Chapter 13

Inhale. Exhale. Straddle that imaginary line.

It was Edward's mantra, of late.

Be supportive; but don't push. Let her know she's loved and wanted; but don't overdo it. Know when to reach out; but know when to back off.

Walk that tightrope perfectly.

He was beginning to realize that one thing was inevitable...

He was eventually going to fall off.

Edward wasn't at all surprised that after her very long and overly emotional day, Bella was completely exhausted and yawning by the time she walked into his bedroom after her shower that night.

He had only arrived back there himself a few seconds earlier, coming back inside as soon as he heard the water cut off. He wanted to already be there, waiting for her, when she got to his room. The last thing he wanted was for her to be alarmed by the fact that he'd suddenly felt the need to stand guard outside the bathroom window that particular night.

He also didn't want to assume that just because he'd been welcomed into her bed the night before, that it automatically followed that he had some kind of standing invitation. No one knew better than he that Bella's reactions — especially to him — currently varied wildly from one moment to the next. So when she came in, he was sitting on the couch with a book he was pretending to read, hoping she would give him some indication what she expected of him.

But she must have been hoping the same of him. Because she stopped in her tracks in the middle of the room, looking back and forth between him and her futon, biting her lip and looking completely lost. Her eyes were puffy, red-rimmed. She'd been crying again, damn it.

He couldn't take it, and he no longer had the heart to force her to be the one to bring up the elephant in the room. He'd just make an offer and leave it up to her to accept or shoot him down.

But maybe, for both of their sakes, he would start with a neutral location.

He set his book aside, opening his arms in invitation.

"Come sit with me a minute?" he asked uncertainly. If he was human, his heart would be racing. He was about to know just how many steps backward he'd taken that day, after finally holding her in his arms the first time the night before.

But Bella wasted no time in coming straight to him and sitting down right in his lap on the couch, apparently as eager to be in his embrace as he was to have her there. She lay her head on his shoulder and sniffled, fighting tears. He closed his arms around her and cuddled her to his chest, practically purring with contentment.

And she stayed there willingly until her yawns outnumbered her sniffles, at which point she settled the issue herself.

"Can we go to bed now?" she mumbled into his neck, yawning. And he couldn't help the way his hold tightened with relief.

"Anything you want, love," he replied gratefully, preparing to pick her up and carry her to bed.

She didn't stiffen like the last time the endearment slipped through his lips, but he did. He froze right where he was.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "Force of habit."

She was probably too sleepy to realize just how much her sleepy, half-slurred response meant to him, how much it touched his heart.

"No, s'okay. I don't want you to stop saying it just 'cause...you know...of him. With you, 's okay."

With you it's okay. His chest felt like it would burst with emotion. God help him, she was going to be the death of him yet.

He didn't trust his voice to reply, so he just adjusted his grip so that he could lift her and carry her to the futon, where he set her down and relinquished his hold only long enough to lie down beside her and pull her fully back into his embrace against his chest.

And despite the horrible day they'd both had, they hit a milestone that night.

It was the first night Bella made it through without a single nightmare.

But Edward was so deep in thought, wondering how to approach the questions he knew he could no longer wait to have answered, that that fact barely registered.

For every single doubt Bella had gone through the day before about kissing him, they were all gone by the second morning she woke up just having spent the entire night in his arms.

They had been replaced by healthy anticipation.

Breakfast was going to be nothing more than an obstacle to endure. She couldn't wait to get to their cottage.

She'd had an epiphany the night before.

With you it's okay.

That sentiment could be applied to a lot of things, she'd realized, just as she was falling asleep. And it changed her entire perspective.

She had been so worried that the moment she got close — the moment her lips touched Edward's — she would freeze up, fall into her memories. That her mind would believe it was Albert kissing her again, making her feel panicky and trapped, desperate to escape — being pushed for more than she wanted to give. She would panic, push him away, even end up in a ball on the floor screaming or something.

And that would surely be the end of even Edward's plentiful patience with her, patience that had to be wearing thin by now.

She'd worried about that so much she'd completely forgotten one important point:

It wasn't pushy, impatient, evil Albert she'd be kissing. It was Edward, who loved her beyond all reason.

So long as she made it a point to remember that, she thought she would be okay.

But from the moment she walked into the kitchen for breakfast, nothing went the way she thought it would.

For all that she had been nervously quiet the day before, when she'd been trying to work up her nerve for her failed attempt to kiss Edward for the first time since he'd left her, she found Edward to be doubly quiet and pensive during her breakfast that morning.

He still smiled at her whenever he saw her looking at him, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. He still answered when she spoke to him. He still offered her his arm as they walked to the cottage, keeping her pulled close to his side as his ever-watchful eyes roved their surroundings protectively.

But his silence only became more pronounced as they walked through the door of the cottage and he immediately started preparing to lay the flooring in the living room, lost in his thoughts.

In an almost complete reversal of their roles from the day before, she sneaked peeks at him, watching him sit on the ground 'working' and casting nervous glances her way, until she simply couldn't take it anymore.

"Edward?" she finally asked tentatively, from where she stood across the room, putting one final coat on the repairs from their paint battle. "You want to tell me what's going on?"

He looked up and met her eyes, one corner of his lips briefly turning up as he recognized his own words from the day before.

"Not really," he said softly, using the same reply she'd given him, albeit far more gently. He took a deep breath and looked down at his hands, which had gone still. "But we do have to talk about it. We have to finish talking about it, Bella. It can't wait anymore. We can't just keep pretending it never happened. I haven't wanted to push you. But maybe I should have."

"Oh." It was all she could think of to say, especially with her heart suddenly in her throat. She sat down on the floor right where she stood, swallowing hard. "Edward..." she just shook her head, not able to say more.

