Bella sat in her truck right there on the road for a few minutes trying to make out where he might have gone. She shut her eyes to try and put the pieces together of the nights events with no success. He would just have to explain everything to her once he could. She finally pulled up the house and sighed as she got out and shut the door carrying her things.
Alice came out of nowhere and scared her half to death. "Is Edward ok?" She sounded worried. Bella got her heart beat back to normal before explaining anything. "He took off."
"What happened? I saw him hurt and bleeding. Everyone is worried." Alice grabbed some of Bella's bags as they walked inside since she noticed her struggling.
"I don't know. Charlie did something to him and then he was so angry, or hurt, or I don't even know. He wouldn't talk to me about it. He wouldn't even let me help." Bella tried to hold back her tears, once again getting upset at how he acted. Alice being the great friend that she was tried to comfort her. The others knew she was there in the house and had been over hearing their conversation. For the sake of them they stayed hidden and left them alone.
"I can take it from here Alice." Bella pulled away from her at that voice and turned to face Edward coming toward them. Alice knowing how he was left them alone to figure things out on their own.
She looked at his face the closer he got. His eye still looked slightly messed up, but not as bad as she would of expected. He no longer tried to cover it and hide it from her.
"Bella..." He reached out for her, his voice never sounding so broken and tormented before. She instantly went to him. Of course she wasn't happy with what had happened, but he was obviously suffering and taking it a lot harder than she would of thought.
"Trying to say I'm sorry isn't going to take away what I did. I can only hope that you forgive me. I was so scared..." He once again found it hard to admit to her he had been scared of something. "I had never experienced something like that before as a Vampire. The pain was so intense it clouded my sanity. I wasn't seeing things for the way they were. All I knew was trying to make the pain stop and when you kept grabbing onto me... I slipped. I let that side of me go that you should never have to see. My instinct when hurt is to feed. For the first time in a long time your blood was once again extremely hard to resist. I couldn't have you near me and put you at risk until I had calmed down." He cupped her face with one hand and brushed some hair behind her ear with the other. "It will never happen again. I would never want to cause you pain."
Bella just listened as her heart broke for him. She figured his suffering was enough punishment and a reminder to not let it happen again. She placed a hand on the back of his neck as he touched her and pulled him down for a soft kiss. "What happened?"
He moved to pick her up and let her legs wrap around his waist as he went to their room. The door shut behind them and he set her down on the bed. She did not let him go so he joined her there.
"I'm not really sure. I was so focused on trying not to harm him for your sake. Even though the rage inside me was so tense I had to let my guard down just to fight against it. I wanted to kill him so badly, but I knew it would hurt you so I couldn't. Next thing I know he had something in his hand that came in contact with my eye before I could even react. All the damn feelings and stuff going on in my head slowed me down. I can't really explain it because it's never happened before. I hit him one last time and I guess knocked him out because he didn't come after me again. All I could focus on after that was the pain and the smell of his blood. You have to think I haven't felt physical pain like that since I was human. It was an extreme shock to me. If you had not come into the room when you did I may have fed on him. Let my instincts take over" He looked off in the distance at the wall as he spoke.
Bella reached up to lightly trace her fingers near his eye. It looked horrible, the beautiful golden color she was used to seeing was now gone and faded to a light grey along with a nice gash that followed out to his skin. "Will it heal?" The thought of him feeding on her father worried her, no matter how much she hated him at the moment.
He turned his head away the longer she stared, it making him slightly uncomfortable. "Feeding will make it heal faster, but yes it will go back to normal. I don't want to think how bad it had been before I left."
Everything started making sense to her now, she only wished there was something she could do to help him. Physically or emotionally.
It was nearing 2am and Bella was drained for the night. Edward did not leave her side as she fell asleep beside him in the bed. He reached down to carefully remove her shoes and pull some covers over her as he watched her sleep.
Edward layed there for about 2 hours before he suddenly picked up on a vision Alice was having and instantly sat up and ran out of the room to find her. He made sure not to wake Bella at his sudden movement. He found her with Jasper and quickly approached.
"Alice please tell me it hasn't happened yet." His voice cracked at his worry and sadness he could feel building. He grabbed her shoulders and pleaded for an answer, but she wasn't sure herself right then. "We have to find out." He was about to take off out of the house when she stopped him. "It's already happened..." She had the same tone in her voice as Edward.
"What? Are you sure?...No...This can't happen...You're wrong." He then took off again and made it out of the house this time without her stopping him. He ran as fast as he could until he was there. The place he was scared to death to go at the moment because he did not want to face the truth. Once inside he could already smell the blood. "Oh God." He said to himself as he slowly made his way to the room. The same vision he had seen in his head now layed out before him in real life, he was too late.
