This will be our last update for a while. We're still working though.

The start of the new year was quickly approaching. Rowena had agreed to come to the Hoshido house for the night, celebrating their reunion and the beginning of their first full year together in over a decade, mourning Mikoto but knowing she'd want them happy.

Of course, Revan Hoshido had hit yet another roadblock in his investigation, so Mikoto's ghost was likely disappointed in her son's obsession.

"The New Year..." he said to himself, staring at the plan for the family's New Year's party. "The Chinese New Year has a celebration with a giant dragon, so maybe there are assassins hiding in the dragon to..." He frowned. "No. No, that doesn't make sense. Where would they get all that cantaloupe?"

Ryoma slowly shook his head. "Revan, you've certainly raised a few points, but think of our situation. When was the last time you slept?"

Revan looked up at his big brother, blinking slowly. "The last time I...what?"

"Your dragon obsession. I don't think Mom would want this."

"What are you talking about? I'm making her proud!"

"No, you're not," said Takumi. "You're embarrassing her in front of all her dead friends."

"But it's my new year's resolution!"

"Then make a new one," said Ryoma. "Why not try 'kiss a girl', for instance?"

"Or get laid," Takumi suggested.

Hinoka thumped him on the back of the head. "You know Mom made us all promise that we wouldn't do that until we were married or Sakura was eighteen. Unless you want us haunted..."

She let the rest of the sentence hang there. Takumi just snorted.

"No wonder Subaki's so uptight."

"That's not my fault!" Hinoka protested. "He was born a neurotic mess! I've been trying to help him!"

"Not enough, apparently!"

"Are you saying you've broken a promise to Mom?"

Takumi fell silent. "Uh...no?"

"Did you say it that way just to make it sound like you got some?"

"Ye..." he caught himself, "no?"

"Can we get back to the matter at hand?" Revan complained as Sakura shook with silent laughter, tears rolling down her face. "We were talking about dragons!"

"No," said Ryoma. "You were talking about dragons. I was trying to make plans for the holiday, and they were talking about sex."

Sakura squealed and laughed even harder. Revan glared at her. "You could try helping, you know."

"Sorry," Sakura hiccupped, wiping away the tears. "I just...I d-don't really have ex-experience with anything you guys were talking about." Sure, she'd daydreamed about kissing her crush once or twice, but she was also sure that if she even imagined him with his shirt off, she'd die of embarrassment.

"You were going to invite Hana to a party," Hinoka reminded her, the conversation about Subaki forgotten. "And Takumi was in charge of snacks."

Hana. The daughter of Sumeragi Hoshido's second in command. She'd been Sakura's playmate and one of her closest friends since they were in diapers, and even the fact that Hana had graduated high school the year before hadn't gotten in the way of that.

Hana was only 18. She probably didn't know of dragons, either. "And she is invited?" Sakura asked, looking toward Revan uncertainly. "We m-might not get anything out of her."

"She's your friend," Revan pointed out. "And it's a party."

"You won't int-interrogate the guests about the dragons?"

"Uh...I won't now."

Sakura finally lost the last traces of her laughter and gave him a hug on the way out. He could tell it wasn't an 'I love my big brother' hug, but instead a hug of pity.

He'd show her. He'd show them all. He'd solve the mystery of the dragons, avenge his mother, and prove that he wasn't crazy.

As he realized that he'd said all that out loud, he decided to change it to 'not too crazy.'

Revan did ask Hana about dragons. Sakura could only offer a half-hearted apology as Hana struggled to think. Hana's boyfriend, however, froze at the mention, and now Revan was interrogating him.

"Look, I've only heard stories!" Hayato complained. "I grew up hearing that I'd get eaten by dragons if I was out past my curfew, ok? If they're real, even if it's only a group of people..."

"I don't think they'd eat you since there weren't any reports of half-eaten corpses," Revan tried to protest, but Sakura stepped in and pulled Hayato into a conversation about what happened at the school since he and Hana left.

Felicia stopped him from going after them. "Let them catch up," she warned. "I'm sure Hayato has nothing to do with dragons."

"But if he could tell me where he heard about them eating rebellious teenagers..."

"You can interrogate him later," Felicia promised. "It's nearly midnight! Weren't we going to have a conversation with our sisters about the Mystery Twin business?"

"Rowena hates that name," he said immediately, "and Flora doesn't take it seriously. The group disbanded, anyway."

