Author's note: for those of you who read this story before, I made some pretty hefty changes to this chapter! It's not one of my favorite chapters I've written from Edward's POV (his POV is so hard for me). Leave reviews and let me know your thoughts please!
TRIGGER WARNING: GRAPHIC DEPICTION OF SEXUAL ASSAULT, MEDICAL PROCEDURES, DRUG USE. Protect yourself and your health. Don't read this story if it will be harmful for you.
National Sexual Assault Hotline (USA): 8006564673
Chapter 3 – Hospital (Edward POV)
"Drive faster!"
The words as a sharp snarl from my mouth. Alice looks at me, her expression completely masking the terror in her thoughts. She turns the engine, forcing the needle of the speedometer just beyond the highest tick mark. The car groans as it pushes over the maximum of 155 miles per hour. Still, the car was much too slow. Even Emmett was getting frustrated in the back seat.
Alice's thoughts were a furious storm of visions. How she had missed a decision that endangered Bella's life, no one knew. But now she was searching for every remote possibility – looking years into the future – ensuring Bella survived. The results were infuriating.
My fists squeeze tighter in my lap, my jaw tense. I could run faster than this car. But Alice had insisted I drive.
"You can't show up on foot, Edward. What will Charlie think?"
"It doesn't matter." I'd snarled in response.
"You can't see her if you're fucking dead, Edward." Emmett had grabbed my arm, physically holding me in place. "The Chief's gonna kill you unless you have an alibi."
I laughed maniacally, imagining the Chief with his gun trying to hunt me down. If only he knew. . .
"The only logical conclusion would be that you were close enough to walk. Which means you were close enough to do this to her. You need an alibi. You need to be out of town." Alice insisted. "You need to arrive when Bella is out of surgery – after her father is there, after the news has spread. We will drive."
I surrendered, knowing Alice and Emmett were entirely right. Charlie would attempt to blame the entire situation on me and arrest me on the spot if I didn't have solid proof that I was out of town.
It was decided, then. We had been camping in Spokane when we heard the news. Distraught, we immediately turned back to Forks to arrive a few hours after Bella got out of surgery.
Jasper met us with Emmett's jeep and then we drove. Not toward Forks Hospital, toward Spokane. We collected receipts documenting food, gas, and a camp site ticket. If Charlie, the chief of police, needed proof, we would have it.
"None of the timings correspond to our story." Alice had said, her mind racing as she thought of gaps in our tale. Emmett, sitting in the back, rubbed ink off, spilled coffee, and tore receipts until the ticket times corresponded with our plan.
It was massively frustrating – meeting Jasper in Ellensburg, taking the car he'd brought, and slowly driving down to Forks again. Each stop at a restaurant or gas station, waiting as Alice concocted parts of her story, destroyed me. But there was little I could do.
"Alice!" I spit through ground teeth.
Alice's visions were flashing through my mind – Bella dead in her room. Bella dead in the hospital. Bella dead in the woods.
Bella dead in Volterra. There was blood. So much blood.
"Enough!"
Alice didn't hear me. She was grappling with her visions. Why hadn't she seen Bella was in danger? Why hadn't she seen a decision made that put Bella in danger? Why was she seeing these visions now?
Bella dead in the meadow. Her neck broken and bruised in the shape of crescent teeth marks.
"Stop!"
Alice jumps at my voice, her concentration interrupted. "I don't understand. . ."
"Fifty visions of Bella . . ." I choke on the word. She wasn't dead. Esme called and said she wasn't.
"I don't understand." Alice whispers again, shaking her head.
"Believe me, it's illustrative enough." I snarl. "Emmett, call Esme."
Emmett pulls his phone out without a word, dialing quickly. I soak up Esme's voice as the two converse. Bella was in surgery. She was stable now.
Alice's vision masks mine. Bella in her bedroom, bleeding, in pain.
Someone was going to pay for her blood.
