The night of the Ball was possibly the most passionate night that Clarisse and Joseph had experienced with each other, and anyone else for that matter. Over the past year or so they had spent a countless number of nights together and they had admitted their love for the other long before that, while the King was still alive. Clarisse had never gone against her wedding vows, even though she had wanted to the first time she had saw Joseph, 27 years ago but now they were together.

Joseph woke up the next morning and wrapped his arm around Clarisse. He started kissing her shoulder which woke her up, she turned round to face him and said, "Morning darling."

"Morning my love. We should probably be getting up soon or your maid might catch me in here!" Clarisse pouted a little,

"Why can't we just be together without having to sneak around. I want it so badly!"

"I know sweetheart, it will happen one day, maybe when Mia has taken over as Queen... Never doubt what love can conquer Clarisse!" He dropped a kiss on to her lips.

"I won't and you are perfect, just remeber that no matter what I say when I'm angry, I will always want you as my own, Joseph!"

"I already am yours forever and I really think I should be getting dressed." With that he stood up and searched around her suite for his clothes. After he had got dressed he went over to her bed (she was going to pretend to be asleep when her maid came in) and kissed her again. She tried desperately to pull him back down on to the bed but he was too strong so a couple of minutes later they broke the kiss and he went down to his own room as usual.

As Joseph had predicted Olivia arrived within seconds of him leaving. While Clarisse was getting dressed in another room Olivia found Joseph's tie from the previous night which he had forgot to pick it up when he left that morning. Olivia put the tie in her pocket so that she could speak to Mia and Charlotte about it later.

A few hours later Clarisse and Charlotte were sorting through some letters, Clarisse's mind wasn't concentrating on the work so before she moved on to the next pile she let Charlotte go on an early lunch. As soon as Joseph saw Charlotte turn a corner he knocked on Clarisse's office door,

"Come in." When he entered, he saw Clarisse sitting with her glasses on the table, massaging her temples, trying to work out what to put in the next letter,

"I was just wondering whether the Queen had just fired her personal assistant." He said with a teasing smile.

"No! I let Charlotte get some food because my mind was on other things such as last night's activites with a certain Head of Security guy I know." She was starting to flirt with him so he went over and kissed her.

"Oh about last night, have you seen the tie that I was wearing because I can't find it anywhere?"

"No I've not saw it but it might still be in my suite even though it was cleaned this morning." He wrapped his arms around her waist and kisseed her all the way down her face and her neck.

At that precise moment Clarisse's mobile rang, she picked it up and it was Mia,

"Hey Grandma! Do you want to come up to my room later and watch a movie or something like that with me and Charlotte? And because I can guess that Joe is somewhere in the same room as you ask him if he wants to come along, I'll invite Michael and Shades if he is!"

"Amelia I have no idea if I am going to busy tonight, I would love to come and so would Joseph but if I'm not able to, then sorry."

"It's alright, if you both can then come at about half past seven... Bye and please give Joe a kiss from me!"

"Amelia! Why did you just say that?!" Mia knew she was going to get that sort of reaction so she had prepared before-hand,

"Oh come off it Grandma, everyone can see you are crazy for each other and we all saw you sneak off together last night, I wonder how many kisses he got then!"

"Bye Amelia!" She couldn't carry on with the conversation, everyone apparently knew about her relationship with Joseph no matter how hard they had tried to hide it.

She turned round to face Joseph and kissed him with all her might,

"I've told you before, I don't like getting felt up when I'm on the phone to my grand-daughter! We're spending this evening with Amelia, Charlotte, Michael and Scott." She knew he wouldn't want to go but she also knew that he would go wherever she went,

"Aww but that means we get even less time together in your suite!" He pretended to look annoyed so she hit him gently on the arm,

"Is that all you think about! And I found out that they all know about our little affair!"

"That means that we can kiss every now and then in the palace when there are no new guests around." He was just teasing her but it was sort of true and she would take advantage of it.

"I love you!"

"Love you too!"

They broke apart a while later when they heard Charlotte approaching and Joseph left the two women to chat and get on with their work.

Quarter to eight - Mia's room

"Grandma! Joe! You made it!" Mia was screaming and hugging them both, Clarisse looked as though she was in pain thanks to the sheer capacity of Mia's lungs and Joseph was already in the room, talking to Shades and eating the snack food that was laid out on the table. Michael was playing with his band at the garage so he wasn't able to come.

