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Bella stared open mouthed into the dark burgundy eyes which held her's captive. She hadn't really looked at the rest of him yet. The eyes alone were mesmerizing and drew her to their owner in a way she had never been drawn to anyone before, it tugged on her heart. It was with complete conviction she knew this man was hers.

Aro clapped in glee, the blond rolled his eyes. "Can you please try to refrain from behaving like a child when we have visitors?" he growled and turned away from Bella toward the darker haired man with an intense scowl on his face.

Bella was overwhelmed with the urge to go to him, to make him smile. She tried to step towards him but Aro held her firmly, "Not yet" he whispered.

"Come now Caius don't be so anti-social, come and greet our guests." The growl that echoed throughout the chamber made Bella cringe.

"I am not at your beck and call brother." Caius announced, this time Bella got to look at the rest of him. He was gorgeous obviously, but there was a maturity about him which appealed, his looks were what she had always imagined rugged to be. His blond hair was just past shoulder length and he looked to be about six feet tall, not that Bella was really a good judge of height. The thing that struck her the most was the look of utter fury on his face, he was probably the scariest vampire she had ever seen and it turned her on no end.

Unfortunately at this precise moment the furious glare was fixed on her. Instead of being intimidated however this made Bella angry.

"What did I do?" she asked under her breath.

"Nothing but be human" Marcus, she assumed, answered.

"And that is bad because?"

"Humans are pathetic and weak." Caius growled.

"Yeah better than being an animated corpse, we 'pathetic, weak humans' have everything you want, blood, vitality and LIFE" she yelled back.

Both Aro and Marcus laughed loudly at the look of shock on Caius's face. Bella glanced round to see Felix trying desperately not to laugh and he wasn't the only one. Alice had a grin on her face that would put the Cheshire cat to shame. She stepped forward to give Bella a hug.

"You are going to have so much fun" she whispered into Bella's ear as she hugged her. "I won't get the chance to say goodbye later so I will say it now. You will always be my sister. Remember that."

It was at that moment that it all went to shit. Edward, clearly reading something in Alice's mind he didn't like, roared at Caius "SHE IS MINE" and launched across the room at him.

Bella couldn't follow the movements at all but heard an almighty crash and looked at the far wall to see Edward in a heap of stones, with Felix and Demetri grabbing his arms. Caius didn't appear to have moved at all, but had the smuggest grin imaginable on his face.

"She is not now nor will she ever be yours boy." The blond vampire snarled out in the general direction of Edward. "You are not man enough to have her or to keep her."

"And you are?" Edward shrieked.

"Edward! Will you, for once, shut the fuck up! Don't you ever think about anyone but yourself? You have no idea how hurt Esme and Carlisle were by your insistence we leave Bella. Or how much Emmett and I missed her. Do you have even the foggiest notion how devastated they would all be by your suicide? Do you even care? NO, NO, NO! And now you go off half-cocked, screaming about ownership and just about sentence us all to death. You stupid, selfish, bastard. Just grow the fuck up or I swear I will kill you myself."

"Wow Alice, I never knew you had it in you." Bella sniggered quietly breaking the shocked silence.

The room erupted in laughter. Even Caius had a ghost of a smile on his face.

"Wow, Caius, I never knew you had it in you" Aro said in a sing song imitation of Bella's voice.

That brought the scowl back to his face with a growl.

Whether it was the strain of the day so far or the priceless look on Edward's face after Alice's rant. Perhaps it was even Caius's face as Aro made fun of him. But something in Bella snapped and all she could do was collapse there on the floor laughing. The laughter poured from her like a pressure release, tears streamed down her face. Try as she might she could not control herself.

"Someone please put the human on a chair and stop that noise. Throw some water in her face or something."

"Caius please have a little more tact." Aro admonished. "Bella would you like some water?"

"Yes (hic) please, (hic)" There was chuckling all-round the room as she tried to contain her giggles and hiccups. Caius was looking at her with an odd expression, part amused, part annoyed.