The moment I'd seen Alice's vision – Bella writhing in pain in Carlisle's ER – I'd waged war against the Mutts. I could perfectly see it in my mind, my plot constructed in a fraction of a second and executed within the hour. I would run to La Push and single handedly destroy the mutt that Bella called her friend. I would destroy anyone who got in my way, anyone who tried to protect him, and anyone who tried to stop me. They could not win when I could anticipate their every move before they did it. They could not rival my anger. The monster in me was filled with glee. Their blood didn't tempt me but killing was not against my instincts as a vampire.
The soul and heart Bella's love emanated for was not repelled. I was not a monster – I was ridding the world of monsters. Those mutts deserved it. They were accusing us of harming humans when their rap sheet was becoming as long as ours.
Esme was quick to pull me from my fantasy. Her call came only moments after Alice's call to Carlisle. She was frantic – barely able to explain that Jacob had brought Bella in, that he had accused me of the crime.
No one said the word aloud, but it was painfully clear what occurred. The thought of it made me sick – a feeling I hadn't quite experienced in a century. In learning of his innocence, I could not channel my rage into Jacob Black's murder.
Just four hours I had been away. The thought made me more furious than I could stand. four hours unprotected was all it took.
Bella dead in her truck.
I wince at Alice's vision. My hand grips the plastic of the door handle so tightly it cracks. I seethe at Alice's speed, wanting to break the door off and run to the hospital. I would be there in a fraction of the time.
As if he could read my mind, Emmett puts his hand on my shoulder. "Don't even think about it." He warns, raising an eyebrow.
I shove his hand away, snarling. "Drive faster, Alice."
Alice shoots me a glare. You know I want to get to her as much as you do.
Alice's mind was a swirl of potential futures for us, but she was utterly inhibited by her concern over why she hadn't had a vision prior to Bella arriving at the hospital. She was furious with herself, and terrified. What other things had she missed?
I wondered the same question.
I could only think that Jacob Black was not as innocent as he seemed. Perhaps he was there, conveniently blocking Alice's visions. Perhaps he had been involved. I'd hunt him down to find out. The mutt wouldn't be able to hide his thoughts when he saw me. My besotted revenge may still be warranted.
Alice pulls up to the small garage of the hospital, smoothly pulling into a spot close to the door. I was out of the car before she had thrown it into gear.
Decades of training to act like a human gave me enough insight not to run at full speed, but I was close to breaking every human-trained instinct of mine now. Carlisle might berate me for not acting human, but I cared little for my own welfare in this moment.
I could smell her blood. A floral essence gone bitter from seeping out of her body.
Emmett catches up to me easily, laying his large hand on my shoulder again and yanking me to slow me down. I don't shake him off this time. Even I knew I might need him to restrain me.
"Esme is in Carlisle's office. Let's wait there for now." Alice tells me as she glides over. She's more collected than we are, but only in physical form. Her eyes now reflect the panic of her thoughts. Panic that ruminates though my entire body.
I shouldn't have left Bella alone. I knew better than to leave. Not with Victoria on the run still. Not weeks after narrowly escaping death by the Volturi. Not with tension from the wolves due to our return.
There was too much. Too many loose ends. Too many enemies.
I shouldn't have gone today.
I follow stiffly after Alice, pushed along by Emmett. I could smell the lingering scent of the mutt as we walked. He had, as Carlisle said, brought Bella here. But he did not stay.
How could he leave when the girl he claimed to love was on death's doorstep?
My eyes were focused on Carlisle's thoughts – watching him scribble notes from the surgery onto papers in Bella's folder.
"Vanessa, I'm assigning you to Bella's case."
"Dr. Cullen, doesn't the chief normally handle assignments?" Vanessa, a young, innocent CNA, asks.
"I'll deal with him."
"Do you have her chart?"
"Document her stats in your notebook for now." Carlisle says, leaving her. Bella's folder was sealed away in his office.
"How bad?" I say under my breath. I knew he could hear me.
I'll be up in a moment, is his only response.
