Bella lay on the faded quilt she had owned since she was five, the sun shining on the back of her tee shirt, knocking her ankles together as she read Jane Austen for the thousandth time.

"Pride and Prejudice, huh?" Rose laughed as she sank gracefully to the ground beside her friend.

Bella closed the book with a snap, sighing. There was nothing worse than an interruption whilst reading a good book. "Yep." She answered, a slight edge of sullenness in her voice.

"Why don't you try something new? There must have been a good five hundred thousand books printed in this century." Rose studied her nails as she spoke, searching for imperfections that of course wouldn't dare to exist.

"What I've found lacks the romance of stories from other ages."

"Well, then you've been looking in the wrong places. I found a great one…"

Bella nodded her head as Rose discussed her latest 'book' find, and smiled to herself. Rose's idea of literature usually ran towards the latest article in her favorite fashion or car magazine, her interest only occasionally stretching outwards towards novels written to tie in with her preferred movie of the moment.

"And so the lion ends up with the lamb and they all run away with the spoon." Rose finished lightly.

"Ah…what?" Bella sat up, shocked.

Rose snorted. "See, I knew you weren't listening."

"Sorry, Rose. I was on another planet. Where's Alice?"

"She's not feeling well, she sent her love, said she'd see you later."

"Ah." Bella frowned. "She seems a little…off lately."

Rose shrugged. "Something with Jazz, I think. She doesn't talk about it." She seemed unperturbed.

"You're not worried Rose?" Bella toyed with the corner of her frayed bed cover.

"Nah, everyone has there stages. They'll be fine. I mean, it's Alice and Jasper we're talking about; they were made for each other."

"Huh." Bella climbed slowly to her feet, followed by the ever elegant and willowy Rose. Stooping down, Bella folded the quilt carefully, still frowning, and scooped up both it an her book.

"Anyway, Emmett's inside waiting for you. He wants to tease you some more about Edward."

Bella face turned crimson and Rose giggled. "You're actually blushing Bells? Well, that's a good sign." They began walking towards the house. "You only ever blush when you're embarrassed, or you're attracted to someone…" They entered through the rear door.

"Or you've fallen flat on your face," Emmett interjected with a snort from the kitchen, where he was raiding the Swan's fridge for food.

Bella blushed again.

"Don't you normally have leftovers in here?" Emmett pulled his head out of the fridge to glare at Bella. "I'm starving."

Rose laughed, floating across the room to her fiancé and kissing him on the cheek. "There were leftovers in there when she was 17. Charlie can't cook to save his life, remember?"

"Ah, true, but then there is you instead, my thorny Rose. You're more than enough to sate a man's appetite…" He bared his teeth and buried his face in Rose's neck. Bella fled, followed into the living room by the sound of Rosalie's squeals and Emmett's roars.

"Those two are too much." Bella grinned to herself, flinging her quilt and book onto the sofa. The happy, 19th century face of Elizabeth Bennett, and the more serious one of Mr. Darcy stared up at her. Much of her life Bella had dreamed of a fairytale romance, of her own Mr. Darcy, her own Romeo. She smiled sadly at her own thoughts. Well, she sure got her Romeo, he'd even died for her. Was it too much to hope, though, that Romeo could have been reborn, that love could be given another chance, in another time?

The ringing of the phone interrupted her private reverie.

* * * * *

"We all miss her still, son." Carlisle Cullen patted his only remaining child on the back as they both looked at the portrait of the stunning strawberry blonde girl hanging in Carlisle's study.

"I just can't understand how no-one has found anything out. It's been 13 years! No body, no trace, nothing. Just questions. Still."

"The police did their best. There were no leads."

"How does someone just disappear like that, though? I don't get it."

"We probably never will. Tanya will always be in our hearts, though. Now," Carlisle turned his back on his daughter's picture and strode to the window that opened out over the woods. "Tell me more about this Isabella."

With a heavy sigh, Edward followed his father. "You remember, Charlie Swan's daughter."

"Oh! The one you had a crush on in your senior year?"

"The one I've had a crush on since my senior year."

Carlisle laughed. "Like father like son, huh? A one woman man."

"Yeah, but you got Mom on side long before the 12 year period." Edward ran a hand through his hair roughly, his nerves getting the better of him.

"Son, sometimes good things take time."

