AN - I promise these will be at the bottom from now on and rather short, but I'd like to explain a few minor things. This story is an AU that takes place in present day 2013/2014, in this story Francis is the son of a very rich French noble man and Mary is the daughter of an extremely successful business man from Scotland who's done close business with Francis' father in the past, which is why as children they played together and also why she spent her summers there. Like in the show the accents will be English instead of French and Scottish like the would have been, however Francis can speak french, obviously as do most of the homes servants. Because this is present day relationships are a lot less formal, although they are expected to be somewhat formal, the rules aren't as strict clearly, so I've turned the characters into present day versions of themselves, Mary is adventurous, stubborn, and kind, and Francis is brave, somewhat bashful well also being confident and polite. The reason I wrote this is just in case the characters seem oddly OOC at first. I hope you enjoy! The more reviews the faster chapters will come! :) Thank you! xoxo Jess

Chapter 1 – Follow the Leader

Mary twirled her thumbs nervously as her car approached the drive way of the beautiful French mansion, she gazed longingly at the lavish marble pillars and delicately carved stone lions that guarded the homes ice white ivory steps. It hadn't changed a bit, frozen in all its glory as if it were a photograph, she smiled thoughtfully, remembering how she and Francis used to play tag in the homes never ending gardens, and how he'd always have to slow himself down so that she could catch up to him…his legs had always been longer than hers, but she imagined what had been a bad thing when they were children was a good thing now.

As the car pulled to a stop she could feel eyes on her just past the thin tented window, her stomach fluttered with butterflies as she stepped from the shade of her car into the bright mid-afternoon sunlight, she blinked a few times, ridding the sunlight from her eyes, and glanced towards the steps. Nearly the entire Valois household was standing in her wake smiling at her kindly, she returned their kindness with a shy smile, as Henry Valois, known to her for most of her life as Sir Valois, stepped forward to greet her, "Dear Mary, look how you've grown, the last I saw of you, you were barely eleven and now, well, you're a grown women." he said with a smile that seemed genuine, but for some reason she found herself questioning it's truthfulness.

Regardless Mary smiled bashfully at the noblemen's complement and replied with a nod, "Thank you kindly for letting me stay for the summer Sir Valois."

"The pleasure is mine," just as he said this the front door of the mansion opened and a tall slender boy with wavy blond hair and cornflower blue eyes made his way towards them, he was dressed simply in a patterned button down shirt and a grey blazer, his smile held a familiar air of mischief that she recognized immediately, "I take it you remember my son? Francis?"

Mary nodded as Francis took her hand a placed a delicate kiss on her knuckles, the gesture was old fashioned but one she enjoyed none the less. "How could I forget." She said with a kind smile.

"Mary, I can hardly believe it's you…" he said clearly surprised, she couldn't blame him, she defiantly didn't look a think like she had at eleven, her hair was much longer and curlier now then it was then, her eyes had lightened from a nearly black shade of brown to a fitting warm chocolate color, not to mention she was taller and she'd moved from a training bra to a snug fitting B, "You're certainly not eleven anymore." He said, finding it necessary to state the obvious.

"I'm not the only one; if it weren't for that smile I wouldn't have recognized you." she lied. He was Francis, and it was obvious. A much older more attractive version of Francis, but Francis never the less.

He laughed and offered her his arm, "I can show you around if you'd like?"

She glanced at Sir Valois who gave her a small nod, "I would." She said taking his arm with little care as he led her into the house.

He showed her from room to room giving her less than exciting information about each until they reached the kitchen, which was empty due to the staff having been called to greet her, he began to laugh and released her arm, "God, Mary, can you believe they make us greet each other that way? You're my best friend you'd think they'd let me hug you in public." He said grabbing her by her waist and spinning her around into a comforting hug, "It's insane they make us pretend we haven't seen each other in six years."

Mary laughed with him and hugged her old friend, it was true for a few years after her last summer at the mansion they'd lost contact, but luckily she'd mistakenly bumped into him at a gala when they were fourteen and they'd quickly rekindled their friendship, although their fathers both seemed to be against the idea for some mysterious reason and hadn't allowed them to see each other except on special unavoidable occasions, though that hadn't stopped them from texting and Skyping whenever possible. Until last month when her father had uncharacteristically decided she'd be spending the summer at Valois House which she, of course, hadn't argued about, "Insane, huh?" she inquired coyly.

