You guys are freaking amazing! Thank you to everyone who reviewed or alerted this story! I'm gonna try my hardest to get two chapters out this week for you all as a thank you!

As always I wanna thank ArabellaWhitlock for making this chapter make sense :) you rock lady!

I own nothing. Despite wishing on a shooting star :(

Firework

All's Fair

"Okay, okay... Okay." I said, freaking out a little bit. They'd found me, somehow I'd been found and I was dragging all these kind people into this with me. Elena and Jeremy who'd accepted me into their home and their family with nothing but love and friendship. Caroline who'd become a friend to me in only a week. Stefan, Bonnie, Matt, Tyler, Damon... Damon!

"I've got to go." I said before trying to run for the door, maybe if I ran they'd catch my scent, they'd come after me and leave Damon alone. I couldn't let him die, not because of me.

"Hold on! You're not going anywhere!" Caroline said standing in front of me faster than should have been possible. "It's not safe out there! Look I know you're freaking out and you probably think we're insane, but please, please don't go out there Bella."

"You don't understand..." I trailed off, hang on, how did they know about vampires? What was going on here?

It didn't matter how they knew, I had to get to them, I had to try and save Damon, if they hadn't killed him already. I couldn't think like that, they wouldn't have killed him, not yet, they'd use him as bait for me. I hoped.

"No you don't understand Bella, it really isn't safe out there." Elena said softly to me.

"I know I believe you, but Damon's out there... They'll hurt him..." I said, I needed to get out of here but Caroline was still blocking my way and the others looked like they were ready to jump up and get in my way any second.

"Bella's right. I'm going to go help him." Stefan said looking worried and standing up.

"No!" I shouted. "Let me go, please." I couldn't let anyone take my place here. They were here for me, I had to go and face them. I always knew it was going to end like this, and really I was living on borrowed time anyway.

"Bella..." Stefan started saying but he was cut of by a deep velvet voice full of cockiness.

"Yeah... Bella... Someone's got some explaining to do." Damon said in a singsong voice.

"Damon!" I gasped out. Never had I been so happy to see anyone before in my life. The relief hit me so fast that I felt dizzy. My knees gave way and Caroline caught me.

"Glad to see someone's happy to see me for once. Of course I am awesome.." Damon smirked at me as Caroline and Jeremy sat me in a chair and Stefan pushed a glass of some amber liquid in to my hand with a soft look.

"How many?" Stefan asked Damon seriously as I took a sip of the burning liquor. It tasted foul, but then so had beer to start with and I'd gotten use to that fast enough. I couldn't figure out my thoughts so I just concentrated on the alcohol feeling slightly numb inside. This was just too much, I got away from all of this right? It was gone. I wouldn't have to deal with it anymore. Wishful thinking.

"There were four, there's two now but they hightailed it out of here." Damon replied pouring himself a drink from the bar then turning to look at me with a shrewd look. "The strangest thing though is that they were cold ones."

"Cold ones?" Bonnie asked looking confused.

"Different type of vampire, slower, weaker and they glitter in the sun. Tragic really." Damon smirked. "And do you know who they wanted?"

"Damon what are you talking about?" Jeremy asked.

"Well it wasn't you Van Helsing, Witchy there wasn't their target either. They didn't want the doppleganger, wolf boy or Blondie. And neither Saint Stefan or my amazing self have pissed anyone off recently. No they were here for 'Edward's mate'." His words made my head snap up, shock taking over my body. It couldn't have been them could it? Were they back looking for me? Oh God had Damon killed two of them? How had Damon killed them? What was going on?

"Edward..? You're ex Bella...?" Bonnie asked sounding very confused, she should join the club.

"Yeah Bella? You're ex?" Damon asked, sounding slightly pissed off now. Not that I blamed him.

"Hang on, you're ex was a vampire?" Matt asked me looking as confused as the rest of us. "No wonder you fit in so well..." He muttered so low that I thought I might have misheard him.

"What colour eyes did they have...?" I asked in barely more than a whisper, my body shaking and I couldn't stop it.

"The same as all cold ones; red." Damon replied his forehead creased into a frown.

"Not all cold ones have red eyes. Some have gold." I told him, looking at just him, it was easier than watching everyone else's faces as well.

"Gold?" Damon asked me. "You better start talking Klutz." He almost sounded threatening, but not quite.

"If they live on a diet of animal blood then their eyes turn gold." I said, I couldn't believe I was talking about this. I was giving away their secrets. Well, so what, they left; an inner voice taunted me and pushed me on, it was right, they'd left me.

"Hmm... So you're ex hunted thumper too?" Damon asked.

"More like mountain lions." I mumbled.

"That's gotta be more satisfying than a squirrel Stef." Damon smirked at his brother.

