Plot Summary: Newton's Third Law states that for each action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. When Bella Swan survives James's attack, she thought things would go back to normal. Instead, the attack sets off a series of events that will not only changes everything but also uncovers a long kept family secret.

Pairings: End pairings undecided. Some Edward/Bella, Stefan/Elena, Bella/Damon, and other canon pairings for both Twilight and The Vampire Diaries.

Warnings: This is AU for both Twilight and The Vampire Diaries. It begins after the events in Twilight and before the beginning of Season One in The Vampire Diaries, but some events in canon may be altered due to Bella's presence.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: I apologize for the long wait, but I had a big exam on Friday that I had to prepare for. Also, I wanted this to be longer, but it felt right to end it here.

Chapter Four

When Damon's words registered in Bella's mind, a surge of energy went through her replacing her fear with white-hot anger. She was tired of people telling her what to do. She narrowed her eyes at the man—or better yet vampire—in front of her.

"I don't think so. Get your hands off of me," she bit off.

He did not let her go, though. If anything, his grip on her arm tightened and a confused look flitted across his face before a stormy expression settled there.

"You don't think so?" his voice was soft, but there was an edge beneath it. The same danger she had picked up on only moments ago.

She took a deep breath. While she was angry at his manhandling because she was likely to be bruised as well as his attempt at ordering her around because she was tired of vampires ordering her around, she didn't want to make what appeared to be a volatile vampire even angrier.

She tried to think of a way to get away from this situation but found nothing. "Why don't you want me to leave?" she asked instead.

This seemed to bring him up short. The hand that wasn't holding onto her arm reached out and trailed one finger down her face and across her lips. "You look just like her. How can you look so much like her?"

She knew then exactly what he meant. Jasper's research had told him that Damon Salvatore and his brother had both been involved with Katherine Pierce, whom she just happened to be identical to.

"Um, we're not sure why I look like Katherine—"

Bella didn't get to finish her sentence because the moment she said the word Katherine, Damon became enraged. Red bled through his eyes, and the veins around his eyes became protruding. Then he grabbed her by both arms and shook her.

"How do you know about Katherine?"

She was vaguely aware that she was beginning to have a panic attack. Thinking someone was a vampire and seeing the proof was different especially when so much rage seemed to be directed at her.

"I—I..." she stuttered, but she couldn't finish the sentence.

When she stopped speaking, he shook her harder. "Tell me!" he roared.

Her head was aching from the force of him shaking her. She felt like her brain and her teeth were rattling in her head.

"I have a friend," she gasped. "Jasper—he's a vampire. He knew her—met her in the 1870's when he was fighting in the Southern territory wars."

At this, he became completely still. His features went back to normal, and he shook his head in disbelief. "You're lying. Katherine has been in the tomb beneath Fell's Church since 1864."

She cried out when his grip on her arm tightened once again, "I'm not lying. I can prove it. I've got pictures of her in my bag."

He searched her face for a moment before he let her go and nodded to where her bag had fallen to the ground once more. "Get them."

She ignored her aching head and arms as well as her shaking legs and scrambled to her bag. She pulled out the envelope labeled 'Katherine Pierce' and handed it to the vampire before she sank to the ground, her legs no longer able to hold her. She watched as he looked through the pictures in the envelope and then read the letter Jasper had included.

When Damon was finished going through its contents, he dropped the envelope on the ground, the pictures inside scattering as they fell. He let out a strangled noise and grabbed the fallen tree trunk Bella had been sitting on earlier and tossed it into another tree uprooting that tree in the process and causing both trees fell to the ground loudly. He stalked back and forth through the trees ranting as he did so.

Bella wasn't listening though. She pulled her legs up to her chest and hugged them, burying her face into her lap. She knew that she should leave, that she should make her way back to her car, but she couldn't find it in herself to move at the moment. For all her bravado to Edward about being able to take care of her self, she was doing a terrible job of it.

She raised her head off of her knees when everything grew silent. The area near the waterfall was in disarray, but Damon had either worn himself out or worked through his rage because he was now picking up all of the fallen pictures of Katherine off of the ground. He no longer looked angry. Instead, he looked heartbroken, and Bella could see the tears glistening in his eyes. Something about his pain resonated within her.

Carefully, she stood up and walked over to where he was standing. She wanted to touch him, to comfort him somehow, but after earlier, she was definitely wary of him. Still, she didn't run away from him like she probably should have. Her sense of self-preservation was obviously faulty.

"I'm sorry," she told him, needing to say but not knowing what else to say.

Damon scoffed and turned to look at her, taking something in her disheveled appearance and rapidly bruising arms. "You're sorry. I'm the one who stalked you, attempted to compel you, and attacked you, and you're apologizing to me."

"Yeah, you did those things," she agreed. "But I am sorry. Katherine obviously meant a lot to you, and I can see why you'd be angry, especially if you spent the last 140-something years thinking she was trapped in the tomb when she wasn't."

