Disclaimer: Twilight belongs to Stephanie Meyer. I'm just playing with her characters.

A/N: The first couple chapters of this story are in third person but for the most part it will be in first person JPOV or BPOV. Thank you to Imma Vampire and remylebeauishot, the betas from Project Team Beta, my awesome beta Laurie Whitlock, my pre-readers AlwaysJASPERsLOVE and Shadman, and my beloved sister Shelljayz who also happens to pre-read for me. :)

Thank you so much to everyone who favorited or put this story on their alerts! You are all awesome! :)

oOo

Late July 2080

Carlisle and Esme exchanged a surprised look. They'd been so caught up in each other, they hadn't noticed there was a human in their house. They just couldn't figure out how a human had gotten into their home. They kept their doors locked, more because of Esme's priceless antiques than anything else, but had no need of spare keys because vampires didn't forget their keys. They didn't forget things at all.

Esme and Carlisle moved toward the kitchen, the origin of the noise according to their vampire hearing, at human speed, picking up their pace when the squeaking did. They'd figured out that the noise was the rubber soles of shoes sliding against the wood floor. Whoever was in their kitchen had obviously heard them come through the front door and was now trying to make an escape.

Carlisle skidded around the corner that led into their open kitchen in a move Emmett would have been proud of, Esme just a beat behind him as she had taken a moment to slip off the heels she'd been wearing. A figure dressed all in black was moving carefully but quickly through the dining room, heading in the direction of the patio door. The person's back was to them, so they couldn't make out much about him or her but they were determined to change that.

It wasn't that they were angry with whoever this person was. Really, they were more curious about the whole thing. Well, Esme was at least. Of course, this person didn't know they'd broken into the home of vampires. Maybe she should have felt angry or violated, but she didn't. In fact, she found it kind of funny, even if it really wasn't. Carlisle, ever the compassionate vampire, didn't find it funny. He wanted to know why this person had broken into his home so he could figure out if there was some way he could help them, but he couldn't do that if he didn't stop them from leaving. He rushed to the light switch in the dining room and flipped it on.

"Stop!" Carlisle said authoritatively, his tone still not unkind.

The person froze both at the light and the sound of Carlisle's voice.

Now that Carlisle and Esme were relatively certain their intruder wasn't going anywhere in the near future, they studied the person. From behind, with the hood pulled over their head, all that was clear was that he or she was slender, their clothing was ripped from God knows what and had holes from too much wear, and they were soaking wet. The person wasn't close enough to anything with a glass surface to show a reflection that would provide any more detail, so Esme made a decision, one she knew Carlisle would have agreed with.

"Turn around," she requested. Her voice was soft, but the room was so quiet there was no way the intruder couldn't have heard her.

While the person had frozen at the sound of Carlisle's voice, they'd still been relatively loose-limbed. At the sound of Esme's, their whole body tensed as if ready to run or fight.

"Turn around," Carlisle added, sounding serious even though he wasn't, "or we'll call the police."

The intruder let out a heavy breath, their shoulders slumping, and turned around slowly.

It turned out their burglar was a girl, a young girl that couldn't have been more than sixteen or seventeen. Esme sucked in a breath. The girl looked to be about 5'7" with dark hair that was most likely brown, but with how wet it was, it was hard to tell for sure. Her eyes were a deep, soulful chocolate brown with livid purple circles beneath them that suggested she hadn't slept in days. Her cheekbones were sharp, the skin a flawless peaches and cream that was pulled too tightly over them. Esme was willing to bet she hadn't had a decent meal in a very long time, and judging from the tattered state of her clothing, which were not only sopping wet but muddy, she hadn't had a proper shower for quite a while either. Despite all that, the girl was beautiful. Exquisitely so.

"Well," the girl said, "this is awkward."

Of all the responses they might have expected, that was not on the list Carlisle or Esme had come up with. Needless to say, it elicited a surprised chuckle from both of them.

"I'm guessing this is your house," she continued, her tone blasé.

Carlisle crossed his arms over his chest and gave her an amused look. "I'm Carlisle Cullen. This is my wife Esme," he said, gesturing toward his wife, "and you're correct; this is our house. May I ask what you're doing in it?"

"It was wet. I was cold. I figured your house would be the antithesis of both," the girl answered with a shrug, and she was indeed shivering. "I was right on one count, at least, but damn, it is freakin' freezing in here!"

They both studied the girl for a moment, then Carlisle's eyes met Esme's, and they came to a silent agreement. After so long together words were not needed for them to communicate with each other. That glance said all that needed to be said. They wanted to help this girl, even if it could only be for a short time.

"What's your name?" Carlisle asked. Esme remained by his side waiting for the girl to respond. She didn't, and from the way her jaw was set, she wouldn't be telling them who she was any time in the near future.

Esme made the decision to turn on the heater, leaving to do so without a word and returning to the dining room as quickly as she could without giving her true nature away. She wanted desperately to offer this girl a hot shower or a towel at the very least instead of just letting her stand there, dripping and shaking in the middle of the room, but her instinct told her that the girl was too proud to accept that kind of help from her and Carlisle just yet.

While Carlisle and Esme had been studying her, she had also been studying them. She met their gazes steadily, thoughtfully - Carlisle's first, Esme's next — holding them for a long while. Then she dropped her eyes briefly, bit the inside of her lip, let out a breath, and looked back up at them.

