As always, huge thanks to my betas, Beans827 and Shug!

EPOV

I could hear singing somewhere through the fog in my head left behind by the copious amounts of alcohol imbibed the night before. Hmm, apparently the after-effects of alcohol consumption made my internal monologue speak like a pretentious asshole.

"Well you know that it's going to be all right…"

What the fuck?

"I think it's gonna be all right…"

No, really. What the fuck?

"Everything will always be all right, when we go shopping."

Slowly, I tried to pinpoint the source of the singing, my hearing growing progressively sharper by the second, and eventually I realized it was Bella's phone and the music that had interrupted my sleep was actually Barenaked Ladies, letting us know that Alice was demanding our attention.

The song stopped, and I dropped my head back onto the pillow. As tired as I was, it would've only taken seconds to fall back asleep, but the phone started ringing again just moments later. Bella hadn't moved an inch and showed no signs of acknowledging that her persistent best friend was trying to get a hold of her. I nudged her, and she still didn't move. I nudged again and whispered her name into her ear. The only response I got was an odd grunt and her hand reaching blindly behind her to swat me away. I would've laughed and teased her about it if I wasn't half-conscious and barely able to function. I tried a third time and still earned no response, so I stumbled out of bed to search for the phone that was now on its third call.

I followed the sound of the ringtone until I found the phone in the living room of the suite. Just before Alice's call was sent to voicemail yet again, I answered. "Alice?"

"Get down here, immediately," she barked into the phone.

"What?" I asked, trying to remember if we had plans, certain that we'd decided to take it easy in the morning since we'd overindulged the night before and the welcome reception for the conference wasn't until this evening. "What are you talking about? We're still sleeping."

"Well, wake your asses up and get to Emmett and Rosalie's room, pronto. They just, they, they're…" She kept stuttering her words, and I heard her cover the mouthpiece and mutter something inaudible to somebody in the room. When she moved her hand away, I could clearly hear Emmett and Rosalie arguing.

"We'll be down," I said quickly before disconnecting the call and running back into the bedroom. "Wake up," I said as I nudged Bella with more force than I'd used earlier.

"Don't wanna," she mumbled and buried her face in the pillow.

I laughed and pulled the pillow out from under her head then laughed harder as her head thumped to the mattress and stayed there. She made no attempt to move so I rolled her over onto her back, her only reaction was to cover her eyes with her forearm.

"Come on," I urged. "Alice just called and said we have to get downstairs. Emmett and Rosalie are fighting or something."

She moved her arm just enough to look at me through squinted eyelids for a second before sitting up and scrambling out of bed. "I'm up."

We both rushed around the room, grabbing clean clothes and getting dressed as fast as we could. After fighting for counter space to brush teeth, Bella quickly pulled her hair into a ponytail and we headed out of the room, grabbing only the keycard to get back in.

The elevator seemed to take forever, but we eventually made it to the right floor, searching for and quickly finding the correct room. I had been expecting a blow out, something the neighbors would be calling security over, but the hall was surprisingly quiet. Bella knocked on the door and in seconds, Alice swung it open, pulling us inside in one swift motion. I looked around, trying to piece together what was going on. Jasper and Alice appeared to be standing along the sidelines, watching as Emmett and Rosalie occupied themselves in a stare down. More accurately, Rosalie maintained an arched eyebrow, as if daring Emmett to speak, while Emmett seemed apologetic and searching for words that would dig him out of whatever hole he was currently residing in.

"What's going on?" I whispered, though with the silence that filled the room, I may as well have been screaming the words.

"We could hear them arguing from next door," Jasper said quietly. "We came over and it seems—"

"It seems," Rosalie spat out while continuing to glare at Emmett. "It seems that this happened last night"—Rosalie held her left hand up in the air, a simple gold band featured prominently—"and somebody flipped his shit when he woke up this morning."

Bella made an odd choking noise as her hands came up to cover her mouth, her eyes wide as she looked at Rosalie.

