A/N: When I started writing this story I had planned for it to happen in real-time, leading up to Christmas 2019. Well, shit happened, as it usually does. Life got in the way but I'm doing my best and I'll keep writing the original storyline… so yeah, it's going to get a little festive as the chapters progress. But hey, it will make great reading when we come to Christmas 2020!

You can thank ShesAlwaysSinging for this chapter – without that simple 2 sentence review, I would never have found the motivation to get this chapter finished. Never underestimate your power as a reader to fuel us writers 3

Do you ever get so anxious and nervous you feel like you're going to throw up? That's what I feel like right now, hurriedly tidying away clutter as the clock ticks down to our date tonight. The date. After 2 blissful nights snowed in together, this shouldn't be such a big deal… but it is. My heart thumps in time with my feet as I trail up the bare wooden stairs, finally ready to focus on myself and not procrastinate with the mess downstairs.

The walk home from Edward's house had been, well, interesting. The winding trail through the woodlands is lighter every time I pass through it, thanks to the falling foliage and bright winter light skimming around naked branches. Yet I can't seem to shake this feeling of being watched, the big bad wolf hiding behind one of the tree trunks is ready to pounce. It's a relief when I burst out of the trees on the other side… and it's a pain too. The harsh bright daylight and freezing cold temperature throbs behind my eyes, reminding me I'm not immune to hangovers either. But my heart is swelling up in my chest. Edward makes my green Grinch heart grow.

Soft smiles turn my lips up as I think about him again while I fill the bathtub and wait for the painkillers to kick in. Tonight we'll be talking and… stuff. The ominous, terrifying, thrilling and exciting stuff that my mind can't stop exploring. Nerves flutter in my stomach.

Stop being silly. This is Edward, the guy who saw you a complete muddy mess the second time you met.

Yes, this is Edward. The man who sets my body alight. He's already seen me near my worst. I turn the taps off as the butterflies settle. I trust him already, I realise. I trust him with my well-being, something I'd been adamant was only my responsibility since mum left.

Well shit, finally some personal development.

I huff and will away the inner monologue as I lower into the tub, reaching for the expensive bodywash bottle I'm cracking open for the first time. As much as I'm beginning to realise how close I feel to Edward already, I'm not quite ready to share all of me. The inner me. All the fantasies and adventures are just so… personal. They're one world and Edward is another. I don't think they can mix. Besides, Edward wouldn't want an immature, daydreaming girl. He wants a woman. The sexy seductive woman that was with him last night.

I focus on bringing that Bella back out – minus alcohol – as I soak in the tub.

Pale limbs stretch out before me, muscles slowly relaxing under the rippling surface of the pearly, perfumed water. Jasmine scents snake over my pores. My head tilts back with a sigh.

A sharp cold drop from the tap on my inner thigh shocks me awake again. The water is lukewarm and the light filtering down into the bath is that hazy warm glow of the golden sun in the late afternoon as the tap continues to drip its persistent rhythm. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

The cool bathwater swirls down the drain with all my hopes of being picture-perfect by the time Edward gets here. At least I'm clean, my skin soft and supple from such a long soak. I try to massage out the prune wrinkles on my fingers and toes with lotion, quickly smoothing it into my skin.

Digging out the old hairdryer from the back of my closet, deciding there's not enough time to let my hair dry naturally, I start to wring out the wet mahogany strands. I managed to find my favourite royal blue lingerie set to wear, the soft silk and pretty lace hugging my curves underneath the bathrobe as I sit here and let the hairdryer heat soak into my skull. Some things can't be rushed and this is one of them.

I fight the urge to chew my lip, not wanting to tear the skin as I start to think and worry about tonight. The hairdryer clicks off and it's time for soft hair oils now, letting the golden liquid glide over my fingertips as I massage it into my locks, scratching my scalp with gentle nails and trying not to overthink things. My eyes close involuntarily as I work to tease my hair just right, like Rose did for me.

"You should lock your door," his quiet voice, rich like honey, radiates across the room to startle me.

Wide doe eyes lock onto vivid green ones in the mirror reflection in front of me. He's here already, leaning in the door frame like a Levi's model in his dark jeans and tight t-shirt. But in the slowly fading light, as twilight approaches, he's something else entirely. Not quite human but definitely all man. His skin glows, his toned forearms crossing over his chest as he watches me with an amused smirk. The hint of dark circles under his eyes is the only traces of yesterday's late night. They draw me in further, making the magnetic greens of his eyes sparkle and seemingly glow in the gloom of my bedroom.

