When I got back to the house, Rosalie was sitting on the porch. She had a pair of clothes in her hand, obviously watching me shred my previous clothing.

I walked up slowly and took then carefully. My hearing was so much greater now than it was when I was a human. I tilted my head when I heard the heartbeat, it was stronger, louder. Rosalie laughed at me as I barely nudged the small belly with my nose. I let the others hear the heartbeat and I could sense the excitement and happiness from them.

After a moment I walked back to change, thankful that I had a pile of clothes here. Or rather that Rosalie liked to shop, and I happened to be one of her subjects.

Exhausted, I walked slowly up the porch steps to sit next to Rosalie. "we should get you inside" she murmured. I nodded and followed her into the house.

More changes. The room had shifted back to normal—almost—in the last twenty minutes. The big flat screen was on, low volume, showing some chick flick that no one seemed to be watching.

Carlisle and Esme stood by the back windows, which were open to the river again. Alice, Jasper, Lucia, and Emmett were out of sight, but I heard them murmuring upstairs. Bella was on the couch like yesterday, with just one tube still hooked into her, and an IV hanging behind the back of the sofa. She was wrapped up like a burrito in a couple of thick quilts.

Edward caught my eyes; it was amazing to see he was just as exhausted as I was, and he didn't need sleep. I saw him smirk a little.

"They just wanted to talk," I mumbled, my voice dragging with exhaustion. "No attack on the horizon."

"Yes," Edward answered. "I heard most of it."

That woke me up a little. We'd been a good three miles out. "How?"

"I'm hearing you more clearly—it's a matter of familiarity and concentration. And you're pretty open recently. So, I caught most of what passed out there."

"well, that's good. But don't get used to it... it's getting harder to keep the walls down. Like something pulling at the back of my mind." I shook my head.

"it's okay... you should sleep" he replied. I nodded and Rosalie led me upstairs to her room or could I call it our room? It didn't matter, there was a bed.

Before I laid down Rosalie helped me shower then she spoke. "Esme, would like me to tell you that Seth and Leah are welcome to the amenities of our home." I looked at her my foggy brain not quite following. She smiled softly seeming to understand.

"showers, food, extra clothes. I'm sure we have some mattress pads if you guys prefer to sleep outside."

I nodded "I'll tell them... I promise"

I heard the soft chuckle before I closed my eyes.

When I woke up Rosalie was gone but I wasn't alone. I looked around to see the pixie form of Alice. She was sitting like she was meditating, which was weird, but it made me think they would make great Buddhist.

"hey Alice"

"Good morning Alex..." she replied quietly, seemingly relaxed.

"why aren't you with the others?" I asked stretching my limbs. I searched the air for the scent of Rosalie and focused until I could find her in the kitchen with the others.

"Headache," she answered.

"Vampires get headaches?"

"Not the normal ones."

I furrowed my brows "is that why you're avoiding Bella?"

"Yes."

"how?"

"Not Bella, really," she amended. "The... fetus. I can't see it," she told me, though she might have been talking to herself. "I can't see anything about it. Just like you. Bella gets in the way. She's all wrapped around it, so she's... blurry. Like bad reception on a TV—like trying to focus your eyes on those fuzzy people jerking around on the screen. It's killing my head to watch her. And I can't see more than a few minutes ahead, anyway. The... fetus is too much a part of her future. When she first decided... when she knew she wanted it, she blurred right out of my sight. Scared me to death."

I felt bad for Alice. "I'm sorry, Alice... I wish I could help more."

"you're already helping a lot. For Rosalie and Bella and the whole family. You should take care of yourself too. Besides being around you is nice; everything goes away, and it numbs the headache."

"well, I'm glad I can do that" right at that moment my stomach growled.

"you should go eat... Esme and Rosalie made breakfast." I nodded.

"yeah I need to check on everything" I replied standing up, offering my hand to Alice "unless you want to stay"

She smiled shaking her head and allowing me to pull her up, before following me downstairs. Things hadn't changed too much, except that now Bella was sitting up in the middle of the sofa, and the IV was gone. Rosalie was sitting at her feet head resting against Bella's knees. Edward was on one side of her, holding her hand.

"Hey, Alex's coming around!" Seth crowed. He was sitting on Bella's other side, his arm slung carelessly over her shoulders, an overflowing plate of food on his lap. I guess I don't have to worry about him eating.

Edward looked at me a face of confusion before he covered it "He came to find you, and Esme convinced him to stay for breakfast."

"Yeah, Alex—I was just checking to see if you were okay 'cause you didn't ever phase back. Leah got worried. I told her you probably just crashed human, but you know how she is."

"it's okay Seth, at least you're eating. What about Leah?"

"I took some thing out to her" Rosalie added beginning to stand up, Lucia helped her up and she approached me with some oatmeal, just like I used to make at home.

"I also called your mom, she heard from Sam. But she respects your choice" Rosalie muttered.

"it was always going to be this way... I was always going to be here, it's just under different circumstances now." I smiled kissing her forehead. I didn't want her or any of them to think I was only here out of obligation; I was here by choice and so was Seth and Leah. The hardship and circumstances didn't change that.

