Jasper turned to me.

"Keep driving. Can we catch them?" I muttered, forcing my sight to follow their trajectory. While I did, I pulled the stub through my teeth and scribbled an address at the bottom of the picture followed by names: Emmett Hale, Esme Cullen nee Hale.

When my eyes regained focus I saw Jasper staring at me, worry creasing his brow. He hadn't slowed. "They're leaving. Moving to a new city. I saw Edward picking up documents for them in Seattle." I spat the shavings from the pencil out the window and flipped to a new page. I began sketching the house they were moving to. This was all I had of their destination so far.

"And can we catch them?" Jasper asked.

I looked up and cursed. "I'm sorry Jasper." I said just as the siren started behind us.

"Should I try to outrun him?"

"It won't help. Go ahead and pull over. I'm really, really sorry about this Jasper."

He didn't understand, but felt my remorse. The trooper came to the window then. Jasper rolled it down.

"License and registration?" He frowned at Jasper and then smiled at me.

The wind of a car in the opposite direction blew the man's scent into us. Jasper reflexively pulled the officer through the window and sank his teeth into his neck. I continued to sketch and try to find when the Cullens were leaving, where they were going. I put down my pencil and opened my door once Jasper had finished, carrying the body back to the cruiser and putting it in the driver's seat. Then I went to the back of the car and ran full out, plowing it into a tree. I looked through the smashed window and grabbed a shard of windshield. Stretching over the hood I drove it into Jasper's wound and slid back to the ground.

Jasper stood watching me. Barely two minutes had passed. "Really, really sorry." I repeated. I climbed back into the Lincoln and pulled the pad back onto my lap.

Jasper was still standing on the highway looking at the wreckage. "Come in, Jasper. The traffic is returning." He was sparkling in the sunlight, a beacon to the next car that would pass.

I was already sketching again when he put the Lincoln back into drive. He looked at the picture. "That's where they're going?"

"Yes." My inner sight was already trying to nail down when they were leaving, how, how long it would take. "But I have no idea where it is. Middle America, small town. Could be anywhere!" I shrieked.

Calmness filled the car, but the disappointment and agony didn't completely abate. "We'll find them, Alice. I see how much this means to you. I'll help in anyway I can." His fingers traced my ear, trying not to disturb the flying pencil.

A hospital. Of course. I stuck the eraser of the pencil in my mouth. Carlisle would need be working in a new hospital and probably already knew which one. It might even be one he'd worked in before. I bit the end off my pencil and the spat it out the window with a growl.

"What now?" Jasper was trying desperately to keep up with me but with little to no success.

"Put those on." I nodded to the glasses on the dash. I half-snarled, jotting the name of the hospital under the house. Sacred Heart. Could it have a more ubiquitous name? I didn't think so. He reached for them and shoved them on. "We'll be passing through a few towns soon, fortunately the clouds are rolling in, but your eyes..."

"Right. So what did you see?"

"Did I tell you Carlisle is a surgeon? He works Emergency Rooms often, too. Well the hospital he's going to could have been a good clue where they're going, but it wasn't."

"We'll find them, Alice." He ran his hand down my left arm and took hold of my hand. "You know we will."

That pulled me up. I took a deep breath and focused only on the present and our immediate future.

"You're right. I do know that." Then I looked down at my top and snarled again. A ragged snag pinched it over my left breast and a gaping hole was under my arm. I ripped off the sweater and pulled another blouse from the bag. Jasper's eyes popped at the sight of my white skin. I idly thought of tempting him by leaving it off, but he was due to make the next move and we were heading toward civilization. I buttoned up my blouse quickly and he averted his eyes. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

We were silent while I continued to sketch and search for any clue in their intentions.

After a while Jasper did ask a question, "I don't really understand how your visions work but... are you able to follow them as they travel?"

I smiled. "Yes, unfortunately they aren't taking the highway. I doubt I could track their plan closely enough to map out where they come out of the forests." I wished I could cry.

"They're only taking what they can carry?"

"No, but they've hired men to move their things. Humans are much harder for me to follow." I focused for a few minutes on the truck and saw it going East. I saw it turn onto the interstate and then it just vanished. Humans! "So I know they are going east, but from Washington, that's hardly useful."

