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Last time...

"Forever" I said and leaned in to kiss his cheek. We held hands the whole way home, and I marvelled at how easily Will could calm me down and centre me. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.

CPOV

It was only moments before Will and Bella were due to arrive at the house. I had had a family meeting this morning and informed the whole family that I expected them to introduce themselves at the very least before running off from our company. Most of them were not too happy at my forcing them to 'mingle with the human', Edward and Rose especially. Edward since he was doing his best to ignore everything and everyone he could, secluding himself and wallowing in his room, and Rose because she didn't like our getting close to humans, she didn't mind going to school among them but the idea that they might find out about us if they became too close to us terrified her. Emmett was as always easy going about the whole thing not caring one way or another, and Jasper was just worried about his control; Bella's birthday incident has really done a number on his confidence.

I heard the soft crunch of wheels as it left the highway and pulled onto the gravel of our long and winding driveway and called the family to line up. They did so instantly, some mumbling others just quietly getting in place.

"Now remember, Will doesn't know about us and it should stay that way, okay?" I said to the family, it was the best thing I could say in order to get them not to acknowledge Bella the way some might wish too.

"Of course Carlisle, I think we know that by now." Emmett said, looking at me with an expression that said "Duhhh"

I heard Will let out a soft chuckle that sounded like it was in answer to something Bella had said but I hadn't been paying attention enough to their conversation to know what it was about. I heard them walk closer to the house and ascend the porch steps. I could hear one quiet steady heartbeat and one elevated, poor Bella; I hope it was the right thing to not warn all of the kids about who was coming. Then it came, the knock.

I looked at my family all lined up and looking like an ad out of some family magazine. "Remember best behaviour" I said and then went and opened the door. "I'm so glad you guys made it, I hope you didn't have any difficulty finding the place?" I greeted Will and Bella, they looked amazing together, they were matching and looked as if they had always belonged to each other and I knew then that this was going to break Edward, yet it was too late to change it now. I motioned for them to come in.

"No, not at all, your directions were great." Answered Will

I looked over to my family who all looked like they had just seen a ghost and I hoped they could hold it together in order not to slip in front of Will. I needed to give them a moment. "May I take your jacket for you Bella?" I asked and helped her out of her coat.

"Bella?" I heard Alice say, "Bella?" she said again a little louder and took a step towards her like she was about to run and throw her arms around Bella.

"Alice" I said in a stern voice looking at her. I hoped that she would remember that our company was not just Bella and we had a cover to keep up.

"Family, I would like to introduce you to William Campbell, and his fiancée Bella. Will, Bella, this is my family. My wife Esme, and my adopted children: Edward, Alice, Jasper, Emmett, and Rose." I introduced them all in order, I was surprised when I got to Rose and she looked genuinely happy to see Bella.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all, Thank you for having us over, I hope it wasn't too much of an inconvenience for you?" Bella said, she was doing a very good job at keeping our cover. In fact she was doing it better than most my family at this point

"No, not at all," Esme said, "I'm so happy you could make it." My poor Esme looked like she would be crying if it were possible and I wanted to go and hold her, and promise that everything would be okay now, but that was a promise I couldn't keep.

"We didn't know what to bring you so we just grabbed a bottle of Pinot Noir, hope that suits?" Will said handing me a bag with the Wine in it. I showed our guests to the living room, all of my 'children' following after us having decided all of a sudden that having to fake it through dinner was no longer such an inconvenience. I poured the wine for the 'adults' and we mad small talk before Esme called us into eat. I noticed Bella and Will hang back not knowing where to sit and then found their seats. Will lovingly pulled out the nearest chair for Bella to sit in, which just so happened to be next to Edward. Bella didn't hesitate and seemed unfazed by the proximity of her and Edward.

"Your house is amazing Esme, You sure do have a talent for design." Bella said placing her serviette on her lap she was so poised and grown up now, my daughter still young and beautiful yet she seemed more confident and assured than ever before.

"Thank-you Bella, but I really didn't do much to this home actually, Perhaps now that we are all settled in I can try to design it some more." Esme replied and I smiled at her knowing that the thought of her family being back together was already doing wonders for Esme.

