Title: Promises to Keep

By: Cheddar the Cheese

Chapter Eight: Breathe

Summery: When Edward left, he thought that it would make her life better- instead, he left her to a world that she was not ready to face.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything you recognize from Stephanie Meyer's Twilight series. I do own the plot and any original characters that may pop up.

Note: A short chapter this time. But it's important.

Cause you can't jump the track, we're like cars on a cable,
And life's like an hourglass, glued to the table.
No one can find the rewind button boys,
So cradle your head in your hands,
And breathe, just breathe,
Whoa breathe, just breathe

There's a light at each end of this tunnel, you shout
'Cause you're just as far in as you'll ever be out
These mistakes you've made, you'll just make them again
If you only try turning around.

-Breath (2AM)

It was warm and safe where I was. I didn't want to open my eyes because of that pressing feeling in my mind that there was something outside of my warm safe place that I did not want to face. But I didn't have the option of staying there. Someplace outside of myself, my phone was ringing.

I opened my eyes and found myself face to face with Ian. His eyes were silted open and he stared blearily at me.

"You stayed," he murmured as he pulled me closer to him.

I didn't have the awareness at the time to reply. I reached for my phone but ended up elbowing Ian in the ribs. He grunted as I wrapped my fingers around the phone.

"Hello?" I answered even as I watched him.

"Did you like my gift?" asked the voice on the other end of the line. "I had fun picking it out for you, Bella."

My mind was suddenly awake. "Who is this? Where's Emily? What have you done with her?"

He laughed. "I'll see you soon, Bella Swan. The rest is irrelevant." And the line was dead.

My hands were not working as I tried to hang up the phone. "Ian," I said. My voice was shaking so bad I wasn't sure he heard me. But he understood.

"Was it them? The people who took Emily?" He asked me even as he had my phone and was dialing.

I managed to nod. The world seemed very surreal to me. The colors, muted by the predawn pallor, seemed sharp and clear and bright. The world was suddenly harsh lines and distinct shapes. Ian's voice seemed to float in from somewhere underwater. His hand running up and down my arm was warm. I wanted to huddle into that warmth but a dim part of my mind knew that that was over. I felt like I would never be warm again.

Ian hung up the phone with a loud, sharp snap. I jumped and he put his arms around me. "It's alright, Bella. They'll be here soon. They can trace the call. We'll get her back. Don't worry." But he was wrong.

There had been something in that voice that I knew very very well. There was a strange cadence to the voice- an odd way of saying words that no one still living still used. No one living…

"I need to get home. I need to call…" But who was I going to call? Edward? I'm sure that would go over well: Hi, Eddie! Remember me? The girl you hate? Well, anyways, my new boyfriend and I were wondering if you could…What? Help us track down a vampire?

"Bella, we have to stay here. The police are coming." The police… We couldn't tell the police about vampires. They couldn't know. I wasn't supposed to know. Sometimes I wished I didn't know… Only sometimes.

I nodded. "I have to go to the bathroom," I said. Ian didn't say anything. He just shifted over so I could climb off the bed and padded into the bathroom.

The bathroom was cool and white with tile on the floors. I splashed water on my face. It was ice cold and woke me up. I took a moment to take deep breaths.

What did I know? There weren't a lot of facts to look at but I was determined to figure it out.

First: Emily was missing. She'd been missing for over a week. No one had heard from her. She hadn't called anyone and no one had known she was missing until she didn't show up for work the day after Thanksgiving.

Second: I had found Emily's hand on the beach. I went to the beach whenever I needed to get out of the house. Someone had known that I would eventually find my way down to the beach.

Third: I'd had a dream about finding the hand the night before. In fact, that dream had been what had sent me down to the water in the first place.

Fourth: The phone call I had gotten just moments ago had come from someone who had known a lot about me. He had admitted that he had left the hand for me on the beach. He had also said that he would see me soon. The thought sent chills down my spine but it wasn't what mattered. I had to focus. The caller had been a man with a faint accent of some kind. It sounded vaguely Latin. It hadn't been a particularly deep voice but it felt somehow obscene.

