A/N: Well, you all reached a consensus regarding Jacob quite easily, lol! Seems like I might have to do an outtake about Charlie's talk with him. We'll see. Any other outtakes you would like to read? Let me know.

Dazzled Eyes22 returned this chapter to me in just a few hours! She's awesome that way.

Happy reading!

"Edward."

Her voice was low and soft and my whispered name lingered in the air around us. I held out my arms without opening my eyes. Her sweet, familiar scent engulfed me like a comforting blanket as she quickly lay down beside me. I placed my head on her chest and her arms came up to wrap around my torso.

"You're trying to get me killed," I mumbled against her shirt, which made her giggle. "What? It's no laughing matter. Your dad is a cop; he's licensed to kill. He has a gun."

"He is the sheriff of Forks, Edward, not James Bond," Bella said lightly. "That gun has not seen the light of the day in over a decade. Besides, he flew here, so, it's not like he has it on him now."

I had to smile. "I remember making the same argument in my mind when I saw him in your room at the hospital."

"Wise minds," she remarked, raking her fingers through my hair and gently massaging my scalp.

"That feels heavenly," I sighed, as the tension drained bit by bit from by body with every stroke of her fingers. "You know you can't stay for long, though. We can't have Charlie see you here."

"I'm a big girl," she muttered and I could hear the petulant pout in her voice.

"We're getting him to understand that, Bella, but I'd rather he adjusted to the idea slowly, so that he is more receptive to it."

"Yeah, I get it," she admitted. "How did your talk with him go?"

I reflected over the conversation for a few seconds before answering. "I said what I had to. I told him that this was not a fling, explained that my feelings for you are real and that until you order me away, I am not going anywhere. Oh, and I mentioned Jacob's recent behavior, which he conveniently omitted during his talk to Charlie."

"I still can't believe Jacob had the nerve to go behind my back and report to Charlie as though I have committed some crime!" she grumbled. "He's such an ass."

"He has not dealt well with the idea of losing you, to put it mildly."

"But that's the thing, Edward. He never had me, at least, not in the sense he is implying."

I looked up at her troubled face and gently smoothed the furrows on her forehead. "He doesn't want to believe that. Anyway, Charlie was not happy after hearing about it, so, I'm sure he'd be happy to knock some sense into Jacob and deal with him. You don't have to worry about it anymore."

She sighed. The hand in my hair pushed it down, so I placed my head back in its earlier place. Her collarbone was right before me, so I pressed my lips to it, simply because I finally could.

"If you keep that up, I will not be going anywhere for a long, long time," she warned me.

I pulled away with an exaggerated sigh. "Okay, okay."

"I meant to say, your parents have been really sweet and understanding, Edward. Their acceptance means a lot to me," she told me with a smile, and I echoed it.

"I'm glad."

A moment passed in comfortable silence while we were lost in our respective thoughts.

"You know something? I want to go back to the time where our only concern was whether or not Jasper confesses his past to Alice," she said suddenly.

I chuckled. "Yes, those were simpler times." I pondered over my thoughts before voicing them. "Maybe… maybe it was a good thing."

"What was?"

"That Jacob called Charlie."

"How was it a good thing?" I could hear the surprise that colored her voice.

"It, kind of, forced our hand, you know? We had no choice, but to come clean in front of our parents. We knew that Charlie wouldn't accept our relationship in the blink of an eye, Bella. We anticipated it to be difficult, and that is why we probably would have avoided telling him for quite a while. If we waited too long, he would have been upset about that too, and it would look like we felt… I don't know the right word… guilty? Yeah, guilty enough that we hid it from him."

"You're making far too much sense for this time of the night," she joked.

I shrugged. "I'm sorry?"

She laughed once. "No, you're right. I agree. Anyway, what's done is done. I guess I am glad to have this off my back. Whatever he decides, it's up to him. Our job was telling him and that is done."