I whip my head around from the mirror to the doorway, like I'm scared he'll evaporate into the air if I take my gaze off his lean figure and striking eyes. I'm surprised he can't hear the thump thump thump of my heart from there, it's throbbing in my ears.

With just 5 words and 1 look, he's completely mesmerised my unprepared mind. Realising I should say something instead of unashamedly ogling him, I squeak out the only reply I can think of.

"Okay, I will."

He nods once, a sharp acknowledgement of my words that sends a wiry lock of copper hair stray. I want to wrap it around my fingers, tugging his face down to mine so I can feel that slight stubble scratching my skin so deliciously as our lips meet. The butterflies flutter back to life at my brazen thoughts.

I close my eyes as the blood starts to colour my cheeks, taking a deep breath in and letting it out with a soft laugh at the absurdity of what I'm feeling right now. Nervous and shy because there's a man in my bedroom, like I'm a teenage girl again and not a fully-grown woman who sucked said man's cock not 24 hours ago.

The tension and nerves leave me with my breath. This is Edward. He wants me.

"Hi," I start again with excitement bubbling in my veins, "you're here."

"As promised, for dinner and… stuff," he muses quietly, still leaning in the door frame.

"Are you hungry?"

His eyes slowly and deliberately trail down my body, taking in the soft white bathrobe tied carelessly around my waist. The low v-shape revealing how fast I'm breathing already as my breasts swell in soft silk. His gaze travels further, my lips parting slightly in a silent pant as his eyes reach the silky smooth legs twisted beneath me.

"I could eat," his lips pull up into a crooked shape as his eyes reach mine again, considerably darker than they were a moment ago.

Liquid starts to pool lower down, making my softest lips so slick with wetness. He waits for me to respond, still waiting in the doorway with ungodly stillness, just his eyes flickering with movement in time with the rise and fall of my chest.

Oh God. He's so fucking hot. I'd always thought 'dripping with sex' was a silly, unjustified cliché but damn. It is dripping off him, creating a wave of lust that's drowning me so delightfully.

My gaze still locked in his, I lean back and rest my arms on the vanity desk behind me, feeling the slide of silk as my robe parts just a little further. I tilt my head back, long tresses tickling my arms as I unabashedly let him see me, tempting him with my body, a wanton mess for him in mere minutes.

He stalks forward slowly, torturously, his gaze finally breaking from mine to travel my body again. And he sees right through me, through the lustful, confident, wanton woman who wore her best lingerie. He sees this move for what it is. The prey tilting her neck back, giving in to the predator. Offering her body as a sacrifice to the God. Submitting to the darkness, the dominance and the pure unadulterated power that this man has over me.

I want him to claim me. He knows it.

The musty spiced scent of him swirls over me as he looms closer, until he's blocking out the dimming light. Trembles threaten to weaken my arms as I feel the weight of his gaze bearing down on me. My eyes drop from the pressure, taking in his muscular thighs wrapped in jeans and the thick, suckable bulge under the zipper.

His light chuckle shatters the silence in the air as his hand, that rough-skinned nimble hand, reaches towards me, tilting my chin up gently and exposing my throat so he can wrap his fingers around it again. Back where they belong.

Nothing can move us in this moment, my pulse throbbing under his palm and my eyes locked in his hungry gaze. I want it to last forever, but it doesn't. He gives in first, curving his hand to trail up from my throat and into my hair, roughly pulling me up and his other hand curling my waist to secure my body to his.

And then his lips are on me. Rough meets smooth and I whimper, unable to stay silent as everything descends into madness. The kiss doesn't deepen, it starts that way. Raw passion as his tongue roughly plays with mine, saturating my taste buds with his scent and consuming my mouth until my plump lips are swollen and my lungs burn for breath. He doesn't let up, using his rough fingers on my scalp to tug my head back and pull my body under him, bowing to his height as he pants hot breath on my neck and traces fiery patterns with his tongue.

His hands roam down my back, groping my ass as he kicks my legs apart. Coarse fingers wrap around my thighs and roughly pull me up to my favourite place. Legs wrapped around his narrow hips, fingers gripping those muscular shoulders, and that thick hard cock of his pressed tightly between my legs.

