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LadySharkey1 rocks my world by being the most amazing, kick-ass beta I could ever imagine.

Chapter 6

Made a big mistake. But hey...I was drunk!

By six o'clock the following Friday, Rose must have had enough of my moping because as soon as the final customer had left the building, she stalked into the back—all five feet and nine inches of her—and stared me down. I must admit, her bitch face is still a little intimidating after all these years.

"That's it," she snapped, huffing at my indifference as I finished cleaning up. "I've had it with you walking around the place like the world is coming to an end. I'm taking you out."

"Can't." I sighed, knowing she was right and that I had been slightly overdoing it on the 'depressed co-parent thing'. At the same time, I just couldn't pull myself out of the funk I'd landed in. "We've got customers coming in bright and early tomorrow, remember?"

"Tomorrow night then," she ordered, because when Rose talked to you in that particular voice, you knew whatever she said wasn't up for debate. "We're leaving as soon as the shop closes and I'll book us a room in Port Angeles so we won't have to bother about getting home and designated drivers and shit—though if we play our cards right, we aren't even going to need it."

"I'm not going home with some guy, Rose," I warned her. "Getting drunk and having some fun? Yes. But hookups with random strangers?" Or in other words: people who aren't Edward. "Definitely no way in hell that's ever going to happen."

"We'll see." Rose smirked like she wasn't so completely sure about that and popped a leftover boozy sugared cherry from the chocolate fudge cherry cake I'd been baking for Victoria Halston's bachelorette party into her mouth. "By the way, do you know Vicky caught that son of a bitch cheating on her with one of the bridesmaids the other day?"

I nodded. "Dad was called out to their house because she threatened the cut off the bitch's face. I still can't get over the fact that she chose to go on with their wedding like nothing had happened."

"Minus one bridesmaid," Rose quipped, popping another cherry into her mouth. "I can't get over the fact that she agreed to marry the son of a bitch in the first place. I mean, this wasn't exactly the first time she'd caught him having some strange on the side."

I smirked, knowing Rose was right. In a town as small as my home town, there were very little secrets and so it was common knowledge that James Carson had been cheating on his girlfriend almost since their senior year of high school.

If Rose hadn't had a strict 'no cheating' policy, I'd have been willing to bet she was on that long list as well. After all, James was male and he was breathing, which just about summed up the criteria she had when looking for her next victim.

"I can't imagine living like that." I sighed, soaping up one of my workbenches. "Why marry someone who clearly doesn't love you?" The words weren't out of my mouth before a sharp pang shot through my heart. Aren't you a bit if a hypocrite, Bella? I mean, it's not like you're still holding a candle for someone who's clearly over you…or is it now?

"Not everyone thinks that stuff's important?" Rose tried. "But hey, what do I know? I'm not exactly relationship material here, so finding a reason why some bitch, who I never liked in the first place, wants to make herself unhappy by marrying the most worthless asshole in town is beyond me." She shrugged, picking the final cherry up by its stem with her long, perfectly manicured nails. "All I'm saying is that she's going to need all the booze she can get. Which is why this will be the perfect cake for her." Rose licks her lips. "By the way, these cherries are amazing. What did you put in them?"

"Sugar and cherry brandy," I answered, wondering as I'd done so many times how Rose could work in a cake shop for the better part of three years and still not know anything about baking.

The ding of the shop bell pulled my friend back into her workspace as I finished my work. One of the perks of not having Charlie waiting for me upstairs was that I could prep for the next morning; measuring out the flour, sugar, and other non-perishable ingredients until I was done.

Still, as I finally dragged my tired ass upstairs to the cold, dark and empty apartment, I didn't feel nearly as satisfied after my day's effort as the amount of work I'd actually done would implicate.

Jeez, well, maybe it has something to do with the fact that there's nobody here to share this with, Einstein!

Pushing the button on the answering machine, my heart sped up with happiness as I heard my baby's voice. "Hey, Mom! I know you're still at work but Daddy wanted me to call you now because he's taking us out to dinner and he thinks you may be out or something by the time we get back, but I know that's not true because you're always home."

Great! I sighed, rubbing my temples. As happy as I was that my kid was having a great time with her dad and with…with her—no single mom wanted to hear about the complete and utter fucking failure of her social life. Especially from her own damn kid.

Charlie, in the meantime, droned on. Speaking as she always did: in long, excited sentences that left her slightly blue in the face at the end of them. "Anyway, we're having a great time. Angela brought us cookies, which was nice even though they aren't anywhere near as good as yours and tomorrow she's gonna take us to see the new animal shelter in Port Angeles she's volunteering at and then we're going to the movies." She took a deep breath, the sound of which almost audible through the connection. "Okay, Daddy says we've gotta go. I love you. Bye!"

