A/N: Happy weekend, and happy reading.
Thanks to Kim, Melinda and Biebs. And everyone lovely enough to fave or leave a review.
Hope you enjoy.

Hoodwinked

Chapter 9

I can't look at him again, which is really bloody frustrating. Instead, I stare up at the porch light at the swarm of Christmas beetles and flying ants as if they're more interesting than the good-looking shithead before me.

The good-looking shithead who knows exactly what's going through my head and is smirking accordingly.

"Kiss me."

"No," I immediately counter, meeting his eyes for no more than a second as mine narrow.

"Yes." His gaze shifts to what I'm staring at and his smirk broadens.

"No!" I stress. "I don't have to get used to you feeling me up because you're not going to feel me up."

He scoffs obnoxiously. "What if I do it subconsciously?"

"Restrain yourself. I'm sure it's possible even for you. Have I ever grabbed your...?" I quickly abandon it, feeling my face flush brazenly.

"My...?" he coaxes me to elaborate as a full grin momentarily supplants his self-assurance.

"Shut up—you know what I mean." I huff.

"My penis?" he mocks me, arching a cocky brow while fighting the obvious urge to laugh.

"God, you're a smartass!"

"Stop your bitching and kiss me—your old man will be here soon," he reminds me.

Yeah, my parents are due home in roughly twenty minutes. My mother warned us. Or more to the point, she warned Edward, and of course he found great amusement in it. How she got his number is anyone's guess. Though she more than likely asked him for it. Still, the moment I get hold of her phone I'm deleting it.

"Who do you think he'll kill if that happens?" I put to him, folding my arms across my chest.

"Me," he replies, shrugging an indifferent shoulder, "but it'll be you who'll get handcuffed to the bathroom sink."

I huff for the second time because he's right and he knows it. "Would you just bugger off already?"

"Well, kiss me!" He over exaggerates it.

"No," I reiterate.

"You did grab me, by the way. Or have you forgotten?" He arches that brow again, his grin returning full force.

"That was different," I point out.

"No, it wasn't—how?"

"We weren't kissing."

"Doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does!"

"Plus, you kneed me—forgotten that, as well?"

"You...you came at me too quickly!" I blurt, immediately becoming flustered.

He snorts back how he obviously wanted to reply and before I can turn around and slam the front door on him, he reaches out and grabs my hand. "I'm not going home until you kiss me."

I shove him off me. "Fine, I'll kiss you—on one condition."

He rolls his eyes. "God, here we go."

"Tell me you want to have sex with me."

"Of course I want to have sex with you," he says without hesitation, and naturally he's completely stumped me.

"...What...?"

"I'm male, aren't I?"

"What?" I repeat through clenched teeth this time. "Is that all?"

"What did you want me to say? That I'm in love with you, too?"

I open and close my mouth repeatedly and in silence while he all but laughs at me. "You...you said you're not going to make me go through with it!" I refresh his memory with a little too much desperation.

He shrugs again and shoves his hands in his pockets. "Depends how I'm feeling at the time."

"Go home."

"Kiss me."

"Bloody hell!"

"Just do it. You know you want to."

"ALICE!" I call out at the top of my lungs as Edward advances on me and clamps his hand over my mouth.

"Would you shut up?" he demands in a whisper.

"I will when you stop accosting me," I return.

"Accosting you..." he echoes, rolling his eyes and scoffing again half beneath his breath.

"Am I acting virgin? Hm?"

"You are."

"Say it."

"You think I'm an idiot?"

"You want to have sex with me—badly," I taunt him, pretty bloody naively.

"Yeah, it's been a while. I'm pretty horny," he responds casually, shrugging again.

"Fuck you!"

He laughs, sinking a hand into his pocket and pulling out his phone. "I think you owe me after this," he says, opening his Facebook and showing it to me in explanation.

You think I don't know you hacked me, you snivelling little prick? He'd written along with a screenshot of his post from this morning outing me. He'd tagged me in it. I didn't get the notice; I turned them off for my own sanity.

"Owe you!" I repeat in disbelief. "Did you forget it was you who wrote it? —and buck-toothed?" I shove him, instantly recalling my offense to it. "That was shitty."

"It was, but you pissed me off," he says as if that's somehow justification. "Stop stalling!"

"What?"

"You said you'll kiss me if I admit I want to have sex with you. I did, so pucker up, buttercup."

He's rendered me speechless again, and you'd think after this many times I'd see the error in arguing with him. This of course, only causes that immensely annoying grin of his to broaden, as he curls his arms around my waist and draws me to him.

