8
Unlike when they fled before, Charlie didn't utter a sound as they raced from the monster that had been torturing them. It was the only part of the small girl that reminded Bella of herself. The way she shut down, pulled inside herself when everything became too much. Dealing with tantrums and attitude were one thing, but being unable to reassure your daughter that everything was going to be okay was hard. But Bella knew first hand just how cruel the world could be. She had the scars to prove it.
After driving for a few hours, Charlie fell asleep and Bella found herself staring out the window, watching as the plains turned into desert, and faded into mountains. How could she go back? After eight years away, two of those in the grip of a monster, and six running for her life, how would they ever welcome her back? Wouldn't it have been better if she stayed dead?
"No," Edward murmured, drawing her attention to him, and she realized she had spoken her mental ramblings. Jasper peeked at her from the driver's side, while Alice turned and flat out stared at her. "They've suffered long enough, B. They deserve to know that you're . . . Well, I was going to say okay, but you're not okay. But they need to know you're alive."
"He'll look for us there," she argued. "That's why I had to stay away from them, remember? It was too dangerous for them. That's what you told me, E!"
"What has hiding gotten you, B?" Jasper asked, and she looked at him. "I get why you and E did what you did. Hell, Al and I stay off the grid, too, but you're not really living, B."
"I'm surviving," she argued, unsure of she could call what she did surviving. "Charlie and I have . . . had a good life."
"Maybe you did, but it would be better with them," Alice said and Bella sighed. "They ask me about you every time I see them, B. They ask what happened to you, what you went through. I don't tell them the truth. I lie and tell them that you didn't suffer, that the end was quick. And I feel like a jerk for lying to them because I know the hell you went through — that we went through."
"Al . . ." Bella shook her head and looked away. "They'll never forgive me. Never."
Though all three of them tried to tell her she had nothing wrong, nothing, Bella knew the truth. She had been stupid and reckless, naïve and immature. At sixteen, she allowed herself to fall into the hands of sadistic, abusive monster, who would do everything he could to reclaim what was his. And make no mistake, Marcus Volturi considered Bella to be his most prized procession.