The two men watched the play of the breeze on the trees outside.

"She's the one," Edward said finally, breaking the silence.

Carlisle nodded. "I assumed as much, from how you speak of her, and your long attraction." He stifled a laugh.

"Mmm. There's just something about her…even when I first saw her, and I tried to think of her as a little girl…something in her air drew me in. And now, now that I have finally had a chance to spend some time with her, I know. I just know."

Carlisle watched his son's serious expression from the corner of his eye. "If you feel it's right, son, then I'm happy for you. Does Isabella know you feel so strongly?"

"No."

Carlisle sighed, noting the tightening of Edwards jaw. "That's probably a good thing. You don't want her to run for the hills before she even has a chance to see what you're like."

"You mean, before she finds out what a mess I am?"

"Of course not. You're a wonderful man, son. I just mean…"

"You mean the fact that I am hell bent on revenging my sister?"

"Something like that."

Edward turned and strode across the room, slamming the wall with his fist as he went. "I can't leave it alone though."

"I know," Carlisle said, his voice heavy with the years of guilt and misery. "You shouldn't blame yourself, it had nothing to do with you."

"It had everything to do with me," Edward responded bitterly, leaning against the door frame with his back to his father. "Could I use your phone?"

Carlisle's eyes widened in surprise at the sudden subject change. "Sure."

"Thanks." Edward waited as his father crossed the room and brushed past him through the door. He closed the door quietly behind the older man and walked slowly over to large and imposing wooden desk, the same one that had graced his father's study since as far back as Edward could remember. When he was a child he would hide under the desk from his mother at bath time; when he was a little older he would poke through the locked drawers (after finding the not very well hidden keys, of course). When they moved to Forks he dug through the papers his father didn't want him to see on a daily basis, poking through the police reports over and over, hoping to find something that would give him any kind of clue as to what had happened to his beloved sister. The only thing that could possibly lead to anything was a name; St Louis.

He sunk into his fathers chair heavily, his eyes trained on the portrait of his sister. It was taken a few months before her disappearance and in it was everything she was in life: vivacious, beautiful, carefree. She'd been only 12. She would be 27 now. Maybe married, maybe with children of her own.

Huffing in irritation at himself, Edward focused instead on the phone in front of him. Antique brass, the kind of style seen at the beginning of the twentieth century. His father loved history, loved to highlight their modern home with well chosen pieces such as this, and the sixteenth century cross that hung on the wall at the end of the corridor.

"Bella," Edward breathed. "Must focus on Bella." Bella, who had been his lifeline from the first, who had given him something to dream of other than the horrible death his sister must have faced.

* * * * *

Luned sighed happily and blinked against the bright sunlight overhead. For the first time in forever she had woken well after dawn, her bed a press of moss and leaves, her blanket the stars, the smell of the ocean and Jacob. When he had said he wanted her to see him, he'd meant everything of him. He had dragged her roughly along the beach, shown her the caves he had hidden in as a child, then hurried her through the woods that he loved, the areas where he would be alone after his mother had died, showed her the home he sometimes returned to, the bikes and cars he was fixing. When the sun had fallen and the moon had risen, and the sound of wolves bayed in the distance, he had returned with her to the woods and shown her an unforgettable night, had pushed her memories of her past Jacob far to the back of her mind.

"Sorry," He said softly from her left, curled in a ball on his side. "I owe you better than that."

Luned laughed, and he rolled to face her, shock and dismay in his brown eyes.

"I am, really. I mean…" He sat up quickly. "I know we don't know each other well yet, and I do respect you, I just--I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that."

Luned laughed again, and let her head fall to the side so her eyes and his met. "I regret nothing, Jacob Black, and nor should you."

"You don't?" Jacob choked out.

"No, I do not. I am, however, regretful that you wish you had not acted in this way…"

Jacob shook his head, completely overcome with guilt again. "Let me take you home, Luned."

Eyes wide with concern, but her heart happy, Luned nodded. "On the way you can explain 'mechnics' to me again."

"Mechanics," Jacob said automatically, pulling on his cut offs.

"Mechanics," Luned repeated.

* * * * *

"Hello?" Bella said tentatively, her stomach fluttering.

"Bella?"

It wasn't Edward, but another voice she thought sounded familiar.

"Bella? It's Laurent. Remember me? Laurent St Louis?"