CF - Prologue

"I don't understand," I whispered.

"What's there to understand?" He spoke flatly, eyes averted away from me toward the boxes of inventory lining the far wall in the backroom of my parent's store. But his normally confident self was faltering, visible by the slight tremor his hands made at his sides.

"You just said… you wanted me." I bit my lip, feeling the heat begin at my face, whispering its way down to my chest. I hated being this transparent.

"Yeah." He still remained indifferent, still keeping his eyes off me.

"I mean…" I paused, hesitant to continue, but the curiosity won out. "I didn't expect for you to feel… that way. Are you afraid or embarrassed to… uh… want me?" I rationalized that this could be a trick, that he could be bating me for some kind of self-enjoyment in torturing me. And though I accepted that was a possibility, something in my gut told me that wasn't the case.

His head snapped in my direction, eyes flaming with what appeared to be anger, darkening the bright green of his eyes to an almost black tinged with a red fire of lust. Finally, there was some kind of emotion. The right side of his lips turned up as he smirked, but his eyes still burned with rage and desire. "It's not that I'm afraid or embarrassed of wanting you, Bella. It's not fear or embarrassment of wanting. You wanna know what it is? It's about wanting you too much, especially when I shouldn't want you. I've tried not to. God knows I've fucking tried not to feel anything for you."

I stepped backward as he stalked toward me, coming to a halt as my body collided with a wall. I was thrilled and terrified by his reaction. He placed his hands on either side of me, blocking me from moving, and my body instantly ignited from the proximity of his nearness. I could feel his warm breath on my mouth, taste him as my tongue dipped out to drag a path across my bottom lip. Being this close to me, this was not something Edward did. "I fucking want you," he admitted through gritted teeth. "And I fucking hate that I do. So stop. Stop whatever it is you're doing."