CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

My winter holiday was in full swing. I had successfully been able to sit down and hash out some wedding details to help make my fiancé happy. I managed to slip in a meeting with the boys over at WMG about some more publicity pushes making them happy and I was able to spend more time with Savannah and Gracie making us both happy.

Matt had emailed me the artwork he had completed for my two albums and I loved it. He drew half of my face for one cover and in the background all these images having to do with day and then on the other album was the other half of my face with images of night. When you placed the two covers together you would get my full face. The Night and Day albums were complete.

Seth was able to show me the final product before we started our meeting and I had never had such a proud day. Seeing the hard copies right in my hand was what Oprah would call a full circle moment.

Seth was then ready to tell me that they had lined up several radio shows for me to debut the first single off the album. The label surprisingly decided to go with a song I wrote for the Night album entitled The Problem with Tabloids. My first interview was to take place on December sixteenth at the number one radio station in Los Angeles. That date rolled around in my head the whole drive back to the house. Why was that date important? Did I have something important to do on that date?

Maybe I should call Emma.

I walked into the house with my phone out and ready to dial.

"Good, you're back. I wanted to talk to you about Savannah's birthday." Embry stopped me. I looked up to him and then it clicked.

"December sixteenth!" I exclaimed.

Embry stepped back startled by my outburst.

"Yes…good job Bella." He said slowly like he was talking to a child. "That is a date."

"No. I…I was just at a meeting and they asked me to do a radio show to promote my single and they want me to do it on December sixteenth, the day that your album comes out."

"You're debuting your first single the day that I am debuting my single?" he asked.

"Well you were the one who wanted to push-off your single's debut until the date your album actually hit stores." I rolled my eyes. Everyone knew that usually an artist put out a single a couple weeks before their new album but Embry was hell-bent on keeping it secret until his album dropped. I can't imagine the hell he caused his label.

"So…we are going up against one another." He laughed tauntingly while rubbing his hands together evilly.

"First of all, we are not going up against each other. We all know there is no competition; you are definitely the better artist here. And second we have completely different genres. So I don't see it as competing." I remarked.

"Oh, B." he shook his head.

"So…seeing how your song is going to finally hit the airwaves maybe you can finally let me hear your single?" I asked irritated. Embry had let me listen to his whole album but left one song off the copy he gave me. He said I would have to wait along with everyone else and as conceited as it might sound I was maddened by the fact that I had to wait.

"Uh…" he pretended to think about it. "Nope."

He laughed and started to walk toward the family room.

"You are so…frustrating."

"Hey, can we not fight honey. Not in front of the kids." He joked.

"Where are the kids?" I asked looking around.

"Gracie's on a timeout. She threw a mad fit…you don't want to know." He looked exhausted just thinking about it. "And Savannah is reading out by the pool which is why I thought that now would be the perfect time to talk over her birthday. I know you and Edward were planning on getting her that video camera but I still haven't been able to come up with anything good and I really want to do something nice since all the shit I put her through."

I flopped down on the couch. "Well I happen to know something that she might love. A couple of weeks ago I was talking to her and she said she would be interested in taking riding lessons. Maybe you could give her that." I suggested.

"Awesome. Thanks." He looked relieved.

"Also I really wanted to make her birthday special since I know she must always just be an afterthought since her birthday falls on Christmas. I asked Becky to help me out with coming up with some decorations for the day…I know that a real party won't be an option since she hasn't had the chance to make many friends out here in L.A. so maybe we can give her a summer party when she has had a chance to meet some people at the school she goes to. Which reminds me, Northwest Academy has their final week of classes if we wanted to check out that school, this may be the last time we can look before all the schools go on winter break?" I suggested.

"What time did you want to go?" he asked.

"Well obviously for both of us Tuesday is out. I can do Monday." Tuesday I had to be at the radio station at seven a.m. for the interview and I was sure that Embry might have some phone interviews himself to attend to as well.

"Great." Embry got up from the couch. "uh… I needed to ask you something."

He started to pace. "Around January, February; Darren asked if I would fly out to New York with him and guest on his concert and then maybe work on helping him with his next album. He is doing a one off at Madison Square Gardens. I would only need to perform two or three songs at most. I was hoping you could watch the girls for me. It would only be for a week or two."

"Wait, you're performing? I want to go."

"Bella, please I don't want to make a big deal out of this. I don't even know how I really feel about this but I am just going to do this one show and see if I can maybe…get back to where I was a couple of years ago. I promise if I ever decide to do a concert, you'll have front row seats." He looked over to me and I could see in his eyes the doubt swimming behind them.

"Okay. Of course." I nodded slightly. "Why is Darren going out to New York to work on his album when he lives here?"

