Alice was walking to her house lost in her thoughts. Walking around town in the morning proved to be enlightening. She heard the vicar talking to Mrs. Cope, Jasper's landlady. She was worried because her nephew was going to marry and wanted to move to Forkshire. And she thought that the house she was renting to Jasper was perfect for her nephew, but she didn't want to throw away the poor Doctor. The vicar told her to not worry, Jasper was planning to move to another town.

In that moment Alice was boiling with anger. How dare he! It was time to take matters on her own hands. But first she had to talk to Edward or Emmett, she had to get her inheritance. While walking to her house, she heard two maids talking about how the police arrested Esme Platt last night. Alice smiled. If Esme was convicted, then more money would come to her hands. With that money she could convince Jasper to be with her, they could build a clinic, or a laboratory. Jasper wanted to do some research. The possibilities were endless. He won't reject her again.

xxxx

Bella stretched herself in the armchair. She was bored. They were visiting old Mrs. Gianna's farm. Jane was riding the horses and playing with Gianna's granddaughters. Didyme and Helen brought them here to keep Jane of witnessing how they arrested her aunt. The downfall was that all day they were talking about future weddings and babies. Bella didn't see the point. Aro was firm that none of them will marry until this case was solved.

"You are bored, right dear?" Gianna's sweet blue eyes were looking at Bella.

"I'm tempted to run with Edward and elope in Africa."

"Your mother and sister wouldn't be happy if you did it."

"I really don't plan on do it, but they talk and talk, and we can't tell for sure when will it happen. What if they took more time? Or if they never find the culprit?"

"Don't you trust your uncle?"

"Of course I trust him, is just... They took Miss Platt, and we know she isn't guilty."

"Are you sure she isn't guilty?"

"Why would she do it? She isn't a greedy woman, she lives a comfortable life."

"From your point of view. What if she wanted to secure Jane's future? You could imagine her doing something for Jane, right?"

Bella was quiet. That was the only reason she could imagine for Esme to make something so awful.

"But Mr. Cullen had a lot of enemies. I don't think they are looking into them."

Gianna laughed.

"Oh Bella, of course they did it. Don't worry if Miss Platt is innocent, they will release her."

"But why they're so sure she is the culprit?"

"Don't you think it's a bit unusual Carlisle left her more than he left Alice, his only daughter?" Helen said, coming to seat besides Gianna.

Gianna just coughed. Which brought all the stares to her.

"What? Are you telling me that you don't know?"

All of us denied with our heads.

Gianna exhaled and started with Esme's story. "Esme Platt came here to Forkshire a long time ago. She was a young woman who had just finished her education, but her family was in need. So somebody recommended her as Alice's governess."

"After Cynthia's death?"

"No, before. Cynthia wasn't right. Somewhere along her ten years of marriage she discovered that love wasn't the reason Carlisle married her, but her money and family status. Then she started to hate Carlisle and resented Alice. Most of the time she was in bed, emptying bottle after bottle of 'cologne'." Gianna accentuated the quote marks with her hands to make it clear to everyone that Cynthia was an alcoholic.

"So a charitable soul recommended Esme to take care of little Alice, who was nine or ten at the time. Because of the erratic behavior of her parents, Alice wasn't ready to go out, she was home schooled. Esme was perfect for the job. So everything was settled and Esme came to Forkshire. Now Alice had always been the spiteful girl we all know. She made Esme's life hell. And she also had to deal with Cynthia's mood swings. But Carlisle was nice to her, so imagine poor innocent and naïve Esme, looking at him like he was her knight with shinning armor. She fell in love, but she was conscious of the impossibility of her love because he was married. So Esme kept working trying to imbue some knowledge through Alice's thick skull. And Cynthia got worst. Her only friend in town was Carmen, who was recently abandoned by her husband, so you could imagine how much she cheered the Cullen's house mood. One day Cynthia said that she couldn't stand it anymore, so she took a bunch of sleeping pills and finish with everything."

"Oh God!" Bella was horrified. It was the saddest story ever.

"To make matters worst, Carmen blamed Carlisle very publicly. And Alice witnessed all. Esme took Alice under her wing, and tried to cheer her up, but it was difficult. Alice started to resent her father. Given the drama Carmen caused and Alice's tantrums, the whole staff quit. Esme once again took matters in her hands and she became the housekeeper. She suggested Carlisle to take Alice to a doctor, and the doctor recommended to send Alice out for school, and so they did; thus leaving Esme and Carlisle living almost alone. You can imagine what happened. One day, Esme came crying to me, she was pregnant."