I guided Rosalie back to the couch where I sat on the corner, her leaning against my legs.

"Is Leah running patrol?" I asked Seth, taking a bite of my food.

"Yeah," he said as he chewed. Seth had new clothes on, too. He was fitting in perfectly with the Cullen's and it made me feel better about him being here. "She's on it. No worries. She'll howl if there's anything. We traded off around midnight. I ran twelve hours." He was proud of that, and it showed in his tone.

"Midnight? Wait-what time is it?"

"'Bout dawn." He glanced toward the window, checking.

I'd slept through the rest of the day and the whole night—dropped the ball. "Crap. I'm sorry about that, Seth. Really. You should have waked me up."

"Naw, man, you needed some serious sleep. You haven't taken a break since when? Night before your last patrol for Sam? Like forty hours? Fifty? You're not a machine, Al. 'Sides, you didn't miss anything at all."

Nothing at all? I glanced quickly at Bella. Her color was back to the way I remembered it. Pale, but with the rose undertone. Her lips were pink again. Even her hair looked better—shinier. Rosalie looked better as well, her eyes weren't as black, nor were there big bags under her eyes or the pained expression on her face. But she still looks a little malnourished, though I suppose her pregnancy takes more of a toll on the baby rather than her. Her body is stronger than Bella's.

"I'm glad your feeling better Bella. And you too?" I looked down at Rose to make sure, my fingers running through her hair. Bella was easy I had been sickly like she had before, you can see the improvement.

"I'm doing just fine" she smiled, but I knew there was something else... she needed to eat, hunt. I glanced at all the others in the room, they needed to hunt too. Rosalie couldn't survive on human food, and she was losing nutrients too.

"you guys need to hunt" I said, feeling a little bad that I could eat but them they needed something else.

"That's going to be an issue" Carlisle began.

"I understand that our previous truce is inoperative at the moment, so I wanted your advice. Will Sam be hunting for us outside of the perimeter you've created? We don't want to take a chance with hurting any of your family—or losing any of ours. If you were in our shoes, how would you proceed?"

"It's a risk," I said, trying to ignore the other eyes I felt on me and to talk only to him. "Sam's calmed down some, but to him the treaty is void, and with Jacob spearheading it..." I shook my head "From what Jared said they want to wait, until" I trailed off looking at Edward. He knew what I was suggesting. "The real threat is Jacob, but Sam's still the alpha, so he won't let him run off alone. And they aren't big enough to mount hunting parties and protect the tribe..."

Carlisle nodded thoughtfully.

"So, I'd go together... in big groups with Emmett or Jasper. Sam thinks they're the biggest issue and they are. He'd need Jacob or I to help, the others wont risk it. And go during the day, Sam always had us do the biggest patrol at night, since you know 'vampire legends and stuff'. You're fast—go over the mountains and hunt far enough away that there's no chance he'd send anyone that far from home."

"And leave Bella behind, unprotected?" Edward asked.

I shook my head "we'll stay behind"

Carlisle's face was serious again. "Alex, you can't fight against your brothers."

My eyes tightened. "I'm not saying it wouldn't be hard, but if they were coming to kill her—I would be able to stop them."

Carlisle shook his head, anxious. "No, I didn't mean that you would be... incapable. But that it would be very wrong. I can't have that on my conscience."

"It wouldn't be on yours, Doc. It would be on mine. And I can take it."

"No, Alex. We will make sure that our actions don't make that a necessity." He frowned thoughtfully "We'll go three at a time," he decided after a second. "That's probably the best we can do."

"I don't know. That still leaves one group down one."

"We've got some extra abilities that will even it up. If Edward is one of the three, he'll be able to give us a few miles' radius of safety."

We both glanced at Edward. His expression had Carlisle backtracking quickly.

"I'm sure there are other ways, too," Carlisle said. Clearly, there was no physical need strong enough to get Edward away from Bella now. "Alice, I would imagine you could see which routes would be a mistake?"

"The ones that disappear," Alice said, nodding. "Easy."

Edward, who had gone all tense with Carlisle's first plan, loosened up. Bella was staring unhappily at Alice, that little crease between her eyes that she got when she was stressed out.

"If you separate Jasper, Emmett and Lucia into one group each then you'd have better chances. The smarter ones won't do anything, and you guys are stronger than the individual."

Carlisle nodded thoughtfully, I squeezed Rosalie's shoulder, then started getting up. I needed to take over for Leah.

"Seth, I'll expect you back on at dusk, so get a nap in there somewhere, all right?"

"Sure, Al. I'll phase back soon as I'm done. Unless . . ." he hesitated, looking at Bella. "Do you need me?"

"I'm fine, Seth, thanks," Bella said.

I looked at Bella "if you need help keeping warm don't hesitate to ask, I'm sure one of us would be willing." She nodded and I kissed Rosalie on the forehead before leaving them to figure everything out.

Outside I phased and told Leah to get some sleep and eat if she was hungry. She offered to go inside and take over for Seth, mostly keeping Rosalie safe but I was okay with that.

I was glad that my mate and best friend got along.