"He's working with Johnny D.; that producer who worked on his last album and Johnny D. doesn't want to come out to Cali which is completely ridiculous if you ask me. Who wants to be in New York during the winter months." He shook his head at the thought.

"Oh, okay. Uh...hey, have you seen Jacob?" I asked. When I returned from D.C. on Monday, Jacob gave me the awkward one arm hug and said a brief welcome back. We didn't have a sit down like we had discussed because the last couple of days he had been busy. I was hoping that either today or tomorrow he would pencil me in.

"Nope. Bro's been a trip." He replied.

I sighed. Yep, bro's been trippin all right and I wasn't going to keep letting him get away with it.

I stayed up extra late that evening hoping I would catch Jacob coming through the door but around two a.m., Edward pulled me off to bed with him. The next morning I went by his room and he looked like a corpse laying upon the bed still dressed in his clothes. I decided to leave him a note to meet me in my office when he finally emerged.

As I was walking down to the pool house/ office I decided to dial-up Rosalie.

"Hey woman, long time no see." She answered the phone.

"I know. I was wondering if you wouldn't mind coming by. I haven't seen you in a while and I wanted to talk to you about some things." I replied.

"Sure. I don't have a lot to do today. What time?" she asked.

"Uh…now? I have coffee." I tried to bribe her.

"See you in ten."

While I was waiting for Rosalie, I sat down at the new piano and fiddled around on it. It wasn't even ten am and I was in desperate need for some coffee but I tried holding off for Rose.

"Hey, I was pounding on your door for like five minutes. Becky let me in." Rose said crossing the yard to get to me.

"Sorry." I stopped her. "Coffee's in the main house." I pulled her along.

"So what's up." She asked.

"Well, I haven't really had time to sit down with you…alone." I replied serious. I started to pull mugs from the cupboard; pouring the coffee that Edward made that morning into each one.

"Bella, are you breaking up with me?" she joked.

I smiled and rolled my eyes. "Well, you have been a tad clingy lately. Uh…no. I wanted to ask you if you would be a bridesmaid."

"Really?" she looked surprised which I found funny since my first two maidens seemed already in the know even before me.

"Well, yeah I mean of course."

"Wow, I'm…honored." She took a sip and set it back down on the table cautiously. "Did you ask Alice?"

I sighed, "No and I wasn't planning to."

She looked down and gave a small sad smile.

"I'm sorry. Is it bad that I wasn't planning on asking Alice? Edward said she would be more upset if she thought that I asked her out of obligation. I just don't feel that close to Alice anymore."

"No. You should ask who you want. I know Alice still feels really bad for what she did. She knows that she's the cause of your friendship ending." Rose confided.

"Our friendship didn't end. I still think of her as a friend and if she ever needed me, I would be there. But yes we aren't as close anymore and part of that is due to the fact that a part of me doesn't trust her. I love her but I still feel like she would choose Tria Fata over me or us if given the option and I would never choose an organization over my friends or family. Edward knows this which is why we haven't practiced the Tria Fata beliefs."

"So you and Edward…you really aren't?" she asked.

"Well, we don't practice the punishment aspect but I can still tell that he monitors me closely to see that my safety is up to par. I can see him fight himself with certain issues. In some ways I wonder if there is more he is not telling me. Sometimes I can tell that there are cracks beneath his calm façade."

"Cracks?" she asked.

"Cracks…he panics slightly. When we were in D.C. I got out of bed briefly to get a glass of water and I called Jacob and then when I relayed to him about my nighttime conversation he seemed panicked. Like he couldn't believe that I would be able to leave his side and he wouldn't know. Weird, huh?"

"Bella, maybe you should talk to him. You know Tria Fata wasn't something he got into overnight. I'm sure he struggles more than you know with not practicing what was ingrained in him and if you really feel this way I bet there is more that he may not be telling you."

"What do you mean?" I probed.

"Just that…if he really is "monitoring" you, I imagine he may be doing it without you even knowing. Once Tria Fata, always Tria Fata."

"How is he going to monitor me other than checking in with me and making sure that I keep my nighttime activities to a minimum or at least supervised?"

"You have an iPhone, Bella. There is an app for that. He can see where you are at all times."

I sat there and thought about her words. I hadn't told anyone about Edward's behavior. I think I hadn't clued even myself in on it trying to use whatever distraction at the time to hold me off from it. But if I was honest, I knew that there were definitely more things going on with Edward then he would care for me to know.

Rosalie and I had a nice visit with one another but we both had things to do so we finally parted ways. Once more thanking me for asking her to be a bridesmaid. It was Sunday afternoon and I still hadn't heard from Jacob so I decided to go up and check on him. When I got to his room his bed was unmade and he wasn't lying in it anymore. I called out for him but nothing.

"He left." Becky said from behind me.

"Oh…where did he go?"

