"What do you mean you can see me?" Jacob crouched down so he was at Alice's level as she struggled to sit up without Jasper's help.

"It's like I broke through a wall. I can see your future. My future isn't black anymore, neither is Bella's. I can see the pack!"

Bella sat down heavily on the couch. "How?"

"I don't know. I think, if I had to guess, that it's because I've been bonding with them. That we've progressed past the enemy thing. Jacob called me his friend, and it was like a light went on and as soon as I realized that he was my friend too, I got flooded with the pack in my head. It was overwhelming at first."

Jasper stroked her hair, soothing her. "And now? Does it still hurt?"

"No. Or it's ebbing at least. I think it was just the initial burst that made it hurt so bad."

"Can you see everyone?"

Alice nodded, biting her lip thoughtfully. "I think so. It's still muddled some, but it's getting clearer. Give me a few hours and I shouldn't have a problem."

Bella grinned, hugged Alice tightly. "This is great! Now we don't have to worry about anything! There's nothing coming at us that you can't see! This is a great advantage over the Volturi."

Alice nodded, still holding her head. "I'm very pleased about this development. But I don't remember ever having had a headache." She rubbed her temples gingerly. "I can't say I care for it."

Jasper rubbed her shoulders gently. "I'll take you hunting. Some food will make you feel better." He tugged her to her feet, slipped an arm around her. "I'll have her back before your dinner, Bella. But she hasn't fed in a couple days anyway."

Alice shrugged out of Jasper's embrace, took Bella's hand. "I just want to talk to you for a minute first. Alone."

Once Jacob had taken Jasper out to the garage where they could mutter about an engine together, Alice patted the couch, sat down next to Bella. She leaned back, stretching one of her arms across the back of the couch, crossing her legs casually.

"Bella."

Bella lifted her eyebrows. "Alice."

"You've been here a month."

"Yeah, so?"

"You haven't slept with him yet!" Alice's voice dropped to a stage whisper, and the shock laced through her words made Bella giggle.

"Alice! Things with Jacob are complicated. I'm not even sure what we are yet."

"He's completely in love with you. A blind man could see it. Why haven't you?"

Bella squirmed. "I don't want to tell you."

"I'm your sister! There isn't a thing in this whole world that you couldn't tell me! So spill it, Bella. Why have you not consummated your relationship with the man I think you're going to spend the rest of your life with?"

Bella took a deep breath and squeezed her eyes shut. "Because I've never done it before."

Alice was shocked. "I never saw, but then I thought, because I only looked periodically to make sure you were okay. Never?"

"Never."

"Why in hell's name not?!"

"Well Edward didn't ever want to, and then you left, and I was a mess for years, and doing that with anyone else just seemed completely wrong, and then I was twenty four, and who believes you're still a virgin at that age? And men weren't very interested in me anyway. So every time I went on a date, I would always think, is this the person I want to have take my virginity? And the answer was always no, so I never went out with them again."

"This is unacceptable. Bella! You're twenty eight years old!"

"I know, I know. I don't like it. It wasn't something I ever wanted to do. I didn't decide to be frigid on purpose! It just sort of happened."

"So when you're with Jacob and you think, is this the person you want to have take your virginity, is the answer still no?"

Bella slowly shook her head. "No. It feels right. I want to, and I know he would jump at the chance. But I have no idea how to bring it up, or how to tell him what I want, and that I haven't done anything with anyone before. We haven't even talked about it yet. He hasn't tried anything. It's patrol, and work, and Mackenzie, and sleeping, and we've only been on one date. And all we've done is kiss. I swear it's like we've been married twenty years and can't find time to talk to each other, only we're barely dating."

Alice sighed. "Okay, we've got a lot of work to do. But that's okay. I can take care of it. We'll figure it out." She stood, patted Bella's head. "I'm going to go eat. I'll be back by noon."

At one-thirty, Bella, dressed in stone gray slacks, a ruby red sweater and heeled boots, Mackenzie chattering excitedly on one hip, entered the hall and found Emily setting up platters of turkey and Sue arranging a dozen bowls of side dishes. Jacob entered behind her, carrying a box filled with pies. Alice and Jasper followed, also loaded down with desserts.