"It just—" Emmett started to explain before Rosalie's flipped her hand around, moving it from showing us her ring to nonverbally telling Emmett to shut up. He did, but only for a second before he soldiered on. "It just caught me by surprise. I'm not opposed to the idea—"

Rosalie scoffed and folded her arms over her chest. "What every girl wants to hear. That her boyfriend isn't opposed to the idea."

"Will you let me finish?" Emmett pleaded with her, riding the line between apologetic and frustrated. "It's just something I'd like to actually remember doing. I would have preferred it to have been a conscious decision."

By now, Bella had her face buried in my arm, shaking as she peeked at the scene in front of us with one eye. I looked down at her, perplexed, and sure enough she was struggling not to laugh. I watched her try to compose herself as Rosalie and Emmett continued to argue, not paying attention to what they were saying. Once she had quelled the laughter, she waited for an opening so she could begin speaking.

"Okay, obviously this isn't how either of you imagined this happening. Why don't you see about getting it annulled so you can start from scratch? Do you even know that it's legal? If neither of you remember it, are you sure that it's binding?"

Emmett reached behind him and pulled a sheet of paper off of the desk. "According to this, it's legal."

Bella's body shook with another laugh which she quickly stifled. "Who was the judge, or minister… or Elvis impersonator who performed the ceremony? Maybe you can track him down just to make sure."

Jasper, Alice, and I all snorted in an attempt to not laugh out loud at Bella's words, trying not to draw attention to ourselves and failing miserably.

"Why would we have this if it wasn't—" Emmett started but was interrupted by Bella.

"Just look. It can't hurt to find out who signed off on it and make sure everything's legit, right?"

He looked at her for a moment before shrugging in defeat and looked down at the paper, his eyes skimming, trying to find the name. "The Honorable Judge—"

His eyes shot up to Bella, and at that point, Rosalie turned her back to all of us and snorted. Bella pressed her lips together tightly, but couldn't stop shaking. Alice, Jasper, and I just looked around trying to figure out what we had missed.

"What?" Alice asked, frustrated. "What does it say?"

Emmett slammed the paper back on desk, not taking his eyes off of Bella but answering Alice's query. "The Honorable Judge Jelly Belly."

Bella and Rosalie were now both doubled over in laughter, taking steps closer to one another so they could hang onto each other to stay upright while laughing and speaking back and forth in high pitched, choppy phrases that only they understood.

Emmett attempted to look pissed but traces of humor were starting to peek through, while Alice, Jasper, and I started to laugh after piecing together what had happened.

After taking a few minutes to gather ourselves, Bella threw herself down onto the couch, beaming with pride at what she had managed to pull off. Emmett looked at her with his arms crossed in an attempt to appear menacing, but had a half-smile on his face and was shaking his head. "I can't believe you did that."

"Oh, come on," Bella responded. "I owed you huge. You were long overdue for a good prank. And are you finally ready to retire that nickname?"

"I think you just took all the fun out of that name," he said with a pout as he looked down at the fake certificate.

I walked over to sit beside Bella and asked, "How… when did you do this?"

She looked at me with a guilty expression. "Remember when you woke up and I was just crawling into bed and I told you that I hadn't been able to sleep so I was in the living room, looking out the window at the Strip?"

I nodded. "Yeah?"

"I had actually been out with Rosalie, getting everything together. She texted me to let me know that Emmett had passed out, and she ran out to find two cheap rings at a gift shop that was open while I sat in the Business Center and made the fake certificate."

"It was all her idea," Rosalie added from the edge of the bed, wiping away tears. "Fucking brilliant."

"I… I… I can't top that. You win. I'll never be able to outdo this one," Emmett said, completely in awe.

Bella ignored his declaration, instead yelling at him. "I can't believe you were so horrified at the idea of being married to her!"

She was still laughing, as was Rosalie when she interjected, "I know! If his reaction wasn't so funny, I'd be offended."

"I told you, I was just surprised. It caught me off guard," he defended. "I wasn't pissed. It's actually not a bad idea. We can go while we're here, do it for real."

He grew more and more excited at the idea and Rosalie rolled her eyes at him. "That's not happening."

"What, now you're the one with an aversion to getting married?" Emmett accused.

