Hello! My first Captain Swan story! I adore these two, I ship them like mad and they are easily my favourite couple ever. I've read so many Captain Swan FanFics I thought I'd give it a go. This is Killian and Emma at the dinner table with their five year old daughter, Hope. Who wants to hear all about the story of how they met.
P.S. I have no experience with young children so I have no idea how they talk. I didn't want Hope to come across as stupid or a baby, yet she is still only five. I think I've made her attitude realistic enough for a young child.
Enjoy!
"Daddy?"
"Yes Hope?"
Killian, Emma, and little Hope, were having dinner together in the late afternoon. Emma was putting out the plates and Killian handing out the food from the container. They've learned from experience not to let Hope take her own food from the containers, she's either so hungry she scoops it all up and there's next to nothing left for Killian and Emma, or she drops the handle as she's using it meaning food is spattered everywhere, she accidently sneezes on the food (they decided to go out for dinner after that incident), the list went on. At five years old Hope was still struggling a bit with hand eye co-ordination. So until she grew up a bit, Killian and Emma agreed to hand out the food and cut it up for her.
"Granny and Gramps were telling me the story of how they met today."
"Did you like it?" Emma asked.
"Yeah; although Neal doesn't, he kept groaning and rolling his eyes." Hope furrowed her eyebrows.
"Yes, I suspect that's because he's heard the story a million times; just as I have." Said Emma.
"Heard it? We got to see it in action love." Killian grinned at her, both of them grinning, remembering their time travel adventure.
"I was wondering," Hope ignored her parents. "Can you tell me the story of how you met?"
"Well we've already told you." Killian frowned down at her.
"When?"
"About a year ago, that night you refused to go to sleep without a story."
"But every night I refuse to sleep without a story. I don't remember that night."
"Well that your own fault," Killian said. "You need to learn to pay attention sweetie."
"No! Please tell me! I'll pay attention I promise." Hope begged, clasping her hands together while Killian used his hook to help cut up her dinner into smaller pieces.
"Alright," Killian sighed playfully. He was done with the cutting and the three of them were now sat down munching happily. "Basically what happened was 'Once Upon a time…your mother, Emma Swan, was walking down that street and saw this deviously handsome pirate across the road," Killian gave his most charming smile, "and fell instantly in love with me, and it took years of asking and asking but I finally said yes to marrying her, the End."
"Killian, never has a bigger lie been said in this house! And that includes the time Hope said ogres had nicked her Easter egg so she must be given another one."
"Mummy," Hope turned to her mom. "Will you tell the story?"
"What? No! I wanna tell the story" Killian pouted.
"Then tell it properly!" Hope whined.
"Alright…Once Upon a time…your mother and your Granny Snow were trapped in the enchanted forest, after falling through a magic portal. Now, along with them were two other women, Mulan, a fearsome warrior and the princess Aurora, you know her? She's Phillip's mother."
"Oh yeah!" Hope's eyes widen in recognition. "I like Phillip."
"Not too much though right?" Killian narrowed his eyes at his daughter.
"Killian…" Emma smiled. "She's five." As entertaining as it was to watch Killian be an over-protective dad, crushes and romance was thankfully still a thing Hope had yet to ask about, and she was not in the mood for the talk tonight.
"Now, your Granny and your mother were trying to find a way to get home." Killian continued with the story.
"Back to Storybrooke." Hope added.
"Yes, now…erm…"
Ah, Killian had barely begun and already he had reached a brick wall. How do you tell your five year old daughter that her mother had found her father underneath a pile of dead bodies, after an evil Witch had killed a group of innocent refugees?
"We were making our way back to Mulan and Aurora's camp but it had been destroyed. By Cora, Regina's mother." Emma jumped in.
"Aunt Regina had a mom? What happened to her?"
"That's a story for another time." Emma waved off. "This story is the story of how your mummy and daddy met. Now, do you want to listen? Or do you want to keep interrupting? In which case we'll stop, you'll go to bed early and we'll never tell you the story again."
"No. I want to hear it! I'll keep quiet." To prove her point Hope pretended to mime zipping her lip.
"Okay," Emma smiled; her daughter was still pretty young, and pretty easy to wind up. "So, Cora was not a nice woman."
Killian let loose a high pitched laugh. "That's putting it mildly love, she was a heartless villainous Bitc-erm-witch. She was a heartless Witch." Killian glanced at his daughter but she didn't seem to notice the slip up. When Hope had started to talk as she was growing, the Charmings made sure he wasn't teaching their granddaughter any 'vulgar' words. Or to put it in David's words, 'you better watch what you say around her pirate, I don't want my granddaughter growing up cursing like a sailor'.