Alice opens the door to Carlisle's office. Esme was pacing the length of it, her expression one of horror.
"Edward," she breathes, her eyes full of tears.
"How is she?" I demand. "Have you seen her yet?"
Esme shakes her head sadly. "No. She just got out of surgery. . . You may want to go help Jasper and Rosalie at Bella's house." Esme says, spying Emmett and Alice.
Alice shakes her head defiantly. "I need to be here. Charlie will need me."
"I'll go." Emmett stands up, his muscles bulging. "Find the piece of shit that did this. He's a dead man the second I have him within my sights."
"Make him suffer." Alice hisses. Torture him until he regrets it.
My stomach twisted in confliction, wanting to accompany Emmett and wanting to stay and see Bella.
That monster, whoever he was, hurt my mate. My Bella. I needed to be the one to destroy him.
I twitch as Emmett leaves, desperately wanting to follow him out of the hospital. Esme grabs my hand, her fingers wrapping around mine.
"She needs you, Edward." She whispers, her voice thick with emotion. I tried in vain to ignore Esme's thoughts – the memories of the abuse she faced at the hands of her first husband. How desperately she clung to Carlisle's comfort when remembering it as a newborn. She needs you here.
"I need to kill him." I steel, unable to control myself enough to prevent the way I hiss the words at my mother.
Esme shakes her head, not disagreeing. "There's time for that. They'll call when they find something. But Bella is here now, and she was asking for you."
"She woke up?"
"When she first came . . . Before they sedated her."
My dead heart wrenches in my chest – the closest it had come to beating in over a century. I swallow thickly, my throat burning as I inhale the thick scent of blood. I hadn't hunted.
The door swings open and Carlisle walks in, bringing in the heavy perfume of Bella's blood. The smell is wrong – it's not sweet, it's sour. His expression was a mix of so many things I had never seen from him before – anger, exhaustion, grief.
"Where is she?" I demand. I didn't need him to tell me – I'd be able to smell her and find her myself.
"You need to wait, son." He murmurs. They'll need time to get her set up in a room.
I want to argue with him. I want to demand that he use his seniority, but Alice cuts me off.
"I didn't see." Alice whispers to him, breaking the briefest silence that followed in his wake. "Not until she was here. Carlisle, what happened to her?"
"You know as well as I do." He mutters, cringing.
I could hear jealousy in his thoughts. It was a surprisingly potent emotion against his normally calm, tamed ones.
All the doctors who had treated Bella upon her arriving were planning to go home, get absolutely wasted and forget about today's patient. Carlisle, who had been at peace with his being for centuries, yearned to be human now. He wanted to join them and distance himself from the patient he was presented with today. He thirsted with the need to incapacitate himself and blur his memories, so very similar and different to the way Bella's had been blurred.
I swallow thickly, turning away from him as if it would tune out his mental voice.
I very much wanted it too. I wanted to forget this, even for a few depressing hours. I wanted my memories of this to be forever altered in an alcohol-induced daze. A few shots of hard liquor on a mostly empty stomach would be satisfactory. But I would never be able to haze these moments and memories.
"Have the police been informed?" Esme asks. "They'll want information from her. . . From you." Esme covers her mouth, shaking her head. I wince, wishing I didn't have the fearful tenor of her thoughts invading my mind.
Carlisle shakes his head. "Charlie will be here soon." He sits down on the couch, dropping his head into his hands. Esme moves to his side, sitting next to him. They didn't do the rape exam, yet. She was barely conscious when she came in . . . A contemptable violation that would have been.
Another one. I think furiously.
They'll need her consent.
"She won't give it." I mutter.
Carlisle stays silent, thought his thoughts are sharp in my head. I see Bella in his memories. Her body on the gurney, twisting in pain. Her speech was disjointed and slurred. Her brown eyes open, bloodshot and unfocused. The first indication that she was intoxicated. Then Carlisle smelled the drug in her body and saw the bruises, and he knew what had happened.