We talked about the house and Will asked for my help in the future, helping him and Bella find a bigger place after they were married, hinting at the idea of needing more space for children. Edward growled then and I warned him in my mind to behave himself or leave. Bella looked up obviously having heard Edward and looked at Will and seeing he was obviously unaware of what had just occurred took a sip of her wine. We continued talking, Alice and Rose asking questions and Rose seeming to be genuinely interested in Bella's answers. It was all going relatively smoothly until Emmett decided to join into the conversation and in usual Emmett style finds the one topic that is trying to be avoided to the forefront of the conversation.

"But, isn't there like rules against students and professors dating?" Emmett asked, "I thought you could lose your job if you did that?"

"Well..." Will started, what he thought he could say to that, I don't know, since at WWU that was exactly what Will was facing, I had gotten a long spiel about that even though I am a married man, WWU took it seriously not only could Will lose his job but it could potentially effect Bella's degree.

"Emmett that is none of your concern, besides their engaged, it's hardly some fling" I said sternly not knowing what else to say, then I looked at all of my children saying, "I will expect that all of you will respect Will and Bella's privacy and not talk about their relationship around the university, do I make myself clear?"

"Umm, yea, I'm sorry I didn't mean anything by it sorry man." Emmett said "Actually it's kinda hot."

"EMMETT!" Esme, Rose and I yelled at him all at the same time while Rose hit him in the head.

"What it is, they wouldn't make schoolgirl costumes if it wasn't hot."Emmett said trying to defend himself. Could he be more insensitive to Edward bringing that little visual of Bella and Will to Edwards mind, Bella blushed then.

"Its okay man, don't worry about it." Will said to Emmett smiling. A minute later I heard a chair being loudly moved and then Edward said, "Excuse me but I have to go" in a pained voice and took off upstairs. Shit, I excused myself, and made my way up to Edward's room knocking on his door while walking in, I didn't want to give Edward a chance to tell me to go away.

"Edward, Son are you okay?" I asked him he was pacing his room and pulling at his hair.

"AM I OKAY? Is that a joke Carlisle? Do you know what he was just thinking about? Oh of course you do you walked in on them! How could she Carlisle, how could she let him touch her, it just makes me sick, I didn't even know vampires could get sick. I should go downstairs and rip him limb from limb for touching my angel."

"Edward stop! Now I'm sorry but you have to get a hold of yourself. You left her remember? We all asked you not to and you demanded we follow you, and out of respect for you we did, but that's my daughter down there and after how I saw she looked in those months after we left her and I went to Forks to check on her..." Edward winced at the visual I had of Bella thinking about those times. "Edward, you wanted her to move on, to live a normal life, to get married and have kids. She is happy now anyone in this house can see that, even you. So pull yourself together and face the consequences of your actions like a man." We were quiet for a while listening to the conversation down below, Rose was asking why they chose to have their wedding at the beach, when all of a sudden Edward Picked up his Lamp and chucked it at the wall."I can't take this! I want her back, I need her back, She's mine." Edwards said staring at the shards of broken glass that lay sprawled across his floor.

"No Edward, I'm sorry but she isn't yours anymore." I said gently, I hated to hurt him but he had to come to grips with reality. He had let her go when she was willing to give up everything even the chance at an afterlife to be with him and he had broken her heart and abandoned her. Now she had moved on and in his letting her get away, she had changed in such a short amount of time from a young women to a women. She was different now, we could all see it plain as day all over her; Her speech, the way she carried herself, the way she dressed and presented herself, hell I had walked in on Will and her role playing at his work, the Bella I had known wouldn't have done that.

"I'm going for a hunt, I need some fresh air and I can't listen to his thoughts anymore, they are always on her, his whole life revolves around her and its driving me insane. He said walking to the window. I'm sorry Carlisle, I'll be back tonight I promise tell Esme, But its ripping out my heart to see them together." And he jumped out the window running into the forest.