Clarisse and Joseph had made a pact to try not to draw attention to the fact that they may be together. They both knew it wasn't going to last long but they had to at least try.

After a few minutes of everyone just doing their own thing Mia told them all to shut up, they all did as they were told but Clarisse had a look of shock on her face because no matter how hard she had tried, Mia would not stop going back to her old way of speaking.

"Right guys, I don't know about you but I'm not really in the mood for watching a DVD so does anyone want to join me for a fun, little session of telling the truth to each other?"

The others looked at each other, all of them were up for it apart from Clarisse, who was a bit worried of what sort of things Mia would ask,

"Oh come on Grandma! It's only some fun!"

"Fine! But this is only because I want to find out more about my friends." She said with the hint of a smile.

They all arranged themselves in a circle. Clarisse was on the couch and somehow Joseph had got pushed down onto the same couch so they were sitting next to each other, looking anxious and up for some fun.

The first question was to Shades; "Do you ever take your sunglasses off?" He smiled and shook his head, "Nope."

Charlotte was next; "Have you ever swore at Grandma?" Charlotte winced and turned to face Clarisse, "I guess that includes the time I called you a 'bitch that isn't able to even feel love anymore'?"

Mia didn't know what to say, "When did you call her that?!"

"A couple of months ago in San Francisco, I was annoyed with her because Joe had danced with her but then she turned back to the queen façade that she puts on and rejected the idea of them going public again!"

"Well that didn't stop them from sleeping together apparentely!"

Joseph got into the conversation at that point, "That's because I had no idea that Charlotte had said those things and if I had, then I may have let Clarisse have a bit of time to herself." He wasn't angry he was just surprised that he hadn't been told about it before.

Clarisse turned to face Joseph, "As if that would have stopped me from getting you into my room every night!" Then she realised that she had said it out loud and in front of her grand-daughter and turned an extremely deep shade of red and turned to look out the window.

"And moving quickly back on to the game..." Mia thought she would be scarred for life by the turn of the conversation and she tried to block out the visions that were entering her head, "Joe, how long have you loved Grandma for?"

He looked over at Clarisse who was now facing him, instead of the window and gave him a look which he took as a sign to answer truthfully, "About 24 years, the first 3 years I worked in the palace were when I fancied her, not loved her." Clarisse was smiling because she had felt the same back then, although she hadn't admitted it to herself for much longer.

"Aww that is so cute! Grandma, when did you and Joe admit to each other how much you loved them?" Clarisse was surprised at what a good question it was, because she knew the answer precisly,

"Now that is simple. It was fifteen years ago just after I got a phone call saying you had been born. Joseph was obviously there with me (I can't remember a time when he hasn't been, true enough) and we flirted outrageously with each other but then we looked into each others' eyes and it, sort of, just all fell into place. Amelia remember, no matter what we felt like, we both understood I was married to the King and that we wouldn't be able to do anything improper until the marriage was somehow over!"

"I know but how could either of you manage having to hide being in love and working with each other every day?!"

"Once we got used to, it just seemed like second nature."

"Wait! I thought we were only getting asked one question each, this has been more than that!"

"OK Grandma!... By the way if you two want to go somewhere else just now, instead of here, feel free to!"

"Funny! But we said we'd be here and we'll stay!" Clarisse and Joseph gave up trying to hide being together at that point, because they had admitted near enough everything in the space of five minutes.

A couple of hours later they had given up with the game and were all chatting about how fast the past couple of months had gone. Clarisse had changed her position on the couch so her legs were now stretched out to her her right and her head was resting on Joseph's shoulder while his arm was around her back, making sure shecouldn't leave his side, even though she had no intention of going anywhere soon without him.

The others weren't paying much attention to the happy couple so after a while they managed to escape from Mia's room and make their way up to Clarisse's suite. None of the guards that were stationed in the castle noticed that their Queen and Head of Security had a tight grip on each others' hands and nobody was standing outside her door so they sneaked in and spent another night doing improper acts together.

Back in Mia's room Charlotte looked up at the couch where Clarisse and Joseph had been but when she saw that they weren't there she told Mia and they both smiled, knowing that sometime in the future there would be journalists who wanted as much information on the couple as possible, when they finally went public about this affair.

Hey I know it wasn't a great fic but it was my first one about Joseph and Clarisse and I really wanted to write one about them so if you would review this I would be extremely pleased!! Cya, Lee x