Title: The Rose and the Gypsy Queen, Chapter Two

Author: Miya Kressin aka Fiberkitty

Summary: "I miss the way a girl kisses, the way they smell, and I especially miss the way they touch." Self-conscious Siobhan fell hard when she read Rosalie's romance novel, Memoirs of a Girl in Love. Can Rosalie teach her beauty has nothing to do with size?

Now, Rosalie is finding that love is something you have to work on and fight for. Is Siobhan willing to put in the same effort?

Chapter one was written for the "For The Love of Women" Contest. Chapter two was written for the Fandom4SAA compilation.

Rating: M

Disclaimer: While I do have my own original fic out there, I am not the owner of Twilight nor its characters. No copyright infringement is intended, and I do not receive any monetary compensation for works of fanfiction.

Chapter Two, because the drabble doesn't really count and is included at the end along with a handful more.

Rosalie POV

She was late, again. I'd purposely saved my draft, emailed my status to my editor, printed out the new chapter I'd typed up, and then closed my laptop for the night. I was going to give her my undivided attention; my book's deadline was well under control. Supper had gone cold, twice, while I waited for her.

Cooking was never my strong suit, but I did make a fairly decent chicken Parmesan with penne. With some freshly diced tomato, you almost couldn't tell that I used jarred sauce. Unlike the hearty stews and casseroles Siobhan likes to tuck away into the fridge and freezer during the winter, I knew my meal wouldn't taste as good reheated. I'd put the plates into the oven on warm twice to keep the food hot, each time hoping the car coming down the street was hers.

In my imagining of how the evening was supposed to go, Siobhan would have come in on time, kicked off her shoes, sat down on the bench to rub her feet, and then came to find where I was. She wouldn't have found me at my desk. Or in my exercise room. She wouldn't have even found me sitting on the floor of the living room with pages of my storyboarded chapters surrounding me. Tonight, I was giving Siobhan all of my attention.

Or rather, I would, when she arrived.

My phone chirped, the sharp tone obliterating the silence in which I was stewing. I put the plates on the table again and retrieved my phone from its resting space. It wasn't whom I wanted to see; no dancer in mid spin, hair and skirt whirling around her, greeted my eyes. Felix's charming grin adorned my screen; a text message awaited my attention.

I'll be there in five. It's important. Not about your manuscript.

There were exactly two things that would be important to my agent that weren't book related. Something huge with the press that I needed to do damage control on was number one in his mind. Number two, which was more important to me, was that he'd gotten word of Siobhan or someone in my family being hurt and wanted to break the news to me himself. In three plus years of being my agent, we had become as much friends as coworkers.

I fretted for the four minutes it took Felix's Lamborghini to fly around the corner of my drive, worrying about what could have happened to Siobhan that he was coming to tell me. I'm not sure the engine was off as he slammed the car door behind him. We met somewhere in the front yard before I realized I'd left my perch by the foyer window.

"Fe?"

He shook his head, taking off sunglasses that hid hard eyes. "Rosie," he started. The worst crossed my mind, breaking my heart. My agent drew me into his arms and pressed a kiss into my hair, affirming my fears. The smell of his cologne choking me as he half-carried me into my home. As quickly as he'd stopped my heart, he restarted it. "I spotted Vahn at the bar I was at with Tanya." Relief flooded me; she was okay. "Rosie, I saw her with that red head, Maggie, I think you said her name was."

I nodded as I pulled back. I knew Felix had been out trying to recruit an author who was making a name for herself through self-publishing ventures. It made sense for him to be out; it did not make sense for Siobhan and that bitch to be together for dinner on our anniversary. "What were they doing?" It hurt to ask. I trusted Siobhan, but Maggie was another story. She'd been a thorn in our side since Vahn introduced us the first time. Last year, on our first anniversary, Maggie had kissed Siobhan at the dance studio, earning a slap from Vahn and urging me to ask my girlfriend to move in with me sooner rather than later.

"They were certainly cozy looking." Felix plastered his media-smile while speaking, giving him the appearance of the cat that caught the canary. "Siobhan seemed rather upset to notice me. She followed me out into the parking lot after I finished my business with Tanya, but she didn't say a word. She just looked at me with tears in her eyes." His gaze swept across the room, the candles, the food, the wine glasses. He knew what this meal meant to me. "Maybe it was nothing. What do you think it was about Rosalie?" His voice was part-concern and part-amusement.