"Our little group thought that the camp was empty," Emma continued, brushing off Killian's comment, "but then we saw someone. This person was crying out for help. And this person," she waved her arm across to her husband at the table, "was your d-"
"Daddy!" Hope cheered, again interrupting.
"Yep." Killian smiled. "That's it, that's how we met. Now," he tapped his hand on the table, "time for bed."
"No! That's not it! That's just how you met," Hope grinned, "it's not how you fell in looove."
Killian looked down at his smirking daughter. "Your grandma said that when she was describing her story didn't she?"
"How did you know?"
"Lucky guess."
"So, you found daddy in the destroyed camp, then what?" She looked at her mom.
"Well, your father tried to pretend that he was an innocent man who managed to hide from Cora and got caught up in the wreckage."
"But your mother used her super power on me." Killian said, pointing his fork at his wife sitting opposite him, beaming. "She knew I was lying."
"I hate you super power mommy. It's really annoying." Hope sulked.
"I know." Emma smirked.
"I could have got another Easter egg if it wasn't for your power."
"Trust me sweetie I didn't need your mother's supper power to know you were lying about the ogres eating your Easter egg." Killian said.
"Funny you should mention ogres. Because they're about to come up in our story." Emma said. "The land was surrounded by Ogres. I knew your father was lying. So, I tied him to a tree and threatened to leave him there for the Ogres to feast upon, until he told the truth."
Emma thought her daughter would smile at her cleverness but instead it had the opposite effect as her daughter looked very shocked.
"Mommy! How could you do such a horrible thing to daddy?!"
"Yes mommy," Killian grinned smugly, loving his daughter's reaction. "How could you do such a horrible thing to your True Love?"
"Hey! I'm not the bad guy here, your father was the one who was lying!" Emma protested.
"Will you feed me to the Ogres if I lie?"
"Yes." Killian said adamantly. "So you better tell the truth to us from now on."
"Killian!" Emma kicked him under the table. It's a fine line between stern and threatening. She didn't want Hope to come crying into their bedroom tonight spouting nightmares about Ogres eating her.
"Er no-sorry." He looked down at his daughter who had started to look a bit worried. "No, mommy and daddy would never feed you to Ogres."
"Of course not." Emma said.
"I mean where would we find Ogres round here?"
"Killian! Daddy's only joking sweetie," Emma said in a much softer voice to her daughter. "I think we should get back to the story, yeah?"
"Yes please." Said Hope.
"You see, what you have to remember Hope, is that this is when your father and I first met. We weren't in love at this point, and both your father and I were different people back then."
"How could you be different people?" Hope asked.
"Well we weren't your mommy and daddy back then." Emma tried to explain. "We weren't in love in that moment. And both of us had our own goals and plans and needs that didn't involve each other. We were strangers. Do you understand?"
Hope nodded. "I think so. So it wasn't love at first sight?"
"No," Killian said, taking the glasses to fill them up, passing behind Emma. "But it was very much attracted to at first sight." He smiled, kissing Emma on the head as he passed, Emma gave a laugh.
"So you thought mommy was pretty daddy?"
"Pretty? No," Killian shook his head, coming back to the table after filling water for Emma. "I thought she was downright beautiful. And she hasn't changed a bit since."
"Well I have changed a bit with the odd wrinkle or two."
"Hmm," Killian leaned over the table to give Emma a long survey of her face. "Nope, haven't changed a bit in my eyes."
Emma smiled and leant over the table to give Killian a kiss, she would have wanted to carry on the sweet moment but a groan from Hope had to cut it short.
"Mommy! Daddy! Finish the story! This is taking much longer than Granny and Gramps did."
"That's probably because they didn't have so many interruptions." Killian shook his daughter's long blonde hair curling at the tips. She was an exact copy of her mother including the green eyes.
"You were leaving Daddy for the Ogres." Hope reminded them, getting back on track. "Evil mommy!"
"Wh-Hey! Don't call me evil!" Emma argued. "I wasn't actually going to leave him; I just needed him to think I did. I knew he was lying and I knew this was the only way to get him to tell the truth and it worked. Your father came clean, admitted to lying and said how I had bested him."
"What does 'bested' mean?" Hope asked.
"It means she won against me." Answered Killian. "From that moment I knew that this woman in front of me was certainly something, and I knew no tricks or lies would work on her. Your mother is far too clever for that. So remember that next time you eat all the cookies and want to blame it on your big brother." He tapped Hope on the nose.
