Disclaimer: Visions of Our Destiny is a Twilight fan fiction, intended solely for the enjoyment of the readers. No copyright infringements are intended. Any original story directions and plot lines herein are the property of the author.

A/N: Thank you huggles and kisses to Kiva for her beta magic, she rocks my world. Also, a great big shout-out to my pre-reader Cullen Sistah, thank you for not sending the men with the white coats and allowing me to talk to myself while being totally neurotic about this chapie.

I swear that I can go on forever again
Please let me know that my one bad day will end
I will go down as your lover, your friend
Give me your lips and with one kiss we begin.

~ I'm Lost Without You, Blink-182

Bella

Jasper pulled me into a hug after I shared my story of being changed and my experiences at the hands of the Volturi. I didn't know if he was aware of the sadness he was projecting up until that point, but the moment I was in his arms his feelings changed and, in turn, so did mine. All I felt was relief coming from him and I too felt relief in his arms. It was the same feeling every time we touched. I had never been very expressive or comfortable sharing my life with anyone, but with Jasper, it was as if I needed him to know everything about me.

"Jasper?" I softly called to him, my face still pressed to his chest. The fingers of his right hand were tangled in my hair, while the other hand pressed against my lower back, holding me to him.

"Yes, darlin'," he answered, brushing his lips against my hair.

"What is this pull between us?" I lifted my face to look into his eyes, but I continued our closeness, never wanting to be out of the safety of his arms again.

Jasper looked deep into my eyes and I saw pure anguish in his expression before he composed himself. Then all I saw was determination.

"Before I answer your question, I need to tell you my story," he said, leading me by the hand as he guided me towards a nearby tree. "Let's sit this one out."

Jasper sat with his back against the tree and pulled me to sit between his legs. I leaned my back against his chest as he wrapped his arms around me. He rested his chin on my shoulder, his cool breath blowing against the side of my face as I held my own breath, anticipating the shiver that would come when I heard his low voice at my ear.

"Bella, my story isn't pretty and I am ashamed of many things I've done. You spoke of monsters; well this may be the scariest tale yet. I was born in Texas," he began. "The year was 1843."

I sat, unmoving, as he shared the fading memories of his human life. He was a Major in the Confederate Army and I realized how young and naïve I was in contrast to his life experiences. He continued on to the night he had been approached by three female vampires that he had mistaken for damsels in distress. One of the three, Maria, had changed him without warning and I felt a deep sadness that, he too, had been brought to this life without a choice. I was grateful that Jasper continued to hold me to him in his strong arms as he recalled his newborn days at the hands of Maria. Anger bubbled up inside me and all I wanted to do was run in search of the fiend of a woman and tear her limb from limb.

Jasper continued to share the torture that he had been put through at the hands of Maria. She had convinced him that the existence he had been brought into was the only life for vampires, a life consisting of fighting and surviving. I knew he was holding back, but the little detail he did share made my dead-heart break. I began to cry and I felt tormented by my inability to shed tears for the man that held me so close in his arms.

"Maria realized I had a powerful gift that would be useful in conquering her objectives," Jasper said with sadness. "And I had become a minion that followed her every deceitful word."

A wave of understanding washed over me as thoughts of Volterra came to mind. I had asked myself, while in their presence, why the guard were so easily manipulated into doing the bidding of the three brothers sitting on their self-appointed thrones? They were, like Jasper, bound by deception and confused into believing they were loved.

We continued to sit under the tree, with Jasper's arms wrapped around me. The day had turned to night as he re-hashed his past. Jasper was tortured by his gift as he executed Maria's orders to dispose of the newborns that no longer held the strength she needed to fulfill her goals. He felt their shock, fear, pain and then their determination to survive as they fought him in their attempt to continue to exist. He was so engrossed in recalling his past and so worried that I would react badly to his accounts that he continued to project his feelings. I felt his remorse and self-loathing as he reached the part in his tale where he had finally escaped his lot with help from his brother, Peter and found Alice. By then my sobs were uncontrollable. Tremors wracked my body. All I wanted was to take away Jasper's grief and assure him that all I felt was admiration for his ability to choose another life after a century of war.

I turned from Jasper's arms and sat on my knees to face him. As our eyes met, I saw a deep sadness in his eyes and a longing for my understanding. I placed my hand on his cheek, hoping the gesture would give him the comfort he was seeking. His eyes closed and he leaned his face into to the palm of my hand. I felt his relief as he continued to project his feelings onto me.