He backed away against the wall as he stared. Charlie layed before him on the floor motionless and cold with his gun in hand. He was almost in the same position he had been when they had left the house, only this time blood had pooled from the gunshot wound to his head and surrounded his body. The smell did not even bother him, he was too hurt. Sure just hours before he probably could of killed him at how angry he was, but he had stopped himself for the sake of Bella. Now this? His heart broke and he would of cried if he could. How was he suppose to tell her?
He growled and punched the wall causing a hole to form under his hand. "Dammit Charlie..." He dropped to his knees and couldn't take his eyes off him. They could of gotten him help and things could of gone back to normal. Did Charlie really feel he could not of been brought back? That his only chance to stop causing Bella pain was to end his life?
Edward had no idea how long he sat there and just looked at him. Trying to think of a million different ways he could of prevented this from happening or ways to bring him back. He felt like he was in one of Bella's nightmares.
He finally pulled himself off the floor to leave. She would be waking soon and he had to figure out a way to tell her. This wasn't something he could pick up the pieces from and pretend it never happened. He chose to walk back to his house instead of running. It gave him time to think and he had the time to waste before the sun was to rise fully
Once back home he waited outside his room and looked in on her still asleep. He quietly opened the glass door and went back to his position on the bed with her.
She stirred to wake and he ran a hand through his hair as he sighed and sat up. He did not want to deal with this and began to uncontrollably pace through out the room.
Bella opened her eyes at the sound of movement and spoke tiredly. "What are you doing?"
He froze at her voice and swallowed hard as he turned to face her. Unable to hide the horrible look on his face no matter how hard he tried.
She picked up on that look fast and sat up. "What's wrong?"
He approached her and knelt down to her eye level beside the bed and took her hand. "Bella..." He stopped trying to get the words together. "Sweetie...fuck." He could not do this.
That really started to worry her. "Edward what is it?" She felt his hand tremble and pulled her hand away from his to place them on his face and make him look at her.
He shut his eyes at first and took in a deep breath before removing her hands from his face to hold them again after kissing them. "Charlie..." He had to pause again. "Charlie killed himself last night." Why did he have to be the one to tell her this. He wanted to just disappear so he could avoid what was coming next.
Bella's heart stopped at his words and she felt a lump form in her throat. "What?" She pulled her hands away from him.
"Bella I'm so sorry." He tried to reach for her again but she rejected him.
"No! He can't...why...why would he?..." She broke then. Placing a hand over her face while the other gripped the front of her shirt as she cried. Edward tried to go to her and hold her, try to take some of the pain away, but she did not allow him to. Instead she slapped him away and yelled at him.
"It's your fault! If you had not been there and fought him...He would of just went after me and then went to sleep! None of this would of happened!" She cried out unable to hold back her anger and sadness. She really wasn't mad at Edward, but at that moment she did not want to believe it was true. Wanted to blame anyone else other than Charlie.
He flinched hard at her words, they really hurt his feelings and caused him more pain. "Bella I didn't want this..." He pulled her to him despite her fighting. He took the hits she gave and still held her. Knowing that in the end his contact would help her more than she wanted to believe right then.
"No...Let me go!" She could not even speak anymore over her sobs and finally gave up against him. She buried her face into his chest as she clutched against his shirt desperately trying to find a way to ease the pain. All he could do was hold her and rub her back, try to soothe her the best he could. He knew nothing he could say was going to bring Charlie back and nothing was going to make the situation any better.
After several minutes of her sobbing she finally sniffled and lifted her head to look at him. He could not stand the look on her face and would of died for her to take that pain away.
"Why did he want to leave me?" She frowned as new tears fell.
He tried to wipe them away with his thumb as he gently cupped her face. "He loved you. I Don't think he wanted to leave you."
She shut her eyes. "Then why this?..." Her voice was so sad.
"I don't know sweetie." He pulled her against him again and kissed the top of her head. "I wish there was something I could do."
"I'm sorry." He looked at her confused that time. "You have nothing to be sorry for."
"It wasn't your fault..." She started to cry again and just gave up on talking then. He left it at that not wanting to upset her further with anything else. He just held her as long as she wanted. She surprised him when she pulled away and got up, talking about how she had to get ready for school.
"You don't have to go." He spoke as he watch her get dressed.
"Yeah I do." Her voice was quiet and horse from crying. She did not want to sit around and constantly be reminded of this. She had to do something to distract her and school seemed only logical at the time.
"Ok." He did not push and let her do what she wanted. He went with her once they were both ready, offering some breakfast that she refused along the way.
She stopped before they were about to leave and changed her mind. "I can't." He was instantly there to hold her when she needed it. "It's ok."
"Does anyone even know? Does my mom know? How did you find out?" She began to freak out which took him off guard with all the questions. He only knew how to answer the last one, because he was just as clueless as she was to the rest. He pulled her to the nearest sofa to explain to her how he found out.
