The Help

13.

It seemed impossible, but it was definitely true. Tanya had cut back on her work hours.

Suddenly she was home all the time.

She was there in the morning when Bella arrived, breakfast already laid on the table, pressing coffee into her husband's hands and her lips onto his. She was there when he arrived home, taking credit for the dinner Bella had simmering on the stove, taking his jacket and smoothing out the creases before using her fingers to smooth the creases on his face.

Bella wasn't as irritated by the resulting reduction in her own hours (although her wardrobe was mourning the overtime pay) as she was by the lack of sincerity in everything Tanya did. Every smile, every touch looked false. And it turned Bella's stomach to see Edward's face light up with pleasure each time Tanya smiled at Alice, or offered her a kind word.

Alice was not so easily fooled. Bella wished she could react as freely as Alice did to Tanya's overtures, she wished she could glare, or snap, or storm out of the room. She wished she could tell Tanya she, too, hated her. That she also thought Tanya was ruining everything. That she wished Tanya had never married Edward.

Instead, she kept her expression blank. She kept her smiles bland. She kept her words polite. Her rage simmered on the inside. And it threatened to boil over every time she saw Edward fall for Tanya's fraudulent charms.

He'd fallen so far in her esteem. She didn't think he could ever recover.

.

Emmett bore the brunt of her unhappiness, which he did in his usual unflappable manner.

"You've been PMSing for about three weeks," he told Bella over a drink and a bowl of free wasabi peas (they were branching out in the snack department) at their usual bar. "Are you about to have the Noah's Ark flood equivalent of periods or something?"

Not amused, Bella glared at him over her beer. As well as trying their hand at exotic and disgusting snacks, the bar was doing a month long craft beer festival. Bella didn't care for them. They all tasted like piss. But she was saving her funds again, no more over spending. So cheap craft beers it was. And they were both mourning the loss of their favourite deluxe fries, which had been replaced on the menu by tempura battered vegetables. Bella had a feeling Proust girl was behind it. She looked like a vegan, she'd always had her suspicions. As a rule, Bella didn't trust vegetarians. Anyone who willingly sacrificed bacon for principals had priority issues.

"You're disgusting." She sniffed, then added with little pleasure, "And where's your better half? I thought she was meeting you here?"

"She'll be here a little later. She's at a work thing."

Bella had also recently begun to realise she didn't care all that much for Lucy. She was irritatingly materialistic, had never read a single book of substance, spent most of her time posting overly filtered selfies on Instagram and Facebook, actually thought Tom Cruise was a good actor, and generally hadn't had a single original thought in her life. This unfortunately coincided with Emmett realising that he really did like Lucy. Like, a lot. In fact, he'd told Bella two days ago that he wanted to ask Lucy to move in with them.

Bella hadn't responded to this yet. Well, not properly. At the time all she'd said was, "are you joking?" to which Emmett hadn't actually replied. Emmett, wisely, hadn't again raised the subject. But now she was regretting mentioning Lucy at all tonight, because it seemed she'd opened the door to revisit the discussion. Hopefully the cider Bella'd bought him would have provided Emmett with some clarity.

But apparently it hadn't.

In a manner unlike her, Bella flew almost entirely off the handle. "So you're kicking me out now, huh?" She stormed, slamming her bottle onto the table, and drawing the curious eyes of Proust-girl. "Got your girlfriend so you don't need me anymore? Oh that's fine. I'll just live on the streets. I'll be forced to move back to Forks, with my Dad. I'll -"

Emmett cut her off. The only reason he hadn't before this moment was because he'd appeared so shocked at Bella unexpectedly losing her cool. "You don't have to go anywhere," he told her. "Chill. Seriously. I don't want you going anywhere. There's no way in hell I'd make you move back to Forks, either. Don't even say stuff like that."

Understanding this to mean Emmett wasn't going to move Lucy in, Bella calmed down. Took a mouthful of beer. "Okay," she said quietly.

