Thank you Sri, for reading this first.

Thank you Iris. She consistently goes above and beyond to get these back to me.

Bella smiled to herself when she pulled into work. Edward's new car stuck out among the minivans and aging compact cars in the library parking lot. It really was a departure from the Volvo. She grabbed her coffee and her purse and headed in, unsure of what their first day working together would bring.

He was waiting outside her office, a cup in each hand from the coffee shop down the street.

"Oh," he raised his hands slightly. "You bring it from home."

"When I've time, I start the week off really well, but I'm usually taking a quick detour by Wednesday." She opened her door and followed him in. "Is one of those meant for me?"

"Both of them actually. I didn't know if you drank tea or coffee in the morning." He put the cups down on her desk and thrust a hand in each pocket of his jacket, pulling out an assortment of milks, creams, sugars, and sweeteners. "I didn't know how you took them either..." He trailed off and put his hands back in his pockets.

"Thank you. Between you and Alice, I'll never go hungry. That's for sure."

She put her purse away and went to sit down, but Edward was still there. "Tim wants to meet with the both of us after lunch today, and Carlisle's arranged for us to meet with people at the hospital to discuss some ideas."

"About the clinic?"

He nodded. "It seems some pediatric nurses have been looking to start a mother-baby clinic-"

"Fuck me." And with that exclamation she sat at her desk.

Edward froze.

He knew her tone was just frustrated sarcasm, but her words... Oh, to fuck her.

"Are you all right?"

She had cradled her head in her hands, but when he spoke, she tilted her head up to look at him. "I'm sorry. That was really unprofessional. But seriously, I'm starting to think the universe is plotting against me." She scrubbed her hands over her face. "Thanks for last night," she whispered.

"Are things okay?" His voice was full of concern. Watching her wounded like this hurt him, too.

She looked at him and then looked away. She pressed her lips together, and he saw her head shake slightly. She took a deep breath. "I can't right now." She looked at him again. "I just... Not right now, okay?"

"Sure." He tapped his hands on her desk. He wanted to offer her an ear, if she needed one later, but didn't. He didn't know how long he could give her objective advice for. He suspected it wasn't much longer.

Tim was running late for their meeting, which meant they were now running late for the meeting at the hospital. Unfortunately, Tim still had a long list of items he wanted to go over with the pair.

"Tim, I'm sorry. We've got a meeting in ten minutes." Edward closed the folder in front of him and stood.

Bella watched him. It was intriguing to see him so confident. She would never have had the balls to end a meeting like that.

Tim looked a little shocked, too. "I'll need one of you to stay. There's a board meeting tonight, and they'd like some follow-up on some of the questions they had for you last week."

Edward looked to Bella. He didn't want to send her to the hospital given her reaction this morning, but he didn't know if she had enough information about the foundation to answer the questions from the board. "Bella? Do you want to stay here or handle the meeting at the hospital?"

"You stay here. I can meet the nurses."

"Are you sure?" He wished Tim wasn't there. He really wanted to know she was okay with this. "We could probably reschedule."

"It's fine, Edward." She made sure she held his eyes and tried her best to convey her gratitude over his concern. "Thanks."

He nodded and watched her walk out of the room… until Tim's thoughts clued him in that he was watching her a little too long.

Carlisle met Bella at the front doors and walked her to her meeting.

"No Edward today?"

"No. He had to stay behind and deal with some issues the board's raised." Her smile was a little too tight. He sensed the tension she held in her body. In the few hours he was with his family this morning, he'd heard about Emmett bringing Mike home from the bar. He wanted to talk to her, without Edward around, about the possibility of her shield being behind some of her physical changes. Today wouldn't be that day.

Despite her initial misgivings, Bella left the meeting excited. The nurses had a solid plan for their clinic. They just needed a reliable public meeting space to run it. They worked through a schedule for an eight-week trial, and Bella was on her way back to work with their first program established.

She was excited to tell Edward about the initiative, so she felt a pang of disappointment when she saw him tutoring in the conference room. She paused near the door ‒ not to watch, she told herself, but just to give him some indication that her afternoon went well. She didn't need to wait long. She expected to just give him a quick thumbs up, so she was surprised when he stood up and walked to the door.

"How'd it go?"

"Amazing! They had the whole program figured out. We'll start advertising it around town, and the first clinic will run in two weeks." She bounced with enthusiasm.