"No," she responded matter-of-factly. "I just refuse to get married in response to a prank." She turned to Bella and arched an eyebrow. "No offense, but I'm not letting you take the credit for me getting married."

Bella laughed. "Oh, I'm so taking credit—whenever it happens. The idea's planted in his head now."

After the intensity of the morning began to fade, we decided to head out for breakfast since we were all up anyway. Everyone headed back to their rooms for wallets, purses, and to freshen up before meeting downstairs. Most of the meal was spent reliving the events of the morning, everything much funnier now that we were all in on the joke.

After relaxing the rest of the day, catching up on missed sleep, we spent the evening at the welcome reception hosted by the conference organizers. I knew quite a few people there—and knew of many more—but it seemed like Bella knew just about everybody and everybody knew her. She'd blush madly every time someone came up to her to let her know how excited they were for her presentation while I just watched on proudly. A few were obviously just being polite, but judging by how many people began lobbing questions at her, forcing her to insist it would be brought up in the presentation, there was a significant amount of interest in what my girl had to say.

She introduced me to a number of industry bigwigs that I'd heard of but had never met, always having dealt with regional representatives instead. As the night wore on, I recalled Peter's words about the company hopefully recognizing Bella's work, and I realized just how much corporate had cheated her of what she deserved. Judging by everything I'd heard throughout the evening, she was already a major player in the industry, and even without the title to signify it, people respected her and looked to her as a leader, somebody to watch and learn from, an innovator. Even some of the biggest names in live entertainment respected her opinions, seeking them out because they were truly interested in her perspective.

The evening came to a close, and we spent a couple hours in the casino before calling it a night around midnight—two hundred dollars up, thanks to a lucky streak at the Blackjack tables—since we had to be up early for our first seminars. I laid in bed in the morning, listening to Bella move through the room getting ready, thankful that, as a guy, I only needed about ten minutes after my shower to get ready. Even a girl as low maintenance as Bella still had a hundred things to accomplish to get ready, it seemed.

I ordered room service for the two of us before I hopped into the shower, and by the time I was finished getting ready and Bella was digging through her bag for shoes, the food was here. She and I weren't attending any of the same seminars, so once we made it downstairs, we headed off into separate directions. Her presentation wasn't until the next day, and the full day she had ahead of her seemed to keep her mind off of everything, not allowing a free moment for the nervousness to get to her.

We broke for lunch at different times so, other than the five minutes I got to see her before heading off to my afternoon seminars, I hadn't had a chance to talk to her to see how things were going. At four, I was finally done for the day and couldn't wait to get back to the room to see her, knowing her last seminar was supposed to be over a half hour earlier. It took a few minutes, but I managed to sneak away from the room filled with syndicators trying to work connections and find their next project.

I was walking through a busy hall full of tourists, cameras at the ready for sightseeing, when I noticed a small crowd ahead. As I got closer, I stopped dead in my tracks when I realized that Bella was standing in the middle, arguing with some asshole who had been talking throughout my entire morning seminar, not paying any attention to anything that had been said. It only took a second for the surprise to wear off and I was moving again.

At first, the crowd wouldn't let me through, and I wished that Emmett and Jasper hadn't had a different seminar to attend that afternoon so they could help clear a path. I tried to simultaneously push through and listen to what was being said.

"Don't you dare," Bella spit out venomously. "You and I both know that you have no case. It'll be a waste of time and money for you to pursue it. You won't get a penny from me."

"We'll see about that," the asshole responded with a smug smile as I slowly made my way closer. I took another look at him, trying to figure out how she knew him. He was significantly taller than her, but still a little shorter than me, with dark hair, and a vague familiarity in his features. "You know what it'll take for me to drop it, so either pay up or I give my lawyer the green light."

"Go ahead. You signed away your rights—you have no claim to him or the money." Bella's words caused me to stop again as the realization hit over who she was speaking to: Max's father.

I pushed my way forward with even more force, ignoring the grumbles of complaint, and was by her side in seconds. It was then that I realized just how close the two were standing to each other, as if they'd been inching closer to gain an advantage, both refusing to be the one to back away first.

