The first light of the day painted the ceiling with pale tones, and the curtains danced with the breeze. The world was still asleep.

She, lying between the crumpled and warm sheets, moved slowly, like someone who wakes up from a dream... but that dream was still there.

He was there.

Edward

Sitting next to her on the bed, his bare back exposed to the golden light, his eyes fixed on her face as if he were seeing her for the first time. The fingers slowly ran down the curve of her waist, as if making sure that she was still alive, whole... and his.

“Are you okay?” He asked, almost in a whisper, his voice full of emotion.

She opened her eyes with difficulty, sleepy, her lips curling in a lazy smile.

“I’m perfect,” she murmured. “Better than perfect.”

His eyes closed briefly, as if it relieved him more than any promise.

“I stayed up all night... just watching you,” he confessed. “Thinking that at any moment you would disappear.”

She stretched out her hand, her fingers sliding through the firm lines of his arm, until they intertwined his.

“You didn’t hurt me, Edward. You just... loved me.”

He leaned over, his lips tenderly meeting her shoulder, then her collarbone, then the curve of her neck. Kisses so light that they looked more like apologies.

“Do you promise to tell me if it was hurting? If you were uncomfortable?”

She laughed softly. “I Promise. But I think you have no idea how good it was for me.”

His eyes filled with a different glow - not hunger, but relief. Be careful.

He gently pulled the sheet, covering the two while lying next to her. Her head found shelter in her chest, and his fingers began to draw slow and smooth lines on her back, as if they calmed her down, as if they said:

“You’re safe. I’m here. I’ll never leave.”

“Can I ask you a question?” He murmured, his lips on top of her head.

“Of course.”

“Who was scarier: falling in love with a vampire... or marrying him?”

She looked at him, her eyes lit up in the morning.

“It wasn’t scary, Edward. It was inevitable.”

He closed his eyes, smiling. And there, in that sunny room on an island lost in time, the vampire who swore never to give in... now he only wanted one thing:

Stay. With her. Forever.