Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, favorited, and/or followed this fic!

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This story is set in 2012.

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A huge thank you to everyone who over the years has helped make this fic happen, from those lovely campers on A Different Forest who've offered their expertise on details, to the multitude of betas who've read a chapter or chapters from way back with Project Team Beta, to all those who've volunteered to help me since then. You're all stars! An especially loud shout out to Raum for her years - literally, years- of support and encouragement.

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Disclaimer - All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners.

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Chapter 8

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He has such lovely eyes, Gray thought to herself with a mental sigh. Such a true, vivid green. So uncommon. Then there were all the rays of gold surrounding his pupils. Like little sparks.

Gray laughed to herself. What a difference a day makes. To think that only just yesterday she'd have snickered at someone's mooning over another person's eyes, and now here she was, memorizing the exact shades in Edward's. Thank the Lord Rosalie would never know. Gray'd literally never hear the end of it.

The smile faded from her face. The inevitable fact was that once Edward was changed, all those wonderful shades of green and little gold sparks would exist only in her memory. But the only alternative was worse: that he not be changed, and one day it would be Edward himself who would only exist in her memory.

Like the dew on the mountain,

Like the foam on the river,

Like the bubble on the fountain,

Thou art gone and forever.

Gray's stomach clenched, and she curled in on herself as if physically struck.

"Are you okay?" Edward asked, worry etched in the beautiful eyes that kept her so spellbound.

"It's nothing," Gray assured him. Her hands wrapped around the cup of tea she'd been forcing herself to consume, and she pushed the thought aside. Heaven knew, there'd be time to dwell on it later, when Edward was not sitting within arm's reach. Right then, she just wanted to enjoy her time with him. "Just someone walking over my grave."

"Are you sure you don't want anything else?" Edward asked, gesturing to the empty bowl in front of her.

"Very," Gray responded, repressing a grimace.

After they'd finished their walk, they'd gone on a second, along a different trail. It was now twilight, and they'd stopped in at a little place called the Hard Rain Cafe for something to eat. Gray set her cup down and reached across the table to stroke her fingers along the back of Edward's hand. Of course, both the tea and the tomato soup she'd forced herself to consume had been revolting, but they had done their job, and that was what mattered. Their warmth had seeped into her, and her hand would not feel so cold to him now.

Nor would her lips, were they to kiss again. . . .

She'd kissed him—she could scarcely believe she'd been so brazen. Every detail of their first kiss was etched into her perfect memory to be savored again and again.

Gray rested her head on her palm. She could see the strong, steady rhythm of Edward's pulse beating in his neck. It had been racing earlier. She could still feel the echo of its rapid pounding in the tips of her fingers. But it was calm and relaxed now, as was his breathing. The tell-tale signs of agitation and discomfort were all absent. Edward was completely relaxed with her.

Incredible.

She wished she could know what he was thinking at that exact moment. "Penny for your thoughts," she prompted.

With a sharp exhale that sounded suspiciously as if it was masking a laugh, Edward turned his head and pressed his lips together. The muscles at the corners of his mouth and along his jaw twitched, as if he was trying to repress a grin and on the verge of failing. She thought he looked embarrassed, like someone caught in the middle of making mischief. This impression was strengthened as the skin at the base of his neck developed a lovely pink blush and a charmingly lopsided smile spread across his face in spite of his best attempt to subdue it. Gray's mind raced with possibilities of what was on his. His pulse was no longer as calm as it had been. When he looked at her, his scent changed, deepened.

Gray leaned toward him.

Fuck, she is so hot.

With a heavy sigh she sat back.

"Waiter's coming," she said in answer to the unspoken question in Edward's eyes. "Again," she added, her voice tight with annoyance.

Edward's expression darkened like the storm clouds that had covered the sky the day before. This was their waiter's sixth visit to their table under the pretense refilling drinks and asking if he could bring them anything.

Creepy, though. The way she stares at him—bet she's the possessive type. And difficult. Probably expects him to come running the moment she calls. And I bet he does. What guy wouldn't? Fuck, she is so hot.

"How is everything?" the waiter asked once again, his gaze lingering on Gray and his mind continuing along the same lines. "Are you sure I can't get you anything else?"

"No, thank you," she responded frostily.

Probably the type that's always on one diet or another, I bet. Nothing but tomato soup and tea.

This time spent with Edward was like a dream come true, and fed up with the intrusion of the man's contemptuous thoughts, Gray raised her eyes to him and scowled. She relaxed her features almost immediately, but she had accomplished her goal. The man's face had gone bone white and his mind blank.

One second.

Two.

Three.

WHAT THE—WHAT THE FUCK! he exclaimed mentally once he could form coherent thoughts, and he scurried away, back to the kitchen, like a mouse chased to its hole by a cat.

Edward snickered. "Remind me never to make you mad," he said with an easy laugh as he pushed his plate away.

Horrified that Edward had witnessed the glimpse of the monster inside her she'd allowed to show through—however briefly—Gray lowered her eyes and reproached herself. In the future, she would have to be much more careful. It had been irresponsible of her to allow so insignificant an irritant as the waiter's thoughts to goad her into such carelessness.