"Bella, that's great!" Caught up in their shared thrill, Edward wrapped his arms around her. She reciprocated, pressing her palms to his back and pulling him to her as much as he pulled her to him. As her head made contact with his chest, she felt his sigh move through her so that her chest heaved, too. The moment passed quickly, and they both stepped back away from each other, his joy reflected in her eyes.

Bella didn't get another chance to talk to Edward before she left for the day. The closer she got to home, the quicker her good mood evaporated. She drove by the store but didn't see the truck out front. She wondered if he had even gone in today.

She half-expected Mike to be at the door for her when she pulled in beside the truck. She was preoccupied enough at work that she hadn't put much more thought into what she was going to say to him.

She walked into a dark and silent house. "Mike?" she called into the shadows.

"I'm on the couch," he mumbled from her right.

"Mind if I turn the lights on?"

"Hold on." She heard a quiet groan. "Okay, go ahead."

She flicked the switch to find Mike prone on the couch, a pillow covering his head. "I can't drink like I used to."

"Oh, Mike." She sighed. He was in no condition to have this conversation. She turned the light back off. "I'll go get you some Gatorade. You look like shit."

The rest of the work week flew by. Edward and Bella occasionally had to meet with each other to coordinate ideas, but getting the Well-Baby Clinic underway had consumed most of her time.

She still hadn't managed to talk to Mike. Every night on the drive home, she tried to get her head around their dilemma. She was wavering on her position. She knew that she wouldn't change her mind about the baby. That was solid. But she didn't know how to stand up to Mike. She needed him to make a choice.

But she knew deep down that he'd likely choose her. And this was the source of her vacillation. Did Mike have a choice to make or did Bella? Did she want him to choose her? Did she want him to put his dreams away for her?

Friday morning, Bella pulled into work surprised to see Edward still hadn't arrived. She'd gotten used to him standing outside her door, waiting to have their brief meeting to go over their day. He didn't bring drinks on Tuesday. On Wednesday, he noticed Bella didn't have her plastic tumbler with her, and he showed up after their morning meeting with drinks in hand and pockets full again. He watched her add three milks and a sweetener to her coffee, and knew what to show up with on Thursday. Bella had made an assumption he'd be there with a caffeine greeting. She chalked her disappointment up to that and made her way to her office.

A few hours into her morning, Bella looked up just before a knock at her door. She knew who would be on the other side. "Come in!"

He was overdressed for a Friday at the library, but she didn't say anything. There was something endearing about him in a tie. He had a drink in each hand. "I don't know what time you switch to tea. I brought one of each." He was in high spirits this morning. She hadn't seen him quite this giddy since he'd come back.

"You're in a good mood." She reached for the cup that didn't have a tea bag hanging out of it. "After lunch," she said as she took the drink from him, answering when she made the switch.

"We've got a field trip this morning."

"A meeting?" She wondered why he hadn't mentioned this yesterday.

"Nope. Grab your stuff."

"Where are we going?"

"It's a surprise."

"I can't tell Tim I'm leaving because of a surprise," she laughed, grabbing her purse and standing up.

"I told him we were out for the rest of the morning; we needed to do some field work."

"I thought you said field trip."

"I told Tim work." He leaned over and whispered conspiratorially. "But we're not working."

They drove out of town and Bella started to wonder where he was taking her. It seemed like they were heading to the reserve, but she knew that couldn't be the case.

"How much longer?"

"We're nearly there."

Bella looked around. They were in the middle of nowhere. "Where are we going?"

"Do you trust me?" He knew it was a loaded question.

"I do." She knew it was, too.

"Close your eyes."

She sat in her self-imposed darkness for a few minutes more before the car slowed down and turned off the road. She resisted the urge to peek. They turned again, and the car bounced on the rough road below them before coming to a stop. "Keep them closed," he commanded. Her door opened as his shut. She was instantly hit with the tang of salt in the air and the sound of waves crashing on the shore.

She was worried. "We're at the beach? Did you cross the treaty line?"

"No, we're close, but I haven't crossed it. Give me your hand." She didn't need to reach out before she felt his fingers close around hers. "Just a couple of steps... Okay, open them up."

He was standing to the side, watching her reaction. She looked bewildered. "Whose house is this?"

