a drunkard. "Right now, let's go see if we can find Little Miss Sundae."
They share a complicit grin (she enjoys the hunt as much as he does, he suspects) that only makes his desire spark all the more. He follows her out of the apartment and down the stairs and into the street of this town he's come to call his home. The rings on his right hand feel oddly foreign against his skin, as though Emma's touch has altered them in some way, and he wonders if perhaps the time has finally come to heed the winds of change.
He wasn't always a pirate, after all.