Emily rushed over, wrapping her arms around Bella and Mackenzie. "Oh, I'm so glad you're here. We haven't seen you in over a week!"

"I know, I'm sorry. I've just been so swamped."

Jacob plopped the box on the counter. "Where's Sam?"

"Hello, Jacob. It's nice to see you. I'm fine, thanks for asking. Baby's due in three weeks, but the doctor thinks I could go anytime now."

Jacob kissed Emily loudly, grinned down at her. "You look beautiful, Mama. Now, point me in the direction of your husband."

"Pack business?"

"Good news for once."

Sam walked in then, Maggie's hand securely in his, her hair plaited into two French braids and wearing a pale pink dress trimmed in white lace. "So lay it on me. What's this business?"

Unable to contain herself, Alice blurred over to him, bouncing back and forth on the balls of her feet. "I can see you now. All of you."

"I see you too, Alice. I wasn't aware that had been an issue."

"No, silly! Your futures. I can see your futures. This morning it started happening, and now it's crystal clear. No more blind spot."

"How?"

"Alice thinks it's because we've moved from being enemies into being friends. Now that we're not at war with one another, that we're opening up to each other, that we're getting along, there's no reason for her to not be able to see us, so now she can."

"So the battle?"

Alice shook her head. "It's too far out, there are too many variables. It goes somewhat differently every time I look at it. I can see the future for several months, but anything further than a week or two is blurry. The further out, the blurrier."

Sam nodded. "Well you'll keep us up to date, make sure we know everything we need to know."

"Of course. Now that I can see you, I can make sure of when you're going to encountering the rogue vampires. I get to know a ton more now, important things."

Bella looked up from laying out pies when Jacob slipped his arms around her. She smiled, turning in his arms to face him. "Does this mean we can relax the patrolling a little?"

"Probably not. We're each taking one shift every other day. That's something that's doable. What it does mean if we have a bigger advantage than we did yesterday." He backed her against the counter, his hands sliding down so that his fingers dipped inside the pockets of her slacks. "Things'll ease up even more now that Collin and Brady are back."

"Good." She looked over her should as Embry and Leah walked in, Alicia perched on her father's shoulders. "I should finish getting this set up. Everyone's getting here."

"They can wait one minute." He dipped his head so that his lips were brushing against her ear. "Tonight, I want you to stay with me. I don't have to patrol tonight, and I want to sleep holding you."

Bella's stomach lurched, filled with butterflies. "I don't know if that's a good idea. I don't want us to get carried away."

"We won't. Sleeping only. You let me come in and hold you before you left, Bells. Now that we're together, I think I should get to at least do everything you let me do then."

Slowly, Bella nodded. "Okay."

"You know we need to talk."

"I know." She leaned her forehead against his chest. "We have to figure out what we're doing. Get on the same page."

"It's not going to be easy."

"I know. But we have to do it."

Jacob looked across the room to where Jasper was chatting with Seth and Alice was letting Maggie and Alicia play with her hair. "I cannot believe I'm going to say this, but do you think Alice might take Mackenzie for a night so we can talk uninterrupted?"

"I'm sure she would. But are you sure you're okay with that? And what about Billy?"

"I don't know if you noticed, but Billy and Sue have gotten pretty close lately. He's been spending some nights at her house."

Bella's mouth fell open. "Your Dad and Sue? Since when?"

"A few months. If it weren't for Mackenzie, I bet they'd have moved in together already."

Alice was suddenly next to them, having over heard the conversation. "They'll announce their engagement next week. And I'd love to take her for a night. Saturday night. I'll give her too much sugar and we'll stay up all night playing." She giggled. "It'll annoy Jasper to no end. Fun."

Any further conversation was cut short by the arrival of Paul and Rachel and Cameron and Damon, follow shortly by Jared and Kim, Jared holding Alex in one arm and Andrew in the other, both grinning wildly. Cameron and Damon came barreling for their uncle, and Jacob swept them up obligingly, stopping to kiss his very pregnant sister.

