**Disclaimer: The characters and situations of the Twilight Saga depicted in this story are the legal property of Stephenie Meyer, Summit Entertainment, and Little, Brown & Company, and have been used without permission. No copyright infringement is intended, and no profit is being made.


Chapter 2: Prom

I returned home from a run late in the afternoon, when the air turned heavy with a drizzle portending the coming storm. My footfalls slowed when I caught sight of Alice crossing from the big house to intercept me at the side door of my cottage, two waterproof garment bags over her arm.

"Bella's not going to be happy with you," I said, holding the door open for her anyway.

Alice slipped by me and into the kitchen. I followed.

"Shows what you know. Bella asked for these." Her tone was a little smug.

That took me aback. "What are they?"

Alice answered me with images in her thoughts rather than out loud: an off-the-shoulder, gauzy, deep blue Oscar de la Renta gown and a black Armani tuxedo.

"Our prom clothes?"

"Yep," Alice chirped, draping the garment bags over the back of a kitchen chair.

"Why?"

"It's a sex thing," she answered casually.

For a moment, I wondered if I had somehow managed to choke on air.

Alice looked disapprovingly at whatever expression my face was making. "Don't be such a prude, Edward."

"A sex thing? How?"

My questions would often prompt thoughts to the surface, but in this case she was controlled, not revealing whatever she had seen in her vision. She spread her palms. "Bella asked if I still had these lying around. I told her I did, and she wanted them. I was curious, but when the visions started, I realized where they were going and aborted."

By now, I had gathered myself, and simply nodded. Alice and I both understood the delicate balance of trying to respect the boundaries of our family against the invasive nature of our gifts. You did your best, but sometimes you would hear or see something private, and all you could do was pretend you hadn't, to the other person and to yourself. I was still confused, because Bella hadn't even wanted to go to prom, but I appreciated Alice's discretion.

"Just one problem."

"What's that?" I asked.

"Your tie is missing."

When she said that, my mind raced as I puzzled and then remembered where it was. Alice was ahead of me, spinning out visions of me opening the box at the back of my closet, then of herself doing it now that the hiding place had been revealed. "There it is!" she declared triumphantly, heading there at once.

I was a little slow in pursuit, thrown by the reminder of the existence of the box. I was speaking as I rounded the corner, "Alice…."

But she had already stopped, the shoe box in her hands yet unopened. She was seeing what she would find in there. My blue bow tie, the one that matched Bella's dress, yes—but also, my boutonnière, a note Bella had passed me once in class rescheduling some plans because she had forgotten she had a shift at work, a broken hair tie and tube of lip balm she had left in my car, and a misshapen mess of a daisy chain she had made in the meadow one afternoon, long since dry and brittle.

The box had been moved here along with all of my other belongings, but I hadn't thought of it in a long time and I hadn't opened it since I first filled and closed it—when we had all left Forks in the aftermath of Bella's disastrous eighteenth birthday party.

Oh, Edward. Pity was all over her face, and it grated on me.

I took the box from her. Lifting the lid enough for my hand to slip inside, I retrieved the tie and let it fall closed again.

"It's fine, Alice." I wove around her and replaced the box at the back of the closet. I tossed her the tie. "We found it."

She caught the silk scrap easily and ran through some scenarios in her head, but found I wasn't receptive to opening up about my keepsakes in any of them, so she gave in. She settled for stepping forward and giving my hand a comforting squeeze.

"Yes, Bella will be pleased."

I nodded. "I think she should be home soon."

"Nine minutes," Alice confirmed.

We walked back to the bright little kitchen and Alice placed the tie atop the garment bags. "I'll head out."

"You don't have to." I wanted to reassure her that I wasn't upset.

"It's not that," Alice said, answering my unspoken words as soon as I decided to say them. I saw a flash of a memory from earlier today in Alice's head, Bella's anxious face. "I think she might be a bit nervous about…," she gestured to our formal wear. "I'll give you two some space."

I frowned. "Should I be bracing myself?"