I sighed, feeling all empty and sullen again as a silence settled back over my apartment that wouldn't go away no matter what I did that night—and believe me, I tried—even to the point of blaring some Slipknot.

I knew I was probably overreacting about this whole thing. I mean, it wasn't like I was the only mom who'd ever found herself in this kind of situation. None of the other co-parenting mom's I knew walked around like they wanted to stick their heads into ovens Sylvia Plath-style all weekend while their kids were off having fun with their fathers.

How the hell did they do that?

I'd been spoiled having our little girl virtually to myself for all these years. Sure, Edward had always been there in the background, calling her almost every day and coming back on the weekends as often as he could. But at the end of the day, she was almost always sleeping in her own bed on the other side of the wall from me.

Where she belonged.

There were overnight visits and short trips to her dad's in Seattle once he'd secured himself a small apartment off campus but never something like this…never something so permanent. In fact, most of the times it had been just the three of us acting as if nothing ever happened to drive us apart. After ten years of spending almost every day with her, I had recently realized I'd been spoiled almost to the point of ruin.

And, of course, the whole Voldemary situation wasn't helping either…

Maybe Rose had been right. Perhaps I did need to get over this dream of me and Edward being together—I mean, he had. Maybe it really was time for me to taste some of the other flavors on the buffet and at least try to move on.

oOo

The next day flew by. As with any other Saturday, my day was swamped with providing the good people of Forks with all their weekend treats and, on top of that, I had to prep my bakery for when Emmett would begin on Monday.

I mean, it's not like you can just give the new guy a sack of flour and tell him to get kneading, right? Since I wanted him to have a good first impression of both me and the shop, I spent most of the afternoon turning everything upside down, and reworking the configuration of everything I could possibly drag across the floor and lamenting the fact that half my kitchen furniture was too heavy. In the end, I was mildly satisfied that I'd come up with a situation that would work; something where we could both focus without getting in each other's way, while still being within reach of both the utensils closet, the freezer and the pantry.

"What the hell's the matter with you?" I jumped, my self-satisfied smirk faded like snow before the sun at Rose's ire. What the hell did I do?

"What?" I scratched my head, looking around the place as I tried to figure out what crawled up her butt.

"We're leaving in half an hour and you're still dressed like that." Her face scrunched up as she waved over my somewhat haggard appearance; hair falling out of my ponytail onto my stained, sweaty chef's whites and flour practically everywhere. "You better get your ass upstairs right now and make yourself presentable, or else!"

I rolled my eyes, brushing my hair out of my face. "Yes, Mother."

"Good, I'll meet you out front in half an hour." Her hands were already on the doorknob before she turned around and narrowed her eyes. "And, God help me, if you're not wearing something sexy, I'll drag you back upstairs and dress you myself."

I nodded, probably looking as frightened as I felt at the prospect of being dolled up by a woman who'd have Slutty McSlutterson feeling like a nun whenever she was dressed for a night on the town.

I guess I had managed to make myself presentable enough because when I slid into the car about forty five minutes later, I got a small nod and a little smile before she cranked up the volume of the sound system and tore off in direction of Port Angeles.

The ride was fun. As much as we worked together, it was sometimes easy to forget that we'd been best friends since I was four and she was six. Sometimes getting out of the shop and doing stuff was just what we needed to reconnect with that part of ourselves again.

We checked in at the hotel and dropped off our stuff in our suite before heading back out again to eat at a cozy Italian place before hitting the night life. Rose ditched most of her clothes the minute she heard the thundering bass from the first live-music bar we visited while I watched with amazement-bordering-on-fear as she managed to secure us a booth with prime views of the stage, two margaritas and the company of two guys who looked like they should be on the cover of a Ralph Lauren catalogue.

And all of that in the span of ten minutes.

How the hell did she do that?

"This is Garrett," she announced as she pointed at the man who'd slid in next to me, her arm already wrapped around the other guy. "He and Felix over here…" she purred—yes purred—as she snuggled up to her unsuspecting victim, one hand sneaking underneath the table to do God only knew what. "…are backpackers, visiting from Australia."

Australia, you say?

God help me.

I scowled at Rose, mouthing 'you're dead'. The bitch knew that Aussie accents were like kryptonite to me.

"G'day." And there we had it. Of course the guy, Garrett, not only looked like Hugh Jackman but also sounded like all my Man-from-Snowy-River fantasies boiled into one perfect package.

