A/N: Good day, my gorgeous ducks. Let's see what these crazy kids are up to.

~Some Months Later~

~Edward~

Edward was one of the lucky ones, and he knew it.

He was the child of inattentive parents. They'd given him all the material things he could ask for, but he'd been a lonely, neglected child. He could have grown up never knowing affection; what it was to be loved, but he hadn't.

Wrapped up in their world built for two, his parents hadn't given one single bit of hell for anyone else but themselves. Their self-centered mindset had led to them being arrested when Edward was just seven years old and indicted on a litany of charges. They were tried, convicted, and sentenced to decades apart.

Edward could have languished in an overburdened system, but he hadn't.

Cast adrift, he'd been reeled in, saved from choppy waters by the loving arms of a foster mother and father. They'd sheltered him, called him their own, and raised him with love.

The path he'd walked as a child had been lined with cracks. He could have fallen through any one of them, but he hadn't.

When he was seventeen, about to graduate, and faced with a bright future of nearly limitless possibilities, he'd formed a plan to give back. Becoming a teacher had been the first big step. Now, with his foot firmly planted in his chosen field, Edward took another step in his plan.

He'd filled out every form, taken every class, passed every inspection. He was a licensed foster parent.

It was late on a Thursday night when he got the call. An emergency placement—a boy who needed shelter from his storm.

It was only fifteen minutes after the initial phone call that his doorbell rang. Edward took a deep breath and opened the door. There on the stoop of his small, two-bedroom home was the social worker he'd been working with, Jessica Stanley. She wasn't as well put together as he was used to seeing her, having been pulled from her bed just as he was.

Beside her, clutching what looked to be a Mickey Mouse stuffed toy to his chest, was a five-year-old boy. He wasn't looking at either of them; his head tilted down so all Edward really saw was a mass of unruly brown curls.

"Come on in," Edward said gently, his eyes on the little boy.

Jessica put her hands on the boy's shoulders and guided him through the door. "This is Emmett McCarty," she said as the door closed behind them. "Emmett, this is Mr. Cullen. He's going to take care of you for a while."

"I already have someone to take care of me," the boy said, sounding grumpy. "I keep telling you. Call my sissy. My sissy takes care of me. Mike is stupid. I don't like Mike anyway, but Sissy is good. She'll take care of me. You just gotta call her."

"It's a little bit more complicated than that now, sweetie," Jessica said. "There are a few things we have to figure out before we can leave you with her."

"She's my sister," Emmett insisted.

Jessica got down on his level. "I know this is hard. It's scary, and you don't understand. But you're safe here. That's the important part right now. We can figure out everything else in the morning."

For the first time, the little boy's mad-face broke. He gnawed his lower lip, his eyes gone wide and innocent. "But Sissy will be mad. I wasn't supposed to leave the apartment."

"Your sister will understand. You didn't do anything wrong."

"Come on, kiddo," Edward said, kneeling as Jessica had. "It's like Miss Jessica said—you're safe here. You can sleep and you don't have to worry."

Emmett looked between the both of them. He didn't look pleased, but he nodded. He let Edward show him to his room, and he agreed to look around the small but comfortable space for a minute while they talked.

"I can't tell you much, but under the circumstances, there are some things you should know. As far as I've been told, the situation is like this... Emmett lives with his sister and her boyfriend. Sister works nights. Boyfriend was supposed to be watching him, but Emmett was found by a stranger in the park across the street at eleven at night."

"Oh, wow." Edward shuddered to think what might have happened to such a small child late at night.

"Exactly. Emmett said he'd left the apartment because the boyfriend was making too much noise." Jessica winced. "The person who found him called the police. When they investigated, they found the noise was…not anything legal. When I left, they hadn't gotten hold of the sister yet. This could be as simple as an overnight stay, if we can verify the sister is a safe person, but if she's involved in any illegal activity or otherwise can't provide a safe place for Emmett…"

"It'll be longer," Edward finished.

Jessica nodded. "We'll know more tomorrow."

Edward nodded his understanding. He took a deep breath, knocked once on the door to Emmett's bedroom, and let himself in.

The room was empty.

"Emmett?" Edward called, confused. His eyes darted around the entirety of the room twice, lingering longest on the window that remained closed. "Emmett?" Edward came fully into the room, turning around in a circle.

Jessica followed him and looked behind the door, even though it was impossible for the little boy to have been there without them knowing it.

