The two vampires sat in a penthouse hotel room in Port Angeles. The younger of the two anxiously listened to the audio transmitting from a 'spy mic.' He doubted it would work as well as being in close proximity, but he would give this a try.
The older vampire sat in a chair, staring out the window as people lived their lives. They may have been on top floor, but they could see and hear anyone they wanted. The older vampire sighed.
"That one is in love. His partner isn't." He paused. "She's in love with someone, but hard to tell who." He waited longer. When he spoke again, he sounded bored. "Those two women are in love with each other. Utterly boring." Twenty seconds more passed. "That dog adores his owner, but….hates the dog that just passed them on the street?" He spun around in his chair. "If I can do this so easily, it makes no sense that I can't read Swan and Hale. I should just say they don't have a mate bond and be done with it."
The younger vampire perked up. Their hidden mic was picking up audio. He slumped again when it became clear it was just a passing car. "You could. And then start a war when Aro reads your mind and sees you lied."
The bored older vampire simply said, "And I would finally be free." He turned back to the window and continued to monitor passersby.
Rosalie had every intention of following Edward into the woods and kicking his dramatic ass (again). She was almost looking forward to it. She had just hit the door to the exterior of the school when she heard a sound that made her freeze then turn around: someone was in emotional distress, and Jessica and Bella were with them. She followed the sounds of gasping crying to the girl's bathroom nearest the cafeteria. The scene was chaos when she entered.
Angela was curled in on herself in a corner, crying. Her back was to the wall, but she wasn't supporting herself with it. Instead, her arms were as tight around her legs as they could go, her knuckles white as she clenched her fists and tried to gain control. Jess kneeled next to her on the floor as she tried to ask what was wrong. Bella stood in the middle of the small bathroom looking shell shocked. Rosalie felt the way Bella looked.
"Tell her that you three are safe and she can get whatever it is off her chest. None of you will view her any differently." Alice's whispered voice came through the door. It was so quiet that it was clearly for Rosalie's ears only.
Rosalie knew better than to bet against Alice, so she repeated those words. Angela looked up, eyes red. "Okay Rose, say this next." she listened, then repeated.
"Bella didn't tell me much about what's going on with you, but she did say we would understand, if it came to it. Whatever you need, however we can help in this moment, just say the word."
"The word." Angela hiccuped.
Rosalie smiled. At least the girl still had her sense of humor.
Alice laughed in the hall. "Ask her if she wants to talk!"
"Do you want to talk about it?"
Bella offered Angela tissues, which she accepted. "I have to break up with Ben. And it's your fault." She said to Rosalie. "And yours!" She pointed at Bella and offered a shaky smile.
"I will absolutely put this in my guide. Did you guys have a Threesome?" Jess looked so genuinely confused. "You have to communicate before the act, not after!"
Angela wiped her eyes and put her glasses back on her face. Her face was red. "Jessica! No!" She looked back at Rosalie and Bella. "I see how happy you two are, and how accepting everyone was…and I want that."
"But…everyone does accept…" Jess paused. "Oh?" Understanding blazed across her face. "Oh! Angela!" She dove down and threw her arms around Angela. "Honey, it's 2025. We don't care! I mean, we do care. We see you. We stand with you. Someone stop me."
"What Jess means to say," Bella cut in, "is that we're with you. I do agree you should let Ben down easy sooner rather than later. Whatever comes after, we'll be here for you." The bell rang, signaling the end of lunch, and Bella reached out to pull Angela off the floor. She threw her arms around Bella, stealing a quick hug.
A tiny flare of emotion settled in Rosalie's chest. She felt warmth at the display, and stunned that she was part of it. Why was she in a bathroom offering emotional support to a teenage girl? Even as a true teenage girl, almost 100 years ago, she hadn't been this supportive. She tried not to dwell on it as they all left the bathroom. Ben was waiting, and he looked worried and confused.
Rosalie took the opportunity to save Angela. "Female problems. You never know when they're gonna hit."
