To answer a question from one of the guest reviewers, I am thirty-one. I know. I'm old as dirt compared to a lot of the other writers on here. In fact, my favorite time to write is after I have a 'had a few' when my kids are in bed. I am a lot more relaxed then and words just seem to fall out of me. It's better than drunk texting or drunk posting to my social media sites. I may or may not have done that a few times... Lol!


The blaring of a phone that isn't hers wakes Clary up. She opens her eyes to see that she has fallen asleep while still laying on top of Jace. The way he groans as he places one hand on her back to hold her to his chest and rolls with her to reach for his phone lets her know that he had fallen asleep too. She tilts her head up to see Jace slide his finger over the screen of his phone and answer it. "Hello." Jace says with a gruff voice. Clary lowers her head back onto his chest and presses her ear to his chest.

"Where are you Jace?" says Stephen and Jace looks over at the clock beside his bed. It's four o'clock and he was supposed to be back at his father's house at three forty-five and he is never late. He closes his eyes and runs a hand down his face roughly. "Sorry Dad. I fell asleep." he tells him and Clary stiffens just a little on top of him when he says dad. He brings one of his hands back to her bare back and starts to rub it. The gesture instantly makes her relax more into him. "Do you still need me?" he asks him.

"Yes. Alec is here with the papers to buy Starkweather's store so we can move more product. We also still need to talk about you slacking off this past week. You did well at the meeting but there are still things to discuss." Stephen says on the other end of the line.

Jace looks down at Clary's red hair that is spread beautifully over his chest and smiles at the sight. "Alright Dad." He says after a few silent seconds. "I'll be there as soon as I can." Jace hangs up the phone as Clary looks up to him and props her chin up on his chest.

"You have to go somewhere?" she asks as he runs his fingers through her hair making her eyes close with contentment.

"I have to go sign some papers to buy a place from a guy who owes us too much money." Jace tells her. She smiles and chuckles a little which makes him smile because he knows that she understands why he would be buying a store from someone who owes them money. That is a way for the owner to get his debt forgiven. They buy his store so they can smuggle 'products' in the store shipments while Starkweather still runs the store and would take the fall if he were ever caught with the illegal products. Jace would have plausible deniability if he weren't involved in the everyday running of the store and would blame everything on Starkweather if things were to go badly. That is a pretty common occurrence in the world of organized crime.

"But I don't want you to go." she says with a pout as her eyes open back up and she looks at him.

"Then stay here." Jace tells her. "I shouldn't be too long and knowing that you are hear waiting for me is an incredible incentive to hurry back."

"Really?" Clary says surprised. "You wouldn't mind? You trust me?" She sort of expected him to not trust her because of who her dad is.

"Of course I trust you." Jace says as his hands come up to cup her face. "I told you that I love you and that I don't care that your name is Morgenstern. Yes, things will be difficult with our families but that does't mean that it has to be difficult for us. I don't want anything to change between us and I will fight for it to stay that way. I refuse to let 'us' slip out of my fingers when I just got it."

She smiles lovingly up at him and then pushes up as he dips his head down slightly and she kisses him in a way that lets him know that she loves him. He can feel the love radiating out of her lips as they move against his softly and slowly.

After a few seconds, Clary pulls back and smiles up at her man. "I'll fight for us too." she replies simply yet with fervor in her soft voice. "So why don't you hurry up and leave so you can come back to me sooner."

Jace smiles widely down at her and then pulls her back for one more kiss before she rolls off of him. When she hits the bed next to him, she tosses the thin sheet that was covering her off to the side as Jace is getting out of bed. When he looks back at her, she smiles seductively up at him and his eyes widen with desire as he groans out a frustrated sound. "You need to stop that." Jace says lowly and Clary giggles as she pulls the sheet back over to cover her naked self up. "Just making sure you know what you need to hurry back to." she says innocently while her eyes suggest that she is anything but.

He narrows his eyes at her as he reaches into his closet blindly, his hand easily finding a pair of jeans that are hanging just inside the closet door, and he pulls them off the hanger and slips them on. "No underwear?" Clary asks.

"Nope. Less things to take off when I get back." he says and is beyond thrilled to see a slight blush creep up and into her cheeks at the remark.

