SM owns Twilight and its characters. I own this story. 2010.

Thank you, BilliCullen and Scooterstale. I missed you two these past couple of weeks! :)

You Keep Coming Back for More

"You're distracting me," she accused, batting my roaming fingers away.

How she thought I would do anything else was beyond me.

To make a point, I trailed the tip of my finger between her breasts, following the line of a streaking droplet. It was damned near mesmerizing in the way that it slid down her stomach to the juncture of her hip and thigh.

That one little image was all it took – a reminder of exactly what lay between her thighs. More than enough to make me hard, it made my stomach tighten and ache until all I could think about was her and how much I wanted to spread her out across my bed so that I could make her squirm beneath me. Now that that part of me had awoken, I wanted it all: the bite of her nails raking across my shoulder blades, the humid pants against my neck, the little noises that she didn't even know she made. And more than anything on earth, after the day I'd had, selfishly, I wanted that all-too-brief moment where I could lose myself inside her – no thinking, just feeling. That second of freefall. Fuck, I wanted that.

Feigning as much indifference as I could muster, I shrugged as I followed another line of falling water. This one meandered further to the left, teasing me to follow. When my fingertip skirted the swell of her breast, cheating at the last second to graze her nipple, her skin pebbled, even under the hot spray, and there was a faint hitch in her breathing. That it wasn't just me affected filled me with a sense of power I rarely experienced.

"You're naked, Bella," I murmured, incapable of hiding my wandering eyes. "And you're wet. What did you think would happen? I mean, I am a guy. You realize that, right?" There was no way in hell that I could hide that little bit of self-satisfaction in my smirk.

Amused at either my eagerness or me, Bella's lips twitched, fighting the smile I wanted to see. Just as I opened my mouth to say more – to beg maybe – she grinned that full-face grin of hers that did strange things to my insides. When I raised my brows in mock challenge, that grin somehow widened even more, and she finally laughed.

Her laugh, echoing off the tile and filling the steamy room, was nearly my undoing. And my heart gave an unexpected hard thump against the wall of my chest.

Because I had missed that sound and not even realized it.

But I didn't want to go down that road right now. I didn't want to think about that. So instead, I took a deep, hot breath through my nose and tried my damnedest to not dwell on the fact that this was the first time I'd heard her laugh all week.

Since that afternoon when I was passed out on my kitchen floor and she had broken a window because she had been scared, thinking the worse. Since the day my mouth blabbed what I had not wanted to say out loud. Since she told me that she loved me back.

She loved me.

"I don't know," Bella sighed, drawing the words out, thankfully interrupting my emotional gymnastics in the process. A finger jabbed my sternum. "I thought that we'd maybe… take a shower? And I thought that you said you were starving and wanted to grab some dinner..."

Bella's expression turned comically serious and I wanted to laugh. But her own body betrayed her, and that jabbing finger slid south to where it was joined by nine other searing fingertips. The muscles in my abdomen quivered when her nails scratched across my skin. She knew exactly what that did to me.

Cocking her head, knowing the way I responded to her, Bella went on, "So… I guess we should hurry up and get out, right?"

Dropping my hands to her waist, I gently pulled her close enough that she had to lift her face to look up at me. Eyes dark and always deep, Bella stared directly at me with a depth of emotion that I swore I didn't think I'd ever deserve. It was like looking into something too bright, and I immediately wanted to drop my chin and avert my eyes.

But I didn't. I didn't look away because like I told her I would, for once, I was trying. Trying everything. As exhausting and hard as it was, I was trying to stay sober, trying to stop my own self-destruction, trying to be more than what I was, and more than anything, trying to be enough to keep her. Because I loved her and because for some reason I still couldn't grasp, she loved me, I was just… fucking trying.

Again.

Slowly – purposefully – I leaned down and brushed my lips across hers, swiping my tongue over the warm wetness that had gathered there. When Bella didn't protest, instead of pushing into her mouth like I knew she wanted, I dragged my lips down her jaw to her neck. Hot from the shower and steam, her skin was so soft and slick against my mouth and tongue, reminding me immediately of the way her whole body felt sliding under mine.

While my head spun with visions of having her right here, right now, against the tile wall if I had to, another compulsion grabbed me. One a little less selfish maybe. Or maybe more.

"Later, okay?" I finally whispered, all teasing gone as I swept heavy, wet hair off of her shoulder so that I could find my favorite spot. "For now… let me."