"But you know the place they're leaving? You've seen that several times, right?"

"Yes." I said, not sure where he was going with this thought. Then I saw us in the empty house.

"Maybe they left some clue behind."

I leaned over and kissed his cheek. "Genius. Also, I'm very curious to see the place for myself. It would be like reaching some part of them. Keep heading to Seattle. Maybe we can solve our lack of identification problem at the same time." I flipped back to family portrait and indicated the address at the bottom.

He nodded and turned back to the road. "You seem surprised. Did they have to leave suddenly?"

"No, I've seen them leaving before. They've stayed in Forks for several years now. People would start to notice. But they hadn't set their minds to leaving, and not to where they were going, so I couldn't see it clearly."

"And we can't catch them? If they decided recently they might not have left yet."

I bit my lip. "I don't know when they decided. I haven't looked for them in a while now. Once I found the diner, I put all my sights on nailing down when you'd come there. It's been a month since I really focused on them. Edward's picking up those papers later today and they're heading overland tonight." I hung my head.

He tilted my chin up. "We will find them, Alice. You've brought me hope." I felt it flood through me, the uplifting feeling that comes with a new dawn, a clean sheet of snow, a fresh breeze. "Let me give some back to you."

I closed my eyes and sighed, letting the hope wash over and through me. Then his lips brushed my eyelids. His hand released my chin and his eyes were back on the road when I opened mine. I leaned against his shoulder and looked at the picture of the new house. I clung to hope and tried not to contemplate how long it might take me to find this needle in the haystack.

The drive had been quiet since my revelation. Occasionally Jasper would give me hope again, when despair threatened to overwhelm me. I suggested hunting before going into the city. Jasper found a cougar, and this was much more to his liking than the wolf. I was glad. I took down a mountain goat for myself. I just needed to take the edge off my thirst.

It was raining when we reached Seattle. As we parked in front of a shabby looking law office, I saw Jasper going inside, talking with the lawyer and giving our names and birth dates. While I watched the vision, I pulled my bag over the seat. I was glad I'd kept so much cash on hand. I'd have to wire more to myself in case we needed anything else this expensive.

"What name should I use?"

"Cullen. I believe Emmett is passing as Esme's brother. You should be able to pose as Carlisle's."

"And you?"

"I'm your wife, of course."

The split-second he hesitated seemed very long to me. "Of course."

I scowled slightly. "Use any dates you like, but make me 16, that will put me at the same age as Edward. You should probably aim a little older for yourself."

"Do you have a middle name?" he asked.

"Not that I know of — pick something."

He nodded. "Will you stay here?"

"If you wish."

He strode up to the man on the porch, who was watching us warily at this point. I returned to the vision. Jasper made my birthday August 22. Was that date significant? My middle name would be Marie. Yuck. Too close to Maria. His birthday was just a few days ago. That wasn't his real birthday... that was the day in the diner. Jasper paid half the asking price and Bill, the lawyer, told him they would be ready in a week.

Would I be lucky enough to find a clue within a week? There were too many decisions between here and there. It was a possibility though. In one view I was smiling as Jasper returned to the car with our new certificates and drove off with purpose. Of course, I still couldn't see where to... This talent could be so infuriating sometimes.

I pulled my grid paper out again and started to fill in more of Esme's face as the two men entered the office. She was hunting with the others, somewhere between here and there. In the next vision, she was fixing up the new house. I got a good view of the layout. It wasn't nearly as large as the previous. I flipped to a clean sheet without really seeing it and outlined a floor plan based on Esme's decorating schemes. The largest room, I thought, was hers and Carlisle's, but the pictures that I knew had been in his office at the big house went into the next smallest room. So... the large room was for Rosalie and Emmett? That left the third room for Edward. The only one without a bed and packed with bookshelves. I wondered if all those were his or if he would be holding some for Carlisle, too. I flipped back to the portrait and started filling in Carlisle's face, seeing him in his room with Esme. My breathing picked up a little, and I shook my head when Jasper opened the door.