I feel his movement but my eyes are too tightly closed, blinded by the sensations coursing through me at his touch and his tongue soothing the prickly feeling of his stubble on my sensitive collar bones with wet molten heat. I burn with anticipation, lost in the desire to be pushed up against the cold stone wall and fucked mercilessly until I fall apart, and then some.

Instead, I gasp with sickly surprise as he suddenly lets go and I'm falling backwards into space, my eyes flashing open just in time as my back hits the soft cotton covers of my bed. He looms over me, lips still parted and hair askew as he takes me in.

My legs try to squeeze together, relieve the ache hidden under blue silk panties, but I can't. He's still between my legs, keeping them spread wide for him as he takes his sweet time undressing me with his eyes. This is so much better than the wall, and so much worse, as I squirm on the softness under me and plead with my eyes to have that rough touch back again.

I want to be fucked.

"What do you want, sweet girl?" he toys with me, seeing exactly what I want in my heavy-lidded eyes. His voice is as rough and calloused as his heavy hands, the usual mocking tone is lost under lust.

Words escape me but my body knows what to do. I slowly reach for the bathrobe knot at my waist, my hips jerking automatically as he shifts his rough denim against my sensitive thighs, but my eyes never leaving the dark forest green of his gaze locked on me. This is what I want.

He chuckles again, the low and throaty sound echoing between us. "So fucking greedy," he smirks, "you're desperate to be touched, aren't you?"

I'm too far gone to be offended by his words. They mean no offense anyway… he loves how needy I get for him.

He reaches up to pull his shirt over his head, then dips down. His breath brushes my face before his lips descend on mine, firm but slow. Too slow. My lips part, trying to pull him closer, hungry for more.

He pulls away, dragging a whimper from my lips at the loss. Then the real torture begins. His lips drag everywhere, followed by hardened fingertips. The rough and smooth and wet leaving fiery trails over my body, tugging down the blue silk of my bra to suck and nibble on the swollen tips. My legs try to clamp together again, but he's still pressed between them.

The torture continues until I'm gasping, his lips now hovering millimetres above the damp silky material between my legs. His jeans vanished sometime between the steady sucks on my nipples and the dips of his tongue in my navel as I squirmed beneath him. It's his nimble fingers keeping my legs spread for him now.

He nips at the silk, grazing sensitive lips as his teeth tug the last scrap of material down my thighs. He mumbles something under his breath before he finally gives my quivering flesh the contact it needs. His tongue laps long, slow licks, tasting the creamy juices that are all but gushing out of me at this point. I can't watch, it's sensory overload as the tip of his tongue slips inside to play with my clit.

He circles it until my hips jerk and my fingers reach blindly for his hair, I want to push his face lower, feel that strong tongue dip inside deeper, but he doesn't indulge me.

"Fuck, Edward, I…" my hips lift to increase the pressure of his tongue flicking and pressing into my swollen, throbbing flesh. He pulls away before he makes me cum, ripping my hands from his hair to pin them over my head. He lowers his weight onto me slowly.

"You ready, sweet girl?" his voice is low and rough as his eyes burn into mine, seeing all the answers he needs.

My shallow panting breath fills the room as anticipation zips through my body, muscles clenching inside and wetness seeping from me.

The thick head of his cock glides through the silky skin of my folds as he guides it up and down, coating his flesh in the wetness before pushing in. He groans low and long at the tight feeling of my pussy stretching around the head of his cock. It feels so fucking good as he slides inch after inch inside. The walls of my pussy helplessly grip his impressive girth, trying to suck him in deeper but completely unable to clench. Fuck, he fills me to full capacity. The thought sends more wetness gushing around him as he fills me completely.

Expletives fall from his lips as he lets go of my pinned hands to grip my hips. "Fuck, sweetheart, can you take all of my cock?" he groans, parting my legs further and trying to push his way deeper inside. There's still an inch of his thick length to go, but he's already got me stretched out.

He nudges his hips forward, trying to get me to take all of him. The movement rubs the thick swollen head of his cock against a spot so deep inside me I didn't even know it existed. I mumble out a moan as the pleasure makes my toes curl. He doesn't let up the pressure, continuing to rub that sweet spot until it's unbearable. Until it's too much. "Ungh," escapes my lips as the only warning I can muster before my back arches and my eyes roll back into my head at the intensity of my orgasm.

Edward grunts at the sensation of my tight walls pulsing around him. Rough hands grip my calves and pull my legs up against his chest, the angle allowing him to finally slip deeper so I can take all of him. Every last inch.

