Edge and Belle

Chapter 17 (Belle): Back Here With Us

When a man like Edge tells you his intentions, he means business. When he finally sorts his shit and figures things out, when he tells you he's coming after you and intends to win your heart, your life is about to change.

My mind conjured a visual, like a scene from a movie, where I was standing at the edge of a cliff and an attack helicopter came rising up slowly, its sights set on me, and Edge was piloting the gunship. Of course, considering his career, who else would be flying the helicopter? Then he pulled the trigger and hearts and cupids came out of the barrels of the guns, right before he blew me a kiss. 

When he'd declared he was going to win my heart, I'd given him a speculative look. "My heart comes with two littler hearts, Edge. Two hearts that are actually more important than mine when it comes down to it. If it was just my heart at stake, I'd say win away, but you have three hearts to win."

With a smile, he'd moved closer to me on the couch, his hands going to my thighs. "I know, Belle. I'm very aware it's more than you and all that it means. That's why I want us to take it slower this time, to build things from the ground up intentionally. I'd like to think the last few weeks have been pointing toward that."

I thought of him coaching West's team, of all the repairs he made to things around the house, even the booster seats he'd bought and installed in his truck for the children. Of the way he kept persisting.

"They have. You've been repairing the damage. With all of us, and not only that, you've been doing it the right way, with your time and patience."

"Got plenty of patience, Belle, but time may be trickier when I get deployed in five months."

He'd mentioned a long time ago that he got deployed for about six months every year-and-a-half to two years. I think he'd been stateside for the last eighteen months, so he was due.

"You going to be OK with that?" he asked. "It's not easy on relationships."

"I think I would be, but like anything between us, we won't know until we try. I knew going into this who you were and what you did for a living. I know we started completely casually, but if I wasn't OK with this, I wouldn't have let you meet the children."

He pressed a kiss to my lips, a kiss that made me want to say, screw slow. Let's go!

"All we can do is try, Belle. That's all I'm asking."

"I'm definitely willing to try, Edge."

He began by asking me out on dates. Not dinners that we knew would end in sex, but real dates where we talked even more than we ever had, and there were no expectations at the end of the night except a good kiss. A really good kiss. The kind of hot, wet kiss that left you panting for more, feeling needy and wet and...shit. This going slow plan sucked. But every time I thought that, I remembered Piper and West, and how things had once gone sideways with this man and how their little hearts had been bruised because I hadn't been vigilant enough.

I still berated myself for that, and I determined to go slow with Edge if it killed me. With the way I felt when he tore himself away from me to head home after our dates, I was afraid it might.

"This is killing me, too, you know," he said one night after he'd walked me inside and the sitter had left. Edge had me pressed up against the front door, every inch of us pressed together, his hard to my soft, and his mouth was tormenting mine, pulling away every time the kiss got deep, then coming back for an even deeper kiss. Attack and pull away on an endless, teasing loop.

He'd put his forehead against mine and told me, "You tend to forget this anticipation, this build up, how much fun making out is, where you're going at it until you think you're going to explode. It's like the longest edging in my life," he said, his voice thick with desire and frustration. "I kind of like it."