I hummed in agreement. We stayed like that, holding each other, for a little while longer, but eventually, Bella made her way back into the room after a quick good night kiss. We kept it chaste, as though by a silent mutual understanding- no tongue, and certainly no wandering hands.

I closed my eyes, and tried to push all the… excitement of the day to the back of my mind so that I could find enough peace to slip into a deep slumber. I had a long, busy shift ahead of me tomorrow and I really needed that bit of rest.

The sunlight filtered in through the windows as I woke up. Unfortunately, the heat on my skin was not what had roused me from my sleep. It was the beeping of my cell phone.

I stretched my arm out and grabbed it from the side table. A quick look at the time through my bleary gaze had me groaning in frustration. It was barely 6 a.m. and I was being called in to the hospital because victims of a mass casualty were going to be brought in.

I shot out quick texts to Bella and my mother so that they wouldn't look for me when they woke up. Jumping in and out of the shower took me no more than ten minutes, after which I tiptoed into my room in search of some clothes. Bella was sleeping peacefully, rolled on to her side, and she was clutching my pillow in her hands. The morning was proving to be a chilly one, so I tucked the covers more securely around her.

I couldn't resist placing a feather-light kiss against the wrinkles on her sleep-addled cheek and one side of her mouth pulled up into a small smile. Fortunately, she didn't stir. I quickly threw on my jeans and a shirt and made my way out of the house, foregoing breakfast.

Soon enough, I was at the hospital, gowned and ready to receive the multiple ambulances arriving into the bay. I'd been told that the ten patients coming in were employees of a 24-hr call center injured due to a fire, which had also caused parts of the roof to collapse. There were bound to be burns as well as head injuries, so the plastic surgeons and I stood outside, while Jasper was supervising the trauma rooms' setup inside.

The EMTs got out and narrated the patient's vitals. I walked in with the patient assigned to me first. Fortunately, the man did not seem to have anything more than a concussion, so, I sent him off for a CT to confirm and asked the nurse to find me when the results were ready, before moving on to the next one.

"Dr. Cullen!" I looked across the room and realized that it was Maria's frantic voice calling my name.

I rushed to her side.

"This is Hannah Brooks, 34 years old and thirty-two weeks pregnant. I was doing an ultrasound and she was talking to me, then she suddenly stopped speaking and-" Maria's eyes were frantic and her hands shook as she held the wand.

"Okay, let me take a look." I pulled out my small flashlight and checked the reactivity of her pupils. "Hannah? Hannah, can you hear me? Squeeze my hand or blink if you can understand me." I took her hand in mine, and she gave the faintest of squeezes. Her pupillary response was not encouraging.

All of a sudden, Hannah's head fell back and her body jerked violently. I tried to hold her still and secure an airway, but I needed another set of hands.

"Maria!" I yelled, because she seemed to have fallen into a stupor, while staring in horror at the convulsing woman in my arms. "Maria, I need you to push diazepam now!"

Jasper heard the commotion and came running. "How can I help?"

He realized what was happening, and quickly moved Maria out of the way, and injected the sedative as I'd requested.

I looked at the wildly beeping monitor. "BP's sky-rocketing. We need to get this baby out right now."

I turned up the bars of the gurney, and together, we started rolling it toward the elevator.

"Page OB," I ordered a nurse on the way. "Stat."

"Right away, doctor." She scurried immediately.

Ten minutes later, I had scrubbed in and was waiting for the gynecologist to finish delivering the baby, so that I could go in and do my job. However, we all knew that it was going to be touch and go with the mother. As soon as she gave me the nod, I opened up the skull and found exactly what I suspected- an intracranial bleed.

I had to act extremely quickly if I had any hope of saving this woman, so that she could get a chance to see her little baby.

In the other corner of the OR, I heard the doctor working frantically over the baby, who had not cried yet. I pushed those sounds out of my mind immediately. I needed to focus only on the mother.

"Suction please. More. More," I muttered to Howard, who was assisting me. "Okay, good. Hang another unit. We are going to be here a while."

