Kristina hopped out of the bed and ran over to the dresser where she was quickly reminded that she had packed all of her clothes into suitcases, which were still sitting in the middle of the floor at the Rib.

"Krissy, what are your parents doing here? It's late as hell." Ethan said as he tossed Kristina her dress from the floor and he hurriedly grabbed for his jeans.

"I was supposed to be at my mom's at six o'clock." She shimmied into her dress, bypassing her panties altogether.

"Why didn't you call them?"

Kristina stopped to look at Ethan. Her hands on her hips and her tilted head said it all.

"Right." He answered and rushed over to help her zip up her dress. "You really didn't have a moment, did you?" He laughed.

Kristina smiled. "Don't laugh. I have to come up with some story.

"Right, your father's going to kill me."

Kristina placed her hand gently against Ethan's cheek. "Don't worry, Ethan. I'll come up with something. If you're not ready for him to find out about us, I understand."

"Krissy, I'm not…"

Kristina put her hand up to stop Ethan and looked toward the bedroom door when she realized the hard knocking had stopped. "Ethan, you didn't manage to lock the front door when we came in, did you?"

Ethan didn't reply.

"Kristina, are you here?" The sound of Alexis's voice was coming closer.

"Stay here." Kristina rushed out of the bedroom to find Alexis and Sonny coming down from the living room into the kitchen.

"Mom, dad, what are you doing here?"

Alexis wrapped her arms around Kristina. "Oh baby, your okay! I was worried sick about you. What happened? You didn't show up tonight and I haven't been able to reach you on your phone."

Kristina had to fight a little to get Alexis to loosen up on her grip. "Mom, I'm fine. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to worry you." She looked past her mom to her dad. "Either of you."

"Kristina, what's going on? Why didn't you call your mother to let her know you weren't coming? We were afraid you were off in a ditch somewhere." Sonny stepped forward and gave his daughter a hug.

"I know, I know. It was very irresponsible of me. I… I…" She was stumbling for words.

Ethan was standing at the doorway as he listened to Kristina try to explain her way out of this. She was trying to cover for him. She thought he was afraid to come forward with their relationship. He couldn't let her believe that he was embarrassed, ashamed or afraid. Wherever the path ahead was going to lead them, he wanted to walk it with her. And knowing Sonny, they would probably be running it. He stepped out of the bedroom. "She was with me."

Alexis's hand went straight to her mouth and she looked at Sonny. Suddenly Kristina's disheveled hair made sense.

"Oh hell no!" Sonny shouted.

Kristina smiled as her love came to her rescue. Unafraid of anything that could get in their way. The moment solidified any doubt that she jumped into bed with him too quickly. Not that she had any. Plain and simple, it just made her happy.

"Kristina, please tell me the reason you didn't make it to your mother's tonight was not because you were… with him." Sonny's hands were placed firmly on his hips with the sides of his jacket flipped back. A signature stance when Sonny was mad. "I mean, you fell asleep, right? And Ethan was just getting you up, right?" He knew what he was seeing, but was actually just hoping, no willing, his daughter to lie to him. He didn't want to think of Ethan Lovett in bed with his little girl.

"No, dad," She wrapped her arms around Ethan's waist as he put his arm around her shoulder. "Ethan and I spent the night together." She turned to her mom. "Mom, I'm truly sorry. I just lost track of time."

Alexis still had her hand on her mouth and moved it to rub over her face before walking up to her daughter. "Honey, I know that Ethan has been a good friend to you," Truth was Alexis liked Ethan. He had always taken care of her daughter in the past so when Kristina told her she was staying with him for a little while, she was fine with it. She knew he could and would protect her. The fact was, this really didn't surprise her at all. "But don't you think it may be a little soon after your… you know… your divorce?" She whispered the last part as if it was some sort of secret that she was recently married.

Kristina couldn't even get a word out before Sonny started again. "Ethan, you told me that you would never take advantage of my daughter."

"He didn't!" Kristina blurted.

"Sonny," Ethan began. "I love your daughter."

"Oh boy…" Alexis spun in a circle as she knew those words would set Sonny off."

"You love her?" Sonny questioned.

"Yes, I do. And I'm not going to hurt her."

Sonny looked back and forth between his daughter and Ethan and then at Alexis. "Can you believe this?"

