Hello lovely friends & readers! Welcome to my Cops/Swan Queen AU! I've loved the idea of Emma and Regina as cops for a while now and this story has been molding and forming on my laptop for about 3 months. Finally, I can say, I'm happy with it and decided to post it! I do hope you enjoy! This is very much an AU. I don't watch cop shows often and really have no idea when it comes to the police force, so any errors in name/rank there please forgive - blame Biffy! And please note, I don't own ONCE, I only play with their characters! Enjoy! Oh and if you find the references to various movie/T.V. show here - lemme know! I might have a surprise for you! (; there are 2 in this chap!

A Tip and A Partner

The Miami skyline was splashed pink by the setting sun. The breeze coming in from South Beach had a salty sweet taste, catching the blondes hair, it flitted in wisps around her face caressing her rosy cheeks and leaving kisses along her glistening skin. The sound of soft music wafted on the breeze from some local party. She sighed, reclining even further into her lounge chair. Nothing could ruin the day...

"I'm a sailor peg!
And I've lost my leg!
Climbing up the top sails
I lost my leg!"

Or that would be if this were a TV show and not real life.

Officer Emma Swan said a silent prayer for whatever sorry son of a bitch decided to call her on her day off. The sound of screaming Irishmen mixed with heavy metal that was her ringtone stirred up the remains of her hangover now throbbing in her skull. Ungraciously she retrieved her screaming cellphone, growling roughly into the receiver.

"This is Swan, and this had better be good, because if it isn't Gold's ruddy head on a platter then you've just interrupted me on day off and you're going to have my foot up your ass so quick come Monday morning you wont - "

"Emma, it's me." Emma blinked as she instantly recognized the gruff voice she hadn't heard in years crackling through the speakers, "And trust me, it's good."

xxx

"What the hell is so important that you call me on a Sunday Booth?" Officer Swan belted as she swung open the rusty bar door of the Radio. It was their old spot and there by the brightly colored tiki bar, stood the shadow of the man who used to be her former partner. He was tall, dressed in khaki shorts, a faded base ball cap rooting for their old hometown team, the Red Soxs, and the ugliest Hawaiian shirt she had ever seen.

"The hell you wearing?"

August Booth winked at the tan girl behind the bar, before setting his drink down and turning to his now fuming ex-partner, "It's good to see you too, Savior."

Officer Swan winced at the use of her unfortunate nickname. It had taken a few years for the use of her alleged moniker to die down around the office, and ever since the accident no one had dared utter it in her vicinity again.

"Don't Savior me Booth."

"Ah, but aren't you an angelic vision, all dressed in white?" He said through sips of his overly fruity looking drink, "You never wear white, Swan? What's the occasion?"

"Day off. And if you don't have anything, I'd like to get back to enjoying it."

Without a word Booth set his drink down on the tropical coaster, reaching behind him into a sack, dropping a large manila packet down on the bar.

With a smug look he pushed it towards her, "Don't say I never gave you anything."

Emma eyed the overflowing packet before letting out a irritated huff. It had been years since she and Booth had last worked together and yet, in mere seconds, he proved that no one knew her better.

Giving in to her curiosity she plopped down a few stools away, grabbing file after file out of the protruding packet.

Booth smirked as his former partner ripped through the packet.

"Wow, easy tiger."

Flipping over the largest file Emma drew in breath, running her fingers over the name scribbled across it in messy handwriting. Gold.

"Is this what I think it is?"

"Mmm-" Booth hummed, shaking his head while finishing off his drink, "It's better."

"Better?"

"Like that brunette from the Key Largo case - Ruby," he said, sucking the sugar off of the rim of his glass, "way better.

A wave of excitement rushed through the blonde officers toned body. She had been following the Gold case for years. Back when Booth and her were newbies of the force in Boston, they had heard stories about the notorious Gold. Together, they had naively fantasized what it would be like to be the ones to catch him. To bring him in, to finally put an end to his reign, to be victorious. There were many afternoons, spent on stakeouts together, talking about how they would go down in history as the best cops ever. Saving people, eating doughnuts and putting away one of the biggest villains of their day. But that was before the accident. Those were easier times.

Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Emma opened the file. Scattered among black and white shots of bungalows somewhere in SoBe, there was a picture of a woman. She was short, fresh faced, with wide eyes and a sweet smile.

"Uh - Unless Gold has gone and had a sex change, this isn't him August."

"No, it's not."

