24

Bella laid frozen as Peter stood, turning his back on her. She could see the wound on the left side of his back where Elizabeth had stabbed him, but it was shallow and superficial. Elizabeth's eyes widened as she scooted backward and Bella saw her hands shaking, the bloodied plastic shank trembling in her hands.

"Oh, you fucking little bitch. You're going to pay for that," Peter snarled, grabbing her by the throat and throwing her across the room.

The shank flew from her hand to the far corner of the room, and when Bella scrambled to get to it, Peter grabbed her by the hair, pulling her backward. She threw her fist at his face, but he stopped it, pulling her arm behind her back as the front of his body pressed against hers.

"Don't be stupid, whore."

"I am not a whore," she gritted out, bringing her knee up and nailing him in the balls.

Peter groaned, but released her. Bella turned to go after the weapon, but he had her on the ground before she could more than a few steps, the weight of his body causing the pain in her shoulder to increase. Tears burned her eyes.

"Leave her alone!" Elizabeth screamed, dragging Peter off Bella. When she looked back, she saw he had him by the hair.

Peter grabbed her arm, flipping her over his shoulder so that he was on top of her. His hands wrapped around her throat, and Bella knew she had to act quickly. She scrambled to her feet and rushed over to where the shank laid. When she turned to face Peter, his eyes were locked on her, a smirk playing on his lips like he had won.

Elizabeth was flailing on the ground, her fingers scratching at his arms to free herself. But Bella knew the look in his eyes, the one that Cullen had had the morning she killed him. Peter was never going to let them live after today.

Bella didn't think twice before she rushed across the room, using her body to push Peter off Elizabeth and shoving the shank into his gut. Peter cried out, grabbing her hand, but Bella kept pushing it into him. As Peter fell against the cold, dirty concrete, his eyes widened and Bella felt the warm blood flowing over her fingers.

"I told you I was going to kill you," she snarled, twisting the shank. "When you get it Hell, tell Carlisle Cullen I sent you."

Then pulling the shank out, she shoved it into his chest, feeling it break through his ribs, and sliding into his heart. Peter gasped, his mouth opening, but closing as she twisted it, before pushing it in deeper. Like time had slowed down, Bella stayed on top of him as his breathing shallowed and stopped. Once again, she had blood on her hands.

"Is he gone?" Elizabeth asked, causing Bella to look over her shoulder. She was crouched in the corner, her arms wrapped around her legs, her face saturated in tears.

"Yes," she replied, climbing off him, giving him a swift kick. "Are you okay?"

Elizabeth nodded. "I, um . . . What do we do now?"

"We get the hell out of here." Bella walked over to her, kneeling in front of her. "I need you to trust me."

"Are you taking me to Edward?"

She nodded. "But we are going to have to be careful, okay? People are looking for me, and I don't know who we can trust."

"Because you killed Cullen?" she asked.

"Him, and others," Bella whispered.

"Where they bad people?" Elizabeth questioned.

Bella's eyes filled with tears as once again she nodded, but them she thought about Leah. Was she a bad guy? Maybe in the end, but Leah was just another victim who lost her way. Was Bella any different? She wanted to believe she was, but once again, she had taken a life. Maybe Bella, too, was a bad guy.

"I . . . I'll trust you, Isabella."

"Call me Bella," she said, standing up and offering Elizabeth a hand. "All my friends do."

Elizabeth smiled, probably for the first time in a long while, and let Bella help her up. Bella released her hand and pulled the sides of her T-shirt together as they headed up the stairs to the door. Of course it was locked. Sighing, she gave Elizabeth a look before walking back down to where Peter laid, blood surrounding him. She held her breath as she reached into the pockets of his jeans, expecting him to grab her arm, to drag her to Hell with him.

While searching for the keys, she found Peter's cell phone. She slipped into the pocket of her pajama pants before grabbing the keys and hurrying back up the stairs. Her fingers trembling as she tried key after key, finally finding the right one. The door opened and they hurried out of the room, letting the door close behind them. They walked down a long hallway and into the kitchen. It was clean — almost too clean, to be honest.

"We need to check the rest of the house," Bella whispered, walking over and digging in the drawers and pulling out two butcher knives. "Make sure there isn't anyone else here."

Elizabeth nodded and took one of the knives.

Quietly, Bella lead them out of the kitchen into a formal dining room, formal living room, and a foyer to the base of a set of stairs. Giving Elizabeth a look to be careful, Bella pressed her back against the wall and slowly made her way up each step until they reached the second story. There were half a dozen doors to choose from. She tried to stifle her nerves as she reached for the first on the left. Turning the knob, she swung the door open.

Nothing but an empty bedroom. One by one, they tried each door, finding two more bedrooms and a large bathroom, all of which were empty. With only two rooms to choose from, Bella bit her lip and selected the one on the right side of the hallway. When she opened the door, she gasped.

