Disclaimer: All characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. I own the plot.

A very special thanks to Verucasin, my lovely beta. Remember to check out her stories: Mafia Princess and Isabella Swan.

AN:

This chapter has been kicking my ass and giving me a fucking headache; I have written, rewritten, dissected and deleted some parts several times. I hope it is the best it can be now.

Edward had broken through to Bella's pain, but what is he hiding underneath all the hunky eye candy that he is?

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Chapter Seven

"Ah man...I must have fallen asleep." Edward's voice rang out thick and disorientated. He stretched his curled up legs that had to be sore from lying crumbled all night in my hammock. His beautiful eyes were puffy as he rubbed them with the heel of his palms. I studied all these small wake up rituals with an unhealthy attention.

"That makes two of us." I chuckled lightly at his obvious surprise.

"How long have you been awake?" He asked while he started to sit up. He ran his hands through his hair, trying to tame it into some semblance of order. No such luck, but it looked oddly styled and totally him, except for the unsettling black color.

"About an hour, maybe less?" I shrugged.

"You should have woken me up... now I'm just the creepy guy who sleeps on your front porch." He stared at me warily for a moment.

"I promise I won't tell anyone." I smiled.

"You're in a good mood." He stretched across the small opening between us and surprisingly tamed a few hairs running astray in the soft breeze.

"I am. Creepy sleeping guys do that do me." I tried keeping the conversation light and avert my focus so I wouldn't lean my cheek into his hand. Things had changed between us. I just wasn't sure Edward was aware of how much it had changed for me.

He got to his feet and took one small step that placed him flush against my hammock. He leaned over me, his sleep affected eyes smoldering. "We blew past the first night together quite smoothly, don't you think?" He flashed a crooked smile and kept his eyes locked on mine. I wasn't sure I found the joke funny, but I was completely taken by that crooked grin. It made him... irresistible. Though the insinuation of sex was clear in his words and I would be lying through my teeth, if I said I hadn't though about his lips or that gorgeous body. But a world of physical contact was a world that was dead to me.

"Yeah, guess this takes care of it." I agreed a little too late.

He made a face and let go of my hammock. "Maybe I should go?" He mouthed, his eyes clouding with sadness. His face shifted endlessly dark and I instantly wanted to erase his troubles.

"No, stay." The words flew out of my mouth with the speed of lightning. It sounded hopelessly desperate, but I was frantic to make him stay with me.

"I'll stay." He spoke slowly, like he tasted my mood. He bent over me again and lightly brushed his fingers down my cheek. "You'll be fine Bella. I promise." His eyes were infinitely loving and soft like green moss. "Just give it some time, I swear." He brushed his fingers down my cheek again and feathered his thumb across my bottom lip. My body reacted slightly and it tingled the tiniest bit in the pit of my stomach.

I lay frozen staring at him. How was it he could peer into my soul with those green stunning eyes? I felt like I was stuck under a microscope, studied and being pulled apart. But the strange thing was I didn't mind it one bit when it was Edward doing all the prodding. But for the life of me, I didn't understand why he insisted on hanging around me and my insufferable mood, my aching pain. In addition there was the inescapable fact that he was so beautiful and I was nothing but an average bland girl with a broken heart. It just didn't make sense to me.

I reached up and tentatively laced my fingers into his hair. I was surprised the texture was so soft and complacent as I curled my fingers into it. "What is your natural hair color?" I murmured under my breath.

He smiled. "An odd reddish brown." He answered softly. I rolled a chunk of it between my thumb and pointer finger, the strands grinding the pads of my fingers. I could see that. I closed my eyes for a second imagining the compliment it would make to his fluent, but fairly pale skin and stunning eyes. It could only be perfect, but oddly familiar somehow.

We decided that it was probably best to change clothes before going to breakfast. We thought it might look suspicious showing up for breakfast in the same clothes we had worn the day before. I was still in my bikini and swim shorts and Edward wore his trunks from swimming.

"Shit, I'm so hungry." Those were his only words as he greeted me with a smile. I was waiting for him at my front porch, after having taken a shower faster than a speeding bullet and thrown my hair into a sloppy ponytail.

"I guess we did skip both lunch and dinner yesterday." I added cheerfully, skipping down the steps.

"Yeah, I guess we did. That's the reason why I'm so famished... I can't remember the last time I was this hungry." He said rubbing his stomach. My mind flickered to a time not so long ago, when I couldn't remember what it felt like to be hungry. We raced quickly to the main building. I noticed my beaten competitors on one of the porches on the back row of bungalows. I was gleeful when they spotted us passing.

The food was good and I concluded I was almost as hungry as Edward, because I ate just about as much as he did. It was quiet while we ate and just the sound of forks scraping plates as we filled our stomachs. Today he didn't order breakfast for me, even though I had the same as yesterday and the day before that. I was a creature of habit as he put it.

