It is that time again. Chapter 14 (SEE AUTHOR'S NOTE BELOW PLEASE). I hope you enjoy!

Now that I am going through the story before I post chapters, I am getting more and more excited for you all to read it. I actually have a few chapters ready and waiting, so please review kindly.

I DO NOT OWN TWILIGHT OR ANY OF THE CHARACTERS, THEY BELONG TO S.M.

I DO HOWEVER OWN THE STORY IDEA.

Chapter 14 – Research Project

CPOV

After we came back from hunting last night Esme and I sat down and discussed when would be the best time to invite Bella over. She wanted to do it right away, but I told her that it would be better to wait and let Bella get adjusted to school and let her get settled into a routine at home before we start intruding into her life more than already have. Finally she relented and told me that I was right… She knew the kids would be bombarding her life and we knew that, in its self, was going to be over whelming. We had to be patient and wait.

While we waited for the kids to come home, Esme and I were talking about how well Aro adjusted to life living with a human daughter, while we talked Esme's phone started to ring. She picked it up and looked at the number; it was not one that we knew, so she answered tentatively, "Hello?"

"Esme, this is Bella Swan, you remodelled my house for me?!"

"Yes I remember you, what can I do for you?"

"I was just wondering if I could speak with Carlisle, please." I saw Esme cover the phone with her hand and she pushed it towards me.

"It's Bella she wants to talk to you"

As I took the phone from her I thought to myself I wonder if she knows of the promise I made to Aro, I wondered if she knew that I knew what she could do. Seeing as I couldn't put it off any longer I put the phone to my ear… "Hello, Bella."

"Hello Carlisle, I was wondering if you would be willing to come over and sit and have coffee with me so that we can talk." Coffee?! It must be serious then if she is using the pretence of a 'coffee' date.

"Bella, I would like that very much, I can be there in five minutes is that ok with you?"

"Sure that is fine, thank you."

"My pleasure dear, see you shortly." With that I hung up the phone and gave it back to Esme.

Esme looked at me dejectedly; she was hoping that it would be her that Bella invited over instead of me. "She invited me for coffee Esme. I know we don't keep secrets from each other and there are something's you need to know about Bella but they are not my secrets to tell. She will let us in when she is ready, if she is ever ready; so have faith sweetheart, she will let you in. The kids will be home soon, but you need to trust me when I say, I think Bella is reaching out to me for some help. I will fill you in on some of the details when I get home ok." Without waiting I went to Bella's.

When I got there she offered me a cup of fresh pig's blood, how sweet. We talked about Aro, what she can do, what my kids can do, and most of all she asked me to keep her secret, that will be hard to do but I did promise her that I would. I did however forewarn her that Alice may already know but I did promise her to speak with Alice and I will.

On my way home I started to concentrate on the best way to block my mind from Edward. Alice had probably already figured out what was going on the moment I made the decision to keep Bella's secret. My worry was if she would know exactly what it was that I was keeping secret. As I pulled up to the house I started to sing Lady in Red by Chris De Burg. Esme was waiting for me when I walked into the house, she was about to bombard me with all kinds of questions, I raised my hand to her to hold her off.

"Esme give me 10 minute please I need to talk to Alice and then we will speak after." I didn't give her a chance to answer me as Alice was already in my study waiting for me and for a few minutes we "spoke" about Bella.

10 minutes later I came out and walked into the garden to where Esme was. "Esme, there are some things I have promised Bella that I would not discuss, and what I can tell you is that she had a great life in Montreal and that she said that she is in need of my assistance later on basically due to what I know already. Please don't ask me to betray her trust when I just got it. However I will fill you in on what she told me about her life in Montreal."

With that we sat and talked, Esme laughed when I told her about the fresh pigs' blood she got for me. We talked into the early hours of the morning, she tried to ask questions pertaining to the subject I need to keep secret which I easily diverted all the while I kept singing random songs to block out Edward.

ALICE POV

After Carlisle got home from Bella's I knew he wanted to talk to me so I waited for him in his study. I had been keeping tabs on my family as always when I got the vision of him and Bella sitting in what I guess was her kitchen. When Carlisle told me that Bella and I shared something more in common… I started keeping tabs on Bella too. That is when I knew everything. She decided that she needed to trust someone with her secrets. So needless to say I was shocked that she trusted Carlisle over Esme, but that might be because Aro confided in Carlisle and she had probably figured that out too.