"I need you to understand why I'm forcing this discussion," he said seriously, still not looking at her. He was fixated on his own hands — wondering what Bella saw when she looked at them, after what Albert had done to her with his identical ones. "It's not merely to satisfy some morbid curiosity. I'm certainly not trying to upset you. And I won't be upset with you for anything you tell me. I can promise you that, Bella, although I know you don't trust my promises right now."

That made her flinch. She'd forgotten about that angry, hurt statement she'd made early on, when she'd told him not to make promises.

Edward clearly hadn't forgotten. He'd taken it to heart.

"I really do just want to help you deal with what happened. But also..." he hesitated.

"Also, what?" she whispered, more of a stall tactic than anything — a way to keep him talking so she didn't have to. She found herself fighting the urge to bolt and run from Edward for the first time in days. Even more so when he abruptly looked up and his serious eyes pinned her in place.

"Yesterday, you wanted to kiss me, and it scared the hell out of me," he confessed, his voice raw. "It scared me as much as it scared you, because I still don't know everything he did to you. It scares me every time I reach out to touch you. I want to be close to you again, sweetheart, if you do, but I need to know. I need to know everything so that I don't...do something by accident. Something that makes you think of him."

Her eyes squeezed shut, her breath coming harder as the panic welled up deep inside. "Edward, please," she begged. "I can't do this right now. I can't talk about this with you."

She heard his shaky exhale. "Neither can I. But we have to, and we'll get through it together. Stay put. I'm coming to you."

And seconds later, he wasn't sitting across the room anymore. He was sitting crosslegged on the ground directly in front of her, holding his hand out, palm up, for her to take. His worried eyes did their best to smile encouragingly at her, but she never saw them.

She was completely fixated on that outstretched, open hand.

Reaching for her. Making her feel trapped.

It felt like her lungs were being squeezed shut. She couldn't breathe.

Albert had reached for her exactly like that, in the moments right before he kidnapped her. And he'd wanted something from her, too. He'd wanted lots of things she wasn't willing to give.

Give me your hand, Bella. Just come with me, and I'll explain everything.

And just like that, it was happening again.

She had to get out of there.

She had to get the hell out of there.

She had never experienced a flashback before. The disorientation. The queasy nausea.

The pure, unadulterated terror.

Edward had reached his hand out to her multiple times since Albert abducted her. He'd even reached right out and taken her hand in his a few times. It had never once triggered such a response.

But this time, already feeling trapped by his insistence that they talk, something in her just broke.

Suddenly, she was standing in her back yard, slowly and fearfully approaching the man she believed to be Edward finally returning home for her, and wondering why his familiar golden eyes looked so frightening.

Give me your hand, Bella. Just come with me, and I'll explain everything.

She had placed her hand in his that day, despite her unease and how wrong it felt, wanting to honor the commitments she'd made to Edward — to give him, at the very least, a chance to explain why he'd left her.

And that was where her entire nightmare had started. The man she believed to be Edward had jerked her onto his back and taken off with her, leaving her house to catch on fire and taking her against her will to a dead woman's cabin, pressuring her in a way she had never experienced, and ultimately sexually assaulting her in the woods when she'd tried to run away.

He'd made her hurt. He'd had his mouth painfully on her chest while he pinned her arms down, completely helpless. He'd forced her legs open and forced his fingers inside her body, hurting her, violating her.

He'd done every bit of that with Edward's face, Edward's mouth, Edward's fingers, Edward's body.

He'd made her say Edward's name when he did it, look into eyes that were Edward's.

And now she was right back at the beginning, in her yard, with the same choice to make.

It wasn't Edward in front of her, at that moment, reaching for her all over again. It was him. She could feel the dampness in the air, even hear the dripping of the raindrops off the leaves from the recent rain. She could smell the herbed chicken she had left cooking in the oven.

It was so real.

She knew exactly what that hand was going to do to her if she agreed to go. She knew how it would touch her — the pain and terror she would go through.

And she wasn't going with him willingly this time. He could kill her, if he wanted, but she wasn't fucking going.

"No!" she shouted.

She pushed backward away from him on the floor, then quickly scrambled to her feet, backing up until her back slammed into the wall.

Why was there a wall in her yard? The sickening lurch of disorientation made her queasy. Her eyes squeezed shut, her heart hammering in her chest.

"Bella," she heard a velvet voice, someone standing just in front of her. "Bella, it's just me. You're safe, sweetheart. We're here in our cottage."

"Don't touch me!" she yelled at the top of her lungs. "Don't touch me!"

The one scenario Edward had feared since the beginning of their entire ordeal had finally happened, despite every single effort he'd made to prevent it.

But it was nothing like he'd expected.

He'd built this up in his head, dreaded it, thought that it would completely destroy him if it happened — if Bella ever looked right through him like she didn't know him, screamed at him not to touch her.

But he was shocked to find that it didn't destroy him. Because in reality, watching his worst fear happen right in front of him, he could see it for exactly what it was.

It wasn't him Bella was running from. It was her memories. It was Albert. Not him.

Him, she needed. She needed him to be strong enough to ground her, to pull her back into reality, and then help her deal with whatever caused it.

He was, strangely, calmer than he'd been since the first moment Alice had her vision. He was prepared. He'd done his homework, knew this was a possibility — especially considering how much time she spent every day alone with him, the man who looked exactly like her attacker — and he knew what to do.

Even just the fact that he had something he could do, for once — unlike so much of the time up to that point, where he'd felt impotently useless — was reassuring.

"I'm not going to touch you, Bella," he promised, his voice calm. "You're safe. You're just remembering. Try to open your eyes, sweetheart. Focus on the sound of my voice and follow it back. I'm right here."