Damon cocked his head to the side and studied her face, searching for something—perhaps for traces of dishonesty, she wasn't sure—for a moment before finally sighing. "Look, I don't typically apologize, it's not really my thing, but I shouldn't have put my hands on you."

It wasn't quite an apology, but it was probably the closest she was going to get. "Apology accepted. I might be able to get you more information about Katherine if you're interested. My friend said that when he met her in the 1870's, she was looking for help—"

Realization came over Damon's features, and he cut her off. "She faked her death. She wanted everyone to think she was in that tomb. Why would she do that?"

Bella shrugged. "I don't know. Jasper never told me what she wanted help with only that she only cared for herself. If you want, you could ask him. He's staying with me while I'm in town."

Damon's expression was bleak. "Why not? What do I have left to lose?"

The two made the hike back through the woods to Bella's car and then the drive back to the house. Damon didn't say a word, but several times Bella could feel the weight of his eyes on her. She never caught him looking at her, but she had felt him doing so. He followed her up to the door, but instead of following her into the house, he lingered on the doorstep.

"You'll need to invite me in," Damon told her, sounding more than a little unwilling to divulge the information.

Bella was surprised and a little amused to discover at least one stereotype about vampires was true. "Please come in."

Jasper was waiting on them when they walked through the door. He eyed Damon suspiciously unconsciously sending out waves of distrust and suspicion that rapidly turned to anger when he noticed Bella's appearance. For his part, Damon was studying Jasper in return, his eyes taking in the layers of bite marks that could be seen on Jasper's exposed arms and neck.

It took only seconds for Jasper to place himself between Bella and Damon and to take an offensive position. "Did he hurt you, Bella?" Jasper asked her, his voice deceptively calm.

"Well, yes," she said and then hurriedly continued before Jasper acted on the anger she could feel building in the room, "but it was a misunderstanding. I'm fine."

Although Jasper had always seemed dangerous to Bella, and he certainly seemed dangerous to Bella now, Damon did not seem concerned in the least. If anything, he looked amused. The two vampires continued to stare at one another while Bella stood awkwardly behind Jasper. She finally made a disgruntled noise, tired of the ridiculous posturing, and pushed her way past Jasper.

"Damon, this is my friend Jasper Whitlock. Jasper, this is Damon Salvatore. We were hoping you might tell him what you know about Katherine. He was under the impression that Katherine had been beneath some tomb here since 1864."

Jasper's stance relaxed, and the atmosphere relaxed infinitesimally as he ended his waves of suspicion and distrust. "Damon Salvatore," he said, almost as if to taste the name on his tongue. "Your reputation precedes you."

"As does yours," Damon said.

Bella looked back and forth at the two vampires standing in the entryway. "Why don't you two go sit down in the living room while I try to make myself look somewhat decent?"

Jasper studied her for a moment before nodding. "That sounds fine," he said, his country drawl more apparent than usual. "I'll show Mr. Salvatore to the living room."

Bella threw a last look at Damon before heading up the stairs to her bathroom. She washed her face and tried to straighten up her hair. When she looked down at where the dark bruises ought to be, she was surprised to see they were not the deep purple she expected but instead were the pale greenish-yellow of a healing bruise.

"Weird," she muttered to herself before shaking her head. It was likely just another side effect of the venom in her body, so she filed it away and vowed to talk to Jasper about it later.

She had never tried purposely to utilize the new abilities she seemed to have, but as she went back to join Jasper and Damon, she tried to move as quietly and as quickly as possible. She was frustrated to find out that it didn't worked, and she descended the staircase at her normal speed, coming to stop outside of the living room where she could hear the two vampires talking.

"—Klaus? Who is he, and why would he want her?" Damon was asking.

Jasper sighed. "I'm not sure. I'm not as familiar with your kind of vampires, but I know that as soon as Maria heard the name Klaus, she refused to help her and practically ran her out of the camp. She didn't look afraid, but you can't lie to an empath. She was terrified. Maria wasn't one to back down from a fight, so if she was afraid, then he's likely extremely dangerous. Not to mention how frightened Katherine was. She tried to hide it, but...like I said before, you can't hide your feelings from an empath."

Silence fell over the two, so Bella chose that moment to enter the living room, her mind reeling from the information she had overheard. "Do you think your contact in Richmond—Slater—would know?" she asked. "Maybe this Klaus person is important. If he's after Katherine, maybe that's why my birth parents went to such extremes to hide me away. Maybe they were worried I would be mistaken for Katherine since we look so much alike?" It was a long shot, but Bella was desperate to know anything about her past. She wanted to know why she looked so much like Katherine and why her parents had given her up with such strange instructions.

