August 19, 2010

Suddenly, Bella unfroze, jumping up from her place on the floor she ran past Tanya and me back into the bedroom. Demetri was on her heels just a moment later, but was tackled between Tanya and me. “Go get girl,” Tanya yelled as she wrenched his wrist, making him drop the knife and making good use of the self-defense classes she had taken when she moved here. “Don’t let her run!”

Leaving Demetri to his fate, I certainly wouldn’t want to be in Tanya’s clutches right now, I chased after Bella. She had gone through the same window I had and was rushing down the fire escape. “Bella!” I screamed to her, but she only turned to look at me before a look of determination came onto her face and she continued down the stairs. Swearing I jumped over the edge, swinging myself onto the next landing, hoping I didn’t end up with a broken leg or worse as I chased her. No sooner did my feet hit the landing than I was swinging down to the next one, until I finally managed to get in front of her.

My arms went around her, pinning her up against the wall. “Let me go, let me go!” she screamed. “It’s not safe, I have to go! Please!” she began to cry, great tears falling down her face.

“Bella, you’re covered in paint and have nothing. Where will you go?” I yelled back into her face, hoping that whoever owned the apartment on this floor wasn’t able to hear.

“I’ve got to get away, now!” she yelled back. A pain shot through my leg where she kicked me, hard. “Ow, ow, ow!” she cried out afterward as I bit back an oath.

“No, come back up, get food, get money and clothes, get clean. Tanya has him pinned down, so you’re safe for a little while.” She settled down some. Either that or her foot was hurting too much to allow her to struggle. I took advantage of her hesitation and threw her up on my shoulder. Since we were closer to the bottom of the building than my floor I raced down the rest of the stairs with her yelling at me to put her down.

I did, once we were inside the elevator going up to my floor. Sirens were sounding in the distance, but this was New York, so that wasn’t such an oddity, even if I did hope they were coming here. As soon as she was on her feet she tried to reach the button for the next floor, obviously hoping to run out and escape. “No,” I growled, pinning her to the back wall of the elevator with my body. “I’m not letting you go.”

“You have to sometime,” she snarled back, and I knew she meant it.

Frustration raged through my mind, making me unable to think. I knew she needed to get away, but where could she go? I had to assume that Demetri could get word about Bella to whomever had hired him to find her, so anyone related to me was out. In fact, I should probably warn them. She obviously had no one, so there would be no help from that quarter. I couldn’t trust my boss, I couldn’t take her to a shelter, I couldn’t keep her here, and I couldn’t let her go.

When the elevator opened we could hear Demetri yelling and threatening Tanya while she screamed back. Others were spilling into the hall, wondering what was going on. “Edward,” my neighbor Mike called over to me, “what’s up with Tanya?”

“I don’t know,” I lied. “Would you run up and see what’s going on? I have to take care of something in my apartment.”

Bella was standing behind me the entire time, but Mike caught sight of her and smirked. “Yes, I can see you do.” I knew his assumption was wrong, but didn’t care. Plus, he always was ogling Tanya and would happily take any opportunity he could to talk to her. I’d just given him an engraved invitation. As a result he was jumping into the elevator before Bella and I were even off. In spite of the yelling upstairs and the chattering of the neighbors I could still here him mutter, “How he finds all the hot chicks I have no clue. Must be gay.”

Bella gave a whine of fear when she noticed everyone congregated around. As soon as I had her into the apartment she broke free of my grasp and ran for her room. “Why is it you think you’ll be safe out on the streets but not in my hallway?” I shouted, running after her.

When I looked into her room she was tearing off the designer clothes she’d been wearing, leaving her in next to nothing. I spun to give her some privacy, talking in the direction of the hallway as I heard the dresser opening and closing behind me. “Please answer me, Bella. Why can’t you just stay here?”

“Because they know I’m here now, Edward,” she replied as if explaining something to a child. Pointing up where the sounds of Mike, Tanya and Demetri yelling still came through the ceiling she emphasized her words. “When they come I highly suggest you act surprised when they tell you who I was. Tell them the fake name I gave you, if you try to make one up you’ll forget it.” She was still rushing around the room as she spoke, her voice now cold and clinical. “Don’t make up stories about me, they’ll know you’re lying if you tell them I stole from you or anything. If your boss asks how come you didn’t notice the resemblance, tell them I was too skinny at first, but then you just thought I was a doppelganger since my name obviously wasn’t Bella, and Marie is fairly common.”