"Hi," I somehow managed to squeeze out, trying to wiggle myself enough personal space to keep me comfortable while across from me, Rose seemed to be doing exactly the opposite. "So…have you been in the States for long?"

"Coupl-a weeks," he answered, taking a long, manly pull from his beer. Dear lord, even his drinking style is cowboy-y! "We started out in LA and spent a few days touring California and Nevada before heading north and ending up here."

My thighs clenched as his Australian twang shot straight to my core; the sound of his voice had me inhaling every final morsel until all I could come up with in reply was a dumb, "Oh."

"So, what about you?" he went on, apparently not as scared by my blatant lack of brain activity that he wanted to cut the conversation short. "Are you from 'round here?"

Okay, that got me talking. As always when someone asked me about my hometown, I couldn't stop trying to express my love for it. Sure, the old biddy gossip mill sometimes got on your nerves, and it was a bit unsettling at times to think about how many people in town were actually related to one another, but there wasn't a place on earth I'd rather live or raise my kid.

The town…it was in my bones.

Garrett, fortunately for me, seemed to understand my small-town love, nodding enthusiastically before he went on to explain that he, too, came from a small town—one he loved about as much as I loved Forks. And then he had to go and make himself even more perfect by announcing his parents owned a cattle ranch that he was going to start taking over when he got back from his trip.

Seriously, did Rose compose him from all my girly fantasies or something?

We migrated to the dance floor after the band had finished its set and give over the stage to the resident DJ. Not that I could dance or anything but, fortunately for me, neither could Garrett, which meant that we were both perfectly fine with swaying from one foot to another as we got a little bit closer. Each time we ended up next to Rose and Felix, they seemed to be reenacting a bunch of scenes from Dirty Dancing.

By the time the night morphed into morning, the booze and accents and strobe lightning had made me forget such a thing as an Edward even existed. So when Garrett's hands started to wander more and more, and his lips started to close in on mine, all I could think about was how much I'd missed this sort of intimacy and the thrill that came from kissing and touching.

And—my God—Garrett was a great kisser.

So I let him and things went further and further. In the back of my mind, a tiny voice was screaming at me to stop and think about what I was doing…how much I was going to regret this in the morning.

But I didn't listen.

Instead, a look of understanding was shared with Rose and Felix as we parted ways; she to the boy's room and we walked to my suite.

As the door slammed behind us, my heart was hammering in my throat; arousal pooling inside my underwear as his fingers burned over my skin, shedding me of my clothes while I grabbed at whatever part of him I could reach.

It was new and exciting; my body never having known another man than him but remembering how good it was to feel a man's skin against your own, to stretch around him as he entered me and we moved together in reaching that intense high, where all your worries slipped away and nothing else existed but bliss. For one moment, I was able to lose myself completely and not think about work or the disaster that was my private life.

I just felt…something…again. And it made me feel wanted.

It reminded me that I'm Isabella, a woman with desires, and not just Bella, Charlie's mom.

Regrets came later, though, as predicted, as I lay awake with Garrett dead asleep next to me. My tears were silent as I got up and made my way to the shower; the urge to wash away the evidence of what I'd just done was so great that I wasn't able to resist.

Not that I could escape it, though. In the bathroom, the hastily-ripped open wrapper and the discarded condom visible in the trash were taunting me; almost screaming that I was a disgusting piece of shit, cheating on the man she really loved just because she was too drunk and depressed to care.

Really, what kind of mother was I? Playing 'hide the salami' with some random stud while my kid was tucked up in bed at her father's place? Was this really what I wanted in life?

Was this really who I wanted to be?

Fortunately for me, the morning didn't yield any awkwardness. Eager to be on their way, the boys spent only enough time with Rose and me to not appear like total jackasses and pack their stuff into their rental before they were on their way to Seattle and, no doubt, to many more unsuspecting females who fell for the accent and all the fantasies attached to it.

We, too, were ready to get back on the road, though probably for different reasons. Rose, most likely sensing something was off with me, tried to recreate the same atmosphere we had on our way up. She cranked the volume up as she selected a classic rock station while prattling on about Felix and how he'd almost made her want to emigrate to Australia.

I, on the other hand, remained silent; my shame so overwhelming it had almost become a separate creature, mocking me for my weakness and blaming me with all the details of how I'd messed up as I relived them in my mind.

Not even Charlie's arrival that night made me feel better, though having her around did help to distract me. But then again, only one look at Edward as he dropped her off was enough to make me realize one thing.

I could fuck all the cattle ranchers and their brothers in Australia but, try as I might, I would never get over him.

I was basically screwed. And unlike last night, I wasn't enjoying it.

Thoughts?