"Sasori. Sasori. Sasori I'm so sorry." Sakura kissed him and pet him as he lay unconscious on her bed.

Sakura sighed in relief when she saw his eyes flutter and he groaned.

"Sasori?" She said softly as she lay next to him on her bed.

His eyes flew open, he rolled, grabbed her by the neck and slammed her back down on the bed, his body on top of her and knife to her throat.

Where did that knife come from she wondered as she looked up into his unfocused eyes?

"It's me, It's Sakura. Sasori, please." She whispered, scared that if she spoke too loudly he would just cut her throat.

"Sa Sakura?" Sasori's voice came out slow like he was struggling to remember something.

"Yes." She told him calmly, quietly, "It's Sakura, Sasori."

He slowly looked into her eyes, his pupils focusing on her face finally. He shook his head and slowly lowered the knife from her throat.

"Sakura, I'm, what happened?" He sat up and off of her folding the knife back and slipping it into his pocket.

"I thought you were a burglar so um, I knocked you out." She said sitting up.

"You did?" He rubbed his arm, he must have fallen on it.

"Pressure point. To the neck." She grimaced at him apologetically.

Sasori stared at her. She knew pressure points?

"So you…" He stopped talking, he had finally gotten a good look at her.

Sakura gasped, she too just realized she was in her bra and underwear. She ripped back the covers of her bed and climbed inside to cover herself.

She sat there staring at him red in the face. He smiled at her.

"I wanted to apologize." He said to her.

"I started to push you away because." He paused. "I realized I care about you."

She waited. Itachi had told her to give him time and space. If he was anything like Itachi, she didn't want to push him.

He scooted up on the bed to sit beside her.

"In art class, I could tell something bothered you, you were lost in your head and hurting."

"I asked you if you were okay." He added.

"Yes?" She prompted him to keep going.

"I have never cared if anyone was okay or not before, it had never occurred to me to ask someone that before." He said finally.

She smiled.

"So, you're saying that you care about me." She smiled.

"No." He said.

"No?" She frowned.

"You just said…" She was confused.

"I came home, I paced around my apartment, and thought about it." He told her laying his hand on her leg.

"I don't care about you." He said pointedly.

"Oh." She bit her lip trying hard to understand what he was saying.

"I think, I love you." He looked up at her through his hair that had fallen over his eyes.

"You think you love me." She repeated after him.

"Yes." He said watching her.

"I care about you, a lot. I miss you. When we are apart." He added.

"That's good though, I care about you too Sasori." She smiled at him relieved they were getting somewhere.

"Love is a weakness." He told her.

"It isn't something I have ever sought after, wanted." He admitted to her.

"You destroyed my way of thinking." He looked up at her through his hair.

Sakura held her breath, he looked so good right now, his hair falling over his eyes.

"I can't think of anything...but you." He confessed to her.

"I hate it." He scowled.

"I understand." She said gently.

"I won't push you, take your time. I'm here." She tried to do what Itachi had told her, give him space, give him time.

"You don't understand." He said quietly, almost angry.

"Are you, mad at me?" She didn't understand.

"No, yes, not you, just." He ran his hand through his hair and looked at her again.

"Now, I have something to lose." He touched her face with his fingers.

"I have a lot of enemies Sakura, the Uchiha included." He ran his fingers through her hair and let his hand drop to his side again.

"The Uchiha would never hurt me Sasori." She knew it for a fact.

"Maybe not but there are many others, who will." He looked at her again and almost cringed.

"I'm not a good person Sakura. I'm sure the Uchiha have told you what I've done, what I do. Who I am."

"They have told me things, yes. It is nothing they don't do and I consider them family...well most of them." She waved that technicality away in favor of focusing on him.

"I don't think you understand what you are agreeing to Sakura."

"What am I agreeing to Sasori." She asked him seriously.

"To be with me, to trust me."

"I willingly agree to that. The fact is, and I know you don't like it, I am protected by the Uchiha, so your enemies, are now thiers." She smiled at him.

