Bella's POV

The kiss with Edward seemed to go on forever. Not having to breathe certainly had its advantages. Any electricity I'd felt the few times we'd kissed when we were together before paled in comparison to the feelings coursing through my body now. The closest thing that came to mind was the lick of flames as I burned during the change—only this time, the fire was pleasure, not pain.

He flipped us around and pressed me back against the wall. I moaned when our lower bodies rubbed together. The sound pulled us out of the lust-filled fog we'd been under as we kissed.

My head fell to his shoulder as we tried to control our breathing. It was then that I realized my leg was wrapped around his hip. If I'd been human still, I knew my cheeks would've been beet red. I slid it to the floor, shuddering as it caused us to brush against one another one last time.

"All right, I know it's been a while, but break it up, you two," Alice said, breezing back into the living room with Jasper and a smirking Jake on her heels. "We've got big things to discuss."

No one said anything about the mess. I was guessing they knew exactly what had happened, because they'd known I was going to explain to Edward about Lizzie and the rape. Alice would've seen his reaction, too, so she'd probably prepared Jasper and Jake for the destruction. She took a seat on Jasper's lap in the remaining chair, while Jake stood, leaning against the wall, legs and arms crossed in as casual a pose as he could manage while in the presence of four vampires.

Edward rolled his eyes and smiled at me. "Come on, lo—Bella." He caught himself, shaking his head once as if to clear it, and then looked to the others. "Let's see what the pixie has to say that's so important."

He led me over to the couch, and once I was seated, he sat several feet away, near the other end.

I looked at him curiously, raising an eyebrow in question. "Do I stink now?" I asked, pretending to be offended.

At first, Edward looked shocked, and then he chuckled lightly. "I wasn't sure..."

I shook my head and grinned, crooking my finger for him to move closer. He smiled and slid down the couch, moving close enough that our thighs and shoulders brushed against one another.

Alice beamed and then sobered, looking at me. "Go ahead, Bella. Ask."

I had a million questions running through my head, but apparently, she'd seen me decide on which one to ask first.

I looked at Edward, but he shook his head. "I didn't see anything. She's blocking me."

"Jake," I said first, looking at my friend, "don't you need to get some sleep? I'm sure they can keep an eye on me—make sure I don't eat anybody."

Jake rolled his eyes. "I'm good. I'll go home and get some sleep after we talk. Seth's in charge until I get back."

I nodded and then looked back at Alice. "How'd you know to come back here? Why then? Why didn't you see me sooner?"

I tried, but apparently failed to keep the hurt from my voice, because Edward spoke up in answer.

"I asked her not to keep tabs on you, Bella," he admitted with a sigh. "I thought if she did, I would learn how happy you were, and even though that's what I wanted for you, I knew it would be too much. It would hurt to know you were happy without me."

Closing my eyes briefly, I turned to Alice when she started speaking.

"I wish I'd looked for you sooner, Bella. I'm so sorry," she said, her voice shaky. "I was keeping tabs on Victoria. Unfortunately, she'd been blocking me somehow, so I was only able to get spotty visions of her."

Edward froze beside me, staring in Jake's direction, but I ignored it for the moment to ask Alice, "Could it have been Riley? Could he have had some sort of...talent or whatever?" The fight with Victoria was one of the things we'd talked about before I'd gone hunting with Jasper and Jake.

Alice shrugged. "It's entirely possible, sure. I've never run into a talent that affects my visions like that, but I'm sure it's possible."

Edward turned to look at me then. "You killed Victoria?" he asked, his voice deadly calm. He looked angry, but I'd have bet anything that it was directed at the red-haired bitch herself and not me.

I shook my head. "Jake and Seth did."

"But you fought her," he groaned, raking his hand through his hair before grabbing hold and tugging hard at it.

I explained about her showing up while I was with Seth, about Riley running and Seth chasing after him when I'd ordered him to go and protect the people in La Push and Forks, and about the two wolves coming to my rescue.

Edward looked pained as he turned to Jacob. "It seems I owe you more than I could ever repay."

Jake waved him off with a smirk and a shrug. "Sure, sure. I'll collect one day." He winked at me playfully as Edward turned back to face me.

After a moment, I looked at Alice again. "So you were watching Victoria..."

Alice nodded slowly. "I didn't know she'd sent Laurent for you or planned to come to Forks herself, I swear it, Bella. I only saw you fighting her—you were alone with her, so it must have been right after Jacob and Seth killed Riley. Jasper and I came as soon as I saw that. I'm so sorry."

Shaking my head, I said, "I'm not mad, Alice. I was hurt for a long time—even still, a little bit, maybe—that you could have left and forgotten me so easily, but I'm not mad. With everything that happened, especially now that you're back, any anger I might've felt is long gone."

Alice frowned. "I never forgot you, Bella. None of us did," she said pointedly, looking over at Edward.

Her look reminded me that I had a question for Edward, as well. "How did you know to come here?" I asked him and then shook my head as the answer came to me. "Alice."

"In a way," he said, looking at his sister. "I made my weekly call to check in with Carlisle, and Esme mentioned that Alice and Jasper had withdrawn from school, wanting to travel for a while. From her reluctance to answer my questions, I guessed that they were coming to Forks."