"I'm sorry, I wish I was better company." I bit down on my lip, denting into the flesh of my lip hard. I placed the fork back at the side of the plate.

"Please Bella. Please stop worrying about what I think or what kind of company you are. If I didn't want to be here with you I would just leave. Remember that, okay?" He took my hand across the table and laced his fingers into mine. He gazed at me with those blazing green eyes, staring directly into my soul the way only he could. I simply nodded in response, but I felt a thick obstruction in my throat. He was so sincere and warm. He gave me strength to survive. He was becoming someone I refused to be without.

Another day passed where we did just about nothing. It was comfortable being with someone and not having the need to fill the silence with inane chatter. He sketched and I read. When the heat became too unbearable we swam. It was simple and comfortable.

Some say it is the small things that count. If that was so, everything about Edward mattered. It was about all those small things with him. The way he looked at me, the way he was aware of my every need. He seemed to move closer by the hour by freeing a strand of stay hairs from the corner of my mouth or taking my hand when he said I looked sad. It was all those small things that were at the center of our world now. It was, I suspected, his feelings for me seeing the light of day.

But I wasn't sure how I felt about our physical boundaries being broken down. Slowly and steadily we moved closer. I was unsure if I should shy away form his gentle physical approach or if I should embrace it. It felt so good to be comforted by him taking my hand or stroking my cheek, the problem was I was just so unused to it. In general since Jacob had died I had done everything humanly possible to avoid human contact, except from Alice, and on a few occasions Sheryl. But Edward was breaking down all my boundaries and he had a profound way of settling my uneasy panic. It was my fear that faded away a little more every time he was close to me. His entire person radiated an aura of safety. I felt protected for the first time since Jacob. I felt safe with Edward.

Other times there was something underneath his exterior. He had a facade I knew that, just not around me. Not that he was fake, just trained. He was good at it; it was very rehearsed and 'built in' to his every word and move. He was guarded, but it seemed to me like a learned skill, rather than he had been born with it.

Edward's feet were placed on the small coffee table and he kept gazing overtop his sketchpad and our eyes locked repeatedly. I couldn't stop smiling and he did to. I couldn't see his entire face, but the lines around his eyes changed every time our eyes met. I wasn't sure what he was up to behind the large curse sheet of paper, but I didn't like it. It was an uneasy feeling not knowing what the hell was on that paper and in those playful eyes.

A sharp shrill of a cell phone ripped me back to reality. Edward leaned back and snatched it from his pocket and studied the display for a long moment. The small piece of technology reminded me there was an entire world out there we were purposefully ignoring. He sighed deeply and ran his hand through his hair.

The sketch pad landed on the table with a dull thud and Edward stretched out of the chair. He averted his eyes from me and vanished into his hut. Just before the door closed I heard his voice. "Jenks, any news?"

I tried not to listen to his muffled voice, but I couldn't help it. The words were slurred, but his tenor grew louder and more agitated.

I swung my feet over the edge and the rough planks of the porch grinded against my soles. I left my book beside the latest of Edward's drawings. I stared stunned at the woman on the page. She was clear and perfect, her hair soft around her face. Her eyes were large, dark and tender. Her chin a little pointy, lips uneven in fullness, slight freckles were scattered across her nose. I inclined my head when I realized she looked like me. Perhaps it was me, but I certainly didn't see this face when I looked in the mirror. But was this how Edward saw me? My eyes welled with tears. I was beautiful to him, if this was how he saw me.

I suddenly picked out a long range of profanities coming from inside Edward's hut. I wasn't sure why I did what I did next. I opened the door to his hut without another thought. But with a flick of his wrist and a toss of his arm he hurled a small black device at me. I ducked and screamed as it crashed into the wall just next to where my head had been. I paddled free of my hair and glanced at his face; it had declined into the darkness it had seen before, but now it was deeper than I had seen it. It was that pain that I had no way to decipher. It scared me as it was as unpredictable as where a lightning would strike earth.

"Fucking hell Bella!" He mouthed, gaping.

I just stood frozen in the opening with more tears welling in my eyes. Before me stood a person I didn't recognize. I was distraught. I didn't know what to do. Now that I was inside his place, I couldn't remember the reason I had entered in the first place. But looking at him right this moment, the question of whether he saw me the way he drew me wasn't that important anymore.

He was breathing heavily, heaving air in like a maniac, those dark and endless eyes locking me in place.

Tears fell when I ducked down and started to pick up the scattered pieces of cell phone at my feet. It had dissolved into surprisingly few pieces. "Don't fucking do that Bella!" He snarled. I hesitated slightly, but slipped the SIM card back in and snapped the back cover in place. I handed it to him patiently, when he didn't move. I couldn't read his mood, but his eyes were mournful now. "I didn't mean to throw it at you. Bella I'm so sorry." He implored, ignoring the phone.

