The following Monday morning Rosalie sat down with a huff as she entered the library, which was out of character for the blonde.

Raymond, who had been munching on a bag of chips and debating what he would be binge watching while working out later that day, looked up with a raised brow at her action. It had been a week since they'd first met and the blonde had not once shown this anger. Her lip was pouted, honey eyes a deep amber, and her heeled foot bounced as she looked down to the ground and then up at him.

She seemed to relax a little the longer they stared at one another, like her body swayed to comfort the longer he took deep breaths. He didn't question her, simply waited until her fingers unclenched and she went back to a still demeanor.

He dropped the bag of chips, scooting into the table, "I take it someone pissed you off."

Rosalie scoffed, slightly humored as she responded, "how did you know?"

"Well it's not often that a girl comes up to me with clenched fists and when it does happen I usually get slapped or punched, thanks by the way it's nice to know I don't piss off the entire female population." Raymond wittily answered, winking at her as he relaxed back. He found that this added water to her her fury as she laughed and now seemed to soften.

Jasper walked up to them, looking between the two for a moment before dropping his navy blue backpack. He thinned his lips, "Rose? Raymond?"

"Sup," Ray nodded his way, "everything good?"

The twins looked at each other, merely blank stares and doing that single minded communication. Rosalie's lip twitches as if she was angry, and Jasper smirked at her seeming to have won the argument as he turned back to the Thompson boy. "Edwards back, and he's gonna try and make amends with your sister. Rose here tried to convince not too on your behalf and—"

"It went up in smoke, in one ear and out the other." Rosalie said with a slight vicious nature. She huffed, crossing her arms with more anger then before, she returned her vision back to Raymond. "I'm apologizing in advance for whatever he does but also giving you full authority to hit him with that left swing of yours."

"Oh come on now Rose, you know I'm not allowed to punch anyone, I'll be in jail." Ray joked, surprisingly he wasn't as pissed as he should have been. Although Edward wasn't his favorite person in the world he had a feeling that Bella could handle her own.

"You're not mad?" She questioned after a moment, face blank as she awaited his response.

Ray shook his head, "I thing you've yelled your brothers ear off enough for the both of us besides, I told Bella I'd be more chill about things so I'm gonna let her deal with him and let her call me if she needs my help."

The twins flickered their eyes to one another in the pause it took Raymond to grab his chips once more. Jasper speaking this time, "what if she never does?"

"Then that's her call too," Ray spoke with the same air of calmness. "As long as Bella is happy and safe I'm okay with it all, she's technically my older sister so I really have no place to be telling her what to do."

"You're a lot of things Raymond, but a feminist? I didn't see that one coming." Rosalie commented, her perfect eyebrow arched in intrigue.

"Why? Just because I'm a boxer? An athlete? I was raised by four sets of minorities Rose, a gay couple, a pair of black and Hispanic parents, and a single moms. Let me tell you something I am nothing but pro equal opportunity."

Rosalie seemed to enjoy his statement, honey eyes darkening as her pupils practically consumed him and Ray felt his stomach thump like a drum at that. He really did like her, everything she did was just another perk he added to all the things that made him dumbfound. Sometimes it felt like breathing was impossible, the sheer will of it all was unattainable because Rosalie was better then oxygen.

She laughed, a small bell like chime he had already racked up to be in the top spots of things he wished to accomplish everyday. Her eyes crinkled together, nose pinching in a very adorable way as her white teeth showed, when she would stop it was always looking at him, still smiling, "I can definitely get behind a man like that."

Jasper seemed to always play the role of silence, a close observer of what was happening. In a strange way, he watched people fall in love very visually. It was never just about the physical attraction, although that was very clear by the way these two eyed one another, but he could see love chemically. The taste of ecstasy and euphoria was abundant between them, sweet like honey instead of the fiery cinnamon taste he got whenever Alice and him made love, Raymond and Rosalie weren't there yet, this was their beginning however. He could still remember how falling in love with Alice had been, almost minty, a refreshing change to his palette.

"So how goes the building of your gym?" Rosalie asked while Jasper turned his head back to the assignment he was turning in next week, it was practically done at this point.

