Now you hang from my lips
Like the Gardens of Babylon
With your boots beneath my bed
Forever is the sweetest con
~ Taylor Swift, cowboy like me
AGE 22
I knew better than anyone how dangerous the internet could be, how skewed the information was. There were claims about me online that couldn't be further from the truth, so I should have known to take in every word I read with caution. To not take them in at all.
Still, I found myself in bed with my computer in my lap and a dozen different tabs open to try and piece together every piece of the Cullen family puzzle. A family, as of a few hours ago, my husband was in charge of. And not in the typical patriarch kind of way.
It was something I tried to ignore most of the time, Edward's profession. For two reasons. One, I didn't like how okay I was with the fact that my husband had more illegal business ventures than legal ones. It had been easy to separate him from his work, and I knew it shouldn't have been. My moral compass was just as skewed as his at this point. The other reason I tried to never think too much about his work was because it fucking terrified me.
I saw the guns he had stashed around the house. He had spent an entire day walking me through every security measure in the place, showing me every safe and telling me every password. There was a panic room in the back of my closet.
All of those were measures he took to protect me, us, while he was Carlisle's second in command. Now, Edward was the boss. And while I had put on a smile and held his hand as he was given the position I couldn't help but picture a day where Emmett or Jasper would show up and tell me my husband was dead.
That had been my initial fear, until I got to digging shit up on the internet. He could get arrested. For so many different fucking things. Maybe another family would get brave and try to take him out. They could do unspeakable things to him to get information out of him or simply take a shot at him as he walked down the street. There was no shortage of ways he could get taken away from me forever.
With the amount of fear coursing through my veins, it was easy to hear him when he got home. He went out with Emmett and Jasper, some traditional last night of debauchery before he took over the largest crime family in the country.
He was trashed. And handsy, but I liked it. The firm hands and dirty words were more than welcome. Anytime. Especially when I needed the distraction just as much as he seemed to.
Sex only worked to distract my brain for so long. My breathing was still evening out, Edward's heart still beating a hair too fast beneath my palm when my worries flooded my mind again.
I pressed myself further into his side, unsuccessfully trying to fight off the panic that was threatening to take over.
Edward pressed a kiss to the top of my head, his arm tightening around me. "Are you okay?"
I shook my head, burying it in his shoulder and squeezing my eyes shut.
"Hey," he sighed, tugging my chin up and waiting until my eyes opened. "What is it?"
"I'm scared," I admitted, whispering the words like they were poison.
"Of me?" Edward asked cautiously.
"No," I sighed, though the fact that he asked made me frown. He had said as much earlier, that he was worried his new position would drive me away. It didn't make it any easier to hear again. Or admit my true fear. "I'm scared one day you're not going to come home."
Even in the dim light of our bedroom I could see his features soften. Sadden. He pressed a lingering kiss to my forehead. "I will always come home to you, Bella," he promised. "Always."