Gianna stopped to take a sip from her drink. Helen, Didyme and Bella were almost hypnotized with the story.

"It was a terrible situation. Esme didn't know what to expect from Carlisle, and to make matters worst, Carmen was always lurking around remembering Esme her place at the house, just the housekeeper."

"That spiteful woman! If she wasn't dead..." Helen couldn't hold back.

"So she came to me, crying. She told Carlisle, and he was furious with her. He accused her of trying to ensnare him to marry her. He said that Carmen was right after all."

"Well, this doesn't improve my opinion on him, though I shouldn't speak ill of the dead." Bella said.

"What did you do?"

"I took her to Bexhill-on-sea, with my sister. She had Jane there, and we decided to hide them from Carlisle. He was furious once he realize she left to never coming back. Just the opposite of Carmen, who was gloating how she ran off the social-climber."

"That..."

Gianna stopped the throng of insults coming from her audience. "But her joy was short-lived. A year later Carlisle married Tanya, and she never had the patience to deal with Carmen so she ban her presence from the house."

"Now I'm feeling bad for Alice." Bella said thoughtfully.

"Don't. She was awful since birth. Her upbringing didn't help either."

"Why did Esme come back?"

"Well, Carmen found out where I was hiding Esme. She followed and confronted me. I thought we reached an agreement, Esme promised to never come back to Forkshire."

"And she kept her promise." Renee's angry voice shocked them. Gianna looked around for the girls but Renee said "Rosalie took them for a walk. This is a conversation that Jane doesn't need to hear." They all agreed, but Didyme was shocked about Renee's fury.

"You knew?"

"Of course. Esme and Tanya told me long ago. If you look at Jane, you'll notice her coloring is the same as Carlisle."

Bella asked again. "Why did she come back?"

Her mother answered. "Because Carlisle is a sick controlling bastard."

"Mother!"

"No, she's right. Carmen told him about Jane, and he threatened to let everybody know about Jane's origin. How she shamelessly offered herself to force him into a marriage."

"But that's a lie!"

"And who would they believe, the rich gentleman or the poor woman who left town in a hurry? Esme had to come back to avoid ruin and shame."

"How could he do that to his own daughter?"

"He thought he was doing right, he provided for her education, clothes. If you really think about it, Esme could never pay for her schooling." Helen said, but Renee spat a bitter laugh.

"If he only was a decent human being. No, he did it to control Esme. To any other woman, he would have only paid. For Esme, because she ran away, he wanted absolutely control. He forced her to come back as the housekeeper... at the orders of his new wife. It was cruel. He just never imagined that Tanya found very quickly how disgusting he was, and made friends with Esme."

"And with you."

"Yes, but I came into the picture later." Then Renee looked at them pleadingly. "Please, keep that story to yourselves. If Uncle Aro finds out... it will give him Esme's motive." Then she sat, looking defeated.

Bella stood up to hug her mother. "Well, that's the motive for Carlisle, but what about Carmen?"

Renee remained quiet, but Didyme and Helen looked at each other when the idea came to them.

"She was blackmailing Esme!"

Bella turned to Helen. "Why?"

"Carmen was in bankrupt, she was desperate for money. Esme was afraid Aro would find who were Jane's true parents. I can imagine her asking for some 'help'."

"And that's why she was so adamant to talk to Uncle Aro, but she never told him anything relevant. She was scaring Esme to pay."

"Then it's true she was at the lake..."

"She wasn't alone."

"What?"

"We didn't trust Carmen, so we asked someone to go with her. Demetri, the driver."

xxxx

Jasper couldn't believe the results of the analysis on the glasses. He asked his friend at the lab, to repeat them. He used the time to visit his mentor at Saint Andrews. The same asylum where... He kept walking to Marcus office, when he noticed someone opened the door to let out... it couldn't be possible.

"Alec?"

"Jasper?"

A nurse came walking with two men behind her. "Dr. Protheroe, you have two more visitors."

Jasper couldn't believe his bad luck.

"Edward, Emmett, Alec, what are you doing here?"

A/N: Now that the first secrets are revealed we are coming close to the end. The next chapter will be posted this weekend.

Happy Thanksgiving! And please eat a slice of pumpkin pie for me, I love it but you can't find it easily here.