Here's the last Blood Sisters update of 2024; I wish you all a very happy holiday season and a great start to the new year.
Edward spent the rest of the night fretting over what might be in store for him when he saw Bella the following day; although he had told the truth when he said he had tried not to eavesdrop on her conversation with Bo, it wasn't that hard to deduce what they were talking about since Kenzi's stunned thoughts when Dyson revealed that she had just spent an evening buddying up to a secret shifter were so loud they might as well have been shouted at him through a megaphone. When Bo called Bella immediately afterward, her reason for doing so was obvious…and now, after learning that one of her friends was a fellow fae, Bella wanted to talk to him. In the time since he'd returned Bo's phone to her, his mind had raced through dozens of possibilities regarding what tomorrow's discussion might consist of, and almost none of them were good.
"Sorry, I can't help you there," Alice said when he asked if she could foresee what Bella's state of mind was likely to be when she got up the next morning. "She hasn't really decided how she feels about Jacob Black being fae yet, or the fact that you kept it from her…although at least I don't see her yelling at you or throwing heavy objects at your head."
"If her reaction is anything like Bo's, you should be all right," Jasper added. "Bo was definitely surprised to find out there were other fae in the area, but once Carlisle explained that none of us mentioned it to her because of the treaty and how the Quileutes prefer to keep to themselves, so they shouldn't bother her as long as she stays off their land, she understood that not knowing hadn't put her or Bella in any danger and calmed right down. …Then again, it wasn't exactly personal for her either, was it? I mean, it wasn't one of her friends that turned out to be something different than what she thought, and it wasn't her boyfriend that knew all along and chose to leave her in the dark. I guess that might give Bella a different perspective on it."
"Come on, I'm sure you've got nothing to worry about, bro," Emmett said in an encouragingly upbeat tone as Edward's face fell. "Now that she knows there's another fae in town, she probably just wants to arrange a threesome."
Alice, Jasper, and Edward all gave him horrified looks, and even Rosalie elbowed him and said, "Don't be such a pervert, honey."
"What? I'm not saying it's something I'd ever want to do – you know you're all I'll ever want, babe – but Bella is a succubus."
"Thank you, Emmett," Edward said in a pained voice. "As if I wasn't already sufficiently worried that Bella feels I've betrayed her trust, you've managed to give me an even more disturbing scenario to mull over."
"Hey," Emmett said cheerfully, throwing a meaty arm around Edward's shoulders and yanking him in for a bear hug, "what are big brothers for?"
###
It was still an hour before dawn when Edward set out for the Swans' house, opting to travel on foot so the appearance of his car wouldn't alert them to his presence. He tried to make himself move a bit slower than usual, not wanting to arrive too early and prolong the agony of waiting outside for them to wake up, but despite his best efforts, the sky was just beginning to turn a hazy predawn gray when he reached the edge of the trees bordering their backyard.
Even after the sun rose, it took another two and a half hours for the Swans to follow suit; it was Saturday, after all, and Edward had noticed that many humans (as well as a not insubstantial number of fae) seemed to believe Saturday was a day for sleeping in. At last, he heard movement inside the house, and after creeping close enough to peer through the kitchen window, he glimpsed Bella and Charlie eating breakfast, still wearing the sweats they used for nightclothes. Some time after that, Charlie left the house with his fishing gear in hand, and Bella went back upstairs.
Edward gave her another thirty minutes to get dressed before approaching the front door, but just as he raised his hand to ring the doorbell, the door swung open…leaving him frozen when he saw what was waiting behind it. With Charlie safely out of the way, Bella had clearly decided to ditch her school-friendly wardrobe – what Kenzi called her 'succubus lite' look – trading her new jeans for a pair of dark red leather pants and an off-the-shoulder top constructed of delicate, spidery black lace with a bright scarlet ribbon threaded through around the top, drawing extra attention to her creamy skin and delicate collarbone. If he saw a succubus dressed like that at a fae gathering, he would assume she was on the hunt for her next meal (and that she wouldn't have much trouble finding it), but what could Bella mean by greeting him in such attire? Was she simply taking advantage of the opportunity to let her more confident new self out to play while Charlie wasn't there to see, did she intend to take some perverse pleasure in teasing him by looking her best while upbraiding him…or was she in fact hungry?
