Regina has a tough decision to make...
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Regina's alarm wakes them both up a little earlier than usual. She blindly reaches for her phone on the nightstand and taps the screen until the blaring noise finally stops. She had set it an hour earlier than she normally would for work because she wanted to speak to Mal before her shift was due to start. That's if she even has any further shifts at the restaurant after she reveals all to Mal.
"Morning, beautiful," Emma sleepily mumbles against a tanned shoulder. "Morning, Cocoon," she then says through a yawn as she gently sweeps her fingertips over Regina's stomach.
Regina puts her hands over the larger ones cradling her stomach and pushes back a little further into the warm body behind her, not feeling anything poking her in the back for the first time in a week, a sure the blonde had been more than satisfied with their after-dark activities. "Good morning, my love. Did you sleep well?"
"So good," she breathes against her ear, " I slept like a log… because someone used up all my energy last night," she mutters accusingly.
"Are you complaining?" Regina asks alluringly as she wiggles her bottom against Emma's groin.
Emma's breath catches and she bites her lip to try and suppress the moan rising from her chest as silky soft skin caresses her easily excitable dick, which gives a twitch of approval. Oh how she wants to continue with this. The pleasure Regina brings to her is incomparable to anything she has ever felt before and it goes against every fibre of her being but she knows she has to stop this. "I know what you are doing future Mrs Swan," they both smile at the use of that name. "You are trying to distract both of us because you don't want to get up and face the day."
"I don't want to deal with any of it," Regina sadly grumbles as she twists around and burrows against her lovers naked torso, strong arms keeping hold of her. She loves that Emma knows her so well but right now it was kind of annoying as well because she just wanted to absorb herself into everything good in her life, everything Emma, and forget all the other stuff that was happening outside of the four walls surrounding them.
"I know, sweetheart, but after today it will get easier. I promise." She leans down to kiss the mop of hair that is dishevelled from their previous night's lovemaking.
"Can you check online and see if anything has managed to get out yet, please?" The brunette tentatively asks after a few moments.
"David wouldn't have let anything get out from Cora, and Ursula and Cruella aren't putting the press release out until this afternoon. Nothing will have gotten out yet." As she's saying it she reaches for her mobile phone, knowing that Regina won't relax until she knows for sure. After a couple of minutes of checking the websites of various newspapers and gossip magazines as well as Googling her own name, she can happily confirm that nothing has been leaked.
Emma feels more than hears a big puff of air hitting her clavicle in obvious relief. "Come shower with me?"
"Only if I get to be in charge of the loofah," Emma cheekily requests to try and lighten the mood.
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Regina takes her time to get dressed and do her hair and makeup after the shower. Her nerves were starting to get the better of her once again. Mal had always been good to her and had given her a fantastic opportunity to carve out a career for herself and now she had to go and drop a bombshell on her employer and hope for the best.
Emma was busy making breakfast for them in the kitchen. She had become extremely in tune with Regina moods and right now she knew to give her space as she worked things out in her own mind. It surprised her just how little she cared about the upcoming media frenzy that would no doubt follow the press release, she was far too concerned with the wellbeing of her fiancée.
"You made breakfast," Regina half-heartedly announces when she enters the kitchen a little while later, "a lot of breakfast." The care that Emma constantly shows her in a million different ways wasn't lost on her but the umpteenth day in a row she still didn't have much of an appetite. If it wasn't for the fact she was carrying their baby she would have eaten much less than she had been.
