True Love's Proof

Chapter Six

By the morning of the funeral, Emma had a suspect in custody. It was a routine visit to a friend's house when Snow White stumbled upon a bottle of antifreeze in the back of a closet. The identity had the town full of whispers and sad shakes of the head. Regina smirked at a distance, once again escaping the narrowing noose of justice. As much as Emma hated the woman, she wouldn't pin a murder on the former Mayor that she did not commit. A true Charming through and through.

Belle dressed for the funeral, a small graveside gathering and nothing more, but went to the Sheriff's office first. She told her father and Nick, her two constant companions these last couple days, that she would meet them at the cemetery. She had to face the murderess herself with her head high and wearing her bravery like armor. She had to show herself strong and courageous on this day above all others.

Emma greeted her at the door of the office, grim face and dressed in dark shades of silk. "Are you sure about this?"

Belle offered a small smile. "Yes. I'm sure."

She left her purse on one of the empty desks and concentrated on the sharp tap of her heels on the linoleum floor. The woman behind the bars looked wretched. Her eyes were red-rimmed and shadowed, her face ashen and miserable. She was grieving too. Because of this decision, she had lost her freedom, her life...her daughter. So many lives affected by one hasty choice.

"Cinderella."

The woman can barely raise her eyes to look at her. "Belle, I'm so sorry."

Belle pressed her fingers into her palm, her nails digging painfully into the soft flesh. "Why?"

"He was going to take Alexandra or Thomas. I couldn't...I couldn't live without either one."

"So I'm suppose to live without him? His son is suppose to live without him?"

Ella's mouth opened and closed, twisting in the rush of tears. "I didn't know he had a son."

There were so many things that people didn't know about him and that was the tragedy of the whole event. The town thought a villain had been slayed. They didn't have the chance to see the softening of his features while he would spin, the twitchiness of his hands when he was nervous, or the soft rumble of a genuine laugh. No, she was the only one who had the privilege of being a witness to those quiet moments.

Belle didn't want to understand Cinderella's plight, but she did. Rum had destroyed an entire world to get into this one, the one that held his son. So what did it matter that Ella destroyed Belle's world to keep her own child? But that left Belle without her happily ever after now and she could decide if the fallen princess should be punished or reprieved. Thankfully, in this world, it wasn't up to her. Belle stepped away from the bars and retrieved her purse.

"I'll give you a ride over to the cemetery if you want," Emma offered.

"You're coming?"

Emma grabbed her keys and started to lock up. "I may not have trusted him as far as I could throw him, but he did offer me help when I really needed it. I think he was a lot more honest with me than I gave him credit for."

"Yes, he had that way about him." Belle slid into the passenger side of the yellow bug. "He thought very highly of you. And your parents, for that matter."

Emma didn't say anything until they were moving down main street. "What do you think should happen to her, to Ash-I mean, Cinderella?"

Belle rested her head on the cool glass of the window. "I don't know. I want to show her mercy, to understand why she did what she did but then I think back to all the years I spent locked up. I waited for three decades to be reunited with him and start our lives together finally. And now, now there's a humongous gap that will never be completely filled. Whatever happens to Ella will do nothing to fill that gap either so I can't say what I want done with her."

She wished Rum would have given her instructions, a book or letter that would let her know how she was suppose to cope with his loss. He knew it was coming, that much was clear by how he tried to push her away and in the direction of Nick. But she needed something more concrete to try to fill the crater that his absence left in her life. She wondered if he knew the end was coming this quickly or if he thought he had extra time.

Bae had suggested that they go back to his father's after the burial and the more she thought about it, the more comforting it sounded. She wondered what would happen to the large Victorian home as well as his shop. He had such a vast collection of things, things she had no idea of their capabilities. She hoped with all his foresight, he managed to hide or destroy anything that would be harmful in the wrong hands. Maybe he had left a letter detailing how he wanted his murderer to be dealt with as well.

Emma pulled up to the curb and turned the car off. "For what it's worth, I really am sorry."

Belle gave her a small smile. "That's worth a lot, thank you."

The crowd was small but her father, Bae and Nick were all waiting for her. Surprisingly, Emma stepped up to the group and addressed Bae.

"Are you still planning on going back to your father's house after the funeral?"

Bae looked just as off balance as Emma. "Yeah, I am."

Emma nodded and stared at the ground. "Maybe I'll, uh, stop by, with, um, Henry."

"That, that would be great. Thanks."

