Chapter 9: Remorse

A week, that's how long Bonnie been here. Seven days since Isabella's wedding. One hundred and sixty-eight hours since Bonnie known about her brother's death. Ten thousand eighty minutes since her godchildren let her back in their life. Six hundred four thousand eight hundred seconds since Bonnie found out that she had a mate, Carlisle Cullen.

It's crazy how the world works. One moment you're all alone living in your fancy penthouse in New York City, debating if your life was worth living. Wondering what's the meaning of this so-called, immortality. What was the whole purpose of living forever when you had no one to share it with? You had no one to come home too. No one will be there when you're hurt. No one will care if you die. No one will know because you'll always be alone.

And then the next minute, you're back to the one place you swore you'll never return. To the place where you were once so happy and now it only brings you pain. You would rather be alone than to feel misery. To feel pain worse than death. Worse than the poison that caused your heart to stop, that made you immortal.

Although it has brought you pain, it also brought you closer to the people you left behind. It gave you the chance to fix the damages that you caused when you ran away. It gave you the opportunity to meet new people, people you never thought of meeting. To create new memories and new bonds that will last a lifetime. Perhaps going back to the place that caused you pain might ease the suffering. It just might leave you at peace.

Perhaps you just had to go back there and remember that even though it caused you agony, it made you stronger. Strong enough to go back there and forgive those who had harmed you in the past. Don't forgive and forget, but forgive and move on. Don't waste your time living in the past when you can live for the future, a happier one.

The rain fell softly as if it knew of the hardship both behind and ahead. Each droplet alighted on her skin with just enough coolness to command her mind to the present, to pull her away from the pain of the past and the uncertainty of what was to come. The beads over her face, more numerous than even the small freckles in her skin, joined to wash over her in a delicate fall of trickles. Bonnie raised her eyes to the grey layer that touched every mountain top, there was more to come before the skies cleared, of that she could be sure.

"What do you want," Bonnie's asked, annoyed that he was interrupting her quiet time. For the past few days, she has been avoiding him and his family. She doesn't know what to do with him. Ever since she found out that he was her mate, ironically the murder of her brother, she felt odd. She wondered, how come the world loved to fuck her life up. First, she became a heartless monster, then life took away the one person she held dear to her and now, life thinks it'll be a good idea to make her brother's murder her mate. Off all people, why him? Why choose him?

"It's raining. You shouldn't--" Bonnie rudely cut him off. "Oh please, it's not like I'll get sick. This cold less body doesn't feel a thing." She snickered ready to leave Carlisle standing by himself.

Instead of walking away, Bonnie found herself pinned to a nearby tree with Carlisle staring down at her. She looked at him and she became breathless. Carlisle looked like a god underneath the rain. From up close she noticed the sharpness of his jaw. Felt the warmth that radiated from his body. Felt his breath caressing her cheeks, felt his strong chest speeding up causing it to touch her. She saw his lips part open yet no sound came out. Looking away from his lips Bonnie stared at his eyes. Although he shared the same color eyes as his 'family' yet to her she found them to be unique. The rain illuminated his goldeneyes. They weren't yellow like a comic book cat, but a liquid gold amber. As the seconds passed his eyes darkened with lust- a pure animal lust.

"You've been avoiding me," Carlisle husky voice caused Bonnie to tremble with want. A want she never thought she would crave. As if knowing her emotions Carlisle smirk, a very lustful smirk.

Trying to fight the need of having him right there and then, she tried to push Carlisle off, but she couldn't. Although Carlisle drank animal blood that caused him to be weaker than most vampires, he was still a man. "What gave you the impression that you're important enough for me to want to avoid?" Her sarcastic tone didn't help her against Carlisle.

Instead of answering, he held her tighter, pushing Bonnie closer to him. The tense rising- Desire. Lust. Need. Neither of them talked they simply stared at each other's eyes.

After what felt like a lifetime, Carlisle loosened his hold. "Why are you avoiding me?" He asked, lowering his head to her shoulder. His soft, broken tone caused her to take a deep breath. Oh, how he sounded so vulnerable.

Never once did she cry in front of people, not even in front of Sarah, who she claimed as her family. James, her brother told her that emotions were for the weak. That she had to be calm, collected, stoic for her to win the game of life. She had to be cruel, fear nothing, to survive and to conquer. And yet for some odd, unspeakable reason when she's near Carlisle all she wants is to show her weak side. She wants to scream to the world and cry bloody murder. She wants to let her walls down, the ones she spent so long in building. She wants to be loved, to feel love and happiness. And yet she's afraid that somehow her brother will rise from the dead to hunt her down. To show her that emotions were for the weak. She fears that he'll take Carlisle away just like he did with Sarah.

