Chapter one

It was decided when she was eight, only a year after her father had died, a heart attack all the sudden. It didn't even go a year before Isabella's mother married again, to a hideous man that hated children and the thought of being a father to an eight year old, well, let's just say it didn't sit well with him.

Charles Swan married Renée in 1986 and already in 1987, September 13, they became parents to a small girl named Isabella Marie and their life couldn't seem to become any better than that. Only a few years into his marriage with Renée, Charles, or Charlie, learned that there was one thing Renée would always love more than her husband and daughter; money. Suddenly, it became more important to have expensive clothes, pillows and curtains with the price of 300 dollars, each.

Expensive trips to Paris, Milan, Barcelona and so on became more important than to celebrate their little girl's first birthday, second, third, fourth and so on. Isabella's, or Bella's, birthday were always spent with homemade pizza and a movie, birthday girls wish. It became a tradition between Bella and her father from the very beginning, when she was too small to eat anything but milk and some very disgusting baby food.

They spent every holiday together, even Valentine's Day and they had a tradition for every holiday. Halloween, Charlie would dress Bella up as a mouse, dog, cat and one year, he dressed them both up as dragons. Every Valentine, since Renée would be off somewhere with her friends, as she called her new flame, Charlie ordered a heart shaped cake from the local bakery. It was always a chocolate cake with raspberry cream and when Charlie died, Bella stopped eating chocolate cake and anything with raspberry. There were only three times she had tried to eat anything close to chocolate cake with raspberry cream; Valentine's Day 1997, 2000 and 2004. She had bought a cupcake and brought it with her to Charlie's grave the first time she did it. One bite and she threw up just next to her father's grave. The second time, she brought a cupcake with her, with a small candle, and placed it on his grave and she watched the small candle burn down. The third time, she managed to take a bite of her cupcake, without throwing up.

Bella missed her father terribly, more than she could handle sometimes but she had learned a long time ago that neither Phil nor her mother would notice if her eyes were red shot and red rimmed. And besides, they lived in a big house and Renée and Phil had their bedroom on the first floor, leaving Bella the second floor almost all to herself, at least some days.

Phil loved to have his friends over and when he first moved into the house Charlie had bought and renovated, she hated it. When she learned that her mother loved him, before she knew better, Bella decided that she could live with it,

Then the bomb hit her like an A-bomb over Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

All the men that came and went almost as if they owned the place, they were meant for her. Since she was so young when her father died, Bella didn't get any details about Charlie's will. But apparently, Charlie had left her three million dollars, everything he had had, even the house. Renée didn't get anything and because of that, she pushed Bella even further away, letting her be a parent for herself.

And there were 30 acres of land somewhere in Washington, most of it forest, land that was Bella's. But Phil and Renée were sly, very sly, and they wanted it, at least what it was worth. They couldn't take the land and sell it just to take the six million it was worth but it didn't mean they could get something out of it. With Phil's lawyer, a new plan was drawn up, one that would give them at least a million dollars. All they had to do was to sell the land to a young man with a promise of a dutiful wife. That's right; they were going to sell Bella.

All the men that came and went as Bella grew up were there to see if they could live with her and have her as a wife. As soon as Bella learned it, she became nasty and soon, the house was empty. Renée found new people to be with, meaning a new lover every day, and Phil brought a new girl into the house. More than once, at the age of thirteen, Bella walked in on Phil with a new blond girl, having sex in the down stairs living room or in one of the many guest bedrooms.

Bella sometimes got the vibe that Phil wanted to have sex with her as well as her body started to fill out, her breast growing and her hips showing, but he didn't try anything before she turned eighteen; she kicked his ass and broke a tooth. Since she had felt the vibe, she had started taking self-defense classes, then karate and mixed material arts, all of it without Phil and Renée noticing. Phil never tried anything again and because Bella could defend herself, no one was interested in her.

