I'm finally back into it! Thanks
8
Chapter 7
"Sure, sounds like a wonderful idea" Alice says.
"Really?"
"Well it is your building"
"Well I just…"
"It is your building" Alice assures him. "Bring her by tomorrow" She says with a kind tone.
"You are amazing"
"So how good looking is she?" She questions with a smile in her voice and on her face, one Edward can't see.
"She is very average"
"Liar"
Edward smiles before hanging up on his older and slightly wiser sister.
Edward was itching to call her this morning. He didn't want to make it too early, which meant he totally got side tracked with work related weekend issues.
"Okay Chris" Bella has him on the bed on his back. She finally got showered and did some reading. Reading on babies. Later today she is going to get that baby book she read about, she wrote the name down somewhere. "So we have to find a place to live, not in this room" She smiles at him, holding it for a few moments. She read that babies learn how to smile by the end of the first month and middle of the second one.
"Do you think" She tucks her hair back as it falls against his face. She laughs when he shuts his eyes and almost needs into it like a kitten or something. "Downtown or out of town…it is really pricy downtown, nicer but pricy"
Sighing she lays out stretched next to him and props her head up. "Should we call your mama?"
Dialing Jessica's cell number she waits and hopes her sister answers. 'Hi you have reached Jessica, leave a message'
"Hi Jess, it's me…and Chris, just wanted to say hi, and" Bella shuts her eyes and lies on her back much like Chris is now. "I know growing up was really difficult and you are doing the right thing, getting help, you will be okay. I love you" Bella ends it shutting the phone. She turns her head to Chris staring at her. "You will be okay too" She assures him.
Edward sits in his office with his cell pressed to his ear.
"Hello?" Bella reads the number and knows it is Edward's because she doesn't know anyone else's number here other than the ones she knows slightly by hard, this isn't one of them.
"Bella, hi"
"Hi"
"How was your night?" Edward questions her genuinely concerned.
"It was okay thanks, Chris and I have decided to move in together" Bella rolls over and lifts Chris into her arms, her legs cross at the knee. She cuddles him and smiles when he makes more of those to die for baby noises.
"Congratulations" He sort of knew this would be the run down. "Are you looking in Seattle or heading back to LA?"
"We are going to be staying here" Bella tells him.
"Good" Edward pauses a moment. "Do you have lunch plans?"
"No"
"Let me pick you up in about an hour" He offers and or demands…questions?
"I can't really afford another meal with you Edward" She laughs which is followed by his laughter, which is husky and very sexy.
"It will be on me this time" Edward assures her with a smile. He twirls his pen around on his desk and waits for her response. "I want to discuss something with you" He adds.
Bella purses her lips together and thinks. "What could you possibly need to talk to me about?" Waiting she hears nothing. "Give me a hint"
"You don't need a hint Bella, just say yes" Edward tells her simply.
"Yes, but nothing fancy, Chris and I have nothing to wear"
"No problem, just don't put pink socks on him" Edward smiles before hanging up not letting her get another word in.
Edward pulls up front to the hotel. "I will be right back down" He tells the valet. Heading up to her floor he waits for the elevator. He is dressed in relaxed pants and an old shirt. With dirty black shoes, they are so comfortable he just can't part with them.
"Hi" She says pulling the door open. "I am ready, honestly" She tells him stepping aside and letting him come in.
Smiling he watches her flutter around and when Chris cries she seems to jump, not in a nervous way, in an 'I'm coming my love' way. It is really sweet seeing as it is not her child. "Take your time, motherhood makes you take longer than normal" Edward says with a smile.
Bella lets Edward take Chris's carrier with no complaint. "Is this your car?"
"Yup, let me put him in back"
"I thought you would have a big gas guzzling hummer or something" She is pleasantly surprised by this hybrid SUV.
"Little do you know Bella" Edward says nothing more, just gets Chris in the back before joining her up front.
"So what happened with the boyfriend?"
"Jacob and I" Bella frowns. "Are on a hiatus" Bella can't help but wrinkle her brow. It feels very odd in a wrong way saying that.
"A what?"
"Exactly"
"So are you dating other people?"
"Well according to our very unconventional relationship, we could have been doing that all this time"
"What?" He has to say it again, it has to be said.
"We have an open relationship" Bella explains to his un-buying face. "No promises no commitments"
"No such thing" He disagrees fully. More than fully. "That is what a relationship is, promises and commitments"
"Jake and I believe you can't own someone"
"Sure you can"
Bella raises her eyebrows at him.
"Dog's don't share their bones" Edward gives it to her simply.
Shaking her head she bites back a pig-ish insult one which he would rightfully deserve. "Have you ever been in love?"
"Yes"
Bella turns her head as he drives.
"Once" Edward continues. "It didn't work out" Edward tells her, he tells her the question she is asking in her head.
"I'm sorry, why not?"
There is a long pause before he brings himself to answer her, he doesn't turn his head, and his eyes are on the road fully still. "She fell in love with someone else"
"I'm sorry" Bella says again. "I get a lot of letters like that to the column" She shrugs. It is so very common.
"What would you say to a writer whose girlfriend cheated with his best friend?"
She can feel this is a straight personal story/situation. Bella stares at his profile, she looks at his jaw and the way it is tensing at this moment. "Was it a onetime event?"
"They ended up getting married"
Rolling her eyes. "That is the worst because people then think it absolves the cheating, like they love each other so much they got married so it's not as bad"
"But" He cuts in. "You don't disapprove of cheating because one person can't own another"
"NO!" She tells him quickly. First off that was completely Jacob. But not the point really. "I strongly condemn cheating if the rules aren't understood fully by each party" Bella tells him as a matter of fact.
Edward glances at her, and again she looks much like she did the first day and second day he saw her. Very clean and fresh, bright eyed.
"Back to the question, I would further guess the marriage isn't going well"
"How did you know?"
"Well normally relationships that start out that way have cracks in the foundation"
"They are heading for divorce" Edward admits. "It is ashame because they have a kid"
Bella fiddles with her hands and she doesn't know why she is. "When she becomes available again will you be interested in her?"
"I've thought about it, but no" He shakes his head roughly. "I won't go down that path again"
"I have a theory about men like you Edward" Bella says only after a long break, she had to really listen and study him. Cocking her head to the side she peers at him from her seat. "Would you like to hear it?"
"Sure, why not" He says in a 'what the heck will I lose?' type of way.
"You haven't committed because you date the same kind of women, you know the type tall, leggy, classic" She pauses wondering if he will interrupt her. "You show them all a good time, leaving rivers of tears as you move on to the next while they all wonder why it didn't work out" She pauses again, but sees he is listening to her so she just continues figuring he won't interrupt her. "Little do they know they are not offering up anything new, they are all the same, so the only thing that will change your situation, allowing you to possibly commit is something random coming along, something new"
Edward makes a sound nodding slowly as he looks at the road.
"Which is why you Edward Cullen will end up with a woman completely different from what everyone expects you to end up with…what do you think?" She has a proud smile on her face.
"Well"
"Well?" She waits
"I think you are very smart and opinionated"
Bella frowns at him.
"But it is different" Edward glances over at her and gives her a smile before looking at the road and taking her and Chris to his building for lunch.
