Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. I am in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise, I just use their creations to have my wicked way with them. No copyright infringement is intended.
This story wouldn't be what it is without my wonderful beta, The Real Teacher, holding my hand and correcting my many errors. Thank you so much!
- 35 –
I sighed, pinching the skin between my brows as the tiny little letters in front of me started to swim which was not a good thing when you were trying to concentrate on what they were trying to tell you.
"Fuck!" I growled, my leg bouncing up and down in frustration. I really needed to focus on getting this fucking paperwork out of the way so that I could go home. Plus, walking into the courtroom tomorrow morning actually knowing something about the case you were trying might come in handy…..
"That bad?" I looked up to see Jasper grinning at me from his usual spot against the doorpost. Seriously, was the guy studying to be an office ornament or something? I thought his new job was going to leave him with a hell of a lot of work to do?
"Don't start," I hissed through my teeth. "I was in court all morning which means that right now I've got to wade through all of this stuff on the DeSoto case before tomorrow morning's session in front of Judge Swift or Liam is going to have my ass."
Jasper's face was all mocked compassion. "Poor little rich boy!"
"I thought you were so fucking busy you didn't even have the time to lift your ass and fart so what the fuck are you badgering me for?" I scowled before shrugging my shoulders, my eyes gliding back to the pile of paper in front of me. "It wouldn't be so bad if I could concentrate for longer than two fucking seconds in a row."
"Right." Jasper nodded, pushing his frame back from the doorway and sauntering into the room. "I forgot that Bella has another session with Zafrina today."
"And not only that," I sighed, rubbing my hands over my face. "She's hell bent on getting to and from her appointment on her own."
Jasper's face was all understanding now, knowing that that session was going to take a lot out of Bella even without her having to wade through traffic on her own afterwards. "Ah."
Realistically I knew that Zafrina would never let Bella leave that office on her own if she wasn't convinced my girl would make it back home in once piece, but as I watched the minutes tick away on the clock, I found that reason was overestimated when it came to matters of the heart.
All I cared about was that for all I knew my girl was revisiting hell right about now and I wasn't there to help her. And didn't that make me feel like the biggest ass in the world!
There was nothing I wanted more right now than to take care of her but, realistically, I knew that even if I somehow could make this huge stack of paperwork disappear, she probably wouldn't let me. If she'd been stubborn before the whole business with the Volturi had gone down, she sure as hell hadn't changed her ways after. If she set her mind to something, it was going to happen, come hell, high water or God knows how many hours spent by me trying to change her mind.
"Yep," I smirked. "So now you know why I'm having trouble concentrating and it ain't got nothing to do with my fucked up pedigree."
"It will be fine," Jasper tried to reassure me. "Bella's a big girl She knows better than to be callous with her own safety."
I could only hope he was right.
A few weeks ago, there would have been no doubt in my mind that Bella was going to walk into that office, kick some psychological ass and make it back home without breaking a sweat.
Right now, though, not so much.
Bella had changed. Whatever had happened to her at that godforsaken mansion had made her more pensive and quiet than she had been before….more reserved. While part of me rejoiced in this new, sweeter version of the girl I loved, another – bigger – part of me panicked every time she withdrew into herself. It drove me wild not to know what was going on inside that mind of hers or how to help her.
I sighed, my fingers moving the papers around on my desk while being careful never to disturb the order in which they were stacked and place. God knew I couldn't handle screwing up right now. "Anyway," I concluded, "enough about me. Did you need me for something?"
"I do, actually," Jasper chuckled. "Gar and I need you to come into the main office to work on our response to Tanya's latest accusations."
My scowl deepened. Tanya. Fucking bitch was just about the last person I needed to deal with right now.
Over the last week and a half, she'd been in and out of the media constantly. Following her first, very successful article, she'd managed to come back 'stronger' every time, hurtling everything from blatant lies about my family to snide remarks about me and Bella into the public domain.
She'd tried to hit me where she thought it would hurt most: my reputation.
After we'd helped to bring down the Volturi, Bella and I had had our share of media-exposure; the story of how a young lawyer and a journalism student brought down a powerful organization of the worst criminal kind imaginable being too good to pass up on and making Bella and me the next media darlings…..heroes.
Not that I particularly liked that, though I had to admit I liked it better than the way I was being portrayed right now.
In the few moments we'd spent together, Tanya had somehow managed to pick up (or surmise) more than I ever could have imagined and now she'd used it to paint a picture of me as one of the biggest assholes walking the face of the earth.
The kind of selfish asshole who would use his family name and connections to muscle in on his father's case, even if that could have caused some serious problems for the firm representing him.
The kind of disgusting player who would spent his downtime hanging out in bars, drinking and picking up random girls to fuck and throw out on the streets again as soon as he was done getting his own pleasure instead of staying home to comfort his poor, suffering mother.
The kind of callous cad who would snatch a woman away from a loving fiancé with promises of money and advancement and break the heart and the hopes of many people just so that he could get what he wanted.
The kind of son who thought his father guilty of murder….
The tabloids all ate it up, of course, giving Tanya just the thing she'd set out to get: her own fifteen minutes of fame. But the thing that infuriated me the most in the wake of her vitriolic words was the fact that she had gotten pretty damn close to the truth.