She never got out of the house. She wanted to move but she couldn't, they wouldn't let her. Instead, Bella was forced to learn how to cook, sow and just how to be the perfect little wife, without no voice. But Bella had a voice and she used it every time she was showed off as an animal to complete strangers. Every time, she was told to dress nicely and be at her best behavior but just to piss Phil off, she was late, dressed in old clothes and dirty. She swore, talked only about herself and simply disgusted those who came to see her.

Bella thought, when she turned twenty-one, six years after she was shown off for the first time, that maybe, just maybe, it was over. The last man, who had come to check her out, had come during her small birthday party when she turned twenty-three, a whole year before.

But it was far from over, it barely was the beginning.

It was early spring and Bella was using her day in the garden with the gardener, digging, getting dirty and enjoying the pale sun high on the sky, when Greta, the chef Phil had insisted they needed, came out on the terrace, calling for her.

"Miss. Bella," Greta called out with a shrill voice. She didn't need to say more; Bella knew what was coming whenever Greta's voice became shrill.

"Coming Greta!" Bella called back, getting up from the ground, drying her hands on her jeans as she walked up on the terrace and to the French doors of Phil's office. She could see Phil sitting by his desk, talking animated with a man with strange colored hair. Without knocking, she slowly opened the door and stepped in, not caring much about the dirt on the boots; it was Phil's office.

"Ah, Bella, finally," Phil almost sneered at her but she didn't care; she just wanted to know who the next old, creepy man was. "This is Mr. Cullen, one of our interests."

Mr. Cullen rose from his seat and turned to Bella; he was handsome, very, but he was also older than her, more than five years but he also seemed to be younger than fifteen, which most of the men she had been showed off too had been.

"Mr. Cullen, this is my step daughter, Isabella," Phil informed Mr. Cullen, gesturing with an offhand motion toward Bella.

Mr. Cullen held out his hand with a bored expression and Bella stepped closer, leaving a fine trail of dirt on Phil's hardwood floor, stretching out her hand to shake his when she remembered that her hands were still covered in dirt.

"I think I should wash my hands first," she explained, taking back her hand.

"Well, I'm going to let you too talk alone for a little while," Phil explained, ricing from his chair, giving Bella a pointed look she knew all too well. It meant one thing: If you mess this up, I will make you pay. Pay meant that he might force himself upon her, again and it also meant that she would kick his ass, again.

As Phil left the room, Bella went to his adjoined bathroom, leaving the door open as she washed her hands, scrubbing them good till they were red before she pulled out a small flask of antibacterial gel and squirted some into her hand, rubbing it in thoroughly.

Mr. Cullen was standing by the French doors when she came out and he didn't acknowledge her presence before she cleared her throat. Still, he didn't turn around to look at her.

"I'm just wondering," he started, tipping his head back slightly so his chin were higher in the air. "-how desperate you must be to have your step-father sell 300 acres of land your father gave you and force whoever buys the land to marry you. Are you really that desperate?" he turned to look at her and Bella couldn't help but stare at him; he was beautiful, very handsome.

"I-"she cleared her throat, suddenly losing her voice. "I'm not desperate," Bella defended herself. "I don't have a need to get married but if that's the only way I'll get away from here, I'm willing to do it."

"Why don't you just let your mother and Phil have the land, Bella? They seem more than willing to take over the land."

"I'm never going to let go off the land; it belonged to my father and he gave it to me. My mom, nor my step-father, will have the pleasure of selling the land my father worked hard for, just so they can get more of what they think they need to be happy; money."

"Money can give a lot that will make you happy," Mr. Cullen pointed out.

"But money is far from everything, Mr. Cullen. If you are sad, buying something will only make you happy for a little while and it becomes an evil circle that is hard to break."

"You make a fine point, Miss Swan, and I do believe I might have miss judged you as well, but there will be more room was talking some other day. I will see you later, Bella." Bella sighed when he had left and looked up to see her reflection in one of the many mirrors her mother had insisted the house needed; she looked awful, her hair that had been in a neat ponytail earlier was sticking out, most of it not even in the tail anymore, and her face, no make-up but dirt on her forehead. How could she not have seen it earlier?

~O~O~O