author's notes: apologizing is futile, i know this. so i'm just hoping i haven't been a complete disappointment and that you'll enjoy the new chapter. thanks a million to everyone putting up with me :)

characters (this chapter): Edward/Bella, Jasper/Alice, Rosalie, James, Vanessa (OC)

warnings: au. wip. all vampire. all canon pairings/characters. changing POVs (underlined)

disclaimer: fic•tion [fíksh'n]: literary works of imagination

IN THE SHADOWS

chapter 32: James

(Edward POV)

Victoria's remains were still smouldering on the warehouse floor when Rosalie and I got back from our hunt, the scent sweet and distinct, but only to our kind. I set off to look for Bella as soon as we arrived, but I didn't find her on the roof where I'd left her. Her sketchbook lay on the ground, but Bella was nowhere to be seen. I went back downstairs, and found Alice, without Jasper, now joined by Rosalie as well. "Where's Bella?" I asked, unsuspecting, but Alice wasn't looking at me. In fact, she was doing everything in her power not to look at me. And in her mind she was humming 80s love ballads. "Alice?" I insisted, and she turned, trying to make it look like she'd only then realized I was there. I knew instantly something was off. Where was Jasper?

"Jasper took her out to hunt," Alice answered, a small smile curling her lips. I knew Bella had to feed sooner or later; when I'd left her earlier I thought she needed some more time first to gather her thoughts, the way only my Bella could. At least Jasper was still around to take her hunting. Something told me Bella had never been more grateful for my brother's gift. "Turns out she was pretty thirsty after all. I think she needed Jasper's gift to put her at ease." Alice's words were in chime with my thinking. Her thoughts were still a mystery to me.

"She seemed fine when we left her," Rosalie said, but didn't make anything more of it. She didn't know Bella the way I did, despite knowing her like a sister. Bella would always be a different sister to Rosalie than Alice was; they had completely different personalities after all.

"Yeah, well, this is Bella we're talking about," Alice shrugged, her words – once again – the same as my thoughts.

Jasper arrived moments later. To my surprise, Bella didn't follow immediately after him. The room fell completely silent, a tension between Alice and Jasper that I found particularly hard to place when I realized that Jasper, too, was hiding his thoughts from me – in truth, he could do that more easily than the others. "Jasper," I frowned, a tension now between Rose and me when she realized something wasn't right either. "Where's Bella?"

Jasper looked at Alice; I followed his gaze towards her. Mine moved to Rosalie moments later; she was just as confused as I was. What was going on? Where was Bella? She still hadn't arrived and I knew she wasn't up on the roof. I would have heard it if she was.

"What's going on here?" Rosalie asked suddenly, crossing her arms over her chest. She looked from Jasper to Alice several times. Alice cast down her eyes, and that's when I knew. "Where is Bella?" Rosalie insisted, and I swallowed hard. No, I thought, she couldn't have. Bella wouldn't. But I knew she would.

"She went after James alone, didn't she?" I asked, staring down at the ground, my hands clenched into fists by my sides. It was more a conclusion than it was a question, because I already knew it to be true. Where else would she be? Why else would Alice and Jasper disguise their thoughts from me? They only ever did that when they didn't want me to know something that could harm me. And what could harm me more than knowing Bella was in danger?

"What?" Rose snapped, looking at Jasper now. "And you let her go?" There was an accusation in Rosalie's voice that I had left out of my words. What had convinced Jasper that it was safe to let Bella go? There must have been a reason. Knowing my brother, and my sister, they never would have let Bella go without making sure she was safe.

"Where did she go?" I asked, but already read the answer in Jasper's thoughts. Bella hadn't told them where she was going, just that she was going after James. How could she do that? She had to know what she was putting me – and by extension all of us – through right now.

"She didn't tell us." Jasper shook his head and took a step closer to me. "She told us to keep you away long enough for her to get away."

"She got away," I said, not looking at Jasper. I didn't blame him, even though I easily could have, but this was Bella we were talking about. I imagine that right now, with her daughter's life at stake, she could convince just about anyone to let her go. Everyone, except for me. "Jasper, you're going to track her," I ordered, and saw Alice spring in action immediately. She clearly wanted to go after Bella as much as I did. She hated being in the dark. "She doesn't know how to cover her tracks, it shouldn't be hard to follow."

