Emma was currently picturing Regina naked. Almost naked. It wasn't her fault; it wasn't as if Emma had intended to look down Regina's shirt this morning when she leaned over Emma to kiss Henry goodbye at Granny's, and she certainly hadn't intended to commit to memory the sight of Regina's breasts in a lacy black bra.
She hadn't meant to keep thinking about Regina's breasts. Generally she was pretty good about pretending she hadn't noticed Regina's cleavage, and she hadn't spent the whole town meeting zoned out, picturing Regina perched on the table, her legs crossed and a sultry smile on her face. Nope.
She definitely didn't spend any time thinking about sliding her hands up Regina's thighs, or about dragging her to the edge of the table and spreading her legs and moving her underwear to the side just enough to-
Emma's face burned hot, and she looked away from Regina, who was standing in front of the room of very boring town officials and not in any way naked, and tried to focus on the agenda.
Where were they? She was fairly certain they'd talked about road maintenance already, but had they hit water consumption yet?
God, she hated these meetings. She never had anything to do other than pretend to pay attention and keep from doodling too obviously, and clearly her boredom was going to get her into trouble. Too much time to think about… other things.
She risked looking back up and immediately regretted it. Regina was looking directly at her, and Emma couldn't help herself. Her eyes flicked down to Regina's shirt, buttoned just slightly less than appropriate, just a little tight across the chest.
She looked up as soon as she realized, but it was clear Regina had caught the glance. Her lips tightened, her eyes narrowed, and she turned toward one of the others.
Emma sank into her chair. Great. She could either look forward to a few frosty exchanges until she apologized or Regina would corner her after the meeting and talk to her about appropriate workplace behavior-although she'd never mention what, exactly, Emma had been doing to merit the lecture.
She spent the rest of the meeting resolutely thinking about what she was going to order the next morning for breakfast. If she hadn't been debating whether or not Granny's pancakes were better than her bearclaws, she wouldn't have missed her cue to dash out the door as soon as the meeting ended.
This proved to be her undoing.
She startled as everyone else shuffled papers and stood. Emma stood, a half-beat behind, frantically checked her pockets for her phone and keys, knowing she needed to leave now, before-
"Miss Swan, please stay for a moment. I have something I'd like to discuss with you."
Well, crap.
Emma decided to play innocent. "Sure, what's up?" She leaned casually back against the table and almost fell, using her hands to catch herself and pretending like she'd meant to end up there the whole time.
Regina just waited until the last person exited the room and then walked over to her door, closed it firmly, and locked it from the inside.
"Uh," Emma said, but she didn't get any further because Regina turned to her and undid a button on her blouse.
"Miss Swan," Regina said, undoing another button, "I need to talk to you about paying more attention in meetings."
Emma's heart pounded. Her mouth was dry. Her fingers were clenching the table behind her. She couldn't think to save her life.
Another button, and they were past Regina's bra, deep into territory that Emma had never seen. Regina had great cleavage and showed it off, but this strip between her waist and her breasts? Totally captivating.
"Um," Emma said, fully intending to follow that up with something coherent like, "What are you doing?" but at this point Regina pulled her blouse out of her skirt and undid the two remaining buttons, letting the blouse fall open.
Regina put her hands on her hips, pulling the shirt just a little bit more out of the way. "I was noticing earlier that you were… distracted. I found myself wondering how you could be motivated to pay closer attention."
Emma swallowed. "Regina, I'm sorry. I-"
"If I wanted an apology, I would have asked for one."
Emma glanced toward the locked door, then back at Regina and her unbuttoned blouse. She pleaded with her brain to work for just a minute and did some math. She was so confused and turned on right now, and she really didn't want to jump to any conclusions here, but Regina had unbuttoned her blouse and that had to mean something, right?
"Are you- are you coming on to me?" Emma said.
Regina smiled as if Emma had actually solved a sixth-grade word problem and shrugged out of the blouse. Emma's knees almost gave out and she was glad she was still holding onto the table.
And then Regina stepped into her space, nudging her legs apart so that Emma was spread out like she'd imagined Regina earlier-although she was still fully clothed-and Regina put her hands on Emma's thighs.
"This seems sudden," Emma said, hating that her voice was a little high. "Doesn't it seem sudden? Are you under a spell? Going through some weird Enchanted Forest mating ritual? Screwing with me?"
Regina laughed. Chuckled, really, a throaty sound that Emma had never heard before from the woman. She wanted to hear that again. Often. Preferably in bed.
She squirmed, not sure what she thought that was going to accomplish, and oh, god, she was wet.
She really hoped Regina wasn't screwing with her.
"Emma," Regina said, slowly. "Pay attention."
Emma nodded. "I'm paying attention. Absolutely. You have one hundred percent of my attention."
"Really?" Regina said. She tilted her head. "Because I have been trying to drop hints for several weeks and I was beginning to think you weren't interested at all."
"You dropped hints?" Emma said. She thought back over the last month or so. Yeah, there had been innuendos and meaningful glances and maybe Regina had been wearing some pretty tight dresses lately. But Regina always looked hot, and they'd been playing at flirting with each other for at least a year, and maybe she'd been a bit too committed to pretending she didn't notice Regina-
Regina's hands were sliding up her legs and Emma realized that she could keep cataloging their interactions to see if Regina was making any sense or she could… pay attention.
"I'm not that fond of meetings," Emma said. She ignored the small flash of-annoyance? disappointment? fear?-that crossed Regina's face and shifted up so she was sitting on the table. She reached forward and hooked her fingers into Regina's waistband, pulling her close. She grinned. "I'm really more of a hands-on person." Regina's pupils dilated.
"Well," Regina's voice was rough, and it seemed to travel straight to Emma's core. Regina licked her lips. "Well, Miss Swan, I'll keep that in mind."
"Good," Emma said. She leaned forward, her lips an inch from Regina's. "Item number one."