She tried to back away farther, only growing more agitated when her back came up against the solid resistance of the wall once again. She yelped in fear, her hands coming up in front of her to defend herself.

"That's just the wall in the living room, Bella," he said evenly. "We're here in our cottage. I was putting the floor in. You were painting. The paint is still wet. You can reach back and put your hand on it, if you want. Do you feel that?"

It took some time and more coaxing, but he breathed a sigh of relief when one of her hands tentatively dropped down to her side, her trembling fingers exploring the wall behind her as he had directed. He was starting to get through to her.

"See? Just some wet paint. You're not there, Bella. You're here with me, and you're safe. I won't let anything hurt you. You know I won't. Open your eyes now, love."

Like she was moving underwater, she slowly pulled her hand up in front of her chest and opened her eyes, staring down at the streaks of gray on her palm and blinking with confusion.

"Just focus on breathing, Bella. Deep breaths."

She startled at his voice that time, like she wasn't even aware he'd spoken before then, but her eyes did slowly leave her hand and migrate to his face.

"Edward?" she asked, sounding completely lost.

He thought his knees might actually buckle with relief.

"It's me, Bella. You're okay now. You're safe."

Inhale. Exhale. Stay balanced. Control his emotions. Control his strength. Don't grab her and crush her in his embrace. Don't...

Just don't. Don't follow a single one of his instincts, apparently. He'd tried that, and he'd pushed her right over the edge.

"Please forgive me," he apologized imploringly, still afraid to touch her. "I'm so, so sorry."

All that newfound certainty he'd felt had gone right out the window. He'd kept it together when he knew Bella needed him. Now that it was over, he was trembling too. Scared completely out of his mind that she might run from him, shut him out for good; terrified that next time, he might not be able to reach her.

Tentatively, he opened his arms in invitation. "Come here?" he pled, so very unsure this time. "Please?" his voice cracked.

But she didn't come to him.

All the color had just drained out of her face — and despite the fact that he was now certain she was past the flashback and knew who he was, there was just something about the way she was looking at him that made his stomach sink.

"Bella?" he asked again, but lowered his arms.

He may not have known what just happened in her mind or what was coming.

He did know that both were very, very bad.

"Did you know?" she whispered, sounding horrified. Her eyes were accusing.

He kept his tone even, his hands neutrally by his side. What he wanted was to reach out and grab her, physically hold on to her, because he had a terrifying awareness that she might be about to slip through his fingers.

"Did I know what?" he asked, trying to keep the panic at bay.

"When you left me," she clarified, studying him with open fear in her eyes — that same look she'd held the first few days after he returned, when she had distrusted his feelings for her so very deeply. "Did you know? Did you know this was going to happen to me?"

The question hit him in the chest like a wrecking ball that knocked every ounce of air from his lungs. He couldn't even get a breath.

It sounded like such an innocuous question, did you know. One that implied a simple yes or no answer.

But there was nothing simple about it — least of all the fact that he still knew what was going to happen to her if he didn't find a way to change it, and he hadn't told her that yet either. Despite what had already been done to Bella, Alice's vision remained unchanged, aside from the timing implied by the snow in the most recent version.

He couldn't tell her that. He wouldn't tell her that.

He'd promised not to lie to her, and he'd meant it. But to tell her that she was in danger of Albert getting her away from him again and finishing the job this time, in just a few short months, when the snow fell? No. His entire being rebelled against it.

She had started backing farther away from him along the wall. His hands reached out of their own volition and clutched reflexively at her shoulders, unwilling to let her put too much space between them. He was afraid he might not get her back, if she got too far away at the moment.

"Alice had a vision the day I left, of you being attacked," he told her, guardedly. "So the answer is yes, to some extent. I knew the nature of the danger."

Her eyes filled up with tears as she shivered beneath his hands. "So you knew what he was going to do to me? The way he would...he would hurt me?"

No, actually. He had known it would be much, much worse. He still knew that.

"I had the general idea, yes." His voice was tight with fear, with anger, with the unknown, not knowing what she was thinking or where this was going; tight with the knowledge that he was, essentially, lying to her by omission after swearing from the depths of his soul that he wouldn't deceive her about any of this.

He felt the hard tremor that wracked her body, the betrayal in her eyes, before he fully understood it.

"Then...why did you leave me alone?"

The first tear spilled down over her cheeks, and his eyes tracked it in slow motion as he tried to comprehend her words.

"Did you...did you think maybe he was in Brazil? You were trying to find him?" she asked hopefully, her lip trembling and her eyes begging him to just please say yes.

The truth of what she was asking slammed into him without mercy.

She didn't know. Bella didn't understand, had no concept of the fact that he had fully believed it was him in those visions — him who would be the one to hurt her himself.

She had never known why he really left her, other than his vague assertions that he did it to protect her. Or maybe Carlisle's vague assertions that he'd believed himself a danger to her in some way, which was hardly a new revelation. He'd always believed himself a danger to her, and she knew that. Just not that kind of danger.

She had no idea of what he had put himself through all those months, believing it was him who would do that to her.

The only possible conclusion she could come to, after whatever doubts had been triggered within her by the flashback she just experienced, was that he had knowingly abandoned her to the mercies of a madman — a goddamn rapist — leaving her unprotected against a danger he was fully aware of.

God help him. It was a wonder she was letting him touch her at all.

His trembling hands moved down to clutch her biceps, holding on for dear life.

"Oh, God, Bella, no," he implored, his voice desperate. "You don't understand. When Alice had that vision, all we saw was...was me. There was no context. We all thought...I thought that...that I..."

