Capitolo Venti


All the lies people tell just to cover up the truth that reveals itself in the end.


A/N: Lots of info revealed in this chapter, so be sure to pay close attention.

It had only been a couple of days since the incident with Edward's dad, but I was going stir crazy. I was tired of sleeping constantly, but I had been told by the ER doctor that I would feel fatigued more often and to let my body tell me what I needed. I was currently staring at Edward, who was sound asleep next to me. It was an interesting contrast between a sleeping Edward and an awake one. He looked almost like a little boy. His lips were in a cute little pout, his entire face was relaxed, and he looked peaceful. Lately when Edward was awake, he was stressed out, muttering to himself when he was in his office, and he just seemed ready to burst. I was happy that he wasn't withdrawing because I needed him now more than ever. But there was an expression he was starting to look at me with lately, and it seemed like regret. I hoped it was because of my injuries, and not because he was rethinking marrying me or that we were gonna have a kid so soon.

I got out of bed as quietly as I could, realizing that it was getting easier to get around by myself, even though it still hurt like a bitch. I made a pot of coffee, knowing that Demetri would come get a cup or two throughout the day and Edward usually had one too. I didn't like the stuff. I went to what was my office for the time being. I hadn't done anything with it yet, and the boxes Billy sent me were still there, unopened. I had been avoiding the task of sorting their contents, but I knew it was time to go through them. I hadn't wanted to open this particular can of worms, but I felt like maybe I needed this in order to really move forward. I loved my parents, but I had never had a chance to say goodbye. Maybe this was my opportunity. Sitting in my armchair, I opened the box closest to it. There wasn't a lot of stuff that needed to be gone through again, but I did need to decide where to put everything. I noticed that this was a box I had packed when we were moving everything out of the house for it to be sold.

After going through two boxes without much to see or take out, I finally hit pay dirt with our photo albums and leather-bound books. I sat on the floor to go through them more easily. I took out the stacks of them before I heard footsteps and Edward's voice calling out my name. "I'm in my office," I replied. He opened the door and took in the scene of me sitting on the floor with a stack of photo albums and books in front of me. He leaned against the door jamb and gave me that smirk that always made my heart start hammering.

"Principessa, you should be resting."

"I'm not doing anything strenuous, cucciolone. I was just about to start looking at pictures. Come here." I gestured for him to enter the room as I opened one of the albums. He came in and sat behind me, trying to be gentle and not jostle me. He kissed the side of my neck, and I turned my head so I could look at him over my shoulder. I was lucky that my injury was on my non-dominant side, so it was easy to not jar it. Edward and I couldn't have sex until my doctor cleared me, and I was encouraged to rest for the most part but try to get up and walk around whenever I was awake and able to.

"You found some good stuff it seems," he murmured, kissing me on the tip of my nose, making me giggle. I turned away from him and flipped the pages of the current photo album. I felt Edward rest his chin on my shoulder, looking at the album with me. There were a lot of pictures of my dad and mom, pictures that featured my mom with a prominent pregnant belly, and pictures of the three of us. "Is that you, Bella?" Edward asked in his smooth voice.

"Yeah. That's baby Bella." I smiled.

He chuckled and his hands came around to rest on my still flat stomach. We both knew that there was a baby there, that was half him and half me, and soon it would become obvious to the outside world as well. Looking at pictures of this part of my parents' life and the beginning of my own, I was hit by a tidal wave of sadness. My mom and dad would never hold their grandchildren. When my children asked about their grandparents, I still didn't know what I would tell them. My parents were gone, and though I wouldn't weep too much about it, Ted was living on borrowed time too. I couldn't hold in the sobs that started to bubble up. Edward, being careful not to hurt me, pulled me to him by my shoulders and held me.

"Principessa, I hate seeing you like this. Do you think that this is the best time to go through all this stuff?"

"Yes, because otherwise I will never do it, and I'll never get over it." I tried to breathe and stem the tears streaming down my face. "I want to move forward. We're married, and we're going to have a baby, but all the shit going on around us just keeps messing with that. I mean, you should be able to hug me properly and make love to me, but your fucking father broke my rib." I exhaled heavily and fisted my hair in my hand. "We should be able to share with our family that I'm pregnant and show them sonogram pictures without explaining to them that we got them when I was in the ER because again your dad fucking snapped. This is all just so extra. By the time this baby is born, he won't have hardly any grandparents left."