"He's had more filming. They really have been running him into the ground lately." She stated.

"That's odd. Why wouldn't he come and see me before he left?" I said mostly to myself.

"I think he overslept. He seemed to be in a hurry. He's over at Paramount."

I pounded on the door to Jacob's trailer; I was far past being subtle. He went out of his way to avoid me so I was going to go out of my way to track him down. Well, it wasn't hard to track him down. Becky told me he was on the Paramount lot and now I stood here in plain view of all the crew members banging down his door like some rabid ex-girlfriend.

"What?" I heard him yell from inside. Well at least I located him. I opened the door without the proper invitation and let myself in. Why did this all feel so familiar?

"Bella, geez what the hell?" he was sitting up from his bed wiping the sleep out of his eyes.

"What the hell? Dude, what the hell?" I asked. "I wanted you to come and talk to me and you just ignored my note."

"You were with Rosalie and I had to get going. I was already running late." He explained.

"You weren't avoiding me?"

"Contrary to what you may think, the whole world doesn't revolve around you, princess." He snapped.

"What is your problem? What did I do? I apologized for my remark. Why are you being such a jerk?" I demanded.

He just sat there. He shook his head slightly and stared down at the corner to the left of him.

"I'm sorry for what I said. I'm sorry that I love you but I'm not in love with you. I'm sorry that I am obviously wasting my time by coming here because I wanted to salvage our friendship. If you can't handle that Edward will always be the man in my life and that he no longer needs you to be his number two then maybe you should just move on already." I snapped.

Nothing. He just sat there like the undead.

I turned around to leave and I was about to walk out but I paused. "You know I really need you. You are my friend but it's obvious that you don't want that. Good-bye, Jake."

Walking out toward my car my fury pushing me. I couldn't believe that Jacob was being so ridiculous. Hello! I was giving him all the opportunities to go out and find a life. If we had kept up with this preposterous Tria Fata ideal of The Second, Jacob would spend the rest of his life watching from the sidelines waiting for the moment to be tagged in. I was doing him a favor for demanding that the Second idea be dismissed and let he treated me like I ruined his whole life.

In a tizzy I drove around not really knowing where I should go. I didn't want to go to Warner Bros. because knowing Edward he would try to pin the blame for Jacob's and my dysfunctional relationship on me. I ended up driving to Wilshire, parking and slamming the car door as I made my way to the shop.

"Hi, can you tell Marcus J. that Isabella Swan is here to see him." I knew I was about to catch hell. I never did call or text Marcus back after that day on The Onion talk show. I was about to have my ass handed to me.

The girl working the store picked up the telephone and called him. I wandered around looking at his new designs in the store. A couple of people were shopping about.

"Miss Swan, he said that he doesn't know of an Isabella Swan." The poor girl looked like she was in the middle of passing messages off between a quarreling mother and father. I huffed irritated and this might have been the straw to break the camel's back because I decided to take out the middle man or in this case the middle girl and push past her heading upstairs to where I knew he was working.

"Marcus!" I called out as I reached the top of the steps with my eyes probably as red as a bull.

"Are you out of your damn mind?" Marcus gasped throwing some fabric over what he was working on.

"Really? You don't know of an Isabella Swan?" I scoffed.

"Well, you never call. You never write. What was I supposed to think?" he crossed his arms and looked away.

I walked over to him and placed my hands on his arms. "Marcus, I'm sorry. I have just been crazy busy. I wasn't avoiding you…you aren't upset with me are you?"

He turned his head to look at me, "No." he replied softly. "I just wanted to express my appreciation, that's all."

"I didn't do anything." I admitted.

"Bella, my dear don't ever think that. You are a true friend." He paused and looked around awkwardly, "So do you want to see some of the designs I have been working on for that wedding dress of yours?"

"I'd love nothing more." I smiled.

Edward and I still hadn't settled on our colors although we really hadn't discussed them seriously. I had a couple of colors rolling around in my head and of course Marcus tried to poke it out of me but I told him that once I had discussed it with Edward I promised he would be the first to know.

Monday came and Embry, Savannah and Gracie and I toured the Northwest Academy School. The tour went well and I couldn't get over the little uniform. I had a feeling I was the only one who was excited for that part but in the end we all agreed to give this institution a shot. Savannah promised me once more that she would try to incorporate herself into the school but if she ever felt uncomfortable she would tell me straight away. I only hoped that she would be able to make at least one friend here. Which she did. Some may call it irony but I always thought it was something from a higher power when she managed to finally find a best friend in what also happened to be the daughter to one of Embry's biggest rivals. But we would have to fast forward a lot to get to that story.

