Hello everyone,

I hope you are having a great weekend. Anyway, as to the question asked by a reviewer from the last chapter, Edward is 35.

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Bella studied him, shocked to her very core. Very slowly as if not to startle a skittish animal, Bella backed away from his desk and crossed to the door. Quietly, she walked through the structure, and instead of going back to the kitchen, she wandered to her room instead.

Twisting the fabric of her sweater between her fingers, she sat on the edge of her bed, gazing across the room. Edward must've loved his wife a great deal to still be affected by her photograph. While Bella was intrigued by Edward's affection for his late wife, she couldn't help but wonder what that type of loyalty must be like. Hell, Bella hadn't even inspired that type of devotion from her own parents. That woman must've been one helluva person, Bella decided, flopping back on the bed to gaze sleepily at the ceiling.

Edward was wholly frazzled as he sat back in his chair. What the hell was going on with him? He looked back to the portrait of his wife, and another wave of guilt assailed his chest. His jaw clenched, and Edward found it difficult to meet the pale blue eyes staring back at him with the familiar warmth and happiness. Another zing of sensation shot to his heart as he lifted the glass of whiskey to his lips, and instead of taking a sip or two, he gulped down the contents. Before he even realized what he was doing, his gaze wandered to the trash can where he'd pitched the cheesecake.

At the vision of the splattered dessert across the waste can, frustration welled within, and his nostrils flared as he combatted the idea of Isabella offering him a treat. He could lie to her all day long, dispute his body's reaction to her presence, yet he couldn't exactly hide from the truth. Even now, he could feel the twinge of heat slip over him once again at the mere thought of Isabella Swan. His fingers tingled with the undeniable urge to slip up the back of her thigh, cup the globe of her buttocks he'd felt during his punishment earlier. Hell, a wave of lust shot straight to his balls as he considered putting her over his knee and hearing the startled gasps erupt from her slender throat as his hand connected with her ass.

Before the desire could hold him in a tight grip, Edward's hand fisted, his knuckles turning white. It didn't matter if he wanted to fuck the woman or not; Isabella Swan was off-limits, a fucking innocent woman, for fuck sake. Plus, if Edward expected payment for her, he couldn't very well be sampling the goods. Of course, there were ways to find enjoyment without sinking into her tight, wet channel.

A roar filled the study, and his fist came down hard on his desk. The pain that shot through his hand was appeasing on several different levels and temporarily took his mind off the temptation of sinking his fingers into her tight passage … flicking his tongue over her clit … bending her over the smooth surface of his desk … sucking the buds of her breasts. Edward was just trying to figure out whether or not her nipples were a light pink or a tan when Emmett waltzed into his office.

"Hey, have you seen Isabella?" Emmett started, his attention honing in on the waste can where the smear of cheesecake was across the top. "Well, I guess that answers my question. You couldn't just act like a human for five minutes and take the offering without acting like a raging dick?"

"Emmett," Edward warned, his brow lifting as he looked at his brother. "I am only going to tell you once to shut your fucking trap. I asked you to watch her while she roams these halls, and not thirty minutes into the task, I find her sitting at a table playing tea party with my daughter and my fucking mother. Not twenty minutes later, the little firecracker comes prancing in here with fucking cheesecake. What part of keeping her away from the family did you not understand?"

"Well, what would you like me to do? Huh? Hogtie Lily as she raced down the hallway to our captive? Or maybe you'd like me to put our mother in the basement," Emmett offered with very little conviction as he studied Edward. "The day you expect those types of duties from me, you can take this kingdom and everything with it and shove it straight up your tight ass. I'm not your fucking dog to order about as you wish." Emmett plopped down in the chair across from Edward, his hand running through his short dark hair. "She brought you a dessert, man. What harm is there in that? After I might add, you dragged her across the lawn on her attempted escape. She should've thrown the shit in your face, not peacefully offered you dessert. Asshole."

Edward wasn't about to enlighten Emmett to the harm it could've caused. He'd been seconds away from stripping that woman bare to discover what color pubic hair she had. Perhaps she didn't have any, his mind whispered. Shaking the thought from his wandering mind, he focused on the rest of what Emmett had said about Isabella's attempted escape. "I would like to know how the fuck she got out of that room. Pull up the surveillance of the hallway. Someone had to have let her out, and the person responsible better be ready to find a new job."

Emmett snatched the remote from Edward's desk and turned toward the big screen. "You know, you talk about everyone else being helpless, but you can't press a few fucking buttons for your own surveillance system?"

Edward ignored Emmett's bickering as he focused on the hallway coming across the screen. The timestamp rewound, and Edward watched as Isabella's image slipped back down the hallway back into her room. The timestamp went to about ten minutes prior to his captive finding her way out of his house. Intently, he watched the screen, his brows puckering as he focused on her door. The structure was obviously closed snug tight when Emmett pressed play, yet Edward saw no one indicating anyone had let her out.

