Glad you liked the last chapter and I hope you like this one, too!

Enjoy!

Maddie went hunting with Edward that night. They had left before their siblings came back home, so they couldn't offer to join them.

It was quite complicated for Maddie to hunt with her injured hand ... she was very thirsty, suppressing the searing hot pain had taken its toll on her. So while she was eagerly swallowing the blood of a young doe, she had somehow lost her finger again; she hadn't been careful enough and animals struggle!

So when she came home, the pain was as bad as it had been before. Especially, because the wound was even dirtier now, but she couldn't get the dirt particles out without trembling and crying, so she decided to forego the cleaning part ... her venom would probably dissolve the foreign substances, so there was no need for her to do it.

Jasper felt it immediately - the nervousness, tension and pain was very prominent. That's why he asked her if she was all right or if she needed help, but she just told him she was upset about having to clean up her room.

When he wouldn't believe her and then even threatened to tell Carlisle that she's hurt so that he could examine her, Maddie made him unable to sense the mixed emotions she was feeling by dictating him to feel her being sulky and angry because of her room.

Alice told her that she was being stupid and that she should tell their parents, but Maddie wouldn't listen. It was too late for that now, wasn't it?

She knew she never should have lied ... Edward would have been in trouble for not being careful, she wouldn't! Dammit, and now she had to cover up for him ... and herself.

Edward didn't listen to Alice either, even though the two were very close. In the end Alice just said they were on their own now and she would not get involved.

"Madeline! Time for school, please come down now!" Carlisle called, not wanting to be late.

He drummed his fingers on the kitchen counter impatiently, until Maddie finally came into view.

She had been sitting in her room, taking a layer of gooey tape off her stupid finger once again. The venom kind of melted the tape, so it would lose its function pretty quickly and her finger was loose again.

Yes, Maddie wasn't too smart about that - the tape soiled the wound again and again, that way it just couldn't heal, but she kept on using just that instead of a bandage or the like.

Edward had promised her to stay out of her head, he felt guilty and would have done anything to make her feel better. So he did not notice that what his sister was doing was just plain dumb.

When Carlisle called for the third time, telling her to come down or he would come up, she let out a little whimper, then jumped over to her closet and looked through the clothes and accessories.

Nothing there, except for a pair of mittens. Pink mittens.

Maddie thought about it, but then dismissed the idea of wearing them in order to hide her injured hand. She hated the colour pink with a passion, and it was still too warm to be wearing mittens. Her parents would know for sure that something was off.

Putting a fresh layer of tape around her finger, she then pulled her old, black gloves over her hands and nodded her head in satisfaction. These ones didn't hide all the tape, because Maddie had cut the fingers off of these gloves a while ago, but maybe nobody would notice.

"There you are. Let's go, we do not want to be late," Carlisle said as soon as his youngest walked into the kitchen. He hastily kissed his wife goodbye, waited for her to kiss Maddie goodbye, the led his daughter into the garage.

Maddie had yet another idea for hiding her hands: Instead of wearing her school blazer, she had just draped it over her left forearm, effectively hiding her hand from view - it looked casual and inconspicious. Perfect.

"Carlisle!" Edward followed them to the garage, saying, "I could take her to school."

Carlisle frowned. "It is quite all right, Edward, we'll still make it in time."

"But -" Edward started to say, but Carlisle interrupted him.

"Get in the car, Madeline," Carlisle just said, pointing towards his Mercedes.

Maddie nodded her head and obeyed her father.

Then he turned back around, letting his arm rest on the roof of his car. "What is going on, Edward? What's this about?"

"I would just like to spend more time with Maddie."

"You'll pick her up from school today," Carlisle remarked, then tilted his head to the side. "What's really going on?"

Edward hesitated, then answered. "I held her up, it's my fault she wasn't ready on time. If you allow me to take her to school, you won't be running late for work. I'd make me feel better."

"No, I still have time. But thank you for your concern. Now go and wait for your siblings."

He gave his son a pat on the shoulder, then walked around the car and sat down in the driver's seat.

"Buckle up, sweetie," Carlisle said while fastening his own seatbelt.

Maddie rolled her eyes at her own stupidity. Why hadn't she just buckled up while her Dad was talking to Edward?