Alice's answer was breezy. "No, not about tonight. She's just shy. You will respond more favorably than she is thinking. This time."

The last words were an afterthought, and I could tell she was immediately unsure whether or not she should have said them.

I looked at her squarely. "Elaborate."

Rolling her eyes, Alice silently called me ridiculous. I tried to dig into her thoughts, but she was stonewalling me with memories of last weekend's shoe shopping trip. "Don't overreact. This is normal. You two are getting into your respective kinks and fantasies, right?"

My hand gripped the chairback in front of me tightly, too tightly. There was no doubt in my mind that I was making the face Alice had dubbed prudish again.

"I didn't pursue the visions when I realized what they were, but that seemed to be the gist."

"And?" I prompted through clenched teeth.

"Don't be surprised if you don't like all of hers. Which is fine—you don't have to do anything you don't want to do, and your feelings are as valid as hers. But you shouldn't tell her so in a way that makes her feel bad." Her eyes were steely. "I'm serious, Edward. If you hurt her or make her feel ashamed, I will be very cross with you."

My temper flared, and I opened my mouth to snap that I would never do any such thing. But then her brow raised and I abruptly cooled; if Alice was bringing it up, she must have seen it in a vision. I didn't like the reminder that there were still myriads of ways that I could hurt Bella, but my sister was right.

I nodded curtly.

She accepted my answer, pleased. Then she wished me luck and fluttered out the door.

The chair I had been gripping scraped against the floor as I pulled it backward. I dropped into it, eyeing the garment bags warily. Since our afternoon in the meadow a week ago, I had been looking forward to exploring Bella's next fantasy. The first one had been so electrifying, so intimate. But Alice's words gave me pause. What could Bella possibly want from me that I would find distasteful? I wished I could say nothing, but I knew that wasn't true. There were plenty of sex acts and fetishes I found personally unappetizing, or even repellent. What other people did was their business, and I tried not to judge them for it as long as it was consensual. But I was an old-fashioned animal in my own desires and boundaries; a great many things were outside my comfort zone and lying to myself would not help me prepare. My mind whirled with possibilities. Well, Alice had said tonight's fantasy would not be a problem, but I didn't know how comforting that was.

I heard the first rumblings of Bella's car and followed the sound until it arrived and parked in the garage. She entered the cottage through the front door and into the parlor. "Edward?"

"In the kitchen." I rose from my chair and met her at the archway connecting the two rooms.

Bella's face broke into a wide smile when she saw me. She was wearing a light turtleneck sweater and black jeans, her hair tousled and damp from the rain. So lovely. I cupped her cheek and pressed my lips to hers. "Welcome home."

I tried to pull back, but she kissed me again. I smiled against her lips.

"How's Charlie?" I asked when she released me.

"Good. He's really getting into this grandpa thing."

"Yeah?"

Bella elaborated. "Renesmee planned a whole slumber party for the two of them, eating ice cream, painting their nails, and watching scary movies. He had no objections."

I laughed.

She grumbled. "If I sound bitter, it's because he hasn't tried to force fishing on her once. It was years before he stopped trying with me."

I rubbed her upper arm in a reassuring way. "It just means he learned from his experience."

Her eyes caught Alice's delivery behind me. "What's…?" she began, but then took in the bow tie. "Oh."

"Yes, Alice dropped them off. She said you wanted them."

She glanced from me, to the bags, and back again—then Bella groaned and covered her face. "She told you."

"Not really." I lifted her hands from her eyes and pulled her toward me, into my arms. My own anxiety was gone now that I could see her distress. I wanted to make her feel safe, safe to tell me anything. "No details, but I deduced that it might be related to what we talked about in the meadow. Our next game?"

Bella smiled weakly. "I hadn't decided for sure. It was more just something I was thinking about. Tonight seemed like it might be a good time."

"Because Renesmee is sleeping at Charlie's?"

She nodded.

"I confess to being a little blindsided." I lifted her by the hips and walked her to the table, setting her down beside the zippered pile, feet dangling over the side. "You didn't want to go to prom. Alice and I basically had to kidnap you. And now I find you have a fantasy you want to play out?"