After all, I had been an asshole.
True, not quite as big a one as she claimed I was but I still knew enough of her words were true to make a defamation suit against her a hopeless undertaking that would only lead to me attention for her and more embarrassment for me, my family and the firm.
Not that I particularly liked taking the highroad, though.
I wanted to fucking kill the bitch.
"A reaction, really?" I snorted. "Whatever happened to taking the high road? Did Garrett change his mind?"
I had to admit that I'd been more than a bit surprised and disappointed by the fact that, for now, Garrett didn't want to press charges against Tanya and the Seattle Star for defamation of character. For all the time he'd been spending with my family of late, I'd expected him to be as mad as we were, not to go on about a lawsuit being just the kind of reaction they were going for and 'letting it all blow over'.
"Don't think so," Jasper smiled apologetically. "But I think he's looking into you giving a short interview with a more respectable newspaper where you get your side of things out in the open."
I arched one of my brows. "Really?" I'd thought about a similar tactic myself but instantly dismissed it; the risk of me screwing up more than I could ever fix by talking to the press filling me with an immediate performance anxiety. But if Garrett believed I could pull this off, I just might…provided I didn't spill anything about my dad's case or the upcoming case against the Volturi, it might work.
Jasper shrugged, motioning for me to follow him into Garrett's huge office at the end of the hallway.
With most of the media storm about the Volturi-arrests dying down again, things at the office had slowly quieted back down. Liam and Jasper had settled into their new positions and were shining in their new roles as senior partner and partner in the firm. For me, of course, it also meant that things were changing in my workplace. With Jasper gone I was starting to pick up some more responsibilities around the firm as well as coming to grips with working under Liam, who was my new direct boss.
I was lucky. Not only did Liam turn out to be an okay kind of guy, he was also a great mentor. He may not be as experienced as Garrett was and Eli had been but what he lacked in seniority, he more than made up in fire and passion for the trade.
Plus, he also knew what it was like to be me – fresh out of law school and starting out at a new firm. We were eager and dying to proof ourselves, but had no real experience in the courtroom or in the day to day proceedings at the firm other than the stuff we'd learned during our internships.
He allowed me and the other associates working under him to grow while still keeping an eye on us to prevent us from making any kind of mistakes that would reflect bad upon the firm. It felt almost like I was back at Peter and Charlotte's firm, the one I'd left in Boston when I came back home.
It felt great.
It felt like, among all the ugliness that had entered my life and Bella's, there was finally something to be happy about and look forward to every day.
A future.
"Ah, Edward!" Garrett's eyes lit up as Jasper and I walked into the room. "I trust Jasper already told you about our plan?"
"You want me to talk to the press?" I verified.
"Hard to believe, huh?" Garret snickered, his hands folded around the back of his head as he leaned back in his chair. He went on when I nodded. "I wish I could take credit for the plan. But I can't It was actually your missus who brought it up."
"My…." I frowned, trying to digest his words.
"Bella?" Garrett snickered. "You know her. Short little spitfire who sleeps next to you every night? That one."
"How…." I went on, apparently unable to utter any sentence longer than one word.
Garrett seemed to enjoy my confusion very much. "I just got off the phone with her. Apparently she'd been having lunch with one of her newspaper friends and they got to talking about your recent stint as Seattle's latest 'media darling'. Apparently that friend of hers brought this up…."
"And Bella called you?" I interrupted, still not quite getting to grips with the fact that apparently my girlfriend had called my boss instead of me; her boyfriend.
"You were still in court, I guess," Garrett shrugged. "And she called Jasper, to be honest, but he put her through to me when he she told him her suggestion."
I scratched my head, beyond caring if that made the already scraggly mess of hair on top of my head stand even more on end. "When did all of this happen?"
"A few hours ago." Garrett held up his hand, stopping me before I could interrupt him this time. "We wanted to put in some calls, make sure there was a respectable newspaper willing to work with us on this one, before we brought you in. The newspaper friend seemed to be convinced that The Daily was the newspaper to go with but we figured we'd be better of picking something that had a more….wider audience."
"Right," I muttered, understanding now how it must be for my dad to stand by while others were running around, trying to organize your life for you. It sucked. No wonder dad looked so sullen all the time. "And did you find someone?"
"We did, actually," Jasper chimed in. "You have an appointment with a mister Alastair Moore at eight AM sharp, tomorrow morning at Joe's diner on Broadway. You should be able to say what you have to say and make it out of there with more than enough time to make it to court."
I nodded, making a mental note of the time.
"Don't be late," he warned me, "and don't say anything that will get us in trouble or you're fired. Don't think I forgot what it was that got us into this whole Tanya Denali mess in the first place."
"Noted," I sighed, knowing he had a point there. It figured that I would be the one to clean up the mess since, as he'd so aptly put, I was the one who created it by trying to poke my dick behind enemy lines.
"Good," Garrett nodded, a satisfied smile playing on his lips. "Now get out of here. I've got a client coming in and I'm sure you two have got better things to do than hang around here lookin' pretty."
Jasper grinned, shaking his head as he opened the door. "But you have to admit that the two of us are mighty pretty, boss."
