AN: Whew, looks like most people loved that last one, lol. It's pretty awesome that people who reviewed earlier chapters with things like "I don't know if I can read this story…" are now reviewing with things like "Oh my god, I must be sick because I loved this chapter!" If there's one thing I was always good at as a writer, it's corrupting my readers. ;)

Some people were disappointed it was so tame, but don't worry. It was Bella's first time and I wanted to leave room to escalate. Personally, I thought the fact they used to be friends made it even worse than when Victoria killed the vet. The vet was just some random stranger, but Jess was an actual friend. It's a more disturbing context, at least that's how it felt to me.

Anyway, this chapter's a bit short. It's mostly transitional, a link to the next plot twist. ;)

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Chapter 20:

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It was fully dark by the time we began to clean up. It had started raining again and the rain was roaring loudly outside and accompanied by periodic flashes of lightning in the windows and thin cracks of thunder – perfect ambience for the ghoulish task of corpse disposal.

Bella was covered in blood and kind of quiet, traumatized but in a good way. I was covered in blood as well, both of us naked, and I had dragged the body into the bathroom where I was now dismembering it with my bare hands. I was sitting on the rim with my legs inside the tub and I had a slim severed fore arm in my hands. Bella was kneeling on the tiles outside, watching me avidly, and she shivered as I snapped the forearm in half. Pointy white bone poked up through the skin but no blood dripped. Ms Stanley had been well-drained.

I dropped the pieces of arm back into the pile of gore in the tub. Her head was separated, her eyes wide and gaping, her pale hair stained pinkish red, and her arms were also in pieces. Only her lower body was still intact and it was time to break it up. Both legs were attached to the hips and now I split them in half, planting a foot in the fork of her crotch and pulling the legs apart like a wish bone. The entire pelvis split down the seam of the buttocks in a sickening squelch of wet rending ligaments and bonecouplings and a loud crack of thunder outside caused Bella to jump in fright.

I chuckled at her and continued my ghastly work. She smiled at her own jumpiness and continued to watch, somewhat mesmerized by both the gore and the power of my vampire strength. I had both of the legs separated by now and she shook her head in mock sympathy as I licked at the blood stained thigh like an icecream.

"Poor Jess," she said. "I almost feel bad."

I smirked at her. "Almost?"

She smirked as well and gave a shrug. "Almost."

I chuckled as I lowered the leg to my lap and broke it over my knee like a piece of firewood. Bella cringed at the sound and sighed and shook her head once more.

"She really was kind of hot, though, huh?"

"Mmm, she was very nice."

"Did she taste good?"

"She was divine, but you know what they say; the best meals are those shared with loved ones."

I flashed her a smile, more sinister than the flash of lightning in the window behind me, and then I leaned over the pile of body parts in the tub and pressed my lips to hers. She had raised up on her knees slightly to close the distance and she moaned softly as she returned the kiss before breaking apart and gazing into my red and well-fed eyes.

"I guess we're true partners now, huh?" she asked softly.

"We always were, but yes. We are. All that remains is you to become a vampire but that's merely a formality at this point."

She nodded and sat back on the tiles as I went back to work. "Can we do it soon? I don't want to wait anymore. I don't care if I'll be frozen at eighteen forever. I kind of like being young, anyway."

I nodded as well, snapping the calf in half before reaching for the other leg. "I'm quite anxious to turn you as well," she said. "Perhaps the sooner the better. I can't imagine you attaining any more perfection in the following years than what you possess now. We'll talk about it when we get home, okay?"

She smiled brightly. "Okay."

Lightning flashed, thunder rumbled outside. I finished up with the other leg and now Bella reached into the tub and took hold of the head. She lifted it, surprised at the dead weight of the heavy skull—like a bowling ball—and smiled at the pale and blood smeared face of her old friend as she stroked back the blonde hair with one hand.

"Sorry, Jess," she said.

Ms Stanley stared at her with empty blue eyes. Bella kissed her cold dead lips and then giggled and set the head back among the other pieces of her.

I shook my head with a smile and reached for a garbage bag.

Once we had the corpse stored in several garbage bags we set about cleaning the rest of the house. The mattress was quite bloody but it didn't take long to shred with my bare hands and stuff into a few more garbage bags. A little bit of blood had gotten on the walls and carpet as well but there were plenty of cleaning chemicals under the sink and soon there was little trace of any violent occurrence there at all. All that remained was safely stashed away in garbage bags and in the shared memory of our hearts.

Finally we cleaned the tub and went for a shower. Most of the blood on my beloved's body had already been licked off but there were still streaks of pale pink over her breasts and legs. I washed it all away with soap and my bare hands, cleansing every inch of her from the stain of her victim. There was dried blood in her hair too and it washed away in a pink swirl down the drain as she rinsed it out and smiled and lifted her lips to mine for a kiss. I kissed her under the warm water and moaned into her mouth and continued kissing her for a long time. After the dirtiness of feeding it was nice to be clean again.

