Chapter 51 teaser

“What did you do, man?” Jasper asked, straining his neck to see where the girls had disappeared to.

“I’m…not exactly sure,” I replied, just as confused as he was by the turn of events. Jasper laughed, knowing that his wife would be back for him at some point.

I shook my head and refilled my glass before settling back. The traffic in this club was insane. It was easy to pick out the different types populating the place. There were gangs of women enjoying their ladies’ night, while groups of guys made me wonder about bachelor parties. There were easily identifiable couples, and business types suited up despite the fact that it was Sunday night. The business part of my mind was trying to calculate the buy-in for a piece of a place like this.

“I’ll be right back,” Jasper yelled. I nodded as he headed towards the brightly lit sign pointing the way to the restrooms.

My eyes continued to wander the area around us. I was starting to wonder if Bella was ever coming back when a familiar voice said my name.

“Edward?”

My head shot up as I took in the small blonde woman who had approached the table. She was dressed in a black suit with a shimmery silver top underneath.

Chapter 50 pictures

Bella's jammies.

Bella's scandalous blue dress.

Orange cover up.

Bella's white bikini.

Fandoms Fight the Floods

Hello!

This is a teaser for the standalone one shot I wrote for Fandoms Fight the Floods. My submission has been sent in and acknowledged. Compilations are being sent out on March 1, but you can donate until March 30. I hope you'll support all the marvelous Aussies who've been ravaged by flooding. All it takes is a $5 donation. Donation information can be found here!

Need You Now

Friday nights weren’t my night. I understood. It wasn’t their fault, so why should they suffer?

But, even though Friday nights weren’t my night, Rose and Alice still stopped by before heading out.

“This is just so stupid,” Rose complained. She said it every week.

Didn’t change a thing.

“You guys don’t have to come here on Fridays, you know,” I told them. I said this every week.

Didn’t change a thing.

“It’s not your fault we’re not together, and there’s no reason for you to suffer.”

“There’s no reason for any of us to be suffering. You’re not seeing anyone. He’s not seeing anyone. Why don’t you just get back together?”

“You know why.”

“No, I don’t. I don’t know why. None of us know why.”

“We just don’t work, Rose. All we ever did was fight.”

Alice snorted. “That’s not all you did.”

I blushed. Every one of our friends had walked in on us at some point in the past three years. My relationship with Edward had been volatile and passionate. He’d get that look in his eye, or I’d get a whiff of his intoxicating scent and the next thing you knew we were christening the closest horizontal surface.

“Where are you going tonight?” I asked, not thinking that I might not want to hear the answer.

Alice and Rose exchanged looks.

“Oh.”

Not one to beat around the bush, Rose said, “The guys thought that Edward might have some luck there.” She made reference to our usual watering hole with a challenging arch of her brow.

“I get it, Rose. No need to paint a picture.”

"Well, paint this; if you don’t do something soon, he will find someone else.”

Chapter 50 teaser

“It’s pretty,” I commented, since he seemed completely lost in thought. He nodded without turning to face me.

“I’m done,” I told him, hoping to drag him out of his reverie before hanging up my dress and throwing the rest of my stuff in my bag.

When he turned to gather his things, he caught my eye. I watched as his gaze flitted over me, from ponytail to bare feet before coming back up to meet my eyes. He dropped his stuff back on the bed before reaching his hand out to me.

“Can we talk now?” he asked.

Ramblings

I’ve been getting more than the usual amount of interest in the many unfinished stories on my profile. Thank you for that. Here’s the plan. My FFTF fic, Need You Now, is complete and will be published with the compilation available here. I will finish THTF (See that light? It’s the end of the tunnel.), finish Gives You Hell, which is one chapter from completion, and complete Rejection, my AU New Moon story. I am committed to a Halloween one shot for 2011 as well. No, I’m not kidding. If you want something from me, you need to ask at least 10 months in advance to have a prayer of me getting it to you on time.

U + UR Hand, Lips of an Angel, Resubmit, Christmas Wrapping, and Be There are complete. (I’d love some reviews on those, friends! Just saying.) Nice Guys Finish First might be turned into a fluffy short story. Might. Metamorphosis and Gotta’ Be Someone are my earliest attempts at fanfiction. They’ll never be more than fluff and they might not ever be completed. I was writing off the cuff and that doesn’t work. Then again, I’m ridiculously OCD and having them unfinished bothers the hell out of me. So who knows!

Then I have two insistent plot bunnies. One is an AH E&B which will be fully written, beta’d and preread before it is posted. The other is a Darkward fic, which some of you may have heard me talk about on Twitter. I refer to it as my Priestward fic. The Darkward fic may or may not happen. Not sure I’m up to the challenge. And I know I’m not willing to put up with bullshit from religious zealots who will want to try to save my soul. This is a bad, bad fic. It also requires some research, which I don’t have time for. Right now all I have is a handwritten prologue in a purple spiral notebook that I keep losing.

More news: The Bargain has a new home. Well, it will have a new home. Sandy at Southern Fanfiction Review has agreed to host the story when I’m ready to put it back up. She and I have talked about the issues that got it pulled from ffnet and have, what we believe, is a workable solution. I’ll let you know when I have a date for it to go live. It won’t be soon, but at least it is off life support and breathing on its own again.