**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 9: Sunrise

"You seem happier," Esme said.

My hand paused midway through the stack of hand-stitched quilts I was thumbing through and my eyes swung to my mother's face beside me. "I am," I admitted.

She nodded, and I knew she was trying not to pry. Nevertheless, I could see in the thoughts she was so bad at hiding how much she had worried about me lately.

Metal clinked and clanged as her hand fished through a crate of miscellaneous brass hardware for drawers and cabinets. She was looking for something that would suit an Edwardian desk she was restoring. Esme was at home here. The antique shop was busy enough today that the kind couple who owned it had more to do than hover nearby in case one of their best customers needed something.

"Bella seems happier, too."

I nodded in agreement. I hoped so, and it seemed so, to my immense relief.

She smiled. Her thoughts skittered over this or that brass bob while incomplete memories of a conversation she'd had with Carlisle about me a few weeks ago lingered in the background. Esme didn't like how little I was smiling. Carlisle said that I had never been much of a smiler.

Until Bella, Esme had added as a caveat.

But Carlisle pointed out that I was still prone to melancholy, with or without Bella.

My serious boy, Esme had called me.

Was I serious? Melancholic? I supposed so, but Esme had the right of it—Bella made a difference.

"My life is good, and I'm happy, Esme," I told her. Then my lips quirked. "Even if I'm serious."

She playfully batted my arm, but I knew she didn't mind me reading her thoughts. She held up a handle inlaid with porcelain and scrutinized it for her needs. Ultimately it went back into the crate and she continued looking. "You're serious because you care. You're always aware of others around you, how words and actions affect them. It's one of your best qualities."

My grin twisted sardonically. "That's not my character. It's my gift." I gestured to my head.

But Esme wasn't having that. "If it wasn't your character, you wouldn't have that particular gift in the first place."

I looked away, fidgeting uncomfortably.

"I'm glad," she said, "that the girl you found makes you happy, and even more that she looks at you the way I know you deserve."

There was no way to respond to that. Esme had a mother's bias on that account, but I knew there was no justification for the way Bella looked at me.

Even though I said nothing, she knew where my thoughts had gone. "You don't agree?"

I shook my head. "I didn't say that."

Esme gave a low, musical laugh. "You didn't have to. But you're wrong—Bella sees you properly. You're not a villain, Edward."

"I'm not a hero, either," I said, planting my fists in my jacket pockets.

She wanted to touch me, but talked herself out of it. I hated how despondent my posture looked in her eyes, so I rolled my shoulders to loosen them.

"I've done a lot of bad things," I pointed out.

Memories of me coming home to her with red eyes flashed through her mind, including one particularly gruesome night when I had dripped the blood of my victim all over her kitchen floor and tried to hurt myself. Of course, that was impossible. The thirst was too strong after living on human blood for years, and I was beginning to despair at ever mastering it again. Carlisle stepped out, too overcome to know what to do, leaving the little house on the cliff for several hours. But Esme had stayed. She held me, no trace of disapproval or disappointment in her. The thirst had never been easy for her either, and she loved me unconditionally.

"I remember," she said quietly. "I remember all of it. Right from the first time you left home."

Esme's human husband, the one who beat her, stalked and terrorized her, who would have killed her if she hadn't killed herself—he was my first kill. I ripped his throat open and drank every drop of his alcohol-poisoned blood. I could say it was to protect any other woman who caught his eye in the future. Esme was beyond his reach by that point. But I knew it was just revenge, retribution for everything he had done to my new mother.

Her arm wrapped around my rigid shoulders as she decided she couldn't hold back. "I know that you and Carlisle subscribe to a narrower view of morality, but I've never looked at the things you did the way you two do. I was grateful knowing Charles wasn't out there trying to find me anymore, that he wouldn't hurt anyone else. And I'm sure all the other vulnerable people you protected felt the same way when the monsters in their lives disappeared." She kissed my cheek and smoothed my hair while I did not look at her. "I'm not saying it wasn't wrong. I'm just saying I see a difference between your bloody past and others. I'll leave it at that."

I stood stiffly and silently while Esme went back to searching through the crate of brass. Mostly, it was to give me emotional space. She knew how sore the memories were for me. I wanted to let the subject drop, but felt I owed her something.

"Mom."

That got her attention immediately. I usually called her by her name, but sometimes it didn't feel appropriate.

"I'm sorry. And thank you. That was a bad time," with all my withdrawals and relapses, "especially…especially that one night. I put you through a lot, but I don't know what I would have done without you."

Her eyes softened. "You came back to us. That's all I hoped for."

