A/N: I don't own Twilight or its characters; they belong to Stephanie Meyer. I do not own any publicly recognizable entities herein. No copyright infringement is intended.

Bella:

Dancing with my girls was a lot of fun, and a lot less dangerous than my dance with Edward. Nessie joined Angie and me, and soon, most of the room was dancing to cheesy choreographed routines and having fun.

As the evening wound down, Nessie and Jake were caught up in a string of goodbye hugs and congratulations as the guests started to leave. Soon, only close family members were left.

Kate and Tanya were standing with Edward's parents, next to Edward and Emmett, as Nessie and Jake approached. They were about to leave for their room, then their honeymoon in the morning.

There were more hugs all round as Emmett joked about them not getting any sleep tonight.

"That's true," Edward started. "Nessie, I don't know how you put up with Jake's snoring; he was awful in my room last night…"

"Ha, you can talk!" I blurted out with an amused scoff, before realizing about one second later what it was I'd said.

Oh Shit!

All eyes in the room turned to me.

Shit, shit, shit!

Everyone's eyes were boring into me, including Edward's, who looked utterly horrified. Emmett spluttered out a loud, nervous laugh and Kate nudged Tanya in unspoken communication.

I froze.

Oh Shit! Shit, shit, shit! What the hell had I just said! I didn't think. It just came out, and now Jacob and Nessie were looking at me, waiting for me to elaborate.

But it was Kate who was the first to actually speak. "How do you know Edward snores?" She said, asking the question everyone was wondering.

Edward rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and looked somehow even more uncomfortable than I felt.

I squared my shoulders, stood up taller, and looked Kate in the eyes as I spoke. "The first night I met Edward, I slept at his place."

I don't know what on earth possessed me to make it sound like something had happened between Edward and me, especially when I was trying desperately to cover the fact that something was, in fact, happening between us. But it was worth it to see the look of surprise on Kate's face.

She raised her eyebrows and looked at Edward, who nodded in confirmation, a small grin now playing on his lips as he saw how put out Kate was.

"… with Vanessa and Jacob," I added. "It was New Year's Eve, so we all stayed up until midnight, and then it made sense to stay over."

"Oh." Kate didn't have anything else to say as I continued. "Although, maybe now that I think about it, it could have been Jacob I heard snoring down the corridor. I assumed it was Edward, but... who knows?" I shrugged, trying to add nonchalance to my tone.

"Anyway…" Emmett clapped his hands together before going in for a hug with Nessie. "Have a great honeymoon if I don't see you in the morning. I have no plans to be up early!" I secretly thanked Emmett for changing the subject as I dared to glance at Edward.

He gave in to the grin he was trying to suppress as he shook his head fondly at me.

I bit my lip, making sure I didn't say anything else inappropriate before I hugged Nessie goodnight and assured her I would be up to see her in the morning before they left for their flight.

Edward:

"Christ, Bella, that was close." I joked with Bella when she opened her hotel room door and dragged me inside by the lapels of my tux.

I smiled, pleased she was in a playful mood too.

"Mmmm, whoops!" She mumbled. "Maybe if you didn't snore so loudly, we wouldn't have a problem."

My lips left hers long enough to grin at her. "I'm not sure either of us will get the chance to snore much tonight anyway!"

She nodded and set to work on my shirt buttons, not stopping until they were all done, and she was pushing the fabric aside.

I watched as her eyes widened and she pushed the shirt and jacket off my shoulders in one swift movement. I let the material fall off my arms and watched the lust in her eyes as her fingers traced over my chest.

Now that I was shirtless, she unexpectedly pushed me down on the bed, but I willingly fell, happy to let her take the lead.

"Oomph." I landed on the soft mattress as Bella smiled.

She stood between my legs at the end of the bed and whipped off her dress. It had looked so beautiful on her all night, accentuating those bare shoulders and displaying her neck in a way that made me want to suck the delicate skin there. Her waist was curved in, and her legs were smooth and long despite her small frame. Now that the probably expensive dress was in a heap on the floor, the version of Bella that now stood in front of me looked even more magnificent. Her underwear was a navy-blue set, matching her dress perfectly.

I leaned up, propping myself on my elbows to get a better look at her, but she straddled my waist, and pushed my chest back down. I groaned at her body meeting mine at the most intimate of places.

"Edward..." she spoke through gritted teeth like she was having a hard time holding herself together. She rocked her hips slowly back and forth, on top of mine. "Oh, God, yes!" She groaned, and I sucked in a deep breath at the sudden rise of need she provoked in me.