"There are always loopholes, Bella," he said, arms crossed and leaning over, trying to intimidate her, but it didn't faze her. "Nothing is airtight."

"Bella?" I said quietly, trying to get her attention, wanting to get her out of there, and I placed my hand on the back of her arm. She startled and turned to look at me, her features softening, washing over with relief, when she realized I was standing there. She took a moment and looked around, her face paling when she realized how many people were watching.

"Edward." She sighed my name, but she was interrupted before she could say anything further.

"New boyfriend?" the asshole asked with a humorless chuckle. "Better watch out before she gets desperate and tries to trap you, too."

I saw red and instinctively pulled my fist back, ready to lunge at him. Bella noticed the movement and immediately put her hands on my chest and tried to push me backwards, placing herself between me and him. I looked down to see her looking up, eyes pleading. "Please don't. Don't give him anything to hold over my head. Please?"

The only thing that stopped me from throwing the punch was the look of absolute desperation on her face. I could feel the pressure from her hands as she tried to force me backwards, to create distance in an attempt to halt the confrontation. I took two steps backwards, not taking my eyes from her. She looked at me for a moment longer, assessing me, trying to make sure I wouldn't act, before she turned back to him. Her body tensed again, ready for a fight, and her tone grew colder.

"You drop whatever delusion you've convinced yourself will happen. You don't scare me. Your threats are just that—threats. Empty threats, at that. No court will ever rule in your favor, and I know that you know this. You need me to believe otherwise so that I'll buy you off. It won't happen, so give it up. Now."

She turned to walk away, refusing to look at anyone, including me. She pushed her way through the crowd that had grown even more in the short time that I'd been there as the asshole tried to get the last word, yelling behind her, "We'll see about that."

"He's a child, not a fucking lottery ticket," she called out through the crowd of people, quite a few of them cheering at her words.

I was torn, wanting to go back and rip him apart, limb from limb, but she was my priority so I followed. As soon as we made it through the crowd and halfway down the hall, I watched security rush past us toward the crowd and rolled my eyes. They sure were on top on things here, I thought sarcastically.

"Bella?" I called from behind her. She didn't turn around, simply held one hand in the air to tell me to stop. Her head remained ducked down, and she wrapped both of her arms around herself protectively.

I jogged a few steps to catch up so that I could get closer to her, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Bella, please."

Her hand went up again, she shrugged away from my touch, and she shook her head frantically, not moving it from its ducked position due to her watching the floor rather than anything around her. She didn't even appear to be breathing, except for the occasional quiet gasp for air.

I stayed silent, walking directly behind her, running my hands through my hair in frustration. I replayed everything in my head and still wanted to rip the fucker's head off. I couldn't understand why she wouldn't speak to me though. Had something happened before I showed up? Was she angry that she had to stop me from hitting him? Shit, that was probably it. She was pissed that she had to stop her train of thought to break up a fight before it started.

We wound our way through the casino while I tried to figure out how to make things better, how to fix things. We made it to the elevator, and she pushed the up button a few times with her thumb before crossing her arms in front of herself once again.

"Bella?" I tried one more time. She didn't take her eyes off of the numbers above the bank of elevators, trying to figure out which would open for us, but she shook her head again to let me know that she heard me but wasn't going to respond.

Finally, one of the cars opened, and she stepped inside first while I followed right behind. She still wouldn't look at me, instead punching the button for our floor and staring at the panel. My hand was once again running through my hair, and I was caught off-guard when the door closed, leaving us alone inside, and she turned quickly and launched herself at me.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I couldn't… I just…" Her arms were wrapped around my neck, and after the initial shock wore off, I held onto her just as tightly, lifting her feet from the ground, relief washing over me while she tried to find words through her sobs. "I didn't know if he was behind us, and he has friends here and I didn't know if they were close by. I didn't want any of them to see me break down, and if I would've allowed you to speak or to touch me, I would have lost it. I couldn't let him know that he upset me this much."

"Shh," I tried calming her, running my hands up and down her back in a soothing motion while she kept chanting her apologies. "It's okay, baby. I'm not mad. I was just worried. Stop apologizing. It's okay. You're okay."

