The Dead Tell Secrets

*a little OOC*(Edward Cullen is left at the alter by Bella Swan, who leaves him for his brother, Jasper, who left Alice to be with Bella. Jasper has to protect Bella from Edward’s vengeance, but can he protect her from herself as she constantly puts herself in harm's way to bring her father's killer to justice?)

Chapter1
The night was cold, and rainy. Edward had found me. I was still wearing my wedding gown and he was still inside his tuxedo. We sat across from each other. The clock on the wall was ticking away. I had ran away from our wedding and came here to the cottage that we would call our home after the wedding. I played with my hands, the nervousness building. Edward’s face was cold and hard. He was angry at me. I don’t know what happened. Something inside me went off and I bolted.
“Edward?” I asked, my eyes filled with tears. He didn’t respond. In fact, he shielded his face from me even more. “Edward, please. Let me explain-“
“What is there to say?” he broke in.
“It’s not that I don’t want you.”
“You don’t want to marry me. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried to.”
“You did not!” he stood up. I jumped.
“I already made the commitment,” I said. “And I was afraid to break it.”
He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter, now. You embarrassed me infront of all of our friends and family. You made me look like a fool, Bella.”
“I felt like a fool.”
“You weren’t the one standing there like an idiot, having all eyes on you.”
“I’m sorry, Edward.”
He paced around the kitchen. “It’s over, now.” He looked straight at me. “Go home, Bella.”
“Edward.”
“Go back to Charlie.”
He walked into the bedroom and shut the door. I picked myself up and left the cottage. I broke down outside, gripping the porch rail as rain peddled me softly, shrinking and soaking my puffy white dress. I tripped and fell, getting mud on my corset top. I got up and ran through the woods. I ran as fast as I could, tears falling down my face, wolves howling in the distance.
Chapter 2
I was back at home with Charlie. He had fixed me pancakes in the morning. I changed into jeans, and torn converse sneakers. I slid my wedding dress on a hanger and put it in the closet.
“Bella,” Charlie said. “Someone’s here to see you.”
I got off my bed and went downstairs.
“Jasper,” I gasped, lightly.
“Hi, Bella,” he said.
“Can we have some privacy?” I asked Charlie. He nodded. Jasper and I went up to my room. He pinned me up against the wall, and we kissed, melting into each other.
“I couldn’t do it,” I said between kisses. “I couldn’t.”
“I know,” he said, calmly. “I know. You did the right thing.”
“I did?”
“You didn’t love him,” he said, brushing strands away from my temple, and softly kissing me there. “Now, we can be together.”
I looked into his eyes, and bit my lip. He was right. We could be together, now, just Jasper and I.
“And you’ll turn me?” I asked, eagerly. He pursed his lips together.
“I’ll see what I can do about that.”
I was confused. “Well, what does that mean? You said you would do it.”
“Trust me. You don’t want to rush into things.”
I pushed him away. “You’re just like him!”
“Bella. No, I’m not. I am nothing like Edward. I can give you what you want. And, I will.” He grabbed me. His hands cupped under my face and he pressed his lips down hard against mine. He pulled away, leaving me breathless and needing more.
“I want to go away and take you with me,” he said in a light, airy voice.
“No, I can’t leave Charlie,” I said, my eyes closed, as his lips traced my jaw.
“Well, we can’t stay here. Edward will kill me,” he said.
“He wouldn’t kill his own brother.”
“We’re not actually brothers. Vampires can break bonds just as easily as they can make them.”
“But, he loves you,” I said. “You’re brothers.”
I gasped when he wrapped his hand around my neck. He let his sharp teeth graze over my skin. I wasn’t scared. I wanted it.
My hands gripped the sleeves of his shirt, tightly. To my dismay, he pulled away.
“You shouldn’t tease me like that,” I said. My knees buckled under me. His grin was wicked.
“I want to make you mine, Bella,” he whispered against my ear. His hand traveled down my arm and clasped his fingers between mine. He led me over to my bed. All the while, I stared into his lucid, dreamy eyes. We sat down and fell back. Jasper unbuttoned my shirt and planted kisses along my collarbone. He closed my eyes with his hand, and I experienced his love in complete darkness. When I couldn’t feel anything anymore, I opened my eyes. He was gone.
I looked around the room, but he was nowhere to be seen.
“Jasper?” I got no response. I laid back and put a smile on my face.
Chapter 3
A nostalgic feeling overcame me as I slept. I was running through the meadow, looking for Edward. I was screaming his name. Then, suddenly he appeared before me. I called out his name again. His eyes turned red, suddenly, and he growled at me. He snapped his teeth. Something was different about him. I started to back away. Soon, I was running- running for my life. Edward chased me out of the meadow. He grabbed the back of my neck and slammed me onto the ground.
“No,” I moaned. I forced my eyes open. Relieved that it was only a dream, I hugged my pillow, tightly. I found myself crying. Night after night, the nightmares progressed. Each time, Edward was a little bit closer to ending my life.
I went to see Alice. I wanted to ask her if Edward would hurt me.
I wasn’t the most liked person in town. Everyone hated me for what I did to Alice and Edward. They had both been very good to me, but I had to follow my heart.
Emmett let me into the Cullen house. He didn’t speak to me. Rosalie told him not to talk to me, anymore.
Alice appeared. She knew what I wanted. Rosalie also showed up, probably to watch me wallow in self- pity and take verbal blows from Alice. I deserved all the pain she would deliver.
But, Alice was calm. Her mouth was a hard line. I had never seen her with such an empty expression.
“Alice,” I muttered. “I need to ask you something… about Edward.”
