Belle held the gun steady—steadier than she'd held the keys last night while locking up the shop door. "Lie down, Keith."
"Bitch," he said. "You invited me up here, remember?"
"And now I'm inviting you to lie down. Or get shot. How many bodies do you think Rumple buried in the basement?" None, so far as she knew. But, there was no reason to tell Keith that. He lay down on the floor.
"Hands behind your head," Belle ordered. "And spread your legs." Positioned like that, it would take two motions instead of one to get to where he could stand up.
That wasn't how Keith saw it. "Knew you liked the rough stuff," he said smugly.
Belle fought the urge to just shoot him. "I know how to handle prisoners," she said. After all, she'd been one for thirty years, first in Regina's tower, then in Regina's asylum.
And she was sick of it. Sick of people like Regina and Keith dismissing her, treating her like nothing. "Do you know what was the worst thing when Rumple tortured someone?" she said. 'Someone' meant Robin of Locksley, but she wasn't telling the Sheriff of Nottingham that. "It's the blood. Do you have any idea how much laundry I had to do when that happened? Do you know how long it took to get those stains out?" All the anger and the frustration and the fed-up impatience she felt with everyone who thought they knew how she should be living her life came boiling out at a man who still didn't take her refusal seriously even when she was pointing a gun at him, ready to shoot. "At least Rumple had potions that could remove bloodstains. Have you EVER tried to get blood out of clothes in this world? And in our world, before I came to Rumple's castle, it was even worse. She was thinking of the Ogre Wars and treating the wounded in the castle infirmary, but she hoped Keith was taking it to mean she was a psychotic serial killer with a collection of corpses worse than Regina's collection of hearts. "If I have to shoot you here, do you know how many HOURS it will take to get your blood out of the carpet? Have you ever TRIED to scrape dried brains off a wall? I am SICK and TIRED of cleaning up after everyone in this town! Do you understand me!?"
Keith made a whimpering noise. Belle realized her hand was beginning to tighten around the trigger. It would be so easy. . . .
No. Even Rumple, for all his anger and threats and the Dark Curse inside him, had been able to keep himself from killing Robin—a man who'd broken into his home, threatened him, and tried to shoot him. For all his show of torturing him—and for all the aprons Belle had had to clean—Robin had walked away without so much as a limp the moment Belle let him go. Outside the castle, he'd made such good time, it had taken Rumple's carriage hours to catch up.
If the Dark One could hold back, then so could she.
Belle took a ragged breath, trying to regain some control. She had to call someone. Probably the sheriff. She wondered what Emma would think when she came. If she could be bothered to come. If she didn't have something more important to do.
And, what if Hook came with her? He always seemed to be luring in Emma's shadow these days. He'd be on Keith's side. How long before he started telling Emma Belle must have lured Keith up here. She'd asked him to the house, after all. She'd invited him into this room and given him a drink. How long before Emma was convinced Belle was the one to blame? After all, what was she? The Dark One's wife, the woman who'd seen the truth about Rumplestiltskin and married him anyway.
She wanted to call Will. If nothing else, he could throw Keith out while she held onto the gun. But, she hadn't gotten his number. There was no way to get ahold of him. Calling the sheriff was her only choice unless she really did want to bury Keith in the basement.
Too much work, Belle told herself, moving towards the phone.
That was when the door to the house was kicked open.
X
The first sign Emma had that something was wrong with Notting was when he woke up, but no one expected a guy with a hangover who woke up in jail for a robbery he really couldn't remember committing (Emma's superpower didn't always work, but it kicked in loud and clear on that one).
And then there was the quick chat she had with Granny when she brought over lunch. Emma might have taunted a prisoner who really annoyed her with food once or twice (foster kids, especially ones who didn't always get their meals, picked up some bad habits about food), but the jail had an arrangement with Granny's when they needed meals brought in.
Ruby was the one who usually got sent, but Granny had decided she should do it. She didn't like Notting. She didn't go into why but, her eyes shining with a cold light that reminded Emma Ruby wasn't the only wolf in town, she'd said that she wasn't at all surprised to see him in a cell.
