AN: Hi All!

Thanks for your continued readership!

Huge gratitude to the reviewers for Chapter Sixteen: traceybuie, ForrestersWitch, Goldielover, sycoscorpio66691, Kyra, AHealingRenaissance, catgrl, SpawnGirl234, Naenae30, and charverv, you all make my heart flutter with joy!

So there is a time skip in this chapter. Rather than showing each of the visits with the other allied covens, I decided to summarize them briefly.

As such, this chapter brings us to the end of the vanilla stuff!

Chapters 18 and 19 will be where we make all the lemonade, and then Chapter 20 will wrap things up for the time being.

But before we get ahead of ourselves too much, here is Chapter 17!

Chapter 17: Death and Birth

Bella's POV

After we told the Denalis about the new relationship dynamics, Jasper and I, along with Alice and Em were tasked with taking Kate, Garrett, Tanya, and Ricky hunting. It was bound to be a good opportunity to visit with them and find out how they really felt about our news.

As Jasper and I ran through the forest, hand in hand, we found ourselves running beside Kate and Garrett. Not surprising, since I generally tended to be closer to Kate than Tanya. Also, Jasper had become pretty good friends with Garrett over the years since the Volturi conflict. Both being of military background, they had a lot in common.

"Well, I have to say, when it comes to you two at least, this whole thing makes a lot of sense." Kate admitted as we jogged along.

"Yeah? How's that?" I asked, curious as to what specifically she thought made us a good match.

Kate grinned mischievously. "Well for one thing, I've talked to Alice enough over the years to know that Jasper is good at sex. And I've talked to you enough to know that Edward isn't."

"Kate! I never said Edward was bad at sex. Not even once!" I defended.

"I know. You're far too polite to besmirch his good name. It's what you didn't say that gave it away." Kate assured me.

"Good glory. Well… either way, I don't see why that particular issue makes Jasper and I better suited?" I questioned.

"Because, if I could tell that you were sexually unsatisfied with Edward, don't you think he could probably tell too?" She reasoned.

Oh shit!

She was probably right. I mean, it wasn't that I was never satisfied with Edward. Our sex life was...fine. But realistically, I was a much more sexual person than Edward. That much was evident even during our courtship back when we were both still virgins.

I was always the one trying to initiate things, even back then. And after all these years, it was still me initiating at least seventy-five percent of the time. Maybe Kate had a point.

"Okay, can we talk about something else besides whether or not I've been unsatisfied? Geez." I laughed trying not to seem as concerned as I felt.

"Sure thing." Kate nodded. "So how does this whole transition period work? Do you all just go back and forth between your spouses and your mates until you leave the island?"

"Uhh, do you mean sexually? Wait, you're Kate Denali, duh. Of course you mean sexually." I laughed wondering why I was surprised.

Kate smirked. "You better believe I mean sexually. After all, I put the suck in succubus if you know what I mean."

"Remind me why we're friends again." I laughed with an eye roll. "But in all seriousness, we haven't even done that yet. I think once everyone feels ready, the mated couples will just go their separate ways for a weekend and consummate their bonds then, so that everyone is transitioning at once and no one feels left out."

"Ugh, fine. Well, I hope you're at least getting some hanky panky. Even if it is just fingers and tongues for now." She boldly proclaimed. Good ol' Kate.

Thankfully, Jasper didn't embarrass easily. And really, neither did I, after being around Emmett for so many years. He always made it one of his life's goals to embarrass people, so I had a lot of practice and had gotten pretty good at not reacting anymore.

"I mean, we've only known we were mates for a few months so we haven't really gotten too crazy yet. But it hasn't been entirely chaste either." I admitted, casting a discrete glance at Jasper.

I couldn't help my mind from wandering back to a few days prior when I'd had my first Jasper-induced orgasm. I mean, I guess I should specify that I mean the first time he gave me one physically.

Jasper's gift had a habit of sending people careening of the cliffs of bliss unintentionally, without even touching them, any time his own pleasure got out of hand and caused him to project without meaning to. And just like the rest of the family, I had experienced that particular phenomenon many times before.

But as far as having his lips on mine and his hands tangled in my hair and my body pressed up against his in all the right places? Well, so far we'd only gone that far once. And somehow on that particular occasion, we had both succumbed to pleasure without losing a single article of clothing.

I could tell by the intense way he was returning my gaze that his mind had also been drifting back to that amazing night. My grasp on his hand tightened slightly as we continued making our way through the jungle.

