-𝐀𝐥𝐞𝐱𝐢𝐬'𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐯-
"You've been here?" Alice asked us. "I used to go there," Bella added. "The school had the same bars. They taught all kinds of dance there as well." "Was your school here in Phoenix?" Ella asked.
"Yeah, around the corner from our house," Bella replied.
"But I haven't been there in ten years," she finished. "Do you have any reason to go now?" Ella asked. "No. Hell, no. I hated the place," Bella replied.
Alice and Ella share a look, trying to figure this out.
Suddenly, Bella and I jumped as our cell phones rang. I picked it up as I saw the caller's I.D. and exhaled relief. I head to the bedroom to talk. "Jasper, thank God," I sighed.
"Are you alright?" "I'm fine, Ma'am," Jasper told me. "Edward, Carlisle, Emmett, and I are now heading to pick you guys up.
But...." "But....," I prompted. "We lost the tracker. The woman is still in the area. Layla is following James. Rosalie and Esme are protecting Bella's father, and your family" Jasper sighed.
"This is my fault. You warned me, but I didn't think. I just...," I sighed.
"Alexis, we're in too deep. We can't change how we feel...," Jasper replied. "No... we can't," I agreed. "When will you get here?"
"In a couple of hours. Then you and I will go somewhere. Together," Jasper told me.
"The others will keep hunting. Alexis, I swear to you, I'll do whatever it takes to make you safe again." I sighed happily as we hung up.
-𝐁𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐚'𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐯-
I was in the room as Ella and Alice went to the lobby. Alexis was talking to her family. I was gathering my things when my phone rang again. It was from home.
"Mom, I'm so glad you got my-," I started to say.
"Bella? Bella? Where are you?" Mom asked me, scared. "Calm down, Mom. Everything is fine, okay? I'll explain every --," I told her as I heard rustling on the line as if Mom dropped the phone.
"....Mom? Are you there?" I asked. Then I heard a voice that sends a chill down my spine.
"Nice house you have here. Not the best on the block, but comfortable," James told me.
"I was prepared to wait for you. But then Mom came home after she received a very worried call from your Dad. It all worked out quite well." I felt fear.
"I must say, Forks High School doesn't protect its students' privacy very well. It was just too easy for Victoria to find your previous address," James told me.
"Bella? Bella?" Mom called out.
"Leave my mother out of this," I asked.
"You're protective of her. That's nice. You can still save her. And your friend as well. Best friend. Alexis, her name was?" James told me.
"But you'll need to get away from your friends. Can you do that?"
"I... don't think so," I replied, scared. "If your mother's life depends on it?" James asked me. I was terrified, but there was no choice here. "Where should I meet you?" I asked.
"The old ballet studio around the corner. And I'll know if you bring anyone along," James told me.
"Poor mommy and bestie would pay the price for that mistake" he sniffed the air.
"She smells like you. Delicious." I hung up as I panicked. I started flinging open drawers, searching for any kind of weapon, a pen, or a sewing kit. Useless. Then I remembered. My purse.
I dumps out the contents and found the pepper spray Dad gave me.
I held it, my only protection now.
I would have to protect my friend, after what she did for me. I walked through the lobby, scanning for Alexis, Ella, and Alice.
I spotted the two vampires outside under the Porte cacher, loading the Mercedes, deep in a heated discussion. Alexis was on the phone.
I slipped out the opposite door, rushed toward a taxi, and jumps in, closing the door. The driver was an elderly woman with a hacking cough. "8th and Palo Verde, please," I asked as the taxi pulls out.
I watched the hotel disappear.
-𝐀𝐥𝐞𝐱𝐢𝐬'𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐯-
I went into the hotel room to get Bella. When I opened the door, she was gone. I tried to use my magic to locate her, but I couldn't find her.
"Bella? Bella?!" I yelled as I looked around.
I ran through the room, looking for her.
Alice ran in, in panic. "Where's Bella?!" She asked as I picked up a note.
It was from Bella, telling me she was meeting James at the studio, and he wanted me there too, and to not follow. Alice walked up, looking at the note, reading it.
"Bella..." Alice sighed as I thought. "I didn't see her make a decision"
"We have to tell everyone" I nodded as we ran downstairs, informing them.
-𝐁𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐚'𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐯-
I remembered what Alexis told me before when she started dating Jasper. Her poem.
"I've never given much thought to how I would die. But dying in the place of someone I love seems like a good way to go," Alexis reads to me.
"I can't bring myself to regret the decisions that brought me face to face with death... they also brought me to Jasper '' I knew she was right. It brought me, Edward.
I climbed out of the taxi and I looked at the school.
It's never changed. The taxi pulls away, leaving me on the curb facing the deserted building.
I twirled my dad's ring around my finger, then reached for the pepper spray. I slid the pepper spray into my purse.
I took a breath and approached the school and I peered in the windows. The blinds are drawn. But from inside, I heard a faint sound. "Bella? Bella?" Mom called out again.
It's time. I went to the front door. It's unlocked. I cautiously entered this grand, empty room of mirrors.
