#Neal hides it well but he's actually pretty fragile and soft

[thejollyroger-writer]

To Serve and Protect - Chapter 6

a/n: this chapter took way longer than anticipated, but y’all have been so incredibly patient with me and my new lovely daughter, so I’m very proud to finally bring you this chapter, which -- as a surprise to us all, myself included -- is actually not the last. 

SUMMARY: Detective Killian Jones has been investigating a stalker-turned-murderer for months by the time he goes home from the bar with Emma Swan. But when he thinks he sees the very man in question outside her apartment, can he separate his feelings for her and his need to keep her safe?

TRIGGERS: well, this is a fic about a serial killer. mentions of violence and death, with some physical violence/whump. as always, if you need me to discuss this further for you to be comfortable, message me. – rated teen

Prologue // Ch. 1 // Ch. 2 // Ch. 3 // Ch. 4 // Ch. 5 // Ch. 6 on AO3

-- -- -- -- 

Henry is unsurprisingly quiet during their ride to the hospital. She tries to ask him about what happened, tries to get some sort of answer out of him, but he seems as nervous as she is, staying completely silent. 

When they pull up to the hospital, she only has more questions, because the parking lot is filled. 

With police cars. 

More police cars than she thought Storybrooke had, honestly. 

Because they’re not all from Storybrooke, she realizes. Some of them are only marked “Maine State Trooper,” some of them from other towns Emma recognizes from around Storybrooke. And then, she sees one from Boston. 

What the hell happened here? 

She walks past them all, past the officers that line the hallways, both uniformed and not. Past Graham outside Killian’s hospital room. And right up to Killian, wide awake in his hospital bed. She’s glad he’s okay, glad he’s awake, but she also really wants to hit his arm, wants to find an outlet for her anger even though she knows it should be anyone but him. 

“What the hell, Killian?” she says, trying not to yell and not quite succeeding. “What the hell happened?” She closes the door behind her, stopping Graham from following her into the room. She can’t deal with Graham right now, can’t deal with anything until she can wrap her head around what happened. 

If that’s even possible.

Killian sighs, desperation in his eyes begging for her to come closer. “He showed up at the hospital, we think for Felix’s body, but he got here much too quickly if he came all the way from Boston, so now we’re thinking he must have been closer anyway and may have been a part of this whole thing from the start. Apparently he didn’t expect me to have protection, though, because I think his goal was to kidnap me, though it’s also illegal to bring a firearm into a hospital, no matter who your father is.”

None of what she just learned surprises her, but it also doesn’t change the question on the tip of her tongue: “Where is he? I want to see him.” 

Killian holds his hand out towards her. “Please, love, just… can it wait until tomorrow? Give everyone the night to figure out what the hell we’re going to do.” 

There’s something he’s not telling her. For a moment, her anger rages. All she wants to do is question him, ask him to explain what the fuck has been happening, but between Killian’s outstretched hand and the pleading in his exhausted blue eyes, she gives in and fills the rest of the space between herself and the hospital bed, her shoulders rising and falling with a slow breath. And then another. And then she meets his eyes, the same sparkling blue she remembers so vividly from the night they met. The same eyes that she has been drawn to since the first time she met them, and the same eyes that have, somehow, been honest with her the whole time. 

And this moment is no exception. 

“Do you think we could both fit on this stupid hospital bed?” he mumbles, pulling Emma down for a kiss. 

Finally — finally — she smiles. “I think we can at least try.” 

It takes a little finagling, but they figure it out well enough. They may not be comfortable, but they’re together. 

Safe. 

-- -- -- --

Killian had hoped that having the night to sleep would change her mind, but it doesn’t. Though they both wake up refreshed in the small space of the hospital bed, he can tell there’s a myriad of questions sitting on the tip of her tongue just waiting to come out. She sits silently outside while he gets his bandages changed, not forcing any of her questions on Graham, says nothing as the three of them make their way down to get breakfast, but their table is as far as she makes it. 

“I want to talk to him.” 

There’s no need for explanation. They both know exactly what she wants, but neither of them want to tell her that they’re not comfortable with it. 

“Emma,” he says softly, looking around the cafeteria before reaching across the table to cover one of her hands with his. “I don’t—” 

“Oh, come on,” she says, her voice filled with anger, not even letting Killian finish. “If nothing else, I deserve this. Felix killed people, tried to kill me, almost killed you. Felix never acted on his own, so this all has some connection to Neal and all I want to do is ask him why.” Finally, she notices that he’s shaking his head, and she turns to Graham, who can’t even bring himself to look at her. “Don’t deny me this. Please.”