"You wanted me to say something else, didn't you...?" he teases me, the tone of his voice dropping me as he dips his face closer to mine.

"No," I say defiantly, but I'm acting petulantly and too defensively. We both know it. "Okay, just bloody get on with it," I concede with a sigh.

He doesn't hesitate, and last thing I see is that smile of his before I close my eyes and feel the sensation of his lips closing over mine. While his mouth is slightly parted, it's only brief. It's the last thing I'm expecting, but still, I'm as equally gobsmacked as if he kissed me like he did at the cinema. Or this afternoon in the treehouse when he'd taken a handful of my boob.

Maybe if Mike had ever kissed me like this, I'd be more immune, I decide to rationalise while staring up at him, knowing I'm just as dazed as I am turned bloody on.

"You're a shithead!" I blurt out of nowhere in an obvious attempt at diversion, and like an utter lunatic.

"I know..." he replies complete with a charming bloody smile this time, before he flicks me in the forehead. "Get inside before your old man kills me."

"Bye!" I snap like a child, and in reply, he blatantly snorts.

"Bye!" he imitates me. "See you tomorrow, booger."

"See ya, asshole," I mutter, deciding not to react, and turning my back on him I trudge back inside.

. . .

"So...?" My mother asks expectantly exactly half a second after cracking open my bedroom door and poking her head inside.

I sigh very deliberately and only half beneath my breath. "So?" I know what she's hinting at. How could I not?

"Did you...?" she steps inside my room, her entire face animated.

"No," I say simply, staring down at my phone; at Edward's Facebook post more specifically and the conclusions everyone's coming to about his "hacking" incident.

Mike is quite clearly the scapegoat, and Edward is vowing revenge. I'm beginning to think he planned this from the beginning. He's that cagey.

"What?" My mother sounds aghast; though, it's in the same context as if I'd just told her I drank drain cleaner. "What happened?" her tone softens and she sits herself beside me.

"Nothing..." I mumble, my eyes steeled to my phone.

"Did you have a fight?" she continues to probe, treading lightly around me, as I laugh dryly.

"When are we not fighting?" I mutter more or less to myself.

"It just means you have great chemistry, sweetie," she adds continuing to play devil's bloody advocate, before wrapping her arm around my shoulder and squeezing me with entirely too much enthusiasm.

I sigh again for her benefit this time. "Can you not text him for now on?" I change the subject.

"He gave me his number," she replies in her defence, as I immediately quirk a dubious brow.

"He did?"

"Okay...well, I asked for it," she admits, waving her palm offhandedly.

"Mum..." I complain, but I'm not the least bit surprised. "You do realise the more you pry into our relationship the further back you're setting us?"

"Honey..."

"I don't need a third wheel in this. He's hard enough to deal with as it is!" I snap, giving my frustration free rein for a moment, but it's not exactly my mother who's the cause of it; it's the good-looking shithead next door. The good-looking shithead who is beginning to get under my skin in ways I never expected.

"He's not a schoolboy, sweetie, so of course he's going to be harder to deal with. I'm always here if you need me," she says with a lot more tact in her tone and I suddenly feel terrible.

"I'm sorry to take this out on you, it's just..." I have no idea what it is, and that's the whole problem. I let it go, and it's best I don't give my mother any more details than she already has.

"Would you like a B12 tablet?" she offers, squeezing my shoulders again with affection this time, while I internalise my agony.

"Sure."

My mother returns with a mug of herbal tea—which I have little doubt is laced with some kind of aphrodisiac—and two vitamins, and after feigning a sudden bout of exhaustion, I allow her to tuck me in bed. My parents' date night does not end when they return home, and it's better for my overall psychological wellbeing that I'm not in any way privy to it.

Five minutes later, however, Alice texts me. Can you sneak out?

Why? I reply with an inward groan.

When the cat's away... She deliberately alludes, before her explanation arrives a few seconds later. Edward cracked the lock on Dad's liquor cabinet.

No. Is my very definitive answer.

Why? She replies complete with several sad-face emoji's.

I have no desire to be around your brother when he's drunk. Being stoned with him was enough for one day.

Come on, Bells! If it's just me, him and Jas it'll be awkward. Besides, Jas has no idea you and Edward are only pretending. I want to see if you two can pass around him.

Why isn't Edward asking me this? I reply for want of a refusal that she'll accept.