"What?" I asked looking in-between the two brothers. They weren't saying what I thought they were. Were they? No they couldn't be. I'd seen them eat, I'd seen them drink, their eyes, they were normal not gold or anything.

"So no-one's filled her in?" Damon sounded exasperated now looking round the room at everyone.

"No Damon. How do we tell someone what we know? How does someone hear that?" Elena asked Damon her voice rising with the tension in the room.

"Easy." Damon replied with a roll of his eyes. "Bella... Stefan the hero, Blondie and me, we're vampires. Tyler there is a werewolf and Judgy is a witch. There you are simple."

"What!? Are you insane? You aren't vampires. I know vampires. And werewolves, witches? Are you guys crazy? Are you winding me up?" I asked the people in front of me, this was just too much. Were they taking the piss out of me cause they knew I knew about vampires? Cause if they were it wasn't funny.

"Don't worry Bella, I know this sounds insane, but with any luck you'll be freshly compelled and back in your own bed tonight, and this won't even be a horrible dream." Caroline smiled widely at me.

"Compelled...? What does that mean?" I asked.

"Means we mess with your head, your memories, change them around make you forget all of this." Damon explained to me casually. "But we can't compel you."

"What, of course we can. Why can't we?" Caroline asked looking at Damon with a frown on her otherwise perfect face. "She's freaking out, let's help her and make her forget."

"You guys are mental." I said drinking more of my whiskey, or bourbon, whatever it was.

"Good plan. Try it." Damon said with his arms crossed and motioned to me.

Caroline glared at him before walking over to me and kneeling in front of me. Her eyes bored straight into mine, I really wanted to know where she was going with this so I sat and let her do whatever she was trying to. Whatever it was it wasn't going to work. She wasn't a vampire.

Her eyes dilated, and she started talking in a slow strong voice. "You will forget that vampires were after you. You won't remember coming here or any of this conversation. You will only remember the party. You will think we came here because the cops busted the party." Caroline told me.

"Well that didn't prove anything. What was it supposed to do?" I asked, slightly more at ease now. I could go along with a joke even if it was a stupid one.

"What!? How did you resist it? Are you wearing vervain?" Caroline asked me shocked and a little angry as well it seemed.

"What! Why would I be wearing a vitamin? You guys are crazy. Sorry." I said, what did a vitamin have to do with anything?

"You knew?" Elena asked Damon, ignoring Caroline's outburst.

"Obviously." Damon drawled with an eye roll. "But no-one listens to me till I'm right. Then it's all 'ooh Damon, you were right! We're so sorry! You're amazing Damon!'" He put on a high pitched girly voice that despite everything had me holding back a laugh.

"You tried to compel her before?" Matt asked, but it sounded more like a statement.

"Well done quarterback, you've finally caught on..." Damon smirked back sarcastically.

"How then? If she's not wearing or using Vervain?" Stefan asked with a brooding look, that wasn't so different from his normal look.

"That's what I want to know brother." Damon said looking at me.

"You're all insane and this joke has gone way too far. I'm going home now." I declared standing up and heading for the door. A blur came at me though and stopped dead in front of me. Damon. He'd moved faster than... Okay... That wasn't normal. And how Caroline and I had arrived here? Maybe there was something in this after all. "How...? You guys eat and drink, you don't sparkle, your eyes?"

"I know we're amazing!" Damon smirked at me. "How about this, you answer our questions and we won't kill you?"

I rolled my eyes at that, did he really think that would scare me? Obviously it didn't, because he was lying. "If you wanted me dead you'd have handed me over to the others. And you don't scare me. I've lived with vampires that don't hide their bloodlust, I'm not gonna be scared of Anne Rice vamps."

"Now that was a book." Damon agreed with me with his trademark smirk. "Okay how about we play this quid pro quo?"

"Clarice." I added for him. "Fine." I accepted I wanted to know more, and I really did owe him for not handing me over to the vampires that were trying to kill me.

"Okay, you first. Why can't we compel you?" Damon asked me seriously, both of us still stood facing each other.

"I really don't know." I answered thinking hard. Why couldn't they control my mind? My mind? My thoughts! There was something there, something about my thick head. "I have a theory though, or half of one anyway."

"Go on." Damon replied with a raised eyebrow.

"Right you know that vampires have abilities I'm assuming?" I really hoped I wasn't giving away trade secrets here, but considering Damon thought he was a vampire I was guessing that I wasn't.

"You mean cold ones?" Damon asked me. I nodded in return. "Yeah, one ability at most right?"

"Hang on, how come they only have one where as..." Bonnie started asking but was soon cut off by Stefan.

"Cold Ones have one ability, well some do anyway. But they're heightened traits of their human personality that they bring through the transformation with them." He told Matt, Bonnie, Tyler, Caroline, Jeremy and Elena who looked really thrown by this new information.