Emma nearly spit. Biting back a growl of frustration as she felt the dull shot of a migraine beginning behind her eyes she spoke, "What do you mean-"

"It's his girlfriend."

"What?"

"His girlfriend whose pissed at him and able to testify."

"What?"

"Yeah," Booth said, signaling over the bar girl for another drink, "Apparently she didn't like it when she found out he procured her diamond ring as a form of blood money."

Emma starred at the man in disbelief, quickly going over what was said in her head, "August where did you get this?"

"Never you mind about that." He said, swiveling back to see her. "She's your key to nailing Gold. Names Belle French. Looks like a goody two shoes if you ask me, but don't let that fool you. She's wicked fast."

Officer Swan stared at her former partner. Before she could question Booth on how he got his hands on this information while being outside of the force, or on his reasons for handing it over to her he pushed a second drink in front of her.

"Drink up kid. You're about to solve the case of our lifetime!"

Stunned, Emma looked down at the drink. Dr Pepper, her old favorite.

xxx

Come Monday the central offices of the Criminal Investigation unit of the Miami Police Department was in a flurry. Cops swarming in and out like bees. Every few minutes a new face would come through, entering and exiting the doors of the office, trying to get a glimpse at something hidden behind the door of the majors office.

Officer Swan had barely noticed the commotion. She was already buried in paperwork from her last case of the robbery of the famous locals diner, Grannys, owned by South Beach local Eugenia Lucas.

"Swan!" Came the voice of her unit boss, Major Nolan. "My office."

Emma stood immediately, not caring that all eyes were on her as she made her way to his office. She was more concerned with the massive overload of paperwork that would be left unattended.

"You called Sir?" She entered the room.

"Emma," Major Nolan spoke, acknowledging the officer with a familiar tone. The moment Emma had transferred to the Criminal Investigations unit of the Miami PD, Major Nolan had taken her under his wing. Emma wouldn't admit it to anyone, but in the time she had been there, Major Nolan had become the closets thing to a father figure she had ever had in her life. "Come in and shut the door behind you."

Officer Swan did as she was told.

The moment the door clicked, signaling that it was locked she heard a shuffling inside the room.

Major Nolan sat behind his large desk, filled with his many badges and plaques and certificates of honor. He was a fine Major and had become a good friend of Emma's in her short time on their force. She would say that by now she could read the man pretty well, and judging by the way he was currently fidgeting, running his hands through his well kept dirty blonde hair, he was nervous. He kept readjusting himself, moving in his seat, until his knee bumped the desk causing a stack of papers to scatter on the floor.

Officer Swan immediately knelt to help pick them up, and that was when she saw her.

Legs. All she could make out was legs. They were long and sexily curved, covered in fishnets that only seemed to go thigh high, before they were cut off under the hem of a grey skirt with a slit up the side revealing an unholy amount of tan flesh. They seemed to touch the sky.

She looked up, following the curved hip until she met sinfully red lips, perfectly coiffed brunette hair and two eyes staring back at her.

"Office Swan, this is-"

"Regina Mills."

xxx

Major Nolan was known throughout the precinct as a well respected man. He was highly revered, idolized even. His work was through and his moral compass sound. It was not often that he was bested when it came to the inner workings his job or his people. But in this case he felt completely out of the loop.

He surveyed the two women before him with his highly observational eye, critiquing their every move and came up with nothing so he spoke.

"Okay, am I missing something? Do you two know each other? Swan?"

"I'm afraid I'm just as confused as you are Major," the dark brunette said. She turned to face the blonde, "I'm sorry, but have we met before?"

The woman's voice was deep and the normally cool Officer Swan had to swallow not once, but twice, in order to get her throat in working order again.

"N-no." She responded, stuttering slightly, eyeing the woman who appeared completely unaffected. She cleared her throat and tried to pretend that she hadn't seen the eyebrow raise of her Major across from her out of the corner of her eye. "We haven't personally, but I am very familiar with you work."

"Oh?" The brunette responded, raising a perfectly arched brow.

"Yeah. The closing of Ingrid the Ice Killer case. Nice thought to freeze her out of her next victims house, by literally freezing her hand to the door. Slightly poetic, isn't it, Officer?"

"It's Detective."

"Really?" Swan said before she could stop herself.

The woman shifted, exposing more of her delicious looking tanned skin, "For someone that claims to know so much about me, you seem to actually know very little."

