Holy reviews, Batman! When I posted Chapter 14, the reviews were at 285 and I wondered if I'd get enough reviews on that chapter to push me over 300. And right now it's at 420! Wow! I can't tell you how touched I am that so many of you are reading and liking the story. I know it's been mentioned on Lillie Cullen's blog and on lion_lamb on live journal. If you see the story mentioned anywhere else, do let me know, so I can properly thank people
The general reaction to the last chapter was "Poor Edward!" even though all of you were calling him the world's biggest douche just a few chapters back, which I find hilarious. But I'm delighted that you're warming to him. A few reviewers are looking to give him a nickname. Starward and Hollyward are my two favorites. What do you think?
Disclaimer: It's not mine
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BPOV
I shoved Edward off of me in a panic. What the fuck just happened? I pushed my hands through my hair in an effort to clear the fog from my brain. My tank top was still pushed all the way up to my bra, exposing my stomach. I yanked it back down, feeling the blush flood my cheeks at the same time.
Edward. He'd been kissing me…touching me…just a second ago. The bedroom. I'd been just about to lead him back to the bedroom. And Jasper just walked in…
I shot a look at Edward. He looked as much of a mess as I felt. His already crazy hair was in complete disarray, from my fingers clawing through it. He was still breathing hard and his lips looked slightly swollen. My fingers twitched. I wanted to reach out and curl my fist in his shirt and pull him in to me and…
"Bells? Babe? You here?"
Fuck. Right. Jasper was here. I had to fix this. Try to act natural, get him back out the door fast, and then we can get back to…
Edward's eyes locked with mine. They were wide and intense, his jaw clenched. He seemed to be challenging me, but I didn't know why or what he wanted me to do.
"Back here, Jazz," I called, pulling my gaze away from Edward. I couldn't look at him right now and still focus. I winced when I heard myself. My voice sounded so forced and unnatural to my ears. Could Jazz hear that? I ran my hands over my hair to smooth it and hoped we didn't look as obvious as I felt we did.
"Hey, Bells, I was going to meet Emmett and Rosie for some dinner and I thought I'd stop by and see how you were doing after this afternoon. Do you want to come…." Jasper was talking loudly to me as he walked through the house, as usual, then he rounded the corner into the kitchen and stopped when he caught sight of Edward…still standing closer to me than he probably should be, and both of us still breathing heavily. Jasper's eyes shot from me to Edward and back to me. He knew. Of course he did. You could practically smell sex in the air.
"Hey, Jazz. Edward came by to see if I wanted to go to dinner, too, but I was already cooking. And you know how I always make too much. So he stayed to eat and we were just cleaning up…" I sounded frantic, too bright. I was explaining too much, I was making it worse. And I could feel Edward growing black and glowering as he stood there. He wasn't helping me fix this at all. Of course, he wouldn't know about the conversation I'd had with the band just this morning, warning me off him, pointing out how foolish it would be to get involved with him.
"You just came by?" Jasper asked, straightening up. There goes the guy stare again.
Edward squared off to face him and his chin went up. I could see a muscle working in his cheek as he clenched his jaw.
"Yeah, I was in the neighborhood. Like you."
Edward and Jasper spent another moment staring each other down. I had to break this up before they started beating on their chests.
"So I've already eaten, Jasper. Thanks anyway…" I intended to shuffle Jasper out of the house as quickly as possible, but suddenly Edward turned on his heel and brushed past me, headed for the door.
"Edward, are you leaving?" I followed him through the house and I heard Jasper following me.
"You have company. I should go," Edward's voice was hard and forced through clenched teeth.
"You can stay…" I began.
"I'm going," he said again, firmer this time. And with one quick motion, he was out the door and it slammed shut behind him. I heard his car start and the sound receded quickly.
Fuck.
I fell against the door, leaning my forehead on it, closing my eyes. I was tired of fighting this. I wanted him, however I could get him, whatever I could have of him. And I thought he wanted me, too. I know he wanted me. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind five minutes ago that Edward wanted me. All I had to do was get rid of Jasper and then he could have had me. But he just fucking walked out, and he looked really angry. Why didn't he stay? Maybe it was a mistake, and he didn't mean to do it. Maybe the interruption made him come to his senses and realize that this was a bad idea. Maybe he could tell how I felt about him and he knew this would irrevocably complicate things. It must have been something like that or else why would he go when he clearly wanted me? I felt embarrassed and stupid, mostly because even if all that was true, I still wanted him. Pathetic.