"Please take it Edward." I said softly. My heart worked like a jackhammer in my chest, but I wasn't scared for some reason. Edward didn't scare me. I had experience handling these kinds of temper tantrums, Jacob hadn't been a stranger to them. It was easiest to be docile and rather submissive till the storm settled.

"Forgive me please. I never meant to hurt you."

"Just take it." I gave the phone a small shake, but he still didn't take it. I tossed it to chair next to me, I just wanted to rid myself of it. He stepped me closer and I stepped backwards woodenly.

"Please don't leave!" He implored. I nodded stiffly, still a bit shocked. "Stay with me please. I beg you."

"Okay." I whispered. I didn't recoil when he stepped forward again. His arms locked around me, pressing my face against his chest. I inhaled deeply and with the insane state I was in, I never felt safer. He had a warm and sweet smell mixed in with some body product, the kind that was subtle and expensive.

"Forgive me." He whispered. I freed my face from his shirt and gaze up at him; his eyes were gentle, but scared.

"Tell me what's wrong." I breathed.

His head dropped and his forehead touched mine. His entire body slumped and he stood there like a broken statue, hovering above me. I watched his face intently as the walls protecting his pain smoldered and faded away. The lines of his entire being were tainted with agony. Unknowingly I had opened a floodgate and I was stuck in the riptide with no escape. I wanted to be strong for him, as he had been for me, but my shoulders weren't broad enough to carry what ever was causing him this much misery.

"It seems that you don't know anything, and I do not mean that in a condescending way." His words were emphasized and his eyes were soft. I tried to blink the confusion from my eyes. "But you're right and there is… something, obviously." He joked flatly, then hesitated, not entirely oblivious to my confusion. "Something happened… a while ago, not something that I regret. But it has come back to haunt me in a way I never dreamed of, and now it just escalated again. I can't tell you about it for two reasons. One, it hurts so fucking much. Two, I'm not allowed to, at least not yet." He spoke clearly and deliberately, like he was explaining this to a kindergartener. Not that it mattered; I didn't understand a word of it anyway. "What happened is something that hurts me to the core of my being, and can never be taken back. It makes me a monster Bella." His eyes were burning into mine. I had to concentrate to even breathe. I swallowed back hard to speak.

"And you can't change this? What ever it is?" I breathed.

"It's out of my hands, so no. There is no way." He sighed and his eyes still blazed so close to mine.

"I'm so sorry." This revelation of whatever truth it was was so excruciatingly heavy, that I almost gladly returned to my own shell of horror at any time.

"You're not going to ask what it is?" His eyes narrowed with disbelief. It was like he was looking for some kind of conspiracy in me.

"No." No I answered confidently. "You said you couldn't tell me. I figure that you'll tell me someday… when you can or if you want." I returned his hard glare with a much honesty I could muster. A big gush of air whooshed from of his chest and feathered across my face. He relaxed and heaved in another deep breath. It looked like this secret was able to crush his entire existence and he was guarding it with his life.

A million emotions were sent flying around my body - like the butterflies had multiplied many times and they escaped their cage in my stomach from the unexpected closeness. I slowly put my arms around his chest, feeling the warmth from his body through his shirt. My hands carefully moved across his back feeling the contours as I tightened my grip around his body. I stood there in his arms, lost in time, letting go of a piece of my personal pain. I literally felt the healing in my heart, but I also felt something else. Something I had buried deep within me, it stirred relentlessly.

"I'm sorry." He whispered quietly into my hair when he dipped his face lower, burrowing into my hair.

"It's okay. For a minute there, you looked like you were going to take my head off." I mumbled.

"I'm so sorry. I'll tell you as soon as I can... I promise." Edward's lips were close to my ear, so intimate. I felt a slight chill at the back of my neck. "Please forgive me." The words rang out with a meaning that ran deeper than the current revelation.

I hoped I was able to comfort him the same way he had me, but my attempt felt feeble and insufficient compared to his. He probably wouldn't use me the same way I had used him. Not that I had much to offer anyway, but I had to try. I wanted to comfort him and I wished he would let me. Maybe it would let my life hold some kind of value again, to be something to someone else.

Time stopped. Our bodies were flush against each others, his pulsating against mine. Delicately he drew his fingers into my hair. Goosebumps raised on my flesh sending warm sparks down my spine. Our cheeks met when Edward pulled back slightly, but leaned his forehead against mine again.

I knew this moment, every girl who had ever been in love and kissed for the first time, knew this moment. It was the eerie calm before the storm; it was the seconds before our lips would meet. Tantalizing slow he moistened his lower lip and I had mere seconds to decide yes or no.

Half an inch before his lips were about to meet mine I opened my mouth. Every part of my body was screaming no, but I couldn't do this. No matter how much I wanted to, no matter how conflicted I was, I couldn't ignore the betrayal. If he did this it would be irrevocably.

"Please Edward. Don't do this." I whispered.

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