CHAPTER 33

'Cause I'm a real tough kid

I can handle my shit

They said, "Babe you gotta fake it 'til you make it"

And I did

Lights, camera, bitch, smile

Even when you wanna die

~ Taylor Swift, I Can Do It With a Broken Heart

AidenPOV

"We should get to the stadium," Kate whispered, breaking the uncomfortable silence in the living room.

It was packed. From Mom's team of Heidi and Kate and Claire to Maggie and Jared and Alec and all of our family. Alice and Rose had tired themselves out cooking food no one bothered to touch. I don't know who called him, but Peter even showed up. Looking just about as despondent as Dad had been before he left.

Alec was the only one who seemed as restless as me, as frustrated at being left behind as me. He always had a finger or two dipped in the family business. He got his degree, opened a few restaurants around town to help clean some family money, and was always as eager as his dad for a good fight.

Our fathers tried to feed us the protect the family bullshit as they left, saying we needed to be left behind for protection, but we both knew they were just trying to placate us.

"What's the fucking point?" Alec muttered.

Heidi frowned at him. "The show starts in five hours."

Nearly every head, save for Kate, Claire, or Peter's snapped in her direction.

"Bella isn't here. For all we know she could be de—"

"She's not dead," Peter snapped. "She's too stubborn to die on a show day."

"This isn't a fucking joke," I grunted. My voice sounding more like my fathers than my own.

Peter frowned at me. "Do I look like I'm laughing?"

"The show should have been canceled hours ago. There's no way she's making it on time, let alone going to want to perform after…"

Christ, after whatever had happened to her. Was happening.

I checked my phone for the twentieth time in the last two minutes. Nothing.

They all ignored me. Heidi, Kate, Claire, and Peter. They stood, each still as stoic as they had been when we told them what happened, and started gathering their things.

"Do you know how fucked it is that you're doing this? That you're going to make her—"

"No one makes Isabella Cullen do anything, Aiden," Claire said sternly, but forcing herself to sound somewhat soft. Gentle. "We are not employed by the… Cullen family business. We have been by Bella's side since she was eighteen-years-old."

Kate muttered something about being around longer, but I ignored it.

"So that makes it okay for you to work her to the bone?"

Heidi and Claire glared at me while Kate took a few steps closer, sad blue eyes on me.

"It's a shitty situation," she said under her breath, voice almost cracking. "But we've been working for Bella for a long time, Aiden, and we know what she would want us to do. Unless we know for sure she is… incapacitated and unable to perform, we move forward as if nothing was wrong."

"Even if—"

"Nobody makes her do anything, Aiden," she continued. "Not us, and not you. If she is conscious and here in time, she would rather put on the show as planned than cancel or reschedule."

"She shouldn't have to."

Peter shook his head. "No, she shouldn't. But you do not reach her level of talent and success without making a hell of a lot of sacrifices."

Then they were gone.

EPOV

I always knew our luck would run out eventually. I should be thankful for every moment I got to spend with her by my side, but all I could do was rage against the fact that it wasn't long enough. It never would be, but it shouldn't end like this.

Because the other thing I was always certain of was that the moment anyone else had her, they would hold all of the power. She always rolled her eyes at the armored cars and security, but never fought it after that first time. Even she never knew how much power she held in regards to the underground business dealings I lived with.

I had alluded to it over the years, always telling her how important she was, how powerful she became the moment she put a bullet through Aro Volturi's chest, but I don't think she ever understood it. Not completely. Maybe she didn't want to put the pieces together.

But Isabella Cullen would go down in history as one of the most influential people in the Chicago mafia in decades. Combined with the overwhelming notoriety her own career gave her, she was a living legend in just about every way you looked at her.

That also made her the biggest target around.

So, I always knew. Once someone had her, it was done. They held every fucking card and knew they had me entirely at their mercy.

As Emmett sped down a dusty back road, headed inland toward some tiny town in California in the middle of nowhere that we were confident was a property owned by O'Malley, I let myself enjoy my memories of my wife one more time before I knew they'd be tainted forever.

I remembered the first time she smiled at me. At that godforsaken Chicago Police Department benefit I had debated skipping a dozen times before walking in. Then she was there, sitting beside me like a fucking present waiting just for me. Even then, she commanded the room. Had everyone's attention whether she wanted it or not. She was proudly covered in tattoos every other woman in the room was sneering at while their husbands appreciated the raw beauty that was Isabella Swan.

