When she had left Grannies, Belle had been excited to be having dinner with Rumald and Albert, humming to herself as she walked to their house. The nearer she got to their house, the harder she clutched the bottle of wine to her chest, nervous of how the evening would turn out for all of them. Her thoughts were cruel to her, teasing her that Albert would be horrified and Rumald would throw her out of their lives. If it did happen, which she very much doubted as she crossed their street to their side, Belle would fight to keep them. They meant more to her than life itself.

Her eyebrow rose quizzically seeing Rumald's Cadillac was not in the drive. She paused at the bottom of the path leading to their house, her gaze inspecting the driveway and then up and down the street. Pouting her lips and scrunching her brow, Belle sauntered up the path to the porch and went up the steps to the house. Inside she could hear loud music playing, the noise contained by the walls of the house. Belle knocked loudly on the door and let her arms fall to her sides as she waited, holding the bottle of wine by its neck.

On the other side the door, she could see a shadow jump down from the stairs and ducked out of sight before the door opened. With the front door now open, the loud music poured out onto the porch, drowning out the idyllic sounds outside. Belle's eyebrows rose expectantly, as she came face to face with Albert. He looked lost for a second and then smile crept over his face, while he gestured for her to follow him into the house. Albert ran off up the stairs, leaving Belle to close the front door. She shrugged her jacket off her shoulders and pulled her arm out of a sleeve, exchanging the bottle between her hands to remove the sleeve of her jacket from her other arm. As she hung her jacket, the dance music abruptly stopped and Albert came pounding back downstairs, jumping the last three steps to join her in the entrance hall.

"Hey, Belle!" Albert smiled at her. "Do you want a drink? Oh… You brought your own."

She touched his shoulder to guide him towards the kitchen. "Just get me the corkscrew and a glass."

"Sure." He nodded his head at her and went to dig through a draw for a corkscrew. Belle slid a chair out from the breakfast table and sat down onto it, placing the bottle onto the table. With the corkscrew hooked around his finger, Albert carried a can of coke and a wine glass to the table, joining Belle at the table. He dropped the corkscrew in front of her before carefully placing the glass on the table, using his foot to kick a chair out from underneath the table.

"Dad's been called to one of his tenants, who's locked themselves out of their house. Told me to tell you, he should be back in about an hour." Albert sat down onto his chair with a satisfying hiss escaping his can as he opened it.

Belle wriggled and worked the cork out of the bottle with the corkscrew, a pop echoing around the room when she managed to free the cork from the bottle. "How long has he been gone?"

"About an hour." He estimated with a glance to the kitchen clock.

"So, he should be back any minute then." She said pouring the wine into her glass.

"Belle, can you just tell him, we don't need to have the talk again." Albert pleaded to her, his hands protectively clasped around his can of coke.

Belle sipped at her wine, her brow scrunched together in thought at him, before she said. "What're you talking about?"

"I told him I understand." Albert shyly looked at her. "You know, the birds and bees chat. It was so embarrassing."

"Oh, right, yes." Belle felt her cheeks redden, feeling embarrassed for Albert and herself.

"I promised I wouldn't do anything, but I don't think he believes me. Hence why you're here tonight." Albert explained throwing his hand in her direction as he spoke.

"Is that what he told you, Bae?" She asked, as she doubted for a second why Rumald had asked her to dinner.

Albert shook his head. "No, but I don't see any other reason, why the three of us would need a chat."

"Bae, I don't think that's what your father wants to chat about." Belle told him and sipped her wine.

"Then I hope it's nothing to do with my mother." Albert groaned down at his can of coke, resting his head into the palm of his hand, leaning his weight onto the table.

"I very much doubt it has anything to do with your mother." She said rather quickly, surprising herself and Albert, who frowned at her.

He sat back into his chair, as he asked. "So, what does he want to talk about? It can't be school, because my grades are back at A's. I haven't done anything wrong recently, so it can't be that either. And I've stopped pranking him, like he asked, even though it was so funny."