The manager, a plus-sized woman with salt-and-pepper hair that was decidedly heavier on the salt than the pepper, was coming to check on them now, both confused and exasperated by her employee's sudden and absolute refusal to re-enter the dining room. Her train of thought changed the moment she caught sight of Gray.

Can't imagine what the hell—Oh, my . . . She is a beauty, isn't she?

"Everything alright, dears?" the manager asked, her eyes flittering between Gray and Edward as her mind filled with a sense of uneasiness she couldn't make sense of.

Gray schooled her expression into one of complete innocence. "Perfectly fine, thank you," she responded in the carefully cultivated tone of voice she used when wanting to put humans at ease. She gave the woman a hint of a smile, letting not a sliver of her teeth show between her lips.

The woman blinked as if too bright of a light had been shined in her eyes.

"I think we're ready for the check," Edward said.

"Oh, yes. Yes, of course. I'll just . . . I'll just . . ." The woman walked off, dazed and moving as if she'd had one or two too many, leaving her sentence unfinished.

Perhaps I went a little too heavily in the opposite direction with her, Gray mused.

.


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It had been dark by the time they'd gotten back to town, and Edward had barely been able to see the narrow gap in the trees Gray had instructed him to turn in to. He'd lived in Forks all his life and had traveled this stretch of highway countless times, but the forest concealed the narrow road so well, he'd never had any idea it was there.

As dark as it had been on the highway, the winding access road through the virtual sea of towering pines was darker still, and Edward could only see where he was driving as far as the next curve of the road until one of those curves opened into a clearing the size of a football fields.

"No way," Edward said.

Beside him, Gray giggled.

In the center of the clearing stood a huge house that looked like it belonged in a fairy tale.

"Do you like it?"

"It's incredible," Edward answered sincerely, his eyes staring up at the house as he put his truck in park. This was no dilapidated fixer-upper. The house was three stories tall and big enough to have several large rooms on each floors. There were apartment buildings in Forks smaller than this house. How long had it been there, he wondered? Who'd built it? And why here? How long had it sat empty? How had no one in town known of its existence, and how had Gray's family found out about it?

"Would you—would you like to come in for a little while?"

Edward turned to Gray, who was looking at him with a dreamy look on her face that reminded him of how he felt when he looked at her. Speechless, he could only answer with a nod.

Edward pulled the key from the ignition, and he heard the heavy slam of passenger door closing as he opened his own door, but before his feet even hit the ground, Gray was already standing there, waiting for him.

Without warning, she kissed him again, and Edward's head swam, but she stepped away just as suddenly as she'd kissed him, leaving him feeling dazed and breathless. He inhaled deeply, letting the cool night air fill his lungs and clear his head.

Gray took his hand and raised it, twirling under their raised arms like a dancer. She took his hand in both of hers and stepped toward the house. "There is so much I want to show you," she said.

The house was predominantly white with dark wood timbers, very European-looking, Edward thought. It also featured gray brickwork along the first floor, and light shone out large rectangular windows on either side of the square front porch, showing off diamond-shaped leaded glass.

"The house was designed in the 1930s by a woman named E. A. Rochester. She was only the second woman to become a licensed architect in the state of Washington," Gray said proudly. "It's a blend of styles, primarily Tudor and Craftsman."

The front porch was made of gray stone and had square-shaped pillars painted white, standing atop heavy stone bases. Two entry doors, made of the same dark wood as the timbers, stood easily ten feet tall.

"This is amazing," Edward said. "I can't believe this house has been here all these years, and no one in town knew anything about it." It really was like a fairytale.

"The Rochesters only lived here for a few years. The house has sat empty ever since, but a building management firm in Seattle has had charge of its upkeep."

The Rochester family must have been big shots in the logging industry, Edward thought, to have the kind of money a house like this represented. He ran his hand down his stomach self-consciously. Between this grand of a house and his memory of the shiny black Mercedes Gray and her mother had driven the night before, Edward felt the old flannel shirt he wore over a t-shirt from a touristy Mexican restaurant in Seattle, along with the age of his truck and all its dings and dents, acutely.

Gray opened one of the two entry doors and led him inside, their fingers linked together.

Inside, the house was even more beautiful than it was outside. They entered into a large entry hall with wood paneled walls and a hardwood floor covered in thick rugs. Artwork covered the walls, interspersed by brass light fixtures with frosted glass covers, and archways with heavy wooden molding led into rooms that looked like they belonged on the set of a period drama on PBS. Furthering the period impression, a large wooden staircase dominated the far end of the room.

"Gray, you're home."

The woman he'd met with Gray last night walked toward them, smiling welcomingly. She was wearing a ruffled apron and carrying a plate of cookies.

"You remember Esme, my mother for all intents and purposes," Gray said to him.

The two guys who'd been with Gray earlier came tearing into the room, the bigger of the two shouting, "Oh, boy! Cookies!"

Esme moved the tray out of his reach and scolded them, telling them to behave in front of Gray's friend.

Gray rubbed her forehead.

"Ah, Gray's home," said a man's voice.

Gesturing to the man descending the staircase, and with a note of resignation in her voice as she gave Edward an apologetic glance, she said, "And this is my father, Carlisle Cullen."

Just like the rest of her family, Gray's adoptive father was indescribably handsome. He also shared the same pallid skin tone and tired eyes. Had the entire family been sick, Edward wondered? Or was it just the strain of the move that had run them down?

