Author's note: First I updated my other story, and now this one. Guess I'm on a roll this week...

Chapter 3

Emma was halfway to the station when she spotted his car. It was heading in the exact opposite direction from her parents' apartments, thereby extinguishing any hope she had left that Killian had not been lying.

Before she could second guess herself, she was turning her car around, the tires squealing as she wove expertly into the line of cars heading in the opposite direction. She kept her eyes narrowed on the back of his car, the black standing starkly out against the sunny morning, irony that was not lost on her.

Just another perp. I am just tailing another random perp.

He took a right and drove further down the road, never stopping to check his rearview mirror. When she'd first taught him to drive, he'd been aghast at the notion of needing to watch out for other drivers.

"But Swan!" He'd protested. "A good captain should have full command of the seas before him."

"Not when this so called captain shares the road with about a hundred other drivers."

Emma smiled briefly at the memory, the sun peeking out from behind a line of dark clouds, before she was reminded of what exactly she was doing and why.

The laughter they'd shared filled her mind for a moment.

What happened with us?

She barely noticed that he was pulling into the parking lot of the inn portion of Granny's, barely stopping her car before she would've barreled into his. Granny's? What was he doing there? Although he'd stayed in a room there previously, he'd moved back into the Jolly Roger soon after Ursula retrieved his ship.

Emma knew what a secret rendezvous at a motel meant, of course. But while her eyes drank in the sight of him exiting his car and pulling open the door to the inn, her mind refused to reach the same level of comprehension, stalling in the mud as she stared, hard, at the sight unfolding before her.

Killian hated what he was doing.

Lying to her, that is. He hated that he had to create such ridiculous stories, ones he knew were rather insulting, as Emma Swan was nothing if not smart.

He tried to tell himself that it would be worth it, that once he saw the look on her face, all of the lies and the sneaking around and the mysterious phone calls would instantly become very clear.

But a small, niggling voice inside reminded him with each passing second that things could go very, very wrong, as they had before.

He couldn't just sit around on his ship, where all he could see, all he could hear, was Emma's angry voice, her hurt expression, and finally the way she'd left in a hurry, her heavy footsteps echoing on the deck above. No, he needed to leave, find someplace else to decompress and plan his next move.

So he found himself in the library, with only a vague, rum tainted idea of how he'd ended up there. The long stacks of books that loomed before him as he sat against the wall, sipping from his flask some more, seemed to calm him. All those books, they represented years upon years, centuries upon centuries, of lives, histories, and stories that had existed. He was but a small blip on that scale.

Gazing on the shelves, he had the strangest thought that compared to everything that these books stood for, his fight with Emma was nothing. Surely he could deal with that.

But it wasn't nothing. Emma was everything to him, and he was at an utter loss.

Footsteps, light and far different from Emma's angry ones, sounded on the floor, and suddenly the lights flickered on.

"Oy!" He protested, automatically covering his eyes with his arm. "Turn the bloody lights off."

Belle clucked her tongue. "I thought I saw you come in here."

"Yes, well, it isn't illegal."

"No." She agreed. "But you looked like you had something on your mind, so I followed you in here."

"I'm fine." He said. "Just needed a quiet place to enjoy my rum."

"Really, is that all?" She teased lightly, crouching down next to him. "Is everything alright?"

"Of course." He responded. "Don't I look as devishly handsome as always?"

"Not sure how to answer that, but I'll tell you this. You look like you could use someone to talk to."

"I don't."

Belle studied his face for a long moment. "Trouble with Emma?"

"Aren't you quite perceptive." He said, irritated.

She shot him a sympathetic look, and suddenly he found himself blurting out the entire story of what had happened, mildly surprised at how easy it was to tell her.

(But then again it wasn't as if he had dozens of friends, and he couldn't exactly tell David, and could hardly imagine himself repeating this story to Leroy).

"…and she just bloody left." He finished. "And I haven't a single clue as to how to fix this. I don't even know what made her so angry."

"Well," Belle began. "I do know that objects such as keys or a drawer are not simply what they are." When he fixed her with a raised eyebrow, she continued. "I mean yes, a key is a key, but it's about what they represent."

Before she could explain further, he'd already figured out her meaning. "A commitment."

She nodded. "And the fact that Emma seems reluctant to exchange that with you suggests-"

"I know." He interrupted. "I know." He sighed. "I've always been so careful not to push her into doing things she isn't comfortable with."

"It wasn't your fault. You didn't know. And perhaps this was an especially sensitive topic for her." Belle added.

"How am I supposed to avoid this in the future if she isn't so keen on sharing everything?"

"Hmm." Belle paused as she considered this. "I'm not too sure. But I think Rumple may be able to help." Before he knew it, she had dragged him onto his feet and began to lead him out of the library.

Rumplestilskin? As he followed Belle outside, he was filled with doubt. How could his longtime enemy help him with this?

But desperation lead one to do the unthinkable, he figured.

Should she go through with it? Every instinct in her was telling her to run, run as fast as she could. Her fingers were itching to reach for keys and just drive. She could be in any random city by sundown, where she could start her new anonymous life.

But it wasn't like she could just drop everything and run as she had done so many times before. She had a family now. A kid who depended on her, and parents who would do anything for her. The thought of leaving them behind? Well she didn't think she could make herself cry on the spot. Guess she'd been wrong.

Besides, if she left it would mean he'd win. And if there was one thing Emma hated, it was to admit defeat.

She leaned back in her chair and twirled her pen between her fingers. Yes, this is just another game. She mused to herself. Just another dirtbag I need to outsmart.

Except that it wasn't.

Author's note: A hotel room?! What could that mean?

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