"I mean, she'll move into my room with me," Emmett continued calmly, "And she doesn't have that much stuff anyway, but she does have a dining table - a proper one - so we can get rid of our crappy one."

Bella stared at him. What the hell was wrong with their dining table? It was a great dining table. They'd gotten it from the second hand furniture shop down the road, it had been a bargain. The chairs didn't match, but Bella had taken upon it herself to paint them one weekend. They were crazy kaleidoscope colours now. And so what if it listed dangerously to one side, and was covered with the grafitti of it's former owners? It was theirs! The first piece of furniture she and Emmett had bought together - and he wanted to chuck it and replace it with something of Lucy's?

"And just what the fuck am I meant to do when she moves in?" She demanded, the fury rising again. "Sit around on the couch and watch you two play happy couples? Yeah, you say you don't want me to move out now, but I know what will happen. You'll want the place to yourselves, I'll become an inconvenience. Well, I'm sorry," Bella snapped, aware that she was overreacting but unable to stop herself, "that my presence in your life is such a fucking inconvenience."

Proust girl wasn't even bothering to appear discreet. She'd put her book down and was watching them with an expression that hinted closer to interest than Bella had ever seen on her face.

"Okay, you're officially nuts tonight," Emmett said, looking mildly embarrassed. "I can't even take you seriously."

"Yeah," Bella shot back furiously, "I'm just a fucking joke."

Emmett's eyebrows shot up. "Seriously, what is with you? What's going on?"

Over at the bar another patron attempted to order a drink, and Proust girl shushed him with a hissed, "Shut up! Can't you see I'm busy?"

The poor man she'd shushed looked at her with bewilderment. "But - but I'm the only one at the bar."

Her glare was venomous. "The entire world doesn't revolve around you, you misogynist."

"What do you think is going on?" Bella snapped, oblivious to what was happening anywhere else but at their table. "I'm pissed off that I'm being - I'm being fucking usurped. That's what's going on."

"Lucy is not usurping you," Emmett said, his eyebrows shooting upwards in a demonstration of his surprise. "Look, I don't see what the difference would be. She's around at ours all the time anyway -"

"Yeah, I know. And I hate it. She records stupid shows on the TiVo and she uses my damn towels!"

"Okay," Emmett said slowly. "I'll tell her not to use your towels. But she doesn't record anything stupider than you. I mean, you have two whole seasons of America's Most Haunted recorded -"

"Yeah, which I'm allowed to cos it's my damn tv!"

"It's our tv," Emmett gently reminded her. "We both found it out on the nature strip in front of the apartment block, remember? I lugged it upstairs and you washed the grime off. We agreed that made it equally ours."

"Yeah, ours," Bella retorted. "Yours and mine. Not yours and mine and Lucy's."

Emmett looked baffled. "I don't understand - where's this coming from?" He asked. "I thought you guys got along? You're making this harder than trying to introduce two Tom cats into the same house. Is there something else going on? Is it stuff at work?"

Bella bristled. "Work is fine," she said stiffly.

Emmett clearly did not believe her, but wisely didn't probe her further. "Fine," he said, taking a pull on his honey flavoured cider. "Let's just not talk about this anymore tonight."

But to Bella's dismay they returned to the same topic only two nights later. Feeling slightly less volatile (and a lot less hungry. Emmett had made his renowned lasagna and she'd had a whole roll of garlic bread to herself) she was able to listen to him without firing up (and without an audience), but she was still unable to hide her displeasure.

"I don't get it," Emmett said, trying to insinuate his feet into Bella's lap, like how they usually sat on the couch. Bella pushed his feet away. She felt bloated and slightly nauseous from all the garlic. Her doctor kept trying to tell her she was fructose intolerant, and that she should avoid garlic and onion type foods in general, but damned if she was going to give them up. Eating garlic was one of her great pleasures in life. "I don't see how things would significantly effect you."

"This is my home, though, Em," Bella told him tiredly. "It would be all different. I don't want that to change." She frowned, feeling like an idiot, then reached down and pulled Emmett's feet back into her lap. "I don't want us to change," she said quietly.