Once the house was taken care of we drove out into the woods with the garbage bags in the back of the SUV. It was still raining very heavily and I told her she could wait in the car but she didn't want to. She even offered to carry some of the bags but I wouldn't let her. I carried them all myself, almost a dozen of them with little bits and pieces of dead girl in them, and we began hiking uphill through the wet and dripping rocks. Bella followed, stumbling on tree roots, soaked to the bone already, hugging herself against the cold. Eventually we came to a deep gully that was filled with rainwater and here was where the late Ms Stanley would be interred.

I tossed the bags over the edge of the bluff, one by one, and you could hear them plop into the water even over the rain. Bella had her hands buried in the pits of her jacket and she spoke loudly over the thunder.

"Can I throw some?"

I smiled at her and nodded at the pile of bags. She grinned and began helping me throw them over the edge, a helpful accomplice.

"Is this how you always dispose of victims?" she asked, fairly yelling over the rain.

"Most of the time," I answered her, just as loudly. "It's generally preferable to leave behind a missing person's case as opposed to a corpse."

"Do you think this could be traced back to me and you?"

"It's possible, but unlikely, and either way they'll never find us, much less apprehend us."

She nodded at that and threw another bag into the ravine. I smiled at her and watched her, proud of how she was asking questions, learning.

Once the body was disposed of we hiked back to the car and drove back into town. It might've been wiser to head back to Seattle this very night but I didn't want Bella to sleep in the car after such an ordeal. I wanted her to sleep in a bed. With me.

By the time we got back to the motel it wasn't even midnight, which really seemed to surprise her. I reminded her that it was only about four in the afternoon when we had begun. Still, she was exhausted—exhausted and satisfied in a way she had never experienced before. I took her for another shower so that I could strip her out of her rain-soaked clothes and warm her up a little and then I took her to bed. She waited for me under the covers while I turned off the light and then turned off the bedside lamp as well and she giggled in the dark as I climbed into the bed and made love to her in perfect blackness—much like how death must be itself.

She didn't seem to require any comfort or soothingness but she certainly didn't object to it. I climbed on top of her body and let her feel me smother her, pressing my breasts into hers and moaning as I kissed her and stroked her hair. She moaned as well and let her hands roam my back and my buttocks. I kissed her for a very long time, over an hour. Slowly and gently and with all the love I felt for her. And I did love her so much. Eventually I lowered myself under the covers and began kissing her netherlips instead, making her moan even louder. I moaned as well, hooking my arms around her thighs and pushing my tongue in deep. More delicious than blood. Her breathing became high and fast and finally her legs tightened around my head in an orgasm that made her whimper.

Afterwards I chuckled and slithered back to her side, letting our bodies brush together. She whimpered again and sniffed in the dark. She sounded like she was crying but I knew she wasn't. Not about that. She stirred beside me and tried to go down on me but I stopped her and drew her to my side and whispered for her to just sleep. I could tell how exhausted she was. She cuddled against my side, still breathing heavy, and said that she'd do me in a minute. She just needed to get her breath first. But I chuckled in the dark and held her and stroked her gently and whispered for her to go to sleep.

She didn't reply, she just lay there with her head on my chest. I continued stroking her, her skin so soft and smooth under my hands, and after a while I spoke again.

"Why aren't you sleeping?" I asked her softly.

"I don't know," she said. "Do you think I'll have nightmares?"

"No," I said, chuckling softly. "You won't."

"How do you know?"

I gave her a squeeze in the dark and whispered over the sound of rain outside. "Because you are the nightmare, my love," I said. "A dark dream come true."

A wet chuckle came out of her, a small sniff of happiness. "I love you, Victoria."

"I love you too, baby," I said, and placed a kiss in her hair.

She snuggled closer to me, wrapping a leg around mine under the covers, and soon after she was asleep.

The storm cleared in the night and she slept all the way till morning, silently like a lamb. I stayed with her the entire time, even though I was tempted to go get her some breakfast so that she could eat right away. She hadn't eaten at all yesterday, aside from her somewhat carnivorous devouring of her old friend's pussy. I was slightly nervous about how she might feel about all that today but only slightly. Her enthusiasm yesterday had done nothing but reassure me that we truly were destined to be together. She was my other half just as surely as I was hers. She had taken care of her friend exactly the same way as I had taken care of her—only without the happy ending Bella and I now enjoyed.

