This is long and, again, way out of my comfort zone. And there's a bit more to come.

Epilogue 1.2

Because of the flight delay, I told Edward not to worry about meeting me at the airport. I said I'd take the shuttle bus with the rest of the girls. I can't say I'm surprised, though, when he texts me as I'm going through customs to tell me he'll be waiting by the Hertz counter. It's classic Edward.

I walk straight into his arms and he pulls me against his chest, his chin finding its place atop my head.

'I'm so glad you listen to me,' I tell him.

I feel a small laugh rumble through him. 'I've missed you too much,' he says. 'There was no way I was going to wait another two hours to see you.'

I love the way Edward doesn't hold his feelings back. Some of my girlfriends complain about their partners never expressing how they feel, but I've never really had that issue with Edward. He's strong enough to be okay with making himself vulnerable and putting his heart on the line.

Of course, the problem with Edward picking me up is that as soon as I lift my face to kiss him, I want him. Bad. He groans into my mouth as my tongue finds his and I'm trying to rub my tits all over his chest and wishing he'd grab hold of my butt and pull me against his dick. He doesn't, though, because he has some sense of decorum.

'Get a room,' Rosalie says as she rolls her suitcase past us. 'Bloody exhibitionists.'

Edward pulls away from me and grins at her. 'Still mad Emmett's arse isn't as pretty as mine, Rose?' In the years Rose lived with us, she never busted us fully going at it, but there were a few too many close calls.

Rosalie flips him off and keeps walking towards the sliding doors. Jess stops to hug me and thank me for helping make her hen's party so memorable and the cousin whose name I keep forgetting says, 'See you at the wedding.' She doesn't look thrilled about it.

Edward tilts his head as he watches me wave goodbye. 'Everything okay?'

I shrug. 'I couldn't make her name stick. I tried so freaking hard, but every time she told me it would just'—I snap my fingers—'disappear.' I sigh. 'Sometimes I think I'm actually getting worse.'

Edward grabs the handle of my suitcase with one hand and my fingers with the other. 'Home?'

'God, yes.'

Almost as soon as we get on the freeway, it starts raining. Fat, heavy drops drum against the windscreen and turn the taillights of the cars in front of us to ruby smears.

I grimace as Edward flicks the wipers on. 'Did you put the buckets out, by chance?'

He shakes his head, his lips pressed into a line.

I don't say anything, because he likely left home hours ago and the sun was probably shining then. But if he hasn't put out the buckets, then we're going home to huge puddles and wet spots on the carpet.

When we bought our house, we knew it would need renovations. The bathroom was no longer watertight, the deck was a safety hazard, and the kitchen was so tiny we couldn't both be in there at the same time. Mick's wife, Angie, once told me that shacking up with a carpenter would mean watching Edward build other people's dream homes while living in a perpetual construction site myself. She wasn't wrong.

I understand that it's the nature of the job. When there's work, he has to take it. Even if he's just gutted our kitchen and it means we live on takeaway and toast for a month. Even if it means we go without a properly functioning bathroom for a few weeks, or have a tarpaulin covered hole in our roof for going on eight months.

Edward sighs. 'Sorry, mate.'

'It's fine,' I say. And it is. As much as I was hoping to head straight to naked time, it won't take too long to clean up the mess.

I don't mean to fall asleep. I have dozens of stories I want to tell Edward and I want to hear what he's been up to, but the rhythmic thrumming of rain on the windscreen is hypnotic and the stress of the day finally catches up with me.

Edward shakes me awake, murmuring that we're home and that he's got something to show me.

'Is it your penis?' I mumble. 'That's the only show and tell I'm interested in right now.'

He chuckles. 'I'll definitely show you that later.'

The pout slips off my lips as soon as I step out of the car.

'Holy shit.'

If I hadn't seen Edward's sketches, I would think he's pulled up in front of the wrong house. The wraparound verandah he's been doodling since our very first viewing now hugs our little house. It looks like it's yet to be painted, but it's there.

'How did—' I stop, thinking hard. He always said the verandahs would be the last thing he'd get to. A new, bigger kitchen was priority number one, and even though it was a slow process, he finished that about a year ago. The bathroom was next, and most of that overhaul had been done by Emmett because, as Edward said, tiles and plumbing and 'shit that gets wet' weren't his area of expertise. (I'd disagreed and told him that in my experience he was quite the expert at getting things wet, and had shoved his hand into my knickers to prove my point.)

With those two jobs complete, our next step was going to be to knock out the back wall, add a new master bedroom and en-suite, and then build the deck.

Which means…

My hands cover my mouth as I put it all together. I look at Edward, my eyes wide. 'Seriously?'

He nods, his grin huge. The street lights glimmer on his teeth.

'No.'

He pops the boot and hefts my suitcase from it. 'Yep.'

'All of it?'

He runs his hand through his hair then waves me towards the house. 'Still some painting and finishing to do, but yeah. All the main construction jobs are done.'

