A/N: Thank you all for your patience! Thank you to everyone who has shared their honest thoughts and kind words. I appreciate each and every one of you, and I also want to thank all of the different groups and sites that have recommended this story. I'm humbled and flattered. Thank you.

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#Belward – Chapter 11

Where we left off last chapter…

The moment Edward heard the tinkling of the hotel door unlock was the moment he realized that he forgot the most important thing that day. He forgot to tell Embry to take the night off. Before he could do anything to stop it, Embry burst into the room like Kramer from Seinfeld.

For a few seconds, all three stared at each other in silence.

"Holy shit! You have a girl in here!"

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Edward was stunned. He had a million thoughts going on in his mind. There were so many things he knew he had to say, but none of the words would make their way past his lips. Because he wasn't fast enough, Embry got the jump on him.

"Hi, I'm Embry Call, and I'm Edward's babysitter," Embry said stepping up to Bella with a big, devious smile on his face.

Before Edward could say anything, Bella burst into laughter and doubled over. Clutching her stomach, she stood up and tried to catch her breath. "I'm so sorry. But you sounded so much like Olaf from Frozen when you said that. 'Hello, I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs.' I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude."

That was not the response that Embry expected from the girl in Edward's room. He expected yelling. He expected curses screamed at Edward for thinking that he'd set her up somehow. But he had not expected her to laugh at him. "I'm not offended. You seem like a cool chick. What's your name?"

Bella finally stopped laughing and extended her hand. "I'm Bella Swan. It's nice to meet you."

"Bella. Is that short for something? What do you do?" Embry asked walking a little closer.

At that point, Edward finally came to his sense and immediately realized what Embry was trying to do. Stepping closer to Bella, he said, "Embry, stop. You don't need to run a background check on her."

"Edward, will you let me do my actual job here? I'm just trying to protect you," Embry said. "It won't hurt her or anything. I'll just ask Jasper to make sure that she's cool."

"I already know she's cool-"

"Jasper? Jasper Whitlock?" Bella asked. She didn't mean to interrupt Edward, but she could feel him getting more and more tense next to her. She was sure that he thought that a background check would infuriate and offend her, but it actually didn't.

Both men looked at her and Edward asked, "Yeah, Jasper Whitlock. He's Alice's husband. Do you know him?"

Bella nodded. "Yeah, Jasper does all of the security on all of my properties. He's the best. He has actually done a background check on me from when I came on as a client. He can give you whatever information you need. If you need my authorization, you can tell him I said it was okay. Or he can just call me for verification. It's not a problem. It doesn't bother me, Edward. I get it."

"You're a client of Jasper's? Well, that makes it easy," Embry said with a shrug of his shoulders. "Now, I'm sure I can tell you all about Edward and his dirty little secrets. No one spends as much time with him as I do. I can tell you that he snores when he's drunk. He's a whiny little bitch when he hasn't had his coffee in the morning, and I'm going to take a wild guess that you're the reason why he's been so happy these past few weeks."

When Embry looked at Edward, he could see that Edward was glaring at him. He knew when he wasn't wanted, and he intended to leave quickly. He just wanted to spend a few more minutes antagonizing Edward. It was just too much fun. "Edward, don't look at me like that. Let's be completely real for a second. You get paid to pretend to knock guys like me on my ass. While I, on the other hand, am professionally trained to beat up light weights like you. I don't want to embarrass you in front of your girl, so let's just save the evil eyes for another time. Okie dokie artichokie?"

Edward just growled, and Bella laughed. She liked Embry. He was cute, and he reminded her of those puppies that just wanted to play, except that their definition of playing was to nip at your ankles.

"All righty then," Embry said in his best Ace Ventura voice. "Bella, it was a pleasure to meet you. I'm sure I'll be seeing you around. Edward, I will see you at 10 a.m. tomorrow. Have a good night, kiddos. And remember, Edward. No glove, no love."

"Out!" Edward yelled as he pinched the bridge of his nose. Embry just laughed and wandered back out the door. When the door clicked back into place, Edward was relieved to see Bella's eyes twinkling with laughter. "I'm so sorry about him."

Bella could tell that Edward's blood pressure had probably been skyrocketing through that whole exchange with Embry. Acting purely on instinct, Bella wrapped her arms around Edward's waist and pulled into a hug. She was so glad she'd chosen to wear flats. At that height, her forehead could nuzzle into the cleft of his chest at the base of his sternum. "It's totally fine, Edward. Don't even worry about it. Besides, now we can tell our grandkids that Kramer burst into our first date."

