Chapter 10

At seven-fifteen, Edward walked into the lobby where he'd already spent twelve hours of his day. But this time, he wasn't in uniform. He was freshly showered, wearing jeans and a black Henley, and the palm of his hand was stinging from the heat of the pizza box he carried.

He nodded at the other guard at his usual post, and headed for the elevator. By the time he made it to Bella's door, his heart was pounding far too hard for a man of his age and overall athletic ability. Quietly telling himself to get a grip, he knocked on the door twice.

When she didn't answer after a full minute, he knocked again. The panic he felt that something might be wrong was a real live thing in his chest, and he briefly wondered if this was what Bella felt like all the time. And if it was, he was even more amazed by her strength than he had been the previous night. She'd actually let him – a man she barely fucking knew – into her home. Let him touch her and hold her and kiss her.

Fuck.

What if she was rethinking everything, and too nervous to go through with their date?

He was about to knock again when the door opened. And there she was, her long brown hair spilling over the shoulders of a blue bathrobe. Her skin was flushed, pink and warm. And against the deep blue of her robe, it had never looked so beautiful.

She was, he thought.

So fucking beautiful.

"I'm sorry," she said, her voice shaking just a little. "I was running late because I had to finish something at work. And I thought I'd have time to shower and change before you got here, but you…you're early."

Edward didn't respond.

He couldn't stop staring at her. Even though he knew she was finished speaking. Maybe it was the relief that rushed over him in a warm wave that she was there and she was safe. Maybe it was the flush of her skin, and it felt like it was the first time he was seeing it. But it was most likely the fact that there was a high fucking probability that she wasn't wearing anything underneath that robe. And it wasn't that the robe was indecent. In fact, she was all covered up as if she was wearing her clothes.

But his thoughts were suddenly indecent.

His mouth was suddenly too dry.

"Edward?" His name was a question on her lips, and her face went from flushed pink to deep red like she knew what he was thinking.

"You're beautiful," he said. Because he had to. Because he couldn't keep the words inside, and she needed to know.

If it was possible, she blushed even more. Hell, he was probably blushing.

"I'm… I need to change."

"Yeah, umm…" he stammered, as she stepped to the side, letting him in. "And I should probably put this down."

"Pizza?"

"Yeah, I–uhh…I didn't know what you would like. And I thought maybe Bella was an Italian name. And it was safe or whatever, but if it's not what you want, I can go get something different while you umm….change."

"Pizza's great," she said, a small smile forming on her lips.

Edward breathed for the first time in what he felt was about twenty minutes, her smile taking away the sting of feeling like a total asshole.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

She quickly disappeared into her bedroom, closing the door behind her. Edward looked around, trying to decide where to put the pizza. At first, he thought the dining room table, but that seemed too formal, so he settled on the coffee table. He made his way to her kitchen, wondering if he should be making himself so at home in her space. He saw a roll of paper towels on the counter, and he figured that plates would be unnecessary, wanting to keep things as casual and comfortable as possible. It was just pizza after all. But what if Bella was the kind of person who didn't eat in the living room? What if she preferred the dining room? He couldn't even remember the last time he'd eaten a meal at an actual table that wasn't in a restaurant.

He was still lost in thought when she appeared in the kitchen.

She was wearing black leggings and a long grey sweater. Her little feet were bare against the tile of the floor, and since when did Edward think feet were sexy? But they were the only exposed skin on her body, so he decided they actually were.

"I didn't know where you wanted to eat, but I was thinking we could sit in the living room at your coffee table," he said, holding up the paper towels.

"That sounds…good."

"Unless you wanted to sit somewhere else."

He realized he sounded like a bumbling idiot, but he couldn't seem to stop himself. She made him stupid with wanting.

She approached him slowly, reaching out to take the paper towels from his hand. "Are you okay?" she asked. "You seem…nervous."

Edward let out a deep breath. "I just…I don't want to fuck this up."

She laughed a little, doing nothing to help his current state of mind. "I was just thinking the same thing when I was in there changing. Besides," she added, "I thought I was supposed to be the nervous one."

"I've been nervous all day."

"Really?"

"Well, nervous and excited."

"Me too," she said, and he relaxed so much at her words.

"You look nice," he told her, finally acknowledging that she changed.

"Better than the bathrobe?"

"No…uhh…" he said, clearing his throat. "The bathrobe was…nice."

He could practically feel her embarrassment.

"I mean the color," he tried to clarify. "You look good in blue…and grey."

"You look good, too."