"Well obviously, look at you, who in their right mind could spend six whole years away from you?"

She snickered, "Flattery will get you nowhere."

"Dammit," he faked a pout, "and here I thought I was getting somewhere?" he laughed, "So how are your girls?"

"Hmm?" she said confused for a moment before realizing he met her best friends, "Oh! Well Keena is convinced I came here to spend the summer snogging you, Greer has a new boyfriend who's apparently a really good cook and really, really middle class, Aylee is convinced she's going to prison for stealing her stepmothers diamonds and Lola is just…Lola."

Francis smiled, "Sounds like a normal day in the life of Miss. Mary Stuart."

"Typically, and you? How are your brothers?"

"Charles and Henry are good, they're dying to meet you actually."

"Me?"

"Yes, I think their exact words were, 'Is Mary the pretty girl from the computer screen?' and 'Do we get me meet her? I wanna meet her first because you're gonna marry her one day.'"

"Oi, marriage? Francis you know you have to actually ask me first?" she joked shoving him gently.

"Hey, they're not the only ones, Keena seems to think you're saying here to, what was it again? Spend the summer snogging me?"

She snorted, "You wish."

"Or maybe you do?" he teased raising an eyebrow and running from the kitchen up the stairs towards his room, she followed behind him, finding it terribly difficult to keep up with the taller boy, she raced into his room after him where she found him sitting on his bed legs crossed liked he'd been there ages, "Took you long enough." He prompted.

She crossed her arms seemingly done with their little race, when much to his surprised she bounded across his large room and pounced on him, her arms locking around his neck as they fell back against the neatly ironed satin sheets, they laughed, and she pushed herself up so she was looking down at him, "Did I win?" she asked looking into his blue eyes.

"Um, no, if I recall correctly, and I do, I got here first?" he replied starring up at his childhood friend, though truth be told…she wasn't a child anymore…not at all. Neither of them were children, nor were they dating despite the numerous speculations, however they had managed to find themselves in a fairly compromising position, not that he minded and by the looks of it neither did she, to be perfectly honest it seemed they were both as comfortable with each other as they were with their closest friends, maybe that's because they were each other's closest friends? He didn't really know, but he did know he had a very beautiful women on top of him and for once he wasn't planning to sleep with her.

"Still," she said, "I win because I tackled you. Don't you remember? That was how we used to play as children."

"Only because it was so easy to tackle you back then."

"And it's not easy to tackle me now?" she said cocking an eyebrow.

"Not without looking like a rapist."

"Do it I dare you. Tackle me. Person who ends up on top wins. I won't think you're a rapist, I swear."

He snorted, "Okay, so do I have to tackle you from way over there or…"

But it was too late she'd already tightened her grip on his shoulders pinning him against the mattress as best she could, though her attempts were futile against his strong swift arms and within seconds she was under him. He looked down into her eyes, "I win."

She laughed and he relaxed a bit, before realizing this was a huge mistake as he suddenly found himself under her again, "No you don't. Rule one: Never let your guard down."

He rolled his eyes, but said nothing.

"So, what's my prize?" she asked playfully.

"What do you want?"

"Hmm, a star named in my honor, a yacht, a song about me sung by Nate Ruess."

"Well don't we have an imagination? Something I can actually get you?"

"Okay then, you have to be my personal alarm clock the rest of the summer."

"What does that mean?"

"You have to wake me up every morning, and sweetly too, no throwing water on me and I swear to god if I wake up to find you putting gum in my hair or shaving cream on my face then I will expect a yacht. A real one."

He laughed, "Deal."

Just as the deal was made, a knock at the door, followed by a maid, made them freeze where they were, which happened to be…sadly, the same terribly compromising position from earlier, the maid who hadn't actually noticed them yet, looked up with a gasp and commenced to smacking Francis over the head with a wash towel and screaming, "You perverted, perverted boy. Miss. Stuart is here two minutes and you've already tricked her into your bed. You are an awful scoundrel, Francis Valois, I will not stand for this you…you…you impudent child." In French.