A ballet bar wraps around the walls. "Bella, Bella, where are you?" Mom asked. I whirled, trying to find its source. I followed the sound to a cleaning supply closer.
I threw open the door to find a t.v. screen, a video played.
I was seven years old at the time as I hid in the very closet the T.V. is in now.
Little me looks up at the camera. The frame jiggled as Mom's hands someone the camera. Mom, ten years younger, appears on screen and kneels next to me as I heard laughter behind me.
I spun, trying to locate James in the mirrors.
"That's my favorite part. Stubborn child, weren't you?" James asked. My face flushes with rage... and relief.
"She's not here," I sighed. "Sorry. But you made it too easy," James told me. "You would protect your family at all costs." He sniffed my hair as he holds my neck.
He steps back and points a video camera at me.
"So to make things more entertaining, I'm going to make a little film of our time together," James told me.
"Borrowed this from your house. Hope you don't mind." He turns it on. "And... action!" I grabbed my pepper spray and sprayed it at him. I immediately bolted for the door.
"Excellent! An escape attempt," he exclaimed as I ran.
He jumps over me and threw me at the pillar. "It'll break Edward's little heart," James told me.
"Edward has nothing to do with this," I replied. "He will. His rage will make for a more interesting sport than his feeble attempt to protect you," James smirked.
I felt blood on my head as I touched it.
I was scared as he stalked toward me. James captured it on film. "Beautiful! Very visually dynamic," He smiled.
"I chose my stage well." He advanced toward me. "Still stubborn, aren't you? Is that what makes you special? Because frankly, I don't see it," James asked me.
"That's because I have people to fight for," I replied as I felt my head bleed.
He inhales as if he can taste me already.
"Too bad he didn't have the strength to turn you," James shot back. "Instead, he kept you this fragile little human. It's crue." James flipped on the camera, but the lens was coated with pepper spray.
He tries to wipe it off.
"Well done! You've succeeded in annoying me," he told me.
"Good," I shot back as he stomped on my shin. I screamed in agony.
"Tell Edward how much it hurts," James shouted as he shoves the camera in my face. "Tell him to avenge you. Tell your friend, Alexis, to avenge you."
"No! Alexis, don't...," I screamed as he touched my broken shin.
James inhaled as my blood pooled. He leans in, hungry.
I, being half-conscious, watched him turn the camera on his face. "Cut! The end," he smiled as he shuts the camera. Suddenly, James was knocked out.
He rose to find himself face-to-face with Edward and Layla.
Layla charged at him as James threw her aside and tackles Edward, forcing him up against a column.
"You're alone... because you're faster than the others. But not strong enough," James snarled as he smashed Edward's face into the mirror until it cracks.
"I'm strong enough to kill you," Edward replied.
He flung James backward, smashing through a freestanding mirror into the doorway.
Layla grabs him as Edward ran over to me and scooped me up and leaped toward the balcony exit door when suddenly we were jerked downward.
James yanks Edward violently onto Edward knocking me out of his arms as James flung Edward up into the top window, embedding him in the casement and bricks.
I landed on pieces of glass as one piece entered my leg.
I pulled it out as blood pooled around me. James crouched beside me. He grabs my hand.
"N-no!" I managed to scream as Edward looked at me.
Looking directly at Edward with a sinister grin, he sinks his teeth into my hand. I screamed in agony as Edward's and Layla's rage erupted, hearing me scream.
He climbed out of the window casement and suicide-dive-bomb James, savagely plowing him through the floorboards.
As my vision fade in and out, I saw Edward and James fighting.
"Ed-Edward," I stuttered.
Edward heard me as James was kicking Edward, delivering death blows. That's when suddenly Edward's hand shot up and grabbed his ankle.
He roared up to his feet and swung James around like a baseball bat, smashing him into mirror after mirror. James was battered, beaten. Layla rushes to my side as she tries to stop the blood.
"You're not going to die on me, Bella," She told me, but my vision began to fade.
The venom slowly moved in my veins as I moaned in pain and the sound of my pain slices through Edward.
In an animalistic fury, Edward bites off a piece of James' flesh. I saw Carlisle now standing beside Edward, placing a hand on his son's shoulder.
Edward turns to see his father, with Jasper, Emmett, Ella and Alice, dropping down from the balcony. "Bella!" I heard Alexis call out to me as she ran to me.
"Please be okay!" She saw my leg bleeding and immediately puts pressure on it.
I nearly screamed as Edward looked at me.
Edward's expression changes as he realizes he's gone too far. He backs off as his siblings crouch into attack mode and lunge at James like a pack of animals.
Carlisle rushes to me as I screamed again in pain.
Jasper dashes toward me. My vision of focus faded as I saw the others rip they rip out the floorboards and build a fire.
It's like a funeral pyre as they rip James apart, throwing limbs into the fire. Jasper reached my side, trying to calm Alexis down as Layla moves aside for Carlisle.
I could have sworn I saw the same thing in her eyes that's in Layla's.
