You and Tequila

Chapter Eight

"Uh, hey."

"Hey," Emma drawls, inspecting the disheveled black tresses, to the woman's flushed cheeks, down to the faint smudge of scarlet staining her collarbone.

Her heart sinks.

"We were just...going over some new songs-"

This woman hardly is granted the opportunity to defend her actions before Regina steps behind her, her fingers curling around the door and losing all color when she finds a blushing Emma Swan.

"Milah, there's no need to justify your presence to my staff," she coldly remarks.

Her stomach twists.

"Right. Well, have a nice night," Milah seductively tosses over her shoulder as she slips right passed the makeup artist who has yet to even blink.

As Milah saunters away from Emma and down the hallway toward her own hotel room, Regina is slowly closing the door in Emma's stunned face. But before the door inevitably vanishes Regina from Emma's existence, she kicks her foot forward and wedges it securely between the frame.

"Miss Swan," Regina growls in a warning that Emma comprehends all too well; she better move her damn foot or Regina will cut it right off.

"Regina, wait."

"Contrary to what you may believe, I do not owe you an explanation for my actions," she declares, slamming the door harder against Emma's foot, causing her to wince.

"I...will you just let me in?" Emma exasperates, bumping her shoulder into the door against Regina's strong hold. "We need to talk."

"There's nothing to discuss."

Emma sighs, her patience slowly slipping through her fingertips, but she came here for a reason and she will be damned if Regina bullies her once again. Even though there's an unfamiliar twinge settling in her gut that she is not very fond of. Not to mention the blaring alarms shrieking in her mind that she needs to run very far away from this woman before the singer flips her entire world upside down.

"Please, Regina," she grunts through her clenched jaw as she rams her shoulder into the door once again.

Regina exhales her annoyance and quickly steps back, allowing Emma to stumble recklessly into the room. Much to her own surprise, she somehow finds her footing instead of face planting directly at Regina's feet.

"What do you want?" Regina vacantly inquires, sashaying those voluptuous curves away from the door and disappearing into her bathroom.

Emma observes right away that Regina is in the same outfit she was in earlier, but she has her suspicions about what went on in this room before her arrival. She doesn't trust the calm and put together appearance Regina is portraying at the moment.

"Umm," she stammers as she tries to scrape the back of her mind for a sentence to begin this terrifying conversation. She softly closes the door behind herself and takes one steady breath. "So, Milah...huh?"

It's not at all what she had meant to say. In fact she rolls her own eyes at the stupidity and mentally kicks herself. She has no control over her mouth because the second it pops open, her true intentions spew out like poison. A poison that unknowingly crawled into her body, inflicted her blood and spread like the vile evil that it is.

"As I previously stated, my personal life is none of your business," comes cruelly behind the bathroom door that's slightly ajar.

Emma swallows her pride because even though Regina is acting all cold and distant right now, Emma knows in her heart something is shifting between them. She has to dig deep and unbury whatever is being securely hidden, because if she doesn't, there is no way she will survive the rest of this tour without suffering from a psychotic episode.