My first radio show had my stomach in knots. Partly due to the fact that this would be my first interview since The Onion talk show and we all know how well that went. A driver was sent from the label to pick me up and deliver me to the Wilshire studios but most of my morning was thinking about how Embry's song was debuting sometime this morning and I could hardly wait. I knew if I turned on any hip hop radio station I was sure I would hear it but I wanted to wait because I wanted to hear the unedited version.

"97.5 P.O.P. FM the music you want, right now. This is Brian Creston and I am happy to introduce to the show Isabella Swan. Welcome Isabella to P.O.P FM and thank you for coming in this early morning."

"Thank you for having me." I replied.

"We are about to debut a new track off your album Night and Day but first I wanted to ask you that E.C. Crime also dropped his single today. I know you two are good friends, did you plan that?"

I laughed. "No, actually we didn't even realize it until a couple of days ago."

"A little healthy competition?"

"Well, we are completely different artists and of course there is no competition. Embry is one of the finest rappers of his time. I am honored to even know him. I have learned so much from him." I answered.

"What did you think of his single?" Brian asked.

"Uh…I actually haven't heard it yet. He was being a real butt about letting me listen to it. I heard the whole album a couple of months ago but he absolutely refused me the single which has frustrated me to no end."

"So even now with it playing across radio stations, you still haven't heard it?" he asked.

"No. I wanted to wait until I get the unedited version. Nothing irritates me more than having to listen to the edited versions of things especially with rap."

"We have the unedited version if you want to take a listen during the commercial break. How bout it? Maybe you wouldn't mind if we could make a reaction video and upload it to P.O.P FM dot com."

How did I feel about that? I always thought it was weird that people would tape themselves reacting to something they were watching or listening to but I guess I could play along. I can't imagine Embry's song causing too much of a reaction from me.

"You're on." I smiled.

"We have a trooper. But first let's talk about this single of yours."

"Yeah, I probably should or else my label might be disappointed in me for spending all my time on Embry's music and not my own." I laughed.

We spent a little time talking about the two albums coming up and the first single before the commercial break.

"Thank you for doing this, Isabella. For some reason these type of videos always get a lot of hits on our site." Brian said as the small film crew came in and set everything up.

"It's no problem and please call me Bella."

"All right we have the song all ready to pot up."

"Just make sure this isn't going out over the airwaves. I hate to see you in trouble with the F.C.C. for the first f-bomb that Embry's sure to drop." I teased.

"Don't worry we got it covered. Okay, go." Brian signaled the camera and he pressed play. The music started and Embry's single Stronger Now played. He rapped about all the things that life had thrown at him the past few years but he's stronger now. He rapped about how he overdosed but he was stronger now. And the last verse he rapped about me and how I was the reason he was stronger now.

I was listening to every word closely not wanting to miss a thing. The song kept going and with his beat and words I knew this would be an instant hit but when I heard those words he wrote about me, I couldn't hold back the tears. I tried. Good god how I tried knowing that I was supposed to remain professional but never in my life did I feel so... honored. E.C. Crime was my favorite rap artist of all time. Hell, he was my favorite artist of all time and now Embry E.C. Crime had rapped about me on his single. Honored could not truly express how I felt in that moment.

At the time I was embarrassed that I had agreed to do the reaction video and when I left the building and the driver asked me where I wanted to go I chose Warner Bros. because some part of me wanted to get to Edward. I didn't know what to say to Embry. I didn't know if WMG was going to be happy with my interview or how they would feel about the video.

I could hear my phone ringing and I saw Edward calling but I knew I was going to see him soon so I ignored the call sensing it was the best thing to do at the moment. I had a million things going through my head. Embry, who wrote something so beautiful and powerful. WMG who I had yet to hear a reaction from, what were they going to think? Jacob who still lived with us for the time being but hadn't talk to me for days and then there was Edward. Edward, who I worried, was leaving me in the dark over a few things.

The car pulled up right outside our production offices and I thanked the driver for taking me around that day. I walked up to the doors and let myself in greeting Angel along the way to Edward's office. She seemed tense. Other people were looking at me as I passed. What was going on? This couldn't be over the reaction video, could it?

I entered Edward's office, "Edward, something's seriously wrong out…" I stopped in mid sentence.

There was a woman in Edward's office dressed in a rather tight business suit and she was accompanied by two gentlemen who I immediately recognized from past events.

"Bella, these people would like to speak to you for a moment. Could you close the door?" Edward asked.

Slowly I closed the door behind me and walked over to take Edward's hand. I was suddenly very nervous. Why would the Secret Service be here in our production offices?

AN: Thank you for reading and reviewing. I am sure that some of you would have liked more Edward in this chapter but there were a lot of things that needed to happen so please bare with me. He will be back. Sorry it took longer for me to update, I was sick this week and wasn't able to go to work. I usually work on this story when I am at work so that's why the delay. Hope to get you another update in a couple of days. THANK YOU once again!