He and I left before Garrett could throw some kind of office supply at us, both grinning from ear to ear as we heard our boss mumble something about 'damned young yuppie lawyer scum and their arrogant ways'.
"So…." I drawled as we lingered outside the door,. "Any news on my dad's case?"
Jasper smirked, shifting around uncomfortably from one foot to the other. "Not much I can share."
I huffed, pinching the bridge of my nose in frustration. "What can you tell me?"
It wasn't as if I didn't understand why Jasper and Garrett couldn't share stuff about my dad's case as freely with me as when I was still part of the team, it just made me feel kind of left out of the loop. I knew it was only right an proper for a son to stay as far away as he could from his own dad's murder case, but being involved…knowing what the fuck was going on…..it had made me feel kind of connected to dad in a way that had been missing from the rest of my life. It was like helping my dad made it harder to hate him and keep my distance.
Now that that connection was gone, I hardly knew how to talk to him or even look at him. Not that he was making it any easier for me….The way he moved around the house like some kind of stray dog, expecting to be beaten the minute someone noticed he was there, made it hard to strike up a conversation even if I had known what to talk to him about.
And then there was mom…
Bella had been right when she'd broached the subject of my dysfunctional family a couple of weeks back. To the outside world my mom may have been coping with the discoveries she'd been forced to make in a miraculous way, the ones who really knew her, knew how hard she was taking all of this.
She just didn't know what to do anymore. Her husband, whom she had stood by through good times and bad – as she had promised on her wedding day – had turned out to be nothing more but a common crook, and her brother – whom she had always looked up to and almost revered – had turned out to be an even worse kind of human being. In a way, she'd lost them both even though dad was around much more now than he had been in the last ten years together and her brother was safely locked away in King County jail.
But that wasn't all.
Maybe, if all there had been to it had been my dad and uncle getting arrested and standing trial, she would have been able to cope with it as well as everyone thought she was. After all, mom had always possessed of a miraculous ability to bounce back from adversity. Who knows what she could have done if she'd have had anything to fall back on?
But the thing was….she didn't.
When dad had been arrested, it had affected more than just mom's personal life. Throughout her whole adult life and maybe even before that, mom had used the position she had in society to do as much as she could for those who didn't have as easy a life as she had. Over the last thirty years she'd been involved in just about every charity that crossed her path. She'd been a welcome guest at many gala's and charity balls in town and a generous bidder at the various auctions benefitting the needy….
But all of that was gone now; her whole life up in smoke the moment the police had turned up to arrest my dad for murder.
After my dad had been arrested, the invitations had stopped as quickly as the changing of tides. It seemed that not one of the charities my mom had given so much of her time and hard work to, wanted to be associated with the wife of a murder suspect, ironically enough not even the one that claimed it was trying to help former inmates find their way back into society.
And so she sat at home, every night, when only a few months ago she would have been out and about meeting the people she thought were her friends and doing the things she held more important than anything else. I figured she must have been bored out of her skull, even if she waved away every suggestion Bella and I made to include her into our plans claiming she 'didn't want to intrude on our time alone'.
"Edward?" Jasper nudged me, trying to get my attention.
I looked up. "Huh?"
"Did you hear anything I just said?" he asked, snorting loudly when all I gave him was a vacant look. "I was saying that we hadn't really gotten any further with the DA's office seeing as they don't want to take the murder charges off the table and we don't want to go ahead until they do."
"Right." I nodded, knowing that this was the deadlock the prosecution and defense had held each other in for weeks now.
"Time is running out, though," Jasper went on, "and your dad is getting more and more impatient."
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
"He wants to see the Volturi-ringleaders go to jail and he wants to be the one to send them there – or at least one of the people," Jasper explained. "Most of all, he wants to come clean to the police…."
I nodded, already knowing my dad's desire to do 'the right thing' for once in his life.
"It makes our job kind of hard, though," Jasper smirked. "We want to give him the best possible deal and we feel that we can only do so by holding out until the state prosecutors drop the murder charges…."
"Which they're not going to do," I finished.
Jasper nodded. "We've got another meeting with Fisher in an hour, though. He called us this morning claiming he had 'something to discuss with us'."
"Do you think he's going to offer a new plea deal?"
He shrugged. "I hope he does. I don't know how long we can keep your dad happy before he cowboys out on us and goes to the police on his own account."
I cringed. "That bad?"
"You really should talk to him, Edward," Jasper sighed, rubbing the goatee he was trying to grow. "I know things around your place are…difficult…."
I snorted. You could say that again!
"…but your dad is wrestling with some pretty heavy stuff right now. And as much as you may hate or resent him or want to blame him for stuff he did in the past, he needs your help. Talk to him, before it may be too late."
I stopped him, my hand heavy on his shoulder as I narrowed my eyes, trying to read the expression on his face. "What are you saying?"
"Whichever way you twist this, your dad is going to jail," Jasper explained as we reached his office. "I'm just thinking that you might want to set the record straight before there are bars between the two of you. You have a chance to make this right….I think you should take it."
"I'll think about it." I sighed, looking past him at the clock on the far wall of his new office space. Thee PM. If everything went according to plan. Bella would be on her way back right now.
