Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.

Beta'd by SunflowerFran!

I'm sorry this is so late, the next chapter has already been sent out to be beta'd and I'm currently writing the next, so you won't have to wait so long next time.

There had always been something comforting about the rain. Growing up in the wettest place in the continental U.S. you would think that I'd be completely tired of seeing grey clouds and buying umbrellas, but I wasn't. Even after nearly twenty years of the same weather, I still loved seeing rain-fogged mirrors, hearing it as it landed on the pavement around me and smelling the air just before it fell from the sky.

I'd always thought that there was something incredibly intimate about the rain, the way it pushed people together and forced them to spend the day indoors watching old movies and huddling together for warmth.

I'd been sitting on the plush, ivory carpet of my bedroom floor on Saturday, following the game of Truth or Dare. I was watching the rain hit my floor-to-ceiling window when my phone buzzed beside my socked feet.

I picked it up, my eyebrows pulling together at the unknown number before I opened up the text.

Are you coming tonight?

Frowning, I wracked my brain to try to remember if I'd given my phone number out recently.

Who is this?

Edward.

A tiny gasp escaped my lips and my heart picked up double time. I felt like a teenager getting her first text from a boy and I rolled my eyes at my juvenile behaviour.

How did you get my number?

Alice. Is that okay? Is it endearing that I asked her for it? Or totally creepy?

I smiled a little and bit my lip. A little bit of both. But I'm not complaining.

So, are you coming tonight?

To the party? Or? I left it open, not wanting to assume he wanted to hang out with me, although I really, really wanted him to.

Both, but mainly OR.

I blushed furiously, throwing my head back and giggling like a thirteen-year-old girl before replying. I was elated that he wanted to see me too.

Do you know what tonight's theme is? I asked because although he didn't dress up, Rosalie had told me in the past that Emmett took deep offence at every non-costumed person who came to his parties.

Nineties film characters.

I groaned. Who on earth could I possibly dress up as at such late notice?

Where does Emmett get this crap?

Pinterest. I'm not even joking.

I'm dying of laughter right now. Emmett has Pinterest AND maternity pants?

He's his own kind of unique. Are you coming tonight?

I sighed and rubbed my eyes. I wanted to go; I wanted to see him, this gorgeous, beautiful, but confusing-as-hell man. He made me feel more than I had in four years and it frightened and excited me.

And God help me, I wanted him.

If you promise not to laugh at whatever last minute costume I manage to throw together.

I promise.

I'll see you later then.

I stood up and threw my phone on my bed before making my way through our apartment to the living room where I knew Rosalie would be. She religiously spent her Saturdays watching romance movies.

She was lounged on the couch in a onesie covered in red hearts; her hair up in a messy ponytail that looked more glamorous than any hairstyle I could ever achieve on my own. She looked up from where Claire Danes and Leonardo DiCaprio were locking lips on our television.

"I need your help," I told her.

"You don't think this is a bit much?" I asked as Rosalie applied scarlet lipstick to my mouth, her perfectly arched eyebrows pulled together in concentration.

"Definitely not," she said, pulling back to admire her handy work. When I glanced in the mirror, I felt immense relief that I still looked like myself. Rose, on the other hand, had gone to great lengths to put together her flawless imitation of Cher from Clueless, right down to the knee-high socks.

I stood up, manoeuvring carefully so that I didn't hit her with my angel wings. These were left over from last Halloween when she rocked Emmett's world, with white lingerie. Paired with the white floor length gown she'd worn to her senior prom and my hair straightened and half of it pinned up, I looked very much like Baz Lurhmann's Juliet.

I didn't even want to think about the possibility of my Romeo.

"You look amazing, Bella!" Alice shouted over the music as we weaved our way through the crowd made thicker by the inability to extend the party outdoors due to the downpour.

Despite her tiny frame, the crowd moved aside as Alice made her way through to the living room, her Matrix costume garnering the unwavering attention of every science fiction fanatic in the room.

"Thank you!" I shouted back, covering the top of the red solo cup in my hand so that I didn't spill red punch everywhere. "You look amazing too; I bet Jasper is having the worst time right now."