"That may be true, but the baby will have so many people around that will love it. Not only does it have a mom and dad, but it will have an aunt and great-grandparents. Not to mention, countless other friends and family that are gonna be there. It fucking sucks, ragazza, but we take what life gives us and make the best of it." His voice was soft but firm. He knew that I needed to look at this from another perspective, and he was trying to gently guide me there.

I nodded and tried to get myself under control. He stood up and put his hand out for me to take. I looked at him and shook my head. "I can do this, Edward."

"I know you can, but you're going to do it in bed. You can prop yourself up with pillows and browse to your heart's content, but while you are still healing, I would prefer you didn't sit on this hard floor," he said, no nonsense or compromise detected in his tone. I sighed and took his hand. He gently helped me up and then carried me to bed.

True to his word, he helped me get all propped up and comfortable, and then he and Demetri brought in the photo albums and books, spreading them around me on the comforter. Edward got a call from Felix and needed to leave shortly after that. He didn't give me any details about where he was going or for how long, so I figured it had something to do with his dad. He kissed me hard before leaving, a new intensity bleeding through our exchange. I cupped his cheek, and even though I wanted to tell him I loved him, I swallowed the words down and just told him to be careful. He smiled at me and then took off. When I told Rose that I thought I was falling in love with Edward, she told me to have a talk with him and see what his feelings were. I was scared to bring it up, and then he started looking at me with that regret, and I just couldn't set myself up for disappointment like that.

After Edward left, Demetri handed me a little walkie talkie, already turned on. "This is an easier way to get a hold of me, Bella. If you need me, just let me know." I smiled at him and nodded. He left the house too, and then I was alone while he did his rounds.

I picked up one of the leather-bound books, expecting it to maybe be a first edition of a novel or something since my dad collected books. When I opened it, I saw handwriting and a date. I skimmed through the page and realized it was a journal. Starting back at the top, I noticed the date of the first entry was July 1999. Throughout the page, there were several mentions of my dad's name as well as Ted's. As I studied the handwriting more, I realized this had to have been written by my mom. My mom's writing was precise, not super frilly or filled with huge words, but she still painted a clear picture. I found myself smiling at some of the entries. She gushed about the nice house they had just moved into in Washington, which was the home I grew up in, and that she was glad that they had left New York when they did.

I read through more of the entries and just got an idea of what life was like for my dad and mom before I had been born. There was the occasional mention of Ted, Elizabeth, Edward, and Rose. It seemed like they kept in touch, but it wasn't often. I picked up another journal and saw this one started when I was born. Ted and Elizabeth had come and visited them shortly after my mom gave birth. My mom mentioned that she was pretty uncomfortable during that visit because Ted was acting strangely. She described the fight Charlie and Ted had before they left New York, going into details about the lingering tension between the two men.

She talked about how after Ted and Elizabeth went back to New York, she and my dad started to distance themselves from Ted even more. It broke my mom's heart because she liked Elizabeth and thought Edward and Rose were lovely children, but now that they had me, they couldn't afford to be so tightly entangled with Ted. I snorted when I read that. It did give me pause though. The night my mom told me to find Edward, that he'd keep me safe, why would she do that if she knew what he was like? That was another thing I began to notice—she referred to Edward Sr. as Ted, and Edward Jr. as Edward. I thumbed through the other books, trying to see if there was a journal that was more recent, like from right before they were killed. Eventually, I found one that had entries from the past year.

I immediately turned to the back of the book, searching for the latest entry. As I flipped through the pages, the pattern along the border caught my eye and I realized that my mom must have used paper from this book to write the letter she left me. This theory was further cemented when I reached the very back of the book and found that several pages had been torn out. I had to hope she had been the one to do it, and it wasn't the result of some other page being taken or trashed. I gingerly got out of bed and rummaged through the top drawer of the dresser, finally finding the letter my parents left me. Once I was settled back down on the bed, I pulled the sheet out of the envelope and held it up against the missing page in the journal. The torn edges fit perfectly.

Setting the letter aside, I lifted the journal up, and a sealed envelope fell out. Puzzled by this, I picked it up and turned it over. Written on the front, in my mother's loopy cursive scrawl, was Edward's name. This made no sense. How did my parents know to write both Edward and me letters before they were murdered? Most people don't have a heads up.

