Chapter 3: Who Are You?

BPOV

Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie and Emmett stared at the back door for about ten seconds before Rosalie rounded on me. I retracted my hand from Peter and crossed my arms over my chest while he stepped behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist with his thumbs lightly caressing my stomach.

'Here it comes, the bitchiness that is Rosalie Hale,' I thought to myself with a light smirk. Boy, was I ever right?

"Isabella Marie Swan, how could you just let your mate walk out of the back door like that? And then just cuddle up to another vampire, a human drinker at that, like nothing is wrong, like you've been with him all along? Carlisle, are you just going to allow her to do this, to tear apart this family?" she screeched. I rolled my eyes as Carlisle nodded his head.

"Yeah, Rose, I'm going to let her do this. She isn't ripping this family apart, Edward is. You arrived a bit later than everyone else and didn't hear a good portion of what happened. Edward threatened her on their way back from Italy. She didn't want to be with him yet he threatened the lives of her parents and their spouses in order to keep her with him. Bella is her own woman and can do as she pleases. On top of that, Peter is her true mate.

"This isn't just a thing where she saw him, thought he could save her, and went to him like you think Rose. She hadn't seen him when she was affected by him; she smelled his scent coming off of his truck and nearly collapsed! For a human to be affected by a faint scent like that is remarkable. Rosalie, this is how things are going to be. As much as I hate to do it this way, I'm standing behind Bella on this one. If there is anyone here who doesn't like that, they can leave this right this moment, leaving all things Cullen behind, until they are ready to understand this. All of you have mates; you should understand the pull that one mate has on the other." said Carlisle.

I looked at him with tears in my eyes over his support. I figured that I'd receive support from Emmett, Alice and Jasper; Carlisle and Esme could have gone either way and I knew that Rosalie would be completely against this, especially since I fought so hard to be with Edward to begin with. This was fantastic.

Rosalie stared at me, wide eyed, and took a step towards me. I leaned back into Peter more and Emmett put a restraining hand on her shoulder. She looked at him before looking at me again and opening her mouth to speak:

"Bella, I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was like that. I don't want to dislike you anymore; I can see now that you were meant to be in this world with us. I want to make up all of those times that I was mean to you; will you allow me to do that? Whatever you want, all you have to do is ask. I want you as my sister. Please Bella, you mean so much to the rest of this family, including my husband."

I looked at Carlisle, Esme, and Emmett, and they seemed happy by her statement. I then looked to Alice, Peter and Jasper because they were the three that would be able to tell me if there was anything malicious in her statement. All three of them hesitated and I nodded. For the sake of the moment, I extended my hand to her.

"Rosalie, I accept your apology but you have a lot of work to do to gain my trust. I'm not trying to be rude; I just don't automatically trust people who have been completely against me for so long. I need proof that you're willing to change your ways and truly want to be around me, that you really want me as your sister and that you aren't just trying to keep your credit card and car."

"OK, Bella, I understand completely. I will do my best." She smiled at me and shook my hand.

I looked to the rest of the family. "I love each and every one of you very much and I would understand if any of you would like to follow Edward; I've been in your lives for less than two years while he's been in your lives since all of you joined this family, half of you since you joined this existence. I do hope that, maybe one day, he and I can be friends but I'm not holding my breath. Is there anything extremely pressing that needs to be discussed or do you mind if I go lay down for a bit? I'm exhausted at the moment."

Jasper cleared his throat, drawing my attention. "Bella, there is the matter of safety of your parents, step parents, and step-siblings. We need someone to get over to Charlie and Sue's immediately."

I thought about it for a split second, then shook my head. "No, they'll be fine. Edward won't go there in malice because of Seth and Leah. If he does, they'll rip him to shreds in a heartbeat. I told them that if he ever showed up there without me that they should kill him immediately. There is always a wolf near Charlie and one near Sue in case Edward tries to attack them while they're not home. I told them what he told me because Leah and Seth always leave when he was coming over and they told the rest of the pack because they knew that none of them would come in contact with him. They should be fine.

"Is there anything else that needs to be said immediately or can it wait for a while? I need to lie down before I pass out. My head is pounding and I can't think straight at the moment."

Esme looked as if she wanted to say something but Peter stopped her and said: "Esme, if you would bring it upstairs, I will make sure she eats after she takes a hot shower and before she goes to sleep. I apologize for cutting you off but my mate needs her rest. If she doesn't at least get into a bed within the next twenty minutes she's going to pass out, resulting in Carlisle needing to use his degree to suture the laceration in her head."

Carlisle and Esme looked to Alice, who nodded her head with a small smile on her face while I swooned slightly at the protectiveness rolling off of my matepire, or maybe it was from the shock of the day's events. Either way, I was swooning. This wasn't the kind of swooning that I did around Edward, however; I actually kept my awareness of what was going on around me this time.

I looked at Peter as he took my hand and asked, "Bella, are you able to walk upstairs to our room or would you like for me to carry you?"

"I think I can manage to walk, as long as you promise to catch me if I start to fall." I replied.

"Siempre, mis Bella bonita, mis corazon, mis amor. I will always catch you if you fall, as I know you'll do for me."

I put my hand on his chest to steady myself as he chuckled (who knew that Spanish could sound so sexy?) and, with that promise, we proceeded to walk upstairs hand in hand for that hot shower and the dinner that Esme was going to bring up, then I was going to take a nice, long nap.

A/N: OK, so, there will be a family meeting in the next chapter. I'm so sorry that this is a short chapter, I'll try to make the next one a bit longer than normal to make it up to all of my avid readers. Thank you so much to everyone who has read this story up to this point, I've gotten almost (and it may have surpassed this number by now) 2,000 hits on this story alone!

I'm also writing an Emmett/Bella story that's loosely based on my relationship with my ex-boyfriend/current best friend so hop on over to my profile and check it out!

Also, I don't have a beta or a pre-reader for this story or for my other one so all mistakes are mine. If you're interested, send me a PM and let me know. I'll greatly appreciate it!

Disclaimer: I do not own any recognizable characters or situations in this story; however, the plot is mine and I love it. If you don't, I'll tell you like Agent McGee told the assistant director in NCIS: stick it! :0) Have a nice day.