Emmett poked at her belly with his big toe. "We'll never change," He told Bella. She glanced up, alerted to the note of bitterness in his voice. But he had his face turned away so she couldn't read his expression.

"Will we still do this?" Bella demanded, tickling his feet until he squirmed. "I can tell you now, we won't. Lucy won't like it. You might think she's not jealous, but I know how girls work. We're jealous by nature. It doesn't matter about reasoning or anything like that. Reasoning goes out the window when you fall in love. Reasoning is two blocks away and never coming back the moment a girl feels an inkling of jealousy."

"She's not going to care about this sort of stuff," Emmett told her. "I promise you. You know Luce, she's easy going. And if she does care - well, I'll just tell her not to."

"Emmett," Bella said sadly, "no girl likes seeing the guy she likes spend time with another woman. It's just how it is, how it's always been, since mankind first began."

"Then we'll be some sort of historical anomaly," Emmett said bravely. "Forging a new path in relationships and friendships! We'll change the world, the three of us."

Bella was quiet, Emmett's optimism making her suddenly sad. And after a long moment, Emmett asked her seriously, "is there something else that's the matter? Or is it just Lucy? Because you really have been down in dumps lately." He frowned. "It seems like everyone I know is shitty lately, half the office has been walking around like a wet week. Maybe it's the weather."

Bella shrugged. She hadn't told Emmett about anything that had been going on with work lately, not since the disaster with Alice on the anniversary of her mother's death. And since then everything had spiralled, it would be impossible for Bella to know how or where to begin. And if she was being honest, she was too embarrassed to tell him, and that was saying something. If he had any inkling that she'd developed this strange crush on her boss (because surely that's all it was, a stupid crush) then she'd never hear the end of it. Np, she was going to wait for it to blow over, and then when it was in the past she would tell Emmett, and laugh about it with him.

"Seriously, Bella," Emmett said then. "I know, you're worried that our friendship will change. But it won't, I promise. You're my best friend, and nothing will change that. No girls, nothing. And to prove it - how about I take you to that architects ball I told you about."

Bella turned to him suspiciously. "The one at that new art gallery on the docks? The one you've been talking about for, like, six months?"

"The one our firm is being awarded at?" Emmett countered, with obvious pride. "The very same one. Black tie, as many canapés as you stuff in your purse, as much champagne as you can drink until they inevitably cut you off, celebrity architects - heck, I'll even rent us a limo. I'll buy you a dress. As long as you say yes."

"Yes to the ball or yes to Lucy?"

"To both." Emmett sat up, hoisting his legs off Bella's lap. "Bella," he said pleadingly, "I wouldn't ask you this if I didn't really want it. I want to take that next step with Lucy. I want her to move in." He gazed at her. "Please say it's okay."

"Emmett, I'm just..."

But she couldn't finish. Because he was her best friend, and this was important to him, and all her stupid reasons weren't important.

"Okay," she said quietly. "Yes. But you can't renege on your promise about buying me the dress. I want long, black and strapless."

Emmett quirked an eyebrow. "Gonna snag yourself an architect?" He teased. Bella turned her face away, suddenly worried about what her face might reveal.

"Not likely," she murmured.

.

.

.

For the first time in weeks, Edward arrived home before his wife. Bella heard his footsteps in the foyer and for a moment she was excited, she felt her lips turn upwards in a smile of genuine pleasure. For a moment it felt like old times.

His good mood was obvious, from his cheery greeting to the exuberant way he lifted Elizabeth up and out of her chair, to the playful way he teased Alice. He even sneaked up behind Bella and tried to stick his finger into the pot of pasta sauce she had simmering on the stove top. It was the sort of good mood that made Bella wonder crassly if he'd just got laid - and with the thought of him and Tanya having some sort of lunch time rendezvous her mood took a very rapid downward spiral.

