A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this chapter up. I was on vacation and then there was a death in the family. Thank you all so much for reading and reviewing this story!

"Bella!" I exclaimed loudly as she answered the phone.

I heard her pause on the other end before she asked, "Edward?"

"Listen, Bella. I just had to call you and apologize. I'm so very, very sorry."

"You called me at five in the morning to apologize?"

What? What was she talking about? It wasn't five in the morning. I frowned and looked down at my watch trying to read the little roman numerals.

"It's not five in the morning, it's only two."

I heard her let out a strangled sigh. "I'm in New York, Edward. I'm three hours ahead of you. It's five."

"Oh. Sorry. I'm sorry I keep upsetting you, and talking about Charlie and shit, and for calling you so early."

"Great. Thanks. Are you done apologizing now? I'd like to get back to sleep," she said in an irritated voice.

I made a face at the phone. I didn't get what her problem was. I'd apologized, hadn't I?

"Yeah, I'm done."

Before I could even say good night or whatever, she'd hung up on me. I stared at my phone in disbelief. I couldn't believe her! I'd called to apologize and she acted like a bitch. Scowling, I turned around when someone asked me I needed a ride home.

I looked up and saw that James guy with his Tanya look-alike wife. I really did need a ride home but even as drunk as I was, I knew it was a bad idea to get in a car with a stranger. I would know. I wrote about that kind of shit, and it never ended well.

"I'm good," I slurred as I turned my back on him and scrolled through my phone until I found Jasper's number.

"Ed, man, what the fuck?"

"I need a ride home."

"Oh, Jesus. You're fucking drunk, aren't you?" he asked sounding pissed.

"A bit."

He told me he'd be there soon and fifteen minutes later, I was being poured into his car. He looked pissed and I commented on it.

"Of course, I'm pissed. Dude, I was fucking asleep."

"Think of it as good practice for when that kid of yours shows up. You'll never get sleep then," I informed him, wisely.

"Which is why I want to enjoy my sleep now."

Soon, I was stumbling up the steps to my house and in the door. I managed to lock it before I face-dived onto my couch.

I woke up the next morning to someone pressing on my doorbell. Cursing, I made my way to the door, yanking it open with a scowl on my face.

"What?" I snarled.

My mom raised and eyebrow and said in a deadly voice, "Don't take that tone with me, young man."

Immediately, I apologized. If there was one person I didn't want to piss off, it was my mom.

"Go take a shower. You smell like you drowned in alcohol and when you come back down, you'd better have a better attitude."

Scowling, I stomped upstairs feeling like a scolded little kid. Ten minutes later, I made my way into the kitchen and found a platter of pancakes waiting for me. Through mouthfuls of food, I told my mom how awesome she was.

"Of course I am. I stopped by to see if you need anything for the house. I'm going to an estate sale in Seattle later," she explained.

"I could use some furniture for the living room and guest bedrooms," I told her.

She nodded. "Do you want to come with? Maybe get away from the house for a bit."

"Sounds good. Mind if we drop my car off at Rose's shop. She said she'd look at the scratches the she-devil left on it."

"What scratches?" Mom asked.

"I'm pretty sure Tanya keyed my car the other day."

Mom's eyes narrowed as she muttered something about ungrateful, spiteful, evil women under her breath.

"Edward! Look at this table. It would be perfect for your living room," Mom said, grabbing my arm and dragging me over to look at it.

It was a nice table so I told her to go ahead and get it. Her eyes lit up the second I gave her the go ahead to start haggling. She lived for it. Leaving her to do her thing, I wandered around until my eyes landed on an antique desk. It was gorgeous, and I needed it in my office.

As I turned to find my mom and let her know I'd found something else I wanted, I spotted a unwanted, yet familiar face in the crowd. Victoria Hunter. Hoping like hell that she hadn't spotted me, I quickly took off in the direction my mother had gone. I wasn't ashamed to admit that I was more than willing to hide behind my mother.

"Edward, honey. Did you find anything else you wanted?" Mom asked as I approached her.

I told her about the desk that I needed, all while keeping an eye out for Victoria.

"What's wrong?" Mom asked, putting her hands on my face.

I shook my head. "Nothing, it's noth—shit!" I exclaimed and turned my body around and ducked my head as Victoria looked my way.

"What in the world?" she asked.

"There's this creepy woman I met at Dooley's and she's here," I hissed out.

Mom tried to cover up a snicker and failed.

"It's not funny! She looks a lot like Tanya."

Mom instantly sobered up. "Where is she?"

"Like I'm gonna turn around and look? You can't miss her. She's has bright curly red hair," I muttered, still trying to stay hidden.

I saw Mom looking around from the corner of my eye and knew the minute she'd spotted her.

"Does Tanya have a sister?"