It was the conversation with Belle, though, that really got her thinking. Killian had been so cheerful every time he talked about Belle and Notting. According to him, Notting was everything Gold wasn't. Social, for example. He'd told her how Notting had lived in the middle of one of the larger towns in the old world. He'd had friends and coworkers, with a reputation that was known and respected for miles around. Notting had been given a royal appointment as the town's defender, that was how Killian had put it. He didn't say "Nottingham" and he didn't say "sheriff."
Will, by his own admission, was one of the guys who used to commit highway robbery, the literal kind. What he thought about local law enforcement wouldn't exactly be unbiased. If he kept a journal, Emma wouldn't be surprised to find out the page on her was covered with skulls and "DIE! DIE! DIE!" every place she got mentioned.
Belle, however, wasn't into highway robbery. She was a quiet, law-abiding librarian. It had taken less than a day of Belle knowing Will when he was sober to let him in the store and have him putting away magic supplies while seeing Notting was enough to make Belle lock the door and sleep in the back room.
Emma thought there was more to the story than that. She'd had a feeling Scarlet would have liked to tell her, sheriff or not, but Belle was somehow holding him back.
Emma thought over that meeting. There'd been something else that was off about it. It wasn't just that Will Scarlet, the professional thief, was the one wanting to spill all to local law-enforcement—the one Emma thought had been stopped from spilling all to local law-enforcement. There'd been something off, something about Belle. Will had seemed downright protective of her, and Belle. . . .
She'd only just met Will, but there was already something different about her. Belle had been burning the candle from both en—OK, bad metaphor. Belle had been wearing herself out since she'd had to take over for Rumplestiltskin and the fairies and all the other jobs that it seemed like only she could do. Emma could understand that. She was a sheriff and savior and magic student and half-a-dozen other things. They were all pushing themselves harder than they ought to. But, Belle was letting the pressure get to her a lot more than Emma was. Today was the first time in weeks Emma had seen her with her makeup up to its old standards. Maybe even a little beyond its old standards. She'd really piled on the foundation, which was funny because she really hadn't done much with her hair. Maybe she'd been interrupted or maybe—
Emma stopped, thinking it over again. A woman with too much makeup but who otherwise hadn't put too much effort into her appearance, a woman who seemed scared of a certain man—scared enough she went out of her way to avoid him.
And another man who wanted to talk to the cops, to get them to do something about it, but the woman stopped him.
No, that was the bail bonds person talking. That was the cynic who saw everyone as a criminal on the run, who saw every guy she met as a jerk who was just using her and the only question was whether or not she wanted to date him before he stabbed her in the back.
Killian liked him. She'd heard the truth in his voice when he said he thought Notting was good for Belle, that she deserved a guy like him.
But, people made mistakes. There were guys who had all their pals thinking they were the best thing ever who went home and beat their kids bloody.
Or their girlfriends.
She tried to talk about it to Killian when he came to bail Notting out, but he'd just smiled cheerfully. "Don't worry, love. Keith's a great guy. He's just what Belle needs."
"I think he should give her some space," Emma said. "Just for now. Until this burglary thing is cleared up." Cleared up. As if Notting had been caught jaywalking.
But, Tom Clark was already wavering on pressing charges. Yeah, his place had been broken into, but the guy had paid for what he'd taken. And he'd shown good taste in beer. Apparently, to a Dwarf, that covered a lot of sins.
"I'll talk to him," Killian promised. "Don't worry. I'll make sure he knows to treat her right."
He was telling the truth. So, why didn't Emma believe him?
Killian had taken Notting over to his place. When David saw Killian heading over to The Rabbit Hole later, Notting wasn't with him. Maybe he was doing the smart thing, Emma thought. Maybe he was laying low and giving Belle her space.
Emma tried to believe it. She really did. Then, she gave up and called The Rabbit Hole, asking if Killian Jones was there.
