Rosalie looked down at her phone, intent on crushing it and moving on to the next location when a text message suddenly popped up.
'I'll help.' It was from Edward. Her pink tinted lips curved into a victorious smile. With Edward on her side, no one would be able to find them.
Or so she thought.
Alice knew the second that Edward chose to aid Rosalie; however, she figured she could use this knowledge to her benefit. So, in lieu of telling the rest of the family, she kept it to herself. There was no need to have everyone involved and it cut down on the likelihood of Edward catching on. She had, over the years, learned to keep her thoughts her own when around her mind reading brother. With the newly discovered information in hand she made preparations for an interception of Emmett.
Emmett was thoroughly confused, first, he knew that something happened to his phone and it wasn't that he lost it like Rosalie adamantly insisted. He had noticed small shards of glass and plastic near the bed but chose not to say anything to Rose about it. People had always assumed that he was the dumb, oblivious, jock type; his own family included but that couldn't be farther from the truth. He knew something was amiss and that Rosalie was hiding something. He'd just have to bide his time to figure out exactly what it was.
He was drawn from his musings by a surprisingly chipper Rosalie.
"I'm ready to go to the next destination on our little love trip." She giggled. Right then Emmett truly knew that something was wrong with her. In all their time together she had never giggled like that, it was sending up red flags but still, he had to play along.
"Oh yeah, where ya wanna go next babe?" Suddenly the word tasted like ash on his tongue. How many times had he called her that and never had an issue? Millions. He had a feeling that something life altering was happening as he felt an odd tug in his chest.
"How about we just roam around? I don't want to make plans, I just want to explore." She said, curling herself into his arms.
Yes, something was indeed off. She was always about the planning, so much so that it was annoying. She had to pick the best hotel within range of the best shopping. For her to runaround on a whim was something entirely new.
"No problem babe." There was that taste again.
"So which direction first?" He queried.
Once again she couldn't give him a straight answer. "I'm not sure, let's just start running and we'll go from there."
His face must have shown his skepticism. "Oh give me a break Emmett, I can be spontaneous." She huffed pulling from his arms.
He sheepishly rubbed the back of his head, "Yeah, sorry. You just usually like to go where the shopping is best." He admitted.
Her deep rooted frown softened a bit, "I know Em, I just want to try something different, you know?" Her voice held sincerity, however, when he looked into her eyes he could detect a bit of deceit. He decided that for the meantime he would appease her, that is, until he could figure out what she was hiding from him.
"Yeah Rose, I get it." He said while pulling her in for a chaste kiss. "So when do you want to go?"
She giggled slightly, "No time like the present." Just like that she was a blur as she sprinted out of the door and onto which ever destination she deemed appropriate. With a grin he gave chase. He had to hand it to her she certainly was pulling out all the stops to get what she wanted, starting with his favorite game, chase. He was, after all, a hunter in both of his lives.
Alice strode back into the living room that was aflutter with planning and phone calls. She spotted her brother sitting on the steps like he hadn't a care in the world, that was until Kohl walked by, then a look of disgust covered his features. She grinned as she approached the mind reader.
"You know, making that face isn't going to change the fact that he exists. And in all honesty I would place some of the blame on you for his existence. In fact, I would place a great deal of the blame on you." She paused and gave a little laugh."All you had to do was act like a typical teenage boy and sleep with your girlfriend when she asked you to and now…now we know that your aversion to sleeping with Bella wasn't due to what you said it was." By this time the rest of the family stopped what they were doing and started paying attention to the one-sided conversation that was taking place. "You were never concerned with hurting her and we can now plainly see that it can be done without harm. Your biggest issue was that she's not your type."
Alice looked over to Bella to see a flash of hurt within her ruby orbs. Alice just smiled at her friend and continued. "No Edward, we all know the real reason." Alice looked back at her brother's face and the fear she found there almost made her lose her composure. He was reading her thoughts and he must've known that she was getting ready to hit the nail on the head.
"Alice…" He warned.
She ignored him. "Edward, we've let you pretend long enough and I think Bella deserves to know the reason why you'd never touch her or gave her such chaste kisses."
The tension was palpable. Edward's eyes darted around the room.
"Or we could start with the real reason you're so upset that she has a child with Emmett." Her eyes gleamed with barely containable humor.
Jasper must've caught on to what his wife was trying to uncover as he smothered a laugh and attempted to mask it with a poor attempt at a cough.
"Darlin' I don't thinks he's fully admitted it to himself and here ya are tryin' to make him say it. I think you're gonna have to spell it out for 'em."
It seemed everyone in the room was catching on. Bella's light bulb visibly went off and her filter broke, "YOU'RE GAY?!"
Edward sputtered and jumped up, slowly inching backwards up the stairs, ready to sprint to the safety of his bedroom. "No…well I…gah…no…no, no, NO! I'M NOT GAY!"
His eyes were wild and it was then everyone knew the truth, whether he was willing to admit it or not, Edward was indeed gay. Alice had seen a fishy vision of Edward staring longingly at what appeared to be Rose at the time but over the course of their shared lives together she had come to believe differently. His sidelong glances at Emmett that were once thought to be Edward reading his mind were, in reality, Edward having a crush on Emmett.
Bella slouched into the nearest seat. "So you mean to tell me that I dated a gay guy and had sex with my boyfriends crush? Well, it makes sense. Kissing him was like kissing my grandma. What was I thinking? Oh lord, I can see it clearly now. I wonder what he thinks of Jasper, I mean he's attractive too. I-"
"Okay darlin', that's where I draw the line on your ramblin'." Jasper cut her off, not allowing her inner thoughts to make an appearance.
"Sorry Jasper. I think he broke me. Out of all the reasons we broke up, I never once thought it would be because of the very reason I broke up with him. I guess all along we were both in love with Emmett." She shrugged at that last part but suddenly went stiff when the realization of what she had said aloud sunk in fully. "I-I mean you know love as in care about not love. I don't love Emmett. I don't, I swear. Girl scouts honor. My mouth just sometimes spouts nonsense, you guys know that right? I'm just being dumb old Bella that doesn't mean a word of what she says." She tried to laugh it off but both Jasper and Alice gave a knowing smile, one that made her uncomfortable.
"So let's get back to finding those two so Kohl can meet his dad and I can be on my merry way." Bella immediately jumped on the laptop and continued her search in hopes that no one would approach her about her serious blunder.
All the while Alice wanted to call bull shit. She had intended to get Edward's feathers ruffled but she had unknowingly set off Bella as well which ended up revealing her true feelings. Which, in the same manner as it did Edward, had Bella flustered and unwilling to face the truth; she too was in love with Emmett. Now the biggest question that had Alice wondering was how did Emmett feel?
A/N. So guys, it's been a while and for that I am sorry. It's been a real juggling act lately and I can't make promises on when the next chapter will be. I'll try my best to get it out fairly soon. Hope you enjoyed this chapter and I can't wait to hear your thoughts on it!