"Let you what?" Bella murmured, closing her eyes and gasping softly when I sucked on her skin. Her voice was shaky and low and her nails dug sharply into my stomach, leaving faint, crescent-shaped marks.

Instead of immediately answering, I guided us both out of the spray until her back hit tile.

When I caught a pale pink nipple between my lips, her chest expanded and she arched into me, pushing against my mouth. When I bit down a little with my teeth and suckled, making it hard and round, she gasped again, this time louder, and she moaned something that sounded vaguely like my name.

Some not-so-small part of me reveled in the fact that I could do this to her, that I could make her shake and groan my name. That I could make her come unglued. Because this – being with Bella, making her come – was one small thing I knew I could do for her. When we were together like this, everything else faded away. There was no scotch or trembling hands, nor was there a broken family that didn't know how to mend. There were no past lives or inconsolable deaths. Now, like this, it was just her and me. And it was the closest thing to normal that I'd had in years. I wanted it with her every day, so, so much.

"Let me do this," I breathed, my voice even softer as I fell to my knees to kiss first her stomach, then the slope of each hip. Bella's palms dropped to the top of my head and her fingers threaded through my hair, pulling sharply before pushing it off my forehead.

"May I?" I asked again, not really waiting for her assent. Gently, not taking my eyes off of her face, I spread her thighs so that I could circle my thumb over her clit. At contact, she jerked, and over the relentless thump of water against marble, I heard her suck in a harsh breath.

I watched in some kind of half-wonder as her head tilted back against the wall. Eyes screwed shut, her teeth clamped down on her lower lip. As though she were afraid that speaking aloud would break the spell, Bella nodded slowly as her grip in my hair tightened, tugging me closer.

I wasn't sure how many minutes I spent on my knees, licking, rubbing, and sucking, watching her quiver and shake with each change in angle or pace. This was different than when we had sex because while my dick was hard and fucking begging for some kind of release, I could focus solely on her. Now, I could see everything. I could concentrate on what she looked like when I touched her the right ways in the right places, what she tasted like on my tongue, what she felt like when she lost it.

When the tips of my two fingers crooked and found that secret spot deep inside, her eyes went blank and her lips dropped into a silent moan as every muscle in her body seemed to lock down. Feeling her come against my mouth like that was erotic and so intimate, like it was some special thing that only I got to see, and all I knew was that I wanted to give it to her like that over and over.

"Edward," she finally whispered, breathless, still leaning back against the tile as though she would fall without it there. From the steam or from me, I wasn't sure, her skin was flushed and her chest was heaving. To me, she was something out of a dream.

"Okay?" I asked, pressing my lips to her inner thigh before slowly rising. My knees protested, but the blissed-out look on her face erased any discomfort of mine.

Bella didn't say a word. Instead, my answer came in the form of her flinging herself at me the moment I straightened. Mashing her mouth to mine like I'd just given her the world, she kissed me in ways that made my forearms immediately tighten, pleading to lift her up and position her thighs around my waist just like they had been that first night after Emmett's wedding.

Her lips were so soft and full, aligned against mine just right, and the sensual in and out rhythm of her tongue nearly killed me. Lost in sensation, listening to her little whimper-sighs, I groaned and my hips involuntarily flexed, pressing my dick against the soft skin of her stomach. Before I could even contemplate pulling back, however, Bella's slender fingers suddenly wrapped around me, scattering my wits. And like a goddamned teenager, I was instantly falling apart to the rhythmic jerk of her hand, stroking in time to the slide of her tongue.

"No– you don't… have… fuck… to," I stuttered against her mouth, even as I recalled all too well the times I'd jacked off to this same fantasy. This – the reality of it – was so much better.

"Be quiet," Bella murmured, smiling at my incoherence. "Let me, too."

Obediently, powerless to argue when she had me in her hand like that, I slumped against the wall, pulling her with me. When her wrist sped, twisting around my head on the upstroke, my eyes damned near rolled back in my head. It was like some kind of vicious-sweet torture with half of me wanting to explode right then and there and the other half wanting to hold off as long as I could so that it wouldn't end.

"Jesus, I'm close," I muttered, dropping my forehead to her shoulder so I could see what she was doing to me. Without thinking, I reached down between us, targeting her breasts, wanting to feel the weight and softness of them in my hands.

Bella was all I could feel, all that I could smell – everywhere around me. When I licked my lips, I could still taste her – clean and sexy and girl – from before and I abruptly felt drunk, high on pure sensation. The steam in my lungs paled against the heat in my abdomen and tightening of my balls.

