Roberto didn't throw a tantrum. He sipped at his coffee gracefully, crossing his legs, and slowly turned around to face Keith. "Keithy."

"Roberto." Prince Keith responded. "You're n-"

"This is my girlfriend and this is our first honeymoon. I want to practice things with, on, and over her."

I went bright red at that and flung a piece of toast at Roberto. "Hey..."

Prince Keith had gone red as well and he stood back very suddenly, as if he'd only just thought about what Roberto had meant, his face flustered. "Y... you should show a little tact!"

"It's true though." Roberto gazed at me and winked. "I want her all day and then all night, till tomorrow morning. Then she gets the afternoon to sleep."

"This isn't-"

I flushed deeper as he slid a foot up my leg, nearly dropping my own coffee. Did he mean what I thought he meant? I wasn't sure.

"Fine!" Prince Keith must have noticed the foot as well. "Fine. I'll be here at five tomorrow night. I'll … I'll change the plans. Don't call me at five in the morning again!"

Roberto cheered when Prince Keith was gone, foot dropping, and threw the toast to Otis. "There! See? Now we get all day and another night together."

"You know honeymoons happen after weddings, right?" I prodded him.

"I'm changing the rules." Roberto muttered, "And we need to get Keithyboy a girlfriend."

"We do?"

"It'll relax him." He might have been right about that. I wasn't sure. Roberto clapped his hands suddenly. "Okay! Let's get ready for a date! I don't want to wait for tonight."

I would have thought a date, without leaving the property, would be a problem. Instead, it wasn't. Alberto wouldn't have been Alberto without being the magic butler that he was. Before I knew it we were dressed, in the kitchen, and making lunch together while the last Harry Potter was on.

Movie and cooking together. One of my suggestions to Alberto.

"Does Alteria have an aquarium?" I asked as I whipped the eggs together.

"Well, yes, but it's old." Roberto frowned. "I visited it once and … it was kind of sad. You like them?"

"Yeah. Liberty's aquarium is incredible."

"Then we should find a way to upgrade ours so that it rivals Keith's one!" Roberto grinned. "When all is peaceful you and I will go on a research trip. Write down everything he has and then make it three times as good!"

"Kids should design it though." I added. "And big kids at heart. They have the best ideas about these things."

Roberto nodded, grinning, and reached out to ruffle my hair. "Yes- we'll get all the orphans to help us design it. But how?"

"Um. Get an architect to design sections of the aquarium." I pictured it as I said it, lowering the bowl, thinking seriously. "All on different pieces of cardboard... or those 3d models they make. Plus things like fish tunnels, dolphin tunnels, all of that, like it's lego pieces."

"Then the kids put them together?"

"Exactly!"

"We could give them crayons too. They could colour it. Then the public could vote!" Roberto seemed excited. "Al, I need a pen and paper!"

"But we want them all to feel like winners." I added, quickly. "So... how many orphans are in Alteria?" There might be more than we wanted to admit.

"Don't know. Al- find out!" Roberto was excited. Maybe it was because we'd both lost our mum, I had to assume so, but for us... clearly we were on the same page about orphans. That was good. "I guess each group could each design part of the garden outside. It would be like the secret garden and put together by kids."

"Yeah, they could! There might be too many orphans for this though. We might have to ...I don't know, have an art contest just to select a hundred or so kids." I laughed as he scribbled this all down. Was he seriously going to do this?

It was kind of exciting though. We talked about it, not just orphans, but all kinds of things Roberto wanted to do for Alteria. I could see how passionate he really was about them- how he wanted free swimming programs for kids, because his country was surrounded by ocean, how the festivals were amazing and he wanted me to see all of them, and the shops and small towns were so full of history.

"There are around five thousand orphans." Alberto returned as he gazed down at a sheet of paper. "Alteria has the lowest rate."

"Who has the highest?"

"Oriens has over thirty eight thousand orphans."

I cringed at that. Roberto looked a bit surprised too. He asked, meeting my eyes a moment, "Why so many?"

"Oriens has a different culture around adoption- it's seen as shameful for a family to loose a child to a orphanage, to loose a member of their line, and shameful for an orphan to be without family. Blood ties is valued highly and there is often a stigma around orphanages. Adoptions are rare and never spoke about in Oriens."

"But there's so many..."

"Rather than give a child up for adoption, which is socially frowned on, many parents may put a child in an Orphanage but not give up the parental rights. It's common in single parent households, when one has left, died or … was not around to begin with." Alberto had figured out a lot. He added, "This way they are still apart of the family line but left in an Orphanage, and are brought back into the family as adults or teenagers with the expectation that they will care for their family."

