"Mother?" Diana exclaimed, shocked and amazed.

"Hi, Diana!" her sister Drusilla popped out from behind the Queen, and threw herself into her sister's arms. "We wanted to surprise you."

"Well, you certainly did!" Diana hugged her tightly, and wiped away a sudden tear with nervous fingers.

"Hello, daughter," Hippolyte opened her arms, smiling as she her eldest daughter stepped into the welcome circle of her arms. Diana breathed deeply the familiar scent of apple blossoms that she always associated with Paradise Island still clinging to her mother's hair.

"It's so wonderful to see you." Diana stepped back, marveling at her mother's transformation. "Look at you!"

"Yes, well," Hippolyte adjusted her hat, "Drusilla insisted that if we were to visit you properly, we were to wear these ridiculous costumes—"

"They're not costumes, Mother." Dru sighed, exasperated. "Everyone dresses like this in America. We can't be drawing attention to ourselves, right Diana? We have to fit in."

"You fit in just fine." Diana laughed, delighted, as Dru twirled around to show off her skirt and sweater, her dark hair done up in a pony tail tied with red ribbon. She had forgone the sadle shoes Diana had bought her on her very first visit to Washington, and instead had a pair of pumps that matched her sweater. Diana was struck suddenly by how grown-up her little sister had become. "Look at you! You've gotten taller!"

"No, I haven't." Dru giggled. "You know that!"

"Well, I think you look taller." Diana gave her a one armed hug. "I can't believe you left the Island. Mother, you haven't set foot on land in... in..."

"Two thousand years, and it doesn't seemed so very changed." Hippolyte sat down on the sofa, ankles crossed, and smoothed the skirt across her knees. She peered around at Diana's apartment, taking in the second-hand furniture and threadbare rugs. "Although this shabby little place can't begin to compare with your apartments in the Palace."

"Mother! It's a very nice apartment, and very affordable." Diana couldn't keep a note of pride out of her voice. She was terribly proud of herself for adapting so quickly to American life, and had hoped her mother would be as well. "Only forty dollars a month, with utilities included."

"Ah, yes. Money. The great vice of the so-called civilized world. I remember it well. One cannot have money without poverty, daughter. Need and want are the price of commerce."

"Not this lesson again—" Dru began, rolling her eyes, and stopped at the knock at the door.

"Steve!" Diana suddenly exclaimed, one hand flying to her mouth. "I almost forgot."

"Steve?" Hippolyte echoed, with a raised eyebrow, and Diana flushed.

"Major Trevor—he's picking me up for dinner."

"I wondered why you were so dressed up," Dru said with a knowing smile, and Diana gave her a look. "You're looking slinky."

"Drusilla, this dress is not slinky," Diana said quickly.

"Slinky?" Hippolyte asked, and Diana's heart sank.

"Mother, please, be very careful what you say—" Diana began, panicked.

"I will comport myself accordingly, daughter. You may admit him," she said, with a regal wave of her hand. Dru rolled her eyes again, and Diana stifled a giggle, smoothing her skirt down and checking her hair before she opened the door.

He had it all planned out. He'd called the Franklin Arms Hotel and made a dinner reservation in their dining room, then stopped off at the florist on the corner, and picked out the prettiest bunch of flowers they had that weren't roses. Roses were... too dangerous. But daisies were different. Daisies could mean many things, like "Happy Birthday" or "Get Well Soon", for example.

Or "I'm sorry".

Except that he wasn't sure if he was sorry. He'd spent all day trying to figure that out. He had to admit—she was an awfully swell girl. And kissing her sure hadn't been a chore, that was for sure... But Diana wasn't the kind of girl he was used to. She didn't seem to have any hidden agenda, and she never played coy. She didn't know how—there was no guile about her at all. She looked up to him as a hero, and because of that, he never wanted to let her down. What worried him was that he had. The look on her face after he'd kissed her in his office that morning was just killing him.

Ergo, daisies.

The thing was, over the last three years, Steve had come to rely on Diana not just as an assistant—though she was a damned capable one at that, and he couldn't count the number of times she'd helped him with a particularly tough problem, or come up with the one avenue he hadn't pursued. More than that, she was always the first person to stick up for him, and the first person to challenge him when she believe he was wrong. He relied on her. Heck, he remembered how furious she'd been when he'd been ordered to shadow that Andros character. The disappointment in her eyes had been a kind of living hell, and he wished somehow he could adequately apologize. But he couldn't. Not for doing his job. Not for doing what he knew had to be done to defend his country. But when Andros had gone, he hadn't just felt relief because that meant the enigmatic alien was out of Wonder Woman's life, though that was the glib answer he had given Diana at the time.