Belle grabbed both her father and Nick's arm to keep them from walking away with Emma and Bae. It didn't matter if that was all the conversation they were going to have that day, Emma and Bae were starting to meet each other half way. They were awkward, hurt and on uneven ground but they were together.

She watched them throughout the ceremony, never letting go of the two men who were flanking her. Belle was dimly aware that Regina had emerged from her solitude to stand in the back of the crowd. She saw that Nick had zeroed his sights on the former Queen and she let him engage in the staring contest, leaning more on her father's sturdy frame. When prayers had been said and the crowd started to disburse, her leaned down close to her ear.

"Did you put it in the casket?"

She started to answer but her throat closed so she nodded instead. She had gone to the funeral home herself and when she was allowed to say her final goodbye, she slipped the chipped cup into the satin folds of the casket lining. It was the only thing she could think of that properly represented her desire to have gone with him. She couldn't let herself start to cry now for the fear she wouldn't be able to stop. Instead, she let go of Nick and turned her face into her father's shoulder to hide the few tears that had escaped.

"Miss French?"

She lifted her head to see the man who had been King George in the other world, Storybrooke's district attorney now, standing in front of her. She did her best to remember her bearing in the presence of the once King. "Yes, sir?"

"There is the matter of his will."

She didn't want to hear this right now. Over George's shoulder she could see them lowering the casket into the ground and she didn't want to be here anymore. The only sound that she could make at the moment was a strangled sob. Her father squeezed her shoulder but it was Nick who spoke up first.

"I really don't think this is the time."

George looked over at Nick in surprise and then minor annoyance. "Do you know who I am?"

"Not at all and right now, I don't care. This can be discussed at a later time." Nick put himself between Belle and her father and King George.

Her father tugged her away from the confrontation and she allowed herself to be steered away from the graveyard. The last bit of conversation she could hear came from Nick who claimed he didn't rightly care if George had been king because he certainly wasn't one here. The desire to look back to see George's face was strong but that would mean she would see an empty hole in the ground. The desire to accidentally fall into the hole and be buried with her true love, she feared, was stronger than the one to see George's face.

Belle was surprised at how much she wanted to lose herself in the rambling pink house. She had even smiled briefly at the thought of being able to call it pink now instead of salmon. Her father had led her to the front porch but had some deliveries to make that afternoon. He was leaving her in the presence of Nick and Bae both or else she would have found herself making deliveries with him, she was sure. But Bae was busy staring out the front windows for Emma to bring Henry by and every time she turned around, she tripped over Nick.

She sent the scientist out to the garage to see if anything could help him return to his spaceship and get out from underneath her feet. But as she wandered around the second floor of the house, she missed his presence. He didn't try to placate her with "it'll be alright" or "I'm sorry." He did look at her with understanding because he had been in the wasteland where she found herself now. There were no words that would ease the pain so he didn't say any and she appreciated that more and more.

There were so many doors and rooms that she had never seen in the house and the discovery of guest rooms turned storage rooms were enough to distract her mind from the fact that the owner of the trinkets was never coming back for them. When she opened yet another door to some unknown room, she was surprised to see that it wasn't dust coated and stuffy. In fact, a window was cracked open and the Tiffany lamp on the mahogany desk was still lit. There was even a thick volume of some sort open on the desk.

Her chest constricted as she stepped into the room and could still catch the scent of his cologne. How many hours did he spend in this room for his presence to be so terribly strong? The books, volumes and volumes of them, lined the walls. Upon closer inspection, she found them all to be law books. Her fingers traced some of the spines and smiled sadly. His deals, he always loved his deals and the fine points he wove into them. She was certain his compulsion for details would have earned him some kind of label in this world but she appreciated his hawk eyed intensity to the minor things in life.

She was just about to see what he had been reading when the floorboards creaked in the hallway and revealed Emma standing in the doorway. The Sheriff paused on the threshold, unsure whether she would be welcome or not. For a savior, she was very unsure of herself. Belle gave her a slight nod.

"You can come in, Emma."

"If you want to be alone, I understand."

Belle managed a smile. "I don't mind."

Emma eased into the room, crossing and uncrossing her arms as she wandered around the office. "Where's Dr. Rush?"

"I banished him to the garage. If he's found anything to write with, he's probably doing equations on the walls out there."

"Man likes his math."

Belle touched the open book on the desk. "It's how he understands the world around him. We all have those particular things that help center us, gives us that way of reconciling events that happen to us."