"I'm not sure," Jasper said after a moment. "I never asked Slater about Klaus. I suppose he might know." He turned back to Damon. "That's all the information I have on Katherine. If you want my opinion, I would say you dodged a bullet. Like I told Bella, from what I observed, she is the most selfish being I've ever come across."

Damon's expression was inscrutable. When he finally replied, his voice was low. "Yes. Yes, she is." He stood up. "I should go now, but thanks for the information."

A frown came unbidden to Bella's face at the thought of Damon leaving. "Oh, well, I'll walk you out then."

Jasper watched Bella as she lead Damon out of the room; his brow furrowed no doubt as he accessed her feelings of disappointment. Living with an empath did have its drawbacks.

Bella followed Damon outside. She groaned as her eyes landed on her car. "I completely forgot that you road with me. Do you need me to take you back to your car?"

Damon grinned. "I can get back on my own much faster than you could drive me." At Bella's confused look, he continued. "Vampire, remember?"

"Oh, yeah. I'm not used to there being a whole other breed of vampire. What makes your type different than Jasper's besides the face-thing and people having to invite you inside? How come you don't sparkle in the sun? Jasper has had to stay inside because of the weather," Bella asked him rapid fire, her curiosity getting the best of her.

He didn't respond at first, but then he walked over to one of the rocking chairs that were on the front porch and sat down. He indicated she should sit as well when she didn't follow his lead.

"I can't give away all of our trade secrets, but I suppose I could tell you a few. For a price."

Bella's eyes narrowed. "What sort of price?"

"You have dinner with me. Tonight."

"Are you asking me on a date?" she asked him.

Damon arched an elegant brow. "Is that a yes?"

"You can't answer a question with another question!" Bella said with a huff.

He didn't reply merely continued to stare at her with an infuriatingly smug look on his face.

"Fine, yes, I'll go to dinner with you, but it's not a date. How can you even eat?"

He shrugged. "So long as I keep up a healthy diet of blood, my body functions pretty normally."

"Huh. What else is different?"

Damon grabbed her hand and pressed it against his chest where Bella could feel the faint beating of a heart. "There's the heartbeat, for one, and for another, unlike those sparklers, we burn in the sun—"

"But you were out in the sun today!" Bella exclaimed, cutting him off. "Why didn't you burn?"

He shook his head rapidly. "I'm afraid that is a trade secret."

She barely resisted the urge to huff. "Fine, fine. What about sleeping? I assume you don't sleep in coffins, but can you sleep?"

"We don't need as much as a human does, but yeah, we do."

Bella made a humming noise and studied Damon trying to catalog the differences. He looked almost human, though there was a sharp quality, an otherness to his appearance that could be seen if you were looking for it.

"So, who's stronger, you or them?" she asked after a moment.

"Me, of course."

Bella scoffed and rolled her eyes. "And so humble. I wonder, is arrogance a requirement in all vampires?"

"I'm just stating a fact. There are certain disadvantages to being either type of vampire, and I will admit that their impervious skin gives them some protection that we don't have, but overall, we are the stronger breed."

She sat back in the rocking chair and stared out across the yard; her mind wandering once again to how much her life had changed in just a matter of weeks. A new type of vampire was really the least of her worries everything considered.

"It's your turn to answer a few question. How do you know the Major? I have to admit that I am surprised to see him in the company of a human girl."

A frown tugged at Bella's lips when she thought about exactly how she knew Jasper. "He doesn't really spend much time with humans typically. I'm sort of the exception to the rule as he's my ex-boyfriend's brother."

Damon looked intrigued. "Jasper is your ex-boyfriend's brother, and now you are living with him?"

"It's not like that!" Bella snapped. "He's just my friend. God, what's wrong with you?"

Damon raised his hands in surrender. "Hey, I just assumed there was something going on given how protective he was of you before."

Bella scowled. "That's why he's here—to protect me, the weak little human from the big bad world. Not that I'm even in any danger, ignoring the events of this afternoon, of course."

"Of course," he agreed. "Are you adverse to being protected? I thought most girls liked that white knight in shining armor rescuing the damsel in distress crap."

She crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, I guess I'm not most girls. I happen to hate being the damsel in distress. I want to be able to protect myself for once."

"Ah," Damon said, a knowing look on his face. "I get it. You're tired of being the weak little human. I've been where you are now, a human in love a vampire. It sucks to always have to rely on their strength. Plus, it's pretty hard to be with someone forever if you can't live forever."

Bella sighed. "Yeah. I know. You were with Katherine, right? Is she the one that turned you?"

A dark look flitted across Damon's face before his expression closed off completely. "I have to go," he told her and was gone in the blink of an eye.

She sat there and stared as the empty chair for a long moment before she went back inside. She was still feeling sweaty and dirty from the hike, so she took a long bath before grabbing her sketchbook and going into the living room where Jasper was playing a video game of some sort on a gaming system that Bella hadn't even noticed before. She was in the middle of sketching Damon as she had seen him earlier this afternoon, with his protruding veins and fangs, when Jasper turned off the TV and turned to Bella.