"Wait," I said, interrupting the story. "You weren't with them?"

He shook his head once. "I tried at first, but being around all of the happy couples was too hard. I've just been traveling across the country and up into Canada the whole time. It was..." His voice broke, and he cleared his throat before continuing in a whisper, "It was worse than before I met you. I knew what I was missing, and being surrounded by the love I didn't have hurt too much."

My heart broke for him then, even though his leaving had been all his doing. I understood it now, of course, and even though I still thought he should have talked to me about it, I hurt because he'd obviously been hurting. I scooted the rest of the distance to him and took his hand in mine, whispering a quiet, "I'm sorry, Edward."

He squeezed my hand before continuing his story. "I was in Toronto yesterday, and early that morning, I had this feeling I needed to be close to you. I didn't know about Victoria, Bella, I swear it, or I would have come back."

I nodded, urging him silently to continue.

"Anyway, I was about halfway to Vancouver, which was as close as I was going to allow myself to get—for fear of giving in and coming to check on you, when I was so sure it would be the wrong thing to do—when I called and learned that from Esme. I tried calling Alice immediately, but neither she, nor Jasper would pick up their phones. Finally, I went searching online to see if I could figure out what had made them suddenly want to visit, and I found a press conference your dad gave a couple of days after you went missing. I knew Alice had to have had a vision about it, and because you'd gone missing already, I knew something had already happened."

He sighed, looking pained. "Once I got to Vancouver, I kept calling, and after not hearing from them, I finally had to come down and find out what had happened. I couldn't live anymore not knowing..." He swallowed, shaking his head. "I ran straight here, figuring I'd find Alice here or a trail that led me to wherever she might be."

I looked at Alice knowingly. "You knew he was coming, didn't you?"

She nodded sheepishly. "I saw his decision to leave Vancouver a few hours ago."

"That was your vision?" Jake asked, throwing up his hands in exasperation. He looked at Edward. "She said she saw Bella getting upset, so she needed to hunt, and she asked us to take her while she readied the house for the three of them."

"I wanted to talk to Edward alone first," Alice admitted. "I figured the news about Bella would be easiest coming from me."

Edward sighed, shrugging. "That news would have been hard coming from anyone, Ali, but thank you."

Then she smiled brightly. "The good news is that now we have all the time in the world to catch up!"

The reminder that I was now immortal caused any happiness on my face to disappear. "About that," I started. "I'd planned to go north to Canada, but..." I looked at Edward, unsure as to what he wanted—or whether I should include him in any future plans.

"We'll go wherever you want to go, Bella," he murmured. "I mean, if you want me with you. If you don't, I under—"

"I do," I said quickly, stopping him from continuing. "Wherever we go, I want to go together."

"That's what we tried to tell you earlier, Bella," Alice chirped. "Right before I got the vision of Edward coming here. You don't have to go anywhere!"

I shook my head slowly. "Alice, I can't stay. Just because I didn't charge through the window and attack Charlie and Lizzie doesn't mean they're safe around me. I'm too strong and too dangerous to be around her. If I stay, I'll hurt them—and if I don't, others, like James, Laurent, or Victoria, could. As much as it will hurt Lizzie growing up without me and as much as it will kill me to be without her, I just..."

I broke down into tearless sobs again at the thought of leaving. In my heart, I knew it was the right thing, but that didn't make it hurt any less.

~*~*~FC~*~*~

Edward's POV

Hearing Bella's cries was my undoing. I pulled her onto my lap, hugging her tight with one arm and using my free hand to caress her hair, brushing my thumb lightly across her cheek.

As she cried, I realized that she was doing with Lizzie exactly what I'd done with her.

"Bella," I crooned softly into her ear, "that's the same reason I left you in the first place. I already know I was wrong. Don't make the same mistake I did, love. If there's a way for you to stay, we need to try to see if we can make it work."

She sniffled a few times before looking up at me, her red eyes bright with emotion. "Y-You really think there might be something to what Alice and Jasper said?"

I nodded. "I think it's worth looking into, anyway."

"How do we find out?" she asked, looking between Alice, Jasper, and me.

"I'm not sure how comfortable I am with this," Jacob spoke from his spot against the wall. He'd been mostly quiet throughout everything, but he clearly looked on edge at the moment.

"Jake, they won't let me hurt Lizzie or Charlie," she said quietly.

"Bella..." He huffed, shaking his head slowly. "I don't know them. All I know is the stories..."

She stood firm. "You don't know them, but you do know me, Jake. You may not be able to trust them yet, but I do. I trust every one of them," she said, squeezing my hand. "So trust me."

Hearing Bella tell Jacob that she trusted us—me—made me want to cry like Bella had just done. After all I'd done—leaving her to be attacked not only once, but twice—she still trusted me. She was truly amazing.

Jacob sighed. "Fine. I trust you to know whether or not you can trust them to keep your family safe, Bella." He looked around at the rest of us. "So, like she said...how do we find out?"

I spoke up then. "I think our first step should be to call Carlisle. He may have some answers to Alice's vision."

My sister flashed a grin at us. "Already done." Closing her eyes, she was quiet a moment. "They'll be here in nine hours, sixteen minutes."