And that was it. It wasn't a lot to go on but it was something. No, it wasn't. I was missing a giant piece of the puzzle. It was like I was a pawn on a chess board that couldn't see what the rest of the pieces were doing.

That was when I realized that I did have more information.

The vampires.

Back when Ian and I had our first date, there had been vampires- three of them. I knew that Jasper had only followed Alice. She had come because she knew something. And what had I done? I pushed her away. I ignored her.

And that same night there had been the other vampire- the strange woman with the blonde hair and red eyes. She had seemed to know something as well. She knew Carlisle. She had known a lot. But it was clearly not her voice on the phone. So who was she and was she involved in this? She had to be. She'd known things she shouldn't as well.

So somehow, it was clear to me now, there were vampires involved. But why? It was clearly a planned and deliberate attack on myself but by whom? All the vampires who might have reason to kill me, were dead. James and Laurent and Victoria. They were all gone. So who?

"Bella?" Ian asked through the door. "Is everything alright?"

I wanted to tell him no. Nothing was ok. Emily was being tortured because of me and the madman who took her was coming for me next. Nothing was alright.

"I'm fine. I'll be there in a minute," I called through the door.

Ian seemed like he wanted to argue but at that moment, the doorbell rang. Ian went to answer the door as I pulled myself together.

For the next few hours, I recounted the entire thirty second conversation fifty times. I told them everything I could think of about the voice, about Emily, and I told them what I could about my history. I think I did well putting them off the scent of anything that might lead to the supernatural.

By the time they had left, the sun was high in the sky and I was hungry. The day was bright with a sharp cold blowing on the wind. Ian was pacing the living room so I excused myself to take a shower.

The warm water pounding on my back wrapped me in a kind of peace. I didn't want to get out. I knew in my heart that I owed it to Ian to tell him the truth. But I couldn't tell him all of it. There were parts of the story I couldn't tell him… Like Vampires. He'd laugh… he'd have me committed. But I had to tell him something.

I was wrapped in one of Ian's bathrobes and was drying my hair when I heard my cell phone ringing in the next room. I rushed out to grab it and saw a number I didn't know. The blood froze in my veins.

Ian was standing in the doorway. "Answer it," he said. "If it's Emily…" He trailed off but he didn't have to say anymore.

"Hello?" I said, hating the way my voice shook.

"Bella? Bella, get out of the house! Run!" It was Alice. Alice who knew what was going to happen- who knew that if I stayed in the house…

"Alice? What's going on?" Even as I spoke, I grabbed Ian's hand and dragged him to the front door.

"He's coming, Bella! Hurry."

We were nearly to the door when the window shattered. I screamed. On the phone, Alice was yelling my name. I turned around to see what had happened.

The vampire was standing amid the shattered glass like a diamond god. I didn't see anything else because Ian pushed me behind him.

"No, Ian," I cried. But it was too late. The strike sent him to the floor like a stone. I turned to face the vampire and he grinned at me. It was the most terrifying smile I had ever seen. It was cold and hard with not mirth behind it. His red eyes sparkled with hate- old hate that I couldn't understand.

"Did you like my gift, Bella? I told you I'd see you soon."

A part of me wanted to run and part of me wanted to throw myself on Ian to see if he was still alive.

"Bella! Bella!" The small tinny voice of Alice came out of the phone that lay amid the glass on the floor.

In a flash, the vampire was there. "Oh, I don't think so, Bella. No, we can't have that." And he crushed the phone into dust.

Turning to me with the cold hard smile of a madman, he glared at me." I truly hope you enjoyed my gift, Bella. And I know exactly how much you are going to enjoy being a gift for Edward."

He took a step toward me and all of my courage disserted me. The world swam black and I knew nothing more for a long time.

TBC?