For the gang lord Mr. Gold the world whirled about in a kaleidoscopic dizzying tempests frenzy dancing madly inside his tactile mind. All other thoughts for good or ill or anything in between receded like the tide from his mind leaving her and only her branded in his head and his shriveled heart.
Her soft, warm mouth, pressed to his thin lips with a tender exploratory, kiss melted his heart into an oily puddle dripping into his stomach like melted wax. Care and passion stoked a bonfire deep in his soul, illuminating every jagged, perilous crevice of the darkness lurking through his gangly being.
The kiss took him to another place in time where he had not been in decades. Love and bitterness and remorse and fear and passion all crept over his heart akin to mold growing over a cold stone. He was no longer in the library but a cold, drafty place with dull light glowing in a hearth. She was no longer in the black and gray knee length dress but clad in a lovely blue and white chemise with her thick umber hair kept back by a blue ribbon.
In his minds eye he could have stared at the unexplainable image forever, yet darkness crept over the image turning his mind back to the Belle of here and now and the kiss of the moment.
Utter shock traced his weathered visage with the thrill of the kiss. Her body pressed and molded against his in their novel embrace. Brightness harangued his souls, casting his cold cruelty into summer's radiances burning away his vileness. His heart thawed in steady trickles to beat warmly for her and pulse with some locked away memories fettered at the base of his mind.
The kiss was so familiar he was tempted to let his mind wander down the lazy, snaking river of reminiscent bliss. What he would find at the end was a mystery, but to let his thoughts flow free, going into some forbidden territory was a coaxing thing.
Instead despite his desire, he pulled away, closing the tributary of his mind to focus solely on the woman who dared to show him such emotions.
Misunderstanding danced warily in his chestnut eyes, his mouth swinging agape with unfathomable astonishment. Awe stamped his features, shockingly displaying what lurked in his dreadful heart. How could she want to kiss him voluntarily? How could she even fathom pressing her lips to his in the tenderest of affections wrought by the most impassioned of lovers?
"Belle." Her name sputtered from his lips disbelievingly. Only in the rarest of moments did he use her name and never so softly.
Did she really know what she had just done?
Realization flared in her cobalt depths for what she had wrought in the unthinking moment swept in some foreign emotion. Against everything, she kissed him with no thought of consequence or remorse. Pressing her lips to his had been almost like a natural instinct she could not control in her body.
When he allowed Hood his life, he had not been Mr. Gold, but something more, something… magical.
Tossing her head, warmth rushed to her cheeks in a carnelian blaze. Her body felt afire with imminent embarrassment stealing along her skin. "Mr. Gold. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm sorry."
"No you're not." He refuted softly in a whispering breath. Just by looking into her cerulean depths he knew the falsehood for what it was. She wasn't an inkling of sorry or any other plaintive, melancholic thing.
Some instinct along with attraction triggered the moment and she readily complied to her body's wishes.
Staring into his eyes, the beauty felt her being mingled in a vat of stewing emotions bubbling over the roaring fire lodged in her heart. She had been attracted to him for what seemed akin to years rather than the few months she knew him. There was something under his coarse beastliness that drew her like a load stone to the stars or a quivering compass arrow to the north. So long she wished to see some form of goodness in him and there his light was, in a simply gesture to let Hood live.
The gesture was the first crack in her dam of emotions and the walls so staunchly built up burst forth in a flood that swept all else away.
Still, the moment was just that - a moment.
"We can't do this." A sad smile curved upon her pink lips thought she did not deny his words.
How could they think of showing one another such ardor when they were worlds apart in every way? He was a gang lord and she was nothing but a desperate woman. They found friendship, but there was a huge chasm between simple friendship and interest in the other. Who knew what would happen if their rendezvous began to become romantic in nature.
Light from the windows gilded his features into a golden hue of time gone by. Grasping her book worn hands in his, he held them close betwixt their beating hearts. "Who's to say not?" He countered gently, his words soft as the dust motes floating through the honey shafts of light filtering over them.
Now that she started their avalanche to feelings long kept hidden he was in no resistance to stop the track of their errant emotions wildly tumbling through their souls. Her kiss left no doubt he wanted her near, to taste the nectar of her lips and feel the satin of her creamy skin in a grazing brush of his finger tips.
She seemed like someone lost he had found and again and he was loathe to let that go again. Never again.
Cocking his head to the right slightly, as though the position could allot him a different view into her tumultuous soul and mind, he ran the pads of his fingers against her white knuckles. "Do you fear me? Do you not wish to entwine yourself to a monster? Say yes and I'll never ensue to this words again."
