Hello! Thank you so much for your reviews! I think my shifter stories have a bit more success than my vampire stories :)...

I'm glad you're enjoying this..Here goes another chapter.

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KISS PROTOCOL.


CHAPTER TWO: IN PLAIN SIGHT.

Her lips were swollen and her cheeks were incredibly red. Her eyes were hard to read. "I think we need to talk." She said breathlessly.

He chuckled helping her get down of the counter. "What do you want to talk about?"

She moved away from him to restart dinner. However, she turned her back to the food and faced him when asking the question.

"Why did you leave last night?"

"To give you privacy. I assumed facing the pixie was hard on you, and you sounded very distressed. I wanted you to come to terms with it yourself without my interference. I planned on talking about it today, but I didn't know how to bring the subject."

She visibly relaxed. "What about what happened here yesterday?"

He decided to tease her a little. "Well, you kissed me. You tell me." He smiled wickedly at her making her blush.

"I meant what I said. I choose to take a chance at being happy. You have managed to help me out of that numbing state. You know I have feelings for you. But I'm not at the same point as you are yet." He nodded, he didn't expect her to be on the same page so early. But her admitting to having feelings for him was a good starting point.

"I know, honey." He kissed her forehead. "Just one condition." She nodded, dazzled by his proximity. "As long as you're only mine, we can take it however you want it."

"Only yours?" She whispered.

"I'm possessive. I don't share. If we're doing this, you're only mine." He stated seriously. What he wasn't saying out loud is that if Edward ever came back, he wasn't going to condone being thrown around as if he didn't matter.

Bella nodded. She understood what he wasn't saying out loud. "Just, be patient with me, please."

He pecked her lips. "I promise."

After addressing the elephant in the room, they proceeded to have dinner. Charlie wasn't coming home that night due to having the night shift. It had been nice to have the space to speak freely. She admitted that she didn't want the Cullens back.

"Why didn't you tell the pixie that?" He asked curiously.

She shrugged. "I'm not sure. But I guess that I didn't tell her because this is their home too. I have no right to tell them not to come. The fact that I don't want to be back together with...Edward" he noticed she had some difficulty saying his name, just as before. But at least now she referred to him by his name and not just a pronoun. "Doesn't mean I'll stand in the way if they want to come back home."

Jake smiled at her. She was so preciously innocent and good. "I'm pretty sure they'd be coming for you, not for sentimentality over the town." She nodded. She knew that was also the reason if not the main one.

"I still stand by what I said to Alice. If they all come, it's their decision, but I'm not going to drop everything and go running back. They hurt me, a lot. And I'm starting to feel more like myself now. And I want to be with you. I like who I am when I'm with you." She admitted the last part very softly.

He caressed her cheek lovingly, locking his eyes with hers. "You don't need anyone to be happy, or 'whole'. But we can be happy together. You know I'm crazy about you. And I also like who I am with you." Bella smiled and hugged him.

"I really don't know what I would do without you." She murmured into his shirt.

He smiled and forced her softly to break off the embrace. He grabbed her face in between his big hands. "You would be just fine. You are strong just by yourself. You don't need anyone. You choose to be with someone because you feel comfortable, happy, safe, and because you love them." He winked at her and she smiled. He was so good with her. He had always believed in her, even when she didn't.

When it was getting too late for Jake to be there, he jokingly suggested staying the night, which made Bella panic a little. "I'm teasing you, honey. Relax." He kissed her goodnight and left. However, he turned back and knocked on the door. He shook his head, feeling dumb.

She smiled amusedly when she saw him. "What's up?"

"Would you like to go out on an actual date?" He asked kind of rushedly and a little flushed.

"I'd love to, Jake." She smiled more tenderly this time. "Is Friday okay with you?"

"Absolutely. I'll pick you up at 7."

She nodded excitedly. He kissed her cheek and left on his rabbit. She shook her head amused. She liked this version of herself, she realized. Relaxed, happy.