"Not being cared for by the family. Or thought about. Or loved." Roberto muttered.

That made no sense to me. I frowned and scratched my head. "Oh." Now that I thought about it- that might explain why Father had been so determined to get me back into his family. He, and other people in Oriens that were 'noble blood' would often talk about that. Old blood. Preserving the blood. Blood blood blood.

"So that's why Father wanted me back?"

"I am not an expert, as Yu may be, but I believe so." Alberto bowed his head somewhat. "It would have been shameful of him to allow his only daughter to remain out of his family. Daughters care for their elderly parents. It's their culture."

Shameful. Yeah. I sighed. I suddenly remembered those documents- the suggestion that maybe... maybe Mum's death had something to do with Father.

Roberto smacked me over the head with a wooden spoon. "Never mind that. You can choose your own family."

"I know."

He lowered his voice as he moved closer. "But you can tell me about them, okay? You don't need to hide them. Let's enjoy cooking and eating it, then later you can tell me everything. Get them out of your head."

I nodded, smiling as Roberto squeezed my waist, and he bent down to quickly kiss me on the lips. "Thanks."

We played around with food, creating a 'late breakfast', which we eventually needed the chef to come help us with. I could cook, of course, but mostly basic foods. Some of the things Roberto wanted … well, I didn't know how to cook them. Fancy things. Still we had great fun as the chef, clearly flustered by the role reversal, tried to tell us what to do.

Luckily I was learning what he liked. I could learn these things later on.

We were in a small area, a small private room afterwoods, like a really fancy living room. Roberto had covered things with blankets to hide the 'fancy' furniture. We spent all afternoon alone, watching silly movies, and teasing each other.

Only now it had escalated. Teasing became more physical, more openly affectionate, this crazy mixture of a shy game of 'Who can do more' and 'how much can I make you blush'. I was glad Alberto waited outside... we were so busy teasing each other, both bright red half the time, that we'd missed the movies.

Of course, some part of me was thinking about other things, and there was a point where Roberto fell asleep after dinner and for the first time all day I managed to watch an entire movie without being kissed, touched, tickled, bitten, poked, licked or tackled. At one point... Roberto just lay on top of me, literally between my legs, and I suddenly realised that right now I just wanted to ravish him.

It wasn't like me. I wasn't the kind of person to just throw myself at a person and offer my body up. Was it all the ups and downs we had? Or was it something else? I just felt … I just felt the urge. More than sexual. I just wanted to claim him from head to toe and from the way he held me, pressed up against me, I knew that it was the same.

It had been a pretty busy day. Everything we'd felt, all those pent up feelings, it was now impossible to ignore them. And... and it'd triggered other feelings. I supposed they'd happened on and off for a while now, before we'd started this, but I hadn't been pinned under him long enough to notice them. Natural 'hormonal' reactions that … that we both felt. We weren't just flustered because of the teasing game.

I fell asleep after the movie, soon after Roberto woke up, and found myself being carried back to the bedroom. He squeezed me as I blinked sleepily up at him.

"I want to stay the night. Can I?"

"You didn't ask last night."

Roberto flushed then, swallowing, and then gave me a look. "No... I mean, I want to … I want to really stay the night."

Oh. I flushed as well, my heart suddenly beating fast, and snuggled into his chest. "Okay."

"You sure?"

"Mmhmm." After all that teasing? "As long as I can... change my mind."

He didn't say another word till we were inside my room. Roberto lowered me down carefully onto the bed, scratching his head, and laughed. "Um. Where were we?"

"Here." I pulled him down and he knelt, slowly sliding between my legs, our gentle kiss turning into something more heated. This wasn't normally how I was. I'd had boyfriends before but usually they'd try and take the lead. This time... this time it was different. It made me feel awesome to be so much apart of it.

His hands grasped my legs, trembling, sliding up my body and cupping my face. "You sure?"

"Are you?"

He shoved me backwards onto the bed suddenly, bending over me, Roberto's breathing fast as he pressed against me. He slid sideways to avoid my leg, his eyes searching mine, but there wasn't hesitation. Just genuine shyness.

"You won't ...won't dump me after it?"

"I'm going to marry you." He grinned down at me. "Whether you like to or not."

"M... marry?"

"Of course. Why do you think it was so important for everyone to like you?" Roberto slid his fingers along my waist slowly. "Don't you want to?"

