Chapter eleven
The snow had settled in Boston by the middle of December. It was different from sunny San Francisco and California, which had been hot and nice, but it felt good to be back, to be home where she felt that she belonged.
A large wool coat shielded her body from the cold and the snow that was falling, but she knew it wouldn't protect her from what was to come.
She dreaded entering the building where everyone would ask her how she was doing after clearing out Charlie's house. Packing up all his stuff, deciding what to keep and what to donate, it hadn't been as hard as Bella had expected it to be. The house had been cleared in three days, all the boxes marked and stacked in the living room, leaving more than enough room for her other reason to go to San Francisco.
Bella had a secret she wasn't about to share with anyone. She had known for a few weeks, from the moment she asked to go to San Francisco, that she was pregnant. It was easy to figure out who the dad was as she had only been with one man in the past six months, but Bella knew she wasn't ready for anything like that, to become a mom.
With a doctor in San Francisco, Bella had had an appointment to have an abortion but when she had turned up, changed into the terrible hospital johnny, Bella had changed her mind and quickly left.
She knew she had to tell Edward but she had no idea how and she lacked the courage to do so.
At least she had a plan. Helen had refused to have anything to do with clearing Charlie's house as she refused to acknowledge the fact that he had been happy in sunny California. The house now belonged to Bella and she was waiting for the sale of it to go through.
A small family of three had laid their eyes on it long ago, they had admitted, and though they were sadden by the fact that Bella had lost her dad, they were more than happy to buy the house.
With the money the house would bring in, Bella wanted to buy a place larger than her loft, a place for her and the little one she was expecting in eight months' time. it was just her luck that the place she found perfect, was in the same building as where Edward lived, even the same floor as him, making him her closest neighbor.
The contract had been drawn and Bella had signed it, now she was just waiting for the money to go through.
"Let's just get through the weeks until Christmas," Bella told herself with a hand resting on her stomach. "Let Christmas pass and then I'll find a way to tell him."
"Bella!" at the sound of someone calling her name, Bella jumped slightly and almost slipped on the icy ground. "Easy there."
She knew it was Edward the second his laid his hands upon her and her body filled with longing and need, but most of all, lust that no one could satisfy but him.
"Edward," she smiled at him when she was sure that she wasn't going to fall on her ass.
"We didn't expect you back until next week, but we're glad that you're here: we need everyone we can spare for the current case."
"Oh right, the one for the fifteenth of December," a picture of her calendar, lying safely in her desk with her notebook, locked away, came to her mind. "Clearing Charlie's house didn't take long as he didn't have as much as I believed for him to have. Instead of staying back there, waiting for the house to sell, I thought you would be needed me more here."
"I will always need you, the best assistant I've ever had, even better than Kate."
"I'm only better than her because I'm not married or in a relationship," Bella pointed out as they entered the building together, the door attendant welcoming Bella back.
"That too, but you've managed to keep everything in perfect order and you memorize things so you don't have to look it up all the time: a quality I praise highly."
"And something Kate wasn't able to do?"
"I don't know, but if she was, she didn't take her time to do so."
"I've always felt the need to feel somewhat organized. Everyone is different, so Kate might not have felt the same need as I."
"Probably," Edward agreed as they entered the same elevator and took it together up to the right floor. "Well, I have a meeting with one of our lawyers from San Francisco, so I will see you later."
Bella smiled politely and watched him leave before turning to the ladies room and locking herself inside before turning to the toilet and barfing her breakfast into it. How she was going to be able to hide the fact that she was pregnant from everyone until over Christmas, Bella didn't know, but she was going to do her best at least.
It turned out that hiding her sickness was easier than she had believed it to be. With an important case going to court in matter of days, everyone on the floor busy making sure that everything was written down, sorted and organized, that Edward had everything he would need to win the case. No one noticed that she spent twenty minutes every morning in the lady's room, or that she didn't drink her coffee anymore.
However, just as the case was over, won by Edward of course, everything calmed down and everyone went into holiday modus, ready for a well-deserved vacation.
"Got a bug or something?" Bella looked up from her desk, popping a mint into her mouth just as Edward appeared at her desk.
She had just returned after spending a dreadfully long forty-five minutes in the toilet, barfing up her stomach and spleen. It was the last day before everyone was off for the Christmas and the smell of coffee, gingerbread and eggnog filled the whole floor
"Maybe," Bella answered him vaguely. "Been feeling a little off since I got back from San Francisco but it's probably nothing and will pass soon." She hoped that would become one of those pregnant women who had a few bad weeks filled with morning sickness, then having a perfectly comfortable eight months.
"If you don't get better soon, you should see a doctor: you've been flying between your desk and the bathroom since you got back." Bella cursed inwardly, so sure that no one had noticed her frequent trips to the bathroom on their floor.
"I'm feeling better already," Bella assured him with a smile.
"Good to hear, don't want the holidays to be spent in bed or over the toilet." He turned to leave but stopped at his office door. "By the way, welcome to the building," he threw over his shoulder with a smile.
*** C R S ***
Bella spent Christmas basically alone in an almost empty apartment. The closest thing Bella had to company on Christmas Eve was when she Skyped with Rose, then with Alice, who had gotten married in Taiwan, to guy named Jasper Whitlock. She seemed to be ecstatic about her marriage and Bella was genuinely happy for her friend.
Even though she didn't have much to fill her new home with, Bella had made sure to make it feel like Christmas as she switched between sorting through her things and running between the bathroom.
