This story is written in the first-person point of view, and sometimes switches between characters by scene or chapter. (Please do not panic; I do not repeat each scene from various points of view.) I do not label my chapters with character names, subsequently, your key is thus: Chapter titles that are short & succinct are Bella's, long witticisms are Esme's; song titles are in quotes, belonging to Edward, and Rose's are questions, finished off with an interrobang (‽).

Chapter Notes:

The most formidable team this side of the pond: cookEgawd, Blackjacklily, MunkeeRajah and Detochkina. Hells yeah.

"The Space Between"

Esme and I talked until late into the afternoon. We talked about a lot of things, and for many reasons I felt like a great burden had been lifted from my shoulders. I repeatedly took every opportunity I could to apologize for my daftness. The first time I did it, she scolded me about having missed the point. The second time, she accepted my apology and told me that I should shift my focus towards making amends in regards to Bella. The third time she ignored me, and with the fourth time thwapped me lightly on the back of my head.

By the time I walked into the house around noon, I still hadn't made any decisions on exactly how to go about things. My mind had changed gears entirely, and now I was completely focused on the knowledge that I would see Bella later. I thought it would drive me mad. Now that it was set—I would be seeing her today whether I wanted to or not—my hyperactive mind was highly agitated that I couldn't see her now. My protective inclinations kicked into high gear; I asked Esme where Bella was living so that I could sneak an early peek, make sure she was okay, see her safely to the house—all justifications that were complete nonsense. I just needed to see her face, and I swore I would crumble to dust from the pressure of the anticipation if my need to be in her presence weren't satisfied soon. Needless to say, Esme wasn't going to tell me anything about where Bella was. I looked in the school directory and only her email address was listed, so I had no recourse but to wait.

One of Carlisle's lab assistants called with an interesting quandary, so he decided to go into the office for the morning. His mind told me that he was just as excited as everyone else to see Bella, and he thought going in would sufficiently distract him until it was closer to six o'clock. He smiled at me, and I nodded in acknowledgement before he walked out of the door.

All of my flitting, nervous energy left me vulnerable to prodding from my siblings when I walked into the living room. Alice just smiled at me, trying to be supportive.

It's going to be alright, Edward. She'll be here soon.

I paced. "Do you even know how she's getting here?" I asked.

"I think Esme said she was going to take her bike," Alice said.

"Bike? Bike! Really? Surely there's something we can do about that, this is so far off campus it would take her at least, what, 45 minutes to an hour maybe? And one of the neighborhoods she'll have to peddle through to get here isn't so great. There's traffic, and it'll be getting late by then—"

"Edward. She'll be here at six. There's nothing we can do. What would you have Esme do, force her?"

"No, of course not, but perhaps she could have been more convincing or something, I mean—"

Esme cut my statement off with her thoughts.

Agapatos, remember the position I was in. I was lucky she came to see me at all. I wasn't going to pressure her into anything. You would do well to remember the same when she gets here. We'll all have to just focus on something else in the meantime. You could always come here and put on an apron; help me bake. If not, let me focus on my cookies. I'm determined not to burn them this time.

"Cookies?" I asked aloud. I thought I had smelled something mildly unpleasant, but I ignored it in my all-consuming obsession with Bella's arrival method.

Alice grinned at me. "Mom's trying to get back into the practice of being able to cook human food for Bella. She's very optimistic like that, you know."

I wrinkled my nose. "What kind of cookies? Something smells like... rancid milk, perhaps?" At a lower volume I continued, "I thought she was trying to win her back, not kill her."

Esme thought at me. They're Blueberries and Cream, and you'd do well to keep your opinions of them to yourself. I'm following the recipe exactly, and you're just jealous you can't eat them anymore.

"Suit yourself, Mom," I said.

I noticed Alice was ignoring this exchange. Normally she would be prodding at me to get me to repeat what Esme was thinking. I looked down and finally noticed that Alice was on her laptop, staring blankly at an Illustrator file. I reached over her shoulder and manipulated the mouse cursor until I could figure out what she was doing.

"Alice! Really! A banner?"

