newborn

Do I have to tell them as well?" I asked nervously before we got to the house.

"If Alice hasn't already told them everything than they deserve to know, Beau. It'll be alright."

Every muscle in my body tensed but I'd said I wouldn't run anymore, so I squeezed his hand again. "Okay."

"Why are you worried, Beau? They won't judge you anymore than I have."

"Rosalie and Jasper?"

"Jasper understands sides of being a vampire that almost none of the rest of us do. He's not going to judge what you did, Beau."

"Even given the fact that it puts all of you at risk?"

"You're assuming that the Volturi are going to find out? If they'd been able to suss that out, they'd have already come here to kill you, Beau. At this point it's fair to say it's safe." There was humor in his voice as he spoke.

I glowered at Edward for a moment. "This is not even slightly amusing Edward."

"You helped to destroy one of the oldest members of the Volturi... I'm not a hundred percent certain that she wasn't older than the leaders of the Volturi even. I'm not sure that they'd try to come after you even if they did know you were part of it. Aro values his life too much to risk it."

"But –"

"But nothing, Jasper won't judge you." He cut me off, point blank.

"And Rosalie?"

He opened his mouth for a moment without saying anything before shrugging and finally stating, "She's Rosalie."

I let out a small chuckle under my breath and then sighed. "She and I have never been... in a good place. Not since I was changed, before that actually. She hates me, and nearest I can tell, it's not something I'm going to ever be able to fix. How tense is it going to be between her and I now?"

"Beau, everything will be fine, I promise."

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. "I just don't want to be the cause for any further strife in your family's life."

He raised our combined hands and kissed the back of mine. "Then coming home is the right thing to do, Beau. Our family is missing you. We need you home – I need you home."

"Then home is where I'll be, for however long you need."

"You're talking about forever," he said, his voice was hesitant in a way that I hated to hear because I knew I was the cause behind it.

I squeezed his hand again. "Then forever is how long it will be."

…

The Cullens reaction, with the exception of Alice, was closer to what I was expecting than what Edward had been hoping for, I was sure.

I'd barely finished the bare bones of telling my tale once again when Rosalie stormed off angrily. I flinched at the sound of the sliding glass back door slamming shut suddenly.

Edward squeezed my hand gently before speaking quickly to Emmett, "Go after her because you don't want me to chase her down at the moment." There was barely restrained fury in his voice. I couldn't help but wonder at that moment what Edward was hearing or had heard to cause such anger.

Emmett shrugged and got up from the dining room table, then he came around the table and clapped his hand on my shoulder as he said, "There is a real vampire in you, after all."

I flinched again as Edward ground his teeth together at Emmett's casual comment.

"What you did isn't the end of the world, but the repercussions of such an action –"

"Stop it," Edward said, cutting Carlisle off. "Not all of us our pacifists and even then most of us would react violently if our mate was threatened. It's in our nature as vampires."

I looked down and away from my family. "Look, I know what I did was reckless and stupid. I'm sorry for that, but at the time I wasn't thinking like I probably should have been. At the time..." I shrugged, because the truth was that whether had it been for revenge or justice, my guilt told me it was wrong and I had no excuse as a result. "I just don't know."

"You were being a newborn," Jasper said, his voice quiet but firm.

I was so shocked by his words that I looked up towards him.

"We keep judging you as if you've had decades to assimilate to being a vampire because most of the time it feels that way. You awoke to this life in so much more control than any of us have ever seen before that we all often forget you are extremely young. But, the truth of the matter is you've been a vampire for less time than Alice has owned most of her shoes."

"HEY!" Alice exclaimed, sounding wounded.

In spite of the conversation, I chuckled.

At the end of the table, Carlisle sighed. "Jasper's right. It's troubling, what you did, more because of the potential ramifications of such actions than anything else, but we're family and family sticks together."

I swallowed, looking down again. I didn't know how to respond to his words. I'd had a limited amount of family as before I was turned. Two parents and a single grandmother until I was eleven... and that was it. I knew, realistically, that my dad's parents had both been alive until I was about four, and while I was relatively certain I might have had a memory or two of them before I was turned, I couldn't remember them at all anymore. The thing was, my family hadn't stuck together.

It was something I'd had difficulty with when I'd first tried to settle into their family as I wasn't used to being in a family unit. It was something I still wasn't used to.

"This meeting is done," Edward said and tugged on my hand so I got up with him. "Come on, let's go up to my room."

"Okay," I agreed willingly.

…

Once we were upstairs and in his bedroom he put on some music.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly.

I'd stayed away all this time afraid of not only causing strife with him but with his entire family as well and I hated that it looked like I was right, at least with the second part. I didn't need to be a mind reader to guess some of the thoughts that not only Rosalie had, but likely most of the others as well.

"Stop, Beau. You have nothing to be sorry for. They just need some time to digest it all. It's not the kind of thing any of us saw you as doing – and that's not a bad thing. We all see the good in you, the humanity in you if you will, and it's because of that that all of us have a hard time remembering that you are a predator too. We all get so used to the human facade we live by that we sometimes fail to realize just how instinctual our species is, and since you were so easily able to fall into that same facade as the rest of us... I think it's even harder for us to realize that the same is as true for you as it is for the rest of us.

"Actually... that's wrong. It's more true for you. You've only been a vampire for a little more than fourteen months and you already have found things that most vampires spend decades – if not centuries – searching for. You woke to this life already knowing who you love, who your mate is, and you had a family, a coven, from the beginning. It's true that most of our family had, at the minimum, family from the beginning, but we are all anomalies in that respect.

"The thing is that we, I, messed that up. I never should have left you the way I did. It's little wonder you reacted in such a way. All of it, everything was –"

I could tell exactly where he was taking his current train of thought so I slapped my hand over his mouth. "Stop it. I don't blame you. Not for any of it. We've both made mistakes... me more so than you."