"Yeah, well Ed... My ex's was mind reading. He could read anyone's mind, anyone's but mine. His ability didn't work on me." I explained.

"Wait he could read minds? How did that work?" Jeremy asked me.

"It's my turn." I said, I wanted to make sure that I was getting answers in return in this session. "How do you differ from Cold One's?" I asked.

"We're human in appearance, we're not cold, more like room temperature and we have human skin, not like stone." Stefan started telling me.

"We don't sparkle like fairies." Damon added.

"You were almost spot on with the Anne Rice reference. She got things pretty much dead on. Sunlight, steaks, etc." Stefan carried on.

"We can eat food, drink. Thank god." Damon raised his glass of bourbon. "We can control our bloodlust."

"Hang on, the sunlight? How? I've seen you walk in the sun?" I asked.

"Our turn." Damon smirked maliciously at me.

"Okay, go ahead." I conceded going back to my chair and picking my drink back up, I had a feeling I was going to need it.

"Why are there Cold One's trying to kill you." Damon asked me.

And so I told everyone in the room my whole story. James and his coven coming across the Cullen's and me, James hunting and tracking me. Everything. Even the things that I'd rather have forgotten about. All of it. Including the break up and them leaving me.

Everyone wanted to examine my scar, Stefan and Damon taking more interest in it than the others though. I had a feeling that they actually had an idea of what it meant. What I'd gone through, what I'd survived to come out with it. All thought the others were amazed by it and the story behind the cresent shape that would forever be imbedded on my skin, they didn't really understand, they didn't really get the emotions one tiny blemish could bring. Stefan and Damon, they did. They understood.

When I got to what Ed... He had told me, and what had happened I was surprised to hear Damon, Stefan, Caroline and even Tyler growling low in their throats. It was an eerie sound that raised all the hairs on the back of my neck.

"So yeah, that's why Victoria's after me." I mumbled looking at my shoes. I felt terrible for bringing this to these people.

"Did you know they were after you before you came here?" Bonnie asked me in a sharp voice, almost accusitory.

"Didn't you listen to Bella Bonnie? She clearly didn't." Jeremy answered his girlfriend just as sharply.

"Look, I'm really, really sorry that I got you involved in this and put you in danger. All of you." I told the people in the room that were now possibly the closest friends I'd ever had sincerely. They knew everything about me, all my deep dark secrets that I'd wanted to tell someone but had never been able to before. Well almost everything, the things they didn't know were just the minor details. Like how Rosalie hated me, how Jasper struggled to be in the same room as me, that kind of thing. "I'll leave, I'll go back to Forks, make sure that they don't come here again." I added meaning it, mentally working out the soonest I could leave. Perhaps I could drive back to Forks in my new car, that wouldn't be too bad I guessed.

"You're kidding right?" Damon spoke up that smirk back on his face, but something hidden in his eyes that didn't match the cocky, happy look. I couldn't figure out what it was though. "That's the first time I've been able to kill something and not have someone bitching at me in ages. Let them come. Means more fun for me."

"Bella you can't leave, we can protect you here." Caroline said to me, her eyes almost begging.

"I can't ask you to do that. You might get hurt and trust me I'm really not worth that." I told my new friends meaning every word.

"Why would you say that Bella, of course you're worth it." Bonnie said softly to me, she looked worried for some reason.

"I'm not. Really I'm not." I said, thinking back to them. If I was worth it, then they would have stayed. I wasn't good, he told me that. These people in this room were all worth three of me each, I wasn't worth them going through pain, worry or getting hurt. I wasn't and I wouldn't let them put themselves in danger just for me.

I was startled out of my thoughts by a pair of baby blue eyes looking up at me from Damon's handsome face who was kneeling in front of me. "Don't listen to what he said. You're staying here. We'll look out for you. And besides, I like having a reason to kill things for a change." I couldn't tear my eyes away from his. Even though I knew there was a really good reason that I should. "Anyway sweet lips, any reason to spend more time watching your back and I'm in." So quietly that I almost wasn't quite sure if I imagined it or not I thought I heard him whisper; "you are worth it." But it sounded so unlike him that I dismissed it as soon as I thought I'd heard it.

In the blink of an eye Damon was stood back up, glass back in hand, his trademark smirk still on it's face as though it had never left.

"So it's settled then, you are staying here." Jeremy told me firmly. I didn't respond, despite what Caroline and Damon had said I didn't think this was a great idea.

"Bella, you are staying. Stefan and Damon can make sure that nothing gets to you here. Or any of us. If you went back to Forks and for some reason that Victoria couldn't get to you what do you think she'd do?" Elena asked me gravely.

"Charlie..." I whispered out scared. Oh god he was all alone there with no-one to protect him, what if... But no, they knew I was here now, they'd come here for me. But then...

