[Disclaimer] Everything Twilight belongs to Mrs. Stephenie Meyer.

[A/N] Hi everyone, hope you're all well and haven't forgotten about my little story here. I'm back from my vacation and managed to write a few new chapters for you. Are you happy to hear that?

This chapter here is dedicated to rpattzluver4ever and Villemo79 for leaving such lovely reviews. I appreciate them a lot.

**Chapter 61**

If someone had told me just a few months ago about the direction my dull life was heading to, I had probably laughed at said person. Not only had I managed to free myself out of a loveless marriage but I had also found –or maybe I should better say – had been found by the most incredible, wonderful person on earth. And thanks to something that I couldn't see as anything less than a miracle, she loved me back.

"Hello? Earth to Bella!" 'I cringed and almost spilled the content of my coffee cup all over the table.

"You're a little bit dreamy today, aren't you?" Zafrina stated while she nibbled on the sugary donut between her fingers.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled halfheartedly.

"Don't have to be. It's quite amusing to tell the truth."

She cleared her throat before she continued.

"Well, about the wedding thing again. I'm afraid that I can't really help you with that. There is no gay marriage or registered partnership or whatever you might call it in the State of Washington."

"But we could get married in a different State, couldn't we?" I asked her while I added some cream and sugar to my coffee.

"Yes, you could. But that wouldn't change the fact that your marriage wouldn't be officially legal here in Seattle."

"Oh, I see." I mumbled, taking a sip from my coffee.

"I could set up a contract for Ali and you, if you'd want that." she suggested.

"Contracts? What for? I don't want a stupid contract. I want to get married."

Zafrina chuckled slightly and licked off a bit of the donut frosting from her fingers.

"For someone who is already divorced, you're extremely naïve."

"I'm not naïve," I croaked out, embarrassed by the cracking sound of my own voice.

"It's just that...this is so…so,"

"Unromantic," she finished cheerfully, before she took another donut and stuffed the half of it between her burgundy colored lips. I wondered how she managed to keep her figure although she was eating so much candy stuff. Probably it had to do with her being so tall.

"Look, Bella, I know that you don't want to think of it that way. But basically a wedding is nothing but a contract between two individuals."

"Ali says it's a way to show the world how much you love each other."

"Your pretty, little fiancée is even more naïve than you are, Bella. It's good that the two of you have me for stuff like that."

"What should we need a contract for anyway?"

"Well, there's the name thing…and then there's Lilly for example. And as you're planning on having more kids together, you should…,"

"How do you know about the kid's thing?" I asked her while I thought about the amount of unnecessary calories the chocolate covered donut on my plate would contain. Whatever it was, it was too much. Not that this knowledge would keep me from eating it in the end…

"The baby thing? Oh, I think that Jasmine mentioned something about that when I talked to her the last time."

"Oh, I see. The two of you are not dating or something like that, are you?" I asked her curiously. It would be good if Jasmine would start focusing on another woman.

The edged of her mouth twitched for a split second before she answered me, trying to keep her voice calm.

"No, we're not. Miss Goldstar dyke thinks that…, well it's not important. I had to call her because of the shrink that your ex-husbands lawyer hired to be around during his meetings with your daughter. She says she knows the guy from college or something like that and thinks that he only took the job because he obviously needs the money. I've done some research and it looks as if Peter Nomad has some problems with the tax authorities over in Houston."

"Zafrina, I don't care about the stupid shrink. And I don't like the idea of Edward being in the same room with Lilly. He's not quite right in his head right now."

"Yes, that's true. It's the reason, at least partly; why the judge decided that he can't meet with Lilly alone."

"I still don't like it." I stated after a few awkward moments of silence.

"And I don't want a shrink that is best buddy with Jasmine Whitlock. She hates me."

Oh Bella, please stop being so overdramatic. Jasmine doesn't hate you. Does she want to get into your fiancées bed again? Hell – yes. It must be Ali's being so tiny and delicate or something like that, that makes Jasmine go all cave-woman for her."

"She needs to move on…like now." I mumbled between greeted teeth.

"No, she doesn't."

"Zafrina, I thought that you were on my side…,"

"Calm down, Bella. This is just as if you and she are fighting over Ali like two dogs fighting over a bone. Ali is with you and even if she wouldn't. She wouldn't be with Jasmine instead. But the fact that Jasmine is in love with Ali, or thinks that she's in love with her, is going to be pretty useful, I hope."

"Useful? How can this annoying crush that she has about my fiancée…," Jeez, now I was starting to sound like a male macho asshole.

"This crush that she has about Ali is the reason why she is so willing to help us with the shrink. She's still mad at your stupid ex-husband for hurting his sister."

"Don't you think, I know that?"

"Yeah, probably, see, Bella, I really think that it will be useful for us if this Nomad keeps telling Jasmine everything that Edward mentions during his visits. Because if he's really mentally sick, I'm going to make sure that won't see Lilly ever again before her eighteen's birthday. It is way too dangerous to let the poor child get influenced by a lunatic."

I felt a shiver of fear running down my spine.

Maybe you should consider moving…

"Bella?"

"Hmm?"

"You do want Lilly to stay with Ali in case something happens to you, don't you?"

"Of course, I want that. Or well, I never really thought about that before." I didn't want to think about stuff like that –ever.