"Touche." she says with an amused smile as he steps into the closet and pulls on a blue button up shirt. He rolls the sleeves up and runs his hand through his hair a few times to smooth down his sex hair before sliding on his shoes. He walks back over to his bed where Clary is watching him and she smiles as he approaches. He leans back onto the bed and she wraps her arms around his neck. "When I see you laying here in my bed...it really makes me think that pissing off my dad might be the more desirable option in this moment." Jace tells her.

She smiles widely and lets out a breathy chuckle as her eyes sparkle while looking into his. "Don't worry." she says softly to him. "I'll be here when you get back and we can pick up where we left off."

Jace groans low in his throat and pulls her into him and kisses her passionately. The world begins to spin for Clary as his lips are insistent against hers; holding promises of what is to come later tonight. Her tongue pushes into his mouth and she can't help but let out a tiny moan into his mouth when he bites down lightly on her bottom lip. Her arms involuntarily tighten around his neck, holding him tighter to her. "Okay. I change my mind. I don't want you to go." she says sexily when he finally pulls back.

He smiles down at her mischievously and smirks. He is clearly happy with himself that he was able to have that affect on her. "Trust me. I won't be long." he promises her. With one last kiss, he stands back up and walks around the bed and out of the room.

Clary hears the door to his penthouse shut and rolls over in his bed with a smile still on her face. She lets out a dry and humorless laugh when she thinks about irony of the situation that she has found herself in. She always wanted that type of romance that completely sweeps you off of your feet and leaves the world spinning around you and makes you forget what life was like before him. The kind of romance that her parents had.

Since the first moment she saw Jace and when he followed her outside and asked her to have a drink with him, she didn't see anyone else. He made her completely forget about every trouble that she had. She didn't even think about Sebastian until her mother brought him up when she got home that night. Jace has given her everything she ever wanted in a relationship. The attraction and the passion that balances perfectly with the intellectual stimulation that he gives her. He is able to keep up with her quick wit and handle her with ease where Sebastian would usually crumble under her intense gaze and personality. He isn't afraid to call her out and makes her laugh and relax with one look or touch.

And then she finds out he is a Herondale. The world is cruel bitch to give her everything she ever wanted with a backhanded slap to go along with it.

She rolls back over just now remembering Jordan. Jace told her that Jordan is why he told her today. He is probably pacing a hole in the floor wherever he is. She sits up and throws her legs over the edge of the bed and looks around. There by her feet is Jace's white button up shirt that he was wearing earlier. Clary picks it up and brings it to her nose and inhales deeply. It smells just like him. She then slips her arms into it and buttons it up after rolling the long sleeves up and trails back out of his bedroom. She vaguely remembers dropping her purse on one of his couches as she made her way over the wall of windows and goes in search for it.

The view is just as incredible as the first time she saw it and has to tear her eyes away from it again so she can focus on finding her phone. She spots it on one of the white cloth couches and grabs it and pulls out her phone. When the screen lights up, she can see that Jordan has texted her once. She opens up the text and it reads, "Hey, Clary. Just checking in on you. Call me when you get a chance. Maia said that she hasn't seen you today and neither have I."

She can hear Jordan's worried tone in the words he texted and she suddenly feels bad for doing that to him. When she left her parents house this afternoon, she told her mom that she was going to Maia's and Maia probably never knew that she had been at their place because she was at school. In fact, no one knows where she is right now. She sighs heavily and quickly dials Jordan. It barely gets through the first ring when Jordan picks up sounding slightly frantic. "Clary." he says worriedly.

"I'm fine Jordan." she tells him before he has a heart attack. "I'm with Jace."

"Oh...uh." he says sounding very unsure and nervous. "Okay. Where are you exactly? I should do my job and be with you. I can bring Maia and make it look like a coincidence and that we just happen to run into you."

She smiles at his extremely worried sounding voice. She knows that he genuinely cares for her and is concerned for her safety. He also isn't sure if she knows who Jace really is and is trying to tip toe around the subject. "Everything is okay, Jordan. He told me." Clary says calmly into the phone.

