Bastard Out Of Forks - Prologue

A/N: This is a story that keeps speaking to me, keeps needing to be told and I finally feel I am at a place I can write it AND my other canon stories. This is a powerful story of Bella Swan Black, and her journey to find out where she came from and where she belongs. In the process she finds out a lot about herself and missed opportunities and lucky stars. AH/OOC, romantic and angsty.

Characters: Bella, Edward, Jacob, Carlisle, Ephraim, Esme, Renee, Alice, Jasper and Rosalie.

This is a new journey for me and I am hoping for so much more in this AH universe. I want to see if I can fly on my own. Of course, I still have my right hand girl, ForksPixie who I would not do one thing without. She remains my canon beta and my cheerleader but Cullen Sistah has taken on the task of putting up with me for this AH journey. She is also a great friend and hopefully will still like me when all this is done.

There are several people that have given me great support and encouragement and I want to give them a shout out; krazyk85, SparklingWand, AndyMCope, powerpuffgirll, DreamsOfEdward. You all give me more courage than you will ever know.

Prologue

I sit on the front porch of my Lexington, Kentucky home, surrounded by the mares and foals that are the bread and butter of my husband Jacob's horse breeding business. I help when I can but I had finally established myself as a free-lance journalist and was working hard at making my life-long dream of becoming a writer, a reality.

Jacob Black had turned my head nine years earlier, when I was a senior in high school. Jacob was ten years older than me. I was a journalist for the high school newspaper and had gone to the Black's Horse Farm, 'A Bend in the Road'. I was writing a story on the importance of the horse industry in our part of the country. Jacob gave me a tour of the barns and grounds. He then introduced me to the mares and foals that made their farm a success. The Blacks had been successful at breeding several graded stakes winners.

"Here's my number, Mr. Black," I said timidly, handing him my home phone number. "Feel free to call me if you think of anything else regarding the story. And, thank you so much for taking the time for me today."

He lowered his head and smiled a broad, blinding smile, taking my number and putting it into his wallet.

"It was my pleasure, Ms. Swan," he said. "If you would like to come back and see the birthing process or just watch the mares with their foals, let me know. You are always welcome."

Three tortuous days later, Jacob called me and asked me on a date. I wondered what had taken him so long to call me.

"Bella, you are much younger and I need to be careful," he explained. "But I feel a pull towards you and I need to take a leap of faith."

I didn't tell Jacob for years, but the moment I saw him I knew I would marry him. He was so good looking. He was part Cherokee Indian which made him tall, dark and handsome and his body was spectacular. He was a success in his business at the age of 27. Well, it was the family business, but it was becoming his. I saw Jacob as my life preserver.

I was raised as an only child by my grandparents, Carlisle and Esme, who were extremely strict. I was already attending college classes at a local community college while I finished high school. I knew I would attend a local university while still living at home. I loved my grandparents, but I never felt as though I belonged. Their daughter, Renee, was my mother.

Renee got pregnant when she was my age, dropping out of Forks High School in Washington. She insisted on having me but ended up abandoning me when I was five years old. She left me on my grandparent's door step and ran off to New Mexico, following one of what would be a multitude of men with empty promises. She would pop in and out of my life when she wanted or needed attention or affirmation as a mother. My real father? Well, his identity was a well-guarded family secret until I was fifteen. That was when Renee revealed the dark family secret to me.

When my mother discovered she was pregnant and shared the glorious news with Phil Dwyer, he was anything but pleased. As it turned out, Phil already had a son and daughter with an ex-wife in Ashland, Wisconsin. On top of that, he was married to a sixteen year old girl in the state of Florida, who was pregnant at the same time as Renee.

"Your father was a logger in Forks, Washington, where we lived at that time," Renee had told me, against strong protests by my grandparents. "I loved Phil and I thought he loved me. He was divorced, with two kids, Alice and Jasper. I saw Phil as my salvation. I thought he would marry me," she sighed.

"Why didn't he?" I asked.

"Because of his family in Florida," she said the pain still raw in her voice.

"I'm sorry," I apologized, as though what had happened to her was somehow my fault.