Her small laugh warmed me. "It's not like that."

"Not like what?"

"Not like I secretly wanted to go to prom all along. This fantasy wasn't something I thought up before. It came after, when Angela and Jessica were telling me about their nights. Angela lost her virginity to Ben. Jessica didn't go all the way, but she went further than she had before." Bella's forearm was resting on my shoulder, her fingers stroking the hair at the nape of my neck idly as she talked. The information she shared wasn't a surprise to me, as I had heard the thoughts of everyone involved in the days afterward, but it did surprise me that Bella had compared her experience to that of her friends. "I started to think of what a similar night would have looked like for us."

This seemed reasonable to me. I could imagine how it might feel to watch your friends reaching milestones around you, to want to keep step with them. Especially if said milestone was something you wanted to do anyway, and Bella was confirming for me what I had long suspected: that yes, even that early in our relationship, she had wanted to have sex with me.

She sighed. "So, it was thought up post hoc, and I added to it, changed it over time, until it seemed like something that could have happened. Just, it didn't."

My brows pulled together. "Bella love, it couldn't have happened. Not that early."

I thought of the way it felt to be inside Bella, to have her core stretch for me, clench me, milk me—and knew, knew in my bones that I hadn't been strong enough not to hurt her that night. Not yet. Especially with the taste of her blood such a recent memory. It would take eight months apart and three days of believing she was dead to teach me that the only real hell was existence without her and that no physical sensation, no extremity of pain or pleasure, could compare. I had needed that crucible to bring my self-discipline into maturity.

"No, it's not…," Bella stumbled over her words. "It's not sex."

"What?"

"The fantasy is not sex, at least, not the way you mean." My confusion prompted her to explain, her eyes fixed on her knees. "You were really clear—no sex for us. But I was so…. I wanted…. There had to be a way we could explore without crossing the line, without it becoming unsafe, right?" She shrugged. "So my fantasies were mostly about us touching each other, or touching ourselves in front of each other."

I swallowed. What she was describing was so erotic. And so sad. I was reminded of a conversation, years ago, when we had first been getting to know each other. I asked about her college and career plans, and she talked about the practicalities of scholarships and state schools, her plan to become a professor at a community college because it was the most attainable of her ambitions. I'd marveled at the time that all of her dreams had clipped wings. It was occurring to me now that something similar had happened in her sexual awakening due to my lack of availability.

She was studying my face, and her eyes widened with sudden epiphany.

"What is it?"

Bella shook her head bitterly. "I was a fool, wasn't I? I thought I was playing by the rules with those fantasies, and I kept waiting for our physical relationship to progress that way, but I was too shy to ask for what I wanted and you never made a move. And that's because it didn't matter, right? It was never about a specific checklist of things we could and couldn't do. It was like with hunting—you letting go of your control at all around me was the dangerous part."

I wished I could tell her she was wrong. I closed the distance between us, my hand cradling her head into the crook of my neck. Self-loathing welled in me, old friend of my days before her turning; I wished I could have been something other than what I was for her. And maybe, even as the monster, I could have done more, should have tried harder? My pleasure had been out of the question, obviously. But all those nights in her bed, listening to her heart race every time I kissed her, why had I never thought to satisfy her with my fingers? Surely, even with my unnatural hungers and deadly strength, I could have managed that?

Part of it, I knew, was how repulsive I had believed the feel of my skin must be for her, how unpleasant the chill of my proximity. It was a long time before I began to trust that Bella didn't perceive my touch the way I thought she did. And I definitely had not understood the way Bella felt about sex. I started to get an idea when she declared it the only human experience she would not sacrifice, but it didn't really hit me until well into our honeymoon: when she begged me for more even after our rough, in every sense of the word, first time; after she seduced me to try again, and again, and then offered me months—years more of her humanity so long as I just continued to make love to her. Only then did I begin to appreciate how truly important sex was to Bella. In the early days of our courtship, I never could have guessed how central physical intimacy was to Bella's love language, how high her sex drive could possibly be.

