Author's note: I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas (if you celebrate) and (or) a very lovely weekend. This is the last update that will happen for a while as I do a lot of traveling for the holiday. The next chapter will probably start right where this stops. So it will be a wonderful, fun chapter. Keep your eye out for that one somewhere next week possibly.

Happy reading!

Chapter Two

My mother ran out as soon as we pulled in. "Sydney, I need to warn you before you go in."

"What?" I asked, alarmed.

Adrian walked over and I gave him his keys back.

"Hi, Adrian." My mom said quickly before turning back to me. "Your just father came home. I told him you were coming over with your boyfriend and he went into a rage. He doesn't want you to be here."

I sighed. "I'm sorry, Mom."

"Well, it's my house too. And I want you here. I fought for you, Sydney. And I reminded him that you aren't one of his anymore. He locked himself in his office. He refuses to come out."

"We shouldn't be here." I took the cake from Adrian and handed it to Mom. "I'm sorry. I don't want to cause trouble with you and Dad. You have to live here."

She looked at the cake pan in her hands and then back at me. I could see the tears in her eyes. "You're my daughter, too. I want you here."

"I know." I looked to Adrian. "Maybe we can have dinner at my house tomorrow. Dad doesn't have to come if he doesn't want to."

She gave the vampire standing beside me an apologetic smile. "I want a chance to get to know you more, Adrian. You seem like a great guy." She looked over my shoulder. She gave a nod of approval. "You were right about that car. Very nice." She looked back toward the house and sighed. "Just come inside. He has to get used to this."

"I don't want a fight with him. I don't want you to suffer from it."

"You're my daughter, too, Sydney. I won't lose you just when I'm getting you back."

"Mom, we work together. You see me every day."

"I could still lose you." She draped an arm around my shoulder and led me to the door.

I reached out and grabbed Adrian's hand and pulled him along.

My father was standing in the kitchen when we walked in. He froze. He pointed. "I don't want that creature in my house."

"He's welcome, Jared." She turned to Carly and Zoe. "Come meet your sister's boyfriend."

My father stood in the middle of the room, visibly seething. His arms were crossed over his chest. My sisters greeted Adrian. Carly was full of unveiled kindness. Zoe shook his hand with apprehension.

"You have a very lovely family, Mr. Sage." Adrian commented.

My father snorted and shook his head. He made a plate from the food that was still on the stove and then left the room.

Mom sighed and then said, "Come have a seat." She walked over to the stove and started putting pots and pans in the middle of the table.

I helped while Carly and Adrian had an animated talk about art. Carly had taken an art appreciation class and enjoyed it, but she kept with the practical course and was now working toward a law degree.

"I'd like to see some of your work sometime." She said.

"I can show you one on my phone." He took out the device and tapped the screen a few times before handing it over.

"I hope that's not one of me." I said as I sat beside Zoe across from him.

"They're all of you." He said with that signature smirk.

"Wow, this is great." Carly said, she zoomed in and moved it around. "I'd love to see this in real life. Look, Mom." She passed the phone over.

"Beautiful, Adrian." Mom commented.

He smiled and looked embarrassed at the praise. "Thank you." He took the phone back and looked across to Zoe. "Would you like to see?"

"No, I'm fine, thank you." She said quickly.

Adrian eventually had all of us laughing and even coaxed a few smiles out of Zoe. Mom winked at me. I guess that meant I had her approval.

"Can I see your fangs?" Zoe asked tentatively as we got up from the table.

"Why would you want that?" He asked her gently. "Don't you see enough of vampires in your profession?"

"Dad won't let me interact with them unless he's around. Which is stupid."

Adrian smiled and nodded. "Not all of them are as kind or as awesome as me." He raised his top lip away from his teeth, showing his fangs for a moment. "And I hope you're satisfied with that." He patted her shoulder. "You'll be as good as your sister at this. I can tell." He leaned in. "Maybe even better, but don't tell her I said that."

I poked a finger into his ribs. "I heard that. But you're right. Zoe wants this, so she will do all she has to do to make herself the best."

She gave me a grateful smile. "I want to make the organization better." She said boldly. She looked at the closed door down the hall to our father's office. "We need to convince him. This guy's not really so bad. And if he's not, that means not all of them are."