Edward's teeth clamped down on the palm of my hand.

I yanked my hand back, shaking it. "Ow! What was that for!?"

"I once told you that if you put your hand over my mouth to say something idiotic ever again I would bite you."

"And what was idiotic about that?"

"I'm not going to let you take the blame for what all started because of my own insecurities. It's no more your fault than it is mine, so don't you dare say otherwise."

"Edward..." I trailed off. I didn't know what to say or where to go as I didn't want to keep hashing out the same things over and over. As I'd already stated, I didn't blame him.

The last few months had been a bad comedy of errors, for both of us. We'd both made mistakes, both made costly decisions, and both failed to understand the consequences of our actions. I knew there was no way for either of us to forget, but I wanted us to move forward and put it behind us. I just wasn't a hundred percent sure how to do that.

"I'm –"

I didn't get to finish my sentence because suddenly Edward's lips were on mine.

He pulled back after a second to say, "Shut up, Beau." Then his lips were on mine again.

I kissed him back, my lips moving with his. It was hardly our first kiss but it felt like a homecoming in a way that nothing since I'd been turned had, because for the first time we were both here – not just physically, but mentally and emotionally as well.

I could feel his silken lips against mine and I moved my lips with his gently. I could once again feel the burning need to practically accost him – the same burning desire that had been there all along, from the very first time he'd kissed me when I was human until that last time with the Denalis. I didn't want to attack him though, I just wanted to be with him.

I pulled his lower lip into my mouth, sucking on it. His hands tangled in my hair and I could feel his nails scraping against my scalp as I opened my mouth to his. His tongue entered my mouth and I pressed my tongue against his, they tangled in a way they really hadn't ever done before.

I reached up cupping the back of his neck even as my other hand gripped his hip. His hands stroked down the back of my neck and down my back as we continued to kiss, our lips fused and moving together in synchronicity.

His fingers lightly traced around the edge of my shirt as he pulled back slightly from the kiss. "I want this off," he murmured.

I could still feel his fingers dancing along the bottom hem of my shirt so I had no doubt as to what he meant. "Then take it off."

His hands fisted the bottom of my shirt and pulled it up. I lifted my arms so he could get it off as he pulled it up over my head.

The instant it was off, part of me felt like blushing – I was quite certain I actually would be if I still had that capability. It was hardly the first time he'd seen me topless as there had been more than one occasion when I'd pulled my shirt off after hunting because it was shredded or drenched in blood – or both – but it was the first time it had ever happened in his bedroom. It was the first time it was in an intimate setting.

I moved to cross my arms over my chest self consciously when he kept staring and didn't say anything or go back to kissing me but he stopped me.

"Don't," he said softly. "You have nothing to be ashamed of. Not here. Not with me."

He kissed my lips again before trailing kisses across my jaw and down my throat, pausing at the junction of my neck and shoulder before nipping lightly. Edward didn't break my skin, I knew without any doubt that he'd never do that, but still the brief shock of pain made me gasp.

He used my surprise to his advantage as he pushed me backwards and onto his bed. As I sat back on the bed he straddled my legs. He leaned forward to kiss me but this time I stopped him.

"If I'm going to be shirtless in this bedroom than so are you," I said.

He laughed and then pulled off his shirt. It was the first time I'd ever seen so much of his skin, not that there was anything too revealing as he was wearing a plain white undershirt. He saw my eyes linger for a moment on his chest and he reached behind his back, but I immediately reached forward and put my hand on his arm.

"I want to do that."

He smiled briefly and then kissed me again. Our lips moved together briefly before he pulled away slightly and started kissing his way down my chin and chest. I closed my eyes and bit my lip to keep from groaning. I had never felt like this before, had never known the type of pleasure that his lips were causing and it was making me forget every reason why we shouldn't be moving so fast.

It felt as if every kiss was heightened and more intense on my flesh than anything I'd ever felt before. The kiss at the base of my collar bone, at the top of of my ribs, just below my sensitive pec of flesh, the base of my rib cage, just above my belly button...

It wasn't until his hands touched the band of my pants that my attention came back into focus. I took his hands in mine before he could unbuckle my pants.

"Don't."

I said it softly but he still flinched and there was a flash of pain in his eyes. He tried to pull away but I kept hold of his hands.

"Edward, no. I don't mean it that way. I know you desire it, I can tell that I said glancing at his pants... and I'm sure we both can tell that I want to." I refused to glance at my pants. "But you always wanted to wait until we were married. I don't want you to give up what's important to you just because of some fear reaction."

I gently rotated us until our positions were reversed and I was hovering over him. "If you really want us to go there Edward than I'm more than up for it. But I want you to be sure. I want our first time to be special." I kissed his lips. "Important." I kissed his throat. "Beautiful." I kissed his collar bone.

"I don't want you to think we have to go there to secure what we have, that I need you to prove you love me, because I know you love me." I looked up at him to make sure he was paying attention. "I know, okay, Edward? And I know that the fear in your eyes was caused by me and I'm sorry for that. If I could take back leaving, take back hurting you, I would, but I can't. All I can do is tell you that I love you."

I pressed my forehead against his shoulder and his fingers entangled in my hair. "And show you if that is what you require."

I barely whispered the words but I was certain he could hear me. I pressed my lips to his skin.

It took Edward a moment to answer.

"No... I don't want that."

"Good, because having half of your family in easy hearing range of our first time wasn't exactly what I think of when I think special."

I pressed my lips to his skin again.

"Our family," he said. He let out a quiet moan as I nipped at his skin. "Just don't stop." I nipped again. "Doing that."

"Good," I murmured and then reached underneath his back and lifted up his undershirt.