He looked at me with a smirk on his face. It was clear he knew what I'd been thinking about. I scowled back at him. He wiped the smirk away.

"All set. We'll meet him at the dock next Wednesday, but you probably already knew that."

The smirk returned and this time I smiled, too. "Of course."

"Which why now?"

I directed him west around the sound. Then I turned to Rosalie's face in the drawing. She was watching Emmett wrestle with a bear, laughing heartily as he let the bear fight futilely. Then I saw them in the largest room of the new house and blinked my eyes rapidly to clear my sight. I'd pressed the pencil too hard into Rosalie's nose. Her right nostril looked like it was bleeding. I sighed and tried to smudge some of it away.

Jasper looked at it. "Attractive," he said with some sarcasm.

I stuck my tongue out when he turned his head back. He snickered. I felt emotion from him again, quickly suppressed. "Do I distract you?" I asked.

"Yes," he answered honestly. "I haven't done that, unintentionally, in years."

"You don't have to repress it, you know." I started on new sketch, this one the Emergency entrance to Sacred Heart Hospital.

"I want you to feel what you feel, not what I make you feel."

"And that sentence almost made sense," I teased.

He growled quietly.

"Really, Jasper. Lust is fine. I can handle lust. I'm a big girl." He laughed out loud and looked down at me. "Ok, not big. Grown."

His laughter stopped short. "I know that." It wasn't lust before, I realized now, just affection. This was a wave of lust. He was remembering me, I was sure of it. I was also sure he wasn't going to touch me that way again before we got to the Cullens'. All I could do now is nudge him toward the decision to do so when we got there.

I blew in his ear. "And I have all grown up parts." I slid back down in my seat before I could do anything more than tease.

"Turn here," I instructed as we approached the narrow lane that wound to the large house. What would it look like without them here? What did they take with them?

We sped along the drive and pulled up to front porch. I nearly leapt out of the car in excitement. They weren't here, but already I could smell them. They'd left their scent all over this place. I held each one in my mind as I entered the house to learn which person they matched. Jasper was right beside me, opening the door.

The front room was made up for sitting. The armchairs had been covered by tarps. Also under cover was the grand piano. It would still be in tune. I ran to it and ripped the cloth off. Sitting on the bench, I bent my nose to the keys.

"Edward," I murmured taking in his scent. Jasper stood behind me. I saw he had the grid paper in his hand and pointed to Edward. I walked more slowly through the rooms after that. The dining room furniture was not covered and I sat for a moment in one of the chairs remembering the images of them discussing problems that they'd faced. Jasper looked in cupboards, under the sheets. A few minutes later I rose and skipped up the stairs.

I entered Carlisle's study and indicated him in the portrait for Jasper. Many of his books were still on the shelves. I leafed through one or two. Mostly they were medical texts. I found one that looked different. Historia was all it had for a title and it was written in Latin or Italian, I wasn't sure which. I showed it to Jasper but he didn't know it either. I saw Vampiro though and knew I wanted to learn how to read this book. I looked to Jasper, who was flipping through papers on the desk.

"Anything?"

"No. Just information about patients here in Forks."

I sighed and then twirled for the door. The next room was Edward's. I paused just long enough to take in the turn table and the gaps in the shelves where he'd removed some of his possessions. Which music he left behind probably wouldn't be much help in determining where they went. Jasper stopped for a longer tour anyway while I traipsed to the next room. This was evidently Esme's workshop. I memorized her scent. The drafting board held designs for updates to this house. I flipped through the pile hoping to find more information on the house they'd moved to but came up empty. I flipped back to review some of the drawings for changes to Edward's room and the sitting room. A wall of windows? Ambitious. I knew she'd made plans to do this to her own bedroom. Perhaps she'd even completed it by now.

Jasper came in then and arched an eyebrow. "No good. These are all for this place." I set the drawings down. I flitted to the door on the adjacent wall. It was a storage space but larger than I expected — filled with furniture, painting gear and carpentry tools. I squeezed in around some of the larger pieces to examine some at the back. The gleam of the wood grain on one bureau and the carvings of cranes and herons on a matching table were exquisite. I ran my fingers over the aged wood appreciating Esme's taste.