He said you'll more than likely agree if I ask. She answers, and of course he did. The shithead is just as crafty as he is good looking. Please come? She adds when I don't immediately reply.

Fine. I give in knowing Edward will more than likely legally break into the house to get me if I don't come willingly. Now that he's an official key-holder.

"Ugh..." I grumble as I begrudgingly pull myself from beneath my covers and switch on my bedside lamp. After yanking on the same clothes I wore today, I tiptoe out of my room and into the darkened hall.

My parents have obviously taken Date Night Part Two into their bedroom, and with that knowledge I creep into the family room and escape out the back sliding door.

Edward's waiting for me just outside; he jumps out at me from behind my mother's frangipani tree and almost gives me a stroke.

"I'm trying not to alert my parents, you idiot!" I hiss, after he releases his palm from over my mouth; I'd almost shrieked down the entire neighbourhood.

"Who'd you think it was?" he replies in a whisper, wrapping his arm around my shoulders and leading me in the direction of his house.

"You need to give me warning!" I insist as he smirks; something that's obvious even in the moonlight.

"We tried that already. I didn't go down well—for me. Remember?"

I only sigh but don't reply.

Edward hops the fence between our houses and then helps me over. We enter his house through the patio sliding door, the same way I'd escaped mine, and into the family room. Alice and Jas are holding up on one of the sofas that sits away from us, getting pretty heavy and heated with each other. In the hand he has around Alice's shoulders, Jas is clutching what looks like a bottle of vodka, while his other is cupped to Alice's breast.

Immediately uncomfortable, I look away and straight into Edward's gaze. He looks repulsed, and as he walks past the two of them, he slaps Jas in the back of the head, sending him lunging forward.

"Jesus!" Jas exclaims, releasing Alice's breast to rub the place Edward had just assailed him. "What d'ya do that for?"

"If you spill that bottle, I'll rip your dick off!" Is Edward's typical reply before he adds. "And stop feeling up my bloody sister in front of me!"

"Get real, Edward!" Alice snaps, but from the looks of her she's embarrassed more than anything. "How many times have I been forced to witness you put your grubby little hands all over your latest fling?"

Edward scoffs as if it's completely ridiculous, while I almost automatically tense. I have no idea why, though, and I don't really want to analyse it.

"Hey, Bells," Alice greets me as if only just noticing my presence.

"Hey," I reply, my voice stiff, and whether Edward notices I have no idea. Curving his elbow around my neck, he yanks me to him and pulls me toward the kitchen. "Edward!" I protest, attempting to shove off him.

He releases me casually and picks up the bottle of Tequila sitting on the kitchen island. "Want a drink?" he offers, pouring himself a shot.

"No."

"Sure?" he adds simply, throwing the glass back and drinking its contents in one go. He clears his voice roughly, tilting his head against it.

"I haven't really drank before," I confess in a quiet voice. "I'd probably get sick."

"Yeah," he muses, turning to face me with a shrewd grin. "Didn't your oldies serve punch at your eighteenth birthday party?" He snorts beneath his breath and pours himself a second shot.

"That you spiked!" I remind him, nudging him.

"That wasn't me!" He feigns innocence, but I only tsk not even remotely convinced.

In truth, it's best I don't drink. It would more than likely only exacerbate this attraction—or whatever the hell it is—I have for him that is completely blindsiding me.

"Besides, I don't trust that you won't take advantage of me," I add after a pause.

He rolls his eyes, but doesn't appear too offended. "So, we're back to you thinking I'm going to roofie you again."

"Look what happened in the tree house!" I point out a little too sharply as Edward places his index finger to his lips in emphasis. "Well?" I stress my point, ignoring him.

He snorts, completely at my expense this time. "You weren't exactly removed from your faculties, booger."

"Synonyms are out, too!" I insist, refusing to let him get around his banned insults.

"What?" he asks blankly.

It's me who scoffs this time, as he once more curves his arm around my neck; gentler this time.

"If you can't trust me, how are you going to give me your virginity?" he murmurs against my ear.

"I do trust you," I'm forced to begrudgingly admit.

"Of course you do. You're in love with me."

"Can you just stop?" I sigh.

He chuckles, all too sure of himself, and once again leans closer to me. "If we're going to pass in front of midget's boyfriend, we're going to have to act like they are."

I elbow him away from me. "I wouldn't hold your breath."

He laughs easily, then picks up the recently filled shot glass and downs it. "Sure you don't want a drink?" he extends the offer.

"I'm sure."