'But how?'

I follow Edward across our new deck and into the house. It smells like plaster and sawdust and paint. Like one of the brand new houses Edward has walked me through when I've visited him on site.

'How?' I ask again as I follow him to the door of our new bedroom. He flips the light switch and I see that the while the walls haven't been painted, and the floors still need to be varnished, it's done. Our dream room.

It's big enough that a king-sized bed and a cot will fit comfortably—because Edward knows I want any babies we have to sleep within arms reach for at least the first six months. There are wide, yet-to-be-shuttered windows on two sides, as well as a walk-in wardrobe and an en-suite.

'I was only gone twelve days.' My voice echoes in the empty room.

Edward follows me as I poke my head into the en-suite. It's bigger than the existing bathroom. It looks amazing: huge his-and-hers shower heads, polished concrete floor, a freestanding tub.

'I called in every favour I could. Promised a shitload more,' Edward says. 'There's been about a dozen people here most days. Even Katie and Riley tried to help.' His wry smile tells me everything. Riley probably helped heaps, pitching in wherever they could. Katie would've been assigned a task, quickly grown bored with it, and then wandered off to find someone to chat to. She puts in enough hours at the hospital, though, that no one who knows her would begrudge her flightiness.

Edward puts a hand on my waist and turns me to face him. 'I would've loved to have it completely finished, but at least we're a bit closer now.'

'A bit?' I shake my head at him. 'Edward, this is amazing. You're amazing. Thank you so much.'

I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him hard. I'm overwhelmed by his selflessness, the amount of work he's put into finishing our house while I spent the time chilling in Bali.

He catches my hands as I fumble with his fly. 'Wait,' he says.

I shake a hand free and cup his erection. His eyelids flutter as he groans. 'Bel. Wait, please.'

He clearly has something important he wants to say so I let him capture my hands and pull them to his lips.

'I just wanted to do this for you,' he says. 'I know how much it's sucked, having to live on takeaway for weeks and having to set up a fucking camping shower in the backyard and just… not be able to just have a space where you can fully relax.'

'I haven't minded—' He stops me with a quick kiss.

'I know,' he says. 'That's the thing. You've hardly complained about stepping over missing floorboards in the middle of the night or having to set up buckets every time it rains because there's a giant fucking hole in the ceiling. Even that time your laptop got fried when you were in the middle of doing reports because the skylight leaked, you hardly fussed.'

I frown at him. 'It wasn't a big deal. The reports were all saved on the cloud—'

He kisses me quiet again, and I've gotta say, his method of shushing me is pretty damn pleasant.

'You're proving my point, you know? You've just rolled with it, no matter how inconvenient. So I wanted to do something to show you how much I appreciate that.'

'Well, thank you,' I say. 'Although saying that feels woefully inadequate.' I grab his chin and give his face a little shake. 'You're amazing and I love you so damn much.'

His smile is smooshed between my fingers. 'Love you, too.'

I drop my hand and kiss his lips. 'Can you please, please fuck me now?'

Edward inhales sharply and his hands find my bum. He squeezes my arse as he lifts me. I wrap my legs around his waist, already squirming, trying to press myself against him, find some sort of friction to ease the ache that's intensifying between my legs. He turns and presses my back against the wall, his lips find my neck and his kisses drag goosebumps across my skin.

'Do you want to christen this room?' he asks me, his voice gritty. 'Or would you rather go somewhere more comfortable?'

As attractive as the thought of having sex in our new room is, I'm not sure I've got the energy for the sort of manoeuvring the lack of bed would require. I'm not against a wall fuck or even just going at it on the timber floor, but I'm tired and sore and with the amount of work Edward's put into getting the house finished, I'd bet he is, too.

I loosen the grip my thighs have on his waist and slide down his body. I hook my fingers into his belt loops and tug gently.

'Bed,' I tell him. 'But I'll take a raincheck on sex right here.'

'Deal,' Edward says. He cups my face and kisses me until I'm weak in the knees before he scares the shit out of me by tossing me over his shoulder and carting me back down the hall to the room we've called ours for the last two years.

Despite the caveman antics, Edward sets me down on our bed carefully. I know he's secretly terrified of bumping my head and doing my brain any more damage. He makes quick work of unbuttoning my shorts and pulling off my knickers, and before I can even catch my breath, his mouth is on me. And holy fuck, I think he's missed me. All I can do is anchor my hands in his hair while he licks and sucks and does that thing with his teeth that makes me want to scream in the best fucking way. When he adds his fingers to the mix, I just about lose my mind. And it's a good thing we no longer have to worry about housemates, because I know I'm being loud, and I know the dirty words spewing from my mouth would make me blush if I wasn't completely wasted on the orgasm bearing down on me. I fight it, force my eyes open and look down at Edward. He meets my gaze, his eyes so full of love and lust while his mouth does terrible, wonderful things, and it's too, too much. I come hard and fast and loud.