Irritated by his good mood and his good looks and his too close proximity to her, Bella scowled and went to get something from the pantry. When she came back out Edward was leaning up against the bench, watching her carefully. "Everything alright?" He asked her casually. Like he hadn't been brushing her off for the last two weeks or anything.

"Everything's fine," was Bella's reply. And Edward raised one eyebrow, but didn't press her. Instead he said, "Tanya told me she spoke to you about the trip. I know it's a big ask. Thank you so much for making yourself available."

Bella grabbed a bunch of parsley from the fridge and took it over to the chopping board. Edward trailed along behind her. "That's alright," she said quietly, and began finely chopping the green leaves. "I had no other plans for the weekend, anyway."

"It's always a great time," Edward said, as though trying to reassure her that she'd made the right decision. "You'll love it up there."

He was talking about the upcoming trip to the Denali family's lake house in mountainous region in the north of Washington, way up toward the Canadian border. Tanya had asked her that morning if she would be available to join them there for the Fourth of July weekend. She'd even expressed something of akin to an apology for not having asked Bella earlier, and as much as Bella had wanted to say no, just to cause Tanya some inconvenience, it had actually been too good of an offer to pass up. She needed the money, especially now that her overtime had been cut back so much. And besides, a free trip away was a free trip away - even if she did have to work for most of it - but Bella wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Yeah," Bella said neutrally. "It sounds great."

She prepared the plates when the meal was ready, setting them at the table with Alice's help. She was settling Elizabeth in at her usual place at the table when Edward appeared beside her again, and after having clearly counted the plates laid out he said to her, sounding surprised, "you're not staying for dinner?"

"No," she replied, a little stiffly, surprised that he would think she would after the last couple of weeks. Once she would have laid one for herself without even a second thought. But that had been before. "Once I'm done in here I'm going to head home."

Edward frowned. "Is everything alright?" He asked again.

"Yes." Then seeing his sceptical expression, added, "I'm just trying to get home before this rain they've forecast for tonight."

Edward glanced towards the windows, where rain was already beginning to spatter softly against the panes. "You might be a bit late for that, I'm afraid."

"Yeah, well," Bella said quietly. "I should get home anyway."

Bella kissed the top of Elizabeth's head, then went in to say her farewell to Alice, who had rushed back to the living room to watch the end of America's Next Top Model before she came to eat. When she stepped out into the hallway Edward was waiting for her.

"I'm not convinced," he said.

Bella was startled at the sudden sight of him. "About what?"

He was still wearing his suit, but with the tie and jacket discarded, his white shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Had he always been so damned attractive? Bella wondered with some irritation. How had she been so oblivious to his appearance in the past?

"That you're fine," was his reply.

She forced an insincere smile, and directed her words to the buttons on his shirt. The top two were undone. His skin around his collarbones was lightly tanned, and she wondered if he'd been taking his boat out on the weekends, making the most of the weather before it faded. "Well, I am."

He frowned. "If it's about the trip, please don't feel obligated. If it's an inconvenience, if you have other plans -"

"No, it's fine. Really. I had no plans." And she tried another unconvincing smile, suddenly hyper aware of the fact they were alone. She could hear the sound of Elizabeth clattering her spoon against her dish, and the muted sounds of the television Alice was watching, but they suddenly seemed a world away. She felt her stomach swoop uncomfortably, like she'd missed a step when walking downstairs, and hated the sensation. She didn't want to feel that way, not about him. It was too messed up for words. She hated everything about it, from the way she spent way more time getting ready in the morning - like he actually paid attention to what she looked like - to the way she recognised his scent immediately. She smelt it in the street sometimes, the cologne he wore, even on other men it made her whole body react. Even though it never smelt as good on them as it did on him.

"You've been very quiet lately," he said, then cleared his throat. "I was concerned," he finished.

The fact that he'd actually noticed her at all in the last few weeks was a surprise. She'd assumed he'd been too busy playing happy families with Tanya. Anyway, she didn't want his concern.

"Don't be," she said, a little irritated. Was he patronising her? "Really."

