Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or plotlines of the Twilight Saga and the following is a form of fiction based on the brilliance of Stephanie Meyer's work.
Author: ToryD
Beta: Splendorous Night Unfurled
Title: A Forbidden Forever
Chapter Eight – (This chapter has not been proof read yet so please forgive the errors. SNU please email me an let me know that you're okay.)
Esme paused at the opened doorway to the room that held a peacefully sleeping Bella with Edward's unmoving frame standing guard at her side, his intense gaze focused solely on Bella's still face.
"She hasn't moved all night," Edward answered Esme's unspoken question as he read her thoughts.
Smiling softly Esme crossed the room to stand just behind her son. "And you Edward?" she asked with a mother's concern flavoring her words as she reached out to push back a stand of bronze hair that had fallen out of place on his forehead.
"I'm fine," he answered with an abruptness that stood in sharp contrast to his words.
Esme closed her eyes briefly as she fought against the wave of pity that threatened to engulf her so that Edward would not be able to read her thoughts. "Carlisle mentioned that you might need me this morning," she said as she crossed to pull a chair from the corner of the room to Bella's bedside.
Without taking his eyes from Bella, Edward smiled gratefully at his mother; knowing that her serene presence would be able to help Bella through the difficult hours ahead.
"Edward?" Esme called to him with a slight frown marring her pale features. 'How are you doing in your struggle with your thirst?' she thought the inquiry in case Bella, even in her sleeping state could somehow hear their conversation.
Reaching out Edward stroked Bella's smooth cheek with a slightly unsteady hand. "I won't say it's not hard," he began with a short mocking laugh directed at himself. "But she is more important to me than anything else in the world, so her needs will always come first," he confessed so softly that the words were almost inaudible to Esme even with her enhanced vampire hearing.
'I've brought some food and Alice will be here shortly with some clothes and other human essentials that Bella will need,' Esme once again relayed to Edward via her thoughts.
"Thanks Esme," Edward broke his unblinking stare from Bella to turn his warm appreciative gaze towards his mother.
"She should be waking soon if Carlisle has it correct. I'll go and start her breakfast," Esme announced as she rose gracefully from the chair and leaned over to kiss Edward's cold cheek.
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Bella sighed contently as she embraced her dream where Edward's cool hand was caressing her cheek so tenderly. In her semi-wakeful state she smiled, basking in absolute awe of the unparalleled authenticity of the dream for she could swear that she did feel a cool hand upon her cheeks. Opening her eyes she instantly felt an odd sense of confusion fill her as she looked about an elegantly decorated room that she had never seen before. A frown began to form between her brows as she felt an alarming uncertainty wash over her as she became more aware of her unfamiliar surroundings.
"Bella," Edward called to her softly as he tried to help her gauge her surroundings.
Bella looked towards Edward's velvet voice with a panicked look upon her soft features. "Edward!" she cried out as she sat bolt upright in the soft bed. "What…where am I?" her stuttered question was delivered with such a look of fear that Edward had to fight his intense need to pull her protectively in his arms.
"You're in my home," Edward answered in a calm soothing tone as he watched her reaction with an intenseness that attested to his mounting concern.
Bella tore her gaze away from his worried features to her tightly clenched hands that were beginning to show small droplets of blood from the crescent shaped punctures her nail were unknowingly inflicting. Memories of the previous night began to assail her with a ruthless unrelenting speed. "Oh God!" she whispered with a soul wrenching anguish seeping into her tortured brown eyes.
"Bella," Edward whispered hoarsely, his hands immediately reaching out to unclench her fists while his throat began to burn with an almost unbearable thirst at the intoxicating scent her blood held for him.
At his touch, Bella recoiled with an almost animalistic cry of pain as she sprung from the bed to race towards the opposite side of the beautifully decorated room. Shaking her head slowly from side to side she began to sob as she pushed herself tightly into the corner to slowly slide down the wall to her knees, never once letting her weary frightened eyes break from Edward's frozen form.
Edward felt as if his world had just shattered into a million pieces as he watched the undeniable terror that Bella's gaze held for him; a terror not from him as the vile blood lusting creature that fate had decreed upon him, but terror of him as a man; a man who in her eyes represented a threat far worse than that of a mere vampire. Unable to endure the look of Bella's unmitigated fear, he softly called to Esme knowing that only she could be of any assistance to Bella now.
Esme came rushing into the room and came to an abrupt stop as she saw Edward with a such look of raw agony gracing his face that she gasped out loud. "Edward?" she asked as she began to go to him.
"Please," he said in such a pain filled voice that Esme once again froze. "Help Bella," he finished as he turned his face away and sank down heavily onto the bed as if his legs could no longer sustain him.