"Dr. and Mrs. Cullen," Edward greeted. "You have a beautiful home."

Edward thought Gray's mother glowed at the complement to their new house.

"Carlisle and Esme, dear, please." She held the tray of cookies out to him. "Please, help yourself. They're just out of the oven."

Gray's adoptive father joined them and wrapped his arm around his wife's shoulders. A moment later, the remaining family member, Alice, came skipping down the stairs.

Gray tugged on his arm. "I'm going to show Edward the house," she said with something verging on desperation in her voice.

Alice glided across the room and stole a cookie from the tray. Their mother made a tsk, tsk sound. Gray's family stood together, looking like a photo shoot for a designer clothing catalog, and the hair on the back of Edward's neck stood on end as goosebumps raced down his back. When Gray tugged on his arm a second time, he was glad to let her lead him away.

As they mounted the stairs, Gray closed her eyes. "I'm sorry about that," she said quietly.

At her embarrassed tone, Edward grinned. "Your family seems very close," he said. Only after he'd begun to speak had Edward realized he wasn't sure what word to use to describe Gray's family, and he was glad he'd come up with "close" in time.

"You must show him your piano, Gray," her mother called to them as they reached a landing halfway up the staircase.

Edward glanced back down at Gray's family and saw as Alice slipped her hand into Jasper's back pocket. Edward's eyes widened, and he gasped. His gaze flicked to Alice's face before darting away, and he stared straight ahead. Alice had been looking directly at him, and she'd winked. The goosebumps he'd already had spread. He could feel them against his shirt.

Beside him, Gray released a long breath. "You saw that," she said resignedly.

"Um . . . Yeah," Edward admitted. Extremely uncomfortable, he ran his hand through his hair. "Your sister and, um, cousin. . . ."

Gray fidgeted. Her eyes darted here and there, and she rubbed a hand up and down her arm as if she were cold. She looked toward him, but not at him; her attention seemed focused on the pattern of the carpet running up the middle of the stairs. "We've all lost everyone we'd ever loved," she explained in a soft, sad voice that tore Edward's heart in two. "When you know the enormity of a loss like that, you hold on to a second chance at love with both hands, should you be lucky enough to find it, in any form in which you find it. Alice and Jasper . . . like Carlisle and Esme, and Emmett and Rosalie, they're two halves of one whole."

Edward swallowed. He inhaled and licked his lips. He'd give anything to drive that broken tone from Gray's voice for good. "You don't have any family left in Chicago?" he asked.

She shook her head as she led him up a second flight of stairs. Twisting her fingers together, she answered, "No. They're all gone now. Only my mother's family was in Chicago, though. Papa was British. His name was Edward, too. I only met his family once."

"You called your father 'Papa?'"

"Um, yeah," Gray answered somewhat sheepishly. "Mama and Papa. And there was Grandmother. She died a year after my parents. I think losing my mother was too much for her." Gray smiled, though it was full of sadness and regret. "During their lifetimes, they rarely saw eye to eye. I remember Grandmother being very disapproving and stern. I never realized how much she loved my mother, or me. Not until after. . . ."

They continued up the stairs from the second floor to the third, and at the top of the stairs, Gray guided him left.

"This is my part of the house," she said.

Her part of the house? Edward thought to himself. The bottoms of his jeans were pretty badly frayed, he only just noticed.

Four paintings hung along the hallway, the dark wood of their frames contrasting the off-white walls. One painting in particular caught Edward's attention. In it, three women in flowing, medieval-looking gowns stood before a man seated on a boulder and holding a golden apple.

"The Judgment of Paris," Gray said. Edward looked at her questioningly, and she explained, "These are all of scenes out of Greek mythology,"

"Greek mythology," Edward repeated, as much to himself as to her. First, music and art. Now, Greek mythology. Oh, and good at advanced math, don't forget that.

Gray went on to explain, pointing to other paintings one after the other, "The moment Orpheus loses Eurydice for the second time, Hades abducting Persephone, and Hercules killing the Nemean lion."

Apart from Hercules, Edward had never heard of any of the names she'd just said. "You know about Greek mythology?" he asked in surprise he was afraid sounded more like disbelief.

Gray smiled the sad smile he'd seen on her face too many times that day.

"I'm a wealth of useless knowledge. A veritable treasure chest," she said in a self-deprecating tone. "Maybe I should tack a minor in mythology on to my art history and philosophy majors."

"You got the 'treasure' part right," Edward responded, thinking out loud before he could stop himself. He felt heat spread across his face and could only imagine how red he'd turned, but at the sight of the happiness that shone in Gray's face, he was glad he'd said it. "What exactly is the Judgment of Paris?" he asked. He didn't know the first thing about Greek mythology, and to tell the truth, he couldn't have cared less. What did he did care about, however, was hearing Gray talk about something that interested her.

"It's a rather long story, all told, but essentially, three goddesses—Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite—each wanted to claim a golden apple from the Garden of the Hesperides, which had been inscribed 'To the Fairest,' for herself. They asked Zeus to judge which of them was the fairest and award the winner the apple, but he did not want to choose one of the goddesses over the other two—and put up with the anger of the other two as a result, I'm sure. He selected Paris, a Trojan mortal, to be the judge.