"Oh fucking hell." Jordan says exasperatedly. "Thank God he told you! I did not want to have to be the one to tell your father."

Clary can't help but throw her head back and laugh loudly at that. "Yeah. I wouldn't want to tell him if I were you either." she says after the laughing dies down.

"You sound like you are in a good mood." Jordan remarks when the line goes quiet. His voice is skeptical if not a little incredulous when he says that.

Clary huffs out a long breath before she responds. "It was one hell of a shock." she admits as she sits down on the couch. "But after talking with him and seeing his reaction to finding out who I was, I believe that he had no idea just like I didn't. He looks absolutely nothing like his father and you know how my dad has been sheltering me all of my life. He has mostly kept me out of the public eye and away from his business until this past couple of years. I had no idea what Stephen's son looked like just like he had no idea what I looked like."

She hears Jordan sigh heavily on the other end of the line and she can just see him running a hand through his hair like he does every time he is stressed out. "What are the two of you going to do?" he asks.

"I know it sounds crazy but, we are going to stay together." she admits to him. "I am in love with him, Jordan, and he loves me. He told me and...I can just see it in his eyes. I know you have seen it when I talk about him and I am sure that Maia has told you every thing that I have told her. I'm not saying that it is going to be easy but I think that it will be worth it because I don't want to give up on us so easily."

"Just be prepared for the worst." Jordan says flatly to her. "Because your father is going to try and kill him."

Clary closes her eyes as she hears those words knowing that they are true. "I know." she says seriously as the gravity of the situation starts to fully sink in.


He swings open the door to his parent's penthouse with a huge smile on his face. "Alright." he says loudly as he claps his hands together and turns into his father's office just off of the kitchen. "Where are those papers?" He looks up to see Alec looking inquisitively at him while his father glares slightly at him.

"Why do you seem so happy?" Alec asks with a worried and curious look on his face. "Did you kill someone? Go ahead and tell me if you did so I can know what kind of a day I am going to have tomorrow."

Jace looks over to his best friend who looks incredibly worried that he actually did kill someone and he can't help but laugh at him. "No. I didn't kill anyone." Jace tells him and he visibly relaxes. "I just have an incredibly beautiful and sexy woman waiting in my bed for me."

Stephen rolls his eyes while Alec's tighten a little in annoyance before surprise flits across his features. "You let a woman stay in your apartment?" Alec asks with shock laced into his voice.

"Yes. Clary." Jace replies with a smile. "You know. The one I have been telling you about. The one I have been spending all my time with for the past week."

"The one you cancelled all of our appointments and lunches and dinners to see." Alec says a little bitterly. A slight scowl appears on his face and Jace walks over to him and tosses an arm around his shoulders.

"Don't worry, Alec." Jace says with a playful smile. "I'll take you on a fancy date to make up for it. I might even buy you flowers." He then lets out a tiny laugh and Alec seems to relax a little as he looks over at him. "I like tulips." Alec replies with a half smile and Jace lets out a small laugh. "Duly noted." he tells Alec as he lets him go and takes the seat next to him; across the desk from his father.

"You seem to really care about Clary." his father tells him. "You have never let a woman stay in your apartment much less spent as much time with one as much as you have with her. It's almost as if the impossible has happened. It's almost like you have..."

Jace interrupts his father then. "...like I've fallen in love with her?" he finishes his father's sentence and is satisfied when his father furrows his brows in confusion as Jace continues to smile. If his father were to ever say he was in love with someone or would fall in love with someone just two weeks ago, he would have scoffed and laughed in his face. The fact that he is making eye contact with his father and smiling at him now says everything that he needs to know.

"Oh. My. God." his father says as he leans heavily back into his large leather chair. "You are. You're in love with her." he says accusingly.

Alec's head snaps over to Jace and sees that he has a radiant smile on his face as he looks at his father. "What can I say, Dad?" Jace says with ease. "I don't know how it happened, but I can't really deny it, nor do I want to. I, Jace Herondale, infamous womanizer, has fallen in love."

"Holy hell." Stephen says with a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "I never thought I would live to see the day."

"How the hell could you love her?" Alec says sounding incredulous. "You barely know her. You only met her last week."

