Hi one and all, another chapter as you can see! ... After much debate over the content since I had a bit of trouble deciding just HOW much I was going to spill in this chapter, and just how much I was going to leave to unfold as it happens.

Anyway, I've just gotten back from one of the nicest holidays I've been on (I feel like I'm always blah-ing about holidays on here), but a SERIOUSLY cold one at that. I'm a wimp. I don't think the temperature got lower than 1 degree celcius at night, but for a sun-and-sand girl it was a massive shock to the system! I had around 3-4 layers of clothing on a lot of the time and a pre-requisite for going to bed was 2 jumpers and 2 pairs of socks over PJ's, with an electric blanket, and cuddles and two thick quilts. It was COLD!

Thanks to the chapter 24 R&R's... Enjoy this one and have a lovely day/night - I sure will be with about 4 hours of Home & Away to catch up on and a brand new onesie is calling my name to christen it!

Chapter 25 – Free To Choose

Bella's POV

"Hi, it's Amy. I can't come to the phone at-the-mo. Leave a message and if you're lucky, I'll call you back!"

I waited expectantly for a few moments, for the tone to follow it as I balanced my phone on my shoulder. My head was slightly tilted at a weird angle to keep the phone from slipping and falling to the tiled floor, allowing both hands to apply makeup appropriately while looking at my reflection in the mirror.

Bzzz.

"Hey Amy. It's Bella. I'm not going to be able to make it into work today, but would you please be able to forward on emails or message me if anything comes up. That way I can do the rest here. Hope it doesn't put you out too much. Thanks! Bye."

I ended the call and placed the portable home phone on the vanity bench next to the makeup bottles and brushes that I was using. Taking a deep breath, I looked up to ensure my façade, my cover, was acceptable and that the makeup kept the secrets of the deeper darkness and truths that my face had bore the brunt of.

Moisturizer, concealer and then foundation… Finish the layers off with some smoky eye shadow and there you have the killer combination for applying cover-up makeup.

Killer makeup was exactly what I needed since I hadn't got any sleep last night. That factor had only accentuated the bruising and bags under my eyes, which had developed overnight. I couldn't shut an eye in fear of the locked door somehow opening and thinking about or fearing the fact that I had nowhere to keep Allie safe and away from Daniel without me being with her. I knew how angry he was with me…

I had no idea how I was going to get through tonight with him.

~24 Hours Earlier~

I was sitting on the seat at the end of the dining table, supervising Allie as she messily fed herself her usual apple-yoghurt breakfast. Really, I didn't need to be supervising her the way I was, looking up from the article I was reading on the tablet every few seconds, but it was just a matter of falling into a habit. It was something that I was used to doing since she had started eating solid foods and even now that the toddler would insistently fed herself; I still couldn't get out of the habit of watching her. I had never been one for change.

Although the early morning was quiet, there was still noise in the room. The noise coming from the television was the most obvious as Allie half-watched Iggle Piggle from her highchair…The kettle was boiling on the other side of the room… The light hum of a police car was heard in the distance… However, it was the footsteps that came closer from the hallway that caught my attention.

"Good morning" I greeted as I looked over my shoulder to Daniel who was entering the large living area; a room that was unnecessarily large for just the three of us, resembling the rest of the home.

He walked passed us, ruffling Allie's messy bed-head hair that I hadn't had a chance to brush since she had woken up while declaring how hungry she was. He continued in his path, bending down momentarily and kissing my head on his way over to the lounge that he crashed on, looking over at the TV as if the Tumbliboo's were half-interesting for a twenty-five year old guy... A very different target audience, compared to one year olds, as my own let go of her spoon with her arms outstretched with a: "Mummy!" Her vocabulary and conversation skills still had a very long way to go, but any idiot could have understood what she wanted.

Unbuckling the little girl and lifting her out of the contained chair, I placed her on the ground as she toddled over to be closer to the lounge and Daniel. This time she tried for Dan's attention that even he understood, pulling my little girl onto the lounge with him.

"What's for breakfast, Bells?" Dan questioned from the lounge, looking over in my direction as I began cleaning up the mess that Allie had made while feeding herself her own breakfast.

"I don't know. I had breakfast ages ago" I replied honestly, having had breakfast hours ago, before Allie had even woken up.

"Well, what are you making me?"

I sighed before replying. It was only a little thing. A little thing as stupid as who was making breakfast for who, but just lately it was the little things that I had been starting to take a notice of.

To rub salt in the wound, my memories just had to trigger the reminder and comparison of my former boyfriend... Saturday mornings had always been Will's weekly treat to me, even when things in our relationship had been in the process of turning pear-shaped; it had still been a little tradition between us. It was no big deal or anything, it had only ever been a little thing back then too, but he would either make me breakfast on the Saturday morning, or we would head out to a café for a cooked breakfast.

