Five years ago, I wrote Darling, You're Mean, which detailed the journey of Kyleigh Montgomery and Jasper Hale. Just last year, I decided to delve deeper into Kyleigh's history with a prequel entitled Give Me Love. This is the sequel to Darling, You're Mean. Before you can read A World With You, go back and read the previous two stories. Don't worry, we'll wait. Okay, all caught up? Excellent. Enjoy the final installment of the Kyleigh Montgomery saga.

Kyleigh Whitlock-Hale sat on the back porch staring out at the rain. The book on her lap lay forgotten, though she kept a finger on it to hold it in place. So intent was for focus on the drizzle that she didn't hear the deck door open.

"Kyleigh?" Jasper said softly from the doorway.

"Hm?" she murmured, turning her attention to her husband. "What's up?

"I just wanted to see where you'd disappeared off to." He walked across the deck, leaning against the support beam.

"Just meditating, enjoying the weather."

"Because it doesn't rain enough for you?" he teased lightly.

She smiled at him. "Other parts of the country are in a drought. We should enjoy this while we can."

"Oh, so ominous." He pretended to shudder.

She swatted in his direction, though she was laughing. "What's going on?"

"Do you want to come inside and watch a movie with me? You can pick any Johnny Depp you want."

She stood up slowly, still holding her place in her book. "Five years later, and you're still willing to watch some good old JD with me?"

"For you, darling, anything." He pulled the door open for her, allowing her to pass through before following her inside.

Many Johnny Depp movies later, Kyleigh lay resting against Jasper's chest, the most relaxed she'd been in awhile.

"I was thinking," he said, sounding casual, "That maybe we could go on a trip soon."

"A trip?" Kyleigh sat up slowly. "A trip where?"

He shrugged. "Wherever you would like, my dear. Europe, perhaps? Or maybe somewhere in Canada?"

"Alaska sounds nice."

"That's neither Europe or Canada, but yes, it would be great this time of year."

"I'd have to talk to Carlisle, of course," she said, pretending not to notice Jasper stiffen slightly.

"Of course. Maybe he'll even come with us."

"Nonsense, Jas, he can't leave his patients. I just need to discuss a few things with him, that's all."

"Like what?" Jasper too sat up, dislodging her from his chest.

"I've had this idea brewing in my head for awhile. I wanted to talk to him before I brought it up to you. Didn't want to waste your time with my silly thoughts," she added quickly at the look on his voice, though this did nothing to appease him.

"It didn't used to be this way, Ky," he said quietly, sounding a little desperate. "You used to tell me everything. What happened?"

She gave him a 'you know why' kind of look. "I'll explain later. We can definitely go on a trip once I work things out with Carlisle, okay?"

"Fine," he said in a voice that implied this was anything but fine.

Up in Carlisle's study, Kyleigh found the doctor pouring over thick, dusty books. He didn't even look up to see who it was, instead just saying "hello Kyleigh, what can I do for you?"

"Carlisle, it's like you have the sixth sense," she teased. She flopped herself down on a chair across from his desk, waiting for him to give her his undivided attention.

He soon shut his book carefully then looked up at her, his usual smile playing around his mouth. "What can I do for you, little one?"

"Carlisle, I want to find my mother," she said, deciding that beating around the bush would be useless.

"For obvious reasons, I think that's a bad idea, Kyleigh. For one thing, you're supposed to be dead," he started but Kyleigh cut him off.

"Hear me out: remember almost ten years ago when you were trying to figure out the timeline for my illness and how it didn't add up?" She didn't wait for him to agree. "I've been thinking it over. What if I was adopted and my biological mother had HIV and died of AIDS or was just too sick to take care of me? That would explain why my parents insisted I had cursed blood that needed to be purged. And it explains why they let me go so easily. I wasn't theirs, I belonged to someone else." Kyleigh' eye shined brightly, more brightly than usual.

Carlisle considered this carefully. "If she truly was that sick, she would be dead by now. It's been 24 years."

"Maybe we can just track down a death certificate then, or something. That would put it all together. That would be the missing puzzle piece I've, we've been looking for!"

"It would be, but how would you do it? You can't very well contact your parents and ask them."

Kyleigh had grown animated. "If I were adopted in Washington, it wouldn't be that hard. Presumably if my real mom died, which she must have cause why else would she have given me up, then we can look for death certificates with AIDS related illnesses as the cause of death."