I shook my head no.

"Well, don't look now, but she's coming over here," she warned me.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

"Eddie! Fancy meeting you here."

"It's Edward," I corrected, tersely.

"And who is this stunning woman?" Victoria asked, turning toward my mom.

"Esme Cullen," Mom replied cooly, looking Victoria over. "Edward's mother. Who are you?"

Victoria gave Mom a fake smile. "Victoria Hunter. I met Edward at Dooley's earlier this week."

"I see," my mother said, though I have no idea what she saw. "What brings you here, Victoria?"

"I heard about an estate sale going on and thought I'd see what they had. I love estate sales!"

"Hmmm," was Mom's reply.

"Is James here with you?" I asked.

Victoria shot me a look but shook her head no.

"Who is James?"

"Her husband," I explained.

Mom's eyes grew even colder. "Well, Victoria, it was nice meeting you, but we have to go."

Mom all but grabbed my arm and dragged me out of the building. The ride back was spent listening to my mom go on about people not respecting their marriages.

"You stay away from that woman! Something about her isn't right."

"No worries," I snorted. "I have no desire to be anywhere near her. She reminds me too much of Tanya."

"Yes she does and that has me worried. I have a bad feeling about that woman."

"Which one?"

"Both," she said.

Monday morning, I wondered about my house trying to decide what to do with my day. It was a horribly stormy day and according to the weather reports, we were in for a severe thunderstorm. Not that I minded.

I lazed about and was laid out on my couch with a beer and a book when the electricity went out. Sighing, I stood up and went in search of a flashlight. I found one in a drawer in the kitchen, but the batteries were dead. Figured. So, I went in search of some candles. That only took twenty minutes of fumbling around in the dark, using my phone as a flashlight until I had located them.

Once I had the candles strategically set about, I sat back down on the couch to read. Just as I reached an incredibly suspenseful part, my phone rang, scaring the crap out of me.

"Yeah?"

"Is your power out?" my sister asked.

"Yeah. Yours?"

"Yeah, and now I'm bored," she whined.

I rolled my eyes. A bored Alice was an annoying Alice. We talked for about thirty minutes before I told her I had to go.

"Go? Go where?"

"The bathroom," I lied, but it worked. It got her off the phone.

As I was about to lock my phone, I noticed a recent call that I'd made. Oh, shit. Apparently, I'd called Bella on Saturday night. I cringed, almost afraid to know what I'd said. My thumb hovered over her number before I pushed the green button. It looked like I needed to apologize yet again. I swore, I'd apologized more to Bella than to any other woman in my life.

"To what do I owe the honor, Edward? Calling to apologize to me some more?"

"Uh—yeah," I said, dropping my head into my hands. "I have a feeling I need to apologize for my call on Saturday night. I don't even remember making it, but my phone says otherwise. Just tell me that I wasn't overly rude."

"You called me at five in the morning my time to apologize to me."

I let out a breath, I hadn't realized that I'd been holding. That wasn't as bad as I'd imagined. I'd pictured myself calling her and demanding to know why she wouldn't talk to Charlie.

"I guess I owe you an apology for my ill-timed apologizes," I said, stretching back on the couch just as a loud clap of thunder shook the house.

"No, it's fine. I owe you an apology for being such a bitch when you called."

"Considering I don't even remember, it's fine."

"No, it's not. It was rude of me to hang up on you," she said, her voice soft.

"Let's just say we're even."

"Sounds good. Also sounds like it's storming out there," she said as more thunder rumbled.

"It is. I lost power about forty minutes ago."

We talked a bit about my book and my plans for a new series when she asked me a question that took me by surprise.

"How is Emmett?"

I was stunned. After her almost belligerent reaction to the last time that I'd brought up her father and brother, I didn't expect her to ask about them.

"He's doing good. He's a cop in Port Angeles and married to a woman who is so completely perfect for his crazy ass."

"He's married?" she asked, sounding stunned. "Does he have any kids?"

"Not yet. They want to a little while."

"What's his wife like?"

"Tough," I said on a laugh. "Rose doesn't put up with any of his shit."

There was a pause on her end. "Is he mean to her?"

I frowned trying to figure out where that question had come from. "No. He's so head over heels for her, it's not funny. They're completely in love with each other."

She let out a relieved sigh. "That's good. I was afraid that Emmett would grow up to be like Charlie."

I frowned, confused as to what she meant. "He did grow up to be a lot like Charlie. Why do you think Emmett followed in Charlie's footsteps and became a cop?"

"Charlie's still a cop?"

"Yeah, he's the chief of police."

"Un-fucking-believable," she muttered. "Why the hell would people elect him to be the chief?"

Now, I was starting to get angry. "Why the hell wouldn't they? He's an honorable man."

She let out a snort. "Oh, yeah. Real honorable, that one."

