Thanks to my team and you all for sticking around.
Edward watches as Isabella nods politely in farewell before disappearing around the corner. His eyes follow her until she is out of sight, his brow furrowed in concern as he brings a cigarette to his lips. The flame from the match is strong enough to emphasize the unsettled look on his face, and Rosalie sees it from down the block as she approaches.
"I know that look," she muses, shaking her head with a teasing smile on her face.
"Not here," Edward answers, his cigarette perched between his lips. "I'll tell you inside."
Rosalie nods but doesn't ask for more as she pushes past him to enter the pub. He stays outside to finish his smoke, the streets beginning to fill with more people as late afternoon filters into early evening. Not long from now, The Lost Key will be filled with the evening regulars, which leaves Edward without much time to speak to Emmett.
After speaking with Isabella, Edward fears it is imperative to talk to Emmett immediately.
But first, his eyes scan the row of stores, butcher shops, and pubs like his own, landing on one pub in particular. The intricacies on the doors and the size of the building are impressive; the man standing on the sidewalk in front of it even more so. Edward watches him for a moment, an uneasy feeling settling into his bones by the second.
As if the man can read his mind, his eyes lift to meet Edward's on the crowded street, a slow and sinister smile on his face as he nods in his direction. With his hands in his pockets, Marcus Volturi turns on his heel and vanishes inside his pub, leaving Edward to finish his cigarette without any company.
Marcus Volturi has been the owner of Dark Shadows for the last twenty years, undisputedly one of the most successful pubs in Port Angeles. He had gone with his popularity unthreatened, his turf unclaimed, his word unchallenged.
… Until Edward's vision of The Lost Key came to fruition almost a year ago.
Edward and Marcus' relationship has always been cordial; Edward has no time in his life, nor desire, to devote to a feud simply because he opened a pub in the same vicinity as Marcus Volturi. He had a dream as a young boy to open one of his own, and nothing was going to stop him, no matter what kind of obstacles crossed his path.
While Marcus Volturi has never succeeded in blocking said path, he makes his presence known to Edward in other ways. Like this afternoon, Edward had been at the docks to oversee a shipment of Canadian whisky arriving from Canada, and Marcus had appeared alongside him. It wasn't the first time he had conveniently shown his face at places where Edward was throughout the city, so he wasn't caught off guard when he approached. Over the course of the past ten months, he had listened politely to Marcus discuss business strategies and pleasantries disguised as insults, only to try to gather information on Edward and The Lost Key. It would be easy, thrilling, to Edward if he were to engage with the man the way Marcus would like him to. Marcus Volturi enjoys and purposely tries to provoke Edward with backhanded compliments to see if he could gain some, any type, of reaction from him.
But Edward will never allow him the satisfaction.
Even when Marcus speaks of bloated profits from his pub and his women, Edward's face remains stoic and unimpressed. His vision of opening a pub in the city stopped there — no profits from women were part of what he envisioned for himself. It still isn't now, even at the temptation of how his earnings would increase at the price of female bodies working for him. His pub has become exponentially more profitable than he had ever imagined, and unlike Marcus, he doesn't need to regulate money from women and the services they can provide.
Especially after meeting women like Rosalie, who had no choice but to wrangle a deal with the devil himself in order to remain the owner of her building.
Extorting Rosalie Hale would prove to be a problem for Marcus Volturi, even if Edward wasn't quite sure how just yet.
Sighing in thought, he tosses the finished cigarette onto the cobbled street and clears his throat, blinking the concern off his face as he turns and pulls open the door to The Lost Key. He is immediately greeted by the comforting smell of musk and tobacco, the tension in his shoulders loosening just enough for him to regain focus.
It is exactly how he pictured it in his head when he was a little boy. The echo of his wingtips against the wide-planked floor, the dark yellow and gray from the sky filtering through the shuttered blinds onto the polished wood bar top combining to create the atmosphere he had desired. It temporarily distracts him as he makes his way behind the bar where Emmett is unloading some of the new bottles of whisky Edward had overseen on the docks. The men quickly delivered the shipment to the pub while Edward escorted Isabella back to where she belonged. In some ways, he is glad he had run into her today; she has inadvertently provided him with information he wasn't expecting.
"I need to speak with you," Edward says below his breath to Emmett. "And Rose."
He says nothing else and turns on his heel towards his office in the back, knowing he will be followed momentarily. He doesn't mind waiting; Emmett has proven to be exceptionally loyal and would never ignore this important request. Even if he hadn't given Emmett any details, the tone of his words had said enough. He sinks into his chair, one set of fingers strumming one after the next on the dark mahogany desk while the other brings another cigarette to his lips. Smoke billows above his head as he waits for Emmett and Rosalie to settle business in the front of the pub. He hears their footsteps down the hall as they approach, and they walk inside when they see he has left the door open. Without saying anything, Rosalie closes the door behind them.
"Is everything all right?" Emmett asks. He leans against the wall, his large frame blocking most of the window. Rosalie takes her place on the other side of him, their body language betraying the façade they want the world to believe.
Edward clears his throat and puts out his cigarette in an ashtray on his desk. "I'm not sure, Emmett. Maybe we should ask Rosie?"
Rosalie crosses her arms and shoots Edward a glare. Most of the city fears him, but not her. "What are you saying?"
He makes sure her eyes remain glued to his when he speaks next. "I ran into Isabella today down by the docks."
Rosalie shrugs. "She had the day off and wanted to explore the city. What's wrong with that?"
"Nothing," Edward says. "It's good for her to get to know this place if she still thinks she'll be here a while."
"She has no plans of leaving soon," Emmett adds cautiously. "What's this about?"
"She told me she ran into Victoria last night," Edward answers, his heated gaze never leaving Rosalie. "In your kitchen."
"Victoria is back?" Emmett asks, not able to keep the disbelief out of his voice.
Edward nods. "Apparently, so."
Rosalie sighs and shakes her head slowly, her eyes leaving Edward's to land on the floor between them. She is reluctant to share but knows it's futile to keep it from them. "I had gotten a letter from her a few weeks ago that she was thinking of returning to Port Angeles. I've had her room ready for her just in case. Marcus brought her over at half past ten."
Emmett hesitates and inhales deeply. "Just her?"
Rosalie nods. "Just her."
The silence in the room is penetrable as the three of them let the reality of the situation soak in. Edward clears his throat and shifts his eyes towards the window. "Where's the baby?"
Rosalie shakes her head. "She hasn't spoken a word to me yet other than asking if her room was ready for her. She'll be staying there as long as she pays."
It was something Edward and Rosalie hadn't agreed upon then, and it turns out they don't agree on it now. After a few minutes of contemplative silence, Edward turns to both Emmett and Rosalie, his eyes flicking back and forth between them.
"She has one week to tell you where her baby is," he says, "or I'm going to ask her myself."
It was great meeting some of you at TFMU this year! Hopefully next year will bring even more out! :)
See you soon! (I promise this time. I've got a lot more chapters written and ready to share!)