Hi guys!Yeah...chapter 2 is up...already. I didn't get a lot of reviews but decided to go ahead nonetheless because some of you added this to their alert list thingy. Tell me please what you think, and if you think it sucks then please tell me why,so I can try and improve it. Thanks!:)

Disclaimer: None of these characters are mine...only borrowing them.

Chapter 2:

Sleep didn't come easy to her that night. Even though she was lying in bed she was simply not capable of relaxing...instead her mind kept wandering back to Niles. Why had she left him like this?Well, it had clearly been due to the panic the sudden situation had induced but still...she should've explained more. And what would she tell B.B. once she arrived in the morning? She had already blown her chances when she had tried to protect him. As much as she hated to admit her, her mother knew her well...at least well enough to notice when she cared more about a man than simply in a platonic way. Thinking about the feelings Niles evoked in her only served to make her realise how very unlike a Babcock she was behaving...Her mother was right, he had softened her...but she failed to see what was so bad about that.


Niles himself wasn't better off...he had spent the entire night tossing and turning and wondering about C.C.'s strange behaviour. He knew about her mother, of course, and how proud she was of the Babcock family name and everything this entailed...but none of it explained C.C.'s sudden departure and that was why he found himself in front of her door early in the morning.

C.C.. was already awake and just getting dressed when she heard a soft knock. Cursing under her breath and thinking that not even her mother could be that punctual, she wrapped her bathrobe around herself and went to open the door.

He had been wanting to ask her what was going on, if she suddenly regretted the events of the previous night. But when he saw her standing there in her bathrobe, he simply pulled her into his arms and kissed her. She responded in the same frantic way, pulling him inside the apartment and running her hands through his dirty blonde hair, clinging onto him as if she would drown otherwise. When they finally moved apart he muttered:

"You certainly don't seem to regret anything."

This statement seemed to bring her back to reality and,risking a quick glance at her watch, her eyes widened.

"Mother will be here any minute, you have to go!"and she went to push him back.

He simply wrapped his hands around her wrists and forced her to look him in the eye.

"C.C., I know you and your mother aren't on good terms, but where's my role in all of this?"

"You're a domestic." she whispered,the hurt in his eyes nearly breaking her heart.

"Do you see me that way?" he asked, just as quietly.

"It is who you are,Niles, but you're still the same,wonderful man."

He looked at her closely, realising that it was her way of telling him she loved him.

"But I've grown up with the sentence "Babcocks and servants do not mix"...someone told my mother last night that we were seen together...and when I told her to keep you out of this she instantly knew about my...feelings. She won't let me be with you, Niles, that's why you have to go. She will try and break you, because she knows that that's the only way to get to me."

"C.C., I can't believe I'm hearing this. You are the toughest woman I know, the one who can make grown men cry. I can't bear to see you so defeated. She's your mother, yes, but we are both adults...and as long as you want me,as I want you, there is nothing she can do."

She sighed and sought refuge in his arms, in the safety they provided, and the fantasy he was building. Without her high heels she was just a little bit smaller than him, enough so that he could plant a kiss on her hair.

"You may be a domestic, Butler Boy, but you are my domestic." she whispered and her heart skipped a beat when she heard him chuckle.

"That's the C.C. I know."

But the calm was soon shattered when a demanding knock sounded. Taking a deep breath,she pried herself out of his arms and went to open it. B.B. Babcock looked incredibly like her daughter, the same blonde hair and piercing blue eyes, but her entire appearance was sharper, more bitter somehow. She opened her mouth but then caught sight of Niles. And instantly her eyes moved from his dishevelled hair to C.C. in her bathrobe.

"How dare you greet me like this?" she spat "I hope you two haven't..." she stopped,too disgusted to finish the sentence.

"No, we haven't...not yet." C.C. replied with a tone that suggested she was willing to change that immediately.

"Chastity Claire, don't you dare take that tone with me!It's vulgar and beneath you...it shows that this working class...person...has already rubbed off on you."

"You're wrong. Niles is too much of a gentleman to even suggest something like this." C.C. said crossing her arms and walking over to where Niles stood.

Instantly B.B. locked eyes with him and began addressing him directly.

"You are a servant, I can't blame you for wanting something that is out of your league. But you would do well remembering your place...and you would too,C.C. The man scrubs toilets for a living, for heaven's sake!"

C.C. closed her eyes,blinking away the tears. She wanted to shout that she didn't care, that Niles was a warm and giving human being,that it wasn't his fault that he was stuck in this station in life and that he had been there more often for the Sheffield children than their own father. But she couldn't...because the coldness in her mother's eyes made her feel sick with fear. Niles protectively wrapped his arms around her and, resting his head on her should whispered:

"She can't break me. But you need to fight back."

Giving her all the encouragement she had needed she then said: "I don't care,mother. He makes me laugh and he makes me feel alive. He earns money, and unless it is in an illegal way, I don't care how. I'm lucky to have him!"

Her mother visibly shuddered and then said "This is worse than I thought. I think you should go home now,servant, I'd like a word in private with my daughter."

Niles didn't move an inch but eventually C.C. turned around,her eyes pleading.

"You know where I am." he said quietly and she nodded,walking him to the door.

She was just about to close it when he kissed her softly, whispering "I love you."