I was looking at the file for a three foot tall, fifteen foot long banner that read 'Welcome Home, Bella!' I heard Jasper chuckle from the other side of the room. I was surprised he was anywhere near, given he was trying to stay as far from me as he could without leaving the room since I had been agitating him with my excessive anxiety. Alice looked up at me, face covered with annoyance.

"Don't worry, I didn't have enough warning. There isn't a printer in the city that can get it made on such short notice on a Saturday." She pouted.

Once she spoke I realized that when I first approached the computer, she wasn't looking at the monitor at all. She was trying to see something. I didn't see any images in her mind, so if I wanted to know, I would have to ask.

"What, or who, were you just trying to see?" I asked.

"Bella. It's so very frustrating. I don't think there's anything wrong, I think it's just that you made me shut my mind off from her for so long that I think I need to be with her again just to, like, find her frequency again. But I should at least be able to see her when I try to look at Esme's future. Instead I'm not getting anything at all; it's bugging me. I'll be glad when today is done and over with and hopefully I'll have my friend back."

Alice tried to feign calm, but I wasn't buying it.

"Besides, the timing is good—I wasn't able to get out of taking a British Lit class and I might be able to use her help to survive the utter boredom of it all. If I remember correctly, her perspective on the classics was far less jaded than yours," she said.

Apparently Jasper wasn't buying it either. "Well, now that absolutely everyone is stabbing me with nervous tension, I think it's time for me to make my exit. I'll be back closer to six, guys."

Alice blew him a kiss before he left the room. I returned to my pacing the room and continued to do so until I heard Rosalie and Emmett descend the stairs into the foyer. The closed floor plan of the house annoyed me; I noted that it was very strange to be able to hear my family moving around the house but be unable to see them.

Esme usually opted for open, spacious homes in sparsely populated areas, but in the interest of staying near campus and our short time frame for a house hunt, our options were limited. She ended up settling on an eight bedroom, 4,000 square foot Queen Anne style Victorian property that she liked for its size and the densely wooded three acres it was surrounded by, giving us some small protection from human notice. It was a divine example of the period, and had been fully restored before we bought it, much to Esme's dismay. The house, which Emmett called "The Manor Cullen," was even trimmed in a vibrant, period-accurate green and cream against its brick. Unfortunately, its 120-year-old architecture meant that the interior was composed of many smaller rooms, mostly closed off from one another. Esme was still warring with herself over whether she should knock down some walls and make larger spaces; she didn't want to compromise the historical accuracy of the layout.

I was still with Alice in the parlor, my mind nicely and firmly re-focused on how I was going to approach Bella, and was pacing and tracing the patterns of the old hardwood of the floor when Rosalie impeded me by blocking my path. I had less patience for her than usual, ever since Esme compared my behavior to hers. That wasn't exactly fair, but at this moment I could not have cared less. Knowing that Bella would be here soon and that Rosalie might be somewhat less than welcoming towards her made me even more agitated.

"How may I help you, Rose?" I said through gritted teeth.

"Relax, Edward. I'm going to play nice today. In fact, I'm so absurdly kind that I thought I would remind you that you might not want to be inside this house when Bella gets here this evening."

I kept my face as relaxed as I could. I was determined to be a good vampire brother and not lose my temper again today. I would at least let her explain before I decided whether to abandon my efforts or not.

"And why would that be?"

"Because from what I heard, you blew a gasket last night when Alice opened the door to Mother's office, and that nearly sent you on a homicidal spree. And that was over a stale scent. You don't have the resistance built up to her that you did before. How do you think you're going to react when she gets here?"

She had a point. This fact only irritated me more, but I still held on to enough manners to realize that I should give credit where it was due. My response probably still came out stilted.

"That's fair, Rose. I'll have to rethink this ... and I appreciate your concern."

Now I was anxious, agitated, and ready to punch something. I wasn't afraid I would hurt Bella. I was now convinced nothing would cause me to hurt her, but that didn't mean my thirst wouldn't prompt me to do something else stupid that might put her or some innocent in harms way. This meant that I would have to wait outside; maybe acclimate myself to her scent while she went inside and spent time with the family. Even more time before I would be able to see her, talk to her. I seethed. I stalked off until I was past the front door, then I ran.

"Howl"

I returned home close to 6:40, thinking that if I came back any earlier I just wouldn't be able to hold myself back from seizing her in my arms. I slowly approached the house from the backyard, hoping to determine what was going on by the voices. What I heard was disconcerting.

