Not Without a Fight
Annaleise Marie

Round Twenty-Nine

AN: Heyyyyy guys… It's been awhile, eh? I could make just all sorts of excuses but the short of it is that I basically just suck. Anyway, I hope some people are still with me. Let's just pretend this wasn't such a thing and move onward, yeah? :D

As of last week I officially own one-fourth of a college degree—still quite a ways to go—but I still don't own Twilight. Yeah, bummer, I know.

X

EPOV

Jasper had me up at the crack of dawn on Valentines Day to help him set up. Needless to say, I wasn't really prepared to be a good sport about it.

"Fuck you, Jasper." I sipped my coffee as he unloaded everything we had bought from the back of my Jeep.

He glared at me, his face flushed with the exertion of carrying everything. "You could help, you know."

I shrugged. "I could, but then you'd never learn anything about waking me up at seven in the morning when we don't have school."

Jasper muttered something under his breath in response and set down the heavy boxes before turning back to the Jeep and starting to unload the lumber in the back. "Could you at least help carry this stuff to the back yard? We've gotta get the Jeep back to your house before Alice notices what we're up to."

I shrugged and set my coffee down to pick up a few of the boxes. We had decided to set everything up at Alice's house, since weirdly enough, it was the one place she was least likely to go. As it turned out, that had been the hardest part of this whole thing: simply keeping Alice occupied. Right now Rosalie had taken up her post in the living room, so that she could try to prevent Alice from going outside if she woke up and went looking for Jasper. Being just at the end of the street, if Alice made it outside, we were pretty much caught.

This, of course, made it perfectly reasonable that Jasper would want to get all of this done early, before Alice was likely to wake up, but still. Logic had no place in my sleep-deprived mind.

Jasper followed me into the backyard, dumping the lumber and then pulling out his phone. "It's not supposed to get warmer than twenty today, so this should work, right? I mean, it should be good by tonight."

"No worries. If it does, we'll just head up to Port Angeles." I shrugged, beginning to unpack the boxes.

"Yeah, but still. I'd like for Alice to have a good memory here, you know." Jasper started moving the lumber, boxing in an area about twenty feet by forty feet. "Anyway, all that's left in the Jeep now is the sheet plastic, right?"

I shuffled through the boxes, double-checking their contents. "Right. So you wanna come grab that? I'll take the Jeep back to my place and then walk back here."

Jasper nodded, looking down at the unassembled framework. "Yeah, sounds good." He was quiet for a minute. "Hey man, thanks for this. Seriously."

"Stop being so nice, dude, you're freaking me out." I took a step away from him, looking at him like I thought he might be unstable.

He shook his head and started towards the Jeep, muttering something about knowing better than to try. I followed him, going over my own plans for the holiday in my mind. Mine were infinitely simpler in execution than Jasper's, but I still wasn't sure how Rosalie was going to respond to it.

X

Four hours later, we were almost done. I finished nailing the last of the plastic sheeting in place just as Jasper plugged in the last extension cord. All that was left was to fill up the frame and wait.

I went to grab the hose when Jasper's phone started blaring. "Oh shit it's Alice!"

"Well, answer it," I said when he just stared at me wide-eyed.

He hit the answer button and nearly dropped the phone. "Shit. Hey, darlin'." He paused, listening to Alice on the other end. "No, Emmett and I are just…" He cast around to for an explanation before looking to me for help. Wow, he really had trouble lying to Alice.

I snickered. "Watching porn."

"Watching porn." Jasper automatically parroted me. His eyes bugged out when he realized what he had said. I'm going to kill you, he mouthed at me. "No, darlin', we're not watching porn, I was just joking." He frowned as he listened. "Yes, darlin', I know it's not funny." Pause. "Probably about a half hour?" He raised an eyebrow at me in question and I nodded and gave him the thumbs-up. "Okay, darlin', I'll see you then. Love you too." He hung up.

"Yes, darlin', no, darlin'," I mocked him.

He glared at me. "Watching porn?"

"I can't believe you actually repeated that, dude."

"Whatever. Let's just get this done." He took the hose from me and walked over to lay the end of it in the frame.

I turned the water on and met him on the porch to wait for the frame to fill. When it was done, we'd have a not-too-shabby private ice-skating rink. The lights that Jasper had strung all through the garden would create a romantic mood, and hopefully Rosalie and I would still be together by then.

It really all depended on how tonight went.

X

I picked Rosalie up at her place at nine, just as Jasper arrived to pick Alice up. Which was strange, since it was Jasper who actually lived there.

"Dude?" I asked, eyeing his obscenely preppy sweater and fluffy earmuffs.

He glowered at me. "Part of Alice's gift to me. She thought it'd look cute."

"Well…cute's a word for it." I tried to hold back a laugh. Jasper hadn't been able to wear his cowboy hat with the band of the earmuffs in the way, and the overall effect was that his head looked strangely small. "So why exactly are you out here?"

"Alice says it's proper for a young lady to be picked at the door by her suitor." Jasper's voice was barely audible, his cheeks flaming. "I couldn't exactly pick her up at her house, you know." His voice suddenly grew stronger. "I swear to god, Emmett, if you ever mention this outfit or what I do to keep Alice happy to anyone, I'll—"

"What? Hop in the Mystery Machine and drive through a creepy swamp with Daphne?" I was still snickering at his sweater.

