I Followed Her, and She Lead Me to You

Chapter 3

It had been almost a week since Edward had left due to the smell of the new girl's blood. She was Isabella Swan, or Bella as she preferred, seventeen years old, and the daughter of the chief of police in Forks. She was returning to the town she was born in after living with her mother for her whole life somewhere in California and Arizona. Gossip ran through Forks quickly, and it had already reached Esme, who was usually one of the last people to hear it because of the humans' natural aversion to us. She had been told by Mrs Stanley, the mother of Jessica from school, all of Bella's story, how her mother ran away with her, kept her away from her father and was a flighty person, now abandoning her daughter to run off with a new man. Mrs Stanley had even known about how Bella was behaving at school, because of her daughter, and I found great amusement in the fact that Edward hadn't been at all discreet in his actions when they first met, and Bella found him frightening, yet had asked a couple of people at school why he wasn't there. She was curious.

Her curiosity had peaked my own, and I decided to spend the next few weeks watching, discreetly from a safe distance, to observe why this girl was curious. No humans were curious about us, they simply feared us. And while she had been scared in the classroom, from what I understood from Alice's description of her vision, the girl hadn't consciously been aware of her fear, and instead simply felt uncomfortable. Maybe I could run some emotions by her and see how she reacted. Maybe there was something wrong with her and how she processed her emotions. While it was rare, I had found a couple of humans in my existence who hadn't naturally felt fear, until I showed it to them anyway.

But now we were heading back to school, as was Edward, and apparently he had a similar plan to me because he wanted to get to know the girl as he had been unable to read her thoughts. That information alone further peaked my interest because if the human girl had a gift powerful enough to stop Edward's, could she stop mine, or Alice's. If none of our gifts worked around her then we could be in danger, what if she started to have suspicions about us and we were unaware until she told someone. Things could escalate immensely if we didn't take proper care.

Monday was mostly uneventful, Edward spoke to Bella Swan, and I observed her when I had the chance, but we were mostly unable to find anything. Edward did confirm some of the story of how she came to Forks, but commented that Bella seemed unwilling to give this information away. I however did find that my gift worked fine against her, as I was able to feel the change in her emotions from across the cafeteria at lunch when she became embarrassed for being caught staring at Edward. The change in emotions was almost comical because normally a human couldn't feel such a quick change in emotions, and I also normally couldn't pinpoint someone's emotions from such a distance unless I was much attuned to their emotional climate. I would easily be able to do it over this distance for my family, and probably twice that for Alice, but for an unfamiliar human it was odd. Maybe she had very strong reaction to emotions, or maybe I accidentally projected my expectations of her emotions on to her.

Everything was fine until Tuesday when Edward exposed us to the girl. It had rained all night, and then the temperature early this morning dropped to below freezing. It had no effect on us, but none of the humans were coping properly, they forgot the basics when it came to driving on ice, they forgot how to walk, and they just became more accident prone. I was breathing as little as possible at the moment, should a human fall and bleed everywhere and destroy my self-control. While it was the best it had ever been, I still worried about being in situations where I could snap. Everyone stopped breathing when we heard the tires of a minivan squeal as they drove over ice. In a fraction of a second, Alice had a vision, and Edward ran towards Bella Swan, who was in the direct path of the van. I groaned as he pulled her to the ground and stopped the van with only his hand. Now she knew.

I forced myself to remain calm and tried to project the feeling onto my family, however Rosalie was fuming, and even Emmett was angry at the possible exposure. Great. Now we would have to kill the girl and make it look like and accident, and then we would have to leave. Long enough after she died to ease suspicion on us, but soon enough that no one questioned how Edward got their so fast. Or maybe would could just kill the girl and disappear. We would be the prime suspects, but a decade of hiding was a small price to pay considering there was the possibility of the Volturi getting involved because of the exposure. Fucking hell Edward.

"Okay people, damage control," Alice quickly spoke, "Rose, you and me need to play the part of the worried sisters who are concerned for our brother's safety while Emmett and Jasper need to fix the damage Edward did."

"Why the hell should I have to help fix Eddie's stupid mistake?" Rose questioned, she was livid about the possibility of exposure.

