A/N: So most of the reviews all said something about wanting to hurt Edward last chapter. What can I say? He's dumb.
Profmom72 is a better writer than I am. Twike teaches grammar. Everwondering wrote a Mike/Jessica smut fic. I owe them all my love and affection.
Characters are not mine.
Good Enough Chapter 13
I was torn between my need to try and fix the biggest mistake of my life and self preservation. I looked from Bella's door back to my friends, and when I saw Rosalie start to lunge for me, I dove for the bathroom door and locked myself inside.
"Bella, I'm coming in," I heard Alice say in the hallway. I listened as a door opened and closed.
"Let me go! I'm going to kill him!" I heard Rosalie scream.
"Baby, no. We don't know what happened," Emmett pleaded. "Ow! Don't bite me!"
The rest of the conversation was garbled, and I didn't really care to listen anyway. I was a fool. Why did I have to ruin everything? Bella was the best thing to happen to me in a long time, and I'd probably lost her. If only I could get to her, I would make it right. I had to make it right.
A few minutes later, everything was eerily quiet. I considered sneaking out of the bathroom and trying to talk to Bella, but the look in Rosalie's eyes was the stuff nightmares were made of.
Finally, there was a knock at the bathroom door. "It's Emmett, let me in."
"Are you sure it's safe?"
"Jasper hypnotized her or did some of his weird voodoo stuff on her. She won't hurt you right now."
I slowly opened the door and let Emmett inside locking it again behind him.
"What did you do?" he asked.
"I screwed up. I kissed her." I hung my head in shame.
"Are you serious?" he asked. "Wow, I could have sworn she would have liked that."
"I think she did," I said. "It's just the whole thing was a mistake. It can't be like that with Bella. I'll hurt her. I'll change my mind. I'll make her as messed up as I am. I couldn't live with myself if I did that to her."
"Did you tell her that?" Emmett asked with a disgusted look on his face.
"Not all of it. I just said I was sorry for kissing her."
Emmett bitch slapped me across the face. "Ow!" I rubbed my cheek. "What was that for?"
"Edward, the only girl you've managed not to screw things up with for longer than three days is Alice, and she's been in a relationship since you met her. You say you're looking for the one, and from what I can see Bella IS THE ONLY ONE willing to possibly tolerate your sorry ass."
"That's just it. She does that for everyone. She gives them what they need without thinking of herself. Loving Bella would be the most selfish thing I could ever do. I would be the luckiest man in the world, and she would end up miserable."
"So you made that decision for the two of you, without even giving her a choice in the matter?" I'd never seen Emmett look so disappointed in me before.
"I don't deserve her, Emmett. She's too good." There it was – the truth. I had nothing to offer Bella and everything to gain.
"You're right, but for some reason she wants you anyway. You love her, don't you? I mean if you don't love her than by all means it's better to hurt her now than to keep playing mind games with her, but if you love her…"
"I do." I admitted it to Emmett and finally admitted it to myself. I was in love with Bella. I wanted to be the one that made her happy. I wanted to be the one to give her everything she deserved. I wanted to kiss her like that every day.
"Then you have to give her the choice. She knows you're an ass. She told me so herself."
"But what if I hurt her?" I asked. I needed Emmett to tell me I wasn't going to hurt her.
"You will," he said. That wasn't exactly what I wanted to hear. "We all hurt the people we love, but they keep on loving us. That's what it's all about my friend. Lord knows it's going to hurt when Rosalie cock blocks me for the next century after I refused to let her cut you, but I'm going to love her anyway."
"Emmett McCarty – FBI Agent slash love expert," I shook my head in amazement.
"Yeah, I don't understand why people are always surprised to find out I double majored in pre-law and English Lit. I don't know why I can't have the ability to kill a man with my bare hands and still enjoy Jane Austen."
"How am I going to get in there to talk to her?"
We both jumped when someone banged on the door. I hid behind Emmett expecting a knife wielding Rosalie to come through any second. "Open up, it's Whitlock."
I made Emmett open the door while I continued to cower behind him.
Alice shoved her way into the bathroom and kept trying to get to me to talk, but I kept running around Emmett. I was pretty sure she could be almost as lethal as Rose.
"WILL YOU STOP!" she cried. "I'm not going to hurt you."
I stopped but stood as far away as possible. I considered standing in the shower where I could close the door and put another barrier between us.
"I just have one question for you." Alice's look wasn't exactly friendly, but it didn't seem like she hated me either. "Do you love her?"
I shook my head yes.
"Then I am going to trust you to fix this. Come on, Emmett, we're going to leave them alone. I don't think Jasper can keep Rosalie calm much longer."
"Please don't hurt her any more than you already have." Alice put her hands on both of my shoulders and begged me with her eyes.
"I know, Alice, I know."
They left, and I didn't come out of the bathroom until I heard the front door close. I might be trained to use lethal force, but I was also trained to know how people might react in any given situation. Rosalie was not to be underestimated.
I walked into the hallway and put my ear on Bella's door. I could still hear her muffled sobs. I slowly turned the door knob, and what I saw broke my heart. Bella was lying diagonally across the bed with her head on one arm. Her shoulders shook as she cried.
The only thing I wanted was to be able to take away her pain, to make her smile, to know that I made her happy.