She was standing behind me now and placed her hand on my back. “You have to let me go,” she whispered softly, emotion creeping back into her voice as it broke at the end. I looked up momentarily when I heard a scream and thud, but didn’t worry, knowing Tanya was a black belt and could easily throw even Emmett.

I replied without turning around. “I can hide you.” My voice was pleading as tears began to fall down my own cheeks.

“No, you can’t.” She was almost sobbing now. “They will track every purchase you make, so you can’t pay my rent somewhere, or buy me food. The only place they can’t see me is on the streets, living among the homeless. The only thing I ask is that you don’t tell them you found me on the streets. They’ll think I was skinny because I couldn’t buy food.”

Not able to take it any more I spun around and grabbed her into my arms, crushing her to me in desperation. “Let me give you money, I have plenty of cash.”

She was already shaking her head before I even finished. “I’ll be mugged if anyone suspects.”

I felt her empty hands come around me and realized she was wearing the clothes she came in, but was taking none with her. “At least take some luggage, clothes, food,” I begged. More voices joined the threesome above and I assumed the police had made it.

“No, it’ll be stolen and traceable back to you. Homeless don’t wear designer labels, so would make me stand out.” I knew she was right but was shaking my head in denial. She lifted her hands from my waist and took my face in them, forcing me to look at her. “Food would be questioned. I’ve lived out of dumpsters before, I can do it again.”

There was only one more thing I could ask. “Kiss me,” I whispered and she gave me a wan smile. Lifting up onto her toes she softly pressed her lips against mine before pulling away. I wasn’t having that.

Hungrily I pressed her against the wall, consuming her mouth with mine, tasting her lips with a long lick across her bottom lip. Never had I been so forceful and demanding, and her moan drowned out the shouting above. Lifting her she wrapped her legs around my waist, inciting my need for her to a fever pitch.

All too soon she unwound her fingers from where they had found purchase in my hair and pushed my face away. “I have to go.” With a nod I set her back on her feet, feeling my heart break. For so long I had looked for the one I wanted to be with in every way, and now that I’d found her she was running away, afraid for her life, and I couldn’t protect her.

She stepped away from me and sped to my bedroom, where the other fire escape led down to the ally. In a heartbeat she was out the window and racing down the steps, rubbing dirt on her face and hands when she reached bottom, running it through her hair as she tried to make it look wild. I watched as she transformed herself, hunching her shoulders, affecting a limp and started to mutter.

When she reached the end of the ally, just before she turned the corner she looked back up at me, standing in my window, and lifted her hand in a small wave. “I love you,” I whispered as she turned and disappeared from my sight forever.

In the dark he is mine. Vulnerable and sightless, I own him. We sprawl over each other, writhing and twisting like an intimate snake pit. He can’t see me, but he can feel me. Everywhere. The sheen of moisture over our skin subtly encourages our movements so that we glide over each other effortlessly.

There are so many things to explore, to see, to taste. Must I be judicious in my choosing? Do I lick this angle? Do I suck on that softness? With no impetus to stop or to hold back, with no expiration date in sight, each musing becomes a decision. Each move becomes a manifestation of my curiosity.

I lick his jaw. I suck on his tender pout. I smooth the furrowed brow with a delicate finger. I trail my hand over the fine hair that covers his secret parts and seek out the smooth flesh that becomes firm. My hand skims over every possible plane and surface of his body, the neverending combinations of slope and line draw my touch repeatedly. New configurations of his body draw me near in every new second of being with him.

Can love someone just by worshipping his body? Can he feel the unspoken words through my touch? He can’t see me, so it is nothing but tactile. Just how far will body language take me when his sight is out of reach? When all we have is our sensuality to show us the universe?
I massage the tightened muscles and linger over tense areas to help him relax.

I embrace him to show my closeness and desire to be near him.

I wipe away his tears and stroke his face so he knows that his sadness is something I wish away.

I kiss his cheek and then the other to show affection and tenderness.

I hold his hand to show him I’m present; that I’m not leaving.

I feed him to show my desire for his well-being and to manifest the sensuality of being allowed to care for him.

I wash him to ready him for the day and night when we slide again over one another in ecstasy.

God it felt good to get rid of Tyler. Edward was there and I was protected, heck, he’d even brought Emmett, but I’d done it virtually on my own. I was very proud of myself; it was extremely liberating. And it had been a huge turn on for Edward apparently, given his…attention all afternoon.