"I'm just saying…I know it was a lot for you to take on. You were still settling into your new life with Carlisle, and I kept things difficult."

There she smiled affectionately. "I signed up for it. My new life wasn't just with Carlisle."

I swallowed.

"What? You thought I only fell in love with the handsome doctor? Not the lonely lost boy full of anger who needed a mother as badly as I needed to mother?" She touched my cheek. "You saved me, too."

I hugged her—there was nothing else to do.

Things were somber after that, but comfortable. Esme had a way of making all of me, even the things I was ashamed of, feel seen. And loved anyway. Only Bella could do it better. I didn't deserve such blind love from either of them, but I tried my best to not let them down at least.

For some reason, I didn't feel as tight or dour as I might have expected. Thinking about the years that I rebelled against Carlisle and murdered my way through city after city, or the hard period of reconciliation and rehabilitation when I made my way back home, usually put me under a dark cloud that would follow me for days. But it seemed today I was feeling more resilient.

"It's Bella," Alice said, her head resting on my shoulder.

She had met up with us at the antique store almost ten minutes ago carrying four giant bags filled with designer shoes and found me seated against a wall. I was waiting for Esme to make a decision on whether to buy a Spanish Colonial wardrobe with some water damage on one side. Seeing that we would be here a while, Alice had sat down beside me. I'd expected to be regaled with a harrowing tale of battling the fashion district all afternoon, but it seemed Alice had been keeping an eye on me and my decisions while she was away. She'd been doing that a lot lately—ever since that night in Port Angeles.

So, Alice had seen my conversation with Esme.

"Bella's been helping you actually deal with things. The same stuff still hurts, or makes you panic, or whatever, but you snap out of it faster. You don't spend as much time lost. That's what it feels like to actually heal, process baggage, psychologically."

I scoffed. "I'm not sure that's true."

"Of course it's true," Alice said airily. "All the stuff you're going through with Bella is helping, and you know it."

Squirming slightly, I said, "You don't have to keep checking in on my future, you know. Bella and I are doing fine."

"At the moment."

We sat in silence, listening to Esme haggle on the other side of the store.

"Was it that bad?" I asked. "What you saw in your visions?"

She had explained, after she started talking to me again, that she hadn't stayed away because she was mad at me. Or, not only because she was mad. Mostly, she had worried how I would react if I saw the visions she was having. So far she had done a good job keeping herself from thinking of them around me.

Long after I had assumed she wasn't going to answer, she said, "Maybe not."

That surprised me. "What?"

"They weren't apocalyptic or anything," she confessed. "But they were enough to scare me, and definitely enough to scare you. You and Bella are my family—I didn't want to take any chances."

I understood that.

"In that case," I said heavily, "I'm glad Bella and I are on the other side of it."

"Me too." Alice sighed. Straightening up and stretching, she inclined her head in Esme's direction. "Should I tell her that if she buys this thing, Emmett is going to break it thinking there is a secret compartment in one of the drawers?"

Laughter burst from me when I saw the vision. Emmett would break one little piece off first, but then make the situation worse and worse as he tried to fix it.

"She'll be able to repair it, right?" I prompted.

Dutifully, Alice checked. All of her visions showed Esme able to finish the restoration regardless of what Emmett did to it.

"In that case," I said, "what's life without surprises?"

Alice grinned, an annoyingly knowing glint in her eye. "Agreed."

"What?" I asked warily.

She shook her head. "Nothing. You're just really going to like Bella's gift for your birthday is all." Something about the way she said the words made me think what she was referring to was sexual.

"Alice! Stop keeping tabs on our love life."

She rolled her eyes. "Prude."

I tried to put Alice's words out of my head as much as possible, but I wasn't entirely successful. What could Bella be planning? Did I want to know? A few days later, I got my answer.

"I have a proposal," Bella announced. The sun had set, our daughter was asleep, and she had just joined me in the parlor for our nightly reading date wearing a simple blouse and a pair of cobalt blue silk shorts.

"What did you have in mind?" Try as I might, I couldn't keep my eyes off her bare legs and the shorts that hugged her hips and thighs. A suspicion took hold immediately that I was about to be seduced. After Bella had drawn attention to it, I couldn't help but notice that she did try to wear blue for me, especially when she was angling to be swept off to bed.

It would be nice to be able to say that such a simple, obvious tactic didn't work on me, but of course it did. I had never been partial to the color blue, at least, not so far as I noticed, until I saw it on Bella, perfectly complementing her skin, her eyes, her hair. These days, it was worse because it wasn't just that she looked nice. She was doing it on purpose, sending me a signal, a secret code. An invitation.

