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As always, huge thanks go to my pre-reader/cheerleader team Gredelina1 and IamTheAlleyCat. Also to Snarkymuch for beta'ing this chapter and listening to all my bitching when the words wouldn't flow. I love you all.

~ Chapter Twenty-One — Progress ~

Carlisle POV

"Gotta say that wasn't how I imagined the reunion would go," Emmett said. "I thought there would be more hugging and less throat tearing."

I forced a smile. It wasn't how I imagined our reunion either. I expected some fear from Bella, but never did I imagine she would attack me.

"Alice, what's happening?" Jasper asked, pacing the length of the room.

Alice was sitting back on one of the couches. Her eyes were glazed and unfocussed as she sought out a vision of Edward and Bella.

"They're just running," she said, then laughed. "Well, Bella is running. Edward is being dragged along behind her. It seems she has speed on her side for once."

"You mean she's faster than Eddie?" Emmett was delighted.

Alice grinned. "Much."

"Do you think it's safe to go outside yet?" Esme asked fretfully. She was more distressed by my injury than I was.

"Not yet," Alice said. "They are still too close to the house."

The house afforded us no physical protection from Bella, but at least we were out of sight.

"I can't believe she attacked you," Rosalie said for the umpteenth time.

I was having a little trouble processing it, too. I had never even been bitten before today. The wound on my neck was astonishingly painful. I now had a lot more sympathy for Jasper and his legions of scars.

"It wasn't her fault," Alice said defensively. "She thought she was protecting Edward."

"From Carlisle." Rosalie rolled her eyes. "She might as well be defending him from a kitten."

I raised an eyebrow, a little insulted by the comparison.

"You know what I mean. There is no one Edward needs less protection from."

"She doesn't know that," Jasper said. "She has been tortured by Carlisle's and my voice countless times. The only reason she didn't attack me is because she thinks I am the good Jasper."

"Yeah, I still don't understand that," Emmett said. "How come there are two of you and only one Carlisle."

"Because I wasn't there with her," I said. "When we were in the jungle, Alice and Jasper were the only ones that she saw. Alice had to create a story for Bella so she wouldn't be scared of Jasper and so the 'good Jasper' was born."

"So we need to do the same with Carlisle," Emmett said.

"I don't know that it would work a second time," Jasper said. "We were dealing with 'human' Bella then. As you saw, she seems to have embraced her vampire side."

"That was the worst part," Esme said dolefully. "I have never seen someone so out of control. Even Emmett was more manageable as a newborn than that."

"Thanks, Mom," [S1] Emmett said with feigned hurt. "You saying Bella makes a better vampire that me?"

Esme smiled at him fondly. "No, dear, what I meant is that she was given over to her instincts completely. You were never that…"

"Feral," Jasper supplied. "Wild? Whatever you want to call it that was a vampire working on her base instincts. I have seen that before. Countless times."

"But that was with newborns," I said. "Bella is not a newborn anymore."

"In a way she is. We don't know how she was in Volterra, but if the human act was instilled from the beginning, she would never have suffered through the newborn madness. Now she's aware of what she is, there's no knowing what she will be like. The one thing we have on our side is that she doesn't have newborn strength anymore."

"I don't know about that." Emmett stretched his arms, showing his bulging muscles. "She certainly gave us a run for our money."

"Because she thought she was protecting her mate," Alice said vaguely—she was still searching out Edward and Bella's path. "Imagine what you would be like if you believed you were protecting Rose."

Emmett expression darkened, and he looked at Rosalie with cautious eyes, as if he was expecting someone to launch themselves at her.

"Precisely. You would probably be even more out of control. Huh. It's okay to go out now. They are at the waterfall."

"What are they doing there?" Esme asked.

"Bella has taken him into the cavern behind the falls."

"What is it with that girl and caves?" Rosalie asked.

I was disappointed in her. When she had heard what happened to Bella, she had been so upset. I'd hoped it presaged a change in her feelings towards Bella. It seemed I was wrong.

"It's where she feels safe," Jasper said. "If you had spent the last two years like her, you would understand."

Alice laughed suddenly, and we all looked to her for an explanation. "Edward was being a little slow on the uptake, so she knocked him on his ass."

Emmett bellowed laughter. "Man, I wish I'd been there to see that. What she doing now?"

"I'm not sure. They're talking. Edward seems upset about something. Oh, she's leaving again."

"Leaving to come here and finish the job on Carlisle's throat?" Rosalie asked. I would have been touched by her concern if her tone was a little less scathing.