"Sorry," the bartender said. "He just left with a few of his buddies. Maybe they're heading over to Granny's? They said something about a merry man they had to meet. Robin's guys mostly drink at Granny's if they're not here or over at their campsite."
A merry man. Scarlet.
Don't be paranoid, Emma, she told herself. Killian didn't have any reason to go after Scarlet.
She headed out. She wasn't sure where Scarlet lived, but he'd been sticking close to Belle. Both Belle's library apartment, where she'd been living since Gold left, and the pawn shop were in the same general direction if you were heading over from The Rabbit Hole. She headed down the road, not sure what she was looking for or if she would recognize it when she saw it—
Until she saw the group of men heading down the alley.
Alarm bells were going off in Emma's head. She tried to tell herself there were all kinds of innocent reasons for a group of men to head down an alley. She just didn't believe any of them applied.
There was just her, she thought. One woman, one gun, and an erratic talent for magic .
At the very least, she didn't have to be stupid enough to jump right into the whole bunch of them. She knew this part of town pretty well. There was another alley not far from here. She could cut down it and come at them the other way where they wouldn't be expecting it.
It would also give her a chance to see if they were doing anything besides taking a shortcut or coming in the back door of a place one of these guys lived. Just because every instinct she had told her this was trouble didn't mean she was right.
For a minute, when she saw Scarlet holding Killian's own hook against his throat, she'd hoped he was the one in the wrong. OK, he was outnumbered, and the rest of those guys looked nasty. That didn't mean he had a good reason to be threatening Killian. Being outnumbered doesn't mean being right.
But, she got close enough to hear what they were saying.
"Where's Snotty?" Emma heard Scarlet demand. Snotty. That was his name for Nottingham.
"Wherever Belle is—or wherever he's taken her."
Wherever Belle is.
Emma remembered what Killian had told her. Don't worry. I'll make sure he knows to treat her right.
He'd been telling the truth, she just hadn't listened to what he was saying. Even now, she could see he was enjoying this. It should shock her. But, it didn't. She remembered when she'd first met Killian, the jokes he'd made about women—the jokes he'd made about what he'd like to do to her. She couldn't say she'd never seen this side of him before.
"So, where'd he take her?" Scarlet said. "And, if you don't want your hook buried in your throat, you'd better answer."
He meant it. She could hear it in his voice, the desperation, the anger. One wrong move, and Killian was a dead man.
Killian didn't hear it. He laughed as if Scarlet were just a kid acting tough. "No idea where he's gone, mate," Killian said cheerfully. "Doesn't matter. You won't find her." Then, he sniggered. Sniggered. As if this were a schoolyard joke. As if he weren't talking about a woman's life. "Not in time."
"She saved your bleeding life, and this is how you pay her back?" Scarlet said, asking the question Emma wanted answered.
This was wrong. It had to be wrong. In a minute, Killian would say something and she would understand what was really going on.
Instead, Killian's face flushed with anger. "Her," he growled. "Rumplestiltskin's pet. You think I needed help from her?Maybe Nottingham taking her down a peg will teach her a lesson."
Emma stared at him. She'd heard the gossip around town, how people said Killian was the one who'd stopped Gold, not Belle. She'd thought she'd understood where that was coming from. It wasn't like she'd lied about what happened when people asked her. She told them how she and Snow ran in and got caught in Gold's spell, unable to move. She told them how she could see Killian high above in the clock tower, standing by Gold, and how Belle had suddenly been there.
It made sense that people found it hard to believe. Belle looked like she couldn't win a fight with Sister Astrid. How were people supposed to believe she took down the Dark One? How were they supposed to believe it when she admitted Snow White, Warrior Princess, and Sheriff Emma Swan, aka, the Savior, had been stopped cold before they were through the door? Of course, they figured the clever pirate was the hero of the story. What else made sense?
She'd put it down to the way gossip went, people telling the story they wanted to hear instead of the one that really happened. She'd never thought maybe Killian was telling his own version of events.
