Far too dangerous- part 2
HannahM asked for a oneshot of a sequel to Ch950 "Far too dangerous" (thank you for giving both the chapter # and name, much appreciated) where Emma pays Grumpy a hundred bucks to say she's with him and goes after the guy. She's gone for seven hours so Charming fills Snow in, they get a babysitter and go to Grumpy. He tries to cover for Emma before Snow says he's disappointed in him he caves. Snowing find Emma just as she is handcuffing the guy. Both parents are furious because her shirt is ripped and she has a scratch on her face. Again, trigger warning of minimal mentions of rape.
Charming tapped his foot impatiently against the floor as he checked his watch for the seventeenth time in five minutes.
"Emma's going to have a real headache in the morning if she's been having a drink with Grumpy for seven hours." Snow sighed, checking the clock on the wall. "I can't believe she hasn't called herself to let us know she's ok. That's unlike Emma."
"I don't think she's with Grumpy." Charming admitted. Snow turned and looked at him. Only now could she notice that he was hiding something.
"Spill." She said firmly. She didn't like secrets involving the children. Charming then explained the whole situation with Mike Foster and the deal he had made with Emma about needing a witness to prove she wasn't going after him again. She had obviously used the deal against him. Snow looked totally and utterly furious with him when he had finished. "And you didn't think I'd want to know my daughter was stupid enough to go after a suspected rapist alone?" She said spitefully.
"Oh I knew you'd want to know, but I didn't see the point in worrying you over it. As far as I was concerned the matter had been dealt with and I trusted our daughter to take on board what I had said and respect the rules. Apparently she's sneakier than I gave her credit for. Takes after her bandit mother."
"Need I remind you of the situation with Excalibur? Anyway, there's no time for us to bicker. God knows what could be happening. I swear down if he's laid so much as a finger on her…"
"Then we'll both beat him to a bloody pulp. Come on, first we need to drop Neal off with Granny and Red. Then we need to check if Grumpy knows where she is."
Snow and Charming quickly deposited Neal with Granny and Red whilst they hunted Emma down.
It didn't take long to find Grumpy, sitting alone at the bar he was meant to be in with Emma. Seeing him sitting there alone had Charming seriously contemplating making Emma wear an ankle tag. His eyes widened when he saw Snow and Charming.
"Uh, hi guys. Emma's not feeling so good. I think she has gastroenteritis or something. She's been in the bathroom for ages…"
"Oh I see. Well that's a shame. I'll just go and fetch her and we'll take her home to look after her there…"
"Uh don't go in there sister!" Grumpy called after Snow. Snow stopped and raised an eyebrow at him, daring him to come up with a good reason. "Um it's not pretty in there. One of the barmaids came out gagging. She doesn't want anyone else embarrassing her like that. Just leave her. I'll help her home when she's got it out of her system…"
"Oh for Heaven's sake Grumpy we know she's not in the toilet." Charming snapped, becoming irritable under the circumstances. Didn't Grumpy realise how much danger Emma might be in? "Now where is she really? She must have given you a rough idea so you'd convince us to avoid there if we came looking for her."
"I honestly don't know. She just told me to give her the alibi so she wasn't found."
"Grumpy I'm very disappointed in you." Snow said, her tone conveying her emotion. "You're meant to be her godfather." Grumpy's whole face fell as he was reminded of that.
"Look, I'd imagine her and Hook are on his ship. That'd be where they'd get the most privacy. I wasn't mad keen on the idea either but I felt like she deserved a bit of a break."
"Hook?" Charming said. "She told you she was with Hook? No, Grumpy, she's not. She's off chasing down Mike Foster. Alone." Grumpy's face paled and he looked like he was going to be sick.
"I'm so sorry. I had no idea. If I had known of course I'd have never let her go."
"Looks like she's juped all of us. We need to go find her before something serious happens." Charming pulled Snow to her feet and the pair of them sprinted out of the room, ready for a wild goose chase if necessary.
It took them half an hour before they caught sight of the cruiser. They immediately parked alongside it and looked around. Charming quickly spotted Emma with Mike. She had him pushed up against a wall and wash putting the handcuffs on him, by the looks of it pretty tight.
"Emma!" Charming called out. Emma pulled Mike away from the wall and started walking towards them. Snow and Charming both gasped. Her shirt had a good few buttons ripped off revealing the bra underneath. There was also a thin gash on her cheek going from the corner of her eye to her chin. Neither stopped to notice how battered and bruised Mike's face was. As they reached her Charming shrugged off his jacket, draped it over Emma's shoulders and took Mike off her, slamming him against the cruiser.
"You think you're going to weasel your way out of this one, huh punk?"
"I might sue for police brutality." He muffled through a swollen lip.
"You lay your hands on my daughter as well as those other poor women. You ain't seen no police brutality yet…"
"Dad, just leave him. He never did anything, I stopped him before he could. I found out had been keeping a close eye on Delia Kanter so I bribed Grumpy into covering for me and I followed them. Just as well I did. But now with my testimony this creep is going behind bars where he belongs.
"Yes and you could have got yourself hurt in the process." Charming said sternly as he shoved Mike into the back of the cruiser and slammed the door. "If you had a lead and you didn't want to miss it you should have called me for backup and you know it. Give me the keys to the cruiser. Your mom will drive you home in our car. I'll handle Mike from here." Emma could see she wasn't getting much choice so handed her dad the keys. Charming got into the front and rode off with Mike leaving Snow and Emma alone together.
"Don't ever do that to us again." Snow said, sounding hurt. "Do you have any idea how scary it was? Seeing you there with your shirt ripped and a scratch down your face? Speaking of which…" Snow tilted Emma's head so that it was in the light to get a better look. "It doesn't seem deep, I don't think you'll need stitches. What you will need is a good book or stash of magazines because you are totally grounded."
"Excuse me?" Emma spluttered. "I am a thirty year old sheriff! You can't ground me!"
"Wanna bet we can't?" Snow challenged her. "Some bozo tries to…I can't even bring myself to say it, anyway, you think we're letting you out alone after that? You might be an adult, Emma. But we're still your parents and it's always going to be our job to protect you. I keep telling you- get used to it. Now get in the car. We're going to pick up your brother and go home. You can call Grumpy tomorrow and apologise for lying to him." Emma sighed and grumbled under her breath but got into the passenger seat of the car. She often wondered if other cops got this much agro from their parents.