Baby Fever [Jacob & Edward]

27

a/n: this might need a lil editing.

Edward nibbles at his fries despite being unamused by Darlene's conclusion of his current condition. He's gone back to bundling up in Jacob's shirts, adding a hoodie on top for added modesty. 

Jacob wants to tease him about it, but his head is elsewhere as he tries to discreetly look into the man's ex. There weren't a lot of places she could be. Her father, Charlie Swan, lived in town. He assumes that would be the second place a concerned mother would look after searching Bella's house. He could call hospitals in the surrounding area, if she were struggling to keep both her and the baby alive, she could've checked herself into a hospital. He sends a list of hospitals to Stanley and asks her to look for a generic description of the woman he was looking for: Brown hair, brown eyes, five months pregnant, potentially in distress. It's a wide net, but the chances of her giving her name and her mother not having found her already were low. He sends a picture of Bella and tells her to take Mike and show it to the front desk at the hospitals that gave an affirmative.

He's more curious about what Charlie can tell him. Maybe he had more information than the Chief or at least enough to guide Jacob in the right direction. 

Charlie opens the door slowly, before his eyes narrow and he throws it open the rest of the way.

"Jacob?" 

It suddenly dawns on Jacob that he hasn't seen the man since his dad died. Despite working in the same station, he's not sure he's even accidentally bumped into him. 

"Mr. Swan, I wanted to ask you some questions about your daughter." He watches as the man blinks a few times as if it takes him a moment to comprehend the words coming out of Jacob's mouth. 

"Bella?" he asks, head cocking to the side in confusion. 

"Yessir, Chief Dwyer said she was missing," Jacob elaborates, slightly miffed by his confusion.

He watches the man's confusion morph into concern as he stares at Jacob.

"I-I talked to Bella last week. She said she was with her mother." All of the color has drained from the man's face as his eyes search the air for answers. 

If that were true, Dwyer hadn't alerted anyone. It was pretty clear in the little briefing that they'd had, that she wanted to keep this quiet. But not telling Bella's father? Jacob's not sure if it's because she doesn't think Bella's in actual genuine danger or if it's because of her condition and how'd she'd gotten into that condition. He doubted she wanted the entire station knowing that she was not only pregnant out of wedlock when she'd previously been engaged, but she'd also gone missing while pregnant with a coworker's baby. Without context, it seemed more than a little suspicious. 

"I'm sure she's just with a friend." Jacob offers, trying not to startle the man more than he already had. 

The expression on Charlie's face says he highly doubts it as he wracks his brain. 

"Maybe she's with that Cullen boy." Jacob hears him mutter before pulling out his phone and Jacob has to train his face to keep from looking completely dumbfounded by the conclusion.

"Cullen?" He forces himself to ask. 

"Yeah, she's pregnant with his baby," He admits before looking like he immediately regrets it, as he glances back at Jacob, "she was crazy about him at one point, but we thought that was all over." 

It suddenly truly dawns on Jacob that this relationship was serious, serious enough that they'd been engaged at one point. That type of connection might mean that she'd been close with Edward's family. Emmett and Jasper seemed completely unaware, but that doesn't mean she hadn't gone to other family members, more qualified family members.