"Yeah," she weakly smiles, "I may have gone a bit overboard," she says about the feast on the dining table. It looks like she has emptied the entirety of the fridge and pantry onto the table. Every box of cereal they have is lined in a row on one side, there was a giant bowl of fruit salad, toast, eggs, bagels, pancakes, sausages, juices, and there's was even bacon frying up on the stove. "I just…" she sighs and takes the pan of bacon off the hob before making her way over to the brunette, who she gently pulls against herself by her hips. "I didn't know what you might want and if I didn't make anything you would probably try to skip breakfast and that scares me. I know you are stressed right now but I really need you to take care of your yourself and our little one. I'm not trying to control you…" This is what Emma found really difficult, she was trying to help Regina but she didn't want to overstep the line that meant she was indirectly trying to control her. "I just want you to be okay. I want you to eat and be healthy. I'm trying to be strong but underneath everything I am so scared for you both. Please eat something for me?" She had been keeping an extremely close eye on Regina who had been eating less than usual, which was understandable given the circumstances, but she was pregnant and had to make sure she was eating properly.
It hit Regina like a tonne of bricks. Emma had been bottling up her feelings, not about their massive secret that could ruin her career but her worry and concern for her and their baby she was carrying. She was the cause of Emma's worry and she hadn't even noticed because she had made it all about herself for the last week. Emma hadn't complained once. She just kept plugging away every day, taking care of Regina by making appointments with Archie for her and bringing her food and drink or just cracking a joke to try and make her smile. She wanted to burst out crying but that would just be about making it about herself again.
"I'm scared too. I'm scared to tell Mal the truth and I'm scared of the fallout when all of this becomes public but I guess that is all out of my control," she concedes. It was hard for her to admit that. All her life everything had been out of her control and she hated it. But this was in her control she realised in an eureka moment. Taking care of their baby was completely in her control and it was the one thing she could do that was ease Emma's worries. "I never meant to scare you. I would love some breakfast, I'm starving," she genuinely smiles up at Emma.
"Yeah?" Emma shares her smile.
"Yep. Our little one is ravenous." She manages to eat more than she had in a long time, only partly because her body needed the nutrients and energy. For the most part it was because she just wanted to do her best for her two loves.
"Come on, we had better get going if you want to speak to Mal before your shift starts," Emma states optimistically. She wasn't going to let Regina think that she wouldn't have a job after her talk with Mal, even if that was to be the case. "Don't worry about that," she gestures to the dishes that Regina starts clearing away. "I'm sure the gannets upstairs will finish it all off when they wake up," she jokes.
Emma drives her to work and when they arrive there Regina asks her if she will wait around in case things go as she suspects they will, and she needs a lift home.
"It's all going to be fine. Mal is a decent person. I will stay though… just so I can say 'I told you so' when your shift starts and because they do a great coffee in there," she says with a wink before jumping out of the car and running around to Regina's side to open the door for her.
The restaurant wasn't open that early in the morning but with Emma being who she was she had no problem being shown to a table and given a coffee as Regina goes to find Mal in her office.
She steadies herself and takes a deep breath, exhaling slowly before lightly knocking on the door.
"Come in," Mal calls from the other side of the door.
"Good morning. Do you have a few minutes spare?" The brunette meekly asks as she stands in the doorway.
"Regina, dear, what have I told you before? You don't have to knock. My door is always open for you. Please, take a seat," she gestures to the pair of leather armchairs on the other side of her desk as she clears away the paperwork in front of her, showing Regina that she has her undivided attention. "What can I do for you?"
"I… urm… I need to… urm… tell you something," she nervously stumbles through her words.
"Don't tell me… those delicious scones you made… they aren't your own recipe?" She teases to try and settle Regina. She had never seen her acting so jumpy before or looking so pale.
"I…" Now it really felt like she had eaten far too much breakfast as her stomach rolled. "I think I'm going to be sick."
Mal quickly jumps into action and grabs the waste paper basket at the side of her desk and rushes around to Regina in record time, just as the brunette's stomach ungratefully rejects her breakfast. Regina clings onto the receptacle as Mal rubs her back with her free hand.
"Are you okay?" The elder woman asks in genuine concern. She sits in the chair next to her and scoots it a little closer so she can continue to rub her back.
Regina weakly nods her head and wishes she could run away from there. She was absolutely mortified that she had just thrown up in front of her boss.
