CHAPTER 28

The trip back to the house seemed to be a lot shorter than the trip to wherever Victoria had taken me had been. And it looked exactly the same as when I'd left. The decorations were still up, and surprisingly still looked brand new. And the guests were still here, and rushed out to greet us when we returned. Seth, being so young and seeming to like me a lot for some reason, was extremely worried about me, but calmed down once he knew for sure I was alright.

"Where are Edward and Rosalie?" Tanya asked, noticing the absence of the two most noticeable family members.

Everyone was silent for a moment. It seemed to me like no one wanted to admit that Edward was really not coming back, and Rosalie probably not either.

"Edward Mason has been banished from the Cullen family."

There were murmurs all around and finally Katie burst out, "but why Carlisle? For what he did to Bella earlier this year?"

"Not only what he did to Bella then. He was in on the plot to kidnap her from the wedding. He was in league with Victoria. For that he has been banished. He has betrayed her, a member of his family since she said I do, and he has betrayed us, his family and friends. He has not lived up to what he knows to be the Cullen code of conduct. For that, he is banished. Until, and if, we say so, Edward Mason will not be coming back to this house. The wrong he has caused one of our number is too great for us to overcome now."

Carlisle's voice was full of the pain he'd suppressed in the clearing. Now it almost broke my nonbeating heart to hear him so forlorn, so broken.

"But what about Rose?" Tanya asked.

"Rosalie can return whenever she wants. She is still part of this family. If she will come back, I do not know. She appears to love Edward but we will see if her love for him will overcome her love for the rest of her family. There is no telling at this point."

There was a very loud silence before Jake cleared his throat. "So…newlyweds, you want to open your presents?" he asked with a sly grin.

I looked up at Emmett and he shook his head. We might not have Edward's mind reading ability, but we knew what each other were thinking.

I looked back at Jake. "No, we don't want to open our presents yet. Because you see, we haven't really had our wedding yet."

Alice let out a shrill squeal. "We're redoing it?" she demanded, bouncing up and down.

"Well…we're redoing the vows, but I am not getting all glamored up again. I don't think I could handle it, especially since we're already married and I've waited way too long for this as it is. But…it won't feel the same if we don't redo it."

"Come on Bella! You have to at least wear the dress!" Alice pouted.

I shook my head. My wedding dress had been a one time thing, a thing to wear for one special moment. And that moment had been the minute I walked down that aisle and saw the man I was going to marry, his eyes filled with love for just me. I would not be wearing my wedding dress again. "No Alice, but I will let you pick out a different dress for me, just a simple one though. Nothing extravagant!" I yelled as she flitted away before I was done talking. I sighed and looked at Emmett. "I'll be back soon, and then this will all be a memory and our life together will start."

He grinned down at me, kissed me swiftly, and pushed me from him gently. "I suppose I should at least put on something presentable?" he questioned. I looked him over and realized that he was wearing his tux, and it was a complete disaster from his trek through the forest searching for me.

"I suppose you should," I said, giving him my breathtaking smile, laughing, and flitting away after Alice.

She'd already picked out a green dress of me, floor length but slimming, not poofy at all. It hugged my curves and had a generous v neckline and little back to it, much like my ball dress had been, but without the beads, and it was a different color green. I didn't let her do my hair, or my makeup, that would have taken too long. I just put on the dress, let her find a necklace and earrings to match it, put on some silver high heels, and walked from the room.

Emmett was already waiting in black dress pants and a pristinely white shirt that seems almost out of place on him. He was even wearing an emerald green tie. We smiled at each other simultaneously as I walked toward him, and burst out laughing.

The words this time seemed to be less than a second long, and in a flash Emmett was kissing me, bending me backward like they do in the movies. Jake and the guys let out wolf whistles and everyone clapped. We didn't break apart right away and eventually Alice intervened, pulling me away from my husband.

"You can do all that and more on your honeymoon! This time is for the rest of us!" Alice said loudly to general laughter. I sighed and let her pull me away. But she made the mistake of leading me to the dance floor. Instantly Emmett's arms were around me and I snuggled closer.

"This time is for me," Emmett growled at her good naturedly. Everyone knew that the first dance was important. And then my very favorite love song came on, God Blessed the Broken Road. We twirled around and around, not talking, just looking at each other, listening to the words. It worked so well for us, we had both been through lovers and significant others to get to each other, and we had had our hearts broken, and this had led us into each other's arms.

The song ended and Emmett twirled me away from him, so we were holding one hand and our other was swung out parallel with the floor. Of course everyone clapped, I would get sick of that relatively quickly I was sure. More dancing followed that, and the cutting of the cake, of which none of the vampires ate. But for the group of always hungry werewolves…the fact that half the people here wouldn't be eating left more for them and they were happy with that.

And finally to the part that Jake had apparently wanted us to get to; the presents. The Denali group gave me a beautiful necklace with what they said were very rare emeralds from the crater of a volcano, what emeralds were doing in a volcano I'd never know, but they were gorgeous nonetheless, and they gave Emmett a beautiful watch made from solid gold with a ring of diamonds around the face. The wolves gave us something even more special, to me anyway, they gave us permission to cross the treaty line, to let us visit whenever we wanted to. I hugged Sam especially hard for this, I knew it was really his decision.