He trailed off, choking on it. "Damn it, I can't even say it. But if there was even a chance that I could hurt you like that, I couldn't take it. I had to get as far away from you as I could. It was the only way I knew to protect you. God, Bella, please tell me you understand."

He was going to hurt her if he didn't relax his grip, but he was utterly terrified she was going to push him away and slam the door between them, figuratively and literally. Her face had gone even paler, completely white, staring at him in shock, her arms limp in his hands.

He had to make her understand. He was desperate to make her understand.

"If I had known, if I had found the first reason to believe it was anyone other than me in that godforsaken vision, I would have never left your side. I wouldn't have let you leave mine. Jesus, Bella, do you have any idea what I'd have done to stop something like that from happening to you? I'd have probably kidnapped you again and never brought you back. I was half out of my mind. Just the thought of anybody hurting you that way, let alone me..."

His hands pulled her even closer. His voice was a raw, ragged whisper, completely undone.

"Sweetheart, the thought alone is enough to destroy me."

Her breath came out in a long, slow, shaky exhale. "Edward..." she whispered, shaking her head in denial.

"Please tell me you understand," he begged quietly, his eyes pleading with her. "Please tell me you understand why I left. Why I had to leave."

But her head shook adamantly. "No," she whispered angrily, and it couldn't have hurt worse if she'd opened his chest and ripped his heart out. She reached up and furiously swiped away a stray tear from her cheek. "No. I don't."

His lips slowly parted, his heart breaking. His hands carefully loosened their grip on her, willing himself to find the strength to let her go when she inevitably demanded it of him. "Bella..." he pled.

But she reached out and grabbed hold of the front of his shirt, twisting it up in her fingers, her expression furious. "How could you believe something like that, Edward? Oh my God! When Carlisle said you left because you thought you were a danger to me, I thought he meant my blood, like usual, or...or having sex, or changing me, or whatever else you were always so worried about. But this? How could you not know? How could you believe for one second that you would do something like that to me?"

"Bella," he attempted again, desperately, but she wasn't having it.

She pushed at him, trying to shrug off his hands, putting some space between them when he willingly released her and let himself be pushed back.

"You wouldn't!" she reiterated. "Not ever. Don't you think I would have known that if you just told me? How do you think I figured out he wasn't you in the first place, when I found the proof he had killed Lacey? I know you, damn it! And you'd never hurt anybody like that! Especially not me!"

She was so angry she was shaking, so furious she didn't even want him near her, but that didn't matter. The words she said felt like she had just reached into his chest and put his dead, broken heart back together.

Bella believed in his integrity, whether she was furious enough to slap him at the moment or not. And that was huge.

It was overwhelming.

"Bella, I know that, okay?" he explained, hands out to his sides. "I know that me, in my own right mind, would never raise a hand to you. I knew it then. But we also knew there was a good chance someone else was involved. What if it was a vampire with the power to influence minds, to coerce me into attacking you? What if I could be forced to hurt you, or even kill you? Do you think I would take a chance like that with you?"

She was still shaking, and not with fear. "Then why didn't you just tell me the truth?"

His heart sank in his chest, because he knew he still wasn't being truthful with her — at least not about the future Alice still saw.

"I couldn't. I just...I couldn't. I can't even imagine trying to tell you something like that. And it wouldn't have mattered. I had to leave either way, and I was afraid to go near you even long enough to say goodbye. We didn't know the timing of when Alice's vision would happen, at least not back then."

He realized his mistake instantly — and so did Bella. She went still, her mouth dropping softly open. She studied him intently.

"Back then. So you figured it out at some point? You knew when it was going to happen?"

Her eyes widened with betrayal as the obvious implication of that sunk in...

"Oh my God...Edward..."

He heard the unspoken question as clearly as if he could read her mind:

If he knew, why the hell wasn't he there to stop it?

He froze, his lips still parted, his body going perfectly still. In contrast, his mind raced, scrambling for what he could possibly tell her.

He had two choices, both equally awful: either let her keep believing he'd known when her first attack was going to happen and that he'd failed to come to her rescue in time, which was both false and cruel; or admit that it still hadn't happened yet but he knew when it would, thereby hanging a deadline over her head that would only terrify her without reason — because he'd find a way to stop it, one way or the other.

That option was quite possibly worse.

But he didn't end up having to make that choice. Bella had been right. She did know him. She read his expression perfectly.

She took a step farther back from him, her finger coming up to point at him accusingly. "There's something you're still not telling me. Something else."

His eyes closed in agony. How could he do this to her? How could he tell her her nightmare wasn't over?

"I'm only trying to protect you," he confessed hoarsely. "Let it go, Bella. Please. I'm asking you to let this go. I'm not going to let it happen."

"No. Look at me," she commanded, and he did so without question. She studied him closely. "What aren't you telling me, Edward? Has Alice seen something else?"

He took a slow deep breath, surrendering to the horrific inevitable. "Yes."

At least she touched him again, surging forward, her hands clutching at his shoulders. She was trying to be so brave, but he felt the way her fingers trembled with fright. And it was only about to get worse. "What is it? Edward, please!"

He shook his head, gritting his teeth, barely able to believe he was about to do this.

"The same thing she saw before, Albert attacking you as me. Bella, it...it still hasn't happened yet. I didn't know when he was going to go after you the first time, or that he even existed. I swear to you I didn't. We all still thought it was me in the vision. But now we have some idea when it's supposed to happen."

She exhaled like he'd punched her in the gut — and he felt as guilty as if he had.

He stood watching her process the horror of it all, hating himself more by the moment.

"When?" she finally whispered, her eyes filling with tears, her chin going up bravely. "When will it happen? So I can try to...be prepared for it."

And that statement — that maddening, horrifying statement — that was just it for him.