"Nope, she's hunting." Alice said in an amused tone.

I wondered at the tone, but I had a more pressing concern. I walked out to the beach and retrieved my missing flesh from the sand. Pressing it again my neck I hissed as the venom began to fuse it to me once again. It would leave a scar but that was not the end of the world. In a way, it felt deserving.

When I got back into the house ,Alice was watching Bella's path carefully in case she ventured too close to the house.

I sat beside Esme on the couch, and she ran a finger over the thin scar on my neck. I patted her hand. "I'm fine, my love."

"No thanks to Bella," Rosalie said.

I stiffened and tried to tamp down the anger I was feeling towards my eldest daughter. I managed well, but Jasper didn't.

"Dammit, Rosalie, haven't you heard a thing anyone has said?" he shouted. "Bella has been through hell. She lived in a cave in the middle of the damn jungle for two years. She was tortured by the Volturi God knows how many times, and she thought she lost Edward. The fact she was able to function through the depression she was feeling is a miracle! So, for once in your spoilt existence, will you try to think about someone else before yourself."

Rosalie sat in stunned silence for a moment. As far as I knew, no one in her entire vampire existence had ever spoken to her like this.

Jasper was still breathing heavily, and I knew it was taking a lot of effort for him to not project the rage he was feeling to us all.

"Just… just try and have a little sympathy, Rose," he said in a heavy tone.

She nodded curtly, but didn't speak. I was surprised to see this side of my son. I had never seen him so defensive of anyone but Alice. He and Bella had not formed much of a relationship in the time we knew her before. Her bloodlust had always prevented him from getting too close to her. It seemed that the sight of her so traumatized and frail had affected him deeply. I was proud of him for his defense of Bella.

We all fell into an uneasy silence as we waited for Alice to give us more news of Edward and Bella. Almost an hour passed when she suddenly laughed.

"What is it?" Jasper asked.

"She hunted for him!" Alice said incredulously. "She brought him back a deer and is trying to get him to feed." She huffed. "Come on Edward, get with the program."

Emmett grinned. "Is Eddie being slow again or is his male pride hurt?"

"He doesn't seem to understand… Nope, now he's got it."

"He's feeding?" I questioned.

She nodded, a wide smile curling her lips. "He's feeding."

"Does anyone else find it ironic that Bella is feeding Edward?" Emmett asked. "I mean, it's not normal. None of us have ever felt the urge to hunt for our mates before. I think Rosie would have kicked my ass if I tried it."

Rosalie nodded, confirming his thoughts.

Jasper shrugged. "It makes sense to me. She's taking care of him. Remember how attentive Edward was after Bella was hurt by James? This is Bella working with the same instinct."

"Instinct," Esme sighed. "It's all instinct. How long will it be before she stops running on instinct and comes back to us?"

"There is no way of knowing." Jasper said. "It's all down to Edward. He needs to break through her wildness and reach the person she is inside. It could be hours or it could be weeks. He needs to find a way to connect to her."

"And what do we do in the meantime?" Rosalie asked. There was no bitterness in her tone now. Jasper's outburst seemed to have done the trick for now at least. "We can't hide in here indefinitely."

"I think we should go back to the mainland," Alice said. "We can find a place to hole up in the city and work on our next step."

"And what is our next step?" Emmett asked.

Alice looked at him with an uncharacteristic scowl on her face. "We need to make Bella safe. Which means we need to deal with the Volturi."

xXx

Edward POV

After when felt like hours, but in truth was only minutes, Bella's hands stilled and she leaned away from me.

"What is wrong?" I asked.

She didn't reply verbally, but into her mind flashed an image of Carlisle's face again.

I stiffened and prepared myself for her to run. I didn't want to be forced to restrain her—the idea was abhorrent to me—but I couldn't allow her to attack Carlisle again. As much as I loved her, and I loved her more than my own life, I loved Carlisle, too.

Thankfully, she made no move to flee. Instead, she ran her hands over my face searching for something, though I did not know what. Her small hands cupped my cheeks and her thumbs traced the light shadows beneath my eyes. I hoped she wasn't planning to hunt again; I couldn't feed anymore for now. However, her hands moved from my face to my neck and across my shoulders to my chest. With a sharp tug, she tore away my shirt, leaving me bare-chested to her gaze. Her hands run over the planes of my chest and then along my arms.