"I don't fear you." She admitted bravely, her azure eyes finding his searchingly. "But you're the leader of the Dark Ones, a feared legend for good cause and I'm…" She dipped her head down, unwilling to allow him to see her inadequacy. "I'm Belle of the library."
Laughter fell from him in a soft chortle reminiscent of some long, long ago age. Gently lifting her chin with his finger tips, he smiled softly with an expressive tenderness long housed in the barren haunts of his soul. "You see what little goodness there is in me, and I see what wonders lay in you though you cannot see them yourself. You are so much more than just Belle."
She was the Belle who brought out the good in him. A Belle who saw other than darkness prowling in his cruel marble eyes and saw to the very fringes of his soul. She was Belle who fearlessly dared to kiss him and dare to cross a line long ago forged in the sand.
Leaning down, he dipped towards her to repay the kiss in full.
In that instance she could have backed away from him and proclaimed she did not wish to show her affections. She could have placed her soft hands on his chest and pushed him away to rebuff his advance, but she couldn't. Even if she did want to deny his ardor glimmering in his orbs and the attraction brewing in herself she couldn't; not that she wanted to if she could.
His kiss met chastely upon her lips, daring to be bold, to be brave in the face of his terror; daring to recall the familiarity of her mouth. Her lips were like cool water to a parched mans lips, bringing back sweet life. Adoration seeped thickly through his being with the force of a gale, filling him with old emotions freed deep in him from some fettered dark corner.
Untangling her lips from his, the beauty stared knowingly into his eyes. Love of old sparkled like faceted sapphires locked in her depths. Her fingers slowly trailed against the edge of his clean shaven chin as though the skin would rub off into a different flesh. But that was only just a fancy of the mind of course.
"So…?" The word dribbled off his mouth unable to connect any other phrase to his frozen mind. Where did they go from there? Finally they shed off their thick cloaks hidden about their hearts to display what the other felt, but what now did they do with such emotions bared forth?
A small grin tipped aloft her lips. "So… let's take this slow. I bring lunch to your place tomorrow?" She queried softly her brow perched. They didn't have to change their everyday lives because of what they felt. Starting small would be just what was in order to arrange their hearts.
A faint, uncertain smile stole upon the gang lord's lips. "Lunch would be nice." He replied, his voice shaken by their abrupt progress.
Neither wanted things to change drastically, they knew in their hearts, but how they had.
~8~8~
Halfway across town things weren't looking so optimistic.
"What's Gold up to?" Emma backed a portly shady dealer against the brick wall of an old, abandoned shop. Her lips contorted into a snarl baring her anger forth in a wave of unrequited fury.
The shabby looking drug dealer trussed up in three dark coats and jeans with a bright red cap flopped over to the left stared wide eyed at the tenacious Emma Swann. His black gloved hands shot up in surrender to the former deputy as though she were inducing a mugging on him rather than the other way around. The gun he once toted in the folds of his jackets lay in a trash choked corner of the dim alleyway away from reach and his knife was broken in two and kicked in the gutter. His powdery white cargo lay ruined and useless from broken baggies in the wet alleyway, mingling with the mud and grit vapidly rushing into the sewers.
Word was going around the fired deputy was harassing any who even sniffed in Gold's direction and with the police looking the other way in some cases she wasn't one to be trifled with.
Swallowing hard he shook his head violently, trembling bearded lips betraying his terror. "I don't know." He stammered frightened at the bounty hunter. "You got to believe me, I only deal. I don't mess with the boss. I drop off the money, collect my cut and that's all! That's how it's always been!"
"Who do you drop off the money too?" Grabbing the fringe of his ripped black coat she pinned him against the rough brickwork wall. Her gun pressed hard into his abdomen, the barrel indenting small circles that could spell death if she pulled the trigger.
He gasped for breath, his body wheezing for the cold autumn air. Pinching his eyes shut he sputtered. "Jefferson, he's Gold right hand man. He handles things and sometimes the other one comes and collects the cash."
"The other one?" The blonde's eyes searched the frightened dealer intently for any hint of a lie. Blood surged through her valiant heart at the thought of finally pinning down the mystery smuggler. If she could find out who the new gangster was part of her was more than certain Mr. Gold would unravel like a thick spool of thread.
The dealer hissed painfully not daring to move in her clutches with a gun pointed at his torso. "No one knows; you have to believe me. That's why things have worked so well. Mr. Gold keeps the identity a secret. Everyone is wondering. "
"Who else would know?" Stabbing the barrel of the gun deeply into his skin and against bone, she spoke through barely pried lips. "Who!"
He squealed, bright tears flecking his eyes from the pain. Billowing, milky vapors huffed from his foul, yellow mouth. "Jefferson! If Jefferson doesn't know then nobody does."