She refused to listen to Francis who was desperately begging for mercy and trying to explain the situation to the maid whose name was surely Lucinda, counting how many time Francis shouted it.

Finally Mary spoke up, "Lucinda, he didn't touch me I swear. We were playing, like we did when we were kids."

Lucinda stopped hitting Francis, "You are not children anymore Miss. Stuart. You are both seventeen years old, do you have any idea what it looks like you were doing?"

Mary blushed vibrantly and nodded, "Honestly nothing came of it." She begged, but Lucinda continued scolding them.

"You cannot just run around mounting boys as if they are horses, you do not want to be considered a whore, do you?" at that point Francis stepped between them.

"That is enough!" he shouted at the women, "Mary is our guest and a very dear friend of mine. You will not speak to her that way. We have been friends for a very long time, what we were doing was a mere show of friendship and even if it hadn't been you reacting as you did is unacceptable. I will not have it."

At that point Francis' father and mother barged in as well demanding to know what had happened and the two teenagers were having a hard time explaining exactly what it was they'd been doing when Lucinda had found them, especially since the position Lucinda had explained to Catherine and Henry seemed fairly self-explanatory in most cases except for, coincidentally, theirs.

Henry excused Lucinda with a quick cold flip of the wrist as Catherine starred disapproving at the teenagers, though her cold glare seemed to be directed, for the most part at Mary.

"What in gods name was going on in here?" Sir Henry boomed.

"Nothing happened, we were just—" Mary began, but found herself cut off by another spout of Henry's voice.

"My son's explanation please Mary."

Francis gulped and met his parent's eyes, "Nothing. We were playing an old game, one we'd invented as children, honestly it was nothing, but a game."

"What game is this exactly?" Catherine asked sternly, glaring at the pair with disappointment.

Francis and Mary glanced at each other before Francis said, a little ashamed, "A version of tag that is won by the person who ends up on top."

Catherine's eyes grew wide, "On top of the other person?"

Francis nodded.

Henry who looked a little less angry and more curious now asked, "And who ended up on top?" that earned his a sharp scolding and a slap from Catherine, but it was obvious by the look in his eyes he expected an answer.

Francis' cheeks flushed, "She did." He said, with the tiniest hint of embarrassment.

This earned an amused laugh from Henry, "She topped you? Honestly I knew you weren't the strongest Francis, but she topped you?"

"I didn't want to hurt her!" Francis shouted.

Mary caught his arm trying to calm him as she added, "He did top me once, but he let his guard down."

Only after she'd said the words did she realize they sounded as if they had a more negative connotation then they actually did, which caused her to blush brightly as well.

"This is entirely inappropriate." Catherine yelled, "I knew you two had grown close, but this isn't even acceptable on those terms. Not even if she were your girlfriend would that be acceptable."

"We were playing, not having sex." Francis countered.

"Be that as it may, I do not want to find the two of you in a position such as that ever again, am I clear?" Mary and Francis glanced at each other, and nodded, "And please. Restrain from entering each other's rooms again, understood?"

The two nodded again.

"Then you may go."

Francis and Mary nodded yet again and dashed across the room a faster than normal speed, rushing into the hall way both full of relief.

"I'm so sorry about that…my parents are—"

"Not the only ones who would have assumed that? I should be apologizing anyway. I tackled you."

He smirked, "You got us thrown out of each other's rooms, so much for the alarm clock idea."

"Oh no, you're still doing it."

"Why?"

"Because if you don't you owe me a yacht." She teased.

He rolled his eyes, "Breaking the rules for you already. You are a terrible influence."

She laughed, "You love it."

She always had been the more adventurous of the two, always coming up with some big idea that Francis would surely go along with. She used to lead him around everywhere when they were kids, she was bossy and possessive, with a undeniable stubbornness that couldn't be avoided. She refused to give up or give in and yet managed to remain kind and loving in all lights. It was something he'd always liked about her. Something that made him sure, no matter where this girl went…he would follow.

AN - What do you think? Got a little touchy feely there. Hope you enjoyed please leave a review for a quicker update!