Chapter 32: Invite
B POV
Edward and I had showered (separately) and dressed after round two. I was sitting on the side of the bed calling down to the main office to express check out.
"Okay thank you," I say as I set the phone back in the holder.
"Who was that?" Edward asks as he walks out of a cloud of steam wafting from the bathroom. He has one towel wrapped around his waist and he's roughing another through his hair to dry it. I lose control of my ability to speak, God he's fine. It makes me want to jump him again, but if I do we'll never get out of here and Charlie will have to bust through the door to get us out, that's one experience I can definitely live without.
"Umm," I shake the fog out of my head. "Front desk. I just checked us out."
"Oh good." He says as he tosses the hair towel aside. "In that case how about I dress and then we go to breakfast?"
"Sounds good," I nod. "Do you want me to text Alice and Rose and invite the others?"
"Sure," He strides over. "Sounds great." He leaves a kiss on my lips and saunters back to the bathroom to change into his clothes. I smile dreamily after him, collect myself quickly and track my phone down.
Twenty minutes later we're pulling into the parking lot of the local cafe. I'm singing at the top of my lungs to a song on the radio. "Let's go all the way tonight! No regrets, Just love! We can dance, until we die! You and I will be young forever! You! Make! Me! Feel like I'm living a teenage dream, the way you turn me on! I can't sleep, let's run away and don't ever look back, don't ever look back! My heart stops when you look at me! Just one touch, now baby I believe! This is real, so take a chance and don't ever look back, don't ever look back!"
Edward chuckles as he parks and turns the ignition off. "You do Katy Perry better then Katy Perry does Katy Perry."
"How many times did you just say Katy Perry? 'Cause I think you broke a record." I tease.
"Oh hush," He waves me off. "Let's go get some food, I'm starving."
"Sounds good to me." I open my door and let myself out. We reach the front of the car at the same time and automatically reach out to grab one another's hands.
"I spy with my little eye four friends who have quite a multitude of questions." I say aside to Edward. He looks at me questioningly as he holds the door open for me.
I step in and walk straight to where I had seen Jazz, Alice, Rose and Emmett sitting in the window corner horseshoe booth. As we near they break out in applause. Emmett lets out a double finger whistle and then proceeds to yell "Atta Boy!" at the top of his lungs. A blush spreads over my face as I bite my lip and attach my eyes to my shoes.
Edward grips my hand in his, I look up at him and he gives me a reassuring smile and wink and a sudden confidence fills me. I lift my chin and face them full on. I slide in next to Alice and Edward slides in next to me.
"Okay okay." He pushes his hands in an up and down motion to signify to the group to calm down. "That's enough." He leans back and wraps his arm around my shoulder.
"So spill," Rose leans over the table with interest. My eyes get wide, does she seriously think I'm going to give her the details with Edward, Emmett and Jasper sitting right here?
"Not about that, about the Tanya thing." Rose clarifies. I relax immediately and let out a breath I had been holding.
"Well," I begin. "She came in and was all sickly sweet, then she asked how my night was going. I knew it was a rouse, so I told her that it was great and that Edward was a great date, as always. Then she was all 'As good as Drake?'?" I use a valley girl accent.
"That bitch." Alice chirps from under Jasper's arm.
"It gets better," I shoot her a pointed look. "So of course I was confused, then she clarified. Apparently trying to steal my boyfriend isn't enough for her anymore, the meddling bitch got into my file at school, looked at my transfer records and saw that I was bullied at my old high school. So what does she do? She pretends to be her mother and phones down to my old high school to ask around!"
"WHAT?" Every single face even Edward's is plastered with outrage.
"Yeah, so she finds out about Drake, but I don't think she even knows half the shit she thinks she does. She just knows that Drake was the ringleader. Her reasoning was that she just connected the dots, figuring I had a history of seducing a certain type of guy. So now she's got it in her head that I seduced Drake and got what came to me and now I'm seducing Edward and she's going to be the one to make my life hell."
"PLEASE, tell me you said something." Rose whines.
"I told her to fuck off, that she had no idea what happened and something about being a jealous bitch and to go crawl back into the sink hole in hell she came from." I shrug.
"Damn," Emmett commends.
"Touché," Jasper gives me a hat tipping motion.
"Good, but what she did had to be three kinds of illegal, at least. You should report her."
"I don't know," I groan. "I want to but at the same time she could get in a lot of serious trouble."
