Chapter 3:
By the end of the week, Bella's little group of friends was my own. I spent lunch with them and sat next to them in the classes we shared. Well, with Angela ad Eric, that was. I didn't really care much for Jessica or Mike. Those two were everything humans shouldn't want to be; petty, envious, and full of bad intentions. At least as far as I was concerned.
While my school life was easy, home life was beginning to get tense. The Cullens weren't happy about me being friends with humans and specially being friends with Bella, they knew the effect the girl had in Edward and they were worried about that. Alice seemed to be the only one who didn't care. I could tell however, that her easy-goingness wouldn't last too long. She yearned for Bella's friendship while Edward all but forbid it, claiming it was enough with me. That plus the fact I was withdrawing myself from all of them was making her restless.
It was early, now, just about to be eight thirty. Alice and I were standing with Edward in the parking lot, waiting for the bell to ring. Silence surrounded us. I rolled my shoulders and grimace at the painful tension there. Something bad was about to happen, I could feel it in my bones. I just didn't know what. It didn't help, either, that every time I would start to have a vision it would fade away into the back of my mind. I fought the urge to stump my feet. What was the point of me being able to see the future if I couldn't control it?
Suddenly, Edward disappeared from beside me, Alice gasped aloud. I hadn't turned to her fully, about to ask her what was wrong, when the clear sound whining metal reached my ears. I faced the parking lot once more. There, at least six cars away from us, Bella was knelt on the ground, looking at her wheels quizzically. And there, racing towards her, was a blue SUV. The driver, who looked awfully familiar, was clutching at the steering wheel, struggling to retain control of the vehicle. Bella was completely oblivious. Until she looked up. I could see the fear flashing in her face. Just when the SUV was going to hit her, Edward appeared between the car and Bella. He moved Bella out of the way.
The whole parking lot let out a breath. There was a beat of nothing before every single student present geared into action. People yelled out Bella's name, called emergency services. The whole place was in a rampant. I took out my phone and dialed Carlisle.
"Marie? What's wrong? You know I don't like to be disturbed at the hospital." I heard Carlisle say from the other side of the line.
"I know, but this is important." I paused and waited for the words to sink in.
"What's happened?" he asked.
"There was an accident at school. Bella almost got run over by a car. Except Edward saved her." I explained. "People are calling you check on her? When she gets to the E.R.? That way no doctor will be too suspicious over the fact that she's not injured at all." I took a deep breath after that. I had said it very lowly so no one would hear and really fast so in case someone had heard, they wouldn't understand.
There was a pause on the other line and I started to wonder if Carlisle had left me hanging, which I highly doubted. Cluttering was heard on the other line. I waited.
"I will, when are they bringing her here?"
That got me thinking. I never thought of Bella to be the kind of girl to go in an ambulance if it wasn't needed, but I was obviously wrong because when I turned around I could see her getting into the ambulance next to the driver. Edward was nowhere to be seen.
"They should be there in about ten minutes. Carlisle? I have to go, Alice needs me." I said and hung up as I walked towards Alice who was making signs at me. I came closer to her and she grew impatience because she ran towards me and grabbed my hand.
"You have to get us both out of here, now! So do one of your witchy things and make us appear at the hospital, Bella suspects something." Alice whispered and I did as I was told. Soon enough we were at Carlisle's office.
"I don't like it, Carlisle! Marie Antoinette is already at risk by being friends with them but Edward crossed the line!" Rosalie whispered yelled at Carlisle. They were outside the office and Alice was about to step into the conversation but I stopped her, I wanted to know more.
"What do you want me do to Rosalie? He's my son I can't punish him for having humans feelings," Carlisle said calmly to Rosalie. I frowned, what was that about humans' feelings?
"What did he mean by that?" I mouthed to Alice and she shrugged.
"We'll figure it out later." She mouthed back.
"He's going to get us all killed! I don't want to move out just yet!" Rosalie whined.
"We'll discus this later with everyone, now goodbye Rosalie." Carlisle was about to enter his office, where Alice and I were (how convenient) and was going to catch us eavesdropping in his conversation with rose.
Not good.
I looked at Alice to see her frowning, she was thinking a way out and I had it, I grabbed her wrist, turned around and we both disappeared with a loud crack! At the same time Carlisle entered the room.
Five hours later, Edward and Carlisle had still not arrived home. We were all waiting, though, quietly sat in the dining room table. It was tense. Rosalie and Emmet were frowning deeply at nothing in particular, while Alice was staring into space, most likely attempting to trigger a vision. Jasper and Esme seemed to be the only ones unbothered by the whole thing. I, however, was bored out of my mind.
Finally, the front door opened and closed with an audible bang!
"Carlisle I don't understand why you're doing this," I heard Edward.
I saw Carlisle enter the dining room, where the family meetings were done, and Edward close behind, fuming. Carlisle sat on the corner of the table and Edward sat on his left, Esme was sitting on his right, Emmet was next to Esme and Rose was next to him. That left me at the other side of the table, right in front of Carlisle and between Jasper and Rose.