"Look," Belle reached over to him and touched his hand on the table. "Let's just wait 'til your father comes home."

"You've got to have an idea of what he wants to talk about. Otherwise, he wouldn't have asked you to be here." Albert said astutely to her, making her smile at him.

She squinted her eyes at him as she regarded him. "It's scary how clever you are at times."

"I know something's going on." He poked his finger at the table. "He's…" Albert paused to find the right word. "Changing."

"Changing?" Belle probed and drank from her wine.

"Like I told you, my mother and father would argue about me or anything like cat and dog. Sunday morning, he didn't do anything. He just stood there" Albert flung his arm in the direction of the kitchen behind him. "And did nothing. She threw his phone, some plates and a glass vase at him. But he just stood there and did nothing. Didn't shout back."

Belle propped herself onto the table with her elbows. "What would you rather he'd done?"

"He should have told her to get the fuck out of our house!" Albert's temper got the better of him.

"Bae!" She exclaimed at him, shaking her head at his swearing.

"Sorry, but he should have." Albert voiced sternly to her.

Deciding over her words, Belle took a long drink from her glass of wine before she said. "Sadly, Bae, your mother is going to be a part of your life, whether you like it not. I love my father to death, but at the moment, I'd rather be in a separate zip code to him."

The corner of Albert's mouth twitched, his eyes pinpointed on the can in front of him. "I do love my mother, but I hate what she did to us, what she does to my dad."

"Bae, there's nothing wrong with feeling like that." Belle reassuringly squeezed his hand. "You have every right to feel like that."

"My grandma told me, my mother ruined my dad. She broke his heart, which made him into this hard, cold person, which is why everyone in town are scared of him. And I hate her for that." Albert told her, squeezing her fingers hard with his thumb.

"But you said he's changing." Belle titled her head in an attempt to make eye contact with him.

"He's… He's being nice to people." His gazed moved from the can to Belle. "He's smiling."

"Well, isn't that a good thing?" She queried and finished the remnants of her wine before pouring another glass.

Albert drank some of his coke and said. "I supposed so."

"You want to see your dad happy, yeah?" Belle pushed for a more definitive answer.

"Course I do." He answered shifting in his chair. "It's just…"

Belle rolled her eyes at him. "It's just what?"

"It's just… weird." Albert confessed with a shrug of his shoulders.

"It probably would be, if he's been like that nearly all your life." She summarised holding the glass to her lips, ready to take a drink from it.

As Belle drank from her glass, Albert said. "No, it's weird to think dad's having sex with someone."

The instant she heard the words dad and sex used in the same sentence, Belle spat her mouthful of wine back out of her mouth. The wine sprayed over the table. Swiftly Albert had shoved himself away from the table on his chair, taking his can with him, whilst he laughed at Belle's reaction. She coughed and struggled to breath, as the wine she had managed to swallow seemed to be stuck in her throat. Albert left the table and went into the kitchen to grab a dishcloth and the roll of paper towels.

"I wish I'd filmed that!" He chuckled, while he wiped down the table and offered the roll of paper towels towards Belle. "That could have been an instant hit on YouTube!"

Belle's voice was hoarse, when she spoke. "Why do you think it has anything to do with… sex?"

"It was an article in one of Emma's mum's magazines." Albert explained taking the dishcloth back to the sink and rinsed it out under the tap. "It said that people's moods could be affected by sexual tension." He shrugged his shoulders. "Me and Emma always put dad's mood down to not getting any. So now he's all smiles, he must have gotten some."

"Bae, do me a favour?" Belle asked drying the table with the paper towels.

"What?" He returned, sitting down onto his chair.

"Stop using the word sex." She pinned him with a look. "Hearing you talk about sex is too weird for me. You're like a baby brother."

Albert shook his head with a smile. "I can't do that. Who am I gonna talk about sex to when I'm older?"

