A/N… Really quick – This site is having issues with reviews. It says you've already reviewed when you haven't, but you can log out to leave one. Just letting you know.

Okay, I'll get out of your way.

~oOo~

Chapter 29

BELLA

I gasped awake when the bed dipped, and I glanced over to see Edward sitting on the side, his shoulders hunched, but he smiled a little over his shoulder when I hugged him from behind.

"Hey," I said softly against his sharp jaw.

"Hey, sorry I woke you," Edward whispered, brushing his lips over mine awkwardly. "Love you. Go back to sleep, beautiful."

Edward was still in his dress shirt and tie, though the latter was loosened and crooked. He kicked out of his shoes and socks; it had been a late night for him, it seemed. With a five o'clock shadow on his face and his hair in disarray, he looked tired. He'd gotten it trimmed, but it was no more tamed than it had been before.

Slowly, I tugged his tie until it came undone, and once I'd pulled it off the rest of the way, I tossed it toward the chair in the corner, not bothering to see if it made it or not. His shirt buttons were next.

He chuckled a little at me, but he wasn't stopping me.

We hadn't quite moved in together, though most of his clothes were in my closet and his bathroom stuff sat next to mine in the shower. If he made it home in time, I made us dinner. If he was late, then he had lunch to take with him the next day of leftovers I'd pack up for him. It was easy, and it was comfortable.

But the best part was how he looked at me like he was right then. His love for me made his face stunning. No one had ever looked at me like that. The expression was a mixture of awe, love, and maybe a bit of fear – because he'd told me I held everything about us in my hands – but it was also heat and fire and want. And Christ, that was a heady combination on that handsome face of his.

His eyes were dark as I slipped off the bed to stand in front of him. Pushing the shirt off his strong, broad shoulders, I leaned in to kiss him lightly as he shrugged out of it. Once he was shirtless, I leaned in again to kiss the small, round scar on his shoulder.

"Baby, you have to get up in a few hours," he reminded me gently, but it was a weak argument at best.

Grinning down at him, I said, "You woke me up. Now you have to figure out how to make me tired again."

His laugh was low, soft, and oh so fucking sexy as his hands slipped beneath my shirt to find that it was all I was wearing.

"Challenge accepted," he whispered against my lips, gathering my shirt up.

We pulled away just long enough so that his big SPD T-shirt that I'd totally stolen could be removed completely. I remembered at one time thinking when Edward was petting Sid that he could make anyone purr with those hands of his; oh, I was so right.

His hands were strong yet gentle, calloused yet soothing as he slipped them up and down over my body – up my thighs, along my sides, even flat over my stomach and between my breasts. He leaned in to kiss a freckle at the top of one of those breasts, his eyes locking with mine.

"Do you want to be simply tired? Or do you want to feel me all day?" he asked, letting his tongue trail around that same freckle a little before kissing it with an open mouth. "I can do both, beautiful." His lips tickled my nipple with that declaration breathed against my skin.

I huffed a humorless laugh because I didn't have an answer for him. Sometimes, he was as deadly as he looked. Sometimes, his confidence came through unexpectedly.

He smiled against my nipple. "Both. Definitely both," he answered for me.

Wrapping an arm around me, he stood up just enough to place me in the middle of the bed.

Just to tease him, I asked, "How was your day, dear?"

His grin was glorious and sweet as he unbuckled his belt. "About to be infinitely better, beautiful," he said once he'd kicked out of his pants and crawled up my body.

When he was finally braced above me, I did some touching of my own. Edward was in fine shape. He'd been working out at the gym near the station in order to strengthen his shoulder back up, and he had toned up a bit, but he always looked good to me. Not bulky or jacked, but lithe and strong and beautiful.

Suddenly, I couldn't take it anymore. I just wanted him. Urging him closer, I wrapped everything I had around him to keep him close, to relish in his weight and that gorgeous expression on his face when he gazed down at me. With his hands on either side of his face, I pulled him in for a kiss. And it built and grew, sparked and swelled into something more; soon there were moans for more, grinding, and gasps for air when we'd pull away. When his touch skimmed across my skin and down to where I was practically throbbing, my head fell back.