Unfortunately for him, she didn't seem inclined to share any clues to the rationale behind her choice of clothing, her expression remaining inscrutably neutral as she stepped outside, shut and locked the door behind her, and shrugged into her coat (the one Bo had given her, which Edward had noticed seemed to be her new favorite). "Charlie said he'll be gone most of the day, but we should take this somewhere more private just in case he comes back early. Will you take me to the meadow?"
"Of course." He would take her anywhere she wanted to go, though her choice of venue raised a whole new set of questions. The meadow she spoke of held a deep significance to both of them, since it was the place where they had finally admitted their feelings for one another and officially commenced their romance, and he felt certain that her sudden desire to return to that place presaged a new, equally significant shift in their current dynamic…but of what kind?
She climbed onto his back with no hesitation at all, proving that whatever else might be going on inside her head, she still trusted him unconditionally with her physical safety, and they were off, rocketing through the forest at an impossible speed. As she watched the blurry shapes of trees shoot past mere inches from her face, she felt a rare moment of regret over the fact that being born fae meant she could never become what Edward was; she had gotten used to the idea of being a succubus and was pretty content with it most of the time, but still, to be able to run like this…
His strides ate up miles of woodland in a matter of minutes, and before she knew it he was letting her down at the edge of their meadow. It was as gorgeous as she remembered, full of gently waving grass and vibrant wildflowers; the only thing missing was the brilliant sunlight, unfiltered by even the thin layer of clouds that stubbornly loomed overhead today, that had made Edward's skin glitter like a sculpture carved from a solid block of diamond.
When he stepped out into the sun that day, Bella had been awestruck, overwhelmed by his otherworldly beauty…and so amazed that he wanted to share something like that with her – plain, boring, clumsy Bella Swan – that she had barely been able to form coherent sentences; looking back on that day now, she thought wryly that perhaps the most incredible thing about it had been that she was able to talk to him at all. She liked to think things had changed since then; for one thing, she was no longer the timid girl plagued by feelings of inadequacy that she had been and had deliberately dressed in such a way as to remind herself of that fact, because the old Bella would have died of embarrassment just from looking at her current attire.
For another, her relationship with Edward had been tested almost constantly since that day, with everything from near-death experiences and revelations that had turned her whole life upside down to a (hopefully) temporary separation. Harrowing as those trials had been, she felt that they had brought her and Edward closer, giving her a deeper understanding of him that allowed her to see past his dazzlingly flawless, inhumanly perfect exterior to the person underneath…who wasn't always so perfect. Vampires and other fae, it turned out, were people like everyone else, people with character flaws and insecurities, people who sometimes made mistakes, and while that realization had been somewhat disappointing when it first hit her, it was also reassuring in a way.
Keeping that in mind, she turned to face him and said in a frank, direct tone that held no trace of awe or bedazzlement, "So, I'm guessing you already know what we need to talk about."
"I have an inkling, yes."
"One of my best friends is fae," she stated bluntly, watching his face closely to see how he reacted to her words. "Didn't it ever occur to you that that was something I should know?"
"Of course it did. I just didn't think it was my place to tell you."
"You're right, Jacob should have told me. I'll have a talk with him later, but right now I want to know why you didn't think it was your place. I understand not wanting to break someone's confidence, but I'm not just some random person off the street! You could have told me."
"That's true," Edward agreed quietly, bowing his head slightly but refusing to let himself break eye contact, knowing that whatever anger or condemnation he found in her gaze, he deserved it. "Yes, we made a treaty with the Quileute shifters which, among other provisions, forbids us from exposing them to outsiders, but they never explicitly included fellow fae in that stipulation, if only because so few of our kind venture into these parts that they simply didn't think of it. Outside of their own community, my family were the first nonhuman creatures they had seen in almost a hundred years."
