When I Too Long Have Looked Upon Your Face

When I too long have looked upon your face,
Wherein for me a brightness unobscured
Save by the mists of brightness has its place,
And terrible beauty not to be endured,
I turn away reluctant from your light,
And stand irresolute, a mind undone,
A silly, dazzled thing deprived of sight
From having looked too long upon the sun.
Then is my daily life a narrow room
In which a little while, uncertainly,
Surrounded by impenetrable gloom,
Among familiar things grown strange to me
Making my way, I pause, and feel, and hark,
Till I become accustomed to the dark.

- Edna St. Vincent Millay

OFYL/OFYL/OFYL

Chapter 7

I stand naked and clean at last in the motel's steam-filled, closet-sized bathroom and agonize over whether I should don the light blue dress shirt Edward has left for me … or put my own pajamas back on. On one hand, my jammies are crusted with dried blood and stained with sweat and dirt. On the other, while Edward's shirt is far cleaner, it reeks of him.

His scent saturates the fabric, which has somehow managed to retain its crispness despite going through a day on Edward's buff frame, a late-night shootout, our desperate crawl over my lawn, and a mad dash out of Dodge in Emmett's Hummer. The aroma it emits is some tantalizing brew of citrus and spice and fuck-hot man, and my God if I could bottle it I'd never have to work another day in my life. Men would pay a fortune to slather it on and women would claw each other to death to get at the men wearing it.

It's amazing and arousing and frustrating, all at once. I know that if I put this shirt on, the lust that always simmers just below my skin whenever I'm around Edward is going to boil over. In Alice's lingo, I'll be as horny as a frat boy in a long-distance relationship. The humiliation of Edward's rejection when I kissed him earlier tonight still crawls beneath my skin like ants on a carcass. I have no intention of tempting myself into a replay.

I carefully drape the shirt over the hook on the back of the bathroom door and retrieve my pajama top from the now-damp floor. Holding it aloft by the shoulders, I flip the top this way and that, trying to decide if there's any salvaging the situation.

Quickly, I decide to try ten minutes of soaking to get the worst of the grime out. Then, I'll rinse the pajamas, wring them out as best I can, hit them with the motel bathroom blow dryer, and wear them damp. Surely I can tolerate the sexual frustration of wearing Edward's shirt for a few minutes. I'll need to hurry, though, because he's already been gone a half hour; I want to be shielded by my own wet clothes before he returns.

I close the sink stopper and fill the basin with cold water. Then I sop my PJs up and down a few times, scrub briskly with the bar of face soap, and sop again a few more times. I drain the water, refill the basin and make sure the worst-stained portions of cloth are totally submerged. Satisfied that I've at least improved the situation, I dry my hands, slip on Edward's shirt and exit the bathroom.

As my bare toes touch the fungal feast that is the bedroom carpet, the outside door clicks loudly. My heart pounds thunderously for three beats—because it's far too soon for Edward to be back—and then decides to give up altogether.

My lungs follow suit and seize into suffocating stillness … as the door swings open and Edward steps into the room. His arms are so full of stuff only his high forehead and disheveled copper hair are visible over the mound he carries.

My heart spasms and restarts, my lungs flutter into action, but now my legs aren't working. I stand frozen in the bathroom doorway as Edward strides to the bed and dumps his armload on the stained bedspread.

"I hope you're not a health nut or vegan or some shit like that," Edward says without preamble—and without looking at me.

He dumps a paper bag on the bed and begins pawing through shiny packages of what is obviously the most nutritionally worthless junk foods he could find. "The store clerk said they'll have some breakfast sandwiches in a couple of hours, but for now all they've got are snacks."

He locates a particularly obnoxious-looking orange foil bag, seizes a corner with his teeth and rips it open. "Christ, I'm starving," he mumbles around a mouthful of … something I'm not sure I wish to identify. "I found some clothes too. T-shirts and a skirt for you. They're souvenir stuff, but I figure they'll do for now."

Popping another handful of greasy, unidentifiable snack into his mouth, he grabs and dumps a second large bag. Brightly colored cloth spills onto the bed, partially covering the mound of food wrappers. "Take a look."

I don't move. I don't speak. I'm still waiting for my body to accept the unexpected fact that neither fight nor flight is necessary at the moment. Having primed in seconds for total doom, my heart and limbs aren't ready to give up the terror trembling through them, no matter that my mind has recognized I'm safe.

It takes Edward ten more seconds of loud munching to realize I've not responded to anything he's said or done since he walked into the room. Finally, he looks at me.

And stops chewing.

Suddenly, the air between us feels thick and charged, like the heavy atmosphere that settles over the landscape just before a summer thunderstorm. My spinning mind wonders if I should rethink the conclusion that I'm safe.

The hand that was half-raised to Edward's mouth, preparing to stuff in the next handful of artery-blocker, falls slowly back to his side. His verdant eyes darken, the pupils expanding until that amazing green is almost completely obscured by black. He tosses the half-empty bag onto the bed, and—never looking away from me—slowly stalks across the room.