"Bells..." Jasper's voice was low and warning behind me.
I didn't turn from the door, I just held up a hand in warning, "Jasper, no. I don't want to hear it."
"But Bells, I thought you weren't going to do this. What the hell…?"
"Jasper, I can't help it, okay? I know it's stupid and destructive and a recipe for disaster, but I just…" I shook my head slowly, eyes on the floor.
"He's going to hurt you. It would be one thing if you didn't care, but you do. I know you do."
"Yeah, I know, I know. Rose has said all of this. It's been well-covered, believe me. I tried to stay away, I really did. But he's…Whatever," I drew in a deep breath and raised my eyes to the ceiling, running my hands through my hair in frustration, "He left, and you saw him, he was really unhappy. We just got carried away, so it's all a moot point. You probably just saved me from a terrible mistake, Jazz." Then I finally met his eyes and smiled, "But you better not ever walk into my fucking house uninvited again."
He grinned a little and shook his head at me.
"I'm sorry, Bells. This was…Jesus. This really sucked. Do you want me to stay so we can talk about it?" He looked a little panicked that I might say yes. The last thing Jasper would ever want to do is to sit with me while I angsted to him about a guy. He hurried to add, "Or should I call Rose?"
I let out a long, shuddering laugh, "No, I really don't want to talk to anybody right now about what just happened. This is all humiliating enough already."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, just go. I'll see you tomorrow."
I pushed him out the door. He leaned back in to plant a quick kiss on my cheek.
"Hang in there, Bells. You know we all love you, right?"
"I know you do, Jazz." I smiled as I shoved him a little harder out the door.
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EPOV
FUCK!!!
I slammed my fist into the steering wheel of my car as I sat at the first red light I hit. I could barely see to drive I was so fucking angry.
Fucking Jasper fucking cock-blocking Hale! Goddamn him, that arrogant fucking son of a bitch! I wanted to rip him limb from limb and burn the pieces. Fucking asshole, just walking into her fucking house like he lived there.
But Bella…that was so much worse. Her face when she pushed me away…frantic and embarrassed. The way she desperately tried to cover up what had just happened between us, to keep Jasper from finding out…well, fuck. I figured when he walked in on us, that I'd be dealing with some sort of unpleasant scene, just not that unpleasant scene. I was thinking there was a good possibility that he might deck me, that there would be yelling and anger as Bella told him that she and I were together…But no, she pushed me away and made as if nothing had happened. Not she and I. She wanted to pretend there was no she and I.
So she apparently had some sort of…whatever…with him that made her feel obligated to him, not me at that moment. Who the fuck cares? I had no moral qualms whatsoever about stealing her from him. I fucking relished it. But she had to want to be stolen. And it seemed she didn't want to be.
Okay, then. So that's how it was.
But damn. The feel of her against me, the taste of her on my mouth, I felt like I would never be able to get her off my skin. I closed my eyes and let my head fall back on the headrest and wallowed in the memory for a second.
I was pretty certain that if I attacked her again and we weren't cock-blocked by Jasper, that I could get her into bed. She really wanted to. I was also equally certain that she'd kick me out the door as soon as it was over and pretend it never happened. So it seemed I could have her just for sex, if I so chose. And it would be just my damned luck that for the very first time in my entire life, that was nowhere near enough.
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BPOV
I paced around the confines of my tiny house for hours, wondering what I should do next.
Call him? He wasn't calling me. Maybe he didn't want to talk. The way he stormed out of here, the look on his face…Jasper's interruption must have made him realize we were making a mistake. Because if he wanted me, if he wanted to come back, he would have called, right? Or he wouldn't have left in the first place.
I wondered what our situation was now. Were we still "Edward and Bella" or was that all done? Had I just blown the whole deal out of the water? My stomach dropped to my feet at that thought.
I grabbed my phone and scrolled to his number. I'd never called him, unless it was to sort out some logistic pertaining to a date. I wasn't sure I wanted to call him now. What would I even say? Beg him to come back and fuck me? As desperate as I was for him, some instinct of self-preservation kept me from sinking that low. Or worse, did I want to listen to him trying to let me down gently, apologize and tell me he got carried away and it was all a dreadful mistake? No, I really didn't think I could handle hearing that right now.
Maybe I could text him…just to clarify where we stood. I mean, there were plans in place for the next few weeks. Were we still on? Alice was mobilizing all of LA in preparation for the Academy Awards. Certainly that was a reasonable excuse. It occurred to me that I could go through Aro and Laurent to sort this out, but the thought of that conversation made me blush furiously. "Yeah, so I inadvertently almost fucked Edward even though I wasn't supposed to and now I need clarification on our status." That conversation is never going to happen.