Raymond smiled, he had told her about it Friday and found it sweet that she followed up with it. A brief chuckle left his lips when he thought about his weekend with Bella, remodeling the garage into a small gym, boy had it been a challenge. The beginning had mainly been calling both their fathers while they were on duty to determine what was trash and what was necessary (most of it was trash) then it had been a job in itself to clean up the after mess. Many of the things were there fishing gear which meant the garage reeked like rotten sea creatures and at one point throughout the first day neither sibling could stand it.

It had taken a total of twenty minutes and refusing the urge to gag for them to throw bleach on everything and another hour to scrub everything down with it until the smell had completely vacated the premises. After that they were understandably tired, Charlie and Marcus walked in on them practically passed out on the floor with sponges and mops surrounding them. After they had laughed long enough to burst one of their kidneys and death glares to kill them 6x times over both parents agreed to a pizza night, promising that the following day they would go pick up the gym equipment in Bella's truck and help plug it in.

Sunday had arrived and both fathers had let their kids sleep in, grabbing breakfast at the diner and then picking up the equipment while Bella and Raymond woke up later then usual. Neither spoke much that afternoon, mainly because Bella was so sore from lugging around heavy bags of trash the following day she could barely walk and then blamed it all on Ray who only laughed at her.

"Lets just say, it was eventful," Raymond answered back. "I got it done though, and surprisingly all the of the equipment is in pretty good shape."

Rosalie nodded her head, thankful that the apples of her cheeks no longer peaked a rosy color when she lied or knew a secret, she couldn't possibly tell him how jittery she had felt last Thursday when he described the extensive training he had done for boxing. She had sat through an hours worth of every year he had been boxing, listened to why he had done it and all the accomplishments he had made. Her stomach had tightened when he had yanked one sleeve of his sweet off to show the scar from where he had clumsily swung his fist the first time he had ever been in a boxing gym and tripped over his feet. This had ended in him falling into a set of equipment that was sharp and in response received a few stitches and a lasting scar that he proudly showed the twins. He had next gone onto explain how Charlie and Marcus were now paying for all the equipment set up he would be receiving the following weekend and although it was a set of hand me down's he didn't care, he was just happy to get back to boxing.

Rosalie swallowed thickly, apparently now she needed air whenever she was around him, like she was completely flustered every time he spoke her way. For the most part the same went for Raymond, he simply just felt she overpowered him.

The blonde pushed back a piece of hair, Jasper briefly moving as if to fidget instead of revealing the flicker of a smile he wanted to show. Jasper knew exactly why Rosalie was unusually jumpy, over the weekend she had left to find this equipment Raymond would be using and made sure every piece of it was suitable for him to use, any piece that wasn't she had done her best to fix or replace. The blonde female had tried to be as inconspicuous as possible but unfortunately she had dragged her best friend Emmett along and well... the brunette wasn't as quiet when they'd returned.

"That's amazing Raymond," Rose smiled, imagining it all in her head. The thing about him was he was attractive yes, with deep set dimples and clearly a defined body but the thing that amazed her was how sweet he truly was. Raymond was like a ray of sunshine, constantly filled with warmth that aimed its way directly towards her. He talked about the people in his life more then himself,

Rosalie didn't want to admit it because she was realistic, a relationship between a human and a vampire wasn't exactly easy, but with a person like Raymond it was hard enough not to want it.

She leaned further back and Ray practically scooted towards her, unknowingly doing it all. "You could come to see if you'd like, it actually looks pretty amazing."

"One day," Rosalie agreed; smiling at him as if he was the only man in the world.

"I feel like all I do is talk about me," he swallowed thickly, replaying the last week to make sure he wasn't lying to himself just to hear her pretty voice. "What do you like to do?"

"You'll never believe me." She responded with a shake of her head, pushing back.

"Try me." Raymond countered; he disregarded the assignment he was on, pushing the papers off to another corner of the table.

Rosalie eyed his curious brown eyes, the fluorescent lights and gloomy weather not doing them justice. They were a distinct brown, something between muddy and amber, the perfect tint mixed together. She remembered what his question was before her mind drifted off again and cleared her throat, "I like to fix things, cars mostly, but anything with an engine and grease."