Edward didn't respond because, honestly, he didn't want to say something stupid again. So, they stood silently in her kitchen, and she was just holding the paper towels and looking at him with this expression he couldn't quite understand. Her eyes dropped to his mouth for just a second before shooting back up to his again, and he wondered if maybe she was thinking about kissing him. She was definitely sending out signals, that under any other circumstance, he would take a clear sign. And while he wanted nothing more than to kiss her again, he didn't want to press shit too far, too fast.

However, he couldn't seem to be the one to move away first. He liked her proximity, liked knowing that she was close enough to touch. Even if he wasn't making a move to touch her.

She broke the silence first.

"Hungry?"

"Yeah," he told her, not giving a single fuck about the pizza. "I'm starving."

.

.

Bella leaned back against the couch, looking at the half-eaten box of pizza. She was sitting on the floor, legs crossed under her coffee table. And Edward sat next to her. She could feel the heat emanating from his body. He seemed more relaxed than he had earlier. And she was glad. Although, if she was being honest, there had been something so soothing about his apparent nervousness. She understood how he felt, of course. But it was nice to know that maybe she wasn't alone in her feelings. Bella had felt alone for so much of her life where her anxiety was concerned. And for the first time, possibly ever, Bella felt as if she'd been seen, felt as if she was understood.

It was more than that, though. It was the way he looked at her – like she was something desirable. No one – not a single person – had ever looked at Bella like that. It made her feel things, made her want to do things. Like, kiss him in her kitchen because she thought he wanted her kisses.

And she wanted his.

But she wasn't brave enough for something like that yet.

Their conversation had been pretty light as they ate dinner. She told him pizza was one of her favorites, and it had seemed to please him a great deal. He asked a lot of questions about her work, what she did, and how she liked it. He told her that he used to be a police officer and had been injured. And even though he was clearly fine now, the idea that someone had actually shot him upset Bella more than was probably appropriate for someone who'd only known him for such a short time.

"What's your favorite color?" he asked, pulling her from her thoughts.

"Green," she said, looking into his eyes. His returning smile made her glad she'd been honest. "Yours?"

"Blue," he said, lowly, clearing his throat. "Has anyone ever told you how uh…good you look in blue?"

Maybe it was how close he was, or the low tenor of his voice right next to ear, but Bella shivered at his words.

"Just you," she said, leaning in a little closer to him without even realizing. "But I'm okay with that."

"I'm more than okay with that," he said, lifting his hand to brush her hair off her shoulder. It was the first time he'd touched her all evening, and even though the touch was innocent in the grand scheme of things, it made Bella feel anything but innocent. "It's your skin," he continued. "It looks really fucking good next to blue. When you answered the door in your robe earlier…" he paused. The incomplete sentence was beyond frustrating.

His fingers were trailing lightly over her neck, causing what felt like a million nerve-endings to tingle under her skin.

"What?" she asked, needing to know what else he was going to say.

"You don't want to know."

"I do," she insisted, softly. "Tell me."

He looked at her for a long moment like she was a puzzle he was trying to figure out. Then an expression of resolve cemented on his gorgeous face, and he said, "I looked at you in that robe, with your skin so pink and hot and probably damp from the shower, and all I could think was that you were naked underneath it."

Bella sucked in a breath on the word 'naked' and suddenly, her whole body was hyper-attuned to the man sitting next to her.

And he wasn't sitting close enough.

"Distract me," he said roughly.

"What?" she asked, confused.

"Distract me before I do something stupid," he said, the gentle touch on her neck changing to something rougher, something pulling and gripping, and Bella liked the change more than she probably should. "Distract me before I kiss you, or do something really stupid like tell you that I've never wanted anything more than I wanted to see all that damp pink skin under your modest robe."

Arousal hit Bella hard and fast. Maybe it was his words, and the images that rushed vividly into her mind as he said them. But all she knew in that moment was she wanted him, wanted his kiss, and wanted – for the first time in her life – to be stripped bare for someone to see.

Not someone.

Edward.

Because her naked flesh was nothing compared to the things she'd already revealed to him. And he was still there, wanting more.

"I don't want to distract you from that."

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.

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A/N

Real talk: I didn't realize how foreboding I made the end of the last chapter sound. It wasn't until all of you pointed it out to me. I was mostly trying to convey how little Edward really knew about Bella. So, yeah…sorry about that. Lmao

As always, thank you for reading. And thank you for loving these two. Writing fic again has been fun. This has made me remember why I've written like 545484212 of them.

Once again, Marvar makes everything I write better. And I adore her.

See you tomorrow!

Reviews are love.