AN: Sorry I couldn't upload this morning, I hope that you all enjoy this chapter.

I am tackled in the parking lot by Leia, her arms wrapping around my legs and she won't let go. I talked beth into letting me bring Nova to the clinic since she is trained to be a service animal and won't bark or frighten anyone. She knows how to act and react in a clinical setting.

"Hey Bug," I giggle. "If you let go you can help me get Nova out of the Jeep."

She lets go and stands on the back tire to peek over the back. I clip on Nova's leash to her collar before unclipping the leash that holds her in. This way she doesn't just leap out she waits to be called out. I lower the tailgate and hand Leia the leash, and she holds it with both hands.

"Okay," I hold my hand up to stop Nova from hopping down. She'll listen to hand cues over auditory. "Leia, say 'Nova Siéger', and when she is sitting really nice you can say 'Calme Toi', alright?"

Leia nods and I lower my hand and Nova stands up, wagging her tail to wait for me to let her out of the back. She was trained in France first, and so she knows both english and french commands while I gravitate to french ones with Nova and English with Comet.

"Nova siéger," Leia says slowly and waits, I nod at her when she is sitting. "Calme toi."

Nova gently jumps down and waits beside Leia, I grab my backpack that holds everything for the day out of the back and lead both of them into the clinic where a nurse has been watching from the lobby so that Leia doesn't make some grand escape.

"She listened to me!" Leia giggles.

"She did," I smile. "Lets go get us weighed and then to breakfast, okay?"

We walk down to the weigh room, stopping constantly since Nova is the highlight of everyone's morning routine. We're weighed and off the cafeteria, and Leia seems happier then most of the people here when it comes to weigh time. When we finish breakfast I go with her to her room where she is figuring out what to wear for the day.

"Do you want your present now or later?" I ask her.

"Now!" She jumps up onto my lap.

"Okay," I take the small pink box out of my backpack and hold it out for her and watch her lift the lid to reveal the antique oval locket that is pretty big for a little kid. "This was my great-great grandmother's, who gave it to my great grandmother, who gave it to my grandmother, and since she had a son my dad was the one who gave it to me when I was a little younger than you. I have worn this everyday since I was five, and now I am giving it to you. So you know I will always be with you even if I am not here at the clinic. I printed off one of the selfies you took yesterday of both of us and it's inside."

"Thank you Ana, can you help put it on?"

I hook the clasp of the platinum chain, that holds the silver locket, and kiss the top of this monkey's head. She turns around and hugs me like her whole life depends on it, I hug her back like Grace, Kate and Mrs Kavanaugh hug me.

"I love you Ana," She mumbles in my hair.

"I love you too."

She gets dressed and I walk her to the classroom where she'll be all morning till lunch, I go and have a meeting with Beth and Lisa about meal plans and how I am handling the amount of food, how I personally handled eating out this weekend because they know that eating in public is one of my achilles heels. The conclusion is to lower the size of the meals into eating normal sized meals but more snacks throughout the day. That I also have to eat three meals a week at a restaurant where I can't control the ingredients or the portion sizes, and eat everything while sat at a table.

"This time next week you could be Leia's foster mother," Lisa states. "I want to be sure that you're sure about this, that you'll be prepared to take care of yourself and her and what all of that means."

"I wouldn't have offered if I didn't think I could handle it, and I know better then anyone that any kids labeled as damaged goods in the system will be beaten down and torn apart in a matter of months. She doesn't deserve that, and I will be able to take care of herself and myself."

"Okay, and it is nothing against you, it was just to make sure."

"I know, thank you. I don't like to be second guessed though."

"I know."

I go out to the back outdoor area to let Nova let off some steam and get some fresh air out here. So I can get some fresh air out of that place. I trust them and their judgement, but to be question if I know myself well enough feels too far. I know what I can handle now, I have been standing on two feet for a while now. I'm good enough, better then I've ever been, and I'm not alone anymore. Things are better than ever, and I'm hoping by September no one will question how certain I am because that is when I want to have the adoption completed. We'll have a family, even if it is only the two of us.

I leave right after lunch, heading into Seattle and Grey House to surprise Christian. Taylor takes Nova, awkwardly, and sends me up in the fancy private elevator to the top floor with all the big heads.

"Ana?" I hear Ros behind me before I make it to Andrea.

"Hey," I turn and smile at her, hug her. "Long time no see."

"Yeah, you look more beautiful than every," She winks. "Christian is a lucky man, but could I steal you for a couple minutes."

"I don't feel like Gwen or Christian would approve," I giggle.