"So you probably could've told me without risking a fight with the tribe – which would have been a totally understandable motive for keeping your mouth shut if that's what you were worried about," Bella added quickly. "I wouldn't have wanted to be responsible for blowing up your peace treaty… Since that wasn't an issue, though, what stopped you?"
"A more personal reason." Now he did look away, just for a second. "You'll probably think it sounds foolish."
"Foolish or not, I'd like to hear it." She took a step closer and made an effort to soften her tone. "I'm not judging – I just want to understand what went on inside your head." When he still appeared reluctant to answer, she reached out and pressed her hand to the side of his face, turning his head back toward her. "Talk to me, Edward."
Her touch seemed to break through whatever reservations were holding him back; his eyes closed and a slight shudder went through him when her fingers met his skin, and then the words came out – haltingly, almost as if they were being pulled from him against his will, but they came. "I didn't want you to think I was using the information for self-serving purposes – that I was sharing Jacob's secrets in order to turn you against him."
"Why would I think that?" Bella asked, her hand dropping back to her side as her brow furrowed in confusion. "There's nothing wrong with being a wolf."
"Before I got to know Dyson, I would have begged to differ," Edward replied with a wry grin. "Still, the fact remains that young, inexperienced shifters often find it difficult to control the animal inside them – and when that animal is a lethal predator like a wolf, it is…not always safe to be in close proximity to them. Given your previous complaints about my overprotectiveness, I didn't want you to think I was slipping back into bad habits…or that I was exaggerating the danger because I had an ulterior motive for wanting to keep you and Jacob apart."
"Like the fact that he wants to be more than friends?" Bella asked, a sardonic twist in her lips to match his. "Succubus senses can be a real pain sometimes, especially when they're like a giant neon sign telling you which of your friends are secretly lusting after you."
"My telepathy often serves the same function," he offered in an attempt at empathizing with her predicament. "It can make it…uncomfortable…interacting with people when you know they're thinking of you in a way you'd rather they didn't, particularly when you can't let on that you're aware of their desires. Still, I suppose it's unfair to blame Jacob Black for being attracted to you. I'm certain he can't help it." He underscored his point with a pointedly admiring look that earned a faint smile in response.
"Thanks, but I think there's more to it than the…enhancements that come with being a succubus. Last night, he said all this stuff about how I should be with someone who's like me, who can understand me. I didn't know what he meant then, but if he knows I'm fae, he was probably hinting that we should be together because of that. I mean, it's classic, right? Childhood friends reunited just in time to discover that they both have supernatural heritage… If I read something like that in a book, I'd expect those characters to end up together."
"I guess it does make a certain amount of sense from a narrative perspective," Edward agreed, tilting his head curiously at her acerbic tone, "yet you don't seem to find the idea terribly pleasing."
Bella wrapped her arms around herself, pulling Bo's coat tighter as if to shield herself from a nonexistent cold wind. "It's a little presumptuous to assume I would automatically return his feelings just because we're both fae, don't you think? We're not even the same species, and it's not like he's my only alternative to making do with a human boyfriend while trying not to slip up and kill him."
"Yes, but as I've told you before, most purebloods don't see my kind as true fae."
"Well, that's stupid, and bigoted…and the fact that there's so much prejudice in the fae world makes me wonder whether he'd still be interested if I really was the regular old clumsy human with a pitiful fruit fly lifespan that I thought I was for the first seventeen and a half years of my life."