My needy cock perked up, slave to its Pavlovian conditioning.

"A different kind of game." She stepped forward, directly in front of me, and confirmed my suspicions by lifting the hem of her top over her head and dropping the garment to the floor. No bra underneath—just milky skin and pink nipples. I drank in the lines of her elegant neck and collar bones, the curve of her waist, the way her long, silky hair fell over her shoulders. "You said you enjoy the idea of me topless, in an all the time kind of way."

I didn't know whether that was a statement that required a response at this point or not. Regardless, I wasn't capable of one besides the ogling I was already doing.

"So," Bella continued, "I was thinking we might try that out."

After a moment, I was able to process what she was suggesting. "For tonight?"

She shrugged. "I was thinking a week, maybe? From now until your birthday. See how we like it."

I goggled. "Bella, that's not…."

"Not all day, of course," she cut in, reassuring me. "Just when we're alone." And then she gave me a smile that was half shy, half naughty. "Any time we're alone."

My pants were painfully tight, but the rest of me was still not convinced. "We'll get caught."

Bella rolled her eyes. "We will not. You'll let me know if anyone is approaching, and I'll cover up." She gestured to her exquisite nakedness. "Otherwise, I'll be like this, and you're free to look, touch, squeeze, lick, suck—whatever you want."

I groaned. I didn't know if it was out of exasperation or arousal. "Bella…."

She grinned. "Happy birthday, Edward."

It was my disciplined reaction to refuse. This was irresponsible. Everything in my upbringing said that it was improper. Bella was a person and her breasts were a natural, functional part of her body—not mere objects of beauty or toys for my benefit. She was my wife, and as such she was entitled to my respect at all times; she shouldn't have to put up with my lustful stares and groping hands at all hours. But, good God, what she was suggesting sounded sexy as hell. What's more, she wasn't just offering for my sake. I could see in her dilated eyes and trembling fingers that this game turned her on as well.

So, I said yes.

Bella joined me on the loveseat with her book for our reading date like it was any other night, casual as anything. I didn't last long before I began to touch her—less than two minutes, if I'm honest. We both continued to hold our books and stare at the pages, but they were just props at that point. I was solely focused on Bella's breasts. How pretty and sexy they were, how they felt in my hands. And the little noises Bella kept making? The way she would hold her breath and then slip with little gasps? Her involuntary whimpers and squirms? Maddening. Within twenty minutes, I was on her, inside her.

Afterward, she remained naked, but cuddled into my side, rested her head on my shoulder, and picked up her book once more. A few minutes later, I was touching her again. All of this was just so hot, I couldn't help myself. After coming inside her for the second time, I gave up pretending any reading was going to happen and cherished her body on the rug until morning.

I had plans with Emmett at noon, but just knowing that if I stayed home, Bella would walk around topless all afternoon, was enough to make me cancel on him. He accused me of being whipped and he was right. Whipped and so horny I was practically humping her leg while she tried to get some laundry done. Her nipples were too tempting and I discovered she liked it when I nipped or tugged them with my teeth—the harder the better for my beloved masochist, of course. Before I knew it, I ended up lifting her onto the machine and sucking her clit for an entire wash cycle.

One might think that having near constant access to naked Bella breasts for an entire week, I would get better at controlling myself or that the novelty would wear off at least. But no. I somehow got worse. Not only did my hands go right to fondling any time we were alone and she was topless, I started doing it sometimes when she was clothed and other people were nearby. Not looking at us, of course—never that. But around, in the next room. Without even thinking, my hands would slide under the hem of her top and up. After I grumbled once about her bra being in the way, she stopped bothering with them altogether. There was no hope for me at all after that. She tried to hide that she wasn't wearing one by choosing her garments very carefully, for her own sense of modesty and other people's benefit rather than mine, I would guess. I didn't have the heart to tell her that those tempting nipples and a mesmerizing jiggle were still slightly discernible for anyone who was paying enough attention.

And I was extraordinarily attentive.

In my defense, it wasn't just boobs I was after. The curved lines of her entire torso were so lovely, her skin so soft. I obsessively traced and kissed her bare shoulders, her sternum, studied the way the curtains of her hair draped and slid across her skin. She loved the feel of my nose trailing its way up her spine, and then my lips, and then my tongue. Her belly was ticklish, and kisses there always made her giggle and moan at the same time, even when I went at a deliberate, sensual pace. I discovered how much Bella enjoyed the sides of her ribs and waist being caressed. Half the time I reached up her shirt, my hands didn't even make it to her nipples. Instead, I would stroke the tips of my fingers over the sides and back of her ribs, no bra band to stop me, and then mold my hands to her shape, rubbing slowly up and down from her hip bones to the sides of her breasts. Bella would swoon into me every time and lay her head against my chest.