I made my way back downstairs, making an excuse for Edward and we finished our meal in peace. I asked Will to come upstairs with me to help me with some questions I had in order to give Bella some time with the others to speak frankly with one another. In no time Will was itching to go back to check on Bella and I had no legitimate reason to keep him in my office any longer so we made our way downstairs. After a few more blushes from Bella and a quick farewell we made plans to have dinner at Bella and Wills apartment in 2 weeks, and after a quick car chat between Will, Rose, Emmett, and Jasper Will got in his car and drove away back home. The night was over, and my family had Bella back at least in a sense we did. Hopefully in time and with patience she will open back up to us, but either way I knew that this was the simplest it was going to ever get again in this moment. Now that everyone knew she was here more drama would ensue.

RPOV (Rose)

I'm not going to lie, I wasn't crazy about moving back here in the first place, but Carlisle thought it would bring the family back closer together and I thought hey whatever can restore us to what we were is fine by me, people always get the wrong idea about me, my family means the world to me. But then Alice has this vision of some human man coming to dinner and then this morning Carlisle calls a family meeting to say we all had to meet and greet him before running off to ignore him and I thought 'not again!' What was with my family and the need to befriend humans and bring them into our home. Had we not learned anything from Bella?

I know I was always a bitch to her. At first it was because I couldn't believe what Edward saw in her that he had never seen in me. Don't get me wrong, I have no interest in Edward never have, never will, but it bothered me that I was lacking something that he thought was needed and I worried that her knowing would doom us all. After that my jealousy turned to her human side, She was human and had everything I wanted most and she knew about us, she knew that she would never be able to have children with Edward and have a normal life and she was throwing it all away, and I knew that she didn't realize yet how important those things might one day be to here. She was blinded by first love and intended or not Edwards's vampire qualities only deepened this love she had for him.

I liked her, no one else in my family knew that of course, I even managed to hide those thoughts from Edward but I did like her. She would come around more and more and she reminded me in a lot of ways of Vera my human best friend, the only person I had ever been jealous of as a human; And seeing Vera in Bella only enhanced my need to drive Bella away and into a normal life because Vera who had never wanted a husband and family like I had, had become her best and happiest self once she had those things and I knew Bella would be the same. So I was mean to her in hopes that she would get fed up and leave Edward, find a man that she got along with his whole family. Then her 18th birthday rolled around and as usual Alice went way overboard. It was nice to see Bella aging, she had more time to choose, to figure out her priorities. Then with one little paper cut everything went wrong. We were generally not affected so much with blood, if we had been then we could never have allowed ourselves to attend school, but I think it was the shock of it all and the fact that Jasper hadn't been hunting in about a week and a half. So there we were all staring at Bella with a degree of bloodlust, yet under control, and Jasper is there feeling all of our bloodlust along with his own while being hungry. It all had happened so quickly even for me; and next thing I know Bella had been thrown across the room into a pile of plates and is bleeding even more.

When the night was all said and done Carlisle had fixed her up as usual but our life was never going to be the same, everyone had adopted Bella into our family human or not. Then Edward came home to tell us we were leaving NOW! He was panicked, he had almost lost his love tonight and he was going to do anything it took not to have a repeat, that meant he, along with us, were leaving Bella. We left and my family fell apart, and now just as we are trying to get back to what we were Carlisle was bringing yet another human into our lives.

I mumbled and reluctantly got in line when Carlisle called us to line up in order to greet his guest. Carlisle reminded everyone to be on their best behaviour as we heard voices talking about our house. One sounded a little familiar. Two voice, two heartbeats (one a little more erratic then the other) and then a knock on the door. I wasn't paying any attention until our guests entered our Foyer and I looked up to see Bella. See looked amazing, still small and petite, yet so different she even had curves now. She looked beautiful with a black and white cocktail dress, black cashmere trench, black clutch, and black pumps. She wore her long brown hair poker straight and she wore the perfect amount of makeup not overdoing it. I couldn't help but smile as I registered the man she had arrived with, tall, dark, and handsome was an understatement; even for a human this man was hot. They were matching in black and white and looked so comfortable and happy together, he had his arm around Bella with his hand settled around her opposite hip keeping her close to him in a loving way.