My eyes narrowed at her tone of voice. "How the hell would you know? You weren't ever around," I snapped.

"For good reason!" she shouted.

"Oh, really? And what reason would that be?"

"Wow, he's really got you snowed, doesn't he? Bet he acts all perfect, but I know all about him."

I thought back to what Emmett had said about his mother poisoning Bella's mind. It seemed that she'd done one hell of a job.

"Look, Bella. I don't know what your mother told you about Charlie, but I can guarantee it was a lie. If Charlie was this horrible person you believe him to be then why did your mother let Emmett go live with him?" I asked, determined to get to the bottom of things.

"Don't talk bad about my mother, Cullen!" she growled. "And she didn't let Emmett live with Charlie. Charlie took him and refused to give him back."

I quickly realized that I was going to get nowhere with her, so I took a different tactic. "Look, why don't I give you Emmett's number and you can call him. Or I can give him yours. Talk to him for yourself. I know that he'd love to hear from you."

She seemed lost at the sudden change of topic and it was quite on her end of the phone before she finally agreed that I could give Emmett her number. We hung up right afterward and I sat staring at my phone, wondering what the hell I'd just done. I groaned as I realized that I'd probably just made things way worse. Our relationship was already strained and if I wanted to continue to work with her, I was going to have to let go of the fact that she and Charlie had their differences.

A loud jarring boom of thunder startled the shit out of me, and I jumped as the electricity came back on. Shaking my head at my own foolishness, I got up and headed into the kitchen. Opening up the cupboard, I grabbed a box of Captain Crunch and a bowl, when I saw a flash of something outside the kitchen window. Leaning closer, almost pressing my nose against the glass, I saw it again.

What the fuck?! Grabbing one of the candles, I made my way toward the backdoor which was at the opposite end of the kitchen. Slowly, I opened it and peeked my head out. The rain was coming down hard and heavy, and I could barely see in front of me. Gently closing the door behind me, I inched my way onto the back porch.

Within seconds, the wind blew the candle out and the only light I had was the frequent flashes of lightening. A little voice in the back of my head was warning me this was a bad idea. Ignoring it, I set the candle down and stepped off the porch into the torrential downpour. I was soaked through in a matter of seconds and my shoes made squishy sounds as they sunk into the muddy earth.

Another flash of lightening lit up my backyard and out of the corner of my eye, I saw it again. Except it wasn't an it. It was a person. It took everything I had not to let out a scream worthy of a stupid girl in a horror movie. I whirled around, but the person was gone. I placed a hand over my racing heart and ordered myself to breath.

A few deep breaths later, I'd decided that it was a figment of my imagination. I chalked it up to working too hard and letting the storm get the best of me. I headed up the steps and went to open the door only to find it locked.

I let out a growl as I tugged on the doorknob willing the fucking thing to open. It hadn't been locked when I'd walked out; of that I was positive. I knew for a fact the front door was locked and my phone was lying on the coffee table.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" I screamed into the storm.

Pushing my wet hair out of my eyes, I headed around the house toward the driveway. I kept a spare car key in a little magnetic box under the front of the car in case I ever locked myself out of my car. Once I got that, I could head over to Mom and Dad's. Mom had a spare key for my house.

I was halfway to the driveway when I remembered that I didn't have my car. It was at Rosalie's shop. Letting out a string of curses, I couldn't help but think that the fucking universe was out to get me.

What the fuck was I going to do? I asked myself as I walked back around the house. As I walked by the living room windows, lightening lit up the sky and I saw that one of the windows cracked. I hadn't cracked the window, but at the moment that wasn't my concern. My concern was getting inside and warming up.

I pulled the window up enough for me to get through, then I had the fun of trying to hoist myself up and inside. It took a few tries, but I finally got it done. I ended up sprawled on my hardwood floors, water falling in through the open window. Getting up, I slammed the window shut and took a moment to get myself together.

Standing there, I felt a sense of unease as my mind flicked through everything that had happened over the past forty minutes. I'd seen someone outside in the storm, my backdoor ended up locked, and a window had been opened. My mind concluded that someone had broken into my house and locked me out, but who? More importantly, was the person still inside my house?

Of course they were. The person was probably hiding in a closet, waiting for me to walk by, where they would then leap out and stab me to death. That's what I would have a killer do. And then my mind came to a complete halt. I did have a killer do that in my book, Hell Hath No Fury. Jane Alec, the female killer, had done exactly that. She'd broken into her ex-lover's home during a thunderstorm and had stabbed him forty-seven times.

I quickly told myself that wasn't the case. Tanya wasn't hiding in a closet waiting to kill me. I mean sure, you read sometimes about life imitating art, but that didn't happen that often. Right? Right.