I stroked her hair. "You didn't do anything wrong, Bella. Nothing you wanted was wrong."

Bella straightened up, a half smile on her lips. "Wrong and naive are different things," she said wryly. She eyed the blue bow tie beside her. "It was silly, anyway."

"Oh, no you don't."

"Don't what?"

I grinned at her. "Don't you downplay it now. I am giving you your fantasy."

She laughed. "You still don't even know what it is."

I shrugged, lifting the tie. "I assume it involves some dress up?"

Bella's expression was strangely tender as she watched my face. She nodded.

"Then we should get dressed."

I stepped back so that she could hop down from the table. We each took our garment bag and parted with a kiss, splitting off to separate bathrooms. I expected that I would finish before she did and planned to wait patiently, even putting on some music in the parlor, but then I heard her growling and cursing.

"Bella?" I called through the door, knocking lightly.

"Come in," she mumbled.

The dress still fit her the way I remembered, draping over every curve of her body like it was inviting sin. She had thrown on some simple makeup, a rare occurrence—eyeliner, lipstick, and a little blush from the look of it. Bare feet peeked out from under her hem as she moved. She had attempted to curl her hair and pin some of it up the way Alice had done on prom night, and that seemed to be the source of the frustration. I didn't need an explanation to see that it had not been going well.

Despite my better nature, I couldn't hold back the chuckle.

She glowered.

"May I be of service?"

Bella lifted and dropped her shoulders despondently, which I took as a yes.

I entered the room and surveyed the situation, standing beside her at the sink. When I had an idea of where things had gone off the rails, I began gently disentangling the damage. It looked worse than it was—really, all we were looking at were a few misplaced and poorly angled bobby pins.

"Well, we're off to a good start."

I smiled. "It's not that bad, Bella."

"No, not bad at all. Except that I am a grown woman who can't do my own hair."

"You can. You do it every day," I reminded her. "Curls are fussy. You don't usually mess with them, so you don't have as much practice, that's all." I piled the curls the way I remembered, but they didn't look exactly right. Bella and I, even with our combined efforts, could not match the artistry of Alice.

Bella was watching the progress in the mirror. "It looks so much neater. Like the mornings you do Renesmee's hair."

There was no denying I had more of a knack for tidy braids, buns, and ponytails than Bella. Bella did Renesmee's hair the way she did her own: simply, the result always looking effortless, a little messy, a little windswept and romantic.

"I like the way you do Renesmee's hair." The sincerity in my voice made her pause. I stepped back and surveyed our work. "I think that is the closest we are going to come without calling in reinforcements."

Bella agreed. She gestured to the vanity stool where her satin shoes were waiting. "I think I am just going to wear both of them. Throwing on a fake cast just seems like…a bit much."

"I don't think we need it. So long as that cast didn't play a key role in the scenario. Did it?"

First she was scandalized, then she cringed. "What? Ew! No! Of course not."

I laughed, entertained by her outrage. It had been an out-there kind of question on my part, but Alice's words from earlier may had left me a little paranoid. I knew first hand that the world was full of people with unconventional fixations. For all I knew, Bella had some, and I was making no assumptions that anything was off the table until proven otherwise. The games I was playing with Bella required that I try to be open-minded, and I had promised Alice that when I couldn't be, I would at least be kind.

Bella sat on the stool and I knelt to help her into her shoes, crisscrossing the ribbons up her calves for her. It was impossible not to become distracted and I found myself brushing my lips against her knees. Nuzzling the skin of her inner thighs, I tied the bows at the top, reveling in the feel of her soft skin against my cheeks, brows, and nose. I could hear her breathing quicken, the scent of her arousal heavy in the air. I felt Bella's left hand sink into my hair, holding my head in place. I kissed the inside of her right knee dutifully. My eyes rose up to her face and her lids were drooped low, her lips parted.

Damn. We needed to get back on track.

"So, what game are we playing tonight?" I asked huskily.

She shivered. "Hmm?"