"That'll take too long," Rosalie said, and helped Alice pack our things together. I looked around for Bella's bag, but I remembered I'd seen it on the roof a few minutes earlier.

"It's the only way, Rose," I said, and took off upstairs fast.

"Edward." I heard Jasper's voice behind me once I reached Bella's things.

"We don't discuss this, Jasper," I snapped, too fast. Whatever it was that Jasper was trying to tell me, I wouldn't have it. I knew Bella believed she was protecting us, me, and perhaps she was. But I wasn't about to let her face her biggest nightmare on her own. And I knew why James wanted her with him. "She's never fought vampires before. Even if she's somehow stronger than James, which I doubt, she doesn't stand a chance." James ripped Victoria to pieces; now he needed someone else by his side. My heart ached at the thought of Bella by his side again. I was never going to allow him to touch Bella again.

James won't kill me. I heard Bella's voice echoing through Jasper's mind. But he will kill Edward if he gets the chance.

I closed my eyes for a brief second, forcing myself to stay calm. "That's a chance I'm willing to take." This much was clear to me; I couldn't live in a world where I knew Bella was unhappy, and by James' side she truly would be. Could she give up everything we had to be with her daughter? But somehow I knew I already had the answer to that. "Wait," I said when something on the ground caught my eye. It was one of Bella's sketches. It looked new. "Did she sketch this?" I asked, turning around to face Jasper.

"You recognize it?" Jasper frowned.

"Yeah, it's where—" I started, but to utter the words just seemed too cruel. Why would James want her there? What possible purpose could it serve? "It's her old ballet studio back in Phoenix," I explained to Jasper, and my heart rejoiced. Now at least we knew where she'd be, and I was going there, no matter what. "Let's go."

(Bella POV)

I was anything but prepared for this. What was I thinking I could face James on my own? The closer I got to Phoenix, the more a feeling of despair crept up on me, a sense that tried to get me to back away, to turn around and run for Edward's arms. But something else, instinctual, maternal, kept heralding me closer. My life didn't matter, only Vanessa's. Still, I couldn't shake the unsettling feeling that Phoenix no longer felt like my home. I knew my home was with Edward and the Cullens now. A home I would bring Vanessa into no matter what it took.

The memories of my human life as a child had mostly faded, but when I laid eyes on my old ballet studio, to which I thought I hadn't returned since childhood, something seemed eerily familiar about it. I knew in the moment I walked through the door that I had been there not long before turning into a vampire. What was it about the place?

It wasn't cold inside, but I shivered nonetheless, my footsteps resounding through the big mirrored room. It looked just like how I'd sketched it not an hour ago; dark, tall mirrors lining the walls; the same reflection in them. In the centre of the room, still as a statue, stood the very man that took away everything I had ever loved in my human life.

"James." My voice shook with fear. I had pictured this very moment in my head thousands of times, but I never could have imagined I would feel like this. I felt weak in his presence, despite what I had become, despite my resolve, despite my hate for him.

"Isabella," he said, tilting his head, and a coy smile spread across his lips. The sound of my name coming from him chilled me to the bone. "You're alone," he added matter-of-factly.

"Isn't that what you wanted?" I asked, unable to move. My legs felt like lead. "I mean, you don't want me dead." Of that I was absolutely certain. If James had wanted me dead I would already be dead.

"Perceptive as ever, I see." Another smile, bringing back so many memories I truly wished they had faded. How could he have ever pretended to love me? How could I have ever mistaken that love for real, now that I knew what it really felt like with Edward?

I shook my head, and looked around the room. What was it that made me feel so uncomfortable? I knew this room, I had been there before, not just as a child. I'd been here with James once before. When— no, oh no. I almost choked on the mere thought of James bringing me back here. The night he tore me to pieces. This is where Vanessa was born. Why would he bring me here? "Where's Vanessa?" I asked, jaw clenched in anger. My fear was waning, being replaced by something much darker and much more empowering.