With a shaky voice, she speaks to him, "you're too pure for me, Carlisle. I'll soil what's left of your soul." Shaking his head and tightening his hold on her, "you're perfect."

Something in her chest tightened, she clenched her jaw and glared at the tree in front of her. "You don't know anything about me. How can you say I'm perfect?" The coldness of her voice matched the air around them. Too much to bear for a human yet for vampires like them, it was tolerable.

Carlisle pulled his head away from her shoulder and stared at her ruby eyes, no longer wearing her brown contacts. He noticed that the color of her eyes wasn't a vivid red of the freshly spilled blood, but more like the browning red of old blood. She hasn't feed since she came to Forks, too much on her mind to care about wasting one's life.

Slowly Carlisle picked up his hand and gently placed it on her cheek. As his cold hand touched her cold stone face, Bonnie couldn't help but close her eyes in satisfaction. "You're perfect. Everything about you is perfect. You're my mate-" Bonnie angrily opened her eye and shoved Carlisle away.

"Just because I'm your mate doesn't mean I'm perfect, Carlisle. I've done things you could never possibly imagine." Carlisle steps forward cutting her off. "We've all done things we aren't exactly proud of." Carlisle looked down, remembering the day he and his family killed James; the last family his mate had. Carlisle regretted killing him. If only he had talked with James; made him realize that they weren't a threat, that they only wanted to be left in peace. Perhaps James could have been alive. Perhaps Bonnie and Carlisle's meeting would have been different.

"You?" she asked, doubtful. Bonnie's cold, hysterical laugh caught him off guard. Bonnie pushed herself from the tree and looked at Carlisle.

"What has the great, Carlisle Cullen done that he isn't proud of?? Umm," Bonnie step forward, hatred, anger radiating off her cold body. Anger boiled deep in her system, as hot as lava. It churned within, hungry for destruction, and she knew it was too much for her to handle. The pressure of this raging sea of anger would force her to say things she did not mean, or to express thoughts that she suppressed for days, perhaps years.

"You Dr. Cullen haven't done one single bad thing in your life. Whether it be your human or vampire life. You haven't done shit. You don't know anything about not being proud." Carlisle opened his mouth but closed it with one single glare from Bonnie. "You saved five lives from death. You let in two abandon nomads into your coven. You fought against an army of newborns JUST TO SAVE A LIFE OF A FUCKEN HUMAN!!!" Bonnie's venomous shouts could possibly be heard from miles away.

Bonnie laughed softly, running her hand through her hair. "Whereas I would have killed everyone including the human for starting such trifle thing." Carlisle fists clenched, "you wouldn't." Carlisle narrowed his eyes as Bonnie continued her speech as if what she just said was a normal thing to do.

Once again Bonnie laughed, a cold laughed. "Ohh but I would. You see, just like my dear big brother James, I relish on the thought of murdering. Slaughtering dozen. Even hundreds. I practically enjoy hearing the screams of innocent people--" Carlisle slammed Bonnie against the tree. His once goldeneyes where now black with rage. "SHUT UP. You don't mean that."

Shocked for a split second, Bonnie composed herself once more. She pushed Carlisle away from her. Bonnie tightened her jaw and glared at him. "Why do you do this to yourself, Carlisle? Why put an unrealistic image of me in your mind? Why picture me as one of those weak, pathetic, insufferable females?" Carlisle didn't answer, his mind to busy trying to understand the reality of this all.

"I am nothing like them and I will never be. I am Bonnie May Jones and I am proud to say I am more like my bro--" Carlisle pinned Bonnie to the ground, hand on her throat stopping her from talking. Carlisle tightens his hand around her neck, small cracks started to appear on her glass-skin. His eyes weren't the same, they were pitch black. Bonnie nor Carlisle couldn't recognize him anymore, the man she used to know was gone, and it was all because of him; James.

"DON'T YOU DARE SAY IT. YOU'RE NOTHING LIKE HIM!!" Carlisle shouted, burning rage hissed through his body like deathly poison, screeching a demanded release in the form of unwanted violence. He has never felt anything like this before, but with Bonnie claiming to be like her monstrous brother something snapped in him.