She had been asleep for almost twelve hours when she finally woke, stirring adorably in the sunlight from the window before fluttering open her sleepy eyes. The first thing she did was smile and kiss me. As if it was any other morning. I kissed her back, stroking aside her hair, and asked her how she felt. She giggled and said she had to pee. I giggled as well.

She used the toilet while I went for a quick shower and then she got into the shower while I went out to get her some breakfast. I found a hamburger place and ordered her half a dozen different kinds of muffins, egg, bacon, sausage. She hadn't eaten in over twenty-four hours. She was done in the shower by the time I came back and she was dressed in her jeans and hoody. I handed her the brown paperbag and the scent made her eyes light up hungrily like a cat waiting for breakfast. She took the bag eagerly and settled down on the bed to eat, sitting crosslegged in the middle of the mattress and taking a huge bite of the first muffin she pulled out of the bag.

I sat down on the edge of the bed to watch, pleased she had an appetite. She took another huge bite, almost half the muffin gone already, and moaned and nodded.

"Mmm," she said. "I'm starving."

I'd bought her a diet soda as well and I smiled as I handed it to her. "Eat up, but be quick," I said. "We have to leave as soon as possible. It's not safe for you here. Anybody could recognize you and I'm sure Ms Stanley's absence has been noticed by her parents by now."

Bella snorted. "They're probably happy to get rid of her."

I shook my head, smiling, and let her eat for a while, sitting there on the edge of the bed, watching her, searching for any signs of trauma. She slurped at the soda and grabbed another muffin out of the bag hungrily. I smiled as she bit into it.

"How do you feel?" I asked her.

My tone made her look up. She knew exactly what I mean and she took the question seriously enough to think about it for a second before shrugging.

"Fine," she said.

I continued looking at her. She grew embarrassed and giggled and slurped again from the straw.

"Seriously," she said. "I'm fine."

I nodded, still watching her. "Good," she said. Then I added: "Because you do realize we'll be doing it all over again in a couple weeks, right?"

She had been going to take another bite of her muffin. Now she lowered it.

I could tell right away that hadn't occurred to her, at least not consciously. On the surface she had perhaps thought yesterday was sort of a onetime thing. Not something she would do again. And again. And again.

Forever.

It was occurring to her now, though, and I was watching her face in the filtered gray light of the motel room. First surprise, then a chuckle. Then another chuckle.

"Oh yeah," she said. "I didn't think of that."

I raised a teasing brow. "Still fine?"

She grinned and took another huge bite of her muffin. "Fuck yeah," she said. "I can't wait. Next time it'll be even better. To be honest, I'm a little disappointed about Jess now that I think about it. Can't believe I actually went down on her skanky ass. I should've raped her with the knife instead."

She took another chomp of her muffin and I chuckled and shook my head. Yesterday had been absolutely perfect and there was absolutely nothing to be disappointed about. She was just being silly. Still, I waved a hand and played along.

"Well, it was your first time," I said. "A girl is always reticent her first time. You'll have plenty more opportunities to experiment, don't worry."

She nodded and munched on a mouthful. "How soon?"

"A couple weeks, maybe."

"I guess next time it has to be a total stranger, though, huh?"

"I'm afraid so."

"Can it at least be someone hot? Like you?"

I laughed at that and gave her a suspicious look. "Why like me, my love? Do you have any repressed aggression toward me that you'd like to express on a clone?"

She grinned at that and gave a shrug. "Not that I know of."

I shook my head and then I smiled and stood up and went around the side of the bed so that I could climb behind her and wrap my arms around her middle while she ate.

"Well, we'll shop around," I said, resting my chin on her shoulder. "The perk of doing a stranger is the ability to seduce her first or even date her. It adds a certain something to the experience. Any ogre can kidnap and rape a girl, but it takes a seductress to guide her into the trap with wile and willingness."

She nodded and kept eating. She was on her third muffin by now and most of the soda was gone. I watched her over her shoulder, steadily breathing the scent of her shampooed hair and soap cleaned skin—all mingled with the subtle aroma of egg and sausage muffin—and then I sighed and tightened my arms around her middle a little.

"We also have to consider leaving Seattle." I whispered.

I heard a quizzical frown in her voice. "Why?"

I chuckled once. Why indeed. Mostly it was because I was worried about what Heidi might try next but I couldn't fully explain that to Bella without revealing that I had concealed a small incident of stripping and tit sucking from her. Damn you, Heidi, for forcing me to keep secrets from the woman I love.

So instead I simply took a deep breath, as if it were simply something on my mind, and gave a shrug. "Why not? Heidi still worries me and the magnitude of our crimes means we'll never be able to move completely freely through the west coast. We need to head east and eventually to Europe."

I thought she might object a little but she seemed rather preoccupied by the remnants of her last muffin. "What about Leah?"