The hairs on his arms rose as the doorknob turned and the door popped open. Only a few seconds passed before Isabella's blonde head appeared as she looked up and down the hallway and slowly crept out of her prison. Edward could scarcely believe what he was seeing … "Rewind that to maybe fifteen-twenty minutes before she came out."

"Did the doorknob just turn on its own?" Emmett wondered aloud, his eyebrow rising as he shot a look at Edward. Again, they silently watched the same scene unfold on the big screen, and Emmett, as big a man as he was, shifted uncomfortably in his seat as the knob turned with no visible presence. "Dude, what the actual fuck is going on?"

Edward wasn't a superstitious person in the least, yet there was no disputing what was before them playing out. "Maybe you forgot to lock the fucking door when you took her lunch. That is the only explanation for this phenomenon. I mean, she's not a fucking witch despite her ability to piss me off like no other. That doesn't take superpowers."

"No shit," Emmett mumbled in agreement, completely mystified. "If the wind blows in the wrong direction, you are pissed off. But that doesn't explain what is going on. Maybe she opened it from the inside, or the lock could be broken."

"The knob wouldn't turn on its own if the lock were broken," Edward mumbled, rubbing his eyes as he watched the screen. Perhaps he'd had too much whiskey tonight. Obviously, he inwardly scoffed, he nearly dragged his prisoner into his lap, over a piece of fucking cheesecake. He must be drunk to be seeing this crazy shit and acting the way he was. Pushing free from his chair, he withheld the groan in his throat. "I'm going to fucking bed. I'll figure this shit out tomorrow."

Edward didn't even glance in Emmett's direction as he strode from his study. His steps staggered as he hurried toward the staircase to the master suite at the far end of the hall. Without conscious thought, Edward's attention went to Isabella's room several doors down. As her image filtered across his mind, he turned, and unbidden, he made his way to her room.

To Edward's shock, he found her door wide open, and he chanced a look toward her bed. She was turned away from him, facing the far wall, curled into a tight little ball in the middle of the mattress. His chin tilted, and a shiver slipped down the side of his neck as this urge to enter her private room gripped him. His lips thinned as he refrained, and his gaze landed on her doorknob. Without hesitation, he wandered closer to the object and turned the lock before testing it. The hairs rose on his arms and the nape of his neck when the knob didn't turn in his grasp. Trying harder, it still didn't budge. So fucking strange.

For the first time in his life, Edward felt an odd sensation course down his spine, and his dark blue gaze shot around the room in search of an answer. When nothing happened, and the woman curled in her bed moaned in her sleep, he slipped out of her room and back down the hallway.

Entering his private room, he disrobed and headed for the shower. Maybe he needed to get under the hot spray of his shower and try to clear some of this fog from his brain. Edward rolled his shoulders, attempting to reduce the tension in his muscles as he climbed into the steam filling his shower. Letting the hot water sting his tired muscles, his forehead came to rest against the heated tiles lining the wall.

When he'd taken those vows to love and cherish Irene years ago, he would've never imagined falling so deep into the relationship it would take him a lifetime to climb out. Edward had never envisioned caring so much about another person; he couldn't shake them from his soul. Maybe he had loved her more than he'd ever admitted, even to her. Or perhaps the loneliness was more pronounced in her absence because she had been such a release and comfort for him in his crazy world. Of course, when he'd taken those vows, they were primarily for the benefit of the family business, total control of the Midwest. Yet, somewhere along the way, she'd become so much more than just a means to heighten his family's objectives.

Then before he could fully comprehend what she'd become to him, his sweet, beautiful wife had been taken. Now, where exactly did that leave him? Did he want to find a woman to marry again? If so, how the fuck could he do that when he clung so heavily to the past? If he decided to remarry, who the fuck was he going to marry? Did he want more children? After the last debacle, not that Lily was a debacle, but the events that had transpired after her birth … well, it wasn't something he wanted to ever experience again. So, in a sense, he didn't want more children.

He supposed his best option was to remain alone. Pushing away from the wall, he proceeded to follow the pains of actually showering as he soaped up and rinsed the suds from his form. Finally, with many lingering minutes beneath the warm spray, Edward felt some of the tension ease. Releasing a breath, Edward turned the water off and grabbed a thick towel from the peg, and wrapped the cloth around his lean hips. Unbidden, his captive came to mind, and another wave of heat rippled through his body, his cock twitching.

Just because he didn't want to have children and the prospect of remarrying was in the air didn't mean he couldn't enjoy a warm body. What would Irene think about his current thoughts, he wondered, as he dried off, heading to the bed. Edward flopped back in the middle of his bed and stared unseeing at the ceiling, his arm going behind his head as he lay there stark naked. One thing was for sure, he couldn't touch his prisoner, but he was sick and tired of his fucking hand.

Where the fuck did that leave him?

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