"In their turn, each of the three goddesses attempted to bribe Paris with her powers. Hera offered him wealth and power, to make him king of all Europe and Asia. Athena offered him wisdom and glory and victory in all his battles. And Aphrodite . . . Aphrodite, in her turn, promised him the world's most beautiful woman in return for choosing her, a woman equal to the goddess herself in beauty. Paris had been drunk with excitement at the rewards offered to him by Hera and Athena, but after Aphrodite's promise, he handed her the apple without a second thought."

"Then what happened?" he asked.

"True to her word, Aphrodite gave Paris the most beautiful woman in the world, Helen of Sparta. However, Helen was already married—to a Greek king. Paris abducted Helen and took her back to Troy. Or she ran off with him willingly—thanks to Aphrodite's influence. There are various versions of the legend."

"Helen of Sparta? Helen of Troy?" Edward asked. He'd at least heard of Helen of Troy before, not that he could've told you a thing about her.

Gray dipped her head in confirmation. "Enraged, the Greeks launched a force to retrieve her, and so began the Trojan war, which eventually both killed Paris and destroyed Troy, fulfilling a prophecy made before his birth that he would bring about the destruction of the city."

"And you know the stories behind all of these paintings?" Edward asked, trying to grasp a seventeen-year-old who knew the things Gray knew.

"I'm rather overly well read. I've had a lot of time to kill." Gray looked up at him through her lashes with a smirk on her face. Turning distinctly satirical and tipping her head to the painting, she added, "The goddesses are typically painted nude, although there is no basis for that in the legend."

Edward cleared his throat and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. "Are they?" he asked. The pitch of his voice was noticeably higher than normal, and he cleared his throat a second time. He could feel heat spreading across his face again.

Gray's smirk spread, and she leaned against the wall, her arms folded in front of her. "Of course, those paintings were all done by men."

"And—and this was, these were by a woman?" Edward asked. He looked for a signature, but there were only initials and a date: G.I.M. 1941.

Gray hummed a confirmation. She looked at the painting then at the ground. Her hair hung down, largely hiding her face from his view, but what little Edward could see was haunted.

As he tried to think of something to say to drive that look away, Gray turned her head to the stairs, as if she'd heard someone coming. She took his hand, leading him down the hallway.

"This is my room," she said.

Instantly, the muscles in Edward's stomach tightened, and he thought his legs might give out beneath him. He followed her obediently, struggling to keep the fact that all the blood in his body had just sped to one location from being obvious as he walked. At the end of the hall, she opened a door, and Edward stepped in after her, his palms sweating.

It was just a room, not a bedroom. Her part of the house, she'd said. Edward's shoulders drooped as much with relief as disappointment—her parents were somewhere around. Not to mention Emmett and Jasper and their muscles. . . .

The room had a vaulted ceiling. The hardwood floor was bare, and most of the exterior wall was floor-to-ceiling windows, giving what had to be a spectacular view of the ancient forest surrounding the house, although it was too dark to appreciate it then. A sound system sat in one corner, still in boxes, and a glass door led to a small deck. Shelves filled with books and music—both CDs and records—interspersed with a number of small knickknacks, more artwork, and several vintage-looking black and white photographs lined the interior walls. The only piece of furniture in the room was a large suede couch.

"Wow, you've got, like, a ton of books and music," Edward said, walking over and reading some of the titles. He'd never heard of most of them, and he was pretty well-read himself.

"I read a lot."

Edward looked at her. "Are you reading anything right now?"

Gray shook her head as she curled herself down onto the couch. "Not currently."

Right, with the move there wouldn't be much time for reading.

"I'm trying to read Falling Man by Don DeLillo, again," he said as he joined her on the couch. "But I'm not getting any further this time."

"Don't you like it?" she asked.

Edward sighed. "I don't, but I do. Kind of, but not really. It's hard to explain."

Gray tipped her head to the side, questioningly.

"It's kind of disjointed. It's about a man who survives the collapse of the North Tower on 9/11, but it just . . . feels kind of . . . numb."

"Disjointed and numb are both very accurate words to describe September 11th. It was both of those things."

Edward felt his eyebrows draw together, and he relaxed them. He'd been six on 9/11 and had no memory of it. Did Gray, he wondered? She'd lived in a major city at the time, of course, so her experience would've been different from his.

"It skips around from one point of view to another a lot," he explained of the book. "This is my third time starting it, but . . . it's hard to get inside it, you know? None of the characters feel real. I'd probably have given it up completely if it weren't for one conversation."

"One conversation?" Gray asked, curling further into the couch and resting her head against her palm.

"The main character, he's separated from his wife. His wife's mother is very artistic. The estranged wife and her mother are arguing about the estranged husband. The mother is criticizing him, and the wife snaps—defensive, like—I mean, the guy was just nearly killed, and he is the father of her child—and she confronts her mother, saying that if he were an artist, she'd forgive him anything. That . . . surge of emotion, it's the only part of the book that feels like real people."

"It is powerful." Gray slid closer to him.

Edward agreed and angled himself towards her. "Not enough to justify reading a two-hundred-and-fifty page book, though."

"No. It's not," Gray said, leaning towards him. "I can think of a much better way to spend your time."

"So can I."