I could see how Bella reacted to him touching her. How, in an effort to treat her injuries, they stripped her of her clothes. She didn't even notice.
I can see, in his memories, the hand-shaped marks developing on her skin. The shadow of bruises on her jaw and neck. The confusion, fear, and pain in her eyes. The hoarse way her words slipped out from the effort she'd extended before. The way her body twisted in defiance, fighting the people who were trying to help.
I swear loudly, my hand slamming onto Carlisle's solid wood desk. A piece of it splinters, dropping to the floor.
Carlisle's eyes snap to mine, realizing at once what he had inadvertently shared. He quickly pushes his memories away, grimacing. Esme looks at me with pitiful eyes, but I pay her no attention.
I needed to get out of here. I needed to hunt. I needed to kill him.
I take a shaky breath, trying to steady myself. Trying to force the monster away, to resolve my anger. I needed to stay. I needed to take care of Bella.
"Edward, she'll be okay." Carlisle tells me, his voice strong with conviction. "Her injuries are not life threatening anymore."
Alice's visions flash through my mind. Bella dead in her kitchen. Bella dead in my arms. Bella dead over and over again in numerous different ways.
I scoff, seeing red. "Physically. Mentally is another battle, you know that."
I turn away from him, bringing my fists to my eyes as if that would block out the world. I force myself to ignore Carlisle – his thoughts spoken and unspoken. Alice's mind was just as loud as Carlisle and in blocking him, I saw hers.
She was searching, again. But every vision was muddled and uncertain, constantly changing and shifting. But nothing was clear. Nothing made sense. No person was concrete, no scene was specific. The visions of Bella dead slipped in and out – sometimes present, sometimes nothing but a difficult memory. It was making her anxious. She was never unsure about the future, not like this. She had never missed an important decision, not since Bella jumped off the cliff. Alice had been watching her. Alice hadn't missed anything.
I needed to be away from her – away from her failure that inhibited Bella's safety.
Carlisle breaks the silence that was growing thick with tension. "You can go see her now." Bella is sedated, but you'll have some time to see her while I talk to her father.
"Charlie is here." Esme murmurs. I can hear him as he converses with Carlisle's colleagues casually. He was called down for a report about a sexual assault. He didn't – doesn't – know it was his daughter.
I take a deep breath, trying to control my rage. If only Jasper was here. I steal the thought away. No – Jasper had to be with Emmett and Rosalie. They needed to prepare Bella's house to fit our story. Then, they needed to start hunting. Jasper was the most skilled fighter amongst us. He needed to be there.
Carlisle stands up, running a hand through his hair. "I want to talk to him about a reduced hospital stay. She won't do well here." And I don't want her to be forced into consenting to unnecessary exams and tests.
His thought was not for me, it was for himself. His grief over watching Bella tormented in the ER by his hands was more than he could take.
"He may agree to letting her stay with us." Alice murmurs, her eyes closed as she digs into the future to support her claim. "If he knows she's getting the best care there and that it's what she wants. . . He'll agree to it."
Esme hesitates, conflicted. "Should . . . Would it be best if we both speak to him?"
Carlisle shakes his head, squeezing her hand in his. "Given the threats I've thrown around regarding HIPPA, it's best you didn't for now. Right now, Bella is just a patient."
Prepare yourself, Edward. Carlisle instructs as we walk. She likely won't wake for a few more hours. Either way, it will be difficult for you.
I don't respond. Difficult for me? I was enraged. I wanted to tear apart the man – the monster – that did this to her. Difficult wasn't the word I would call it. It certainly wasn't a word I would use for both Bella and I in this moment.
Carlisle disappears down the hall to find his colleagues and Charlie, and I route myself towards Bella's room. She was two floors below, hidden in a corner room with a rather large window. I would have to thank Carlisle for that later.