"Shit," Edward laughed. Squeezing Bella tightly, he leaned down and placed a light kiss on her forehead just as her stomach growled. Laughing lightly, he said, "Okay, we better feed you."

Bella and Edward sat down to eat around the coffee table for a living room picnic. He loved that she didn't think she needed to pick up from Eleven Madison or Le Bernardin. He'd eaten at the finest restaurants in the world, but he was still a down home, comfort food kind of a guy.

As they ate, they talked and got to know each other better. Bella took a sip of her Dr. Pepper, and looked up at Edward. "What's the hardest part about being you? Being THE Edward Cullen?"

Edward swallowed the fries in his mouth and took a second to think about his answer. Sighing, he said, "the know-it-alls. I started my career off slow and steady. I got bit parts in tv shows. I played a cadaver once on an episode of CSI. That was pretty cool. Eventually, I made my way into television movies, and then Hollywood films. It was after the third movie that my life kind of blew up. All of a sudden, people thought I was hot shit. I got offered modeling contracts, endorsement deals, A-list movies, and A-list paychecks. But as much as they wanted me professionally, they also wanted me personally. All of these reporters started to make assumptions about me and my life. They thought that because they studied movie stars for a living that I was some kind of textbook case, and they could predict everything about me. I hate that."

"Is that why you didn't date for so long?" Bella asked. "I can understand wanting to keep your private life private. It's yours, and it should stay yours."

"I don't think I avoided dating because of the know-it-alls. It definitely wasn't a motivating factor to get out there and start dating someone, but I just wasn't interested in the whole thing. I was never a serial dater. I was more of a serial monogamist. I had two girlfriends in high school, and both were long-term. When I think about dating, I think about long-term. Any relationship I'm in, it's for the long haul, and I wasn't about to commit to someone when I knew I couldn't give 100% of myself to the relationship. I was too invested in my career and proving myself than looking for potential girlfriends," Edward said. Looking down, he stared at his half eaten hot dog and said quietly, "I don't know if that makes me sound like a selfish prick."

Bella nudged Edward's knee with hers, and said, "That's not selfish, Edward. My last boyfriend was in college. At the time, I was already writing professionally, and I was in school as a back-up. I had just started to dabble in real estate because I needed a tax shelter. I just didn't have enough expenses to balance out my income, and I hated seeing all of my hard earned money being sent away to Uncle Sam. So my CPA suggested investing in properties. I enjoyed it, and I was getting pretty good at it. But Riley just thought I was spreading myself too thin. He just wanted a normal girlfriend. He wanted someone that would eventually become a Stepford wife, and I wasn't turning out to be that person. It started to become glaringly obvious that we weren't what the other wanted, so we shook hands and parted ways."

"His loss is my gain. He sounds like a tool," Edward said. Looking up at Bella, he said, "So, what's the hardest part about being you?"

Bella smiled and played with the napkin in her hands. "The hardest part about being me is being both M. Dwyer and Isabella Swan at the same time. There are times when I feel like I've overextended myself, but every time I ask myself what I could give up, I can't think of anything. I'm not willing to give up anything that I do because I love it all so much. I have an amazing team now that runs the real estate arm, and I have an equally amazing team that basically handles all of the Foundation's work. It frees me up to write at the frequency that my imagination demands. But there's still a lot of business stuff that I have to do. I have to go on book tours. I have to go to groundbreaking ceremonies and scholarship award banquets. Granted, I could send Angela and Ben most of the time, but at what point do I just become the bank and lose touch with the reason why I chose to do all this to begin with?"

Sighing, Bella looked up at Edward and saw the compassion and empathy in his eyes. She knew he got it. He had to be Edward Cullen and THE Edward Cullen just like she had to be both Isabella Swan and M. Dwyer. Smiling softly, she said, "So, this thing with us…Edward, I can't and I won't ask you to sacrifice your career for me. I would think less of you if you did."

"And I won't ask you to be less of who you are for me. But I'm in this, Bella. I'm in this all the way. I can't imagine giving up and walking away from you. Maybe I've finally gotten to the point where I can be more than just an actor. I think I figured out how to do the actor thing well enough," Edward said with a cocky smirk.

