Chapter Twenty-Five: Exposure

Bulma looked across the high, round table, trying desperately to hold in her laugh. Deciding that he didn't want to chance meeting up with Goku and Chichi, Vegeta had driven Bulma to a café on the edge of town. He was currently shoveling piles of food into his mouth at top speeds. Bulma slowly twisted her fork in her pasta and sauce and delicately placed a small-sized forkful in her mouth as she watched Vegeta. He stopped shoveling to glance up at her for a moment.

"What's so funny?" he grumbled past his mouth full of fries and a slice of pizza. Some cheese was still attached to the plate by a melted string. Bulma smiled and pursed her lips.

"I guess I can pay for all this," she said, letting out a small giggle, "Seeing as you can easily bankrupt yourself in one meal." Vegeta tilted his head and she thought he was about to decline her offer, but then he just shrugged.

"Whatever you want," he replied, beginning to shovel food down his throat again. Bulma knew it was traditional for the man to pay for the meal, but she had already decided that there was absolutely nothing traditional about them. Plus, she had money to throw around while Vegeta did not. It was a simple and easy decision for her to make.

After Vegeta had his fill of lunch and Bulma finished her plate of pasta and white sauce, she paid the bill and left an extremely large tip for whichever poor waiter had to deal with her and her hungry Saiyan boyfriend.

Everything seemed so new and exciting for her now that things between them were as perfect as perfect could be. Bulma knew that their fiery nights together weren't even close to over, which meant that they had something going for them. But even more remarkable was the simple fact that Vegeta had willingly chosen her over his entire planet and his throne, nonetheless. She felt pretty special to have a prince choose her over his title and his command. It was like a dream come true. Her dream boy was no longer a dream to her. He was anything she wanted him to be.

Vegeta stretched as they walked out of the café and diner. Unexpectedly, when his hands dropped back down to his sides, he took Bulma's hand and entwined his fingers with hers. It was a short walk to his motorcycle, so it didn't last very long, but Bulma cherished every second of it. If this was what love felt like, then she was never going to let him go. She instantly feared what could have happened, should he have decided to leave last night instead of staying with her. But he was here now, so she had nothing to worry about.

"Where are we going now?" she asked, looking up at the bright blue sky. It was an hour after the middle of the day and the sun's heat was diminishing some of the cold winds that brushed past Bulma and pushed her hair every which way and back again.

"The beach," he replied.

"The beach? But, Vegeta, the water is probably freezing. And my bathing suit is back at the hotel room anyway. I don't carry it around with me everywhere I go, you know."

"Then we'll go back and get it first," he said simply and Bulma tilted her head at the lack of his usual insult or criticism. Maybe having a productive morning put him in a good mood for the remainder of the day. "And try not be so forgetful all the time. Sex won't get you what you want forever." Or maybe not…

But the notion that she could get what she wanted because she was having sex with him was almost more enticing than the sex itself. She was now Vegeta's prize, but every time he wanted her, she had to approve of him and what they were going to do. He had no control over the situation because he clearly would never mind sleeping with her even if he was an inch from the end of his life or just flat-out tired. She snickered at the things she could make him do.

"Stop getting horrible ideas stuck in your head, woman," he added sternly, seeing her expressive smile at his previous comment.

When they were both on the motorcycle and Bulma had her familiar black helmet on, Vegeta drove over the speed limit without getting caught, as usual, until they arrived at the hotel. Bulma swung her leg over the side and balanced herself on the ground from the windy ride. Vegeta set his ride down on the kickstand and led the way to their room, key in hand.

Along the way, the big man that Bulma regrettably had to call her hotel neighbor was sitting outside his room on one of the plastic chairs. His face was flushed, but he wasn't holding any empty bottles. She knew something was wrong with him when Vegeta pulled her arm until she was standing on the right side of him. Vegeta was between them as they walked by and Bulma could have sworn she heard growling from deep in his throat.