"We all know why we are here…" Carlisle began but he was cut out by none other that Rosalie.
"To talk about the recklessness of your 'oh so dear' son."
The warning hiss that left my mouth was accidental. The anger behind it wasn't.
Edward cleared his throat and then started talking. "Anyway, I apologize for the risk I put you all in."
That made me roll my eyes, I mean seriously? He finally did something good other than just keep our façade and he apologized for it?
"What are we going to do about Bella?" Emmet asked without concern.
He was obviously not too bothered by this whole situation. I couldn't say I blamed him.
"I say we let Marie Antoinette talk her out of her doubts, you know? Tell her that she hit her head too hard," Esme said quietly.
Immediately, the all turned to look at me. I considered it, I truly did. Before I realized the whole argument was moot. There was nothing to be done here. As I looked at Edward, I realized he was half in love with her already. Why should I lie to a friend, when lying would only hurt her and Edward? Meeting Carlisle's eyes over the table, I said:
"No."
There was a pause. The Cullens seemed shocked over my rejection of a direct order. I didn't blame them. I always followed orders, very nearly without thinking. But this made no sense to me, in my heart. Tell her, Edward. She won't freak out I promise, I thought softly.
"There's no way I'm doing that, Antoinette." Edward snapped at me.
"Why not? It's bound to happened, I've seen it," Alice said, stepping into the conversation for the first time.
I sent her a small smile.
"We are not killing her, Rosalie." Edward growled.
Edward's word brought me back to the table. I fought the urge to roll my eyes at his indecisiveness. Things were beginning to go south, I realized. I hadn't been the only one to notice Edward's unvoiced threat towards Rosalie. Emmet had already squared up, while Rosalie was glaring at him. The whole table had tensed again. Don't go after a fight Edward. You know how it'll end.
He looked over at me and relaxed a bit, he knew I was right. Were there to be a fight, Edward would lose. Esme wouldn't be willing to participate. Emmet would fight on Rosalie's side and so would Jasper. He wouldn't let anything happen to Alice. And while I would protect Bella, she was an innocent human after all, I still didn't think I'd be capable of hurting Emmet or Jasper.
I drummed my nails against the glass surface of the table. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. With a half start, I realized I'd found a solution to this whole thing without even thinking too hard about it. It came as second nature, of course, I had been in politics nearly my whole life. But I hadn't used that part of my brain, that part of my very self, in almost a century. It felt strangely liberating.
"Carlisle, May I decide?" I requested, knowing that, while I was an inborn leader, Carlisle was still head of the coven.
He considered me for a minute or so before nodding reassuringly.
"We are not killing Bella Swan, Rosalie." I finally announced, sitting up in my chair.
"But she's—!"
"She is an innocent, powerless human being." I raised an eyebrow. "I understand your worry. You cherish what you have here. But cold blooded murder is not the way. Bella will find out eventually, anyway. I have seen it several times. So has Alice. And you all know very well that once a vision is had, it cannot be changed." I levelled my eyes at Edward.
He would have to admit telling her, or at least letting her figure it out on her own, was the only way to go.
"You should finally tell her, Edward." I insisted with kindness. I knew that when it came to stuff like this, Edward had to be treated like a wounded, wild animal. The smallest sudden movement could make him bolt. "It is obvious you care about her, and she feels the same. The truth should not come from me. I am not even a vampire."
"I can't tell her," Edward shook his head. "Not yet, not ever."
I sighed and got up, nearly exasperated.
"alright. Don't deny anything either, then." I shrugged. "Bella is a smart kid, she's probably already figured it out. Let her come to you." After that, I looked at the other vampires in the room, suddenly realizing I hadn't had a voiced confirmation of them agreeing with me. "You are not, however, hunting and hurting a human. Are we clear?" I asked, making sure they all understood the hidden meaning of my words.
I would not stand idly by if they decided to give up their ways and begin behaving like normal vampires. They all just looked at me, mostly surprised, partly shocked. I realized then that, while all of them knew my past, none of them had ever seen me act with the demanding superiority of a queen. I had always been mostly submissive since I met all of them.
"Are we clear?" I repeated.
They all nodded and muttered "yes" under their breath but I still heard them, so I got up and smiled.
"Okay, so if you don't mind I'm going to sleep." I turned around and left to my room with a smirk on my face. It had been too easy.
A/N: This chapter has been semi-revised. Let me know what you think of the idea in general and of Marie. The story is now on Eclipse territory and I'm taking the time to revise the first chapters because this was my first story ever and I took a few years off of it and now I'm looking back at it and I was bad at writing. So, I've decided to fix it and finish it with a bang.
Anyway, every review is highly appreciated and I would thank the people who reviewed, favourited and followed this chapter but there are no reviews for this chapter and I don't remember who followed it because it's like from three years ago or something.
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love, titieli.