Author's note: Thank you, everyone, for all the reviews and follows.
Chapter 7
Regina took Emma's advice to heart. Planning dinner turned into a combination internet search and a magic query of her own body's preferences. Finally several ingredients her magic had decided she wanted lay on the central island: oranges, ginger root, and thin slices of soy seasoned beef steak. The recipe, which she had never made before, was Orange Beef, to which she planned to add her favorite spice: red pepper flakes. The rice was already in the freezer, cooling so it could be mixed with egg and vegetables for the fried rice side dish.
The sounds of sizzling beef and vegetables and the savory aromas of soy, ginger and the tang of oranges were pleasantly filling the kitchen by the time she heard the front door bell. A glance at her watch showed it was quarter after six.
"I got it!" Tromping loudly from the second floor, Henry rushed to the door before Regina could finish removing her apron.
She was turning toward the kitchen doorway when it was filled with Emma, dragged forward by Henry.
The blonde held a reusable cloth bag in her arms. Stepping into the kitchen she withdrew a bottle of diet ginger ale. "Here," she said, putting it on the counter. "I got two more, on special."
"Put this in the freezer so it will chill a bit before we eat." Regina gestured toward a narrow wooden door in the far wall. "Put the others in the cupboard."
"Okay." Emma inhaled as she crossed through the kitchen. "Whatever you're making smells delicious."
"It's a new recipe: Orange Beef," Regina answered.
"Oranges again, huh?"
"There is also ginger." Regina ignored Emma's snort of laughter. "And rice. It's Chinese."
"Yeah, I know." Emma was still smiling, but she seemed appropriately chastised so Regina turned away and tended the sizzling pan.
A glance to the side found Henry leaning on the counter studying both Emma and herself. Regina cleared her throat. "Henry, please set the table."
"Sure."
Soon a clatter of dishes and silverware came from the dining room. Regina noticed Emma pinching a piece of carrot from the fried rice. "Go wash your hands, Miss Swan. Dinner is not yet finished."
Emma took her hand from the serving platter. "Gotcha."
Henry apparently intersected Emma's return path to the kitchen, because next Regina heard him say, "Come play a game until dinner's ready."
Regina found she was curious to know Emma's response. "We can't just leave your mom in the kitchen."
"Mom!"
Regina jumped. "Yes, Henry?"
"Is it okay if Emma and I play PS4?"
Regina imagined having Emma in the kitchen with her and wanted to say "yes," until she envisioned the woman's green gaze catching hers across the space - and felt the sizzle of oil splatter her fingers. Quickly wetting a towel, she pressed it to her knuckles.
"Mom?" Henry appeared in the doorway.
"Yes, Henry. You and Miss Swan can play." Better not to be too distracted, she chastised herself.
After dinner, Henry and Emma washed the dishes. "Go upstairs and do your homework, kid," Emma said as she dried the last dish and he put it away in the proper cabinet. She noted the serving platter went in a low cabinet to the right of the stove. She was trying to memorize where things went a little at a time.
She hugged and kissed Henry. "Are you going to talk with Mom?" he asked.
"There's a lot to talk about," she reminded him. "And I don't want you eavesdropping, all right?"
"Okay," he answered, sounding dejected. That told her that had been exactly his plan.
"Good night, kid." She smiled but pushed at his shoulders.
While wiping down the counters, she heard Henry enter his mother's study, which apparently shared a wall with the kitchen. Their voices were a low murmur, but the closeness of mother and son warmed Emma's heart. She redoubled her efforts to see the kitchen spotless.
A lifetime of impermanence had taught Emma to find ways to make herself useful, give people reasons to let her stick around. While Regina had agreed to let Emma move in and help with the pregnancy, Emma was slowly feeling caught in a wish-cycle. They were not a couple, and the emotional baggage between the two of them could fill a cargo jet. But it was there all the same each time Emma looked at Regina. Beyond simply getting a thank you for the tip about ginger ale or holding Regina's hand while she was examined by Whale, Emma wanted to kiss the brunette, and be kissed in return.