When we’d finally made it to Emmett’s pub I was starving, sex all day will do that to a girl. I was also happier than I’d been in a long time and most of it was due to the man sitting across from me. He was the complete package: intelligent, gorgeous, kind and completely in to me.

As I licked my fork clean of the dessert that Emmett’s mom had made us, I watched Edward’s eyes darken with lust. I wanted to see how far I could push him before he’d scoop me up and get me home, because the truth was, I really just wanted to be back in bed with him. Turns out it’d only taken one more bite.

o * o

“That was…amazing,” Edward said, rolling off of me and gathering me close. As much as his gentle touch excited me, made me melt and gave me mind-blowing orgasms, this was my favorite part: him curled around me, me molded to him, and his lips on my neck. He had a way of loving me that set me free instead of boxed me in; made me more myself than someone I was supposed to be.

“We have to go back to Alice’s tomorrow, or in a few hours,” I said as I checked the clock. It was after one in the morning and although my body was tired, my mind was working overtime, filled with thoughts of him, of me, of us making love.

“Yep, back to the reality of a seven year old,” he laughed as I smacked his arm.

“I can’t wait to see Lucy,” I said and as I said the words, I realized I really meant them and for the first time it occurred to me that she had become as important as her father. I had never really thought of myself as maternal before in the present sense. Of course I’d thought about children, but in the distant, ‘oh one day’ sort of way. Now, the man I had fallen in love with had come complete with a child and I realized that I was being given a gift.

“Yeah, I miss the little bugger,” he said with a smile that I could feel on my neck. “I guess I’m gonna have to have a talk with her.”

“What about?” I asked absently, still caught up in my daydream of a ready-made family. I wasn’t exactly sure how to deal with all this, the logistics began to overwhelm me.

He turned me in his arms so that we were face to face.

“Bella,” he began. “I am in love with you. If you think for one minute that I am going to let you slip through my fingers, you are mistaken.”

His words warmed me and I smiled.

“But I understand that this isn’t just my decision. I don’t come alone to this relationship and you have to be okay with that.” His eyes were very serious. He was leaving this decision of whether or not we had a future together up to me.

“I am in deep at this point and as hard as it would be to let you go, I would if it was what you wanted. My situation, my life is a lot for anyone to take on and I would never want to keep you out of selfishness when it has the potential to make you regret me, regret us.” Edward looked sad and scared as he said this to me and I realized how brave he really was. He was essentially giving me a way out, and he was terrified that I would take it.

I thought for a second what it would be like to never see the little girl again with the flying, beribboned blonde hair, with the eyes that could see through a situation more quickly than most adults, and my heart clutched. I thought about letting Edward go and felt immediate emptiness, even though he was in front of me, in my arms.

I couldn’t let either of them go.

“I understand what you are asking me…telling me,” I began hesitantly, and I moved closer so that my breasts were pressed up against his chest; I couldn’t get close enough. “I am in love with you too, and if you leave me, you will be taking my soul with you. There would be nothing left.”

I continued, he had to understand that I was in this for the long haul.

“I want to be with you. I want Lucy. You are both my life now and I can’t imagine you not being in it. My only fear is that she won’t want me, that she’ll think I’m trying to replace Rose.”

He shook his head, “Don’t think that. I’m not saying that it will be easy, but Lucy loves you. She was the one who led me to you. She wanted to meet you that day on the plane. Lucy brought us together.”

“So you’re saying you never would have talked to me on your own?” I looked up at him from under my lashes.

He kissed my nose, my eyes, my cheeks and then finally, my mouth. “Oh I would have found you somehow. The minute you burst on to the plane, I was lost. I just wasn’t above letting a seven-year-old do my work for me,” he smirked.

His fingers had stroked down my back and were tracing my bottom. His touch was so gentle and deliberate. I felt him harden against my stomach and my breathing hitched. How could he do this to my body with nothing but his fingers on my back?

I felt his touch drag back up my spine and I shivered. His jaw, rough from his stubble was delicious under my tongue and I trailed kisses down the line to his ear and neck, licking and nibbling. His fingers traced around my ribs to my breast, rubbing his thumb along its peak. My body melted into his touch and I pulled myself on top, straddling him, pulling him into me.

Loving Edward came as natural to me as breathing. Watching his face as I meshed my body with his, knowing it was me that made him feel this way was empowering and as fulfilling as my own release. In the short period of time that I had known him he had become my everything, and as I coaxed us towards the edge, I knew I would do everything to keep him.