"Thank you so much Sam. I was…that was one of the things I regretted most about being a vampire, I'd lose all of you. And now you've given it back to me," I whispered.

"Bella, you were our friend before you were a vampire, we wouldn't just forget you like that. Besides, we didn't have very much money, not like all these vampires that have been accumulating it for centuries," he teased, "and we wanted to give you something you would enjoy."

I nodded, speechless now. Next was Charlie. I thought that Charlie had little more money than the pack, but somehow he'd managed to buy Emmett and I a house, way up in the mountains, for when we wanted to be alone. From the picture, it wasn't a small house either. It was two stories and had a wrap around porch and big white columns. The master bedroom was huge, probably half the top floor. It included a big walk in closet that Alice seemed to love, a huge bathroom with a whirlpool, and the best thing of all, an enormous bed that could easily have fit the whole Cullen family, Charlie, and Jake comfortably, though I doubt Jake would have been very comfortable.

"Dad, how did you…." I couldn't finish, just looked at him questioningly.

"Bella, I lived all alone for a long time. Other than the necessities, I didn't buy anything. And a cop does make pretty good money… What do you think I did with all of it?"

"I don't know. I never really thought about it. But dad this is too much! It must have cost a fortune!" I protested.

"Not really, just about…let's see. I think it was around $55,000, because it doesn't come with a lot of land, and the land it does come with is all forest so you can't do anything with it except hunt. And I figured…you'll be doing a lot of that so…"

"55,000 dollars!" I exclaimed.

"It's nothing Bella, honestly. I still have some left, and being a vampire…I'll be getting plenty more…just thank me already will you? Or I'll give it to Alice and Jasper."

From the corner of my eye I saw Alice jump up and down a little and said, "thank you so much dad, I love you," as I hugged him tightly.

"I love you too Bells, and I'm happy you're happy. You've got a good man now, don't ever let him go like I did your mother."

"I won't." I let him go and kissed his cheek before moving out of the way so Emmett could thank him.

And then came the presents from the Cullens. Knowing them they would be extravagant and very expensive. Indeed, Carlisle and Esme gave us airplane tickets to go to Iceland, though I wasn't sure what there was in Iceland that was so interesting…but just to be out of the country would be amazing for me, and I was sure not everyone had a chance like this in one lifetime, let alone eternity. Rose wasn't here, but Alice gave us her present. I wasn't surprised that it was something romantic. She'd gotten us reservations at a really expensive, really nice restaurant, and tickets for the Opera.

And then came Alice and Jasper's present. I was surprised when, instead of handing us something, she dragged me around the house, the rest of the guests following. And there, sitting in front of the house looking brand new and extremely inviting was an emerald green 2008 Camaro. I let out a gasp as she handed me a set of keys.

"No way Alice!" I squealed, looking at her. She just smiled at me and nodded toward the car. I was next to it instantly, running my fingers gently over the sparkly green paint as I made my way toward the driver's door. I had wanted one of these since I had seen the Transformers movie, and now I had one! I slid gracefully inside and admired the grey leather seats, the CD player, the GPS system, the sound quality, the satellite radio. Everything I could have wanted to be in my car was here. I turned the key and the engine revved to life, but it was such a soft purr compared to my old truck that if I hadn't had superhuman hearing I wouldn't have heard it at all. I turned it back off and got out, running to Alice and swinging her around in a hug.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" I squealed, letting her go and hugging Jasper as well. He hugged me back and laughed. Emmett was still standing there, grinning at me. And then he frowned at Jasper, "where's my Camaro?" he demanded.

Jasper burst out laughing. "It's over there," he said, pointing into the trees. And there, between two gigantic tree trunks was a H4 Hummer, not exactly a Camaro, but I was sure that in Emmett's eyes, it was just as good. He let out a really loud yell, grabbed Jasper around the next and hugged him, and then was off. I stood with my arm around Alice's waist, laughing at my husband as he acted like a little kid.

A little while later Emmett and I were saying our goodbyes as we walked down the path to my new Camaro. Throwing our bags in the backseat and hugging the family good bye, we slid into the car and started off to our new house to get on with our honeymoon.

Okay, here's the gist. I have no idea if you can find emeralds in volcanoes, so I totally made that part up, but it sounded good to me lol. And I just figured we might need a recap of the wedding so I had them redo it, it would have seemed odd to me that they just opened the presents and everything, and I really wanted that dancing part with God Blessed the Broken Road in there. That's my favorite love song. ALSO I'm not sure what to do about the honeymoon. Let me know if you want it rated T, like how it is in the books, or if you want it M…I don't know what would be better. Please Review and let me know what you think!

By the way, this chapter was more than 2000 words, so it might be a little longer for the next chapter to come up, since this one pretty much equivocates two chapters for me. But it won't be too long, I like to keep you guys happy, and in return you can keep my happy by reviewing this story, and by checking out the other story I'm writing with a friend of mine, Unexpected Answers, about Bella and Jacob! It's called It Must Be Fate, read it and review! Thanks! Enjoy!