Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.
Bella woke in the morning hearing her dad walking around downstairs. She heard Alice's tinkling laughter and that let her know that last night hadn't been a dream. Her eyes were as dry as sandpaper and she had a pounding headache. She made her way downstairs to the kitchen and almost ran into Charlie.
"Sorry Bells. Alice was just telling me about the slumber party you guys had last night."
"She needed it." Alice offered as she put a hand on Bella's shoulder.
"Alice is a good friend to have when you need her."
Alice smiled tenderly at her before giving her a sympathetic look.
"I've got to go in early today. I won't be home until eight, so don't worry about making dinner tonight. I'll eat while I'm at work."
"Yes sir." Bella said with a nod.
Charlie left a few minutes later once he had hugged and kissed Bella goodbye. She searched through the cabinets over the stove and by the refrigerator for the aspirin to no avail.
"They're in the medicine cabinet in the downstairs bathroom." Alice offered.
Bella gave her a grateful smile before heading down the hall. Alice handed her a glass of water when she came back into the kitchen.
"What did you want to do today?"
"Nothing, I'm just going to stay here. I'm going to go take a shower." Bella said once she had put her glass in the strainer.
"Okay." Alice said with a nod.
"You can stay down here. I don't think anything will happen with you in the house."
"I'll keep an ear out." Alice said as she walked into the living room.
Bella started the shower then went to her room to get clothes. Downstairs was silent as she closed the bathroom door. She didn't even lock the door; she didn't want to give Alice a reason to worry. She was down to her underwear when she noticed that the window was open. Her dad must have finally gotten around to scraping the paint from the window sill so he could repaint it. Sure enough, he had left the ladder underneath the window.
She dressed quickly before quietly going back to her room to get her shoes. She climbed down trying to be aware of her surroundings but keeping her thoughts to herself. The last thing she needed was to have Alice find out that she was making a getaway. Using her truck was out of the question. Alice would definitely hear it. She would just have to walk to where she was going.
XXXX
Jacob hadn't gotten any sleep again last night. His body was bone tired, but he couldn't make his mind shut off. Everything that he had said to Bella yesterday ran through his head on replay. He wished that he had handled things differently. He held so much guilt because he knew that Bella couldn't help what was happening any more than he could. If anyone was going to be with her in her time of need it was going to be him. He had made that known last night when he talked to Carlisle over the phone.
He wasn't ready to see her. He was going pull himself together and he would go and see her later. He needed to get his head on straight first. He knew just the place to get some thinking done where he would be left alone.
XXXX
Alice had gone upstairs to check on Bella an hour after she had gotten in the shower. She heard the shower running as she made her way up the stairs. Fear gripped her as she ran the rest of the way to the bathroom. What if something had happened to her? Had she slipped and hit her head? She would have seen something like that.
She turned the knob to the bathroom slowly as she called Bella's name.
"You're going to freeze. Turn the water off." Alice said not looking into the shower as she crossed the room to close the window.
That was when she saw the ladder just under the window. She ran out of the room to cross the hall to Bella's room. She glanced quickly around the room and didn't see anything missing. She crossed the room to the closet when she noticed that the door was ajar. Bella's shoes were gone. She ran down the stairs and onto the front porch to see that Bella's truck was still in the driveway.
She pulled out her phone and dialed the first number on her contact list.
"Alice?" Carlisle asked once he answered the phone.
"She's gone." she said in a panicked voice.
"Who's gone?" he asked.
"Bella is gone. I never saw it. She's on foot." she said quietly.
"I'll have Emmett comb the woods. Edward will have to go down to the reservation. I'll be there in two minutes."
Alice hung up, glad that Carlisle was being rational about the situation. Her mind was running in all different directions. How could Bella have done something like this? Didn't she realize how dangerous it was for her to be alone? Where could she have gone?
Carlisle opened the front door to find Alice folded into a ball on the couch.
"This is all my fault." she said in shame.
"No it isn't. Don't think like that."
"If I had been paying more attention this would not have happened." she said as she shook her head.
"Who is on patrol for the wolves today?"
"Jared and Leah, I've already talked to them. They didn't see or hear her leave. Jacob is going to be so angry with me." she said as her face fell.
"No he won't. He will understand that this was something that you had no control over. Would you like me to call Jasper?"
Alice nodded her head as she looked down at her hands. Wherever Bella was she hoped that she was safe.
XXXX
Jacob looked out over the ocean with his phone in his hand. It was ringing for the third time in ten minutes. It was Rachel again. He had asked her not to call him and so far that afternoon she had called him six times. He was contemplating throwing the phone into the water. He heaved a sigh of relief once it stopped ringing. He would have to have a talk with Rachel about respecting his privacy later.
Rachel wasn't the only person who had called him. Sam had called him a couple of times and Paul had called him several times himself which wasn't normal. Of all the people who had called him the one person he hadn't wanted to talk to hadn't called. He didn't know what he would have done if Bella had called him.
The feeling of regret still had him in its grip but at least he wasn't thinking of Bella as much. He hoped that she would be happy with the decision that he had made. He had a feeling that she would be.
His phone rang again and he glanced at it quickly. It was Carlisle. Even he had been calling him nonstop. He turned the phone off once it stopped ringing then sat it at his feet on the sand. Maybe he could come up with a decent apology for Bella now that he wouldn't be distracted.
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Carlisle shut his phone with a shake of his head. Jasper held a still distraught Alice in his arms as Carlisle sat in the recliner once more.
"What time is it?" he asked.
"Six." Jasper answered.