My smirk was involuntary. It was impossible to be humble when Bella was this hot for me. I freed my hair from her grip and rose to my feet, then I bridal-lifted her into my arms and carried her to the parlor where I had left music playing. I allowed her legs to drop free and lowered her so that each of her feet were balanced on top of mine.

"You're the devil, Edward Cullen." But there was no venom to her words. She wrapped her arms around my neck and held tight when I began to dance us around the room.

"I'm just trying to keep us on task," I said. A bold statement given that we both knew I was the one who started it, and sure enough, she snorted, unimpressed. She could also feel the evidence of my hypocrisy, the full-blown erection I was pressing into her belly. "Besides, this is prom, right? I carried you everywhere because you didn't have your crutches. We danced, like this, your feet on top of mine. What comes next?"

I couldn't see her face because she was flush against me. I felt her hand tighten on the back of my neck; she used the leverage to rub herself against me to the tempo of the song. I groaned.

"Bella…?"

"What?" she said, her breath against my ear. "This is part of it. How could it not be? Our bodies were so close—you looked so good. How could I not want this? Tell me you did, too." Her wet tongue swept my earlobe, and my hips jerked against hers.

Truthfully, the thought of dry humping her on the dance floor never occurred to me at the time. Of course, now I would never be able to dance with her again without thinking of it.

She had it backwards—she was the devil.

My hands gripped her hips and stilled them. "Bella," I managed, my voice strained. "If you don't stop that, I am going to cum in my pants."

Her response was a keening sigh. "That's okay."

"But is it your fantasy?"

That gave her pause. "No," she admitted with a grumble. She stepped back, off my toes and onto the hardwood floor. We weren't touching anymore and just like that, my body was brought back from the brink. Her expression was surly. "None of that was, really. I was just worked up. Here in private is fine, but I would never want to do something like that in front of other people."

That checked out. Bella hated people paying attention to her. There was no way she was an exhibitionist. Internally, I let loose a sigh of relief, crossing a lot of stuff I wouldn't want to do in public places off the list of things Bella might ask me for.

"You made it up?"

"You kissed my thighs!"

I burst out laughing; she resisted, trying to look stern, but couldn't help herself, and we were cracking up together.

"Okay, what is it then?"

"My fantasy?"

I nodded. "Moment of truth."

She smiled up at me with playful eyes. "Let's go for a drive."

Was she going to drag me to the gazebo on the school grounds? A janitor's closet or an empty classroom? Wouldn't breaking and entering be taking things too far? "Where are we headed?"

"Where would you drive if you were going to steal my virtue in the back seat of your car?"

Damn. Well…that answered that. The back seat of my car? Unlike feeling Bella up on the dance floor, this was something I actually had thought about before.

We turned out all the lights, powered down the stereo, and locked up the house. Light rain sprinkled each of us on the dash to the garage.

As I fired up the engine and moved to back us out, I felt Bella's hand come to rest atop mine on the Volvo's gearshift. Initially, I thought it was just a sweet little caress, like we did with each other all the time, but then her thoughts rushed into me. As before, they were hazy and dreamlike, but this time she took me through the scenario, moment by moment, showing me exactly what she had imagined in excruciating detail. By the end, my hands were clenched so tightly I was worried about the steering wheel and gearshift of my car and I was on the brink of exploding again.

I snatched my hand out from under hers. "Jesus, Bella!"

She giggled, delighted that she had made me curse in front of her. She knew I hated doing that.

"That was…." I was at a loss for words. Based on our conversation earlier, I had expected something more reserved.

But Bella was making no apologies. "Well, if all of it was impossible anyway, I want the naughtiest version. The one even I knew was out of the question at the time."

Out of the question—yes, that was a fair description. I gazed at her hungrily, so glad that was no longer the case.

"So," she ventured. "Now that you know…you want to?"

"I want to." My voice came out almost as a growl.

She shivered.

I peeled out of the garage, tires squealing before we hit the road. Bella braced herself and shot me a disapproving look. Becoming a vampire had done nothing to endear Bella to fast driving. She almost always drove the Ferrari I bought her at or under the speed limit, which should be a crime.