His hips continue to rock minutely, letting me feel every inch as I come down slowly from the high. Green eyes bore into mine, too lust-filled to tease me about cumming so quickly just from the sensation of his cock in me.

Then he pulls back, eyes still locked on mine, as he pushes his way back in. There are no words now, just the push and pull, the delicious friction as he sets a steady, firm pace. Every inch of him, slick with my cum, claims me over and over again. My hips rise to meet his, pushing against his hands with every thrust until he falls forward. His hands dig into the mattress on either side of me as he fucks me harder, pushing us both closer as his thrusts start to lose their rhythm and I throb around him, my fingers clawing into his back.

His head falls into my neck, tongue tasting the salt sweat sheen on my skin as his release hits, his cock still buried in that deepest place inside me as I cum with him.

Our hot skin melts together as rough touches turn to soft kisses and licks. This is what heaven feels like.

After 3 hours, 2 bowls of tagliatelle, and 1 awkward but necessary explanation about the contraceptive pills I take, we're settled back into our spot. Legs glowing in the warm light stretched out in front of the fire, backs resting against the sofa, his strong arm around my waist and my head pillowed against his chest.

He feels different and the same. Still Edward, still that enticing contradiction of soft and rough… but different. I could melt right into his chest because his skin feels like my skin. Like we're one being, bound together. Is it supposed to feel like this after sex?

Maybe you shared something more than just a lustful fuck session.

It's a rare occasion when my inner voice comes up with an idea that soothes me.

"What are you smiling at?" he asks, the smile on his own face evident in his voice.

"Nothin'," I whisper more smiling words into the comfort of his chest, "how did you know I was smiling anyway?"

"I just know."

Silence swarms around us again, a comforting blanket as the fire crackling fills the room once more and the steady rise and fall of Edward's chest lulls me back into my mind.

For a moment, I wish we weren't here. I wish we were in Alaska, or deep in the wilderness of Russia, hidden away in a cabin with no connection to the outside world. No responsibilities or jobs or worries. Just his body, mind and soul endlessly dancing with my own.

"…really know a person," the rumbling vibrations under my cheek pull me back to hear the end of Edward's sentence.

"What?" I murmur, feeling too mellow and languid to pretend I heard what he said.

His shoulders jerk a little as he chuckles.

"That's exactly what I'm talking about," he leans down to press his lips to my hair before continuing, "so, Miss Swan, tell me something about you."

I mock groan. "Not this game again, don't you already know so much about me?"

He doesn't reply. After a beat, I struggle to pull myself upright.

His eyes are kind, his face still soft, yet also serious, searching my eyes for answers.

"You know more about me than anyone else," I let my whispered words float between us, showing him with my eyes that I mean it.

His hand comes up to my throat again, feeling my pulse as I lean into him. This new physical connection between us feels so good, so natural.

He feels it too. "Okay, little one," he murmurs back, "then tell me where you went just now."

He's got you there.

Seeing I have no answer for him, he carries on with that soft voice, probing further. "Or when you were cooking up dinner and didn't see it burning in the pan. Or how you could disappear inside yourself enough to fall asleep inside a busy pub…" his voice trails off, using his eyes to ask more than his words can.

He's too observant, seeing right through me, deep down to my soul. It's not fair. I can't tell him. I don't want to tell him. What if it ruins everything?

There's nothing I can do but return his gaze.

He smiles softly and shifts against the sofa, getting comfortable. He's not leaving.

"Just tell me something, any little thing, from inside here," he taps his fingers gently against my temple, "let me read your mind for a moment."

With my heart in my throat, I lean into his hand until it's cupping my face.

"I've never been bored," I whisper to the spot on his t-shirt I can't look away from. "It's just…. There's always something, y'know? Maybe I'm simple minded. I don't… I don't know. It feels like my mind is endless. How could anyone with an imagination ever be bored?"

My eyes involuntarily flicker to his face, finding nothing but kindness and curiosity and the curve of his smile.

"Your mind isn't simple, Bella, it's beautiful. Don't hide it away. Not from me."

I'm pulled back into his embrace, the heat from the fire washes back over us and everything would be perfect if it weren't for this quiet thought in the back of my mind. The thought that eventually I'd have to tell him everything if this is to last. Not just the poetic words and imagination, but the way I've carved out my life around it. The way that I'll never be 100% present when we're having a conversation. The way it's dangerous for me to take on responsibilities. That maybe I will never be truly living in the moment.

He won't find that beautiful in the slightest.