29. Reveal
The tall, dark-haired vampire that stepped out from between the bookcases couldn't have looked less pleased to see customers. His burgundy eyes snapped straight to Edward in a way that put my hackles up. Was a woman not deserving of his brooding stare?
"How may I help you?" he asked, drawing each word out in an accent that was certainly not American.
"That's my line," I said.
He cocked his head to one side. "Excuse me?"
I put every effort into smiling politely. "How may I help you?"
His eyes widened. "Well, that rather depends on who you are, doesn't it?"
"My name is Isabella Swan. I'm the manager of this bookstore. Might I ask how you got in?"
"I used my keys."
"Your keys?" Only three people possessed a set of keys to the store and one did not have need of them.
His lips twitched as he patted his pants pocket, ensuring I would hear the pieces of metal clanking against one another. I looked back up at his face and studied him.
He was young, maybe in his early twenties, perhaps a little too young to be in a romantic relationship with a forty-five year old woman without generating unpleasant gossip.
"Alistair?"
"Indeed. Now, where have you been, Isabella? I have been minding the store since Thursday afternoon and it would seem we have increased our clientele substantially in my absence, not least to include some rather boisterous male students."
He arched an eyebrow at me. If only he knew where the blame lay for that particular phenomenon.
"Oh. Um… Would you believe I've been turning into a vampire?"
"Ah." He nodded and turned his attention back to Edward. "So you must be…"
"Edward Cullen," Edward said, extending his right arm and shaking hands with Alistair. "Bella's mate."
"Cullen? I have a close acquaintance who goes by that name."
"Carlisle is my sire."
Alistair's eyes widened in surprise. "How is he? It's been well over a century since we last visited with each other."
Mrs C had said time didn't mean the same thing for vampires, but not seeing someone you referred to as a close acquaintance for over one hundred years seemed to stretch that statement to its very limits. I glanced at Edward but, apparently, he wasn't phased.
"My father was in good health when last I saw him," he said, "as were all my family."
"Carlisle has a family?"
"Yes. There are seven of us – eight now that I've found my mate."
Turning to me, Alistair said, "Do you intend to leave my employ?"
"I'd like to stay, for us both to work here, but I don't know if I can refrain…"
"Bella is exceptionally contained for a newborn," Edward said, "but as yet untested with human blood." Then, as he finished his sentence, a sly smile crept across his face.
I wasn't smiling, though. I'd heard his heartbeat before he'd even become visible through the window and I had sucked in two lungfuls of his scent before I'd thought to hold my breath.
The bell clanged ominously as the door swung open and the look on Mike's face shifted from happy relief to absolute terror in the same split second.
"Don't run!" Edward said.
I had no intention of moving, let alone running. I was too busy trying to root myself to the spot.
"Try to breathe a little slower," Edward said. I'd stopped breathing and I wasn't about to start again while Mike was still within sniffing distance. "It will lower your heart rate."
What?
"You did it," Mike whispered, looking right at me. A tear escaped one eye and rolled down his cheek. I nodded. "Your eyes are red. Are you going to…? Do you want my…?"
I frowned and shook my head, flexing my hands to keep them from curling up into claws. Venom was repeatedly filling my mouth and each time I swallowed it down, more came to replace it.
"You're doing well, Bella," Edward murmured so low I wondered if Mike could hear him. "Do you want him?"
Yes! "No," I whispered through clenched teeth and barely parted lips.
"It's probably best that you leave for now, Mike," Edward said. "Slow and steady."
My heart sank, watching Mike turn and go. He walked back to his store with his head down and his hands quivering. I wanted to cry but no tears would come.
"Well, she cannot be doing this every time a customer comes in, can she?" Alistair said.
"What would you rather she do?" Edward replied. "Drink first and ask how she might help them later? She is less than half a day old and she just resisted her first human – her long-time friend. Could you have done that?" He paused to stare at Alistair's tormented expression. "No, I thought not."
I looked down at the floor. "I love this store, Alistair, and I love my home above Mrs C's, but I'll understand if you want to find someone new – someone human."
"I don't know," he said. "Shelly said that– "
"She told me about you and her."
"She did?"
"She encouraged me to make the change before it was too late."
"I still love her. I still want her. That's why I come back."
"That's why she waits for you. I'd have done the same for Edward."
