Thanks to Twilightzoner for the validation.

Thanks to xrxdanixrx, charmie, and milehighhopes for the beta work.

I wanted to have this to you all sooner but school just started back and I've been sick.

Thanks to everyone who continues to read. You guys seriously blew me away with the response to the last chapter. I don't think I can say enough how much each and every review means to me. I love you guys for sticking with me. And I will be responded to reviews from the last chapter and this one.


Chapter Twelve

Bella pulled her hair up on top of her head and stretched. It had been a long day and she was ready to get home… home to Edward. Bella smiled to herself and shook her head. He made her ridiculously happy and she didn't know what she had done to deserve someone so wonderful.

Sometimes, she couldn't believe that she and Edward had ever had a difficult start to their relationship. The days of hardly speaking to each other and barely spending any time together were over. Edward made her extremely happy, and for the first time in her life, she was glad that the Matching existed. After all, anything that brought her together with Edward couldn't be that bad.

She was cleaning up in the kitchen when she heard her phone ringing. Her smile grew exponentially when she saw it was Edward calling.

"Hi," she answered, hearing the smile in her own voice.

"Hey, baby. What are you doing?"

"I'm just cleaning up before getting home to see you. What are you doing?"

"I got home early and I want to make you dinner. I was wondering what you wanted?"

"That's sweet. You don't have to do that."

"Well, I want to. I knew you wanted to go to sleep early last night and I felt bad for keeping you up."

Bella blushed and bit down on her lip, thinking about exactly how Edward had kept her up the night before. "I didn't mind. You can keep me like that anytime you want."

Edward chuckled. "I'm surprised. I thought for sure you would be in a bad mood because I kept you up and you had to go in to work early, hence my offer to fix you dinner."

"Hmm," Bella hummed. "I guess I must just really love you."

"I guess I really love you, too," he replied.

"Since we really love each other, why don't we make something together?" Bella suggested.

"We always cook together. I wanted to do something nice for you."

"Well, since you're being so nice, I guess you can pick what to cook."

"Okay, I think I'm going to head to the store and pick up some noodles so we can have spaghetti," he said.

"You don't have to do that. I can just stop on my way home."

"I don't mind. I'm going to leave now and I'll see you when you get home. I love you."

"I love you, too," Bella replied, hanging up the phone.

When Bella turned to put her phone back in her purse she noticed Alice was standing in the doorway of kitchen and it looked like she was vibrating slightly.

"Oh. My. God," Alice screamed.

"Alice, you don't have to yell," Bella said, covering her ears.

"Rose," Alice yelled, ignoring Bella's obvious objections and running out of the kitchen. "Rosalie, where are you?"

Bella groaned and sent a text to Edward. She told him she was probably going to be late getting home because her sisters wanted to talk.

Her message had just gone through when her sisters burst in the door. Alice was still shaking and Rose looked concerned and angry at the same time.

"What is going on?" Rose demanded, looking back and forth between her sisters.

"Ask Bella," Alice said.

Bella sighed and rubbed at her eyes. She hadn't told her sisters that she and Edward were in love. They knew that things were better between them but Bella was enjoying keeping this new part of her relationship with Edward to herself. However, thanks to Alice's eavesdropping, it seemed that her secret was a thing of the past.

"Bella," Rose called. "What happened? Alice came running into the office screaming and practically dragged me in here. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," Bella mumbled.

"I think she's better than fine," Alice almost sang.

Bella rolled her eyes and took a seat. She decided that the sooner she told her sisters what they wanted to know the sooner she could get home.

"Go on, Bella," Alice continued. "Tell Rose what your phone conversation was all about."

"Alice, you shouldn't be listening in on other people's phone calls. Bella doesn't have to tell me who or what she was talking about if she doesn't want to."

"Thanks, Rose," Bella said. "But it's okay. I was going to tell you two eventually but I sort of wanted to keep it to myself for a little while longer."

"Bella, you don't have to say anything-"

"No, it's fine Rose," Bella interrupted. "Alice overheard me tell Edward that I love him."

"What?" Rose asked, her face softening.

"See, I told you it was big news," Alice said, clapping.

"Oh, Bella that's wonderful. I'm so happy for you two," Rose said and gave Bella a hug.

"Thanks, Rose."

"So, how long has this been going on?" Alice asked.

Bella shrugged. She wished her sisters didn't always know when she was lying. She knew without a doubt that this wasn't going to be a fun conversation. "A little over three weeks."