Taking a deep breath, I kicked off my muddy and soaked shoes and socks before padding over to the coffee table to grab my phone. The phone that wasn't on the coffee table. It was on the arm of the couch, where I knew I hadn't left it. Quickly, I unlocked the phone and went to call 911 because someone had definitely been in my house. Of course, that was when I noticed that I had no cell service.

Things were going just great. I was trapped in my house with a psycho and no cell service during a severe storm. So, I didn't actually know if their was a psycho lying in wait for me, but it fit the theme.

Taking a few minutes to try and calm myself, I then headed toward the closet in the living room where I kept random crap, such as baseball bats. Armed with a metal one, I grabbed my phone and a candle and started making my way through the house.

Once I'd cleared the downstairs, I began to slowly make my way upstairs. The minute I hit the top step the lights came back on, effectively blinding me for a moment. Blinking to clear my eyes, I blew out the candle and set it down before resuming my search.

Cautiously, I opened my office door when I heard a door slam from downstairs. Racing down the stairs, I saw the front door was shut and locked, so I headed toward the back door. I found it shut but unlocked. There were wet footprints by the door and they weren't mine. Using my shirt, I locked the door before digging my phone out of my pocket. I checked for service and let out a relieved breath when I saw I had it.

Quickly, I dialed 911 and got Shelly Cope, the operator.

"911, what's your emergency?" she asked in a calm voice.

"Shelly, it's Edward Cullen. I've just had a break in," I told her, explaining what had happened.

"I'll send someone out as soon as possible. It's been crazy busy with the storm taking down power lines and causing accidents."

I thanked her and hung up, feeling better now that someone was on the way. Walking back into my living room, I grimaced at the mess that the open window as well as myself, had made. Rain and mud were all over the floor, and I was still dripping water all over it. Making the decision to change quickly, I raced upstairs, dried off and threw on a clean shirt and some sweatpants.

I made my way back downstairs and began the tedious process of waiting for someone to show up. Thankfully, I didn't have to wait too long. A ringing on the doorbell alerted me to the fact that someone had arrived.

I opened the door and found Mark DuPont, one of the deputies, on my doorstep.

"Hey, Mark."

"Edward. Had a break in?" he asked, in a gruff voice; the result of too many years of smoking.

"Yeah."

I explained what had happened and he did a search of my living room and kitchen for evidence and whatnot. Pulling out his camera, he took pictures of the footprints on the kitchen floor and the ones near the window.

"The ones near the window are most likely mine," I told him.

"There's more than one set. Are these your shoes?" he asked, pointing to my discarded loafers.

I nodded, watching as he turned them over and photographed the soles.

"So we can compare," he explained.

I sat back and let him do his thing, mentally recording every move he was making. When I'd been writing Hell Hath No Fury, I'd ridden along with a few cops out of Seattle and asked relentless questions. I'd even shadowed a Crime Scene Unit. It had been cool. Watching Mark though, I realized things were done quite differently in a small town.

We walked through the house together and the minute we stepped into my office, I knew someone had been in there. I pointed out that my papers had been rifled through and my laptop was open. I never left it open. I always shut it down and closed it. Mark made note of it, took some more pictures, then headed back downstairs and out onto my back porch.

"Unfortunately, this rain is gonna screw us up in getting any real evidence outside of the house. But, I'll come back once the rain's cleared a bit and take a look around outside," he said after an hour.

I agreed and walked him to the door, thanking him.

"No prob, Ed. Any idea who'd want to break in?" he asked on his way out.

"Just the ex."

He nodded and made a note of it in his little notebook. "We'll check her out. Have a good night, son."

I locked the door as soon as he left and vowed to get a security system installed asap. Knowing that there was no way I'd be able to sleep that night, I headed up to my office to grab my laptop. Laptop in hand, I went back downstairs and settled in on my couch.

I turned the laptop on, typed in the password, and brought up the history to see if any files had been rifled through. Sure enough, several folders had been opened and closed; most of them having to do with my books. Except for one of them. The folder was hidden inside of several other folders, and you'd have to really look for it. It contained information regarding my divorce and my will. Yes, I had a will partially drawn up. It wasn't complete, but my mother had insisted that I have one, despite my young age.

Looking at it closer, I noticed that my will had been copied. I frowned, knowing that I hadn't copied it. Hell, I rarely ever even thought about it. Immediately, I wrote down the date and time it had been copied as well as took a picture of it with my phone. First thing tomorrow, I'd be calling my attorney to let him know my computer had been compromised. Then, I'd go buy a new laptop and a get a security system installed.

I spent the rest of the night watching TV but constantly on guard. Every little noise had me paranoid, thinking that someone was coming back. It had been one hell of a night, and I hoped that I'd never have another one like it.

a/n: Leave me a little somethin' somethin'.