"Look, I'm sorry," the girl said, the sincerity both in her voice and eyes making it hard for them not to believe her. She gave them a rueful smile and a half-hearted shrug. "Believe me or don't, but I didn't mean any harm. I honestly thought this hulking monstrosity," she said and then backtracked, casting a brief glance at Esme, "this very elegant, tastefully decorated, hulking monstrosity, was someone's summer home. I mean, the place doesn't look like it's been lived in for weeks, so I thought that whoever was insane enough to summer here had already vacated the place for somewhere with a less hostile climate, and was, you know, actually warm during the summer," she continued.

"All I was going to do was get dry, crash on the floor, and take off tomorrow. I wasn't going to steal anything except for the odd canned good or two, but I would have found some way to pay you back for them and the towels I was bound to ruin. Aside from some puddles, I really haven't damaged anything but your pride," the girl finished. She didn't look ashamed of what she'd done, but she didn't look proud either.

She waited for a beat before saying, "I'll just be going now," and starting to turn back toward the patio door.

Esme took two steps forward, keeping the same distance between her and the girl as there had been before, mindful not to crowd her.

"Oh no you will not, young lady," Esme said, using the voice she reserved for Emmett when he'd destroyed some piece of furniture or another. It was the "mom voice" that made most children cower in a corner. Her eyes were blazing. "You will do no such thing."

The girl spun around to face Esme, taking just one step toward her, eyes narrowed dangerously.

"You are not my mother," she ground out.

Immediately, Esme's eyes softened, and she took a step back as a show of good faith. She wasn't a confrontational woman, and confrontation was certainly the last thing this girl needed at the moment. Esme longed to reach out to touch the girl's cheek, to show her some sort of comfort, but she knew the girl would not respond well to that.

"You're right. I'm not," she said gently. "I should have been more careful not to insinuate otherwise."

"That's true," the girl said coldly and then repeated, "I'll be going now."

Esme put her hands on her hips. "I apologized, and I meant it, but that doesn't mean I wasn't serious about you not leaving. Since you went to all the trouble of breaking into our home to get out of the wet and cold, it hardly makes sense for you to go right back out into it. You're staying the night with us," she said firmly.

The girl's lips tightened into a thin line, and she crossed her arms over her chest in defiance. Her voice was a stubborn growl when she said, "No, I'm not."

Carlisle just stood by watching the verbal ping-pong match going on between his wife and the teenage girl, waiting to see if Esme would need his help to manage the situation. He may have been the patriarch of the family, but she was very capable of handling situations like this, and he would only intervene if it was absolutely necessary.

"You're staying with us or we're calling the police and you'll be spending the night in juvenile detention," Esme promised, hating the words coming out of her mouth. The last thing she wanted was for this girl to be locked up when all she'd been looking for was a place to stay warm and dry.

Carlisle knew his mate meant it. They wouldn't press charges, but if calling the police kept this girl out of the weather for the night, they would do it. Since Esme had been the one to threaten it, thus taking on the role of bad cop, it was now his duty to play good cop and convince the girl to stay with them instead.

The girl scowled darkly. "Are you going to threaten me with the cops every time I don't do what you want?"

Carlisle stepped forward, the picture of calm, and gave the girl a reasonable look. "This isn't about what we want you to do. My wife and I are the adults in this situation which means, consequently, that since you are a minor—"

"Who says I'm a minor?" the girl interrupted indignantly. Carlisle gave her a pointed look. It had the desired effect because her mouth shut with an audible snap.

"Since you are a minor, we are responsible for doing what's in your best interest. Right now, with the storm, what's in your best interest is keeping a roof over your head. That's something that can be provided either by us or by the Forks Police Department. It's your choice."

To her credit, the girl didn't huff or stomp her foot, two things that were very common amongst girls her age, two things that were very common amongst his own daughters who were decades upon decades older. Her eyes, however, did flash, and her fingers flexed where they gripped her arms, still folded across her chest, until they turned white.

Carlisle gave her several seconds before he asked, "Well?"

The girl just glared. He got the impression she was hoping he would scream at her or just react in any way at all, but he didn't. He just stood there looking at her, his expression patient.

"Ignoring my request for an answer is hardly mature, don't you think?" he asked, his voice still amiable. From the eye roll he got in response, he imagined the girl found his continually even tone annoying.

The girl gave a noncommittal shrug. "Maturity isn't a character trait that's required until I turn eighteen," she said, no longer bothering to pretend she was of age.

"How about you follow me, dear," Esme cut in with a smile, beckoning the girl with a graceful twist of her wrist. She turned on her heel and headed in the direction of the kitchen, but the girl didn't follow her. After a few feet, Esme stopped and pivoted back around, planting her hands on her hips once more and cocking a brow at their guest. "It's obvious you're struggling with the decision you have to make, and I can't stand to leave you there dripping wet and freezing in the middle of my dining room for one more second. You're likely to catch pneumonia, if you haven't already. You can contemplate what you'd like to do while you're soaking in a hot bath, after which you'll change into something dry and appropriate for Forks weather."

The girl's scowl softened into a confused frown, but when Esme began moving through the kitchen and up the stairs toward the guest bathroom, she followed.