EPOV
I took a sip of my beer looking around the bar while I waited for Emmett. I'd be leaving for Chicago in a few weeks so we were trying to hang out before holiday craziness set in. I didn't want to think about leaving Bella here for a week without me.
Rosalie was still remaining tight-lipped, though she had been hanging out more with Bella's friend Angela. Bella took that as a good sign.
"Hey, sorry I'm late," Emmett greets taking a seat across from me.
He looks a little tense which is odd since Emmett is usually jovial. I've never seen him in a bad mood especially when we are dealt a shitty job for the day at work.
"You okay?" I ask.
"If I tell you something will you promise not to react?"
"React how?"
"I mean listen and wait until I'm done before you cast judgment."
"Do I seem like I cast judgment easily?"
"No, but I think if you know Bella is semi-involved, you might," he says biting into his lower lip.
I want to ask more, but he doesn't seem as open to sharing if I react with Bella's semi-involvement. He wasn't wrong, before her, I was pretty open-minded and laid back, but now due to her circumstances, I wanted to shield her away from the evil in the world she has faced.
"Okay, I promise to be non-reactive," I tell him with a nod.
He puffs out a breath. "So, I've been hanging out with Rosalie Hale," he confessed in almost a whisper. "I mean she was always this shy kid that lived next door to me, to see what King did to her—"
I watch his knuckles turn white while his fist rests clenched on the table.
The waitress is heading over so I hold up my IPA and two fingers. It's rude as fuck, but Em needs a minute to collect himself and I'll make sure I tip her very well.
"You knew what he did to Bella, how did you not lose your shit on him at that game? I think of him and wish I could beat his face in," he says sitting back in his seat.
"He's not worth it, Em. We have to let the justice system handle this," I explain.
The waitress sits both our drinks down in front of us, Em looks a little surprised but takes a long pull from his bottle.
"She's so afraid of people finding out, ever since that news report aired, he has texted her a few times."
"Wait, what?"
"She said she's gotten texts from an unknown number telling her to do the right thing—"
While he trails off I keep my thoughts to myself because I'm trying to stay true to my word and keep my opinion to myself.
"She thinks Bella is the devil," he says wryly. "Swan has always been nice, so I'm not sure where all that came from. I know when I was at Forks High that Bella would stand up for people if she thought any kind of bullying was going on."
"Bella doesn't quite understand the hostility toward her."
"I think it's her mom, I heard my dad once talking about Bella's mom. They all went to high school together, Chief Swan and Renee were like this golden couple or something."
I snorted because Charlie Swan doesn't scream big man on campus to me.
Em gave me a look.
"Sorry, but Charlie Swan was half of a golden couple?"
"I know, I know but my dad said he was so in love with Renee," he explains. "The town folklore was that she started drinking heavily after Bella was born. My mom said it was postpartum depression, but my dad said parenthood spooked her… and being married to the Chief spooked her even more."
"So she left."
"It's not that simple, Chief Swan made her leave."
"Bella never said that," I frowned.
"I don't think she even knows the full story. The stories amongst our parents is that Charlie found Renee passed out on the couch when he got home. He heard Bella screaming bloody murder and found her in freezing water in the bathtub," Emmett says sadly.
"How old was she?"
"Renee skipped town when she was a baby."
"How does this have anything to do with Rosalie's mother and her fueling Rosalie's hatred?"
"She thought with Renee gone she would be out of her shadows. She had Rosie and thought she would live up to her legacy."
"But Bella was the one on the cheer squad and they both are competing for Valedictorian," I responded.
He nods.
"Rosalie has to know that Bella saved her life," I say.
"Angela Webber has been trying to get that through to her," he says with a sigh. "I think Rosie's mom and King have poisoned her views of reality."
We're both quiet for a minute and taking sips of our beers.
"So you and Rosalie are friends?" I ask.
Emmett was a ladies' man, he was always respectful but when we hang out a lot of women flock to him. He also eats up the attention.
He looks down with a frown.
"She's recovering and needs to heal not only physically but mentally," he says carefully before he groans covering his face with his hands.
He's in love with her or something close to it.
"She wasn't ugly before all the surgery, I always thought she was cute," he confesses. "When I saw her at that Homecoming game, I was a little bit startled. Why did she want to change her appearance so drastically? She's a complete knockout now but there was nothing wrong with her before.
"When she was a kid, she used to follow me and Brady around. Brady hated it but my mom always told me that with her being an only child she had no one to play with. Why did any of this happen to her? She only wanted to fit in."
The situation overall was shitty, but Rosalie did physically harm Bella. The verdict is still out on whether or not she was capable of it all on her own or if it was pressure she felt she was under.
"Do you know if she's going to give her statement?" I ask, because she was stretching this out.
"I think she will in time," he answers.
"King has been out on bail, Emmett. The longer she waits the more she might not remember, it's all in the details."
"Is this legal advice, Ed?" he asks.
"It's common sense, Emmett. My legal advice is she should have been interviewed as soon as she was able to communicate what happened to her," I tell him honestly. "I get it that you don't want to see her suffer any more than what she already has, but she is really the only person who can stop this."
He lets out a heavy sigh.
"I don't want her to push me away," he says.
"Emmett, she needs to realize that she was manipulated. Until she understands that, I don't see any change with how she sees what happened," I say.
"So you're saying she's a lost cause?" he asks with a huff.
"No, I'm saying she still believes he loves her. I don't know if that will ever change."
He didn't want me to react, but he needed to see this for what it really was. Rosalie was the key to her own happiness; she needed to see what happened for what it really was. A kid who wanted to retain his power by going after women who were smaller or younger than him. He got off on it.
Emmett sulked while he drank the rest of his beer but I decided to call it a night. I didn't want to tell Bella about this conversation because she had hoped that Rosalie would end up doing the right thing.
I only hoped for her sake that she was right.
Once I got home and ready for bed, I thought about everything that was going on. I'd have to deal with my dad when I got back to Chicago regardless of whether I wanted to or not. It was something that needed to be done.
My mother had the joy of kicking Kate out of the townhouse when she got back after Thanksgiving. She showed up with the building manager and my mortgage agreement, which Kate wasn't on. She was listed as living with me and Kate did make the payments for the months she lived there.
Mom said she pleaded to stay, but the building manager was clear that I called her saying I wanted Kate out.
The only thing I was looking forward to was speaking more to my grandfather about the type of law I wanted to practice. He wanted me to know all of my options and the impact I could make in the world.
It was important to me that I know for sure what I wanted to practice within my first year of law school. I wanted to go into it with certainty that I was happy with what I was doing to build my career.
Bella knew what she wanted out of life and she hadn't even graduated yet, she honestly influenced me to focus on the future like I never had before.
I only hoped that we could navigate through our lives together.