I walked out of the OR hours later. I stopped outside the door, and stood there leaning against the wall. With my head tilted back and my eyes closed, I took the first calming, deep breath I had a chance to enjoy since I'd been called in the morning.

"How- How is she?" Maria's desperate voice broke through my moment of peace. "Is she going to be okay?"

I looked at her carefully. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her cheeks bore tracks of dried tears. Jasper had always described her as easy-going. I remembered he said that she was the everything-bounces-off-her-like-water-of-a-duck kind of a person. What happened before her eyes today had obviously impacted her seriously, though, and it was the first time I was seeing such an emotional reaction from her.

"I don't know," I said truthfully and she blanched right before my eyes.

"She seemed fine, so, I- I was just checking her baby," she choked out. "She was fine. Neuro consult was coming in, but there did not seem to be any rush, because she was chatting with me. She said th-that her husband wanted to name their daughter Destiny or Apple, but she thought these were ridiculous names. He just wanted to act like a celebrity with all their fancy, but senseless names and-" Her body trembled with barely restrained sobs as she got more agitated by the second.

I grabbed her by the shoulders. "Maria," I said, my eyes intent on her face to make sure that she was listening. "Listen to me. You could not have predicted this. It was pre-eclampsia and she had suffered an intracranial bleed; they tend to not show any symptoms until they are pretty far gone. You couldn't have done anything else for her. Her brain herniated during surgery. I did my best, but I am not sure if she is going to wake up and whether or not there will be any deficits."

She nodded before looking around anxiously. "Jasper… Have you seen Jasper?"

"No, he didn't scrub in. He was pulled into another surgery, I think."

"Okay," she whispered. "I- I will go look for him."

I watched her retreating form with a sigh.

I was exhausted. All I wanted at this point was to go to Bella, hold her tight in my arms and breathe in her warm, sweet scent. She would run her fingers through my hair and comfort me like nothing else could. I needed to feel her, warm and soft and alive in my arms.

Instead, here I was… watching Maria seek Jasper for comfort, since he obviously hadn't spoken to her about Alice yet. Next, I had to go and inform my patient's husband about the fact that his wife may or may not get a chance to see or hold their newborn daughter.

The utter bleakness of the day made me wish I had never gotten out of the bed this morning.

Once I had delivered the bad news and watched Mr. Brooks break down into gut-wrenching sobs at his wife's bed side, I headed toward the nurses' station, wondering why I'd been paged.

Charlie Swan was there, waiting for me, and in the blink of an eye, the fatigue seeped out of my mind as adrenaline kicked in when I saw the expression he wore. It was same serious, determined one I'd seen so many times on his daughter's face.

"Can I talk to you for a few minutes?" he asked.

I asked the nurse and she indicated that she had nothing else for me. So, I nodded at Charlie and followed him as he led me out of the building and to a nearby bench.

As a full minute passed in loaded silence, I wondered if he was expecting me to say something. I had nothing more to add to my speech from last night, but I wracked my mind nonetheless.

"Bad day?" he guessed.

"You could say that. My patient… I don't know if she's going to make it."

"I- I'm sorry," he said. "To disturb you at work. I didn't realize that you were so busy today. The nurse told me about the unfortunate accident."

"Were you waiting for long? I'm sorry. I just got out of the OR."

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it. I got the address from your father, actually. I needed to speak to you before leaving."

"Leaving?" I parroted blankly.

"I'm heading back to Forks this evening. I have work to do at the station. I left in a hurry and my state of mind was… well, you know how it was. I realize that I might have been a little impulsive in coming here."

The appropriate response to that admission escaped me, so I opted to say nothing. Charlie wasn't looking for an answer anyway.

"Bella was… quite vehement in defending you last night."

Another moment of suffocating silence followed.