"Good." Kate nodded in response to my unspoken conversation with Jasper. "So long as everyone's needs are being fulfilled, that's the main thing."

"Oh trust me. No one in the family has been feelin' neglected in that department." Jazz, as the resident Empath, assured her.

"I bet!" Garrett snickered. "If anything, there's probably an overabundance of that sort of thing. I mean, you've got your mates and your spouses and everyone is probably just super horny. I mean, y'all have been married to these people for several decades so they'll probably wanna get in all the sex they can before they can't anymore. And then also, everybody's probably chomping at the bit to get it in with their mates as well. It must be hard to be an Empath during this time of rampant sexual frenzy. Man, I dunno how you do it."

"Yeah, it's been interestin' on that front. I mean, some of the married couples still have that sexual chemistry, so that vibe is still there. But then of course they feel guilty for it, so it's a constant cycle of all kinds of emotions all the time. But always there is love, no matter who we're talkin' 'bout, so that helps put everythin' else in perspective." Jasper explained.

"Which ones?" Kate asked.

"Which ones what?" Jasper puzzled. "Oh, ya mean which couples still have chemistry? Umm, I dunno if they'd want me to share that information."

"I bet I can guess." Kate grinned. "Emmett and Rose probably still have it. They always had a very physical relationship. And surprisingly, I would say Carlisle and Esme?"

"Dang. You sure you're not an Empath?" Jasper laughed.

I wasn't surprised to learn that Edward and I had lost our chemistry. What we'd once had in that department had been waning for a long time. But I was much more surprised that it seemed like maybe Jazz and Alice were losing that too.

"We'll talk later, Darlin'." Jasper said softly for my ears alone, obviously sensing my confusion.

I nodded and Kate began to explain that Carlisle and Esme had always had a great sex life at which point, I gladly tuned out.

Soon, we found some larger prey to feed from and took a break from conversing to focus on the hunt. It was nice hunting side by side with Jasper. We worked well as a team and it took a fraction of the time to take down a kill working in tandem as it did alone.

And, of course, our desire for one another spiked during the primal activity of hunting, but we were able to settle for a fairly tame makeout session afterward, even though we both longed for much more.

After a while, our group decided to merge with the others and see how things were with Tanya and Ricky.

"So, I'm definitely sold on these two as a couple." Tanya smirked gesturing at Em and Alice. We'd caught up to them on a deserted island that was reasonably close to our own and the Denali sisters were debriefing one another on what they had learned so far.

"Oh yeah?" Kate asked sounding slightly skeptical.

"Yep. They can barely keep their hands off each other. And they were finishing each other's sentences. It was adorable." Tanya elaborated.

"And they even did that thing with their noses that used to be called an Eskimo kiss. What do we call that now? I assume it's not correct anymore." Ricky asked.

"It never really was correct." Tanya, who had been living in Alaska for many decades answered. "For one thing, 'Eskimo' was what the Europeans dubbed all northern indigenous people regardless of their tribe. They prefer to be called Inuit, but there are actually several tribes within that grouping."

"Yes, and those 'kisses' which are actually called kunik are not even romantic in nature. They are a platonic, traditional greeting between family members that involves pressing one's nose and upper lip to the other's forehead, cheek or nose. That whole nose rubbing thing everyone thinks they do is a total misconception." Kate added.

"Oh, okay, thank you. Well these two were doing that nose rubbing thing then, not the kunik thing." Ricky clarified.

"That's just called rubbing noses then, as far as I know." Tanya laughed.

"Yes, but it's still adorable." Alice defended.

"True. It's just not an aboriginal practice per say." Kate agreed.

"Well, now that we're thoroughly educated on that topic, go back to tellin' 'em why we're such a cute couple!" Emmett encouraged excitedly.

"Oh yeah! Okay so, he calls her the Indonesian word for mate. I think he plans on calling her a different local word for mate everywhere they live. It's goofy." Tanya grinned.

"Goofy but adorable." Emmett corrected.

"Yes, Em. Goofy but adorable." Tanya rolled her eyes. "Oh and his Tennessee accent comes out now which it never did before. He didn't expressly say as much but I think Rose made him talk like a northerner."

"Pretty much, yep." Em shrugged.

"Oh, huh, okay. So they feel more comfortable with each other and more able to be themselves? That's great then." Garrett agreed.

"Yeah. So what's the verdict on Bella and Jasper?" Tanya asked. As if any of us needed their seal of approval to be mates.

