Gingerly, Edward took his seat next to Bella on the bed. She gazed at him, cheeks flushed, and placed her hand into his, threading her heated fingers through Edward's own icicles. Her skin (that dangerous fire to his ice) was so smooth, so warm. The wedding band Edward placed on Bella's third finger merely hours before glowed hazily in the soft light of the hotel room.
"Are you completely sure that you want this, Bella? I'm not sure if…I don't know if I ca-" Edward was silenced as Bella touched a finger to his lips. She leaned in and gently pressed her lips against his, quelling his anxiety.
"I love you, Edward. I want this, I need you. I want to remember what it was like, before I…before it happens," Edward turned his head away and scoffed.
"It doesn't have to be that way, Bella. You can still choose life," Edward lowered his melodic pitch to whisper the last word.
Bella, absolutely resolute in her decision, completely unwaveringly sure of herself in this moment, shook her head. "I choose you, Edward. You are my husband. Today. Tomorrow. Forever," each murmured declaration punctuated by a soft kiss upon Edward's granite face.
Edward's face turned toward Bella, he noticed the few teardrops clinging to her dark lashes. He untangled his hand that was still clutched in hers and brought it up to join the other as he cradled her face. "Oh, my Bella," he sighed, and with an exhalation that had nothing to do with ridding his body of toxic carbon dioxide and everything to do with stripping himself of his anxiety and fortifying his resolve, he smiled that lovely crooked smile that made the fundamental gasses from Bella's own vitally functioning lungs escape in a gentle whoosh, "as if I could ever deny you anything."
A prominent blush creeping its way onto Bella's cheeks, Edward took hold of Bella's shoulders, and as gently as he could possibly manage, urged her body to lie back against the lavish pillows of the plush hotel bed. He hesitantly removed her silken nightgown while she pushed his shirt over his shoulders. Each movement becoming less and less calculated and measured and more instinctual as each other's bodies were revealed to one another. The soft yellow light of the lamps on the adjacent nightstands making Bella's skin appear even more flushed and rosy. Even while the blackness of night lingered merely outside the curtained windows, reminding him that with each revolution of the Earth the Volturi's deadline loomed ever closer, Edward found solace in this simple illuminating effect. Bella looked, and felt, more alive than ever. He could hear her erratic respirations, her heart speeding up to a steady flutter, her very flesh scorching under his icy touch.
Edward placed his lips onto Bella, placing light kisses on her neck, her collarbone, her stomach. Summoning bravado she didn't know she had she reached for Edward's belt and slowly tugged it away, pushing his pants over his hips.
He gently positioned his body over hers, careful not to lean any weight against her slight frame. Edward was visibly nervous; his eyes squeezed shut, his brow furrowed. Bella tugged at his wrist and he followed her direction, Bella leading his palm against her chest to feel the rapid thudding of her heart.
"I'm yours, Edward. Please…please do this for me," she pleaded, sensing the apprehension that was forming in Edward.
Gazes focused intently on one another, Edward brought his lips down to meet Bella's. He kissed her gently at first, always the fear of breaking his fragile Bella teetering in his mind, threatening to overthrow the passion. The slow, cautious movement of Bella's own lips under his was a well practiced act for the two of them. He felt her velvet tongue dart out to slide languorously along his own frozen lips, which he always kept clamped shut (always). Edward felt the venom ooze in his mouth, the sickly sweet poison that would eventually, inevitably, take Bella's life from her pool in his mouth. He forced the toxin down, swallowing each mouthful as discreetly as possible.
Bella began shifting below him, tortuously writhing and sliding her warm skin beneath his. When Edward felt at last that neither could handle the intensely concentrated need for friction any longer, he squeezed his eyes shut and readied himself. He descended on her and when Bella gasped Edward's eyes shot open and began to immediately back away. He knew that he could not do this, could not actually go through with it. Impossibility was the first word that sprang into Edward's mind; necessity is what burst into Bella's thoughts. She locked her arms around his neck and pulled herself up to kiss him. Her lips moving over his own cold mouth to encourage him to continue, his breath so unimaginably sweet as she drank in his scent. "It's okay, I'm alright Edward. This is going to be alright."