I wrote and re-wrote the text, trying for the perfect tone, apologetic, but not begging, Inquiring, but not hopeful. Every word seemed to take on immense import as I agonized.
Finally at nearly midnight I closed my eyes and hit send.
"Are we okay?-B"
The answering ping came startlingly fast, like he'd been waiting for it.
"Yeah, we're okay.-E"
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I hunched as far down into the back seat of the cab as I possibly could as the driver negotiated the crowded parking lot, trying to edge close to the door of the recording studio without hitting any of the scrambling paparazzi staked out there. I could just make out John coming outside, ready to meet me at the door of the car and herd me inside as quickly as possible. I'd given up trying to drive my truck to the studio. I couldn't negotiate the paparazzi on my own to get inside, plus after it nearly left me stranded in the midst of them, I didn't really trust it anymore.
It had been four days since that day with the paparazzi, and four days since "The Kitchen", as I called it in my mind. Edward and I hadn't alluded to it in any way, although thanks to Alice in Academy Awards overdrive, I'd seen him a couple of times at his house since that night.
Alice had commandeered a guest bedroom and the neighboring office in Edward's house as her "staging" area, where she and her new assistant, Angela organized the non-stop flow of dresses arriving for my perusal. Yes, Alice had hired an assistant. To pick out one dress. For me to wear for one night. It seemed over the top and insane to me, but she kept insisting that this was how it was done, at least at "this level of the business", whatever that meant.
The first time I ran into him there, two days after that day, two days ago, Alice and I were just crossing his entryway to the stairs to head up to her staging area as Edward appeared at the top of the stairs heading down, keys in hand. I froze on the spot and I'm sure my face turned six shades of red. He paused for a long moment, too, just watching me. I had absolutely no idea what to do next, how to act. He was a mystery to me. I couldn't begin to guess what he was thinking or what, if anything, he wanted. So I waited to see what he did, standing partially behind Alice, staring up at him like a moron. Bless her heart, Alice didn't seem to notice anything amiss, chattering away to Edward about our plans for the afternoon.
He was the one to finally break, making some non-committal polite comment, something about hoping the dress search was going well and that we should make ourselves at home and that maybe he'd see us later. Then he was down the stairs and out of the house.
Okay. So I guess we're pretending it didn't happen. Well, in case I was starting to forget, he was Edward Cullen. Edward Cullen, who doesn't do girlfriends and relationships. Maybe this was just how he handled girls "the day after", even if we never actually closed the deal. Business as usual, nothing else to say about it. I was being stupid thinking that a few nice moments when we were alone together, when it seemed like we had a connection, meant anything at all. Clearly they didn't.
Edward seemed determined to put it behind him, so I would have to do it as well.
It took everything I had to make my feet move, to follow Alice up the stairs and pretend like I was fine. Luckily she was so excited about our project and the dresses that had been delivered that day, that she really didn't need any input from me, I just had to smile and nod occasionally and strip down on command.
I'd seen him again yesterday when I was over there to try on dresses. Again, he was on his way out as I came in. Again he was polite and brief and barely made eye contact. I cursed myself for how I let it make me feel.
And now I had to face another day of this. Hunched in the back of a car, being driven from one location to another, trying to get from a car to a building spending the absolute minimum amount of time visible while hoards of paparazzi snapped pictures of me and shouted questions at me. I was exhausted and I felt utterly alone. Rose, Em and Jazz certainly worried about me, worried like crazy, really. But they were all still sort of anonymous. If we showed up together at an opening night or something, they were recognized for sure, but Jasper could still walk into a Starbucks alone without much fallout other than perhaps having to sign an autograph for a barista. So although they cared and desperately wanted to help me, they just didn't quite understand what had happened to me. Frankly, I still didn't understand either. Was this really my life now?
I couldn't make a move out in the world. Everywhere I went there was this frenzy of cameras and jostling bodies and grasping hands and people shouting my name, shouting Edward's name.