Felix appeared behind her with a chair and moved to pick her up but was stopped by an infuriated growl from Caius. Bella managed to lever herself up from the floor and slumped down in the chair still hiccupping.

Caius handed her a glass of water. "Please stop that noise."

"It's not (hic) that easy." Bella hiccupped out while sipping the water.

The blond vampire looked at her for a moment then slowly he smiled the most evil smile Bella had ever seen.

"BOO!" came a yell in her ear. Bella screamed at the top of her lungs. She threw the water in the air, fell off the chair and gracelessly tried to scramble across the floor away from him.

"You bastard, what the fuck was that for?"

"I remembered that if you give a human a fright it stops them hiccupping. As you can see it worked." He was laughing loudly.

"Fucking hell, you almost gave me a heart attack. Fright does not mean cause a cardiac arrest. I am human remember." She picked herself shakily up off the floor and sat back down in the chair

"I am hardly likely to forget that small detail. Beside if you had died you would of at least been quiet."

"Fuck you" Caius simply cocked an eyebrow in response and laughed.

Aro slinked over to her chair with an almost manic grin on his face. "While it is wonderful to see you getting on so well, we do have some rather pressing matters to discuss."

Both Bella and Caius stared at Aro, Bella almost choked. "On what planet would you consider this getting on well? He tried to scare me to death!"

"I did not. That would have been a tragic waste of good blood" Caius quipped rolling his eyes. "What more pressing matters?"

Across the room Alice gasped. She looked at Edward wide eyed and shook her head. "Please keep your mouth shut"

Edward growled and struggled against Demetri's hold. "You will not have her. She is my mate, I demand you hand her over to me. She will leave with us now, I will change her when the time is right."

Caius was in front of him and grabbed him round the throat, pinning him to the wall "Be silent boy. You are in no position to demand anything. The only decision remaining is how painful your death will be and at the moment I am leaning toward very."

"Please don't kill them" Bella whispered as she walked toward them. Demitri moved to intercept her but stopped at a growl from Caius. She reached up and touched the arm that controlled Edward. "Please I'll do whatever you want just don't kill them. Alice is one of my best friends and Edwards death would destroy Carlisle and Esme. That is the only reason I came here in the first place."

Exasperated Bella turned from Edward and started walking across the floor. After several paces she stopped, the long buried painful memories of loss then embarrassment surfaced. In a flash or rage she raced towards the restrained cause of all her pain.

"Your mate?" Bella questioned Edward venomously. "You, left, me, remember. In the forest, alone, I got lost. I almost died. It was several hours before I was found. What sort of moron leaves their "MATE" like that? You didn't want me, you would barely touch me. You said you would never change me. You certainly never wanted me forever."

She sighed and added sadly all the anger gone. "I am not yours, Edward. I don't think I ever really was and I certainly never will be again. I did what you wanted I moved on. More like I grew up and out grew you."

Turning to Aro Bella pleaded "Please don't kill them, just let them leave. Besides they have a mess to clear up."

"What mess?" Aro asked.

"There is a nomad after me. She wants revenge for the death of her mate. The Cullen's killed him a while ago because he threatened me. Unfortunately she now wants a "mate for a mate". If she is not dealt with she may try and use my Dad to get to me."

"Well that settles it then" Aro announced. "They will leave and deal with the nomad. I will contact Carlisle and inform him of the situation. He will deal with your disappearance and inform us when the nomad has been neutralized."

"And hopefully she will kill this idiot and save me the trouble" Caius added with a nod at Edward.

"My disappearance?" Bella bowed her head, in her heart she knew this would be the case. Glancing at Caius she saw concern on his features.

"You know of our world" he said releasing Edward and taking her arm to escort her out of the room. "You cannot remain human and to return you to your home is unacceptable. Your future is here now. With me."

There was scuffling behind them and a cry of pain. Bella didn't turn round. He was her past, literally.

The doors closed behind them. "You handled that quite well in there. I was almost impressed" the vampire that was her future said with a chuckle.

"Praise indeed" she snarked back.