That was when the tightrope snapped beneath his feet, sending him plummeting into freefall.

It was when he snapped, right along with it.

Every bit of the pressure, the guilt, the worry, the anger, the frustration of months on end feeling helpless — it all finally boiled over, and he simply couldn't take it for another second.

"Never, goddamnit!" he grated through clenched teeth, his voice rising. His hands found her waist, gripping harder than they should have as he hauled her closer. "Never, because I'm not going to let it! Do you hear me, Bella? That bastard's not going to touch you again! Not now, not EVER. If me dying is the only thing that can stop it, I'll find a way around Alice and make it happen!"

Inhale. Exhale. Stay on the tightrope. Ease Bella's fears. Hide his own. Walk that goddamn, fucking line.

And he had just fallen off. All the way off. He was scaring her to death.

Immediately, his hands were off her and he was across the room from her, only narrowly restraining the urge to put his fist right through the stone fireplace as he paced, his frustrated hands running through his hair.

"You dying?" Bella called after him in a voice high-pitched with fear, like those were the only words out of his mouth she had even comprehended. Maybe they were. "Edward, what are you talking about? You're scaring me."

And yeah, he knew that. And God help him, even that awful knowledge couldn't stop him. He'd hit his damn limit, not having dealt with any of his own emotions while he tried so desperately to deal with all of hers. And now, everything he'd internalized for far too long was spewing out, completely out of his control.

"What happened in the cabin?" he demanded, abruptly turning to face her but staying across the room. He was too intense, too demanding. His voice was just short of a growl. "Not knowing is killing me. Do you understand that? When I find him...when I take him apart piece by piece...I need to know I've exacted vengeance for all of it, everything he did to you! I need that, Bella. I need the truth!"

She stared at him across the room like she didn't even know him.

"I told you what happened." Her voice was horrified, her eyes searching his face. "What is it you think happened, Edward?" Her lip trembled like she was about to burst into tears, and he still couldn't stop.

"I was there yesterday," he shot back, his fists clenched at his side — something she noticed and shrunk away from him a step. The fresh wave of self-loathing that caused only fueled his frustration. "I saw everything. I smelled everything. I know you were both in that bed, and I know you never mentioned a bed to me once. What happened with him there, Bella? What are you not telling me?"

Bella was reeling. In a few short minutes, Edward had gone from gentle and supportive to...to this.

Was he accusing her of something?

Her mouth fell open softly, her eyes wide. She was at a complete loss. "Oh my God. Edward...I..."

But her response — and their argument — ended as abruptly as it had begun.

He suddenly sucked in a sharp breath, head shooting up, his eyes getting that unfocused look they got when he was listening to something she couldn't hear.

His eyes snapped back into focus a few heartbeats later, locking on her wide ones for an all-too-brief second.

And then he was moving — right at her with a speed too fast for her eyes to focus.

She felt his tight grip on her waist as his arms locked around her, clutching her against him. His already stone-like muscles were so tightly coiled — like steel wires under tension — that she could feel the power thrumming through him. His eyes roved everywhere, from windows to doors, his already tight grip on her growing stronger as he angled them to shield her from every entranceway possible with his own body. An audible growl emanated from his chest — low, but as fierce as she'd ever heard.

His eyes were furious. His teeth were bared.

And she knew without question it wasn't directed at her.

"What is it?" she managed to gasp, utterly terrified, hands grasping and clawing at his shirt.

"Do not leave my side unless I tell you otherwise," he ordered tightly, not looking at her. He was intently focused on their surroundings. "The others are coming to help. I won't let go of you unless I absolutely have to fight him myself. You have my word, Bella. I won't let you go."

A high-pitched ringing started in her ears, her mind so terrified that the world moved in slow motion.

"Oh, God. Oh my God...he's here."

It wasn't a question. Edward answered it anyway, his lips pulled back in a snarl.

"He's about to be."

The front door to the cabin slammed open in the next moment, and she screamed — a shrieking, throat-ravaging sound of utter terror. Her knees buckled, her hands covering her face as she fell into Edward's side.

She distantly heard his voice calling her name, his hands pulling her upward until her feet weren't even on the ground. His grip on her was almost painfully tight, his arms like steel bands around her.

There was a sudden lurch of movement, like he was taking her somewhere, but it ended as quickly as it started.

It sounded like his voice came from underwater as he continued saying...something.

It didn't matter what.

She just kept screaming.

"Bella...Bella! Listen to me. That's just my family. Come on, Bella. Damn it. Jasper, help me calm her down! They're almost here. Emmett, guard that window! Bella, look at me."

Edward knelt against the interior wall of the master bedroom where he had immediately run with Bella, the most sheltered and defensible location in the house — something he'd made a note of the very first day he had brought her there with him alone to work. He held her clutched against his chest, watching as his family all converged in a protective semicircle around the two of them.

If he had to run with her, he had a good grip and he was ready. Even carrying Bella, his speed was formidable. He could outrun them if he had to. His thirst for vengeance he would absolutely satisfy, at some point, but he hadn't forgotten Carlisle's warning on the phone to keep his focus on Bella. Vengeance must necessarily come in a distant second to protecting his mate.

He was as concerned with her mental state, at the moment, as he was with her physical safety. She wasn't responding to him. At all.

And he could hardly blame her.

At the moment that Alice had had a vision of Albert and Victoria deciding to make a run onto the Cullen property, he had missed it at first. Because he hadn't been paying attention.

He'd been too busy destroying every bit of Bella's trust he'd worked so hard to earn.

He had, on the other hand, physically heard it when Alice yelled from the main house for everybody to get down to the cottage as fast as they could, shouting out a warning to him too. Bella's human ears didn't hear it — but his did.