“Listen, Emma, you don’t understand—” Killian tries, but Emma cuts him off again.

“Believe it or not, Killian,” Emma says, not even trying to hide the anger in her voice. “It’s not up to you.” She stands up angrily, almost toppling her chair to the floor. “I don’t need your permission to do anything, so whether you’re joining me or not, I’m going to talk to Neal.” 

In her storming away, she misses the glance Killian and Graham share, the screaming in Graham’s eyes, but his hand as it stops the elevator door from closing stops her rage in its tracks. 

“Emma, listen,” Graham says, stepping in the elevator beside her. 

But listen she doesn’t, rolling her eyes as Graham holds the doors open for Killian, moving much slower than usual with his IV attached. 

“I’m not taking no for an answer. I hope you know that. I hope you both know that.” 

“It’s more difficult than that. We have to—” Emma doesn’t miss the nervous way he gulps, the way his eyes never leave Killian once he comes into view, even once he steps into the elevator with them. “When we get back to Jones’ room, we have to talk about this.” 

“There’s nothing to talk about.” 

Killian reaches down to take her hand, which catches her off guard. 

But not nearly as much as when he speaks. 

“He’s dead, Emma.” 

She freezes. Every muscle in her body — her heart — even the rushing of her blood through her body. Everything stops. Between Killian’s confession and the stopping of the elevator, she almost collapses. 

“You had to tell her here?” Graham asks, which only makes the world spin around her a little faster, and Killian must sense her unease, wrapping his arm around her waist and leading her out of the elevator. 

“She wasn’t going to stop arguing with us.” 

This… just makes her angry. This time, she does punch him in the arm. “Are you fucking kidding me? You’ve been keeping this from me? Both of you?” 

“I didn’t know how to tell you, love,” Killian tries, his voice soft as he reaches for her hand again. 

She doesn’t take it, crossing her arms over her chest. “That’s not an excuse. You could have told me. You could have told me on the phone when you called, you could have told me when I got here, or at any point this morning, and you decided not to.” 

Neither of them have anything to say, apparently, silently walking down the hospital hallway on either side of her. 

Rightfully, she’s angry. That’s an understatement, really; she’s far more than angry, a whole slew of emotions that she’s so overwhelmed by that she can’t possibly articulate them all. Even she doesn’t notice the tears streaming down her cheeks until she sniffles, which catches the attention of the men flanking her who, until now, were trying to avoid turning their attention to her. 

“Swan,” Killian whispers, trying to wrap his arm around her waist, but she shakes her head.

“I can’t—” she starts, pushing his advances away, and she speeds up her walk to move ahead of them. “I just need some space.” 

It’s the last thing she wants, really, to be alone, but she knows that she needs space from the two of them. There’s a possibility that she’s never been more angry in her life, even with the man who sent her to jail for his own crimes — a man who is now laying on a slab in the morgue in the basement of the hospital. 

A man whose death should not have been hidden from her. A man whose death she definitely should have been told about instead of lied to, treated like a child, too fragile to know the truth. She needs to talk to someone, someone she trusts, someone she can vent to knowing that she won’t be judged for being angry at Killian and Graham, because she knows they were doing what they thought was best for her, whatever kind of masculine, overprotective bullshit that is. She needs—

She raises her eyes from the ground, taking her anger out on the door at the bottom of the stairs and out into the lobby, and finds the answer standing by the exit, arms crossed over his chest as he stares out the front window. 

“David?”��

He turns around, eyes wide as if seeing Emma is the last thing he expected. But then he smiles, and she feels a little better already, some of the weight somehow lifted off her chest. “Hey, Em.” 

“What are you doing here?” she asks, though the answer is pretty obvious.

“I decided to come down and check on you, see how everything is going.” 

“And you’ve just been… standing by the window, hoping that I come downstairs?” She manages a half-smile, even with the anger that’s still surging through her veins. 

David, of course, laughs at this, leaning back against the large window. “No, no, I called Graham when I got here and he said you were on your way down anyway.” 

This makes her smile grow a slight but barely noticeable amount. “That… makes much more sense.” 

“So, tell me, what’s going on? What happened last night?” He wraps his arm around her shoulder, but all Emma can do is shake her head. 