"Here you go," Mal plucks a few tissues from the box on her desk and hands them to her very pale employee.
"Thanks." She wipes her mouth and drops the tissues into the basket she's holding.
"Do you think you're done?" Mal asks kindly.
"Yes. Sorry." She's pretty confident she had nothing left in her stomach to bring up but she's so close to tears.
"That's okay. Let me just get rid of this," she says as she takes the basket from Regina and moves it to the far side of the room. She then sets about getting Regina a plastic cup of water from the water cooler. "Here, sip this."
"I am so sorry. I am just a little stressed at the moment." That was a massive understatement.
"Don't worry about it. You should have seen me after my last birthday," she laughs. "Take a moment and then we can discuss whatever it is you want to talk about."
It was now or never… or at least until this afternoon when Mal would find out for herself. "I didn't work in Europe," she quickly rushes out, Her eyes are trained on the floor, unable and unwilling to look at Mal as she confesses her secret. "I was an escort, a prostitute. I didn't want to be. I was one of the women in that Gold case that's been all over the news. I didn't…"
"I know," is all Mal says, very softly. When she had first found out it hadn't changed her opinion of Regina, except for the fact that she realised the woman in front of her was much stronger than she gave her credit for. Like everyone else that knew of the Gold case, which was most of the country, she felt such sympathy for the women that had been imprisoned and used in such an awful way.
Regina's head shot up and she looks at her boss for the first time since throwing up. "You do?"
"There's isn't anything I don't know about my employees or friends," she says with a sweet smile that hid no sign of it being disingenuous.
"How?" Her eyebrows are furrowed and she's not sure if she's more scared or confused.
"I have my ways," she replies simply and secretly as she taps her nose.
"And you still let me work here? Even though you knew?"
"Of course. Why wouldn't I? You haven't done anything wrong and you really are very good in the kitchen. Pierre speaks very highly of you." She says it like Regina's past truly doesn't matter to her. When Regina's thinks about it, since she had been free of Gold no one she had met that had learnt the truth had judged her for it.
"So you know about the press release later today?"
"Press release?" Mal queries with one brow raised.
"I guess you don't. Someone has tried to blackmail us about exposing us and we've defied them so we are going to the press first. Cruella is having a statement issued later today."
"Good for you," Mal says sounding impressed.
"Just one more thing," Regina tentatively says. "I'm pregnant," she can't stop the smile that comes with that sentence.
"Congratulations!" Mal beams and leans in for a seated hug. "That is wonderful news… and it explains that," she points to the basket on the far side of the room, when they part from the hug.
Morning sickness hadn't even entered her mind as a possible reason for throwing up. She had assumed that that it was something that only happened in the morning. "I guess so." It was still better to have Mal think that than to believe it was because she had been so scared.
"So, do you need today off to deal with things?"
"No, I'd rather be in work. That is, if you still want me to work here?"
"Absolutely I do. I'll have a word with Pierre later. We will try to keep you on afternoon shifts from now on so you can take it easy in the mornings." Regina was flabbergasted at being shown such consideration, and Mal could tell. "Look, you are a wonderful employee and those are hard to come by. You are always on time and you never complain, you just get on with things. Pierre tells me you have serious potential as a chef and I must say after tasting some of your creations I have to agree with him. You will always have a job in any of my restaurants."
"People are going to find out I work here. What if it puts them off?" She felt like she should take Mal's words at face value but she wanted to prepare them both for every eventuality so she didn't have to face having the rug pulled from under her feet at a later date.
"Then good riddance I say. I don't want that type of clientele in any of my establishments. Besides, you are engaged, (she's immediately noticed the ring on Regina's finger after her return from Europe and got her to spill all the wonderful details) to the most famous soccer player in the country. People will flock here just for that reason alone. I assume that will be coming out in the press release too?" Regina nods her head. "Perfect. I can't wait to see my takings by the end of the week," she says it jokingly but she was a businesswoman and she could see the potential in having Emma Swan's future wife working in her establishment.