"Come for me first, Bella," he coaxed breathily against my throat while his fingers brought me closer and closer to the edge.

My breath caught when I finally fell, and then there were no more words. Edward slipped slowly and deeply inside me; his face was fierce in concentration but just as lost to me as he'd been the very first time we'd made love.

I remembered the beginning of us, of truly getting to know him and his dark history. I'd thought then that I wanted to wrap him up in a warm, fluffy blanket to protect him from the world, but as he kissed me into oblivion, I realized that I was that warm, fluffy blanket of comfort for him. It was me he wanted and needed to make the bad things go away.

I felt it in his kiss, in the way his hands would hold me, and in the way he drew out pleasure when we'd make love. But I also saw it in the way he'd help with Common Ground occasionally, how he'd put my apartment back together when it had been ransacked, and how he'd say something silly-sweet just to see me laugh.

But even more, I felt it when he'd make sure I didn't work too hard, that I'd had enough sleep, or that I knew his job wasn't as important to him as I was.

He took care of me.

While I felt like I took care of everyone else, he took care of me. And that showed me his love way more than when he said the words.

It wasn't long before we fell over the precipice together, and I found myself wrapped up in strong arms with kisses pressed to my forehead. Sid hopped up, finding a spot by our feet to curl up.

"I'm sorry I woke you," Edward whispered, pressing more kisses to my head as his fingers trailed lazily over my shoulder.

"I kinda was listening out for you," I said, but my yawn gave my weariness away, because my job got me up before the sun.

"Sleep, my beautiful Bella," he whispered. "We'll talk in the morning."

~oOo~

"Is he working from here today?" Carmen asked softly as we worked the front counter.

"I don't think so. He's off, but he tends to study cases even on his day off," I explained, glancing over at the man in question.

Edward was on his laptop in the dining room. If he could, he tended to take the table in the corner along the brick wall, facing out over the rest of the room. It kept his screen from being seen by customers. Not only did he not want to scare anyone with crime scene photos, but he also needed to keep whatever case he was working on private.

"He's a handsome thing," she muttered, and I grinned her way. "But, sweet girl, he loves you, because only you can break that man's attention away from his computer."

I nodded and chuckled a little. Women of all ages surrounded him, some giving the dark, quiet man in the corner surreptitious glances, and some blatantly ogling him. He saw none of it. He rarely did. And I wondered how that was possible.

Garrett and I joked with Edward all the time. Garrett said when Edward first became his partner, every woman on the force or who worked with them in some way always knew Edward's name, and Edward himself was clueless as to who these women were. Garrett found it hilarious. Edward didn't think anything of it.

To look at the man, a girl could jump to the conclusion he was smug, charismatic, egotistical, or even a player. But he wasn't any of those things. He had charm – loads of fucking charm – but that was only for the people he knew. He had confidence in his job, but on a personal level, he could totally be awkward and nervous, which to me was utterly adorable. To those who didn't know him, he came across as cold, terse, impatient, and harsh. Honestly, he used that to counter his shyness and anxiety.

I poured him a cup of black coffee, muttering to Carmen, "Guess I'd better dash all their hopes."

She cracked up, greeting the next customer.

Once I made it to Edward's table, I set the cup of coffee down. "You looked like you needed a refill."

That slow smile spread across his face before his eyes broke away from the computer screen in front of him to meet mine. "Thanks," he said softly.

"You hungry? Or are you just here to use my Wi-Fi?" I teased him like I had the first time he'd come into Common Ground with his laptop.

He laughed. "Yeah, in a minute, baby."

Suddenly, I wondered if there was another reason he was sitting in my shop on his day off.

"Are you… Are you guarding me, Edward?"

He sighed, pulling me to the seat next to him. "Yes and no, Bella." He pointed to his screen. "Felix wanted me familiar with some of Aro's men, so he had Santiago send me profiles on the more dangerous of his employees."

He pulled up pictures of a few of them, and I said, "I don't think I've seen any of them."