"She's here, don't worry. I haven't harmed her," James answered, his eyes narrowing precariously on my face. He was looking at me as if he didn't know where to place me, as if he didn't know what I was. I realized then he'd never seen me as a vampire. "What do you think of the stage I've chosen?" he asked, eyes darkening. "Poetic, don't you think?" I looked around again, seeing myself lying torn and bloody on the floor, Victoria taking from me the one thing I couldn't possibly love more in this world. It was the same room Edward had seen me in when I'd shown him my memories.

"I want to see Vanessa," I snapped, looking back at James. He owed me that much – he owed me so much more than he could ever give me. I wondered if he could grasp what he took from me all those years ago. I doubted he was capable of feeling remorse the way Victoria had.

"Nessa, darling," James said, and stretched out his right arm. "Come to daddy." I heard the soft shuffling of tiny feet to the left side of the room. I knew what was coming, who would make her way out of the shadows seconds later. I stopped breathing. I stopped thinking. There was only hope. The girl that appeared from the dark was everything I had ever dreamed her to be, everything I'd imagined she would be. But never in my wildest fantasies could I have believed my eyes when I saw her moving towards James, and taking him by the hand. "She's beautiful, isn't she?" James asked, but I was beyond hearing anything clearly. Of course she was perfect, a mini-Bella, with my thick brown curls and big brown eyes, a teddy bear hugged close to her body. She was perfect. "Perfect in every way but one."

I almost missed the words in my reverie, but they hit me like a tidal wave. "Excuse me?" I frowned, almost choking on the question. Where in his right mind did he justify calling my daughter anything less than perfect? Did he know it was the biggest insult you could ever put to a creature so tiny, so perfect, so beautiful?

"Her humanity, Isabella," James said as if it was something obvious to me. I was grateful for her humanity, it would mean that she could lead a somewhat normal life, the life James had deprived me off when it became Victoria's obsession to have a child. "Of course it was the only way. Victoria wanted a child, the one ability her vampire life had deprived her off. I indulged her. That was a mistake." I flashed back to the look of hurt in Victoria's eyes. He truly meant to get her killed. "After so many years with that child, even Victoria grew a heart. It made no never mind to me, I took a liking to our daughter as would anyone. But it made Victoria weak, vulnerable."

"Human?" I spat, and balled my hands into fists by my sides.

James laughed loudly, a very unsettling sound. He was actually enjoying putting me through this. Just like he'd once enjoyed making me fall in love with him; it had all been a game. "But look at you, my Bella," he said, knocking the breath right out of me. How could he possibly think I would ever be his Bella again? After what he did to me? But I knew the hunter in him regarded me as the one that had gotten away alive. "So beautiful and strong. Driven." I wondered if he knew exactly why I was driven. "There's no trace of that fragile little human I met all those years ago. How did that happen?"

"Because Victoria bit me, you bastard!" I shouted, loudly, too loud, because before I knew it Vanessa buried her face in her teddy bear, and her small shoulders started shaking while she hid her tears from me. Something inside of me snapped, the ground washed away from under me and I hurtled to the floor on my knees. "Oh Vanessa, I'm sorry," I blurted out, and if I could have cried myself I would have. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean—" the words caught in my throat. I was defeated, James had won, here I was, his for the taking once again. I cast down my eyes, staring at the floor.

"Mommy's just a little upset, sweetheart," I heard James say. "Why don't you go and give her a hug?" I looked up again, and frowned. Why would he ask her to do that? Why was he putting me through this excruciatingly painful experience, more painful than the wound of having lost Vanessa in the first place? I saw right there and then, how my own daughter, my own flesh and blood, loved James, trusted him, like I once had. It was enough to tear me apart.

Time slowed down around me as Vanessa took her first careful step towards me, hesitant yet with a childish curiosity I reveled to see in her. How unlike James she was; she was me entirely, and I had never been more grateful for that then in those moments that closed the distance between us. I didn't move when she halted in front of me, I didn't even pretend to breathe. All I saw was her perfection, and felt a blooming of my heart unlike anything I had experienced in either of my lifetimes. She raised a little hand to my face, and placed it on my cheek. "Mommy," she whispered, the very word leaving me a mess inside. Yes, I was her mother. And yes, she was my daughter.