"She's been missing for nine hours. Why hasn't someone found her?" Alice asked.
"I don't know." Carlisle said with a shake of his head.
"Do you think that Victoria could have her?" Alice asked in a scared voice.
"Possibly." Carlisle said gravely.
"Don't think like that. She's out there somewhere. We just aren't looking hard enough." Edward said as he came into the room.
"No one has been able to pick up her scent."
"But we haven't picked up Victoria's either."
"There was an hour window after Bella left that Victoria could have taken her." Jasper said as he tried to reason with him.
"Try Jacob again." Edward pleaded with Carlisle.
"He's turned his phone off." Carlisle said with a sigh.
"I'm going down to the reservation again." Edward said as he turned towards the door.
"Please be careful. Sam said that he would handle everything there." Alice said quietly.
"I'll call him and let him know that I am coming." he said as he shut the front door.
"We have to think of something to tell Charlie in case we don't find her before he comes home." Jasper said.
"Can you mimic her handwriting Alice?"
"I can try." Alice said with a nod.
"I'll see if I can find something that has her handwriting on it." Jasper said before rising from the couch.
Alice could copy anyone's handwriting as long as she had something with their handwriting on it in front of her. It was one of her hidden talents that she had from childhood. Jasper came back with the grocery list from the kitchen. Alice tore a page out of a notebook on the coffee table and began testing out Bella's handwriting.
"Where should we say she is?"
"With us?" Jasper offered.
"Charlie would just come and get her." Carlisle said with a shake of his head.
"Well we can't tell him that she's with Jacob." Alice said as her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
"Maybe you should say that she's with Sam. I'll go outside and have Edward let him know." Jasper said as he stood.
Carlisle nodded in agreement as Alice started writing a quick note to Charlie. Edward came back in a minute later and sat next to Jasper.
"What did Sam say?" Jasper asked.
"No one has seen her. He has the entire pack except for the two in the woods looking for her. Sam has been looking for Bella and Jacob on the reservation all day."
"Who is on patrol right now?" Carlisle asked.
"Embry and Quil, they relieved Leah and Jared while I was outside." Edward answered.
"You don't think that Bella and Jacob are together, do you?" Alice asked.
"They might be. I hope to God that they are." Carlisle answered.
The room was silent as the grandfather clock in the corner struck six thirty. They would need to leave soon. They didn't want to be there when Charlie got home. The last thing they wanted was to raise a red flag and let him know that something had happened.
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Sam walked down the beach hoping that Jacob was where he thought he might be. It was the only place he hadn't looked. No one knew exactly where his and Bella's spot was, so he had been combing the entire beach for the past two hours. He saw a flash of white a few hundred yards ahead of him and he sighed in relief.
"Jacob!" he called.
The person turned to look at him and he took off at a run towards them.
"Do you know how many people have been trying to get in touch with you today?"
"I figured my voice mail message would have let everybody know that I wanted to be left alone. Can't anybody take a hint?" he seethed.
"Something has happened."
"What now?" he asked as he rolled his eyes.
"Bella has been missing since this morning."
"What?" he choked out.
"Alice didn't see it. Where ever she is, she's on foot. Everybody has been looking for her and there's no sign of her anywhere."
"Has anybody tried calling her phone?" he asked pulling his out of his pocket.
"It's on her desk."
"I'm going to her house." Jacob said as he shook his head.
"The Cullen's are there. I need you here with me. Is there anywhere that you can think of that she might be?"
"Here, but I haven't seen her."
"Check your messages; maybe somebody who has called you has seen her."
He listened to his messages and the first one was from Rachel.
"Hey, I don't know where you are, but Bella is here. She let herself in while I was at work. She doesn't look so good. Come home as soon as you get this."
He shut his phone and shook his head.
"Did you think to check my house?"
"I checked your house once every hour personally until Rachel got home."
"And you didn't notice anything?"
"I've gone in and checked."
"Not good enough, unless she hid."
"Go home. I'll call the Cullen's."
Jacob ran the mile and a half to his house and was there in less than thirty seconds. He threw open the front door and Rachel came out of the living room.
"She's in the bedroom."
"How did Sam miss her?"
"I'll let you figure that out for yourself. She's sleeping, so be quiet."
"Is she alright?"
"She was coherent and asking for you until half an hour ago. I got her to eat something because she hadn't eaten all day."
"Thank you." he said hugging her.
"You're welcome. Where were you?"
"I needed to be alone. It was stupid and I shouldn't have done it." he said letting go of her.
He walked the short distance to the bedroom and opened the door silently. The overhead light was on and he noticed that she was asleep over top of the covers. She was wearing one of his shirts and a pair of his basketball shorts. That was why Sam hadn't picked up on her scent. Jacob's scent was masking it and Sam hadn't thought to check the bedroom since he couldn't smell her.
He stripped down to his boxers before turning out the light. He moved her gently so that she was against the wall before getting into bed. She stirred as the bed shook. She lifted her head to look at him through bleary eyes.
"Go back to sleep." he said as he turned on his side to face her.
"It's about damn time you got here. I've been waiting for you all day." she said sleepily.
"Sorry. I'll never make you wait for me again." he said kissing her forehead.
"I love you." she said quietly.
"I love you too." he said as he draped an arm over her waist.
She moved closer to him and he placed his chin on the top of her head. He never wanted to worry about her the way he just had ever again. He couldn't believe how selfish and stubborn he had been. He drifted off to sleep to the sound of her gentle breathing. All of their problems could be put on hold until tomorrow.