He huffed. "Look, what I wanted to say is that when Jacob told me about you, all I could picture was a middle-aged guy playing with my daughter's innocent feelings for nefarious reasons and I came as soon as I could to make her realize that. Instead, I find you proclaiming your undying love for her. I have to admit, it threw me for a loop. I couldn't sleep and kept thinking about what you said all night."

The memory of Bella's nightly visit came unbidden to my mind.

If Charlie was awake, did he hear something?

But if he wasn't bringing it up, then I certainly wasn't going to.

He turned to face me. "She has told you about her Nana and Renee. That means you know Renee took her away from me and I let her, thinking that a little girl would be better off with her mother. I never thought Renee would basically pawn her off to Marie. Ever since I learned of that, I have never stopped feeling guilty for my inaction in the matter." He paused, inhaling deeply and breathing it out in a gush. "When Bella came to live with me after Marie's death, she was a teenager. I didn't know much about teenage girls, but I did know that they rarely talk to their fathers about their feelings. She had just lost the most important person in her life and there was nothing I could do to ease her pain. I have never felt more helpless. Bella, though… she's a strong one. She bounced right back, found her passion, her goal and focused all her energy into it.

"Edward, your parents are kind people and I know they have raised you to be a good man. Bella… has chosen to be with you, and because I love my daughter, I am going to try my best to accept that. You were right last night; she is smart and mature enough to understand what she wants in life, and I must learn to respect that."

"Chief Swan, I…" I trailed off.

"No matter how old she is, she will always be my little girl and I will always barge in wherever and whenever the hell I need to in order to protect her." He held my gaze steadily. "I will never stop feeling like I failed her once, when I let her go so easily with Renee. That makes me even more determined to shield her from any and every bit of sadness I can. If I hear about you causing her an ounce of hurt, I will find you from the darkest corners of the earth and make you pay. I'm not loosening up about you; in fact, I'll be watching you even more closely now. Do you understand me?"

I bit back a smile, lest he thought I wasn't taking his warning seriously. "Perfectly, Sir. Bella's happiness is the most important thing to me."

He regarded me intently and I met his stare with an unwavering one of my own. Finally, he nodded. "Good. Then we have an understanding. One more thing. I will hold you to what you said last night about not rushing her in anything. You will give her time and space and let her make her own decisions, without any influence from your side."

His moustache twitched as his mouth flattened into an uncompromising line. I nodded solemnly. "You have my word."

"And I –uh, I guess you can call me Charlie."

And that was that.

Once he had left, after an awkward as hell goodbye, I shot off a text to Bella about her father's rather begrudging sanction of our relationship. She replied with a series of smiling and dancing emoticons and I laughed. It felt good, especially after the difficult day I had had.

My shift was not over yet, so I made my way back inside and rest of the day passed while I checked up on the non-emergent cases. Most of them just needed a quick neuro exam and the confirmation that everything was fine. I had to go in for another craniotomy, but thankfully, it was an easy procedure and I didn't have to face the possibility of losing another patient today. I checked in on Hannah and her baby, too. There was no change in Hannah's condition, but her baby girl seemed to be doing fine. She was still in an incubator, but the pediatricians were happy with her vitals so far. I prayed that her husband would get some little solace in that. Nothing could possibly bring any measure of relief to him on this day, other than their daughter.

Before leaving, I checked in on my concussion patient and assured his wife that he was doing fine. It was a relief to finally deliver good news to someone's family.

When I reached home, I was greeted by Bella's grinning face. Her smile fell quickly, though, when she saw my haggard appearance.

"What's wrong?" she asked, as I removed my coat and threw down my bag carelessly onto the floor.

She sat beside me on the couch and took my hand. My parents walked out of the kitchen and expressed their concern when they saw my defeated posture.

I didn't want to dampen everyone's spirits, but they persisted, so, eventually, I came out with the story. Without divulging any specifics, I told them as succinctly as possible and with as much information as I was permitted to give.

My father's face filled with understanding immediately, and he clasped my shoulder in silent support. There was nothing to say; it had been an impossible situation. Mom tried to hide the tears that fell from her eyes, but I caught the movement. She gave me a few encouraging words and a watery smile.