"You want a Coke then? Pepsi?"

"Yeah."

After pulling open the refrigerator and grabbing a diet coke from inside, he passes it to me and wraps his arm around my shoulders.

"My room, or do you want to hang with midget?" he puts to me.

"We'll stay with Alice," I say wryly, because it's not as if his motives aren't really obvious.

"I'm not feeling you up in front of my sister," he immediately objects like the shithead he is.

"Stop it!" I burst, almost completely exasperated, but I'm not angry. It's becoming almost impossible to get angry at him; which is a real bloody worry.

He only breaks into a grin and pulls me back in the family room. I lay my phone on the coffee table and sit on the sofa opposite Jas and Alice as Edward flops beside me.

At that exact moment my phone lights up with a message, as Mike's name flashes on the screen.

"What does that piece of shit want!?" Edward demands, his voice all but turning to a growl, while curious—and a little annoyed—I click it open.

I had nothing to do with hacking your boyfriend's Facebook, so tell him to get off my back!

I barely get the chance to read it when Edward suddenly snatches it from me and starts typing out a reply.

"Edward!" I protest, attempting to grab it back but he jerks it away from me, and only after he's finished, does he hand it to me.

I haven't begun to get on your back yet, you weak-ass cunt, and if you ever contact Bella again, I'll fucking kill you. You got that? He replied.

"What...?" I begin, but abandon it in sheer bewilderment at his sudden hostility.

"If he's got a fucking problem, he should bring it to me!" he fumes.

I arch a brow subtly letting him know that this whole Facebook debacle was his doing, and in reply he only huffs sharply through his nose and clenches his jaw.

"What did he say?" Alice speaks up, obviously as curious by her brother's behaviour as I am.

"Nothing!" Edward mutters, his voice hard.

"Edward," I turn to him and whisper. "Calm down."

"I'm fine," he states darkly.

"Okay, we need a chiller," Alice says, and getting up she switches on the stereo system in the corner of the room; romantic music immediately starts streaming from it.

"You calm?" I ask Edward, grabbing his hand and squeezing, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned about him. It's rare to see him this angry, and I don't like it.

"Yeah," he replies, expelling the air from his lungs as his eyes break from mine.

"What did he do to you, Mate?" Jas breaks in, because that's what it would appear like from an outside observer; that something went down between them. Something other than me.

Edward glances at him momentarily and shrugs, then pulling himself abruptly from the sofa he disappears into the kitchen; to get more alcohol, I assume.

Jas smiles at me; I return it with the same amount of discomfort.

"What happened, Bells?" Alice asks, dropping her voice covertly.

I open my mouth to reply, but shut it again, shaking my head. The truth is I have no idea.

"Do you want a drink, Bella?" Jas offers, as some kind of icebreaker I can only conclude, and to hell with it.

"Yeah," I concede.

Jumping up, he grabs a clean glass and fills it roughly an inch high from the bottle he's been drinking straight from. "There you go." He hands it to me.

"Thanks," I mutter.

"Bottoms up," he says, raising the bottle to his lips again.

Leaning his head back, he takes a large gulp while I empty the contents of the glass into my mouth and swallow simultaneously.

I've just set my throat on fire, and after several minutes of coughing and spluttering, Edward returns to the room.

"What happened?" he asks puzzled, taking the seat beside me again.

"Vodka...nothing..." I utter through my still burning vocal cords.

He almost smirks, but says nothing.

"Are you alright?" I ask softly after I've recovered my voice, and this time he does smile, but it's awkward.

"Yeah," he answers, tilting his head toward me, and the storm brewing behind his eyes has definitely calmed. "Sorry."

"It's okay," I assure him.

He smiles; though, it takes a good twenty minutes before the tension completely leaves him and he's back to his old self, while I begin to feel surprisingly relaxed. So relaxed I really just want to lay against him and close my eyes; something I eventually do. He doesn't appear surprised; he only wraps his arm around me and tugs me closer.

Opposite us on an identical sofa, Alice and Jas slide up to each other and begin to get inappropriately intimate; considering they're in company. Ironically, I'm glad for the distraction, but it means I have no option but to centre all my focus on Edward.

"Doesn't that bother you?" I whisper in his ear.

"If your oldies started getting their rocks off in front of you, would it bother you?" he replies dropping his head to my shoulder as if he were deliberately shielding himself, and I immediately pull the both of us to our feet.

"Okay, screw that. Let's go to your room," I immediately decide, as he lifts his head to reveal his broad grin.