After the initial lust Siobhan and I had for one another subsided, developing into a real relationship based on mutual interest (besides in getting one another naked), long conversations, and laughing together, Felix didn't get it. The love between Vahn and I was real, something beyond his comprehension. He'd never fully accepted my relationship with Siobhan; well, not besides the sex. To him, love was one big game of whom you wanted on your arm for an event and in your hotel bed after, and what you had to do to get her there. When the affair was losing its spark, he moved on to the next beautiful face.

My mind was spinning out of control thinking of what Siobhan had done or was doing. "Please tell me you have something in the car to distract me," I begged. If I didn't find some way to pull my mind out its spiral, I was likely to do something horrible like throw my computer into the hot tub, rip up all my hard copies of my current novel, and then drink myself into a stupor as I waited for her to come home. The paparazzi would love to find me in such a state and post pictures of me all over the web. I could just see the headlines: "A New Memoir to be Written by the Jilted Rose?" or "A new Tale of Woe for Ms. Hale." When a photographer captured Maggie kissing Siobhan last year, the headlines had us laughing until we cried. "Gypsy Queen a Size Queen?" with a byline of "Best-selling author left for curvier redhead."

Felix left me standing there for less time than I knew it felt like. My watch hand clicked out each second he was away, each second she wasn't home, and the sound echoed through my head like the gong of a grandfather clock chiming midnight. By the time Felix returned, my body was limp with emotional exhaustion.

We sat down on the porch swing, and I glanced at the stack of papers Felix handed me. When he repeated his question, asking my opinion, I just shrugged. I tried to go back to looking over the chapters he'd brought from my editor but found my thoughts constantly returning to Siobhan.

"I trust her, Felix. I love her. That's good enough for me." I thought of the way she'd kissed me before starting her commute to work this morning. That turned into the way she'd slid her hand up under my nightshirt and fingered me to a climax, leaning me back against the kitchen counter, and then left with the proof of my arousal upon her hands. He had to be wrong. He had to be.

"She's just a woman, Rosalie. If you haven't noticed, you have your pick of pretty much any gay, bi, and probably a good share of straight women out there."

I rolled my eyes in my disgust at his grasp of sexuality and desire. I love her, only her. "I know she's not the woman the marketing team would like to see with. You want me to have someone more like Victoria or even Tanya on my arm for the scandals, ratings, and everything else your department loves to see. When have I ever cared about that, Felix?" I thought of everything I've been through and shook my head. "I gave up second-guessing my choices when I left Royce. She's it for me until the day she tells me otherwise. She trusts me when I go away on book tours; I have to trust her too."

Another thought was about to pass my lips when a girlish giggle interrupted my tirade. A taxi had pulled up to the curb, an open door the source of the laughter, and I watched as two women emerged. On unsteady feet, a very drunk Maggie and Siobhan crossed the yard and climbed the stairs to the front porch, hanging on one another to not fall. Siobhan's eyes, glazed from alcohol, widened when she saw Felix and me. "Oh, Rosie-" she paused to hiccup, "I didn't know you were home."

"That's pretty obvious by your state of mind, though it was you who told me not to forget our anniversary. I guess you did instead." Leaving the three on the porch, I went inside and blew out the candles on the table. I wasn't going to fight outside; I didn't want to fight at all. I just wanted it all to go away.

The heated words shared outside, only some of them in English, and more than a few of them being Felix's Italian curses coming to the fore of the discussion, passed me by without lingering effect. I was too numb from it all to care what was going on. It was only the roar and following purr of Felix's car that caught my undivided attention. He was leaving me here with them... alone.

I was not going to do this, whatever this was, in the pencil skirt and sweater Siobhan liked the best on me when we were out. My heels thudded against the door with a carefully flicked foot. I left my clothes on the floor where they looked tawdry and used. It was appropriate, I assumed, given how my heart felt. A cotton jersey dress that was hanging over the door hook slid down over my panties, far less constricting and much more comfortable. I wore it often when tackling a particularly tough chapter to be written. Now, it would be my battle armor.

With a deep breath to sustain me, I stepped back out into the hall and walked to the kitchen. Dark hair was out of its usual knot, strewn across the small table, white washed wood showing through her long locks. Siobhan's turquoise body suit expanded at the waist, narrowed, expanded again, as she breathed, her face turned away from me. Only the soft trembling of her shoulders told me she was still awake, crying silent tears.

