Note: Disclaimer in first chapter. Had to go back and rewrite a good chunk of this chapter that I didn't like, so it's late a day. Bleh. Thanks once more for all the reviews and comments. I was very happy receiving each and every one of them. You are so supportive and that's rare in the fan fiction community. Kisses!

Chapter 7

Alice rolled off me with a content smile on her face. "I feel so much better. Don't you feel better?"

I looked to the bathroom and then kicked off the last of the shredded sheet. "I feel like a glazed donut, but I do appear more relaxed."

"Bella," she protested. "Don't be crude. That was magical and spiritually cleansing."

"I just never knew what it was like from different perspective. You've got to admit that this kind of sex is virtually nothing like the hetero kind."

She lay on the bed, stretching out and I paused to watch Alice arch into an impossible back breaking contortion. Her eyes were on me the entire time as I stalled in my short journey to the shower.

"See something you like? All you have to do is ask and I'll be accommodating."

I had to groan and turn away before we found ourselves in bed for another four hours. "We have to pick Isabella up from the sitter."

Alice giggled joyfully. "I'd hardly call Jasper a babysitter. If he is then we've definitely got to talk to him about keeping his hands off Isabella. They've been very naughty; or rather I should say that she's been very naughty."

After I flipped the shower on to let the water get hot I looked back at the bed. I learned long ago not to question how Alice knows things. "So Jasper's been the perfect gentleman?"

Pushing herself up, Alice fell out of the bed into a perfect handstand, flipped around to where she could see me and grinned. It was very distracting. "He tried; really. They made it about halfway to the house and Isabella tackled him. He suggested a clean bed and she told him that staying clean was the last thing on her mind."

"Ugh." I seriously didn't want to picture this.

I kind of felt sorry for Alice that she had to witness all these things without any kind of porn filter. She couldn't just fast forward past the naughty parts. With certain couples that wouldn't be too awful, but with the good comes the bad.

"Kiss me, Bella."

Turning my head I tried to see how that was this was doable without going into a handstand like my mate. She giggled at me.

"Handstand, Bella, handstand!"

~O~

Alice was much less manic as we ran hand in hand through the forest to the Whitlock house, though she did have a smile plastered on her face the entire time. We came in the back way and slowed to walk before exiting the tree line only to not hear much going on inside.

"Are they not here?"

She squeezed my hand and nodded. "The others have gone hunting to give them some time alone in the basement."

Before I had a chance to step inside Alice stopped me.

"Give them another ten minutes. They're almost done."

I frowned and chose to sit down at the patio lounge, while Alice chose to sit on my lap and tease my neck with her lips. There are worse things in the world that I have to put up with than an affectionate girlfriend, mate, whatever.

Mate. I almost didn't want to think about the subject. If she was my mate then that meant we were meant to be together forever and that basically meant a committed relationship much like marriage. Did this mean we were supposed to get married? If we were getting married it would mean that I, being the marriage hating person that I am, would not have only gone through the process once, but twice.

Would she take my name or was I supposed to take hers? Or maybe we would just keep our own names. Was I supposed to propose? We really didn't have any gender roles we were following. I remember specifically how aggressive she was in bed and how aggressive I was as well.

"You're thinking too hard," Alice whispered before flicking my earlobe with her tongue. "Just let things happen naturally."

With a sigh I tried my best to relax. "I don't know if you've noticed this about me, but ever since my family was killed I've been very task oriented. I make lists in my head of things that have to be done and then do them as fast as I can so at some point I can relax."

Her hand moved up on the side of my neck, caressing it lightly while she planted little kisses on the other side. "And have you ever reached a point where you can relax?"

That didn't take too long to figure out. "No, I got killed the same day I finished my last task. Or I came here rather. So, I've got to start all over again. That's why I've been running around so much."

"Mmm."

I was getting severely distracted by the way Alice was giving me attention. It was a little peck here, a tiny lick there, and then she'd find a spot that she liked and opened her mouth to for a perfect seal so she could suck on my neck.

"I've got to arrange for new ID, a new passport, travel arrangements to… to… uh, what was I talking about?"

Her succulent mouth detached from a very sensitive spot and Alice whispered. "Taking a break and spending the next week in bed with me."

Was I really? Getting distracted like that didn't sound like me in the least. "Are you sure?"