Jefferson. The name stuck in her gullet like a sharp fish bone. Rapidly this Jefferson was becoming a man not to be dodged. But he was one of the higher ups of the Dark One's, not expendable dealers kept well feared and well paid.
"Where can I find this Jefferson?" She asked squeezing her hands against his throat in a vice.
Paling, the drug dealer squeaked out. "His home on the edge of town. Big mansion; can't miss it."
Satisfied, she dropped the dealer, letting him fall away like trash and backed off from her assault.
Falling hand and knee to the cold cobblestone alley, the dealer gasped thankfully for breath. Hand shaking, he touched his tremulously bobbing throat with mud stained fingers. His body trembled fitfully; relieved the woman had not done more.
Disgust marbled her features staring down upon the dealer with disdain. His cargo was destroyed at her feet and his fear bringing doubt in his belly from attempting to deal again least she seek him out for another dose of questioning.
"Tell your 'boss' I'm coming for him." Emma stated icily as she watched him pick himself up from the gritty puddles.
Weeks passed and she was hot on the gang lord's trail. She knew mostly all of his people and how they operated. Some had already been put away but most carried on unafraid with the canopy of Mr. Gold offering protection. She was a one woman army going against not only Gold, but the mayor who constantly became a thorn in her side in keeping her son away.
The only thing they did seemed to agree on was that Mr. Gold needed to be stopped and it seemed to reach that goal she needed to speak to the hit man himself.
Turning away from the defeated dealer, kicked the gun into the sewer as she departed. Tactfully, the bounty hunter began on how to plan her next meeting with the hit man.
~8~8~
Thick darkness completely ensorcelled the sleepy town as Emma padded into the soft glow of neon lights shining from Granny's. The all night diner was a haven for those whose sleep evaded them or late night projects which were few and far between. A sigh of relief like reaching a safe haven brooked from her lips as she lumbered tiredly to the door.
Cocoa would do her a world of good before she went home to Mary Margret's apartment and plotted on how to ensnare the wily Jefferson. He would be a challenge, she knew thoroughly as she opened the door. One did not become right hand man to a person like Mr. Gold without being extremely cunning or lucky.
"Took you long enough to find me, Miss Swann." Jefferson smiled in greetings to the bounty hunter as she entered Granny's diner.
Surprise alit warily in her features as she paused at the door. With a night done of harassing Gold's people she looked forward to sit down with a cup of chocolate and plan her next move alone. The last thing she expected was the hit man to meet her.
She was only away from the dealer for 30 minutes how had the word gotten around so swiftly?
Grimly placing her infamous red leather jacket on a coat peg by the door, the blonde stoically shook the thought away. Jefferson was there and the diner was empty enough to hold conversation or apprehend should the need arise.
Padding over like a nimbly stalking lynx she slipped into the dark blue booth and eyed the hit man icily. She hadn't imagined such a well cared for murderer for hire working for the gang lord. He showed no bleary eyes or beer stains and blood under jagged nails nor the shakiness of someone who lived close to death and doled out demise.
He was calm and collected, insanely at ease almost.
Settling rigidly, her hand on the cold hilt of her gun, she stared hard into his eyes. "Tell me about Gold." She demanded firmly, her words laced with threat.
If he was wary of her growled words he did not show his fright. Smiling widely, he ran a hand through his ebony tresses. "Trust me, Miss Swann Mr. Gold will be the least of your worries very, very soon."
Emma tensed, her lips a thin line upon her serious visage. "Is that a threat?" She inquired wryly, challenge brimming in her tone.
Both looked up as the Ruby placed a steaming mug of tea in front of the insane hit man. Paleness swathed her features in the paint of fear dancing in her eyes like fire. Everyone in town knew Jefferson and what he did, making him nearly on par with the gang lord in the area of terror.
Without inquiring anything of Emma, the scarlet server swept out again and into the safety of the kitchen where no doubt granny awaited armed with a frying pan in case things got dangerous.
Dexterous fingers calloused by needles plucked up the wide, brown mug. Gingerly taking a small sip, the mad man looked over the rim of his cup in a searching manner. Amusement danced in his eyes, speaking more of his condescension of her than mere words could broach.
"No Miss Swann not a threat. A simple warning and a hope I give." He took another draught of his tea leisurely and shifted in his seat. "What I mean to say is that you will have no need to pursue Mr. Gold in the near future. What is wrong in this town will be righting itself very soon."
As if on a metal impulse the clock tower struck out into the cold night. The ringing boomed through the leafless trees and shivered across the mostly sleeping town with the silvery peal announcing the late time.
Chuckles erupted softly from his throat as he leaned relaxed in the booth, his eyes admiring the lovely Miss Swann. His fingers circled the rim of his cup as he echoed in a smirk. "Very soon."