"Funny. No, we're looking into some publishing houses and I know you like books and thought you may know something."

"She can stop by after I have her," Christian chuckles from his office door. "I heard your laugh, Blue."

"Fine, but I want to pick her brain after," Ros points at him and heads to the elevator.

I walk over to him and hug him tight, he pulls me into the office and shoves me up against door, lips locking with mine. I jump up a bit to wrap my legs around him, I was coming to his office to talk and not to have a quickie against the door. I'm carried over to his cleared desk, laid down over the cold top as he rips my panties off from under my dress.

"This is going to be fast," He says, lowering his pants and boxers.

I nod frantically, "Okay."

He plunges into me, thrusting hard and fast. I grip to the top of the desk as his lips play against mine. The fact that we could be heard is hot, making this whole scene incredibly hot. God! I meet him thrust for thrust even though he tries to keep me pinned, both of us cum with fire, shaking and pulsating. He takes great care in cleaning me up thankfully since he ripped my panties and I don't need to talk to Ros while he's leaking out.

"If you worked here we could do this multiple times a day," He whispers in my hair.

"If I worked here you'd get nothing done, and I told you yesterday I would think about it. Working in a cubical was never on my list of dream jobs," I sigh.

"There is an empty office next to mine, one that could be yours."

"Christian, I don't understand business and mergers or whatever the numbers and data tells you. I understand English and Politics, not helpful to your realm."

"I'll wear you down eventually," he smiles.

"You're going to ask me in the middle of sex, aren't you?"

"Possibly, I love you."

"I love you too, but you need to get back to work."

He rolls his eyes, "Fine, go talk to Ros. Yours or mine tonight?"

"Yours. I'm taking Nova back out and they're going to be staying with a trainer for a couple weeks just to better them," I kiss him gently.

"So two weeks at my place?" He says into my mouth.

"Maybe," I end the kiss and wave bye.

ONE WEEK LATER

I wait for Beth and Lisa to come into their office where I have been told to wait for them, to endure some intense conversation about what my fate is, what Leia's is, and if we're changing things up again. Last week they decided to trust me to eat normal again, and I've done that. I've done everything they asked of me last Monday, and last Thursday I am officially responsible for a seven year old's well-being.

"Morning, Ana. Sorry we're late but we had some new patients arrive over the weekend and we already have had to tube fee one of them," Beth apologizes.

"No problem, I totally get it," I smile.

"So, we have talked and don't think you need to be in program anymore. You've been doing incredibly on your own and in voicing your concerns with Lucy, and as long as you continue to communicate with her as often as you are now then you don't need to come in twice a week for full days," Lisa explains.

"We do want you to come in every other week for one day till September to make sure that you don't slip," Beth adds.

"Yeah, of course. That's awesome, you actually think I'm doing good enough for this?" I am excited and scared. Christian is going to be so proud of me. "I thought I had to stay in program till the completion."

"Normally you do, but everyone is different. You do need to make sure ether you look after yourself, and come to us or Lucy if you start to struggle again."

"Of course, I don't want to be that person again."

"Good, but that means we do have to restructure how often you can come here to hang out with Leia. You'll be coming as her parent and not a patient, which means you will visit during the designated hours. You can come to family sessions which will help her a lot, and follow along on the other side for her sessions," Lisa states.

"Of course. She's not in for that much longer, right? She was already here for a while before me," I ask.

"We think by the middle of July she'll be ready to go home, she has been doing better and trying more since you've been around. She's almost at the weight she needs to be at, but we want to keep her longer to see how she acts if she is less supervised at meals and has meals like we put you on last week."

I nod. We have to go over what needs to happen for Leia the next five or six weeks, going over family sessions, outings, weekends with me, how often I can visit a week, and all that fun stuff. We all agree that when she has her panic attacks that she can call me at any time because if they stop that it would not help her.

I have to come back Wednesday for my first family session with her, but I get to bring her home until then to see how it goes. Then for Christian's birthday weekend, if she passes these couple days, I get her from Thursday till Tuesday for all the celebrations and prep. I'm going to take her with me to stop by Christian's office so that we can have lunch there with him, Taylor and Andrea know and are organizing food for the three of us.

I help her pack up in her room, including her school books, and get dressed to go because it's warmer outside then in the clinic. She dresses in dark blue cotton short shorts, a white peasant top and has white sandals on; she is dressed like a little me right now if we reversed the colours. At least I chose to drive that car today, not my bike because the car has the booster and I'm not sure how she'd react to the bike yet.

We're close to Grey House, a couple blocks away when she seems to get restless in the backseat and tugs on her seatbelt.

