Many thanks go out to LoriAnnTwiFan and NinaQ of PTB for working through my mess.


Chapter 3 (Telephone calls)

Bella

I pressed my lips softly against my little angel's forehead and then stepped away from her sleeping form. I placed the book I just finished reading to her back in it's place on the shelf and then went to leave her room. I turned the light off but left the door slightly ajar for her, I walked down the little hallway, passed our bathroom and my own bedroom door and turned left into the kitchen to clean up some.

When that was done, I made myself a cup of tea and went over into the living. I sat down on the couch and grabbed my phone.

"Charles Swan speaking", he answered after the third ring.

"Hey Dad," I said as lightly as possible, but my voice was shaky.

"Kiddo? Are you alright?" Of course he saw right through it.

"Yea...no. I don't know! Something...happened today." My breathing was getting heavy, and I tried to will away the tears forming in my eyes.

"What happened? Are you okay? Is Josie alright?" my usually calm cop of a father asked worriedly.

"Dad, we are fine...for now. I-I met somebody at the mall today. One of them..." I trailed of at the end, awaiting his reaction. We both knew who was meant by 'them', so any further explanation wasn't necessary.

I waited for him to say something and wiped the one escaped tear from my face. Two minutes later, he still hadn't said a word. "Dad, are you still there?"

"Yea, I´m here kiddo! I just...needed a minute, I think. Which one of them was it?"

"Emmett"

My father exhaled loudly, probably relieved that it wasn't someone else. We both knew it could have been so much worse.

"What happened?", he asked again.

"We...ugh...kind of bumped into each other", I wasn't in the mood for a lecture from the chief, so I stretched the truth a little bit, "and well, as soon as he saw Josie-"

"She was with you? He saw her?", he interrupted me frantically and far too loud for my liking. I sighed.

"Yes dad, she was with me. So yea, um...he asked me to join him for a coffee, and I really didn't want to go but then the prick mentioned ice cream, so of course Josie was all game... I don't know, I was irritated and shocked...and well...I don't know what..." I sighed again," In a nutshell, Josie had her ice-cream and for a few minutes it was actually fine, but then..."

"Then what, Isabella?" he interrupted me yet again.

"Then he started asking questions!" my voice was harsh as I answered him.

"Isabella Marie, don't make me come over there! What kind of questions?" Great, now he was really pissed.

"He asked me if he knew about her, and when I said no he asked if I had any intention of telling him in the future, and well, after that we kind of, um,...had a little disagreement, and then I left. "

"Son of a bitch!" he yelled angrily, and I heard something crash to a wall or the floor in the background, causing me to flinch slightly in my seat.

Silence.

"Dad? You okay?" I asked tentatively. The last time I had to witness an outburst like this—and yes, for my father this is actually an outburst—he had slammed his fist repeatedly against the wall in my aunt's kitchen. That was the day I told him I got knocked up by my ex-boyfriend-slash-almost fiancè.

"Yea, sorry, kiddo! Do you- do you think he noticed?"

I chuckled humorlessly. "Well, it's kind of obvious, isn't it? Anybody unable to make the connection has to be really dense."

"The eyes." It was his turn to sigh then. "Dammit all to hell! Bet that son of a gun already informed his whole precious family of self-righteous pricks!"

"That's pretty much what he said he would do." I could feel the moisture forming in my eyes again.

"Motherfucker!" To say that I was shocked to hear Charlie cursing like that would have been an understatement. It was rare for him to curse at all, but it happened. Never in all my twenty-four years, have I heard him use that word, though.

There was another pause in our conversation, but instead of silence I could some mumbling in the background this time.

"I'm sorry baby girl, but I've got to go. The station just called; they need me down at the diner." He paused for a beat. "Listen, I know that you don't like to come down here, but if you need me, just call. I can take a few days off and drive up to Portland in a heartbeat, okay? Just say the word and I'm there. I'll call you tomorrow, and then we can talk some more, yea? Probably around the same time. Take care and give Bunny a kiss from me in the morning, will ya?"

"Okay, Dad. You take care too. And you make sure you give Sue a few kisses from us as well! I love you!"

"Love you! Bye." With that the line was dead.

Carlisle

I was pacing in my home office, fuming and waiting for that useless employee to pick up his damn phone.

"Jonathan Jenks speaking," he finally answered. About damn time!

"Jenks! Carlisle Cullen here," I barked into the phone while I refilled my glass with scotch.

"Oh, Mr. Cullen, what a pleasure! How are you, sir? How is the family?"

"Cut that, I don't have the time for your poor attempts to ingratiate yourself with me! I need your service. I don't care what else you are working on right now—drop it! This job will be your priority! I want you to find anything and everything you can about one Isabella Marie Swan, resident in Portland, Oregon...

One week later

Bella

I couldn't sleep.

Ever since my encounter with Emmett and the conversation with my dad one week ago, sleep was avoiding me. It started off with me waking up a few times the first two nights after reliving the most painful memories in my sleep. As the days passed, the times I spent awake became longer and longer. Tonight was the first night, though, I couldn't close my eyes for one second before the flashbacks started.

And I needed sleep so badly.

The constant worry about what was might to come, how the Cullen-clan would react, what they'd do after Emmett shared with them what he saw, what he found out, coupled with the fact that I accused myself for not handling the situation better and the lack of sleep, it really was wearing me down. The bags under my eyes were more than obvious, and my mood was really bad most of the time now.

I rolled around some more in my bed, but eventually gave up. Sighing, I switched the bedside lamp on and, left the warmth of my bed for a second to grab my laptop from the desk and then snuggled back into my pillows and blanket as quickly as I could.

Once my lappi was booted up, I checked my emails, since I hadn't had the time to do so earlier, and noticed that I had a new one from Jacob. I instantly had to smile.

Jacob Black was my oldest and probably dearest friend. We pretty much grew up together, even though he lived down at the rez in La Push, a few miles away from Forks, the podunk town I grew up in. Our parents were really close and would often visit each other. Therefore, it was inevitable for us to hang out and eventually become friends, even though he was two years younger than me.

There were no secrets between us; we shared everything with each other: the good, the bad and the ugly. I held him in my arms after his mom passed away from breast cancer, and in return, he let me cry against his shoulder when my mom left my dad and me behind to start a new life. He even passed on the chance to earn some much-needed money when my heart was broken and shattered into pieces and comforted me instead.

Jacob was my own personal hero, only in second place though, since Charlie will always be my number one.

Unfortunately, Jake's mail didn't keep me busy for long. He asked how I was and said that Charlie told him about what had happened at the mall. He, too, told me that he would be there for me in a heartbeat if I needed him, and reminded me that we would see each other on Josie's birthday. He also sent me a newly taken picture of him, his father Billy, his fiancèe Leah Clearwater and her younger brother Seth.

Leah and Seth were Sue Clearwater's kids. Sue and my Dad had been daring for almost two years now, but I know that Charlie is going to ask her to marry him soon. I actually can't wait for that to happen. I've always wanted siblings, and Jake and I would be related in some way, too.

I quickly wrote him a few lines in return and was then left with nothing else to do. At 2:30 in the morning. Fucking A.

I read five chapters of the fan fiction I was currently reading, but I stopped that once my concentration wavered so badly that I read the same sentences over and over again without actually processing what I was reading. I was about to shut the laptop down again, when I remembered that I never looked for a new fishing hat I wanted to give Charlie as one of his Christmas presents.

I pulled up Google, but after I stared at the screen for ten minutes, what I looked up in the end had absolutely nothing to do with fishing.

I typed two words into the search bar and then did something I had not done in over a year since I'm not a masochist on a daily basis...

Edward Cullen