"Is- is she here?" I finally managed to ask.

Startled, she bolted upright, her hands scrubbed at her eyes, coming away blackened from mascara and eyeliner. "No. Felix took her home. I told her she needed to leave, and he didn't think it was safe for her to take a taxi back to the pub and then drive herself home."

My lips ached from pressing together and tingled when separated. "How long has this been going on?" I went straight to the heart of the matter. After Royce's abuse, I knew the worst that could happen to me. Her breaking my heart would hurt, but I'd recover.

"Rosie?" Her eyes were red rimmed and raw looking. "What are you talking about? I'm the one who saw you kissing that bastard Felix in the pub!"

"What?" My eyes were wide, jaw slack, and my whole body tensed. "I've been here cooking, for you, and I'm not interested in Felix, so why the fuck would I kiss him?" My mind thought back on Felix's depiction of the encounter. "Did you think Tanya was me?" I shook my head as I walked around the table. "She's like three sizes smaller and a bleached blonde. You couldn't tell the difference?"

I watched as hands that have wrapped around my hips, weighed my breasts, slid inside me, and a thousand things more began ripping a napkin to shreds. "Maggie said you-" She stopped as I held up a finger.

My mouth pursed and eyes closed as I tried to calm myself down and not just scream that she's an idiot. "You took Maggie's word over our relationship and didn't think to confront me? Especially after last year?" I shook my head, the incredulous tone creeping in despite my desire to remain neutral. "You then followed Felix into the parking lot but didn't say a word to him, either." At her look of confused surprise, I barely practiced restraint in rolling my eyes. "What? You thought he was just dropping off papers? I'd told him tonight was a work-free zone." With a sigh, I continued. "So, you were bringing her here?"

"I dunno." Siobhan's head was back in her hands. "After Felix and the apparently-not-you left, Maggie and I started drinking, and drinking, and then we were here, and you were here. I haven't done anything with her since we got together. I wouldn't-"

I raised one eyebrow at her statement, ending her train of thought. With everything I'd planned for the night I was still numb, but that didn't make me unaware of the two women's barely chaste conduct. "You were hanging all over each other, I know that you're hornier than hell when drinking, and you were bringing her here to our home!"

The room spun as I turned, hands landing on the island behind me. Copper bottomed steel pans reflected a dull glow of my pained visage. "I gave up my house to find one that could be ours. We've both had friends over that the other isn't fond of, but never ever when drinking or when we thought we'd be alone with them. You, yourself, said 'Oh, Rosie, I didn't know you were home!'"

It was all too much. "Ya know what?" I asked. "I had bought this for you with my latest royalty check. I made dinner and dessert." As I spoke, I tossed her the velvet box that was sitting on the kitchen island beside the canister of sugar. "Hell, I even bought wine and some champagne to enjoy by the hot tub after."

I walked away, letting her hold the ring I'd picked out. She called for me, a few times of "Rosalie" and eventually getting to "Rosalie Lillian Hale!" before stomping after me. By then, I had reached the back door leading to our privacy fence surrounded hot tub and had left my dress on the hook. When she reached the patio, I was already neck deep in the water, staring off at the shadows created by the setting sun.

"Wha's this?" she whispered, her t's almost silent, as she held out the sapphire and diamond ring.

"I was going to ask you to marry me. Your parents and I had a long conversation on the computer two weeks ago. They gave me their blessing."

"You talked to Da?" She was more interested in that conversation than the fact that she was holding what was to be our engagement ring.

"Yeah," I said dumbly. My eyes were soon glued to the skin she exposed in stripping off her jeans, blouse, and bodysuit to climb into the tub with me, her fist still closed around the ring. Siobhan's nipples rested just below the surface of the water, and a fading bruise from too hard a nip of my teeth a few nights prior stole my attention from my anger. All I could think of was the sight of Siobhan beneath me, my lips, tongue, teeth, and fingers making her moan. I thought of the way she sang in the shower in the morning, how she'd make coffee for me while I took mine, and all the days started off with us reading the news together.

Shaking my head to clear it gave me some grasp of my thoughts. "He's happy for us, Vahn. They invited me to come with you at Christmas. I- just- fuck." The tears started in earnest, falling down my cheeks. Chlorine, the scent of our garden, her perfume, it all inundated me, overloading my senses.

"I've never given you reason to doubt me, Vahn." My tears fell like raindrops into the water. "And you were going to do something with her. I don't get it," I sobbed.