"And you may not. Unlike James, Aro knows how to stay low, inconspicuous. His issues aren't with you, but they may be with me. He's been running this city for decades through backdoor deals and blackmail and lots of fucking money. The last thing he'd want is to publicly get caught threatening the innocent."

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "What does that mean for you?"

"Nothing, except finding patience. Felix worked really hard for me and Garrett to be able to close the case on James and Inferno. He'll be closing the case on Powell in the next twenty-four hours. And once he does that, Powell will be a threat to Aro."

"Oh." I grimaced at the thought.

"And Aro doesn't leave many witnesses."

"Right. Okay." I glanced at Edward's computer screen as he scrolled through more pictures and police reports of whatever Aro's men had done in the past. But then my eyes locked on to Edward's face. "Which is why Aro sold you out to Powell."

"Smart girl," he whispered, kissing my temple. "Aro fears what I may or may not know. You seem to think he's been watching me since the death of my mother, and I'm beginning to see your point. Giving the info to Powell about me, about my family… He might have been hoping that he'd remove me in the process… Just in case." He huffed a humorless laugh. "Funny thing… I don't remember him from my childhood at all. Like he was just this faceless, nameless 'businessman' from my dad's work. I didn't know him or who the fuck he was. I never put that shit together because I never bothered to read the case file." He held up a finger, smiling ruefully. "But he doesn't know that."

"Mmm, you're cute when you're being all sneaky." I leaned in to kiss his lips.

He laughed, shaking his head and gazing up at me when I stood. "So to answer your question – yes, I'm guarding you, but only in the sense of acting as a deterrent. A cop sitting in the café drinking coffee and having breakfast will keep the bullshit down, especially since we're getting closer to some dangerous people."

I kissed his wrinkled brow because he was looking at me like I'd be pissed off about that, but I wasn't. I had a feeling my dad was mixed in with some of these decisions too, and I was okay with what they decided. I didn't want anyone here to get hurt.

"Okay. Food, Edward."

He smirked, going back to his computer. "Surprise me."

"Will do," I sang on my way back to the counter, trying not to laugh at the fallen expressions of some of the women who'd been ogling him.

~oOo~

EDWARD

I parked my truck a few blocks down from a small pizza place. It was owned by one of Aro's men – Demetri Scaletta. The Volterra Kitchen was authentic Italian food, and it did okay. It was a legit business, though in the back dining room, Aro held a lot of fucking shady meetings.

The passenger-side door of my truck opened, and Jasper slipped in, closing it behind him. "He's here, and he's pretty pissed off his boy was arrested this morning. He's trying like hell to find out where Powell is being held." He grinned, letting out a light laugh. "I totally could deal again; he offered me a job. He welcomed me like a lost son, and I tucked that microphone under the table."

Smirking at that, I glanced over at him. "Okay, then get the fuck out of here. Everyone else is in place. I'm waiting on Garrett."

Jasper reached for the door but stopped, glancing my way. "You could probably get him if you went alone. I'm just saying… You go in like you're simply wanting answers to some personal shit, and he may open up."

Nodding, I sighed deeply. "Yeah, I thought that too. Garrett is merely running things as they listen. He'll give the order with Felix to come in."

Jasper nodded, hesitating again. "Look, I need you to be careful. I need you to come back to my sister, so please don't fuck up in there. If you can't get this shit done without bloodshed, then walk away. She… You're the first thing that's made her happy since we were kids, so… Just be fucking careful. For Bella, okay?"

"You have my word, Jasper."

My cell bleeped with a message from Garrett that he was in the building across from the restaurant, that Felix was already inside, and that Powell had been put into solitary for his safety for at least the next twenty-four hours. The microphone was apparently transmitting loud and clear.

Once he exited my truck, I made one phone call.

"Hey, baby," Bella answered.

"I love you," I stated simply. "I need you to know that before I go talk to Aro. I need to thank you too."

"What for?"

"For holding my hand," I said with a grin. "Just holding me together for this."

