Disclaimer: SM owns all recognizable characters. No copyright infringement is intended. The plot herein is mine. No plagiarism!

This story contains mature themes and is suitable for those eighteen and over.

All Inspirational pics and songs for chapters, bio of the characters, and more can be found on the story's blog. Just go through my main blog (address on my profile) and click on the 'A Better Tomorrow' link. There is also my FB group where teasers and story updates are posted.

Chapter One: From Marie to Bella

Bella, December, 2010, 3 am, Sacramento, California…

I watched his sleeping form rise and fall with each breath, taking comfort in the fact that he was fast asleep, but wondering when I could make my escape. Phil was waiting for me, and if I was going to go, now would be the time.

James groaned in his sleep, tightening his hold on my naked body and I held my breath. When he was asleep, it was the only time I could count on him not hitting me.

The right side of my body still ached from the beating he dealt out a couple of hours ago, and because I had been lying on it for the last three hours or so, I was in a tremendous amount of pain.

But I didn't dare complain.

Earlier this evening, I had received a "lesson" after he'd arrived home and was displeased that I'd yet again prepared chicken for dinner.

The funny thing was, he was the one who had demanded that I make Chicken Parmesan before he left for work this morning. However, by the time he got back home, it was very clear from the punches and kicks I received that he had changed his mind.

After that 'lesson', I was sure he was done with me for the night. But I was wrong.

When he decided that it was time for bed, James wanted us to make love. I foolishly tried to talk him out of it, but he wasn't having it, and I was thrown down on the bed and he took what he wanted from my body.

When he was finished, I was told to go clean myself up because I was filthy, and then, we were to lie in each other's arms while we slept.

The room was freezing and the fact that I was naked didn't help matters one bit. My teeth were chattering, and my limbs were screaming in protest from my lack of movement. While my bladder felt like it was about to burst.

Looking up at the clock on the nightstand, I sighed in frustration. It was time to go. This would be my one and only chance to do this, and if I wanted out of this hellhole, I had to make a move now!

Another opportunity like this wouldn't come around again. I had to run now!

If I stayed, eventually, James would kill me and I wanted to live. I was sick of this. I was sick of the abuse and humiliation. I was more than this.

I had to take my life back.

Six years.

It has been six long years of this and I was slowly dying inside. I wasn't being blinded by my love for James. I was never in love with James. This was a sham of a marriage brought on by my willingness to trust a mother that didn't care about my welfare and a cruel bastard who I knew killed the one guy I have ever cared about.

So when my stepfather Phil discovered the abuse I was living with and opted to help me, I took the chance and said, 'yes'.

Phil had always been great to me. He was married before my mom and his son, Micah, treated me like family. Micah and I used to talk before James, but not anymore.

James hated Phil and everything that went with him.

Before Phil, no one did a thing to help me. There were no more friends to turn to, because James alienated me from them. He thought that I didn't need anyone but him. So Phil, Micah, and no one except for my mother knew nothing about the hell I was living in.

And with a mother, who wanted me to stay with a horrible man because he benefited her lifestyle, I had nowhere to go.

Mom was a cheerleader for James. She would constantly tell me to stop my complaining and be happy for the wealth and luxury I'd been lucky enough to marry into. She said that with me being such a plain girl, I should be grateful that a man like James was even interested in me. Much less! He married me.

It was funny, because I never felt plain or ugly around Garrett. With him, I was the most beautiful girl in the world. Nothing about me was plain, not to him.

However, when James sank his claws into me, he made sure I understood that no one would ever love me because I wasn't worth it. He was the only one who wanted me, and I would be with him until the day I died.

When I first met James and he expressed his interest in me, I turned him down. I was in college, and I cared deeply for my best friend, Garrett. I didn't want anyone but him. We skirted around each other, until we gave up and decided that we wanted each other, but we would wait, and promised each other that by the end of college, we would be together.

But it wasn't to be.

Garrett died, and I got stuck in hell with the devil for my husband and a demon lover for a mother.

But tonight, my stepdad, Phil, would be my savior.

Maybe it was God, maybe he'd finally answered my silent prayers, but after a particularly bad beating that left me hospitalized, Phil came to see me. I knew he didn't know what was going on and just thought it was as Mom said, I fell down a flight of stairs.

Phil's business kept him out of town a lot, mostly overseas. However, he was the closest thing I had to a father seeing as my mother kept me away from mine for our 'safety' as she had claimed over the years.

Phil was a great person and was very kind to me, both when I was younger and now.

So when he questioned me while I laid there in the hospital, I wanted to answer. God knows I wanted to tell him everything, but I was afraid.

However, it was a good thing I didn't say anything because James had been listening and after Phil left, he nearly choked me to death telling me he would kill me if I ever talked.

But when Phil came over one day, weeks after I had left the hospital, wanting to invite me to come and visit Micah and his wife, Celeste in France, I lost it that day.

I broke down and told Phil everything, right after he asked if I was okay. I just couldn't hold it in anymore. I was lost and if he was to tell James as my mother does, then it would be the death of me. But I couldn't care anymore, I was losing myself in this hell and I wanted out.

I couldn't die here.

Phil immediately offered his help, and begged me to stay silent and wait a little while.

So I did.

By the time, Phil returned a week later, he had a plan, and also, he had the truth. He shared that Garrett was killed by an overdose, but it wasn't self induced as the reports claimed.

A fact I knew, because Vicky had shared that.

