Okay, so I upped the rating on this chapter just incase...Buffy and Edward get a bit out of hand in the beginning and I'm just a little paranoid =]

(Edward)

Buffy and I laid in bed for a few hours, just snuggling. Sometimes we would speak, sometimes not. It was so odd to be able to hear her thoughts now.

I loved every second of it.

When we weren't speaking, I'd just lay next to her and listen. Her pain, physical and emotional, was slowly subsiding. Though, every now and again, she'd think of a memory from…before…with Spike and it'd bring the pain bubbling to the surface once more. She would try to hide it, but occasionally, I'd see a tear or two slip down her soft cheeks. I'd just squeeze her tightly to me and reassure her that it'd be all right. I didn't know what else to do.

I'm not exactly sure if the tears were for the memories or for Spike himself. I could tell that he meant a great deal to her, even if she'd never admit it. I also fathomed that she hadn't really had the time to properly grieve over his loss.

I looked down at Buffy. She'd fallen back asleep a little while ago. I didn't want to wake her, but I had to. I gently moved a piece of her soft blonde hair from her face. She was absolutely beautiful with her natural golden locks. The way her hair naturally framed her face made her look almost angelic at times. In my mind, I often referred to her as my own personal angel, sent to me straight from Heaven itself. Learning that she had actually been there confirmed my secret beliefs.

I lightly kissed the side of her face, down her neck and across her collarbone. Her eyes remained closed, but I knew she was awake now. She was just pretending to be asleep.

"Buffy, darling, I know you're awake." I whispered, playfully in her ear.

"Me? Awake? No, no. You must have the wrong 'Buffy'." she said, her eyes still closed.

I left another trail of kisses across her throat. I looked up and her eyes were partially open, looking at me. When our eyes caught, she quickly snapped hers closed again, mumbling.

"Still not awake, no no, still asleep."

I laughed softly and stood up, next to the bed.

"Bufffffyyyyyyyy…" I taunted.

"Whaaaaatttt?" she whined.

"You've got five seconds to get up and out of bed." I said with mock firmness in my voice.

"Or what? Going to beat me up if I don't?" she giggled.

"One..."

She opened her eyes and sat up. "You're actually counting?"

"Two..."

She laughed.

"Three..."

"I'm very impressed with your counting skills, Mr. Cullen."

"Four..."

"How many college degrees do you have again?"

I used my speed and scooped her up off of the bed and into my arms. She looked at me, momentarily dazed. She clearly did not expect that.

"I thought I had five seconds?"

"Well, I am a vampire. As a whole, we're usually not very trustworthy associates. Did you really expect me to go all the way to five?" I asked, jokingly.

She smiled wide and laughed. Her grip tightened around my neck and she pulled me down into a deep kiss. I held her tighter to me and kissed her back, more passionately. She dropped her legs from my arms and wrapped them tightly around my waist. I pulled her as snug to my body as I could and dropped us down to the bed.

Low in my body, I could feel the fire start to burn. It didn't take long for the it to shoot through my veins. I was struggling between instinct and self-control.

Instinct, so far, was waaaaaaaayyyyyyyy in the lead.

I wasn't exactly worried about hurting her, especially now. I was just raised in a different era where a gentleman was expected to court and respect a lady, until they were wed.

At the moment, I wasn't being very respectful.

Buffy was lying underneath me, legs still firmly wrapped around my waist. I had, unknowingly and unintentionally, ripped part of her tank top across the middle. One of the straps had been torn off completely.

The fire inside me was blazing now, sending my still blood to its boiling point. It would only be a matter of mere minutes-maybe even seconds-until the fire completely engulfed me.

Suddenly, I heard snickering in my head.

Damn it.

I reluctantly-very reluctantly-pulled myself off of Buffy.

She looked up at me.

The fire that I had felt coursing through my veins was very clearly felt by her as well.

I noticed a few more rips in her clothing. Her hair was disheveled.

She was gorgeous.