Bella laughed and nodded her head. "Yeah, Hollywood. I think you have the actor thing down. Edward, I'm in this too, and I'm in it for the long haul if you are. But I know it isn't going to be easy. Between your schedule and mine, we might not get to actually see each other very often."

"Yeah, I know," Edward said softly. Running his hand through his hair, he knew that they wouldn't be able to find any answers right away. "But we can try our best, and we can promise to be honest with each other. Bella, I want you to know that you can tell me anything. If this gets to be too much or too difficult, I want you to tell me. I want to know if you're unhappy. I don't want you to feel like you can't tell me things because you think you have to be strong or you have to protect me from something. Please, don't be a noble idiot and fight for us alone. If we're in this, we're in this together."

"The same goes for you too, Edward. 'Just because I'm the girl doesn't mean that I'm able to handle less than you. I don't need to be protected or sheltered. I can handle just as much as you can, and I'm of equally sound mind. I know what I'm getting into with you, and I'm aware of everything that can and might happen. I create drama in my mind every day, and I've walked through every relationship scenario with my characters. I'm not naïve, and I think I'm adult enough to handle whatever comes next," Bella said. Leaning back on the couch behind her, she said quietly, "So what does happen next?"

"I'm going to give Kate and Garrett a heads up that I'm seeing someone, but I don't intend to send out a formal press release. That's just asking for attention, and I don't want that. I just want them to be prepared ahead of time that at some point, I will take you on a real date. But I'm not sure I'm ready to share you with the world just yet," Edward said. Quickly, he turned to Bella and put his hands on her cheeks. "But please don't misunderstand and think that I'm embarrassed of you. I'm not. You're so much more than I could have ever hoped for. I'm just a selfish motherfucker, and I want to keep you to myself for a little while longer before those bloodsucking vultures descend."

Bella smiled for a second before she realized what she needed to do on her end. Closing her eyes, she mumbled, "Oh my god. I have to tell Jake."

Quirking an eyebrow, Edward asked, "Who is Jake?"

"My agent. He's also happens to be my step cousin, but he thinks he's my brother," Bella said. When she saw the look of utter confusion on Edward's face, she explained. "I told you about how my parents divorced when I was little, and my dad married Sue when I was six. I basically grew up with Sue's kids, Leah and Seth. We're as close as real siblings, and I don't really think of them as steps. But their cousin, Jake, thinks that he's part of the family too. He was around pretty frequently too, but there's no actual blood relation between us."

"And why don't you want to tell him about us?" Edward asked.

"Because he is a gigantic pain in my ass! What Embry is to you is what Jake is to me," Bella said. Leaning forward, she grabbed her Dr. Pepper. "I should have gotten chocolate shakes. I was just worried they'd melt."

Standing up, Edward went to the hotel phone and dialed room service. "Hi, this is Rob Pattinson in Suite 1717. Can I get two chocolate shakes with whipped cream and a cherry on top sent up, please? Thank you."

When Edward hung up the phone, he saw Bella snickering. "Your alias is Rob Pattinson?"

Feeling his cheeks burn with blush a little, Edward said, "Yeah. Emmett wanted me to be Clark Kent, but I told him that was so over used. Don't you have to use an alias when you check in to hotels?"

Bella shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. "I don't really have to check into hotels all that much. Most of the places I go to I have a home there."

"Bella," Edward said. He was intrigued, and he didn't want her to get the wrong idea. "I'm just curious. But exactly how many homes do you have?"

"Uh, like actual homes that I live in, right? Not owned properties," Bella asked. When Edward nodded, she said, "I have a condo here in The City, a condo in Chicago, a house in LA, a lake house in Seattle, a cabin in Victoria, a loft in Nashville, a flat in London, and an apartment in Venice. I'm still working on finding just the right place in Tokyo and Shanghai."

"And those are the ones you stay in. You have additional properties that you own but don't live in?" Edward asked. He was intrigued. Utterly intrigued.

"Yes. There are some that we flip and resell, and there are others that we use as purely commercial real estate. Most of the condos and apartments I stay in, I also own the entire building. The Foundation also owns all of the Learning Center complexes, and I've donated to several schools to build new libraries and wings for students," Bella said quietly. She was always worried that when she told people these things that it would make her sound like some rich, entitled bitch.

"Wow," Edward said softly. Leaning back, he looked at Bella with a mischievous glint in his eyes. "I scored myself a Sugar Mama. Way to go me!"