"Go home, Cullen," Jasper snickered, his eyes following mine. "Be with your girl."
"I can't…." I started.
"Yes you can," Jasper countered. "Personal experience has taught me that no matter how hard you try, you can't focus on your work when your heart's at home. No matter how hard you try, you won't be able to come up with anything good before you know Bella's alright."
"Fine," I gave in, knowing he was right.
Jasper chuckled. "Just make sure to keep a log on your hours. Garrett is going to throw a major hissy fit if he's cheated out of some of his precious 'billable hours' because you were too lazy to keep a register."
I snorted. Garrett would have made a mean accountant if he hadn't chosen to settle into the law, but for all his nagging about all of us keeping a close track of the hours we made, the firm was flourishing again, which wasn't something a lot of us had been expecting.
In fact, it was nothing short of a miracle.
"Get out of here!" Jasper snickered, playfully shoving me in the direction of my office. As I made my way to my office I heard him call after me, "And tell Bella I said thank you for the advice. Alice loved her idea of me taking her to see that new exhibition on Quileute art at the Art Museum."
It took me all of five minutes to log off, shove the paperwork into my briefcase and lock up, the elevator taking way too long to bring me back to the garage where my car was waiting for me.
Mine. My own. My precious.
I knew that if Bella were there, she'd launch into another one of her lectures about how cars were nothing more than 'modes of transportation' or 'mere appliances' and how ridiculous it was to get emotionally attached to them, but as I slid into the driver's seat and let the engine purr to life with a mere flick of my wrist, I couldn't stop a huge smile from settling onto my face.
Ah, the joys of being back behind the wheel again…
I'd only been cleared to drive again a couple of days ago, my wound now as good as healed and my body bounced back from being almost dead.
It still felt kind of surreal, knowing that I'd been dead for a while and that, had it not been for the EMT's shocking me back to life, I wouldn't be here there right now.
If anything, it only made me appreciate life even more and want to live it to the fullest.
With the people I loved the most.
I made it back home in record time. With traffic not being quite so gruesome at this hour of day as it normally was, I was able to step on the gas, the engine revving enthusiastically as I tested some of its strength.
I couldn't fully enjoy it, though, because as much as I loved being back behind the wheel and having my car to myself, right now my worry for Bella overrode everything else.
I was relieved to see her car parked safely on the driveway when I finally made it home, the new paintjob shining in the watery, late-November sunlight as I pulled up next to it.
No matter how much I'd pleaded with her to let me buy her a new and more reliable car than good old Jerry Garcia, Bella wouldn't budge. Jerry was part of her history and with everything else around her falling apart, I could sort of imagine how she'd want to hold on to those few things that remained the same. And her truck was definitely one of those things.
After some gentle – and some not so gentle – persuading she had agreed to have her truck put through a complete overhaul, though, because as fond as she may have been of her truck, even Bella could see why it would do her no good to get stuck somewhere between Seattle and Woodway because the archaic engine couldn't hack it. In the end only the bodywork had remained, the rest being redone, rewired, updated and repainted, making the truck look a lot better than it used to be while still being the same old Jerry Garcia. And still being so….Bella.
I grinned at the stark contrast of Bella's beloved sturdy old truck against the polished elegance of everything surrounding it. Like everything else, it had breathed a bit of life into our dreary existence. Or at least….it made a brave attempt to do so.
Looking up at the elegant stone façade made me sigh. After Bella and I had come home from our hospital stay, I had hoped that things would slowly return to normal, but regrettably they hadn't. My parents still went out of their way to avoid each other while acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever come to pass, creating a suffocating atmosphere in the house that was thick with resentment and regret.
It was why Bella and I, in turn, went out of our way to avoid them, preferring instead to spend as much time as we could in my rooms, creating out own little Eden, far away from the rest of the world where we talked, laughed and made love and tried our best to erase the past.
But it was still there and the lingering effects of it were what made me speed into the house and rush up the stairs to be by Bella's side.
"Edward? Is that you?" I groaned when my mom's voice, coming from the kitchen, made me screech to a stop halfway up the stairs.
I growled out a reply, my mood sinking even further when I spotted her coming out into the hallway, a dishtowel draped across her shoulder. "You're home early."
"I wrapped up all of my meetings early and figured I might as well do my paperwork from home," I shrugged, somehow feeling like I had to justify my decision to my mom. It frustrated me, even though I knew she'd never judge me for picking my girlfriend over my job.
"It's good you're here." I smiled as my mom immediately confirmed my assessment. "I think Bella may have had a tough time in therapy today…."
My lips pressed into a tense line, knowing exactly what that meant. "How bad is it?"
"I can't say," mom answered, her sadness and compassion thick in her voice. "I was just basting the chicken when I heard her come in and when I finally had my hands free, she'd already gone upstairs…."
I nodded. "Thanks, mom."
Over the past couple of weeks mom and I had gotten used to Bella walking into the house like a ghost, her mind far away as her body moved like a robot until it found some quiet place to think about and digest the stuff she'd just worked though in her session with Zafrina.
It freaked me out, even though she'd always snap out of it after a couple of hours. I knew it was just her mind's way of dealing with what happened but even so…..that vacant look in her eyes killed me every time.