He looked extremely uncomfortable. "Uh… do you need a tampon or something? I keep extras in my locker."
"Don't worry," Jess cut in. "We're all stocked up. We got her. Let's hurry to class!"
Angela attempted to smile at Ben before Jessica led him away. The smile didn't reach Angela's eyes. The rest of their little group hurriedly split up as the late bell rang.
Rosalie was still caught in the confusing high of being relied on when she walked Bella through the double doors at the end of the school day. She had spent hours contemplating it. Was it the fact that, technically, she could have killed everyone in that room? She decided it couldn't be that, because she could kill them every day. Could it be the way everyone in the room had trusted her? That was new. Humans avoided her on principle. She landed on something she never would have expected: It was just the joy of offering support, that support being accepted, and knowing she would get nothing from it but happiness.
Was Rosalie becoming an altruist? She smiled to herself. No, that wasn't possible. She couldn't possibly be convinced to sacrifice herself, or anything she loved dear, for someone else. It couldn't be that.
Rosalie and Bella approached her car, and something was off. As she reached for the door, there was a scent that didn't make sense: bleach. She shut the door she had started to open and pushed Bella against the car. Bella looked up at her, and she pressed a single finger to her lips. The girl took the hint and stayed quiet. Bleach continued to burn Rosalie's nose, and she remained confused. The ground around the car was wet, but so was the rest of the parking lot; They lived in Forks, after all. Bella caught Rosalie's belt loops and pulled her in close. She must have seen that Rosalie needed to think, because she tucked her head against Rosalie's chest and stayed still. Rosalie set her chin on Bella's head and listened. There wasn't any danger around that she could ascertain.
Bella's heart was racing, and that would have kept Rosalie's attention if it wasn't for the disruption across the parking lot. She heard a young man saying, "I don't understand." He sounded angry. No, that wasn't right. He sounded more perturbed than anything. Rosalie's senses were being overwhelmed. She heard a small, tinny, electrical feedback whine, but couldn't focus on it. Bella leaned back and looked around Rosalie.
The boy continued talking. It was Ben. "We've been together for two years. Why now?"
"It's not you..." Angela softly said.
"Don't you dare say, 'It's not you; it's me.' Don't waste your breath if that's all you got. Is there someone else?" He was starting to get louder.
"I think Angela is breaking up with Ben." Rosalie said quietly. She backed up, letting Bella move freely. The smells and sounds around her car bothered her, but she knew Bella would want to go with her friend.
"No, Ben, please. There's no one else." Angela didn't raise her voice. If anything, she was getting quieter.
"Then what? Please, tell me." Rosalie sighed. The boy was practically begging.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Rosalie turned around to look at the pair. Angela had tears running down her face, and Ben was pulling on his hair. Students were gathered around the parking lot, some by their cars, some just openly watching the scene unfold. It tugged at her dead heart. She felt bad for them both.
"Don't be sorry, Ang. Be honest." Rosalie watched his body language anxiously. If he so much as looked like he would lay a hand on the girl, she would scatter his body across the entire Pacific Northwest.
"I am. It's over. I'm sorry."
Ben stormed away to his car. He threw his backpack angrily into the backseat, then slammed the door closed. He ripped open the driver's seat, almost got in, then stopped. "I drove you. Do you need a ride home?" The casual way he cared for Angela, even as she was breaking his heart, made Rosalie feel a twinge of sadness. Angela shook her head, and Ben nodded. As he pulled away, Bella left her as well. She went to Angela and wordlessly pulled the girl into a hug.
Bella was leading Angela over to the BMW when Rosalie heard the strange high-frequency noise again. It reminded her of the low noise an old TV made when it was turned off before all the machinery wound down. There was no reason for her car to make that noise, especially when turned off. She had no time to investigate as Bella and Angela made their way to the car.
"Babe, can we drive Angela home?"
"Absolutely." She unlocked the car and opened the back door for them. Both girls slid into the back seat, leaving Rosalie to chauffer them. She didn't mind.