"What the…" Edward's heartbeat picked up in triple time as he bent at the waist, looking under one of the room's small beds. The floor beneath was pristine. There was a nightstand beside each bed. The drawers were all open, the contents rifled, but there was no little boy anywhere to be seen.

Jessica darted to the window as Edward turned around in the center of the room. Bookshelf. Desk. There was nowhere to hide.

"The window is still locked," Jessica said.

Edward strode to the closet, calling Emmett's name again. There was no boy. The random sets of various-sized clothing were mostly too short for anyone to hide behind.

Just when Edward was beginning to think in terms of possible alien abductions, he noticed a stack of blankets had fallen to the floor. The closet had a set of built-in shelves along the side. His eyes rolled upward, and he was not at all surprised then to find a set of deep, brown eyes staring back down at him, lit with mischief.

Of course. The top shelf stretched long, hugging the contour of the roof in a slope that Edward had always found strange. What the hell was the point of the oddly shaped space? It wasn't great for storage.

But it was, apparently, big enough to hold a small, limber boy who could climb to the top and back himself in.

"Hi," Emmett said, smiling big and showing off a dimple.

"I'm going to need you to come down from there, buddy," Edward said, his voice stern. "That's definitely an off-limits space."

Emmett furrowed his brow. "You said I could touch anything in here."

"I'm not mad about the blankets, but it's not safe to climb the shelves. I'm going to help you down, okay? I don't want you trying to climb down on your own and getting hurt." Edward reached up, pulling Emmett out and guiding his body down to the floor.

Jessica ran a hand through her hair, looking harried. "I never would have thought to check that during the inspection," she muttered and shook her head.

Edward shoved the stack of blankets that had been on the top shelf all the way to the back. "I'll figure out something more permanent tomorrow. I wouldn't have thought about it as unsafe either, or you know I would have done something before."

"I'm sure," Jessica said, offering him a reassuring smile. She turned to Emmett. "You keep everyone on their toes, don't you? I can tell. Try to get some sleep, okay, sweetheart?"

Emmett sat on his bed, arms crossed. "I'd sleep better if Sissy were here."

Edward left Emmett only long enough to walk Jessica to the door. Thankfully, this time, when he came back, Emmett was still on the bed where Edward had left him, looking sad and uncertain. Edward sat down, leaving ample space between them.

Emmett tilted his head, looking at Edward with a sideways glance. "Will you take me home?"

"I'm sorry, Emmett. I can't do that. It's the same reason you can't climb tall shelves. It's not safe right now."

"The police came and took Mike away. He's the dumb one, and he's not there. I'm safe with Sissy."

Edward's heart twisted and he put a tentative hand on the boy's back. He wished he could promise him he'd be back with his sister in no time, but he thought it was probably a safe bet that it would be more complicated than that. Whatever this Mike person was into, Emmett's sister was probably involved.

"It's late," Edward said instead. "Because the police got involved, they have to check on a few things to make sure it's okay for you to go home. That might take a while, and it's nighttime now. Things will look different in the morning."

"Because this isn't my room," Emmett said, nodding.

"What?" Edward raised a perplexed eyebrow.

"Things will look different in the morning because I'm not in my room. Duh."

Edward had to smile. "Right. Duh." He reached over and pulled down the blankets. "Go to sleep. We'll figure everything else out in the morning."

~Bella~

It had been a horrible, long day by the time Bella got back to the apartment she'd shared with Mike. Actually, it had been more than a day. She'd been pulled out of work by the police the night before and dragged down to the station. They'd questioned her relentlessly for hours. She knew from her penchant for true crime shows that they couldn't hold her for long without charging her, but they'd kept promising they would tell her where her brother was if she answered just one more question.

Confused and intimidated, it took a while for Bella to remember her rights and that she was free to leave if they weren't going to charge her with anything. They'd grudgingly pointed her in the direction of social services to figure out who had Emmett and how to get him back. She'd gone straight there, shaken and desperate to have her little brother back in her arms.

And now, she was home, her arms empty and her soul shattered for the second time in just a few months. She came back to an apartment the police had trashed in their search for whatever evidence they could find against her asshole, apparently criminal, very-ex-boyfriend.

