A/N: ***TRIGGER WARNING FOR SELF HARM***
Their breathing was coming hard and fast by now. "You have five minutes before my next meeting, Ms. Swan," the Mayor snapped at the Sheriff's intrusion only seconds before hands were fisted into short brunette locks, and Regina was being shoved up again her desk, the back of her calf bashing into the sturdy office leg.
Emma quickly flung her leather jacket to the floor before taking the brunette's weight in her hands and hoisted her up onto the desktop. The Mayor's legs parted to receive the blonde. Regina felt a shiver run up her spine as Emma's hands ran the length of her inner thighs, traveling underneath her skirt to play at the hem of her underwear teasingly.
Emma's hands brushed over a space of skin near the top of her thighs, and Regina felt her stomach clench. Not even the blonde's hot mouth against her neck could draw Regina's attention away from the motion.
Emma's hands returned to gliding underneath her skirt over the tops of her thighs, and Regina felt her movements hover, and then still. Emma repeated the touch as they mapped over the same patch of skin in a slower double take as if attempting to read braille.
Recognition was a small bud that bloomed in the blonde's green eyes, and Regina had to look away from her gaze. Emma's hands remained over the lines of Regina's life that had been carved into her tanned skin.
"Oh, Regina…" Emma said softly, with a tinge of sadness to her voice.
Regina pushed the sheriff away from her, and the warmth of the blonde's hands ripped free from her body.
"Don't look at me like that," the brunette replied low.
"Like what?"
"Like I'm wounded—broken," she clipped.
Emma's eyes lowered. "That's not what I was thinking."
Regina remained silent, weariness breaking through her posture. "Then?" she prompted. Regina had brought her legs back together, and Emma's hands were tracing circles on her exposed knees.
Emma hesitated before asking, "Can I see them?" Regina's deep chocolate eyes could see herself reflected in the other woman's green.
Emma fingered the hem of the skirt Regina had pulled back down before inching it up to reveal her legs more. Regina placed her hands over Emma's and guided them further up, back again to the tops of her thighs. She let them go when the tips of Emma's fingers started to trace the ugly, raised slashes there.
Regina's gaze tilted to the wooden floor, peering away from the other woman and over to the window as the blonde examined her. Emma took an audible intake of breath when she removed her hands so that she could see what was beneath.
All over her skin were scars. Some thin, white, and fully healed, other shades ranged from pink to a suffocated purple in color. Regina was covered in the haphazard and varied lines. Some short and deep, others long and superficial.
Immediately, Emma sank to her knees in front of the brunette, and with Regina still sitting on the desk, it brought her at just the right height. Emma slowly guided Regina's legs apart, and soon the blonde's lips were brushing against the raised flesh.
A murmur. A kiss. Another murmur. Another kiss.
Regina's fingers curled over the edge of her desk in an uncomfortable shift at watching the blonde. "What are you doing?"
"Shhh, I'm busy telling them they're beautiful," Emma said, her response slightly muffled as she kissed another scar.
"No, they aren't," Regina nearly whispered.
"They're beautiful because they are a part of you. And I love you. I love everything about you," Emma genuinely confessed as their eyes met in a deep hold.
Regina swallowed thickly. She had run though this moment in her mind so many times late at night and not once did she imagine the scenario that was currently proceeding. She had pictured nothing but revulsion, scrutiny, lectures, and 'why', but never this.
Emma pushed the black fabric of her skirt up further to reach the scars that were highest, near her underwear. She took her time and it took all of Regina's resolve to let her. Emma bestowed a tender loving kiss for each line, each memory, and each self-inflicted wound to help ease the pain that had put the incisions there in the first place.
"And the best for last," Emma said minutes later and rising.
Regina was about to give her a questioning look when Emma kissed the last scar on her body: the one across her lip.