"So?" Edward chimes from next to me. "She's so desperate to get anything against you that she's going to make a mistake sooner or later. You need to call her on it, let her know that you're not going to take her bullshit." I look up at him in a pathetically desperate way I'm sure. I never thought Tanya would resort to doing something so out there in order to keep this threat up on me but he has a point. She needs to be stopped.
"Okay," I sigh. "I don't want to tell Charlie though. I don't want my dad to know the real reason I moved up here. He can remain blissfully ignorant like my mom did. Who should I tell?"
"The principal?" Rose offers matter-of-factly.
"Oh yeah because Tanya's mom would believe that Tanya is searching through private files and posing as her in order to find dirt on me." I roll my eyes. "I could see her taking Tanya's side over mine."
"Well," Alice shrugs. "I don't think she'd do that, and besides, what other choice do you have?"
"Good point..." I mumble just as the waitress arrives to take our orders.
"So how do we go about doing this?" Emmett asks as the waitress walks off.
"We don't do anything." I point out. "I don't need you guys to throw yourselves under the bus for me. Tanya's beef is with me, I'll figure something out."
"Bella-" Jasper starts in.
"No!" I put my hand up. "I'll simply send an e-mail to the principal saying that I got a call from my old high school and that they are returning the inquiry they received from the principal from my new school. When she realizes that it wasn't her, well then she'll hopefully figure it out."
"That might work, but what you should do is just bull face tell Mrs. Denali that you're tired of Tanya fucking with you." Emmett chimes in.
"I concur." Edward raises two fingers in agreeance.
"If it gets down to it, maybe. But please, please don't get involved." I look at Edward sternly. He nods slightly and averts his eyes. I don't want to scold him in front of everyone so I just drop it.
"On another note," Alice quickly diverts the conversation. "How was your night last night?" She eyes us knowingly and suspiciously.
Edward chokes on the drink of water he had just taken and I blush and divert my eyes to the hands in my lap.
The table breaks out in giggles. "Come on now," Rose adds. "You can't keep it from us for long. We'll get it out of you eventually."
Edward takes his hand in mine and brings it up to his mouth and leaves a reassuring kiss.
"It was amazing," He says not taking his eyes from mine. "Perfect actually."
"Awww," Emmett coos. "How was it for you Bella? Of course it was great for him, it always is for the guy." I break my eye contact with Edward and turn to Emmett.
"It was exactly as Edward said it was, perfect." Alice and Rose do a little wiggle dance and Jazz and Emmett roll their eyes at each other. We break our gaze as the waitress arrives with our food.
"Bella!" I freeze at the sound of my father's voice. "How the?" I look up from my plate to see my dad walking in the front door.
"Oh, hi dad," I wave. He takes that as his cue to come over and makes his way to our table.
"Hey kids, how's it going?"
"Why don't you ask Edward and Bella?" Emmett grunts softly.
"What?" Charlie leans in closer to Emmett so that he can hear him better.
Rose elbows Emmett in the ribs and then answers for him. "Oh nothing Chief Swan, we were just talking about the dance last night and how fun it was."
"Oh good! Glad you kids had fun, uh Bella, can I talk to you for a minute?"
"Sure dad," I answer. Edward squeezes my hand in reassurance and then relinquishes me to my father.
Charlie leads me outside and over to his car. "So, your grandfather called me yesterday."
Oh shit.
"He wants to come over for dinner this week. I told him that I'd talk to you about it and get back to him. So what would you be comfortable with?"
"Dad," I sigh. "He's your father and I don't want any relationship you might be trying to maintain go down the drain over a few offhand comments he makes about me."
"That doesn't answer my question."
"Fine. He is incorrigible and difficult, but he's also my grandfather and I'd hate to miss out on any relationship we might have if he decides to get over himself. However, can I ask something?"
"Shoot." He nods.
"Would it be alright if that night Edward could join us for dinner?"
"Hmm," Charlie smoothes his mustache as he thinks it over. "I think that's allowable. I've been wanting to have dinner with the two of you for some time and it would definitely be nice to have Edward there to kind of alleviate some tension after the last dinner with your grandfather."
"Good, then I'll talk to Edward about which day works best for him."
"'Kay," Charlie agrees. "Love you kiddo, go finish your breakfast with your friends, I'm meeting Jimmy here, so I won't interrupt you." Jimmy was another deputy and one of Charlie's friends, young but good at his job.
"Thanks dad, love you too." With that I head back in and take my seat in the booth next to Edward.
"Everything okay?" Edward eyes me and says quietly so as not to interrupt the rest, who are now discussing the whole Tanya thing.