"Holy shit," she muttered, stepping into the room.

The far wall was covered in televisions from floor to ceiling, each one showing what Bella was sure were camera feeds from more than three dozen human traffickers abusing dozens of girls and boys. She walked up to them, placing her hand on one of the screams, were a girl who couldn't have been older than twelve was being brutally raped while three guys stood ready for their turn. Bile filled Bella's throat as she turned and looked for the command center, which was on the back side of the room.

"There's so many of them," Elizabeth whimpered from the doorway. "Why do they do it?"

"I wish I knew," Bella replied, moving over and sitting behind the large mahogany desk where the computer sat. "I hope I never understand."

"Edward's safe, right?" Elizabeth asked again, causing Bella to look at her. "They didn't do that to him?"

"No, they didn't," she said softly. "It broke him when they took you. He felt guilty, said he should have protected you."

"He was a kid," she argued. "They told me he had gotten into trouble, that they had taken him because he had caused them to lose a lot of money."

"Who told you that?" Bella asked. "Your parents?"

Elizabeth nodded, confirming what she and Edward had long suspected. His parents were assholes, who abused their children every chance they got. "They lied, didn't they?"

"They did."

She blew out a deep breath. "And you're sure he's okay?"

Bella stood up and walked over to Elizabeth, grabbing her hands. "I am sure he is fine. He'll be even better when we get out of here. I just need you to be patient. I need to search through his stuff, find out as much as I can about him, about his network, okay?"

Though she could tell Elizabeth was scared, she nodded. Bella hurried back to the computer and started searching through Peter's files. He was smart, she thought. Everything he had was encrypted, and thoroughly done, too. Bella, however, was smarter than most people gave her credit for, and with a few quick strokes, she broke through the encryptions. The screen flickered before filling up with thousands of files.

"Whoa," she murmured, opening one of them. "Holy fuck!"

On the screen were hundreds of pictures of a high ranking senator on his knees while Peter flogged him, fucked him, the senator raping a young boy, and so much more. Closing that folder, she selected another, this one not much better. This was of a woman with a young girl tied to a tree, while a dozen men threw rocks at her.

As Bella filtered through them the more she found herself wishing she had made Peter Davis, Carlisle Cullen, Esme Platt, and those like them suffer more than they had. Men like her father, who sold their children into slavery. She hated them.

Bella pulled open the desk drawers and searched for blank disc to save what she had found, when a file on the bottom right hand corner of the screen caught her attention. It was named Swan, and Bella knew what it was immediately. Tears filled her eyes as she opened it, finding thousands of pictures of her time Hell.

Pictures of her killing Carlisle Cullen, killing Esme Platt.

Killing Charlie Swan.

Bella closed the files and continued to search for a disc. She didn't find one, however she found a USB drive and plugged it into the computer, transferring all the data onto it before ejecting it and standing up.

"Are you ready?" she asked Elizabeth, who simply nodded.

Picking up her knife, Bella walked over to her, pulling the door closed behind her. She put her hand on the back of Elizabeth's arm to lead her back downstairs, but stopped when they heard a noise coming from the room across from them. She and Elizabeth shared a look before Bella reached out, turned the doorknob, and threw it open. Curled up in one of the corners was a young girl, who couldn't have been much older than sixteen or seventeen. She was naked and looked like she hadn't bathed in days. Her blond hair was filthy and she had bruises on her face, arms, and legs.

"I'm not going to hurt you." Kneeling in front of the girl, Bella held out her hand. "Want to get out of here?"

The girl nodded and placed her hand in hers. "My name is Kate."

"My name is Bella," she said, trying to smile, but knew it came off as fake. "Let's go."

They stopped in one of the bedrooms and found clothes. Bella knew none of them wanted to wear Peter's clothes, but seeing as her shirt had been ripped in two, Kate was naked, and Elizabeth's looked like she had been wearing them for the better part of the last year, they couldn't be too picky.

Bella led both women downstairs and out the front door, snorting to herself that Peter hadn't had an alarm set on it. When they walked outside, it was pitch black. Bella looked around, trying to make out any sense of direction, but there wasn't any.

Sighing, she looked back at Kate and Elizabeth, and asked, "Which way should we go?"

Neither reply, so Bella led the way, down the front path, out to the road and to the left. While they walked down the deserted highway, Bella pulled out the phone she had taken off Peter's body. She was surprised that there wasn't a passcode set on it, which made her nervous. However, she had no choice but to use it. With no clue where they were, she needed to get help sooner, rather than later. With shaking fingers, she opened the phone can called a number she hadn't called in over a year.

The phone rang almost half a dozen times before there was a click and a breathy, "Baby."

"Edward."