"Uh-huh. Pretty sure."

"Prague!" I announced.

"Ugh." Alice pulled away and looked me in the eyes with a very serious expression. "If we go over to Prague and take care of this Bert person…"

"Kurtz."

"Whatever. If we take care of this Kurtz person then will you take a break? Like maybe a month or two and just spend it with me? We could go someplace where we could be alone with no cares in the world except each other."

That sounded really nice, but I knew that wasn't the end of the threats out there. "I'll have to take care of the Volturi too."

Her shoulders dropped. "Bella, it's not your duty to protect the entire world."

"I know. It's for our family. I'll never be totally relaxed unless I know they're all gone. Then, I promise, we'll take a vacation until you're satisfied that I'm chilled out."

Leaning forward she traced my lips with her tongue and then plunged it into my mouth as she grasped the back of my head roughly and let me know how much she wanted me. Of course, we had to be distracted by a sudden earthshattering thump. All the windows on the house rattled and Alice pulled back to look over her shoulder.

"Jasper's showing off," she said.

The first thump was soon followed by a very rhythmic thumping, and I tried my best to get the images of what was going on down in the basement out of my head. It was impossible, especially when the thumping sped up and I could have sworn I heard a muted scream.

"Ah good," Alice announced. "They're done."

"Finally."

She turned back to me. "You sound jealous. Should we leave her here tonight? I can make you scream much louder and a lot longer than that pitiful showing."

Of that I had no doubt. "I really need to get on her training so I can get to Prague."

"We."

"Sorry?"

"You said 'so I can get to Prague.' Where you go, I go. So, we."

"Alice."

"Tough. I need to look over your sexy hunting outfit, so I can make one for myself. And you'll need to get me some guns like yours, or maybe something bigger. Do you think I'd look hot carrying one of those miniguns that you were talking to Emmett about?"

My mind went to a weird place right then. "I think that a mini gun is bigger than you are and it would be awkward for you to carry around, but yes—definitely hot looking."

"We can get some professional pictures taken and blow them up for our walls, maybe get Emmett to photoshop some explosions in the background. He has the best Girls With Guns portfolio around."

"You're a very weird person, Alice."

She smiled and pecked me on the lips before hopping up. "Thanks. Normal is boring. Let's go let them know we're here before Jasper tries to destabilize the structural integrity of the foundation. Esme's going to be pissed if she has to have humans out here fixing things."

Alice cracked the basement door open just enough to be heard. "Yoohoo, we're back. Could you quit defiling Bella's childe long enough for her to take a shower? My nose would appreciate it."

Then she shut the door and gave me another brilliant grin.

"Let's wait in the living ro… ugh." She paused long enough to have a mini-vision and then backed up to open the door again. "You'll flood the basement if you do that, Jasper."

Grabbing my hand, Alice shut the door again and led me to the living room. "He was about to follow Isabella to the shower. She forgets her strength in the middle of the act and accidently rips out the plumbing."

I just want it said for the record that I look ridiculous hanging off Jasper's arm looking up at him all adoringly while wearing a baseball jersey that read Whitlock on the back. There are some advantages to having a twin. I can let her try out all the clothes that Alice probably has in mind for me. If they look bad then I don't have to wear them even once! The problem is going to be separating these two horn-dog lovebirds from each other long enough to get anything done.

Jasper looked absolutely, unequivocally chilled out. All the tension that normally sits in the corners of his eyes and around his shoulders was totally gone. I almost expected him to drop down on the couch light up a bong and say, "S'up."

Instead, he dropped down on the couch, Isabella balled up under his arm, still staring at him longingly, and he said, "Mrs. Cullen, Alice."

"Mr. Whitlock," I replied. "Is Isabella totally useless for the rest of the day?"

His lips twitched, but it was Isabella that answered with a sigh, "Yeah. I mean… Hey! I'm not useless."

"Well, you are if you can't take your eyes off Mr. Perfect here for five seconds to acknowledge your sire."

She huffed at me. "Look, um, Jasper can teach me everything I need to know, so you know… thanks and everything. I'm going to be a Whitlock from here on out."

I nodded knowingly. "Okay. What are your plans for next week's training, Mr. Whitlock?"

"I have trained a newborn or two over the years, Mrs. Cullen." When I didn't comment back he looked up in the air and pulled some plans out of his butt. "Hunting and feeding from the local fauna will be first."