Regina was stuck for words. All her mind could find for her was, "thank you."
"You have nothing to thank me for. Just keep doing your job and bringing me in money," she winks.
"Speaking of which, I had better go and get ready, my shift starts shortly."
"You go do that," Mal agrees as she makes her way around back to her side of the desk. "And Regina," she says as the brunette is halfway out of the door, "if you start feeling unwell or if you need some time for the press release, just let Pierre know that you are taking some personal time."
Regina smiles and floats out of there. Every time she expected things to cave in around her they somehow seemed to miraculously work themselves out. Just like Emma always promises they will. She quickly makes her way to the still closed bar area and Emma, so she can relay how kind and caring Mal continued to be.
"I told you so," the blonde grins smugly when Regina gives her the highlight reel of the conversation she had just had with her boss.
"Yeah, yeah, you were right. I have to go, call me when you know what time the press release is happening?"
Emma tries steals a quick kiss but a hand to her chest stops her. "Sorry," Emma says looking like a kicked puppy. Regina never really stops her from kissing her, maybe it was because she was at work?
"I may have thrown up a little," Regina offers by way of explanation.
"What? Why? Are you okay? Our baby?" Her eyes somehow manage to become wider and even more panic stricken when she asks the last question.
"I think the worry just overtook me. Mal thought it might be morning sickness. I promise I feel okay now, though," she tries to reassure her.
"Do you want to come home?" Emma was tempted to just throw her over her shoulder, march directly to the car and drive her home so she could keep her nearby all day.
"No. I really am okay. I want the distraction of work today. Just tell me that everything will be okay after the press release?"
"It will. Ingrid actually called when you were talking to Mal. The club apparently have a few ideas to turn it into good publicity for themselves and they are going to issue a statement saying that they will stand by Ruby and myself," she informs her of the phone call as if she was just passing on a piece of unimportant information.
"That's amazing. Why didn't you tell me as soon as I got here?" Her face lightens up at the news.
"Because I wanted to hear your news first. I'm going to go pick up Ruby and we are going to head to the stadium to meet up with Ingrid . Will you call me if you start feeling unwell?"
"I will. Now go," she says as she playfully shoves her.
Emma plants a kiss on her cheek. I'll let you know about the press release as soon as I know anything. Have a great day and call me if you don't feel well."
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"So… what do you think is going to happen?" Ruby asks her teammate as she busily types out a text at the same time.
"I have no idea. Ingrid didn't sound too pissed when she called me. So she has to be okay with everything."
"She seemed okay when she called me too, I guess. How's Regina handling things?" Out of all of them Regina was obviously the most panicked over the whole situation.
"Mal was great with her and I told her that the club are going to stand by us so she's a lot calmer than she has been. She always seems to carry the weight of the world on her shoulders and she can't seem to enjoy anything for too long before pessimism sneaks in. If I could get my hands on Gold and Cora… I swear to God…" She spits out angrily as her knuckles turn white due to the tight grasp she has on the steering wheel, almost to the point of pain.
"You know… I don't think I've ever seen you angry before," Ruby muses as she manages to peel her eyes from her phone screen to look at the driver.
"Yeah, well, they should bring back the death penalty for those two sickos. They don't deserve to live for what they did."
Ruby reaches over and pats her friends shoulder. "Damn right they don't."
"Anyway, those dirtbags don't even deserves to be mentioned." She clears her throat and decides to change the subject. "Things seem to be getting pretty serious between you and Kathryn. I thought you guys were meant to be casual." She quickly glances over to her friend to see her blushing before she turns her eyes back to the road.
"It started like that… and it was like that… but shit I don't know. It wasn't meant to happen."
"Wait," Emma glances over at Ruby again. "Do you love her?" Her eyes are darting between the road and the brunette, but she catches her shrugging. "You do!"
"Shut up," she exclaims not too unkindly.
"I'm happy for you."
