Thanks to Fran for beta'ing. Thanks to mykcullen96 and Gabby1017 for pre-reading.

Chapter 17

Her mind was jumbled and racing. This couldn't be what she thought it was, could it? There had to be some oddly complex reasoning for this to be occurring. Some chance in hell that her dialing skills with one hand were incorrect both times, maybe the number Peter provided was just similar to Edwards?

She stood to pace around the kitchen.

She opened the internet browser on her phone, punching in the eight-four-seven area code into the search bar.

… Chicago, Evanston, Illinois area code.

Or maybe there's a lot of people from Illinois.

Or maybe Occam's razor was it.

Since absolutely none of this made sense.

Bella looked back toward the living room where Charlotte and Peter sat on the couch, talking quietly amongst themselves. And she wanted to kick herself. She reacted terribly. She worked in a hospital for crying out loud. She knew better than to fire off questions a million miles a minute, but she was frantic.

Damn, maybe if you let the kid speak Bella, he would have told you…something to go off of.

Was it that simple?

She felt nauseous at her next thought.

Was Edward's nephew—the one he poured his heart out over, literally only hours ago, sitting on her couch?

How? How? How?

It couldn't be.

Staring back at her phone, she opened her Facebook app. She quickly moved to a recent search history and tapped the person in question's name.

His old profile stared back at her, but her eyes weren't on him.

She studied the cover photo—the jawline of the kid, the toothy grin.

She shook her head and scrolled down to where she'd seen his face before.

The "Missing Child" tags littered his timeline. And it took just one photo to make all the air in Bella's lungs disappear as she let out the long breath she'd been holding.

Her phone dropped out of her hand, landing with a thud on the floor. She stood, staring at the offending object.

It couldn't be.

But it was.

Peter Cullen sat in her living room, engaging in a simple conversation with her daughter.

Peter Cullen … the child Edward Cullen held heavy guilt over …

Peter Cullen … the child Edward Cullen was overcome with sorry about… the person who felt responsible for his disappearance.

Peter Cullen, who Edward was losing hope for, was right here.

In. Her. Living. Room.

Bella gripped the table with her good hand, ignoring the phone. She pulled herself back into a chair, willing herself to fight the nausea waves that roared to life in her stomach.

What was she going to do?

She had to tell him …

Should she call the police …

She had to ...

Truth be told, she didn't know what she needed to do.

She wasn't doing herself any good sitting at the table when there was a boy full of mystery sitting in the next room.

Right now, she needed answers.

And she was going to get them.

"Peter…can you tell me your full name?" She asked, softer and less frantic, heading towards the kitchen with an extra plate. That would be the easiest place to start. She needed to make sure Charlotte understood the severity of the situation, but she didn't want to startle Peter. It would be one thing explaining to Edward that she had his missing nephew in her living room, but an entirely different one if she had to tell him he was here, but she scared him off.

"Mommy, you can't call—" Charlotte attempted again to argue, her mouth full of eggs.

"Charlotte, please do not argue with me. I told you we would talk. This is very important." Bella said softly.

"You're going to send him away! You can't send him back!" Charlotte gasped, spitting out her food before wailing.

"It's okay, Charlotte. We have to tell her." The young boy put his hand on her shoulder in an attempt to console her crying.

"Okay, Mommy, but you can't tell his uncle, okay? He might be mad…" Charlotte said softly, nodding as she sniffled. She reached up to brush the back of Peter's head.

Peter stared at the floor, sighing.

Bella dropped to her knees beside the crying girl. She brushed her hair back and wiped away the stray tears.

"I'm not telling him anything until we get a chance to get the entire story from Peter, but Charlotte-" She trailed off, thinking about what the obvious next words would be. She would ask about his parents—parents that, if she hadn't known what Edward told her, should have been worried sick about their child. Were they?

"No, Mom. We can't. They will hurt him. Why can't he just stay here with us?" Charlotte whined.

"Who will hurt him?" Surely, she couldn't be referring to Edward too.

"His parents! That's why he ran away!"

She didn't know that much—Edward didn't go into specific detail. Were his parents physically abusing Peter too? Her heart beat a pang of guilt through her body. If that was the case, her fierce line of questioning might have been worse than she thought.

Bella moved her eyes to Peter. She studied his face, taking in the minor differences from the photo. She focused on his eyes. She'd seen the same shade of green on one other person. And if there weren't any other factual evidence, the eyes would have convinced her on the spot.

"Peter, I am going to need you to tell me everything. Is that all right? I'm not going to…hurt you or call your parents right now…"

"Um…okay." Peter sighed, sitting back against the couch.

"So…Peter…what?" Bella started, looking at him.

"C…Cullen."

Even when she expected it, it made ice run through her veins.

"And…Is Edward your uncle? She tilted her head to show him that she knew. "He's also a friend of ours, and he's been here at the house. If you've been here like Charlotte said, have you seen him, or heard him?" Bella asked.

Peter's eyes grew wide. His breathing halted for a few seconds but gently nodded. He met Bella's eyes as he spoke.

"Please don't tell him…He will be so angry…I don't want him to hate me. I can't have him hating me too…" Tears spilled over the rims of his eyes.