Jasper also happened to be a science fiction fanatic. Alice threw me a sly look over her shoulder. "He's already made me promise not to take it off until after everyone has gone, if you know what I mean."

I laughed, knowing that it was absolutely true. Alice and Jasper, like Rose and Emmett, had the kind of relationship dynamic that a hopeless romantic like me envied. Unlike the stale and borderline awkward times Jacob and I would get together to hang out without having sex, they thrived together, feeding positive energy and unwavering support to one another. They loved and were loved unconditionally.

I prayed that someday I might feel that same love.

I was sandwiched between Rose and Alice on the sofa, watching Emmett and Jasper try to drink one another under the table when my phone buzzed in my pocket. Edward's name appeared on my screen and I blushed before opening the message, trying my hardest to hide the name on the screen from my nosey friends.

Where are you?

I bit my lip and contemplated my answer before typing. Downstairs.

Whatever happened to OR?

I giggled quietly and shoved my phone back into the small bag I'd brought with me before pulling myself out from between the girls, making sure I didn't hit them with my wings. "I'm going upstairs," I told them, not lingering long enough to see their expressions before I was out of the room and making my way to where I knew he was waiting.

I forced myself to take the steps leading to his door slowly, determined not to seem too . While I knew I wasn't falling for him at the moment, I also knew it was only a matter of time before I did.

He opened the door the second I lifted my hand to knock and I was momentarily dazzled into silence by the sight of his wide smile.

"Hey," he said, eyes twinkling almost mischievously.

"Hi," I replied, still slightly dazed as I entered his room. Like last week, there were open textbooks and pens covering the coffee table where he'd spent the night studying.

"I like your costume."

I turned to find him staring at me, much in the same way he had the night that we'd our almost kiss. I blushed furiously. "Thank you."

"I have to finish reading the chapter really quickly, but we can put a movie or something on after that if you want?" he asked and I was shocked, to say the least. Never in the past had he wanted to do any of those things, not even with his cousin and friends, yet now he wanted to do them with me.

"Sounds good," I managed to reply, making my way over to the couch without looking at him, well aware that my cheeks were flaming. I sat sideways on the recliner, with my legs over the arm of the chair so that I didn't crush my wings. I pulled my E-reader from my bag and opened it to the book I'd spent the better half of the morning devouring. While I loved the feel of paper between my fingers and the scent of a book as you opened it, there was no denying the ease of owning an e-reader.

I was five pages in when I forgot where I was, finding myself pulled into the world of Greek gods and Argonauts. I was up to the fifth book in the Eternal Guardians series and I found myself consuming each one quicker than the last.

I was at the point in the book where the lead characters finally gave in to rational thought and reason to be together, and as I read line after line of how they worshipped one another's bodies, I found myself rubbing my thighs together, fighting for the friction I desperately wanted.

"Bella," Edward said and I gasped as I looked up to find him standing beside the chair, looking down at me. "Are you okay? I called your name like three times."

My cheeks flamed impossibly redder and I looked down at the screen of my e-reader and turned it over. "Uh, yeah…sorry."

"What are you reading?" he asked, as his eyebrows rose.

"Nothing," I snapped back, making him smirk. He leaned down, slowly until his face hovered above mine and our lips were a breath away. My heart skipped a beat as he licked his lips, a little gasp left mine as he leaned in a little further and … took my e-reader from my hands.

"Edward!" I hissed as he laughed, making his way into the bathroom, locking the door behind him before I had the chance to stop him.

I groaned loudly, collapsing onto his bed with my head in my hands as he read the book behind the locked door.

When he came out a few minutes later, I said nothing and refused to look his way, even when he sat on the bed beside me.

"Did reading that make you wet?" he asked, his voice hoarse and I looked up from my hands so quickly that I startled us both.

"What?"

His eyes flashed and I watched as he moved from his place beside me, sliding down onto the floor in front of my feet.

"Are you wet?" he asked, his eyes trained on mine. I felt his hand on my ankle, his thumb stroking over the skin above the strap of my sandal.