Raymond nodded his head, trying to picture her golden strands of hair matted and dirtied against her forehead, black specks of grease scattered across her alabaster cheeks and hands with her angled eyebrows creased in perfection trying to get an engine to start. He suddenly found himself remembering the many times his car had broken down on him, his mothers yells of irritation as she had told him repeatedly to take it into the shop when even the slightest kink had happened. His mother had been gorgeous, like a queen, much like Rosalie and his lips hummed in agreement, "no I can see it. Pretty girls and cars, it's a contradiction but definitely something I can get behind."

Rose smirked at the repetition of her words being used against her, "oh? You've had pretty girls fix your car?"

Raymond smiled, fondness in his eyes that made Rose burn a little inside at this girl she competed with but the feeling was cut short when he answered, "not fix but yell repeatedly at me to get fixed. My mother was a car enthusiast, she could assemble anything from scratch. She gave me the Impala."

Rose found herself yearning to meet this women, such a force she must have been to raise a respectful and dominant man, someone who was full of Power like Raymond but tender as well. She blinked, pushing hair back and suddenly realizing how deeply she was falling for him.

With a clear of her throat she looked down at the forgotten work and said, "let's get back to English yeah?"

|•|•|•|•|

Study Hall seemed to fly by and soon enough they were walking down the narrow hallway, at the tail of the hordes of students making their way to the parking lot.

Rosalie kicked a small pebble with her flat as Ray went onto to detail the list of problems he needed to fix with the car before he could get it running in Forks. His head suddenly snapped in her direction, "hey! You're good with cars! Would you mind coming with me to one of the body shops? Seeing what's good and not? I'll take you to dinner after, my treat."

His childish grin had Rosalie stopping in her tracks, puddles barely bothering the satin of her shoes as she thought over his request. One day with him, she wondered, one normal human date, what could it be like?

Rosalie's blank expression suddenly turned into one of pure happiness, forcing Ray to exhale his breath as she responded, "sounds like a date, when?"

Ray had already thought over his answer before she had spoken, going over the many possibilities and finally answering, "whenever my car finally gets here? I was thinking I can borrow Bella's truck or my dads and we can drive up to Port Angeles or Seattle? I hear the reservation has some good things."

"Port Angeles sounds good with me!" She decided, knowing that many of the other spots were lost causes due to sun or prohibition. "I'll drive."

Ray didn't seem bothered by her quick answer and nodded, "you don't have to—"

"I want to," Rosalie softly cut in this time, patting his hand and silencing the protest going to leave his lips.

"Oh my god! Bella! Bella!" The very loud and concerned yells of other students suddenly gained their attention. A squeal of tires and broken glass followed suit just as they rounded the corner of the parking lot.

A silent Jasper looked towards his blonde sister, both having heard the the whoosh of their brothers run and his hands collision with the car. Rosalie eyed Jasper for the briefest of seconds before her eyes were back on Raymond who had taken longer to process and then jumped into action, "did they say Bella?"

Rosalie, knowing there was no sense in hiding the truth answered, "I think so."

Raymond jogged forward, using his height and body to move around the crowds of kids while the Hale siblings followed behind him. He stopped dead in his feet, Rosalie practically colliding with his back had her hand not stuck out.

"Bella!" He yelled, having taken a moment to see his step sisters car smashed against Tyler Anderson's minivan, people collecting around the part between the cars. He suddenly was running, shoving people out of the way and hopping over the van's front to get into the small crevice.

His sister was curled into a ball, glass surrounding her as blood tricked from her head. His heart sprang out, watching a her eyes fluttered and cradled one side of her head, she had practically been crushed.

Leaning down and blocking out most of Angela and Jessica's loud yells he pulled back Bella's hand with a gentle touch. One of his hands touched the ground to balance himself, shards of glass suddenly sticking into his palm but that was the least of his worries.

"Goose!" He called out, hoping not to recognize signs of a concussion. As many times as he had boxed he had also been one of the handlers after the match and could instantly tell when someone had been hit too hard. "Hey goose, what happened?"

Bella groaned, hand attempting to lift again but realizing it was in her stepbrothers palm let it stay there and with a squeeze she answered, "Edward... Edward saved me."