"It keeps us safe and lets us stay here for at least another eighteen months. You hate moving, so deal with it!" Alice never got aggressive towards Rose, she knew Rose was a tough opponent, and also her best friend and sister. "Jasper, once they move the van and get them in the ambulance, smuggle Edward's things over near the van and pretend you are picking up his dropped books. When the principle asks what Edward was doing over here, he wanted to ask Bella about the homework he missed last week. Emmett, fix up the dents in the cars to make it look like the van hit the corner of the truck bed, not the idiots hand." Even Alice was annoyed. Good.

We played our parts as best as we could, probably earned ourselves a couple of Oscar's for our performances, and then made our way to the hospital as quickly as possible. Most of the junior class was doing the same, as well as a few other people in other grades, everyone always looked for excuses to leave school, and I doubt any teachers would punish anyone for missing today. The teachers probably wouldn't be too effective anyway as they were all as shaken as most of the students. A near tragedy in the parking lot before school that resulted in three students going to the hospital was a big thing in such as tiny town.

By the end of the day, everyone was pissed off at Edward, and Rose and I were about ready to kill the girl to keep our secret. Alice dragged me out to hunt before I snapped at Edward, who wanted to protect the girl, and before I hunted the girl down. A smart move by Alice. It was only after we were far enough away from the house that no one would over hear us, and Edward couldn't read our thoughts, that Alice confided in me about her vision.

Edward had only seen the first part of the vision and reacted on the assumptions from that, but before we arrived at the hospital this afternoon Alice had a second part of that vision.

"Bella is hugely important to this family Jazz, she is going to test us but in the end she is going to save us."

"What do you mean test us and save us? Is there danger coming?" I worried for my family, I was going to slip back into my old ways of military mode and find a way to destroy the threat before it reached us.

"No, the danger is within us, without her, we cease to continue as a family. She and Edward will form a strong relationship, and fall in love, but they are not mates. And then something big is going to happen, I don't know what yet but it has the power to separate the family. Then Bella helps to bring us back together. And she is the key to us finding our soul mates Jazz."

"Then I guess we have to protect her, and when the time comes we will have to trust her."

"Thank you Jazz, I love you!" She sang, knowing she got her way and changed my thoughts on the girl.

"Love you too, Ali. Let's quickly hunt then head home and get ready for school."

…..

It was now Thursday, the week after the almost accident and Edward was behaving like a prissy little boy who had his favourite toy taken from him. He was head over heels in lust for this poor human girl but had avoided her since last Tuesday, apparently to avoid her suspicions. But really I knew it was because he freaked out about his emotions and feelings towards a human. Alice and I had sworn we wouldn't let him know what was going on, so we kept him out of heads with a range of techniques. My favourite technique was sex. Either doing it or thinking about it kept him out. Although there was quite a humorous issue with this plan of using sex to keep Edward out of our thoughts. Last night Alice had done this amazing thing with her mouth and I was so carried away I projected a massive amount of lust throughout the house. Let's just say that for all the couples in the family I may as well have initiated an orgy, and they all ran to their respective rooms. Actually, I don't think Rose and Emmett made it to their room. But Edward ran to Canada. The prude. Everyone else had a good time, he should learn to enjoy the issues I occasionally have with my gift.

The original plan for today was we were all going to school for half a day, because all the bio classes were blood typing today and it was safer for us if we avoided bleeding humans. Edward however was going to mess all of that up for us. He had finally decided to talk to Bella again, and hopefully would be able to do it without exposing us. He would of course have to skip bio, after lunch, but he planned to spend lunch with Bella.

Of course, like everything Edward planned something had to go wrong, usually because Edward was the world's worst planner. Well, maybe not the worst, but he was frozen as an emotionally immature seventeen year old boy forever. And of course seventeen year olds hardly ever think of the consequences of their actions, or how their plans might affect others.

So when we emerged from class after the final bell signalled the end of the day and we saw Edward's car was missing we all panicked a little. Had he finally snapped and lured her away from the school to drain her? Or had he drained her and ran away from the consequences. The only thing we could do was remain calm on the outside and not alert the humans to the possible murder. The panic only increased when we all saw her truck; that was until Alice's face went blank before she smiled widely.

"Edward is fine, and he is under control with Bella. He found her stumbling around outside the classroom half conscious and took her the nurse before driving her home. I have to deliver the truck to her place."

It was a relief to know we didn't have to cover a murder up. At least not yet, he could still snap just from being near her because her blood smelt so potent to him.

