A/N: No excuses this time I'm just plain evil to you guys :( My house was broken into and my laptop was stolen but it only had half a chapter on it so I still wasn't ready to upload the next segment anyway.

"On with it" I hear you cry!

Bella POV

If you focus on infinity for too long it warps your mind. The idea that my life, or at least my existence, could go on for all eternity was a pretty hard concept to grasp.

Even more so when I was confined to the house with its white washed walls.

It wasn't that Carlisle had imprisoned me, in fact he wanted me to practice being around humans to get used to the smell of blood coursing at a tantalisingly steady pace through their fragile bodies.

He trusted me completely. I didn't trust myself.

But, at heart, I felt that the only thing holding me back, tethering me to my spotless vampiric life was Carlisle. Of course I didn't wanted to hurt anyone but the burning, the absolute agony of depriving yourself from something which would barely touch the fire that raged within made every day a constant struggle to resist.

In truth I had imprisoned myself for fear of letting him down.

"Good evening, Pumkin," he said as he walked through the door, shrugging off his long black coat – his "Sexy Doctor coat" as Alice called it.

His greeting roused a growl from the depths of my throat.

"Are you ever going to give up on that?"

I wasn't a fan of my new nickname. So he may have come in from collecting the mail and discovered me with my pearly razors lodged into a pumpkin. It was either that or the mail man's neck.

"I think it's cute. It suits you."

"You think Pumpkin suits me? You realise I wanted to rip his head off?"

"But you resisted...by biting a pumpkin." He smiled again, that really irritating smile which makes it hard for me to be annoyed at him.

Our conversations were always like this now. Light-hearted, easy chit chat and even though we always found something to talk about it felt like we were avoiding something.

There wasn't just an elephant in the room. It was a huge fuchsia pink elephant on a tightrope with a banner draped over it reading "Awkward!"

Carlisle had chosen not to ask me about my feelings anymore and I had resolutely buried my little conversation with Alice in the back of my mind as I was sure Carlisle was lying to me and that he could indeed read my mind.

However, I think we both knew that the dynamics of our relationship had changed.

Was I ready to admit that to him just yet? I couldn't find the words.

Besides the tightrope walking elephant there were also a few baby elephants in the room. One of them labelled Rosalie who was the only Cullen yet to visit despite Emmett showing up three times. Carlisle had insisted that it was a difficult time for her as she had decided to tackle medicine this year. Understandable but even Carlisle couldn't hide the truth behind his calm composure and, although slightly hurt, I accepted that Rosalie would never like me a long time ago when Edward was still with us – the second baby elephant in the room. Last but not least we had the Charlie issue. Having returned from a fishing trip to find our house very much unlived in I listened patiently to his lecture about my impulsiveness but as I was pretending to be with Alice considering college with her next semester he didn't take too long to calm down. Everyone loves Alice.

Apparently I'd lost myself in my own little world of elephants for when I came back to earth Carlisle was looking at me through those honey coloured eyes, a knowing smile playing about his lips.

"I think we have some things to discuss other than your teething habits."

He gestured towards the couch and together we sat down, a comfortable distance between us yet noticeably closer than we ever would have back when he was just Edward's father.

A casual silence settled between us in our white palace.

Carlisle was the one to break it. "Okay, Bella I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to talk to you about this but it can't wait any longer. We both know what's going on here and what will happen if we keep our little set up to ourselves. We have to deal with Charlie."

His words rolled around in my head a few times but I wasn't quite sure I caught their meaning.

"I don't understand."

"Sooner or later he's going to work out what's going on here, Bella. We can't let that happen."

"What do you mean "we can't let that happen"? What are you going to do? "We have to deal with him"...you sound like the Godfather! What makes you think he won't accept us?" I'm not sure what bugged me more, the fact that he was so confident in "our little set up" or that he was talking about cutting Charlie out in such an off-hand way. The whole thing was beginning to sound incredibly seedy.

"You can't possibly tell him about us Bella. Who knows what he'd do or what would happen." Carlisle seemed shocked at my reaction but he reached his hand out to cover mine. I jumped back from his touch, on my feet seething at his words. Was he ashamed of me? Did he not want the humiliation of people talking about him? Was Charlie really that scary even to a vampire?

"Charlie loves me Carlisle!" My conversation with Alice floated to the forefront of my mind...

"What is the one thing you always want for someone you love?"...

I rolled my eyes. "Happiness. Happiness is the thing you want for someone that you love."

"And he likes you...a lot. He'll want us to be happy."

"Bella, this isn't about happiness, it's about what the Volturi will do if...when they find out your father knows about us." Carlisle had also risen to his feet and was staring at me utterly perplexed yet intrigued.

Simultaneously we realised we hadn't been talking about the same thing.

The heavy tension between us choked us into silence.

Again Carlisle spoke first.

"Is there a reason why you felt the need to tell me that Charlie likes me a lot, Isabella?" His voice was like velvet. I felt like I was his prey, being lured in by every intoxicating syllable.

How could he possibly have this effect on me now that I was just like him? And why didn't I hate him using my birth name?

He took a step towards me which was both tentative yet quietly confident. I hadn't told him, hadn't said that my feelings for him had changed but the crossed wires in our conversation had said it all.

"I'm glad that he likes me a lot." He whispered his face so very close to mine. I kept my eyes lowered, scared to look at him and be eaten up by the honey trap. "But that still doesn't mean he can know about this." His words tickled my neck as his lips made their way to the mark he'd left on me weeks previously. Carlisle allowed his lips to delicately pepper kisses over the almost invisible wound. I sighed heavily. It was as though I was breathing out all pent up frustration and secret truths.

Encouraged, Carlisle began to move his kisses up my neck and along my jaw line. He placed one final kiss just by the corner of my mouth, so close to where I wanted him to be. But I realised he was leaving it up to me. This was my decision and, as he held his face close to mine, lips almost but not quite touching, my eyes wandered treacherously to his and my fate was sealed.

Closing the gap between us I tenderly rested my lips against his. I could feel his soft smile and I playfully bit his lip to chastise his smugness. Again our eyes met and instantly knew that he was taking over from here. My kiss was my permission and now I was his.

"I love you." He gasped between kisses.

Raw and vulnerable in his arms I had to confess.

"I love you too."

The fourth little elephant in the room I always chose to ignore vanished.

A/N: Elephants and pumpkins? I blame Christmas for getting me hyped up on sugar and festive-ness :) Hope you all had a good one and that you like this! I always love coming back to this story and hate that I've left it so long but my motivation to write just vanished.

I make no promises for the next chapter...but I think this is an ok place to leave it. Maybe a good place to finish...? Let me know.