When I buried my face in her neck, she squeezed me, just a little harder, as if she knew exactly what I wanted – what I needed to fall over the edge. Blood rushed through my veins, whining in my ears, and my heart seemed to pound against my ribcage. She squeezed one more time, and, no longer capable of holding off, with a garbled curse and a blast of color behind my eyelids, I spasmed long and hard against her stomach.

A minute later, or maybe a day, somehow we found ourselves on the shower floor, my back against the tile, her wedged between my legs and leaning back against my chest. My fingers traced some mindless pattern on the inside of her arm.

For a long while, we were quiet, just listening to the soothing patter of water against marble. All around us, gray mist swirled and eddied, spiraling upward and softening the sharp edges of the glass door and beyond. Gradually, lulled into relaxation, my heart rate slowed, and when I breathed in, sucking down lungfuls of steam, the air smelled clean, untainted by anything from the outside. Abstractedly, I wondered whether, if I stayed in here long enough and if I breathed deeply enough, it could somehow clean me on the inside, too.

"How was today?" Bella quietly asked, finally breaking the stillness.

Startled, my shoulders tensed without my permission, any and all relief vanishing at those three seemingly innocuous little words. Normal words. My mouth was suddenly dry, and despite all my desires to the contrary, I struggled to find an answer that didn't make my stomach roll in anxiety.

"Not the best?" she guessed, her voice so soft that I barely heard it over the noise of the shower and the whir of the overhead fan. Picking up my hand, Bella slowly drew the crevices of my palm, repeatedly following the longest line.

Light and languid, her touch was meant to be soothing. I knew that. Only instead, because of who I was, its necessity just reminded me of my inadequacy, my fucked up mind, and, never mind all my trying, just how far away from normal I still was. For once, I was glad that her back was to me; God only knew what my expression held.

"Not the worst," I mumbled before gently touching my lips to the top of her shoulder, silently trying to make her understand that it wasn't her fault that I couldn't have a normal conversation without falling apart or turning into some idiot basketcase. It was me; always, it was me. Tongue thick and fumbling, I tried to come up with some excuse. "I just don't wa–"

Sensing the strain I couldn't voice, however, like she somehow always managed to do, Bella saved me from myself.

"I talked to Alice today."

The change in subject was jarring and too obvious, but nonetheless, my shoulders instantly released and fell in gratitude. My whole body seemed to unclench, and inwardly, I sighed in relief.

"Yeah?" I kissed her other shoulder, letting my lips linger against her skin, and I looped my ankles over hers.

Bella shifted, leaning deeper into my chest. "She's coming back for Christmas, remember?"

"Yeah, I remember," I answered, recalling that night in Port Angeles all too well. "You two were planning to cut down a tree or some shit."

Bella's shoulders shook with silent laughter. "You know, she's pretty excited about that. She said she's already picked out her 'attire'. Not kidding, I think it involves plaid."

It was my turn to laugh, my earlier abrupt anxiety somehow fading just enough for me to mean it. "Let me guess… Lumberjack-chic?"

Laughing outright, Bella tried to fake a huff. "Hey, it's not like you get to do much of that in Arizona or Florida. Or where she is in California, either. Call it a novelty, I guess."

I crossed my arms around her waist and rested my chin on top of her shoulder. "You probably want snow, too, right? Like the whole White Christmas thing with Bing Crosby and all?"

"Of course," she answered, turning her face to the side. Staring straight into mine, her eyes were dark, nearly unreadable. But there was something there, something more serious than our conversation that I didn't quite recognize. For a split second, it looked like sadness or maybe longing – for the present or for the past, I didn't know – and I immediately wanted it gone. That kind of look didn't belong on her face. Slowly, wanting to banish away whatever it was, I kissed her, once and then twice, closed-mouth and softly.

When she smiled again, I grinned and tried to divert her from whatever it was that haunted her. "Snow sucks, Bel-la."

Shaking her head, a chuckle spilled out, and then she popped my wrist in play. "Snow – I'll have you know – is a hell of a lot better than perpetual rain, Ed-ward."

"Okay, true," I acquiesced, inwardly grateful that I could at least make her laugh again. "You're right. Rain in January blows. It's cold as fuck."

"See? Told you. And snow is… I don't know… beautiful. It makes everything look clean and perfect. It hides all the ugly."

There was no argument for that.