"Exactly, when you're older!" Belle giggled at him and shoved the used towels to one side on the table, lying the roll beside them. She observed him beside her, mirroring the smile he showed her whilst he scooted his chair closer to the table. When things finally came out about Rumald and Belle, she hoped the dynamic between Albert and her would not change too much. She enjoyed their chats and his company, even considered him one of her best friends. Apart from, telling him about her feelings for his father, there was not much she did not discuss with Albert.

"Is it weird that he's having… sex or that he's with someone?" Belle curiously asked him, sipping at her glass wine.

Albert pressed his lips into a thin line, thinking about the question. "I didn't think of it like that."

"Like what?" She pushed, tracing her finger round the rim of her glass.

"That he has a girlfriend." Albert replied to her distantly, thinking over the new prospect.

"You assume he's had sex, but not that he has a girlfriend." She said to him.

He shrugged his shoulders. "He's never been with anyone. It's always been me and him."

"Or none that you've known about." Belle added before drinking from her glass.

Albert chuckled. "I remember when I was ten. The mayor's mother was trying to get him to take her out on a date. Kept bringing him things to the shop and turning up when we were out. Remembering the look on his face," Albert laughed harder, while Belle could only look amused. "He was so frighten of her touching him that he would shove me between them."

"He couldn't have been that scary then, if she liked him." Belle said chuckling at the image.

"I think she knew him before my mother left." Albert suggested and drank from his coke. They shared a bemused look between them, as the front door opened a smell of pizza and a chorus of grumbling entered the house. Hearing the door shut, they angled themselves to see Rumald enter the kitchen carrying a pizza box and his phone pressed to his ear.

"Dove, I don't care!" He grumbled into the phone, as he delivered the pizza box onto the table in front of them. "Get those people out of that house!" Rumald hastily strode over to the fridge and yanked it open. "When was the last time you did an inspection on that house? They've damaged all the woodwork and the walls. It's going to cost thousands to get those original features back."

Albert leaned over to Belle to whisper to her, as she was about to take a sip of her wine. "Sexual tension, perhaps?"

"Shush!" She smiled at him and shoved him away from her.

The fridge shook when Rumald kicked the door shut with his foot, using the momentum to turn on the spot to put his beer onto the kitchen island. "Dove, it's simple." He wedged the phone between his head and shoulder, so he could twist the cap off his beer. "You notify Sheriff Graham that you're going to evict them and show him clause sixteen F in their tenant agreement. Or do you want me to come and do what I pay you to do?"

Belle watched Rumald swig his beer across the kitchen, his eyes fixed down on the counter top in front of him. Seeing the cold calculated side of him, thrilled and scared her. Though hearing what he wanted his employee to do, surfaced memories of when she and her father were thrown out of apartments due to him not paying the rent. One side of her, tingled for the 'beast' in front of her, but she was saddened knowing what the family would go through tomorrow, when they were thrown out of the house, they called 'home'.

"Get it done, Dove!" Rumald ordered and hung up the phone, as he came around the breakfast island with his beer. "Sorry about that."

"The damage is that bad?" Belle inquired, while he claimed the chair opposite her at the table.

He closed his eyes, shaking his head at her, as he laid his phone onto the table. "It's like Jason and Freddy had a field day in there. Scrapes deep into the walls. Marks and chunks missing out of doorframes. The back door is hanging on only one hinge."

"Oh…" She glanced at Albert beside her. "Tenants, who'd have them?"

"Me!" Rumald said exasperated, opening his eyes to see her.

"I'll get some plates." Albert excused himself from the table, heading off into the kitchen to rummage in a cupboard for plates.

"I wish it was the weekend." Rumald said sighing and took a long swig from his beer. Sitting across from him, Belle finally noticed the cut and bruise she had been told about. She had been too distracted earlier to notice the black bruise above his left eye with a thick red line running through the middle of it and through his eyebrow.

Belle subconsciously rubbed her left eyebrow. "She got you good."

"Hmm…" Rumald gazed over his shoulder at her, while he put his suit jacket on the back of his chair, and saw where she was rubbing, which in turn made him do the same, now she had drawn his attention to his cut. "Yeah, she did."

