We got super lucky with Dorian. Fingers crossed the storm continues to veer right.
4
The Hunk
Edward is stupefied when he finally sees Bella's face for the first time.
Even panic-stricken, she's still breathtaking.
He knows he shouldn't have touched her like that. It was stupid of him, doing something so bold.
When she tells him that she isn't worth it, the evident pain in her voice hits him straight in the heart. She slams her door, and he registers the thud on the other side. He stands up, placing his hand on the hardwood.
"I'm not giving up on you, Bella. I don't care what you say," he says.
He thinks he might hear a sniff or maybe a soft sob, and he wants to break down the door and make her smile. He'd do anything to wipe the sad frown off her pretty face.
Instead, he steps over the small fence separating their stoops, goes inside, and drops onto his couch with a heavy sigh. His hands find his hair, and they pull in frustration. He wants to scream, but he's afraid she'd hear him, and that wouldn't do either of them any good.
There is only one thing he can think to do, so he calls his sister.
"What's up, bitch?" Rosalie greets.
"I'm in trouble," Edward says sadly.
"Legal or personal? I can have Emmett come up with bail money, I guess. With his history, it wouldn't be hard to make it look like an accident," she says thoughtfully.
Edward can't help but laugh. "You don't have to kill your husband, but I appreciate the sentiment. It's a personal matter."
"Did you get some whore pregnant?"
"No, dumb ass. You have to get laid in order to procreate, and my focus has been on The Bakery. Will you just shut up and listen to my problem?"
Rosalie hums and tells him to go on.
Edward tells her everything about Bella. It's not much, but he tends to ramble a lot.
"You want my honest opinion?"
"I wouldn't have called you for anything less, Ro," Edward says.
"You've got a lot of work to do. She's obviously damaged, so you need to make sure this is something you want to take on. You're going to have to take it slow. Like turtle slow. Capiche?"
"So, what should I do? Keep slipping notes under her door?"
"Yeah, but put some romance into that shit. Continue with the flowers on her doorknob. Bake her something special, not something you bring home from The Bakery."
"I bake everything there, so what difference would it make?"
"Come on, Edward. Let her smell that shit through the walls. Show her you're putting in the effort."
Rosalie gives Edward some more advice before he hears a loud bang.
"Shit. Emmett just fell off the fucking ladder. I think he knocked himself out again. I gotta go."
She hangs up.
Edward makes a mental list of things he could bake for Bella. Something he doesn't make for The Bakery. Rosalie is right; she deserves something special.
He finally decides to make white chocolate macadamia nut cookies with a Godiva drizzle. After he makes a list of ingredients he'll need to pick up after work, he heads to bed.
Once he's settled under the covers, he tries hard to listen for any noise on the other side of the wall, but all he gets is silence.
The three days that follow are shit for Edward.
For some reason or another, he gets held up at work. It's not at all surprising, considering the fact that the doors have only been open for a couple weeks.
Edward's head is so far in the clouds that he burns batch after batch.
He's frustrated to the point of tears when he finally gets thirteen perfect cookies, drizzled with chocolate, plated on the special dish he picked up just for this occasion.
He steps over the fencing and stands in front of Bella's door.
Edward has learned enough to know that Bella won't open the door if she sees him on the other side. He came prepared and pulls the sheet of paper out of his pocket and slips it under the door. After setting the cookies on the welcoming mat, he knocks softly.
Then Edward goes back inside and waits.
till next time, XOXO Ashley