"What's up Love Bug?" I ask.

"I think I've been here before," She frowns.

"We didn't come here last week, maybe when your parents were alive. You were little, it wouldn't be a big memory if you had, but that's what it could seem familiar."

"Okay," She settles down.

I park out front of his building, a the VIP Valet he has set up for executives and some visitors. For me when I'm too lazy and frustrated to actually park my own car. I grab my purse and then help Leia out of the backseat, she's seven and I don't know how old a kid should be to be fully safe in a car so I have the child safe locks on so she can't open the doors from the inside. It was all Christian's idea when he freaked out about driving a kid.

"Why are we here?" He looks up at me, frustrated.

"What's wrong?" I crouch down to her level.

We're in the lobby with Sawyer hovering close by, I ask him to go get Christian while I calm her down a bit. I scoop her up and go sit down on one of the white couches, rocking her in my lap. People are looking and staring but I don't give a fuck, they're adults and she's a child.

"What's wrong Love Bug? This is Christian's building, he owns everything around here, all his companies are based from here," I hum.

"I feel familiar here, in my head," She taps her forehead.

"What is your head saying?"

Christian walks out of the elevator with Taylor and Ros, probably thinking something is wrong with me and not expecting a child. She looks up at Ros really close, examining her under a microscope.

"Daddy and Mommy worked for you," She points at Ros.

"They did?" Ros's voice is calm. "Do they still work here?"

Leia shakes her head, clinging to me, "No, they died at work two years ago."

Christian, Ros, and even Taylor freeze and shift awkwardly. Right, so this is going to turn into an interesting day and interesting conversation when the time comes. Christian takes my purse while I carry her the the elevator and into his office. Ros joins us for a quiet and calm lunch, once we're up here Leia was quickly distracted by the view and the space he has in his office. The chair is also a hit since it spins and has wheels. This is what I get for letting her to have a cupcake that had more icing than cake.

"Are you going to tell me why the three of you froze downstairs? I never asked what happened to her parents as I didn't want to press but if you know something you have to tell me now. I don't want her to have an anxiety attack every time I bring her here," I whisper threaten.

We're huddle far from where she is colouring on Christian's desk, still in view in case she comes over and we can stop before saying something to upset her more.

"Two years ago we had an issue with an employee we had fired a couple months earlier, he was off and wasn't performing at the level we expected," Ros explains.

"He entered the lobby and managed to shoot fifteen people, killing three, before being taken down by security and is currently serving a life sentence in a federal prison," Taylor says.

"It was all over the news and papers, only a few months before we met. How did you not know about this?" Christian looks at me.

"Because if I had read or saw something like that in the news then I would have been a bigger mess then the one you found me in," I snap. "I'm going to take her home and talk to her about it later, thank you all for joining us for lunch."

Ros and Taylor leave while I gather both my things and Leia's, Christian tells Andrea to have the valet bring my car around. We're not really talking or looking at each other or talking right now, but he still walks us down to the lobby.

"Come over tonight?" He asks.

"Leia's staying with me till Wednesday," I say. "You can come out but I don't know how settled she will be first night."

"And her room is complete?"

"Yeah, thank you for helping me."

"Always."

He kisses me, I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him too me. Both of us getting really into the moment.

"You guys are kind of gross," Leia laughs.

We break apart and I'm a bright shade of pink while I lead her into the car. Christian makes sure she's buckled before making sure I am.

"I'm going to ask Kate and Elliot to dinner tomorrow so Love Bug can meet them, and you are expected to be around to help out at five. I've cleared it with Taylor and Andrea," I smile. "You can come tonight if you want."
"I'll stay at Escala, but I'll call before bed."

Dinner, snack time and bedtime go off without a hitch with Leia. The two walls you can paint in her room are a lilac purple, her bathroom is a sea-foam green, and the closet is a light yellow; all of her furniture is white; and her textiles mix all the colours together with a light grey.

Half way through the night she's poking at me with tears from a bad dream so she comes up into the bed for a cuddle. I switched my normal alarms off and have one set for seven like at the clinic instead. I hate to say that seven in the morning feels like sleeping in, but it is for me.

We make pancakes together and bacon for breakfast, she's a little upset that the dogs aren't around for a bit but they'll be back and I need to keep reminding her that they're not going to be gone forever. She helps with the dishes, and makes it official that my seven year old is more help in the kitchen then my almost twenty nine year old boyfriend.