"Oh, yeah," Felicia mumbled, disappointed. "So, eh...what do you...what do you want to do instead?"

She sounded nervous. Revan could understand - he felt nervous. Felicia had been a good friend to him after his trial, coming over to bring him food when he was too deep in the web searching dragons, even though she was no longer a maid and couldn't really cook. She could microwave leftovers, though, and that was helpful. He wasn't sure when he'd developed an interest, but he was pretty sure she felt the same.

Before he could suggest that they take the traditional midnight kiss together, the conversation was interrupted by the sound of Rowena Nohr going on a loud, drunken political rant.

"Politicians," she said, with all the seriousness one would expect of a college student who thought she knew everything, "are all stupid. They don't even tell you their sides of the issues, they just turn the other side into a boogeyman to scare you into voting for them! But you know what? It's all BULL!" She took another gulp of what was hopefully water and not vodka. "I've met politicians on both sides. They're all too STUPID to be that evil! I say that next time there's an election, we make Dumbo and Jackass fight it out like Rock-em-sock-ems!" She slammed the table for emphasis like it was a courtroom desk.

Hana whistled. "You go girl!" she cheered and turned to Sakura, grinning. "You gotta love drunk people. They say what we're all thinking!"

"I d-don't think t-toy robots are the way to go," Sakura said, but she voiced no complaints about any other part of her sister's rant.

Orochi had her phone out, laughing quietly as she recorded it all. "She's gonna love this when she sobers up," she whispered to her fiancé, who merely shook his head and said nothing.

"Maybe we should try making them duel it out in a game of Yu-Gi-Oh," Takumi's friend Hinata suggested.

"No," Rowena said at once. "Can you imagine Trump playing Yu-Gi-Oh? 'I summon my credit card with a million bajillion attack points!' And then he'd screw the rules because he has money! And Biden would play with Uno cards!"

Revan pulled out his own phone and dialed the number Rowena gave him in case something happened to her. Jakob answered immediately - "I'm already in the car. My Rowena senses were tingling."

"Thanks," Revan said quickly. "She's drunk and rambling about alternatives to presidential elections."

There was a quiet, horrified "Dear lord" from the other side. He heard the car start, and then Jakob hung up without a goodbye.

Rowena was barely conscious when Jakob took her to the car, which made putting the seat belt on her more awkward than he would have liked. She laughed when his hair fell into her face, but whether it was tickling her or if she was laughing at the situation, he had no idea.

"Daddy's not gonna like this," she half-sang before blowing the hair away.

"I don't care about what your father thinks. I'm keeping his stolen treasure safe."

"Dad's a people pirate," said Rowena, nodding as if that sentence made sense. "He got on the Hoshido ship and took me. He's GUILTY, Your Honor."

Jakob was not amused. "Who spiked the punch?"

"I dunno." She shrugged. "I'll guess...Takumi."

Takumi had just turned twenty-one in December. It was entirely likely this wasn't a pathetic attempt at pinning the blame on her brother.

That did not help Jakob's nerves. "You could have called one of your siblings. They would have come and picked you up."

"But Selena and Niles need their midnight kiss! It's...it's tradition, Jakob!" She stopped, then frowned. "Hey...where's MY midnight kiss?"

"If you think I'm going to distract myself from bringing your sorry behind back to Nohr Manor," Jakob said through his teeth as he turned the key, "you are MISTAKEN."

"But...tradition!"

Jakob sighed and pulled over for a moment. Then he leaned over and kissed her, barely, and returned to his duty. "Are you satisfied, Rowena?"

"Hmm..." She was clinging to her seat belt like a teddy bear. "Maybe. Hey, Jakob? Do you want to get married?"

Well, there went HIS train of thought. "What?"

"Do you want to get married? To me, I mean, not just in general."

"Well, I won't deny that it's crossed my mind. But I won't take you seriously in this state."

"Aww." She pouted. "Please, Jakob? Be my husband? It'll be fun!"

"Marriage isn't about fun."

"But will you marry me anyway?"

"There's no pleasing you, is there?" Rowena smiled innocently. "I suppose 'yes' is the answer you're searching for."

"Yay!" She reached for the steering wheel, and Jakob quickly swatted her hand away. "Let's do it tonight! Take me to Vegas, Jakob!"

"Absolutely not! The last thing I need is to end up in prison for life because we married when you were drunk."

"OBJECTION! I'll testify for you!"

"Overruled, Rowena."

