As Laney looked over the menu in the restaurant, Kyoya looked over her. She was quite a bit shorter than he was, with little evidence of her mother's heritage other than her height. She had generous curves, but she was on the slim side, probably due to her early morning running habit. Her wavy brown hair curled just above her shoulders; short enough to not to take much time to get ready, long enough to put up out of the way. Still, it was beautiful, and suited her oval face. It seemed a good summary of Laney herself, at least from what Kyoya had gleaned from their short conversation in the car and from the information his family had gathered on her. A casual observer might assume she'd be content to be ornamental, but underneath the ready smile and friendly demeanor probably lay an indomitable spirit.

Kyoya sighed silently. Laney Johnson was intriguing, but his father's implication had been clear. Romance her, but don't seduce her. Smooth the way for a possible marriage alliance, but leave it distant enough that, in the likely event that the Ootoris would get what they wanted without a marriage, there would be no hard feelings. Charm her; don't fall in love with her. Right.

Kyoya's thoughts were interrupted by his phone chirping at him. For the fifth time in 15 minutes. Laney looked up. "Do you need to respond to that?" she asked politely.

"No. Definitely not." Kyoya said as he switched the phone to silent. He had no idea how Tamaki had found out so quickly about what he was coming to think of as "The Johnson Situation," but he knew that responding to the texts would only encourage his friend. He really didn't need Tamaki's romantic rhapsodizing right now.

"Really, I don't mind. If it's your father, I'm sure you shouldn't keep him waiting" Laney said.

"It's not my father. It's a friend."

Laney put the menu down and looked at him. "It seems pretty urgent."

"It's not." The phone buzzed again. Laney cocked an eyebrow at him. Kyoya sighed, knowing there was no way to get out of this gracefully. Clearly neither Tamaki nor Laney was going to drop it.

On a date; will talk later. Please don't go around telling everyone Kyoya quickly typed into phone. "My friend, Suoh Tamaki. If we're really going to be dating for 6 months, you will no doubt meet him sooner rather than later. He's somewhat irrespressible."

On a date? Is she beautiful? I bet she's beautiful. Is she The ONE? Kyoya, r u in love? R U IN LOVE-LOVE? Kyoya sighed again and tapped out: Tamaki, give your phone to Haruhi and tell her I said not to give it back to you for at least another 4 hours. He paused for a second; could Tamaki be trusted not to call him at 4 am? Before he could hit send, the phone buzzed again. Kyoya, this is Haruhi. I'm disabling texting and erasing your number. I'll put it back in 12 hours. Have fun on your date. Kyoya smiled. Haruhi was pretty much the only person on earth who could deal with Tamaki when he got wound up like this. He looked up at Laney, who'd been staring at him over the rim of her wine glass. "All taken care of." At her questioning look, he added, "I don't know how Tamaki found out so quickly that we were meeting today—I certainly didn't tell him—but he was a little overexcited. His fiancée confiscated his phone. We're safe from interruptions for at least the next 12 hours."

Laney lowered her lashes and looked coyly up at him. "12 hours, huh? Don't you think you're being a little optimistic there? I just met you, after all."

Kyoya felt a blush rising up. Damn it, he never blushed. He was positive she was giving him that sultry look on purpose, just to provoke a reaction. But that didn't stop a wave of heat moving through his body.

"I'm just teasing you, Kyoya." Laney took pity on him. "Have you decided what you want?"

"Why don't you order for us both?" Kyoya suggested. He needed to get the conversation back on to neutral ground; he didn't particularly feel like going into his friendship with Tamaki and the other former Host Club members, and he was absolutely, definitely not prepared to start trading sexual innuendo with a girl he just met. Particularly not this girl; he had the uncomfortable feeling that she might be better at it than he was. "You went to undergraduate at William and Mary, didn't you? That seems a bit of an odd choice."

"Why odd?" Laney's tone was prickly. Kyoya hid a smile. This could get interesting.

"It's a state school. I would have expected someone with your family connections, not to mention your grades, to go to a more elite institution."

"Kyoya Ootori. Did you get my high school transcripts? HOW did you get my high school transcripts? More to the point, why would you get my high school transcripts?" Laney sounded like she was veering rather close to being outraged.

Kyoya smothered a groan. This conversation was absolutely refusing to stay on the track he had planned for it. Best go with inscrutable—that had always served him well. He gave Laney a bland smile. "I have my resources. But you never answered the question. Why William and Mary?" Before she could answer, the waitress came by with their first round of food. Laney muttered something under her breath that sounded like stalker, but Kyoya couldn't quite catch the rest of it. As soon as she left the table, Kyoya pressed his advantage. "I'd really like to know," he said ingratiatingly.

Laney looked at him flatly, but said. "William and Mary is a fine school. And I wanted to be close to my grandmother. My grandfather died my senior year, and I knew she'd be able to cope with that more easily if I was there to keep her mind on other things."

"You're close to your grandmother?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, were those details not in your file on me?" Kyoya ignored this. After a beat, Laney relented and explained, "I spent almost every summer with her when I was growing up. We'd go to Japan for about a month, but the rest of the summer I spent in Williamsburg with Grandma and Grandpa Johnson. I loved Grandpa, but Grandma … Grandma's just always been my best friend."

"She was a singer in the folk revival movement, wasn't she? But she gave it up when she married your grandfather?" Kyoya tried to recall the information on the older Johnsons. He'd focused on Laney's maternal grandparents, assuming that the Japanese connection would be more important to his family. But observing Laney talk about her grandmother, he thought that might have been a mistake.

"She didn't give it up, exactly. But she and Grandpa had four kids, and Grandma didn't want to leave them to go on tour. Believe it or not, though, my dad and all his siblings can still clawhammer a banjo like no one's business." Laney laughed, almost to herself. "Besides, Grandpa relied on Grandma's business sense. It was all behind the scenes, but she held major influence in almost all of his real estate dealings."

Kyoya was surprised. "Your grandmother didn't go to college, did she? I thought she grew up poor."

"I said her business sense, not her business education. Do you have any idea how much a coal miner made when my Grandma was growing up?" Kyoya shook his head. "Not a whole hell of a lot, I'll tell you that much. A woman trying to feed a family of six children on a coal miner's salary had to know how to spend her pennies. My grandma's people may have been uneducated, but no one ever accused them of being stupid. At least not anyone with half a brain in their head," Laney said, taking another sip of wine. Kyoya was fascinated. The more Laney talked about her grandmother, the more pronounced her formerly faint Virginia accent became. He was sure she wasn't aware of it, but her whole mannerism had shifted subtly. Kyoya had a strong feeling he was getting a glimpse of what Barbara Johnson must have been like when she was her granddaughter's age. He made a mental note to tell his father to dig a little deeper into the Johnson family background. Getting Barbara Johnson on their side might prove to be a prudent move.

Author Note: Thank you to everyone who has been reading this! Special thanks to mutemuia for the reviews. This is the first story I've written in more years than I quite care to remember, so it is very encouraging to have some feedback.