"Could we not? I'm not ready. Are you still grounded?"
"Technically...but I doubt Charlie would care. He loves you." Bella met Rosalie's eyes In the mirror. "Rose?"
"Swan house, coming up." As they made the short drive, she continued to hear the tinny feedback of something electrical.
The last thing Bella wanted to see in front of her house when they arrived was Jacob. But there he was, leaning against his motorbike, arms crossed. He hadn't called in the last few days to apologize, and she didn't think that's what he was there for now, if the menacing scowl on his face was anything to judge by. "I won't be here long." His voice sounded rough. "Sam sent me. We knew you would be here." He spoke only to Rosalie.
"Ladies, can you go inside please? The boy and I need to have a serious discussion about his ability to respect Bella's boundaries." Bella considered arguing. Whatever was important enough for Jacob to come here was probably also a concern for her, too. Rosalie must have realized. "Whatever we talk about, I will tell you. I promise, I won't hurt anything but his pride."
Bella nodded and pulled Angela toward the house. Jacob hadn't tried to call the house phone, so unless he apologized, she didn't want to talk to him anyway. She briefly considered announcing to her dad that her girlfriend and her ex-situationship were outside about to fight, but she realized he was still at work. "If they kill each other, we have to hide the bodies."
"I don't feel stable enough to be a reliable accessory after the fact."
Bella nodded as she dropped her bookbag by the door. "Do you need anything? Food, a nap...a hug?" She and Angela had never been particularly touchy, but if there was ever a time to need a hug, it was after publicly dumping your boyfriend because you're a lesbian (who doesn't know that her true mate is a female shifter).
Angela nodded sadly and walked into Bella's waiting arms. The sniffles betrayed her quiet crying. "This is awful." She let go of Bella and looked ashamed. "I feel even worse than I expected, because I just feel relieved. It's over. It's done. Now I can just..." She shrugged.
"Now you can just text Leah and see if she's interested?"
Angela looked scandalized. "Bella! I am a strong, independent woman who don't need no man!"
Bella pulled a bag of baby carrots from the fridge and sat at the kitchen table. "Good thing I'm not talking about a man." She crunched loudly on a carrot. "Just saying, Rosalie read the tension between you two this morning."
"Stop. I just ended a two-year relationship. I'm not looking. It's been thirty minutes." Angela stole a carrot.
"So, I'm morbidly curious." Angela raised her eyebrows, and Bella took that as a 'go ahead.' "Did you ever see Ben's...baby carrot?" She held one up as she asked, then bit it.
"Did you ever see Edward's?" Angela asked immediately.
"Not once."
"I'm surprised." Angela took another bite. "You know, I don't want to talk about it."
"Noted." There was a moment of companionable silence. "Do me a favor and text my dad. Tell him you're here and why, so he doesn't think I'm breaking his rules. He didn't say you couldn't come over, but we may be breaking the spirit of the grounding."
Angela let out a watery chuckle as she pulled her phone out. There was the sound of a motorcycle roaring to life as the front door opened, still creaking oddly after Jake's previous attack on it. "He's gone," Rosalie announced. "I think we've come to an understanding." She shrugged, but Bella could read the tenseness of her jaw. Rosalie was upset about something, but they would likely discuss it later. "He knows if he doesn't apologize to you, he's not going to be greeted with words next time."
"How did he take that?"
"Honestly, he growled like a dog. It was embarrassing." She smiled. "Thank the gods you have such amazing taste in women because your taste in men is terrible."
Bella must have looked appalled because Rosalie and Angela burst out laughing at her expression. She threw a baby carrot at each of them before putting the rest of the bag back in the fridge. She pretended to look for something but used the time to hope the redness in her cheeks would cool down. The laughter stopped, and she finally turned around. Angela was looking down at her hands, the laughter and smile gone from her face. Her eyes watered, and the silence stretched on.