"I love you too. That's why I did it." I could hear her sweet smile in those words. "Once you stopped breaking up with me, it was pretty easy."

Chuckling low, I sighed at the ease that she brought to everything. "It was you who broke up first."

Bella's giggle was gorgeous. "Maybe."

"Mmm," I hummed, just soaking up her love for just a second. "I've got to go, baby. Jasper's part is done, and he's already out of there. Now, it's my turn."

"Promise me you'll be safe."

"I swear it, Bella," I stated firmly, because I'd rather cut off a limb than hurt her. She'd had enough hurt in her life. So had I, but somehow, we were really fucking good together. I wouldn't take that shit for granted. "I'll call you when it's done."

"Okay."

I ended the call and stepped out of my truck, locking it behind me. I took my time making my way up the street. The scent of garlic, onions, and red sauce hit me like a brick wall when I walked into The Volterra Kitchen.

I specifically didn't wear a suit. My badge wasn't on my belt, and neither was my gun. I wasn't wired, nor was my phone on. I wanted to look like this was a personal conversation I was seeking.

Scaletta was behind the counter when I stepped fully inside the restaurant. "What can I get ya?" he asked.

"Aro Volturi," I answered firmly, and when he didn't move or flinch, I held up a hand. "I know he's back there, so don't bother with bullshit. Tell him Ed Masen's son is here to see him. I'm sure he knows who the fuck I am."

Demetri studied me with narrowed eyes, and he stepped into the back dining room. He reappeared with Felix, who waved me forward.

"What, no badge, Detective?" he asked, patting me down. "And no weapon?" he asked, slipping a gun into the pocket of my jacket.

"I'm not here on police business. I just want to ask Aro a few questions."

I'd finally watched the last tape my mother had recorded. At least up to a point. She'd baited both of those men – Aro and my father. She'd made sure to put the target on herself and away from me. And she'd done it in a way that put all of it right there on film. And that camera continued to run until the battery died. It caught everything – her murder by both men, my father's rush to hide the body, and the kick by my father to Sam that was so fucking hard that his neck snapped when he landed against the wall of the bedroom – all because he'd been in the way. I'd vomited when it was all over, but I'd needed to see it firsthand.

It was all there. And honestly, I didn't have to have this conversation; the video alone was enough for a warrant for Aro's arrest, because it had been turned in by the officer who'd been there the night Elizabeth Masen's body had been discovered in the wall of the basement. Dana had turned it in as evidence properly, so really, I didn't need Aro's confession.

But I really fucking wanted him to talk to me. And almost everyone involved had made it possible.

He glanced over his shoulder. "He's clean."

Felix led me into the dining room, where Aro was sitting at a table alone. He had a plate of pasta and sauce in front of him, along with a glass of red wine. Physically, the man wasn't all that intimidating – average height, slim build, pale skin. He actually looked rather fragile, but it was his eyes that carried absolutely no fragility whatsoever. They were hard, dark, calculating.

"Edward Masen Junior," he sang with a smarmy smile on his face, gesturing to the seat across from him. "Please join me. You absolutely must try the food here. Demetri learned everything he knows in Tuscany." When I sat down, he smiled again. "What can I do for you, son?"

The word "son" made my hackles rise, but I tamped my temper down.

"You know me. You knew my parents. I just… I had questions, and I didn't realize until recently that you employed my father as your lawyer."

Aro's brow wrinkled as he picked up his wineglass to take a sip. "Ed was a fine lawyer. Not only did he work for me here in Seattle, but also for my brother, Marcus, in Chicago."

"Yeah, I know."

"You were fairly young back then. Shame what your father did to your mother," he muttered with false sincerity. "Must've been a shock for you at that age."

Keeping my expression stoic, I nodded and met his gaze. "Not really. My father was a cold, heartless bastard. He lied to and cheated on my mother. He abandoned me for a year, taking off to Chicago. I suppose it was fate or karma or some shit when he died in jail."

Aro sipped his wine again, setting the glass down. "I wasn't his only client. He worked with some not-so-legal issues. I heard it was a fellow inmate who got to him in his cell, someone he'd failed to keep out of jail."