"I saw you two havin' a good time, this mornin'. Maybe I could join ya next time, sweetheart," the man said suddenly. Bulma was about to walk faster when she realized that Vegeta was no longer by her side. She turned to find him standing in front of the burly man, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Vegeta, what are you—"

"Listen, you drunk bastard," he said violently, uncrossing his arms and making a show of clenching his fists tighter and tighter, "If you value your sanity, then you'll never speak to my mate again. If you value your life, then you'll never look at her like that again. Do you understand me? I mean that I'm going to rip your head from that stubby little neck of yours if you do anything I don't like. Anything at all. That being said, maybe you should avoid me altogether. And if my mate even brings you up in one of our conversations, I'll come over here and tear you apart. My advice to you right now is to leave this hotel, maybe even this entire region, because your presence here is already beginning to piss me off. And after this morning, you're just lucky you still have your balls, old man, because you might not have them when you wake up tomorrow morning. Or maybe when you wake up screaming during the night."

The man was clearly drunk, because Bulma would have peed in her pants if Vegeta's current look had been placed on her. The burly man was half-smiling.

"What's so funny, you fucking bastard?" Vegeta snarled. "You think I'm joking? You really think I'm not about to kill you where you stand?!"

"Vegeta!" Bulma cried, not wanting to have to deal with the police right now. Or at any time for that matter.

"Heeeeeey," the burly man said with a drunken snicker, "You're the superman from the news, aren't you?"

Vegeta froze and Bulma tilted her head.

"What does he mean?" she asked, not liking the Saiyan Prince's reaction to such a silly comment.

"Yeah," the man said, standing up and wobbling back and forth. He was a good half a foot taller than Vegeta. "You're the guy that saved that girl from falling off the ride at the boardwalk… And you're the girl that he saved. Geez, no wonder you gave him a night to remember. It must have been nice… I wish I could save a pretty girl like you." When his eyes drifted below her face and widened with passionate excitement, Bulma turned red, but not before Vegeta threw a punch into the man's gut. He doubled over and retched on the ground. Bulma would have reprimanded Vegeta, but she felt that he deserved what he got. No man should look at a girl that way, drunk or not.

"Go put your bathing suit on so we can get out of here," he commanded after opening the door to their motel room and holding it open for her to enter under his outstretched arm.

When she was inside, he shut the door behind them and placed his hand on the small of her back, leading her into the bedroom. Bulma's heart raced when the familiarity of the room brought back the feeling of last night into this morning. She instantly felt hotter when she pulled her shirt over her head and threw it on the ground. She wished the room had the air conditioning unit on. It was always cold enough at night, but not now, of course.

She felt that since both she and Vegeta had seen the other naked, it was perfectly all right for her to change in front of him. She saw nothing wrong with it, anyway.

"If you want to get out of here any time before tomorrow, you should go change in the bathroom," Vegeta said, stretching himself out on the bed with a fake yawn. Bulma glanced over at him questionably, doubting her own reasoning for a moment, and instantly noticed the slightly swelling bulge in his dark blue spandex training pants. She quickly looked away and grabbed her bathing suit, heading for the bathroom. She heard Vegeta chuckle behind her.

"Yes, woman. That's called an erection. It happens sometimes. If you can't get used to it now, then you should probably stay as far away from me as… humanly possible." Bulma instantly shut the door on him and accidentally slammed it shut, jumping because of the loud noise and banging her hand on the sink. She yelped in shock and hit the soap bottle off the counter as she spun around, holding her wounded hand with a pout on her face. She silently snarled when she heard Vegeta chuckle from back in the bedroom.

She bent over and picked the soap bottle up off the floor, thinking about what was going to happen to them. If Vegeta was on the news, then everyone would know his secret. They wouldn't have any idea about Goku being a Saiyan as well, but her main concern was Vegeta. She remembered a bunch of movies where people would capture strange people to do tests on them. Although she doubted that Vegeta could be captured by anyone or anything anyone created, she knew that the information being out in the open could only bring trouble.

The other thoughts she had revolved around herself. Did she really want everyone to know about Vegeta while they were in their current situation in school? Half of the students already thought that Vegeta was staying at her house just so that they could have sex together. The last thing she needed was for everyone to think that she was sleeping with an alien. But it was kind of inevitable now.

The second thought she had about herself was the fact that her parents loved to watch the news channel whenever they got a free moment. They were bound to see her eventually. Her mother would certainly freak out when she saw Bulma free-falling from a malfunctioning roller coaster. And Bulma knew her father wouldn't approve of her being more than just friends with a teen boy who can obviously fly. According to her father, girls shouldn't be dating until after they were out of college and had their own job and money. Bulma had just never considered herself in that statement because she had never felt like this about anyone before. It was pure heaven, being with Vegeta.