Carlisle took her coat from her and hung it up. The whole family except Carlisle seemed frozen. That was until Alice spoke up.

"Bella?" I heard Alice say, "Bella?" she said again and took a step towards Bella

"Alice." Carlisle said in a stern voice. Stopping her in her tracks, it was then that she looked at Will and realized that we had a cover to protect.

"Family, I would like to introduce you to William Campbell, and his fiancée Bella. Will, Bella, this is my family. My wife Esme and my adopted children: Edward, Alice, Jasper, Emmett, and Rose." He said pointing to everyone in the order we stood. We were all just staring at her not knowing how to proceed. We had left her, no we had abandoned her, and now we had to face the music.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all, Thank you for having us over, I hope it wasn't too much of an inconvenience for you?" she said politely. Her voice was different now, and I realized that's why I couldn't place it before. She spoke with elegance and seemed to be saying all the right things, she was here because her Fiancé had asked her to come and meet his friends wife, and she had come for Will. I wanted to talk to her, maybe now that she was so settled and happy in her human life she would be able to see what I tried to do for her, I hoped so because I really wanted to know about her life now. I watched all evening as she drank wine and said the right things; she never let any awkwardness be shown when she was seated next to Edward at dinner. If I hadn't known for sure this was Bella I would have sworn she had no clue who we were and thought it was her first time meeting us, such a change from the Bella that couldn't lie to save her life.

I asked her questions about her and Will, hoping that she would see that I was genuinely interested in her life, and she answered them all politely.

Emmett started asking questions, getting back into 'big brother mode' trying to make sure Will was good enough for Bella when he stumbled no ran, right into the hidden elephant in the room. Will was a professor at WWU where Bella went to school, which was a big no no. They had said they had been dating for coming on 3 years, so they had started dating Bella's first year of University. I have to admit I never would have thought Bella the type to get involved in such a controversial relationship. Hell what was I saying she fell in love with a vampire, a professor was nothing.

It was after Emmett's brilliant comment of the schoolgirl thing being hot that Esme, Carlisle and I yelled at him to drop it while I hit him on the back of his head that Emmett went even further.

"What it is, they wouldn't make schoolgirl costumes if it wasn't hot." Emmett said trying to defend himself. I could feel Bella's blush from across the table and knew without reading minds that Emmett had hit a nerve. I was looking at Bella when I heard a chair being loudly moved and then Edward said, "Excuse me but I have to go" in a pained voice and took off upstairs. Shit he obviously got the inside scoop on whatever was embarrassing Bella from Will's mind and was going to be hell to live with now. I could hear him bitching to Carlisle about Will and what he had seen, apparently by the sounds of things Carlisle had witnessed something between Bella and Will.

We made it through the rest of the evening with little difficulty; Bella surprised us all at her strength and directness when she told us how the situation was going to go. "Listen, I will tell you guys the same thing I told Carlisle, when he popped back into my life. We need to get along, Will doesn't know that I know any of you and I would prefer it stays that way. What with you guys not looking the age you would need to be for me of to known you like I did back then. So I'll see you when I see you. And I won't lie, it has been nice to see you all again, even if it was a bit awkward; but other than that, I'm not the same person you left in Forks, and honestly you all didn't end up being the kind of people I thought you were. So it's a clean slate as of now, ok."

A clean slate, that sounded good, I hoped that applied to me too. She confronted me about my change in attitude towards her and I was able to convince her that it was genuine at least, hopefully she would let me explain later why I did the things I did.

Will returned to her side with a kiss and they reminded me a lot of Carlisle and Esme. You could see their love for each other in every little thing they did, quiet and subtle sometimes but always there. They excused themselves after yet another embarrassing moment of Bella's that I didn't understand and we said goodbye to them. Esme brilliantly got us all invited to their place for dinner in 2 weeks and I thought to myself I would have to try to see Bella before that and try to explain myself.

We followed them out and saw Wills Beauty of a car, Will, Emmett, Jasper, and myself all talked about it until Will realised that Bella was already sitting in the car obviously wishing to leave. He said goodnight yet again, and we watched him drive back down our drive way.