Yeah, looked like the Storybrooke gossips weren't the only ones who only heard what they wanted to hear. Add Emma Swan to the top of that list.
Belle had saved Killian's life. And he couldn't forgive that.
Scarlet looked like he was having almost as much trouble hearing this as Emma was, but he stayed on subject. "You'd better pray he hasn't, mate. Where. Is. He?"
Killian laughed again. "Not telling."
He was enjoying this, Emma thought. A woman was going to be kidnapped and raped, by the sound of it, maybe even murdered. And Killian was enjoying it.
Emma drew her gun. "You won't tell him, Hook?" She'd avoided using that stupid, pirate name ever since they'd started dating. It didn't seem to fit. He wasn't like the stories, she told herself, he wasn't the cold-blooded pirate who talked about good form while murdering children. But, she'd been wrong. "Then you'd better tell me."
X
Emma thought Killian looked troubled but just for a minute. Then, he looked relieved—even smug. Anger overrode the sick, empty feeling inside her. He was so sure of himself, so certain he could twist her around his little finger (or his oversized fishhook).
He didn't even notice as his friends, seeing the sheriff with a gun added to the mix, cleared out. Unless they were planning on going through the back alleys and coming up behind Emma. Probably not. Emma didn't think they had the courage for it, but she changed position to where she ought to be able to see them coming and shoot in plenty of time. Unfortunately, it put her closer to Killian, who seemed to take it as a good sign.
"Swan!" he said, breaking out into a smile. "About time. Get this maniac off me, will you?"
Just like that. He expected her to forget what she'd heard, to act as if nothing happened. She remembered a girl she'd known as a teen, Lily, telling her she should be grateful Lily's lies and stealing had gotten Emma thrown out by a family she thought might actually want to keep her. Destroying somebody else's life didn't matter if it got Lily what she wanted.
Like Killian.
"What did you do to Belle?" Emma asked.
"What?" Oh, he really did do the wide-eyed, what-are-you-asking-me-for innocence well. "I didn't do anything! What are you—"
"I heard you, Killian. You weren't lying to Will. You sent Keith after Belle. Why? What's he going to do to her?" Like she needed to ask to know the answer to that one. No, what she needed was to hear him answer.
"Nothing. Just a good time. I told you, he likes her. Belle's just uptight. That's all."
Emma stared at him. Nothing. Just a good time. Oh, she'd heard guys say things like that before. They heard a girl say "No," and told she was "just uptight." Emma had wound up breaking the arm of a guy who'd said that.
Scarlet was looking at Killian as though he had murder on his mind. The Knave answered Emma's question, not Killian. "Snotty—" Scarlet started to say, then corrected himself, so there wouldn't be any misunderstandings. "Notting tried to rape Mrs. Gold last night. That's where she got that bruise on her face, the one she was hiding under the makeup."
Rape. Bruise. As bald and simple as that. And the part he wasn't saying, Belle hadn't wanted to tell Emma any of this. Emma might not know everything that had been going on in Belle's head, but she could guess why: she hadn't thought Emma would believe—or wouldn't do anything if she had.
Emma looked at Killian, wondering if she had a point.
Killian's face didn't give anything away. There was no sign of fear or guilt—and no sign of surprise or shock. Nothing Scarlet said was news to him. But, that didn't mean Emma didn't have questions for Scarlet. Maybe this was still some crazy misunderstanding. "And how do you know this?"
Scarlet rolled his eyes. "How the bloody hell do you think? And, while we're standing around gabbing, he's making another go at it."
"Killian," Emma said. "Please, where is he? Tell me. You're better than this." Or she wanted him to better than this. She wanted him to make one last try at being better than this. "Where'd he take Belle?"
"Sorry, Swan," Killian said, and he really did sound sorry. But, Emma felt the lie behind it, and something inside of her seemed to break. "No idea." And that was the truth. He didn't know. There was nothing he could to help them find Belle in time.