It didn't take long before curiosity overtook me and I pushed to see the physical evidence that remained of his past. I reluctantly dropped my hand from his face to pull up the sleeve of his shirt. I gasped as I looked upon the interlacing scars that marked his arm. How many times had he defended his face by lifting his arms only to have them bit by a wild vampire? I slowly moved my trembling hands to the hem of his shirt, lifting the garment to witness more crescent marks on his perfectly sculpted chest. For a fleeting moment I forgot what I was doing and all I wanted was to feel the ripples of his muscles beneath my hand. Then Jasper brought me back to the present by turning his face from me, ashamed of the reminders that were imprinted on his skin. I needed him to know that they were part of who he was and that I was falling in love with him, scars and all. I lowered my face to his chest and slowly kissed each scar, my lips lingering on the one above his heart.

"Bella…," he said my name like prayer.

I continued to kiss my way across his chest when he placed his hands under my arms and lifted me to look at him, our faces torturously close together. He searched my eyes for something. I don't know what he found there, but it was enough to convince him before he crushed his lips to mine.

I wrapped my arms around his neck, my fingers tangled in his hair and I couldn't seem to get close enough to him. As if he sensed my need or that he felt his own desire to be closer, he pulled me to onto his lap, my body pressed against his chest. One of his hands came to my hair as he eagerly held my face to his; the other hand gripped my hip as if he needed it there to anchor himself.

Every nerve in my body seemed to be singing with need for this man. The sensations were so much more pronounced as a vampire than as a human. My feelings were indescribable. This kiss was full of passion, a reprieve after so much tension. We were needy and our mouths were hungry as we moaned at the sensation of our tongues sweeping against each other. Then, all too quickly, he pulled away, placing one last soft kiss on my lips before touching his forehead to mine. Our eyes were closed and our breathing was labored, taking short shallow breaths. "Do you want me to answer your question?" he panted.

"What question?" I huffed. My mind was clouded and all I wanted was to kiss him again.

Jasper softly chuckled and bent his knees. I slid from his lap to sit on the ground and rested my back against his thighs, biting my lip to hold back the moan that threatened to escape as I took in the sight of his glorious smile. He absentmindedly took hold of my hand that was lying on his chiseled stomach and played with the tips of my fingers.

"You wanted to know about the pull between us?"

"Ah… that," I smiled as he effectively brought me back to the present.

"After I found Alice and she shared her visions -"

"Visions?" I asked, interrupting his story.

"Alice is a seer. She sees visions of the future," he smiled, tucking a strand of my hair behind my ear. "She saw my future and in it she saw my mate."

My stomach sank. I started to feel panicked by his words; he had a mate and I was already so far gone in my feelings for him that my dead heart ached. It felt as though my chest was being ripped it two. I couldn't sit there any longer. I needed to get away. I had misinterpreted our connection and felt embarrassed by my actions. I acted like a love-sick girl and had begun to fall for him without knowing his true feelings.

I quickly rose to my feet and began to walk away. "I-I'm sorry… I should have known," I stuttered, not knowing what the right words were at the moment. "I'm going to find my way back to the house. Please excuse me."

In an instant he was standing before me. "You didn't let me finish, sweetheart," he said as he placed his fingers under my chin, lifting my face to look at him, his eyes pleading with me to hear him out. "She saw my mate… she saw you."

So many feelings ran through me; shock, confusion, amazement, relief, excitement, elation, and then an overwhelming love that made my knees buckle with its force. "Oh God," I whimpered as Jasper reached out to hold me up, wrapping his arms around my waist and pulling me flush against his body.

"I've got you, darlin'," he reassured me as I felt the weight of it all.

"What… what…?" I was unable to form the words to ask what was happening. My head fell back and my eyes closed, consumed with the immense power of all the emotions that surrounded us.

"I'm sorry," he whispered as we collapsed in each other's arms on the forest floor. "I'll reign it in."

I gasped for air once the thumping of emotions began to lull. "What… was that?" My head fell against his shoulder as he comforted me by rubbing circles on my back with his hand.

"I've been open," he breathed. "I've let you sense all my emotions, wanting you to know how I feel. Except for my love, I've kept it to a minimum until now, not wanting to overwhelm you. But I felt love coming from you too and when it combined with my own, it all came pouring out… it was too much all at once."

I turned to nuzzle my face into his neck. "How can you love me like that?" I asked, inhaling his delicious scent that seemed to center me and clear my head, which was still overwhelmed by all the stir of emotions.

Jasper let out a short laugh, but there was no humor in his tone. "My love for you, Bella has been burgeoning for the better part of the last sixty years. I have waited for you for so long; it is surreal to be here. holding you in my arms – I feel as though I have fallen deep into a dream and never want to come out of it."

"Wait… what?" I sat up straight, stunned by his revelation. "Sixty years, Jasper? How can that be? I'm only twenty-one… my parents weren't even born sixty years ago." He watched me, his eyes fixated on my lips as I shot off question after question, never interrupting, but letting me process what he had said.