"Oh, my baby," I cried, though I could not shed tears. I put my hand on her cheek, the other smoothing down her brown curls. "My beautiful baby girl. Look at you," I said, and I saw tears running down her cheeks that didn't come from fear of me, no, she cried because she loved me. I now saw what had changed Victoria so crucially, what had mellowed her over the five years she stole from me, spend with my daughter. I could never hate Victoria again. But James, that was a different story. I looked at him over Vanessa's shoulder, and my eyes darkened on his face. "I'm taking her," I said, and stooped up from the ground, taking Vanessa's by the hand.

"I don't think so," James said, the same playful smile colouring his lips. What did he hope to achieve by bringing me here alone? "I didn't ask you to come here to claim what's ours." And what made him think that I would ever think about an us again?

"Then why?" I asked, hand tightening around Vanessa's smaller one, holding what was mine.

"Join me, Bella." The phrase hit me like lightning. That's what this was all about? Getting me alone, showing me Vanessa and hoping I would— The feeling of confusion and disgust at the pit of my stomach must have been readily on my face, because James just continued. "Look at what we created together." I wanted to yell at him: look at what you created despite what you did to me! Despite having had you as a parent! but I was too stumped to say anything at all. "Wouldn't it be better for her to know both her parents? To be raised by both her parents?"

"You want us to—" but before I could say it James took a step closer to me. I staggered on my feet and shuffled two steps back. I couldn't risk him getting any closer.

"I want us to be a family," James said. A feeling of despair took hold of me. Why was he being so confident? Was he that sure I'd join him? But I knew that if it was the only chance I had of protecting Vanessa, I would join him willingly. How could I have been so stupid? Why did I have to do this alone? I had an entire family that was willing to fight alongside me; we could have taken James easily. But what about Vanessa? James and Victoria was all she had known for five years. I couldn't just rip them away from her like she had once been torn away from me. Could I?

"How can you even—?" I shook my head. "What do you—?" I blinked, but failed to find the words. I guessed he knew what I was trying to say. "After what you did to me?" I shouted, and felt Vanessa startle next to me. This time, however, she didn't cry. James noticed, and took another step closer. I knew I had already taken too many steps away from him before he'd figure out my intentions.

"I know I can't expect your forgiveness—" he continued.

"You don't deserve my forgiveness." I said it too fast, because before I knew it James rushed me and he was mere inches away. Vanessa shivered next to me, and started crying again.

"But don't you think we owe this to our daughter?" James asked. I was the one who shivered now. He was too close, he was going to— "What is that—?" James frowned and tilted his head, breathing in deeply through his nose.

I pulled Vanessa behind me roughly, but she went willingly. "Vanessa, run," I commanded.

"Nessa, don't," James insisted, while violently grabbing a handful of my hair, pulling my head back.

"RUN, Vanessa!" I screamed, and then James turned me around, pulling me towards his body. I heard the tatter of Vanessa's shoes on the hard-wood floors beneath us. Please God, let her get away, I prayed, closing my eyes as I felt James' hand tearing roughly at my hair.

"You have someone else's scent all over you, Bella," James murmured against my skin, running his nose along my neck. My breathing deepened, nausea setting in; I'd told myself long ago I would never let him do this to me again. He wasn't going to leave me in pieces this time. "It's the youngest one, isn't it? The mind-reader?" James asked, and I gasped. How could he know about Edward? Had he been watching the Cullens? "How did you get him to stay behind, I wonder. Or doesn't he know where you are?"

I struggled against his hold, but James tightened his free arm around my torso, pinning my arms against my body. "Edward has nothing to do with this," I growled, and struggled harder, like I once had. Only now, it seemed it was actually having an effect. I knew I could be just as strong as he was, I wasn't a weak little human anymore.

"Oh, my Bella, he has everything to do with this," James laughed. No, I couldn't let him get away from here. Even if it meant my own death I would never allow him to go after Edward or the rest of my family. "Is he your one true love?" James asked, voice laced with anger and contempt. Yes, the answer echoed through my mind, but I never got a chance to say it. I guessed James already knew the answer.