"Mine."

"Yours?" Her eyes flew to his. "Yours?" she repeated.

He dangled the keys in front of her. "I just got possession this morning. Do you want to come in?"

"Of course!" She followed him toward the wooden A-frame. "What are you going to do with it?"

He misunderstood her question. "It's fully furnished, so I'll have to make some changes there. I'm still trying to decide what to do with the interior actually. But I'll leave the outside as is. I think it's got character."

"So is this a retail investment? Are you going to flip it?"

"Oh, no," he said, stopping to unlock the door. "I'm going to live here. I'm moving out on my own."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I'm well into my second century. It's probably time."

They laughed together as he opened the door. He indicated for her to go in front of him and held the door until she was through. He needed to stop himself from sweeping her off her feet and carrying her over the threshold.

"Wow! It's beautiful." She turned around in the open kitchen and dining room, taking it all in. "There's a lot of wood in here." She stopped and smiled at him.

"As I said, the inside needs some work."

"I bet Alice and Esme can't wait to get in here."

"I've already warned them off. I want to do it. Come on. I'll give you the tour."

He took her upstairs to what was currently the living room area. "Come look at the view." He called her to the window that looked out over the Pacific. They stood together, perhaps a little too closely, for a few minutes. He was the one to step away, eager to show her the rest of the place.

As they walked back down the stairs, he talked about some of his ideas for making the place feel more like his. He opened the door to the bedroom, and before he could say anything, Bella blurted out, "Oh! You've got a bed!"

"Trust you to notice that." He grinned, remembering her noticing his lack of a bed the first time he took her to his room. "The place came furnished remember?"

"Is this your love nest? Oh, my God. It's your love nest, isn't it?" she teased.

He said nothing, but rolled his eyes and shook his head at her. She took a step back toward his bed. He schooled his features. What was she doing?

"Oh, come on. Admit it." She took another step back. "You needed a getaway." She stepped back again, the back of her knee hitting the mattress. "Someplace to..." She smiled mischievously at him before turning and leaping onto his bed. "Bounce around a little." She laughed, and jumped up and down a few times. "Oh, it's squeaky. Good thing there's no one around." She giggled and bounced again.

He laughed with her. "Come on. This is not how I pictured you on my bed."

She stopped and stepped back onto the floor. "You've pictured me on your bed before?"

"Once or twice." He decided to tease her back. He made sure his voice conveyed the joking tone he wanted her to hear. It was a struggle.

"Really?" She tilted her head. She didn't sound like she was mocking him anymore.

"You're not so innocent. One of the first things you asked me was if we would be able to sleep together."

"And you said we couldn't. You stuck to that. Has something changed?" She knew it was irrational, but she felt a sudden flare of irritation. Had he turned her down all those times only to be with someone else? She thought of what Rosalie said to her in the car. If I told you he'd taken up with a beautiful, well, one of us, that wouldn't bother you? "Seriously. Is this about bringing a woman here?"

"No. That's not the intent of this place." She was jealous. He did not expect her to react like this. It inflated the spark of hope he'd held on to.

"Has there?"

"Has there what?"

"Been ladies?"

"I don't think you get to ask me that." His hope shifted into frustration. How did she still not get it?

"You pretty much know my history..."

He got stuck for a moment on the phrase 'pretty much.' Had there been more than Jacob and Mike?

"I just wondered..."

"I told you I barely left my room until recently, and you're asking me if there's been anyone since you?" All of his frustrations were starting to find their focus in this moment. After everything he'd told her, how did she not know? "I can't believe you would ask me that. You're not as observant as you used to be. Come on. We should be getting back."

He turned to leave, but Bella didn't move. She didn't even take a breath.

He didn't turn around, but he put his head down in defeat. "I'm sorry. You didn't deserve me to snap at you like that."

"No... Maybe I did. I'm sorry, too. I... Sometimes... I just default to jokes when things are too heavy." She paused, and he turned to look at her. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

He nodded. "You weren't joking at the end."

"No, I wasn't. That was..." She shook her head and then took a deep breath. "Sometimes when I'm around you, I just... I think for a minute there, I was seventeen and jealous again. I was out of line. I'm sorry."

His anger left him. He realized he wasn't the only one struggling.

Maybe Alice and Emmett were right. Maybe he did need to push a little.