When Dad's phone rang, he went inside the bedroom to answer it. Mom headed into the kitchen, muttering something about dinner, but I knew that she needed to distract herself to regain her composure. I was granted a moment alone with Bella.

My hand was clasped tightly in both of hers, as she sat silently beside me.

"Charlie?" I asked.

"I dropped him off at the airport an hour ago."

"Oh."

"Your Mom asked me to stay for dinner when I came to pick up Charlie's stuff. If you'd rather stay alone tonight, Edward, I completely understand," she said softly, nothing but concern and kindness in her voice.

"On the contrary, I would beg you if I have to, to stay with me tonight," I whispered.

She cupped my face lovingly. "Are you sure?"

I placed my hands on hers, twining our fingers together. "Yes, please. When I had to deliver the devastating news to that man, I-" I swallowed hard to dislodge the lump in my throat. "All I could think was how much I wanted to have you before my eyes so that I could see you and touch you. I must have delivered bad news to the patients' families a hundred times, Bella, and yet, the crippling feeling never goes away. It's like, this weight that settles in your chest and threatens to crush you," I whispered. "You can't help but doubt yourself, even if it's just for a moment. Whether or not you did everything possible to try to save his or her life.

"Doctors, who are far more experienced than me, say that it would never go away, but one day, the feeling would lessen to the point where you can push it to a recess of your mind, and move on to save the next life. I don't know when it would happen for me. All I know is that I am certainly not there yet."

She leaned in and placed a soft, slow, lingering kiss on my forehead. "Nana used to tell me that this anger and sorrow over the lives lost is what makes you human and it's what keeps you going in this profession. The day you stop caring about your patients… that's the day you will have lost the purpose that nudged you into medicine in the first place. You're a great person and a great doctor, Edward. I know I had no hand in making you that, but I'm so proud of you and I always will be. I have no doubt that you did everything in your power for your patient."

"I wish I could have met her… your Nana."

She gave me a tiny, but genuine smile. "I wish that, too. I'd like to believe that she's watching over us and blessing our relationship. She would have loved you, you know. I'm sure of it."

I kissed her, pouring all my gratitude and love into it. I hoped that she could feel it.

"Mmm," she sighed when we broke apart, too soon for my liking, but we could hear the sounds of my mother working in the kitchen.

I took a deep breath and the aroma floating in the air hit my senses for the first time. "Is that-?"

"Chicken Parmigiana? Yes, it is," Bella said with a grin. "Sources tell me that you love it and that this is what Esme had to bribe you with for ending your Donald Duck impression."

I shrugged, not embarrassed in the least. "What can I say? I love it."

"Well, then you go freshen up, get your Dad and I'll set up the table. Esme mentioned that the food was just about done."

"Sounds good."

With a peck on my cheek, she jumped up to her feet and I headed into my room.

When I returned, I saw that my Dad had already taken his place at the table. Mom and Bella brought out the mouth-watering dishes, and sat down beside him.

I watched with a smile as Mom reached out to smack Dad's hand away from the bowl, telling him to wait for me. Bella stifled a giggle, and Mom joked with her, saying something while pointing toward Dad and shaking her head.

As I padded forward, their eyes fell on me. Mom waved me over with an indulgent smile. "Come quickly, dear. Your Dad here is having a tough time waiting to sample the dishes."

Bella winked as I settled down in my chair and a strange sense of peace and satisfaction washed over me.

The sight of the people I loved the most in the world sitting together, interacting playfully and comfortably with each other tugged at my heart.

Bella passed me a bowl, prodding me out of my musing as she looked closely at my face.

"Is everything okay?" she whispered.

I smiled at her and nodded. Calmly. Reassuringly. Happily.

Everything was absolutely perfect.

A/N: Have you voted for Curveball in the poll over at Twifanfictionrecs dot com? No? C'mon guys, please? *pouts*

Until next time :)