She sulked in silence for a few minutes. Then she fell asleep, and Xander had to carry her to her room.

She woke up with a headache and too clear memories of the night before.

She didn't perfectly remember everything, of course, but she didn't drink enough to black out. She had never wanted to, and so far she'd succeeded. Unfortunately, the realization that there was alcohol involved came too late, and though she'd stopped drinking, she'd lost control of her tongue.

She remembered voicing political opinions and something about a card game. Then she remembered Jakob dragging her outside, planting her in the car...

And she remembered that she proposed marriage.

A groan that had nothing to do with her hangover ripped its way from her throat. If only she hadn't gotten over her fear of riding in cars - she could have stayed at her birth family's place until she could bike her way back. Or maybe, if she hadn't still been afraid of driving, she could have stayed at her birth family's place until she was sober enough to drive.

A knock at her door triggered the pain in her head, and it was accompanied by the one voice she really didn't want to hear right now. "Rowena," Jakob said through the wood, "I made you some coffee. We need to talk."

Of course. She debated the pros and cons of pretending she was still asleep before deciding that Jakob would just walk in anyway. There was only so much love could do to mellow out the jerk, after all. "Go away, Jakob," she ordered. "I'm not in the mood."

On the other side of the door, Jakob's expression didn't change. That meant nothing - his mind was made up. If Rowena didn't want to talk to him right now, then he'd just come back later. As his employer and his girlfriend, she'd have to see him eventually. Even if it was just to end one or both of those agreements.

Still, he could respect her current wishes. He handed the tray with the coffee and toast to a passing Elise, gave her instructions, and watched as the teenager easily entered Rowena's room. He could wait it out.

He wasn't a patient man, but he was a petty one.

"Ferdie."

Ferdinand looked up from brewing his tea, just briefly enough to give his wife a heart-melting smile. "Dorothea," he replied as if they were simply acknowledging each other's presence in the kitchen. As if he didn't register the worried expression on her face.

"Your dad's a criminal."

"I know."

This was news to her. "You...knew?"

"I suspected," Ferdinand corrected himself. "But I did not want to be considered an accomplice, so I never looked for evidence. Then we got married, and I was partially disowned, so snooping would be trespassing. But since you apparently have it..." he removed the tea kettle from the stove and switched it off, giving her another heart-melting smile. "We can turn him in together. What was he doing? How will it affect us? Do you want a cup?"

"Sure," Dorothea said immediately, still in shock that her husband, who had usually demonstrated the personality of a golden retriever, had figured out that his father was involved in criminal activity.

Two cups of tea were poured. As they drank, Dorothea showed him the evidence she had literally pieced together, her project from the past week. As he looked it over, Ferdinand grew less casual about his father's criminal activities until he was even more worried than she was.

"I suspected drug involvement at worst," he admitted. "I saw shady people come to the door and not be turned away, I merely assumed he supplied local dealers with their inventory and that I would be accused of making deliveries if I got involved."

"That does explain why you were so calm about it," she admitted.

"But I see now that I should have looked into it. This..." he gestured at the photo, "puts everything into perspective."

"Your dad's the worst," Dorothea agreed. Then she looked away from the photo, giving Ferdinand a heart-melting smile of her own. "Let's get revenge. Let's do it in his bed."

It took him a few seconds to process, but when he did, he enthusiastically agreed.

When Ludwig von Aegir came home early, his flight having a "convenient" opening, he saw no trace of his son or the woman he refused to call a daughter-in-law. This was mildly upsetting, but at least all his belongings were in one piece. They were probably just out looking after their own house.

He got a bit more disturbed when he saw the half-full tea kettle and the two abandoned, empty cups. He had a few...differences from his son, but he knew the man well enough to know that this was out of character.

His phone was dead, but he had a charger in his room. He'd plug it in, and then he'd call Ferdinand.

Opening his bedroom door, however, proved to be a mistake. There were Ferdinand and Dorothea, in Ludwig's bed, clearly in the aftermath of some "shenanigans" of a more adult nature.

Dorothea pulled the blanket up, covering herself from Ludwig's glare. Ferdinand, though thankfully covered where it counted, didn't move at all.

"Oh, hello," he commented, as casually as if they were fully clothed in the kitchen.

"You're back early," said Dorothea, imitating her husband's tone.

Were they really going to just pretend they did nothing wrong? "What the...are you...what are you doing?"

Ferdinand cleared his throat. "Well, when a man and a woman love each other very much..."