"You mean…like Caius?" I asked innocently.

Black fire flashed in his eyes briefly, but he controlled it completely. "What do you know about my son?"

Felix shifted in the back of the room, but he and I knew that the only way to get Aro to say it all was to piss him off, to come at him with all the truth and factual evidence we had in order to make him snap. And it seemed Caius's death was still a sore subject.

"I'm a Seattle cop, Aro. It's not exactly a secret. Caius Volturi had a violent history before he beat his girlfriend to death…in front of witnesses…in a public place. He'd done small bits of time prior to that for assault, B and E, and possession with intent. He wasn't exactly a saint, but you expected the impossible from your lawyer. Didn't you?"

"I put my faith in your father, but he failed me, failed my son," Aro said gruffly. "Are you here to talk about Caius?"

"No. I'm here to talk about my mother," I answered him calmly.

"I didn't know her that well. Ed Sr. kept you two pretty secluded out there in Stillwater," he stated indifferently.

"True, but you came to my house on some sort of regular basis," I countered with a smile.

"Not really."

I chuckled. "You were there for my fourteenth birthday party. I have the picture to prove it." Out of my pocket, I pulled the picture that Dana had kept with her file, slapping it down onto the table. "You know what's funny about that picture?" I asked him as I pushed it closer his way, but I didn't give him a chance to answer. "It almost looks like my mother took that picture from that angle on purpose. Doesn't it?"

Felix fought his smile behind Aro but stayed quiet and alert. Demetri had left the room to cook in the back, so no one was able to see Felix's reaction but me. Aro narrowed his eyes at the picture. He set it down and pushed it back toward me.

"My mother was a teacher – originally. Until I came along," I said, gazing at the woman in the picture. "She quit work to raise me, and she wasn't stupid, Aro." I shook my head as I picked the photo up again. "She knew about you and Marcus. She'd tried to get away from my father, but he wouldn't let her go. He didn't want me, but he allowed her to keep me. Nice, right?

"But she wasn't stupid," I repeated, tapping the picture against my knuckles. Smiling, I decided to start like I'd told Bella. "Tell me, Aro… Have you ever read Sherlock Holmes?"

His eyes shot to mine, confusion on his face. "Yes, but it's been years."

I nodded, smiling sadly. "My mother, she loved that character. In every form, it seemed – books, TV shows, movies. It didn't matter to her. She loved that he held no special powers, that he was a flawed man, but he had amazing observation skills." I nodded again. "When I was young, she noticed my affinity for puzzles, mysteries, riddles, so she fed it. She handed me the world of Sherlock because she thought I'd appreciate the clues and shit."

Aro smirked. "Apparently, it worked, Detective."

I huffed a laugh. "Yeah, I guess."

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked.

"I'm here to ask you a question or two, Aro. About my family. I've got a few puzzle pieces of my own that aren't exactly fitting into the big fucking picture." Before he could lie and say he didn't know us or that he was just my father's client, I went on. "My first question is… How did my father get into debt with Marcus? Gambling? Prostitution? Murder? What? I know that he started working for him to pay a debt, so what was it? And trust me, nothing you tell me will shock me. He was a horrid human being, so…"

When I trailed off, Aro snorted a little. "I remember how he was with you. But to answer your question… I'm honestly not sure. You'd have to ask my brother. Back then, Chicago had a pretty big gambling ring – sports betting, underground poker, and yeah, prostitution. If I knew, I'd tell you, but I don't."

I nodded in acceptance of that answer, and I barely met Felix's gaze. He and I had discussed Marcus and a possibility of a visit to Chicago, but it hadn't moved beyond a half-assed conversation.

"I was just curious because I know he was sucked into your world somehow, but I wasn't sure what did it."

Aro grinned. "My world?"

"Cut the shit, Aro. We both know what you are. I'm not here about that. I just wanted to close the door on some things that remained a mystery in my family for too long," I snapped, rolling my eyes. "I came here without my badge, without backup, and without a weapon. Just fucking humor me, okay?" I asked him, letting the lie roll off my tongue, because I had all of those things; he just didn't know that.