As she flew around the apartment in a fury, Bella had reflected that the one thing that had gone right in this nightmare of a situation was that Mike was locked up. She was devastated. Heartbroken. In total despair. But she couldn't afford to feel any of those emotions. She clung to her rage, keeping it simmering near the surface. If Mike were there, she didn't think she had enough willpower left in her not to punch him in his goddamn face.

She should have known better. Life had always had a habit of kicking her when she was down. So, of course, as she rifled through the pile of clothes the police had left strewn all over the floor when they completed their search of the house, she shouldn't have been surprised when a figure in the doorway caught her eye.

"Jesus Christ," she exclaimed, jumping a mile and dropping her duffel as she stumbled backward. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I live here," Mike said, deadpan. He looked like hell—his blond hair a wreck and dark bags under his eyes.

"I should have known your dad's lawyer would get you out," she muttered, her tone scathing.

"No, honey. You don't have to sound so pleased." Mike's voice was alive with sarcasm now. "I'm just out on bail, after all, my loving girlfriend. I still might be torn away from you."

Bella clenched her fists, only barely keeping herself from launching at him. "Fuck all the way off," she said, returning to the task of getting her clothes off the floor.

"What the hell are you doing, Bella?"

"What does it look like, genius? I'm leaving."

Mike scoffed. "So it's going to be like that? Four years, and everything I've done for you, and you can't be here for me when I need you most?"

Bella whirled to face him. "What you've done for me? What about what you've done for Emmett?"

"Emmett?"

"Of course. He's such an afterthought for you. You didn't think about him even once, did you?" Bella stopped again, picking up clothes and stuffing them blindly in her bag . "You got him taken away, you incredible asshole."

As she said the words, they finally became real. Her legs went weak, and she sank to her knees, her hands over her eyes. "I fought so hard to keep him," she said, voice trembling. "He's gone."

She heard Mike's footsteps approaching, but was too lost in misery to care. "Babe, look. You tried. It sucks that your mom died. It really sucks, but that never made him your problem. I tried to tell you that so many times."

Her head snapped up, her eyes narrowed on him. "He's my brother," she said through clenched teeth. "He's not a problem."

"He can still be your brother in someone else's house."

"Oh my god." Bella ran her hands through her hair and tugged hard. "I can't be here." She really needed to get out of this house before she ended up in jail for beating him to death.

"What? You can still see him. We can get on with our life, and—"

Bella got to her feet and was in Mike's face in a heartbeat. "There is no fucking we. You were supposed to take care of him, and he's gone. I can't stand the sight of you." Pivoting away from the dumb look on his face, she shouldered her bag, she made for the door.

He yanked her back, hand gripped hard on her arm. "I've supported you through so much shit, Bella. You're not going to walk out on me now."

Bella wrested her arm from his grip. "Don't touch me. They found my five-year-old brother alone, in a park, at night while you racked up felony charges. You're a bastard and a scumbag."

Mike's face flushed, even the tips of his ears gone red. He grabbed her bag as she passed, yanking her back again. His voice was low and dangerous when he spoke. "You think I'm scum, huh? What does that make you? You're nothing without me. I've supported your dumb ass while you hung onto me like a leach." He tore the bag out of her arm. "Nothing here is yours. You want out, then get out of my house."

Furious and frustrated, Bella thought about grabbing the bag back, but decided if he was going to play games, she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of a fight. She turned and strode out of the master bedroom, heading for Emmett's room.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Mike asked, following her.

"You didn't buy his clothes. I bought him everything he needed. Nothing in this room is yours." She reached for the drawer to open it, but Mike grabbed her wrist. Hard.

"The room is mine. The house is mine. And you're trespassing," he hissed.

She laughed, twisting her hand, trying to get away from him. "Go ahead and call the cops. See how well that works out for you, fucking felon. And get. Your fucking. Hands off me."

He didn't let go. Instead, he dragged her out of the room. She screamed, cursing at him and trying to twist away, but he had both the element of surprise and strength on her. He dragged her to the door and shoved her out of it.

"You're a piece of shit," she screamed at the closed door, kicking it. She fumed on the doorstep, wishing like hell that she'd punched him when she had the chance.

Finally, there was nothing left to do but leave. She trudged to her car, trying hard not to cry. As she slid inside, her fury drained away. She leaned forward over the steering wheel, miserable tears coursing down her cheeks as she slumped in pure defeat.

Mike was right.

She had nothing and nowhere to go.

A/N: Sooooooooo….