"An invisible alliance of sorts." Sasori shook his head and smiled. "You are a clever woman."

Sakura smiled slyly at him." It is true, I am under thier protection, of the head family no less. I am already associated with your world Sasori, let me in."

"You are," Sasori said.

"Good." She took his hand and pulled him to her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him gently.

"Sakura?" He moved his lips over hers.

"Hum?" She hummed gently into thier kiss.

"Where did you learn to fight like that?" He smiled into her lips, she started to giggle.

They fell onto her bed laughing with one another.

"Um, Hatake Dojo. Kakashi Sensei taught me at the request of my parents before they died when they found out I was friends with Sasuke Uchiha." She laughed again.

"Hatake, I know the man," Sasori said and kissed her again and again on the cheek then the mouth teasing her.

"So, are we okay Sasori?" She asked him in between kisses.

"Yes." He ran his hands down the side of her body and hummed his appreciation.

"I should get dressed." She kissed him quickly and made to get up but he held her in place. Running his tongue along her bare shoulder then down over the tops of her breasts.

"Are you sure?" He flicked his tongue over her skin making her moan.

"Sakura." Her name flowed from his mouth like the kisses hot over her skin.

"Hum?"

"Dinner?"

"Yes, let me get dressed." She went to get up again.

"We can order in." He held her tight to his chest covering her mouth with his again.

She didn't get a chance to answer. Sasori's mouth eclipsed hers in a forceful kiss, his hands slipped under the elastic of her bra and over her breasts kneading them gently. His body moved over hers, his clothes rubbing against her skin.

Her hands rose to his chest, down his chest to his pants pulling and tugging. His hands stopped her.

"Sakura, wait." His breath was short and he gulped in air.

"What's wrong?" She asked him resuming her fumbling at the zipper to his pants tugging it down. She could feel the press of his erection against her hand and she moaned into his neck.

"No Sakura please." He almost begged her.

"You don't want to?" She looked confused.

"I do but." He took a deep breath and moved off of her pulling up the blankets to cover her body.

"You're a virgin aren't you?" He asked her seriously.

She blushed," Yes."

"I want to wait." He said gently pushing her hair behind her ears with both hands and holding her face.

"Why? I want you, I care about you, I know you care about me." She tried to pull him back over her but he stopped her with his arm.

"I don't have a lot of light in my life, a lot of innocence. When I take you, I want to do it the right way." His gaze was intense.

Sakura nodded once." Okay."

"My father he, he didn't let me have a childhood, it was, different in Suna than it is here." He tried to explain, he felt foolish.

"I was six years old when I committed my first murder."He told her.

"I was seven when I tortured my first victim at my father's orders." He continued.

"It was normal for me. You are...you keep me sane." He held her gaze.

"I don't want to corrupt you. I want to do it the right way, you understand." He rose from the bed and offered her his hand.

Sakura nodded again and took his hand. "We can wait Sasori."

"What do you mean do it right though?" She cocked her head to the side.

"When we are married." He told her seriously.

"Married?" She choked.

"I told you. I think I love you." He said.

It wasn't until years later that Sakura would come back to this moment and realize what his words had really meant, and how rare it was in his world to do and say the things he did and said to her.

"Sasori." She stammered.

"You don't have to say anything." He led her to the closet.

"Get dressed. I'll order us some dinner." He left her bedroom to let her dress in privacy.

She pulled the shirt she had dropped on the floor earlier over her head. She could hear him in the other room ordering food. She was tying her pants up when his phone rang again.

"Yes?" He answered the phone.

"Not tonight." He said.

"That wasn't the plan and you know it."

"I will not yield tot hat pathetic excuse for a life."

"He dares…"

"Fine…"

"I'll be there in an hour, do not keep me waiting and I want to leave as quickly as possible." Sasori hung up his phone huffed and walked to the bedroom.

"Sakura, I have to go." He said without explanation.

"Work." He added then paused considering.

"You should go to the Uchiha's tonight, just in case. Don't tell them anything, no matter what they say. Tell them nothing about us." He told her to her surprise.