He had almost immediately picked up the minds of Albert and Victoria coming into his range, moving fast, just after Alice's shout — which had sent him straight to Bella's side, everything else forgotten.

"Is it him?" Emmett snarled, his entire body coiled for a fight. Aside from Edward and Alice, none of the other Cullens knew what was going on. They had simply obeyed Alice's command without question.

"It's both of them," Edward replied, his tone clipped. His focus was still on Bella, limp in his arms but no longer screaming. She had the front of his shirt in a death grip, burying her face in it. "I've got you, Bella. I won't let them near you. Come on, sweetheart, please just look at me. God, I'm so sorry."

"I'm going after him," Emmett growled, and started for the door.

"No!" Alice screamed, and Edward's lips parted as his eyes locked with hers.

He knew exactly what she was experiencing. He could hear it for himself. Feel it for himself.

Someone else had just come into his range outside, someone he glimpsed for only a millisecond — and then he went mentally blind and deaf.

He couldn't hear Alice anymore. He couldn't hear Albert and Victoria anymore, either.

He couldn't hear anybody.

He clutched Bella a little tighter. "Emmett, stop!" he ordered. "Nobody leaves this room."

"There's seven of us and two of them," Emmett argued, cracking his knuckles. "This ends today!"

Edward's snarl was ferocious, despite the terrified girl in his arms. "You try to leave this room, and I'll fight you myself. Provoking us is what he wants, damn it! I can hear him. Or I could a minute ago. Alice...do you feel that?"

"Yes," she answered immediately. "Something's blocking me. It's like they all just disappeared. I can't see what they're about to do."

Carlisle hovered close to his son, who held tightly to his human mate. "Fill us all in, Edward. Quickly."

Edward growled once again, for good measure. "There's another one out there. A male. I heard him, just briefly, before they all...vanished. They're still close. But I can't hear them anymore."

"I saw him too," Alice said, deep in concentration. "Just for a split second, before I lost my sight. Edward, he's...I think he's a shield. But maybe not a very strong one. It's like it's...going in and out."

Edward had the same focused look on his face. He could find the weak spots too, catch a glimpse of a thought here and there, like a weak signal on an old television set, occasionally breaking through the static. Enough to know that Albert and Victoria, while still close, were no longer at a dead run for the cottage.

This was a test, he realized with clarity.

"No, not a weak shield," he mused quietly. "An inexperienced one. He doesn't quite have control over it — can't hold it steady."

His eyes locked with Alice, as they both broke through momentarily, Alice able to see the newcomer and Edward able to hear him. "A newborn," they said in unison.

His concentration evident on his face, Edward added to that, trying to pull as much as he could from the broken thoughts he could pull from all three of the outside intruders. "His name is Thomas," he murmured, eyes glassy. "Victoria created him in Seattle, very recently."

He listened more intently, shook his head when he caught another glimpse from Victoria. "No, actually, that's not quite it. Someone named Riley did it for her. Victoria's using him, playing him. He...he loves her. He thinks she's his mate." He shook his head again. "I lost it. Keep trying, Alice. See if you can break through and see what they're planning. I don't think they plan to attack today, but they're here for a reason."

The semicircle of Cullens tightened up its formation.

"There's four of them now?" Jasper questioned sharply, and Edward didn't have to hear his mind to know he was already altering his battle strategies, adapting on the fly. It was just how Jasper approached things.

"At least four," Carlisle was the one to softly answer. "If this Thomas was created in Seattle by a vampire working for Victoria, that certainly explains what's been happening there. If Victoria is behind it all, there could be more nearby, also shielded, waiting for us to attack. Edward's right: we stay here for now, close to Bella."

"That's why my vision changed, why they're waiting until the winter," Alice whispered. "Oh my God. Edward..."

"She's creating an army before she comes after us," Jasper finished her sentence. "She must be letting this Riley make the decisions and do her dirty work for her, manipulating Alice's vision. Then they got lucky and created a shield."

"An army?" came a soft voice none of them had expected, and Edward's focus was quickly drawn down to Bella. At some point when he was focused on breaking through the shield, she had turned her head back out of his shirt and started paying attention. "What does that mean? Put me down, Edward."

He set her on her feet instantly, but he kept his arm protectively around her waist, his eyes fixed on her face. He didn't like the tired, unnatural calm he saw there — like Bella had given up, resigned herself to a fate he'd die to prevent.

"It means a fight," Emmett was the one to answer, eagerly, to Rosalie's disgusted scoff.

"I don't want any of you fighting an army for me," Bella said, still far too calm, especially considering the way she'd completely broken down minutes before.

"Edward...Carlisle, do you smell that?" Esme cut in abruptly, sniffing the air, before an exasperated Edward could argue the point. "What is that? It's getting closer fast."

Edward recognized the foul odor instantly, having sought it out the day before, but he had no time to make a warning. He caught a glimpse, breaking through the shield, of Albert's intentions in the split second before it happened — too late to do anything about it.

Albert was running in their direction at top speed.

The door to the cottage slammed open, and something was thrown into the room.

Something horrifying. Something that landed on the exposed subflooring with a sickening thud, just a short distance from their feet.

Lacey Matthews' body.

Wrapped in the tattered remains of Bella's clothes and nothing else.

Bella's human eyes, Edward was sure, had caught only the most miniscule glimpse, but the abruptness of what happened was still enough to make her gasp.

Before she could focus enough to recognize her own destroyed clothes that had been torn from her body, now wrapped around the gruesome body of a dead woman, Edward swiftly cupped the back of her head and pulled her face into his chest, turning them both so that his body was between her and the macabre sight before them, blocking her view.

When she struggled against him, he held on firmly, stroking her hair to soften his actions. His other arm he wrapped around her waist, no less securely.