Edward's arms wrapped around me, pulling my face into his chest."
"She hoped this was the reason for your absence," Alistair said. "Maybe I should go and give her the good news. Edward, can you manage alone?"
Edward's chest rumbled as he spoke. "I'm not alone. I have Bella."
…
Alistair had not kept the inventory up to date but he had at least kept a pencil written list of sales. There weren't many but I wasn't overly surprised given his less than personable demeanour.
I also wasn't surprised that he hadn't tackled any of the online orders. I sent out an email to our customers, apologising for the delay and advising that their orders would be fulfilled the following week.
Edward marvelled at my motor skills as I seemed to instinctively know how much pressure to use on the computer keyboard, much as I had with the buttons on his black shirt. We both wondered if the traces of venom from his little feeding sessions had played some part in that.
And so, I kept myself busy at my desk all day, holding my breath every single time the bell above the door clanged. Once, when it got too much, I hid in the restroom, sniffing first the soap and then the bottle of bleach beside the toilet, until Edward told me it was safe to come out.
From then on, we kept the front door wedged open. It was cold and breezy out but, thankfully, not wet.
Much was my relief when, on the drive home, Edward took a detour and parked near the edge of the forest. He leaned across me and opened my door.
"Are you letting me off the leash?" I asked.
"You'd better be quick, Bella. I need to take you home to bed. You're looking very tired."
"I am?"
"Most definitely."
…
"Is it turning you on, smelling the human me on these sheets?" I asked, turning my head to watch him.
"Yes and no." He sniffed my pillow and lay back down beside me. "I've conditioned myself to hold back and now I don't have to, but you don't smell that different for being a vampire. It's just more intense."
I looked back up the ceiling joist. "Shall we play a game?"
"What kind of game?"
"Truth or dare, except without the dare."
"This sounds an awful lot like your game of twenty questions, Bella."
"No, no. It's different, entirely." I schooled my face. "I'll recall something you told me when I didn't believe you were a vampire and you can tell me if it's true."
"I've never lied to you, Bella, so there's little point in going over old ground."
I glanced at him. "So, you really are six foot two?"
"Would you like me to stand against a wall so you can check? You'll need to stand on a chair, mind."
"Watch it!" I said, elbowing his side.
"You know everything I told you about me is true. You only had to look in the mirror to see the colour of your eyes and the pallor of your skin. The hearing, the speed, the breathing and the diet – you've experienced these for yourself already."
I rolled onto on my side and got caught in his gaze.
"When you first stand in the sunlight," he said, "you will see yourself sparkle. When you first touch a human, you'll feel the difference in temperature. And the only reason you needed the restroom today was to distract yourself from eating a boy intent on feeling up your mate."
"Don't remind me." I placed my hand firmly on what was mine.
"Yours," he said, laughing.
I tightened my grip. "You told me it took three days to change into a vampire."
His entire body stiffened, not just the part in my hand. "That wasn't a lie, Bella."
"Then why did it only take me two?"
"I don't know," he whispered. "Maybe my venom..."
I climbed on top of him and sat up, rubbing myself all over his erection. "Or my sheer bloody-mindedness."
His jaw dropped. I winked at him, changed the angle of my hips and took him inside me, making him groan. He gripped my hips with both hands.
"You still can't read my mind," I said.
"No, but you know I read Alistair's. You could tell."
"Yes. Maybe."
His hands glided up to touch my breasts, his thumbs brushing over my nipples.
"Oh! How old are you, Edward?"
"One hundred and eleven."
"And how old were you when you were changed." I swivelled my hips.
"O–Old enough to be legal in the State of Washington."
Was it possible for a vampire to turn any paler? "You weren't playing with me?"
"I told you, I was–"
"Seventeen?! You meant it?"
His hands flew back to my hips, holding me firmly in place. "Oh no," he said. "You're not going anywhere. Breathe through it, Bella. Forget about numbers and focus on us, together, like this for all eternity."
He did that thing with his eyes where I couldn't look away. There had been me thinking it was meant to ensnare his prey when maybe, after all, he had been silently telling me how he felt all along.
The grip on my hips got lighter and his hands travelled up my sides and around my back, pulling me down toward him.
"Kiss me, Bella," he whispered. "Show me it doesn't matter to you."