I remembered the first time I saw her perform. On a stage so laughably small compared to what she was using these days, but she didn't give it any less every night. It was still a rather uncomfortable challenge to control my cock's reaction to her in a stadium full of ninety thousand people.

I remembered everything. Every kiss. Every touch. Every sigh, moan, scream. All of it. The way she looked on our wedding day. How unfairly stunning she was while pregnant with our son. The way the overbearing sun glistened off of her skin one of the first times I saw her truly smile after her incarceration. The sound of her piano floating through the house as she wrote.

"Five miles out," Emmett muttered.

It felt like a knife to the chest.

Because right now, I didn't know. Wasn't sure what the future was going to show me. And that was better than knowing, than having the visual haunt me for the rest of my days.

My nightmares were always full of the possibilities. All of the ways the men I dealt with every day could defile and torture my wife. It was why I worked day and night to make sure no one ever got close enough to even breathe the same air as her.

I should have put a bullet through my brother's head the moment he told me who he was. Crowd be damned.

The house was severely out of place. Either he was too cocky to invest in border security or too stupid, but the team we sent before us was confident there were only a few small cameras right outside of the house. Nothing on the drive leading up or the surrounding areas where our convoy of a dozen vehicles now waited.

I refused to look in the direction of the private ambulance and heavily paid doctors waiting inside.

"Everyone knows their positions?" I grunted out, double checking the mag.

"Edward. Maybe we should—" Jasper started, but stopped as soon as my glare hit his face.

They all knew we were likely walking into my own personal living nightmare. But I'd be damned if I sat back and waited.

"Kill anyone standing between you and the Viper. I don't care who it is. O'Malley, Caius, and Lawrence are preferred taken alive, but do whatever it takes to get her out." I swallowed back the lump in my throat before growling out the last word. "Alive."

BPOV

Caius was surprisingly spry.

After fumbling with his keyboard for a moment, shuffling through security footage if my guess was correct, he was around the table with a knife to my neck before I could take another breath.

There was nonstop gunfire from the rest of the house. It couldn't have been more than a handful of seconds that we stood there, knife digging painfully close to my skin with his hand clenching tighter and tighter around my neck, but it felt like a lifetime.

I had been in my fair share of life threatening situations, but I was usually able to put that facade up and tell myself everything would be fine. I was an excellent actress, able to fool even myself into thinking a situation wasn't quite as bad as it was.

It was hard to look past the cool metal of the knife, though.

My heart froze in my chest, realizing there was a very good chance of dying in the next minute. Two. Maybe three.

I swallowed back a sob in my throat.

It was a good thing he had such a strong hold on my neck because my knees were useless as I realized I was about to lose everything I had ever wanted. Everyone.

I let out an embarrassing squeak as the door was kicked open.

Caius pressed the knife harder to my throat as Edward's eyes looked my body up and down before freezing on the knife. I could feel a trickle of blood drip down my neck.

"Nice of you to join us, brother," Caius said casually. Confidently. "I must admit, it took you longer to find her than I thought it would. We've had a lovely afternoon together, Bella and I."

"It's over, Caius. Let her go," Edward's voice was sharp and demanding, but surprisingly careful. Another tick in the you're about to die column that I didn't like.

"It's not over," Caius cooed. "It's just beginning, really. Because you're going to let me walk out of here with my pretty new plaything, or I'll slit her throat. We weren't done chatting. I'm still hoping she'll see reason and not force me to kill her."

"Over my dead fucking body are you leaving here with her," Edward snapped, eyes locked on the knife at my neck.

There were so many plans he had in place. For situations just like this. Code words he had me memorize to duck or run or fight my way out if I needed to. Caius' grip on my neck was too firm for me to do anything, the knife still slowly cutting into my skin. He had my body pressed disturbingly firmly against his, a human shield covering a majority of his body against the gun Edward had trained on him.

Being short had its advantages, though. Even hunched over with his head beside mine, Caius had a good hundred pounds on me.

His hand tightened around my neck when I tried to slowly tilt it away from his. Tried to give Edward some kind of shot.

"We've got an interesting dilemma, then. Because your options are take that gun in your hands and save me the hassle of disposing of you myself, or watching your pretty little wife bleed out in front of you. Pick your poison, brother."

I could see Edward's jaw tense. My voice was lost in my throat, even as I tried to open my mouth to say something. Anything.

"Close your eyes, love," Edward said softly.

My heart froze. "No."

"Close your eyes, love," he repeated, eyes so detached I wanted to scream. My knees went out again as he lowered his weapon from where it had been steadily aimed at Caius.