"No, Bella," he said gently. "You don't want to see this. Please trust me."

"Is it her?" she sobbed against his chest, going soft in his arms as she quit fighting him. He only held on tighter.

"Yes." The long dark hair was enough to tell him that, even if not for the overwhelmingly awful scent. The exact same odor he'd followed the day before, straight to the original shallow grave. It wasn't exactly forgettable, especially not in such close proximity.

The shield lifted, and he knew Albert and Victoria had already retreated. The test was over, apparently, and it had been successful. With the help of the shield, however imperfect, Edward's enemies had been able to hide their true intentions from him and Alice both until the very last second.

And the shield would only grow more powerful with experience.

"They're gone," he threw in the direction of his family, only the feel of Bella's trembling body in his arms holding him in place — and keeping his snarls at bay.

His rage was indescribable. Albert's very clear threat — and his hope to provoke Edward enough to make him chase them — had very, very nearly succeeded. If Bella wasn't holding on to him for dear life as it began to sink in exactly what had just happened, he'd have been right on their heels — and likely running right into an ambush, especially considering the shield could block his mindreading abilities, to some extent, and therefore his advantage in a fight.

"Somebody get her out of here," he said quietly to his family, with forced calmness. "Please."

"Get Bella's clothes," he heard Alice say to Carlisle, so quietly Bella wouldn't hear it. "Jazz and I will take care of the body."

Then she added, loud enough for Bella to hear, "Her family will get her back, Bella. I'll make sure the authorities find her today. I promise." Alice had heard every word Bella said to Edward about Lacey that first night she let him into her bed, Edward knew, and his sister's thoughts were deeply sympathetic. "We'll take good care of her."

The fact that Albert and Victoria had made such a bold and unexpected move, venturing onto the Cullen property — not to mention the existence of the shield — put an end to Edward's and Bella's blissful, carefree days working alone together in the cottage.

It just wasn't safe for her anymore, not if there was a chance Edward wouldn't be able to see danger coming, wouldn't have time to summon his family for backup.

His only clue that the shield was nearby would be that his ability to hear thoughts would suddenly disappear — a thing that didn't work on Bella anyway. He could hear his family's thoughts from the main house to the cottage, but it would be more noticeable when their thoughts disappeared if his family were in close proximity. So the safest thing was for them to all stay as close together as possible.

But on the other hand, it took about a day and a half for Edward and the rest of his family to realize that their work in the cottage had been the only thing keeping Bella going. She became increasingly depressed and withdrawn in the main house, only eating with a great deal of coaxing and barely responding to any of them, including Edward.

Especially Edward, actually.

He'd apologized more times than he could count for the way he'd yelled at her, even cursed at her, something he never meant to do. He'd meant every word of his pleas for forgiveness, too, as evidenced by the fact that he'd completely dropped the topic they'd been arguing about. His own actions horrified him.

He got very, very little from her in response. She didn't exactly push him away, despite the multiple opportunities she had to do so, considering how very closely he'd attached himself to her side. She even let him touch her, continue to stay in the bed with her when she slept.

She just didn't engage with him very much. She had almost completely shut down on him.

Worst of all, he had no clue if Bella was so distant because she was simply angry or hurt with him, or if it had more to do with the terrifying future she believed she faced.

Her only two interests seemed to be sleeping, which she spent far more time than was normal doing, and obsessively watching the evening news on television. That was one thing she would wake up for.

She seemed somewhat interested in reports of the killings occurring in Seattle, now that she knew the truth of them. But that wasn't what she was watching for, and Edward knew it. That was just an army created for the purpose of helping kill her. Apparently not a big deal to Bella.

No. She was listening for anything possible about the body of Lacey Matthews being found. And it was driving Edward mad.

It took three days, but it finally came: a story on a semi-local romance novelist whose body had been found two days ago, just off the main highway, just outside of Forks — something, Edward saw in his sister's mind, that was intentional so that Charlie Swan wouldn't be involved in any way.

Lacey had just been identified that day. She had no immediate family. But friends and extended family were shocked to hear of her death, despite not hearing from her recently. Last they had known, she had gone off the grid to focus on her most recent novel. The fact that no one had heard from her was par for the course for her when she was deep in her writing process, apparently.

Investigators combing her cabin had found little to no DNA evidence of any kind, aside from a heap of belongings dumped in the woods, many miles from where her body had been found, some of which appeared to have been returned to the home.

It was a mystery what had happened to her, they concluded, although forensic exams did suggest she had been brutally raped.

That was the point where Bella started to squirm uncomfortably, tucking her legs up beneath her and wrapping her arms around herself as she shivered. Edward's arms ached to be the ones wrapped around her, but he didn't dare touch her, at the moment. He did move slightly closer to her on the couch, his focus far more intent on her than on the television set.

A local coffee shop owner was interviewed next — one who remembered Lacey coming in daily for coffee, up until several weeks before. She remembered her possibly striking up a conversation with an unfamiliar male who had never been in before.

The police sketch of that man — whom police would like to speak to — looked uncomfortably similar to Edward.

And that was the moment that Bella jumped up off the couch and ran for the bathroom, with Edward a cautious couple of steps behind her — willing to give her space but not let her out of his sight.

She slammed the door in his face, but it did nothing to hide the sounds of her retching and vomiting into the toilet until there was nothing left and she started dry-heaving.

He leaned his forehead against the door, swimming in frustration and helplessness, and tried to figure out what the hell he was going to do next.

One thing was for certain: after having her back in his arms again, even for such a short time, he wasn't willing to give her up. Not ever again.

After an agonizingly long night, that decision of what to do next was decided for him when the morning news carried yet another story on Lacey Matthews, while Bella was picking at her breakfast on the living room couch.