Aro actually looked chastised for a brief second, but he slipped his cold mask back on quickly. "Fair enough, Edward. What would you like to know?"

"I want to know…" I said slowly, trailing off a little. "I want to know why that little piece of shit of a son was worth destroying my whole fucking family."

My statement landed harshly in the room, and Felix shifted again but stayed primed and ready behind Aro.

Before Aro could answer, I went on. "I get it. He was your son, and my father didn't do what you wanted, but what in the absolute fuck did that have to do with my mother and me?"

Aro stilled like a deer in headlights. "I don't know what you're—"

"Bullshit," I interrupted his lie. "Let me tell you another thing about my mother. She didn't trust a single one of you motherfuckers. Not one. Not your brother, not you, and definitely not my dad's side piece…your sister, Jane."

Felix squeezed his eyes closed and fought his smile over how I'd said that, but he tilted his head to wait for the answer. And I suddenly realized that Demetri had never returned from the kitchen, but it didn't matter to me at the moment.

Aro went even paler than usual, but he'd yet to answer.

"I get it. My dad was an asshole. He was cold and calculating, which made him the perfect mob lawyer. But it made him a shit father and husband. I understand that he'd been digging your boys out of trouble for decades, and he failed with Caius. One fucking failure, and suddenly, my mother and I had to pay the price. I want to know why you just didn't kill him first. It would've been done, over. We certainly wouldn't have put up much of a fuss, but you had to start shit. You gave him a choice between me or his wife."

"How—"

"I know a lot of things, Aro," I sang sarcastically. "My mother didn't trust any of you – her husband most of all. You knew he didn't give two shits about me, so you decided to make it a game. You couldn't just punish him; you had to put a target on us, too."

Aro was completely still and starting to look nervous.

I slammed a hand down on the table. "Tell me!"

There was a touch of satisfaction in seeing him jump, of seeing the cold mob boss start to sweat, and even better the shaky hand that picked up his glass and chugged the rest of the wine in it.

"Demetri!" he called, but no sounds came from the kitchen.

When no one came, I continued. "Why tell Randall Powell about me, about my family? Why put a target on my mother back then and me now?" I started to stand, my hands balling up into fists.

"Okay, okay, okay!" He held up his hands in surrender the more I loomed over him.

"Why, Aro?" I yelled, slamming a fist down onto the tabletop. Plates and glasses rattled and clinked, and the empty wineglass fell over.

"Okay, so maybe I shouldn't have involved you or your mother. Hindsight and all."

"You think, asshole? You could've just put a hit on Ed Sr. Why involve us?"

Finally, Aro snapped. "I needed him! He failed, and he needed to be punished, but I needed him to work for me. And my brother had protected him when he sent him to Seattle."

"And your punishment was for him to choose between me and his wife. And he couldn't just choose, he had to kill us himself. For what? To prove his loyalty?"

"Yes!"

I fell back down in my chair. "But it didn't exactly turn out that way, did it?" My nostrils flared with the hatred I had for the man in front of me, and I shook my head slowly as I folded my arms across my chest. "No, it didn't. It didn't turn out that way at all for you. Not only did your little plan backfire, but you were outsmarted by my mother. She played you both. She essentially threatened to out you both for what giant pieces of shit you were, and she set you up."

Aro's eyes narrowed, but that motherfucker was panicking.

And I decided to shift gears on him a bit. I set my elbows on the table. "I don't care that you had my father killed in jail. I've never shed one single fucking tear over his death. Not one. You didn't do me any favors, but I promise you, my life was better when he wasn't in it."

I rubbed my face. "However, the death of my mother…" I trailed off, shaking my head. "My father played the fucking victim to me, stating she left us. He went to all sorts of trouble to make it look like she'd just run off." I huffed a laugh. "But he didn't like me, or he didn't trust me, because he left me for a fucking year after that lie. Sometimes, I think back and wonder if he simply couldn't look at me without seeing her face, so he avoided me."