"Three weeks? Bella, why didn't you tell us?" Alice asked.

"I'm sorry, but I knew you guys would make this huge deal out of it and I didn't want that."

"But it is a huge deal," Alice insisted. "You came to us asking for advice about Edward and what to do to get him to stop hating you and now that you guys are in love you don't even bother to tell us. It hurts that you would keep something this big from us. We're supposed to tell each other everything."

"I don't know what you want me to say, Alice. Making me feel bad isn't helping though."

Alice looked as if she wanted to argue some more with Bella, but when she began speaking, Rose shook her head.

"You're right, Bella. You didn't have to tell us. Of course we would have liked to know because we love you but I understand why you wanted to keep it to yourself. Isn't that right, Alice?"

Alice huffed and shrugged. "Yeah, whatever."

"So, how did it happen?" Rose asked, taking a seat beside Bella.

Bella told her sisters how things changed with Edward. She told them everything but left out the information about Edward being a Hopeless. She didn't think it was the right time to give her sisters that news. Rose listened intently to Bella's story and asked questions when she needed clarification about something. At first, Alice pretended not to listen but by the time Bella finished speaking Alice was oohing and ahhing along with Rose.

"I do have one question," Alice said.

"Just one?" Bella asked, sighing.

"One depending on your answer, there might have to be some follow up questions."

"What is it, Alice?"

"Have you guys had sex yet?"

Bella didn't respond to her sister's question but she felt her face grow hot and she knew she was given away by her stupid blush. She wasn't blushing because she was embarrassed about having sex with her husband. She just knew that telling Alice was going to mean having to answer a lot of questions that made her uncomfortable.

"Are you kidding me?" Alice groaned. "I can't believe you didn't tell us this either."

"Oh, Bella," Rose murmured. "Really?"

Bella nodded and Rose smiled at her with tears in her eyes.

"That's wonderful, sweetheart."

"Yeah, yeah," Alice said, waving Rose off. "It's wonderful, now I need details."

"Alice," Rose said, a warning in her voice.

"Don't Alice me, Rosalie. She's been holding out on us for who knows how long. How long has it been, Bella?"

Bella sighed. "Two and a half weeks."

"See," Alice said, turning to look back at Rose. "So, how was it?"

"It was good, great," Bella replied, her face growing redder by the moment.

"That's all you have to say?"

"Alice, you know I don't feel comfortable talking about this kind of stuff."

Alice rolled her eyes. "Oh, please, Bella, you're a big girl now and I want details."

When Bella didn't say anything else, Alice huffed. She was quiet for a moment before she began to speak again. To make Bella feel more comfortable talking about her burgeoning sex life, Alice decided it would be a good idea to go into great detail about her escapades with Jasper. Alice was way too specific for Bella's liking. She thought of Jasper as an older brother and she was sure she wouldn't be able to look him in the face for a long while.

"Cut it out, Alice," Rose said, trying not to laugh. "I don't know why you thought that would help."

"What? What did I say that was so bad?" Alice asked, looking truly confused.

"I appreciate you trying to make me feel more comfortable but you know me well enough to know I'll never want to talk about something so private with you or Rose, sorry," Bella responded.

"You don't have to apologize to her," Rose began. "She's the one who loves to over share."

"I just don't understand how I ended up with two prudes for sisters. I swear I was adopted," Alice said, sighing.

Bella wanted to respond to her sister with a smart remark which would have no doubt started an argument. But Rose knew when trouble was about to start and asked Bella, once again, if things with Edward were really as great as she said they were.

"Yes, Rose," Bella answered. "Edward and I are ridiculously happy. I love him and he loves me."

"Well, is something else bothering you? You haven't been yourself lately and I thought whatever was bothering you had something to do with Edward."

Something was bothering Bella but she thought she had been doing a good job of hiding it from her sisters. Bella knew she needed to let them know about the information she learned from their Aunt Lucy. She didn't know how to go about telling them and had almost done so on numerous occasions, but something stopped her each time. She didn't know what was stopping her, but keeping the information from her sisters was stressing her out and she couldn't do it anymore.

"Something has been bothering me but it doesn't have anything to do with Edward," Bella said, looking back and forth between her sisters.

"What is it?" Alice asked.