"Will the two of you be joining me for dinner tonight? Or do you want me to take up a tray to your room?" Mom's voice pulled me out of my thoughts and looking down at her I noticed how she was fidgeting with the towel. "I finally got your dad to join us so I was hoping…."
"I don't know, mom." I sighed, wishing I could give mom the answer she was hoping for. "But I'll do my best."
"My dear boy." Mom's lips pulled into a warm and genuine smile as I leaned down the banister to kiss her cheek. "Now go. Take care of your girl."
She didn't have to say that twice.
When I made it into the room that served as our sitting room/study, I found her seated in the window seat, her head leaning against the cool glass as she gazed out onto the garden and Puget Sound beyond it.
"Bella?" I announced my presence, not wanting to scare her by sneaking up on her. I'd learned the hard way how much of a mistake that would be.
"Hmmm?" Her eyes never left whatever she was looking at outside, her hand coming up to draw patterns into the condensation her breath had left on the glass as her shoulders pulled up in tension.
I slowly moved into the room, setting my bag next to my desk before making my way over to the window. "How did your session with Zafrina go?"
"She wants me to try going back to the university," Bella stated, her eyes dashing quickly to mine before returning back to the garden.
I sighed, knowing how Bella was still having difficulties being around crowds of people. "And what do you want?" I sat down at the opposite end of the seat, taking her feet into my lap, my fingers massaging the firm, soft skin through her socks.
She let out a deep breath. "I don't know."
"Sure you do." I shook my head, not letting her fob me off with an evasive answer.
Her lips drew into a smile as she realized I was on to her, her face finally turning towards me as she answered my question in earnest. "I want to go back, but I don't know if I can."
I shrugged, offering her what I hoped was an encouraging smile. "There's only one way to find out."
"Do you know that those were the exact same words Rose spoke to me when I discussed it with her?" Bella chuckled. "I wish it was that simple, though."
"I know," I nodded, Bella's chuckled turning into giggles when I lifted one of her feet into the air and placed a kiss on her sole before releasing it again. "But do you think you're up to giving it a try?"
She took her time to think before answering. "I think I am," she finally spoke, her voice hesitant and unsure. "I have to be."
"I'm proud of you, sweetheart," I assured her. "You're trying so hard….."
"Yeah, but I'm nowhere near there yet," she interrupted me. "I still have to far to go and….."
"Come here." I opened my arms for her, waiting until finally she bridged the gap and crawled into my lap, my arms closing around her as I buried my face into her hair. "You're trying and that's all that matters to me."
"Even if I fail?" she asked in a tiny voice, her hands gripping me like I was a life buoy.
"Even if you fail," I repeated matter-of-factly. "After all, if you flunk out of college now, we'd have more than enough time to start working on those eight babies we agreed upon when we were kids."
"You agreed upon," she corrected me. "If I remember it correctly I was never asked for my opinion, even if I will be the one to carry them around and push them out through a hole that seems nowhere near big enough for a human being to come out through. Even if it's just a baby."
I chuckled, though I had to admit that the thought of having a baby with Bella – a tiny human being created by the two of us – didn't seem as scary and foreign an idea as it used to be. In fact, I found it more appealing than I probably should.
We sat there in a perfect, comfortable silence, snuggled closely together in the window seat as we watched the sun slowly dip behind the horizon, the water of Puget Sound seeming almost on fire as the fading twilight reflected in it, before all the world turned dark.
"Thanks," Bella whispered, kissing the sliver of skin that had been uncovered when I loosened my tie and unbuttoned the top buttons of my dress shirt. "For being there for me today. You have no idea how much it meant to me to have you here…..even if I haven't been much fun to be around."
"I always love being with you," I assured her, "even when you're down and quiet and I'm going out of my mind trying to find out what's going on inside that head of yours….."
I could still see the disbelief in her eyes and it made me crazy. How could she not see how special she was? How much she'd changed me for the better? How much I craved being with her, ever moment of the day?
"Hey." I cradled her face in my hands, forcing her to look at me and see the truth in my words. "I don't ever want you to feel like you're a burden or anything but the best thing that ever happened to me, Bella. I love you."
She crumbled, her bottom lip trembling as her eyes filled with tears. "Show me?"
My lips were on hers before she was even done asking, kissing her sweetly and chastely before pulling back again, rubbing my nose softly against hers before I spoke. "I will never stop showing you."
She whimpered, her hands gripping my shoulders as my hands slid down from her cheeks down her shoulders and down her spine until they cupped her ass cheeks, pulling her into me until she was straddling my lap. "Do you feel it, angel?" I asked, my voice husky with my need for her. "Do you feel how much I want you….how much I need you?"
I grinned as a small moan rose from Bella's throat, her hips slowly grinding into mine, almost as in a caress, as my hands continued to explore every rise and slope of her body through the fabric of her clothes while my nose was buried in the crook at the base of her neck, trying to breathe her in.
Well, about those clothes….it was about time they were coming off.
"I want to get you naked," I hummed against her skin, the static cackling around us as my hands ripped the lumpy woolen cardigan she was wearing over her head and threw it across the room. "I want that beautiful body of yours, spread out and ready for me on the bed….."