When the elevator re-opened on our floor, I led her to the room and let her cry it out. I wanted to know what the hell had happened, but she needed time to purge her emotions before she could even begin to think about talking to me.

About a half an hour later, she was finally mostly silent. Her breath would hitch on occasion, but the tears had stopped. We were both lying on the bed, still in our dress clothes, on top of the comforter. We hadn't even taken off our shoes. She simply laid there on her side, facing me, getting everything out, while I tried my best to comfort her.

"I guess you want to know what that was all about." She wiped at her eyes, but the tears had dried some time ago and even when they were falling, I had been wiping them away as they hit her cheeks. She looked at me, waiting for my response. Her words weren't angry, accusing, or negative at all, instead sounding more like she was resolving herself to tell me what had happened.

"Only if you want to tell me," I assured her. "Of course I want to know. Anything that hurts you like this, I want to be able to fix, but only if you want me to know."

She nodded slightly and started playing with the buttons on my shirt. "There really isn't anything to fix. It's over. At least, I hope it is."

I waited in silence, giving her the time she needed. It took a minute, but she continued. "That was my ex, Chad. Max's—"

"I know," I interrupted her when she seemed hesitant to finish the thought. I couldn't blame her for not wanting to verbalize the association between a child as sweet, innocent, and wonderful as Max and someone so hateful and vile.

"When I told you the story about what happened back then, I didn't tell you everything." She looked up into my eyes then to gauge my reaction, trying to figure out whether or not I was angry that she had withheld information, so I tried not to show anything other than concern and patience. Sure, I didn't like that there was something big that I didn't know, but I didn't blame her. We hadn't known each other for long when she told her story; I couldn't expect her to lay everything out. Satisfied that I was okay, she continued. "There was a lawsuit. There were a total of six other women, that were involved in this suit at least, that ended up pregnant due to the pharmaceutical company's oversight."

I remembered her saying that she found out that her birth control pills were defective, the active ingredients omitted from the pills, and I didn't know why I hadn't considered that there would be a lawsuit attached to that, especially growing up the son of a doctor, well aware of how often those companies were sued.

I didn't interrupt, letting her get the words out. "There were many more women included in the suit that had prescriptions filled from the faulty batch, but it was the seven of us that ended up with the largest chunk of the settlement. It settled in mediation. I think the pharmaceutical company knew they wouldn't win and it was likely that a jury would nail them even harder than a mediator with punitive damages. Even after the attorneys took their cuts, there was a lot of money to go around."

"He wants the money," I said as everything started to come together. The asshole found out about the money and was threatening to fight for custody if she didn't give it to him.

She nodded, still playing with buttons. "I don't know how he found out. Part of the deal when we settled was that the details were to remain confidential. We weren't allowed to discuss any of it. I don't think he knows all of the specifics or he'd be asking for a lot more."

"What is he asking for?" I asked her.

"Quarter of a million," she said, and I was pretty sure I stopped breathing. Fuck, if he was asking for that and she was saying he'd be asking for more if he knew how much her cut was, I couldn't imagine what she her portion of the settlement was. "He seems to think that he's entitled to it since the mistake 'affected' him, too, since he didn't want a kid with me. Yeah, like those few weeks of slandering me and fighting with me really changed the course of his life."

She rolled her eyes and laughed humorlessly. I couldn't believe the audacity of this guy, and more than ever I wondered why Bella put up with someone like that in her life. Then again, had things happened differently, there would be no Max. I couldn't help but have mixed feelings. He took for granted and wasted the opportunity to be a part of Max and Bella's lives forever—I hated him for hurting her, but part of me wanted to thank him for being such a waste of humanity and simply walking away, leaving a space for me to be a part of their lives. With each day, the need grew stronger and stronger, and I knew I wanted that space to belong to me permanently.

While sorting through my thoughts, Bella continued speaking. "It's not like I even want the money. I haven't spent a penny of it except for the house. It feels wrong somehow, that I sued somebody for giving me the greatest gift I never could've dreamed of having, for something I don't regret in the least. I might regret the circumstances surrounding, but I'll never regret Max."