Why they were murdered was still a mystery to me. Nothing I came up with made any sense, and now I had the added question over why my parents had left Edward a letter. Could their murder somehow be connected to whatever my dad saw that spooked him enough to move to Washington? No, that didn't fit. Why wait almost 25 years to kill someone if they were privy to mob shit they shouldn't have been? Ted and Charlie were best friends, but they had started growing distant after high school. I imagined my dad knew what his friend was up to and probably didn't want to know the inner workings of what Ted was into.

I set the envelope aside, not feeling right opening it without Edward. I blew out a deep breath as I thumbed backwards to read the last two entries, both of them dated days before my parents' murder. The beginning of the first entry talked about what had happened for my mom at work that day and how happy she was that I had moved back in. I smiled because she was constantly saying how glad she was to have me back home. About halfway through, the tone of the entry changed.

Ted called tonight. Charlie was the one to answer the phone, and it wasn't long after the pleasantries were exchanged before Charlie started getting agitated. I wasn't quite sure what the conversation was about until Charlie started shouting. I heard him say, "You're out of your mind, Ted. I'm not giving you my daughter." There was more talking before Charlie handed me the phone. The look he gave me is one I'll never forget. We had to be united on whatever Ted wanted, but in doing so, it would surely bring trouble to us.

I put the journal down before continuing to read. I was almost certain that I didn't want to know the rest. Having witnessed some of Ted's erratic behavior firsthand, I was almost positive now that he had something to do with their murder. Curiosity and needing to know for sure won out, so I lifted the journal to continue reading.

I wasn't surprised when Ted started explaining to me how great his son Edward was, but that he was having trouble finding a good woman to marry. Ted wanted to arrange a marriage between Bella and Edward. I told him that wasn't a decision I was willing to make on my daughter's behalf. Ted wasn't happy that I wasn't on board with his plan, but he let the subject drop and quickly ended the call. I tried to discuss it with Charlie, but we both knew the truth: we had angered the wrong person.

Fuck! There was no doubt in my mind that he was responsible. But if that was the case, then why did my mom send me to him? Another black thought crept into my mind, and I glanced over at the letter I had set aside. Did Edward know? This entire time, was he in on the fact that this was all some plan his father had concocted to bring us together? God, Ted really was a psycho. I fisted my hair in my hands. There was no way that Edward was involved, right? I would normally say no, but now I was looking back and starting to second guess everything. I set the journal down, the last entry forgotten. I was emotionally wrung out from the bombshell that Ted had orchestrated this whole thing from the beginning. Flickers of memories ran through my mind. How Ted listened to me cry over the death of my parents and acted like he cared. How he pretended to look into their murder. But the whole time, he was masquerading as the good guy who wanted to protect me just so that he could put me in a situation to blackmail me into marrying his son.

I was crying, turning the envelope over and over in my hands, when Edward came back home. He called my name, but I was beyond the point of being concerned with trying to soothe his worry. When he made his way into the bedroom, he stopped when he saw me with tears streaming down my cheeks, surrounded by my mom's journals, an envelope clutched in my hands.

He sighed in relief, probably because I had worried him when I didn't reply, but then he hurried toward me. I held my hand out to stop him from gathering me in his arms. "Please, tell me that you didn't know about this, Edward." My voice was hoarse from the tears I had shed.

"Know about what, principessa?" His brow furrowed as he tried to discern what I was asking him.

This made me cry harder. For him to use that name, along with the confused tone of his voice, I just didn't know what to think. "Please, just promise me that you weren't involved in this," I pleaded.

"Bella, you're starting to worry me. I don't know what you mean," he whispered, his fingers twitching as he yearned to reach out to me.

Reaching down, I picked up the discarded journal, flipping back to the page where I had left off and handed it to Edward. I saw his eyes roving over the page. His lips lifted into a slight smile, likely reading my mom's woes of working at a high school, but I knew the minute he got to the phone call because his eyebrows furrowed and then his eyes widened. He put the journal down gently when he finished reading it.

"Motherfucker," he whispered and raked his hand through his hair.

"It seems she left you a letter too, but because she was murdered, I guess she didn't get around getting it in the mailbox," I said through clenched teeth, trying to keep from crying again.

I flicked the letter at him as he winced. "Ragazza, you have to believe me. I had no clue my dad was planning this. He never mentioned getting married to you, or even talked about you to me until you came into town. And even when you got here, I had no idea why you were here." He picked up the letter. "Can I sit? I'll read it aloud. I have nothing to hide from you."