"Mom, you did say six o'clock, right? You're sure you didn't say seven? Do you think she forgot? Did she change her mind?" Alice asked.

"I don't think there's a chance she would have forgotten, but she may have gotten held up by something. Let's not panic quite yet, all right, Mellita?" Esme was worried though, I could hear it in her thoughts.

I rushed into the kitchen, where I found Esme sitting with Alice, Jasper and Rosalie. My three siblings looked at me with fear in their eyes, and it made me realize that I likely appeared haggard and strained with worry. It did not surprise me. I felt as if my neck was positioned under the guillotine, and I was only awaiting the word before I would be split in two.

"It's me, isn't it? She doesn't want to see me. She changed her mind."

Esme frowned. "I doubt that's the issue, dear. I know this is going to be hard for us, but we have no choice than to sit and wait."

"Where's Em?" I asked.

"He's in the living room setting up an extra microphone for Rock Band 3," Rosalie said. "He's convinced that when Bella shows up he's going to be able to talk her into singing backup vocals on all those Silversun Pickups songs he downloaded. Good luck with that, Em!" she yelled, voice dripping with sarcasm.

I went back to pacing the floor again. It was now forty-five minutes after six and I was getting closer to total panic with each passing minute.

"Esme, there has to be a way to contact her. Do we have anything to go on?" I asked.

"Nothing, really. I would have tried to find her by now if I had any leads—" She was interrupted by her cell phone's chime.

I froze, waiting for her to answer it. It was Carlisle. He was speaking too quickly for me to discern what he was saying from where I was standing, but I could tell from Esme's erratic thought patterns that something was wrong. She must have begun to emanate that panic as well, because Jasper ran into the kitchen so fast that he skidded when he tried to come to a stop. He looked directly at me first.

What the hell has happened, Edward? Jasper thought.

I threw up my hands to show my lack of information, and continued to try to listen for either Carlisle's words or Esme's thoughts, but the way Esme's mind worked just didn't lend itself well towards hearing both sides of a phone conversation.

"She'll be dead by midnight." Esme spoke with certainty.

I froze.

"Can we come, Carlisle? Will she see us?" she asked.

I couldn't wait anymore; every second I was closer to snatching the phone from her hand. She snapped her clamshell shut just as I was about to lunge for it.

"What is it?" It came out as a cry.

Jasper and Emmett both put their hands on my shoulders. I could tell that Jasper was trying to alter my emotional state but failed because at this point he wasn't much calmer than I.

"Carlisle's at the hospital with Bella. She's hurt, but she'll be okay. She was attacked by Victoria this morning out at one of the state parks."

The room released a collective gasp and everyone started in with a different question, but Esme held up a hand.

"We can talk about the hows and whys later, but right now we have two priorities." She looked at me. "Edward, you have a recent location and a perhaps a fresh scent. Do you think you can track Victoria from there?"

I was finding it hard to speak; my mind had clouded with rage and all I could think of was Bella in a hospital bed—again. Because of this, it took me an extra second to nod in reply.

"Then how does this sound—Edward, Rosalie and Emmett, take the Jeep and go see if you can catch Victoria's trail. Everyone else will come with me to the hospital to see about Bella."

We all agreed and turned to head towards the garage. On the way out Esme caught my arm; I spun around.

Agapatos, listen to me. I want you to catch her, and in order to do that you'll need to be calm and you'll need to be focused. Carlisle says that Bella is fine and will make a full recovery. I'll see you in a few hours.

I breathed just for the sensation of it; to concentrate on something other than my anger. I heard one more thought from Esme's mind before I turned to leave.

I just told Carlisle that Victoria will be dead by midnight. So when I see you next, I want you to walk in holding a bag with that female in it—in ashes.

I nodded. I would follow through on her command if it was the last thing I did.

In The Blood.

The next time I awoke it was because something pulled me out of my dreamless, narcotic-induced sleep. I was cold. It felt like an ice pack was pressed against my ankle. This was a relief, a stark contrast against the hot, throbbing pain that increased as my stupor began to wear off. I hadn't opened my eyes yet, but I did when I heard a unnaturally soothing voice call to me.