"Why are you asking?" I croaked out, my voice barely a whisper.

"For the contract, Bella; if we don't write it down in the contract it would probably mean that Lilly would have to live with your in-laws or your own parents. Do you prefer that?"

I quickly shook my head. "My father is dead." I whispered.

"I'm sorry to hear that."

I was glad that she didn't ask anything more about it. Charlie's death wasn't an easy subject for me to deal with.

"And your mother?"

I frowned.

"Renee is pretty self-absorbed. She travels a lot with her new husband. Plus she's not really into the whole being a grandma thing."

"I see, so I'm going to set up something that makes sure that Lilly is going to stay with Ali."

XXXX

I buried my face into the silky curls of her short hair and inhaled deeply through my nose to absorb as much as possible of her delicious vanilla-apple scent. My hands stroked up and down her bare forearms while she continued stirring the risotto in the pan.

"You don't have to do that, you know?"

"But I like cooking for you. Please, don't tell me that you won't eat anything again."

She put a bit of the creamy risotto on a spoon and put it to my mouth.

"Try,"

"Hmm, that's really good."

A smile flashed over her pixie-face, making her gorgeous eyes sparkle like melted caramel toffees.

"I wished you would manage to overcome these issues that you have about your weight." She told me, stroking over the roundness of my hips with her dainty fingers.

"Don't you know that I love you just the way you are? Not thinner or smarter or taller; just the way you are, because you are my Bella,"

I cupped her face between my hands and planted a soft kiss on her full lips. The tip of her tongue nudged against my lower lip until I parted my mouth a little to let her caress the inside of it.

"How much I love you." I mumbled against her lips when I finally managed to pull back.

"And I didn't mean the cooking thing,"

Nervously I cleared my throat before I spoke up again.

"I was talking about the custody thing for Lilly."

She sighed deeply and sat down on one of the kitchen chairs.

"I don't want to think about stuff like that, Bella. If you…I mean, if something happened that would take you away from me, I…I couldn't…,"

"Sshhh," I whispered and kneeled down in front of her.

"Me too, I can't lose you. I just can't. But Zafrina thinks that it's necessary to discuss these things and I'm sure she's right. I don't want Lilly to stay with Renee. I hardly survived my childhood with my crazy mother without any kind of permanent damage. And now I don't want Lilly to live with her –ever. And your parents…,"

"Are old-fashioned and stubborn, I know. But there are always Rosie and Emmett."

"Your sister will be busy enough with the twins, once they are born."

"Probably; just tell Zafrina to set up the stupid contract and I'll sign it."

I planted a kiss on her forehead and put a wisp of her dark hair behind her ear.

"I wouldn't want anyone else to be Lilly's mom than you."

"I'll never be a mom…that's impossible thanks to my crappy heart."

I placed my right hand on her chest to feel the beating underneath the thin layer of velvety skin against my fingertips.

"Stop saying stuff like that. You will have a baby. We'll have a baby."

"But it would genetically still be yours and not mine."

She twisted a wisp of my long chestnut hair around her fingers.

"Does the genetic thing matter to you?" I asked her hesitantly.

"No, yes…, well, I don't really know."

Slowly I stood up from the ground again and planted a gentle kiss on the tip of her nose.

"I'm sorry that this is so complicated for you, Ali."

"Please, stop telling me that you're sorry about it, all the time. It doesn't change the situation one tiny bit." She tried to make her voice sound calm but it almost cracked at the end.

I wrapped my arms around her neck and pulled her closer to me.

"You know how much you mean to me, don't you?" I mumbled against her collarbone.

She nodded her head.

"I love you, Bella."

I twisted the fingers of her left hand with mine, letting the metal of our engagement rings clink against each other.

"Eighteenth of October?"

"Like in the eighteenth of October that is in three weeks?"

"We can wait until spring if you preferred that. I just thought that you wanted to get married soon."

She chuckled, her laughter like usual sounding more like a crystal bell.

"The sooner, the better."

I kissed her mouth so lightly that my lips were barely touching hers, still the feeling of her sweet breathe on my lips managed to set each cell in my body on fire. My hands moved under her shirt to caress the skin on her stomach.

"No," she mumbled, wrapping her hand around my wrist.

"I thought that you liked our last…well, little adventure in the kitchen." I asked her, letting my tongue circle over the shell of her ear.

"Of course, I liked it. I liked it a lot. But I…," she seemed to hesitate for a moment before she continued.

"I want our wedding night to be special and romantic and passionate."

Her cheeks blushed into a bright crimson color when I put her dainty hand to my lips to blow a tender kiss on the back of her hand.

"You don't want to sleep with me until we're married? Seriously?"

She nodded her head and smirked.

"I don't know, if I can do that, Ali."

"Patience is a virtue." she whispered, stroking down my cheekbone with her fingertips.

"Being patient isn't really my strong point." I confessed.

"Mine too."

"Then why do you want to wait? You know how much trouble both of us have, keeping our fingers off each other."

She kissed my left cheek and chuckled slightly.

"Just look at it from this angle…once I'm your wife, you can touch me whenever you feel like it."

I pulled her closer to me and twisted my hands into her hair while her eyes never left mine.

"My beautiful, impatient fiancée, how much I long for you to me mine forever."