Jasper peered in from the doorway. "Who works here?"

"Esme, our mother." I laughed then. He offered his hand as I stepped around a saw horse. "Well, she will be." I ran to grab the portrait so I could point her out to Jasper, too. "The bedrooms are at the top of the stairs."

I stopped at the end of the hall to gaze upon the relic hanging there. Carlisle's crucifix. Jasper cocked his eyebrow, but I couldn't really answer this one. I knew Carlisle liked to contemplate here, but I didn't know why or what. Instead, I led the way to the third floor.

Here was Emmett and Rosalie's room. I was a bit sad when I couldn't differentiate their scents. At the same time I noticed that their scents weren't as strong in the house as the others. Perhaps they weren't staying here? I certainly hadn't seen them as often as the other three. The bed was... well it wasn't. It was just a pair of mattresses on the floor, although the rest of the room seemed well kept. I looked at the thick paper on the walls, ornate and quilted to make it thicker. I tapped it in one place and found it wasn't really paper at all, but some sort of cloth, quilted in truth. I turned back to the bed and realized the mattress wasn't for comfort but to reduce noise. I whirled to leave the room and walked straight into Jasper's chest. "I think Rosalie and Emmett must have left the family for a time, their scent isn't as strong as the others." I shared with him.

"Emmett's the big one, right?" He sniffed. "One of them, or perhaps both, has a fondness for the mechanical."

Now that he mentioned it, I did detect a hint of grease, oil and gasoline. I followed my nose around the mattress and lifted a blouse with a dark smear on the right sleeve. "Rosalie, it appears." I held the cloth to my face separating her scent from Emmett's. I tossed the shirt to Jasper and he did the same. I rifled through the pile of clothing making a note to adjust the fit on the things I'd made for Rosalie. She was taller than I'd thought. I also considered making her a pair of coveralls — denim. I dropped a skirt with grease ground into the knees.

Jasper had moved to their closet, but it was nearly empty. "You going to tell me more of the Cullens when you were... overcome. Do you think you might be willing to talk about them now?"

I smiled broadly. "Happily. Emmett," I began shaking out a shirt to show long rents in the back, "likes bears. Well, he likes to play with bears." I dropped the shirt again. "He likes to play, period. He is boisterous and carefree, based on what I've seen. In nearly every vision, he is either laughing out loud or grinning like the Cheshire cat."

Piling up rags I would raid later, I muttered, "Rosalie is a lot harder to describe. Their time away from the family, although I didn't realize what it was then, has limited my visions of her. She is beautiful and knows it. But she isn't very happy. I think maybe she is unsatisfied with the track her life has taken.

"Edward is the musician. He is the closest son. I want to say prodigal, but nothing I've seen confirms that, just a hunch. He is well-learned and gentile, like you." I smiled up at him in the hallway. "I have sensed that I will be closest to him of all the Cullens, but again I can't say why. Maybe some commonality? He has a gift like ours? Not anything I can see."

I crossed the hall to Carlisle and Esme's room. "Esme, as I said, is our mother. That best describes what I've seen of her, a caretaker, full of love, always looking for the best to give her family." The large bed in the middle of the room had a magnificent lace spread. I bent to examine the stitches. "She has an artistic flair and uses it to build a home for her family."

I saw him standing at the large windows looking out to the forest at the edge of the yard. "This... was her plan?"

"Yes. I saw her making arrangements and even saw the glass being delivered, but I wasn't sure of the timing. Probably in the past month or two. She wants to do the same to this whole side of the house."

He looked at me, incredulous.

"She's doing it slowly, one room at a time." I stood at his side, enjoying the view.

"And Carlisle?"

"He's a doctor. He spends a significant part of every day surrounded by bleeding humans. And rather than feeding, he helps them — saves them. He is unbelievable. I cannot understand how he does what he does. He is the guiding hand to this family." My voice broke. "My family. Oh, Jasper, the only thing I've wanted more than to be a part of this family was you. I want a mother and father. I want siblings. I want someone to share this existence with — more than one someone. I want someone to teach me how to live this life instead of just stumbling through. I want it so much." He squeezed my shoulders, and I felt his hope again.