"Yeah but … but …" This was the second time he'd proposed to me. I used to say I didn't care about that stuff, about how proposals were done, but … he was so casual about it. "I'm just..."

"You don't have to."

That was kind of a lie. I knew that Roberto had to marry. "Is it because you haven't got anyone else?"

Roberto froze then and carefully climbed off me. He sat on the bed and scratched his head awkwardly. "Well..."

My heart sank. "Is that it?"

"No!"

"What if I didn't marry you?"

"You don't want..."

"I didn't... I just don't want to … to be thrown there without you really wanting me. I mean- it's not just about your crown, is it?" I slid up slowly and stared at him. "It's just the two of us."

Roberto twisted around and stroked my face slowly, sighing, and leaned forward. "It is. I wanted to ask you... I guess this just made it faster. If you're rushed..."

"Of course I am." I breathed in slowly and tried to think. The creeping hand on my leg was not helping. "I'm really rushed."

"I won't sleep here..."

I grabbed his arm at that, as Roberto went to get up, and shook my head. No. He was my boyfriend, even after a short time, and I... I really wanted to throw him down and ravish him right now, his tousled hair from earliers teasing, the awkward smile, the uncertainty n his face, this raw vulnerability that I'd only ever seen him show to me.

"If we don't sleep here then we sleep in your room and Alberto might show up." I sighed and tried to think. "I … Roberto, I don't know. It's not that I don't want that- I'm just... it's overwhelming."

He nodded and slowly sank back down on the bed. "I guess it is. You don't have to answer it. Just... just keep it in mind. That I'm here because … because that's what I want. You. Not anyone else. And if no one turns up to my wedding to marry me then … then that's fine. I can accept that."

I wasn't sure he could.

Roberto pressed me down gently, kissing me slowly, and slowly started to slid my buttons free. "Forget I said it. I'll propose better. I promise. I think I'm nervous."

"No, I'll... I want to shower." I gave him a gentle shove. I wanted to shave and smell … smell nice. I'd never done this before. I was excited and scared all at once. "I'm nervous too."

Roberto nodded. He helped me stand, hands lingering a little too long, and he looked like he was half expecting me to go running for the door or something. He scratched his head again, and said, "I'll... I'll warn Al to not come in. For any reason."

"Okay."

"Meet you in bed!" He was suddenly cheerful again. Hiding his nerves, I knew, and I slipped into the shower.

I showered a very long time, trying to shave on a crutch, suddenly paranoid about every last hair on my body. About every last smell. Hair wet. I had to blow-dry it. I was so aware of Roberto out there, waiting for me, so aware of what I'd agreed to. It wasn't quite accepting his proposal but for me... for me this was a huge step. A very fast step.

When I'd tugged on my nightie- basically just a thin cotton slip that barely covered legs or chest, perfect for summer, but suddenly pretty sexy, I gazed at the make-up and hesitated. Should I put on make-up? Should I... should I go out there naked? Do a sexy pose? Or just …

What did other women do when they were trying to seduce their boyfriend! I didn't know! I just know that right now I wanted to go in there, please him, and be all 'tigress lover'. Except that right now I couldn't do it. I was so flustered and embarrassed, uncertain, second guessing whether I needed nail polish, or mascara, or lipstick, or...

If we had just 'done it' on the couch this afternoon, while teasing each other, it would have been much better. Spontaneous. A bit rude to use Prince Keith's manse like that but … but who was going to tell him?

I hesitated as I stood at the door, fingertips brushing against the doorknob, and slowly pushed the bathroom door open.

Clothes were piled on a chair, not quite neat, but not totally untidy either. A fish lamp was sending fish dancing across the ceiling in all kinds of colours.

Roberto was naked in my bed.

I flushed as our eyes met, he grinned, winked, but the nerves were back on his face.

"Mood lighting. You sure?" He asked, quickly, sitting up straighter.

"Yeah." I breathed slowly in an attempt to calm myself. Slowly I headed for the bed, careful on the crutches, my soft blow-dried hair around my nearly bare shoulders, heart thudding. "I was just thinking... we could have done this earlier without the nerves."

"I was thinking that too." He grinned and slid the sheets over for me. "I'll stop. At any point. We can just … cuddle."

I nodded and slid into bed, slowly, before sliding the nightie off. Roberto's breath hitched at that and I tried to smile as he slid closer, his bare hip brushing against mine, hand slowly searching.

"We're equal now." I explained. Tried to. I could barely breathe so talking was a slight disaster.

"We were born equal. For each other."