More than once, my touching led to her begging for an orgasm.

"I thought this would mostly be for you," she confessed on the fourth day, an irritated edge to her breathless voice. "But, of course, you can't stop prioritizing my pleasure for even five minutes. You're ridiculous and you're driving me insane. This is non-stop foreplay, you know that? You already destroyed all but two of my bras, and now you're ruining all my underwear."

At her words, my erection jerked, trapped in my jeans.

I had her cornered in the window seat she used as a morning reading nook. Charlotte Brontë's Villette had fallen between some pillows and into the windowsill several minutes ago when I had yanked the curtains closed. I didn't trust myself to monitor possible approaches when I was this far gone.

"This game was supposed to turn you into an insatiable pervert—not me!" Bella accused.

I laughed incredulously. "You think I'm not behaving like an insatiable pervert? Because I'm damn sure that I am."

She whimpered when I nuzzled my face into her neck and slid my hands up her thighs and under her skirt. I hooked my index finger around the, yes, absolutely sopping wet gusset of her panties and pulled. She shivered in my arms while French lace grazed its way down the skin of her legs.

Bella sighed. "It's just…this was supposed to be for you."

I roughly pushed her knees apart and situated myself between them. A smile twisted my lips as I opened my jeans. I leaned in and, forehead to forehead, pinned her to the cushion. "Trust me, Bella love," I growled as I sheathed my cock inside her, "this is definitely for me."

How could she possibly not see what was happening here? I had been all over her, constantly. I had even dragged her away from family game night at the big house and fucked her in the guest bathroom with my hand over her mouth to stop her screams from echoing off the tile. I had spent all of my free time this week with her, following her around like a lovesick puppy and pouncing on her every second we were alone. I would wager the average thirteen-year-old boy was more in control of his body than I was at the moment.

If anything, I was starting to worry that I was taking things too far. Bella was, in her own words, a "demon in heat," but surely I had to be pushing the bounds of her appetite and endurance. Surely. So, imagine my surprise when, on the morning of my birthday, I caught her masturbating. The predawn hunt plans I had with Carlisle were cut short when a medical emergency summoned him to the hospital, so I arrived home hours earlier than she expected.

The sun coming over the horizon cast beams of light through the gauzy curtains and across the bed. She was playing the recording I had given her on her eighteenth birthday of my piano compositions and she was naked in our rumpled bedding, just as I had left her an hour ago. Her eyes were closed and she was biting her lip in concentration. Her right hand was caressing her throat and her left was out of sight beneath the blankets, but from the motion of her hips, there was no mystery as to what it was doing. She didn't hear me approach, not at first, and maybe that was because she was right on the verge of an orgasm. I had seen that expression on her face many times before. She was almost there and squirming with fervent focus to get herself over the line.

Standing in the doorway, watching her, I went on an emotional roller coaster. My first thought was how unbelievably sexy she was. My second was dismay that somehow, somehow, she still wanted more after everything I had given her over the last week. Her sex drive was insane. Or maybe…maybe there was a reason so much of me had still left her wanting. Maybe it wasn't more she wanted, but different. Maybe she was thinking of someone else. I mean, she'd sort of indicated that she didn't do that, but she never said for sure, and if…well, it was perfectly fine, of course. Just because I didn't want anyone but her, that didn't mean she…. It was normal—most people thought of someone other than their partner from time to time and it was largely harmless. Fantasizing wasn't the same as acting on those desires, and oh God, now I was giving myself a pep talk of rationalizations.

At this point, the choking noise my throat made alerted Bella to my presence. Her eyes snapped open, then widened. She scrambled and flailed to pull the covers up over herself, and her eyes were, well, guilty.

But then I caught sight of her neck and everything snapped into place. Of course she wasn't thinking of someone else—I was being ridiculous. She was listening to my music for God's sake. On the left side of her neck, five deep fingernail indents were pressed into her skin. One of them looked deep enough it may have been a puncture, but the marks were disappearing, healing before my eyes. She hadn't been caressing her neck, but clawing it. Perhaps to simulate the feeling of teeth…?

"Edward…."

I cleared my throat and stepped into the room, closing the door behind me. Bella was clutching the sheet to her chest, knees drawn up, when I sat on the bed in front of her. I could smell us on the sheets from our night of lovemaking, and the fresh sweetness of her current arousal was an even stronger scent that made my cock stir. Her hair had gone past rumpled and was now just tangled, wildly disheveled around her lovely face.

"Bella," I said, my voice low. "Were you thinking about me biting you?"