This has been building all day, with the kiss in the elevator when we should have been with our kids, calming them and supporting them, to the way Bella looked at me when she walked down the aisle, right into my eyes, right into my soul. To the dinner, where we'd snuck away for more kisses, more frantic tux talk, and more lust building. Then that damn dance. Christ, I was mad at my brother, but in hindsight, Emmett was right to interrupt us. I was getting far too handsy for the situation.

Now, however, I could finally act on these feelings. Finally, acknowledge the lust in Bella's eyes because this time, alone in her hotel room, we could finally touch.

I looked at Bella as she sat above me, her hands stroking and gripping my chest. Her eyes were drinking in my body, and I tried to give her time to enjoy it; tried to hold back and build up slowly to what we both knew would happen. It wasn't working though; I was gripping Bella's thighs, trying desperately to keep my hands there and not progress this until Bella was ready. She was clearly enjoying my chest right now, and I wanted that to continue until she was done. I realized pretty quickly, though, that she might never be done, never stop wanting more, and I kind of liked that thought.

I moved my hands further up Bella's thighs, my fingers dipping under the edge of her lacy panties, stroking her delicate skin and smiling when even that didn't detract her from my chest.

She moved her hands to my biceps, holding them, feeling the muscles there, which seemed to make her hip movements more frantic.

"Bella?"

She looked me in the eyes, brown meeting green. Me meeting her. "Do I need a condom?"

She bit the corner of her lip as she shook her head no, and I raised my eyebrows.

"I'm protected."

"Oh!" I groaned the thought of going into Bella bare had just rammed my body up further into a gear I didn't know I had.

"Fuck, what are we waiting for then?"

From then on, we were frantic. Underwear was thrown; landing on top of lamps and under beds and who knows where else because it wasn't under the bed I was looking at; it was on top, where our bodies were melting seamlessly into one as we tried to make up for the days, weeks, months of want between us.

She whimpered, just a small sound, but it said so much. She was enjoying this, enjoying me and my body; she was desperate for more, and I was happy to oblige, happy to go deeper, faster, harder.

I wanted this to last forever, I wanted to hear her breaths as she raised her head, and I kissed and sucked at her exposed neck while she breathlessly whimpered, my new favorite sound, wordlessly telling me she needed a fraction more, more of me, more of us.

Seconds later, her body reacted to mine in the best possible way, and she fell, over and over, just seconds before I did.

We both laid still, breathing deeply but still intertwined, our bodies still together, still needy for each other.

'Oh, Christ!" I exclaimed minutes after calming our breathing and giving our minds a chance to catch up with what our bodies had done.

Bella lifted her head to look at me and grin. "Yeah, that was... amazing."

"I didn't think it would get any better then..."

She chuckled, but I was serious. Teenage Edward though sex was good, but in hindsight, he didn't have a clue what he was doing. Edward, post-Kate, was floundering between being desperate to find the love of his life and just plain desperate for sex of any kind. Never before had I had a connection like this. Never before had I wanted a woman this much, but also felt wanted and attractive and needed in return. Now, Edward, in his late forties, was genuinely reaching new highs he didn't know existed, and it felt fantastic. I silently cursed all the years I could have been having mind-blowing sex but instead was on the couch on a Saturday night, beer for one, while my son slept upstairs. I acknowledged the timing had never been right for me to meet someone then… but right now, the timing wasn't right either; that was still all wrong.

It was the person, though. It was Bella that made this different. Our connection and our emotions were all-consuming, despite the bad timing of our meeting, and now being related.

Related…

Now…

Today...

I scrubbed my hand over my face as I physically tried to wipe that thought from my head.

Bella seemed to sense my emotions, but I didn't want to drag us down. Something that made us both so happy shouldn't bring feelings of guilt. I shifted on my side to face her. I grinned, covering up my fleeting thoughts and returning to the emotions I'd felt all evening—lust, need, desire, and plain old happiness.

She grinned back at me, and I dropped a kiss on her soft lips.

"Wanna grab a shower together?"

She nodded. "Good idea."

A/N: Thanks to my great team of people willing to help with this story. Frannie Walsh, ChristyWIX, RebAdams, Heather Stack Riggs and Julie Gotcha Dodge have giving up their time to beta and pre-read for this chapter. Any mistakes are my own because I tinker with this story all the time.

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