Esme watched in horror as her son struggled with some unbearable inner pain that she couldn't begin to fathom. Turning she began her search the room for Bella so that she could hopefully remove the look of agony from Edwards eyes. As her gaze finally settled on Bella's slowly rocking form, she stumbled back a step as she tried to grasp the magnitude of the intense pain emanating from the tortured young woman's huddled form. "Bella," she called softly as she began to slowly approach. "It's Esme dear."
Bella continued to rock back and forth her terrified eyes still locked on Edward's now slumping frame upon the bed, the blue cotton shirt that Edward had lent for her use beginning to stain from the blood seeping from her injured palms.
At the scent of Bella's fresh human blood Esme stiffened her resolved before she leaned down to the left of Bella as she continued to talk to her softly. "Bella, you do remember me don't you?" Esme asked as she began to block Edward's view from Bella's line of sight.
Bella began to frown in confusion at the woman who was kneeling before her. "Esme?" she asked in a bewildered tone.
Smiling encouragingly, Esme nodded. "Yes, we met last night, do you remember?"
Bella looked down at the floor as she appeared to be pulling internally for the memories of the prior night. As a visible fog lifted a renewed look of horror began to fill Bella's eyes. "The ball," she whispered as she drew in a ragged breath.
Nodding her head in acquiescence, Esme reached out to place a comforting hand upon Bella' arm that was currently tightly wrapped around her knees. "Yes, we met at the ball."
"Edward," Bella whispered so achingly that Edward flinched as he leapt to his feet.
Esme watched as Bella face took on a mask like quality as she stood and began to look frantically around the room.
"I have to go," Bella announced with a slightly stilted tone. "Where are my clothes?"
Edward watched as a Bella began to look quickly around the room, her manner appearing uncommonly stiff. "Bella, I think you should stay just a while longer," he said very carefully so not to alarm her in any way.
"No, no," Bella quickly denied, her tone abnormally sharply as she shook her head violently, her waist length tangled hair falling forward to conceal her pale face from view.
Edward looked at Esme who still stood silent as she watched with a look of pity in her golden gaze.
"Bella," Esme said as she smiled warmly. "I've got breakfast just about ready, so why don't you get dressed and join us in the dining room in about fifteen minutes?"
"But I'm so late," Bella said in a strange voice that seemed to be coming from some automatic plane.
"Late for what dear?" Esme asked as she crossed to Bella's side to gently push her hair behind her shoulders.
A bewildered look began to unfold on Bella's features as she stared at Esme. "It's Sunday," she said in a childlike way.
"Sunday?" Esme asked with an encouraging smile.
Nodding her head Bella looked around the room with a slow appraising study as if she were just becoming familiar with her surroundings. "I visit Jacob on Sundays," she said in a far away voice. "What time is it? I can't be late."
Edward tensed at the name of the man who was now serving a life sentence for the murder of the man who had assaulted Bella. Edward exchanged a concerned look with Esme as they both struggled with how to handle Bella's extremely fragile mental state.
"Edward, I believe that Carlisle wanted you to call him this morning; so while you're taking care of that I'll help Bella get dressed," Esme suggested with a purposeful tone to her beautiful voice. 'Go and call Carlisle Edward, I think we are going to need him now.' She sent her thoughts while she guided a confused Bella towards the bathroom.
Edward watched with a heavy weight taking an unrelenting hold within his chest as his mother and Bella disappeared from his anguished unblinking gaze. Closing his eyes, he swayed slightly under the extreme strain of the torment that radiated throughout the room.
'Edward!' Alice's alarmed thought echoed within his head as his mind pulled up a picture of her in her frantic sprint towards the front door of his home. With a deep sigh he turned to walk out of the room to meet his sister.
Alice bounded through the door with a worried frown marring her normally exuberant features. "Edward," she sighed softly as she saw the desolate look on her brother's face. "She's going to be alright you know."
Edward looked at his beautiful little sister and saw that her eyes did hold a solid truth in their amber depths. "You didn't see her," Edward whispered in a dejected tone that caused Alice to wince on his behalf.
"You're wrong Edward," Alice announced confidently. "I do see her."
Edward instantly saw Alice's vision of a smiling contented Bella, a Bella that held no resemblance to the woman who had stared so fearful at him only a few minutes ago. "But," he began only to be stopped my Alice's firm invading visions. Edward felt his breath hitch in his throat as he saw Bella smiling at him in some future time, her face held so much joy and love as she gaze at him. A feeling of such vast relief filled him as he reached out to pull Alice into his embrace. "Thank you," he whispered gratefully into her ear.
Smiling into his chest, Alice returned her brother's hug, knowing that she had succeeded in bring him some much needed solace.
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"I'm going to go over to Edward's to help Esme with Bella," Carlisle imparted as he gathered up his car keys.
Rosalie's beautiful face took on a menacing look. "Why is it that the whole world has to stop for Edward's girlfriend?" she asked with such an undisguised malice that even her besotted Emmett turned to frown at her with disapproval.