So far the ruse about where I lived seemed to be holding, but I didn't know how much longer I could count on that. Anyway, they all seemed to assume I was staying at Edward's,so mostly that's where they waited for me. With Alice dragging me over there nearly daily to try on dresses, the charade that I was shacking up with him was fairly believable, and they got plenty of pictures of me coming and going from Edward's house. It prompted a worried phone call from Charlie, who saw something about it on the cover of US Weekly in the checkout line at the supermarket. Jesus, that was all I needed. I had to explain the whole dismal, sordid arrangement to him. It was definitely a low point in our daddy/ daughter relationship. He wasn't happy about it, to put it mildly, and that was with me leaving out the part about almost sleeping with Edward. But after I assured him that my big burly cousin Emmett was keeping a close eye on me, he backed off a bit.
"Hey, Miss?" the cab driver asked, "Are you ready?"
I nodded. The driver and John exchanged a few brief words and then John quickly opened the back door and scooped me out. We raced towards the door, John's arm clamped tight around me. The bodies crushed in around us, the shouts became deafening. As the photographers jostled each other to get a better position, they invariably jostled us, so I was constantly being slammed into from the sides. They kept throwing themselves in front of us, sticking their cameras down under my face, trying to get a close up of me. But John and I just pressed forward, pretending they weren't there, which was ridiculous, considering I was practically walking on them. John yanked the door open and we darted inside and he slammed it closed behind us. We paused for a second then we both exhaled. I rolled my eyes at him and grinned.
"Another day and I'm not dead yet, John!"
He laughed nervously and I waved him goodbye as I headed off down the hall to our studio, trying to shake off the waves of anxiety those scenes always evoked in me. I couldn't understand how Edward had gotten so used to it. I didn't feel like I ever would.
"There she is, Miss Cover of People Magazine!" Emmett crowed as I came in.
"Shut up, Emmett. I so don't want to hear about that today."
"What's the problem? You don't like being the lead story on Access Hollywood every night for a week?"
"Hey!" I shouted brightly, "Jasper! How are things going with Alice?"
"Nice try, like that's gonna distract me," Emmett grumbled, but it sort of did.
"So have you guys done the deed yet?" Rose chimed in, deciding to join in on my Emmett Redirection Project. And other people's sex lives always redirected Emmett.
Jasper smiled and didn't look up from his bass as he was fiddling with it.
"Oh…Rose, do you see what I see?" I was about to explode with laughter. "Jazz, are you…blushing?"
"Shut the fuck up, Swan!" he snarled half-heartedly, flinging his guitar pick at my head.
"He totally has!" Rose crowed. "Look at his face!"
Jasper pointed a finger at her, "You shut the fuck up, too, Rosie!"
"So…" I wasn't quite ready to give up on this yet. It was too much fun. "Is it any good?"
Jasper gave in and quit trying to shut us up. He rolled his eyes and fell heavily onto the couch, getting that stupid, hit-by-a-shovel look on his face again. "Geez, Bells, you have no idea. She does this thing…"
"Stop!" I shrieked, my hands up in protest. "I now officially know enough! You're not supposed to actually tell me! Yuck, Jazz, what the fuck? Like I want to picture you like that with her! She's my friend!"
"I don't know enough yet," Emmett whined, dropping onto the couch next to Jasper. "Tell me the rest, man."
Rose and I rolled our eyes simultaneously.
"Ugh, we are out of here until you ladies finish this shit," Rose snagged my arm with hers and steered me into the booth with her. Rose flopped into Butch's swivel chair and turned herself idly back and forth while I leaned on the control panel and picked at my fingernail. Butch and Kyle weren't in yet, so we were at loose ends until somebody showed up.
I rubbed my fingers over my eyes and sighed. It was nine a.m. and they were burning already. I had barely slept since "The Kitchen". Every night those moments with Edward haunted me every time I closed my eyes and kept me awake for hours. When I did fall asleep I was assaulted by vivid, realistic dreams of him and me together, which was sort of great, but also completely draining.
"So Rose," I said to distract myself, "What do you think of Alice really? I mean, it seems like she and Jasper…"
"He is so gone for her," Rose said with a chuckle. "It's pathetic and adorable at the same time. I mean, I always thought I'd have a problem with anybody Jazz got serious about. Mostly because you know me, I don't get along so well with members of my own sex."
I snorted, "It's not like it's your fault if the bitches get jealous."
She laughed. "Yeah, still. I figured it would be this endless torture of having one of those insipid fan girls around all the time and me being unable to tell her to go fuck herself because of Jazz. And when I first heard it was Edward's sister…I mean, Edward Cullen's sister? I don't know, with those genetics I guess I was expecting…"
"Someone just like you?" I smiled.