"Yes," Bella's breathy voice called out, her eyes clouded and dilated with lust, her back arching as she offered her lace clad chest to me like an offer on an altar, my hands immediately granting her wish, my thumbs flicking her pebbled peaks as I enclosed those modest, perfect round orbs in my hands.
"…..I want to kiss, lick and caress every single sliver of your skin until you can't stand it anymore….." I let my voice trail off, kissing her deeply as my hands drifted back to her ass, her legs automatically closing around me as I stood up and crossed the room without ever breaking our kiss.
"And I will make you see – again and again – just how much I want you…." I threw her on the bed, my body immediately joining her and crawling over her until we were pressed flush against each other, Bella's chest rising and falling against mine with her shallow, lust-labored breaths.
"…..and need you….." I ground my hips in hers to emphasize my words, eliciting another delicious moan from my girl's lips.
"…..and can't stand the thought of ever being without you," I finished, kissing a trail from her lips down to her cleavage as my hands went to work at opening the front clasp of her bra.
"Fucking perfect." I purred lowly in my chest as finally – after concluding that bra-clasps were the instrument of the devil, whether they closed on the front or the back – Bella's beautiful breasts were revealed to me, her skin breaking out in goose bumps as it was exposed to the cool air.
Bella's hands gripped my hair as I dove in, kissing and nipping her tender skin. "All yours," she gasped, her hips twisting off the bed in search of friction, "…..I'm all yours."
I snarled, her words fuelling my lust until it burned like a wildfire, my dick now painfully hard and begging for relief in its much too close confines of my boxer briefs.
But this wasn't about me.
This was about me showing Bella how much she meant to me…..how much she was loved.
So I snapped to it.
I shed the remained of her clothes, my hands running up her naked legs as I crawled back towards her. "You're so fucking beautiful, Bella," I whispered, kissing the smooth expanse of her flat stomach, my tongue dipping into her belly button before licking a trail down.
Her eyes widened when she realized what I was going to do, though judging from the way her fingers were digging into the mattress it wasn't fear that had caused them to do that.
I chuckled, my hands parting her legs to accommodate me. "Fuck you're so wet for me," I gasped, as her glistening flesh was revealed to me. "I can't wait to get a taste of you….."
My comments garnered another whimper, her body squirming with impatience as I took my time to drink in the sight before me. "Edward…." Her voice sounded almost pained as she cried out, my lips pulling into a smug, crooked grin at the thought that it was me who made her that desperate before I dove in.
It was me she wanted and – God – did I want her.
"I can never get enough of you." I groaned as the taste of Bella – pure, unadulterated Bella – hit my pallet in all her tangy sweetness, her body squirming underneath my hands as they wound around her things, keeping her in place.
"Edward…." My name sounded like a desperate prayer, falling from her lips. "Oh….fuck….God….Edward!"
I smiled against her flesh, freeing one of my hands to enter her, my fingers sliding into her wet heat and curling upwards to find the key to her release.
It was only moments after that I could feel her walls clenching around me, her hands pulling my hair to a degree of pain as she came undone beneath me with my name falling from her lips over and over again.
It was the most beautiful sight in the world.
And it made me want nothing more than to bury myself inside her, be close to her in a way that only lovers could. And so with that thought in mind I quickly got rid of my clothes before joining Bella – who was just regaining her breath after coming down from her high – back on the bed.
She welcomed me with open arms, her lips soft and yielding against mine as she wrapped her body around me. "I love you."
"Fuck," I closed my eyes, leaning my forehead against hers as I lined myself up at her entrance, my mind overwhelmed with emotion and my body with lust as I gently pushed forward. "I love you too…my Bella."
We made love slowly, languidly, holding on to each other as our lips and limbs collided in a growing intensity, the air around us filled with moans and groans and electricity and sex as our movements grew more frantic and needy until we crashed over the edge; Bella minutes before I followed.
"Forever," she whispered, her body falling back against the mattress, her cheeks blushing with the strain of our activities as she kissed my clammy skin.
I smiled back at her, reluctantly sliding out of her and pulling her into my arms as my lips mirrored her words. "Forever."
She snuggled into my hold, pulling the rumpled sheets up to cover our naked forms as we laid there in a perfect, comfortable silence.
"What are you going to do now?" I asked after a while, my fingers ghosting over the naked skin of her shoulder while hers traced lazy patterns over my chest.
She chuckled, her chocolate brown eyes shining up at me as she shifted onto her stomach, her naked limbs tangling with mine. "What? As in right now?"
The glint in her eyes told me I was going to like whatever she was thinking about, but I didn't let it deter me. "I was more thinking about the foreseeable future."
She pouted. "You're no fun!"
I rolled my eyes at her. "So what are your plans?"
"You mean apart from making love to my hot lawyer boyfriend?"
"Bella…" I groaned, trying more than anything to remain a good, supportive boyfriend even though she was literally making it very hard for me.
"Fine," she finally gave in, flopping dramatically onto her back. "I think I'll have to make an appointment at the Advise Office first and foremost to see what I can do about to make up for the stuff I missed and look at my options to switch my focus from news journalism to research…I don't think I could ever go for a scoop as I did before given….given what happened so I'd be wise to change my focus….."