Aro didn't say anything, which was smart on his part.

"The night she died, he must've panicked," I went on, smirking a little. "I was asleep down the hall, so he had to hide her body. It took me a year to find her. He'd hidden her in his wine cellar, in the walls, and he'd taken the time to wrap her up in plastic."

I sat back again in my chair. "I've recently had her case reopened," I lied. "Yup, the officer who came the night I found her body helped me study her case file again. We found some truly interesting things once we started combing through the house. Wanna know what we found?"

"What?" His voice was barely a whisper.

Smiling, I tilted my head at him. "We found years of journals that documented the comings and goings in that house. We found photos and deeds to homes in Chicago and hundreds of hours of video tapes of meetings and phone calls. You guys did some shady shit – all planned in the study of my house. My whole house was being recorded. Every conversation you had with Ed Sr. in my house is on video, every phone call was recorded." I chuckled at him, which pissed him off. "But the absolute best fucking part? She recorded the night she died, the night she was killed by two men – my father…and you."

I stood up from the table, shrugging indifferently as he gaped up at me with wide eyes.

"And I've already handed it over to the original officer."

Garrett had to have given an order for dramatic effect, because the sounds of sirens and police echoed from the streets to the back of that tiny restaurant. Felix, though, had pulled out his badge, gun, and handcuffs, and he was walking slowly toward Aro, who sneered my way, muttering curses and threats.

I reached across the table and gripped his shirt. "The fuck did you just say?"

"I told Ed to kill you in your sleep that night, to remove all the witnesses, but he let you live."

I laughed outright. "I know, Aro. That's on tape too." I glanced behind him to Felix, because that answered the question about Powell; he'd sold my information as a precaution, to clean up an old mistake. "He's all yours, Agent."

To watch Aro realize that Felix wasn't just a regular goon, that he was a federal agent… It was almost comical.

Once Felix started in with Aro's rights, I had to get outside. My ears were ringing, and I felt flushed. I couldn't seem to catch a breath. I leaned against the wall of the restaurant, gripping my hair a bit.

Garrett came to stand in front of me. "We pulled Demetri out of there because he was readying a shotgun at the front counter, so I sent someone in to take him quietly." He jerked his chin toward a cruiser that had Demetri in the back seat.

I nodded, but I could barely see. Uncle Carlisle had diagnosed me with anxiety ages ago, so I just needed a moment to calm the fuck down. I honestly never thought I'd get any sort of closure concerning my mother's case, much less find out she'd been plotting against the damn mob. It was a bit overwhelming.

"Awesome job, Masen." He gripped my shoulder. "Do we need to call Bella?"

I shook my head. "Not yet."

We both glanced up when Aro was led out of the building in cuffs toward an armored van, because the feds weren't taking any fucking chances. When Felix walked toward us, I reached into my jacket pocket and grabbed the gun he had given me as a precaution. He grinned and took it back, stowing it in his waistband.

"Helluva job, Masen," he said, slapping my shoulder. "You'd make a good fed."

Garrett scoffed. "No fucking way. I need his ass in Homicide."

I huffed a laugh, shaking my head. "I'm good, but thanks."

Walking away from them both, I pulled out my phone. There was only one fucking voice I wanted to hear at the moment.

"You're okay," Bella stated as a greeting.

"I'm okay, beautiful." I sighed, feeling some of my stress ebb away. "And it's over."

"Us?"

"Fuck no!" I said, unable not to smile when she cracked herself up on the other end of the line. "We'll never be over."

"True that, baby… So you got him?"

"Yeah, I got him."

~oOo~

A/N… Aro Volturi, you have the right to shut the fuck up. ;) Again, this story isn't over. There are a few more things that need cleaning up.

At this point, I'm going to tell you that my posting day is shot. So you'll get a chapter, but probably not until later next week. My RL work is busy. Training someone new is tedious, and I don't always get any spare time.

There are probably two chapters left – a regular and the epi. That's give or take. We'll see. Until next time… Mooches, Deb ;)