After she was successfully changed into her bathing suit, Bulma grabbed her clothes and opened the bathroom door. Hoping that her dream boy wouldn't make any extra comments about her appearance, good or bad, she allowed herself to walk into the bedroom and throw her clothes into a corner, making herself a dirty clothes pile. She couldn't have put her other dirty clothes in that pile before because Vegeta had nearly torn them to shreds. She mentally chuckled. She wondered what new surprises her Saiyan Prince would have for her today.

"Are you ready?" Bulma asked, turning to the bed, but he wasn't there. She looked around and even checked the tiny kitchen and entrance room. He wasn't even in the hotel room. She opened the door and stepped outside. It was freezing outside and her lack of clothing made it all the worse. She leaned forward and looked down each pathway, where the rooms' entrances were lined up on the bottom floor of the Oceanview Motel.

A loud thump drew her attention to the right, where she suddenly saw Vegeta swaggering towards her, as if he had just won the Nobel Prize for something he really shouldn't have.

"If you don't want our neighbor's face to look any uglier, I would advise you to go back inside our room before he has the chance to piss me off again," he said simply, almost proud of himself.

"What did you do?" Bulma asked, a bit embarrassed by the fact that her tone revealed that she was more interested in the entertainment value of what he had said than the welfare of the man he had probably just beat half to death. She just hoped that the outcome of being beaten half to death two times wasn't based on mathematical principles.

"We're not going anywhere, woman," he said, turning her around with a hand on each of her shoulders, "Get back inside before your weak Earthling immune system fails and you get sick."

The door was shut behind them and Bulma rolled her eyes. She went back into the room to put her clothes back on and get out of her bathing suit when she heard her phone vibrating from the bedroom. She jogged to catch it and picked it up, noticing that it was Chichi just in time to prepare for the high pitched squeal.

"Bulma! You're all over the news!" she yelped. "Somebody caught Vegeta saving you from your near death experience on camera and there are rumors all over the place about Vegeta. Can you imagine what will happen when we get back home? The gossipers in school are going to know all about this by the time we get back and I don't know if— No! Goku, stop that!—"

"Hi, Bulma. It's Goku. What Chichi means to say is that everyone now knows that Vegeta can fly and they think he's the modern version of Superman. Although he doesn't have a weakness like kryptonite, and if you asked him, he'd probably say that Superman wouldn't stand a chance."

Bulma laughed as she heard Chichi yelling in the background. "Sorry, Goku, but that's old news. We heard all about it already. But they don't know about you, do they? They couldn't know about you as well because you didn't do anything supernatural, right?"

"That's true, but I might as well have. What's the difference if they know about Vegeta or both of us? They still know that something's not right. But I think this could lead to more problems than what we had already."

"How so?"

"Well, for starters, it could easily attract attention. I don't know whether or not you like that kind of stuff, but I know that Vegeta sure doesn't. He hates extra attention with a burning passion. It might wind up putting him in an even worse mood than he's usually in."

Bulma turned from a slight sound and jumped, seeing Vegeta standing directly behind her. He snatched the phone out of her hands and held it to his mouth.

"Oh, you want to see a bad mood, Kakarot? Why don't you get over here and I'll gladly show you a bad mood!" And then he slammed the phone shut, making Bulma jump at an uninviting crackling noise and his strength, which could cost her a good amount of money along with a brand new phone. He tossed it back into her purse and began to storm out of the room. But then he paused and turned around watching her interestingly. "Are you going to change or not?" he asked, and Bulma's face turned red at his deliberate meaning.

"I was planning on it, but I don't know if I can get out of this tight bathing suit all by myself," she replied with a tiny smile, just enough to show the front of her sparkly white teeth.

Vegeta playfully snarled to show his teeth in return. Bulma rolled her eyes again and started taking off her top, her back to her dream boy. But before she could get anything done, she could feel his familiarly cool breath on her neck, making shivers run up and down her spine. His arms slowly wrapped around her. He was very warm and she melted backwards into him, ridding herself of the goose bumps that had formed from standing outside the hotel door as the cold wind rolled by, brushing away all her warmth. Now she was eagerly stealing Vegeta's body heat as she was gently lifted and placed on the bed. It hadn't even been made from the previous night and it didn't look like a maid had come to change the sheets either. It felt a little gross to Bulma, but when the bottom piece of her bathing suit came off, she couldn't have cared any less.

Once again, it was going to be a long day…