"Isn't going this far into the national park a little overkill?" She asked me almost twenty minutes later. When I looked over, she was clenching fists of her dress on her thighs, her impatience evident on every line of her face.

"Your dad is the chief of police. This is exactly what I would have done then, and what I am doing now. The last thing anyone needs is for one of his deputies to catch us."

"You'd hear them approach."

"Not with you wriggling on my lap, I wouldn't."

She scoffed, but let it go.

I reached the spot I had chosen and pulled off the road, under an ancient willow that provided the car some cover. I killed the engine and then the only sound was the rain hitting the car. The gathering droplets and drooping branches of feathery leaves caused the moonlight to cast shadows through the windshield and onto Bella's face.

She looked at me with a question in her eyes. Was I ready?

I nodded.

Bella drew a breath, and began. "Why are we stopping here, Edward?"

Seductive, I reminded myself. She wanted me to initiate. I dropped my voice low. "Why do you think?"

She chewed her lip. "I thought we couldn't?"

"We shouldn't, but I can't help myself. I want you." My eyes searched her face. "Is that all right?"

I felt a little corny saying these things, but she'd scripted the lines, and they were having an effect. Bella appeared to be too overwhelmed for a coherent response, and just nodded fervently. She wasn't much of an actress, so I knew it was genuine—I was delivering what she wanted. I made a mental note to tell Bella how much I desired her more often; that was a recurring theme of our last game and this one. She liked the idea of me being so overcome with lust that it sidelined my better judgment.

I got out and walked to her door, opening it and lifting her into my arms. She kissed my jawline and neck in the rain while I did the logistical work of moving us both to the back seat, sliding in with her perched sideways on my lap, arms around my neck.

Without preamble, I buried my face in her hair, dropping greedy kisses behind her ear and along her nape, and I slipped my hand under the hem of her gown. And up. My fingers trailed with purpose from her ankles, up along the latticed ribbons adorning her calves, to her knees, over the swells of her thighs, bunching her skirts as I went and leaving her trembling legs bare. I felt a thrill as I reached the juncture between her legs, my fingertips grazing the lace of her panties. I usually took my time working to this point—I had never just reached my hand up her skirt and gone for it like this, but maybe I should sometimes. Bella was practically hyperventilating.

"Open," I commanded.

She parted her thighs obediently and I took advantage.

We both moaned.

"You're wet." It was my line, but it was also true.

"Yes," she gasped. "I want you. So much."

I found I was grinding my erection against her soft bottom—not part of the game, but it was involuntary at this point. With effort, I reined myself back in and got on track.

Both of my hands were under her skirt now, peeling her underwear down her legs. I guided her movement with a deliberate touch and rearranged her so that she was straddling me, skirts bunched at her waist, her glistening sex naked to my eyes and poised over my lap. My hands on her hips pulled her firmly, down and forward, until she was pressed against the zipper of my tuxedo pants and the full, hard length underneath.

"Show me," I growled.

She whimpered in response and writhed against me. I made a pretense of shepherding the movement of her hips at first, but it was just for show, because it was part of the game. Bella knew what to do; this whole scene had been conjured by her devious imagination, after all. I let go of her, balling my hands into fists and locking my body down. Just like with the last time, we were playing that she was human. My touch and movement might be dangerous in the heat of passion, so I would sit back and let her have her way, her pleasure.

And that's what this was. Her hands were braced on my shoulders, her eyes were closed, her head thrown back, and she was squirming, straining, rocking in my lap—using my cock to get herself off.

"Edward, my Edward." Her every breath was filled with such needy want, they almost sounded like whines. "You feel…. Oh God, the way you feel…."

It was torture to hold still. There were no words for how what she was doing felt—the friction of the fabric, her wet seeping through the layers, her hot hole just on the other side, begging to be filled. But I was also transfixed watching her pleasure. She was so into this, it was breathtaking.

"Edward, my nipples are aching," she panted.

That had my attention.

"I need your hands on me."