Today he smelt like shampoo and soap, and the lingering scent of cigarettes. He'd been smoking and tried to cover it up again by taking a shower at the gym. She hated that she knew him like this. Bella glanced at his face, and almost immediately looked away. Why did he have to be so damn good looking?

"Because I feel as though I've upset you," he continued, then hesitated.

She thought of what she'd overheard the other night, when he and Tanya had returned home early, the way he'd spoken about her so carelessly, as though she were nothing more than a commodity. Of the way he'd been avoiding her for the past few weeks, barely even looking in her direction, barely acknowledging her presence. And today - acting like none of it had happened at all! She didn't know what he was doing, but whatever it was she wasn't doing it with him tonight.

"Edward, I'm really tired," she sighed. "I need to get home."

Edward, too, took a step back. The expression on his face hinted at disappointment, but his voice revealed nothing. "Of course," he said, stepping back, suddenly formal. "I apologise, I didn't mean to delay you."

It had started to rain. She stepped out into it, hearing the front door click behind her.

She was halfway down the driveway when she heard his voice calling her name. And she turned back to see him standing beyond the arched entrance way, apparently oblivious to the pouring rain that slicked down his face in rivulets and plastered his hair against his head. He stood beyond the edge of the puddle of light that spilled from the open front door, but even in the gloom she could see his dark eyes were intent upon her.

"Would you tell me?" He called to her. He had to raise his voice to breach the distance between them, to be heard over the crackling sound of the rain on the pebbled driveway.

She blinked away the rain that kept running down into her eyes. "Huh?"

The way he was looking at her was making her stomach twist in knots. It was stupid, so stupid, that she'd let things go this far, that she allowed him to have this effect on her. "If I had done something that had upset you," he said. "Would you tell me?"

She swallowed. "Edward, I -" She tried to push her wet bangs back off her face. Tightened her jacket around her. And came to a decision. "Of course," she lied.

He didn't say anything else, but he looked like he wanted to. And she knew she wanted to, she could feel the words burning their way up inside her in a bid to escape. But she wasn't going to give them an opportunity to ruin things any further. So she turned on her heel and continued down the driveway.

.

.

.

It wasn't like Bella had been expecting the Denali's lake house to be some rustic cabin in the woods. And even if she had, Alice's casual mention of a hot tub on the deck would have quickly dispelled that belief. And although Bella scoffed at the idea of people who had outdoor hot tubs in one of the coldest, rainiest states in the US, it didn't stop her from packing every single swimsuit she owned.

But she was still a little awed when they finally arrived, late on Friday afternoon. The long, gravelled driveway wound through a thicket of towering trees before they'd emerged into a sudden meadow, beyond which the sprawling building was nestled into the landscape, done in such a way that made its size seem oddly unobtrusive. And it was certainly sizeable - three levels in total, clad mainly in wood and stone, with wings jutting off to the left and right. Bella counted ten chimneys in total, and the gently sloping slate roof seemed to go on forever. It made Edward and Tanya's home seem diminutive in comparison, and while part of Bella wanted to be outraged at the unequal spread of wealth clearly displayed here, the majority of her wanted to get the hell inside to see what the rest of it was like.

"Charlotte and Catherine aren't here yet," Alice said, clearly pleased, as Bella carefully parked the Lexus behind Tanya's cherry red Audi. Tanya and Edward had driven up earlier, with Bella driving Elizabeth and Alice up separately. Bella had been dreading the car trip - three hours with Alice being surly wasn't high on her bucket list. But Alice had had her headphones in her ears for most of the trip, she'd taken them out only as they'd drawn closer to the lakeside town, and to Bella's surprise she'd been in a surprisingly good mood. Now, she was yanking on the passenger side door. "That means I get pick of bedrooms."

The front door of the house opened as Bella swung herself out of the car, stretching. Tanya was making her way down the stone steps that led from the house to the driveway. "Kindly don't park so close behind me," she told Bella, looking irritated. "You give me no room to pull out."

"Sorry - hang on, I'll move it."