She'd ventured a kiss, to Regina's temple, when the woman had curled into her for comfort after throwing up. That moment had been over far too quickly, with the brunette pulling away upon hearing George arrive. If there was anything Emma understood about Regina it was appearances were important. But kissing Regina in comfort was one thing. What Emma really wanted was to revive the passion they'd discovered aboard the Jolly Roger. She wanted to breathe in Regina's arousal and share the something that night had hinted might be possible: love.
Throughout Neverland, especially after finding out about Regina's pregnancy, Emma had been torn between worrying about Henry, worrying about Regina, fending off Hook, dealing with Pan's trickery, and feeling beaten by her mother's wish for another child.
"Miss Swan, I believe the counters are clean."
Emma turned to see Regina standing in the doorway. "Hey," she said. She tossed the cloth over the faucet to dry. She glanced toward the ceiling. "Henry in his room?"
Regina nodded. "He's finishing some homework. I cannot believe they would make him make up everything from the two weeks," Regina said. "I told him one additional assignment, then he was to go to sleep."
"Do you want to talk to the school?" Emma had a brief vision of walking into the school with Regina at her side and demanding a parent-teacher conference. The "togetherness" of it, the "united front" of it fired a heady pride in her.
"Actually, I wanted to talk to you," Regina said.
Resting her gaze on Regina, Emma asked, "Yeah?"
Regina put her hand to her abdomen. "Yes, dear." Emma's stomach fluttered, too. "Join me in the study for a drink?"
"I'd love to, but you can't drink," Emma said. "I definitely remember no alcohol as a rule."
Regina stepped past Emma and opened the refrigerator. "I was going to have some orange juice, actually." She pulled out a carafe of what appeared to be fresh-squeezed orange juice.
Emma chuckled. "All right."
Maybe this will work after all.
Regina's fingers tingled as she reached for the doorknob to open the study. It was not the tingle of her magic. It was better. Emma was a step behind as Regina pushed the door inward. The warmth of their bodies instantly recalled to her mind their night aboard the Jolly Roger.
Taking a fortifying sip of her drink, Regina felt the orange juice firing her synapses. Emma walked to the far side of the room, by the window. Regina saw the blonde's body outlined in a lavender glow. Her gaze drifted down Emma's hair and over a light green blouse, pale in comparison to the particular shade of Emma's eyes. Her gaze hesitated on the blonde's waist, where the blouse tucked into a well-worn pair of skinny jeans. Moving her glass to her other hand, Regina closed her palm, capturing the tingling feeling.
"So." Emma turned arresting Regina with those green eyes she found incalculably fascinating. "What did you want to discuss?"
"The computer," she said, nodding toward the desk. "Figuring out dinner was... complicated."
Emma smiled and set her glass down. "Well, then let's make it easier."
"We can't both sit in the chair," Regina said. "I'll bring the laptop to the sofa. Make yourself comfortable."
Nodding, Emma collected her glass, moving to one end of the white sofa, where she placed the tumbler on the end table after moving a coaster underneath. Coming from the desk with the laptop, Regina paused at the tantalizing sight of Emma's jeans stretched tight across her rear as the blonde bent forward over the arm of the sofa.
Emma turned and settled onto the cushion. She reached up, taking the laptop with one hand while smoothing her hand over the empty leather cushion before Regina sat down next to her.
The cushion invited her to relax her posture. Regina leaned into Emma as they both shifted to look at the laptop balanced on their knees, which were touching. The blonde had a compelling scent and Regina inhaled and exhaled the light mix of sweat and leather. If it was a perfume, Regina had never smelled its like before. It didn't smell like stables or horses, but put her in mind of both. It wasn't a tangy sweat, and it brought Regina incredible peace. She glanced sideways to see Emma in profile, the green eyes darting over the screen.
"You got a password," Emma said.
"Oh, yes." Reaching across Emma's hands, Regina set her fingers on the home key row and her fingers flew rapidly.