I never closed my eyes. But I still somehow missed what exactly made Caius' grip on me tighten for a moment before it faltered. I fell to the ground with him, but the knife still sliced through my skin as we went down.

Edward's hand was on my neck before I could get to it myself.

"It's okay," he said immediately, his hand putting an intense amount of pressure on my neck. I was too afraid to look down to see how much blood was covering his hand. "You'll be okay."

"What—"

"Get the medics!" I heard a familiar voice shout, and watched as Ben walked around from behind us to rush to the door.

"We've done a lot of stuff together, but I don't know if you've ever actually held my life in your hands like this before," I stuttered. I wasn't quite sure what to say. My limbs were jittery and my mind was hazy but I was pretty sure that was from shock and not blood loss.

"You'll be fine," Edward said firmly. "He didn't hit the artery."

"How do you know?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure you'd be at least unconscious from the blood loss by now if he had."

"Oh. That's… good to know, I guess."

Maybe we were both in shock. Because there were a lot of other more important things I could think of that I needed to say to him, but I couldn't really think straight at the moment.

Then Ben rushed in flanked by two people in scrubs I had never seen before.

"You can remove your hand, Mr. Cullen," the man said, voice confident and steady. Like the hand he just asked Edward to move wasn't currently keeping at least some of my blood in my body.

"Are you sure?" Edward snapped. "She—"

"Laceration to her neck, yes. You've done a good job slowing the bleeding, but we need to know what we're working with."

Edward pressed a firm kiss to my forehead. Lingering for a few seconds before he pulled away. My eyes finally drifted closed at the contact.

I kept them closed as the doctors worked. Felt Edward's hand firmly in mine the entire time until a hefty piece of gauze was taped over my neck.

"We'll need to get to the bus for the stitches," the other doctor said. Not quite as confident as the first, but I could only assume it was because of whatever glare Edward was sending her.

"Bus?" I mumbled, finally opening my eyes.

"There's an ambulance waiting for you," Edward said softly. "We didn't —"

Didn't know what he'd find when he got here.

I grabbed his shoulder, attempting to use it for leverage to stand. But my head got fuzzy and my ribs twitched at an uncomfortable angle and I would have fallen flat on my ass had he not caught me.

"I'll carry you."

"No, I… I can walk. I want to walk."

Edward nodded, walking around to the side of me that wasn't dripping blood and barely held together with a bandage. He wrapped a firm arm around my waist and kept a tight grip on me as we started to walk.

It was a shame I would be haunted by nightmares of the house for the rest of my life, because it was a beautiful place. Old but cozy, comforting but luxurious.

The doctors rushed ahead of us to get the ambulance ready. And while I wasn't exactly thrilled about the ambulance I knew I didn't have much of an argument against it.

"I'm glad you two aren't dead," I gasped out as we shuffled past Alistair and Ben.

Last I saw both of them were laying in the middle of the road bleeding out.

"You too, Viper," Alistair said gently.

I snorted.

We all had code names, security names that were somehow easier for the sake of ever changing security details. Mine had changed many times over the years, but the only one that stuck was the one I drunkenly told Edward I wanted one random rainy day on the island a year after the trial.

While I sat in the back of the fanciest ambulance I had ever seen with two unknown doctors stitching up my neck, Edward distracted me with the bits of the story I couldn't piece together.

Apparently the house used to belong to an old historian who liked puzzles and had secret tunnels installed throughout the entire house. Caius bought the place two days ago, but Edward and his men were banking on him being too impulsive to have actually looked at the blueprints.

Edward was never going to hurt himself. He was just biding Ben time to show up behind us and get Caius out of the way.

Caius, whose unconscious body I watched get hauled out of the house and shoved in a black sedan.

I didn't ask any questions.

Once my stitches were done, I fell back against the gurney with a sigh and let my eyes fall closed. There were a million different things to say, a hundred questions I had and probably just as many Edward had, but neither of us said anything. He sat by my side, lips brushing against my hand that he held with an unbreakable grip.

"What time is it?" I mumbled eventually.

"Two-thirteen."

"Where are we?"

"A couple hours outside of LA."

My eyes opened, and met Edward's as he stared at me.

He sighed heavily, squeezing my hand three times. "Are you sure?"

I nodded.

EPOV

The drive back to LA was blissfully uneventful. I convinced Bella to make the trip in the ambulance, resting comfortably on the gurney with a steady flow of IV fluids going to her the entire time. She munched on some crackers and drank some juice and while my entire body was screaming to get her someplace safe and secluded and let her rest for the next forty-eight hours, I knew pushing the subject would do nothing but cause her more stress.