"Just...get out!"

"Now? Because I'm going to need time to fetch my pants."

And Ludwig's worst fears were confirmed. "Goodness gracious, you're naked!"

Dorothea gave him her best skeptical look. "As opposed to?"

Ludwig rounded on her. "This was your idea!"

"Irrelevant!"

"This was a team effort," Ferdinand agreed. "Now, if you will let us...we need to collect our stuff."

Ludwig didn't leave. "Ferdinand, I have entertained this three-ring circus long enough. When are you going to wake up and realize that you could do better?"

"I have to disagree with you there, Father," Ferdinand said quickly before gesturing to Dorothea. "In simple terms...damn."

"I will admit, she is...pretty...from an objective standpoint," Ludwig admitted, "but there are others who are objectively pretty. Take Constance Nuvelle, for example." Ferdinand audibly gulped. His father paid no mind. "And I'm sure she could settle for some nice-looking young man who drives a bus. Why not stay in your league?"

That was the last straw for Ferdinand. He finally moved, standing up and showing that he was taller than his father. Ludwig was more concerned with other things that Ferdinand leaving the bed showed, but Ferdinand barely seemed to register that.

"I thought we could work this out," he said, and Dorothea was intrigued by the sudden courage in his voice. "I thought that we could learn to get along and put this mess behind us. I did not think you were capable of being such a whiny baby that even my life had to bend to your wishes. My life is mine, Father. And I plan to spend the rest of it with Dorothea because I love her more than anything else and for some reason, she loves me too. So, Dorothea," he said, turning around to the startled woman still in the bed. "Will you marry me?"

She laughed, both amused and embarrassed. "Ferdie, we're already married."

He laughed nervously. "Right. I just...got carried away."

"Still, it was a beautiful speech." She grinned mischievously. "But it might have been better if you were wearing pants."

"Seconded," Ferdinand's father squeaked, as his eyes remained covered.

Ferdinand was only half as embarrassed as a normal person would have been because he pointed out the obvious even as he went to grab his pants: "Father, you raised me, and she is my wife. This is not the first time either of you have seen me without my pants."

Ludwig screamed in frustration and left them to make themselves decent in privacy, the echoes of Dorothea's cackling chasing him through the hall.

Rowena had avoided Jakob all day, locking herself in her room under the pretense of sleeping, then studying for her next appearance in court. If she left her room for bathroom breaks, she'd be in there until she heard him do something else. If she got hungry, she'd text Elise to bring her a box of donuts they could share. If she was thirsty, she'd ask Camilla or Xander for tea, even though Jakob was right there and knew that neither could make it exactly the way she liked it. He was starting to get cranky, and her siblings were as helpful as they ever were.

That is to say, they weren't helping at all.

"What did you do?" Leo asked, almost impressed.

"I merely answered a question she apparently regrets asking," Jakob answered, not wanting to go into details.

Camilla seemed to catch on. She smiled innocently - never a good sign - and knocked on Rowena's door. "Rowena, sweetie. Care to let your big sister in? Jakob will stay outside, I promise."

Jakob's objection turned into a furious mumble as Camilla entered the room and closed the door. "What did she ask?" Leo asked after a moment.

"It doesn't matter," Jakob insisted as he turned around to get back to work. "If she regrets asking, then we all should pretend it never happened. I'm sure we both love her enough not to press her on the matter."

Leo remembered how hard it had been to trick Iago into his capture and silently agreed. He did love his sister, and her happiness was important to him. He wouldn't risk making her angry at him.

Unfortunately for Jakob and Rowena, Leo was a schemer. And there was somebody he knew well that loved Jakob and Rowena, but not enough that he would turn down a chance to call them out on anything.

It was the seventh unrequested knock at Rowena's door that day. She had long since recovered from her hangover, but her head still throbbed with every knock. "Who is it?" she called.

"It's Gunter," a familiar voice answered back.

Not sure what her father's gardener had to do with anything - he'd stopped being her tutor once she'd graduated high school - Rowena gave him permission. Gunter opened the door and stepped inside, followed immediately by Jakob.

"You two need to talk this out," he explained as Rowena deliberately looked anywhere but at Jakob. "I don't know what went on in that car, and I don't want to. You're adults, and anything that's not illegal is fine with me. But this is getting annoying, and I want it to stop."

"This doesn't concern you, Gunter," Rowena objected, but the man shook his head.