Jace looks over to him, still unable to wipe the smile off of his face. "Like I said, I don't know how it happened. She came out of nowhere and changed everything. I know it was fast but...I guess the saying is true. That when you find 'the one', you just...know."

Alec scoffs a little and looks away with a roll of his eyes. "Sure, Jace." he says as he sits back in his seat. "You'll get bored with her after a month and move on like you did with that Aline girl."

"That's because I didn't love Aline." Jace tells him. "She was just a really good lay. Clary is different. I love her AND she is a good lay."

Alec rolls his eyes again in disbelief. "Whatever you say." he says dryly causing Jace to roll his eyes in response.

"I know. It's hard to believe." he replies as he looks over to his dad. He is full out smiling at him now and is tapping his pen on his leg.

"Your mom is going to be so happy to hear this." Stephen says to him. "I am sure she will start planning a nursery the moment you tell her."

"Whoa, whoa!" Jace says as he holds his hands up. "Slow down there." he says as the name Morgenstern flashes behind his eyes. "I am not ready for that." he says with a serious tone. "We have to get her father to approve before we can move any further. And then we have to get you to approve." Jace looks up to his father to gauge his reaction to what he just said.

"Why would you have to get my approval?" he says confused. "If she has managed to tame you and nail you down, she's good in my book."

Jace looks away as he raises his eyebrows knowingly. "I might hold you to your word on that one." he remarks causing both Alec and his father look to him questioningly. "Let's get this over with." Jace says as he leans forward and picks up a pen off of his father's desk in an attempt to change the subject before either of them can ask him anymore questions. "Where do I sign?"

Alec seems hesitant to let the conversation go but leans forward anyway and points to a spot in the middle of the stack of papers. "Initial here and here." he says as his finger moves across the paper. When he gets done with his initials, Alec flips to the next one and says, "Sign your full name here." and Jace signs along the line that he pointed to.

"Is that it?" Jace asks as he sets the pen down.

His father looks at him and shakes his head a little in disbelief slightly as he says, "I guess our conversation can wait since I see that you won't be of much use to me in your current state of mind."

"Thanks, Dad." Jace says with a smile as he stands up. "Don't call me tonight. I'll be very busy." he says in a mock serious tone and then laughs once before he turns and leaves his father's office.

When Jace finally gets back to his penthouse, he opens his door to find Clary wearing his button up shirt from earlier and laying on her stomach on one of the couches while swinging her feet in the air. The top part of her body is propped up and he can see her looking up and then back down multiple times. As he steps further into the room, he can see that she has found a pencil and a pad of lined paper that he keeps in one of the drawers in his kitchen and is sketching. She is so deep in concentration that she hasn't even looked up to the sound of him opening and shutting the door.

He sets his keys on the table that is by the door and smiles as he walks silently closer to her. The sight of her there on his couch and in his clothes sends a thrill through him. If any woman before her had put on his shirt and gone through his things, he would have blown his lid and kicked her out immediately. But the sight of Clary making herself at home in his clothes did nothing but make him feel utter happiness and contentment.

It was the strangest thing to have his life flipped completely upside down in such a short time. He was perfectly happy with the way his life was going. But that was only because he hadn't met her. He was an idiot to think that to love someone and let them love you would only be another way for you to be destoyed. In his line of work, if your enemies couldn't get to you, they went after the ones you love and he always said that no one would be able to get to him that way. But now, looking at her beautiful red hair tumbling down her back and over his shirt, he knew that he could never go back. He would take on the whole fucking world to keep her by his side and keep her safe.

Clary seems to feel his gaze and turns and looks over her shoulder at him and smiles warmly at him. "Why are you looking at me like that?" she asks as a slight blush creeps up her face.

"Like what?" Jace asks confused.

"Like I am some beautiful painting that you can't take your eyes off of." she responds as she rolls onto her side and presses her back against the back of the couch.

Jace's lips then curve up on one side as he closes the distance between them while his eyes hold hers and crouches down on the floor in front of her face. One of his hands then raises up as Clary's eyes bore into his with such intensity that his heart starts to beat unevenly under his ribs. His fingers ghost down the length of her face and he can feel the warmth from her blushing under his touch as he leans in close to her and says lowly, "You are way more beautiful than any painting in the entire world. Only God himself could create something as beautiful as you."