Officer Swan wanted nothing more than to wipe the sadistic smirk that had formed on the brunettes face clean off of the face of the earth with a bullet, but decided against it. If there was something she knew she couldn't take back it was words out of her mouth and bullets from her gun. She smiled internally at her own movie reference but then squashed it down as she turned back to the conversation happening in front of her, without her.

"So Major?" The woman spoke again. "Are we just going to stand here, gawking or?"

"Er- Right." Major Nolan began. Officer Swan looked at him in concern. She had never seen the Major stutter. But then again, not many got the chance to come in contact with the famed Regina Mills and live to tell the tale.

She was the best of the best. At age 15 she had been solving cases along side with her father, the illustrious Detective Henry Mills. When she was spotted behind the police tape on the crime scene of the infamous Red Queen case, she had been promptly questioned until the interviewer realized that he had cornered the daughter of the most prominent name on the police force. He was immediately sacked but the interview had still been published on the front pages the next day. Every paper read their own version but the most The Mirror had stated in big, bold print, 'Fifteen Year Old Prodigy Solves Red Queen Case in a Matter of Seconds.'

Ever since then, the cop world had known the name of Regina Mills. She graduated top of her class, and early at that. She had hunted down and locked up more criminals in her first newbie years on the force, then most seasoned cops in the entirety of their long hauled careers.

And she was a kill shot with a bow and arrow.

It was a little known fact that the notorious Regina Mills could shoot a bird down, blind folded, with one hand behind her back, in the middle of a forest better with an old fashion bow rather then a pistol.

But Officer Emma Swan knew. She probably knew more about that woman then even the most extreme fan sitting in university, studying her methods and probably wetting themselves if they ever had the chance to meet her.

And as her brain spun, a small, nagging thought that had been swarming around in the background fought its way to the front.

"Why are you here exactly?" She asked out of the blue.

Just then Officer Swan realized she must have been in her own world of thoughts for longer then she knew because of the simple fact that both parties seemed to have paused, and turned around to face the woman who had interrupted them.

Swan explained, "I'm assuming they pulled you in to help close the Gold case. But I'm wondering why? You're to smart for this."

The brunettes eyebrow raised again, this time pulling up the corner of her red painted lips into a smirk.

"This is easily the biggest case of the decade," Regina responded coolly.

"Yeah," Officer Swan spoke, "but it's not really your style."

"Well," said the woman, narrowing her black rimmed eyes in on the blonde, "Looks like the Me expert has spoken again. Tell me, Officer Swan, what exactly is my style?"

Officer Swan answered without hesitation.

"Dark, twisted, anything that has psychopath written all over it."

Major Nolan's eyebrows shot so far up, Emma would be shocked if they ever came back down. But the brunette only smirked, seemingly amused with the Officer's diagnosis.

"Well," She said after a long, painfully silent moment had passed, "people may just surprise you."

"I doubt it." Officer Swan responded.

Emma had the strange feeling that she was being analyzed fully by the other woman as she stared at her. Before the brunette turned back however, she did a once over of the Officer with her eyes and from the way they darkened and her tongue came out to wet her lips when she was done, Emma knew that she had just been undressed mentally.

"Major?" The brunette questioned.

"Yep," the man said, shaking his head as if to clear his current train of thought, "Swan, this is Detective Regina Mills, but it looks like you already know that. I'm assigning her to the Gold case in the hopes to catch this guy once and for all. We just got a tip off that he's going to be down in South Beach tonight for the opening of his girlfriends new collection at Art Basel. Best guess is it's a cover for him to receive his drug shipments undetected using the art boxes as a cover. You two are going to go in undercover together and catch him. Got it?"

"Understood," said the brunette. And with that she turned, heading straight for the door, hips swaying, hair flowing and her stilettos clicking nosily on the marbled floors.

Officer Swan however was rooted to the spot.

"Swan? Is everything ok?" Came the voice of Major Nolan. When the silence hadn't broken he reached out a hand to tap the stunned woman, but she snapped out of it and spoke.

"Fine."

"You sure?" He asked.

"Affirmative." Swan said. She turned on her heel after giving David a nod to signal he okay state and headed for the door. When she closed it behind her however she took a moment to breathe.

She was going undercover tonight to catch Gold. The biggest case of her and probably every body in the office's careers. And she was going with none other than Regina Mills.

She almost cried.

Hope you enjoyed the first chap! Leave your reviews in the comments & if you spotted the references let me know! x