"What's yours?"

Belle looked up at Emma and saw a pleading look in her eyes. The poor woman had been dumped into a world that went against everything she had believed to be true. She went from a foster care throw away to the savior of an entire town overnight. She was a loner when she rolled into Storybrooke and now she had a son and parents, all of whom wanted a piece of her heart. Belle understood that, that lost feeling of being in a world that always felt off kilter. Rum had been her stabilizer in this strange new world. Now she would have to go back to her original comfort.

"Books. Sometimes it's nice to get lost in another world with a different set of problems that always get resolved at the end."

Emma gave the law books a cursory glance before wrinkling her nose. "I'm not much of a reader. I'm more of a punch-the-problem-in-the-face kind of girl."

"You get that from your mother, so I hear."

The Sheriff sat down on a antique settee that had been placed under a bay window. "I just brought Henry over but didn't want to go far just in case..."

"That's understandable." Belle joined her on the small couch. "I know Bae appreciates you doing this."

Emma was strangely quiet, weaving her fingers together and loosening them once more. There was something, more than just having the weight of saving a world on her shoulders that was causing her to fidget the way she was. Belle had watched Rum's fingers dance through thin air whenever he was disturbed over something.

"So what is it exactly that you need to find that grounding for right now?"

Emma's eyes were fixed on a spot on the carpet. "Everything, I guess."

Belle bit back a sigh. "Not talking about what exactly is bothering you isn't going to help the matter."

"Yeah, well, you're going through your own stuff right now."

"If it makes you feel any better, I would prefer to deal with your problems than mine right now."

They sat in silence for a few more minutes until Emma stood up and started for the door. At first Belle thought that she was just going to leave but then the door shut with Emma leaning against it. Even with her forehead pressed against the door, Belle could still hear Emma's whispered admission.

"I'm scared."

"Of what exactly?"

Emma pushed herself away from the door and started pacing around the room. "I'm scared of letting people down, of losing Henry, of not being able to connect with my parents the way they want to connect with me." She paused, tightened her jaw and closed her eyes. "I'm scared of...of Ben."

Belle sat up straight, slightly alarmed at the confession. "Scared of him?"

Emma rubbed her forehead. "No, not scared of him. Scared of...the idea of him. Of him being Henry's father and in our lives now. Scared of what that means."

"You still love him."

Emma looked up at her with a mix of denial, anger and finally, hopelessness. "Shit."

Belle understood the sentiment. She stood up and went over to Emma, folding her arms around the taller woman. "Love is frightening because it is something that needs to be fought for. There are always obstacles. There are always challenges. But they are less scary when you let other people help you over come them."

"Is that what you told Gold?"

Belle could feel hot tears on her neck and bare shoulder and she was sure Emma could feel her own tears on her neck. "I tried but he didn't listen." She pulled back from Emma and gripped her shoulders as tightly as possible. "You listen. Please, listen."

Emma swallowed her tears and set her mouth in a firm line. "I'll try."

Belle gave her a hard look and that set line wavered into a slight smile.

"I will. I will listen."

Belle stepped back, tears still falling down her cheeks. "Good."

Emma went back to settee and dropped unceremoniously against the side. Henry and Bae's laughter drifted up the stairs and into the room. Belle wiped her tears away and went back to the open book on the desk. Her eyes skimmed over the words and she started to close the book when something caught her eye. A law concerning mothers and she smiled.

"I think I know what Rum wanted to see happen to Cinderella."

Emma gave her a slightly nervous look. "Oh yeah?"

Belle picked up the law book and read directly from it. "If a woman, who is a mother, commits murder due to a confirmed belief that her child is in danger, a judge is allowed to dismiss the charges if he or she sees fit." Belle lifted up the page marker that was used in the book and scanned over the circled part of the contract. "This is the contract that Ashley Boyd signed to give up the child. There's a clause in here stating that the home the child could be placed into did not have to pass a home inspection of the state. Certainly sounds like something a mother could see as dangerous."

"Are you okay with that? Letting her go free?"

Belle closed the law book and set it on the desk. "He never would want a parent separated from their child so yes, I'm okay with that."

Emma nodded. "I'll get in touch with the DA first thing tomorrow and see how quickly we can get this through."

"Good."

"Belle?" Emma patted the space next to her. "Why don't you tell me a little more about who Gold was?"

Belle smiled and took her place next to Emma on the small couch. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "Once upon a time, there was little sea side village that was under attack by Ogres..."