Edward leaned forward and reached his hand to her, sliding it into her hair and drawing her to him. When their lips met, the feel of her flooded his senses. He traced the tip of his tongue along her lip, and hers met his. She tasted sweet. Literally. He wouldn't have thought it was possible for a person to have a taste, but Gray did. He wanted to slip his tongue into her mouth and learn every curve, learn if all of her mouth tasted as amazing as her tongue, but when he tried, she moved her mouth to his jaw, over to his ear and down his throat. Edward dropped his head back, and his mouth fell open.

He wrapped his arms around her, moving them over her back from her shoulders to her waist. His blood raced, and his body felt hyper-aware of Gray's touch.

Gray broke their kiss, but she didn't move. She stayed so close their noses brushed. Then she giggled and traced the tip of her nose over his face. Edward reciprocated by placing quick kisses anywhere he could, her jaw, her hair, her temple.

They pressed their foreheads together. Edward was breathing hard. He settled his hands on her hips and pulled her closer. Gray came to him readily, sliding over him, kneeling with one knee on either side of him, her hands on his shoulders, her face so close he felt her cool breath on his skin.

When their lips met again, Edward felt like an inferno had engulfed him. He tried to taste her mouth, but once again she moved her lips to his jaw. He wanted to growl with frustration, but when her tongue played along the shell of his ear, the groan he fought to repress was of a different sort.

His hands were low on her back. She still wore the hooded sweatshirt he'd lent her. He wanted to feel her closer. There was too much between them. He wanted to slide his hands beneath both the sweatshirt and her own sweater, to feel her skin under his palms. He had never felt want like this before.

Gray's arms were around his shoulders. With one arm low around her back and the other braced on the back of the couch, Edward maneuvered them so that she lay on the couch with him above her, half lying, half kneeling. The feeling of Gray beneath him was making it hard for him to think. His head was in a fog. All he was conscious of was how badly he wanted this girl.

"Edward . . . ," she breathed. "We need to slow down. I need to slow down."

Contrary to her words, Gray's mouth never left his skin, but her words served as a bucket of ice water poured over him. He shuddered and breathed deeply. He still wanted her—fuck, did he want her. He squeezed his eyes closed tightly and pressed his forehead against her shoulder.

As his mind slowly came back to him, Edward realized with a horrible jolt what he'd been about to do. It would only have taken one time. He was so hard and so on edge, so close, it would only have taken one time rubbing himself against her and he'd have humiliated himself. Worse, would she ever have forgiven him? She told him only just a few short hours ago that she didn't normally go around kissing guys she'd only just met, and he'd been about to . . . He sat up, but his body felt heavy, sluggish, and he moved shakily.

He began to apologize, but Gray touched his lips, silencing him.

"Don't apologize. Not on my account. I've never been less sorry about anything in my life." She suddenly looked frightened. "Unless . . . you regret. . . ?"

He shook his head and kissed her quickly.

She sagged against him. "Oh, thank goodness," she whispered as she laid her hand on his arm and her head against his chest.

Edward wrapped his arms around her, his fingers running up and down her back. Just sitting like this with Gray in his arms was pretty fucking great, too.

"You know," she said after a minute, "I didn't say stop completely. Just slow down."

.


.

After a short while spent in each other arms exchanging soft kisses and touches, Edward and Gray reluctantly returned downstairs. It was getting late, and, much as he didn't want to, he'd have to leave soon.

"Can I see your piano?" he asked, glad to have something to give him an extra few minutes with this amazing girl.

"If you'd like."

As Gray led him through the first floor to a large room at the back of the house, Edward was greatly relieved to not encounter any of Gray's family. He was sure his face would turn brick red and give away what they'd been doing.

The room featured two walls dominated by floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the huge backyard. There were a number of musical instruments, but the unquestionable focal point was the piano set in one corner. Oriented on a diagonal, it commanded attention and would grant anyone seated at it a sweeping view of the room and backyard. She took a seat on the bench. With her back perfectly straight and her shoulders back, she looked confident and every bit like she belonged there. She motioned for Edward to join her.

Gray might be in her element seated at the beautiful instrument, but Edward felt like a bull in a china shop. He sat down gingerly, straight and still, with his hands on his thighs, afraid to touch anything in case he might somehow ruin it. The piano was made of rich, red-toned wood, highly polished, and both the instrument and bench sat on ornately carved legs. The words "Steinway & Sons" were printed in gilded letters above the keys.

"Breathe, Edward," Gray said with her musical chuckle.

Edward relaxed, but only slightly.

Gray ran her fingers reverently along the wood. "It was my mother's. A wedding gift from my father."

"Seriously?" Edward asked.

Gray touched the keys slowly, letting each note linger before releasing the key and playing another. "I remember sitting next to her, watching her play and wishing I could play like that," she said. "I wish now I'd been a more agreeable student and had not been so difficult about practicing. I wish a lot of things . . . Too late now."

With that, Gray's random playing became deliberate. The song she played was soft and slow. It was beautiful, but also sorrowful in a way. Wistful. Edward had never watched someone play an instrument before, not really play one well at least, and he was mesmerized. He couldn't imagine how she knew what keys to hit. She didn't even have any sheet music. She played from memory, and she made it look as effortless as breathing.