Carlisle, who had struggle last night not to react to Rosalie's unkind attitude towards Bella, finally snapped. "What is the matter with you?" he asked with a rare disgust tainting his tone.
"What's the matter with me?" Rosalie asked with an affronted glare in her father's direction.
"Yes Rosalie, I am asking just what in hell is a matter with you!" Carlisle roared back, his patience for his beautiful daughter's behavior at last at an end.
Rosalie stalked over to stand directly in front of her father with a venomous look in her nearly black eyes. "I'll tell you what's the matter," she shot back with a blazing tone. "I'm sick of everyone in this family fawning over some stupid human! I mean who is she anyway? Some little nobody from the wrong side of town who sees Edward as her golden ticket. Why any of you can't see that she is only using Edward is beyond me. "
"Rosalie!" Emmett's shocked tone didn't serve to phase Rosalie one iota from her firm stance.
Carlisle shook his head in disgust as he gazed down at his unfeeling daughter. "I don't have time for this now," he said with a coldness that sent a decisive chill through Rosalie's tense frame. "But when I return this evening, be ready to discuss your words today Rosalie, for I can guarantee that this discussion is far from over." With that said he turned on his heel and vanished through the door unaware of his daughter's pained expression.
Emmett walked silently to his wife's side. "Rosie," he asked as he reached out to gently tilt her chin so he could look into her sad eyes. "Why do you dislike Bella so much?"
Rosalie leaned her head against Emmett's strong wide shoulder, not wanting him to see the pain that was so clearly evident on her beautiful face. A pain that she had laid buried for so many lonely years; years that had her longing endlessly for the one person in this world that she loved more than herself. The one person who now had given his heart to some undeserving human.
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"Where is she," Carlisle asked as he placed his medical bag upon the counter of Edward's normally unused modern kitchen.
"Esme has taken her for a walk in the garden," Alice supplied as she frowned at the picture in the cookbook that in no way resembled the blackened chicken she had just pulled from the oven.
"Edward?" Carlisle asked as he took a seat next to Edwards on the comfortable beige leather sofa.
"They been out there a while now," Edward answered with concern emphasizing his every word.
Carlisle sighed deeply. "Let's hope Esme can get her to talk."
"Are you sure that talking is what she needs?" Edward asked with an air of anxiousness as he leapt to his feet to cross to the bank of windows that overlooked his garden in hopes of catching a glimpse of Bella.
"It's going to be alright Edward," Alice moaned in frustration as she had for the past two hours.
"Have you seen this Alice?" Carlisle asked as he stood to walk to her side.
"Yes, I have, and what's more is that Edwards has seen it too," she complained as she shot her brother a telling glare.
"Edward?" Carlisle called to his son.
"The vision Alice was referring to is at some future time, not now," Edward's voice trailed off as if he went off into another place.
"Edward!" Alice reprimanded him sharply.
Growling in frustration Edward walked back to the leather sofa and sank down heavily.
Carlisle sent Alice a silent questioning look.
"He promised Esme that he wouldn't read her mind while she was talking with Bella," Alice explained softly.
Carlisle saw that Edward was struggling with the promise he had made. "She's right Edward," he said with a slightly sympathetic tone. "Bella will probably need to talk about some very difficult things and it is only right that she be the one to decide if she wants you to know about her past. For Bella Edward," Carlisle added as he watched the play of emotions across his son's tortured face.
Knowing that Carlisle was right as always Edward nodded his head slightly as he resigned himself to the endless waiting.
"I don't think I did this quite right," Alice said out loud as she poked at the charred chicken with a long fork.
Carlisle hid his smile as he looked at the culinary disaster that Alice had before her. "No, I don't think that you should serve that to Bella," he advised.
"But I need to feed her something when she comes back," Alice said with an almost whining tone that served to scrap across Edward's last nerve.
"Why don't you just make one of the premade dinner's that Esme brought with her?" Edward suggested knowing that if he wanted Bella to remain well he would need to steer her clear of his sister's cooking attempts.
"Oh, that's a good idea," Alice said as she opened the stainless steel door to Edward's commercial grade refrigerator. "Wow, look at this," she whispered in awe.
"What?" Edward asked with a very inpatient look about his perfect face.
"It's a whole meal for one person in a box," she explained as she held up a package that was wrapped in clear plastic wrap. "I wish they had this when I was a human," she added more to herself than to the other two vampires in the room.
Edward almost smiled at the jubilant expression on his favorite sister's face. "Please read the instruction carefully this time," he advised as he leaned back against the back of the soft leather sofa, his mind already on the woman who was at that very moment beginning for the first time to let go of her pain filled past.
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A/N Oh that Rosalie is something! Okay next chapter really will be Bella and Esme's talk. Thanks so much for the reviews; I really appreciate them more that you can know.