"Bella, child, I'm glad you wanted to see me, but it really would have been much better if you had just come by the house today instead."

Somehow being called a child didn't seem at all patronizing coming from him. I tried to lift my head, but was forced still by a neck brace. The voice came closer and leaned over me. When my eyes were able to confirm what my mind instinctively knew, I smiled. Carlisle smiled back at me.

"Was ... the plan." I was surprised to see that my throat was starting to recover. It wasn't completely painless, but it no longer felt like I was swallowing glass when I spoke, either. Nonetheless, my voice was still weak and not everything came out as intended. "Ow did you find e?"

Carlisle cupped my cheek with his cool palm. He laughed. "You drew me to you by your blood, much like you did Edward. I'll explain in a moment, but first I have to fix something your doctor missed. I'll try to make it as quick as possible, but it will hurt a bit, all right?"

I moaned. He continued to talk. "So ... apparently, you lost quite a bit of blood from some lacerations on your leg and arm. Your body began to reject the transfusion they gave you, but it seems to have changed its mind and accepted the plasma; you didn't have any lasting adverse effects from the transfusion, but it did prompt them to look at your blood work more carefully..."

"AAHH!" My scream followed a loud cracking sound as he pulled hard on my foot and leg.

"Yes, there we are. Sorry about that, they missed a dislocation in the ankle area. That would have set all wrong. No other way to go about that. I hope I at least distracted you somewhat."

I glared at him. He went on.

"As I was saying ... no one could figure out what what was going on with your Coombs test results. When that sort of thing happens, it's protocol to contact my lab. When no one in the lab could identify the issue, one of my researchers gave me a call. Thirty minutes later I find myself looking into a microscope at human blood that, somehow, resembles vampire blood. Not understanding, I demanded to see the patient it came from. I wish I could say I was surprised that it was you, Bella."

"But ..." I tried to point at myself, but even my working, not-fractured hand lamely flopped onto my stomach. I did manage to point my index finger towards my face before I spoke.

"Not vampire. How?" My voice was getting stronger by the minute.

"No, but you were bitten once. While the amount of venom you were exposed to wasn't enough to trigger the change, my guess is that it was enough to produce something like ... antibodies, perhaps. Really, I've never seen it before. It would be fascinating to study it more." He paused. "But first I have to figure out what I'm going to say to sweep this under the rug. You've managed to get quite few people interested in you now, you know."

I groaned.

"Don't worry about it, Bella, I'll take care of it." His movements stopped suddenly, and he turned to look me directly in the eyes, a worried frown marring his otherwise angelic face. "What I want to know right now is how you got here. Witness accounts in the park were inconsistent. Some said that it looked like you jumped, others that you fell. What happened?"

I had noticed during my ascent that some other climbers had arrived in the general area by the time I was near the top, but it didn't occur to me that anyone had seen my fall. That explained why Victoria didn't stick around to finish the job she started. Then it occurred to me that I needed to tell Carlisle something. "Um ... both, kinda."

"Explain, please."

"Victoria. Found me. Was there. Let my knees ... buckle ... to escape."

The look was only on his face for a second, but I'll never forget it. It was easy to forget that he was a predator, given how I loved him, and made worse by how I romanticized all of the Cullens in my memories. I remembered now. The look that flashed across his face reminded me just how much of a vicious, lethal killer he could be if the necessity arose.

I saw a flicker of black as he removed his cell phone from his white coat and dialed a number. He spoke too rapidly for me to understand anything he said, and ended the call quickly. I shut my eyes and let my head sink deeper into the rough cotton of the pillow behind my head. The annoyance I felt creeping up on me put a tell-tale blush on my cheeks, and I started to feel flushed. My body's reaction to the anger made every already stressed muscle cry louder for relief. Eyes still closed, I focused half my energy on forming a polite statement; the other half went towards speaking clearly with my sore throat.

"Carlisle, I hope you're not rallying the troops on my account. I really appreciate the sentiment and all, but really, this is already getting complicated, and I—" I needed a moment to think clearly. "I can't deal with complicated. You don't owe me anything and I'm not your responsibility, so really, I think it would be ... preferable ... if you all just ignored it, really."