"Well, Carlisle wasn't happy about it, to say the least," she said. "I brought shame on my family. He threatened Phil to stay away from me or he would kill him. Phil believed him and kept his distance. When Carlisle got out of the Navy, shortly after that, we moved back to Kentucky so that he and Esme could care for their parents. That's when your grandfather started his own private medical practice."

"And you never had contact with Phil again?" I asked.

"No," she muttered. "Carlisle meant it and Phil was not a good man. You deserved better than that."

"So, is that why you left me with Carlisle and Esme and let them adopt me?" I asked, bitterly.

"Yes," she said. "I always did what was best for you."

"Funny," I said sarcastically. "I thought you always did what was right for you."

When I found this out, my world was turned upside down. I felt a physical void deep inside my gut, a black hole, which had been small and festering ever since Renee left me. Learning I was abandoned again, by my father this time, caused the hole to grow out of control. I always had abandonment issues and thanks to that, the hole had grown into a deep abyss and I wanted, no, needed to know where I came from. I wanted to meet my siblings. I wanted to see who I looked like. I wanted to be an aunt to nieces and nephews. However, my grandparents reminded me every day that Phil was a horrible person and I would do good to leave that quest alone. They told me if I tried to find him it would kill them. They were in such poor health already and knowing I owed them whatever they wanted as thanks for taking me in just deepened my anguish, knowing I had to put off any search for an unknown amount of time. But nothing could stop me. I had a father, a brother and two sisters out there I had to find. I would find them even if it took the rest of my life.

Jacob came from a family where his parents were married until his mother died when he was eighteen. He had two sisters and they were all very close. Jacob offered me what I didn't have – love, security and a family.

Three years after Jacob and I met, we walked down the aisle and began our lives as Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Black. Of course, I kept my maiden name, Bella Swan Black. I didn't have much confidence that our relationship would last forever but hoped it would. Everyone I had ever loved or cared about had abandoned me in one way or another. I didn't expect Jacob to be any different.

Becoming Jacob's wife was quite a wake-up call. He loved me, but he loved his job more. The farm was his true wife and I was his mistress. I never once came first in his life and that was disheartening. I really had never been first in anyone's life and I wanted that more than anything.

Jacob's best friend, Embry, was sympathetic to me, having known Jacob since they were in high school. Embry knew Jacob was driven by success at work. Jacob believed that bringing home money and providing for me meant love. That wasn't love to me. I wanted someone to give of themselves emotionally and physically to me. I found the physical connection with Embry. I knew it was wrong on so many levels, but Embry offered me so much comfort, no strings attached. When we had sex it was full of passion. His wife was a prude who thought she was better than everyone else, so I didn't feel very sorry for her. Honestly, I only felt sorry for me. Because nothing I did, no matter how many men I had in my life, in various capacities, was ever enough to fill the hole, to fill the void.

I told Jacob about the affair, hoping he would fight for me, to show me he cared, that I mattered. But he didn't. He just said he was sorry for not being around. While Jacob ended his friendship with Embry, he and I continued to be friends. In fact, Embry became one of my best friends. There was no more sex. He had evolved into something else I need, a man I could count on.

At that point I had graduated from college and thought starting a family would be better. I would have children to love me unconditionally, the thing I wanted most in the world. But that was not an easy undertaking. I had suffered from endometriosis and had to undergo several surgeries and fertility treatments to get pregnant, first with our daughter Leah and, when she nine months old, I went through it again to conceive our son, Ben. With Jacob hardly ever at home, I found it overwhelming to have two children who were 18 months apart while trying, simultaneously, to build my career. We hired a nanny that lived in the guest house of the horse farm. That helped immensely, but the children became attached to her, not me.

The journey to find my father and siblings took me down many roads, one that included a younger man. Edward that was a freelance photographer for the same company I worked for.

Jacob was always traveling, leaving me feeling lonely and over-burdened with my single-parent responsibilities. It was at this time when a connection between Edward and I formed. We could both feel the electrical charge between us, a deep-seeded desire to be together. Just as the relationship began, the emotional death spiral of my late twenties began, causing the near destruction of the perfect life I had before me.

I was the lucky bastard out of Forks. How dare I feel entitled to one thing more thing than what I had? But I did. I wanted more. I wanted love. I wanted a father's love more than almost anything. But I also desperately wanted Edward's love.