Hope grumbled.
"So," Hope changed the subject. "Why were you lying? Why were you really there?"
"Well, this is where it gets a bit complicated. Do you think you can keep up?" Killian smiled as his daughter nodded eagerly, Hope never admitted defeat.
"Okay, so Cora, the witch, wanted to get back to Storybrooke to be with Regina, her daughter." Hope nodded. "I also wanted to get to Storybrooke."
"Why?" Hope asked the question Killian was dreading.
"Erm…"
"Killian you don't have to explain." Emma said softly, grabbing his hand across the table.
"No, it's alright love. I want to tell her, teach her right and wrong." Killian was hoping that he could wait until Hope was a bit older, five still was too young to hear his dark past. Killian was hoping he would never have to tell her, just because he knew his daughter thought that world of him, a real hero, and he didn't want to shatter that image.
Killian wasn't going to tell her everything, certainly not how dark his past really was in detail. But she should start to hear some of it. Killian had wished someone was there for him to tell him the difference between right and wrong; hopefully Hope will take heed from his past mistakes and know how wrong some things are.
"See, your…" He was about to say 'your daddy' but no. He didn't want to associate his past self as Hope's father. "I wasn't a very good person back then. I had a hole in my heart; I had lost someone I loved. Milah." He hoped Hope wouldn't ask any questions about Milah right now, but he at least wanted Hope to know her name. "Many, many years ago she had been taken from me, and rather than do the right thing and try and move on, I was filled with pain and darkness. I wanted to enact revenge on the man who took Milah from me, along with my hand."
Hope was oddly silent through this. No interruptions at all, she could probably sense that this was not the happy-love filled part of the story.
"He was in Storybrooke, and that's why I allied myself with an evil witch. Why I first lied. This man was in Storybrooke and I wanted revenge on him. Because you see revenge was the only thing I had in my life. I was a villain. I didn't care for anyone else."
Killian didn't dare look into his daughter's eyes, too terrified on what he would see reflecting back at him.
But Hope didn't the strangest and most wonderful thing.
She silently climbed onto her father's lap and gave him a tight, love filled hug.
"You've got me daddy. And mommy. We love you, and you love us. You're not on your own anymore. You're a hero."
Killian heart felt like it had grown in size with how much the words from his daughter meant to him. He had always known it to be true, he wasn't on his own anymore. But hearing it from his daughter, hearing her say she loved him immediately after he's just told her he was not a good person honestly brought a tear to his eye. He wrapped his arms round his daughter and he lifted his head to see Emma smiling at them both.
Killian still couldn't believe how lucky he was sometimes, he never told Emma. But not long after Hope was born he would sometimes wake up and be terrified it was all a dream, or a sleeping curse. Emma and Hope were just so perfect he sometimes couldn't believe they were real. And the fact that two people so wonderful loved him, thought of him as a hero, it just made everything even more perfect.
"I know I'm not on my own." He pressed a kiss to his daughter head. "I love you Hope."
"I love you too." Hope lifted her head and gazed at him. "Are you okay?"
Killian smiled. "I'm great."
"Can we go back to the story now?"
Killian and Emma burst out laughing.
"You still need to work on your patience Hope." Emma said.
"And you need to work at eating all your vegetables." Killian added. Hope hadn't moved from his lap but he moved her plate over in front of her. All of which had broccoli's, peas, and carrots still on her plate, untouched.
"How about, if we promise to finish the story, you must eat all your vegetables." Emma said. It was less of a deal and more of a demand.
"Can I have melted chocolate on them?" Hope asked.
"No." Both mother and father laughed.
"You can't put melted chocolate on everything Hope." Emma said.
"I can try." Her daughter grinned. "It worked with the fish."
"I still don't know how you managed to swallow that down Hope." Killian said. "Chocolate coated fish?!"
"Story!" Hope complained, slamming her arms down. "I wanna hear the story. I'll eat all my vegetables I promise."
"Okay, where were we with it?" Emma asked.
"Daddy had said you beasted him."
"Bested, Hope." Emma corrected. "Bested. Okay, you your daddy gave up his lies and told the truth about who he really was and why he was really there. His name was Killian Jones,"
"-though most people have taken to calling by my more colourful moniker: Hook." Killian finished of the sentence, gleaming his hook at his daughter. Hope's eyes were wide with anticipation hearing the story of her mother and father finally get going.
