AN: Just a heads up, this is the final chapter. In light of feedback, I think it's best. It hasn't turned out exactly the way I wanted and most people seem to have lost interest already anyway.

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Chapter 5:

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It started raining in the night and it was raining when Bella woke up in the morning. The previous night felt like a strange and incredible dream but the proof was in the pain between her legs. She called Victoria several times but there was no answer. She began to get angry. Bella deserved an explanation or at least a conversation. Her father had been called to an emergency at work and after a while she decided to get in her truck and go see Victoria face to face.

She drove fast on the slick wet roads and she reached the house in under an hour. It had begun to rain harder. She had forgotten to bring a jacket and her t-shirt was wet as soon as she stepped out the truck. The sky was dark and gray. A storm moving in. Bella marched up to the front door and pounded on it with her fist.

"Victoria!" she shouted over the rain. "Open the door!"

She pounded again. Victoria wasn't answering and now she was getting very pissed off.

She went into the yard and looked at the window to the livingroom. Then she cast about for something to break it with. There were some loose bricks along the edge of the path that led to the mailbox and she squatted down in the rain with her long hair dangling and wriggled one of the bricks free. Then she rose and turned and hurled it through the window.

The window broke in a great crash of glass. A row of jagged spikes remained along the bottom edge of the window and Bella didn't even know if she could climb through. The curtain was closed and rustling in the rainswept wind and she was about to try and climb in when the curtain flapped out angrily and Victoria emerged with a snarl.

Bella stumbled and fell back on the wet grass. Victoria towered over her.

"What do you think you're doing?!"

Bella was incredulous. "Me?!"

Victoria's red hair was already getting wet and dark. She pointed back at the window. "I can't afford to have this place vandalized, you stupid girl!"

Bella glared at her tearfully. "You didn't have a problem vandalizing me."

That bought the woman up short. She looked down at the girl on the grass, the rain soaking through her hair and her clothes, and then she shook her head.

"It doesn't matter," she said. "I'm leaving town, anyway. Congratulations, Ms Swan, you get to live. Have a nice life."

Then she spun around and went in through the front door. Bella scrambled to her feet and followed.

"Victoria!" she shouted as she chased her up the stairs. "Don't you think we should talk?"

The rain was more muted inside the house. Victoria had stormed into her bedroom and now she was ripping open the dresser drawers and throwing all her clothes into a pile.

"Victoria, please," Bella said. "Just talk to me."

"We have nothing to talk about."

"Yes, we do."

Victoria ignored her and continued ransacking the drawers. Bella watched her for a second while the rain spattered on the window and then she took Victoria's arm to try and force her to stop.

"Victoria, stop," she said. "Stop!"

Bella tried to wrench her away from the dresser but it was like trying to wrench a solid stone statue. Victoria spun around and grabbed her wrists roughly and threw her back on the bed. Bella bounced there and froze on the mattress while Victoria advanced a seething step.

"Do not anger me, Ms Swan," she growled. "Not now."

Bella glared up at her from the bed. "What is your problem, Victoria? You're the one who hurt me. I'm the one who should be upset."

"You're too stupid to be upset."

"Don't call me that."

"Shut up! You've ruined everything!"

Tears came into Bella's eyes. She couldn't understand why Victoria was angry with her. "What? What did I ruin?"

"Everything!" Victoria burst out. "Everything was perfect before I met you! Now James is dead and I can't even avenge him! I can't do anything!"

Victoria's red eyes were wild and her hair was dark and wet and now she calmed slightly and scoffed at the girl on the bed.

"But you," she said, "you wouldn't understand. So eager to move on from your mate. Even with someone like me. I told you your feelings were nothing compared to mine."

"Edward wasn't my mate."

"No. But James was mine."

Bella was leaning back on her elbows and gazing up from a position of submission with her wet t-shirt clinging to her breasts. Like a woman waiting to be made love to, only her eyes were filled with tears and she couldn't understand any of this. "It wasn't my fault," she said. "You can't blame me."

"Then who am I supposed to blame? Who?!"

Bella jumped and her voice came out meek. "James," she said. "Blame James."

"How dare you."

"I'm sorry, but it's true. He knew the risks in coming after me and he did it anyway. It was his own fault. He overestimated himself."

"Enough."

But Bella could see that she'd found a weak spot and now she shifted to sit up on her knees. "You're allowed to be angry with him, Victoria," she told the wild redhead. "He put you both in danger and he got himself killed. He left you. He left you all alone."