She grimaced and nodded.

I didn't know that a half smile was going to pull at my lips until it was already there. "Touching yourself while fantasizing about me biting you." I tsk-tsked her, and she visibly relaxed. The reaction she had been dreading was not the one I was having. "I thought you didn't do that," I said lightly.

"I didn't use to. Not when I was human," she defended herself. And then added under her breath, "At least, not on purpose."

My eyebrows shot up.

"We talked about it recently. More than once—cat's out of the bag. And, yeah, it really turns me on." She shrugged, but it was a jerky, stiff motion. "So, I sometimes kinda fantasize about it now."

I wanted to reassure her. Instead I said, "I thought you didn't have any new fantasies."

She groaned and exhaled a frustrated puff of air. "Cut me some slack here, Edward. Technically it's not new, and we both know this has been a touchy subject. You're working through how you feel, and I don't want to put pressure or expectations on you."

Studying her, I swallowed. "You don't have to keep things from me, Bella."

Her gaze flickered to my face and then down. "So that you can talk yourself into biting me whether or not you're ready or even want to in the first place?"

"Bella."

"You do that, Edward. Anything for me. Anything to make me happy. Especially now that I gave up my humanity to be with you, right?"

My jaw clenched.

She rubbed her face, wedding ring glinting at me in the motion. "I'm sorry, Edward. You're right. I should be talking to you about this stuff."

I chose my words carefully. "I can see why you might feel hesitant."

Bella eyed me for a moment and then a reluctant grin broke out on her face. "You're trying so hard to be the mature one about this."

"I am the mature one." I was teasing, and Bella sniggered, but I had learned a hard lesson about taking my feelings out on Bella. I wasn't going to put her through that again. "So," I prompted, "a lot?"

"A lot what?"

"Do you fantasize about me biting your neck a lot?"

I could see her internal struggle in her eyes, but finally she admitted, "Yes. Lately, yes. And sometimes I think of you biting me other places, too."

That jolted me. "Like where?" I asked before considering whether or not I really wanted to know.

She wasn't meeting my eyes anymore. "I don't know—my inner thighs, my breasts, my wrists. Anywhere. I'd let you bite me anywhere."

Holy shit.

For a moment I was frozen, completely taut, aware only of my body's response. Holy. Shit.

She picked at her nails, ruining the manicure Alice had forced on her over the weekend. "It would be easier telling you this stuff if you didn't look so scandalized every time."

I blinked. "Scandalized isn't the word I would use."

She snorted.

"Bella," I said evenly and waited for her to look at me. "I'm not scandalized. That's not what this is."

"Then what is it?" Her tone was skeptical, but then she noticed the impact of her words on the front of my pants and her jaw fell open.

I might have chuckled at her expression if I hadn't been so uncomfortable. My body's reaction was strong and clear, but I still found it disquieting. "Maybe I'm a little bit scandalized."

Bella swallowed, her eyes locked on my erection. "Because of what I was thinking or because I was playing with myself while I thought it?"

"Both," I admitted grudgingly. And then I blurted without thinking better of it, "I thought I was giving you enough."

Bella's attention snapped back to my face. "Of course you were! Are. Edward, this week has been incredible. Seriously—maybe the best idea I've ever had. But I always masturbate, no matter how much sex we're having."

That was news.

"Don't you?"

Words stuck in my throat.

"No, you don't," Bella concluded, her eyes softening.

I affected nonchalance. "No need, really."

"It's not a matter of need." Bella smiled, slightly shy. "It's fun."

That made me grin. The thought of her doing this just because it was fun was…pleasant. Bella had a way of taking things that were heavy for me and making them seem light.

"And it helps me reflect on things. Process stuff I am sorting through, that kind of thing." Her no-nonsense voice was creeping in. "We don't sleep or dream. We don't cry. We can't get drunk. Sex is one of the few ways we can deliberately release built up tension. When I am doing it alone, I can think about things that are worrying or bothering me, work them into the scenarios. It helps me figure out how I really feel, and it makes it easier to let go of emotions that are wearing me down. I masturbate way more now than I did as a human."

What she was saying made sense, and it wasn't surprising she felt this way given what we had talked about the day we packed up her old room. Yet, honestly, the idea had never occurred to me. "I guess I don't do it often enough to have noticed."

Bella bit her lip. "How often?" she asked quietly.

I hesitated.

"How many times in a…?" But Bella trailed off as she spoke. Maybe it was something she saw in my expression.

After an awkward silence, I finally muttered an answer. "Seven."

"Seven?" she said. "Times a week? A month?"