"It seems like you've already put a lot of thought into it." I smiled, taking her silence for assent. "Do you miss it? Going to school?"
She sighed. "I do. As much as I've tried to keep up with assignments and have Rose brief me on what I missed in class….it just isn't the same."
I chuckled, kissing the top of her head. "Then you're ready."
"I hope so." Her voice sounded weary, the events of the day finally catching up with her as she stifled a heavy yawn. "Do you mind if I take a nap? Today's session was kind of intense and I'm feeling completely wiped out at the moment. Plus, I bet you have a ton of paperwork to get to."
"Do you want me to wake you up for dinner?" I asked. "Mom's planned quite a meal from the smell of it and she even got my dad to put in an appearance."
She shook her head. "I don't really feel like eating right now. Besides….I think the three of you need to have some time to talk….as a family. I'll only feel out of place. Maybe I'll pinch some leftovers later?
"I'll save you some of the good stuff," I chuckled, kissing her one last time before I slid out of bed and got dressed, Bella's deep breaths telling me she'd already fallen asleep before I even settled behind my desk, scowling at the massive pile of legal documents in front of me.
I worked steadily for the next hour or so, wading my way through witness reports and making notes when I came across something that might help me get the best possible outcome for my client.
Bella was still fast asleep when I finally made my way downstairs, my feet dragging at the prospect of spending yet another awkward dinner with my mom and dad.
Not that we'd had much of those lately.
Mom and dad were already seated when I walked into the dining room, their body language spelling 'awkward'.
"I'm sorry I'm late," I muttered, sliding into the empty chair. "Did I miss anything?"
Mom's lips pulled into a tight line as dad fidgeted, both of them answering my question without any obsolete words being uttered.
The whole awkward theme continued through the first part of dinner, the only thing cutting through the sounds of cutlery hitting fine china being those common phases you could never go wrong with.
That was, until my dad dropped a bomb on us.
I was just polishing off my plate of roast chicken when he scrapped his throat, demanding our attention. "I have an announcement to make."
He waited until he was sure he had out attention before he went on. "This afternoon, my legal team and I reached an agreement with the state prosecutors…."
He licked his lips, seeming a little uneasy as mom and I waited impatiently for him to continue. "The details of it need to be hashed out but it involves minimal jail time in a low security prison out of state in exchange for my testimony in the Volturi trial…."
"What else?" Mom's sharp voice cut me to the chase, both of us wary of dad's far too upbeat tone.
Something was wrong with this picture.…
He sighed, running his hand through his hair, his face looking much older than it used to look. "I will have to plead guilty to the murder of Jane Foster…"
"No!" Mom's voice shot through the room, me and dad jumping a little as her small fists slammed on the table top, making the fine China and silverware bounce on top of the pristine white tablecloth. "You can't do that Carlisle! You can't admit to a murder you didn't commit!"
He shrugged, an empty self-deprecating look in his eyes. "Didn't I? Don't you think that girl would have been dead today if I didn't…."
He took a few deep breaths, the sharpness of every inhale and exhale echoing through the laden silence that had fallen over the room. "When Jane came to me for help, I knew there was a ninety percent chance of someone finding out and I knew what was going to happen if they did. Believe me, Esme. I'm as guilty of that girl's murder as the murderer is."
"Dad," I intervened, only to be interrupted the second I spoke up.
"No, son." I could see the resolve in the way his mouth was set even before he spoke the words. "My mind's made up and – as per my instructions – Garrett has already notified the prosecution of my decision."
"So that's it?" mom shrieked. "You're just going to admit to murder and be done with it? Tell me Carlisle? Who do you think you're helping with this ridiculous course of action?"
She shook her head when she saw my dad shift uncomfortably in his seat, his unease confirming her suspicions and adding more fuel to her fire. "Do you think that poor girl's family is going to rest any easier now that you admitted to murdering their loved one? I think not. Not while the real murderer is still out there, free as a bird because the police won't put any effort into finding him now that they've gotten you to admit to the crime he committed."
"And what about us?" she went on after taking a few deep breaths. "What about your own family? Did you ever stop to think what it will mean for us to be the wife and son of a convicted murderer?"
Dad cringed. "Esme…."
"You've already destroyed the social and professional life I've spent years building for myself, but I would have thought better of you than to come back and do the same thing for your son. Our boy!" she seethed.
"I didn't…"
"You didn't think, did you?" she interrupted him before he could get a word in. "Because if you did, you may have realized that, though Edward is very happily situated in the family firm right now, he's never going to be able to work anywhere else thanks to you."
I felt the blood leave my face as I listened to my mother's rant. In my shock about my dad's decision I'd never stopped to think about the implications it might have for me. She was right, though…..
"Any firm worth a damn is going to take one look at his name and reject him," she went on. "No amount of talent is ever going to outweigh the damage a bad reputation will do. You know that!"
"Damn it, Esme." We all jumped as dad slammed his first onto the table. "Will you be quiet for just one second and listen to me before you pass judgment?"
He waited until mom, calmed down or was too shocked to object, nodded. "I know all of that and believe me, the decision I made hasn't been an easy one…..but it was the only way I saw to make sure the Volturi would be put behind bars."