It was the little things like Daniel's bordering-on-rude demands or the little commands that I had started to notice in contrast to Will's treats or little acts of kindness. It was those small differences between the two boys, the small comparisons that were beginning to make a big difference on the way that I saw Dan, and the love that I had had for him…

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A little later, I had just put Allie down for her midday nap and was returning back out to the lounge room, planning on checking my emails and getting a bit of work done from home while I had the child-free chance… However, entering the room, I immediately felt the sinking feeling that I wasn't going to get work done for a while.

Daniel was standing in the corner of the room with one arm sitting loosely in front of his chest with his other hand holding his chin as he looked out on the urban view of the Gold Coast skyscrapers, seen from the large window near where he was standing... I could feel the tension, the heat, and not in a good way.

"Is something wrong?" I questioned with a puzzled half-smile to try and soften the mood, even though I somewhat feared the answer.

He didn't say a word, instead holding up my phone that had been hidden in the palm of his large hand. Across the room from him, I bit my lip, realizing what was coming before I could stop myself from displaying any fear. To make a stronger move of confidence, hoping to make up for my minor slip of the façade in my body language, I crossed my arms tightly in front of my arms.

"You missed a text when you were putting Allie to bed… Will, your EX-BOYFRIEND, messaged asking if you could give him some times that suits you for him to see Allie. Why would he ask that Bella? Why would he ask to see who you said you convinced him to believe was our daughter? Tell me that."

I looked over to him and I knew he knew. I knew he knew I knew. He knew that I knew that he knew.

There were no words that would stop, help or answer his questions... His questions weren't even for an honest answer; they were going to be to warrant the right for him to start yelling his head off at my lie that I had hid from him, for good reason.

"ANSWER ME BELLA!"

With a scream of anger he yelled after my failure to answer his question that he didn't need the answer to, letting go of my mobile phone and throwing it into the wall with a medley of shattering from the glass, the wall and his voice.

"Calm down…" I pleaded desperately, once again not giving him the answer that he wanted to hear. "Please Daniel. You're going to wake Allie..."

I'd expected another predictable response; another demand for the truth that he did not need. However he surprised me, instead taking a deep breath which accentuated his flaring nostrils and expanding eyes and henceforth vision as he slowly took a few steps closer to me... Our bodies neared, getting closer and closer together before he stopped on the spot.

"Tell. Me. Why" he whispered, sending the chill of shivers up my spine.

"I felt guilty, Dan! All the lies, how big what I was keeping from him, it really got to me… He has the right to know the truth and if he wants to know her, then that choice is out of our hands and it's up to him."

His face twitched and I could just sense that he was holding his anger in, thankfully, unless it was all to be released in a sudden outburst of rage. "You promised me that you wouldn't let this happen… You promised that you wouldn't let me lose her Bella! He's going to take her from me!"

"I really am sorry Daniel, but the fact is that no one - not you, not me - can do anything about Will being her father and with that comes the right for him to know about Allie. I couldn't not tell him the truth."

He rolled his eyes and edged back and forth from one unsettled foot to the other as he looked out, passed me and into the distance. "Well you did just fine not telling him for the last two years."

"That's different. I tried, but he wasn't in the picture and he refused all contact with me. You know all of this…"

"You're right" he scowled. "I do know all of this. But I also know that I told you not to tell him. And I know that you said that you wouldn't."

The harsh Daniel that I was being presented with at the moment reminded me once again of the comparison that I had made mentally, earlier today to the kinder Will…The two boys that I had compared to each other earlier this day. "Guess what? You're scared that Will's going to want to be a part of Allie's life and that he's going to push you out, but you want to know what? You're doing a pretty good job of that yourself."

"What does that mean?! WHAT THE HELL IS-THAT-SUPPOSED-TO-MEAN?!" he yelled, blasting me, which for one of the first times gave me the strength and adrenaline to stand up for myself against him in contrast to feeling weaker and belittled by my boyfriend.

"It means that until you can respect my decisions, stay away from my daughter."

However, my sudden surge of confidence and strength vanished as the fight became physical. I had no hope against him… Before I knew it and with one swift movement, my chin was clenched tightly in the palm of one of his hands, forcing me to look straight up at him; I could feel how tight his grasp on my jaw was. "You don't get the last word. Right?"

I knew that he wanted me to answer him. Part of me didn't want to answer him and give him the satisfaction, while I physically could not even answer him anyway due to his clenched force that stopped me from speaking.

"ANSWER ME!" he suddenly yelled, letting go of my chin and pushing both of his palms against my chest and collarbones with an almighty shove as he pushed me to the floor.

I knew the outburst was coming and in spite of the yelling I could hear, the pushes and hits that my body was copping physically, I had the inner peace of knowing that I had done the right thing. No number of punches or hits that Daniel threw could stop that for me paying for the lie.

For the first time in a long time, I had options, I had choices that had been borne from my first choice that I had broken out and made alone without Daniel's consent. It was going against him in the first place that had caused the realization of questioning what on earth I was doing here now.