He watches as she then blushes even more, her face turning a wonderful shade of rosy pink as her lips spread upwards and into a loving smile. "Jace." she says sounding breathless. He takes the opportunity then to lean just a little more into her and claim her mouth with his. Her soft lips move perfectly against his as he hears her drop the pencil she had been holding to the floor and wrap her arms around his neck. Her fingers find his hair as his hands move under her and then he is lifting her up and into his arms.

She pulls back and lets out a small startled breath before leaning back in and opening her mouth to let him slip his tongue in. He doesn't need to look where he is going for him to easily find his bedroom and carry her over to the bed. One of her hands slips down and into the neck of his shirt and splays flat against the skin of his back softly before she lets out a tiny little moan when he clenches her tighter to his body. For some reason, he just can't get her close enough to him.

He lifts one leg up and places that knee onto the bed and then the other. He then lays her gently onto his bed and moves to hover over her. When he pulls back to look at her, her lips are bright pink from their kissing and her eyes are an even brighter green than they were just a moment ago. The color combination of her eyes, lips, hair, and milky skin literally take his breath away. He tries to suck in a small breath but it gets hung up in his throat. "You are so incredibly, stunningly beautiful." he whispers to her.

"God, I love you." she responds as the hand that isn't in his shirt and on his back moves to push some of his hair out of his face. His heart pounds in his chest hard yet fast and slow at the same time as a smile pulls up his lips. "And you're really pretty too." she tacks on after a few seconds with a smile and his smile gets wider. His eyes crinkle almost completely shut as he lets out a few laughs and then he is diving back into her for a blindingly passionate kiss.

She lets out a shocked noise into his mouth at the intensity of it and the sound does unspeakable things to his body. He moves one of his hands down to her leg and he hooks his fingers around the back of her knee and then is pulling her leg up to wrap around him. When she does, he slides his hand up her thigh and when he gets to her hip and discovers that she isn't wearing anything else, his fingers clench involuntarily against her skin. This woman is going to be the death of him if he doesn't get to have her again.

He stops himself then, pulling his mouth from hers and resting his forehead in the crook of her neck, not knowing if she wanted to have sex again. The last thing he wanted her to think was that he only wanted her for sex.

As if she knew what was going through his mind, her hands went to either side of his face and pulled it up until he was looking her in the eyes. "Make love to me again, Jace." she says seductively to him. He certainly didn't need to be told twice. He dove back into another kiss with renewed fervor and let out a gutteral noise out of his throat that he didn't know he was capable of making. He then spent the next hour letting her know just how he felt through every caress of his fingers and every soft kiss that he covered her body with. It was the most amazing experience of his life and he never wanted it to end.

When they finally left his room again, it was late and the sun had dipped below the horizon. Max had shown up at some point and texted him that he was standing guard outside of his door. Clary ordered some Chinese food that Max went down and got and then brought back up. Jace reached out of his door through a tiny crack, wearing just a pair of sweatpants with Clary's arms wrapped around his torso, and took the food from him before Max could see that she was just wearing one of his t-shirts that landed just below her ass cheeks. The sight of her like that was reserved solely for him and him alone.

The moment the door is shut, Clary plucks the bag of food out of his hands and the hurries over to the couch that faces the large television along one of the walls. She sets the food down on the coffee table in front of it and then begins to sort out all of the containers. Jace is once again struck by the sight of her making herself completely at home here. He is beginning to think that it may be one of his favorite sights. His most favorite sight being Clary on his bed...never mind. He needs to get those thoughts out of his head and eat his dinner.

After they eat, Clary picks out a chick flick on Netflix that he would have never watched before, and turns it on then sidles into his side after he throws his arm over her shoulders. About an hour into the movie, he notices that she hasn't moved in a long while and when he dips his head down to look at her, he sees that she has fallen asleep. Afraid to wake her up when she was looking so peaceful, he put his legs up on top of the coffee table and let his head fall back onto the back of the couch where he then drifted off to sleep.