The contrast between our eyes alone was almost laughable. Hers were bright, like a pool or an ocean. They somehow seemed to be…dancing. With excitement. Mine were jet black, dark and fiery and almost definitely filled with excitement as well.

Her expression dropped and she caught her non-existent breath.

"Edward…I'm sorry." she said meekly, almost like…as if…she was ashamed.

I quickly went to her side. "No! Don't think that! It's not you at all."

"Then what?" she asked.

I tapped my forehead and nodded towards the door. An all-knowing look spread on her face and she started laughing.

"Emmett?" she asked.

I smiled and nodded 'yes'. She got up and walked to the door.

"It's just him. He's alone. I can feel it."

She didn't ask, she stated it. As a fact.

She turned to me and a wicked, mischievous grin drew on her face. It was a grin that I came to know well when Emmett was involved.

Without looking back, Buffy, who was still looking at me, grinning wickedly, launched her fist through the door and grabbed Emmett by the throat. She pulled him through, breaking the rest of the door and frame on the way. She tossed him on the floor.

He grabbed her ankle and pulled her down, tripping her up. He got to his feet and before he had a chance to grab a hold of her, she was already up on her feet, in fighting stance. Emmett waited a second-just a second-before lunging at her. She flipped over the top of him and landed directly behind him.

She lunged at him, driving him into the wall, headfirst. His head drove in, causing a rather large hole in our bedroom. Emmett was momentarily dazed from the concrete dust flying into his eyes, but he regained composure quickly. He spun around and faced Buffy.f

A large grin spread across his face and he motioned with his hands.

"Come on little sister, give it your best shot!"

Buffy raced at him, attempting at throwing him through the wall again, but Emmett grabbed her by the waist and flipped her over his head, out into the hallway.

Or, well, that had been the intention.

She ended up sailing clear over the staircase railing and down into the living room. She landed on the coffee table, smashing it into pieces. Before she could get up, though, Emmett was there, with his teeth at her throat.

(Buffy)

I looked up at Emmett, who's sharp, venomous teeth were just mere inches from my exposed jugular.

I started to laugh uncontrollably.

He moved his head away and I stood up, still laughing.

"What?" he asked, confused.

I looked past him, to Edward, who was standing on the stairs, trying to suppress his own laughter.

"What?" Emmett asked again. "I had you. I won. Fair and square."

I walked over and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Emmett-you're going to 'kill' me by what? Nibbling me to death?"

Edward lost it and started to laugh as loudly as I had been.

Emmett fumbled his way through his answer.

"Well…yeah…that's how most of your vampires kill, isn't it?"

Edward laughed louder. I joined.

"Well, it's not so much a 'nibble' as it is…they stick their fangs into the veins. Minus the fangs part, I'm pretty sure you should know that. It's kind of one of those things that, well, if you're an expert, experienced Slayer…you don't tend to let it happen. To you or anybody around you. Not to mention, if I hadn't of started laughing, I totally would've had you."

He snorted. "Yeeeeahhh right. Uh huh. Sure thing, lil' sis."

"No, really. The position you had me in, well, the position iI/i had iyou/i in, that's a prime time spot for stake-age. Your heart was wiiiiiiiiiide open in the back." I explained in-between shakes of remaining laughter.

Edward came down and patted his brother on the back. "I think you need more field experience, Em."

Alice walked in through the living room and looked around. "I think you three should go pack before Giles gets back and sees that Buffy and Emmett have been sparring in the house again."

She skipped out of the room.

I looked at Edward. "Pack? For what?"

"Italy, remember?" Emmett said.

Crap.

I had completely forgotten.

"Rightfully so. You've kind of had a lot going on." Edward said, reading my thoughts.

"Clearly." Emmett said, snickering suggestively. "You know, you're lucky no one else is here, besides Alice and myself. I mean, I could practically hear you two thrashing around all the way down here." he added.

Edward just rolled his eyes. I, however, took a different route and smacked him across the back of the head.

Edward rolled into laughter again.