"Yeah, Charlie wants to know if you'd like to come to family dinner at my house. Before you say anything though, let me warn you that my grandfather will be there, and he's great at making people feel awkward and tense."
"I'd love to go." He smiles. "When is it?"
"I don't know I told Charlie I'd get back to him with which day works best for you."
"Well any evening after six works or the weekends."
"How about Sunday?" I ask, "That way you can come over and spend the day helping me set up and cook."
"Sounds great!" He answers and I can't help but thank God that he'll be there. At least with him at my side Grandpa's inevitable comments won't sink in as deep. After all, Edward loves me for all of my features.
E POV
This morning had been, incredible. There was no other way to describe it. Bella had woken me way too damn early, but it was definitely worth it and the look on her face as she orgasmed was, exquisite. She was so lost in the moment, all of her self doubting was gone, all of the fear, all of the constant inner dialogue that I had grown accustomed to seeing plastered across her face dissipated. I couldn't help but feel proud.
We joined the gang for breakfast and like he had some sort of 'Bella and Edward are getting intimate' radar, Charlie walks in and steals her. I was sweating bullets waiting for her to come back, I was hoping that Charlie hadn't known about what had happened last night...and this morning, but I couldn't be sure. A few agonizing minutes later she came back and invited me to dinner with her family. She seemed a little afraid for me to come to dinner but I wanted to anyway.
Bella and I stand on her doorstep, time to drop her off and let the greatest twelve hours of my life become a memory rather than an in the moment experience.
"Thank you Edward," She sighs as she pushes her body against mine, tucking her head under my chin.
"Thank you my Swan," I reiterate. "Last night was everything I wanted it to be because of you."
"Good," She pulls back and looks up at me. "But I don't want it to end. I feel like once I let you go from right here then everything is going to change."
"Nothing will change. I love you, last night just helped to strengthen and solidify that." She nods almost imperceptibly in agreeance. "Now, I'm going to go home, check in with my parents and I'll call you later okay?"
"Okay," She whispers as she pulls away farther. "Edward?"
"Yes?" I ask.
"Are you sure you want to come to dinner? If you don't that's fine, I just don't want you to feel like you're obligated to."
"No Bella," I disagree because I truly did want to get on a better page with Charlie and I hadn't gotten a chance to meet her grandfather. "I want to go, I want your family to get to know me."
"Okay," She nods her head.
"Then I'll talk to you later?" I ask.
"Absolutely," Her face breaks out in a big grin. "Love you."
"I love you too," I lean in and leave a soft kiss on her perfect lips.
"Bye," She whispers as she heads inside.
I hustle back to my car and head back to my house. I don't get thirty yards before my phone is vibrating.
"Hello?" I answer without looking to see who it is.
"Hey man, what's up?" It's Jake.
"Oh, hey! Nothing, just dropped Bella off at her house." There's no response from the other end.
"Jake?"
"Are you fucking kidding me?" He sounds surprised
"What?"
"Did you sleep with her?" Oh shit.
"Umm..." I don't know how to go about this. Should I lie and just tell him I met her for breakfast. He'd find out anyway, I'm sure. Jake is infamous for finding this kind of thing out. He's got sex radar that far outranges Charlie's.
"Don't even bother telling me you didn't. I can already tell by the way you paused that you did. How did you get away with it?"
I let out an exasperated huff. "Really Jake? You're asking me about my sex life with the girl who is like your sister?"
"Shit yeah man. I gotta know if you made her happy."
"Well she's happy, very happy. She invited me to dinner with her dad and grandpa."
"Oh you're fucked."
"Why do you say that?" I ask curiously, really hoping I don't have to kick my friends ass.
"Charles Swan is one of the most stubborn, hard-ass, insensitive jackasses I have ever met. I've met him once and I hope I don't ever again. He does nothing but complain about and belittle others."
This is an interesting and new development. If that's the case I definitely don't want Bella to be subjected to that kind of bullshit, not with all the progress she's made in her self-confidence.
"Thanks for the heads up man, but I can handle it."
"Sure, sure." Jake fires back. "Anyway, I called to ask if you were free to hang out today? I'm bored and thought I could kick your ass at some Madden."
"I'm not home right now, let me talk to my mom or dad and get back to you."
"Sounds good, text me when you find out."
"Will do," I answer and hang up the phone just as I'm pulling into my driveway. I park the car and sprint to the house.
"MOM!" I yell as soon as I get in the house.