We have a chill day until Kate arrives to help out at three, until then we work on her school and play piano. I try and keep her and myself off of electronics as much as possible because it is not needed. Kate arrives with some of the things that I had on my list for her to grab from the market, and I am happy she was able to find my place alright.

"Kate, this is my foster daughter Leia. Love Bug, this is my best friend from college Katherine Kavanaugh. She is dating Christian's brother," I introduce.

We both watch her try and figure out how to pronounce Kate's last name but thankfully Kate doesn't torture her and tells her to call her Kate. We move to the kitchen and lay everything out. For dinner we are having chicken skewers with onion and peppers, root vegetables, salad, and we're making a cake for dessert. Kate is here to help with the baking, and it will be more fun for Leia to help us with that.

"A seven layer cake?" I ask.

"Yes," Kate nods.

"Seven layers?"

"I have everything needed for it in my car," She's excited. "Let's have Leia vote."

"I want the seven layer cake, it's a rainbow!" Leia squeals.

"Alright then, seven layers it is." I smile.

I let Kate and Leia go get things from the car while I gather the basic ingredients and devices needed that I know I have here. I look at the recipe that Kate has for me on the laptop, and I know that this is going to be a lot of work for us to get done in time for dinner. Good thing that this kitchen came with two ovens, my dream kitchen.

"Okay, lets do this!" Kate fist punches the air. "Leia's picking out the colours for the cake because I have like fifty different food colouring colours."

"How do you have so many?"

"I stopped by a kitchen supply shop and they had that many," Kate answers.

I start on the batter while she preps all the tins, Leia is sitting on the breakfast nook and is looking over all the colours and I know that each colour is going to have a meaning for her. She is so careful at choosing. She lines the seven colours up on the counter, she's not tall enough to see up on the island which is adorable. We are alerted that the colours go from right to left, bottom to top, and thats what she wishes: grey, blue, purple, green, yellow pink. I had no clue that there was such thing as a grey food colouring but leave it to Kate to find that.

"I can't believe you offered to have Christian's party here on the Saturday, before the family meal party on the Sunday," Kate says while Leia mixes the colours into the batter.

"I want it to be a big party, and Mia has sent the guest list already. People will park at the school up the road and we have a shuttle to bring them here. The companies doing set up will be here at like five that morning, and I have to come up with an excuse to not have Christian here for any of that. And I offered to do the cake, don't know why I would do that but I did. It's the fifth today, I have ten days to really organize everything still," I ramble.

"Can I help make Christian's cake?" Leia asks.

"Of course Baby, you can help pick the colours and flavours too, we need enough for about seventy-five people who will all be here."

"You have the property for this," Kate shrugs. "We're all here to help too. Mia and Grace are excited to come out Friday to go over all the specifics, and they have a catering company set and ordered."

"I know, but I want it to be perfect. I should have been here last year and I wasn't. It's my first one with him and I still haven't figured out a gift."

"You need to breathe. You have time, and I am all for a shopping day. We can go shopping, get him presents and party clothes for that weekend."

"Can I come?" Leia asks Kate.

"Of course, I will make sure that Beth and Lisa are alright with it, even if it is just an afternoon," I smile.

I do have the property to handle this, I have three acres on waterfront. While most of it is not cleared there are clearings and areas where we are setting things up and organizing things for the party. I need to not stress myself out about it too much, and I'm fine until I start to think about it. Ten days till the party, well I guess eleven since it is on the sixteenth.

Elliot and Christian arrive at the same time, both casually dressed and sentenced to grill duty. Leia and I are the ones who are putting the meat, onion and peppers onto skewer sticks since it's too gross for Kate while she chops up the root vegetables. I send Leia carefully with the plate of skewers out to Christian, and she chooses to stay out there and help them with the grill. With everything cooking, I set the outdoor table and bring out a pitcher of lemonade, water and chocolate milkshake. Everything set out and looks like a picture from a magazine, the cake is the main attraction.

"I'm just saying," Elliot announces before we start. "Ana, you have great trees out back if you wanted like a tree house or tree village, have an in the tree adventure course."

"I'll get back to you on that one, when pigs fly," I roll my eyes.

"It will be before then. Mark my words."

"Consider them marked."

I plate both my plate and Leia's, pouring her a large glass of lemonade and myself one of water. It's a family meal, and if I am reading Christian well enough tonight he is just as comfortable with this as I am.

AN: I hope you all liked the chapter, next up is when Mia and Mama Grey come out to organize a wild party.

What do you all think will happen, some of you are close with your guesses in the little contest to co-write a chapter with me.

Keep up reviewing and communicating!

Have a good night, Lovely's.

-Mouse