"You don't know what was going through my head seeing 'you' with him. It was a dagger in my heart, Rosalie. If you could do that with him, without even noticing me, I thought maybe I could make you jealous. I wasn't going to fuck her. Hell, I don't think I even would have kissed her."

Siobhan's free hand, hot from the water we sat in, cupped my cheek. Tear streaked cheeks rose into a half-smile. "I love you. Just you. I was hurt and stupid and jealous and angry, but I wouldn't take someone besides you to my bed." Her dark blue eyes clouded with grief. "D'ya want me to go?" Siobhan's husky voice was a purr of a whisper, barely audible above my shaky breaths.

"No, yes, I don't know. Vahn, everyone I've ever loved has hurt me." My trust in us was cracked, and I told her as such.

"Whenever my parents have cracked something, they glue it back together. If it's torn, they sew it. Nan told them that the patchwork quilt of their love was made more beautiful by the colored threads they used. Can we patch us? I'll not see her again, as a friend, anything. I'd take you with me and tell her the reason and a farewell to the friendship, and that would be it. We could move to Texas, near your brother, and start again without our ex-girlfriends around as distraction from us."

She looked at the ring and reached for my hand. "I want to marry you, Rosalie. I want us to find some lovely man to get us both pregnant at the same time so we can have two children at once and be done with having kids. I want us to have a white picket fence-"

I tuned out the rest of what she wanted, a thousand questions running through my mind, each screaming out its query. Could I trust her, trust us to weather through the storm of emotions we brought to this relationship? Probably. We'd both been married before, and found ourselves stronger in the process. While we'd ended up in bed together quickly, our actual courtship had been drawn out and intense.

Would we last forever? Nothing lasts forever, except perhaps a story of something eternal. Star-crossed lovers. War. Love. Pain. We weren't held apart by anything but our own fears. With open eyes and heart, we both knew that marriages didn't always last. But, we also knew what could be tolerated, what you compromise on, and what you dig your heels in on to keep. I wanted her. I love her. She's my everything.

"Not Texas. Ireland. You can teach dance there. I can write anywhere. I'd have to fly out on tours more often, but I could also branch out to northern Europe. I already fly to go visit Jasper and Alice. What difference does a longer flight mean to me?"

Her eyes were wide as saucers, and for a moment I thought she didn't understand me. "You'd have to teach me the language, Siobhan. What I've picked up from you is mostly a bunch of curses."

She let out a string of those curses under her breath, and then reached for my hands. "You, me, and Ireland? It's harder there." I knew from late night pillow talk that except in the larger cities, acceptance wasn't as easily come by. "You're sure?"

The muscles near my mouth twitched as I smiled my first smile of the night, a gentle one full of hope and promise. "It'll take some time to get our place on the market and decide what we actually need to take with us. Not to mention you finding a new owner for the studio, and I'll have to break the news to Felix. Most of my work can be done online and with a fax machine at least."

Her answering smile was shy. "Does this mean I get to wear the ring?"

I closed my eyes against the coy looks she was shooting me. "Siobhan Catherine MacKenna, I love you with all my heart, even when you've broken it," I improvised. "Will you help me patch it back together with the fiery bliss you hold within your soul, lending me some of your strength and flames to support me as I will give to you a bit of my ice and calm? I can only offer you myself, and all I ask for is you. I love you. Will you marry me, legal or not, religious or not, even if it's just you, me, and the night sky to witness our vows?"

My eyes opened, and I jumped back a bit, startled at how close she'd come. Her moonlight white skin was right there, blue eyes taking up all my sight, and her breath was hot on my lips. "Fuck yes, Rosie."

I was going to marry my Gypsy Queen. Fuck yes, indeed.

18 months later

Siobhan POV

I still worried I would "squish" her.

I was stupid.

Rosalie panted and arched as I rubbed my fingers along her slit, our thighs spread wide by her need.

"Touch me," she purred.

My belly made it awkward to reach straight down; time and experience taught me angles that worked better for us until it was almost effortless.

Two fingers slid into her as I leaned over to kiss unpainted lips swollen from my kisses.

"My beautiful Rose." My voice was a broken sigh as I watched her passion reach a crescendo. Glossy red nails dug into her hair, my arms, and then settled for kneading my breasts as she tried to ground herself from the pleasure I gave.