The smell of breakfast cooking wakes Clary up. She opens her eyes and sees that she is in Jace's bed and is still wearing his t-shirt. She can't help the smile that spreads across her face. The fact that she is waking up in his bed after spending the night with him and now he is cooking her breakfast is one of the best feelings in the world. As she rolls over in the bed, her face runs into something that crinkles and is cold. She lifts her head up to see that Jace has left her a note that says 'I'm making us breakfast. If you come out just wearing only my t-shirt again, I won't be responsible for what I might do to you. It took everything I had to keep my hands off of you this morning when I woke up and saw you laying there with it riding up over your hips. Dress responsibly. I love you.'

She laughs and the smile that was already on her face widens immensely at the words on the note, especially the 'I love you' part. That was hands down her favorite part. Clary kicks the covers off of her lower half and rolls out of bed. She pads over to the bathroom and digs a small brush out of one of the drawers and runs it through her tangled hair. When she looks up into the mirror above the sink, she is surprised to see that her features have changed.

Her eyes seem to be a little brighter green than they usually are while her eyes are crinkled slightly from the smile that she can't get to go away. Her skin is more flushed and pink than usual and something about the way she is standing is more confident yet soft at the same time. She looks absolutely beautiful, even to her own eyes, and it is all because of Jace.

This feeling that she has right now is what she has been looking for and waiting for. It's why she broke up with Sebastian when he was so perfect for her in every way. He fit in perfectly with her family and life and her father loved him. But there was always this feeling missing with him. The feeling of excitement and the thrill from being completely in love and knowing that your life was irrevocably changed for the better because he was in it. Knowing that you would be unable to function if he were taken away from you. It was so scary and so wonderfully exciting at the same time. But she knew one thing for sure and that was that Jace is who she was holding out for.

With that thought, she left the bathroom and walked out of his bedroom, still with only his t-shirt on, and over to his kitchen. He spots her almost immediately the moment she comes around the corner and a wide eye crinkling smile breaks out on his face. His eyes then dart down to what she is wearing and he groans as he narrows his eyes at her while she walks over to him.

Clary's hands reach out to him and she hooks her fingers into the waistband of his sweatpants and pulls him away from the stove. She leans back against the counter next to the bacon he is cooking and slides her hands up his perfect abdomen and hooks her hands together behind his neck as his arms wrap around her waist. "I told you I could't be held responsible for my actions if you came out in just my t-shirt again." Jace says lowly to her with his voice full of a dark and sexy promise.

Clary pushes herself onto the tips of her toes and tilts her chin up and presses her lips against his. Once, twice, three times before she pulls away. "Maybe that was my plan all along." she whispers to him and is satisfied as his eyes widen just a tiny fraction before darkening a couple of shades while his arms pull her even tighter against him. "You need to stop talking like that if you have any hope of eating this delicious breakfast I've made us." he tells her as he dips his head down and kisses her once more.

When he pulls back, they both turn their heads to the opposite counter when her phone that is plugged into a charger there, vibrates and rattles against the marble counter. "Your phone has been doing that all morning." Jace tells her seriously.

She groans and lets her head fall forward and onto his chest for a moment before kissing him again and then slipping out of his arms. Jace goes back to cooking the bacon while Clary grabs her phone and unplugs it from the wall. The moment her screen lights up, she sees the ten missed calls and the eighteen text messages. Her eyes widen a little as she unlocks her screen and pulls them up. The moment she sees who they are all from, her posture stiffens and a lump forms in her throat.

They are all from her father. Every single one of them.

She opens the first text to see that is says, "Where are you? We came home to find you not here. Your mother said that you told her you were going to Maia's and your aren't there."

"Shit." she mutters as she clicks on the most recent one. "I am giving you five minutes to respond or I am turning this city upside down till I find you. This isn't funny any more."

She huffs out a long breath and walks out of the kitchen. Jace looks after her seeing how tense she looks and furrows his brows in worry at the sight. As soon as she is out of earshot of Jace, she dials her father and he picks up on the second ring. "Clarissa! Where the hell are you?"

"Sorry, Dad." she tells him apologetically. "My phone has been in another room than I have been in all night. I am just now seeing all of your calls and messages."