Isabella's eyebrows furrowed for a moment. "Um, honey. I really don't like the taste of animals. I really liked the taste of the bagged blood at Bella's."

He turned to her and gently cupped her jaw. "Sweetie, the Whitlocks are a vegetarian coven. We feed from the wildlife."

Her eyes darted to me and me and then back to Jasper. "But…"

"No, buts, darlin'. I'm the coven leader and I know what's best for the members of my coven."

I just smiled sweetly and didn't say a word. Sex or blood; something had to give, and I knew quite well that you can live off of one, but not the other. When she looked to me again I just raised my eyebrows expectantly. I could already see the look in her eyes. It was the same one I always had when I knew I couldn't have my cake and eat it too.

"Okay," Isabella rose off the couch and shoved her hands in her pockets. "You ready to go, Bella?"

Patting Alice on the hand I turned to her. "Would you take Isabella out back? I need to have a private word with Mr. Whitlock."

A peck on the lips later and the room was empty save for Jasper and me.

"Two words of advice, Jasper: one, Isabella is a girl of the new millennium; the whole do-what-I-say-woman thing went out in the fifties. Two: if you ever try to bogart one of my family again without coming to me first I will rip off that thing you've suddenly become so proud of and have it bronzed for Isabella so she won't have to worry about going without."

Jasper stood off the couch and glared down at me. "I think it's time for you to leave, Mrs. Cullen. Consider your guest invitation revoked. You are no longer welcome in my home and will not be under my protection if you enter our property."

While it wasn't completely unexpected, I was somewhat surprised that he had the balls to do it considering I had what he wanted most of all. "Don't make an enemy out of me, Jasper. You won't like what I'm fully capable of doing these days."

He smiled anticipatorily. "Please, by all means, give it your best shot and you'll find out why I've been called the God of War."

Neither of us backed down, but I was in his home and I try to respect people's homes enough not to damage them while I'm inside, unless provoked, of course.

So I left and then immediately whipped out my datapad.

"What are you doing?" Alice asked like I was being a bad girl or something.

Just because she was right didn't faze me at all. "Cementing my point in his stubborn, misogynistic, brain."

Isabella looked back at the house longingly, but ducked her head and turned away.

"You'll find somebody else," I said as my fingers flew over the pad.

"He's not my mate?"

Alice shook her head. "We thought there was a good possibility, but you would have given in to the diet just to be with him if he was."

"Damn," she muttered. "The sex was really good."

"And it'll be better with your real mate," I added and then tucked the datapad away. "So, who's all for visiting a gruff chief of police? Raise your hand."

"Charlie!" Isabella gasped. "I forgot! He's probably worried sick."

Alice grabbed her before she started off. "Do you need to feed first? Are you thirsty?"

Isabella's eyes widened. "Oh my gosh! I could have eaten, Charlie! Can we stop by the house first?"

~O~

"How are you doing?"

Isabella looked to me and shrugged. "He kind of smells – off."

I nodded, seeing that she was having the same reaction I had soon after I was turned. "You've planted him in the no drinking category in your head. You'll do that with a lot of humans, especially the ones you were friends with. It's the ones that annoy you or tick you off that you have to actually try not to eat."

"Wait," Alice said as she looked completely annoyed. "You can just categorize people that you don't want to eat and it magically doesn't tempt you?"

That pretty much summed it up. "Well I wouldn't call it magic, but yeah. It's just a state of mind."

She made a very irritated noise with her throat. "They're all the same to me. I want to eat everyone."

Kissing the top of her head I tried to let her down gently. "Then accept that you love being a vampire and that you want to be one. Oh, and switch your diet to the bagged stuff. You really will have more control that way."

Alice frowned as she thought it over. "Jasper says that we're more aggressive when we're on human blood. That's one of the main reasons all the Whitlocks only drink from animals."

I couldn't exactly counter that argument with any empirical evidence. "So experiment. Try my way for a couple of months and see if you're more aggressive. If you're not then we'll know for sure."

"Guys," Isabella interrupted. "Can we go visit with Charlie now?"

"You remember the rules: no hugs and stay at least five feet away from him at all times until we're sure that it's safe."