"Of course you don't," I said as I moved closer to kiss her. She seemed better now that she was getting all of this off her chest. She melted into my arms, resting her head on my chest as I ran my hand up and down her spine. "Do you think he's really going to try to fight for custody?"

It was my most immediate concern. Max didn't need someone like that in his life, especially if he was just being used as a means to an end for financial gain, and Bella didn't need the stress of fighting this. She shook her head no and didn't seem the least bit worried.

"There's no way he'd ever win. Not only do I have the papers he signed, giving up his rights, but I have every text message, voicemail, and email that he sent—all of it saved on disc. I have a copy at home in a safe, Alice has one in her office in her safe, and my attorney has a copy. It's pretty damning evidence. Not only does it show that he was verbally abusive during that time, but his words prove that he never had any intention of taking responsibility. Some of the messages are from his friends, people his attorney would call to back up his side of the story, so their credibility is shot with what I have."

I grinned at her, impressed that even during what was probably the most stressful, most miserable time of her life, she somehow had the foresight to protect herself and Max. She was so damn smart. She grinned back at me, pretty proud of herself.

Her mood seemed to darken as she got lost in her thoughts. I simply waited, hoping she'd open up and tell me what was bothering her. She sighed once, and I could feel her start to shake again so I immediately pulled her closer, trying to calm her down, whispering into her ear.

"It's not fair," she cried out. "It's not fair to Max. Granted, he has no idea what's going on, but he doesn't deserve this. There are two people that are supposed to love kids beyond anything else, beyond anyone else, when they're born, and Max was cheated of that all because of some self-centered, irresponsible asshole."

I continued to hold her while she got everything out. "Not that I want him in our lives. Realistically, I know things worked out for the best for us, but it's hard not to regret that Max is missing out on something."

"Max isn't missing out," I assured her as she sobbed into my chest. My hands made a continuous circuit over her arms and back in hopes that my touch could offer some amount of comfort. "There's nothing he could've offered that Max doesn't already have. It's just a title—Max has plenty of people willing to fill that role for him without the title."

I had been trying to avoid over-thinking things, but I couldn't deny that I considered myself one of those people willing to—wanting to—step into that role. I lay there, trying to offer whatever comfort she needed, while I thought about how quickly my priorities had shifted and considered what would happen in the long term. As my mind raced, I held her closer, shifting slightly to pull her in tightly and pressing my lips to the top of her head while she calmed down.

We lay like that for a long while, the sky growing darker outside the window as the lights on the Strip brightened. Silence surrounded us as we each processed the events of the afternoon, until Bella's phone started ringing with Alice's ringtone.

"I can answer it and tell her we're staying in if you don't feel up to seeing anyone tonight," I offered, unsure as to whether or not Bella would want to honor our dinner plans with the group.

"I'm fine," she said, tracing my jaw with her index finger before rolling off of the bed and searching for her phone. I heard her tell Alice she just needed a few minutes to freshen up and ask if we could meet them in their room instead of the lobby. When she came back in, she looked at me for a moment before she started speaking. "I don't know who all saw that display this afternoon so I want to tell them what happened just in case we run into someone who mentions it."

"Good thinking," I said as I climbed out of the bed and walked over to kiss her and making sure she was truly okay with retelling the story.

The discussion wasn't as bad as I had expected, but everyone was understandably pretty pissed and ready to go track this guy down, Alice leading the charge. At dinner, we did run into a couple of people who asked Bella if she was okay, having walked in on the confrontation, so it turned out to be a good thing that Bella had told everyone beforehand, giving them a chance to calm down rather than finding out while out in public. As embarrassed as Bella was that these people had observed such a personal display, I could tell that she was both relieved and touched when each of them handed her a business card with their contact information should she need witnesses if her ex decided to pursue things.

I was confident that, at worst, he'd be nothing more than a brief pain in the ass if he was stupid enough to pursue anything; Bella had too much going for her, too much against him for there to be any real problem. There was no way for me to deny, though, that I was irritated that I couldn't have a few minutes to exercise my fists without giving him a little leverage. I'd just have to be satisfied that his epic screw-up was the biggest favor he could've done for me.