Carlisle put his phone away, then sat on the edge of the bed and gently placed his hand on my broken arm. Though my body's insubordination upset me, I relaxed a little under the cooling sensation of his hand, which was acting like a cold compress against my fractured arm. I couldn't read the reaction on his face.

"Bella, you can't possibly be suggesting that you would rather us leave you to Victoria, are you?

"I'm only asking that you leave me to my own fate, whatever that may be. I can't grow to depend on y—" I caught myself and inhaled, as if that would help me get some control of my temper. I continued. "If you're asking whether I have a death wish, the answer is no. But that's somewhat irrelevant to my point. What happened today was partially my fault. I lost my focus. I can't let that happen again."

"How on earth could your focus have anything to do with being hunted by a vampire?"

I was getting livid. I hadn't really had any time to think about the events of the morning for myself, so I certainly wasn't in the mood to explain the hundreds of minute habits, rituals, or actions I did on a daily basis in my attempt to keep Victoria at bay. Restricting my climbing to group climbs was one of them, though I had relaxed my own rules lately since I had not ever heard or seen sign of her in Pittsburgh. The worst part of this was that he was making me feel helpless and weak; something I swore to myself I would never experience again if I could help it. Turning down his assistance might just be the most mindlessly stubborn and ridiculously stupid thing I'd ever done, but I was going to do it anyway, logic be damned.

"Look, Carlisle, thanks for, uh, whatever that is you just did or said on the phone, but no thanks."

"You almost died today, you're lying here with multiple fractures, and you want us to just leave you be? I don't think a plan of leaving you defenseless is going to work out well for you, Bella."

"I'm still alive. I'm alive right now, and none of you were there to save me this morning. In fact, I've managed to protect my own skin, and have managed to do so for a few years now, so perhaps it's working out for me just fine, thanks." My patience with this conversation had ended.

"Maybe this whole meet-up thing was a bad idea anyway—"

"Bella! Wait, please." He had moved his hand in order to give my ankle some relief by that point, but when he spoke he inadvertently tightened his grip.

"Ow. My ankle's already fractured, you know."

His grip loosened. "Sorry. Please, hear me out. You have every right to be angry with us. I understand that—"

The part of me that was raised to always be polite and courteous to others was pinging wildly in my brain, but my anger overrode it.

"I don't know that you do understand, Carlisle. I find it hard to imagine you have any idea how I feel."

He looked at me with so much sincerity and sorrow in his eyes that it was hard to stay mad at him. I managed, though. If the look he gave meant that he truly wanted to know, then fine, I would tell him.

"I lost Edward. I won't ever be near him again, and no one in my life has any idea what that means; how that feels. Do you have any idea how idiotically melodramatic it sounds to the average human to hear me say that I lost my whole existence, or that I feel like I can't even breathe because I lost my mate? No one except for your family would have a clue what that would mean... how that feels, and it's not like I could talk to any of you about it, now could I? On top of losing the person that had become my whole life, I lost the family that I thought came along with the deal. Alice was my best friend, and she left, too. Just...poof, disappeared."

I tried to gesticulate when I said "poof," completely forgetting in my anger that one of my hands was broken. I grimaced and choked down a cry. The pain took a bit of the steam out of my impassioned argument. I went on anyway.

"So not only did I lose these people that I loved, but this whole world that you introduced to me vanished. I may not have truly become a member of that world, but I was sure as hell pulled into it, and eventually I started to feel that in your world was where I fit. That was taken from me, too. I was left to wonder whether I had completely lost my mind. Things start to seem like hallucinations when they're there one minute and gone the next, you know. Edward tells me that he doesn't want me anymore, all of your emails are invalid, any and all pictures of you that I had are missing, cell phones are dead, and I was left there—aloneand hunted." I made sure to add extra emphasis on those last three words.

"Now you're all here again, you've found out that Victoria is after me and you're all up at arms like it's something new, and I'm supposed to feel—" My eyes burned now, but I kept ranting. "How am I supposed to feel? Esme just wants everyone to jump right back into my life and everything will be just great. What, exactly, is supposed to happen? Am I supposed to be able to start 'movie night' back up with Alice when I can't even conceive that she ever gave a flying fuc—" I caught myself just in time. "When I can't feel like she ever cared about me at all? How am I possibly supposed to be in the same room with Edward when I know he doesn't want to see me? When just thinking his name makes me miss him so much that I want to jump off a cliff?" I wondered if he would catch on to the fact that I was being literal just then.