"But seventeen, Edward!"
"My driver's licence says I'm twenty-four."
"That's still younger than me!"
He flipped me onto my back and pressed his mouth to mine. Then he began to slide in and out of me so very slowly I ached for more. My hands reached down to grip his behind.
"Would that I had found you when you were still seventeen," he murmured, lifting his head and arching his back.
"I wasn't quite so curvy then." I smiled against his throat and nipped his skin. "Or as experienced."
I might have broken his carefully crafted civility with those few words. It was a testament to the quality of my sofabed that it survived the pounding.
…
Steam billowed out of the bathroom. I could see it out of the corner of my eye, although my attention was fixed elsewhere.
"What are you doing up there, Bella?"
"Reading." I swung my legs back and forth and turned the page. "Oh, hello!"
Edward landed smoothly on the joist beside me, somehow managing to maintain his modesty. He leaned over and kissed my cheek.
"Nice outfit," I said, tugging at the top edge of his bath towel. "You should wear that one to work."
"I'm not sure Alistair would approve."
"Mrs C would, though. She really likes you."
"Yes, she does."
"I really like you, too."
"In that case, I'll stay right here."
"Are you sure this is where you want to be?"
"By your side on a joist? Absolutely, although you are a little overdressed."
I was wearing my panties and Edward's shirt.
"Next time I'll wear a bedsheet," I said, "but I meant living here in my little one room apartment with the sloping ceiling above the shower. Don't you miss anything from your family home? Your own books and music…"
"Not as much as I would have thought, but if my family gets in touch…"
"Would your things fit in here?"
"We might need another bookcase or three and some storage for my music collection, but I could always put my things in the kitchen cabinets." He bumped his shoulder against mine.
"I'll need to empty those out, won't I?"
"There's no hurry, except for the perishable items."
"It seems weird, the thought of not using my kitchen anymore."
"We've always had a kitchen in every home, whether we've remodelled or not."
"Why?"
"Appearances sake, for when humans come knocking. Occasionally, Carlisle and Esme would entertain his colleagues from one hospital or other. They still do, except they no longer have to pretend to eat and drink."
"What did you do on those occasions?"
"Provide background music, playing the piano."
"Oh! Would you want to bring your piano here?"
"It wouldn't fit. Besides, it belongs in my family home, wherever that is."
"Don't you miss playing it?"
"Sometimes, but I seem to have found other things to keep my hands occupied."
"Oh really? Like what?"
He stared into my eyes, his getting darker by the second. "Do you remember the morning you woke up and saw me up here?"
"You said you were resisting temptation."
"Yes."
"Because I was talking in my sleep and… What exactly was I doing that had you perched up here?"
"A gentleman never tells, Bella, but if you'd like to hop down, perhaps I could show you."
…
It was that brief period of time between dawn and sunrise that had once appealed to Edward when the world was a different place for him. We lay on our sides staring at each other, his forefinger tracing over the features of my face.
"I feel like I'm in a dream," I said.
"Why?"
"It's too easy."
"Maybe that's how it's meant to be, for you I mean."
"But I haven't lost anything."
He smiled. "Except grilled cheese and tomato soup."
"Except that."
"And maybe your friends for a short while until you can be sure you won't eat them."
"Yeah."
"And that's one advantage of our being accepted into society. In times gone by, you'd have had to give up everything."
"Like you did?"
"In a way, except I'd lost everything already, Bella. Both my parents had gone and I was about to join them. And you have lost your father. I'd say that was enough, wouldn't you?"
"Maybe. I don't know."
He fiddled with a lock of my hair. "Just wait until you've lived ten years unchanged. Your friends will have aged a little, maybe had children, but you will look the same as you do today. In thirty years, they'll be looking much older, at best moaning about aching joints, at worst more serious health complaints. And then, in fifty years, they may well have gone and you will be left watching their children's children have families of their own."
I grabbed his hand and kissed it. "But I'll still have you."
"You might be bored with me by then." He winked.
"Somehow I doubt that."
"It's almost light outside. What say you we go out for breakfast and then spend the rest of the day writing."
"Is writing a euphemism for something else?"
"You tell me."
And so we raced to get dressed and out of the front door, jogging along the quiet streets of Port Angeles until we reached the forest.