Eventually I came to the question that would alter my perception of fate, whose answer would put everything I knew to be chance or coincidence in a new light. I paused, needing him to look at me. I needed to see in his eyes the truth behind his words. His eyes snapped to mine and I steadied myself as I slowly asked, "Are you saying that Alice saw me, as your mate, thirty-nine years before I was even conceived and you've been waiting for me all this time?"

He nodded. And this time, I was the one to crush my lips to his. "Bella…," he breathed my name against my lips and I felt his relief, a release of sixty years of agonizing wait. There was so much more I needed to know, so many more questions that had to be answered, but, at that moment, all I wanted was to feel his lips against mine and express my admiration for what he must have endured in the hopes that one day our paths would cross and he wouldn't have to be alone anymore.

"Darlin'?" he spoke between kisses and soft moans, his hand falling from my face, tracing a path down my neck with his fingers, slowly grazing the side of my breast before tucking it under the hem of my shirt to draw small circles on the skin at my waist. "If we continue… Mmm… I'm going to take you right here on this forest floor and I had… oh God… other plans for our first time."

I was lying on my back, my head supported by his arm as he lay at my side, his leg thrown over my own. His need for me was evident by his erection that was now pressing against my thigh. I had moved my mouth to his neck, nibbling and sucking at the soft, sensitive skin beneath his ear as he tried to convince me that we should bring this delicious exploration of our bodies to an end. I had no such plans.

"You've imagined our first time together?" I asked, returning to suck his bottom lip, which I realized hadn't gotten enough attention and I vowed to remedy that oversight.

"Yes," his lips moved slowly across mine as his hands continued to touch wherever they landed. "All I had was my imagination. You see, Alice did not see you clearly in her visions before your change. You were only my beauty in my mind's eye. No name to go with a generic face. I could never have anticipated that you were going to be this beautiful," he punctuated the words by placing his hand on my face, looking deep into my eyes. "This perfect. So much more than my mind could have ever created."

I sighed into his mouth as he lowered his face to kiss me again slowly. My eyes fluttered closed, as his love for me trickled out of him until it grew into an all consuming emotion that effectively melted me into the earth. "That is only a fraction of what I feel for you, Bella," he breathed the words against my lips and I was lost in the sensation of his body and his love. I felt as though the world around us had disappeared. There were no sounds other than our soft moans; there were no smells other than his spicy scent of cinnamon and clover. It was as if the earth had shifted on its axis and at that precise moment I fell in love with Jasper and silently thanked Aro for having played a hand in our destiny, bringing me to the man that would be my life - my everything.

Jasper

I had been projecting my feelings as we spoke, not wanting to hold back. I wanted her to know me by letting her feel my regret for my past and my happiness that she had not rejected me as I had feared she would once I finally shared my history, but it was my love that had overwhelmed her, a love that she was unable to comprehend, a love that stemmed from being altered by her, so long ago.

It was all surreal - My beauty in my arms, accepting my past, feeling her love begin to blossom as I shared the visions of her that had kept me on my path for so long. Every vision Alice had of my mate gave me the strength to fight the bloodlust that had been my constant companion since the moment I chose to resist human blood. The longer I fed on animals, the clearer Alice's visions became and I thrived on those moments when she was given the foresight to my future. Countless visions of my mate and I running through the forest, hand in hand, stolen kisses and quiet moments with other members of our family. I imagined Bella so many different ways and told her of the generic faces with no names that could never have compared to her beauty.

I was using all of my control not to claim her right there on the forest floor. She had reduced me to moans and pleas with my maker to give me the restraint I needed. It did not help that her lips molded to mine. Her body fit like a perfect puzzle piece in my arms and the scent of her skin, lavender and freesia, had my head spinning. I was ready to throw her over my shoulder like a cave-man, run back to the house and fuck her senseless, but that was not what she deserved, nor would I be able to relish the moment if I allowed the animal inside to break free and assert myself as her true mate.

I whispered my declaration of love to Bella with my words and by letting her feel my adoration as it seeped out slowly. Although it was only a fraction of what I truly felt, it had been enough and I was rewarded with feeling the moment that Bella fell in love with me, an unadulterated love and a love that rivaled my own.

A/N: Awe! Some fluff mixed in with the angst, my favorite. So they finally affirmed their love. It's about time, 60 yrs is a long time to wait, but I hope it was worth it. Let me know what you think. Did it meet you expectations? I just love talking to my readers and I appreciate every review. I try to get back to everyone, if I missed you, extra Cullentinis coming your way.

And speaking of Cullentinis, let's get this show on the road...

*serves her special recipe of Cullentinis and adds an extra dose of love for her readers* – The world is filled with flowers, The flowers are filled with dew, The dew is filled with love, For you and you and you… CHEERS!