The morning sickness had started to stretch from the moment she woke up to the moment she fell asleep. She was glad that it was the holidays as it made it ten times easier to hide her pregnancy when she was alone.
In the few days she had been in her new home, Edward had helped her carry everything up and into the apartment, helped her put together a new bookcase they could actually house all of her books, but other than that, she had barely seen him.
Her heart ached every time she heard him leave or come, every time she had seen him smile since that night they had shared in his apartment. it all had only gotten worse after the night in Forks, when Bella learned for sure that she was in love with Edward, no matter how hard she wanted to fight as he didn't share the same feelings for her.
On top of it all, not only did her heart ache for him but her body as well. She found herself rubbing her thighs together to create some kind of friction when she was watching TV, sorting through her books or going through her clothes. As a pregnant woman, no matter how early it was into the pregnancy, she was fucking horny all the time and she was grasping the last straw.
Christmas morning, Bella woke up to a fresh layer of snow covering the city, the fresh powder still falling hours later. Everything was quiet, not a soul out on the streets and for some reason, Bella felt the need to take a walk in the Christmas card presented to her.
Dressed in her best winter shoes, a warm and cozy jacket, scarf, a woolen cap and mittens, Bella locked her door just as Edward, equally dressed, stepped out of his apartment.
"Merry Christmas," Bella created him, feeling herself becoming wet just by the sight of him.
"And merry Christmas to you too," Edward smiled, locking his door. "Going somewhere?"
"Just for a walk. It's too beautiful outside to just sit inside and watch every holiday related movie I know, eat popcorn and make dinner. How about you?"
"The same. Felt like a walk before a long dinner and celebration with my family."
"Sounds nice," Bella murmured, sudden sorrow for Charlie settling in her heart.
"Let's take a walk together," before Bella could answer him, Edward took her hand and led her to the elevator, never letting go of her hand.
They walked together for hours, just walking around on the quiet streets, to the park, where Bella seized the opportunity to make a rather fluffy snowball and throw it at Edward when he wasn't watching.
"I guess Christmas this year can't be easy," Edward said when they started on their way back home. "There can't be much different when it comes to your sister, I guess, as unfriendly she is, but without Charlieā¦" he trailed off but Bella knew.
"When I was little, Charlie and Renee used to find the biggest tree that could fit into our house. Our last Christmas together, before Renee died, they went overboard: we barely had enough room for the dining table," Bella laughed and Edward joined.
"We loved it, the smell of pine as we ate, finding pine needles in our food, everywhere in the house, all expect Helen. She was too grown up to live like that, she claimed, but Renee refused to let her bad mood ruin our festivities, so she went out, found another tree, put it up in her room and decorated: Helen was pissed for weeks after Christmas, finding pine needles in her clothes and in her bed."
"Your mom sounds like a woman worth meeting," Edward murmured as they reached their building.
"Both she and Charlie was extraordinary, always making fun of serious subjects, even when they took them very serious. Look at Charlie and the cancer. From day one, he told me that he wasn't going to die from cancer, that there would have to be something stronger to bring him six feet under. He was only joking but in the end, it was a blood cloth who did it all, not the cancer."
"I believe, mostly because mom and dad told me, that if it hadn't been for the blood cloth, Charlie would still be alive four years from now, even cancer free. They really believed in the new treatment."
"Your parents are amazing," Bella told Edward as they reached their floor.
"You are amazing," Edward said softly, pushing Bella gently up against his door, kissing her greedily.
Bella took everything he could give her, savoring the taste of his lips, the feeling of them upon hers, the feeling of his body pressed against her and the smell of his skin.
It didn't take long before Bella found herself stumbling into his apartment, pulling the woolen cap from his head, removing his scarf and burying her fingers in his hair.
Clothes went in every direction and Bella didn't even know if they had made it up to his bedroom or not before they were both naked.
Everything disappeared when he entered her and Bella was sure that she was about come just from that. And she did. Bella clung to Edward as the orgasm rocked through her, whimpering as the release she had been longing for, lusting for, washed over her.
Edward didn't question it but they kept going and it didn't take long before Bella's second orgasm washed over her, taking Edward with her in the fall.
"That was interesting," Edward said, breaking the silence long after they had broken apart.
"Yeah," Bella agreed. For a second, she thought about coming clean, about everything: her feelings, the baby and her plan to have an abortion but deciding against it. Instead, she kept her mouth shut and rested her head on his chest.
"If I had known you needed it that bad, just like me, I would have taken you when you got back from San Francisco."
"Without the build-up, it wouldn't have been that good," Bella laughed as Edward pulled a blanket from the back of the couch and covering them with it, making sure that most of it covered Bella.
"I have to ask but have your breasts gotten bigger?" Edward asked and Bella almost laughed again.
"I've switched the brand of my pills. Sometimes, the body changes even the switching pills," Bella lied easily, too easily.
"Well, I'm not complaining," Edward shrugged, running a hand over a slightly swollen nipple, making Bella's body react to his touch.
"Neither am I," a smirk spread across Bella's lips as she pushed herself up and straddled him.
She rode them both into oblivion and when her own orgasm subsided, Bela collapsed on top of his chest. When she woke up again hours later, it was dark outside and she was still lying on Edward's chest, the blanket pulled over her and Edward's arms wrapped around her back.
AN: sorry for the long wait but between working and sleeping, I haven't had much time but I'm making it now. Is Bella too much of a push-over again?