She just needs to get out of the hospital for a bit, away from the sickening antiseptic scent and the headache-inducing phosphorescence and the thought of what happened here the night before. “Can we get out of here? Even just outside?”

David pushes no further, agreeing immediately with a vigorous nod. “Of course. I hate hospitals. Let’s go grab a coffee down the block.” 

At this, Emma finally feels relieved enough — relaxed enough — to actually smile at her brother, especially once they are through the doors and out into the fresh morning air. 

At first, she says nothing, not even sure where to start, or how to say the words she knows she has to say. But David doesn’t push her, just walks slowly beside her with his hands in his pockets and his eyes turned down save a patient glance at her every few steps. 

Until, finally, the silence and the words racing through her mind get the best of her, and she has to let them out before she explodes. 

“Neal showed up at the hospital last night,” she says, refusing to raise her eyes from the pavement. “Graham said he was probably here for Felix’s body as his next of kin, but he showed up much too fast to have been in Boston, so they think he was here already. But instead of going to the morgue, he tried to attack Killian, which didn’t go over too well considering he’s a police officer and was guarded by the entire Storybrooke force, plus a few troopers that Graham called in for back up.” 

The words stop as David holds open the door to the small cafe, unsure whether she should continue now that she could be overheard by another patron. But the only other patrons are two state troopers sitting in one corner, their hushed words shared as whispers as they both lean across the table between them; and Lily, the barista, who takes out her headphones when she notices the door has opened again. Emma pauses the story as they order their drinks, waiting until they are seated together at the opposite end of the room as the troopers to continue — and to say the words that she finds lodged in her throat when she is ready to start again. 

“They shot him. Killed him. Graham said he came armed, which was really a stupid decision on his part, to bring a gun into a hospital filled with cops, and normally I would be surprised that he made a mistake that stupid, though I can only imagine how off the rails he went when he learned Felix was dead. And that’s assuming he’s anywhere near as level-headed today as he was when I knew him, which I seriously doubt.” 

“Oh, Em,” David says softly, reaching across the table to rest the tips of his fingers on her arm. 

Surprising even herself, she manages a small laugh under her breath as she shakes her head. “But that’s — that’s not even the worst of it.” Until the words start pouring out of her mouth, she wasn’t even convinced that she was going to share this part with David, but once they start, she is both unable and unwilling to stop them, hoping that letting everything out at the same time will aid in her feeling better. “They lied to me about it, hid the truth from me until this morning. Both of them, Graham and Killian. Graham told me he was there, but it wasn’t until just a few minutes ago, really, that they decided to finally tell me the truth, the whole story, the fact that he’s dead. Killian didn’t even sound convinced that he wanted me to know in the first place, just kept refusing when I asked to talk to him.” 

She hangs her head in defeat, in anger, trying to keep everything from rushing back over her all at once. Takes a sip of her hot chocolate. Waits for David to find some sort of response, to analyze and rationalize all the information she just laid on him the way he always seems able to do — she can tell by the low knit of his eyebrows, by the slow scratching of his left hand through his three-day scruff while his right index finger taps against his coffee cup. 

“I know that anything I say will just be something you’ve already told yourself through your anger over all of this: that they were just trying to protect you, to keep you calm and free from worry—” 

She almost feels bad, cutting him off, because he has always been the most level-headed and the calmest of them all, and this situation has already proven no different. “I would have been far less worried if they told me he was dead instead of leading me to believe he was locked in the single Storybrooke jail cell, which he certainly would have viewed as a joke after the cells and prisons he’s found his way out of his whole life.” 

At first, David just nods. He knew this, too, of course. “Well, I don’t have to tell you that Killian cares about you. Graham, too, though in more of a sisterly way. And they don’t know Neal and his history the way you do, so they probably thought that it would be easier for you to learn that he was dead after you got some rest, especially after the stress of last night.”

She sighs, taking another sip of her hot chocolate. Because he’s right. Of course he’s right, it really isn’t that much of a surprise. “So, what am I supposed to do?” she whispers, her eyes turned down to her mug. “I just stormed out on them, and now I’m just supposed to go back like that never happened?” 

In place of an answer, David wets his bottom lip, his eyebrows high on his forehead. Emma already knows the answer. 

Now she just has to go do it.

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#my writing #wordsbymeganmichael #cs fics #the detective fic #to serve and protect #sooo much dialogue #and some feelings #and HOPEFULLY the real penultimate chapter #but I guess we'll see.