I don't know why I felt fidgety and ashamed. "Ever."

Bella gasped and somehow the melodrama of that broke the tension and made me chuckle.

"You know, Bella, it would be easier telling you this stuff if you weren't so scandalized."

She looked abashed, but laughed as well. Undeterred, she pressed for clarification, "Seven times ever? Ever ever?"

I forced a smile. "Since I became a vampire, yes. When I was human," I shrugged, "who knows. I don't remember."

"Seven times in ninety years," she whispered as much to herself as me.

"It's not a big deal."

She eyed me shrewdly. "Of course. If you didn't want to, it's perfectly fine. But…if you did want to, you know that's okay, right? There's nothing bad or wrong about touching yourself."

"Yeah, I know," I said easily.

Neither of us were fooled.

She watched me squirm for a moment, and then motioned me closer with an affectionate smile. I moved up the bed and oriented myself so that we were sitting side by side. I was both surprised and not when she reached for the zipper of my pants. She kissed my cheek as she gently extricated my cock. It was only half hard at the moment, but was becoming more interested in what was happening by the second.

But then, she let go.

Realization dawned when she lifted my hand off the bed, dropped a dollop of lube in my palm from the bottle in the night stand, and placed it in my lap.

"Bella…."

"I'm here," she said. "Is it really masturbating if someone else is with you?"

I snorted.

"Besides," she continued, "you know I love to watch."

My cock twitched under my hand. I was remembering her prom fantasy.

It seemed she was, too.

"Here." Her grin was wicked as she lifted the blankets off of herself, revealing her naked body to me. "Something for you to look at, like last time."

Her loveliness was so stunning, for a moment I just stared. She stretched out for my eyes. The light of the sunrise cast a warm glow over her skin. Her wild hair and well-used slit, still dripping with my seed from earlier, only made her more tempting. With a groan, my fingers closed around my shaft.

When I didn't move initially, she offered encouragement. So I began to stroke, up and down. Unlike the last time, in the back seat of my car, I wasn't on the verge of exploding or too far gone to think. This was different. I was turned on, but nowhere near losing my head. Which meant my head could wander, fixate on the awkwardness of the situation. How pathetic it was that my wife was holding my hand, figuratively, through jerking my dick.

I stopped. "Bella, I don't think this is working."

She quirked a brow at me. "And I think you're thinking too much."

Probable. I sighed. "I'd rather make love to you."

"Well, you're masturbating, so too bad."

I laughed. "I thought it wasn't really masturbating because you're here with me."

"We both know that was a bald-faced lie to make a broken Catholic boy feel better."

I laughed harder. She was gifted at this—taking things that bogged me under, took me down beaten thought-paths of self-loathing, and flipping them around, defusing all of their power. It always took me by surprise, how suddenly and thoroughly she could make me forget I was a monster and feel like a person.

Bella arched her back sensually and returned my attention to the topic at hand. "What do you want to do to me?"

My smile was tender. "I told you. I want to make love to you."

"Well, I'm not here," she said firmly. "I'm a memory or a picture in a magazine, and you are alone and horny. So, what do you want to do to me?"

To be honest? "Mostly, I want to kiss you."

Bella covered her eyes with her hands in frustration, groaning and giggling. "Stop being adorable and let me help you jerk off."

Her mirth was contagious and the smile on my face wouldn't go away. "You asked and I'm telling. Kissing is important. I need to feel like you know I love you and I'm going to take care of you. Sexually and emotionally. Kissing helps with that. And, okay…maybe I need it too—to know you aren't just doing stuff with me because it feels good. It's…it's easier for me to get hard when…well…like right now."

I felt self-conscious drawing attention to the fact that feeling loved by her was one of the fastest and most sure-fire ways to turn me on, but there was no denying it at this point. My eyes gestured down to my lap and she saw what I was getting at. I was fully erect.

Many emotions cycled through in her expression, and she looked slightly overwhelmed.

"What are you thinking?" I asked.

She shook her head and gave me a soft smile. "I'm just very lucky, that's all."

Her words made me feel warm.

"So," she whispered, "tell me how you would kiss me."

I did. It was largely rambling, jumping from one idea to the next. The truth was I wanted to kiss and touch her everywhere. I talked her through, from whim to whim. Slowly, my hand started to move again on my cock.

"Bella, I need to actually kiss you."

"Well, I'm not here. You're just thinking about me."

She ignored my growl of frustration.

"What does it feel like?" she asked.

"What?"

Bella nodded toward my stroking hand. "Tell me how it feels. Describe it."