The sensation of her skin against my own created indescribable feelings in me and a surge of something I had not felt since before her 'death'. Lust. My body reacted instinctively to her touch; a low growl built in my chest. She brought my right arm up to her face and ran her fingers over my smooth flesh. Finally I understood. She was searching me for injuries.

"Bella, I'm fine," I said in a soft hopefully soothing tone. "Nobody has hurt me."

Hurt me. Her mental voice was soft, almost a sigh, and I could hear the regret in her thoughts.

My heart broke for her. She truly believed Carlisle had hurt her. If the vile creature Jane had been there in that moment, I could have torn her head from her body with an ecstatic smile. She deserved to pay for what she had done to my Bella.

"It wasn't Carlisle, love. He would never hurt you. It was the Volturi. Do you remember what I told you about them?"

She shook her head and a flash of vibrant red hair flew though her mind. I knew that hair, as I knew that face that followed. Victoria.

"Victoria hurt you?" I wondered if that meant Victoria had been the once to change her after all.

She nodded and shoved up the sleeves of the shirt she was wearing. I hissed at what was revealed. Her arms were littered with crescent shaped scars, scars that could only come from another vampire's bite.

She traced the edge of one scar with a fingertip and sighed softly again. Hurt me.

"Bella, I am so sorry," I said fervently. "I should have been there. I should have protected you. I should never have left you…"

She pressed a finger to my mouth to halt the flow of words, and then she smiled. A strange intensity came into her eyes that I did not understand. Her eyes darkened slightly, and she tilted her head to the side. She seemed to be appraising me for something I didn't know what. And then she leaned forward and our lips met and all other rational thought was lost.

xXx

Hours passed in silence, I was content to lie naked with Bella in my arms letting the world move on without us. However, her thoughts showed me she was not so content. She was cycling between the moment she arrived on the island and attacked Carlisle and Alice's explanation of the good Jasper.

I left her to her thoughts and considered my own predicament. I had my Bella with me, but we couldn't stay here forever. If nothing else, we would need to leave the island to hunt sooner or later. There were not enough animals here to sustain us for long. The family would be worried, too. I was too far from the house to be able to hear their thoughts, but it took little imagination to picture the scene. Carlisle, Esme [S2] and Alice would be worried for my and Bella's wellbeing. Rosalie would likely be annoyed at the upheaval this turn of events had caused her. Emmett and Jasper would be fighting their own feelings of impotence. They were both men of action, but by being here they would exacerbate the situation. What Bella needed now was me and me alone.

Perhaps it was because I was absorbed in my thoughts, or because she was more alert than me, but I didn't notice Alice's approach until Bella stiffened and began to growl deep in her chest.

"It's okay, Bella," she said in her melodic tones. "I'm not coming any closer. I come with good news. We're going to leave you two alone for a while."

We're all going to the mainland, she continued in her thoughts. We figure Bella would be more comfortable if it's just the two of you here. You can get to… healing her alone.

I felt a wave of embarrassment at the thought of Alice witnessing what had passed between Bella and I. I understood she would have been keeping an eye on us for my safety, but that I had hoped she would avert her sight when it was obvious Bella wasn't going to hurt me.

"Thank you, Alice," I said loudly, knowing she would hear the annoyance in my tone.

Oh, get over it Edward. You know why I had to watch. A little gratitude would be nice.

I was grateful but my embarrassment was greater. I heard her making her noisy exit through the ferns littering the forest floor. I knew she was making more noise than necessary to set Bella's mind at ease.

She was almost out of earshot when I heard the sweetest voice I had ever heard whisper beside me.

"Thanks, Alice."

I immediately lurched forward so I was kneeling in front of her. She looked at me with wide, fearful eyes.

"Bella, did you just say something?" I asked, hope kindling inside of me. "Did you talk?"

She nodded jerkily.

"Say something else."

Her lips parted, and she seemed to teeter on the verge of speech forever, though it was only a matter of seconds before she spoke. "Edward."

"Oh, Bella. Oh, my Bella." I rained kisses over her cheeks.

I had feared that she had lost herself to her feral side completely but here she was talking to me again. That had to be a good sign. Her mind was clearer now, too. She was focused on her alone and was wondering what made me so happy.

"I'm happy because you are here," I said with feeling.

She smiled a beautiful smile and leaned into my open arms. I'm happy, too.

There was so much more that I wanted to say to her, so much more that I needed to ask, but in that moment, I allowed myself to relax and appreciate the fact a little of the wildness had receded.

Thanks for reading. As always, if you would like a teaser of the next chapter, let me know in a review or a PM.

Simaril x