"I'm certain he would." Edward couldn't believe he was defending Jacob Black, trying to convince Bella his interest in her was genuine, but he couldn't let her think for a single moment that her fae nature was her only or even her most important desirable attribute. "There are innumerable reasons why any sane person would want to be with you, most of which have nothing to do with your genetics. Your intellect, your wit, your insightfulness, the courage and compassion you showed when you chose to confront James alone in an attempt to save your mother-"
"Although if I hadn't been boneheaded enough to let him trick me, I wouldn't have thought she needed saving in the first place," Bella interjected with a frown.
"-And again when you intervened on behalf of a human you had never even met before," Edward continued as if he hadn't heard her, refusing to let her undercut his point with self-deprecation, "your coolheaded resourcefulness in freeing not only yourself but also the human captives when you were imprisoned with them…and, although I wouldn't say it's your most appealing quality, the fact is that you do look ravishing in leather," he concluded with a crooked grin…which was instantly wiped away when she closed the small distance between them in a single swift stride and pressed her lips to his.
Unlike their last kiss in the woods behind her house, which had been charged with the pent-up ardor they had both fought to repress throughout their break, this one was slow and sweet, full of tender emotion rather than physical passion. When it ended, Edward asked, almost reluctantly, "Are we bending the rules again?"
Bella stared up into his eyes with a very serious expression, and slowly shook her head. "I don't think we need to worry about that anymore. I've tried being without you, Edward, and I think it was good for me to have that time to redefine myself outside of our relationship, but I missed you every single minute of it. There's never been anyone else I wanted to be with, and our time apart only reminded me why that is; when I went to that club with Bo, I met lots of fae who would've been happy to take me home because I'm a succubus who apparently looks ravishing in leather-" Her eyebrows arched in amusement as she repeated Edward's comment "-Mike wanted to be with me because he saw it as a way of rebelling against expectations, Jacob wants to be with me because he thinks my turning out to be fae is some kind of sign that we're meant to be… You're the only one who wants to be with me just because I'm Bella. Besides, the fact that you didn't try to warn me away from Jacob even though you honestly believed I might not be safe with him or fly off the handle when I actually got kidnapped shows me that you really have changed."
"I'm trying to," he replied in a voice that was somewhat rougher than usual. Listening to her litany of all the other people she could have been with had been torturous, only for his mood to undergo a sudden, jarring reversal when she dismissed her other suitors' attraction to her as superficial or misguided in comparison to his deeper, genuine love for her – for the person she was, not the new girl in a town where nothing ever changed or the alluring succubus. Now her acknowledgement of his efforts at self-improvement had filled him with cautious hope, but he was afraid of taking it too far, afraid of letting her believe he had changed more than he truly had only to disappoint her later. "But it's been hard, Bella; it still is. Overcoming attitudes that have been ingrained in my psyche for more than a century is a constant struggle-"
"But you're trying," she interrupted. "You've learned not to look at me as someone too weak and helpless to even have a say in things, and you've moved past the knee-jerk reaction to do whatever you think is necessary to protect me whether I like it or not. There was a time when you absolutely would have tried to keep me away from Jacob, wouldn't you?" At his hesitant nod, she said decisively, "But not now. You stepped back and trusted me to handle whatever might have happened with him. That's all I wanted."
By now that tiny spark of hope had grown into something so overwhelming that he could hardly speak, but somehow he managed to get a few words out. "So, are you saying…? Do you mean…?"
"I mean that I'm ready to end the break if you are. I want you back, Edward. I love you."
She spoke with such confident finality that it seemed there was nothing more to say, so instead of wasting time on unnecessary words, he simply took her into his arms and kissed her again, savoring the feeling of being able to do so without fearing that his actions were unwelcome. Bella responded with her typical enthusiasm, her hands gripping his hair as she eagerly kissed him back, then caressing his face…then sliding down to his shoulders, where she began pushing at his jacket, trying to get it off.