Ever so slowly Edward entered Bella and tentatively, so very cautiously, began to move inside her. Moments slipped by where Edward was too frightened to risk any movement, he hovered, still as a statue above her. The need for advancement became too great for either of them. Edward's jaw tightly clenched as Bella's body squirmed beneath him, persuading Edward to continue.
Eventually, his pace began to increase; there was a frenzied tempo that was beginning to form. Bella chewed down on her lip and clutched onto Edward's shoulders for support. Desperately trying to accustom herself, she sensed after several moments that everything was not quite as 'alright' as she had envisioned.
Indeed, something was going very wrong. She looked up at him, the gold of his eyes were receding, rapidly being replaced by a shadowy black. His breath came out in sharp huffs, a low growl emitting from his throat. She turned her face to the side, not wanting him to see her grimace in fear that he would stop and confirm that this task was, once and for all, undeniably impossible.
His growls were louder now, the headboard of the bed nearly sending cracks through the walls. Bella didn't know how long she, or he, could keep this up. Edward was slipping away, each thrust harsher than the last, each snarl more resonant and frightening. She attempted to lift her head to meet his, hoping to calm Edward down, to bring him back to her. Not comprehending how it truly happened, she felt the back of her head crack against the rich wood of the headboard. She emitted a yelp of pain. Edward uncharacteristically failing to notice Bella's mishap, continued without any acknowledgement. She turned her head to glance up at Edward, and for the first time in many months felt a queasy pang of something churn in her stomach. His face, so usually perfectly composed, was scrunched, his brow knitted and lips drawn taught as his head was thrown back, locks of bronze bouncing behind him.
Bella began to feel dizzy, her head felt itchy and she swiped at the sticky hair that coated her forehead in an effort to push her bangs toward the top of her head. Even with that feeling of something in her stomach growing more intense with each passing second, Bella did not want Edward to stop.
Doing so now would have disastrous consequences she feared.
Bella traced Edward's jaw line with her fingertips in a futile attempt to recover some of the tenderness of the moment that was rapidly dissolving with each feral growl escaping from Edward's beautiful lips. For a moment, one brief instant, Bella realized her fatal mistake. Bella was always too keen, her senses too acute, to the coppery-salt smell of blood. For unbeknownst to her, her fingertips were coated in her own blood, fresh from the wound atop her head caused by the headboard of the bed.
Her own blood that was now smeared against Edward's face.
She didn't know how she missed it; how she couldn't have possibly noticed the small trickle of crimson liquid that oozed through her chocolate locks. Edward flinched and then paused for the briefest of seconds. Time seemed to stop completely after that. Seconds ticked by, moments that were draining by ever so slowly, yet Bella felt powerless to do anything but stare. She thought for an instant after that involuntary flinch, that atypical behavior of Edward that did not seem beautifully coordinated and perfect, that everything would be fine. Edward would, could, resume and this little 'incident' would be forgotten and even laughed at during later moments when Edward would sigh at Bella's infallible magnetism towards injury as he cradled her warm, live body in his all-too-stony embrace.
Isabella Swan was, per usual, gravely mistaken.
Losing what little control over his actions he still retained, the last thread of restraint snapped within Edward. Bella was frozen in alarm as she stared at him, his nostrils flared from a large intake of the air. She was all Edward could smell, all Edward could think about in that moment.
Nothing mattered now, nothing could be done. Fates were sealed. The irreversible damage, the snowballing of disastrous effects had been set in motion. The avalanche was careening down the mountainside with nothing to stop it, nothing to halt its cataclysmic advance.