Alexis just lifted her shoulders and waved her hand in the air. She knew it was inevitable.

"Come on, Kristina, your coming home with us." Sonny summoned his daughter to him.

Kristina couldn't contain a laugh at his audacity. "I'm not going anywhere, dad. I'm staying here with Ethan."

"The hell you are. Now come on."

"Sonny…" Ethan started.

"No, Ethan, I've got this." Kristina left him to walk in front of her father. "Dad, I know that you love me and only want what's best for me. I get it, I do, but you need to understand that Ethan is the best thing for me. I mean, we only just made the decision to move forward." She walked back in front of Ethan and gazed into his eyes. "But I trust him with everything that I am. I need you to trust in me and let me live my life." She looked back at her dad. "I know that you want me to be your little girl forever, dad, but I'm not so little anymore. I'm a grown woman and you have to let me make my own choices. And I have chosen Ethan."

Sonny sighed and Alexis put her hand on his shoulder. "I just don't want to see you get hurt again, sweetheart. These guys, they just don't deserve you." He continued.

Kristina made her way back to her parents. "Dad, wasn't Kate your first love?"

Unsure of where Kristina was going with this he just nodded.

"Well even with all of what's going on with her right now, don't you wish you had all those years lost back again?" Sonny just stood silently looking at his daughter. "Well I don't want to miss any more time with the man that I love. The man that I have always loved."

Sometimes when he looked at his daughter it was like looking into a mirror. She was so much like him that it scared him. He was always one to act first and think later. He didn't want her to make the same mistakes that he had made so many times. But her analogy of Kate made sense to him. She needed to see this thing through, no matter how much he disapproved. "Ethan, you better take care of my daughter."

"I will." Ethan stated.

"I'm serious, Ethan. Don't hurt my baby."

"Thank you, dad." She rushed over and kissed him on the cheek.

"I think we should get going." Alexis interrupted and started to pull Sonny back. "Kristina, you missed tonight, but I expect to see you tomorrow. Ethan, you are more than welcome to accompany her."

"Thank you, Alexis. We will be there." Ethan smiled and gripped Kristina a little tighter at the waist.

Kristina walked behind her parents and locked the door behind them. She strutted her way back to Ethan and grasped firmly onto the back of his neck as she connected onto his lips.

Ethan groaned. "Oh, baby, what was that for?"

"For not giving a damn what my father thinks."

"I meant it, Kristina, I love you and I'm not going to let you get away again."

"Good, now let's get back to bed." She led him back to the room by his hand.

"Yeah, you probably should get some sleep. We have a few things to do tomorrow."

Kristina pushed Ethan onto the bed with both hands. "Who said anything about sleeping?" She straddled over him.

"Girl, you are going to be the death of me." He rubbed his hands over her bottom.

Kristina was the first to wake up and waking up on the warm chest of Ethan brought a smile to her face. Careful not to wake him, she quietly tip toed to the closet and grabbed one of Ethan's shirts off a hanger and pulled it over her naked body. When she walked out of the room, she saw her suitcases sitting in the hallway. Ethan must have brought them up after she fell asleep. She floated right by them, at least that is how she felt she was moving, and went into the bathroom where she turned on the shower and brushed her teeth while she waited for the water to heat up.

The last of the shampoo was falling from her hair down to the drain when the shower curtain suddenly opened. A startled Kristina let out a squeal. "Ethan, oh my god you scared me."

"Sorry, love, but I was missing you already. Care if I join you?"

"Be my guest." She welcomed him in.

Ethan grabbed the body sponge and poured the liquid soap onto it, letting the water run over it until it created a soapy foam. Changing places with Kristina so that he was the one directly in line of the water, he gently squeezed the sponge over Kristina's collar bone and watched as the soap ran over her breast and down her stomach where is trailed off past her thighs. Kristina moved in for a kiss, but Ethan shook his head no and smiled. "We're in here to wash, love."

Kristina raised an eyebrow and puckered her lips. "Fine. Proceed."

Ethan continued with gliding the sponge all across her body, stopping slowly over all the right places. Even with the hot water, she was experiencing extreme goose bumps. She suffered through though, because she knew it would soon be Ethan's turn to squirm.

"Your turn." She took the sponge out of his hand. Kristina began to slowly wipe across his chest, kissing each area softly before following with the soap. She continued to bring it down his side, tickling him slightly. He lifted up on her chin. She let his lips get just close enough before pulling away. "We're in here to wash, love." She whispered.