Suddenly, they both seemed very alert. Emmett grinned a wicked grin that had rivaled my own earlier and bolted out the door. Edward grabbed me and ran downstairs to the training room.

"Edward, what the-"

He grinned. "It's nothing. Giles is back."

I laughed. "So, what's our story?"

Edward thought a moment. "Hmm….I've no clue what you're talking about, Miss Summers. We've been down here, training."

I giggled and wrapped my arms around him. "You're evil." I said, smiling.

He laughed. "Well, again, I iam/i a vampire. We're pretty much evil beings." he joked.

I mocked shock and fear at the mention of the word. "Vampire? Oh no! What ever will I do?"

"Hmm…well, for starters, you could….kiss me."

I didn't have to lean up, he bent down to me. Our mushy little smooch-a-thon was interrupted by Giles yelling, presumably about the broken mess we had left upstairs.

It was later in the afternoon that I found myself listening to Faith's message. I had just come back inside from dumping the last bag of the remnants that used to be a nice coffee table, a sturdy railing and an adequate bedroom wall.

"Hey B, it's Faith. How do you feel about maybe taking a little road trip to Italy and helping Robin and I kick a little demon ass? We could really possibly use some help. I mean REAL help. Not these little girls I keep finding, Andrew included. Call me back, ASAP."

I played the message over.

And over.

And once more just to make sure I was hearing correctly.

Faith wanted, no ineeded/i help with a mission.

In Italy.

I laughed at the sheer irony of it all.

I remember wished that Edward had been standing next to me so we could laugh at our dumb luck together.

Alice and Edward were the last two Cullen's to go out hunting before we had to leave tonight. They booked it out the door soon after the morning fiasco, leaving Emmett and I in Giles' wrath.

To be fair, we did kinda…wreck the place.

After much examining, Giles and Esme decided that a patch job would work on Edward and mine's bedroom, but the whole staircase railing would have to be replaced, as would, clearly, the coffee table and a few floorboards I had knocked loose when I smashed the coffee table with my back.

Esme made sure that Emmett knew that he would be replacing everything, at his own cost. After Giles caught me sticking my tongue out at Emmett, he made sure that I knew that I would be the one doing all the work. By the end of that sentence, I already had it planned to pay Xander to do it when Giles wasn't around.

The rest of the Cullen's were running around getting their affairs in order for our impending trans-Atlantic trip. Carlisle had the pleasure of trying to get our late-afternoon flight changed to a late night flight as the day, for once, had turned out to be a sunny one.

Go figure, right?

I think seven glittery vamps in an airport would probably stand out a bit.

Alice and Edward returned later that evening, eyes purely an extra light honey-colored. I filled everyone in on Faith's call. We decided it best to call her, tell her that I'd be there, but that's it. Carlisle and Edward seemed to think it best that we not mention the Volturi.

I agreed.

At this point, the less she knew, the better. Being the good and faithful Watcher that he is, er, was, Giles called Faith and said that I'd be arriving in Italy late tomorrow.

Before we left, Giles pulled me aside. "Buffy, I did some side research on the Volturi. They are very old and very powerful. Very powerful. Carlisle mentioned that they are not known for being…merciful. He did say that those who were more…reserved, polite and straight forward, fared better than the ones who were not. So, for our sakes, please, Buffy, please don't insult or offend or anger them in anyway. Be as polite and courteous as you can. For once in your life, Buffy, please just do as you are told."

He looked scared, so I agreed. After a few heart felt goodbyes to my family, the Cullen's and I were off to Italy.

I awoke several hours later and briefly forgot where I was. I blinked my eyes into focus and quickly remembered the airplane we were on. This was the second flight. The first had taken us from Seattle to New York, this one was taking us from New York to Paris. From Paris, we drove. I was exhausted just thinking about it. Which also made me wonder…if I was truly immortal now…why the heck was I sleeping so much?

"It's just your body adjusting to the change." Edward whispered in my ear.

I almost jumped at the sound of his voice. He raised an eyebrow and smirked at me.

"Did I scare you?" he teased.