The fact is, the passionate way the yeoman had defended Andros had made him, well... jealous. Even though that had been over a year and a half ago, he still remembered that feeling. He wasn't proud of it—but he owned up to it, nonetheless. Diana wasn't just a secretary. She was a part of his life. A very important part. And he hated feeling like he'd jeopardized that. So, he had arrived at her small apartment a few blocks from the War Department armed with flowers, an apology, and a book of red ration stamps.

It wasn't the same as fighting the Nazis. But somehow, he had a feeling that the rewards might be greater. Brushing a bit of lint of the shoulder of his dress uniform, he squared his shoulders and knocked on her apartment door.

The door opened, and Diana's smile was the first thing he saw. Somehow, that smile chased all his doubts and worries of the day disappear. "Steve," she greeted him, and he brandished the bouquet.

"Oh, they're beautiful!" Diana exclaimed, taking the flowers from him, and stepped aside so he could enter her apartment.

"Hi, Major Trevor!" Diana's sister Drusilla greeted him from the couch, and he covered his surprise with a warm smile.

"You remember my sister, Drusilla," Diana said by way of explanation, and his smile widened.

"Of course I do! How are you, Dru? Staying out of trouble?"

"Oh, yes sir," Dru grinned.

"And this is our mother," Diana said as Steve turned to face the stately matron on the sofa.

"Mrs. Prince, it's a true pleasure to meet you. Having met your two lovely daughters, it's obvious they take after their mother."

"He flatters well," Hippolyte remarked to Diana as she offered Steve her hand which his kissed like a gentleman.

"Mother!" Diana blushed, but Steve only laughed.

"Why, thank you, ma'am."

"Dru and my mother came to Washington to surprise me," Diana offered, awkwardly, and Steve patted her arm reassuringly. "I'm so sorry about our dinner plans. Perhaps, some other evening—?"

"Don't be silly, Diana. It's no trouble at all. I'll call the hotel and tell them to change the reservation."

"That's very gracious of you, Major Trevor."

"Please, call me Steve."

"Perhaps later, Major," Diana's mother said with an air of stately grace belied by the twinkle in her eyes. "When we have gotten to know one another better."

"Let me put these in water," Diana said, and Steve got up from the chair immediately.

"I'll help you. Ladies." He gave them a bow, and followed Diana to the cramped kitchen. "While I'm at it, how about I call the General? I'm sure he'd love to join us. That is," he added, "if your mother wouldn't mind some company?"

"It's okay, Steve," Diana said as she took a glass vase from the shelf, and a cutting board and knife from the counter. "My mother hasn't had a 'date' in a very, very long time. And I think she might just enjoy that very much."

"A date it is, then," He held the vase beneath the tap to fill it with cold water. "I just wish I could have found someone for Dru. Maybe we could ask Charlie to bring someone along for her? She's what, seventeen now? Eighteen?"

"I think Dru will be just fine on her own," she confided with a conspiratorial wink as she arranged the daises in the vase. "Thank you so much for the flowers. They really are lovely."

"Diana, about this morning. I want to apologize—"

"Apologize?" she echoed, her smile fading.

"If I overstepped my bounds," he began, taking the vase from her hands and setting it on the counter, "then I want to apologize. The last thing in the world I would ever want to do is jeopardize our relationship."

"Our working relationship," she said, her expression still maddeningly hard to read.

"Exactly. You're a swell girl, Diana, a swell girl. I just wanted to apologize for getting carried away."

"We all get carried away now and again," Diana said with a smile as she gave his hand a squeeze, and then released it. "You'd better call the restaurant before Etta and Charlie get there," she called over her shoulder as she carried the flowers back out into the living room.

Author's Note: Please, if there's anything that doesn't work for you, or is factually or grammatically incorrect, don't hesitate to tell me! Constructive criticism is the greatest gift you can give an author. I'm not a delicate flower who will curl up and die at the first sign of criticism. I want to make this story the very best I can, so please let me know what works for you, and more importantly, what doesn't.