So much for not practicing, he thought, mentally shaking his head. He could only imagine the number of hours someone would need to devote to practicing to make playing an instrument appear as second nature as she did.

As the last notes died away, Gray lay her hands on her lap.

"That was incredible," Edward said sincerely.

Gray looked at him, and a mischievous lop-sided smile formed on her lips.

"Oh, Edward. You impress far too easily."

Without warning, she raised her hands over the keys and slammed them down four or five times with such force it shocked him, and he felt himself jump. The sound produced was deep and jarring, ominous and intense, the kind of sound that penetrated to your bones. She held her thumb and little finger of both hands on the keys, drawing the notes out before releasing them. She winked at him, then did it again.

Over the next several minutes, Gray's fingers alternately caressed the keys or violently crashed down onto them. There were times when it looked like she was slapping her fingers indiscriminately against the keys, but the music said otherwise. By the time she lay her hands on her lap again, Edward felt like he'd just finished a hard run.

"That was amazing!"

Gray shrugged, but she looked pleased he'd liked it. "It was so-so. I flubbed a few of the most difficult passages rather badly."

"Oh, well in that case . . . ," Edward rolled his eyes. "Clearly, you were right. You didn't practice nearly enough."

Gray laughed.

"Maybe something a little more contemporary than Herr Beethoven this time?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

She struck a single, deep note with her left hand; then, with the sound still carrying on the air, she played two on the right side of the keyboard. As she continued to play, she asked if he recognized the song. Something about it did sound familiar, he thought, but he didn't know any more about classical music than he did about art or mythology.

Gray dropped her head and laughed when he said as much, but she didn't miss a note.

"Classic rock, I'll grant you. But let's wait a couple of hundred years or so before we give it more than that," she said.

Surprised, Edward listened. He still couldn't place the song.

"It's hard, only hearing one instrument, of course. November Rain. Guns and Roses."

"Guns and Roses," Edward repeated in surprise. "Are you, um, are you a big fan of theirs?" he asked, his eyebrows drawing together and his mind stuck on her playing Beethoven one minute and Guns and Roses the next.

Gray crinkled her nose adorably as she shook her head. "Just this song."

"My dad plays some of their stuff sometimes. I think he saw them once in Seattle when he was young."

Gray sighed, and her hands fell to her lap. "Your father. Yes, I am too early still, aren't I? Hmm. I'm afraid I don't really know anything much more contemporary right off hand."

"Don't stop playing," Edward said. "I like watching you."

Inordinately happy one moment, she seemed to consider something briefly the next, then said, "There is this. It's a work in progress, though."

The fingers on her left hand were stretched as wide as they could reach, but her hand barely moved, concentrating on the same small area of keys, while the fingers on her right hand slowly danced to the far right side of the keyboard and back again. The song was simple and slow, but it was beautiful, and when Gray lay her hands on her lap after only a minute or two, she pulled her lips between her teeth and looked up at him.

"That was beautiful," Edward said.

Gray looked overjoyed. "It still needs a lot of work, but I think that's basically the backbone of it. It still needs strings and woodwinds, definitely a bit of percussion."

Edward was stunned. "Wait. You mean you're writing it?"

Gray nodded and smiled modestly.

"Actually writing it?" You—you write music? You wrote that?"

"Yes."

"Shouldn't, I mean, shouldn't you have it, like, written down, you know, like, notes and lines and stuff? How do you know what to play?"

"It's a rather simple melody."

"That's . . . God, Gray, that's incredible. I mean," he shook his head, "how . . . how do you do that? How do you come up with. . . ?" Edward was blown away. The longer he spent with Gray, the more extraordinary he learned she was. He had never known anyone anything like her before. She was amazing.

"Just recently, I was fortunate enough to find the most inspiring muse." She looked up at him sideways, and the smile that covered her entire face made Edward's breath catch in his throat. "That particular melody was inspired by the sound of raindrops against a window and the beating of a human heart, and feeling like one's suddenly grown wings and taken flight, soaring high above the clouds. That's where the strings will come in."

"Play it again," Edward requested, and when she did he could hear what she meant. He didn't have a musical bone in his body, but he could hear both the raindrops and the heartbeat she'd said inspired her. He'd never felt emotion from a piece of music before hearing Gray play.

"That—is amazing."

Gray dropped her eyes, but he could see she was pleased. Then, looking enthusiastic, she said, "Play it with me."

"I can't—I can't play music," Edward stammered in surprise. He looked at the wide expanse of keys at a loss, unable to imagine how anyone could know which ones where which, let alone which ones to play.

She waved his denial aside. "Just the first forty-some seconds. You play one of the fingers on the left hand, and I'll play the rest. That part is really very simple. There are only three notes you would need."

Seeing her look at him so hopefully and so eager, he couldn't refuse. He felt his stomach roll with nerves, but he tried to reason with himself that if it was only three notes. . . .

He took a deep breath and listened as she gave him a quick tutorial, showing him the names of the keys—A through G. "Start from the center. Middle C." She pressed a key. "Move two to the left, and you've got A. Notice, the black keys are grouped in two's and three's—two, three, two. Use the black keys to tell you which white key is which note. A is between the second and third black keys, then B," she said as she moved a key to the right, "back to middle C, then D, E, F, G, A, B, C, and so on."