Victoria's eyes looked like they wanted to cry but as a vampire she couldn't. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Maybe not, but I know you like me. And I like you too. So why can't we just…"

"What? Just what?"

Bella didn't know how to answer. Outside a low rumble of thunder moved over the forest. Victoria shook her head. She still had a handful of clothes in her hand and now she tossed it onto the pile and stared at it.

"My life is meaningless without James," she said.

Bella rose from the bed and approached Victoria. All sense of danger had fled her by this point and all she had inside her was the desire to be with this woman who had come to her in her darkest hour and gave her new fire. Victoria watched her and slowly Bella put her hands at her waist and snaked them around and tightened them into a hug.

Victoria didn't move. The girl had laid her head on Victoria's shoulder and after a while Victoria raised her arms and hugged her back. So warm. So soft. She closed her eyes for a moment but there was no more longing to kill this girl. The only longing she felt was to keep her. But the betrayal to her fallen mate was something she could never condone and after a few minutes she began to push the girl away gently.

"Go home," she said.

"I don't want to."

"Just go. It's okay."

"Why?"

Victoria cupped her warm and wet cheek and even offered her a weak smile. "I'm sorry, Ms Swan," she said. "I truly am. For everything I've put you through. You're a special girl. You have a peculiar heart. I don't pretend to understand it but I can see how valuable it is. Whoever you give it to will be a very lucky person. Now go."

"Victoria—"

"Go!"

Victoria gave her a violent shove backwards. Bella stumbled and fell on her side. She winced from the pain in her hip and between her legs and as she went to push herself up she saw something hidden under the bed.

The kerosene cans.

It gave her a bad feeling to see them concealed there like that but it wasn't important right now. She struggled up to her feet and turned to face Victoria. Lightning flashed in the gray window beside that tempestuous redhead and the thunder cracked after it.

"Leave now, Ms Swan," Victoria said. "This is the last time I will tell you."

Bella didn't want to go but she didn't want to risk making things worse either. "Can I call you later?"

"Tomorrow. Call me tomorrow."

"Okay. You're not going to leave town, are you?"

"No. I'm staying right here."

"Because we have to talk."

"I know. Get out of here, Ms Swan. I have to be alone right now."

Bella backed away to the bedroom door. More thunder rumbled. Victoria had her eyes closed and a hand in her wet red hair, as if she had a lot on her mind, and Bella knew she did need some time.

"Okay," Bella said. "I'll go. But call me if you want to talk, okay?"

Victoria nodded without opening her eyes and Bella hesitated a moment before turning and leaving.

The storm got worse until the noon was almost as dark as evening, the black clouds thick and heavy and the thunder cracking down relentlessly. The power had gone out and Bella sat in her room with her notebook of poetry, thinking about nothing but Victoria. She was worried. She had said she wasn't going to leave town but what if she was only saying that to get rid of Bella? What if she was leaving town right now?

The other thing that worried her was those cans of kerosene. Victoria had never struck her as suicidal—until this morning.

Bella frowned and tried not to think it about for now. Victoria told her to call tomorrow and that's what she'd do. Her hair was completely dry by the time her father got home so she didn't have to explain why she was out or where she went. She didn't know what she would say, anyway.

She kept her phone at her side all day and into the night but Victoria never called. Bella never called either. It was still raining when she went to bed and she was lying awake for a long time with a bad feeling in her stomach like a virus. She couldn't stop thinking about Victoria leaving town. Or worse. She didn't know how long she lay there but it was long enough that the rain slackened and finally stopped. Then all there was only darkness and silence.

Eventually Bella couldn't take it anymore and she got up. She called on the phone but there was no answer and instead she got changed and grabbed the keys to her truck.

She snuck out without waking her dad and took the wet black road north. Toward the old Cullen house. Victoria might be pissed off but she didn't care. She had to see her and she had to tell her how she felt. Because she had finally figured it out. She loved her. As wrong and fucked up as it was, it was true. Bella wanted to be with her and Bella knew Victoria felt the same.

The realization gave her heart but then her heart plummeted all the way down again as she noticed smoke rising into the moonless night in the distance.

And an orange glow in the trees.

The breath seemed to collapse out of her. Her hands went slack on the wheel and she almost went off road. The fire was coming from around the next bend—directly where the Cullen house would be. Bella knew immediately what had started it. The kerosene. Victoria couldn't live without James and her feelings for Bella only made her all the more guilty. And now she might be—

Bella hit the gas harder and fished her phone out of her pocket. In her panic she couldn't remember the proper number for the fire department and instead she called her dad on the house phone. It rang for a long time while Bella drove with one hand and eventually her father picked it up and spoke in a voice that was cautious against some kind of emergency.