"What if she's still alive?" Carlisle began taking notes; Kyleigh wondered what he was writing.

"Do you suppose we could somehow go through adoption records?"

"I don't think so, if it was a closed adoption. And again, you're dead, it would raise a lot of questions if you showed up asking about it."

"What if Jasper did it? Saying that he thought I was his sister or his girlfriend or something?"

"What has Jasper said about this?" Carlisle put the pen down, giving her the piercing look she'd grown used to.

"I haven't told him yet. Only that I might have an idea for a trip for us."

"Is that the other reason you want to go? Do you think by finding your mother, you'll save your marriage?"

His direct address of it surprised her; though Kyleigh and Jasper's faulty relationship was well known in the family, it had mostly remained the elephant in the room.

"It's a possibility, isn't it?" Kyleigh asked, her voice low.

"Perhaps." Carlisle picked up the pen again, twirling it between his fingers. "I'm sorry about this."

"Is isn't your fault. It's not his either." Kyleigh slid forward in her seat so she was closer to the young doctor. "But sometimes I think he should just go back to Alice and save us the trouble."

"That's assuming she'll take him back. You don't know Alice quite like we do. Besides," Carlisle cleared his throat, "I don't think it's too late for you yet."

"19 may have been too young," Kyleigh said, either not hearing Carlisle or choosing to ignore him. "Rosalie had mentioned being in love with the idea of love…"

"Forever is a long time, Kyleigh." Carlisle stood up. "It's not your fault," he repeated. "I think that you should use your best judgment."

"Is that your version of a blessing?" she asked, trying to lighten the mood.

"It's as close as you're going to get. Let me know if you need help." He briefly cupped her cheek with his hand then stepped out of the room, leaving her to wonder.

Kyleigh slid into the driver's seat of her mini cooper. Carlisle, Edward, and Rosalie had strongly advised against getting one, instead encouraging her to get a Mercedes or Volvo, but no one could talk her out of it. So it was with great glee that she received a dark green four-door mini for her first vampire birthday.

"This car gets terrible gas mileage," Rosalie warned after helping Kyleigh and Jasper load her car.

Kyleigh just shrugged. "I like driving it. Don't worry, we'll be fine. Right, Jas?" Kyleigh asked her husband, who had just climbed into the passenger seat.

"Maybe," he said, grimacing, "this car is a little small for me."

"I'm telling you, take the bigger car!" her sister urged.

Kyleigh shook her head. "This is my car, Rose. See you in a few weeks…or so …" Kyleigh giggled.

Jasper and Rosalie exchanged slightly horrified looks, which Kyleigh ignored, instead cranking the engine. Jasper just waved to Rosalie while Kyleigh backed out of the garage.

"So, to Washington?" Jasper asked after a few minutes of silence.

"Yup, makes the most sense, right?"

"Are you really, really sure you want to do this? It might make things worse," he warned.

"I think it will bother me more not knowing though." Kyleigh played around with the radio a little until she found a station playing Beyoncé. Jasper knew better than to interrupt Beyoncé, and waited until the song was over to ask again if Kyleigh was going to be okay with this journey.

"Ask me one more time and I'm kicking you out of the car." She tried to make a scary face but failed miserably, making Jasper laugh.

They were halfway to Bellevue when Jasper asked if Kyleigh had thought beyond finding her birth mother.

"I'm running under the assumption that she's dead. And if she isn't…I don't know. I don't know," she said again.

Jasper decided to drop it, which was fine with Kyleigh. She really didn't want to think too much about it yet.

They reached Bellevue around three in the afternoon. Kyleigh parked as far away from the hospital as she could, lest anyone saw her. "Okay, let's go over this again," Kyleigh said, after she'd cut the engine. "You're going to go into the hospital-"

"And ask if I can access the birth records because it was my adopted sister's dying wish to find out who her birth mother was," Jasper finished.

"And if they say they can't, then you-"

"Ask where I can go to find out, and emphasize that it was her dying wish."

"Talk about how pretty I was too, that usually makes people feel bad," Kyleigh added, then laughed at the look Jasper gave her. "Good luck, babe," she said. She leaned over and kissed him. When she pulled away, her surprise was mirrored on his face.

"Be back soon, darling." He winked at her.