For a moment, I was thrown. It seemed like such a strange request, but as I attempted to answer, I realized why she might have made it. I had barely been paying any attention to what I was doing because I was completely focused on her. Now I was aware of the tension in my hand, the strength of my grip, the friction of skin against skin. The milking motion stoked the pleasure, nursed it as it grew. It was strange to be thinking about this, to be watching my hand motions and the head of my cock bobble and jerk as I stroked.

"Usually I'm going as fast as possible to get it over with."

"That's horrible," Bella said with disapproval.

"I've never done this before. It's weird to be staring while I…."

"Really?" Bella murmured. "I love looking at your cock, especially while it's being played with. Watch the way it strains against your hand. So eager. That muscle on the underside clenching like that? It means that your balls are tightening and twitching."

She was right. Neither of us could see it because my cock had merely been threaded through the fly of my boxers and open jeans. But I could feel it happening as she spoke. It was no surprise, really, that she knew my body so well.

"No precum yet," she said, "but you're almost there. I can hear the change in your breathing and the skin on the head is stretched so tight."

For a moment, neither of us spoke as we observed my hand moving up. And down. And up.

"Jesus, this is hot," she muttered. "Your hands are so much sexier than mine."

That was a matter of opinion.

"Look how big your hand is, how powerful it is." She sighed with longing. "Rub your thumb across the head, right over the opening."

I paused.

"Trust me."

On my next upstroke, I did as she suggested, remembering the way her touch felt when she did this for me. The graze of my thumb over the hole sent a shot of pleasure trembling down my entire shaft. I moaned. Drops of precum slipped free and dribbled down, wetting my fingers as they moved. More followed.

"Imagine me licking that up," Bella said in my ear. "Picture it. You know how my tongue feels."

I hesitated, but couldn't help from doing just as she asked. I moaned again.

"Now picture me pressing my breasts against your cock. I'm taking the left one and dragging the hard nipple up the underside of your shaft and across the head."

Goddamn it, Bella was sexy.

Involuntarily, my eyes left my body and found hers. Her lovely naked splendor. Fuck, she was perfect. She drove me crazy.

"What do you want to do to me, Edward?"

"I wanna fuck you," I growled.

Her breath caught. Then I saw her thighs clench together.

"No," I commanded. "Spread them. Keep your legs open for me."

She whimpered as she obeyed, her hips pulsing upward. And there she was—pink and open and dripping with my seed. Mine.

"You're mine, Bella."

"Yes," she agreed breathlessly. "Yours."

My eyes hungrily surveyed her body, jerking myself roughly. Then, my gaze fell on her neck. Her gorgeous, glorious neck. The half-moons of her fingernails were mostly gone, but the one that had punctured her skin was still healing. It took my mind to dark, dark places.

I groaned. I shouldn't think of that. "I shouldn't."

Bella must have been watching me closely to have seen where my attention had turned. "You can, Edward." She arched her bare neck at me. "Go ahead. You can think of it. We're in our room, our bed. We love each other, no one but us will know, and it's okay—you can."

An animalistic noise ripped from my throat as I collapsed into her, breaking the rules of the game. I buried my face in her neck and crowded my body against hers. I opened my mouth and pressed my teeth to her throat. I heard her sharp gasp. My hand was in a frenzy, jerking my cock harder than I ever had before while my hips bucked against her.

She was mine. Her throat was open, her blood flowing into me, filling me, making me complete and whole. I wasn't killing her—I was taking her. Marking her, leaving my teeth branded, tattooed into her skin. Mine.

I came, groaning and grunting in her arms. Shot after shot after shot of release burst from me. It seemed to go forever, until I was dry, and yet my cock continued to shiver and heave in my hand, electric ecstasy pulsing through my whole body. My vision wiped white and my skin everywhere tingled with oversensitivity.

Bella's fingers were stroking the hair at my temple. When the shame and panic set in over what I had just done and what I had pictured while I did it, she felt my muscles tense against her.

"I have you, Edward. I have you," she whispered soothingly. "It's just us. You're okay."

Despite myself, some of my stiffness and disgust leached from me. In that moment, I truly understood what Bella meant when she talked about the difference me making her feel safe made. For a few seconds, I was too overloaded with emotion to move.

I gathered myself and lifted my head from her shoulder. To put off meeting her eyes for a bit longer, I surveyed the mess, and a mess it was. I had shot ribbons of cum across her torso, painting her breasts, stomach, and pussy with white lines. I couldn't help but think it was unpleasant for her, and yet the image seared itself on my brain as supremely erotic.

"I know," I heard her say. "So hot."

I stood corrected. But then, I remembered how she had wanted me to jerk off onto her naked pussy and rumpled prom dress. I swallowed.