For a long moment, we were quiet again. When I looked down at my skin, it was wrinkled and pale from being under the water. The tile was hard and my tailbone was starting to ache. Yet for all that, I still couldn't bring myself to want to leave.

I wondered how differently this trip would go, especially since it would be Christmas. More so, I wondered just how little of Bella I'd see – if this would be like her sister's first visit. I didn't want to think about what else holiday time meant just yet – about whom I would have to see, about conversations I'd no doubt have to have, about all the memories that would inevitably surface, all of which I'd be experiencing… sober. No, I didn't want to think about that right now, because surely, if I went down that path, I'd wind up with shaky palms and a burning esophagus.

So this time it was me who broke the silence. "So… how long will she be here?"

Spinning sideways, still between my legs, Bella glanced up at me before laying her head against my shoulder. "Maybe like last time," she said softly. "I doubt she'll be here more than two weeks. She has work, you know."

I didn't understand the softness of her voice or the unexpected sag in her shoulders. "Are you okay with that? I know that last time…"

"Yeah. I'm okay with it. I think…" Bella sighed and hugged my chest. For a second, I wasn't sure what to do with my hands – what kind of comforting she wanted or needed. Or why she needed it to begin with. "I think she's really looking forward to it."

I shrugged, still bemused. "She misses you."

"Maybe… but…" Bella hesitated.

"What?"

"I'm not sure how much I should say…"

Of course, my insides lurched the moment she answered, plummeting in yet another valley of the roller coaster ride of my days. My eyes closed, but at least this time, by some grace of God, the rest of my body didn't betray me.

Part of me wanted to laugh. At the situation. At myself for trying to push away one unpleasant topic in exchange for another.

But she didn't have to say any more. There was no need. Because somewhere, deep down, I knew what she was going to say – that Alice didn't approve of her dating me, that I wasn't good for Bella, that she was better off without me, and that I'd eventually drag her down to my depths. And if that were the case, I couldn't even be angry with her sister because there was no way in hell that I could argue with her.

Bella just didn't know how to tell me – how I'd react.

Carefully, not really wanting to ask at all, I muttered, "What do you mean?"

"She's kind of…" Bella's lips twisted and her nose scrunched. "Dating someone now."

Instant confusion descended, and that knotty tangle of emotion in the pit of my stomach didn't know whether to relent or tighten. "Kind of?" I managed. "You don't kind of date people. But what does that have to do with Christmas anyway?"

Bella's chin dropped and for once, she was the one not answering.

"Just… " I fumbled, anxiously wiping water off my face, aggravated at everything about this conversation. "I don't know… just fucking spit it out."

Bella looked up and her brows knitted together. "He kind of… lives here."

It took me a moment to follow what she was trying to say, but eventually, realization dawned, washing through my entire body. Any other time, any other place, I would have expected to have been floored by that kind of admittance.

Or bothered.

Or pissed off.

Or something other that what I actually felt.

Strangely, so fucking thankful that Bella's trepidation had nothing to do with her and me – with us – I felt none of that. I only felt profound relief mingled with the urge to shake her for not telling me to begin with. Of course, I knew why she didn't.

"You've got to be kidding me," I chuckled, astounded by the surge of reprieve that allowed me to breathe again.

Bella's brows climbed in surprise. "Are you mad?"

Fidgeting just a little, my laughter ceased and I quickly responded with a quiet and surprisingly honest, "No."

I scrubbed my face, buying time – trying to find some way to articulate exactly what it was I did feel and why. "It's… different than what I thought you were going to say. And okay, fine, I don't quite know what to think about… Jasper and… your sister. Maybe it's a little unexpected…" Thinking back to Bella's birthday dinner, I remembered the familiar way he'd touched her and the way he'd looked at her, so different yet so similar to how he used to be around Maria.

"But no… " I repeated, shaking my head. "I'm not angry…"

"I'm glad," Bella breathed, her own relief palpable.

"You were afraid that I'd freak out." There was no question in that statement.

"Yeah," she whispered. "I'm so–"

Interrupting, despising what she was about to say, I brushed wet strands away from her face. "Don't be… You don't need to be sorry for anything. It's fine. I'm fine. I can deal with him. With them. I'm not…" I trailed off, thinking, not really understanding myself.

I stared up at the gray mist raining down. Softer, more to myself than to Bella, I added, haltingly, "I'm not… really angry with Jasper… Not anymore."

Something not altogether unpleasant fluttered in my stomach when I realized that I wasn't really lying.

.

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Chapter title: Lyrics from Keep on Tryin', by Poco