"There were other ways, dad." I shook my head, disappointed that dad had given up so easily when he could have gone down fighting or even saved the day.
"Really?" he challenged me. "Because as good a lawyer as Garrett is, he's still no miracle worker and you and I both know that with the evidence they have against me, it would have taken nothing short of a miracle to get me acquitted."
"You could have at least tried!" I snapped.
"I could have." Dad sighed, shrugging his shoulders. "But in the end I would have gone down just as well, and the consequences would have been far more severe in that case. No….." He shook his head as if to convince himself as well as everyone else. "This decision has been the right one – the only one."
"So what's going to happen now?" Mom's voice sounded as empty and robotic as it had back when she first heard about my dad's history with the Volturi and I knew that, right now, she was operating on autopilot, her mind solely focused on forming a plan while her emotions were safely locked away in a place that could not be reached by anyone else. "Do we have until dessert before the police come to cart you off to prison or will we have the pleasure of enjoying our crème brullee in peace?"
"We have some time," dad replied calmly. "The final plea agreement still needs to be hashed out and a judge will have to sign off on it before it can go into effect. Before that happens, though, the police will be by to record a video testimony of all my dealings with the Volturi as part of our agreement."
My head shot up, my eyes narrowing as they zoned into his. "A video testimony?"
I could see something flashing inside his eyes before he tried to shrug it off, acting as if this wasn't highly unusual and very unsettling. "Just in case something goes wrong….."
I swallowed hard, knowing exactly what dad meant. In case something went wrong….in case he would end up getting killed in prison before he could take the stand…..
"Carlisle…." Judging from the sound of her voice, mom had come to the same conclusion.
"It's just a precaution," dad shrugged, continuing to play it off as no biggie. "Part of the agreement stipulated that I'll be transferred to an out-of-state facility as soon as I've given testimony in court. Until that day comes, they'll make sure I'm kept as far away from the Volturi as can be… They won't be able to get to me."
I wish his worlds could leave me as convinced of his safety as he seemed to be – or feigned to be, at least. But I wasn't.
I knew that the prosecution had to be worried about my dad's safety, or they never would have taken a step like this. Having witnesses record a video testimony before the case would go to trail wasn't completely unheard of, but it was still unusual in cases where the witness would be on hand to give evidence in court, rendering the tapes and all the money and effort put into making them, useless.
They wouldn't be wasting tax-payers' money on a scheme like this if they didn't think they'd be benefitting from it.
"I-I just…." Mom's voice broke on her words, her frame hunching over the table as she finally gave into her emotions.
Dad rushed to her side, my lips pulling into a small smile as I watched him cradle mom's slight frame in his arms and – more importantly – watched her let him. For the first time in weeks, my parents were trying to get through this together. Like a couple would.
It made me feel a tiny spark of hope that maybe my dad's imprisonment would not mean the end of them. Maybe they'd get through this.
"I…." I started, feeling like I should give them some space to talk and work through the vast flood of anger and resentment that had kept them apart until now alone but not wanting to sneak off like a thief in the night. "I'll be upstairs….checking on Bella."
Dad smiled, taking his eyes off my mom for only the tiniest hint of a moment before focusing his attention back on his wife – where it belonged – as I slinked out of the room and made my way upstairs.
Bella was still asleep when I came in, her eyes fluttering as the light from the landing caught her face. "Edward?" she muttered sleepily.
"It's me," I confirmed, quickly shedding my clothes before crawling into bed with her.
Her body molded itself to mine as she hummed in satisfaction, her eyes never opening although I knew her to be awake. "How did dinner go?"
I chuckled at the sound of her voice, sleepy but still curious. I guess no amount of Volturi interference could ever kill the reporter living inside that girl.
"We talked," I surmised. "Dad cut a deal because he thinks that's the only way to bring down the Volturi with him and now he's going to jail while Jane's killer might still be out there." I froze, not stopping to think how this might be a touchy subject as far as Bella was concerned until the words had already left my mouth.
F she felt any kind of panic, though, she didn't show it. "How does your mom feel about that?"
"She's pretty shaken." I smirked, the memory of my mom, hunched into a ball as she cried onto dad's shoulder flashing through my mind. "But what do you expect? At least it got the two of them – mom and dad – to talk."
"That's one thing." I could hear the smile in Bella's words. "And how do you feel?"
"I don't know," I replied honestly.
She snorted. "Of course you do."
I sighed, knowing she was right. "I hate that dad is admitting to murder out of some sense of obligation to help put the Volturi behind bars. I know that this was the best deal he could cut, given the circumstances but it's just….I don't know. I just don't want to see him go down for a crime he didn't commit."
"And…."
I smiled, realizing how well Bella knew me. "There's something else…..He's going to give a full testament of his dealings with the Volturi on video, even before the case will go to court and I just…it doesn't feel right."
"Oh?" Bella shifted, her brown eyes shimmering as they caught a few rays of light seeping in from the crack underneath the door. "Why?"
"It makes me feel like….I don't know…..something's going to go wrong."
Is Edward right to feel worried? What did you think about Carlisle's confession? Or Tanya's quest to ruin Edward's reputation?
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