"Shut up!"
"We are not having a double wedding," she teases as she laughs at her friend.
"Shut up, Swan." Her cheeks were flaming red at this point and she sounds more embarrassed than angry.
"I suppose I am going to be the one to have this chat with you. If you ever hurt her I will kill you and…"
"You are so annoying, Swan," she interrupts her friends fake speech.
Emma laughs at Ruby's discomfort before she does turn serious. "Please don't hurt her though," she pleads with the passenger.
"I won't, Swan," she promises, appreciating the blondes protectiveness over Kathryn but also feeling a bit irked that Emma would think she would hurt Kat. She had done nothing so far to suggest she would ever hurt her.
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"I've been speaking with the chairmen and managing directors all morning." Ingrid informs the women in her office. "Combined with the press release from your agents we think we have come up with a plan of action. We will put out our press release tomorrow morning at the latest." She hands them both a draft copy of what the bigwigs had come up with so far and gives them a few minutes to read through it.
"It looks good," Emma smiles.
"Yeah," Ruby agrees breezily.
It was quite straightforward but quite righteous. The club spoke of its disgust at the Gold case and how the 'victims' of the awful crimes would always have its support. It was exactly the sort of thing Emma had been expecting. The club was taking the opportunity to use this as good publicity for itself.
"Just a few more things." Ingrid clears her throat and her eyes shift between the two women. "The club want to set up a charity for victims of human trafficking around the globe and they want you both to be the ambassadors for it. They also want you to sign contract extensions with sizable buy-out clauses in them. It's non-negotiable if you want the club to stand by you. It would be pointless to start up the charity if either of you were to leave for another team. We need you both behind this." Emma was only one year into her three year contract and Ruby was approaching the final year of her five year contract.
Ingrid then passes them their new proposed contracts for them to have a quick look over. She patiently sits back as they both scan over the documents. She was well aware that their agents would need to have a look over the paperwork before anything could be signed but the club was asking a lot of the two women, but it was imperative to the continual success of the club that they both sign.
"I'm happy to sign this once Ursula has had a look at it," Ruby confirms happily. Ruby had come through the Slayers academy system, it was the only club she had ever known and she would happily spend the rest of her playing days there. The buy-out clause they had put into her contract was enough to show that they were serious about keeping her.
"Wonderful. I'll let the Director know you are happy with yours and we'll make sure Ursula gets a copy first," she smiles and takes the preliminary contract from Ruby. "What about you, Emma?" After winning the league and with how well their World Cup campaign had been going so far, other clubs had already been approaching the Slayers with their interest in either one or both of the women. With Ruby being the captain and Emma being the star striker there was going to be no shortage of offers for the two before the start of the new season.
"When do you need this signed by?" Emma asks, straight faced.
"Well, it will have to be before tomorrow morning, before we put out the press release. The sooner the better really. Is that going to be an issue?"
"It might be, yeah." She clenches her jaw in frustration, she hadn't anticipated this. "I don't know if I can commit to this," she answers with a heavy heart. They wanted her to sign a five year contract, which wouldn't normally be an issue but the buy-out clause they had put it in was over double of Ruby's, the largest she had ever heard of in fact. That wasn't the problem in itself, butith a buy-out clause of that amount there was no club in the league that could afford to take her on and she didn't know if she could promise the next five years of her life to the Storybrooke Slayers. Cora had just been arrested but it would still be a while before she would face sentencing. Emma's mind was spinning with the possible outcomes of any future trial. What if she got off lightly or what if she got off scot-free? Would Regina want to leave Storybrooke if Cora was going to be there? Would she want to move to the other side of the country, or the other side of the world? She couldn't tie Regina down to something she didn't want. She didn't want to be the one to effectively take Regina's freedom from her. "I need to talk to Regina."