"Well, alrighty!" His tone instantly brightens.

I whack him. "Get your mind out of the gutter. I'm doing it out of empathy."

"Empathy works for me." His grin widens, and in reply I release an exasperated breath; it's all I have. "Hang on." He grabs my hand and detours us into the kitchen where he grabs the half empty bottle of tequila before we hide out in his room.

"Music?" he asks, clicking Spotify open on his phone and browsing his playlists.

"Yeah," I reply, turning to gaze around his room. I don't think I've ever seen his bed made in my life, and he has clothes everywhere; dirty and clean I can only assume. In one corner he has a boxing bag suspended from the ceiling with the gloves lying haphazardly under it. Beneath his window is the same desk he's had since he was twelve with a desktop computer sitting on top of it. It's switched on; his background photo is of a blonde in a bikini, posing suggestively with breasts the size of melons. "Are you serious? You are such a Neanderthal." He glances over at me, and I motion to Miss Blonde and Busty.

He smirks. "At least I lust after real people. Not like someone I know and her weird fetish for that cross-dressing pixel boy, Cloud."

"Hey, he could kick your ass."

He snorts obnoxiously. "In what world? Besides, dudes who carry swords that big are seriously overcompensating."

"Uh, like you and that beast of yours in the garage?" I arch a pointed brow, and I actually make that smirk of his fade for a moment.

For a moment.

"You think I'm overcompensating?" His self-assurance is back and I'm pretty sure I just walked straight into it. "Compared to who, Bella?"

"Shut up," is my paltry comeback.

"Deadshit?" he continues to push me. "Did he show it to you?"

"What? No—we're not talking about this."

"You brought it up."

"You did!" My voice practically fails at his gall. "Cloud's big sword?" I remind him.

"Big sword, baggy pants..." He clears his throat deliberately. "It's pretty obvious he's not sporting much."

"He's anime!" I burst.

"Wasn't that my original point?" He gets that wicked gleam in his eyes and I completely give up.

"Oh my god..." I drop my head into my splayed palm in defeat.

He laughs and connects his phone's Bluetooth to his speaker dock; Kings of Leon start blasting from it. Turning back to me, he holds his hand out. "Would you stop talking and come here."

"Why?" I ask cynically as he rolls his eyes.

"Why do you think?" Grabbing my hand he drags me to him, then snatching the liquor bottle with his other hand he pulls us to his bed.

We fall on our backs, and suddenly awkward, I stare up at his ceiling fan.

"Sure you don't want some?" he holds out the tequila to me again after taking a swig straight from the bottle.

"No," I reply, I'm chill enough and a disconcerting amount of lust is beginning to course through my veins. I turn to him; his cheeks are turning red and his normally astute eyes are starting to glaze. "You're not going to pass out on me or anything, are you?"

He breaks into an immediate grin as muffled laughter shoots through his nose. "No." He extends an arm, and accepting it, I allow him to pull me to him. He's warm, and I'm not sure if it's the alcohol running through his system or it's just him, but I'm getting sleepy. His chest is firm but soft, and the tempo of his heart is oddly comforting.

He takes another gulp from the bottle, and then another, and pretty soon I start seeing an entirely new side of him.

Drunk Edward is sappy, and weird. Really weird. Like gentleman weird, sans all his smartass shitheadedness. He's also more hands-on, but not in a grabby way.

He starts to caress my face and thread his fingers with mine over and over, while telling me how pretty I am. My pretty eyes, pretty lips, pretty body...

"Okay, I'd appreciate this a lot more if you weren't drunk."

"I'm not drunk," he insists even as his words slur.

"All right," I humour him.

"Bella..." he mumbles, closing his eyes and releasing his breath with a long hum.

"What?"

"I like pretending you're my girlfriend," he says, behind closed eyes.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," a smirk pulls on his lips, "it's totally fucking with Lauren."

I huff but I'm not sure I have the right to be pissed off, and I force myself to rein it back. "That's good. She didn't deserve you. Who would cheat on your handsome ass? Girl has rocks in her head," I tease him, and even as I hear my own voice speak those words, I can barely believe it.

He immediately cocks open an eye and squints up at me as his lips tug further into that familiar grin of his. "See, I knew you were in love with me."

"You wish."

"Yeah," he murmurs closing his eyes again and groaning drowsily to himself. "I do..."

A/N: thanks for reading, and goodnight. I'm gonna crash. I'll give all you reviewers spoilers in the morning.
xoxo