When he realized what she was doing, he reluctantly detached his mouth from hers, pulling back just enough to give her a questioning look. "Bella…"
"I haven't fed all week, Edward. I got a lot of chi last weekend from feeding on those human trafficker creeps to weaken them, enough to keep me going through the week, but now…"
She didn't finish the sentence, but she didn't have to; he could see the hungry glint in her eyes, that feral, primal urge beginning to chip away at her restraint and reason. Knowing all too well what that sort of hunger felt like, what it could do to a person's mind, he said, "I'm happy to give you as much chi as you need, but anything more… Are you sure you want to go that far now, when we've only just reconciled? We can wait…"
"Edward!" His name came out as an exasperated groan. "Were you not listening to anything I just said about how you're the only person I want to be with? In all my life, I've never wanted anyone else, and I'm positive now that I never will; that's the one thing that hasn't changed at all in these last few months, so why wait any longer? We already know we'll be together forever, and this is going to happen eventually anyway. Sooner or later, I'm going to need it."
"You've done very well only consuming chi thus far," he pointed out. Part of him wasn't sure why he was still arguing with her – surely he wasn't that habitually stubborn – except that he wanted to be absolutely certain she had thought through what seemed to him a very impulsive decision, that she wasn't simply acting on her hunger or instincts or some notion of what succubi were 'supposed' to do.
"Only because I haven't needed to heal since we fixed my leg," she fired back. "We managed that just by messing around a little, but Bo says that won't be enough for anything bigger than an injury that would eventually heal on its own – anything that could kill me, for instance – and since this is me we're talking about, how long do you think it'll be before I get myself into another life-threatening emergency? So I don't want to wait until I'm bleeding out from a stab wound or something; if we're going to be together as equals, then I want to be with you in every way, and I want to do it on our terms."
"Well, I can't disagree with that." He reinforced this verbal acquiescence by kissing her again, and this time, when she made another attempt to divest him of his jacket and shirt, he didn't stop her. Instead, he reciprocated by sliding her coat off her shoulders (very carefully, since he suspected their reunion might be short-lived if he damaged Bo's gift to her), then began exploring the delicate lace of her top with his fingers, trying to determine the best way of removing it.
"Careful," Bella murmured against his lips. "Bo picked this out, and I bet I'd be in trouble if it got torn up before she had a chance to see me wear it." Personally, she thought letting Edward rip it off her would qualify as sacrificing the top for a good cause, but she wasn't sure Bo would see it that way.
"It would be a shame to ruin your new clothes," he agreed in between kisses, "so perhaps we should leave it alone this time." He bent down and swept her feet out from underneath her, eliciting a startled exclamation, then gently lowered her onto his jacket, which was spread out on the ground in imitation of a picnic blanket. His fingers moved to the fastenings of her pants and paused there, waiting for her approval before taking that crucial next step. "I'm afraid these will have to come off, though."
Bella nodded impatiently, already trying to help by kicking off her boots, but that was unnecessary; as soon as she indicated that he should keep going, Edward sprang into lightning-fast motion, and before she knew what had happened, her pants and boots were both gone, the former neatly folded off to one side. Nice to know he still has the speed advantage, she thought ruefully. She wasn't about to just lie there while he did everything, though; sitting up in a quick, fluid motion as he knelt in front of her, she unfastened his belt and jeans, then shifted onto her knees to kiss him as their hands worked in tandem to push that final offending garment out of the way.
Following the strange new instincts that frequently popped up to guide her through encounters of a more physical nature, she then pushed against his chest, wordlessly urging him to lie down. When he did, with a look that seemed to show a mixture of surprise and pleasure at her assertiveness, she wasted no time in positioning herself on top – and then, with one final movement, their bodies came together at last in a union both of them had longed for since the moment they realized how much they loved one another, even though they had initially despaired of it ever being possible.
Now that it was finally happening, it instantly surpassed whatever hopes or expectations either of them might have previously held. For Edward, those preconceptions were based on thoughts he'd occasionally picked up from his male family members about intimacy with their own partners despite his assiduous efforts to tune them out when their internal monologues turned in that direction, but of course none of them had ever slept with a succubus. Bella's skin was softer and warmer than any female vampire's, naturally, though she had just as much energy and stamina as one of his kind, at least when it came to sex.