Ethan couldn't contain his laughter. "Then can we please finish up? Being in here with you is pure torture."

They laid in bed wrapped up in each other's arms. Ethan was playing with Kristina's hair that was still wet from the shower. "I think we should start to get ready. We promised your mom we would be over and Lulu is having everyone over at the Star this evening."

Kristina rolled over onto Ethan's chest. "Do you want to go alone?"

"Of course not." He answered without any hesitation.

"Well without them knowing about us yet, I wasn't sure what you would want to do."

"What I don't want to do is hide you. We've waited long enough."

She was so happy to hear him say that, but there were still a few things on her mind that she wanted to discuss. "Ethan, I think we should talk."

Curiosity rose Ethan's eyebrows. "Oh yeah? What do you want to talk about? Did I do something wrong already?"

Kristina wrapped the sheet around herself and sat up so that she was sitting across from Ethan. "First thing, I don't understand why you didn't talk to me when you thought I was kissing Trey. I mean, Ethan, you've been mad at me in the past, but you never had treated me so horribly before."

Ethan rubbed lightly on top of Kristina's hand as he looked down and tried to gather his thoughts on the subject. "I have no excuse for the way that I acted. All I can say is that it killed me when I thought you were back with Trey. I found myself feeling things that I had never felt for a woman before. At first I felt confusion hanging out with you again, but then I realized that I wasn't confused at all… just in love. So after talking with Johnny, I was finally able to say it out loud and it made everything more… I don't know, more real, I guess. Then I seen you standing there and it looked like you were kissing him. Again, I'm not making excuses, but I felt like a fool and I was angry with you for choosing him over me."

"I get that you were upset, but Ethan, I'm letting you know now that I'm not going to let you do that to me again. That was it. Now if I do anything that upsets you I expect you to come to me so we can talk about it."

"I promise." He agreed. "And I would like the same from you."

"Promise." There was one more thing that she needed to talk about. She closed her eyes and was saddened by even just the thought.

"What is it, love?"

"Ethan, what about Cindy?"

"What?"

"Is she going to be a problem here?"

Ethan scooted closer to Kristina. He was so mad at himself for making up the whole Cindy thing. "Baby, there is no Cindy."

"What?"

"I'm serious, Krissy. I don't even know a Cindy. I just made her up that night in the hopes of making you jealous."

"Oh my god, Ethan!" She shoved on his chest. "I should kill you! That about destroyed me, you know."

"Look, I was an ass, I don't deny it. But I promise I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you." He pulled up on her hand and brought it to his lips. "I won't hurt you again, Kristina."

"I'm going to hold you to that, you know."

"I'm going to hold onto you and never let you go." He reached over and kissed her.

"Okay, I think we should get ready now." She began to get up.

Ethan caught her arm and pulled her back. "Now wait just a minute."

"What?"

"I have something that I need to say to you now."

Kristina was puzzled. "Alright… what?" She couldn't think of anything that she had done wrong.

"Do you remember that day when we were on the docks and I was wallowing in self pity about how I felt that Maya was ashamed to introduce me to her family?"

"Yeah."

"And you were so sweet to try and make me feel better."

"Ethan, Maya was the one that didn't know a good thing when she had it. I told you that day that I thought you were perfect and I meant it."

"Well, I also remember in that conversation forbidding you from ever running off to Vegas to get married."

Kristina bit the bottom of her lip to keep from laughing. She had completely forgotten about that part of the conversation.

"Yeah, and what did you do?" He grabbed hold of her sides and started to tickle her.

She fell back onto the bed in an effort to free herself, but was having no luck. "Ethan, stop." She giggled.

"What do you have to say for yourself?"

"I'm sorry! Ethan, stop, please! I'm sorry! I love you!" It took every breath she had between laughing to get the words out.

Ethan stopped and his face turned straight. "I don't ever want to think of you being with another man again, Kristina. I honestly can't handle it."

Her faced mirrored his. "You don't ever have to again, Ethan. I only want to be with you for the rest of my life."

"Good." His soft kiss on her led to one with more passion.

Kristina was running around the loft frantically as she tried to finish getting ready.

Ethan was enjoying watching her while he sat ready on the couch. "You sure take a long time getting ready."