"Pssh, please. You saw Bella when we were preparing for the Volturi conflict. You can't tell me there is anyone in the world more suited to Jasper than that." Kate grinned. "Eleazar himself said that the only reason the kings went back to Italy without taking her to be the head of their defensive guard was that they clearly feared retribution."

Oh, holy shit! I knew everyone thought I had helped, but I didn't know anyone thought that!

I knew Jasper had felt my anxiety spike because he rested his hand on the small of my back in a comforting gesture. His touch immediately calmed me. I nodded to him and sent him my gratitude.

"Yeah, okay, fair point there." Tanya conceded.

"So...we all cool?" Emmett asked the Denalis, since they seemed to have turned a corner in regards to processing our news.

"Yes. It's odd, but it seems to be ultimately for the best. Even if it is still kind of cringy to think about Edward boning Esme. Or Carslisle boning Rose." Kate laughed.

Emmett frowned. "Kate, why do you insist on making sex sound like something that is done to women? I assure you, any sex that happens in our family happens to the mutual benefit of all parties involved."

Kate shrugged. "I dunno, I personally like having it done to me."

"She really does." Garrett grinned.

"Well for future reference, I find the phrase 'getting boned' and all of its variations offensive." Em stated firmly.

"Since when?" Tanya asked looking puzzled. "In fact, I'm pretty sure I've heard you use that exact phrase before."

"Yes, but I recently watched a documentary about commonly used language that is demeaning to women. It was very enlightening." He explained.

"Oh. Can I borrow it?" Garrett asked. "I read an article recently in one of Kate's cosmo magazines about how male feminists are sexy af."

"Sure thing. It had a lot of good n' useful information. In fact, if yer interested in women's issues, another great resource is National Geographic: Women, a Century of Change. It even has some really cool graphs ranking how different countries in the world rate within the various aspects of gender equality." Emmett added.

"Oooh, yeah, I read that one too, it was great" I chimed in. "Some of the info is outdated because it was from November, 2019, I believe. But I thought it was super cool to know that 61% of Rwanda's parliament at that time were women."

"Really? Rwanda?" Ricky confirmed.

"Yeah. That's what happens when you have a genocide that takes place and something like 80% of the surviving population are women. Women find themselves stepping into leadership roles out of necessity." Alice agreed.

Carlisle owned every back issue of National Geographic, so most of us had read most of them over the years. That was actually how he found out about this island and that they were looking to hire a temporary western doctor. It was in an issue they published a few months before we ended up coming here.

"Wow. I feel so much more woke now." Ricky stated.

"I don't think it's very woke to call yourself woke, Ricky." Kate laughed. "That's kind of like calling yourself humble, it's a contradiction."

"Yes, I know, it was a joke, Kate. I'm fairly certain learning a few facts about the Rwandan genocide and finding out that some people consider it offensive to say 'boning' isn't exactly enough to make me woke." He shrugged.

"Maybe not, Bro, but we all gotta start somewhere." Emmett encouraged.

"We certainly do, Emmybear." Alice smiled. And on that point, we could all agree.

The Denalis visit went pretty decently after the initial shock wore off. And it turned out to be a pretty good indicator of the range of reactions we could expect to receive from our other groups of friends in the vampire world.

The family had amassed quite an odd collection of allies over the years and as the months went by on the island, we found ourselves hosting each of them, one coven at a time, to deliver our news.

The Irish coven was easily accepting due to Maggie's gift of telling truth from lies. The Egyptian coven, consisting of two truly mated pairs understood pretty easily as well.

The Amazon sisters were grateful to us for explaining our situation, because as single females, none of them had experienced the mating phenomenon and it turned out that they were just as clueless about the signs as we were.

Carlisle and Alistair had patched things up a few years after the Volturi altercation due to Carlisle's unrelenting love for his family and friends, and his exceptional conflict resolution skills. But still it was with great hesitancy that the skittish nomad made his way to the island to hear our news.

Alistair was skeptical, of course, as he was about most things. Yet even he couldn't deny the chemistry between the true mate pairings after seeing it with his own eyes. Speaking of which...by the time we had finished informing all of our friends, the chemistry had gotten pretty far off the charts.

In fact, I seriously doubted most of the couples would be able to wait much longer to consummate their mating bonds. The only reason we had all waited as long as we had was because no one was going to want to take any time away from their mate once they had claimed them. So we had all decided to get the visits out of the way first so as not to be interrupted once it was finally time to take that monumental step.

But that wasn't to say any of the mated pairs were lacking in intimacy. Intercourse was about the only thing that hadn't happened yet, which I knew because, well, girls talk.