There was something more to it, however, something indefinable that convinced him beyond all doubt that no other woman could ever compare to her; he didn't know whether it was the fact that her species tended to be inherently skilled lovers, some sort of pheromone they produced that made sex with a succubus an incredible experience regardless of their skill level, or if it was simply that he loved her more than he had ever imagined he could love anyone or anything, he only knew that at that moment – every moment he got to spend with her, in fact, this wonderful, amazing creature that for some unfathomable reason loved him back – he felt like the luckiest person in the entire universe.
Bella had no idea what making love was meant to be like outside of what she'd absorbed from various books and movies, a vague notion that it was supposed to hurt at first, and of course the things Bo had shared with her – what she felt she could share without violating her lovers' privacy, at least – though she had always assumed those fictional accounts must be wildly exaggerated. She put more stock in her sister's words, though she'd sometimes wondered if those recollections might have been colored by the older woman's feelings for the people involved, especially when it came to Dyson, but not even Bo's stories could have prepared her for the flood of chi that swept through her, electrifying every cell in her body as if she was drinking in pure life…and the fact that it came from her mate, the person she loved most in the world, only made it better.
When it was over, even as she collapsed beside Edward and let her head fall onto his chest, she felt like she would be ready for more in a minute or two. Her entire being was practically vibrating with energy…energy that she had taken from Edward. As soon as she remembered that, her head popped up, and she anxiously examined his face for any sign that she had damaged him somehow. She wasn't exactly sure what she was afraid she might have done to him since he wasn't really 'alive' in the strictest sense of the word, what with his vital organs having ceased to function over a hundred years ago; still, there was obviously some force inside him keeping his body animated or he wouldn't have chi for her to feed on, and she had just tapped that force, drawn on it more than she ever had before.
"Edward? Are you okay? I didn't…hurt you, did I?"
He opened his eyes – eyes that were a shade or two darker than they'd been just a short time earlier, with a hint of shadows starting to form beneath them – and gave her a smile which, while definitely happy, also held a certain amount of irony. "Funny, I always thought I would be asking you that question."
"I didn't. I've never been worried about you hurting me," she said with a slight scoff at the very idea, "at least after you'd made up your mind that you didn't want to. Me, on the other hand… I can't really avoid it. Bo says that every time we have sex, we take energy from the other person whether we want to or not."
"Well, it isn't painful," Edward assured her. "I may need to hunt sooner than I'd planned-" Bella scowled at this, since hunting meant he would have to be away from her for at least a day "-but I'll manage. Don't look like that; if my feeding habits need to be adjusted to accommodate yours, that's just one more thing we'll have to include in our plans for the future."
"You're right," she sighed, smoothing away her frown and forcing her body to relax, "but we don't have to plan anything right now, do we? Can't we just enjoy this?"
"I'm enjoying this moment immensely, although there are things I'd like to discuss with you at some point. Things pertaining to our future together."
"Such as?" she asked lightly, her fingers idly tracing random patterns over his icy skin. She was expecting something relatively minor, like a trip he wanted to take during summer vacation or where he thought they should go to college. Of course, since it was Edward, she should have known better.
"Well, if you truly intend our reunion to be permanent, and think you can content yourself with me as your only partner…"
"I thought we already covered that," she interjected with obvious exasperation. "If you make me go through that whole speech again…"
He still hesitated for a moment, wondering if voicing his deepest desire this soon might be pushing his luck too far…but if they were going to have a more equal relationship this time around, she deserved to know what she was getting into. "Then I hope you'll be amenable to making it official someday. I want to marry you, Isabella Swan."
Her entire body went rigid, as if she had been electrocuted, which was not exactly the reaction he'd hoped for.