"He was in an alliance with Cora," Emma retold, "and he was to befriend our group so he could find out everything he could about Storybrooke."
"But alliances can be broken." Killian supplied. They seem to have got into a pattern of finishing each other's sentences while telling the story. "When I saw how clever this woman was before me. I knew she was a safer bet than Cora, so I offered my services. You see Hope," Killian wrapped his arms round his daughter. "Cora had some ashes from a magic wardrobe that once brought Emma to this land when she was a baby."
"So Cora couldn't get to the wardrobe too, your grandmother and I burned it, but what we didn't realise was that Cora could still make a portal out of the ashes."
"She could open a portal, but she had no way of finding her way through it. Which is where I come in, Cora was after a special compass that working with the ashes, could get her to Storybrooke. Only I could get this compass, I told this to your mother and their little group. And I agreed to help them get the compass first, only if they cut me down from that tree of course." Killian grinned.
"You with us Hope?" Emma asked.
"I think so," Hope nodded. "So," she turned her head back to her father, "you were working with Cora, but you changed your mind and helped mommy instead because she was awesomer!"
"More awesome, Hope." He corrected. "Remember, good grammar is forever. Anyway, yeah," Killian smiled at his kid, "nicely sums it up."
"Where was this compass?" Hope asked.
"Oh you'll love this bit sweetie." Killian grinned and tightly wrapped his arms around his daughter and lowered his voice to ramp up the excitement which he could see growing in Hope's eyes. "The compass was up…a giant BEANSTALK."
"A beanstalk?!" Hope gasped. "What? A really big one?"
"So big you couldn't even see the top." Emma laughed.
"What did you do?"
"Well what else could we do? We climbed it."
"You climbed a giant beanstalk?" Hope gasped.
"Oh yes." Killian smiled remembering.
"Was it scary?"
"Terrifying." Emma said.
"I wanna do it!" Hope jumped on her daddy's lap.
Emma and Killian laughed at no matter how scary a challenge was, Hope was always up for it: in theory. They knew full well if Hope saw how tall and scary that beanstalk was in real life she would not be so eager.
"You'll do no such thing." Killian said. "We didn't climb this beanstalk for fun Hope. Anyway, this beanstalk was protected by magic. I had two special leather bands that could allow us to climb it, but there were only two, one for me, and one for whoever volunteered to climb it with me, and get the compass."
"I had to get back to Henry. Now I know it's hard to imagine but your big brother wasn't always so big." Emma remembered. "Once upon a time he was but a ten year old boy who needed his mother to come back for him. And I wasn't going to let him down. So I volunteered."
"I was hoping it would be her." Killian smiled with his daughter who was grinning at him.
"Because you found her very beautiful and awesome," Hope interrupted yet again.
"Indeed. So, together we climbed up the beanstalk."
"And THAT'S when you fell in love." Said Hope.
"Well," Emma smiled, "it was our first moment together; our first adventure."
"That's when I started to gleam more about your mother. She wasn't very open to talking with me at first."
"Why?" Hope wondered.
"You see, back then, your mother surrounded herself with these walls." Killian said.
Hope furrowed her brows looking at her mom. "Walls? How were you surrounded by walls? How did you get out?"
Emma had no idea how she would explain this but she could try, she never had to explain this to Henry when he was younger as he could already see those walls for himself and he could see they were slowly coming down.
"They weren't actual walls." Emma explained. "It's a metaphor; do you know what a metaphor is?"
Hope shook her head.
"A metaphor is a word used to describe something that isn't physically real, or there, but it feels real to the person, or it's a way of describing what it feels."
"Why did you feel you had walls around you?" Hope looked at her mom and Emma could tell by her tone that she was confused but also nervous about the answer. Emma was nervous too.
She grabbed her daughters hand across the table. "You see back then mommy wasn't as happy as she is now. She had been hurt in the past, hurt a lot, and so I didn't feel that kind of hurt again I put walls up around myself. Metaphorical walls. They weren't actually real but I felt they were there, I distanced myself from people, kept them at arm's length so no one could hurt me again."
"That's horrible." Hope got off her daddy's lap and went around the table to hug her mom. Emma smiled at how caring their daughter was. When her father was lost in painful memories Hope went to comfort him and now Hope was doing the same to her mommy.
"Do you still have your walls mommy?" Hope looked up, her arms still wrapped around Emma.
"No," Emma stroked her daughter's hair, looking at her beautiful face. "Your father helped bring them down."
Hope gave a toothy smile at her dad.
"That was nice of you daddy."
