”Happy birthday,” he said and kissed me. We had just gotten home from my 24th-birthday party.

The wolf pack had given me a guitar, just as I wished for. But right now, I didn’t think about my gifts.

I was present.

Our lips never left each other. He held me tighter. It didn’t hurt.

We had never done this before, but we’d been quite close a few times. Lately, he’d been begging me almost every night.

But I had refused.

Of course I wanted to, too. But I didn’t want to rush things. Plus my Dad was Edward Cullen...

He’d waited long enough. 24 years for me to budge. The 41 years of his life.

We stumbled around our house. I could feel his heavy breathing against my body.

He grabbed my shirt and pulled it over my head.

I did not refuse.

And neither did he.