I sighed and nodded. "I'm sorry, Edward. This is just so much. I honestly never expected to find out this information, but I can't say that I'm all that surprised."

Edward sat down next to me, on my uninjured side, and pulled me, tucking his arm around my waist until I was flush with his body. This position always made me feel better because it took all my weight off my injured side and stretched me. He took the letter out of the envelope with his free hand, unfolded it, and started to read to me.

Dear Edward,

I'm sure you don't remember me, but I'm Renee Swan. My husband Charlie, your dad, and I, we were all like family when we were younger, but I am worried about my daughter's safety. I must implore you to offer her a safe haven and protection. Even as a young boy, I could see how different you were from your father. The good inside you shone through. I can only hope that I'm correct in thinking I can entrust my daughter's security with you. Bella will have no one once her father and I depart this world, and despite my desire to shield her from my past, I know that hiding her is not an option. I am sending her to New York with instructions to search you out. I beg of you to find it in your heart to help her .

Sincerely,

Renee

The tears had started again as he read the letter, and I felt my heart break further. My parents were dealing with all this stuff for a couple days, and I never noticed or even suspected that something was wrong. My parents were making plans to keep me safe, even in their death. Finally it all made sense and clicked in my head. "Oh my god, Edward. You know what that means?"

"I'm a little slow right now," he said thickly, and I noticed that his eyes were watery. The fact that my mom's last plea to him was making him emotional made me fall a little bit for him more than I already had. I wiped the lone tear that had fallen down his face with my thumb and gave him a chaste kiss.

"The whole time I was reading my mom's journals I kept wondering if she knew what Ted was like, why did she send me to find him. In there, she kept referring to your dad as Ted and you as Edward. Now obviously she would have to give me a full name, but she should have said Sr. I think she meant for me to find you, not your dad."

Edward's eyes widened and then he nodded. "I think you might be right, principessa."

I pulled the journal back toward me, remembering there was another entry left. Maybe this one would shed even more light on what went down because there were still some things that didn't match up. I turned the page in the journal, finding the last entry which was dated the very next day. Three days before they were killed.

I looked up Edward Jr. today and was astounded. He has made quite a name for himself with his businesses, surely negotiating much smarter deals than Ted ever did. He's also very attractive and smart, having graduated from university with honors. From what I could see, he'd be a fine catch for any lady, so why he was having trouble getting married was beyond me. Though I'm sure with Ted as his father, any potential partners probably left to stop getting propositioned by him.

Edward and I both looked at each other, eyes wide. It was an interesting theory, and one that wouldn't surprise me.

"Or he wanted to avoid scandal so he offered them money. Fuck, I should have known," he murmured. Seemed he now had his own misgivings about his dad's proclivities.

It shouldn't have surprised me when Ted showed up at my work, but I was admittedly caught off guard. He tried to play it off as a friendly visit, but there was nothing friendly or warm about how he looked at me. Besides, the fact he made a trip all the way to Washington was not lost on me, and it made reality sink in even more. He wouldn't stop. He'd do whatever he had to to get his hands on Bella, and nothing we did would change that. When I got home, I told Charlie about Ted's visit and we made plans. We ensured our wills and other important paperwork was easy to find for Bella. I hope we're overreacting, but we know Ted far better than to think that he'd let such a slight go unanswered. He once told me he was a god in New York, and I know now it wasn't just his ego talking—he actually held a position of power that if he said so, things got done. I plan to write a letter to Bella and a letter to Edward, hoping that everything will work out. With any luck, this will all just pass, and we can move on with our lives.

She didn't write anything after that, and the rest of the book was filled with blank pages. I closed the journal and let it fall to my lap.

"Is that it?" Edward asked.

"Yeah. With everything my mom wrote, how worried she and my father were, I'm now more convinced than ever that Ted was involved in my parents' deaths."

He nodded and sighed. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure he's also the one responsible for the people that have been trying to break in to get to you."

"Oh, I guessed that when he attacked me. The things he said—I wasn't the docile wife he wanted for you and ruined everything—those all matched what the other intruders had said."

"Well, then I suppose only one question remains. How do we take care of my dad and make him pay for his sins?"

"Actually I have a few ideas," I said, my true crime and horror movie knowledge kicking into full gear.


A/N: Thanks for taking the time to read. Leave a review to let me know your thoughts. Until next time, lovelies!