[Disclaimer] Everything Twilight belongs to Stephenie Meyer

[A/N] Thank you for reading my Rosella fic. I appreciate your feedback a lot.

Today's chapter is dedicated to jm1708 and number9

**44**

Rosalie's fingernails were bitten down to the flesh by the time she and Bella entered the office at the police station in Seattle. Her nervous were blank. She was still trying to wrap her head around everything.

"Good evening, Miss Hale." The officer greeted her, clasping a cold hand around Rosalie's hand. "I'm sorry about your loss."

"Thanks," Rose croaked. She could feel her legs turning wobbly underneath her. Quickly, she sat down on one of the plastic chairs across from the officer's desk.

The man cleared his throat and gestured for Bella to sit down as well. "You must be Deputy Swan. Am I right? We spoke on the phone."

Bella nodded her head. "Yes, Sir, that would be me. We brought the letter I told you about with us. Rose, give it to him."

Rosalie's hand trembled when she pulled the envelope out of her handbag. By now, she had memorized its cruel, heartbreaking content by heart. She hated the fact that her mother had killed herself. If Lucy had only told her about her past, Rosalie thought sad. But there was no way to turn back time, no matter how much she wished to be able to do it.

The officer put some plastic gloves on and sighed. "Give the letter to me. I assume you both already touched it?"

Rosalie whispered. "Yes, we did. Shouldn't we have done that?"

Bella placed her hand on Rosalie's, trying to comfort her girlfriend somehow. "It's fine. He just needs to know who already touched it, when they check it for fingerprints."

The officer nodded in agreement. "Now, let's see, what we have here." He mumbled flipping through the pages of the letter. "Sweet Jesus in Heaven," the man called out. Prostitution? Child abuse? A murder?"

"Are you going to arrest the man she mentions in the letter?" Bella asked, closing her fingers gently around Rosalie's hand. "You need to arrest him."

"Miss Swan," the officer snapped. "I don't need you to tell me how to do my fucking job."

Bella cringed. "I'm sorry, Sir. It's just…as you may probably understand the information in this letter is very explosive."

"I understand fully. But the thing is, that this letter alone won't be a very convincing evident in court."

A high-pitched sound left Rosalie's mouth. "Aro Volturi killed my father. How can you let him get away with something like that?"

Bella wrapped her arm around Rosalie. She held her tightly against her chest and whispered. "Rose, it's okay. Please, try to stay calm, honey."

Taking a deep breathe through her slightly parted lips, Rosalie stood up from the chair. "What about Royce?"

The officer typed something into his computer. "I see that the man has already been arrested. Good Riddance."

Rosalie could only agree to this. "How long is he going to stay in jail?"

"That depends." The officer stated, chewing on his lower lip. "The records state that he got arrested for the possession of child pornography."

Bella's stomach cramped. The very thought of the things this disgusting monster had done to Rose and god knows how many other children, was barely endurable for her.

The officer hummed something unintelligible. "Let's see. If things go well, he might get a restraining order to keep a certain distance from schools. A few months of jail, but this was the first time he got caught, so they might turn it into a suspended sentence."

A wave of anger flashed through Bella. How could they let this creep get away so easily? "What if you'd get the testimony of one of his actual victims? That would change things. Wouldn't it?"

The officer's mouth twitched. "Yes, that would most likely change things severely Miss Hale, would you like to have a female officer speak to you about Mr. King?"

Bella exchanged a worried look with Rosalie. Not today, Rosalie told Bella without using words. Today was already hard enough for Rose to deal with.

"Can we get back to this Aro Volturi, Sir?" Bella asked. "You could run his name through the computer and see if anything pops up."

The officer frowned. "Do you think, I won the badge in the lottery? I already checked twice. There is nothing. Not even a fucking traffic ticket."

Bella crossed her arms in front of her chest. "The accusation in the letter should be enough to at least arrest him? Shouldn't it?"

"I agree with you, Deputy Swan." He responded. "We'll see what we can do about that. It looks like Mr. Volturi isn't in town right at the moment."

"Good," Bella mumbled. "Thank you for taking care of this, Sir. I'll give you my number. Would you call me in case you'll find out something new?"

He hummed in agreement and told them goodbye.

Outside on the parking lot Bella pulled out her cell and dialed Edward Masen's phone number.

"Edward?" she whispered in a husky voice. "You need to help me with something. Can we meet up later?"

xxxxx

Much later that night when Bella had tugged Rosalie in her bed and handed her a cup of tea, she felt exhausted. Not so much physically, but mentally. She needed to stay strong for Rose though. Rose needed her to be strong now.

"Make small sips." Bella mumbled. "The tea is very hot. I put two spoons of sugar in. You like it sweet, right?"

Rose sighed and nipped carefully on the drink. "Thank you for being here with me."

Bella brushed a messy curl of Rosalie's thick hair behind the woman's ear. "I love you. And I promise you we'll make it through all of this."

"I miss Mom." Rose whispered. "I feel bad for her. She should have told me and my brothers about her past."

Bella took the cup from Rosalie's quivering hands and placed it on the nightstand next to them. "Maybe she was ashamed. God, I really hope they are going to arrest this Volturi guy soon."

Rosalie closed her eyes. She felt suddenly so numb and tired. Don't fall asleep, she thought but a minute later, she passed out.