"You know Ang, I think we have every single Fast and Furious movie on DVD. Dad loves those. They're ridiculous, they're mindless, and Michelle Rodriguez is in almost all of them. What do you say?"
"You don't have to offer me hot women because now you know I'm gay."
"I didn't say she was hot," Bella countered. "That sounds like a yes."
"Fine, but I pick which one."
The girls settled in the living room. The three of them took up the entire couch while the sounds of cars racing filled the room. Surprisingly, Angela chose the tenth movie. Bella didn't really know what was going on, but she realized she waslooking at the stars a little differently. Michelle Rodriguez was extremely attractive. She had never looked at a woman that way until recently, and now she was looking and seeing. Bella carefully packed those emotions deep down inside. Angela's breakup was not the time to start letting something awaken in her, especially not with the most attractive woman in the world next to her play acting as lifelong mates.
Hours later, after Rosalie had dropped Angela at her house and returned, the two of them sat on the couch, alone. The air grew thicker as the sun went down. Bella had put on a different Fast Movie, this time the ninth. Rosalie's arm rested around Bella's middle. She quietly played with Rosalie's hand. Just as Bella was beginning to wonder if she was imagining the thickness between them, Rosalie leaned in and said, "So Michelle Rodriguez, huh?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"If you have a type, I'm very confused about what it is."
Bella huffed. "What, are you jealous?"
"Please. What do I have to be jealous about?"
"I don't know. She's strong, a fighter, and she drives fast." Bella poked at Rosalie's hand, smiling as she irritated the vampire on purpose. "I mean, look at her working on that car." Michelle Rodriguez was leaning into the engine of a car. "That's…hot? Yeah. Hot. Sexy even." She did not stick the verbal landing, but she could hear a rumbling building. Rosalie was growling.
"You just described me. I am all of those things. I have built one of those cars!"
"Yes dear, I know, dear."
The angry rumble grew. "You know I could kill you, right?"
"I wonder if Michelle Rodriguez would kill me."
"…And I could make your body disappear without a trace?"
"Michelle would never threaten me like this."
"You. Are. Infuriating." Bella covered her mouth to contain the laugh threatening to escape her. The rumbling stopped abruptly. "Why are you torturing me?"
Bella turned to look at Rosalie. Smiling, she told the truth. "Because I just realized how easy it was."
Rosalie furrowed her brows. "I just want to remind you of something." She bared her teeth, fangs falling into place where Bella could see them, glistening dangerously. "That's all." She lifted her lip, closed her mouth, and when she said, "Just in case you forgot," the fangs were gone again.
Bella didn't want to admit she found the display extremely attractive, but her body betrayed her. She swallowed and tried to think of something, anything, to say to distract Rosalie. She failed. A slow smile spread across the blonde's face.
"Really, Bella? That works for you?"
If anyone had asked her whether vampire threats were a turn-on ten minutes ago she would have said no. Now? Maybe yes. She shrugged in response.
"I'll let you refuse to answer the question. It's your right." Rosalie's pupils grew as she let her eyes roam down the length of Bella's body next to her on the couch. "I know the answer, but I'll pretend to let you keep your secrets."
Bella slumped against Rosalie's side, pulling the vampire's arm back around her. "It's not 'letting me keep my secret' if you tell me you're pretending."
"I'm sorry, human. I try to respect your privacy, but I can't stop my senses." Rosalie's cheek pressed to the side of Bella's head. "Do you think Michelle Rodriguez is sexier than me?"
Bella bark laughed in surprise. "No. You are clearly more attractive."
"That wasn't my question."
Bella huffed. She felt odd using Rosalie's exact language, but she did it anyway. "You are definitely sexier than Michelle Rodriguez."
"That's what I thought. At least now I have confirmation you like older women." Rosalie snarled, then made the sound that Bella now knew meant her fangs were out. She whispered in Bella's ear, sending goosebumps erupting down her entire body. "Don't worry, I won't kink shame." Rosalie kissed her neck, and Bella might have crossed several lines if Charlie hadn't come home right then.