Edward scratched his neck. "You know, that's more than three."

"The only ones you need to worry about, are these." She pressed three keys, naming each one: A, C, and G. "Play the note twice—one, two . . . three, four," she said, counting out the timing. "Just like a heartbeat." She played the notes, naming them again. "A, A . . . A, A . . .C, C . . . A, A."

A, A . . . A, A . . .C, C . . . A, A, Edward repeated to himself. A, A . . . A, A . . .C, C . . . A, A.

"You play them now. A, here," she said, showing him which key.

Focusing more than he ever did on that little plastic recorder from the fourth grade, Edward played the note she showed him.

"Good. Again. Good, now C, C. Right here," she showed him. "Two keys to the right."

He played the note she indicated twice, C, C, repeating in his head.

"Now, A, A, again."

Silently counting two keys to the left—and with a passing thought that he hoped he hadn't moved his lips—Edward concentrated on thinking A, A.

"Now, C again. A, A. Right. The only other note you need is G. Immediately to the left of A." She pointed to the key. "Remember to use the black keys to help you remember which white key is which note. A is between the second and third black keys." She indicated the keys. "C is to the right of the first of the two black keys—here. And G is between the first and second of the set of three black keys.

"Okay," Edward said, repeating, A, A . . .C, C . . .G, G, in his head as his eyes moved from key to key.

"Want to try it," she asked, her eyes sparkling.

How badly can I fuck up three keys? Edward asked himself. He swallowed and nodded his head. A, A . . .right two, C, C . . .left three, G, G.

Gray readied herself, shifting her position slightly and holding her hands over the keys.

"A, then, on three. Four sets of two. Next is C, two sets of two. Then, back to A for 6 sets. Don't worry about remembering all that, though, I'll tell you which notes to play. Use my left hand to help your timing, but ignore my right hand. It's an entirely different tempo."

"Okay." A, A . . .right two, C, C . . .left three, G, G.

"On three, then." Gray counted to three, her head dipping on each number. "A," she said.

A, A, one. A, A, two. Shit, I'm doing it, Edward thought to himself. A, A, three. A, A, four.

"C," Gray said.

Fuck, shit, okay, One, two, Edward counted, the tip of his tongue between his lips in concentration, and he moved his eyes two keys to the right. C, C, he said to himself. Second set, C, C. He shook his head in frustration. He'd been too slow, he was sure of it. A, A, next, he told himself just as Gray said it out loud. He moved back to A to play the six sets of two. Smoother, he thought. Kind of like playing Simon.

"C, again. Two sets. Then two of A."

Edward felt himself dip his head in acknowledgment C, C one. C, C two.

He played two sets of A.

"Now G, two sets."

He hummed in response. One to the left—G, G one, G, G two."

"Six sets of A, followed by two sets of C."

He nodded his head. Back one to the right. Edward counted out the six sets of two, matching his timing to Gray's, then moved another two keys to the right and played two more sets.

Gray lowered her hands. "You've just played the piano," she said with an arched eyebrow and a smile.

"Cool." Then, Edward eagerly said, "Let's do it again."

They played the same forty-some seconds of the song through two more times, but then Edward's phone rang, interrupting the little world of their own they'd created.

"Shit," Edward said as he looked at his phone. It was his father. Shit, shit, shit. He didn't have an actual, set curfew, but he'd completely lost track of time, and it was quite a bit later than he'd normally stay out.

When he answered, Edward was surprised how anxious his father sounded and how relieved he was when Edward said he'd just dropped a friend off and would be home soon. But then he thought about his father responding to Mr. Varner's accident on the highway just the day before, and figured it wasn't that surprising he would worry just then when he wouldn't normally.

"He wasn't mad, I hope?" Gray asked worriedly.

"I don't think so, but I better go."

They didn't encounter any of Gray's family as they walked to the front door, and Edward realized he'd stayed well past what might be considered polite, but when he brought it up, she brushed it aside.

She'd been wearing the sweatshirt he'd lent her the whole time they'd been there, but when they reached the front door, she had it neatly folded over her arm.

"Um . . ." He scratched the back of his neck. "Want to do something tomorrow?"

"Yes," she said as they stepped out onto the front porch. Her fingers trailing teasingly down the edge of the flannel shirt he wore, she said, "We have to get down to work if we're going to bring up your trigonometry grade, after all."

Edward's mind had begun to race with the hope of more time spent alone together, but at the mention of doing trig, he deflated, and by the way Gray grinned, he was afraid he'd groaned out loud.

"It's so pointless," he bemoaned as they walked outside. "What do I need trig for to work in forestry?"

"Mathematics is very important in most any profession," she said firmly, the way a particularly zealous teacher might introduce a subject on the first day of school. Standing next to his truck, she held his hoodie out to him. "You should put this on. It's gotten chillier."

Edward did as she said, and then shivered. The hoodie felt cold. Had she been sitting in a draft? He hadn't felt one himself, and they'd been on the opposite side of the room from the door. Maybe there was a vent?

Gray bit her lip, and, looking very nervous, she said how much she'd enjoyed spending the day with him. She reached out and took his hand, lacing their fingers together. "It's been decades since I've enjoyed anything nearly so much."