Before a squeak of protest could have been uttered, Edward scooped Bella up so she was positioned flush against him. His arms holding her to his torso securely, crushing the air out of her lungs. She wheezed. "Edward! Stop, please st-," Bella pleaded as she pushed her ineffectual hands to his face in an effort to distance herself from him. Seeming only to encourage him further, Edward's hand grabbed a fistful of soft mahogany locks and jerked Bella's head to the side, exposing the long plane of delicate flesh that sloped into her shoulders. Edward buried his face into the bow of Bella's neck.
She wasn't ready.
Oh God! She wasn't ready for this to happen now. Not like this. There were so many things left to say; she wanted time. More time to prepare; more time to prepare to die. Edward could feel the pulsating thump-thump of Bella's turbulent pulse as blood rushed through her carotid artery against his lips. It was too much; it was all too much for him. She gasped as Edward's razor-sharp teeth pierced the tender flesh of her neck. The venom stinging, now burning, began to weave its way throughout her circulatory system with every pump of her heart. Her heart that now began to beat slower and slower, thudding deafeningly against Bella's ribs.
No, it was true that this was not how Bella had imagined her life ending. She had pictured it differently; more decided, more controlled. More tender and romantic with whispers of "I love you" falling from their mouths and impassioned kisses emblazoned across their lips and promises of eternal love and never-ending devotion.
If second chances were really granted, Bella Swan would have went about this whole dying business very differently.
As it was, she was left with not much architecture in the matter. It had happened. Isabella Swan was going to die. This was not Edward's fault, not in the least. Bella had chosen this after all; chosen Edward, chosen death.
Summoning her last ounce of energy, she raised her hand to cradle Edward's cheek, his face still buried into the crook above her collarbone. Clinging to the more organized dream Bella held onto of the last moments of her human life, "I love you," was whispered across his granite skin as she began to slip into unconsciousness. It was fitting really; her life would end with Edward and would begin anew with Edward.
He would be the last thing she ever would see with these, her lovely coffee eyes. And Edward Cullen would be the first image viewed from her new crimson ones. This was how it must be, after all.
Conversely, Edward was not the Edward Bella (nor himself) had pictured in the recesses of their minds when planning her inevitable shift from mortality to the eternally un-dead. He was the monster he always feared he would become, but secretly always knew himself to be. Sitting there clutching her body and drinking in her essence, nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed outside the gush of blood that flooded his mouth with each beat of Bella's heart.
All is lost.
And then a hand, her hand, touched him. Actually caressed his demon face, followed by a whispered, "I love you," He willed himself to stop the sucking then, the draining of blood. Bella's blood.
There was absolution for this devil still.
Slowly, as if his limbs were moving in water, he stretched out his arms. Their eyes locked, the honeyed amber completely engulfed by the sinister black that now formed Edward's irises. Bella's eyes, still wide open and bulging didn't blink; didn't move. Her head lolled to the side as her arms became slack and fell from the clutch they held against Edward's chest and face.
She had given up everything. Her friends, her family, her life. And this request, this one request that Bella had asked of him could not be fulfilled. This monster, this mephisto in disguise had deceived her. Had taken everything from her.
Nothing to do but wait now. Wait for his angel to cease her sweet breaths, wait for her heart to flutter its very last beat. Wait for the pain; the liquid fire that would sear through her tiny body for three days. Wait for Bella Swan to die and wait for Bella Swan to be reborn in death.
Wait for eternity.
With great care Edward placed Bella back against the pillows and covered her convulsing body with the comforter. Cradling her head between his palms he gently pressed his marble lips to her. It left behind a stain of blood against the pale flesh of Bella's forehead, the beads of perspiration grabbing hold of the blood as it trickled down her face.
Bella's seizing form thrashing about on the bed; Edward crouched onto the floor in the corner of the room. And if there were anything other than that putrid poison moistening his eyes, Edward would have cried.
Edward Cullen would have cried for the rest of his miserable existence.