Then I had an epiphany, a paradigm shift, or maybe I just finally pulled my head out of my ass. I found my reason to get up every day. Bella's purpose in life was to make people feel better and to take away their pain. She said the happiest she'd ever been was when she was helping those people in Slovakia or wherever it was. She was happy when she made others feel good.
Over the past three days I had been secluded in a subpar living environment. My life was in danger from a wealthy sociopath who had probably paid generously to make sure I wouldn't speak. I'd sat around watching Bella study. I had waited on her, tried to make her laugh, and put her needs before my own. It had been the happiest three days of my entire life.
If Bella was put on the earth to help sick people heal, then I was put on the earth to make Bella happy. Bella was good because she loved everyone. The only good thing about me was that I loved Bella. My love for her made me good. I didn't deserve her, but I would spend the rest of my life trying to.
"Bella, please, I'm sorry. Can we talk?" I sat down next to her running my hand up and down her back.
"Go away," she cried.
"I can't. I have to talk to you, and I'm also being held here by the United States Government."
"I hope they find you and kill you," she spat without looking up. I was pretty sure she didn't mean it.
"Well lucky for you, if they fail, Rosalie knows where I'm at now."
"I hate you," she mumbled into her arm.
"I hate myself for making you cry, love." I tried to brush her hair away from her face so I could see her eyes. Suddenly she sat up. I tried not to gasp at how terrible she looked. The black smudges all over her face, red swollen cheeks, and puffy eyes were almost scary, but she was still beautiful.
"Why are you torturing me? Stop calling me love. You don't love me!"
"I was wrong Bella. I do love you. I was afraid to love you."
"No you don't! You just feel bad for making me cry. I don't need a pity date." She started to stand, and I was afraid she would run off without listening to me. I grabbed her by the shoulders and held her in front of me. She tried to push me off, but I refused to let go.
"Bella, listen to me. I've loved you since the first moment I saw you before I even went into surgery. It scares me because I know I don't deserve you. Just look at Rosalie. Things do not end well when I date. I don't want to hurt you like I've hurt other women."
"You already hurt me," she cried looking me in the eye for the first time.
"I know," I held her gaze no matter how badly I wanted to hang my head in shame. I felt my eyes moisten, but this was too important to worry about being embarrassed. "I'm so sorry. I'm selfish and arrogant, and I don't trust people. I'm not a good person, Bella, but I want to be good. More than anything I want to be good for you." I let go of my hold on her.
"You're a good person." I could tell she meant it. My chest ached. Here I was begging her to forgive me for causing her pain, and she was already concerned about my own self-loathing.
"I'm not without you. I never could be without you. Please, Bella, I need to love you," I pleaded.
"Edward, you played with my emotions. I don't know how I can trust you not to hurt me."
There was a crash of thunder outside and I could hear the rain start to hit the window. I listened to it for a few seconds and then answered honestly, "You can't."
"I just think – I don't know. We need to slow down. An hour ago you said it was a mistake to kiss me, and now you're begging me to love you. I think we both need to take some time apart to really think about what we really want."
I nodded in acceptance and looked down in shame. I'd made a mess of everything and probably just lost the only thing that mattered to me.
"Oh, screw it." She launched herself at me attacking my face with rough kisses and pushing me back onto the bed.
"Bella, wait!" She was making it very difficult to talk. "I thought you said we needed time."
"Will you just shut up and kiss me?" she groaned. I'd just promised to spend my life making her happy, so I wasn't going to argue with her.
She positioned her body on top of me with her right knee between both of mine and was careful not to hurt me as she continued her assault on my face. She was kissing, licking, moaning, and biting. Her hands were moving all over my body, and I could barely keep up. Maybe Bella wasn't such a good girl.
If I thought our first kiss was perfection, it's only because I didn't have this one to compare it to. There was heat coursing through my body, and it was too much and not enough all at the same time. I was on the verge of losing control when there was another loud clap of thunder, and then the lights went out. Bella froze. "What was that?" she asked.
"I'm sure it was just the storm," I answered.
"Oh, okay," she shrugged and started kissing me again.
"Bella," I said between kisses trying to catch my breath. "I better go check in with Yorkie and see if he needs help with the electricity." The house had a backup generator that should have come on by now. Something in the back of my mind told me to be cautious, but I ignored it and reasoned that it was just a weather related problem.
"Mmm mmm," she argued. "I need you here." She was working on my neck at that moment, and if I didn't go now, I'd never find the strength.
"Bella…" I rolled us on to our sides. "I'll be right back," I said and kissed her again. She whimpered, and I nearly gave in, but without electricity, the emergency panel wouldn't work.
I kissed her again and said, "I'll even leave my gun on for you when I come back."
She rolled all the way onto her back with her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath. "Hurry," she breathed.
That was all the encouragement I needed. I jumped up and scurried to the back of the house trying to find Yorkie. I was just about to open the backdoor and look outside, when I heard glass breaking and a blood curdling scream coming from Bella's room.
A/N Why do you think Bella's screaming? Huh. OK so can we all forgive Edward now? Daisy says I can't kill Edward at the end, but I say I can do what I want. Whose side are you on, mine or Daisy's? Most votes wins. XOXO Staceygirl.