"Jesus, I'm right here, no need to yell!" She says from the sitting room. She removes her reading glasses and sets her book down as I enter the room.
"Hi mom." I greet. "Would it be cool if Jake came over for a while? We're just going to hang here and play some Xbox 360."
"Well okay, but two things. First, how was the dance?"
"Oh, it was good," I run my hand through my hair and avert my eyes. I swear to God, mothers (like bees and sharks) can smell fear.
"Just good?" She smirks.
"It was a lot of fun. Bella looked beautiful, as always, and we had a lot of fun with everyone." I answer a bit of annoyance in my tone.
"Okay," She puts her hands up in surrender. "Fine. Now, before Jake comes over, I want you to do a couple things around the house. First I want you to pick up your room, sort your dirty laundry and empty the kitchen trash."
"Okay, thanks mom." I go to take the stairs.
"Edward..." She stops me.
"Huh?"
"Come over here and give your mother a kiss." I roll my eyes teasingly and then stride over. I kiss her on the cheek and give her the smile that she loves, the one I used to give her when I was little and did something wrong and wanted to get out of it.
"Love you son," She says.
"Love you too mom!" I call over my shoulder as I take the stairs two at a time.
It takes me fifteen minutes to finish picking my room up and sorting my laundry. I descend the stairs and head to the kitchen to take the trash out. As I'm walking out to the garage where the trash can is I hear the unmistakable whine of Jacob's VW Rabbit. I stand there, hands in my pockets as he parks and unfolds himself from behind the wheel.
"Hey E!" He greets me as he slams the door. The door springs back open and he curses. He pulls the handle up, slams the door then releases the handle. It works and he turns back to me.
"Damn thing," He mutters.
"What are you gonna do?" I shrug in a 'it-doesn't-really-matter-anyway' way.
"A first car is supposed to be like that right?" He grins.
"Speak for yourself. My baby is in amazing condition."
"Well that's what you get when your dad buys cars from rich doctors that only use them lightly for a year before they want an upgrade." He punches me in the arm as I laugh. The only new cars we had were mom's Nissan and Carlisle's Mercedes. It was really the only thing he indulged himself in, was that car. He told Alice, Emmett and I that if we didn't take care of our cars or weren't responsible with them that they were a privilege that could be revoked.
"You hungry?" I ask Jacob as we enter the mud room.
"Naw, kinda thirsty though. Got anything to drink?"
"Sure," I nod. "We have water, milk, orange juice, diet coke, mountain dew..."
"Shoot me a Dew." He answers as we walk into the kitchen.
"Two Dew's coming up." I say as I yank the fridge open and grab a couple of the green cans.
"Where is everyone?" Jacob asks.
"Mom's in the other room-"
"Hello Jacob!" She calls at my comment.
"Hello Mrs. Cullen!" Jake calls back and then laughs.
"Alice and Rose are doing some cheerleader thing and Emmett and Jazz said something about going paintballing." I shrug.
"Cool, cool." He nods. "Last one downstairs has to be second player!" He takes off toward the basement and I can't bring myself to care.
"Set it up, I'll be right down!" I call after him. I dig my phone out of my back pocket and check my messages. Nothing. I press the speed dial and bring it up to my ear.
"Hello?" She answers mildly.
"Hey you," I answer.
"Hey yourself," She answers her side of our traditional greeting.
"Just wanted to call and tell you I love you and that I'm happy about having dinner with you and your dad and grandfather next Sunday."
"Aww, that's sweet." She coos. "I love you too and you have no idea how relieved I am that you're coming."
"Good, well Jake is here. We're going to be playing some XBox for a bit, so I'll call you later. Or you can text me whenever."
"Okay," She replies. "Have fun, don't kick his butt too hard. I'll talk to you later."
"Alright, bye." I answer and wait for her response before I hang up.
"Bye Edward." She hangs up and I sigh as I press the END button.
"Edward?" Mom calls from the living room.
"Huh?" I answer as I come around the corner.
"Did I just overhear that you're going to dinner at Chief Swan's on Sunday?"
"Yeah I told Bella I'd go. Her grandfather is apparently a pill."
"Well you can't go that day."
"What? Why not?" I ask a little loudly.
"Did you forget that that's the day of your father's birthday dinner?"
"Oh crap!" I smack myself in the head. How did I forget this? He was turning 40, we had been planning his dinner for weeks. What the hell am I going to do? Bella needs me, but if I don't go to the family dinner I'd have to face the wrath of Esme and Alice.