"And then there's you—you and Esme." I lost all the fire in my voice now and allowed myself to drift a bit. "Do you remember that day that Edward saved me from Tyler Crowley? I remember crying on my way to school that morning. I cried because I found out that morning that my dad had put snow chains on my car so that I'd be safer in the icy weather. When he did that it made me feel so ... cared for. For the first time in a long while I felt loved and protected and, again, cared for, and the shock of it all made me cry. I love both my parents so much, but most of the time I feel like I'm taking care of them instead of the other way around. With you and Esme I felt that ... the comfort that comes when you feel loved ... I felt that from you all the time." I wondered if I sounded as pathetic as I felt. I was almost done, however, and I figured I might as well just get it all out.

I was slightly placated by the fact that he hadn't interrupted me. It was hard enough trying to think of everything I wanted to say to him.

"And you both just ... left. Now you're all suddenly back, I have no guarantees that you'll be here even beyond tomorrow, and I'm expected to be just ... dandy about all of it? I'm sorry that I don't feel that way; that I can't get past my hurt and bitterness. My mind can't even imagine being in the same room with Edward. It won't let me. The thought petrifies me."

I swallowed. Still sore, but better now. "So maybe it's for the best if you all just didn't worry about any of it. I'll be fine."

It rang false as it came out of my mouth. I hadn't been fine in almost three years, but I was accustomed to it by now, and if anything I had grown to be completely intolerant of change. Change scared me more than facing Victoria did. Bad things came with the winds of change; people disappeared with it.

It took him a while to respond. He stopped examining my injuries and stared at the floor. I found myself wondering why I was so difficult to talk to nowadays; I didn't remember vampires as being so slow to find their words considering how much faster they were at, well, everything. When he did speak it was slow and I could tell that it was carefully premeditated.

"Well, Bella, I'm not sure where best to begin, but I'll try starting with my apology. While Esme did not share your whole conversation with us, she did tell us a little of what you've been through, and it's entirely our fault. I'm sorry."

His every word oozed with compassion, but it only annoyed me more. I didn't want to be pitied, I just wanted to be understood.

"I underst—" He caught himself. "I fully acknowledge that you have no reason to trust us, and our actions are responsible for that. It was a horrible way to go about things, and our reasoning was clouded by many factors. I don't expect you to welcome us all back 'with open arms,' as you say. I don't think Esme does either. She desperately hopes that you will, but she's not unaware of the challenge we face getting you to trust us again. But make no mistake, we are going to try. We're all going to try our best to convince you to let us stick around. We're going to do that precisely because we absolutely care about you, Bella. It's because we care about you that we've made such a mess of things. The whole 'loving a human' thing apparently comes with many complications, regardless of what form that love takes, and as long as I've lived, no part of my existence has provided any real reference on how to go about things in this situation. This was all very new to us, and I'm sorry that you've had to be subjected to our blunders.

"As far as you belonging to our world, well, it scares me to think that's true, but I suppose it must be, considering we're all here right now, and realistically, I don't see how it would work with Edward any other way..."

"There's nothing to work out with ..." I couldn't say it. "Him."

"Oh, Bella. I don't know how you could have gotten the impression—" Something occurred to him then. "Well, I don't know what he said to you before we left, but I can assure you that Edward loves you more than anything else in his existence. He's been insufferable every minute. I assure you, and whatever he may have said to give you any impression otherwise was simply a lie."

Now it was confirmed. Both Esme and Carlisle were delusional.

I wasn't sure I would ever forget the cold that emanated from him that day. The look he gave me began to break my heart before he even said a word, because I didn't believe that anyone that could look at me that way could possibly love me. It was like being pushed under the surface of a frozen lake. It left me cold, breathless, and waiting for the end to come. "You didn't see him when he said it."

"No, I didn't. But I know how convincing Edward can be when he's determined. It doesn't matter what I say anyway, I know that you'll need to hear it from him."