Her dad smiled back at both Emma and their little girl. "Well it took a lot of patience, hard work and understanding. But it was worth it. I knew it would be."
They all smiled at each other, it really was amazing how far Killian and Emma had come and how much they had changed for the better.
"Just like it'll be hard work," Killian got up from his chair, wrapped his arms around his daughter and picked her up to plop her back on her seat, "eating all your vegetables." He moved the plate back to her side and tapped it with his hook.
"Daddy" Hope whined and Emma and Killian laughed.
"Come on, do what we agreed. We'll continue the story if you eat every last one." Emma said.
Hope did not look happy about this agreement but she picked up her fork anyway.
"Beanstalk!" Hope yelled making both her parents jump. "I wanna hear about the beanstalk."
"We haven't even got to the giant yet."
"Giant?!" If it was possible Hope's eyes widened even further, here head moving swiftly left and right to look at her parents. "There were giants?"
"Vegetables." Both parents reminded her strongly.
"So on this beanstalk, I tried to chat with your mother but of course she had her walls around her-"
"-metaphorical walls" Hope said, proud of all the new words she was learning today.
"Correct- hidding behind her metaphorical walls. But I had a keen eye, and I love a challenge. So I didn't let it put me off. I already could tell why she was the most motivated to go, because she had a child to get back to. But I could see your mother didn't want to abandon him the way she was abandoned. I asked her if she had ever been in love, and she told me no. I knew that was a lie, but I held my tongue for now. We carried on, making our perilous way up the beanstalk, our arms were shaking with the effort to keep ourselves up and we were worried for what we might find up there."
"But we made it." Emma jumped into the story. "We made it up there and found ourselves in a Giant's castle."
"Woah...was it big?" Hope asked the obvious question.
"Huge, you felt the size of a mouse with how big everything is around you."
"And I being the perfect gentleman I am; saw your mother's hand was cut from the beanstalk and wrapped it up."
"What does that have to do with the story?" Hope asked her father.
"Well it was the closest your mother had let me get to her since we met. It was an important moment for me."
Emma looked at him, speechless. "You've never told me that before."
Killian just shrugged. "I thought it was a given love." He smiled at her.
"Mom?" Hope interrupted their moment. She had a habit of doing that.
Emma shook herself, she was reliving that moment. "Right, erm, so we couldn't find the compass in the giants treasure so we thought he would have it on him. Luckily, Mulan gave me a powder that would be able to knock a giant unconscious, we hoped."
"My plan was to wait till the giant had fallen asleep and look for the compass; your mother's plan was to bring the giant out and the pounce the powder on him."
"Mmm…" Hope thought about it, "Yeah mommy's was better. It could have been hours before the giant fell asleep and even then he might have woken up."
"Like mother like daughter," Killian shook his right hand over his little girl's hair again, he liked doing that. Watching all her long blonde curls twirl about. He was well aware there would come a day when she wouldn't like it because it messed up her hair or it was 'babyish', but for now she seemed to enjoy it. "She said the exact same thing."
"My plan worked, your father played a distraction while I threw the powder over the giant."
"And then I said that we made quite the team."
"And what did you reply to that mommy?" Hope looked at her mom across the table at her.
"I didn't." Emma said. "I just wanted to find the compass; although I did find his humour a little infectious."
"I knew it!" Killian pointed at her triumphantly while Emma just rolled her eyes grinning. "Even back then I knew you found me funny!"
"Dad!" Hope complained. "Compass?"
"Right, anyway, you're mother and I, were going through the giants castle and to cut a long story short, we eventually found it."
"And then you climbed down the beanstalk together and went home?" Hope grinned, although her facial expression changed into confusion when she saw the awkward look her parents exchanged.
"Ah," Killan rubbed the back of his ear nervously while Emma avoided her daughters curious eye, bit her lip and looked down at the table guiltily.
"What?" Hope looked between them.
"I was desperate to get back to Henry; I couldn't risk not getting back to him and leaving him alone." Emma explained. "And I didn't know or trust your father at the time, he was a stranger, a pirate and up until an hour or two ago he was working with Cora. I couldn't trust that his alliance wouldn't change again."
"Mommy what did you do?"
"I handcuffed him." Emma said regretfully. "I made a deal with the giant when he woke up; I knew he wouldn't eat Killian or anything. I knew Killian would come down eventually. I just needed time to get away first."
"You betrayed him?!" Hope gasped. "But mommy you were a team!"
"Hey, Hope, don't look at your mother like that," Killian said sternly, "she made the right call."
"She did?"
