Author's note: This is the English version of the German story with the same title which I started to publish roughly a week ago. Although translating is driving me nuts, I will continue doing so, posting the chapters in both languages - German followed by English. It will be interesting to find out which language serves better in telling the story. To everybody who understands both languages - let me know! To all the others - enjoy!

Disclaimer: The characters of Who's the Boss? don't belong to me, no copyright violation intended.

Chapter 1

Angela was sitting at the small kitchen table in front of her third cup of coffee and flipped listlessly through the paper. Fifteen minutes had been enough to peruse this fish wrap. No, you definitely couldn't compare the Branford Gazette to the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal, but in this one-horse town these papers weren't available until the following day and there really was nothing as boring as reading yesterday's paper. So, every morning she contented herself with these few pages, whose main headline for today was "Mayor's wife grew the hugest pumpkin".

"Oh gosh, I'm glad I don't have to live on without knowing this!" she exclaimed sarcastically. She folded the newspaper and shoved it away. She looked out of the window, took another sip of coffee, which had already become cold, and sighed. Another Monday morning to face with five odd days to follow. Five days Tony would be very busy and she would hardly catch any sight of him; five days which would drag on forever; five days with too much time for her to spend. How she dreaded those five days!

She had come to Iowa with so many hopes and dreams. After having graduated, Tony had desperately looked for a job in the Fairfield area. He had even applied as a driving instructor, only to be having something to do. But teaching positions were hard to find; especially as a history teacher, and especially at his age. He had become dissatisfied being unemployed for so long. His college years hadn't been easy; he had worked hard, he had tolerated his younger fellow students making fun about him, and he had still been Angela's housekeeper.

A lot had happened throughout his years as a student at Ridgemont College, but most of all he had met Kathleen who attended the same art class as he. After a late night learning session with their study group in a local motel, they had started kissing and had spent the night together eventually. Sneaking back into Angela's house the next morning, Tony felt like an unfaithful husband who had betrayed his wife, only that Angela hadn't been his wife and he hadn't been her husband. His relationship to Kathleen had almost destroyed everything that they had built up within the previous six years. They had become best friends, they had been living like a family along with Mona, Samantha and Jonathan. Neither of them could think of a life without the other any more. And over time they had realized that there was far more than just friendship between them. They had felt attracted to each other almost from day one, when Tony had moved into the house at Oak Hills Drive with Sam. All these years, the two of them had successfully suppressed their feelings - sometimes to a greater, sometimes to a lesser extent. They were too afraid that the failure of a romantic relationship would destroy their blended family inevitably. So for many years both insisted that they were only friends. It had taken Tony's relationship to Kathleen and Angela's short affair with Andy to knock some sense into their heads as to make them acknowledge the fact that they loved each other. So they had given their romance a go and after having some problems to adapt to the new situation at first, they had enjoyed their new relationship to the fullest.

Since then, Angela had been on cloud nine. She had loved Tony in secret for many years and had been longing to be together with him some day. For Tony, things had been more difficult. To be in a relationship with his boss had put his proud Italian ego to a test. His plan had been to graduate first before opening his heart to her, but then, all of sudden, he had been sitting in this swan in the love tunnel at the Brooklyn fair, and the fear of losing Angela forever had surpassed his concerns. He had to find a way of coping with still being her housekeeper, with receiving a pay cheque out of her hand every month, with not being able to offer her anything. That had rankled him so much that in an attack of megalomania he had bought her a painting he couldn't afford at all, only to keep up with her ex-boyfriends, who had all been affluent and successful business men. In the end, she had lent him the money for her own present; that had been a bitter pill for him to swallow. After that, he had worked even harder at college to become independent from her some day. The day of his graduation had been one of great relief because it finally enabled him to stand on his own feet. He had instantly started to apply for teaching jobs but they hadn't been so easy to find; the longer he was looking without the slightest success, the more frustrated he became. Had going through all that trouble been in vain? Was he supposed to live off of her money forever?