She paused in the hallway. "Hey, I had every intention of being ready on time. I got right into the shower after I woke up this morning. Maybe you shouldn't have distracted me so many times and then we would be gone already."

"Sorry love, but maybe you shouldn't be so distracting." Ethan laughed. He was so happy. Less than twenty-four hours ago he felt like he couldn't breathe. Like he was suffocating from the thought of Kristina with someone else. Now he was with the woman that he loved and was able to share that with her. He never thought he could feel so content with everything in his life. He was mindlessly looking around the room when he noticed a present under the tree.

Kristina grabbed her coat and purse. "I'm ready." She turned her head to Ethan's focus.

"What's that?" He asked.

"Oh, well that's your Christmas present."

"Really?" Just like a kid, Ethan's face lit up and he ran over to it and picked it up.

"Ethan, we really need to get going. Maybe you should open it later."

"No, I want to open it now." He went and sat back down.

"Okay, but it's really nothing. Just something I threw together."

"You made it?"

Kristina nodded. Butterflies were flipping in her stomach. She prayed that he wouldn't think it was silly.

Ethan ripped apart the gold paper. Kristina's eyes were fixated on him for his reaction. "It's a photo album." He said.

"Well, more like a scrapbook." Kristina corrected.

He opened the black cover. The very first page was of Ethan when he was first born. Holly was holding him. "Where did you get this?" He asked.

"Luke was able to get me in contact with Holly a couple of weeks ago. She was so helpful. She had so many photos of you that she sent me. Go ahead, keep turning."

Ethan turned the next page to see a picture of him with his adoptive parents. Every page was of him getting older. "Kristina, I haven't seen any of these photos in so long. Some I don't even remember."

"Apparently your parents would send Holly pictures of you throughout the years."

"This is amazing, Kristina." He flipped a few more pages. There was a gap from around the time his parents died, but picked back up again after he arrived in Port Charles. The first being at Spinelli and Maxie's non wedding. Then several more of him with Luke and his brother and sister. The last page was him with Kristina at the park on the swings. "Where did you get this one?"

"Elizabeth took that one on a day that she was at the park with the boys. She knew the crush I had on you and gave it to me a long time ago."

Ethan was in awe of what she did for him. It might not have meant much to others, but it was absolutely the best gift he had ever gotten before. He didn't have any photos chronicling his life. It was like it gave him more of an existence. He belonged somewhere now. "Kristina, I don't know what to say."

"I know it's silly…"

"It's not silly at all. You have no idea how much it means to me that you did this. You're amazing." He reached over and thanked her by kissing her.

They both stood up. "I have something for you." He said.

"You do?" She was surprised because of the recent events that he would've thought to get her anything.

He reached into his pocket. "It's not much at all really, though I actually spent a lot of time trying to come up with something that would be perfect for you. Then one night I was having a really hard time falling asleep. All I kept thinking about was you getting your apartment and moving out. It was killing me. I didn't want you to leave… ever." Ethan pulled out a shiny silver object from his pocket.

"You made me a key?"

Ethan smiled. "Think of it as a key to my heart. Kristina, I don't want you to move out."

"Ethan, I don't understand."

"I want you to stay here. I want you to live with me… permanently."

Kristina brought her hands to her mouth. "Ethan, are you sure? I don't want you to feel rushed. I know that me laying all my things around the place gets on your nerves. I mean, you might want to rethink this."

He placed the key into the palm of her hand. "Kristina, the thing is, I can't imagine not having your things lying all around. I want you here with me. No, I need you here with me. Please, tell me you'll live with me."

Kristina stared down at the small piece of metal. It was like all of her dreams were coming true at once.

"Say something." Ethan was starting to get a little worried when she stood silent for so long.

"Well it was really a great apartment. It will be hard to let it go." She joked with him. She didn't feel bad, he still kind of deserved it.

"Oh really now?" He raised one eyebrow and began to reach back for the key, but Kristina was quick to pull away.

"But…" She started.

"But?"

"But this one fits me so much better. Ethan, I would love to move in with you… permanently."

Ethan smiled. "Good, then it's settled. We're a couple one-hundred percent now. No turning back."

"No turning back."

Author's note: Okay, so this story was always meant to focus on these two getting together. Now that I have established a foundation for them, expect the next chapter to start putting more characters into the mix with some twists and turns.