"It does," he said bluntly. "I care about both of you, and trust me, you don't make it easy. And if you simply stop talking to him after a single drunken mistake, then you're nothing more than a coward."

"Damn straight," Rowena said immediately, not even trying to deny it.

Gunter shook his head in shame and left the room, closing the door behind him. Rowena stood up and was about to open it, but Jakob grabbed onto her hand before it reached the knob.

"It's best to have this conversation in private," he pointed out, and Rowena lowered her hand, silently agreeing. "I take it you remember what happened on the drive back from your birth family's New Year's party?"

"Sort of," she admitted. "I remember making you pull over so I could get the traditional midnight kiss." And pieces of what came after it.

"Anything else?"

"Some things."

"Do you remember when you started singing about an 'Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Lemon Drop Martini' then?" When Rowena's hands shot to her mouth, and she turned bright red in embarrassment, Jakob merely smiled. "I don't know why you're embarrassed, Rowena. Your singing voice is lovely, after all."

Rowena lowered her hands, though the wide-eyed horror was harder to remove. "You...you're lying."

"I am," Jakob admitted easily, "but I did it for a reason."

"And that reason is?"

She was giving him what Revan had called her 'courtroom stare.' Jakob had to admit, he was proud - she'd learned it from him, after all.

But, rather than compliment it, he decided to answer her question. "I lied to you because what you actually did was far less embarrassing than serenading your boyfriend with ridiculous rewrites of stupid songs." His smile vanished, and he seemed almost...soft. "You asked me if I wanted to get married."

Rowena cringed. "Yeah," she admitted. "Yeah, I remember that. And I remember demanding you take me to Vegas immediately."

"And you decided that shutting me out was the way to handle it instead of simply telling me that you didn't want to marry me."

"I do," Rowena protested and was shocked at herself. "I mean, I've thought about it, and I wouldn't mind it, but I kind of want kids someday and you've made a point of how you'd be a terrible father -"

"I made a point of how I had a terrible father," Jakob corrected. "My biological parents should never have bred, but I escaped the situation and, like you, found myself adopted by a single jerk who had no idea what he was doing. It hurts me to say it, but..." he clenched his teeth and spit out his true feelings as if he was coughing up acid. "Gunter was a decent father to me."

"So you're saying you're willing to have a child?"

Jakob considered his next words carefully. "I am willing to compromise on the issue. I suggest we simply take things as they come, children or no children."

"And if I end up pregnant?"

"What did I just say?"

Rowena let out an embarrassed giggle. "Yeah, sorry. So, I guess we should do this properly, huh?"

Jakob made sure the door was securely closed, and when he turned back, Rowena was already on one knee, looking up at him with her mouth twitching as she attempted to be serious. He felt the beginning of a headache himself. "Could you please get off the ground? I thought we were going to do this properly."

Rowena laughed so hard that she toppled over onto her floor. Jakob's annoyance melted as he witnessed this, and he took a moment to acknowledge the warm feeling that seeing her happy always gave him.

That warm feeling disappeared when Rowena caught her breath and told him he was fired. "Not for anything you've done," she promised when she saw the look of horror on his face. "It's just...you're not allowed in my room in the first place...and Gunter closed the door..."

Jakob's embarrassed groan only made her laugh again.

She had nothing to worry about. And by the time Elise went back to school after the holidays, she had a shiny new ring and a photo of her mother ready to be placed in a chair at the wedding.

Ferdinand and Dorothea hastily threw their things in the car as Ludwig just continued yelling at them. Surprisingly, though, his son was yelling back as he hurriedly rushed his wife to the car.

"It's not that big of a deal!" Ferdinand shouted from the other side of the lawn.

"You did it in my bed!" his father shouted loud enough for anyone outside in the neighborhood to hear.

"No one else was!" Ferdinand retorted just as loudly.

Dorothea, cheeks red from embarrassment, rolled down the window and tugged on her husband's sleeve. "Ferdie," she said in a quiet and flustered voice. "People can hear you."

He looked around and only found one person looking at them from her porch. Ludwig's closest neighbor, a very elderly woman with a walker, was more than Dorothea wanted around. Smiling as if nothing was off, Ferdinand waved at the woman who caught his attention with a smile, and his wife ordered him into the car in a hushed voice, and they drove off as Ludwig shook his head in disappointment.

The elderly woman, with shaking hands, raised up her walker and smiled wide. "You go, girl!" she shouted as the car drove down the street.