A/N:- HERE IS ANOTHER CHAPTER PLEASE ENJOY
I pull up to a modest two story mansion; it's long rather than tall. I have to admit it is beautiful in its simple modesty. I push the button and the intercom crackles as I hear Bella's voice come over the speaker.
"State your name and Business." Her tone is curt, irritated and out of breath, but still business like and polite. If that even makes sense, probably doesn't and I don't know how she can pull it off but she does. It's still sexy as.
"I am Edward Cullen and I am here to see Isabella Swan." I say in a tone that is polite, but to the point as well. I don't know how many would be listening to this and don't know how much others in her organisation and/ or house hold here knew about the situation and our arrangement.
"Hold on a moment." She tells me and then the gates start to swing open. I roll up my window and start to drive up the rest of the way to the house as soon as the gap is big enough. I hear it close behind me as soon as I pass through it.
I pull up to the house and park my car. I can't see anyone to take my keys and park my car, and I am glad for that because I don't like many people touching my cars. I walk up to the door and just as I am about to knock on the door, it opens to reveal Bella.
"Hi, do you not have staff to open your doors and answer your gate?" I ask with nervous amusement. She replies in a somewhat nervous tone that had a little excitement to it and blushes.
"Normally I do, but I dismissed them for the evening. My Father stay's at the hospital tonight so I am all alone and normally I don't mind, but I thought that it will be perfect to be able to talk to you freely and without interruptions. Also when you asked about having dinner together I thought I...um...could...um...cook for you?"
"You can cook? Really? I never pegged you for one to be able to cook, you just keep surprising me more and more every moment I spend with you. Your thoughtfulness is welcomed though.
"I hope you know that you don't have too because I am more than willing to pay for dinner. Don't ever feel obligated to impress or please me ok, I like your independence and strong will its refreshing." I smile at her and her cheeks flush again.
Bella motions for me to come inside and follow her to the kitchen. We walk down the hallway next to the stair case til we come to the last door. She opens it and we go inside.
The kitchen is impressive! It's like my formal kitchen at home, but in a smaller space. I must have looked like a deer caught in headlights because Bella is giggling in front of me while leaning on a counter. She asks me through her giggles.
"H-H-Have you...n-n-never s-s-seen...a k-kit-kitchen before?" I start to laugh with her, step towards her and then taking her in my arms I reply in a whisper into her ear.
"Of course I have silly girl, but I am impressed you could fit a kitchen like this in a space this size because your kitchen looks like my formal one at my home..." then I add in an even quieter whisper as my lips brush her ear lobe "Your laughter is heavenly, by the way." I then leave a kiss on her temple as I pull away from her.
She is breathing hard and her eyes are closed so I ask her knowing full well what is wrong with her. "Are you alright Bella?"
She replies in a shaky voice. "U-u-um...yea I...um...I'm all g-g-good, I will just go get dinner ready." And she walks off to the oven and pulls out what looks and smells like lasagne. I groan out loud because I love lasagne, it's not my favourite meal, but it's up there on that list.
Bella looks at me funny and I shake my head as she plates up dinner and walks back over to me with two forks. She then reaches up and grabs two glasses and goes over to the fridge, she gets an unlabeled bottle of wine and pours some into our glasses.
She motions for me to sit in the table behind me, that I totally didn't see and I pick up the bottle and glasses to help her. I let her sit first before sitting myself and I hear her let out a short giggle before coughing.
I sit and pick up my fork to my mouth, dipping it into the food on the way and OH MY GOD! It is absolutely delicious! I moan at the taste and she gives me a funny look again.
"Bella, did you make this yourself? Because I think I will hire you as my personal chef, this is delicious and this is a great compliment coming from me because my Aunt is a great cook, when I get to eat her cooking."
"Yes I did, I made it earlier to have for dinner anyway and I didn't know what you liked, but I thought that you can't go too wrong with lasagne. I am glad you like it though; no one has ever told me that I am good with my cooking, I mean I knew that they liked whatever I would cook, but they never said anything other than thank you." She replies in a rather shy tone while blushing again.
"Well then let me be the first to say to you that you are not only a magnificent cook; one that would make the top chef's in several of my exclusive restaurants hideaway in shame; but a stunningly beautiful one at that! Thank you, this is without a doubt the best meal I have ever had." She looks into my eyes trying to search for something and I look back at her with nothing but sincerity for everything I just said.