"You know I don't accept those kinds of excuses." Valentine says angrily.

"I know, I know." Clary says softly into the phone. "I'm sorry I worried you. Noodles." Years ago, her family came up with a word to let each other know that they were safe if they were for some reason separated. That word ended up being 'noodles' because no one says noodles on a regular basis in a normal everyday conversation. They also had a word for if they were in danger and and wanted to tell them without alerting whoever they were in danger from.

"Where are you?" he demands and Clary looks back over to the kitchen to see a shirtless Jace jump back from the stove and curse under his breath when he gets popped by the grease from the cooking bacon. She smiles softly and laughs lightly and says, "I'm at Jace's place. I stayed the night here."

The line goes quiet for a few beats before her father says anything else. "I want to meet him, Clarissa. I want to know who my daughter is with and I want to know by the end of the day." Valentine's voice is tight and full of authority and she knows that there is no way for her to say no to him. Now that he knows that she is in a relationship with someone, there is no way that he will let her out of his or his men's sight. He knows that she has been ditching her protection detail after she told him the other night and she was under strict orders to not leave the house yesterday because of the meeting and the fact that he had to borrow the men assigned to protect her. When Jace called her yesterday, she knew her father would be mad but hearing him now, she realized just how mad he was.

His voice was tight and scary calm at the same time. It was never good when it got like that. "But daddy," she started to say and was quickly cut off.

"Don't daddy me, Clarissa. It won't work this time." he says flatly to her. "I want him here for dinner tonight."

She pulls the phone away from her face and mutters "Shit." again before bringing it back up to her ear. "Okay. But you have to promise me something. And I want your word on this." Her voice is now full of her own authority as she levels it at her father.

"What do you want me to promise?" Valentine asks her skeptically.

"That you won't try and kill him and you will hear me out." she says to him.

"Why would you ask me something like that, Clarissa?" he asks curiously. "What don't I know?"

"You need to give me your word before I bring him there. If not, I will stay where I am and I can promise you that you won't find me." Clary tells her father as her voice remains strong and unwavering.

The line goes quiet for ten, twenty, then thirty seconds before he finally replies. "Alright." he says sounding angry and slightly defeated. "I promise."

She lets out a breath that she didn't know she was holding and closes her eyes as relief washes over her. She is praying that he will keep his word when she walks into her house with him. "Thanks Daddy. I'll see you at seven. Love you." She hangs up the phone and tosses it onto the couch in front of her. She hears Jace pull the pan off of the stove top and then his bare feet as they softly hit the wood floor and come to a stop behind her.

"What's the matter, babe?" Jace asks as he dips his head down to the crook of her neck and places a soft kiss there as his arms snake around her waist. "My dad is super pissed because I ditched my security and disappeared while he was working yesterday. No one knows where I am."

Jace pulls her tighter to him and she relaxes a little and lets her head fall back onto his shoulder as her eyes close. "Does that mean you have to go?" he asks softly.

"No." she replies. "I told him I was with you and he demanded to meet you by the end of the day. I suspect that if I don't follow through, he will come looking for me or information about you and the first person he will go to is Jordan. I can't let that happen. Jordan is my friend."

"When you said that you told him that you were with me..." Jace starts to ask cautiously.

"I mean that I told him that I was in love with a guy named Jace but I didn't know his last name." Clary reassures him as she turns around in his arms. She rests her head on his chest under his chin and he turns his face so his cheek can rest on top of her head. "I am afraid that I have to tell him who you are."

"What do you think will happen when you do?" Jace asks curiously. He is pretty sure what will happen but he has to ask anyway.

"Well..." Clary hesitates for a second before continuing. "I made him promise me that he won't kill you and that he will hear me out." She lets out a nervous and humorless chuckle as he tightens his arms around her. "At least there is that."

"Maybe this will be a good thing." he tells her. "It could heal the bad blood between our families."

"Sure." Clary says sarcastically. "And I could be struck by lightning."

Jace takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly as he lifts his head and looks out of the wall of windows with the view of the park. "We knew that this was going to be hard. And hey, if push comes to shove, I would not be against running away with you. Starting a new life away from this."