"Rose, what would be the best way to start the truck without a key? Would hotwiring it be alright?" Alice asked Rose, because although Alice knew what sort of cars she liked, Rose was the resident mechanic at home.

"Nah, a flat tipped screw driver will work just fine as a key in something that old." Of course Rose knew exactly how to steal any sort of car and make it look like the person stealing it just had a key.

Alice pulled my face down to hers for a quick kiss, took a screw driver out of the emergency tool kit in Rose's car and danced over to the truck, where a quick, sharp tap to the door unlocked it and a jiggle of the screw driver started it. No one even looked twice at Alice stealing the car, many of the students saw, but apparently no one made the connection that Alice Cullen was in Bella Swan's car. These humans didn't give a fuck about anything important apparently. I guess we now know to make sure the cars are locked because no one will care if someone just drives off in them.

We didn't even bother following Alice, either she would get Edward to take her home if he was still with Bella, or she would just duck into the woods and run home, it would be faster, and less crowded in the car. By the time we were home Edward was as well, and the emotions he was giving off were comedic gold.

"Eddie's in lust!" I teased as we walked in.

"I am not!" He defended himself.

"And you two are acting like children. Why would you disappear with a human like that Edward? We thought you drained her! We were ready to help you hide the body and leave." Rose was angrier than I had felt her in a long time.

"I will never drain Bella, I lo- find her very interesting." He trailed off at the end, trying to down play what he almost said.

"What was that? You lo her? Do you mean you love her, Eddie?" Emmett teased, once again proving he was the annoying big brother of the family even if he was actually the youngest vampire in the house.

Edward stupidly, or wisely, I wasn't sure which, chose not to comment.

"So you do, don't you. You luuurve her." Emmett continued to tease.

"Shut up Emmett!"

"Wow, witty reply there Eddie. Don't know any stronger words than 'shut up'?" Emmett was enjoying this far too much, and I was riding the high of his emotions quite happily. Alice quietly slipped in the front door at this moment and took my hand.

"Fuck off Emmett!" Edward practically yelled.

We were stunned into silence for a while before Alice broke it with her tinkling laugh.

"Eddie said fuck!" She gasped out between giggles.

That was enough to set the rest of us off, even Esme was laughing rather than scolding Edward and Alice for their language as she usually would. It was just so rare that Edward would swear that it always took us off guard. He, Esme and Carlisle where the ones who really held on strictly to their human values, but mostly Edward. He didn't swear, he believed humans over consumption of alcohol was always inappropriate, and most importantly Edward did not believe in sex before marriage. He was the 104 year old virgin. We should make a movie about it, like the 40 year old virgin but worse.

The rest of us were all raised with similar values, sort of, but had moved away from them when our immortal lives had started. Emmett and Rose had fallen in love straight after his change had ended and abandoned any values they had right then. Well according to Edward that is what happened anyway. And Alice couldn't remember any of human life so she didn't remember how she was raised, she only had her visions of the future to go by.

And I was completely different. Growing up as the youngest of four sons of a cowboy in Texas had given me a strange combination of strict religion and relaxed morals at the same time. Then my rebirth into the immortal world hadn't been very moral. In the newborn armies anything went as long as you weren't killing each other. And with gift that I was mostly ignorant of at that point, I felt whatever everyone else did, and there were often situations much like the previous night when I lost control of my projections. That was always interesting.

The rest of the night passed like a fairly normal one, we all finished any homework at some point, read, Edward played his piano, Carlisle came home from his night shift and everyone spent time with their other halves. Early in the morning Emmett and Edward left for their hunting trip and the rest of us went to school for another day in hell. Although it was funny to observe Bella now that she and Edward had developed some sort of relationship.

…

A.N.: Hope you like a little bit of the sibling teasing and humour here, and my version of what happened after the almost accident.

Anyone questioning the whole thing with the truck and the screwdriver; that was based off of a real life experience I've had. When I was younger my parents didn't have any spare cash so my dad still drove his car from when he was a teenager, an old sedan about the same age as Bella's truck would be, and one day the office at his work closed up before the factory my dad worked in did and he was unable to get in and get his car keys (Dad was the last one to leave), so he made a snap decision, stole a screwdriver from the factory and broke into his own car and drove home with the screwdriver as a key. Luckily he didn't get pulled over because that would have been impossible to explain.

Anyway, thank you for reading, hope you like it.

xx