"I think you should be careful around Damon Salvatore," he began. "He's dangerous."

She scowled, her eyes narrowing. "And you're not? Believe me, I saw earlier how dangerous he could be."

"I am dangerous, I will admit, but you know me. You don't know Damon, and if he is asking questions about Katherine, who knows what trouble he's likely to get into... you heard what I told him earlier about this Klaus. If Katherine is mixed up with him, and Damon goes looking for her, things could get dangerous. I just think it would be better for you if you stayed as far away from trouble as you can get."

"Jasper, I'm not sure if we can avoid trouble if it comes to us. I look exactly like Katherine. If Damon is right, and she has dangerous enemies, then I'm in danger no matter what. I appreciate you coming here to 'protect' me, and I definitely appreciate you helping me discover what you could about my family, but I'm not going to hide away just because I could be in danger. I think not knowing just what sort of danger I could possibly be in is more dangerous because being ignorant of danger does not make me immune to it."

He sighed. "You're right. It is better to be aware of all potential hazards."

"Plus, I don't think you have anything to worry about. I brought up his relationship with Katherine, and he took off. He was pretty mad, so I'm guessing he's not going to take me out to dinner tonight."

Jasper didn't say anything for several seconds, so Bella went back to her sketch. She ignored the fact that she could feel still feel Jasper's eyes on her. Instead, she concentrated fully on the sketch until she was finished. Damon's visage in the sketch was terrifying, but there was a beauty in it as well. She exhaled loudly as she finished the sketch and closed her sketchbook.

"Has Alice seen something about Damon? Or me?" she asked Jasper. "Is that why you're so worried?"

He shook his head. "No, she hasn't seen anything." He paused. "That she'll admit to. You know how tight-lipped she can be, and since I'm not there to read her emotions, I can't really say. She was certainly... enthusiastic about your staying here even after your breakup with Edward, and I have a feeling she is keeping some information from me, but that's all I know."

Bella listened to what Jasper said and what Jasper did not say. She had a feeling that Alice did know something. It was all starting to make sense to her. Instead of preparing for what should have been only a short-term trip to Mystic Falls, Alice had gone overboard, even for Alice. A house when Bella wouldn't be in town for more than a few weeks? A new wardrobe more suited for the climate in Virginia than that of Washington State? Why would she have taken all of the steps necessary for Bella to stay in Mystic Falls permanently if she expected her to only be there for a few weeks? Obviously, she didn't expect her to go back to Forks. Bella wasn't certain how she felt about that, but for now, she would go along with it. She trusted Alice, so for now, she wouldn't question it.

She finally shrugged. "She'll tell us when we need to know. I trust her, and I definitely know enough to not bet against her. She's probably trying to let me make my own decisions which I definitely appreciate." She left the unlike Edward unsaid.

Jasper nodded. "Yes, you're probably right. Now, are we going to talk about those disappearing bruises of yours? I know they were there when you walked through the door, but there's no sign or scent of them anymore."

He grabbed one of her arms and examined the blemish free skin before doing the same to the other arm. When he was finished, he raised one of his blonde brows in question.

Bella chewed on her lower lip and looked at Jasper with wide-frightened eyes. "What am I supposed to say? You think I understand this anymore than you do? You're the vampire here."

"Has it happened before? We know your injuries from the accident didn't heal in the same manner."

She considered that. No, her injuries hadn't healed as quickly as the bruises had, but even the doctor had commented on her progress on a few of her check-ups. She had expected to spend the summer confined to her bed or couch, but here she was across the country. "Not to the same extent," she admitted.

Jasper nodded once before standing. "I'll contact a friend of ours in the Denali coven, Eleazar, tonight and see if he has any knowledge about this sort of thing. He is quite old and spent many years in the service of the Volturi. Tomorrow, I suppose, that we should see about visiting Slater. Alice told me this morning it should be cloudy in the morning. So long as we get there before the sun comes out, everything will be fine."

"Thanks Jazz," she said, giving him an appreciative smile. "So, how about you teach me how to play a video game?"

He gave her a questioning look. "You've never cared anything about video games before. Emmett has begged you to play with him in the past to no avail."

She shrugged. "I have always been more of a reader than anything else, but I think it's time I step out of my comfort zone. You going to show me how to play or not, Whitlock?"

He grinned. "Yes, ma'am. I'm always happy to oblige a pretty girl such as yourself...though I make no promises about going easy on you."

"Is that a challenge?" Bella asked with a quirk of her brow.

Jasper's grin widened. "Yes, it is."

For next time: Will Damon take her to dinner? What will they discover on their trip to Slater's? I'm not sure yet! I hope I can figure it out :)