I took the lead and knocked on the back door so I wouldn't surprise him. Ten seconds later I saw him peek through the window curtains and open the door right after. His eyes shifted past Alice and I to Isabella. Before he had a chance to make any decisions about what to do I raised a hand to his chest.

"Charlie, she has pretty good control, but we don't want to push her limits, alright?"

He turned to look at me. "What's that mean?"

With a shrug I explained. "Think of her as a recovering heroin addict and your neck is her next fix. It all comes down to her willpower and not putting a tempting target inches away from her mouth, so keep your distance until we're convinced of her control."

Charlie simply swallowed and stood back to let us in. Thinking better of the situation he went ahead and moved to the living room to stand beside his recliner until we were all present.

"Isabella." He stood there taking her in, noting all the changes or differences between the girl he knew three days previously.

"I'm okay, Dad."

She took a seat on the couch. Alice sat beside her and I leaned on the arm of the couch so as to be that much closer to Charlie in case she made a break for him.

"You look," Charlie swallowed roughly, "good. A little paler and the red eyes are, um, different."

"They'll darken like mine within a couple of months. I suggest lightly tinted or even smoked sunglasses for school until then. You can tell them she has a light sensitivity or something. We'll pick some up for her."

He just nodded along in a really tense way. "I talked to a friend of mine in Oregon. He's a doctor and he's writing up an excuse for missing school. I didn't give him any specifics. He owes me anyway for keeping his boy out of lockup for DUI."

I grinned at the thought of Charlie being a good ol' boy. "It'll be a good idea for her to skip gym class. Other than that there shouldn't be any problems."

"You might want to call your mom, Isabella. She's worried. I just told her that you came down with the flu and was feeling too miserable to talk."

She acknowledged him and looked as if she was trying to relax. "Is everything going okay here? Are you eating?"

"I'm fine, honey. I've been doing it for years. Just take care of your needs for now." He looked to me, seriously. "Speaking of which. Are you running into any costs? I can help out."

Alice snorted. "Bella's fine, Charlie. She raided the Volturi's bank accounts. She's got more money than Opera and Bill Gates put together… probably more money than most moderate sized countries now that I think about it. Why haven't we gone shopping yet?"

I did my best not to flinch in front of Charlie; he was a cop after all.

"The who?" he asked with great interest and a shifty set of cop eyes.

"The Volturi," I replied. "They're a self-appointed coven of vampires in Italy that think they're royalty. I emptied their bank accounts, but after routing it through twenty-three major banks and stashing it in the Caribbean they'll never find out what happened to it. Trust me when I say that a broke Volturi is a good thing."

Charlie leaned back on his recliner and looked off into space for a moment. "How much are we talking about here?"

I cleared my throat. "A lot."

"And you do this sort of thing often?"

"Well it's not like it took all that long. The program was already on my datapad, I just had to adapt it to this time period."

"Uh-huh. Well, you know there's a new St. Croix Legend baitcaster that that just hit the market. Ted Newton said he's ordering a couple for the tourists and my birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks…"

Isabella looked over at me with a scowl. "Will you quit tempting my dad with payoffs. Ugh… I'm going to call Mom."

I rolled my eyes. She'll eventually realize that her father doesn't exactly pull down the big bucks being a chief of police in such a small town. "Ignore her. She's still getting used to the lifestyle."

He shrugged and relaxed a little, but not much. "So how's she really doing?"

"Good; about as well as I did, so she'll be fine once she gets settled in to a routine. I'll be training her for the week and we should have her back here by the weekend at the latest if everything goes okay."

Charlie looked toward the vicinity of Isabella's room upstairs. "She'll be… um, safe to be around?"

"Oh. Yeah, totally. All she has to work on is her strength. We'll be exposing her to more humans all week. We'll go to Port Angeles so we're not recognized… and so Alice can shop."

"Yea!" Alice clapped happily. Upon seeing my face she added. "What? I never said I didn't like to shop. I just said lack of satisfying sex for ninety-four years made me manic about it."

Charlie's eyes widened and I had a serious need to facepalm, but I held back.

"What?" she continued. "Charlie's an adult, who most likely enjoys satisfying sex. Don't you, Charlie?"

He cleared his throat and tried his best to let the proverbial water roll off his back so he could appear somewhat cool. "Uh… who doesn't?"