James just couldn't stand the fact that another person was interested in me and I wanted Garrett over him. Phil expressed how sorry he was but I didn't tell him that I already knew. I was aware that James was the one who killed Garrett to eliminate the competition.

Nevertheless, Phil further shocked me when he told me about my dad, Charlie.

Mom had said, on the occasions I asked her, that Charlie was abusive and she had to take me and run. She changed my birth name from Isabella Marie Swan to Marie Higginbotham because she couldn't stand for Charlie to get his hands on me because he was diabolical.

Phil said otherwise.

He told me he had been to Forks, upon learning of my abuse a week ago and he met Charlie.

Mom had been lying her ass off.

Charlie never hit her or me. He loved us. Mom just couldn't stand the fact that she would be 'trapped' in small town life in Forks.

She needed more than that life so when Charlie went to work one night, she must have left because when he got home after his shift at the police station, Mom and I were gone; leaving a distraught father behind.

Mom had lied. Everything I had done, had been for her or because of her and we were only here, with me stuck in an abusive marriage, because she needed more.

From ballet to marrying James, I had given her everything.

So Phil and I came up with a plan for me to leave. He said to trust him and to get ready to move when he said so and his order came tonight before James had gotten home from his shift at the hospital.

I had a small backpack packed already and just waiting to go.

However, my plan was almost ruined tonight because of the beating I had to endure earlier on. But that experience only proved to me that I had to leave, and leave now!

With a deep breath, I carefully extracted myself from James's arms.

Feeling me stir, his sleepy voice croaked, "Where are you going?"

"Umm…I have to go to the bathroom," I whispered, nervously. "I ne…I need to pee."

He grunted, but made no move to stop me. Instead, he let me go, and turned his back to me.

Slowly, I made my way out of bed, gripping my sides in pain while walking into the bathroom, where I gently closed the door behind me.

Once inside, I relieved myself while psyching myself up to get a move on. Then, with a deep sigh and hoping like hell that James had fallen back into a deep sleep, I said a quick prayer and got up. I used a feminine wipe on myself and threw it away before turning and carefully making my way out the door. I didn't bother to flush the toilet or even wash my hands because I was too afraid that the sound of the water would wake him up.

Opening the door, I tiptoed into the bedroom, and sighed in relief when I heard his loud snores filling the room. I stealthy made my way from the room and without even considering putting anything on, I ran to the kitchen.

My body screamed against the swift movement, but I bit my lip and bore it while heading to the pantry for my backpack. Inside, I quickly opened it up, grabbing a pair of panties and throwing them on along with my jeans, a t-shirt and my boots. I didn't have much in there; just another pair of panties, a bra, another t-shirt and a box of tampons, along with my snacks.

Walking out of the pantry, I nervously looked around the room, glad that Vicky wasn't staying over or else this couldn't have worked, and made my way to the back door. I smiled to myself as I punched in the new code because James thought I didn't know it.

As the little light turned green, and I opened the door, I could vividly hear my own screams from every punch, kick, and slap I had ever received in this house. I could hear myself hollering from being grabbed too roughly or raped. Then I remembered James' voice berating me or even laughing at me when I'd fallen down after the impact of one of his blows.

So with a sigh of determination, I stepped out the door, and made a run for it.

I ran until the pain caught up with me, but I didn't look back. I didn't stop. I just ran.

When I finally got to the spot where Phil told me to meet him, I was out of breath and in pain. He was waiting for me in his Mercedes and flashed the lights twice, signaling me.

I tried to walk to the car, but I collapsed half way. Phil got out and ran over, picking me up and loading me and my bag in the car, before jumping in and driving off.

We drove for a while until he pulled into a motel a little outside of town and parked.

"Come on," he said, exiting the car and I followed suit.

He took my bag from me and walked over to a Silver 2010 Toyota Corolla that was parked over from where we were parked.

"It's yours," he said, chirping the alarm and unlocking the car, before handing me the keys.

I didn't know what to say as tears streamed down my face. "Thank you," I croaked out. "I don't know how to repay you."

"Yes, you do," Phil said with determination.

"How?"

"By staying alive and never letting James hurt you again." He smiled and I hugged him.

I could hear his sniffles and I cried even harder. I had someone who cared.

We parted and Phil helped me in the car. "Be careful, Bella."

"I will."

Phil smiled and handed me a medical kit and five thousand in cash, telling me, one day, he'd do more; when I was safe.

But before I could leave, he stopped me from closing the door, and told me to hold on. He ran back to his car and grabbed an envelope and made his way back to me.

"Here you go, Bella." I looked up at him, shocked to hear him using my birth name and I sobbed when I opened the envelope to find that name on my new documents.

Phil warned me again to stay out of sight, amidst my tears and to get as far away as possible and stay gone.

"Thank you," I said, lost on what else to say to him.

"You're more than welcome, Bella," Phil said. "Now, go!"

I slammed the door and watched Phil get back in his car.

We drove out of the motel's lot, him ahead of me, and honked our horns as he turned back toward where I was coming from and I turned the opposite one, heading off to parts unknown.

With no destination in mind, I drove on. It was just me and the road. I was tired, I was weary. I needed to sleep, but I went on. The further I got from James, the happier I would be. And as daylight broke over the horizon, I did something I hadn't done in a long while, I smiled.

I used to be Marie Higginbotham-Carter, the woman lost in a world that wasn't meant for her, but once again, according to my new driver's license, I'm Bella Swan and this will be my story.