Since this started I have been constantly reciting the Chinese alphabet backwards, singing various songs in other languages and god knows what else to keep my mind blocked. I was doing all this so that I could keep these secrets from Edward. I knew Bella was keen on keeping her secret and when Carlisle told her I may already know as well I knew I had to keep her secret too. She is a very unique girl; she has gifts that I have never heard of, I wonder if I should talk to her… let her know that I know. I will have to ask Carlisle if it is a good idea or not.

Carlisle opened the door, "Alice we need to talk."

"I figured as much. Carlisle, I know what you are going to tell me and I am blocking it all right now. It is safe with me until it needs to come out."

"Alice, what exactly do you know?"

"I know everything." But on paper I wrote, "I also understand what you meant by; we share something in common." I said, "Should I talk…"

Carlisle shook his head, "In our own way we are each going to be needed. You should try to gift away some of what you have to help if you know what I mean, but I must implore you to be very diplomatic about how you approach this."

"Carlisle I understand... I will approach with extreme caution. You have my word."

It was an unspoken request that we mention no names or any kind of reference as to what we talked about. We had to chose our words and keep them general, and at the same time we each had to block our thoughts from Edward. Normally our family didn't keep secrets from each other, but this was not ours to tell.

EPOV

Since Carlisle came home from Bella's house he and my sister have been blocking me from hearing their thoughts. I was 100% sure that they were talking about Bella, I mean come-on, Carlisle gets back from her place and him and Alice are having a cryptic conversation. It doesn't take a fucking rocket scientist to figure out who they were talking about. We all heard their conversation coming from the study. Esme was upset that Alice knew the same thing Carlisle did, hell all of us were pissed that we didn't know. Even though she was upset, Esme assured us there must be a reason. After Carlisle came out of his study, he and Esme went out into the garden to talk.

A few hours later she came in from the garden and assured us that in time we would know what was going on. It was still a fucking piss off to be kept out of the loop. It was bad enough I couldn't hear Bella's thoughts I was hoping to get an idea of them via Carlisle. I heard what everyone else heard when he spoke to Esme about her life, but when it came to what I really wanted to know… like what the fuck she was hiding… he doubled his blocking efforts.

The rest of the week droned on and my siblings were getting to know Bella slowly, they wanted to be her friend and spend as much time with her as possible. Even thought they didn't voice it, they thought she was being quite a bitch by not sitting with us and seeming like she didn't want to be our friend. And today while sitting in the car on our way home it was no different. Only this time they started venting openly.

Finally Emmett got fed up with all of the bitching he was hearing from Rose at night and Alice and Jasper when they were alone in their room. And to say the least so was I, I am fucking sick of it. Since I was hearing it in their minds every day for a whole week, but what shocked me was Emmett himself. Emmett decided to be the voice of reason for once, go figure

"Good fucking lord…shut the fuck up. Even though she grew up with vampires did you ever stop to think that maybe she is reluctant about getting to know us? Did you stop to think that maybe she thinks Aro set this up with Carlisle or maybe... just maybe she wanted to get to know all of you on her terms?" He said with a frustrated growl. Then he looked at us all, taking in our faces one at a time.

"Guys, Bella and I talk in gym all the time, she confided in me today as to why she has been reluctant to get close to us. Rose you are bombarding her with all that you remember when she was a child, get to know the woman she's become, she could surprise you. And by the way... stop treating her like a child that she clearly isn't. Alice, are you so desperate to have a friend outside the vampire race that you are forcing yourself on her; leave her get to know the real you and not the fashionista that can be. She is terrified that you will play Bella Barbie with her all the time. She loves fashion but could care less who the designers are. So chill, ok! Jasper you need to change, I know... I know, it is hard for you to even be near a human and all but try to be a bit more polite to her. You come across as very stand-offish to her she actually said and I quote: what fucking broom stick got shoved up his ass? And you" He rounded on me, "Edward... dude, chill the fuck out. She thinks you hate her guts even though she knows that it has more to do with her blood than anything else. But dude seriously stop fucking ignoring her."

Needless to say when Emmett got like that, we listened. We were shocked to say the least that they had bonded so easily.

"Emmett, how did you get Bella to open up to you like that?"