"No, you just caught me off guard." I semi-fibbed.

"I apologize for startling you, love." he said with a cocky grin.

I rolled my eyes. "You were saying?"

He leaned over to whisper to me. Not that he really needed to. At close to ten grand per person…there weren't very many first class passengers, besides ourselves.

"It's your body adjusting to the change. You sleep a lot because your brain doesn't know what else to do. And since you're not…'alcoholics' like us…there's no…thirst to quench. Nothing to overpower your brain with imperative need. Your brain function can't shut down because of the…magic, so it does one of the only things it can do-sleep." he said rapidly.

"How do you know all that?" I asked, semi-astonished.

He just smirked. "All of those college degrees."

I smiled and rolled my eyes at his joke. He pulled me as close to him as we could get, being on an airplane. I, stupidly, hadn't brought anything on the plane to occupy myself with, so I just did what my brain did best-slept.

When I awoke, we were just arriving in Paris. We were renting a series of cars to drive into Italy with.

Edward and I walked up to the car rental place in the airport. I listened while Edward spoke beautiful French, quite fluently, to the nice woman behind the desk. The too nice woman behind the desk. The far-too-flirty-far-too-nice woman behind the desk. Hey, I may not speak French, but I know when a girl is hitting on my fiancé. I casually (Ha.) entwined my left hand with Edward's on the top of the desk. The light from the desk lamp caught a sparkle off of the gorgeous diamond that was placed securely on my ring finger. It shone fairly bright. The far-too-flirty-far-too-nice woman apparently took the hint. From then on, she was strictly business, from what I could tell. Edward looked like he wanted to laugh, but he managed to successfully suppress it and make it through the rest of the process.

Once we were in our rental, a jet black Lamborghini, he just cocked a smile at me.

"Smooth."

I glanced over at him. "What?" I asked innocently.

He laughed. "Well, I think that next time, it might just drive the point a little better if you just reach over and kiss me." he teased.

"Oh, don't think that didn't cross my mind."

A bit later, we had reached destination number one-Rome. We got all checked in to our hotel, Edward once again speaking the Italian language fluently. Our room, well, miniature apartment is more like it, was huge. I only had just enough time to drop my luggage i(literally)/i, take a shower and change my clothes. Sooner than I would have liked, we were back in the cars, speeding towards Volterra.

A few hours and a couple hundred MPH later, we arrived at our stop.

My non-existent stomach knotted.

We got out of the cars at the city gates and stepped into what apparently was a time warp.

No cars were allowed inside the city and now I saw why. Besides the fact that it was clearly ancient, there were gorgeous old-fashioned brick buildings, food markets, quaint little cottages and cobblestone walks everywhere.

We walked a little ways into the town and turned down an alley way. My new and improved super Slayer senses started to kick into high drive.

I kind of wished I had brought my scythe.

Not for killing purposes, mind you. Mostly just for comfort reasons.

Edward apparently read into my non-comfort issues. He grabbed me by the waist and pulled me in as close as he could while we walked.

At the very end of the alley stood a pale young girl who appeared no older than Dawn. She wore an all black-ensemble-black dress, black tights, black shoes and everything was covered with a black cloak with a hood that rested gently on her shoulders. Her blonde hair was tightly pulled back into a neat bun. Her red eyes were bright and intense.

This must be Jane.

Edward slightly nodded in my direction, answering my unspoken question.

So, this was my match, eh?

Psht.

She didn't look so tough.

The corner of Edward's mouth twitched into a slight smirk at my thought, but he erased it quickly as we got closer to Jane.

Carlisle extended his hand to her. "It's quite a pleasure to see you again, Jane."

She ignored his outstretched hand. "Come. Follow."

She turned and walked down a large set of stairs directly behind her.

We walked through doors, down more stairs and endless corridors. There was even an office with a small waiting room. Finally, we ended up at a large set of doors. Jane stopped and stepped aside.

"They are expecting you." she said curtly.

She pushed the wide doors open. My stomach knotted again.

Here we go…