Outlaw Queen Shorts

Can't Help Falling in Love With You

Authors note:
First, because a lot of you wanted more of both the first dates thing I wrote a while back, and the parent/teacher au I did, in the next few weeks I'm going to be developing them both into multi-chapter fics, so look out for those!

I've been listening to old Elvis songs and I had a craving for the missing year, hence this piece was born.
I appreciate all your votes and comments, it means the world! Enjoy, folks :)

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Take my hand,
Take my whole life too,
For I can't help,
Falling in love with you...

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There's a change in her. It's subtle, something the untrained eye wouldn't see, and if she's honest, Regina can't quite pin it down herself. She feels it though, this lightness that manages to lift her up like she's walking on top of a cloud. It's wrong of her because she should still be grieving Henry (she is, she thinks of him every single day, wishes she could tell him how much she loves and misses him) but when her eyes betray her and find their way back to the thief she's come to think of as hers, everything else falls away.

His footsteps echo faintly from the corridor outside her chambers - she knows it's him, no one else travels this far west in the castle - just loud enough to have her heart rate picking up and a smile tugging desperately at the corners of her mouth. She pushes it down, suppresses the utterly childish grin threatening to give her away.

A knock against the wooden door cracks the facade she used to fight so hard to keep up around him and when she swings open the doors with a flick of her wrist, he's there, the moonlight filtering through from the balcony to bounce off his chestnut brown hair. His eyes reflect the flickering candles fitted to the fixtures on the walls, making it look like they contain their own flame, and he seems to radiate a contagious energy which she wants to soak up.

"Milady," God, that voice, like the rustle of a willow tree in a spring breeze, it fills her up and weaves around her bones, comforting, familiar.

"Two visits in one day?" Her tone is airy, nonchalant, and completely useless against the defiant smile which spreads over her cheeks at his low chuckle.

"I just can't seem to keep away." Robin steps towards her as he speaks, finally coming within arms length of her and drawing her into him by the hip. The silky material of her nightgown rumples under his fingers when they splay against her warm skin. She tilts her head, admiring the shadows cast over his face in the dim light, the way his dimples fall further into his cheeks after the sun drifts behind the hills.

Regina doesn't know when it happened. She thinks maybe it was there all along, and it only took that one argument ending in a passionate locking of lips to bring her feelings to the surface. Now their barbed tongues are saved for council meetings and forest patrols, nothing but a show to cover the lingering traces of the nights before when lazy smiles and tangled limbs take centre stage.

His touch is so gentle as he runs fingers down her arm and lifts her hand, pressing his palm to hers before twining their fingers together. Eyes brilliantly blue drop their gaze to her lips, she licks them reflexively, and he swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing. There's a bubble around them, palpable, keeping their secret safe from the outside world.

"Regina," Robin's voice is husky, but still loud in the otherwise silent room, her name on his tongue suddenly the only sound she cares about. The only sound with enough substance to drown out the thudding of her heart, so loud he must be able to hear it bounce off the flagstones. 

She can't take her eyes off his lips.

And then, as if it's the last thing he'll ever do on earth, he steps further into her space and captures her lips, teeth scraping, tongues sliding, and hands tangling into her hair. She is alive with his touch. Minutes pass with hands mapping the surface of silk and cotton, fierce exchanges of nipping and sucking lips until they're swollen and a deep shade of pink.

There's a moment when they break apart, a split second in which Regina nearly tells him, nearly lets slip the amount of raw emotion behind her kisses. She has an inkling he knows, that he can feel it in the languid movements of her mouth on his, how her hands fist his shirt and nails scrape his skin. But for the smallest of instances, she almost allows herself to tell him.

"Robin, I--"

She bites her tongue then, panting with mussed hair and wild eyes, dark with desire. He loves her eyes, he's told her, the way they can change shade depending on her mood and she's suddenly aware of every flicker of his gaze over her face, considering, searching. His thumb comes up and presses against her lips. The tingle from his skin sends a shiver down her spine.

"I know."

It's enough.
For now, for both of them, it's enough.