Bonnie wasn't thinking -perhaps she was or perhaps it was a natural instinct- but she let out her boiling antipathy and swung her tight fist, too quick and potent, into Carlisle's defined jaw; the impact like thousands of venomous blades piercing apart her clammed first.

Quickly Carlisle found himself on the floor, regret washed over him like a long slow wave on a shadow beach. Each wave was icy cold and sent shivers down his spine. How dare he harm his mate. The one person Carlisle swore to never harm in any form. How he longed to go back and take a different path, but now that was impossible. There was no way back. There was no way to make it right. The remorse would eat at him every day for the rest of his immortal life.

Standing up from the ground, Bonnie looked at Carlisle with disgust and pity. Disgusted with herself for letting a man harm her and not end him right away. Pity because she knew he didn't mean to harm her just like she didn't mean to harm him. After all, they were supposed to be mates.

Bonnie couldn't take it any longer, she turned around and made her way but stopped when she hurt his call. "Don't go. Let me fix this," Carlisle softly pleaded.

Bonnie looked at him, not understand how a good man like him could possibly forgive a monster like her. Why can't he see that she doesn't deserve him? That her emotions turn- cold, fearful, anxious... causes her to back away, flee or strike out at someone who loves her.

Oh, how she wanted to hate the man before her. She wanted to kill him, torture him just like her brother James showed her. Maybe then, just maybe he could see that she was no saint nor was she perfect. Perhaps this will show him just how she and James were alike. Both had short temper and were extremely violent. Possible show them that despite them being mates, she didn't deserve a man like him nor will she ever.

"Then let me kill one of yours. Eye for an eye. A family member for a family member," Bonnie lethal tone caused Carlisle to freeze. He looked up at her, mouth hanging opened, eyes widen in disbelief. His mind became an icy wasteland, the wind howled in his soul and wrapped an icy tentacle around his heart so tightly it almost felt like it shattered.

"No?" Bonnie titled her head sideways, mockingly as if what just happened didn't affect her at all. Seconds past with neither of them saying anything but stared at one another.

In the background, the wind ripped through the air and hearing its high-pitched screams. Thunder roaring violently and lightning tearing the sky apart. It was as if the storm reflected their emotional turmoil, irrational rage.

Bonnie snickers, "can't give me what I want then stay away, Carlisle. Consider yourself lucky that you're still alive." Carlisle couldn't help but shiver as Bonnie approached, her usual ruby eyes were now filled with fury. "No ones lives after the dare to harm me. NO. ONE," Bonnie growled; her eyes completely turning black.

The color drained from Carlisle's face, becoming paler than usual, rigid, frozen, shaking, unable to speak, wide-eyed, hands clenched, white knuckles, heart in his throat, too scared to comprehend what the hell just happened. This wasn't supposed to happen, this wasn't supposed to happen, not like this. It doesn't make sense. How did this happen?

Carlisle saw Bonnie coming out from the police station and decided to follow her. Ask for an explanation to why she has been avoiding him and his family. He felt insulted that she would deny every single invitation to his house. He wanted to know what he did wrong. All he wanted was for them to get to know each other. To try to get along, after all, they were mates. Destined to be together for all eternity. So why would she stay away from him? Didn't she feel anything for him? That couldn't be true because Jasper said she felt it the first time she saw him, so what's the problem? Why doesn't she want to be with him? Was he not good enough? Was he not capable of loving her? Carlisle doesn't understand but he needed to know why so he followed her to ask her. But he never imagined that this would have happened. Not in a million years.

Seeing Carlisle not responding Bonnie took the chance to leave, thinking she got her point across. However, Carlisle next words caused her to feel more remorse. " You can't run from me. I'll always find you no matter where in the world. You belong to me as I belong to you. You're my mate and I'll be damned if I lose you."

Turning around she saw Carlisle slowly getting up and made his way towards her but stopped when she growled at him. "Let this go, Carlisle. Find yourself an Esme and be happy. I ain't no ones mate." And with that she left the poor broken heart doctor in the middle of the woods, wondering what in Gods name happened.

The guilt sat not on her chest but inside her brain. What she had done she could not undo. She could make amends in subtle ways but a confession was out of the question. Only in her silent prayers could she speak her heart to the Gods and beg for mercy. She didn't feel like she deserved the love of Carlisle nor his forgiveness. She had pushed him for from his limits, made him do things she knew he would have never done, but she cannot go back. They can never go back to the way they were before. She only hopes that one day, perhaps a thousand years from now, she would feel removed from her sin, but the guilt was a stain on her, a hideous scar.