Another thing that happened, which I won't get into here, was that I had gotten my kinky wish. Jasper and Alice had ended up having a sort of 'last hurrah' and had invited me to participate. Of course, we cleared the whole thing with Emmett, as Alice's mate, but he was fine with it and ended up choosing that night to have his own 'last hurrah' with Rose.

Carlisle and Esme, having been together the longest of all the married couples, had opted not to partake in any fairwell sex, since they felt they already had plenty of wonderful memories and simply wanted to make a clean break of things. And Edward and I had also opted not to, because, well, honestly we just didn't desire each other in that way anymore.

So, with all of those previously romantic relationships put to bed, pun fully intended, we were able to focus more on the future. And, if the vibe around the house was any indicator, the future was very soon going to become the present.

Everyone was sitting around the living room snuggled up with their mates one day, when Alice called a family meeting.

"Okay, so, as you all know, our visitors have all come and gone, so that's all out of the way now. And after chatting with everyone in the family at length, it is evident that everyone has had a chance to obtain adequate closure in regard to the married couples. Which means...unless there are any objections...I think...it's time." She announced.

Immediately, the atmosphere changed in the room. Everyone went from seeming slightly disinterested, as was generally the norm at family meetings, to being totally alert and excited. Poor Jasper must have been hit with quite the emotional cocktail. In fact, he appeared to be straining to maintain composure under the force of everyone's big feelings.

"So, any objections to each of the mated pairs taking a little holiday? I've already seen your answers and made all the arrangements accordingly, but I still need to ask, just to make it official." She explained.

Everyone politely stated that they had no objections and were ready to move forward, just for the record.

"Okay, then here we go." Alice smiled seeming much less enthusiastic than I would have expected as she handed us each a manila envelope. I immediately realized why as I opened mine.

It was a bittersweet moment indeed. The packet contained not only our itinerary for a week long holiday, but also a copy of my divorce papers. Courtesy, I would assume, of Jenks, our documents provider. I knew each of the other packets had similar contents.

I couldn't help the memories that came flooding back to me as I clutched those pages in my hands that said I was no longer Mrs. Edward Cullen.

Our wedding, honeymoon, expecting Renesmee, fighting to keep her, dying and waking up as a vampire for the first time, learning to hunt, our little cottage in the woods. Raising our daughter. It was all tied to Edward. All those memories were all mixed up with my identity of being Edward's Bella.

But now?

I wasn't Edward's Bella anymore. And technically I wasn't really Jasper's Bella yet either. Not officially. For the first time since being a teenage human girl, I was on my own. Sort of. It was an odd feeling.

"I now pronounce you all single and ready to mingle." Alice stated once everyone had looked through their packets.

"Ya don't actually mean 'mingle' though, right?" Emmett asked her, looking slightly worried.

"No Em. I just mean 'mingle'." She assured him, gesturing between herself and him.

"Good." He nodded in an exaggerated fashion, grinning like a kid on Christmas morning.

"Okay, so I know a week doesn't seem like very much time, but we still have a lot to do once we all get back to the island. And Carlisle is still on call for the village, so we can't justify all of us being away for too long." Alice explained addressing the group.

"Besides, these aren't meant to be honeymoons, those will come later. Just think of these trips as being like when a human couple goes away together for the weekend, for the first time. Except we get a whole week."

"Thank you for arranging all of this, Alice." Carlisle smiled softly.

"Yeah, thanks, Ally! When do we leave?" Em asked eagerly.

"In the morning, if everyone can be packed by then." Alice told us.

"I'll go pack right now!" Emmett cheered. I was tempted to tell him not to bother, since I assumed Alice would have already packed for them both, but surprisingly she was actually going to let him pack for himself. I guess being mated to Em was already doing wonders for her compulsive need to control things.

"Well, Darlin', shall we get to packin'?" Jasper asked me, holding his hand out for me to take.

"Yeah. I'm ready." I nodded.

And I could feel the truth of it as I said it. I really was ready, for all of it. For him. I was ready to be with Major Jasper Whitlock. Mind, body, heart, and soul.

AN: Okay, so, if you're not interested in sticking around for the sexy times, you can rejoin us in Chapter 20. For everyone else, I'll try to get Chapter 18 done soon, I know some of you are anxious.

Also, I'm willing to do an outtake for the JxBxA threeway that was briefly alluded to in this chapter. I didn't put it in the main body of the story in case it isn't everyone's cup of tea. I think this is my only story without much poly, so I figured I'd better keep it that way. But yeah, lemme know if anyone wants an outtake!

Blessings,

-BMW