None of this calculated. It made no sense to me. Finding out that he didn't want me may have shattered me, and it certainly embittered me, but it made sense to me. Back then, whenever I looked at him I wondered why he had chosen me, and I feared that some day he would come to his senses. For a long time I thought that perhaps my situation was partially my fault—I suspected what would happen, and I was right. I should have been better prepared. Shouldn't have fallen so hard. He was still an asshole for what he did, but maybe I should have worked harder to resist him.

"I can, however, unequivocally speak for myself, and, I suspect, for Esme as well. We considered you family from the moment Edward brought you home. We were just biding our time until you got to know us, the whole time nervous that you wouldn't accept us. We thought you would eventually come to your senses and run from us. When you didn't, we couldn't have been any more overjoyed. I've been around long enough to see thousands of words added to the English language, but I still don't know if I have any to describe how it makes me feel to know that you feel that way about us." He smiled broadly. "It's a lot of what we live for, knowing that we can still form these bonds in spite of what we are. That others can genuinely love us as well ... beyond the simple joy of being loved, it ... gives us hope ... maybe our kind can be more. Perhaps we can be deserving of the gifts we have been given. That it's possible we really are more than executioners.

"As for ignoring this Victoria situation, my answer is simply no. There is nothing you could do or say that would convince us that we should pretend this isn't happening. You know me well enough to know that I don't relish the idea of killing another being, regardless of their crimes. This one, however, has forced my hand, and we're going to see to it that she dies. That's all there is to say about that. I suppose the last thing you need to know is that we won't leave you again unless you have thoroughly considered and subsequently decided that you want us gone. Even that can only be said for the majority of us—I'm not certain you'll be able to get Edward leave you again, period."

My heart rate jumped at the mention of his name in the context of being with me, and it spent the next minute scrambling again to find a rhythm. My cheeks flushed as at least two machines in the room started to beep incessantly. Carlisle was reaching over me to turn down the volume of the electrocardiogram monitor when a nurse peered into the room from the doorway.

"Is everything alright in here, doctor ...?" She didn't recognize him, and she looked concerned. That was when I realized that the scene from her point of view must have been alarming. Carlisle's right hand was high on my upper thigh, just over where my bone was fractured, in his continuing attempt to soothe my sorest spots. The rest of his body was mostly positioned over several inches over me, since he had leaned over from a seated position, to turn down the volume of the machine without displacing the hand on my thigh. Add to this that my heart rate had skyrocketed... well, it all looked very suggestive.

"Dr. Cullen from Oncology/Hematology. Yes, thank you, everything is fine," he said.

Once he had turned to her, the look on her face transformed. She had forgotten all about whatever plight she suspected I was in. Her skin was a rich ochre color, so I couldn't tell if she was blushing or not, but the rest of her body language managed to make it obvious that she was thoroughly "dazzled." He could have said he was Dr. Jeckyl from the department of Absolute and Utter Bullshit, and she would have gone right on smiling.

An uncomfortable silence followed, during which Carlisle gave her the side-eye and asked if there was anything else she wanted to inquire after. She shook her head and walked away. I burst out laughing. He smiled.

"Well, if you'll allow, we'll have plenty of time to talk further. For now, however, I think we should prepare. I'm going to give you an analgesic—a pain medication—that doesn't have anesthetic effects since you'll probably want to be awake for the next few hours. I wish I could give you more time to process everything, but I'm afraid that Esme and the rest of the gang will be here any minute now. They'll certainly want to see you, and I don't think I would be able to stop Alice if I tried."

Once he finished hanging a bag of some unknown medication and added it to my intravenous line, he looked at me pleadingly. "Please be patient with us, Bella. You know that we all have a tendency to get ... overexcited."

I tried to nod. Damned neck brace. My vanity kicked in just then and my eyes widened when I realized they would all be seeing me with various braces, swollen limbs, and bruised, stitched up skin. I used my right hand to start patting myself all over, as if tactile feedback could give me an accurate assessment of just how horrible I looked. Carlisle grinned and said, "Bella, please don't stress. It makes the drugs have to work harder to relieve your pain, and you're still beautiful as always anyway."

I started to smile as I felt that warm, fatherly affection permeate me again. Then I started freaking out that I was letting that warm, fatherly affection do such things to me, but by that time, he had left the room, and I was left alone in my panic.