Embry and Quil flanked Bella, each sliding an arm around her. Bella looked between them, lifting her eyebrows. "Can I help you?"

Embry shrugged. "So I was phased with Jacob the other day, and I couldn't help but notice that something is missing between you two."

Bella was shaking her head immediately. "Oh no. I am not talking about sex with the two of you."

Quil chuckled. "Chill out. Don't wanna know. What we want to know is what your plan is for when this is over. Are you going to go back to Phoenix, or are you going to stay here?"

"Because if you're going to go back to Phoenix, we'd rather you keep holding out. We love ya, Bella, but he's terrified you're going to leave again, and we can't bring him through that again."

Bella smiled, took one of their hands in each of hers. "Boys. I really appreciate the concern, though Jake would kill you if he knew. But I promise, if he wants me, I'm not going anywhere. I'm home. I'm here to stay, and he's going to have to ask me to leave to get rid of me."

"And I know it's probably going to make you mad, but with Alice and Jasper here, we all know there's a good possibility that the rest might not be too far behind, and that would include Edward. What if he wants to rekindle things between the two of you?"

Bella sighed, shook her head. "Not mad. It's a valid question. Edward was a huge part of my life for a long time. But he's my past, he's a beautiful memory. Jacob, La Push, all of you? That's my future."

Embry grinned widely, enveloped Bella in a hug, lifting her off the floor and twirling her around in a circle. When he set her back down, the grin had turned rakish. "So, what d'ya say you leave Jacob and I divorce the bitchy werewolf and we run off together?"

Bella laughed, wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a resounding kiss on the cheek. "Oh Embry, I'd love to, but really, I don't want to die before I turn thirty!"

Four turkeys, twenty pounds of mashed potatoes and nine pies later, dinner was over. And it had been a rousing success. It was loud, it was raucous, there were several children racing around, Leah and Embry still weren't speaking to each other very much, and Emily was half convinced that she was having some contractions, which had Sam on edge. But all in all, it had been something that they had all needed. A reminder that even though what they were going through was stressful, and even though they had to be on edge about the vampires coming, life couldn't come to a screeching halt.

And for the first time in a long time, sitting between Charlie and Jacob, with Mackenzie in her lap, and Seth sitting across from her, Bella felt like she was part of a family again. Like she had been accepted completely, and that everything might really be okay. And as she looked around the room, to where Jasper was using his mind to soothe Sam's raw nerves, and where Alice and Rachel were giggling over the baby kicking, even where Leah was tying Alicia's shoes and for once looked at peace, she was happy. Completely, unabashedly happy.

Sensing that something was going on, Jacob nudged her with his leg. "What's up?"

Bella shook her head, leaning against his shoulder. "I was just thinking about what a dysfunctional family we are. I never thought I'd see the day that I'd see Jasper and Sam getting along, or Alice coaching Rachel on some new Lamaze techniques. It's mind boggling."

Jacob cast a look around the room, smiling softly. "Yeah, it is. But I think you pegged it. We may be dysfunctional, but for better or worse, everyone in this room is part of our family." He shook his head ruefully. "Even the vampires."

Bella looked up at him, then before he could react, she had darted forward and kissed him heatedly. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For this. For everything."

Charlie cleared his throat next to her. "Uh, Bells?"

Bella twisted in her chair, grinned at her father. "Yeah, Dad?"

Charlie coughed uncomfortably, squirmed a bit. "Uhh, I know it's really none of my business, and you're a grown woman and all, but I have to ask. What was that?"

Jacob leaned around Bella chuckling. "It may be a late start, Charlie. I know you and Dad were gunnin' for it years ago, but seems like we've finally gotten our heads on straight enough to know that this is where we belong."

Bella nodded, reaching for her father's hand. "Took me ten years to get there. But I finally realized that being with Jacob? That's the way it should be. It's right. So we're trying to figure things out. See if we can make it work."

Charlie nodded, went back to his pumpkin pie with a small smile on his mouth. "About damn time."