X
X
Dark fury burned inside Rumplestiltskin, almost overwhelming him. But, killing Jones—or cursing him to exquisite tortures that would make Jones wish he'd killed him—wouldn't help Belle. If he killed the pirate, Emma would have to arrest him (or try to), wasting time. If he cursed Jones or used magic to escape after killing him, Miss Swan would know the Dark One was back. He would have to waste more time avoiding her or fighting her when he still didn't know where Belle was.
He hoisted Jones up, shoving him against the wall. The mask he'd made of Will carried memories of nimble fingers and light-handed tricks. As for Rumplestiltskin, his father had been a cardsharp and a sometimes pickpocket. The spinner might have followed an honest trade later in life, but Malcolm had seen to it his son had learned other skills early on in life. As a mere mortal, relieving Jones of his belt would have been easy enough. With a touch of magic, the leather flowed out of its loops like water.
Rumplestiltskin slid the leather tip back through the buckle, pulling it tight around Jones' good wrist. While Jones was still sputtering in outrage at Will liberating the belt, he reached into Jones' jacket pocket and pulled out his pocket knife (required issue in the king's navy, good to see the captain had held onto one good habit). A new belt hole had been added and the buckle's prong put through it before Jones could curse him for the theft.
Then, it was just a matter of tying up Jones properly. There was a sturdy looking lamp with an iron mounting hanging over one of the doors in the alley. It was high enough that, even with Will's greater height, he had to toss the other end of the belt over it, then catch the tip on the other side. But, the knot he made only required a few loops before pulling it tight, leaving it out of reach of Jones' best efforts to grab it.
Not that it would matter if he could. Rumplestiltskin wasn't the Dark One for nothing. The sheriff hadn't noticed his quiet use of magic, but Jones wouldn't get free until Rumplestiltskin decided he should. From the time he grabbed the belt to the time the knot was finished, it took perhaps six seconds, still more time than he had to waste.
All the same, he leaned in close, giving Jones one last warning. Maybe he'd even listen to it. There was a first time for everything, wasn't there?
His voice was as soft and as deadly as he knew how to make it. "If any of your friends come back and try to cut you down, tell them Will Scarlet's not known for his magic. But—" The words that followed were Will's, culled from his limitless knowledge of every action movie ever made, but the sentiments—those were Rumplestiltskin's. "What I do have are a very particular set of skills, skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If they leave you here, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for them, I will not pursue them. But if they don't, I will look for them, I will find them, and—" Will's humor and Rumplestiltskin's collided. He grinned the mad imp's grin, not caring what it looked like on the Knave's face. "I'll gut the entire pack of 'em. Like fish. Got that?"
Jones' eyes widened. Oh, yes, he recognized those words, even after three centuries. Not that he could be sure, could he? Not even with Will giving him that lunatic smile.
X
Scarlet had told Emma he was "bloody good" at his chosen line of work the first time she'd arrested him. She'd made a snide remark—OK, a lot of snide remarks—about the kind of thief who tried to rob a library before passing out in the middle of the job. Hey, she'd known there was more to it than that. Even if this hadn't been Storybrooke, she knew what it meant when a guy passed out drunk wrapped around the picture of a woman he'd known (since this was Storybrooke, it had been a picture of the Red Queen torn out of Alice through the Looking-Glass, but that part was barely worth noticing around here), not that he'd talk about it.
But, this was the first time she'd seen him in action. Killian's belt was off and he was being tied by it to door lamp before he or Emma knew what Scarlet was up to.
Then, being Will Scarlet, self-proclaimed Knave of Hearts, whatever that meant (but, if Emma had had a daughter instead of a son, she'd tell her to steer clear of anyone who picked that kind of job title), he leaned in close and, in as menacing a voice as he could manage, started quoting Taken.
"Are you done?" Emma asked.
"Depends," Scarlet said. "You got any idea how to find Mrs. Gold?"