"Not going to share?" Emma said. The quirk of her lips made Regina's stomach flutter.
"I think not." Regina's throat heated the longer Emma's smile lingered on her face. She pulled her hands back and tucked them together in her own lap.
"It's some form of Henry's birthdate, right?" Emma guessed. Regina's face flamed. Emma's chuckle became a full-throated laugh. "I know you, Mills."
Regina felt the heat in her face recede and relaxed further while she watched Emma queue several results on internet browser tabs. She likely could have done this research herself, but she admitted to pleasure in sitting with someone to talk about it.
Emma's voice briefly disrupted the click of keys. "Do you prefer videos, or reading material?"
"Perhaps a video to start. Then bookmark items for us to read later?"
The screen suddenly blacked out and a spiraling arrow appeared in the middle. Regina leaned closer. Emma leaned back, one hand hovering over the space bar, but her other arm stretched across the back of the sofa not quite touching Regina's shoulders.
A time-lapse video showed them a baby's growth through all nine months, stills and sonogram footage fluidly fading in and out to lullaby background music while a woman narrated. Emma paused the video and adjusted a setting.
"Closed captioning," she explained. "The sound track is nice but…I can't hear always hear the narrator."
Regina nodded, but said nothing. Her gaze was riveted to the screen. She rested her palms on her stomach, trying to comprehend that was inside her right now. "It looks like a newborn rat I saw once in the stables as a child. Hairless, shapeless, helpless little thing."
"She may not look like much," Emma said. "But she's got a brain, spinal cord, and heart."
Regina reached over Emma's hand so that they pressed down on the space bar together. The video continued. The animation showed the spine lengthening, legs and arms sprouting like tree limbs. The head became more recognizable with eyes, a mouth, nostrils. Inside the chest, on the side nearest the placenta, thumped a beating heart. Regina found her fingers pressing down on the space bar. Emma's fingers lay lightly atop hers. The frame froze. The caption read "8 weeks."
Though only in her fifth week, Regina filled with awe being able to see what was coming. She traced the shape on the screen. "That's incredible."
"Yeah, yeah, it is." Emma's voice hitched; Regina glanced to the side to see Emma wiping her face.
"Is this hard for you?" Regina asked. Emma's experience of pregnancy would be helpful to settle Regina's nerves, but if viewing this upset her... "Your experience with Henry…" was different, was troubled, was difficult. She thought all these things, but didn't speak them so as not to hurt Emma further.
"No, no." Emma sat up. "It's… actually, I'm not thinking about my pregnancy at all right now."
Emma sounded short of breath, something clogging her her chest. When she pulled away, Regina felt a bolt of alarm. Emma, however, used one hand to wipe again at her face. With the other she set the laptop aside on the table. Then, hands empty, she turned to face Regina.
Regina was swept up in a radiant smile, caught by a watery laugh, and then her face was cupped by shaking hands. "Emma," she started with uncertainty.
"Right now I'm thinking about the miracle that is you carrying our baby girl."
Emma pressed her lips to Regina's in a sweet, soft caress, lingering. Happiness swelled like balloons filling Regina's stomach and chest. Lifting her hands to Emma's face, she returned the kiss. This is a miracle, she agreed.
One kiss became several. Emma's hands slid down Regina's cheeks, over her chin, down her chest, and spread wide across Regina's waist, holding her hips and thumbs circling across her abdomen. Regina kissed Emma harder. Emma's lips drifted from lips to cheek, to throat, to ear, and hummed with pleasure. Regina pressed closer to the blonde's body, her skin and stomach tingling.
Finally, they parted for air. Emma's fair skin was flushed; Regina felt hot everywhere. Intoxicated. Emma's green eyes had darkened, the pupils widened, narrowing the green to a thin ring.
Regina swallowed. She wanted to keep kissing. She wanted to be wrapped up in this woman again, so close. She wanted to know…
"How safe is sex?" Emma's voice mingled with her own, their question exactly the same.
Regina laughed; Emma grabbed for the laptop again. "Let's find out."
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