"Edward," she said softly. "I need to…." Her hand moved to touch herself.

Of course. She had been masturbating, on the edge of orgasm, when I walked in. And then we had transitioned into a game for me. She'd had so much stimulation and no release.

I caught her hand in mine and lifted it to my lips. I finally met her eyes. "No, I'll take care of you, Bella love." I kissed her wrist and stood to swiftly remove my clothing.

She smiled as she watched. "Can I have your cock inside me?" she asked timidly. "Or is it too soon?"

I didn't need much in the way of a refractory period. An orgasm that intense would limit my ability to come for a while, but I didn't need to—I just needed to get hard enough to give her the climax she sorely needed and absolutely deserved. I could do that.

"You can have my cock," I promised as my pants and boxers hit the floor.

She bit her lip and made a little noise of pleasure.

"Spread your legs for me, Bella."

She complied immediately. She even stretched her arms over her head—completely open and vulnerable and waiting for me. Trembling with anticipation and already marked with my seed. She was the loveliest thing in the world.

I climbed onto the bed over her, between her legs. Her pelvis was already rocking upward toward me in impatience. There was no sense in making her wait. I watched her body shudder beneath mine as I pushed my full length and girth into her. She whimpered and clutched at the headboard above her.

"Hold me down," she begged, so quietly I knew it had been hard for her to ask.

My expression was tender as I gathered her wrists together and pinned them forcefully to the bed with one hand. She cried out and bucked her hips upward. My other hand traveled down between our bodies while I began to thrust. My thumb glided slickly over her skin and I knew I was rubbing my cum into her clit as I circled, pressed, and flicked. My thrusts were controlled and smooth, but her movements were frantic and violent, her cries too loud for this hour of the morning. I kissed her to muffle them.

She bit my lip, hard. I groaned.

Bella was accelerating and escalating this encounter, making me reevaluate whether or not I would be able to come again so soon. Jesus, she was a wanton mess. For me. Only for me.

"Edward," she gasped between open-mouthed kisses. "Please."

I would have asked for clarification, but she lolled her head to the side and presented her neck to me.

"Please."

My cock pulsated inside her tight wet heat and, impossibly, I almost came. Fuck.

It wouldn't be fair to deny her, not after I had done it for my pleasure. My lips dropped to her exposed throat. I kissed her skin sensually, and then opened my mouth. I grazed the curve of her neck with my teeth, trailing their sharp edges over her sweet skin, down to the juncture where her neck met her shoulder. There, I pressed my bite downward into her soft flesh, just short of breaking her skin.

She went insane beneath me, bucking and writhing with a fierceness that took my breath away. Her cries rang out against the walls. Her pussy became a convulsing vice, wringing an orgasm from my already exhausted and over-sensitized cock. I groaned and groaned at the ecstatic agony of it until her spasms faded.

She panted high-pitched whimpers as she came down. "Oh my God…." Her voice broke, "Edward…that was…."

I released her wrists and caressed her jaw. "I know."

"That was…."

"I know."

She felt my body shift atop hers and must have thought I was going to roll off of her.

"No," she clutched my biceps. "Stay."

By 'stay' I knew she meant to stay inside her. "I am." Cradling her in my arms, I gently rolled us both so that I was on my back and she was above me. Since she turned, I knew my weight wouldn't hurt her, and I also knew that she didn't mind it, but I wanted to hold her.

She sighed contentedly against my chest. "Thank you, Edward. That meant a lot to me."

A warm smile took over my lips and I kissed her scalp. "Thank you, Bella."

"For the masturbation seminar?"

I chuckled. "And everything else."

"I don't hear Nessie up. She isn't asleep still, is she? Her heartbeat is steady and it sounds like she's in her room."

I checked. "Yeah, she's asleep. Dreaming even."

Bella laughed. "How? We were so loud."

My answer was a noncommittal grunt. I didn't care how. I was just grateful.

"How was your hunting trip with Carlisle?" she asked, breathing now even, relaxed. "Is everything okay? You were home so early."

"He was paged." I was stroking my fingers up and down her back.

"That sucks."

I grinned. "I don't mind how things turned out."

We laid in silence for several long minutes. The shadows in the room shortened as the sun rose fully and I held my wife.

When Bella finally spoke, her voice was tentative. "Edward…we should probably talk about what just happened."

My fingers tightened their grip against her skin. I found my nerve and blurted my response. "I know, Bella. I want the real thing, too."


Author's Note: Thank all of you for being so lovely and commenting such supportive things on this story. It is the best kind of writing motivation, reminding myself that there are people besides me who are excited for this story. I appreciate your support so much!