My sex clenches and floods. My heart takes off again, like a sprinter incentivized by the kiss of a hungry cheetah's hot breath on her naked ass. My lungs attempt to fully expand, but a giant invisible fist has settled around both useless sacks and squeezed tight.

Edward stops a few feet in front of me and his nostrils flare as he inhales deeply. My God, he's scenting me. I can just imagine what he smells, given how my crotch is practically streaming.

His gaze leaves mine to travel appreciatively down my body. Dipping my chin, I follow his stare—and realize I've stupidly buttoned the shirt incorrectly. The misalignment has left a deep swath of cleavage exposed and the shirt-tail on one side so high that if I could take a deep breath—which I absolutely can't—he's going to know that I am, indeed, a natural brunette.

My eyes tear back to his face. I know every perfect centimeter of it. Have cataloged each long, curled eyelash, calculated the curvature of both elegantly arched eyebrows, visually measured the softness of those rosy lips. His is the only face I've known in eight years, and I've studied it as if it is the only one I will ever know again, because it just might well be.

Yet the Edward who stands before me now is a complete stranger.

This is not the fuck-hot man who came to my house offended that I didn't remember him. This is not asshole Edward, who reacted with anger and resentment to being the only person exempted from my disability. Nor is it empathetic Edward who looked with pain and loathing on the photographs of my ex-fiancé.

And it's most definitely not by-the-books Detective Masen who said it would be "all kinds of wrong" to get involved in anything but a strictly professional relationship with me.

This Edward is a different species altogether. He looks feral and dangerous and alluring—like a powerful vampire poised to mesmerize me and suck the life force from my body. He's looking at me as if I'm something to eat.

"Fuck, Bella." His voice has a dark, rough rumble that I've never heard before. "I like my shirt on you."

He glides the back of his index finger down the open collar of the shirt. My breathing stutters into a choppy rhythm.

"I like it a lot."

The index finger reaches the last button and pauses. His other hand leaves his side and curves around my hip. His eyes glued to what his fingers are doing, he slowly pops the bottom-most button. I suck in a sharp breath and his eyes rocket back to my face. Does he even notice the scratches and raccoon eyes that make me look like a washed out prize-fighter? The burn in his emerald gaze says not.

"Take it off."

The faintest gasp escapes me. It's so little air, I amaze myself that I can speak at all.

"What?"

He steps closer. His long fingers grip my hip tighter, bunching the fabric of his shirt. The other hand moves to the next button—and pops it open. Cool air wafts across the exposed flesh of my inner thigh. The motel room's geriatric A/C unit is doing an admirable job given its advanced age, but I still feel as though I'm about to spontaneously combust.

"I said …" he enunciates precisely. "… take. Off. The. Fucking. Shirt."

"Why?" I squeak.

His laugh is rich, dark … and sinful, like a plate-sized slab of German chocolate cake slathered in fudge sauce and topped with whipped cream.

"Because I'm not strong enough to stay away from you anymore Bella. I'm tired of trying." A glint of anger glimmers behind the undisputable lust in his eyes, but whether it's directed inward at himself, or at me, I can't tell. "We're going to give in to what we both want, and fuck the consequences."

At the word "fuck," the rhythmic clenching in my sex migrates throughout my body, hot lust rolling thunderously from my center. Desire ripples down my limbs until I'm sure the tips of my toes are going to go off like firecrackers.

Another step closer, and now that long, godlike body is pressed up against me, and I can feel something tantalizing digging into my stomach. It's also long and hard. Another button falls to his deft manipulation, and now that cloth-covered bulge is rubbing against the naked flesh of my stomach.

I swallow through a throat gone suddenly dry.

"Edward …" I stammer. "This is a bad idea."

He snorts derisively. And pops the button just below my breasts. His fingers leave the front of the shirt and slip inside. Heat enfolds my breast, cupping its weight, molding, lifting and exploring. He pinches my nipple, and though I've never liked rough handling of any kind before, this is Edward. Everything about him draws me in. Everything he does feels wonderful.

A shrill, outraged voice in the back row of the porn theater my mind has become objects, reminding me that it's only been hours since this man rejected me so humiliatingly. Less than half a day since he turned his back on my confession of love. And while I know that voice is absolutely, one hundred percent right to be incensed by Edward's inexplicable one-eighty, I can't really bring myself to care.

Still, as I watch the ass end of my self-respect disappearing into the distant horizon, I will the voice of reasoned indignation to bleat one last, feeble token protest.

"Edward, you don't even like me—"

He swallows my tepid objection, stealing my breath with a kiss that weakens my knees and has me clutching his shoulders beneath the straps of his wife-beater just to stay vertical. The last functioning cell of my brain wonders why the hell he didn't act this way when I tried to kiss him last night.

His lips are so tight against mine he vibrates my tonsils with his harsh laugh. "Oh, I like you well enough Bella," he rasps. "I like you plenty. That's the fucking problem."