That night was the first night she slept without nightmares, she didn't bring it up, but on the second night Charlie noticed, but he didn't mention anything either, afraid that if he said anything, whatever had made the horrors leave might come back. Instead, he kissed his daughter's forehead and prepared for the day.

Jacob was going to be busy that day. The pack was worried about Alice's presence. It might trigger more guys to phase. She shook her head, that was beyond their control.

She cleaned the house and did the laundry. She decided to leave her room to the last, planning on rearranging her clothes in her closet.

After her chores were finished, she fished a box out of the hall closet and set it on her bedroom's floor. The floor complained under her weight. She found it weird. She balanced from one foot to the other and got the same result. She crouched and moved the boards. At first it seemed empty. But after a second look she caught sight of something. She picked it up and pulled it out. Gasping in shock when she realized what it was. The plane tickets, pictures, a CD, and some other trinkets that Edward had gifted her on her eighteenth birthday. After he left she searched frantically for a proof that he had existed, a proof beyond the hole in her chest. All along it had been hiding in plain sight.

She expected the hole to open up again, she expected to fall on her knees and cry and scream. But all she felt was sadness. Although she did lose her balance and landed on her ass. A few tears escaped, but she didn't clean them. She let herself mourn that past love. However, it wasn't the sadness she experienced the first weeks after he left, this was a sadness you have when you say good bye to an object that held emotional value. This was all it was. Just the reminder of a past relationship. She sighed and threw the things in a bag, with more force than necessary. She debated what to do with it. Burn it? Call Alice and have her pick them up? Throw them away? She knew for certain she wasn't keeping them.

She had loved Edward so deeply. She couldn't understand how someone could abandon a person they claimed to love. It didn't work like that. When things got though, you faced them, and overcame them together. You didn't run away. That was the coward's way to do things. She sighed.

As she held the pictures in her hands, she thought of Jake. A smile crossed her face. She had decided to give him a chance. He had been there for her at every opportunity. Even when he first phased, he still found the courage to break Sam's rules and come to her. He was prohibited from telling her what he was, but she already knew. He found the loophole and told her to think about it.

Think Bella. She ushered herself. What did she want to do? Not what Jake would do. Not what her father would want her to do. What did she want to do?

She accommodated herself on the floor, crossing her legs one under the other. She stared at one of the pictures. She had always thought he was some kind of Greek God. It was now embarrassing how hard she idolized him. He was very handsome, of course. But there was something off about him now that she was alone and wasn't shy about actually seeing him. She felt different. She still had tears running down her cheeks, but they were not heart broken tears. She didn't know exactly what to feel about it.

She sighed sadly. She put the picture at the bottom of the pile she was holding, to look at another one. In this one, he was smiling at her and she was looking at the camera. She didn't deny that he loved her. But it was her face what surprised her. She wasn't smiling. There was no brightness in her face in that picture. She looked…numb, for lack of a better word. She discarded that picture and grabbed another. In this one, she was smiling softly. But it was still…off. What was wrong with her? These weird expressions repeated themselves in a few pictures. Although in some others she smiled like she was happy.

She took out her phone from her jeans' back pocket, opened the gallery and found the latest selfie that Jake took of them in an attempt to be goofy. He had said that selfies were a thing normal couples took. Bella wasn't an enthused photographer but he kind of was, so he had been in charge of taking the pictures. The difference made her gasp.

In Jake's picture she looked so different. Yes, there was still a little bit of sadness reflected on her eyes, or so she thought. She knew, logically, she couldn't see that. But she knew that's how she felt. But the greatest difference was her body language. She was leaning into Jake, even if they weren't touching. In one of the three selfies she had her head tilted backwards and was laughing whole-heartedly. The first time she laughed like that after he left, had been at the pasta party.

What the hell…She called Jake immediately. "Miss me already?" He joked.

"I need you to come now."

"What's wrong?" He asked worriedly.

"It's hard to explain through the phone. Just come up to my room when you come here." She said, and after making sure he had understood, she closed the call.


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