Bella took a deep breath and proceeded to tell her sisters everything their Aunt had told her. She found herself pacing around the kitchen because she wasn't able to look at her sisters while giving them news. She was afraid that if she looked directly at them she would forget exactly what she wanted to say and it was important to her to get everything right. When she finished talking and there was no response from her sisters she turned to glance at them. They were sharing a look that Bella didn't like.

"Will you guys say something?" she asked.

Bella saw Alice mouth something to Rose who sighed and said, "Fine."

"What? What's fine?"

"Sit down, Bella," Rose said. When Bella sat, Rose continued. "We sort of already knew all of that."

"You knew? I don't understand. Aunt Lucy didn't say anything about telling you two any of this."

"That's because it wasn't Lucy who told us," Alice replied.

"Well, then, who told you?"

"Pop, he told us right before he died," Rose said.

Pop was the girl's maternal grandfather. He passed away shortly after Alice got matched with Jasper. Bella always thought she had a close relationship with Pop and she couldn't understand why he didn't feel the need to give this information to her if he gave it to her sisters. "Why would he tell you and not tell me?"

"We went to visit him one afternoon to tell him about Alice and Jasper," Rose began, looking down at her hands. "We asked you if you wanted to come see him but you were spending the afternoon with Jacob and Angela. Alice told him she was worried about marrying Jasper because she didn't like him and she definitely didn't love him. He told her that everything would be alright. She asked him how he knew and that's when he told us about Mom and Dad."

"I still don't understand why I'm the last to know," Bella breathed.

"Bella, you were four when Dad died and we know you don't really remember a lot about him. We didn't want the memories you do have to be ruined." Rose said.

"Ruined, how?" Bella asked.

"What do you remember about Dad? I mean, besides what we've told you."

Bella shook her head. "I don't know. I can't really tell the difference between the memories that are actually mine and the ones I have because of what I've been told."

"Are they good memories or bad ones?"

"They're good," Bella said. "I still don't understand why you didn't tell me."

"Just tell her, Rose," Alice said.

"I will," Rose replied, rubbing her temples. "I just don't know where to start."

It was quiet in the kitchen while Rose gathered her thoughts. Bella sat looking at both of her sisters, wondering why they felt the need to hide something like this from her. The longer Rose was silent, the more Bella grew agitated. She knew if someone didn't say something soon she would say something she might later regret.

"When Pop told us that Mom and Dad weren't ever really in love-" Rose started.

"They weren't ever really in love?" Bella interrupted. "That's not what Lucy said."

Rose smiled sadly at Bella. "I'm just telling you what Pop told me and what I've come to on my own after all these years."

"Fine," Bella huffed.

"When I was younger, I did think they were in love. I guess I didn't really know any better since theirs was the only romantic relationship I ever really witnessed. As I got older and spent more time at friends' houses I saw how their parents behaved and I realized something was right between our parents."

"What wasn't right?" Bella asked.

"They weren't very affectionate with each other."

"That doesn't mean anything. A lot of people aren't comfortable with PDA," Bella responded.

"I know that, but that wasn't all. It was the way Dad looked at Mom and the way he talked to her. It was like she was this obligation that was forced on him.

"Pop told us that Mom tried really hard to make things work because she really loved him, at first. He said he wished we knew Mom before we were born. He said she was a lot happier and a lot less controlling back then."

"I don't understand," Bella said in a whisper. "Why would they have children if they didn't love each other?"

"That was Nana," Alice said, speaking up for the first time. "Pop said that Nana would have cut Mom and Dad off if they didn't kids. They got pregnant with Rose just to get her off their backs."

Bella looked at Rose who was wiping tears from her eyes. "Are you alright?" Bella asked.

Rose cleared her throat. "It's just hard to hear that you were born out of obligation and not love. I'll be fine. I get a little weepy whenever I think about it."

"Why did they have you and me?" Bella asked, looking at Alice.

"I don't really know." Alice shrugged. "Pop assumed they wanted a boy or maybe Nana promised them more money, who knows."

"I think that's why Mom was always so obsessed about us being matched with the right men," Rose told her sisters. "I think she didn't want us to feel what she did. She went about it in the worst way possible, of course, but she wanted more for us."

Bella felt like someone had slapped her across the face. She couldn't fathom how so many of her beliefs had been shattered in a short amount of time.

"Bella, I don't want this to make you think badly of Dad. He loved us and he was so happy when you were born. I think he loved Mom, too, as the mother of his children. He was a good man," Rose said.