Things seemed to take a turn for the better the day Angela had found a letter from Wells Junior College in the mail box. It had been a job offer almost too good to be true; a position as history teacher and head baseball coach of a team which hitherto had only been moderately successful. What a challenge! Tony and Angela had been very excited until the last sentence had brought them back down to earth. "We would like to meet you for an interview here in Iowa next Friday." - Iowa! That was definitely too big a distance to commute! Eventually, it had been Angela who forced him to accept the offer. She knew it was his dream job, that nothing like this would ever come his way again. This job perfectly matched his skills and she didn't want him to turn it down because of her. She wanted him to realize his professional ambitions just like she had been doing all these years. He had worked so hard for his degree.

At the beginning, they had tried to live with seeing each other only on the weekend. They had taken turns in visiting the other just to be able to spend two days together at the same place, and because they yearned for each other so badly, all the trouble hadn't really bothered them. Problems started to show up only after a few months. Either Angela had to attend some kind of business event and had to cancel her visit in Branford, or Tony had an additional practice with his baseball team on his schedule and couldn't make the trip to Fairfield. Once, they hadn't seen each other in three weeks already, all of New York airports had been closed due to a heavy thunderstorm and they had been doomed to satisfy their longing for each other with extensive phone calls only.

That had been the day Angela decided to take the matter into her own hands. She had waited seven long years until she could show her love to Tony openly, now she wasn't willing to accept being separated from him by this 1000-mile-divide between Connecticut and Iowa so easily. All these years, Tony had supported her in running the Bower Agency, now it was her turn to align herself with him. So she had delegated her mother all the necessary managing authority for her agency, she had briefed her two vice presidents and had informed her clients that she would retreat from the daily operative business for an indefinite period of time. She would be available in case of emergencies and would inquire and check on-site regularly, but she was determined to move to Iowa to support Tony in his career as a college professor. And she wanted to be at his side; she wanted to have breakfast with him, she wanted to share his successes and ... his bed - despite the fact that they had once agreed to postpone sex until after the wedding, but this had been rather Tony's wish than hers. Angela physically desired him and didn't want to fight against her cravings any longer. She hoped that in his cozy apartment he would break down and give in eventually.

This one of Angela's hopes had come true, at least. After she had moved to Branford, leaving her old life in Fairfield behind, even Tony perceived their joint life differently. Angela wasn't only visiting anymore but staying in his apartment for good. What a joy that was! They were equal now, and he loved her so much, having yearned for her for such a long time. Tony felt attracted to her almost right from the day he had moved into the house at Oak Hills Drive; first he only admired her secretly, but very soon he couldn't hide his gentle affection and eventually had to admit that he loved her whole-heartedly. It hadn't been easy to resist her feminine charms. She was picture-perfectly beautiful and so indescribably sexy! He had gone to bed with other women - he hadn't been living like a monk - but none of them ever touched his heart in a way that he saw his prospective wife in her. That was different with Angela. The closer they became, the more he felt that she indeed was the first woman who made him want to get married again - the first since Marie, his childhood sweetheart, who had been taken away from him so brutally and much too early by cancer. After he had lost her, he never believed that it might happen again. So it took him some time to get used to the thought but then it elated him.

Marie and he had made love for the first time in their wedding night, too. That was the way Tony looked at women; there were those with whom he was having fun in bed and there were only two in his life he could picture himself leading to the altar. But he wasn't in his early twenties anymore and suppressing his desire for Angela for so many years had weakened his resistance and had put his self-discipline to a test. When she had been standing in the door frame to his bedroom in nothing but a silky, champagne-colored, lace-trimmed negligee on her first night after having moved into his apartment, the amount of his physical desire had surprised Tony but he still thought he would be able to control himself. Only after having shared countless passionate kisses and ardent caresses he had lifted her and had carried her the short way to his bed, his lips never leaving hers. They had made love and their wildest fantasies had come true that night; both had dreamt more than once about this and had visioned what their first time would be like. They were utterly happy, and Angela was convinced moving to Iowa had definitely been the right decision.

Initially!