'I think you broke me,' I tell Edward. I'm a sticky, sweaty, boneless mess. 'Holy shit.'

He chuckles and presses a kiss to my thigh. It's too close to where his mouth has been working its dark magic and I squirm away, trying to close my legs.

Edward's torso is in the way, though. A smirk stretches his lips as he watches me writhe. He moves slowly, making sure I'm watching, as he lowers his mouth to my thigh. He kisses the top of my thigh, which makes me jerk and whimper. When he drags his tongue along the crease where my leg connects to my body, I shudder and moan, and, unable to bear his teasing, snap my thighs around his head to immobilise him. My legs have lost a bit of their strength since I gave up competing in beach sprints. Only a bit, though, because I've started running longer distances.

I don't know what Edward says, but I feel the vibrations of his words between my legs. I loosen my hold on him and take advantage of his surprise to shove him off me. He flops over onto his back and grins up at me as I straddle his waist.

'Hi,' he says. He's so fucking proud of himself. And hey, he deserves to be. The guy has some serious talent.

'Hi, yourself.'

I'd love to yank his shorts down and shock the hell out of him with some talents of my own, but we both know I don't have any. Not in that department, anyway. The last—and only—time I insisted it was all good and told him I wanted him finish in my mouth, I sort of vomited all over the poor bastard.

It was easily the most embarrassing moment of my life. But I knew Edward was a keeper when he helped me clean up the mess and change the bed sheets before he made for the shower.

Actually, that's a lie: I knew he was a keeper well before then.

I give Edward a quick kiss and then sit up to yank my t-shirt off. His hands are on my tits before I've got my bra undone, his thumbs finding my nipples through the lace. I throw the bralette across the room and shove my tits in Edward's face. He chuckles, his whiskers rasping deliciously against my skin, before he does what I want him to do and closes his lips around my nipple. He pinches one hard while he sucks the other, then switches sides. I'm grinding all over his dick and it wouldn't take much for me to come again, but I want more.

I pull back, my hands on Edward's shoulders to tell him to let me go.

'I need you inside me,' I tell him. 'I've missed you so fucking much.'

Edward groans as I undo his shorts. I don't bother taking them all the way off, just tug them down far enough to get to the bits I need.

I stroke him a few times, just to watch that muscle in his jaw flex and his eyelids flutter. God, he's sexy.

I try to fuck him hard and fast, but he keeps messing with my rhythm, grabbing my hips and slowing me down when I'm getting close. It's maddening but also kind of hot. I secretly love it when he teases me like this, winding me up like a toy.

He loves it, too, because it never fails to turn me into a babbling idiot. I tell him how much I've missed him, how much I want him, how good he's making me feel, how badly I need to come.

When he lifts me off him, I shriek in frustration. 'No,' I tell him. 'More.'

He lifts an eyebrow as he presses his palm to my sternum and guides me to lie down. 'No more?'

I shake my head wildly. 'No.' I know exactly what he's doing but I fall right into it. 'More.'

He kicks his shorts off before he crawls over me. His hand slides down my thigh to cup my calf. 'No more?'

I let out this pathetic sounding whimper. 'Fuck me,' I tell him. 'I need you to fuck me.'

He licks his lips as he hovers over me. 'You're so fucking gorgeous,' he says. He lifts my leg until my calf rests against his shoulder, which makes me moan in anticipation.

His mouth drops open as he pushes inside me. I expect him to start pounding into me, but he moves slowly, still trying to drive me crazy.

I scrabble at his back, trying to get him to speed up, but he just bites his lip and slows his thrusts even more. It's torture. Exquisite torture. Each slow, deep stroke sets me shuddering and writhing. I'm covered in sweat and goosebumps.

'Edward.' It's almost a sob. 'Please.' I grab his arse, my nails digging, and try to rock my hips against his pelvis. He has me pinned, though, unable to find the friction I need to get where I want to go.

'Please,' I say again. 'I want to come. Make me come.'

He grunts, and, apparently having had his fill of teasing me, speeds his thrusts. He slams into me, hits me exactly where I need it. A few more thrusts and I think I might actually be crying because it's so good, too good, and then I'm whimpering and coming and Edward's groaning and coming and when my orgasm finally recedes, I'm just a boneless, sweaty, teary mess.

Edward lets my leg slip off his shoulder and gently brushes my sweat-soaked hair from my face. 'You okay?'

I manage a nod. My voice is a little scratchy. 'I think I understand the expression "fuck my brains out".'

He frowns. 'Was it too much?'

'Huh?' I'm confused at first, because I'm not sure how he missed the bit where I was begging him for more, before I realise it's because he's touchy about the brain thing. 'Definitely not. It was amazing.' I reach up and try to wipe the creases from his forehead. 'Hey, Edward?'

'Yes?'

'I want us to get married. Soon.'