"I still don't understand why you two felt the need to hide this from me all these years. I would love it if you could explain that to me," Bella demanded. She wanted to sound stronger than she felt. Crying wouldn't do her any good, any tears she produced would be sure to halt all conversation.

"The look on your face, right now," Alice said, pointing at Bella. "That's why we never said anything. Neither of us wanted to know any of this. I was much happier before I knew. When we first found out, you had just started The Preparation and you were miserable all the time. What good would it have done to tell you then?"

"Fine, I'll give you that. But you had five years after that to tell me and I'm just finding out now. I wouldn't even know now except that I made Lucy tell me."

"I'm sorry, Bella," Rose said. "We both are. I promise you that we did it because we didn't want to hurt you. Maybe we should have told you sooner, but like Alice said, I was happier not knowing, too. I may have had my suspicions before but now I know it's true."

"I need to go." Bella stood up quickly and turned to gather her things.

"Don't go, Bella. We need to talk about this," Rose pleaded.

"I don't really want to talk anymore right now. I just want to go home."

"Bella, don't go like this. You're upset and we should work this out before you leave," Alice said.

"I'll be fine. Edward is expecting me at home and I don't want to keep him waiting," Bella told her sisters as she headed for the door.

"No, sit back down, Bella. We're going to finish talking about this like adults. You're not just going to run away because you don't like what we're telling you," Alice said.

"Excuse me, Alice? Are you or are you not the person who just told me how hurt you were that I kept something from you for three weeks? Something that didn't have anything to do with you, I might add. So, I want you to think about how I must feel. You've been keeping this from me for years."

"Alice, it's alright. Let her go home," Rose said, turning to Alice. "We'll talk about this later."

Bella didn't respond to Rose's comment. She knew it would be a while before she talked about this, or anything else for that matter, with her sisters again. She sat in her car for a moment, trying to come to terms with the news she had just been given, before driving home.

The reasons her sisters gave her for keeping this news about her parents from her just weren't good enough. She simply couldn't comprehend keeping something like this from them for five plus years.

What hurt her most of all was the fact that her parents only had children to inherit money from her grandmother. She couldn't imagine what it must have felt like for her mother to have children with a man who didn't love or even particularly like her. Bella knew she wouldn't have been able to have children with Edward at the beginning of their marriage no matter how much money she was promised.

Thinking about what her mother went through actually made Bella feel bad for her. She wouldn't ever forget some of the horrible and selfish things she had done but she guessed she had a better understanding of why Renee was the way she was. Bella felt that maybe things with her mother would have been different had she known five years ago what she knew now. The things Renee had done in the past made much more sense to Bella presently. Bella thought about what Pop said about wishing the girls had known their mother before she had children. Seeing a kinder, gentler Renee was something Bella would have loved to see.

Before she knew it, Bella was sitting in the parking lot of her apartment complex. She had been so lost in her own thoughts that she didn't realize she had driven home.

When she walked in the door of the apartment and smelled dinner cooking, she realized she had lost her appetite.

"Hey," Edward called. "Have you been talking to your sisters this whole time? I was getting worried about you."

"Yeah," Bella answered, heading toward the kitchen.

When Edward heard her approaching the kitchen he turned around from the stove with a smile on his face. His smile fell, however, when he took in Bella's appearance. "Are you okay?" he asked, walking over to Bella and taking her face in his hands.

"No," Bella responded.

"What happened, baby?" he asked.

"I don't really want to talk about it right now," Bella said. "Will you just hold me for a little while?"

Edward nodded and led Bella to the living room couch. He sat down and Bella snuggled into his chest. She sighed and closed her eyes as he wrapped his arms around her and placed a kiss on her forehead. She tried to keep her tears at bay but the combination of the shocking information she learned from her sisters and not getting enough sleep the night before was too much for her to take.

"Hey," Edward said when he heard begin to cry. "Everything will alright, okay?"

Bella nodded against his chest. Now that she was safe in his arms, she knew that everything would be.


I wonder what everyone thinks about this latest development?

If I can stick to my outline there should be five more chapters until the end of the story. Would you all like me to write the last five chapters and then post one a week once they're written or post them as I write them? Let me know in the reviews.

Some people asked about lemons and I hate to disappoint anyone but this story is rated T/PG-13. So there won't be any lemons in this story. Sorry.

Thank you all once again for reading!