Emma Mills really wished there was a bar in town that didn't water down the drinks and where everyone didn't know her. Granny usually wasn't bad with the drinks but there was something pathetic about drinking shots in a diner, and she expected to see half the regulars in the Rabbit Hole for various offenses in her office within the next few weeks. In a town like Storybrooke the DA's office was much like the watering holes. The kind of place everyone knew your name.

Which reminded her, she really needed to talk to Leroy about dropping the latest charges. The Blanchard murder case was putting a lot of strain on the Storybrooke criminal justice system. Such that there was one. That was one aspect of small town law enforcement she had not thought adequately about before she had moved back home from Boston.

It had been a very long, and very weird day, mostly because she couldn't figure out for the life of her what had gotten into her mother's head. She was acting like Mary Margaret's becoming a murderer was some great triumph. She could swear there was something else going on between the teacher and her mother but she there really wasn't any kind of motive for the level of hate Regina had for that woman. But one thing Emma did know was that level of dislike was blinding. The trial was set to start tomorrow and she was going to have to tell her mother to stay away from the defendant. Which really should be Gold's job, but he seemed to be a terrible lawyer. Almost as bad as that man who got his cousin the bankruptcy lawyer to represent him in a rape case she had prosecuted two years before.

Having given up on the idea of shots in a bar-leaving town to do it wasn't an option because she wanted to get drunk enough not to worry about driving back-Emma picked up a bottle of scotch and was heading back to her car when she heard the scream.

Running around the back of Granny's she met Ruby on the way, who just pointed behind her.

Emma came to a slow stop from her run as she came upon Kathryn Nolan. Alive... if not well.

The investigation into the investigation of the not actual murder of Kathryn Nolan was at least more though than the investigation of the murder of Kathryn Nolan. And Emma hoped she never had to participate in anything like either again.

The best leads as to who was behind her abduction lay in the hospital where the DNA test had been faked. There was enough of a paper trail on the case that she was sure they'd catch the culprit. A darkly suspicious part of her thought she knew who that might be, and she hoped dearly that she was wrong. But then she remembered the way her mother had behaved as the evidence against the school teacher stacked up.

Regina couldn't have been that foolish... could she have been?

Part of her was more disturbed that she thought her mother was capable of kidnapping one of her own friends in order to frame an innocent woman for some vague offense committed in the mists of personal history no one could remember.

"Mom, we're going to be late for the party." Henry said from the door of her office.

She closed the Kathryn Nolan file. "What party?"

"The coming home party for Miss. Blanchard."

She sighed, "Henry, I'm pretty sure I'm not welcome at that one. I almost sent her to jail for a crime she didn't commit."

"But you didn't. And you rescued Mrs. Nolan and proved she didn't do it. So you are a hero."

"I found her in a parking lot, kid, being a hero takes quite a bit more than that."

Henry seemed to think about that for a minute before shaking his head. "No. Not really. Besides. You were invited."

She sighed. "Alright, we can go for a little bit."

A little bit turned out to be longer than Emma expected. She was right, most of Mary Margaret's friends were ignoring her. She found a corner with her own glass of wine and picked up a 6th grade social studies book that was on one the counters.

"Mind if I join you?"

Emma looked up to see the petite woman with the dark pixie cut. "No... but I'm sure there is better company at this party."

"True... though most of them were calling me a murderer the other day."

"So was I."

"But you haven't pretended you didn't. There is something nice about the honesty. I think I need that right now."

Emma just nodded, and tried to find something else to talk about than the case. "This book talks about West Germany..."

"It's the same book we used when you were a kid."

"And it was horribly out of date back then."

"You should talk to the mayor about the education budget."

"Yeah, I don't think I'm my mom's favorite person right now."

"Failed to put me in jail. White Knight fallen from grace?"

"I don't think White Knight's put innocent people in jail. I'm pretty sure in the pantheon of Henry's imagination I should be one of the black knights."

"So you believe him?" Mary Margaret asked casually. A little too casually.

"Of course not. My mother is many things... but a soul crushing evil queen isn't one of them."

Something haunting crossed Mary Margaret's eyes. "Emma... she told me she knew I was innocent."

Emma wanted to jump to her mother's defense, but she'd watched her since the teacher's arrest as well. "My mother is a complicated woman."

"Indeed she is."

Mary Margaret excused herself and for a minute Emma thought she saw tears forming in the other woman's eyes.