"Pizza!" Albert sang sitting back down at the table and issued them each a plate before he opened the pizza box. "What? Where's the topping?"

"I didn't know whether she would like it, so I got plain." Rumald explained to his son, taking a slice from the pizza box.

"But… What about my pepperoni? My spicy sausage meat? My… My hot sauce chicken?" Albert questioned his father, pulling a disappointed look at him at the same time.

Rumald rolled his eyes at his son, while he swigged his beer. "You have plenty of things in the fridge, which you can add to that."

Grumbling Albert shoved himself up from the table and went over to the fridge, yanking the door open. Belle shook her head and smiled at Albert's little performance, as she took a slice from the pizza to put onto her plate. She gazed over at Rumald, who was smiling down at his phone, tapping and swiping the screen as he took a bite from the pizza in his other hand.

Albert returned to the table, dumping containers of different ingredients. "Next time, I'm ordering."

"Whatever you want, dearie." Rumald mumbled to Albert, sounding like his mind was elsewhere as he dumped his pizza onto his plate and hurriedly typed into his phone.

"You should have got two pizzas." Belle commented watching Rumald across the table, as she ate her pizza. Albert was laying his toppings onto his slice of pizza, distracted enough he missed his father's hands halt mid typing and his father's eyes rise from his phone to Belle. His injured eyebrow lifted up his forehead at her. The look in his eyes was playful with one corner of his lips pulling back in half a smile.

"That would suggest, Miss French, that I have common sense." He said looking back down to his phone, his thumbs returning to their dance on the screen. "We're in short supply seeing as you've got it all."

Albert sharply looked up from his pizza to his father and then to Belle. "What?"

"I suppose we could excuse you on this occasion, as you're at a disadvantage." Belle retorted before she bit into her pizza, her gaze on Rumald. The corner of his lips tugged into a smirk. Albert sat silent holding his pizza between his hands, his eyes bouncing back and forth between Belle and Rumald as if he was watching a tennis match.

A swoosh noise came from Rumald's phone as he put it down onto the table. "Right, that's enough with work for tonight."

"I thought you said this morning, you had to go to the Rabbit Hole tonight?" Albert asked with a mouthful of food and received a glare from his father for his manners. "Sorry."

"I rearranged it." Rumald stated collecting his pizza from his plate. "So we can have this little chat."

Belle took a sip from her wine, as Albert said. "Why does this feel like the time, you told me I had to go on holiday with my mother?"

Rumald chuckled discarding the crust of his pizza to his plate. "It's got nothing to do with your mother."

"Good!" Albert cried and his shoulders relaxed. "Then what?"

"I wanted to talk to you about me." Rumald said and folded his arms onto the table.

"Oh god! You're not dying, are you?" Albert asked panicked. Hearing the question, Belle's eyes opened wide at the suggestion, mirrored by the look Rumald wore on his face.

"Dying? I say I want to sit down and have a chat, and you think I'm dying?" Rumald questioned his son, unfolding his arms to touch Albert's arm, gently squeezing his son's forearm. "I'm not going anywhere, Albert. I promised you a long time ago, your worse fears won't come true. I won't let them. I'm never going to leave you. Ever!"

"Okay." Albert responded quietly, almost a whisper.

Rumald sighed shifting his chair closer to Albert and briefly glanced over at Belle before his attention went back to his son. "Albert, I want to tell you something before you hear it from someone else." Albert turned his head to look at his father. "I'm… I'm seeing someone."

"You mean you have a girlfriend?" Albert asked his father, his eyebrows creasing up his forehead. Quietly Belle sat and listened to them, feeling awkward as they spoke to one another. It was refreshing for her to see the kind, gentle, 'father' side of Rumald.

"Erm… Yeah, girlfriend, if that's what you want to call them. Though, I think I'm too old to call them my girlfriend." Rumald answered with a chuckle.

"Okay, and?" Albert pushed his father to carry on.

"And?" Rumald repeated confusedly. "And you don't have a problem with that?"