"No, I need you to bring Elizabeth in first. My sisters and their families are due here any moment and she'll need a bath before they arrive. I had hoped you'd be here earlier."

There was something utterly humiliating about being scolded by a woman only five years her senior. "Sorry," Bella repeated, trying not to get annoyed. "They were unfamiliar roads, so -"

Tanya interrupted her. "Alice will show you inside to Elizabeth's room. And yours," she added, almost as an afterthought. Behind her, the front door swung open again and Edward appeared. He had a beer in one hand, and the cuffs of his pants rolled halfway up his calves. Unlike his wife he looked not only relaxed, like a person on holiday should be, but pleased to see they had arrived, and instead of stopping on the steps like she had he continued down to the car to greet them.

"Girls! You made it!"

"Finally. Bella drives like an old lady," Alice announced. "Dad, are the Wyatt's here yet?"

"I'm not sure, Al." Edward had opened the back door of the car, and reached in to pull Elizabeth from her car seat. "Why don't you check?"

"I need Alice to show Bella to Elizabeth's room -"

Edward glanced at Bella with an easy smile as he interrupted his wife. "I can do that," he said.

Tanya looked put out. "But I need you to help me prepare for tonight."

"It will take five minutes, Tan. I'll show her up and I'll be right back with you."

Alice was already disappearing down a path that led through a line of trees and, Bella assumed, to the neighbouring house beyond them. "Dad, bags me the back room please!"

Bella began tugging the luggage out of the trunk of the car, and couldn't see Tanya's expression, but judging from her voice she wasn't happy. "Edward, you know Charlotte and Catherine always take the back bedroom."

Edward, with Elizabeth perched on his hip, reached past Bella and grabbed Alice's backpack. He shot her a tiny, conspiratorial smile as he did. "I'm sure they'll live," he said drily. "The front bedroom is just as nice."

"If it's just as nice I don't see why Alice won't take it like she usually -"

"Tanya, come on." He sounded exasperated, and Tanya fell silent. Bella dared a glance at her, and was surprised to see a rare display of emotion on the other woman's face. She looked chastised, with a pink flush sitting high in her cheeks that deepened when she caught Bella watching her. Her eyes flashed, and with lips tightly pursed she turned on her heel and headed back up the steps.

"Uh-oh," Edward murmured to Bella, as he pulled the final bag from the car. "I'll pay for that later." And he winked at her.

He'd been like this for the last few days. All casual grins and inside jokes, like they were best buddies. But Bella didn't like it, and her answering smiles were perfunctory and lukewarm. She wasn't trying to be rude, but unlike Edward she also wasn't trying to be fake. If he wanted to pretend that there wasn't some sort of vibe between them then that was his business. But she wasn't into playing games, and his shallow attempts at recreating some of the camaraderie they'd once shared just seemed false and empty to her.

He could pretend all he wanted. But she couldn't. And she had a feeling that sooner or later it was all going to come to a head.

.

"Whoa."

"To your liking then?"

"Shit yeah. Um, I mean - Wow. Yeah, you could say that." Bella glanced behind her, tearing her eyes away from the view with great difficulty.

Not that the view behind her was anything to sniff at. And she didn't mean the room - although the third floor attic room with its sloping ceiling and dormer windows was pretty cute in a rustic sort of way (and made up for the feeling that she'd been shunted up to the attic like a servant). She meant the sight of Edward, leaning up against the end post of the cast iron single bed, shirt sleeves rolled up and hands shoved into the front pockets of his chinos. His forearms bore the signs of a few weekends spent in the sun, clearly he'd been making the most of the short Washington summer. The top three buttons of his shirt were undone, and as well as the tan Bella could see the faintest hints of a fine sprinkling of hair, a slightly lighter shade than the hair on his head. But that could also have been due to the sparsity. But it was distracting is what it was, and all together - with his crinkled eyes and his bare forearms and his curved lips and sharp jaw and cheekbones... It rivalled the sight of the perpetually snow-capped mountains and the rippled surface of the lake reflecting the beginning of a multi-coloured sunset, which was what had greeted her when she'd looked out the window.