And Bella's heart sank.

"Peter, sweetie…that won't happen. He…he misses you. He really does. He's…confused about everything. He thinks…it's his fault you left home."

"No, he's going to be mad. I had to leave, but when he finds out why I left…"

"And why did you leave?"

"Because Uncle Edward was going to leave me."

"I'm…confused. What do you mean he was going to leave you?" Was there something Edward hadn't told her?

"He was going to leave. For good. I had to go with him."

"Peter…"

Peter shook his head, letting the tears fall.

"Where was he going to go?"

"He was coming here … to Forks. I found a letter at his house. It said a lot of stuff…but I read a lot; I could understand what it was. A letter giving him a job. And jobs aren't like the trips he goes on to help people—those times he always came back."

"Peter…"

"The letter said March…but he never came. I don't know why. But even after he didn't show up, I had to stay away from my parents and the people that come there … I won't go back home."

"Why don't you want to go home?"

"They do things to me to keep me quiet… They make me keep it a secret—I don't want to…" Peter trailed off, the tears no longer flowing. He held up his arm, looking down at the floor.

Bella gasped.

Pale, red, marks lined the inside of his arm. The marks were old and aged, signifying they had been done a while ago. She recognized them as cigarette burns.

"Oh …" She said, lightly reaching out to touch his arm, "Charlotte…you need to go upstairs. Please."

"But Mom—" Charlotte started.

"Charlotte, now. Please. Just go upstairs for a few moments. I need to talk to Peter." Bella said sharply but softly. She willed Charlotte to go with her eyes.

The little girl sighed and headed towards the stairs.

When Bella was sure Charlotte was far enough away, she turned back to Peter.

"Sorry, Peter. I am going to ask you some personal questions, and I didn't think Charlotte needed to be around for them. She can come back down in a few minutes."

"Oh. Okay." He said. He pulled back his arms and put them by his side.

"Do you have any other injuries, Peter? Do you have any that hurt now?"

He shook his head looking down.

"And who gave you those?"

He didn't answer.

"Was it your uncle?"

His head shot up; eyes wide.

"No! Uncle E wouldn't hurt me! He would never hurt me! You know him! He helps people, not hurt them."

"All right, I just had to be sure."

"Uncle E is the only one who cares … It…was my parents, and they let some others ..."

Her blood ran cold.

"Does…your uncle E know?"

Peter shook his head, "No. Nobody does. I was scared…" He trailed off, wrapping his arms around himself. He was shaking.

"We can stop with the questions for right now, but we need to tell your uncle, Peter. We can't keep something like this from him."

He looked up at Bella, with a teary expression, but nodded gently.

This was going to be difficult, but it was for the best.

She knew Peter wasn't going to be up for saying much more. And when he was, it wasn't going to be more than once.

She needed answers.

And so, did Edward.

She let the children watch movies the rest of the day. Slowly but surely, Peter's features turned up at Charlotte's meager attempts to get him to smile. Bella didn't press any further.

Hours later, a knock sounded throughout the house.

"Bella, what is going on? I got your message…"

Edward looked tired, no doubt from the shift he just worked. His eyes were weary; bags underneath them gave him away though he would try to ignore it. He was dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt; his hair was wet from a shower. He must have come right from the hospital.

"Is it your arm or something…?"

"No, it's not my arm. Something happened. Something crazy…but I needed to tell you. This is going to sound absolutely insane. You need to see what I mean before you say anything."

"I'm sorry Bella…you lost me."

"Just please. Don't do anything rash…"

"Jesus, just say it," Edward said, getting annoyed at Bella's antics.

"I only found out a while ago. Today. They were keeping it a secret…I—" She explained.

Edward waited. What was she possibly going to show him? He was confused, and she was frightening him.

"Charlotte…come here. You too…Peter." Bella called.

What. The. Fuck.

Edward's eyes widened at the name. His heart felt as though it stopped. His body was ice. Was this some kind of sick joke? It had to be.

Was Bella fucking insane?

Who in their right mind would throw that back in his face? What in God's name was she thinking?

"Bella, what are you talking about?" He demanded, hearing the footsteps come across the floor. His voice grew louder.

"Is this some kind of sick joke? Your idea of fu—"

He shut his mouth, biting his lip in anger. His breathing was ragged. He saw the corner of Charlotte's head come to the door and didn't want to scare her by yelling.

But it wasn't Charlotte that made him stop in his tracks.

It was the boy with her.

It was Peter.

A/N: I can't believe its almost been a year since I joined fanfic! January 22nd was the first day for publishing my first fic (this) and life has changed so much since then! Its awesome to see this story grow! I just booked my flight to Austin for TFMU 2020! Anyone else going?

In the meantime…

My Christmas short story "Oh Reindeer" was nominated for Top Ten Fics Completed in December on TwiFanFictionRecs! Head over to that website to vote once a day until the 31st of January if you enjoyed it! I'd appreciate it!

I have a FB group called "Mariescullen Fanfiction" where I post teasers, manips, and photos for chapters, and even pictures of my dog. Please feel free to join if you're on that platform.

Happy Reading!