He grabbed me by the arm, so strongly that I felt my vampire skin crack underneath the impact of it. He whirled me around, and suddenly a white-hot pain cut through me, more cracks forming across my skin. James tore off my right arm without breaking a sweat. A scream cut through the room that I failed to recognize as my own, and gravity once again pulled me to the floor. I knew he would try to make his way across the room now, so I turned and grabbed his ankle, pulling him back with every ounce of strength I had left in my body. James, too, crashed to the ground. But he was up again in no time; he had undoubtedly done this many times before.

He walked over to me, grabbed my head in both his hands, and smashed it hard against the floor. I felt both the wood underneath me and my skull crack, leaving my eyesight blurred, my thoughts swimming, and the rest of my body open to further violation. James tore off the hand of my other arm without giving it another thought. A hiss crawled up my throat but it came out as a growl. I had never been so mad in my entire life, anger pulsing in my veins, the venom swirling in my mouth. But I couldn't for the moment move an inch.

"You know, Bella, I'm disappointed," James said. Something – humans would call it pride – kept him right there with me, instead of going after Vanessa. I hoped, prayed she'd gotten away, even though I realized that I had just set her free in a world entirely unknown to her. "When I found your little art gallery here in Phoenix I didn't believe it at first. Isabella Swan. Famous artist. But you still sign all your paintings with the same little squiggle. It didn't take me very long to find you, in that quaint little town, surrounded by your new coven."

This is it, I thought, after James got done talking he was going to kill me, I would never see Vanessa or Edward again. But with any luck Edward had found the sketch I'd made up on the rooftop, and his love for me was beckoning him closer by the second. He would find Vanessa outside and take care of her. I knew that for sure.

"I used your friend – Lauren was it? – to lure you out. I knew the little fortune-teller would see it. But then half the coven came with you, almost like they were your family. Most unfortunate. I realized you'd come after me sooner or later, once you remembered, if you remembered. So I went and found Victoria. She was most uncooperative. But nothing I couldn't handle."

Oh God, how could he have ripped Victoria to pieces because of me? Had Vanessa seen him tear up the woman she'd believed to be her mother all these years? How could he do that? But I realized – as the cracks in my skull healed, and I felt my left hand reattach itself – that none of this had been about Vanessa, him and me becoming a family. It was all one of his sick games.

"It was easy to get Vanessa to send you that – I don't know – what would you call it? Vision?" James continued, and unlike me didn't notice the extra scent joining us in the room. I breathed a sigh of relief, finding myself capable of moving again. "She's been dying to meet you for such a long time. I hoped you'd make it harder, bring some of the others along, chase me, but you show up alone." I almost pitied him for not noticing. Almost. "Tell me, Bella, were you hoping you could take me on your own? Because right now I'm less than impressed," James concluded.

I smiled up at him bravely. "I'm not alone," I said.

James frowned down at me, realization dawned in his eyes, but Edward was on him before he turned. The force of their bodies colliding rumbled through the room like thunder and threw James to the other side of the room. His body impacted with the mirror wall hard, shattered glass raining down all over him.

Edward knelt down next to me. "Bella, are you okay?" his golden brown eyes were wild with concern. I hated being responsible for putting him through that kind of panic. I put a hand to his cheek, just as my other arm snapped back in place, leaving an ugly scar behind on my skin. Before I was able to say anything, we both heard a little gasp from the other side of the room; we both looked towards it.

It was Vanessa, standing near the entrance to the room.

Behind us, little shards of glass hit the floor.

It was James, getting up from the ground.

"Go," Edward whispered, looking down in my eyes longingly as I was looking up in his. He knew what I had to do. I knew what he had to do. We stood up together, and rushed to opposite sides of the room.

"You're alone," I heard James say to Edward behind me. Edward knew how to fight; Jasper had taught him and the other Cullens how to defend themselves, but I also knew that Edward might not be a match for James. But I had to get to Vanessa. "Faster than the others?" James questioned. He really had been watching us. "I doubt you're any stronger." James' words reflected my own fears.