"There," Alice proclaimed as she pointed at him. "See! You should know, that your daughter from another world is surprisingly very adept in cunniling… mumph!"

Alice struggled slightly against my hand covering her mouth and then eyed me as I apologized. "Sorry. Alice tends to overshare at times."

When her tongue popped out to lick my palm, I withdrew. "I'm just sayin'. I was paying you a compliment, by the way, and just in case Isabella goes lesbian in the future, Charlie won't be surprised, that's all."

"I'm not going lesbian in the future!" Isabella yelled from her room.

I glanced up toward the stairs and focus in on her conversation with Renée. "You're going lesbian in the future? Oh, Isabella, that's nothing to be concerned about. Didn't I tell you about the time with Sally Curtzfeild, my roommate in college?"

"Ugh," Isabella moaned.

~O~

"I can't believe Renée thinks I'm a lesbian."

Alice shrugged. "It's not like we're diseased or something. We just don't derive pleasure from the male penis is all."

"Would you stop saying penis," Isabella pleaded.

"It's a perfectly scientific term. I don't see what the big deal is. It's the new millennium. Girls are supposed to be secure in their sexuality."

"Well, I'm not. I'm very comfortable skirting around issues, using innuendo, and avoiding confrontations about sexuality."

Alice snorted. "That's not what I heard when Bella and I came to pick you up this afternoon. I distinctly heard someone of the female variety yell out, take me you big stud!"

Isabella turned on her. "I did not say that."

I was pretty sure I didn't hear that either.

"Really?" Alice paused for a moment and appeared as if she was deep in thought. "Maybe that was Esme and Emmett from last week."

"Ugh."

~O~

"Where's Isabella?" I asked when Alice came into my office at the house while I was working setting up accounts that would allow her current credit cards access to the off shore accounts.

"She's in her room sulking."

"Well we did take her new toy away."

"Jasper's not the only fish in the sea, but he's the only single vampire in the area. Maybe she'll find her mate in High School."

That thought made a cold chill run down my spine. "I hope not. I can't think of a single person at Forks High that would make a good vampire. Well, maybe Angela if we could get her away from her father."

Alice smiled as she made herself comfortable on my lap without even asking first. "I could see that. She'd be sexy, all tall and dark hair. Oh! We could take her up to meet the Denali family in Alaska!"

I glanced away from the datapad screen to her eyes. "Are you purposefully trying to hook her up with a girl?"

I received an odd look for a moment. "I think there's another difference in this world and yours."

"The coven is different?" I asked. "The single ones were Tanya, Kate, and Irena."

"And Caius," Alice added. "Although he probably wouldn't be her type. He leans more toward a man's man if you take my meaning, but anything is possible I suppose."

"Caius?" It couldn't be.

"Caius Denali. Um, he joined their coven back in the late eighth century if I remember right. He's an old one. The Volturi killed his companion and he wanted to be as far away from them as possible."

I blinked. "Caius. About five-nine, white hair, attitude problem?"

"You know him?"

I sighed. "He was one of the Volturi on my world."

"Wow. That's… messed up."

Saving my work I set the datapad aside for a moment. "Who are the kings of the Volturi here?"

"Well, Aro is pretty much the leader," she ticked off with one finger. "There there's Marcus, who is an utter bas… um not such a good guy. And lastly is Carl the Conqueror. He's their military brains, and again not such a good guy. He destroyed a number of covens by himself over the centuries."

"Carl…" I replied letting his hang out there. "About six-two, blonde hair, handsome."

"And completely lacking in any sort of compassion whatsoever," Alice added.

"He probably popped up around the late sixteen hundreds maybe?"

"You know him?"

"I hope not."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

What were the odds that two very influential people in my life would be on diametrically opposed sides from one world to the next? Caius Volturi, now an animal drinker and most probably hiding in Alaska from those that at one time he would have called brothers. Then we had Carlisle Cullen, missing his one defining trait, his compassion for human life. A warlord? It was impossible to even contemplate. It had to be someone else.

"There's a little wrinkle between your eyes, Bella. I don't like it."

Leaning in I placed a light kiss on her lips. "I need you to watch over Isabella for the rest of the week, Alice. I have to go to Volterra and see Carl for myself."

"Bella…" she warned.

"Just to see him, not to kill anyone… at least not on purpose."