Caroline pulled up to the grill and parked her car, and the two girls walked in and found a table. They looked over the menu as a waiter approached, asking, " What can I get for you ladies?" 

"I'll have the double cheeseburger meal with fries and a coke,"  Caroline ordered.

Bella read over the menu for a moment longer, "I'll have the same, actually." 

The waiter nodded with a smile, "All right then, I'll be back in a few minutes with that." Then he walked off.  

Bella was talking to Caroline when they heard the bell ding, and her eyes involuntarily flicked to the door. Her breath hitched when she saw who had just walked in. "Oh my god..." she muttered to herself.  

But Caroline, with her vampire hearing, heard her and furrowed her brow as she followed her cousin's line of sight to see the Mikaelson twins, more specifically Rainer, who was also staring right back at Bella, an almost look of shock on his face. 

"Isa, what's that about?" The two were still just looking at each other, eyes locked, and neither could believe that the other was there. "Isa!" Caroline nudged her cousin's shoulder, which made her look at her.

"Huh?"

"I said what was that about?" Caroline asked leaning forward in her seat, waiting for the gossip.

Bella sighed glancing at Rai again only to find him still looking at her, she blushed slightly and looked back at Caroline, speaking quietly "okay so remember when I mentioned the ex boyfriend from Phoenix?"

Caroline nodded, "Yeah."

Bella bit her lip, "Well, that's him."

Caroline looked surprised for a moment and then smirked at her cousin, "Well, I mean, you definitely could have done worse... he's attractive."

Bella blushes again, "yeah, that's true." she couldn't deny that Rai was attractive, even now she thought he'd gotten more attractive than the last time she saw him.

"What happened between you? Because judging by the look he's giving you, he still has feelings for you..."

Bella sighed, looking at her cousin, "It was about a year before I moved in with my dad, and things were going pretty well, and then one day, he showed up at my house, and we were in my room just hanging out you know, and then he gets all serious, says that we need to talk and then he broke up with me but said that he was moving and that as much as he loved me, that long distance relationships were all doomed to fail and it wasn't fair to either of us to put us through that, and then after he left that day it was the last time I saw him... until today."

"Damn." Caroline whistled. "I'd say you should definitely give that another chance... I mean, you said it yourself that you weren't completely over it before you met bitchface, and yes, that's his new name, and he did his little voodoo magic or some shit because what you described to me was definitely not normal, Isa."

Rai furrowed his brow for a moment, he couldn't help but listen in on the two talking, and he felt a feeling of jealousy rise in his chest hearing Caroline say that, his Isa had met someone else. Rebekah was just watching her brother clench his jaw and fist at his side.

He knew that he didn't have the right to be jealous as he broke up with her, but he couldn't help it, she was human, so she didn't feel the bond as he did, so of course, she could end up having feelings for someone else, but he still didn't like it.

"I know it wasn't normal, Care, but I still don't really understand why it all happened so quickly either... like it doesn't make sense."

Caroline nodded at her, "Well, Isa, the way I see it is that bitchface is an asshole and probably a narcissist who most likely got off on being controlling."

Bella snorted at that, "yeah probably, I mean it was like everyone wanted him, and now that I think about it... I don't really see the appeal, but when he was around, it was strong and then weaker when he wasn't around. It's really weird now that I'm thinking about it clearly."

"Damn, that is very weird."

Hearing that, Rai couldn't help the quiet growl that left his throat. He understood what that meant, and his Isa had been played with by a dirty, sparkling vampire knockoff; now, don't get me wrong, he didn't have an issue with some of them, but the ones that used their allure and messed around with the humans and didn't just kill them, for food, as it's in their nature and all like that are the ones he has issues with. Now he gets enjoying the chase and all that but drawing it out over a long period of time is excessive and in Rai's opinion a waste of time.

Rebekah noticed her brother's tense posture and realized that he hadn't even been listening to what she was saying since they sat down in the booth they were in. 

Caroline and Bella got their food and drinks, and they started to eat while talking between bites.

They had just finished their food when Rai approached their table, he looked at Caroline for a moment, "do you mind if I talk to your friend here alone for a moment?"

Caroline grinned at him, "Not at all, as long as it's okay with her."

They both looked at Bella, who nodded, "It's fine."

Caroline nodded, "all right then, I'll leave you two to talk, I'll just be over there." She pointed in a random direction, then got up and left the two exes alone.

Rai sat in the seat Caroline had been previously in, "Hi."

Bella gave him a small smile and said, "Hi." He was always the one person around whom she never felt shy, even before they started dating. This surprised her because, for the most part, she was like that with everyone else. She always felt a sort of connection with him. Now, she realizes that she's never felt that with anyone else, not even Edward, which was strange considering Edward claimed that she was his mate... so wouldn't she feel some sort of connection with him? But she didn't, which begged the question now: was she actually his mate, or had he lied to her?

"How have you been, Isa?"  

"I've honestly been better... but it's kind of a long, complicated story... how have you been?" 

He nodded and gave her a smile, "Well, I'm always up for listening if you want to talk about it, but I've been okay; I'm much better now, though." 

That made her crack a smile, "Well, I might take you up on that sometime, and always the charmer, huh Rai?"

He winked at her, "only for you." 

She playfully rolled her eyes at him, but for the first time in a long time, things felt normal, and it wasn't weird or awkward between the two of them like you would think. 

Caroline was watching them with a smile, thinking that was just what her cousin needed. 

***

Somewhere across the country sat a girl with a pixie-style haircut sitting next to her husband, whom she'd manipulated into thinking that she was his mate... the girl gasped as she was pulled into a vision. 

In the vision, she saw Bella happy with a man with dark hair and brown eyes. The man told her the truth, that she was his mate, and that what she'd had with Edward was just the male playing house with her because she was nothing more than a blood singer to the bronze-haired, golden-eyed male. 

Her husband looked at her concerned, as he always did when she had a vision, but she ignored him, as she sometimes did, and disappeared from the room. She had to tell Edward what she'd seen and tell him that they needed to fix it fast before Bella was told the truth and would no longer trust them. 

He furrowed his brow at that; he'd started to notice more and more how his wife had started acting different since they had left; she had been spending more time with Edward than she had previously done. 

He decided then to bring the issue up with his other two adopted siblings, knowing that his adopted parents would just tell the two what he said, and it would cause problems, and that his two siblings wouldn't say anything if he didn't want them to. 

Note:

Hey besties, so here we are, another chapter in :) I hope you guys enjoyed it.  Isa and Rai are going to get close pretty quick, again, because I suck at slow burns; she'll eventually come clean and tell him everything that happened with Edward and all that. 

Also, I wonder what that last bit was about. You'll see as we get more into this.  Although, I think you could probably take a guess. 

I also was going to finish this chapter and post it last night, but I got called into work, so I couldn't, so I did it before I had to go to work today :)