"Yes," the word was a little more than a whisper as it fell from my lips.

He moved his hand higher, his fingertips leaving warm trails as he lifted my dress higher and higher up my legs and then over my thighs until it bunched around my waist. He placed a hand on each of my knees and paused, looking from the exposed tiny bow on the waistband of my white cotton panties and back up to my face.

"Will you let me?" he asked. I could hear my heart pounding, trying to leap from my chest as I looked at his hands resting on my knees and I had to force myself not to hyperventilate. In less than three minutes, Edward had turned me on more than Jacob, or any erotica ever had.

"Let you what?"

He smirked and it took my breath away. "Let me make you come."

All of the breath left my lungs at once and my lower body flooded with warmth. Slowly, he pulled my legs apart, his gaze moving down to the white cotton that I knew without looking was completely soaked with my arousal.

"Please," I whispered as his fingertips trailed higher and higher to the place I desperately needed them to be. "Touch me."

He slipped his fingers over the wet patch of cotton, pressing down on that spot. I moaned embarrassingly loud and then covered my hands with my face as he continued to rub my clit.

"Look at me, Bella," he said and I lowered my hands to meet his gaze as he tugged at my panties. I lifted my hips, our gazes never breaking as he pulled the cotton from my body, discarding them on the hardwood before moving his attention to where I was bare to him.

"I thought about this," he said quietly as he stroked his fingers up and down my wet folds. "About touching you. I never imagined you'd be bare, but I'm glad that you are. I like being able to see you. You're so fucking pretty."

I hissed as he thrust a finger into me, his eyes never leaving mine as he pushed it in and out of me before adding a second finger. He picked up the pace, harder and harder until I was a panting, shrieking mess.

"More," I begged him and he paused his movement, quirking an eyebrow at me.

"Tell me what you want, pretty girl," He ordered, moving his face closer to where his fingers were and blew, his hot breath hitting my clit in the most delicious way.

"I want you to kiss me."

"Where, pretty girl? Where do you want me to kiss you?" His voice was playful and his eyes shined brightly as they teased me.

"I want you to kiss me there. I've never … No one's ever done it to me before."

"Well, we can't have that, can we?" he asked before he lowered his mouth to that exact spot, dropping a single, tiny kiss on it before sucking it into his mouth. He began moving his fingers again, setting the pace faster than he had a minute before and then bit down gently.

I threw my head back and cried out, my eyes closed as he sped up once again and buried my hands in his hair, holding him to me. I began to feel it a second later, the familiar tingle in my lower belly that told me I was close. So, so close.

"Look at me," he growled. I met his gaze, brown locked with green as he leant down once more to capture my clit in his mouth, sucking down hard. He brought me to the brink of orgasm, and I could see it over the horizon, the white-gold glow right there before he took his fingers out of me, replacing them with his tongue.

A second later I came undone.

"Fuck!" I cried out as my muscles contracted around his tongue, which continued to thrust in and out of me. My hand buried in his hair, continued to push his face further between my legs as I rode out the most powerful orgasm of my life.

I watched as he lifted his head from me, blushing furiously as he wiped his mouth and moved to sit on the bed beside me once more. I couldn't look at him, my face flaming in both awe and embarrassment at the reaction he'd just triggered from my body.

"Look at me, Bella," he ordered, his voice soft and I turned to look at him, gnawing at my lower lip as our eyes met. I was never going to look at green the same way.

"Did you like that?" he inquired, running his fingertips over the bare skin of my arm, making me shiver.

"Yes," I admitted because I'd loved it, every single second of it. I'd never felt anything like that in my entire life, not just the pleasure, but the connection between us. He smiled widely at my answer, moving closer until his lips brushed my neck. I inhaled shakily as he dropped a small kiss on the spot beneath my ear before nibbling at my skin the tiniest bit.

"Will you let me do it again?"

Everlasting Why by suitablyironicmoniker

A student of social work & her troubled client. Longing to help him, she suspects & soon learns there is far more beneath the surface than she could have ever guessed. & perhaps her motives for helping are more complicated than she's willing to admit.