She was hurting for him as well now that he had actually seen it. All she wanted to do was curl up in a ball and wake up from this bad dream.
"Maybe I really should go to school..." She sighed and got back up again, her head was really mixed up right then. She did not want to sit around and let her thoughts linger, but she wasn't sure how well school would go either. Edward just stayed back and let her do what she wanted. He knew it was hard for her right then and she was extremely emotional so all he could do was go with whatever she chose. He ended up driving them to school when she finally did decide on it. Maybe seeing some of her friends could lighten the mood for her.
Bella did fine and kept herself together through her first two classes. It was in the middle of Biology when things turned for the worse. She got an over head page to the office and she instantly knew what it was about. She froze and the teacher looked at her funny when she never moved to leave at first. Her emotions were winning the silent battle Edward could see on her face. The tears finally made themselves known as she stood and tried to leave. She could not control herself and dropped to the floor to cry.
Edward was instantly there by her side to pull her to him. He looked up when he felt the whole class staring at them and glared.
"What are you all looking at? You think this is funny?" He growled and picked up Bella despite the teacher yelling at him to put her down. He walked out of the classroom with her and headed toward the nearest bathroom which wasn't that far.
Once there he gently put her down so she could stand on her own, but did not pull away. "You going to be able to deal with this?" He held her face lovingly as he looked at her. She just shut her eyes and nodded after taking in a deep breath. She had to get herself under control before speaking to anyone about anything. How the hell was she suppose to act when they told her the bad news when she already knew?
She went into the girls restroom to clean herself up and try to think of how to handle all this. Edward had actually been there and knowing her father was chief of police things were not going to go unnoticed.
"Fuck." She slammed her fist on the wall on either side of the mirror before placing them on the sides of the sink to hold herself up.
There always seemed to be something else to worry about when you thought you had already delt with the worst. Now on top of her emotional struggle to deal with the death of her father, she now had to worry about what the police were going to think when they found Edward had been all over the room before it happened. Had hit Charlie and showed up again after he had died. She really hoped vampires did not leave behind finger prints. Maybe they wouldn't even know he had been there. She could only hope.
After taking a last look in the mirror she felt comfortable enough to try and go handle all this. Edward was waiting outside of the bathroom for her and of course asked if she was ok since he heard the commotion behind the closed door.
"You are going to have to go back to class and let me go do this alone." She spoke as she wrapped her arms around him.
"Why?" He asked, not getting it.
She pulled away to look at him. "I don't want them to think anything or even see you with me since you had been there. Don't want to give them any reason to go to you about any of this."
He understood then and gave her a quick kiss before watching her walk away. Regretting having to turn around and head back to class, but he knew it was for the best.
It felt like hours before she finally found him in the lunch room. He could tell she was an emotional wreck and had been stressed out. She once again refused some food when he offered and the stares soon followed as she set down beside him. He was at least glad his eye was healing well enough that it did not draw attention, that could only cause more problems in the end as well.
Bella just sat there spaced out with her head leaned against his shoulder and did not say a word. When the bell rang he broke the silence. "You just want to go home?" She stayed silent, but her nod let him know what she wanted.
A few of her friends tried to come up and talk to her as they were leaving. Trying to find out what had happened and if she was going to be ok. Edward just let them know she did not want to talk about it right then and went on their way.
Once home she went to curl up in the bed and did not move for several hours. Edward was worried, but knew she just needed time. He did not have it in him to disturb her and try to get her to talk. The only time he spoke is when he let her know he was going out to feed, in which case she did not even speak. She just pulled him to her for a kiss then let him go.
Bella sighed when her phone rang. Edward was gone and she was kind of enjoying the time to herself. It was Jessica and she figured talking to one of her friends might make her feel better. The idea of her coming to a party with her sort of got her attention. She for one had never been to a party and it might be good for her to get out and do something instead of moping around the house. Agreeing she got off the phone and went to get ready. She had no idea when Edward was going to be back and he had not taken his phone. For some reason in the back of her mind she felt like he may of tried to stop her from going. She grabbed her keys after thinking it over for a minute and went on with her plan.
Jessica met up with her not that far down the road and she just went with her since she had no idea where the party was at.
Not 30 minutes or so after she had left Edward returned. He was concerned when she wasn't still in the bed and he could not pick up on her in the house anywhere. He began to panic slightly since she was emotionally unstable and quickly he grabbed his phone to call her. He sighed in relief when she answered.
"Bella where are you?" He grabbed his keys insistent on going to be with her when she told him.
"I'm with Jessica, it's ok. I just needed to get out of the house for a while." She had to step outside so she could hear him. All the people inside the house were way too loud and she also did not want him to worry.