"I understand but the food." She protested.

"Wait for it, then leave immediately. I won't be here to protect you and I haven't secured your apartment yet." He kissed her and walked out the door.

"But." She stood there alone in her bedroom again.

Huffing the hair back out of her face she picked up her phone from her nightstand and called Sasuke.

"It's me." She said when he answered.

"Can you ask your parents if I can come spend the night tonight? Sorry, it is such short notice but."

"Ok thanks. I'm just waiting for my food to get here then I'll be on my way."

"No, I'm bringing it with me, yes you can have some."

"Okay, I'll text you before I leave."

She hung up. Ten minutes later there was a knock on her door.

"Order for Haruno?" The boy asked holding the food up.

"That's me." She smiled and took the food from him.

"OK see ya." The boy left before she could tip him.

Sakura closed her door, grabbed her school bag and overnight bag, the food, opened her door, locked it and made her way down the stairs to her car.

Forty minutes later she pulled up tot he Uchiha compound gates. They opened before she could hit the intercom. Sasuke must have been waiting for her.

She parked her car to the side and got her things out. The front door to the main house opened before she could knock.

Mikoto rushed out of the house with a worried look on her face, "Sakura dear, are you okay? Were you followed? Who knows you're here?"

"What?" Sakura asked the obviously worried woman.

"You're here because of what happened in Suna right?" Mikoto took her book bag from her and ushered her inside the house.

"What happened in Suna?" Sakura felt a pain in her stomach, and her mind flashed to Sasori's conversation before he left her and told her to spend the night with the Uchiha.

They made thier way into the kitchen where the family had already sat down to their dinner.

Fugaku rose to hug her, Madara hugged her after him, Obito waved to her, Itachi smiled slightly and inclined his head to her, Shisui grinned and Sasuke got up to meet her by her usual chair.

"Suna was bombed 2 hours ago. The Akasuna manse was raided, al the servants were killed. Sasori's father is dead. They are coming for Sasori next." Sasuke told her.

Sakura dropped into the chair that Sasuke had pulled out for her. "No."

"Sakura, we need to know how much danger you may be in," Fugaku spoke softly to her.

"How close are you and Sasori?" He added.

"He told me he loved me tonight...before he got a phone call and told me to come here before he left." She looked around the room.

"Am I in danger?" She wasn't sure if she wanted to know.

"They haven't been dating that long." Shisui protested.

"And yet he told her he loved her," Mikoto said.

"If his behavior has changed enough, they will know" Madara growled.

"Then they will know about her, and her connections," Itachi said tot he room looking up from his plate.

"They will know she's here," Itachi said.

"She will be safe as long as she stays here," Itachi said and went back to his plate.

"I have class tomorrow," Sakura said.

"Sasori will come here looking for you, he will know we wouldn't let you leave," Itachi told her.

Everyone else in the room was quiet.

"He knew, he knew I was in danger that's why." Her eyes met Itachi's and he inclined his head.

"Oh." She looked down at her hands.

"What is it, what did he do Sakura?" Sasuke demanded.

"He tried to push me away to protect me, but when I, when he realized…" She laughed.

"What is it dear?" Mikoto put her hand on the girl's shoulder.

"I have the worst luck in men." Sakura laughed again and got up from her seat, grabbed her take out food and opened the bag pulling out containers.

"Sasori left before we could eat. I'm not that hungry, help yourselves." She set the food out on the table and closed her eyes.

She pulled her phone from her pocket and texted Sasori.

Text message: From Sakura: Be safe. I'm at the Uchiha compound. I'm not going to class tomorrow. Call me. I love you.

She set her phone next to her plate on the table. If he texted her back she wanted to know right away.

Sasori turned down the last road out of Fire country to Suna. His phone beeped, he pulled it from his pocket and smiled. He slipped his phone back in his pocket, he would text her later...after he took care of these worthless, soon to be dead pieces of shit amateurs who tried to take over his village, because make no mistake...it was his and thier time there was done he would make sure of it.