"We're not." Adrian assured her. "In fact, our queen is one of the best. And I'm not just saying that because we're friends." His phone buzzed in his pocket and he looked at the screen.

"Who was that?" I asked when he put the phone away with a grin.

"Jill." He told the others, "The queen's sister. She's also pretty cool, I guess."

"She'll get you for that one." I warned.

We sat and talked in the living room for a while before Adrian and I made our way out. He kissed my mother's hand.

Mom and Carly pulled me back into the kitchen while he and Zoe made plans to have a better discussion of Moroi politics verses Alchemist politics.

"I love him." Carly gushed. "Please tell me we can keep him."

"Well, I was going to wait for a while to tell you…" I started.

"What?" My mom asked anxiously.

"He asked me to marry him. And I said yes."

Carly threw her arms around me and held me tight. Mom waited until she was done and then pulled me into a more subdued hug.

She held me at arm's-length. "Are you sure?"

"We're going to have a very long engagement. He's going to move here and rent a house eventually and we'll start all our plans then."

"Aw, man, I wanted to be here when you told them." Adrian said from the doorway.

"Sorry. I couldn't keep it in any longer. I guess I'm more excited about it than I thought."

"Excited about what?" Zoe asked.

"Adrian and I are engaged." I said nervously. I knew that her approval was still very tentative.

"Hm." She said, looking between us. "I don't know about this. It goes against everything."

"I know."

"Let me think about this before I say anything." She looked at Adrian. "It was nice meeting you, though." She turned and walked out of the room.

I said my final goodbyes to Mom and Carly and looked longingly down the hall. He wouldn't let me in even if I begged. I brushed my fingers over my cheek a moment and then turned toward the door. "Thanks for dinner."

"Yes, Mrs. Sage, thank you." Adrian said kindly.

"You are always welcome in my home." Mom said. She hugged him and kissed his cheek.

We left the house hand-in-hand.

He took his keys out of his pocket. "Are you driving?"

"No, you drive."

"I think that went fairly well." He said as he drove down the road.

"Yeah. Except for my dad. And you had Zoe eating out of your hand until I told her about the engagement."

"Your dad's not going to like it much."

"Yours isn't either." I leaned over and rested my hand on his thigh. "Are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah. Are you?" He brought my hand to his lips and kissed it.

"We have fifty percent full support. A little from Zoe and I think you can sway her if you're with her a little more. She loves a good debate and I know you'll give her one."

"I want you to meet the rest of my family."

"I've met most of them."

"All the Moroi royals are related somehow."

"Well, Jill has been sending me a lot of pictures of her niece and of Lissa now in her sixth month with baby number two. She wants me to come meet her."

"Dimitri and Rose don't let that baby out of their sight. It's actually kind of cute. And Lissa and Christian are happy to let them help raise her while they guard her." I caught a hint of jealousy in his voice.

"You want children?" I asked softly.

"We don't have to talk about it. We've run it into the ground."

"We have. But I don't know if you get it."

"So tell me." He said softly as he pulled into my driveway.

"I don't even completely know what I am. We don't know what our child would become."

"A human and a Moroi create a dhampir. You know that." he teased.

"And you know that I'm not exactly human. You know with my magic and all." That subject still scared me despite now being engaged to a powerful Spirit user.

He nodded in the dark. "We could potentially have dhampirs who can wield magic. And I personally think that's pretty awesome."

"I know you do." I got out of the car and started the search for my keys on the way to the front door.

"Hey." He hurried up to me. "Don't shut me out. Let's talk about this."

"Magic or no, Adrian, I don't want to have children just to send them off to fight." I opened the front door and walked in.

"We don't have to."

"There are so few dhampirs as it is."

"But that doesn't mean that if we have kids that they will come and rip them away from us in the name of defense."

"But I don't want to risk it." I wrapped my arms around his waist and looked up at him. "At least not right away. Let's do all of this slowly. We plan our wedding and find a house and get married. And then, in a few more years, we can revisit this discussion."

He brushed his fingers over my left cheek. "Okay."

I rested my head on his shoulder. "I love you."

"I love you, Sydney." He kissed the top of my head.

"Let's go to bed." I took his hand and led him toward my room.

"But I'm not tired."

"I'm not either." I smiled over my shoulder.

"Will you take your bra off this time?"

"We'll just have to see about that one." I pulled his shirt off over his head before we fell onto the bed.