"We'd have to say goodbye, I suppose."

"Could we…?"

She let the question trail off and I had to laugh.

"No," I told her, releasing my embrace around her middle. "We're not killing Ms Clearwater."

She pouted at me as I gathered up her trash off the bed and stuffed it all into the brown paperbag. She removed the lid on her soda and tipped back the last mouthful and then she handed me the empty cup.

"Fine," she said. "Anyway, I don't care. I'll do whatever you want. You wanna go, we'll go."

I had climbed off the bed and now I threw the trash into the receptacle by the door. Her words and the unconditional trust and love in them had given me a warm glow. She was still sitting in the middle of the bed, crosslegged with her hands in her lap, and I gave her a loving smile.

"Why, that's very submissive of you, Ms Swan," I said.

She giggled. "Thanks."

I laughed and made a gesture with one hand. "Well, to be honest, that wasn't necessarily a compliment."

But she grinned and rose from the bed and strode over and wrapped her arms around my neck.

"Yes, it was," she said.

Then she kissed me. A firm loving kiss directly onto my mouth. I kissed her back, the glow in my chest intensifying, and then she broke apart and gazed at me with a smile.

"I belong to you, Victoria," she said. "Wherever you wanna go, all you have to do is take me with you."

I returned her smile, loving her so much, and cupped her face. "I think it would be for the best. A fresh start. Away from any possibility of bumping into Heidi. Or your old protectors. Dear Edward would likely seek me harm for what I've done to you."

She chuckled and smirked. "I think at this point it's pretty clear he's forgotten I exist, Victoria."

"Perhaps," I whispered, still cupping her cheek, gazing into her dark and wonderful eyes. "Although it's difficult to imagine letting go of a girl as perfect as you."

She smiled at that. Then she lifted her lips and kissed me again.

Within the hour we were packed and on the road again, coasting down the highway in our bright red sportscar. Bella rode with her window down and her hair blowing around her face, smiling into the wind and gazing out at the racing forest that blurred by. She didn't speak much and I was happy to let her sit there and reflect and enjoy the afterglow. It was quite amazing how proud of herself she was and she wasn't even a vampire yet. After she became a vampire and experienced not only the thrill of murder but the sustenance of blood—then she would know a true glow.

It wasn't a long drive and soon we were passing through Port Angeles. Once again we passed the Uptown Inn where we had first stayed as a couple—a rather unwilling couple—and this time it was my own mind that wandered. When we had passed through this town two days ago I had marvelled at how much the girl had changed since the first time we had passed through. Now we were passing through a third time and even in just these two days she was unrecognizable again. I smiled at her as we emerged back onto the highway leading out of town. Her face was so serene, so satisfied. Her hair whipping in the wind through the window as her thoughts no doubt dwelled on that moment where she had plunged the knife into her old friend's chest. They say you lose a piece of your soul every time you take another person's life but perhaps the people that say that have never done it.

It was mid-afternoon by the time we got back to Seattle and now she became chatty again. She said it would be pretty awesome to live in New York or even London. Phoenix had far too much sun and Forks was a small town shit hole—her words, not mine. I was glad she was responding favourably to the idea of relocating and it filled me with hope. Heidi was the main reason I didn't want to remain in Seattle but even without Heidi perhaps a fresh start was exactly what we needed. Somewhere safe where we could settle down and turn Bella into a vampire.

The sun was just beginning to set when we pulled up outside our house. I fetched the bags from the trunk and Bella smiled as she waited for me to unlock the front door.

"So how soon do you think we'll leave?" she asked me excitedly.

I slipped the key into the lock. "Why not tonight?"

"Tonight?"

"Sure. We'll hit the open road with barely a bag packed. It'll be fun."

She giggled as the door swung open. "Anything you say, Victoria."

I smiled and held it open for her as she went in, grinning at me and walking backwards. I had both overnight bags in one hand and I had to juggle them a bit as I pulled the door closed. Then I turned around and froze and dropped both bags to the floor.

There were four vampires in our living room.

Bella noticed them at the same time and gasped. There was no light on in the living room and in the dark orange light of the dusk leaking through the windows they had almost seemed to be melding into the shadows. Four of them. All female.

I stepped forward, leaving the bags on the floorboards where I had dropped them, and urged Bella behind me to protect her.

"Well," I said to our intruders. "Isn't this a surprise. And who might you be?"

Three of them looked toward the woman by the stairs who seemed to be their leader. She was blonde and wrapped in a chinchilla coat and her eyes were—

—yellow.

She took a step forward, sauntering, unsmiling, and spoke in a clear voice.

"My name is Tanya," she said. "These are my coven mates, Irena, Kate, and Carmen. We're friends of the coven from whom you stole that girl."

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