It wasn't exactly easy to put the buckle into the counterpiece while trying not to move her left hand and keeping it hidden underneath her blazer.

But at least Carlisle was focussing on the road ahead and she could take her time. He wanted her to wear a seatbelt whenever they drove through town - he was a doctor, after all. A doctor, who wouldn't let his children drive without a seatbelt - for safety reasons, of course. Well, at least that was what humans were supposed to think.

"You may put your blazer on the backseat, honey, no need to hold it for the car ride."

"Nah, it's okay," she said coolly.

"Are you trying to hide the fact that you are wearing gloves?" he asked and shot her a glance. "You know you cannot wear them in class."

"I won't wear them in class, just put them in my locker as soon as I'm at school, okay?" She became more and more agitated by the second. Why did he ask so many questions? Ugh.

So she rummaged in her backpack, which was lying on the floor between her knees, and retrieved her MP3-player.

Carlisle looked over at her when she started to disentangle the cord of her ear plugs with one hand. It took longer than it normally would, but finally she was done.

Pushing the plugs into her ears, she started the music. That way she wouldn't need to talk to her father. It was hard enough to ignore the pain and trying to maintain a casual attitude. But answering all of his questions on top of that? Sooner or later she would get in trouble then, she knew it.

Before they reached the street where her school was located, Carlisle nudged his daughter lightly.

"Maddie, put your music away, we are nearly there," he said.

Maddie sighed, then switched the player off and stuffed it back into the backpack. Too bad she didn't coil the cable of her ear plugs around the music devise, because it caught in the zipper of her bag, effectively stopping it from being zipped up.

She huffed, then reached forward with both hands, to open the bag again, stuff the cable into the pocket further and close the zipper.

"Why do you have duct tape wrapped around your finger?" Carlisle asked, frowning. When she had buggered about with her bag, he had looked over to see what she was doing. He immediately noticed something silvery poking out from under her glove.

Damn.

She froze momentarily and went with the first excuse that came to her mind. "I was bored," she answered with a wave of her hand.

"Take it off, dear," he ordered.

"Yeah, I'll do it at school."

"Take it off now. I don't want you playing with it throughout class and then getting yourself in trouble for not paying attention."

"I won't play with it, I'll take it straight off once I'm inside," she replied petulantly, raising her voice.

Carlisle narrowed his eyes at her. Something wasn't right with his daughter, he could sense it; and he was determined to find out what was going on.

They had reached the school by now and Carlisle stopped the car next to the big iron gate that opened up to the front court of the school.

"Madeline, take it off now."

"Why?" she whined.

"I told you why."

Maddie glared at him and crossed her arms in defiance. She wanted to stall as much as possible, so Carlisle would just give up and let her leave before she would be late for first period. And she had actually crossed her arms only to get her left hand further away from her Dad without him noticing.

Unfortunately, that specific gesture made him notice.

So he reached over and wrapped his fingers around Maddie's wrist, pulling her hand towards himself. She struggled in his grip but he was stronger and wouldn't let go.

First he pulled the glove off her hand, uncovering more tape wound around her finger. The closer it got to the palm of her hand, the more deformed it looked. That was odd.

Then he got hold of the tape and unwrapped it from her finger, revealing a nasty cut all the way around it. It was deep, and the tape had gone quite gooey, sticking to the wound. The moment Carlisle pulled the tape completely off - which had gone stringy the closer it got to the wound - Maddie's finger shifted and kind of hung from her hand - like it was boneless or numb. The smell of venom and molten plastic hit them and Maddie gagged. It really smelled worse in the car than back home in her room with wide open windows.

"What happened?" He sounded shocked, then scanned her hand with an experienced eye. He figured out what must have happened, but still wanted her to tell him.

She tried to squirm out of the hold her father had on her wrist, all the while averting her eyes.

"I expect an answer, young lady. What happened to your finger?" he asked, louder now.

"I'm gonna be late, Daddy, let go!" she whined, then finally managed to pull free from her Dad's grip. She wanted to open the door in order to flee from the car, but her father activated the power door locks quickly.

"Oh no, you don't," he snarled and fixed her with a glare.

Well, she still could have opened the passenger door considering she was a vampire and stronger than the stupid lock, but it probably wasn't the best idea right now to destroy her father's Mercedes.