Carlisle works fast to assess my wounds, focusing on a massive bleed from my leg as Alexis puts pressure in it.
But clearly my hand hurts the most. I writhed in pain. Carlisle applies pressure to the gash on my thigh. "Her femoral artery's been severed," He said as Alexis removed her belt.
"She's losing too much blood."
"It's on fire! My hand!" I managed to scream.
"You have to make a choice," Carlisle told Edward. "Either the change happen -." "No!" Edward shot back as he looked at me.
Alice appears behind Edward, fuzzy, indistinct. "It's going to happen. I've seen it --," Alice told him. "It doesn't have to be that way," Edward replied. "Edward, you have to do something,"
Alexis begged. "She's going to die."
"Alice, find me a tourniquet. A rag, a shirt," Carlisle asked as he took Alexis's belt and placed it around my leg.
Alice held her nose and avoids the blood as she rips the sleeve off her blouse and knelt to aid Carlisle. "It's burning!" I screamed. "What's the other choice? You said --," Edward asked.
"Tighter, above the knee --," Carlisle told her.
"Carlisle," Edward begged as he looked at me.
I held fear and pain in my eyes. "You can try to suck the venom out," Carlisle told him.
"I won't be able to stop...," Edward replied. "Find the will to stop. But choose, she only has minutes left," Carlisle replied. Alexis held my other hand as Edward looked at me, thrashing in pain.
Her hand felt soft. It was calming. Her braid was wrapped around my finger, I lightly played with it.
Finally, Edward took my hand. I tried to pull it away. "It's alright, Bella," Edward told me. "I'll make it go away." He looked at me then starts to suck the venom from my hand.
We never took our eyes off one another, our connection palpable, intense.
My eyes held pain that slowly subsided.
In Edward's eyes, the frenzy has begun. He sucks harder. Hungrily. Anguished, he wants to stop but can't. Carlisle voice sounds miles away.
"Stop. Her blood is clean, you're killing her," Carlisle asked but the bloodlust is too strong. Edward was killing me. I looked at him, forgivingly, as I began to lose consciousness.
As my eyes faded, Edward was growing blurry as he disappears into the blinding light.
It's as if I'm underwater, like I was slowly dying. "Bella!" I heard Alexis cry out as I fell unconscious. Death is peaceful. Easy, I thought. I started to float away when suddenly, Edward reached out a hand.
I grabbed his hand as a brilliant light flares.
I slowly regained consciousness. But eyes slowly open.
I squinted at the light. Life... is harder..., I thought.
-𝐀𝐥𝐞𝐱𝐢𝐬'𝐬 𝐏𝐨𝐯-
I was sitting in Bella's hospital room. holding her hand. She had an oxygen tubes resting under her nose, she looked horrible. I saw her wake up and reached for it, confused.
A hand stopped her as her surroundings came into focus.
"You're awake, baby! You're okay!!!" Her mom smiled. Her Mom hovered over her, tears in her eyes.
"Edward? Where's Edward?" She asked. "He's asleep," Her mom told her, nodding across the room to a chair in which Edward 'slept'.
"He never leaves. And your dad's down in the cafeteria," Her mom told her.
"What... happened?" She asked looking at me, "Bella, you fell down two flights of stairs and through a window," I told her, I was telling her what Edward chose for our cover.
Bella looked blank, confused. Her mom jogs her memory.
"Edward came here to convince you to come back to Forks. His father brought him down. You two went to their hotel and you tripped," Her mom answered.
"Went through a window. You even bit your own wrist."
A moment happened then She realized it was a cover story. She nodded. "Sounds like me," I smiled at her. The mom's cell phone beeped. She opened it.
She read a text and started typing in a reply. "It's Phil. He's worried about you," She informed her.
"Mom, you're... texting," Bella gasped. "I told him to stay in Florida," Mom added. "The Suns signed him!" "That's great mom," She smiled.
"Jacksonville is always sunny and you'll have your own bathroom...," The mom replied. I got sad, thinking about Bella leaving. I know I haven't known her long, but she's like a sister to me.
"Mom, wait. I want to live in Forks. I have Dad...," I answered. "... and friends..." "And he's there," She added as Bella looked at Edward.
I shrugged, knowing the truth. "Charlie doesn't like him. Blames him for your leaving," Her mom sighed.
"What do you think?" I asked her mom. The first time I'm talking to this woman. She didn't like me being here.
She tried to kick me out the room but Charlie said Bella would like me in the room.
"I think that boy is in love with her," The mom answered, looking at me more than Bella. "I really love him, Mom," She told her.
I smiled happily as I walked out.
I hear a light thank you from Edward as I leave, anytime I think, walking out. When I walked out, Jasper kissed my forehead soothingly.
I sighed in relief, hugging him. "What happened to Victoria?" I ask looking up at him. "Victoria, she ran off," Jasper answered.
"She may come after you since you killed James," I reminded him.
"She is not going to get to me or you," Jasper replied as I closed my eyes with relief.