Albert pulled a face and shrugged his shoulders. "Why should I have a problem with it? My mother has a boyfriend. Why can't you have a girlfriend?"

"Well… I just thought you might have a problem with it." Rumald confessed to his son, taking hold of Albert's hand.

"The only problem I'll have is if she's a bimbo and an airhead like Jack's step mother." Albert told his father, picking up his slice of pizza to take a bite from it.

Rumald smirked as his eyes moved to Belle. "Oh, she's no bimbo or airhead, Albert. I can promise you that."

Belle felt under the microscope with his gaze on her, causing her to shift on her chair as Albert said. "Good. It's bad enough I have to dumb things down for Killian, when I'm with them."

"Yes," Rumald's smirk fell from his face at hearing Killian's name. "Let's not dwell on that… idiot."

"So, why's Belle here then?" Albert questioned, his gaze fleeting between the two of them. "In case I had a problem with it?"

Rumald took a long swig from his beer, his eyes on Belle over the bottle, before he said to Albert. "No, Belle's not here for that."

"Belle?" Albert frowned at his father, surprised to hear his father use Belle's first name.

"Me and Belle… We're" Rumald flashed a smile in Belle's direction. "We're seeing each other."

Albert froze with his eyes on Belle, his mind slowly digesting the new information. Feeling awkward, Belle tried her best to smile at Albert, observing her young friend blink his eyes in disbelief before he turned his gaze onto his father. Rumald still held Albert's hand on the table, while his other hand rubbed soothingly at Albert's shoulder. Albert blinked his eyes some more and looked down from his father to the table.

Growing concerned, Rumald leaned towards his son. "Albert, say something?"

Albert did not move or say anything as he stared down at the table. Reaching for his hand nearest her, she clasped his hand and squeezed his fingers. Slowly his gaze rose from the table to her. She smiled warmly at him and leaned towards him to grasp his hand between both her hands.

"Bae, talk to us." Belle said softly to him.

He swallowed at the same time his fingers clasped hers in his hand. "I'm okay. Just… I didn't think… It would be you."

"And you're okay with that?" Belle pushed, stroking her thumb over the back of his hand.

"If you're not, that's okay as well, Albert." Rumald quickly interjected with his worry showing on his face. Her smile widened seeing the look he wore on his face. She wanted to get up and hug him, reassuring him everything would be all right.

"I haven't got a problem with it, dad." Albert stated as his gaze moved to his father. "I'm just glad it's not a bimbo or an airhead." Rumald dragged his son into a hug, clutching at his son with a hand pressing his son's head against his chest. The sight of them almost made Belle well up with tears. The relationship they shared made her jealous, as she wondered why her own father could never be as caring as Rumald. She knew every choice Rumald made, was for the happiness of his son. All her father ever cared about was himself.

"Dad." Albert's call was muffled by Rumald's arm. Hearing his name, Rumald released his hold on Albert. "Can I take some pizza upstairs?"

"What? You don't want to eat with us?" Rumald asked with his arms lingering around Albert.

"No, it isn't that. I just want to go and play on my game and talk to Emma." Albert explained to his father.

Rumald smiled weakly. "Okay."

Taking two more slices from the box, Albert smiled at both of them and escaped into the entrance hall. Belle shook her head and took a sip of her wine, as Rumald moved to take Albert's empty chair.

"Oh!" Albert called appearing in the doorway, causing Belle and Rumald to jump. "Dad, we'll need to sit down and have a little chat one on one."

"About what?" Rumald asked confused.

"About the birds and the bees, of course." Albert smiled at his father, whilst Belle giggled into her hand and avoided looking at Rumald.

"Get up stairs before I change my mind." Rumald ordered, pointing in the direction of the stairs. Belle shook with laughter as Rumald watched Albert disappear back into the entrance hall. She shook her head hearing Albert's footsteps up the stairs and picked up her pizza to take a bite from it.

Rumald leaned over the table to collect his bottle of beer. "That boy thinks he's a comedian."