"I cut my finger and -"

"This is not just a cut, Madeline! Your finger has been broken off, am I right?"

When she didn't answer, he spoke again.

"That is why you screamed yesterday, isn't it? Did Edward do that?"

She considered telling him a lie about how it happened during her hunt, but then decided against it. He knew. She knew that he knew.

"It was an accident," she mumbled, but did not dare to look him in the eye.

"Then why didn't you come to me right away?" Carlisle queried with a raised eyebrow, incredibly agitated that she would try to hide such an injury from him. The pain she must be feeling ...

"It's already healing. No big deal, really." She rejected the injury with a shrug of her shoulders, but he could see her eyes glazing over with venom. Now that her finger wasn't supported by the tape anymore, the pain was probably intensifying again.

Carlisle let his fingers run through his hair exasperatedly; he realised that talking about what happened right now wouldn't make any sense. And his daughter was still in pain, therefore he wanted to tend to her wound immediately.

"We are running out of time. I'll clean your wound and bandage it. But rest assured, we'll talk more when I come home from work. Understood?"

Maddie nodded her head - she looked scared and close to tears.

Carlisle got out of his car and retrieved his medical bag from the trunk.

Walking back to the front of the car, he got into the driver's seat and opened the bag.

"Not even the bone has mended!" he huffed, while getting the gluey and dirty remnants of the tape out of the wound. "Madeline, you didn't clean it properly, it cannot heal that way! And don't ever use duct tape!"

"Be careful, Daddy," she begged while taking deep breaths. It hurt, no need to pretend that it didn't anymore.

Carlisle then heaved an exasperated sigh and explained, "I have to detach your finger in order to put it together properly, only the lower layers of skin have grown together."

Her eyes, wide and shining with venom, looked so panicky and scared. "No, please don't ... it'll heal of it's own, don't take it off!"

The school bell rang and the girls, who had still been standing in front of the building, walked inside now.

The windows of Carlisle's car were tinted, therefore nobody could have seen Maddie's injured hand. But he waited anyways because he wanted to make sure nobody was around in case Maddie would scream.

He couldn't pay mind to her begging - the way this wound looked, it would never heal.

So he just looked her deep in the eye and said, "Brace yourself."

She whimpered and bit down on her lip to keep herself from crying out when her father took her finger completely off.

Maddie couldn't help but start shaking and sobbing; it hurt too much.

He felt a pang of guilt for causing her this pain, for making her cry ... but he was trying to help her and there was no way around it. Had she shown him the wound the day before, right after it had happened, then she wouldn't have suffered for so long and he wouldn't have needed to take her finger off.

The irritation and concern he felt were pressing down on his chest. "If you are injured and not come to me straight away ever again, I will put you over my knee, you hear?" he threatened, hoping a situation like this would never occur again. The poor thing had been suffering for such a long time now, and it had been completely unnecessary.

"Yes," Maddie replied in a strained voice, teary-eyed. It really hurt, the disinfection stuff burned and smelled horrible, but he wouldn't let her pull away. He wrapped her hand in a white bandage, fixing everything so her finger could not shift and would finally be able to heal properly.

When he was done, he stroked her cheek lovingly, then embraced her in a tight hug.

"All done, princess," he cooed. "It'll stop hurting soon, I promise."

She nodded her head, and wiped at her eyes with her good hand.

He watched his daughter for a moment and decided that she shouldn't be attending classes in a condition like this.

"Sweetie," he sighed. "I wouldn't be comfortable letting you sit in class all day while not feeling well. I think, I better take you back home to your mother."

"No, it's okay," she said, sniffling.

"You are in pain. You should rest, darling. Esme will take good care of you, all right?"

"Daddy please, let me decide." Maddie didn't really like school, but thinking about facing Esme right now wasn't very appealing. She knew her mother would look after her, trying to make her feel better, but it would just make Maddie feel even guiltier instead.

"I'm staying."

Carlisle thought about that. She had been hunting mere hours ago and her hand would be able to heal properly now, what with all the melted tape removed. So she wouldn't pose a danger to the humans surrounding her. But he also thought about her well-being. She would make a quicker recovery under Esme's care than here at school.

He just started the car.

"Stop! I'm not coming with you!" Maddie suddenly complained.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart, but I am taking you home now," he told her and sped down the street, away from school.

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