We stood there for a long time. I remembered every vision I'd had of each of the Cullens. I tried to insert myself or Jasper into the back of them. How would we fit into this family? While I reviewed the old, new visions were added. Carlisle saving a human girl's life. Esme painting Edward's room. Rosalie under a Cadillac. Emmett and Rosalie.

When that vision hit, I moved for the first time in hours. The sun had set some time while we stood. I stepped away from Jasper and went down the stairs to Edward's room. I needed a distraction from the coupling that seemed inevitable when Rosalie and Emmett's future was concerned. I flipped through the vinyl until I found something I recognized. The band's rhythm was tempo and soon had me circling the room, spinning and jumping, swaying and sliding. I loved to dance. It felt wonderful.

Jasper watched from the doorway for several minutes before moving to the shelf and selecting another record. I stopped abruptly as the music did the same. He had chosen a much more traditional piece. As the orchestra struck the opening chords, he bowed to me, taking my hand. I smiled and bobbed a little in excitement. I'd read scenes like this in pulp novels: the handsome stranger sweeping the damsel into a dance that seals their hearts forever. Such romantic nonsense, and such a perfect description of us.

He swept my hand to the side and wrapped his other around my waist. I didn't know the dance he led, but it was easy to anticipate the steps he directed. He pulled me closer at one point and lifted me by the waist turning a circle before setting me back on my feet. I leaned into him, letting my body slide against his. My hands rested on his shoulders before he took my right again and leading me around the room once more. As the piece ende,d he dipped me and inhaled while tracing my neck with his nose. I gasped. It felt like he'd left a line of fire in his wake.

I stood upright, my hand still on his shoulder slid down his upper arm, then back up again, enjoying the simple curve of it. He bent over me and smelled the hair over my ear then traced my lobe with his nose. I held perfectly still, and if I hadn't, I would have trembled. His lips came to my cheek and drifted slowly down my chin. My head lolled back and my eyes with them. I let my weight fall in his hands as he traced the line of my neck again and held at the cleft where the button of my blouse held him.

He pulled his head away slowly, and I raised mine, curious and a little disappointed. My vision told me I wouldn't be disappointed long. Indeed, just then he cupped my face in his hands and kissed me full on the mouth.

This kiss was so different from our first. That had been full of hunger, heat, need. This one was warm, but not fire. It was still need, but a much less desperate one. It was a need that was filled and fulfilled. We held that kissed a very long time. I analyzed every bit of it and banished every vision of the fires to come when they intruded. He didn't push my mouth with his and he didn't pull me to him. His lips were very slightly parted such that I could taste his breath, and the sweetness was even better than ever. Once his tongue touched my lower lip but receded quickly. I did the same, just once, just a touch — an acknowledgment that we could press further but we were satisfied with what the other gave.

His hands held my face for the first full minute of the kiss but then began to wander — gentle brushes, nothing prodding, nothing pushing. Like our tongues earlier, he seemed to be appreciating everything just as it was. He ran one hand over my hair and then through it. He traced the nape of my neck, the collar of my blouse, the line of my arm to the elbow, several ribs on my left side. Somewhere around minute ten, he ran a finger down my spine from nape to tail.

I gasped and broke the kiss. My hands had been playing with the beginning of a curl on his neck, the planes of his chest, his shoulder blades, but now I clutched his shoulders and let a shudder run through me rather than resist it. My eyes fluttered with pleasure, and his lips moved to my neck. My gasps continued as his tongue pressed my now empty jugular and ran down the length to my collarbone. He kissed each of the points of it exposed by my blouse. His eyes found mine and the fire in them ignited me further.

"Oh, Jasper, you know what I'm feeling. Let me feel you."

He kissed me again and I did feel him. Filling and fulfilling. Our emotions were counterpoints: mine the eager high flame of first love, his the deep ember of long-lived love. Our kiss was no longer still, though, and his tongue did explore my mouth, his hands slipping under the back of my shirt. The fires were lit now, and nothing this side of eternity would put them out again.