The TV was only on because she had insisted on it — the first words anybody had heard her utter since the night before.

She had slept soundly, at least. Carlisle had finally given in and prescribed something to help her sleep, all things considered. And she hadn't made a sound all night long, as Edward faithfully watched over her.

Nobody wanted a repeat of the night before. At the same time, nobody had the heart to turn her down when she wanted to eat breakfast in front of the TV, either. Because at least she was finally eating.

The morning news reported that Lacey's remaining family and a couple of close friends had quickly organized a memorial service for her at a funeral home two towns over — the town where she lived when not staying in her cabin to write. It was open to the public, as she was somewhat well known in her home town, considering the success she'd had with her novels.

The service was going to be that very afternoon.

Bella immediately looked up and made eye contact with Edward, searching his face with a pleading expression that broke his heart — like she fully expected him to let her down. To deny her.

It was also practically the first time she'd really looked at him willingly since what happened in their cottage.

"I gave you my word, Bella," he reminded her softly, without her saying a word. He overcame his nerves enough to reach out and take her hand in his own. She flinched but didn't pull away. "I told you I would take you, and I will. We can't go alone, of course. We'll take Emmett and Jasper, at the very least. But a promise is a promise. And I swear to you — I swear that I'm never breaking another one."

Esme sat down on Bella's other side, putting an arm around her. "We'll all go," she stated warmly and decisively. "You and Edward can go inside, and we'll be outside nearby if you need us, sweetheart."

I'll destroy them myself if they come near my daughter again, was the surprisingly fierce thought Edward heard in his mother's mind. His eyes closed against the surge of emotion he felt.

If Edward had held any misapprehensions that he was in any better emotional shape than Bella, they vanished when he realized how very anxious it made him to have her out of his sight for even the hour that she disappeared into Alice and Jasper's room with Alice that afternoon, getting ready for the funeral.

Once he was swiftly dressed and ready, waiting in the living room, he couldn't stay still. His eyes stayed glued on the stairs as he first paced and then eventually tried to sit on the couch with Jasper, who was waiting for Alice just like Edward was waiting for Bella. Only Jasper managed it with considerably greater levels of patience and sanity than Edward, despite having been kicked out of his own room so his mate could play Bella-Barbie.

The relentless waves of calm coming at him from Jasper were Edward's second clue that he was in a bad way. He was even making Jasper nervous.

"You'll all stay in groups of at least two?" he verified, for at least the third time, not even waiting for an answer before the steady stream of instructions continued.

"You can't leave one another's sight, or Albert could assume one of your identities. If Alice's vision disappears, that means the shield is close by. You have to let me know immediately. I'll get Bella out of there, but I need at least two of you tracking behind us, to make sure we're not followed."

Jasper fixed him with an exasperated look. "You have to relax, Edward. Bella reads you as easily as you read other people. If she sees you like this, it's only going to make her nervous and distract her from the funeral. She needs closure on this. Let her focus on Lacey Matthews today, and you focus on her. We'll have your backs."

Jasper was right. He knew it without question. But that knot of tension in his stomach wouldn't go away.

Not until about thirty seconds later, that is, when Bella and Alice started down the stairs arm-in-arm.

He rose nervously to his feet, his jaw dropping softly.

Alice had dressed her in an elegant but tasteful black dress, sleeveless, that loosely hugged her form and hit just above her knees. She had matched it with low black pumps. Bella's hair was softly curled but loose, and her makeup was understated but still enough to cover the last of her fading bruises.

She was a vision. The most beautiful thing he'd ever seen in his very long life. And despite the tension between them, appropriate to the occasion or not, he was going to tell her so.

He met her at the bottom of the stairs, his heart probably written all over his face. His mouth was still partly hanging open as he held out a shaking hand to escort her off the stairs. She pulled her arm out of Alice's to take it with very little hesitation, her willing touch sending a far greater wave of calm through him than Jasper had managed, even at full power.

"Bella," he murmured, eyes drinking her in greedily as his hand closed carefully around hers. "My God. You're so very, very beautiful."

Not his most eloquent. The best he could manage at the moment.

Her gaze dropped to her shoes, but her cheeks stained pink and her heartrate increased, even as she scolded him. "We're not going to the prom, Edward."

"I know," he squeezed her hand gently, watching mesmerized as her gaze came back up to him. Much as Bella hated when Alice played Bella-Barbie, he had a feeling it might have actually been what she needed that day. She looked more confident than he'd seen her since he returned, pleased with his reaction and not doing the best job of hiding that fact.

He let his own smile peek through, equally pleased with her slightly dazzled reaction to him. "But it's true, nonetheless. I'm always honored to have you on my arm, no matter the occasion."

There. That was more what he had meant to say the first time. Far more befitting of a proper gentleman's reaction to the love-of-one's-life looking the way that his looked in that dress.

And it was more encouraging than he could put into words that his effusiveness made her blush as he gently but securely tucked her hand into his arm to escort her to his car.

Maybe his outburst at the cottage hadn't fully destroyed everything after all. Maybe Bella just needed some time to deal with everything.

And maybe so did he.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Author's Note: I know we're all ready for hearts and flowers, and I'm halfway expecting flames, but I'll stand behind my Edward in this chapter. I think it had to happen sooner or later. He's traumatized too, and he's always been (IMO) a possessive vampire with a few control issues by his very nature. Yes, he wants to be perfect and do everything exactly right for Bella's sake. Realistically, he can't. I want to stay as true to life as possible (I mean, aside from the shapeshifting vampires and all...ahem...ya know what I mean). If you have some happy thoughts or reactions to share, I would love to hear them. I could use them after writing that chapter, lol.