"Sleep, my Beautiful, you need some rest." Bella whispered, pressing her lips against Rosalie's temple. Then she went downstairs, deciding to sit on the steps outside. It was cold, but fresh air was exactly what Bella needed right now. Tomorrow, she needed to convince Rosalie into pressing charges against Royce King. But what if she refused to testify against him? It was so much to ask of her to speak to a random officer about the horrific things King had done to her when she was a child.

"Hey Swan," a deep voice greeted her. "Did your girlfriend kick you out?"

"Hello to you too, Edward." Bella mumbled, rubbing up and down her too cold arms. "Thanks for coming her so soon."

"It sounded important." He stated, sitting down next to her. "Are you cold?"

"Yes, but that's fine. It reminds me I'm still alive."

Edward cleared his throat. "I'm sorry about Lucy Hale's death. It's a tragedy."

Bella rubbed her hands together, now even her fingers were beginning to feel unpleasantly cold. "Did you know she used to be a prostitute?"

He nodded. "Yes, we found out about that during our researches. Aro Volturi is a bastard who has his filthy paws in all kinds of dirty businesses."

"Can we get him behind bars?" Bella asked. "There has to be a way. He killed a police officer."

"Wrong," Edward stated. "He killed someone that was obviously in his way. The question is why."

Bella stood up from the step and wiped a bit of dirt from her jeans. "Let's go inside, before I catch a cold. Rose is sleeping upstairs. I gave her some tranquilizers."

"That's good." Edward said, following Bella inside the house. "It must be hard for Mrs. Hale's kids to lose their mother like this."

Bella pulled out a bottle of diet coke from the fridge. "Do you want some? Rose, hasn't done any grocery shopping in the last time it seems. This is all we have apart from tea."

"I'm fine, thank you. Now, tell me about your theory."

Bella filled a glass with coke and nipped on it. "Will you promise me not to make some sarcastic comment about it?"

"Jeez, you are too sensitive for being a cop. Now, spill the beans. What's your theory, Swan?"

"Officer Hale saved Lucy from her humiliating job as a street hooker. Volturi went and searched for them. Hale got in his way, when he tried to keep his wife safe from him."

"Interesting idea, but you are missing out the fact that Hale was a cop. Don't you think a cop would have tried to get Volturi's ass arrested?"

"You have a point. Maybe officer Hale wanted to arrest Volturi without people finding out his wife used to work for him."

Edward chewed on his bottom lip. "No, you are finally starting to think in the right direction."

He noticed a copy of Lucy Hale's suicide note on the table. Bella had made it before she and Rosalie had brought the original to the police station. Edward's lips moved rapidly while he read through the letter.

"King abused Lucy's daughter?"

"Yes," Bella whispered. "He used to be her manager when she was a child. Lucy made Rose do these awful beauty pageants."

Edward dropped the letter back on the table. "This is perfect."

"I don't see why." Bella responded. "We went to the police today. Royce King is most likely going to end up with a way too mild sentence."

Edward's left eyebrow moved up. "Did you tell the police that King used to abuse Miss Hale?"

Bella coughed. "Not exactly," she mumbled. "It's in the letter, but that won't be enough if Rose doesn't press charges and makes an official statement about the abuse. "I've tried to convince Rosalie to press charges but she doesn't want to. She's scared to speak to strangers about what happened to her."

"Isabella," Edward said in a strict voice. "You're a cop for fucks sake. Haven't they taught you anything at the police academy?"

"Don't talk to me like this!" Bella yelled. "My girlfriend's mother just died. It's not like I don't have enough to do coping with the fact that she's a victim of sexual abuse."

"Lower your voice, Bella." He said. "I know this is hard for you. But you need to be strong and act professionally."

Bella could feel a sob dying in her throat when she swallowed it down with the last bit of strength she could find within herself. "I hate that something horrible like this happened to someone I love."

Edward smiled and nodded his head. "I understand how that feels like. But you need to take your emotions out of this. Imagine someone else walking up at your station, telling you they'd been abused as a child. What would you do?"

Bella coughed, spilling the coke that she was about to drink on her shirt. "Fill a report? I can't do that for Rose, if she doesn't agree to it."

"Yes, you can, Bella. You're right, Rosalie Hale is a victim. You can't expect her to make reasonable choices."

Bella shook her head. "I won't do anything against her will."

"Men like Aro Volturi and Royce King give a shit about what others want." Edward sighed deeply. "If I could only find the connection between those two fuckers,"

"Could it have to do with the beauty pageants maybe?" Bella asked. "Lucy mentions something about Aro having been a judge in one of them."

Edward nodded. "You could be right. What time do you think is it in Paris right now?"

"Somewhat the middle of the night, I think." Bella said. "Why are you mentioning Paris?"

"It's the city of love." Edward responded. "Maybe when all of this is over you should take your girlfriend to a trip there."

"How is this supposed to end?" Bella sighed. "I don't know how?"

"Everything ends, Bella, one way or another. Now, about Paris, that's where Aro Volturi currently is. He's busy doing some business in Europe."

"The police said the letter is not enough evidence to get him arrested."

"I know," Edward said in a self-pleased tone. Bella hated that he was such an annoyingly arrogant prick all the time. "That's because he needs to feel safe. If Aro knew, he was expecting an arrest back home in the States, he'd run off to somewhere outside our grasp."

"But when he returns here?"

Edward smirked. "As soon as he sets foot on US ground again, we'll have him arrested. After that, it's up to us for how long he's going to stay there."