"Oh, Bella." My voice is a strangled whisper. All the terror and pain I had been quelling since I first saw Alice's vision came crashing in a tumultuous wave that sank me to my knees. I stagger to the bed, barely feeling the floor beneath my feet.
The room was small, and yet she looked miniscule in comparison. Her normally pale skin completely lacked color – her complexion was on par with mine. A deep purple bruise was forming along her cheekbone, and a number of them were already shadowing her jaw and neck just as I'd seen in Carlisle's memories. A clear set of fingers were impressed over her throat. The previous exposure to her facial injuries did little to reduce the fury I felt now.
Firey pain batters through my chest. I sit on the bed next to her, unsure of how to touch the fragile girl that nearly lost her life hours ago.
"Bella, I'm so sorry." I whisper. My fingers lightly trace the outline of the bruise forming around the IV in her hand. Whoever put it in was miserable at their job, even under the circumstances of the patient being uncooperative. If she were awake, this would be her first complaint – the needle and the consequential bruise.
"I'm sorry I wasn't here to protect you."
My mind swirls back to the woods. Alice, mid-hunt, freezing as her vision clouds her instincts. The gasp of horror that escaped her mouth, drawing my attention to her thoughts. My hunt interrupted as I watched Bella cry, pleading and thrashing against hands that held her back. And Carlisle – his eyes darting from one injury to the next, realizing what had happened with a pure fury I had never seen of him before. My prey, having luck on its side while I had none, had escaped.
It was difficult to picture that Bella – writhing and begging – when I was looking at this one – still and silent. So perfectly still – not even a flutter of her eyelids as she slept. Her breaths perfectly succinct with the machines that aided her. I couldn't imagine the immense pain she was in, and the additional pain she inadvertently put herself through, by moving and jostling her injuries. The pain she would be in when she woke from her drug-induced sleep with her abdomen cut open and her body bruised.
Charlie's thought – inadvertently loud – catch me off-guard.
"He didn't do this, Charlie." Carlisle voice is bizarrely calm. His mind, however, was simultaneously frustrated that we'd forgotten to ease Charlie into believing my innocence while also trying to find a way to placate him now.
"Don't defend him!" Charlie seethes, his voice loud. As loud as his thoughts. I wince at the hatred in his voice.
Charlies thoughts were vengeful and centered on my murder. A delicate sense of deja vu hits me – hadn't I planned to do the same to Jacob Black? Charlie abandons the thought of attacking me or shooting me – both would land him in prison and possibly grant me an easier sentence due to excessive force during arrest. Charlie's thoughts were somewhat amusing as he imagined calling his deputies to demand a warrant for my arrest. He was almost giddy – having imagined arresting me ever since I left Bella and Forks months ago.
If the situation weren't so serious, I might have laughed. He had nothing on me. He'd never be able to get to me. And if he did, his handcuffs and gun would hardly make this easier for him. He knew this, though. His thoughts as he glared at Carlisle were apprehensive. He knew he couldn't take me on, even if he didn't know why.
I applauded him for wanting to defend her, for knowing he was ill-equipped and still taking a stand. Though, his desire to protect the sedated girl in the bed barely rivalled mine, despite the parental connection. My connection with her would always be stronger than his. His emotions paled in comparison to mine – heightened by my being a vampire. If he truly knew my feelings for her, he might not be fantasizing about murdering me himself. I wanted to think his usefulness was nothing compared to mine, but Bella had been attacked under the protection of us both.
"Charlie," Carlisle starts, sounding slightly exasperated. Carlisle was always calm, collected, patient. I had rarely seen him lose his temper in the decades I'd known him. But now he was tired – his mood parallel to how he felt upon finding Rosalie in the street all those decades ago.
Carlisle's unusual frustration, and Alice's rare uncertainty, were making me anxious.
"How can you be so calm? He hurt my daughter." I knew it was a bad idea when they started going out. Charlie rambles. "This is my daughter!" He's going to prison. Forever. Even longer if I can help it.
Charlie's thoughts turn violent as he debates throwing a few punches, bruising me up the way he thought I'd bruised Bella.