So. Here we were. Naked in bed together. We lay there a moment, a very long moment, our breathing fast, and I was sure that Roberto was as nervous about this as I was. The passion beforehand seemed to have vanished... we were just afraid. I wanted to laugh.

Roberto twisted towards me, kissing me gently, and he breathed out slowly. "Can I tell you something?"

"Um. Sure."

"I have a confession." Roberto whispered against my ear, kissing it briefly, his body trembling.

"What?"

"I've never done this."

I pulled his face out, gazing up at him, and he'd gone red. I laughed suddenly and hugged him hard. Oh god. "Really?"

"Shh, don't … don't tell anyone!" He grasped me hard though, arms around me, hugging me. Naked hugs. I could feel everything. "I just... I just … didn't want to commit like this... and when a woman got too close, she assumed she was the girlfriend of a Prince... suddenly it was my crown she was kissing."

"I'm never kissing your crown." I informed him and he grinned, biting my lip gently, before relaxing a little.

"I know, Phia. I'm just saying... this is … this is how I'm proving it to you. Right now. You don't have to doubt it." Roberto nuzzled against my shoulder. "I'm sorry I made you doubt it earlier."

"And I... I haven't done it either." I admitted and he laughed, so I joined in, some of my nerves fading. When we kissed it was with wider grins, our kiss awkward and clumsy this time, noses bumping. I had to guess he was like me- suddenly so aware of our bodies rubbing against each other, the sense of his skin on mine, his tickly leg hair sliding up between my legs as he slid one leg between mine.

"We both know how this works, right?" Roberto was back to his teasing. "Or do you want me to surprise you?"

"I might have to show you!" I teased right back and inhaled sharply as his hand slid up my body, suddenly bold about it, and shut my eyes. He'd done that before, during our teasing session, but before there'd been clothes between us. When I felt his teeth graze my shoulder I twisted around and bit him right back.

Roberto laughed and pounced.

We 'teased' each other for a long time, slowly relaxing with each other again, laughing as much as we kissed. But soon … soon we couldn't tease. We were distracted.

The passion returned tenfold. Despite the care we had to take of my leg, something Roberto seemed to forget about half the time, we barely slept, and I barely even noticed any sort of pain or discomfort. We only seemed to fall asleep as it was slowly getting light outside and Roberto muttered something about needing sleep or he'd fall asleep at his desk.

Even then, it continued right up until the first rays of light peeked in through the window, our bodies sweaty and tangled together, and we finally fell asleep together.

It was Roberto who got up first, shockingly enough, and I sleepily watched him stumble around the room. He caught my gaze, went red, and tried to cover his nakedness with a pillow.

"Don't dirty my pillows!" I teased and giggled as he tried to go sideways outside the room. Shy Roberto was so cute. It wasn't like I hadn't... well, felt everything last night... he'd even given me the 'grand tour'. "You get shy in the mornings?"

"Well, I..." He grinned as he poked his head out the bathroom door. "If I catch you looking at me like that then we'll just have to stay all day in bed as well. It's for Alberto who is waiting."

"Oh, sure." I wasn't sure how Alberto would feel, being dragged into our bedroom antics like this, and giggled as I shut my eyes. Then I tugged on the nightie that I'd stripped off earlier. I relaxed, snoozing somewhat as he showered, and was woken by pillows being thrown at me. Opening one eye I watched a now dressed Roberto sit at the desk and brush his hair slowly and lazily, his eyes meeting mine, love open in his face.

"You're pretty." He decided, breathing out slowly, and relaxed his head on his hand.

"So are you." I agreed. He was pretty. The sunlight was making him glow again and … "Also, you've got a hicky."

He laughed and touched it. "Yeah. I want all the Princes to see it."

"Roberto!" I laughed though, even though I was embarrassed, and to my relief Roberto tugged his collar up a bit higher. Woops. Next time I'd have to try and hide it a bit better.

But right now, I wanted to try something. I slid the sheets off my legs, amused as his eyes automatically went to stare at them, and crossed them.

I could at least tease him a little.

He froze, I grinned, my hand tracing down my belly and resting below my belly button on the soft fabric. Oh yes. I felt like a goddess, a lovely sexy goddess, because I could make Roberto look like that. No one had ever looked at me like that before.

He swallowed hard, crossing his arms, and asked, "How am I supposed to go now when you're making that face and showing me that view?"

"What face? What view?" I relaxed my legs somewhat, letting the cross legged change into the more relaxed 'leg across' instead of knees crossed, which did hurt a little with the injury to pull off... but it was so worth it. Roberto stiffened and I felt a thrill of triumph.