"Jasper, I just listened. I didn't force anything between us. Listen Jasper you and I didn't officially meet her 12 years ago, so I don't know if that helped me out or not but in gym I let her come to me and not go to her. I didn't force things on her, and man for a human she is incredibly strong, tougher than you think. Did you all know she is a green belt kick boxer? I'm going to help her get her black belt. She can hold her own yah know. She is like a little sister to me now and I swear to fucking god if anyone hurts her…" He left it trail off there looking straight at me.

"Emmett, you know the only reason I am ignoring her IS because she is my singer. If I ignore her then the problem will go away, the internal beast, not her, will go away. If I ignore her then she can't be hurt by me." The thought of Bella hurt, cut me deep down to the core, but I can't understand why.

Thinking back on the time that Bella has been here trying to figure out why it would hurt me so much if she got hurt but I couldn't quite grasp the why of it. Earlier today when I saw Bella in Biology I could tell that she had not been sleeping as much as I'd like her to. Why would I care if she slept or not but I did care, more than I should. That is when I realized it, and boy I was shocked with myself too. There was genuine concern for her; I cared for her, really cared for Bella Swan. I tried to push it away; I have to stay away from her for her own safety. I found myself not being able to stay away from her, I wanted to leave and never come back but I wanted to unravel the mystery that is Bella and what secrets she holds.

I wanted to understand Alice's comment the other night about understanding that they have something in common. I wanted to understand what she meant when she said that she will send my ass flying across the room. I wanted to understand this feeling she is bring out in me. I wanted to understand why I couldn't bring myself to stay away from her, why I had to stop ignoring her. To start loving her, WOAH! where the hell did that come from, is that the unknown feeling I am having… love… no that is not possible.

I needed to get away and think. I sent Alice a quick text to tell her I was going hunting by myself… but she knew anyways. She told me to leave now and she would take my car home. So after Biology I left.

CPOV

The rest of the week passed rather quickly, and today was Friday. Alice got home and told Esme and I that Edward took off to go hunting for a couple of days, but she said that he was really going so that he could clear his head. Alice and I felt relief as we knew for at least 48 hours we didn't have to work at keeping our thoughts blocked. I told Alice, the moment he decides to come home to let me know one way or another, so that we could be prepared for when he gets into hearing range. Later that evening, I got a call from Bella asking if we could meet the following day at 10 am which I quickly agreed to.

Promptly at 10 am I was knocking on Bella's front door, "It's open." I heard her call out. I opened the door and let myself in.

"Bella?" I called.

"Up in the study Carlisle." So I made my way up and I saw Bella elbows deep in piles of old books, binders and papers. She motioned for me to come and sit on the settee in front of the window.

"Carlisle I know earlier in the week I mentioned that I was going to further need your help." I nodded. "Let me explain from the start. I had strange dreams through the course of the week, about a young woman named Prue, short for Prudence. Anyhow, she explained to me that she was a distant family relative and I do mean distant. She said my bloodline ties to hers. That we were both descendants of Warren witches. Her bloodline, headed by Melinda Warren, has always had an active witch each generation. My bloodline, headed by Elyzabeth Warren, has not. At least until I came along that is. She said I was a witch. That bit of information I found out in the first dream, and that is when I decided I needed to start my research and that is how you came into play."

"I don't understand Bella, what do you need me for?" Wow a witch; don't get me wrong I knew that they existed but not an active witch. I knew there were witches that just brewed potions or used spells.

"You have vampire speed and sight; I need your help going through all these papers, books and binders to see if my parents knew any of this. To see if there is by chance anything that would help me learn my history. Umm... Carlisle? Why aren't you surprised that I said the word witch or that I was one?"

"Well Bella to be honest I knew you were something based on what I was told and being a witch makes sense. I also knew that witches existed but I didn't know that witches could have active powers, I just knew of those who brewed potions or used spells. Now in regards to this research, do we have anything else to go by? Something that might help me while I read through these papers. Just so I know when to stop and hand you something."

"Well Carlisle that brings me to dream number two. I was getting answers in this one; Prue had told me that there never was an active witch to have more than one power at a time… or at least in her bloodline. She said I have telekinetic abilities, premonitions and I can freeze time. But she gave a name to the other one as well. As you probably know I am able to move myself from one point to another… telekinetically move myself that is… but she called it orbing. The last thing I remembered from that dream is that she was going to tell me who I needed to talk to but in my stupid dream state I cut her off and then woke up. But all week I have been afraid to sleep as I was scared of what answers she might give me. When I did finally succumb to sleep last night I was so exhausted I didn't even dream. Will you help me Carlisle… please? There are so many books, binders and papers in this room I can't do it alone and it would take me forever before I could even start with the internet research I wanted to do."