"Somehow, I'm delusional to think that five foster kids would be anything but destruction in this town. And my delusions meant my daughter got harmed."
Seething words fill my head – not ones spoken aloud, nor ones that were my own. It was Esme's thoughts that had taken over now.
"Not one of my children have ever given you reason to distrust them." Carlisle says, his voice more firm. "Charlie, most of my kids were camping this weekend, including Edward. We'd be happy to provide evidence to prove this if you feel the need to pursue a case against my son."
The ease at which Charlie's mind shifted to accommodate this new information indicated how weakly he believed that I was to blame. Shock courses through me as I realize just how little I understood Charlie's mind. His thoughts were a deep pool I barely tapped into.
Charlie was fuming, still, unable to determine who to blame. But his anger was dissipating, leaving him exhausted and miserable without anger to mask it.
"Who the hell did this?" He demands weakly.
"I'm not sure either of us can answer that." Carlisle responds. "I don't think she does, either."
"Did she say anything?"
Carlisle shakes his head, grimacing. "We had to sedate her early on. She was scared and disoriented – we weren't able to treat her otherwise. . . Charlie, she was given Rohypnol."
Charlie pales at the mention of the drug he had heard of so often. Sexual assault was a rare occurrence in Forks. In fact, most crime Charlie had dealt with was petty – break-ins or vandalism by high school delinquents and speeding tickets. The height of Charlie's career had been the handful of domestic disputes that almost always resolved themselves quickly. Even still, he understood the severity of Carlisle's words.
This had been planned. She had been picked. The attacker – the rapist – had gone to her home.
"I'm sorry." Charlie mumbles. "I shouldn't have thrown around that accusation." Even if he did leave Bella comatose and cause her to run off to California with no more than a note.
"Jacob Black brought her here, Charlie." Carlisle says. "Did you know that?"
My thoughts shoot to Jacob then. How had he done it? How had he dropped her off at the hospital and disappeared? How did he leave her in the hands of his sworn enemy and run away from the girl he loved?
My teeth clamped together at the thought. He didn't love her. Not like I did. He lusted her. Like so many others.
Charlie's silent, shock masking his thoughts. "No." Wonder why he didn't tell me. . . He hasn't even called. "He didn't . . . He – He didn't do this?"
"No, no." Carlisle says. "He thought it was Edward."
"Oh." Charlie's relief is apparent.
"Charlie," Carlisle hesitates. "I know you want to see her, but before that I do want to discuss her treatment."
"Is she badly hurt?"
Carlisle nods. "It will take her time to recover." Carlisle pauses. "We both know Bella detests hospitals. . . I'm recommending she not stay here."
Carlisle's mind shifts to the conversation of his colleagues. Their insistence on doing exams that would be invasive and profoundly uncomfortable for Bella.
I tune Carlisle and Charlie out, opting to focus on the girl before me instead of the logistics that Alice already assured would occur.
I touch her other hand, covered in a thick white cast. I don't know what bones she had broken in her hand. But the thought infuriated me. He had broken her bones. He had bruised her face. He had done the unimaginable.
I take another deep breath, eager to quell my anger with her scent. But I'm met with something entirely different. Her efflorescent aroma mixed with the scents of so many others. It was clear she had been given at least one blood transfusion, likely during surgery, to account for the blood lost during her attack and the surgery itself. Jacob Black's scent was present, too, though not as potent. Much of it had been wiped clear by the antiseptics. Carlisle was right – Jacob had not done this. Despite my dislike for him, I felt a surprising sense of gratitude that Bella still had her friend.
Beneath those smells and the strong sterilizers, I could smell the scent of her attacker. The pungent odor made my body pulse with rage. The scent was potent. It clung to her while everything else had faded.
I breathe it in, memorizing this new scent instead of refreshing my memory of Bella's. I would never forget it, and, if I had to, I would spend the rest of my miserable existence finding the owner of it.