"What's wrong with it?" Ruby questions puzzlingly as she snatches the paperwork from Emma's hands. "HOLY SHIT!" She shrieks like a howler monkey after her eyes have scanned down the buy-out clause section. "They really don't want anyone getting hold of you!" She rereads the amount, counting the number of zero's in case she had gotten it wrong the first time she read it. She hadn't. "I'm not sure if I should be insulted by my offer now," she says contemplatively.
"I'm going to get myself a coffee. Emma, why don't you give Regina a call?" Ingrid suggests as she stands up. She was just as desperate as everyone else involved to have all of this wrapped up as soon as possible. "Ruby, would you like to come with me?" She offers the unmoving brunette, in order to give Emma some privacy.
"Nah, I'm good. I want to hear this," the unperceptive woman answers as she leans back in her chair, making herself more comfortable.
"Go for a walk, Ruby," Emma sternly suggests, not too unkindly but it left Ruby knowing she wasn't welcome to eavesdrop on the call.
"Fine. I'll just get all the gossip from Kat anyway," she half jokes as she follows Ingrid out of the room.
She whips out her phone and speed dials her fiancée. She wanted to sign the contract, she wants to be part of the club that were standing by her in a very difficult situation, but for the first time in her life she had to think about someone other than herself. This wasn't as simple as an engaged couple deciding where that might want to live a few years down the line. It was a lot more complicated than that. There were other influencing circumstances that neither of them had any say over.
"Hello, Emma. Have you heard from Cruella?" Regina anxiously asks after answering her phone after the fourth ring. It had gone off in the pocket of her chef whites as she was kneading dough so she had to quickly wipe her hands first and in her rush to answer it she had almost dropped it into the dough.
"No, not yet. There's something else I have to talk to you about."
"That sounds dubious but okay. Go ahead…" Regina sighs as she straightens her spine, preparing herself for what was coming her way now. She looks over to Pierre and catches his eye. She nods towards the door, silently asking for permission to be allowed to leave the kitchen to take the call. She was working on making the bread for the evening whilst everyone else was dealing with the brunch run so he gave her a smile and a nod of permission.
Regina hadn't told Pierre of anything about the situation going on in her life or her pregnancy but she had told him she was waiting for an important call when she first walked into the kitchen that morning. She intended on filling him in on everything after her shift, she'd decided that she had bared her soul too much for one morning already.
Emma gives the details of what Ingrid had told her about the way the club were planning on handling the situation and the basics of the contract and consequently what that would mean for them. She then shares her fears of the possibility of Cora being free within the timeframe of the new contract that had been handed to her and what that would mean for them. She hated that they even had to discuss that, as far as she was concerned the evil woman should be locked away until her last breath but that was out of their hands. Throughout the Gold case she had kept positive and been Regina's rock so it was against the grain for her to put everything on the table and focus on the negatives in front of Regina.
"What… what is Ruby going to do?" Regina tries to stop her voice from shaking and bites the edge of her thumbnail .
"She wants to sign. She's really happy with what they are offering her."
Regina could hear the desire to sign the contract in Emma's voice. Emma had spoken many times into the early hours of the morning of how this was the first time in her life she felt at home, how Storybrooke and the Slayers had felt like the right fit to her. Also, Emma had never actually spoken about having any friends at any time in her life, apart from August, so that was an important factor to consider. Emma had friends at the club and a really good friend in Ruby.
She wants to give Emma permission, she wants to tell her to do whatever she wants to do. The blonde had earnt that. She had earnt it in her career and she had earnt it in their relationship. But Regina was terrified, truly terrified. Her hand that was grasping her phone was shaking. The adrenaline that had taken over in the care home and given her momentary strength to stand up for herself had been the only time she had felt strong since David had uttered the name 'Cora' down the phone to her. Cora was her kryptonite. She didn't know if she could agree to living a life where bumping into Cora was a possibility, especially now that they had a baby on the way. Would Kathryn stay with Ruby? Was she willing to lose her best friend or the life she and Emma were building?
"Baby?" Emma queries down the line that had been quiet for quite a few moments.