I didn't care that my hand ached and my arm was tired, my thumb and fingers worked inside and on her clit until she went rigid with a soft moan, thighs locked around my wrist to hold me still.

My lover pulled me down atop her and purred against my neck, a soft chortle of contentment as she nuzzled beneath my ear. "That's three this morning. Are you trying to keep me in bed all day?"

I hummed my agreement as I stroked sweat-dampened hair from her forehead. "Yes, but I should probably get off you so you can breathe."

"I can breathe just fine. I want you here." The sleepy burr in her voice became an angry whisper as she pulled my hair back in her fist and sucked down my breast, leaving a line of pink until she reached my nipple and delivered a sharp nip.

I yelped even as I bucked my hips into hers.

"Mine." Rosalie pushed with her legs, rubbing her heat against mine. "I love you just the way you are. I wouldn't change an inch of you. You're soft, powerful, and feel like the finest silk beneath my hands." Tickling fingers rubbed my hips and moved around to stroke my stomach. "My goddess. My lover. My partner. My wife."

Her fingers moved to pull my hand to hers and kiss the ring she'd put there last year.

A Year After That

Rosalie POV

He was huge. A body so large it rivaled a football player's, but trim, was topped with dark, curly hair and blue eyes that rivaled Siobhan's. He took up space without being intimidating.

And he was my best friend.

Emmett McCarty worked for Volturi Books as my new editor and agent, and he had been handpicked by Felix to move to Ireland from his sprawling ranch in Tennessee. Emmett had been looking to see the world, and one Ms. Rosalie Hale-MacKenna was a good way for him to do so at the publishing house's expense.

Siobhan was the one to first broach the topic of the hour. One comment from me about how much he reminded me of my friend Vera's little baby boy, Henry, had put the thought into her head. A few pints of beer and some homemade pizza for Vahn and Emmett while I was away at a book signing, and then a few awkward visits after my wife blurted out her idea, and we were here. In a bathroom. Together.

"How much longer, Emm?"

He looked down at his watch even as I asked. "Two more minutes, Rose." He blocked the counter, preventing Siobhan and I from reaching the sticks behind him.

"Why the hell did we let him take them away?" Siobhan groused.

No amount of pleading swayed Emmett's heart, not even threatening to call his boyfriend who was still in Tennessee for a few more weeks until the house sale was closed. Peter, and their seven-year old daughter, had Emmett wrapped around their little fingers. They hadn't taught us the trick.

Just because Emmett was the one to donate the sperm (via turkey baster) didn't give him the right to be such a bear. Only when the alarm chimed that it was time to look did he relent and move out of the way. A toothy grin, cheeks deep with dimples, split his face. "They're both positive. The plus signs were purple before I even put them upside down on the counter. My boys can swim," he joked, thudding his fist on his chest.

"Congratulations, Mama," my wife whispered against my lips.

Thirty Eight Weeks later

Rosalie POV

I hated to hear her scream. She screamed like a banshee, or however she spelled it. I rocked the bassinet beside me with one hand, the other clinging to Siobhan's outstretched palm. Our son, Brandon Jasper MacKenna, had so far slept through most of his other mom's active labor. A dry diaper and nursing had him sleeping peacefully beside me.

"Her head is out." Emmett's commentary was met with a growl from my wife. He'd done the same for me, getting him kicked out of the room. Why she allowed him back in here to watch our daughter arrive was beyond me.

The midwife guided Vahn through another series of pushes, and I watched as our daughter was born, all dark hair and round cheeks. She looked a lot like her three days older big brother, but his hair was lighter. "She's here. You did it." Tears of pure joy rained over my cheeks, and I tasted salt as I kissed my wife.

Sweat coated her, slicked her hair to her face and neck, and blood vessels were broken in her eyes and cheeks, leaving her red. She'd never looked more beautiful.

"We did it," Siobhan corrected.

I watched the midwife set Lily Anne MacKenna into her mother's arms, and I fell in love with my wife all over again.

The mother of our children.

My love.

My gypsy queen.

Author Note: And so ends The Rose and The Gypsy Queen

I am working on finishing up the Edward/Jasper story 'Before a Year, After a Day' as well as the outtakes to The Tie That Binds (available on TWCS Library) and the epilogue to Tempering Fire and Ice. Once all of those have been posted, I'll put up the final chapter of Two Vampires and a Mental Patient. It's hard to think of having just 5 or 6 updates left to being "fiberkitty," and I'm thankful for all the readers who have stuck with me.