Emma wracked her brain. Then, she remembered something David had told about when he'd needed to find Jefferson. If he'd been able to ask her, she'd have told him to draw a line between Jefferson's house and the house of a girl named Paige and start searching along it. But, since Emma wasn't around, he'd gone to Gold, and their resident Dark One had had an answer.
"There was a potion Gold had," Emma said slowly. "Put it on something someone owned, at it would lead you to him." She frowned. "We could break into his shop, I guess. But, I wouldn't know how to recognize it if I saw it." Belle would. But, if they knew where to find Belle, they wouldn't have a problem in the first place. "Maybe Regina. . . ?"
Scarlet reached in his pocket and pulled out a bottle. "You mean this stuff?"
Seriously? "Why are you carrying that around?"
Scarlet shrugged. "Mrs. Gold was trying to find a fairy she thought might not have gone into the hat," he said. "I went with her over to the convent. It looked dead useful, so I thought I thought I should hold onto some."
He was telling the truth, including the part about the fairy. Emma saw she was going to have to ask a lot of questions when she had the time. For now, she only asked one. "You stole it?"
"Nah, I wouldn't say steal it. More like maybe I forgot to ask to borrow it. The point is, I have it. What have you got of Keith's?"
"Uh . . . nothing. But, we could go to his place, and—"
Scarlet growled—really growled, like a bad tempered lion at the zoo. "That'll take too long. She could be dead, and we're—" He stooped, eyes went big. The answer, whatever it was, had hit him. "Bloody hell, I'm an idiot." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a twenty. "Get ready to run. These things move fast."
A twenty. Emma thought about Notting's wallet, empty except for some change, found outside the pharmacy this morning. "You robbed Notting?"
"Did I say that? Anyways, he's the Sheriff of Nottingham, I'm a merry man. It's in the bloody job description." While he was talking, he reached back into his pocket and pulled out what Emma first thought was string, but it turned out to be fishing wire. He wrapped it around the twenty in another, complicated knot and pulled tight. Then, still holding onto the wire, he put a couple drops of the potion on the money. The bottle vanished back into his pocket, while the twenty tried to fly away. Scarlet let loose more wire, like a long leash, running after it. "C'mon if you've a mind to," he yelled as he took off after it.
Her first priority was Belle and rescuing her. Like Scarlet, she was afraid they were running out of time.
But, she wouldn't have been Emma if she hadn't noticed things were getting weird. Even for Storybrooke. Again.
I'm running after a man who's taking his money—scratch that, somebody else's money—for an evening walk. On a leash. And we just left a one-armed pirate tied to a night-light.
The worst thing was she was beginning to forget this wasn't normal.
Cursing magic and fairytales, Emma ran after him.
X
His house. Rumplestiltskin's stomach fell to somewhere around his feet. His house. Nottingham had brought Belle to his house—the one place in this whole town—this whole world where Rumplestiltskin had vowed Belle should always feel safe.
He didn't bother with magic or tricks. He just kicked the bloody door in. No one in the front room. But—
He stopped, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. There were strips of cloth lying on the floor, bits of fabric that had been torn and cut to pieces.
There were spells that required odd bits of cloth, but this matched none of them. He tried to make sense of it. It was thin cloth, patterned. In their world, it took a special skill to spin thread that fine. In this world, it took factories with tons of machinery. He could think of dozens-no, hundreds of uses for cloth like that. None of them explained why it was lying by the doorway to his house. The frayed threads suggested it had been cut or torn. The pattern—
Gods. Oh, gods, no.
The pattern. Belle's blouse, the one she'd been wearing earlier today, had been this pattern. Someone—Nottingham—had taken it and cut it into strips. Bile burned at the back of his throat. He wanted to be sick. He wanted to take the cloth and burn it.
Meanwhile, the bill weaved and floated about, leading him on. He didn't have time to waste here. Belle, he needed to find Belle. The twenty-dollar bill led off to the side. His den. Nottingham had taken Belle to his den.