"We both know that that would never work." she says flatly to him. "If my father can find people in the witness protection program then he would be able to find us." She leans back and tips her head up to look at him. He looks down at her as one of his arms lets go and his fingers find her face. "You like what you do." she tells him. "It's exciting. And I would be lying if I said that I didn't like making grown men cower under my gaze and at the sight of me. Sure, I want to be an artist, but I also have to accept who I am and what my name is because that is never going to change. And it won't change for you either. We are our father's children."

As Jace looks down at her, he knows that what she is saying is true. That just means that they will have to stick together. If there is one crack in their devotion to each other, it will all come crumbling down. Maybe one day their parents will fully accept their relationship but, until that day, it will be one hell of an uphill battle. "Come on." he says as he dips his head and kisses her lips softly. "Let's eat some breakfast and then we can talk more after."

She smiles warmly up at him and reaches up on the tip of her toes again and kisses him again. This kiss a little different though. Her lips are pressed against his in desperation as her hands slide into his hair and push him into her harder. Her tongue drags across his lips and then he is opening his mouth to let her in. His arms squeeze her tighter as they kiss and just when he is about to take her back to the bedroom and leave breakfast to get cold, she pulls back. Jace is sure that his eyes are wild and lustful as he looks down at her and by the little smirk that pulls up her lips, she is fully aware of what she is doing to him.

"You're right." she says in a mock serious tone. "We should eat." She pulls herself out of his arms and he turns to watch her as she walks away. Even though his shirt is baggy on her, he can see the sway of her hips and he groans in frustration and then follows her into the kitchen. That woman is going to drive him insane if she keeps kissing him like that and then walking away.


"We just need to try to stick to the plan the best we can." Clary says as she cups Jace's face in his car. They are parked about a hundred yards from her house and Jordan is standing guard by the door. She had to call him and convince him to somehow get the rest of father's guards away from the front door or else Jace would never make it to the front steps. "Don't try to be a hero if things go to shit. Let me handle my father."

Jace leans in closer to her and kisses her one more time before pulling back and looking into her eyes. "I will...to the best of my ability." That is what he had been telling her and he could see that it was driving her insane. He couldn't promise that he wouldn't try to get in between her and her angry father to try and protect her.

"Why do you have to be so stubborn?" she says exasperatedly and he lets out a tiny dry laugh.

"You love it." he says back to her and she cracks one little smile for a split second before she says, "Loving you and loving your stubbornness are two totally different things. Now, are you ready?"

"As I will ever be." he replies and then she is opening her door and stepping out.

They walk, hand in hand, to where Jordan is waiting by the front door. He watches them as they approach and Clary looks everywhere but at him. She can't let herself see the look of worry on his face that is surely there as they get closer and closer. Only when they reach the top step does she look at him. He is standing right next to her and gives her a sympathetic look and a nod to show his support, even though he clearly doesn't think this is going to end well.

Clary looks away from him as her hand finds the door knob and she takes one last deep breath before pushing the door open with Jace's hand still locked in hers.

They step inside to find no one in sight. As she shuts the door behind her, Jace leans down and whispers, "I love you." and she quickly replies with "I love you too." as she can hear her mother's heels clicking softly on the marble floors.

But unfortunately, she isn't the first one to step into the foyer. Her father surprises her when he steps out of his home office only about ten feet away from her and Jace. He looks at her and gives her a tight smile and then his eyes go to Jace beside her. The next thing she sees is her father's face turning completely cold as all human emotion other than pure anger is wiped from his face.

He reaches behind himself and she instantly knows that he is going for the gun that he always keeps tucked into the waistband of his pants. She doesn't spare Jace one glance as her eyes are trained on her father. She instantly steps in front of her boyfriend and makes herself as big as she can as her arms spread out in a protective manor in front of him.

Everything then slows down and the world seems to move in slow motion. Jocelyn walks into the foyer then and her eyes widen when she sees her husband raising his gun in the direction of Clary. He levels the gun and aims it at Jace's head as Clary shouts "NO!" at Valentine and Jocelyn lunges for the gun in his outstretched hand. The next thing that Clary registers is the sound of a gunshot echoing throughout the grand foyer and her heart sinking into her stomach.