Jasper muttered something threatening under his breath and stepped forward to ring the doorbell. I tried desperately to keep a straight face as I straightened my tie. We weren't going anywhere fancy, but you know, I like to clean up for my girl every now and then.

Emmett Fucking McCarty, suave and debonair mother fucker.

Alice opened the door after a moment, dressed in a black flowy skirt that reached just above her knees, a cream colored sweater, and thick black tights. She had a pair of earmuffs in her hand that matched Jasper's, except hers were the same cream color as her sweater, whereas his were black.

I grinned at him. "His and hers outfits. You're such a couple."

"Jealousy doesn't suit you, dude." Jasper grinned back at me. I should've known. It was much harder to make him mad when Alice was there.

"Jealous of your fucking earmuffs," I muttered. "Right."

Rosalie appeared over Alice's shoulder at that moment and held out a pair of blue earmuffs to me. "Don't worry babe. I got you a pair, too."

Fuck me.

But Rosalie was wearing this little black dress and strappy stilettos, her hair falling in loose curls down her back, and dammit if this goddess wanted me to wear earmuffs I sure as hell would. I'd wear nothing but the earmuffs and run around in the snow if that's what she wanted.

Although, you know, I really hoped she'd never ask me to do that.

Jasper ushered Alice into her own car before circling around to the driver's seat. I guess that was part of the protocol for dating 'a proper young lady'. Finally, they were off. I saw the brake lights come on at the end of the street as Jasper turned into Alice's driveway and almost laughed as I imagined the confusion that was surely going on in Alice's head.

"So," Rosalie started, breaking into my thoughts, "where are we going?"

"I figured we'd drive up to Port Angeles, have dinner, walk along the pier." I knew it was pretty standard, but that wasn't the big part of the night, anyway.

Rosalie, for her part, didn't look disappointed. She just nodded and started towards the Jeep. I reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her. She looked up at me expectantly and I braced myself.

"First, though, I have something to show you."

She seemed puzzled, but followed me back to my house anyway. I led her up to my room and motioned for her to sit on the bed before turning to rummage through the back of my closet. Once I found the box I was looking for I turned and moved to sit down beside her on the bed. She waited patiently while I tried to find the words.

Finally, I started explaining. "This box is full of memory cards, zip drives, cameras, discs, and the hard drive to Royce's computer."

Rosalie's eyes went wide. She looked from the box, to me, and then back to the box. Her brow furrowed and she took in a shaky breath. "Why?"

"Because he never gave you a choice. So now I'm giving it to you." I paused, trying to decide how to explain. "That video is on the hard drive. It may not be the only one, and he may have it stored on some of the other devices. But I got them all, or at least I think I did." I had turned his room upside down, and I was operating on good faith that he wouldn't store something like that on any of his parents' devices. "I haven't looked through any of them. It's yours. What happened to you shouldn't have happened but, I don't know, maybe this'll help. You can destroy them if you want, and I'm set up to do that. Or you can keep the hard drive, or all of it. You can press charges." I tried to read her expression, but I couldn't. "It's completely up to you. Royce has no power in this anymore."

It was awhile before she said anything. She took the box from me and ran her hands over the top of it, maybe thinking about opening it and then thinking better of it. She set the box down after a minute and folded her hands in her lap. "Emmett, this is…"

I waited for her to say what this was, but she didn't. "I didn't mean to upset you. I just wanted—"

"It's perfect," she interrupted me, finally looking up. She was close to tears and I was alarmed for a second but then she smiled at me. "Thank you. However you did this, thank you so much."

I breathed a sigh of relief. "So what do you want to do with it?"

"I want to destroy it all." Her voice was firm. "I want to be done with it. I want it to be over."

I nodded. "Okay. I'll help you then. We can go out back and—"

"Not tonight," she said hurriedly. "It can wait until tomorrow. Tonight, I just want to spend Valentines Day with my amazing boyfriend." Her smile turned guilty. "And I got you a pair of stupid earmuffs."

I got up and went to the desk, where I had set the earmuffs down when we came in. I studied them for a second. "Nah, what're you talking about?" I put them on, grinning at her. "They're excellent earmuffs."

She laughed and stood up, coming to stand in front of me. She raised up on her tiptoes, her hands resting on my chest, and I bent down a little to meet her lips with mine.

For once, something seemed to have gone off without a hitch. Maybe we had finally gotten the hang of this whole relationship thing.

X

Rosalie destroyed the contents of the box the next day, in her backyard. She wouldn't let me help with it, and well, let's just say she went a little crazy. There was a baseball bat and lighter fluid involved.

But she smiled more after that. I don't know, maybe it was a symbol of taking back her power. Maybe it was just cathartic for her to beat the shit out of something that had caused her so much pain and then set it ablaze.

Whatever it was, I would take it.

Because damn. My girl was beautiful when she smiled.

X

AN: Next chapter we have quite the time jump. Like, whoa time jump. In-story, it was of course February this chapter. Next chapter, we'll be in the second half of May. I'll try to make it as smooth as possible, but prepare yourself for some whiplash.

For what it's worth, the Royce arch is over. We're on a downward slope to the end of the story from here on out, you guys. I hope to finish it, once and for all, this summer so that I don't have to put it on hiatus again when I go back to school.

So, what did you guys think? I'd love to hear from you guys after so long, especially after tying up such a major thread in the story! So hit that little review button and talk to me, please.

Love you guys, and I'll see you next chapter!