A quick laugh escaped Edward's lips at the exaggeration. "Me too," he said.

Gray laughed as well. "Is that so?" she asked, her eyes sparkling in the moonlight.

Then she kissed him.

"I don't want to leave," Edward admitted once he'd caught his breath, his mind swimming with all the things he wanted to do with this girl.

"I don't want you to, but if you were to not return home, I'm sure your father would send out the National Guard, and that would be . . . inconvenient."

Edward laughed.

Appearing to be considering something, Gray pulled her lips between her teeth and let them slowly slip free. Her head lowered, she looked up at him, and the vulnerability in her eyes as she asked him if he would do something for her made Edward want to promise her the moon.

"Gray isn't my real name. It's—it's Grace. Well, Grace Isabella, actually. Except, only my parents—my birth parents, I mean—ever called me that. Well, sometimes Carlisle and Esme will. More Carlisle than Esme, really, although Esme will on occasion. Grace, I mean. Not the full Grace Isabella. Well, unless I was being scolded. And, well, Grandmother, of course. She was, as I mentioned before, rather stern, and hardly one for nicknames as a general rule." She stopped to draw a breath, and she wove her fingers together, twisting them nervously. "I'm rambling, I know. I do apologize. I'm not normally so discomposed."

Edward grinned and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Gray turned towards his hand, and closing her eyes, she nuzzled her face against his palm. The cool breath of a sigh slipped under the wristband of his hoodie, and he felt goosebumps spread along his arm. She was right. The night had gotten colder.

Her face still cupped in his hand, she said, "I'd like it if you were to call me Grace. Everyone else calls me Gray, but you're not just anyone. You're very special to me, Edward."

Edward's heart pounded. He passed his tongue over dry lips. His throat felt tight, and he swallowed. Running his thumb across her cheek, just below her left eye, he took two breaths and said, "You're very special to me, too . . . Grace. That name, it suits you much better."

Looking at him, she said, "I'm far from perfect, Edward. I've got a devil of a temper, and I can be terribly selfish. I was born into a very privileged family, and I'm afraid I wasn't told the word 'no' nearly frequently enough as a child. From my cradle, I was brought up to expect what I wanted—whatever I wanted—to be obtainable. As a result, I grew very headstrong and obstinate. Spoiled, to be perfectly honest. I still can be. I don't tolerate being told I'm wrong on any subject very gracefully. But I do try. Please believe that. I do try. Carlisle is the very best of men, and Esme is kindness itself. They're a redeeming influence on me." Lifting her head, she looked back at the house. She looked back at him, and took both his hands in hers. "There is much you don't know about me, Edward, but I promise I will tell you everything in time. I only ask that you get to know me first, that you see me for how I am in the things that I can control, before you see those that I cannot. I will tell you now that I have done things I am ashamed to have done. A great many of them. I admit that openly, and I am sorry for them. But no matter what anyone else tells you, I swear to you from the bottom of my heart, I have never injured an innocent person, either through intent or carelessness. No innocent person has ever been harmed by my existence. Of that, I give you my solemn vow."

Edward blinked rapidly in surprise. "Um, okay," he said, perplexed. With an awkward little chuckle, he said, "No one's ever been, um, harmed by my, um, existence either."

She spoke in a strained voice. "There will be those who will try to turn you against me. People you trust. They will want you far away from me. They will tell you things, try to poison you against me."

Perfectly serious now, Edward gripped her by the shoulders. "Let them try," he said with so much vehemence he practically growled it.

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Thanks for reading! Hope to see you back in two weeks!

Teaser for chapter 9—which just so happens to be one of my favorite chapters—on Facebook group Twilight FanFiction Pays it Forward. Gray learns something major and has to decide what to do and where loyalties lie!

Author's notes:

Early women architects in the state of Washington:

Born in 1897, Elizabeth Ayer grew up on a farm in Olympia, Washington. Her interest in mathematics and art led her to pursue architecture at the University of Washington. She was the fourth student and the first woman to graduate from the university's new architecture program, graduating in 1921.

In 1930, Ayer became the first woman to be licensed as an architect in the state.

In the early '40s, when she was an eighth-grader in West Seattle, Jane Hastings wrote about what she was going to be when she grew up. The composition prompted the teacher to keep her pupil after school.

"I just don't want to see you hurt,'' the woman confided. "They'll never let you be an architect.''

At that time, probably only two women were architects in the state.

Five years later, Hastings found herself the only female in a University of Washington architecture class of 200.

In 1953, Hastings became an architect - the eighth woman to do so since the state began licensing in 1919.

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Like the dew on the mountain,

Like the foam on the river,

Like the bubble on the fountain,

Thou art gone and forever.

Excerpt from Sir Walter Scott's The Lady of the Lake

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The Hard Rain Cafe is a real place.

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I don't pretend to be an expert on Greek mythology. The Judgment of Paris is mentioned in the Lady Emily series from Tasha Alexander, I can't remember which book in particular, and I really liked it. The other paintings, I just Googled info on.

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The songs Gray plays are Claire de Lune, Bethoven's 5th Symphony, Guns N Roses November Rain, and Bella's Lullaby. I watched it in tutorials I don't know how many times and got the letter notes, as opposed to the sheet music, online. But, I understand there is more than one version of the song, especially in the beginning.