My body starts to lean in of its own accord, while I am still looking her in the eye and our lips meet in a soft yet passionate kiss. I feel that jolt of electricity go through me and startle me a little bit, but as soon as this registers with me I realise that it must have startled her to because she jumps back and stands up against the wall behind her.
Her breathing is rapid and her eyes are closed shut tightly for a moment til she hears the scraping of my chair as I stand up and with my hands held in front of me, palms up facing her I ask.
"Bella, are you ok? Did I do something wrong? I am just as surprised as you with that kiss and we can talk about it. I would say I am sorry for kissing you, but I am not sorry. However I am sorry for startling you, that I didn't mean.
"Please Bella, talk to me?" I see her relax a little bit and she comes back to the table and sits back down.
She takes a deep breath before saying in a shaky tone.
"I am not sorry that happened either, but I have never been kissed before. The guys I have had to get close to have only ever wanted oral and they never liked to kiss me so that just shocked me a little..." she looks up at me then and with a fire in her eyes that I haven't seen before now and then she continues in a professional business like edge to her voice.
"I would like to try that again, but I have to give you something first. Follow me please." And with that she gets up and starts to walk towards the door. In the doorway she stops and turns while holding her hand out for me to take.
I am all too willing to do just that and gladly follow her back down the hallway we came to the kitchen in and turning left to go up the stairs to the second floor.
Once on the second level we then turn right and go into a room that looks to be a library of some sort. It has floor to ceiling book shelves filled with books, but it also has this floor to ceiling, wall to wall window and a lounge area in the middle of the room.
She walks over to a desk that is to the left of the room, opens a draw and gets out a set of keys. She then moves over to a door that is just behind this desk and opens it to reveal a small room with filing cabinets and many locked draws in it; sort of like what you would see in a Bank Vault where the safety deposit boxes are.
She doesn't stop until she is standing in front of the last row of locked draws to the right of the room, opens one, retrieves something from it and promptly closes the draw back up afterwards.
She says with a giggle as she hands me a small box.
"This was my Grandfathers, he gave it to me to give to the man I was going to marry. I know it's cheesy and all and you did give me your mother's ring, but it will mean a lot to me if you will wear it. I hope you don't mind wearing the Swan family Crest on your finger though."
I open it to see that it is indeed a ring that has a beautiful engraving and embellishments of white, blue and green on it in the shapes of a swan in a pool with a little bit of greenery. What looks like diamonds are set in place of the eyes on the Swan and little sapphire and emerald accents are there as well.
Wow I can't believe this beautiful woman wants to give me something of value to her family like this. I am blown away with the thoughtfulness of this simple gesture because she didn't have to give me this, just like I didn't have to give her my mother's ring.
So maybe this marriage will not be as loveless as I thought at first.
To ME! The cold hearted monster. Why would she want to do that! Ithink to myself.
Well why did you want to give your mother's ring to her huh?
Because it was meant for me to give to my wife...dar!
Yea you keep telling yourself that buddy.
Man what the hell is going on with my brain.
I must have a weird look on my face because anger flashes across her face and she snatches the ring back out of my hands and makes to step away from me. I grab her around her waist and bring her close to my body.
I growl into her ear.
"Give me my gift back Isabella; you didn't give me a chance to get over the shock of being given something that has so much meaning. No one has ever done that for me. Yea birthdays are pretty important, but all I ever get is things that have money value; not that I don't like anything I have ever been given, it's just that it had no history and no emotion to it."
She tries to squirm out of my grasp, but fails and she yells at me then.
"Let me go you brute and I will give it back to you. I just have never given anything to anyone like this before and by you not responding to me straight away I didn't know what to do and I snapped."
She pouts and I lean in to kiss it away before replying while holding out my hand to her, palm up.
"It's ok Bella, I understand and I am sorry. Can I please have your gift back so I can see if it fits and find out if we need to go to the jeweller to resize it." I smile my crooked grin and her breathing picks up again.
She returns a smile of her own to me and places the black box in my hands again as if it is something to be worshiped. I reopen it, take it out and just look at it again for a few minutes before putting it on the ring finger of my left hand.
I feel a tingling and stinging sensation in my eyes that I have not felt since my mother's funeral when I was 5.
I look at my hand as I wiggle my fingers in the bright lights and watch as the gems sparkle and refract the light for a moment before looking up at her with tears in my eyes, a smile on my face and say with pride in my voice.
A/N:- PLEASE REVIEW I WOULD REALLY LIKE TO HEAR YOUR THOUGHTS