I reached Vanessa within seconds. I pulled her to the side of the room, opening a large cupboard and beckoning her inside. "Sit here," I said, staring at her intently. "Cover your ears and close your eyes. Don't move until I come get you, okay?" She nodded at me frantically. I didn't know why, but in the moment my eyes met hers, so very similar in makeup, I realized she knew what I had to do. She knew I was going to help Edward kill her father.

I closed the doors to the cupboard, and was by Edward's side again in no time.

"Isn't this sweet?" After everything that had just happened, and being faced by two vampires now, James was still smiling. My hatred for him coiled up inside me like a fist around my heart; I was not going to allow him to leave this room alive. "Little Isabella Swan and Edward the mind-reader."

Don't let him get to you, Edward, I said in thought, because I saw Edward shaking where he stood. We do this together. Edward glanced at me sideways, but I kept my eyes trained on James. I knew that in James' thoughts, Edward was seeing me, as a human, head over heels in love with the devil James would prove to be. I felt thankful that he had already seen my side of the story.

"You know, Edward, she was so good," James continued. I knew Edward was doing everything in his power not to attack yet. I glanced at him briefly, but this time he was the one not letting James out of his sight. "And her smell, hmm, so sweet. Did she tell you about that? How she allowed me to touch her?"

I saw Edward snap before I saw him move, so I was able to move right alongside with him. We charged James together, pinning him down on the floor. I couldn't help but think about how he must have known Edward and me together would be strong enough for him. The thought got pushed aside however when I ripped off his arm, as he had mine, and Edward ripped off the other one. Still he kicked and screamed, doing what he could to harm us, but Edward managed to keep him down.

"This is for everything you took from me," I said, placing my hands on either sides of his face, and pulling, screaming, until cracks started showing in his skin along the line of his neck. James' head separated from his torso seconds later.

I stood up and straightened my shoulders, staring down at James. I'd done it; I'd taken out my revenge on the one scourge left in my life. I'd gotten payback at Victoria, and James, and I had found Vanessa. I now had everything I'd ever wanted. "Bella," Edward's voice brought me back to reality, a reality I felt now in sync with. "Don't ever do that to me again." His hands were on my face, eyes searching for mine. "You scared me half to death." I would have giggled at his statement if I had been able to.

"I thought I'd be strong enough." I looked up at him. He placed his forehead against mine. I should have known that it was Edward that gave me part of my strength. He was the missing half of me, Vanessa was the other. "I wanted to be strong enough."

"I know, love, I know." Edward hugged his arms tightly around me; my arms coiled around his torso hard, hands clinging to his shirt. I breathed him in, like I hadn't seen him in forever, but I needed him as close to me as he could possibly get.

"Well," a familiar and welcome voice sounded from behind us suddenly, two other pairs of footsteps accompanying my sister's. "Looks like we missed out on all the fun," Rosalie added.

I turned, and smiled at Alice, Jasper and Rosalie gratefully. Yes, how stupid I had been, and how damn lucky I was for being a part of this family. I stared down at James' body again, watching his body parts move; it was just as disgusting as it had been with Victoria's body. "Could you—" I started, and looked up at one half of my family.

"We'll take care of it, Bella," Jasper said softly.

I stared up at Edward again, and smiled. He leaned in, brushed his nose against mine, and kissed me firmly on the lips. "Go," he whispered against my lips, uttering the same words as before, only now they weren't laden with concern. He released me – albeit reluctantly – and I made my way across the room again.

I knelt down in front of the cupboard, where I found my beautiful angel hunched in a corner, teddy bear in her lap, eyes tightly shut and hands covering her ears. I hoped she hadn't heard or seen anything of what went on. "Nessa," I said softly, because the abbreviation of her name just seemed to make more sense to me. "Nessa, darling," I called again, and she raised her head slowly. "Hey, everything's okay, everything will be okay." She moved from her corner in the cupboard and all but jumped into my arms. I hugged her closer than I had ever hugged anyone. She felt a part of me; she was a part of me. "You're safe now."

THE END