"What?" Ray gasped, looking around to see the Cullen nowhere in site, in fact he had been pretty quick to get here and hadn't seen him in the vicinity. Rosalie and Jasper weren't even behind him anymore.

"I called the cops and an ambulance, there on the way!" Angela cut in, speaking over the loud voice of everyone's murmuring.

The siblings looked at her, eyes brimming with concern as she got closer and leaned down, "is she okay? I have napkins to stop the bleeding."

She yanked off her backpack, both siblings glancing at one another and silently saying this conversation would be discussed later on. She pulled out the napkins stuffed into the front pocket a handed them over. Ray released his hold on Bella, using one hand to hold her head steady and subdue the blood while the other worked too steady him. Bella immediately noticed this, eyes widening towards his cut palm, "you cut your hand!"

Ray shook her concern off, "Bella you've got an open head wound and possible concussion, I think my scrapes are the least of our concerns right now."

"You guys are definitely siblings." Angela spoke, handing over a few extra just so Ray could hold them in his palm.

The sirens of the paramedics became so loud Bella winced, effectively earning her to clutch at her temples while Raymond urged her not to move around to much.

After a brief moment the cops pulled up and they urged everyone to move out of the way but Raymond did not budge, he didn't even give the cops a glance in their direction. A stretcher was brought out, the quiet murmurs of the Paramedics speaking to each other was heard as they would quickly.

"Sir, I'm Eric." One of them hopped over the two cars, coming close and bending down. "We're gonna need you to step back and let me pull her out of here, we can't get a stretcher in here and she's not allowed to walk.

Bella went to protest but her resists fell on deaf ears and Ray shook his head, "I'm not leaving my sister."

Eric the paramedic gave a small smile, one of admiration despite the situation, "can you carry her?"

"That's not nece—"

"Yes it is Bella," Ray shot her down and then turned back to the man, "I can, where too?"

Eric turned his head behind him where the ambulance was parked and the stretcher was waiting by the doors of the automobile. The quiet murmur of most kids was heard as they watched the situation.

Ray nodded, looking at Bella and pursing his lips, "come on goose, up you go."

He tucked one arm under her knees, the other careful not to move her head to much so it touch midway up her back and lifted her into his arms. Bella's cheeks were a bright pink as he easily carried her like a doll and students began to murmur that the situation was worse then once though.

Bella tucked her head into the crevice of his chest, hoping to hide herself as she muttered against his sweater, "this is so embarrassing."

"Better you be embarrassed then dead." Ray dryly stated as he had little care for what anyone else said or thought.

"Here," Eric stated, a handful of paramedics ready to take her as they had already driven off with Tyler Anderson.

Ray sat her down gently, immediately being pulled away as they strapped Bella in with an assortment of head gear and began to ask her questions. Ray waited for a moment, allowing them to talk until they began loading her into the truck. Ray went to step inside when another of the medics stopped him, holding out a hand and shaking his head. "Sorry man, only family. You can follow your girlfriend in your car."

"She's not my girlfriend," Ray defensively spoke, after a moment he realized getting angry would do him no justice and sighed. "Thats my sister."

The man scoffed, disbelieving as he clearly saw the difference between the two and then went to continue to push him out when one of the women stopped at his words. She turned, looking between the strapped Bella and a distressed Raymond until brightening up, "are you Marcus Thompson's son?"

"Yes!" Ray shook his head enthusiastically, refusing to budge.

"And I'm assuming that's Isabella," she nodded her head back to the brunette.

Said girl fidgeted and said loudly, "Bella!"

Ray nodded his head as the women put two and two together and then looked at her partner, "let him in, they're siblings. Chief Swan and Thompson's kids."

The man nodded, "sorry Raymond."

Ray shook off his apology, and proceeds to jump into the ambulance. He took the lone spot available for him, cramming his long legs to fit and the reaching for Bella's outstretched hand.

"We can patch you up once we get to the hospital." The man spoke up, working on Bella as they began checking vitals.

Raymond didn't care, his head was filled with a different thoughts, most revolving Bella but there was still the lingering thought about the Cullen's.

He couldn't shake the image of an imprinted hand against the steel of Tyler's van, a brief glance he'd got now seemed to burn the inside of his skull, yearning him to learn more.

|•|•|•|•|

These siblings will be the death of me.