This wasn't part of the scenario she had shown me, but I could deny her nothing. I pushed her already off-the-shoulder neckline and strapless bra down, over the swell of her breasts, until her lovely chest was revealed. I cupped her with my hands, stroking and tugging her nipples.

She kissed me hard. Her body was vibrating with tension and I knew she was close.

"Come for me, Bella."

And she did.

I held her as she cried out and her frame wracked with ecstasy. When she finally came down from her high, a euphoric smile was on her face. "God, that was good," she breathed.

With a throaty noise of exhilaration, Bella repositioned, pulled back from me. She took in how taut I was, my ravenous eyes, how desperate my situation had become. A naughty smirk on her lips, she traced my bulge with a single finger. "Your turn."

I pushed her hand away and unfastened my pants so impatiently, I broke the zipper. I fished my erection free, groaning with relief, and began stroking myself in front of her. For her. It was wild to me, but she wanted to watch. We had never done this before, but there was no time for the moment to feel awkward, not with the way she was looking at me, not with how desperate I was for release. I focused on her rapt expression, her bare skin, her crumpled dress, her open legs—right there, inches away—and knew that release would be fast-coming.

Bella could see I was close. "On me," she pleaded. I needed no reminder. Her fantasy had been seared into my brain.

But her words did it, sent me over the edge. I came with a rasping grunt, wave after wave of pleasure shooting through me, from me, and onto her. Her dress, her pussy. I kept stroking until the overstimulation became painful, then collapsed, limp and spent, into the seat. My head tilted back, the crest of the seat cushion cradling my neck, and I watched the raindrops hit the rear windshield above me while I caught my breath.

Bella was peppering my face with kisses, caressing my jaw, stroking my hair. "Thank you. Edward, you're a saint."

That startled a laugh out of me. "I don't think anything we just did qualifies as remotely saint-like."

Bella's face was serious. Her expression was one of such softness, such adoration. She gently traced her thumb along one of my eyebrows and down over my cheek. "I just mean that, you're so good to me."

I swallowed. "Well, I love you." I captured her wrist in my hand and brought it to my lips.

She smiled. "We should do some of yours, too."

"Mine?"

"Your fantasies."

I hadn't been expecting that. I didn't know why it hadn't occurred to me that Bella might want to reciprocate—of course she would. "Maybe," I deflected, and I sat us both up.

We surveyed ourselves, and Bella snickered.

"I know," I said. "Alice is going to be so mad."

"Well, maybe this will teach her not to splurge on formal wear for me." Bella was fighting with her strapless bra, struggling to shimmy it back into place.

I moved to help her. "I doubt it. You have no idea how many couture pieces Emmett has ruined over the years, and that hasn't stopped her."

We righted our clothing and cleaned up as best we could with the package of wet wipes I kept in the glove compartment.

"Home?" I asked as I turned the key and brought the car back to life.

"Home," she confirmed.

As we drove, she placed her hand over mine on the gearshift once more. "Again, Edward, thank you."

I grinned. "Trust me, it was no hardship. This is fun for me, too." The road in front of me was winding and wending, the reflection of my headlights in the water on the blacktop. "And honestly, when you said prom, I was worried it was going to be something crazy or illegal. This was very straightforward."

Bella's brows rose. "Crazy or illegal? Really?"

"You know, if it was going to necessitate breaking into Forks High School or something." I laughed off my earlier worries. "It's definitely a relief not to commit trespassing just to fulfill a fantasy."

It was almost fifteen seconds before it really hit me that Bella had not responded and she was no longer meeting my eyes. My dumbfounded brain processed what that probably meant.

"Wait—are you serious? You fantasized about the two of us having sex in school?"

She withdrew her hand, folding her arms across her chest, her manner flustered. "It's not that strange, Edward. It was one fantasy really, and I wasn't even going to bring it up."

"You weren't? Why not?"

Her mouth fell open. "Are you serious? It's pretty obvious why not. I wasn't planning on breaking laws either."

She turned to look out the window and I goggled. Was she really just going to stop there?

We drove in silence for another five minutes before the curiosity broke me. "Well…what is it?"