Once he'd gone, Kyleigh reclined in her seat, closing her eyes. She hadn't kissed him like that in months, just out of the blue, totally naturally. She didn't have time to dwell on that though, she wanted to know the truth, because this had been eating away at her since the trial had ended: why did her parents hate her so much?

Jasper returned less than twenty minutes later. "No such luck, Ky. You have to go through some adoption center thing. She recommended doing one of those reunion website searches, but since you don't know her name…" he trailed off.

"Dead end." Kyleigh sighed.

"There's also the possibility that you weren't adopted, Kyleigh," he said, his voice low. "Sometimes, people are just really awful and do terrible things."

Kyleigh leaned her head back against her seat again. "I guess so, but I just feel like something is missing. Carlisle is right, the disease progressed really fast if I got it when I was twelve, plus I was sick all the time when I was a kid. It doesn't add up!" She hit her hand against the steering wheel, putting a small dent in it.

"Nicely done," Jasper teased.

"Oops." Kyleigh knocked on it gently to put it back in place. "Well, now what?"

"Head to the adoption center and see what we can find? If we find your birth certificate, we might be able to trace it back."

"Who's to say that I was even born here in Washington? What if I was born somewhere else and then they adopted me and brought me here?"

Jasper and Kyleigh sat in silence, contemplating this grim reality.

"Well," Jasper said finally. "I guess we have our work cut out for us."

"Do you know where else your parents lived before they hypothetically adopted you?" Rosalie asked. She had her new iPad in her lap, her long, pale fingers poised over the screen.

"Nope, no idea," Kyleigh said, sounding almost cheerful. She loved a good challenge. Eternal life could be so boring.

"Can't we just access their records or something?" Emmett asked. He leant against Rosalie's legs, playing with a tennis ball.

"I'm not sure. We can look into it." Esme noted this idea down on her notepad.

"Keep in mind they could just be aliens who abducted Kyleigh. Or maybe this is all a plot and Kyleigh is the alien. Don't hit me!" Emmett groaned.

"If I were an alien, why would I be pursuing this?" Kyleigh pointed out.

"That's what always happens, isn't it? The whole thing that the dictator brings about his downfall because he can't just leave things be!"

Emmett went quiet at the looks on everyone's faces, ranging from confused to exasperated.

"I'm not sure I'm diabolical enough for that, Emmett," Kyleigh said finally.

"Don't sell yourself short, Ky," Carlisle said from the doorway. "Did I miss an invite to the party?" he added, taking in his family, all sprawled across the living room.

"We're trying to figure out what planet Kyleigh is from," Emmett said. "Stop hitting me!" He glared at Rosalie.

"We didn't have any luck in Bellevue and then Jasper pointed out that my parents may not have even adopted me in Washington, so we're pulling together resources to figure that out, then we can look for her."

Carlisle's expression was hard to read. He sat down next to Esme on the couch, looking at her notepad over her shoulder. Kyleigh was the only one watching Carlisle, waiting for his reaction. He looked up, briefly catching her eye, then looked back down.

"It would perhaps be smarter to track where your parents have lived before looking for her," Carlisle suggested.

"Oh right. Why didn't we think of that?" Kyleigh asked Jasper, who shrugged. "How do we do that? All I can think of is hiring a PI."

They sat in silence for a few minutes, presumably thinking it over.

"I think that's the only way to really do it, Ky," Jasper said, breaking the quiet. "I'm not really sure how else you can do that."

"You could try going to their last known address and see if you can trace it back that way," Esme suggested.

"The last one I knew of is the house we lived in before they abandoned me," Kyleigh said quietly. "And we never figured out where they went after that. Obviously."

Jasper squeezed her shoulder lightly. "We'll figure it out, love."

"Could we contact their lawyer from a few years ago, couldn't we? Would he tell us?" Rosalie asked.

"I doubt it. That probably falls under lawyer-client confidentiality or whatever." Kyleigh pulled her knees to her chest, thinking hard.

"Carlisle, could you call Maxwell and see if he can find out?" Esme asked.

Everyone turned to Carlisle, who didn't say anything right away. Finally he said, "I can call him tomorrow and ask, but that information is usually confidential."

"They showed up to our house unannounced that time, remember?" Emmett chimed in.

Of course they all remembered that day when they had to hide in the basement while Harold and Margaret screamed at Carlisle.