So I did what I could to make the next few hours easier on her. I sent the family a mass text and was immediately bombarded with two dozen questions from everyone.

E: Viper is secure. En route to the stadium. ETA: 4:27pm. Show will proceed as scheduled.

The message had barely sent before my phone was bombarded with responses. Before I could shove my phone in my pocket and ignore them, it was snatched out of my hand by my wife.

E: I'm fine. A couple scratches and bruises, but nothing to worry about. Please have Kate pull wardrobe for tonight and tell Peter he can finalize the set list and leave it for me in my dressing room. I'm sorry for worrying everyone, but I'm okay. Promise. Xo B

She turned off the phone before she could read the responses. She knew as well as I that every single one would be telling her she didn't have to go on tonight, telling her she should rest and recuperate and cancel if needed.

But I knew my wife better than I knew myself, and I understood exactly what she needed. She didn't need a dozen people telling her what to do when she already had her mind made up, and she didn't need people telling her how to feel in the moment.

She needed the distraction. Needed to know she didn't disappoint a crowd of ninety thousand people, no matter how out of control the circumstances were for her. But I knew, most importantly, she needed to prove to O'Malley and Lawrence and Zane and Shay that they did not win.

And she would do anything, including put on a three and a half hour show after a night of no sleep or sustenance to do so.

"What happened to your hand?" Bella asked me out of the blue, flipping over our entertained fingers to look down at my swollen and bruised knuckles.

I shrugged. "I punched a wall. Or two."

Her eyes blazed into mine. There was a lot to say, a lot to come to terms with, but now wasn't the time and we both knew it.

"Can we go somewhere tomorrow, just you and me?" she asked me quietly. Her voice shaking softly, letting a hint of her true feelings through. "Somewhere close, I still have a lot — but somewhere secluded and sunny and —"

"I'll take care of it."

–Love|Power–

The stadium was already crawling with people as we approached. Doors opened half an hour ago, but none of the happily smiling and excited fans seemed to notice the towncar that we had switched into discreetly make its way through the crowd. As we pulled around to the private lower entrance, another crowd waited for us.

"Give me twenty minutes to shower," Bella said to Kate the moment the door was open. "Then send in Chrissy and Maria."

Kate hesitated. "Bella—"

"Twenty minutes."

Everyone, myself included, knew her tone meant not to question her. That she was barely holding herself together and needed her space and distance to keep herself from breaking before the show. She gave herself a few moments to hug Aiden, who stared at his mother with wide, worried eyes, before following us down the hall toward her dressing room.

"Is she okay?" he murmured to me as we followed behind her. She was speaking in quick, rushed words to Kate about wardrobe.

"She will be."

He had a hundred questions, I knew he did. But I saw the moment he reeled them in and steeled himself for the next few hours ahead of us. "What can I do?"

"Make sure all of the security is in place for the show. Get Ben and Alistair to help you."

He nodded and went off with a determined frown.

We reached the door to Bella's dressing room and she froze with her hand on the handle. Turning toward her team, she said, "Twenty minutes," before pulling me inside with her and locking the door behind us.

She stood in the center of the room. Staring at nothing. Seeing everything. Barely holding herself together.

I approached her slowly, carefully wrapping my arms around her and pulling her into my chest. Her breath started coming out in pants, her hands shaking against my chest as they fisted my shirt.

There was nothing I could say to make the situation better. Nothing to make the day less of a fucking disaster. So, I held my wife as she allowed herself a few measly minutes to fall apart before haphazardly piecing herself back together.

My lips brushed against her ear as I whispered, "Breathe in, breathe through, breathe deep, breathe out."

It took her—us—a few minutes to even out our breathing, but we did it eventually. Basking in the unspoken gut-wrenching relief flowing between us that neither of us was currently mourning the other.

It always hit me like a freight train when I forced myself to remember that she had already done that once. Mourned for me as if we were separated forever.

"What can I do?" I asked her quietly, once her body stopped shaking in my arms.

"I—I don't know. I'm… okay right now. But once I'm in the shower alone I won't be. Once I c-can't see you I'll start to panic and…"

"Okay," I said calmly. "I will keep you in my sight and within reach at all times."

She frowned up at me.

I tried to give her a comforting smile, but I wasn't sure if was anything more than an odd twist of my lips. "Will it make the next four hours easier on you? If you know I'm always close?"

"Well, yes, but–"

"Okay, then.

A/N: Everyone's homework is to go watch the eras tour on disney plus. See you next time :)