At her exclamation, the corners of his lips crooked upwards. "We aim to please."

It was the sort of intimate smile that had gotten her into this mess in the first place, and the responsive swoop in her stomach served as a reminder that everything about this was a Very Bad Idea. Elizabeth was just downstairs, in her bedroom arranging the bears on her bed in a very particular order (a treasured and important ritual), and the floor below that Bella could hear Tanya's heels on the hardwood floors. But she couldn't help herself, and found herself shooting back, "You do, do you?" And wished she could take it back - the suggestive tone, the quirked eyebrow - the very moment the words escaped her lips.

Edward became very still, and it was like all the air had been sucked out of the room.

Bella Swan, you are a fucking idiot.

"Well," Bella said, when the silence between them became thick enough to gnaw on, "I guess I should get Elizabeth sorted."

Edward cleared his throat, and his easy, relaxed manner slipped away, like it was just a mask he could discard. "Before you do, I did want to speak with you."

Sometimes Edward seemed like he was no older than she was. When he was joking and teasing with her, when he was playing with his daughters, when they were just hanging out it was so easy to forget he had ten years on her. And age wasn't everything, but Bella'd always had a healthy respect for authority, and when she was reminded of his age she was reminded of his authority over her. Sometimes he was Edward her friend, and sometimes he was Edward her boss. Right now he was Edward her boss, and his manner was confident and calm and everything that Bella definitely wasn't feeling right then.

She needed a drink. A shot of tequila, preferably.

"I'm well aware of the tension recently."

Well, she hadn't been expecting that.

So he was finally acknowledging the tension between them? She needed more than a shot of tequila right then, she needed a whole bottle. She'd been anticipating a conversation like this, as irritated with him as she'd been she'd known he couldn't go on ignoring the situation forever. But she'd been dreading it, because acknowledging it opened a whole floodgate of issues. Like what the hell they were going to do about it. Keep ignoring it? He might be able to play that game, but she couldn't. It was distracting, and she was there to do a job, not to try and suppress her feelings of attraction towards her boss.

"And I wanted to express my appreciation to you for the way you've handled it," Edward continued, still sounding so assured and in control. "I know things have been particularly difficult lately, and I'm not oblivious to the effects it's had on you."

She flushed then, feeling guilty. Because despite his words to the contrary, she felt like she hadn't been handling anything well at all recently. She knew she'd been hot and cold towards him, but she'd been confused and trying to figure her own feelings out.

"The last thing I wanted was for you to be dragged into any of this," he said. "I'm well aware that it was not what you were hired to do."

Bella blinked. Well, that was very true - but it was kind of an odd way of phrasing it.

"I've been really grateful for the way you've provided so much assistance and support with the girls" he said. And here Bella raised one eyebrow, officially confused. "It's difficult for them," he explained. "Elizabeth is so young and Alice is so impressionable and I hate that they get dragged into my and Tanya's issues. I know it's impossible to shield them completely, but I can see how hard you've worked to make things as normal as possible for them over the past few weeks."

It was glaringly obvious to Bella now that Edward hadn't been referring to the tension between them at all, but to the tension between him and his wife, and when her embarrassment faded she very quickly became annoyed. She knew damn well that there had been a moment there, back on that couch. A moment that could have gone further, and would have gone further if they hadn't been interrupted. And she knew that it wasn't just that one moment on the sofa. There was a frission between them, the constant suggestion of something more. It was in his smile and his eyes, and the way he always stood just that bit too close. And it had crept up on her so slowly, this development of an easy friendship into the flames of attraction, that it had been too easy to deny initially. But not anymore. And she couldn't believe that he was, still. She knew for a damn fact that he was aware of it.

How long was he going to continue to ignore it? How long was he going to pretend?

And it was like he knew exactly what she was thinking right then, as he seemed to execute his next words with precision.

