I sensed them first. They were in the thickest part of the forest so the noise was muffled, but that did nothing to camouflage their stench. I wasn't sure what they were, but risks weren't something I was prepared to take; Renesmee and Jacob were visiting.

I glanced up from my magazine. Edward was listening to chamber music and didn't seem to notice anything out of the ordinary. That would change the moment I moved; he would be at my side instantly. My Edward, he still sees me as the simpering little human he rescued all those years ago. I smiled thinking back on the first years we were together.

The rancid scent drew my attention back to the moment. Edward smelled it now, and we were across the room standing at the window in quick order. Nothing seemed out of sync. I viewed every blade of grass, every drop of water. Not a grain of sand around our home was disturbed.

"What are they?" I asked.

"I'm not sure." Edward placed his arm around my waist and pulled me close. "I want you to stay here, Bella. I'm going to check."

I shook my head; my husband never learns. We raced through the house and out to the deck. The foul odor filled the air and I stopped my breathing for a moment so I wouldn't gag.

"Bella?" Jacob stuck his head out the door.

"You smell it too?" I asked, turning toward him.

"Yeah, and I've smelled it before." He came out onto the deck and stood beside us. "The packs on its way, things are fixing to get interesting."

"What is it?" Edward asked; his voice calm but guarded.

"Zombies." Jacob said.

"Be serious." I laughed. I believe in just about everything-mostly because I've seen just about everything-but not once in over a hundred years had I heard about zombies being anything but B Rated movie fodder.

"I am serious." He growled.

I looked up at Edward expecting to see his crooked smile. They had to be playing a joke on me, but if my heart still beat it would have stopped. There was no other way to describe the look on Edwards face; he was scared.

"Edward?" I asked.

"Bella go in the house."

"No."

"You don't want to see them, believe me." Jacob added his opinion.

"Where's Renesmee?" I wasn't going inside but I wanted to make sure my daughter stayed there.

"In the safe room, I made her go in before I came outside."

"Thank you, Jacob." I touched his arm gently. "Now…since zombies have been added to the list of weird but true things, what do they want?"

"Bella please go in the house." Edward wasn't ready to concede defeat.

"Do they mean us harm?" I was ignoring him, and it worked. He ran his fingers through his mussed up hair and sighed resignedly.

"They haven't got working brains, Bella. They don't do anything intentionally. They just migrate where the scent's the strongest."

"They smell us?"

"They smell the blood. Carlisle just restocked the coolers; one of the large vats busted today. You were out with Renesmee, Carlisle and I cleaned it up."

"Not good enough." Jacob's upper lip curled.

"The blood was tainted, that's what they smell."

"I don't understand, I mean where did they come from? Zombies don't just pop up out of nowhere looking for blood."

"Bella, that's why I wanted you to go inside…" Edward stopped talking and refused to look at me. "Tell her Jake." He said without emotion.

"Ah Bella, why wouldn't you just go inside?" Jake asked past the lump in his throat.

"Tell me." I demanded, although I was beginning to wonder if I really wanted to hear it.

"Someone had to purposefully create them, and going by the stench there's a lot of them. The only place with enough dead bodies in the area is the Forks cemetery."

I saw red, and my fangs distended instantly. I'd dealt with the death of my father many years ago, but the pain of loss was ever present. I read between the lines of what the two most important men in my life couldn't bring themselves to tell me.

Someone had desecrated the cemetery and that meant only one thing…I was going to have to fight the reanimated corpse of Charlie.