"I'm not asking you to elope with me tomorrow," he quickly clarified. "I don't expect it to happen for several years, so there's no need to quit breathing over it." He waited a second and then, when she remained paralyzed with shock: "Really, Bella, breathe." He tapped her sharply on the back and was rewarded with the sound of air whooshing out of her lungs, followed after a short pause by a shaky inhalation.
Once she had gotten back into something resembling a regular breathing pattern, she finally choked out, "You did say 'years', right? Several of them?"
"That's correct. I realize it may have been premature to bring it up now, but I thought, as much as we've discussed the terms for resuming our relationship recently, it was only fair to give you advance notice. I suspected you might need time to get used to the idea, and it seems I was right."
"Advance notice!" Bella scoffed. "More like you almost gave me a heart attack! So this is something you've had on your mind for a while, huh?"
"You could say that."
Something in his tone piqued her interest, causing her to push herself up on her elbow once more in order to peer into his face. "How long?" she demanded.
"Since the first time I brought you here, I suppose." As her eyes bugged out again, he explained, "I'm from a different time, Bella; in my day, there was no question that when you found the girl you loved, you would marry her. Of course, I recognized that times have changed, particularly with regard to the age at which people are expected to marry, and that our situation presented its own unique challenges, so I wasn't going to mention marriage until you'd graduated from college, assuming you still wanted me by that time…" Even now, the memory of those old fears of her outgrowing him, wanting to move forward with her life while he remained frozen at seventeen, were painful enough to make him wince.
Seeing her frown in disapproval of that notion, he went on. "Now that things have changed, however, I decided there was no more reason for delay. To be honest, I wish we could have been married before consummating our relationship, but I know it would have been horribly unfair to tie such a demand to something that is essential to your survival."
"Thanks – that would've been a heck of a thing to hold over my head," Bella agreed, still frowning, though for a different reason now. The truth was that she'd never thought much about marriage – in fact, Renée had argued vehemently on several occasions that she shouldn't think about it for at least another decade or two, which had been fine with her – but if she had, she guessed that she wouldn't have been totally opposed to the idea of it happening someday, if the right person came along after she'd been on her own for a few years, had her own home, and was well-established in her chosen career. She hadn't counted on the right person showing up so far ahead of schedule, but since he had, she figured there was no reason they shouldn't get married eventually…as long as 'eventually' was the operative word in that sentence.
"I mean, I never wanted to be the girl who gets married right out of high school and everyone jumps to conclusions about why she's doing it," she said with a slight blush as she finished talking through her train of thought, "but if we waited at least ten years, even Renée couldn't complain too much. She may have hammered it into my head that you shouldn't get married until you're old enough to really know yourself, but it's not like she's dead set against the whole institution; she did marry Phil, after all."
"We can wait until your thirtieth birthday," Edward assured her, "or your three-hundredth; I don't care how many zeroes your age encompasses, as long as I get to call you my wife."
"Somewhere between thirty and three hundred sounds just right," Bella agreed with a relieved laugh. "I'm sure we'll find the perfect moment somewhere in there." It was a wonderful feeling to know that they could afford to wait for that perfect moment; an endless ocean of time stretched out before her, an ocean that would have been terrifying if she had to face it alone, but now that she was certain that he would be by her side for every minute of it, the prospect of eternity wasn't frightening but exciting, thrilling, intriguing, something to look forward to.
As she leaned down to kiss him, she thought that despite the lack of sunlight, the meadow had never looked so beautiful.
Well, the long-awaited reunion has happened at last; sometimes all it takes is some time apart and looking around at your other options to renew your appreciation for the partner you already have. And they had the big talk about what eternal commitment really means to both of them, because with Edward being Edward I figured it had to happen sooner or later, even if it's a less urgent matter than in the books since it's not tied in with Bella's wish for him to personally change her into a vampire.
Now that we've passed this major milestone, I've been reviewing my plans for the rest of this story and realized to my surprise that we're only four or five chapters away from the end – I can't believe it snuck up on me like this, but I can't wait to share the last chapters with you next year.