"Tanya and I," he stated, meeting Bella's eyes and holding them, "Well, things haven't always been easy. What marriage is? But we're working on things and... And really I just wanted to let you know that. You know, so you don't have any unnecessary concerns about this being an ongoing issue."

Ah. And there it was.

He kept talking, saying something about how he was aware that their home was also Bella's workplace, and how he wanted that workplace to be as comfortable as possible for her, but Bella was barely listening. She wasn't so stupid that she couldn't read the real meaning behind his words. They were so obvious that each one felt like a slap in her face.

And suddenly she realised that Edward had stopped talking, and was staring at her expectantly. She was humiliated as hell, annoyed as fuck, and and all she wanted right then was that bottle of tequila. But she had some pride. She wasn't going to let him know any of that.

"Well, thanks for telling me," she said, with the falsest, brightest smile that she could muster. "I'm just happy that you think I'm doing a good job."

He at least had the decency to look apologetic. "I've upset you," he began. "Maybe I didn't word that well."

"You worded it fine," Bella said. "Trust me."

Edward sighed, and suddenly, stupidly, Bella was fighting back tears. They were tears of embarrassment, she was ridiculously humiliated right then. She'd been a fully fledged idiot. What the hell else had she seriously expected him to do? Acknowledge that he'd felt a few mistaken moments of desire towards his children's nanny? Had she been expecting him to totally forget about his children and his wife and thrown her down on this bed and ravish her or something? He had a family, and they were his priority. He had responsibilities. He was an adult, and he was acting like one.

Something that she realised she wasn't.

So she smothered her humiliation to the best of her ability, and instead put on her best professional face. "Really," she said. "I'm really pleased to hear things are better with Tanya. I know that's really important for the girls."

"It is." And he suddenly looked intensely uncomfortable, and she realised the confidence, the self-assuredness - that's what the true mask had been. He took a step towards her, lowering his voice. "I think now is also the appropriate place to apologise for my behaviour -"

Tanya's voice floated up to them, carrying from two floors below, the sickly sweetness not quite masking her obvious irritation. "Edward? Babe, I really need you down here."

Edward's eyes didn't leave Bella's face as he called back to his wife. "I'll be just a minute, Tan." And to Bella he said, "I regret that I've made things uncomfortable -"

"You didn't," Bella interrupted him, which was a lie, because she was intensely uncomfortable right then. And he smirked at her, like he knew just how much.

"I think you'll find you're an open book, Bella." His smile was wry. "Your face gives everything away."

Bella flushed. "My face is stupid," she muttered.

"It's anything but," Edward said. "Your face - it's many things. Stupid is not one of them."

Bella couldn't look at him. She felt like she was combusting from the inside. "I'm sorry," she mumbled.

Edward's laugh was soft. "I'm the one in the wrong here," he said gently. "What on earth do you have to be sorry for?"

"Acting like a child," she replied, keeping her eyes focussed on his feet. "The other night, when you asked me if you'd done something to upset me, I lied."

"I know."

She glanced at him. His eyes were watching her face so intently that she could barely meet them. And suddenly the entire situation overwhelmed her. Not just what was happening right then and there. But the whole thing, the attraction between them that could never feasibly go anywhere, the pointlessness of it all. And she wanted to laugh. "This is ridiculous," she said.

And he didn't ask her to clarify. He just said, "Isn't it?"

She cleared her throat. She wanted to touch him, somewhere on his forearm. For reassurance. But instead she clasped her hands behind her back. "Thank you," she said, and took a step away from him. "For... Being honest. I'm glad we, like, cleared the air. I think it's going to make things easier. You know, for me to do my job properly."

He looked like he wanted to say more. But Tanya was calling him, and Elizabeth was calling her, and part of her thought maybe it was best they just leave it. But she couldn't stop thinking about it. About the words he hadn't said.

Author's note: Thank you for your patience, dear readers. I'm powering through this now, and I can tell you that the next chapter is the one you've probably all been waiting for. I'm editing it now and hope to have it to you sooner rather than later.