Tea got ready for school in her new home, the Kaiba residence, for the first time. She was nervous to go to school, because she was not sure how her friends would react to her dating Seto. His past relationship with the group was rather instable. She had tried to get them to become friends in the past, but Seto refused to trust anyone and they didn't care for his attitude…not that I could blame them. Fully dressed, I walked over to the room Poppy was sleeping in. We would be dropping him off at a day care facility while we attended school. I filled a duffle bag with a few necessities Miss Angela had picked up from the store yesterday, including: baby food, formula, and diapers. She was even sweet enough to pick up a car seat, which neither Seto nor Tea thought about. Seto had found some of Mokuba's baby clothes packed away he let me use. Holding this child, had me a nervous wreck. In another 8 months or so, I would be caring for another child. How am I supposed raise 3 kids when I am not even an adult myself?

Seto had taken the liberty to set up the car seat in the limo. Now that the secret was out, there was no point in trying to hide our relationship anymore by driving in less conspicuous cars. Much to his dismay, when he exited his door to put the car seat in. Hundreds of reporters were outside his home taking photos and asking questions.

"Mr. Kaiba, Is Tea Gardener your girlfriend?"

"Mr. Kaiba, Are you planning on marrying your secretary?"

And of course, his personal favorite, "Mr. Kaiba, is the infant yours?"

Seto's nerves were wearing thin and he hastily double checked, that the car seat was correctly put together and went in to get the kids.

He heard a commotion in the kitchen and found Mokuba and Rini eating pancakes. There was a plate on the counter left for him. Tea was sitting on the floor in the kitchen with the baby in her lap. She was trying to feed poppy a bottle of formula, he was resisting however since he was used to breast milk. The look of frustration on her face was evident. Seto told her, "Relax Tea, he will eat it when he is hungry enough."

She grimaced and replied, "I know, my frustration has more to do than just him being picky."

While eating his pancakes, Seto nodded, he had an idea of what she was thinking. He was too wondering if he could handle an infant. He came to the conclusion that he was able to handle Mokuba as a small child so he should be able to handle Poppy, especially now that he had Tea to help. He then checked his watch and realized it was almost time to leave. "Did you eat anything Tea?" He asked.

She shook her head no and said, "I am going to grab a pop tart (I don't own pop tarts) and eat it before class. You guys can go get in the car while I finish up with Poppy."

He frowned, he wished she would take care of herself sometimes. Just to be sure she didn't forget, he slipped a pack into her book bag.

Tea snapped the cap onto the baby bottle and placed it back into the fridge. She then met Kaiba and the kids by the door and asked, "Why didn't yall go to the car? You didn't have to wait for me."

Kaiba scowled and answered, "You'll see."

The minute he opened the door reporters bombarded us. The flashes were blinding and the yelling was making Poppy cry. "Give me the baby," Seto commanded.

Knowing Seto knew how to protect the child from the press, she did as he commanded.

Seto held Poppy close to him and swiftly made his way through the press. The security guards were more interested in making sure Rini and I got through since we were new to this.

Seto worked on getting Poppy in his car seat while we went around the other side of the car to get in. Once he finished adjusting the arm straps and Poppy was secure he locked the door and went around to our side to get in. Seto looked over to Tea and could tell she was nervous. When she was a child her father kept her almost completely out of the public eye to protect her. This was not the life she was used to.

Seto wrapped an arm around her and pulled her closer to him. As crazy as things were right now, knowing he had Tea by his side was the best thing he could have asked for.

After dropping poppy off at the nursery and the kids off at school, they found the outside of their school was not only lined up with reporters, but also curious students who had seen the photographs in the newspaper.

When Tea made it inside the school, she went to their homeroom, and broke down. Thankfully, there was no one in the classroom at the time since they were 10 minutes early.

Some of the things the students were yelling were worse than the reporters.

"Whore!"

"Gold-digger!"

"Kaiba, did you pay her for her services or did she do it for free?"

Seto knew this wasn't going to be easy, but if Tea was going to live with them, she would need to grow thicker skin. Instead of comforting her this time, he went to the back of the classroom and sat in his desk. He let out a sigh and thought, 'this is going to be a long day.'

Soon enough the geek squad came in bombarding her with questions, mostly about her relationship with me. Wheeler, knowing about the relationship ahead of time feigned shock although, he did ask about the new child. Tea tried her best to explain to them the situation and they appeared to have mixed emotions. Yugi looked heartbroken. Tristan didn't seem to care one way or another. Serenity simply looked surprised. Tea clammed up as other students started to enter the classroom and sat in front of me. When Yami entered the class, Seto balled up his fist. He wanted to kill him after that stunt he pulled the other night. Yami and Seto glared at each other until Tea grabbed Seto's hand to comfort him and he looked away.

Suddenly Tea distracted him as she said, "Tristan, where did you get such an amazing necklace. Is that the flame swordsman?"

He looked up and sure enough it was a gold flame swordsman he wore around his neck. He had to admit he was pretty impressed at how detailed it was.

Tristan grinned widely and said, "I made it! One of my biking buddies is teaching me how to do welding and I have been getting really good at it."

"I can't believe you made that." she said flipping it over to get a better look.

The teacher then walked in and said, "Ok class, time to start the lecture."

….

After school, they picked up all the kids and headed towards Kaiba Corp. Thankfully the reporters avoided this area due to the tremendous amount of security. If anyone with a camera dared show their face there they were instantly thrown out.