"Hello? Who is this?"

"Dad, it's me," Bella said. "You have to call the fire department. Right now."

"Bella? Is that you?"

"Yeah."

His voice went rough with anger. "Bella, what the hell is going on? Where are you?"

There was no way she could explain everything but right now all she cared about was trying to help Victoria. "I'm at the Cullen's old house," she said. "It's on fire."

"Fire? What the hell are you talking about? Why aren't you in bed?"

"Dad, please. Just call the fire department for me, okay? I wasn't sure which number to call. It's an emergency."

"Jesus, Bella, are you alright? Are you in the house?"

"No, I'm not there yet. I'm still driving but I can see it. Please, just call the fire department. The address is 1719 Meadow Lane. You know the address, don't you?"

"Bella, I want you to turn around and come home right now. Right now, do you hear me?"

"Just call them, dad. 1719 Meadow Lane. Hurry."

"Bells—"

"I love you," she said out of some fey instinct of impending death, and then hung up.

She threw the phone on the seat beside her and pressed down on the pedal even harder. In less than two minutes she came around the bend and saw what she feared—the entire house ablaze.

She could hear the roar of the fire as she pulled up and she could feel the heat of it as she got out. Flames were licking up the outside walls and steam was rising from the wet grass like souls from the ground as if the burning house occupied some special pocket of hell encroached here upon the living world.

"Victoria!" Bella screamed at the house. "Are you in there?!"

She lifted an arm, as if to block away the heat, and searched the yard briefly. Nothing. She looked around the side of the house and ran around the back. The blaze was well-advanced and the windows were beginning to pop outward in small explosions of glass. Bella looked up at the back of the house to where Victoria's bedroom window was. The smoke was billowing up into the black of the sky and the heat caused sweat to break out over her face.

She looked down and saw the sliding doors that led into the kitchen. They were broken like all the rest of the glass and the interior was in flames like a portal to hell.

Victoria could be inside and she still might be alive and Bella knew what she had to do. She took off her jacket and wrapped it around her head to protect her hair and then she took a deep breath and charged in.

The heat was incredible. She avoided direct contact with the flames but she didn't know how long she could last in here. The kitchen counter was bare. The refrigerator and the blood all gone. Victoria must've gotten rid of any trace that someone had lived here. Bella released her breath and took another one. It was full of heat and smoke. She coughed and ventured further into the house.

She found Victoria in the livingroom. Completely naked so that she would leave behind nothing at all, not a stich of clothing, nothing. Standing there among the burning furniture with her body bathed in the orange glow like some redheaded demon seeking to return to the flames from whence she came. Bella stumbled toward her through the heat. She was soaked with sweat and already beginning to lose consciousness.

"Victoria," she wheezed. "Victoria…"

Victoria turned and caught Bella as Bella collapsed. The jacket slid off her head and fell to the floor. The burning house continued to rage all around them.

"Bella," Victoria said. It was the first time she had ever said her name.

"Victoria," Bella wheezed again. "Victoria, you have to get out of here."

She was trying to pull Victoria away. Her eyes were half closed and she could hardly stand. Victoria didn't budge. Instead she took Bella's face in her hands, those palms like pure ice against the blaze of Bella's cheeks, and shook her head softly.

"No," she said. "I have to stay here."

Bella coughed. Her eyes were red from the smoke swirling through the room and leaking tears. "Please," she rasped. "Don't do this."

"Go, Ms Swan. Get out."

"No."

"It's okay. You're young. You'll be alright."

Bella shook her head and wrapped her arms around Victoria, there in the middle of all that fire, pressing her face into the crook of her neck for the coolness of it.

"No," she said. "I'm staying with you…"

Victoria didn't reply. Bella was slumped against her cold nakedness and Victoria put her arms around her. She looked out at the swirling flames, the billowing smoke. She held the girl in her arms and warred against the desires of her heart. She tried to lift Bella's face but Bella's head only lolled lifelessly. She had fallen unconscious. Victoria gazed at that dreamless face while the fire raged all around them and then she hefted Bella into her arms and carried her like a bride from this damnation.

She kicked down the front door and the door exploded out into the yard in a shower of sparks. Victoria emerged from the fiery doorway with Bella in her arms and then she laid the girl in the dark and dew soaked grass.