Now, the most obvious part of our relationship, the love, was feeble at most. I loved the Daniel that I had first fallen in love with, but the monster that has only grown the last few months was not that guy. Not only did it feel like violent-Dan didn't love me, but it was blatantly obvious that he didn't even care about me if he was so quick to take his anger out on me. There was no mutual respect in our relationship either. That was one of the qualities that had brought us together… We knew and could relate to what each other had been through; we were both lonely and going through a tremendously hard time in our lives. But now, how could I respect someone I couldn't trust and how could he possibly respect someone and then treat them so badly?

Not that it was a motivator for loving Dan in the first place, but the financial-side was a perk of being with Daniel. Being a single mother with a newborn baby had been a huge stress financially when Allie was born, but within a few months of dating, Daniel had started helping out and I was more than happy to not have the pressure of finance weighing me down. However, I had a better job now and at the end of the day, and just like it was never a reason for dating Daniel, it was not going to be the end of the world if I didn't have the financial backing from him anymore.

And the final matter that Daniel had provided me with was a father figure for Allie. That was what had inspired my change of heart in the first place. The 'figure' after the word 'father' diluted the word completely. Sure, Allie was way too little to understand the lie behind her father figure that she had only translated as being a father in her young age, but that one word changed the meaning entirely. There was no figure needed when the father was in the picture… when he was the figure.

Of course, I could not completely trust the fact that Will wanted to be in her life or change his mind, but that was going to have to do for now. There was no need for Allie to have the father figure of Daniel when Will was around – there was never fully going to be a replacement for him.

I had made my choice with telling Will about Allie in the first place and now I finally realized that that wasn't the only choice I was free to make…

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"Hey Bella" Rikki answered within seconds of me making the phone call to her number.

"Hi. You busy?"

There was a mumbled groan over the line. "Uh… Yes and no. If you want me to do something, no, I'm at work, but if you're wanting to talk I can spare a few minutes."

"Work on a Saturday? Yuck. Anyway, talking's good. I'll keep it brief. I was just calling to check whether or not you're going to be home tomorrow? Like late afternoon?"

There was another noise, similar to that of the first of Rikki's. "Yeah. I've got nothing planned. Did you want to come over?"

"Yeah. I've got a really big favour to ask you…And Will… And Zane. Do you know whether or not they're going to be there too?"

"I don't know about the guys, sorry. They're not very good with talking or communicating on the plans front. I can text them if you like? Tell them not to make plans..."

I couldn't help but remember the aftermath of Will and I's last time communicated via text messages. I held out hope that it wouldn't be for much longer.

"That would be great, thanks a lot Rikki."

"Anytime, but what is this all about Bells? Is there something going on? Do you want to talk about it?"

I was tempted to just blurt it all out to my friend right there and then for advice. Was I doing the right thing? Was there some fatal flaw in my risky plan that I had overlooked? Would I be able to make it and pull it off? Instead, I simply resisted the urge, pushed it aside. "Yeah, something like that. It's okay, I'll explain everything to all of you at the one time tomorrow."

"Alright. I'll check with the boys and let you know if one of them can't make it for a life-or-death situation, and even still, you know how persuasive I can be…"

I couldn't help but laugh over the line. In spite of the pressure and stress that felt as though it was weighing my shoulders and my world down, it was nice having that little moment of relief, the joke that helped me forget for just that mere moment.

"Thanks Rikki. Anyway, I'll leave you to it. Don't work too hard."

"You know it! See you tomorrow, Bella."

"Bye", I replied to my friend, before ending the call. There was one more detail that needed to be set into action too, but just thinking about how many more loose ends needed tying was daunting… completely daunting but a momentary sigh slightly relieved some of my pent-up tension.

While my phone was out, I made one final text message and with that, my plan was set in motion and I just hoped that everyone I needed would play their role.

To: Daniel Shapiro:

Dinner date tomorrow night? Charlie's on the strip? Allie at mum n dads xo

From: Daniel Shapiro:

Sounds good. Sorry about this morning, I've got a surprise for ya to make up for it ;) xx

Now, there was no going back.

So what on earth has Bella got planned? And even more so, what has plan has Daniel got up his sleeve?

Also, you all have my apologies and warnings in advance. I am going in to next term expecting the worse. Within the next 3 months, I have 19 assignments/essays/tests/exams left and they're all worth big-mamma percents (I'm talking like 15-30% of my grade each). So, I'm going to put my all into that, not to mention shaping up more for my dream formal body, and if, IF I have time for an update, I will, but that's going to be about last priority. No promises! Worst case scenario will be early November before I'm free (I DO have one other finished chapter up my sleeve), but fingers crossed I'll get another one up before that!

Next chapter: As Bella's plans are set in motion, the other's help and loyalty is in question. Meanwhile, Will has a difficult start to bonding with Allie.