I had just finished filing away some papers. While Poppy sat quietly playing with my keys in his car seat, the party planner from last week showed his face again. "Mr. Kain, to what do I owe this honor?" I asked.

Kaiba walked in from the break area and said, "He is designing the nursery. Tell him what type of design you want and he will put it together for you."

Tea paused for a moment and said, "Ummm I don't really know anything about what boys like. After all, it has only been Rini and I for a long time. Why don't you choose something Seto?"

Seto was equally clueless, so he took the easy way out, "Mokuba, Rini how do you want the nursery themed?"

"Hello Kitty!" Rini screamed. (I don't own Hello Kitty)

"Dragons!" Mokuba answered.

Kaiba smirked at Mokuba's suggestion and said, "I think we have a winner."

Tea jokingly asked, "Hello kitty?"

"No, Dragons." He then turned to the designer and asked, "How soon can you get all this done?"

The designer tapped his chin and replied, "Dragons isn't a common theme it will likely all have to be handmade. For you however, I am sure I can persuade it into being done in a week's time."

Tea then interrupted, and asked, "If you are planning on making it from scratch anyway, how about making the room Blue eyes white dragon themed?"

Kaiba smiled and thought to himself, 'even better.'

The designer nodded and replied, "As you wish Ms. Gardener."

With that he exited the room. Seto sat at his desk and said, "I can't help but be excited to see how this is going to look when it is finished."

I nodded and picked up Poppy from his car seat. I noticed something strange about poppy, he never cried. He didn't cry when he was hungry, wet, or sleepy. When I first changed him yesterday, I had found the worst case of diaper rash I had ever seen. My mother may not have been the one to raise this child, but whoever it was, wasn't much better. Since he didn't cry, I had to check periodically to see if he needed his diaper changed and watched for visual cues to see if he was hungry.

Seto must have seen how nervous I was because he told me, "Relax Tea, he will let you know if he needs something."
I looked over to Seto and realized, he hadn't noticed yet. She asked, "Seto, don't you find it odd that he hasn't cried once yet? Especially when we changed his diaper yesterday and found that horrible rash he should have cried at least when we were dealing with that but he remained silent."

Immediately, he picked up the phone and called Dr. Rob. They talked for a few moments and he said, "He is going to meet us at the house. Pack his bag so we can go."

He took poppy from me and placed him in the car seat while I got the other 2 kids together. When we were finished, Kaiba grabbed his laptop and briefcase in the hand that wasn't carrying the car seat and made his way to the car.

Tea, Rini, and Mokuba were talking about school behind him. They were currently struggling with long division. I agreed to help them while I worked on cooking dinner that night.

Seto sat with Poppy on his knee typing away on his laptop while I sat a pot of water on the stove for macaroni and cheese. Rini and Mokuba were also at the kitchen table with Seto. While I waited for the water to come to a boil, I started to explain the first math problem to the kids.

We got about half way through the paper when the doorbell signaled Dr. Rob's arrival. Seto answered the door and was immediately handed a bottle of cream for diaper rash. Dr. Rob explained, "The stuff that you got from the store works good, but judging the case you described over the phone, this will work much better." Seto nodded and allowed the doctor to come in. He evaluated the child and decided, "Other than the diaper rash, the child looks perfectly healthy. As to why he isn't crying, I don't know. He could just be a very happy baby or his crying might have been 'disciplined' upon by his previous guardian and he may be afraid to cry."

Kaiba glowered at the thought of a child this young being hurt. However, if it did happen, he couldn't change the past. Dr. Rob then asked, "How is Tea doing?"

"Her hands look much better today, the puffiness has gone down and they are no longer red. I don't think I heard her say anything about her hands burning." Seto replied.

The doctor shook his head and said, "That's great, but I was actually talking about how she is adjusting to her new home and the new child under her care."

Seto turned his head and looked around. Tea was still in the kitchen and didn't appear to hear anything going on in the living room. "Oh, she appears to be doing ok. She has been quieter lately but I think she is just nervous. She looks like she is terrified she is going to break the child." Seto explained.

The doctor smiled softly and said, "That will get better with time. As I am sure you have already noticed, Tea is a gentle and loving young lady. More than anything, she wants to give her family, including Mokuba and you, the best chance at happiness. She has likely had a bad childhood and wants to be sure that Rini and Poppy have a better one than she had. As she begins to know the child, the family will grow closer and her fears will slowly begin to fade…. So, have you thought about asking her?"

Seto unconsciously played with the rings in the pocket of his jacket and replied, "Yes and no, I want to but the timing is just not right." He pulled the rings out of his pocket and continued, "I have been carrying them around in my pocket ever since we had that talk. Between Yami, Tea's mother, and Gozaburo's attacks, my desire to make her mine has only gotten stronger. More than anything, I want to protect her. That is why I suggested to the social worker that she move in after the chaos in her apartment. I would be there to watch over her and my entire security staff will be readily available. Not that it did much good the night that Gozaburo showed up."

Seto ran his hands through his hair and continued, "The worst part is that the signs were all there, but I ignored them simply because I didn't want to believe he could ever be back in my life."

"You can't blame yourself son. I probably wouldn't have believed it either. So what are you going to do about those three?" The doctor asked curiously.

Seto replied, "Well the mother is in jail now, so she is no longer a concern. I have several private investigators trailing Yami, hoping he will lead me to Gozaburo. When I find him, I will do whatever is necessary to protect my family."

The doctor nodded and picked up his briefcase. He then said, "I know you will son, I know you will." With that, he left for his next appointment.