"He is funny." Belle said, as she discarded her cold pizza to her plate and pushed the plate away. Taking a sip of her wine to wash away the taste of the pizza, she glanced over at Rumald to find him staring at her, his chin supported by his hand, his elbow bearing the weight onto the table. His face was so relaxed, his mask forgotten.

"What?" She queried him, leisurely placing her glass of wine on the table.

"It astounds me how you have an effect on both of us." Rumald admitted to her.

Belle smiled at him. "I'd be more interested to hear about the effects I have on you."

His eyebrows briefly shot up his forehead before he leant off the table and dragged his chair to be closer to her. "I think if I was, to digress these effects to you, you would use them against this old monster."

"I don't see an old monster in front of me." She told him and twisted on her seat to face him, raising her hand to touch his cheek, his lightly stubble cheek tickled her palm. "I see my handsome boyfriend."

Smiling Rumald inclined himself towards her, his hands came up to cup her face as he kissed her. Her hand dropped from his face, melting against him, and opened her mouth to allow his tongue to explore. The taste of her wine and his beer mixed, leaving a rather bittersweet taste in her mouth. The kiss was over rather too quickly for Belle's liking, when Rumald pulled away from her, his hands lingered on her face.

"Are you staying tonight?" He asked in a hopeful tone.

"I can't." Belle replied, not liking the disappointment in his eyes. "I've got the early shift tomorrow."

He groaned closing his eyes for a second and said. "What're you doing for lunch tomorrow then?"

"Ruby and me are going to Portland after work." Belle informed him, giving him a sympathetic look.

"Portland? What for?" He frowned at her, as his hands fell from her face to rest on the tops of her thighs.

"I need to get Albert something for his birthday and I want to have a look at some dresses for Albert's birthday dinner." She explained to him and drank from her wine glass.

Rumald pulled at his tie and loosened it. "I know you're probably not making much at Grannies, but…" Belle scowled at him. "If you need some money, you only need to ask me."

"I appreciate the offer, but I'm sorry, Rumald, I won't borrow money from you." Belle told him.

"I wasn't going to lend it to you. I would give it to you." He captured one of her hands in his. "Look, I know you'd rather do things off your own back. I know you've worked hard to get where you are, but it doesn't hurt for me to help you out."

Belle's eyebrow raised at him, as she smiled at him. "It scary you know that already."

"I mean it though, you only have to ask." He repeated to her.

"I'll bear it in mind." Belle promised to him, as she noticed the time on the clock. "I better go."

"I'll drive you." Rumald said standing up from his chair and drew her up from her chair by the hand he held. Belle stepped pass him, whilst he leant over the table to collect his phone, and playfully slapped his backside. He jumped and spun round to face her, a mischievous half smile on his face. Smirking at him, Belle started towards the opening to the entrance hall when Rumald captured her into his arms, a surprised scream escaped from her while he drew her against his chest.

"Don't tease me, Miss French." He whispered seductively into her ear and kissed the tender skin behind her ear. She shivered unwillingly against him and squeezed her thighs together at the sensation it caused through her body.

"Hey!" Albert's bodiless voice called from somewhere in the house. "No, hanky panky!" Belle laughed placing her hands on top of his, while Rumald dropped his head to rest on her shoulder. His hands slid down and freed her from his arms, whilst he shook his head. Stifling her laughter, Belle went over to where her jacket hung and took it from its hook to put it on.

"I'm taking Belle to Grannies." Rumald shouted up the stairs, fishing his keys out of his pocket. There was a distant cry of okay from upstairs.

Rolling his eyes, Rumald followed Belle out of the front door. "It's a good job, he's my son."

"Just remember," Belle started to say, descending the steps of his porch. "its better he be like this than against us." He grumbled to himself joining Belle at the bottom of the steps and took hold of Belle's hand to lead her to his car. Nodding her head in thanks to him when he opened the car door for her, she climbed into the car and let him close the door for her. Belle watched him come around the car and get into the driver's side. She had never felt so light and care free before, and knew it was because of him and Albert.