"Do you want me to come be with you? Tell me where you are." He could clearly hear all the people around her even though she had stepped outside.
"No." She knew that sounded bad. "I mean I just want some time to hang with the girls right now."
He understood. "At least tell me where you are in case something happens I know where to find you."
She had to ask someone exactly where she was and told him. He let her go then not knowing what he was going to do with himself.
Alice tried to keep him sane after a few hours passed and he had not heard from her again. "Edward please don't turn into the clingy obsessive boyfriend." She wasn't trying to be mean, just honest.
He glared at her. "I would not be like this if she had not just lost her father and was vulnerable." She was about to speak again but cut her off when his phone rang. When he answered it all he could hear was music and her saying his name like she had no signal and could not hear him. The last thing he heard was her curse and the phone hang up. That was it, he did not know why but he had to go find her. She did not sound like she was in any sort of trouble, but he still felt very protective of her.
He had no trouble finding the house with the directions she had given him before. Plus the ton of cars parked outside was a dead giveaway. Not liking parties and taken back slightly that this is what she was doing he pulled himself from his car to go find her. He was really surprised that no one really gave any acknowledgment to him being there. They were all too wrapped up in themselves and everything else going on. He found Jessica first.
"Where is she?" He kept this tone calm just to not draw attention to himself.
She smiled still dazed by his look and the fact he had just spoken to her. Turning her head she pointed in the direction she was, talking to some people. Edward instantly picked up on her changed state and growled at Jessica uncontrollably. "You let her drink!?" Even though his voice was harsh he still kept the tone low. It kind of startled her.
"She is a lot more persistent than you would think."
He clenched his jaw and walked toward where she had pointed. He knew it wasn't her fault that she had made that choice. He could not believe it though after all the stuff with Charlie. As he approached the people around her kind of started talking to each other, but still did not seem to care he was there.
"Bella what are you doing?" He was more concerned than mad at the moment.
Bella put a huge smile across her face at how surprised she was to see him there and instantly wrapped her arms around him, stumbling in the process. "Edward!"
He held her to keep her from falling and swiftly took the cup she had been holding away from her. "You did not answer me."
She looked up at him still in her drunken state but seemed as happy as she could be. "Hanging with the girls."
He tried to move them to a corner so they were away from as many people as possible. Mainly so he could try to talk to her. "How could you Bella? After everything. How could you do this?" He was very disappointed in her.
She could not walk straight when he tried to move them and he had to help. "It's helping me to cope." She ran her hands over his chest. "You're sexy when you're mad." She grinned just as wide as when she first saw him there and tried to kiss him.
He pulled away and tried to get her to listen to reason. "Drinking isn't going to solve anything. You of all people should know that."
She was obviously ignoring anything he was trying to say and he knew that trying to talk sense into her right then wasn't going to happen. "I'm taking you home."
She pouted at him in a playful drunken way. "I don't want to leave." She then took him by surprise and reached her hand down to grab him between the legs. "I want this."
He pushed her hands away. "No." Apparently she was not comprehending his actions of stopping her and tried again. This time she went for his zipper and he grabbed her wrist making her look at him.
"Stop it." He was serious and looked around to make sure no one was watching them. He wasn't easy to embarrass but this one might of taken the cake and he couldn't very well man handle her out of the house without making a scene.
She took her other hand to grabbed the front of his shirt and pull him down to her. "I want you to fuck me." She then pressed her lips against his hard and urgently shoved her tongue into his mouth.
Those words even in the state of things made his cock betray him. He knew it was wrong and she should not being doing this, but dammit when she said things like that it made it hard for him to think straight.
He instinctively kissed her back and it took him a moment to regain control of the situation. He had to stop this before he got overwhelmed and gently pulled himself away. "No...Not like this."
"But see? You want me." Her hand found it's way back down to his forming hard on and he growled.
"Bella, I said no." He then pulled himself away from her and started to walk away until he heard one of the on lookers comments about taking her if he wasn't going to. "I don't think so." He spoke to himself but out loud and turned back to grab her hand and pull her along with him. He had a good enough hold on her to keep her from falling, but she came willingly so it was less obvious to getting her out to the car.
He went to open her door and help her inside, but she kept trying with her games. He finally got tired of it and grabbed her, forcing her to bend over the side of the hood of the car to press his hard on against her.
He then leaned forward so he was talking into her ear. "Is this what you want?" He pressed against her harder which caused her to moan a yes to him. He then pulled away from her and made her stand straight again. "You should of thought of that before you started drinking." He narrowed his eyes and of course his actions did not harm her, but he was getting angry and made her get into the car.
She was speechless. Even drunk she could feel the vibes coming off him in the car and kept her mouth shut. That part of her brain seemed to be functioning better than her lust for him.
He did not hate her and very well could not stay mad at her for long, but he hoped she would learn from this.