"Carlisle" we all said at once, "you have some explain to do."

"Yes, I know, but let's wait until Edward returns shall we." Carlisle stopped the conversation and walked inside ignoring all of our objections.

CPOV

I knew tonight was going to be long, I was just sitting in my office waiting for Edward to return. At 2 in the morning I heard the back door open.

"Carlisle" Edward said, his voice still tense

I made my way downstairs and into the living room where everyone was sitting already. Edward looked better but not by much, at least his eyes were golden so he had managed to hunt.

"I know you all must hate me right now for keeping her a secret" I started but was cut off

"How long? How long have you known about her? Is this why we moved here?" asked Edward, his voice was strained

"No Edward I honestly thought she would be far away from here when we moved to Seattle, I ran into her on Monday by accident and that has been the only time I've seen her since." Edward flinched obviously having thought about the vision of me walking in on them.

"Why didn't you tell us Monday?" Esme asked softly and it broke my heart that she was hurting

"I didn't know what to do at first, and I thought if Edward or Jasper knew they would try to disappear or try and make us disappear, Bella had already seen me, I couldn't do that to her again." I said

I looked at Edward, "I know this is hard son and I'm truly sorry, but this is what you wanted to happen and now it has. You needed to see it, your sacrifice was right for Bella she is happy now."

Edward just growled, he was frustrated torn between wanting to get Bella back and knowing that what I said was the truth, he was leaning over his head in his hands pulling at his hair.

I looked at Jasper," Jasper son, You needed her forgiveness. No one blames you for what happened all those years ago but you kept holding on to it and beating yourself up. You needed to see her again, to see she wasn't afraid of you. Do you understand?"

"I do Carlisle and your right, I would have tried to run and I did need to see her and have her tell me to shut the fuck up." He laughed a smile playing at his lips for the first time in a long time, "Man she is feisty now, so strong..." he stopped talking and looked as if he was thinking of Bella.

"I know your right and you did what you did because it was for the best but it breaks my heart that she has been so close and I haven't even known." Esme said softly.

"I know Esme, we have missed so much of our daughter's life and now here she is grown up and engaged, I think it will take some time but I think she will let us back in. It may never be like it was before but it could be better, who knows." I said wrapping my arms around Esme.

"I hope so" Rose said quietly and we all looked at her

"WHAT? I don't deserve forgiveness?" She screeched

"No, I mean of course you do it just that.." I said, "Well, I thought you hated her."

"Well I don't." She replied leaning into Emmett.

"What I don't get is why I didn't see her?" Alice said.

"I don't know, I have been wondering about that myself actually. Perhaps in time we will figure it out." I said, it was no more easily explained then why Edward could not hear her.

"Actually I couldn't always feel her emotions either." Jasper said looking at Alice. "I could sometimes when she was really embarrassed or feeling overjoyed and in love but other than that she could have been a wall for the lack of and emotion rolling off of her."

"Hmm that is odd" I said, "perhaps whatever it is that enables her to keep Edward out is growing stronger with age?" I hypothesised.

"Okay everyone; before we end this family meeting I must stress one thing. Bella lives with Will who has no idea of our past with her; He knows she had an ex boyfriend named Edward and a best friend Alice that moved away but doesn't know anymore or that we are them obviously. We need to be extra careful, which means no breaking and entering, Edward, Alice, It's not like it was when she was with Charlie. William will know if you just pop in through their bedroom window for a quick chat. I think we should be patient and let Bella come to us." I said.

"Okay" everyone said quietly they didn't like it but knew they had no choice. "K then, Family meeting adjourned."

Everyone went their separate ways and I hated seeing Edward walk upstairs alone, yet again the odd man out.

A/N: Well my wonderful readers and reviewers, I apologize for the amount of time it took me to post this, I wrote my last midterm today so hopefully I will be updating more often, thank you to those who are still with me and those who continue to review. working on the next chapter so hopefully it'll be up quickly. hope you enjoyed it and give me shit if you don't :)