"That's true. I'll see what I can do." Carlisle still didn't sound forthcoming about it. Kyleigh made a note to ask him later.

"Do you think I'm crazy?" she asked Jasper later that night.

Jasper set aside the book on Marxism he'd been reading. "Not crazy, no, I can understand why you want to know. I'm just worried, and Carlisle is too."

Kyleigh sat down by his feet. "Worried why?"

"What if you weren't adopted and they really are your birth parents? Or what if you do find your birth mother. Then what?"

"I just want to put together the timeline for my disease."

Jasper gave her his best 'I don't believe you look.' "Really? Is that all?"

Kyleigh crossed her arms, feeling defensive. "What else could I want?"

"I don't know, Ky. Maybe answers for what happened ten years ago? Some sort of closure? I don't blame you, I'm just worried you won't find what you're looking for, and you'll only be hurt because of it."

"Newsflash, Jas, I'm a big girl. I can handle it." Kyleigh tried to smile reassuringly, though his disbelieving expression didn't change. "It's fine, honestly. You'll see." She patted his knee lightly.

"Carlisle wants to talk to you before he goes to the lawyer. Just so you know." Jasper's voice had suddenly gone cool.

"Oh, okay." Kyleigh got to her feet, his attitude change noted. "I'll see you in a bit then."

He didn't respond, just picked his book back up, shutting her out again.

Kyleigh knocked lightly on Carlisle's office door.

"Come in," she heard. She found him sitting behind his large wooden desk, surrounded by large books. Kyleigh glanced at them, noting that the majority were law books.

"Hi," she said. "You summoned me?"

"If telling Jasper I wanted to talk to you at some points counts as summoning, then yes. Have a seat." He smiled at her, putting her at ease.

"So what did you want to talk about, oh powerful one?" She curled her legs under her, making herself comfortable.

"I think you know what I want to talk about." He slid one of the books out of the way so he could lean his elbows on his desk.

"Let me guess-you think that me looking for my mother is a bad idea because I won't find the closure I'm looking for."

He smiled briefly at her joke, then his expression became serious again. "It's a valid concern, Kyleigh. Are you absolutely sure you want to go down this road?"

"This isn't just some whim, Carlisle. I really want to know, and I know that you want to figure it out too." Kyleigh thought back to the amount of times he'd gone over her spotty medical history.

"I do, but this isn't how I want to do it. I don't want you getting hurt anymore, little one. Haven't you been through enough?"

Kyleigh smiled at him, though it was a somber smile. "You can't always protect me, Carlisle. At some point you need to let go."

"I promised I would be there for you for as long as we both lived, remember? That counts just as much now as it did then."

"Did you intend for me to live forever when you said that, though? Because neither of us saw this coming." Kyleigh picked at a stray thread on her pants.

"I didn't know at the time that you would become a vampire, no, but I made a promise and I'm going to hold true to that."

Kyleigh avoided eye contact as she repeated her sentiment from earlier, "Forever is a long time."

She heard her doctor stand up, moving around his desk so he was standing next to her. Still, she didn't look at him, even as he crouched down in front of her.

"What are we really talking about, Ky?"

She finally met his eye, no longer smiling. "Whatever you want us to talk about."

He took one of her hands in his. "Just drop it. Go someplace fun with Jasper. You're always welcome to visit the island, or you can go up to your cabin in the mountains. Just get out of here and clear your head."

Kyleigh looked at their entwined hands, at the Cullen crest engraved on his ring, matching her locket. "You know me, once I start something, I can't really be stopped."

He laughed softly. "I know that all too well." He squeezed her hand as he stood back up. "As always, follow your heart, Ky. If you think this is really what you need, I won't stand in your way."

"Thank you, Carlisle. You've always been too nice to me." She too stood up.

"Kyleigh," he said, just before she walked out of his office.

"Yeah?"

"Have you considered drawing anything? It's been awhile since you've created something, I'm wondering if that might help."

"You always suggest that when things get tough." She laughed. "Art isn't always the answer."

"But it certainly helps."

She turned, looking up at the painting she'd done for him as a Christmas present all those years ago. The never-ending sunrise to sunset cycle meant a lot more to her now. Who knew that eight years later, she would be living in that infinity?

"I'll think about it."

"That's all I ask," he said, as she closed the door behind her.