“The nerve of you,” Alice said, softly. I stilled myself. “-to walk in here. You pretended to be my friend, but the whole time you were just trying to take Jasper away from me.”
“Alice, I-“
“I don’t want to hear what you have to say.” Her eyes closed tightly. Then, she opened them again. Her eyes, they were colder than ever as they took me in. For the first time, Alice actually looked like a vampire. I took a step back. Rosalie hissed at me, and forced me closer to Alice.
Both girls cornered me in the center of the room. My heart was pumping loudly. I felt as if it were going to burst out of my chest at any second.
“Alice, Rosalie,” a soft, velvet voice said. We looked up. Edward was looking down at us from the second story. Alice and Rosalie backed off. I turned to leave as I was not welcome here, anymore. Rosalie snapped her teeth at me, inches away from my head. A short and high pitched sound came out of me.
“Rose!” Edward bellowed. She looked at him and ground her teeth together. I left. I went home and curled up in a ball on the front porch.
The sky started pouring down rain. But, I couldn’t move. Charlie came outside.
“Bella, what the hell are you doing? I didn’t even know you were back.” Charlie peeled me off the steps and carried me inside the house.
Chapter 4
I slept for the rest of the day. The next day, when I pushed myself to get out of bed, I walked downstairs for some breakfast. A strange, rustic smell caught up my nose. I went into the kitchen. Charlie was sitting in a chair at the table, his upper body leaning downward. A chunk of his neck was missing, and there was blood everywhere; under the floor where he sat, on the table, on him, and splattered across the kitchen cabinets.
“Dad,” I whimpered. My voice was shaking and so were my hands. I stepped into the bloody scene and touched Charlie’s shoulder. He toppled over backwards in the chair and hit the floor. I screamed to the top of my lungs, horrified. He was dead.
“Dad!” I screamed. Dad!”
I reached for the phone on the cabinet and called 911.
“Help. My dad’s been murdered. He’s the chief of police.” I gave out the address and hung up. I went and stood outside the house, as I waited for cops to arrive. They did, in a military fashion. Policemen swarmed the house, looking for evidence. I watched Charlie’s body be carted off and shuffled into an ambulance. Officer Holmlund, a plump guy with shaggy, yellowish blonde hair, and deep- set sky blue eyes, stared at me with scrutiny. Officer Lane, a brunette female cop with big, dark green eyes, nodded her head at him. Her uniform was horribly unflattering on her hourglass figure. They both walked over and bombarded me with questions.
“When did you discover your father’s body?” Officer Holmlund asked.
“Do you know if Charlie had any enemies?”
“Is there anyone outside of town who would want to harm your father?”
“Has Charlie been acting strange prior to the murder?”
“Has he made any new friends in the past few days?”
I took a deep breath. “I found him dead right before I called you guys, after I woke up. Dad didn’t have any enemies. Everyone loves Charlie. He barely leaves town, and if he had any friends outside of Forks he would have introduced them to me. He’s always the same old Charlie, so no. And, he hasn’t made any new friends in the past few days. He would have told me.”
They paused.
“Are you sure?” Officer Lane asked.
“How long were you asleep before you woke up and found Charlie dead?” Officer Holmlund asked.
Overwhelmed, I went and sat down on the porch. The ambulance pulled away.
“Bella, I know this is hard for you. Maybe we can make things easier if we knew more about each other,” Lane said. “I’m Officer Clarissa Lane. You can call me Claire. This is my partner Officer Thorsten Holmlund.”
“You can call me Thor,” he broke in, with a weak smile.
“We knew your father very well. We want to do everything we can to help bring Chief Swan’s killer to justice. Our first step is to rule out any family members.”
I looked up at them, my eyes wide.
“I didn’t kill my father,” I protested.
“No one is accusing you,” Thor said.
“Not yet,” Claire added. “Let’s be realistic here. People are going to start talking, and they may say some things that might hurt your feelings.”
“But, if you have nothing to hide, then you don’t have anything to worry about,” Thor said.
I looked down at the ground. “If I had been awake, this wouldn’t have happened at all.”
The two cops looked at each other.
“You can’t blame yourself for what happened,” Claire said. “The blame solely belongs to the persons who committed this crime.”
I shut down, unable to respond. Officer Lane reached in her pocket.
“Here,” She wrote on a piece of paper. “I’ll give you my personal number. Call me, if anything new pops up. Thor and I will be here, immediately.”
I took the paper, and closed it in my fist.
“Thanks,” I grumbled. It didn’t seem professional of them to allow me to call them on personal numbers or by their first names. But, since Charlie was their boss, I guess they think making friends with me will help them solve his murder. I don’t know how that will work because I don’t know anything about what happened or how it happened or why.
“We want you to help us help Chief Swan,” Thor said.
“I’ll do my best,” I said. I didn’t sound very confident, and they noticed.
“As long as you do your best,” Claire said, encouragingly. “We have to get down to the station. Stay in touch. And please, don’t talk to any lawyers without talking to either of us, first.”
“Lawyers?” I asked, confused and alarmed. “Why would lawyers get involved in this? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I’m just saying don’t talk to anyone besides us. We’re handling this case,” she said.
“We have to go,” Thor said to Claire.
“Bye, Bella,” she said.
“Bye.”
Billy Black called me and told me to come stay at his house until Rene arrived to come take me to Florida with her and Phil. I called Claire and she told me not to go anywhere outside of town. So, Rene will have to stay in Forks with me when she gets here. Billy Black said that Charlie said if anything happens to him, that I am to stay at his house.
I drove to LaPush, in the middle of the night, with a bag of clothes on the passenger seat. I cried the whole way there.
I pulled into Billy’s yard. A tall, buff figure was standing outside the screen door, waiting for me. Jacob Black.