"Bella… breathe honey, I will go through all this and you go sit in front of your laptop and start your research. I am here for as long as you need me to be, Ok?" she just nodded and went to sit in front of the laptop and I started with the books.

After about 3 hours I had gone through all of the books, they looked like personal journals of sorts that spanned a few generations, but not one had any information about Warren's, orbing or any of the other abilities she had. "Bella, I'm done with the books but they came up empty. How is the search going on the internet?"

"I found various sites pertaining to Warren as a last name but nothing jumped out at me. There was some of a Melinda Warren but when I read further it mentioned nothing about a sister. I closed them, Melinda as a first name and Warren as a last must have been popular." She turned her head back to the screen and I turned back to the binders of papers.

After another hour or so I had gone through the binders, but they all had the same thing, tax papers, bills from various companies and a lot of receipts from years and years ago. It looks like the Swan family liked to collect and keep stuff from generation to generation. Some of these receipts date back 100 years. I looked over and noticed Bella deep into what she was reading I decided not to bother her. Once the last binder was done with… I turned to the mound of papers in different folders. I took the top 3 and decided to start there.

The first one was Bella's; it had her birth certificate, a copy of her medical records and various other important papers. The next one was her fathers, Charlie Swan, written across the raised tab of the folder. I opened it and saw the same things. Except this time there was also a death certificate in the folder. Nothing to out of the ordinary I guess. I opened the third one with Renee Swan (nee Willams) on the tab. The first thing on top was her death certificate, underneath was her birth certificate and I was going to flip it over to look at the next paper underneath but something on her birth certificate caught my vampire eye. The year of birth was altered, why was the year of birth changed?

Then it hit me, Renee was not born in the year that was currently 'typed' in its place. Upon further inspection I could see that Renee was born 60 years earlier. The current year says 1972 but under it I could see faint… faint outlines of a 1 where the 7 is. What the hell was Renee, I knew she was not a vampire, we don't die and Renee clearly died in the auto accident. Oh my god should I tell Bella? Would this be the piece of information she was looking for? How would she be able to process this knowledge if she had nothing to back it up with? No, for now I would keep this bit of information to myself. Yes, I should tell her, even if it means nothing on its own it might help with future results. Bella knew none of the internal debate as it only took a split second for me to process it all.

So while she was researching on her laptop I finished going through the folders, unfortunately they don't go past Charlie's mother, Bella's grandmother. But there is still none of the information that she has mentioned in any of these folders.

"Bella, how is your search going?"

"Carlisle it sucks, I can't find anything that has anything to do with the family name nor the corresponding first names. I can understand that they didn't keep great records or anything but you would at least think it would yield something. What did you find?"

"Well…" still a bit of a minor debate going on in my head. "My search yielded something strange. I almost didn't catch it at first. Look at your mother's birth certificate, what do you see for the year of birth?"

"She was born in 1972."

"To your eye, yes; but to mine I see the type over. It actually said 1912 at one time."

"What does this mean… my mother can't be that old. She was barely 25 when she died. What the fuck kind of family did I come from? Oh man if I ever needed answers it's now more than ever."

"I know honey but we will figure this out, I promise. You know you have an entire family that wants to help right?"

"I know… thanks anyway Carlisle. I have kept you too long from your family, and I should eat. We worked most of the day away."

"Bella, Esme keeps bugging me to invite you over and she would probably kill me, figuratively speaking, if I came back with no answer at all. Would you join us for diner tomorrow night?"

"Carlisle, for the sake of your life, will you tell Esme I would love to. I think it is time I sit down with your family and told them what is going on. I have a feeling I'm going to need all the help I can get."

She walked me to the front door and hugged me good-bye. I ran home to give Esme the good news.

Author's Comments: CHAPTER 15 IS ALSO BEING POSTED TODAY. I DID PROMISE YOU A DOUBLE POSTING... SO THAT IS WHAT YOU ARE GETTING. HOPE YOU ENJOY!

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