She was still unconscious. Victoria patted her pale and smoke smeared cheek. She didn't stir. Her heart wasn't beating. Victoria brushed a thumb over those soft and lovely lips and then she leaned down and breathed into them, holding her nose closed. Then again. She put her hands on the girl's chest and pressed down five times and breathed into her mouth again, breathing the life back into her, and finally Bella's heart began to beat again.

She woke in a fit of coughing and she coughed until her lungs were raw. Then she lay back and gazed up at Victoria with weeping eyes. The woman was entirely naked and with her redhair and lusciously exposed breasts she looked less like an angelic saviour and more like some sultry demon who'd taken her from the flames for her own purposes.

"Victoria," Bella whispered weakly.

Victoria gazed at her sadly. "You stupid girl."

"I'm sorry."

In the distance came the sirens of firetrucks. Victoria could see the flashing lights miles down the road in the darkness and she went to rise. Bella snatched her arm.

"Don't go," she said, and the urgency of her words made her cough again.

Victoria knelt there and touched her face. "I have to," she said. "They can't find me here."

"Then take me with you."

"I can't."

"Kill me then."

"What?"

"Kill me. Please."

Victoria caressed her cheek. Bella blinked up at her with her round brown eyes that were full of tears and there was nothing in them at all but the desire to belong to Victoria—one way or another.

Victoria began to gather her up in her arms. Bella winced at the ache in her lungs. Behind them the house was entirely engulfed in flames and there was the occasional crash and boom of roofbeams collapsing in great cascades of sparks that rose into the smoke and the night.

Victoria brushed Bella's hair from her throat. The sirens of the firetrucks were getting closer. Bella smiled at her.

"Thank you," she whispered.

Victoria looked at her. "For what?"

"For making me feel alive again."

Victoria stroked her hair away and watched the peace settle over the girl's smoke stained face. She brushed her knuckles over the girl's throat. Bella sighed and her eyes fluttered. Victoria gave her a small smile.

"Is this what you want?"

"Yes," Bella whispered. "And I know you do too."

But now Victoria's smile grew and she shook her head. "No," she said. "Not anymore. I want something else."

"What?"

"You," Victoria whispered softly. "Just you."

Then she swooped down and bit into Bella's neck.

Bella gasped and closed her eyes. She could feel the heat from the burning house and she could hear the sirens of the firetrucks but none of it mattered. Victoria growled into her neck and bit deeper, wrenching at the flesh like a dog, and Bella gasped again and smiled and wrapped her arms around Victoria's neck. She could feel Victoria's venom entering her system and right before she passed out she realized that Victoria wasn't actually drinking her blood. She only seemed to be pumping her body with venom.

—

The transformation took five days. Victoria carried her to a lake in the forest and laid her down on the shore and held her down when her body buckled from the pain. She fed her from the remaining blood bags she had stashed away and stripped off her clothes and washed her with water from the lake. Bella was in too much pain to speak but on the fifth night she woke to a sky full of stars and no more pain. She blinked and sat up. She was naked and her legs were long and lustrous in the moonlight and she could see her breasts and her hands. Her skin was perfectly white in a way it had never used to be and she wasn't cold at all.

Victoria was in the lake. The water came to her hips and she was standing in the center of it. Her hair was dry and dark red and she was watching Bella. The lake was pitch black and shimmering like satin an a collection of stars twinkled on its surface like diamonds on a jeweller's blackcloth. Bella looked at Victoria and rose and made her way into the lake. Wading into the cool water until the water came up to her hips. Her body was alive with sensations and she took a handful of the water and let it spill and then she looked at Victoria.

"You turned me," she said.

Victoria cupped her cheek and gazed into her eyes. "I've already lost one mate," she said. "I couldn't bear to lose another."

Bella smiled at her. Victoria leaned down slightly and Bella lifted her face to complete the distance. Their mouths connected in a kiss and Bella wrapped her arms around Victoria's neck. She pressed her breasts into the other woman's chest and moaned and opened her mouth for the other woman to deepen the kiss. The water flowed around their legs and trickled in the quiet and in all that cold and all that wetness they continued to burn for each other as they would now forever.

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AN: That's it. Sorry for the abruptness, but I wanted some of you guys to at least have an ending. I wish it had turned out a lot more differently. I've really grown to love Victoria and I really wanted to give her an epic story. Anyway, thanks for reading. As short as it was, I hope you liked it.