"I did?"
"Your mother HAD to get home. There was no way she was going to take any unnecessary risk. Your mother couldn't take the chance of never seeing her boy again on the word of a pirate; pirates aren't exactly famous for keeping their word. None of these thoughts were going through my head at the time of course."
"I bet you were really mad at her?"
"He did have very good reason to be." Emma mumbled, she still felt bad about it, even though God knows they've both made mistakes that have hurt each other in the past. And they've both apologised and forgiven each other over so many things. But none of that sadness, guilt or anger over each other holds a candle to the love and happiness they shared now.
"But I see now that your mother had good reason to do what she did. And if I can forgive her," he tapped his daughter on the nose making her giggle, "so can you."
"Hmmm…" Hope looked between her parents. "I guess so. I mean it all worked out for the best didn't it?"
"Unquestionably." Killian said.
"Completely." Smiled Emma. "Everything that has happened has led us to this moment; the moment…where our daughter has eaten all her vegetables!" Emma cheered.
"Hope!" Killian gasped.
It was true, Hope's plate was vegetable free, she had eaten every last one.
"Oh well done. Mmmwha" Killian put a lovely squishy kiss on her forhead. Both Emma and Killian clapped at their happily grinning daughter.
"Does this mean I can have a special cookie now?" Hope asked sweetly. "I ate all my veg!"
"Absolutely." Emma got up into the kitchen, reached up for the special cookie jar Hope had painted a few weeks ago in art class. Hope loved special cookies but she only got them if she had done something great (great by five year old standards). So in order so Hope didn't nick them, Emma let Hope paint a jar and then Emma placed a spell on the jar so only she could touch open it.
"Can I have two?" Hope begged.
"Alright, since I'm in a happy mood and you've eaten all your vegetables. Here you go," Emma came back to the table to give her daughter two cookies.
"Thanks mummy! Thanks daddy!" Hope jumped down from her seat and rushed back upstairs to her room, happily gorging on her cookies.
Once she was out of the room Emma moved to sit on Killian, who was still sitting on his chair, she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him tenderly.
"I love you." Emma said when she came back.
"I love you too." Killian replied; His arms circling around her, both of them taking up the space of the chair.
"You know one day she's gonna ask for the whole story, not just how we met but also how we fell in love. We're going to need to take hours out of our schedules to tell that story."
Killian just gave her a cheeky look as if to say 'and whose fault is that?'
Emma's slapped his shoulder playfully. "It wasn't my entire fault. You took you're time showing how good a man you could be."
Killian laughed. "I know. We're both to blame for how long it-what's that?" Killian stopped his grinning and was staring at something. Emma saw Killian and lowering his head to try and see something on Hope's chair. Emma got off his lap and looked too. Now she noticed it, Hope's chair did look odd, or the cushion did.
Because Hope was still quite small they had a special cushion she used that was bright blue and shimmering; like the ocean. To be fair Hope probably didn't need it anymore as she was big enough to sit up sat the table and eat. The cushion looked wonky and bumpy, Emma grabbed to cushion and removed it from the chair.
"Those are all her vegetables." Emma said.
Hope's carrots, broccolis and peas were all underneath her cushion, squished and mangled.
"She must have stuffed them all under her cushion while we were distracted talking about how we met."
"Then she told us she had eaten them all, and then she got two special cookies," Killian added up the events together. "Oh, she is good."
So not only had his daughter not eaten her vegetables, but she also tricked them into giving her two cookies. Half of him was angry at Hope, but the other half of him couldn't help but be a bit proud for how much of a mischievous bright spark she was.
Just as he was about to open his mouth to call Hope down and tell her off he couldn't. Because Emma had climbed onto his lap once again, wrapped her legs around him and was giving him a tenderer, deeper kiss than one appropriate for a child to see.
"What was that for?" He asked after they had indulged themselves for a good minute or so.
"Because I know you were about to call her down and tell her off. And I thought, we could spend the next half an hour scolding our daughter, telling her off and a five year olds temper tantrum would ensue. Or, we could let her get away with it for now, and spend the next half an hour doing this…"
She went in and gave him another kiss.
When she leant back and gave him a look 'what's it gonna be?"
It took less than a second for the advantages and disadvantages to be weighed in his head.
"…well when you put it like that Swan."
He dove in again. Both of them knew full well they would have to tell off Hope eventually and certainly keep and closer eye on her next time they're having dinner.
But for now, after all the up and down emotions of re-telling their first meeting; they were both in silent agreement that they deserved this kiss.