Chapter 11

There was an ominous feeling in the air, like something was going to happen. Something bad. She got out of the car and rushed towards the elevator and pressed the button for nineteenth floor. But before the elevator door could close someone put a feet between them and they slid open.

The moment she looked at the face of the new entrant to the elevator, her mouth went dry. She could somehow feel the tension thicken the air, so much that you could cut it into slices.

"I need to know why?" he demanded.

"I'm sorry I don't know what you're talking about." She shook her head with frustration.

"You know what."

"I don't have time for all this." She waved her watch in front of him. "Please, someone up there needs me right now."

And I need you, too. "I need you to answer me," he said.

"I don't know anything –" she was extremely defensive.

"You haven't heard the question, love," he said, his voice strangely grave and sexy at the same time. She felt her body react the same way it had all those years ago. A sharp chill went up her spine, almost numbing her brain in the most crippling of ways, she could no longer think. She simply gaped at his face.

"Please, Bella, we should talk," he softened. She managed a nod, if she had to protect herself and not lose her daughter she needed to be in a better position and not so vulnerable to Edward and his charms and whatever effect he just had on her. She didn't want to be 21 and in love again. The nod, seemed to calm him, his posture eased, he moved back, "let's sit somewhere and talk."

It was not an offer, she complied.

"Can I at least attend my patient first?"

"Yes, sure."

An hour and ten minutes later they were sitting in the tiny coffee shop, one block away from the hospital. A quaint little place, with a few customers, some working on their laptops. Three yards away there was a couple bickering over their wedding guest list.

"So, what is it?" Bella finally broke the silence that had persisted since the barista took their orders, one chai latte and one black coffee, no sugar.

He had pictured this in his a lot of times over the last few days, but now that he was down to it, he didn't know what to say anymore. Every opening line that he'd planned seemed to fail him, or too rude. So what if she had taken off? He felt betrayed but, he hadn't tried looking for her much either, he'd given up after a while, despite the fact that his PI had tracked down Bella and the baby in her humble studio apartment in New York, he hadn't tried to contact her. He had no right to ask any questions. He didn't deserve the answers.

"How've you been?"

"I'm – I – I've been good, fine, I mean good." She wondered if she should let her guards down or not, the question she'd been expecting did not come.

"Yeah, you look good. You've not changed a bit," he smiled at her. Scolding himself for not asking, and wanting to ask her about his child at the same time.

"Neither have you," it was like one of those awkward meeting of ex-lovers after a decade, straight out of some Hollywood movie. General courtesies and pleasantries, no courage to stop beating around the bush and just say what they've been wanting.

To save herself the trouble of having to say the next sentence, Bella picked up her cup of chai latte and took a sip, too hot¸ she winced at the fact that she had burnt the tip of her tongue. That's what happens to liars, her mother used to say. She simply pretended to take the next sip, just so she didn't have to talk.

"So, I wanted to ask you, - I mean, the last time I saw you – Bella, don't be offended, please, but I really want to know – about – our – baby."

Bella looked up from her cup to see Edward's face, filled with intense impatience and something else, like someone who'd been deprived of everything in his life – he looked stricken and pale, he seemed ten years older than his twenty eight.

Edward

"I cannot tell her right now, I can't tell her something like this. At least not now. I guess we should wait until the delivery. I'm not sure how she'd take it. Plus, I'm not sure about it myself, if I'm ready to take such a big step or not." He talked too fast, mostly out of excitement than nervousness.

"Calm the hell down, bro," Emmett said. "You're proposing and not going to join the Army."

"It pretty much feels the same, you know, I don't want her to feel as if I'm doing this out of obligation."

"Aren't you?"

"No. I want to bring the child into a proper family, I want to be responsible for them both. It's out of love and not the need to make it more acceptable socially."

It's been too long, but this time, I promise that I'll finish this story.

XO