"Exactly and here if they try to hurt anyone you're close to we can be ready! We've got witches, werewolves and vampires on our side." Elena said thinking along my brainwave. At my inquisitive look she carried on speaking, her voice lower and less insistent. "I've had to think about these things too, I know what you're going through."

I nodded, maybe they were right, but could I really let these people look out for me? They'd only just met me, why would they do that?

~0~

3rd Person P.O.V.

The group of mix-matched friends carried on talking until the early hours of the morning and only then they stopped because Damon had noticed that Bella had fallen asleep.

"I'll take her up to my room." He said with a nod to the girl who'd fallen asleep in his favourite chair, her head lolling to one side in a way that would give her really bad neck ache, Damon knew from personal experience.

"No, we'll wake her up and take her home." Elena declared with a sharp glance at the vampire. She didn't trust him round Bella, hell she wouldn't trust him round a dog if she had one, let alone a friend of hers, look what happened to Caroline after all.

"What do you think I'm going to do while she's asleep Elena?" Damon asked his brothers girlfriend with a roll of his eyes. Bored now of the game he'd played of being interested in her when he'd first arrived back in Mystic Falls. Sure it had caused Stefan the misery that Damon had promised to make sure his little brother was in, but it was boring and annoying, and as much as he liked Elena as a person she was too whiney for his tastes. Hot though.

Elena opened her mouth to argue with Damon when Stefan cut over her. "Fine. Take her up. But we've still got things to talk about." He said in a serious voice. Stefan didn't particularly trust his brother either, but something was happening with Damon. He wasn't exactly changing, more like he was showing a bit more humanity, whenever Bella was around anyway. If he didn't know his brother any better then Stefan would think that Damon was developing feelings for her. However he was pretty sure that even if he was Damon would never admit to it and would probably sabotage everything once more if anyone were to even suggest it.

Damon nodded and picked Bella up before blurring her upstairs. Matt watched him go, or as much as his human eyes could anyway. He felt bad for Bella, she was a nice girl and she'd been thrown into this world, just like he himself had been.

"So what more do we need to talk about then little brother?" Damon asked as he was back in minutes, glass of bourbon clutched in his long fingers, a frown on his face.

"What are we going to do about the Cold One's? We've got more than enough going on without adding this to our load as well." Stefan said to his brother, knowing his words were probably going to start an argument with the teenagers but it needing saying and Stefan was more than curious to hear what Damon's solution would be. Probably death and destruction knowing him.

"So what, you're saying we just let those vampires kill Bella because we haven't got enough time!?" Jeremy barked out sounding pissed off.

"Stefan! We can't let Bella be hurt! We can't! She's my friend we've got to find a way!" Elena cried out, her eyes widening imploringly at her boyfriend. But Stefan's eyes remained firmly on Damon's blue ones.

"What's another couple of vampires in the scheme of things? They come we kill them, Bella's safe and I have fun. So we're all satisfied." Damon answered, what was the problem? Saint Stefan always wanted to save everyone, hell Damon bet that he didn't even kill spiders in the tub. So why would he not want to save his girlfriends friends life?

"You really think it's going to be that easy? And what if Bella gets separated from us?" Stefan questioned his brother, pushing him further. Stefan wanted to know how Damon would react, wanted to know if his suspicions were right.

"Of course it's going to be that easy, have you met me? I'm kick ass, way better than those sparkling fuck wits." Damon argued back.

"Just humour me here, what if she does?" Stefan said.

"Then why can't Alaric train her like he did with Elena, Jenna and me?" Jeremy suggested lightly.

"Cause mini Ric, you can't kill a Cold One like that." Damon replied slowly, as though talking to a small and slow child. "But that's not a bad idea. The more Buffy's we've got running around the better. She might actually be useful to us then."

Stefan was disappointed, he was wrong Damon didn't have feelings for Bella. He was just trying not to be an ass, probably for Elena's sake. Another act.

When he'd said his bit Damon sat back and watched the group talking about Bella and how to go about taking care of her. He didn't interrupt even when they started talking about a rota, making sure she was never unprotected, much like they'd all done for Elena at some point or other, and look how well that had worked out for them, not.

No Damon was listening but he was also thinking. Thinking about the brown haired girl asleep in his bed. The Klutz who had freaked out when she'd thought her friends were in danger, when she thought that he was in danger. But other than that, the girl had been calm and adult about the situation, more so than most adults were when they found out.

She was strong, stronger than he'd ever have given her credit for and her mask was better too. Maybe even better than his, either that or she starting to heal here. Damon surprised himself by thinking that he wished that it were the latter.

Soo... What did you think? I'm happy to answer any questions and I'd love to hear from you. Next chapter Bella wakes up in Damon's bed. Lucky cow ;)