She chuckled. "I guess. But then she's all tiny and adorable and pocket-sized. She's just a lot different than I was envisioning. Don't get me wrong, she's kind of crazy and I don't know how Jazz stands the bouncing. But she doesn't irritate me, and she's not a bitch. She's actually really nice to me, which is weird."
"She likes you. It helps that she may be one of perhaps four women on the planet who isn't deathly afraid of you. I'm glad you like her, though. I do, too. It must be hard, I think, to come into this..." I waved my hand to indicate the four of us, "…from the outside. But she…I don't know, she just seems to fit."
"Yeah, she does, "Rose smiled and shrugged, "So, what about Edward? Any more weirdness since the big weirdness?"
I had told her about The Kitchen because how can you not share that with the girl you're closest to in the world? She had been admirably restrained, though, asking only a few questions and not pestering me about it much since, although I knew it was eating her up to keep her mouth shut.
I knew I blushed so I kept my eyes down. "I see him sometimes when I'm at his place with Alice trying on dresses. He'll be going out as we're going in. We don't really spend time together. But he's always nice. Well, polite anyway."
"Has he mentioned it at all?"
"No. And neither have I."
"That must be driving you crazy."
"Yeah. I feel like I'm losing my mind sometimes. But he's clearly trying to send a message. He must have regretted it going so far, or regretted it happening at all. I guess I should be glad Jasper walked in on us. I mean, how much worse would it have been if we'd…"
"It would have been much worse."
"Yeah, much worse," I mused softly.
"But you still want to, don't you?" Rose asked.
"Ugh, so damned bad it hurts. I'm crazy," I moaned as I buried my face in my hands.
"No, just human. Half the world wants to sleep with Edward. Why should you be immune?"
"Exactly because half the world wants to sleep with him! I just wish I'd met him outside of all this. If I was nobody and if he was nobody. I could have done it, gotten it out of my system and filed it away in my box of racy memories from my young glory days."
"You think you would get it out of your system with one time?"
"No, probably not. I'd have to have more. And all that would do is fuck everything up."
"Which is why you're not going to do it," Rose said reassuringly.
Right.
Which is why I won't do it. Because that's who I am. The smart girl, who does the right thing. Who dates the right guys and avoids the wrong ones. Yep. That's me. So why did I want so badly to do something really stupid?
We were both quiet for a moment. Something was eating at me and finally I just spit it out.
"Hey, Rose, do you ever think that maybe we're all too close?"
"What do you mean…too close?"
I stared at my hands, uncomfortable. "I don't know, just a little co-dependant, maybe? Like Jazz just walking into my house like that? Alice noticed it, too, the day they met. I mean, we all used to do that when we were kids, but…"
"We're not kids anymore…is that what you mean?" Rose asked.
"Yeah, I guess. And like I was saying, about how hard it would be to come into this from the outside?"
"I get it. But don't you think it's changing?" Rose said. "Jasper has Alice now. And we all live apart. I think we're getting our personal space. Maybe it's harder for you to feel it because you're alone and Emmett and Jazz are so protective of you."
"Yeah, maybe."
Rose snorted, "Who am I kidding? I'm the one who's most protective of you. I guess ever since your mom split, we all just wanted to take care of you."
I looked up at her cautiously, and after a pause, I said, "But I'm not eight anymore. And I can take care of myself."
I didn't even know what I was trying to articulate to her, or even if there was a point I was trying to make. All this stuff was just bubbling out of me. I loved them all so much, I didn't know how to survive without them around me. Was I really wishing they'd back off? Was this all some knee jerk reaction to Jazz walking in on me and Edward? Maybe. Maybe I just wanted them to look the other way while I did something reckless and dumb for once, something I knew they'd all disapprove of. Like getting involved with Edward Cullen. Or maybe it was that I was afraid that I'd let the three of them fill up my life so fully that I hadn't left room for anyone else. Or maybe I was just fucking sleep deprived and sexually frustrated and I was taking it out on my best friends. I couldn't tell anymore.
Rose reached out and gripped my hand, "I know you can take care of yourself. It's just this crazy thing we've fallen into, and what's happening to you now…It's scary for us. We don't know how to handle it exactly. Everybody just wants you to be okay."
I sighed and closed my eyes against the anxiety and exhaustion nipping at me, feeling defeated. "I know, Rose. It's scary for me, too. Believe me. And I have absolutely no idea how to handle it either."
Butch came in at that point, interrupting us and shortly after that Jasper came in to chase us back to the studio and get us down to business. Edward, my fiercly protective friends, and my sheltered little life all got pushed to the corner of my thoughts for the time being and it was a relief.