A list of reasons why Nottingham would have gone there flashed through his brain as he raced to the door. A small room, ground floor, easier to get a struggling victim there than to the bedrooms upstairs—easier and quicker. More time for him to hurt Belle. It was also towards the back of the house. If Nottingham had been worried about anyone looking in the windows or hearing the screams. . . .
Rumplestiltskin charged in, ready to tear Nottingham apart, and maybe the Savior, too, if she tried to stop him. Images from his nightmares flooded his mind. For years, he'd been haunted by dreams of Belle tortured and bloody at the clerics' hands; dreams of his first wife, Milah, and the brutal death Jones had promised her. Three hundred years of knowing Jones lied hadn't been enough to burn those visions from his mind. He burst into the room ready to see any or all of his nightmares come true.
Instead, he came to a screeching halt when he saw Belle pointing a gun at him.
X
Emma was having trouble keeping up with Scarlet. He should have been leaving a small trail of fire behind him, the way he was tearing through the town. When they reached Gold's house, Scarlet didn't slow down. He bounded up the stairs to the porch, three at a time, and kicked in the door.
Kicked it in. Nobody kicked in doors. No matter what every action movie ever made said, most doors weren't made to just snap open as soon as a shoe hit the wood.
Maybe it was some kind of magic, something Gold left behind if anyone came charging in like a lunatic to save Belle. Maybe it was something of Scarlet's, maybe this was what being a Knave was about.
Or maybe it was just something that happened when houses were put together by a curse that, deep in its heart, had really had a thing for over-the-top melodrama.
Emma, breathing hard, ran after him (she only managed two at a time on the stairs). She had her gun out, held down but ready. After all, no point in accidentally shooting the guy you were following, assuming you ever caught up with him.
This turned out to be a good thing, since she almost ran into Scarlet soon as she was through the door. Scarlet was standing still, sizing up his surroundings—No, she realized, not his surroundings. He was staring at some shreds of cloth on the floor. With a blank, almost stupid look on his face.
Emma knew that look. Your brain had all the pieces but it just didn't want to see what they added up to. She had to give Will this. It didn't hold him up for long. She'd managed to catch enough breath to try saying his name when the blood drained from his face. He looked at his magic bloodhound money and where it was trying to lead him. Then, he took off again. She didn't think he'd even heard her. He might not even remember there was a sheriff running after him.
And, that wasn't good. Because, when a woman's clothing has been torn to shreds by the man who kidnapped her, things were getting really bad. And Emma didn't want to arrest Scarlet for murder.
X
"Will?" Belle said. She lowered the gun but still held it ready, not sure if she believed what she was seeing. "Is it really you?"
Will nodded mutely. He let go of a bit of string, and something that looked like a quickly folded butterfly on a string floated away and settled on Keith.
Emma, red in the face and dripping sweat, came in after him, her own gun gripped tight in her hand. "Belle?" she said, as if she didn't quite believe it. "You all right?"
"Sheriff!" Keith yelled, looking up from the floor. "She's crazy! She lured me here and pulled a gun on me. You have to arrest her!"
"Save it, Snotty," Emma said. "Killian sold you out. I know all about what you were doing." She pulled out her handcuffs as talked, then walked over to Keith and cuffed him. "You have the right to remain silent," she told him. "If you choose not to exercise this right, anything you say can be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney—although I'm not sure we have any left in town, and you'd be safer on your own than with Gold if he shows up. Maybe we can do something over the internet. If you can't afford an attorney and if we can find one, we can see about getting one appointed for you. If you—"
"She brought me here!"
Belle was starting to shake. These were hard tremors, not the tired, frightened trembling from before. She put the gun down on the desk, afraid of it going off in her hands. Will was suddenly standing by her. He pulled his jacket off and slid it around her.
Uncertainly, as if he were afraid of touching her, he put his arms around her. It wasn't the way Keith touched her. There was no demand in it, no hunger from a man who saw her as nothing but a thing. Because of that, Belle leaned close against him. Will's arms tightened around her and, for a moment, she could imagine this was Rumple holding her. She could imagine she was safe.