"Now there's even more showing!" He didn't seem to be complaining though. He grinned at me and gazed to me, his breathing a little faster. "Alberto will have to ..."

"Have to what? You have to go." I uncrossed my legs, briefly letting them hang open, before shutting them at the knees, giggling as he dropped his hairbrush. "Bye, Roberto."

"You tease." Roberto threw himself onto my bed sideways, sitting there, gazing at me as he pushed my knees together. "Now, my love, my Phia..." He grinned, his breath a little faster, hands gently on my knees. "I have to go to work or Alberto will make me do it in here. And this room is our sanctuary. And-" To my shock he opened my knees, gazing down between my legs without a shred of embarrassment, his face flushed with that faint desire he'd still had when he got up, "-same goes for you. Let me go to work in peace."

"Hey!" I pushed at him, squeezing my legs shut, laughing and red faced all at once. I knew that he'd already seen me, every inch, but his boldness was still pretty embarrassing. Even if I liked it. "Eyes up here."

"You were just teasing me with flashes of it. Don't be embarrassed. It's you." Roberto slid up alongside the edge of the bed, sliding his legs over the edge, and leaned down to kiss me with a long tender kiss, his breathing slowing. "Love you."

"Love you too. Do your best."

"Mmhmm. I'll come back for that." He slapped my thigh, grinning, and stood. I didn't know how Roberto did it, look like a happy man-child, and still be kind of sexy... but he was. He breathed out, resting his head against my stomach, adding, "I feel like ... like I'm just like every other man now. Off to work. I can't wait till I can take you home with me."

"With your Alberto there to make sure you make it." I reminded him but I breathed out slowly as I shut my eyes.

"Mm. I'm sure I can sense him waiting outside in the hallway." He squinted at the wall. "He's probably afraid you're still naked."

"I practically am." I fingered the near-transparent cotton of the tiny thigh length nightie, the way the very low neckline grazed my breasts with lace pretending to add some height, and gave him a shove. Alberto did not need to see me dressed like this. "Go! Unless you want Alberto to see me like this."

"Never!" Roberto stood up very sudden. He kissed my lips one last time before he headed out in a quick run.

I hadn't meant to snooze more but it was so hard not to, I felt so silly, content, and a bit sore, that I just slipped back off to sleep under the sheets. I'd promised Prince Keith that I'd get back to 'work' being bait that evening and I meant it... so when I woke up at eleven in the morning I honestly wasn't that stressed out.

I cringed a little as I got up. Okay then. Now I had two 'sore areas'. The leg was, like usual, the worse of the two, and I tested it carefully. The tendons, muscles, whatever it was they'd fixed, they still couldn't do the job without excruciating pain. Luckily the crutches made it simpler to skip that. Once I'd pressed the 'all clear' maid button I headed for the shower.

Once I'd showered, I found breakfast waiting for me, and found that I was starving. I couldn't stop grinning either, so amused with last night, because while it hadn't all been ...well, romance book style... it was still just as good with Roberto. Even during the embarrassing parts, the sounds, the fart that we both claimed wasn't us, it had been hilarious and crazy good all at once.

"You're happy." The maid commented.

"Uh huh." I agreed. "Hungry too."

She nodded and her face was also warm, as she turned away to clean up the sheets... which had me standing with embarrassment... but the maid called as she gathered them up into a basket, "It's my job to clean sheets. Don't worry about it. Prince Keith has cleaners that professionally clean it all."

"But-" But... it had evidence of last night. I flushed and tried to accept this.

"Just relax. There's nothing to be embarrassed about." She didn't even look at them, I realised, just bundled them up together and put them into a laundry cart.

I tried to let it go. Professional cleaners had machines. Right? This was probably a normal thing in places like this.

I'd hoped to see Roberto before we left, later that day, but he was still working and Prince Keith was impatient to get started. I supposed I couldn't blame him- we had more or less forced him to wait a day and a half. The funny thing was that he was now twice as flustered and twice as awkward, hiding it under his temper, which I could only assume was either due to Roberto giving him details about last night... I hoped not!... or Roberto had shown him the hicky.

I hoped it was the hicky. That was much less embarrassing. But then I had heard men tended to over share.

Or maybe it was the big silly grin I couldn't shake because he snapped, "You have to act like you want to leave, Sophia, you can't look that happy!"

I tried my very best to look depressed... and just started laughing. Oh god.

"Hopeless." Prince Keith shook his head and turned away. He gestured to me and I followed after him for the car.

"Okay. Time to really lure them." I decided.