THE TIME ALWAYS WENT SO QUICKLY. SOON BELLA WOULD NEED TO EAT another
meal, and currently there was no food at all in my house; I planned to rectify that in the near future. Time to return to the human world. As long as we were together, it was not a burden but a joy.
So a meal, a little while to soak up her nearness, and then I’d have to leave her. I expected she would want to talk to Charlie alone before my introduction. But as soon as I turned onto her street, it was clear that my expectations for the afternoon were thwarted.
A 1987 Ford Tempo that had seen better days was parked in Charlie’s usual spot. And under the meager protection of the porch roof, a boy stood behind a man in wheelchair.
Bella beat him home, the old man thought. That’s unfortunate. Hey, it’s Bella! The boy’s thoughts were much more enthusiastic.
I could think of only one reason that Billy Black would be unhappy to see Bella arrive before her father. And that reason involved a broken treaty. I would have confirmation soon enough; Billy hadn’t seen me yet.
“Has he forgotten who the treaty actually protects?” I hissed.
Bella glanced up at me, confused, though I doubted I’d spoken slowly enough for my words to be intelligible.
Jacob saw me in the driver’s seat just a second before Billy did. Him again. So she must be dating him. His enthusiasm vanished. NO! Billy’s thought was a shout, and then a mental groan. No.
I heard his half-articulated fears—should he tell his son to run? Was it already too late?—and then his guilt.
How did it know?
I saw that I was right, that this visit was no innocent social call.
Parking the truck against the curb, I locked eyes with the frightened man.
“This is crossing the line.” I enunciated clearly this time. I hoped he could read my lips.
Bella understood immediately. “He came to warn Charlie?” She sounded horrified by the idea.
I nodded, not breaking away from Billy’s stare. After a second more, he looked down.
“Let me deal with this,” Bella suggested.
As much as I would have loved to get out of the truck and stalk up to the helpless duo—to lean over them, intimidating, close enough that all the little signs of what I was would feel like they were screaming at the old man, to bare my teeth and snarl a warning in a voice that would sound anything but human, to watch his hair stand on end and hear his heart splutter with panic—I knew it was a bad idea. For one thing, Carlisle wouldn’t like it. For another, though the boy was well aware of the legends, he would never believe them. Unless I got in their faces and flaunted my less human side.
“That’s probably best,” I agreed. “Be careful, though. The child has no idea.”
Annoyance flashed suddenly across her face. I was confused until she spoke.
“Jacob is not that much younger than I am.” It was the word child that had offended her. “Oh, I know,” I teased.
Bella sighed and reached for the door handle, no happier about separating than I was.
“Get them inside so I can leave. I’ll be back around dusk,” I promised. “Do you want my truck?”
“I could walk home faster than this truck moves.”
She smiled for a second, and then her face fell. “You don’t have to leave,” she murmured.
“Actually, I do.” I glanced at Billy Black. He was staring again, but he looked away quickly when he met my gaze. “After you get rid of them…” I felt a smile spreading across my face, a little too wide. “You still have to prepare Charlie to meet your new boyfriend.”
“Thanks a lot,” she moaned.
But while she clearly worried about Charlie’s reaction, I could see that
she would go through with this. She would give me a label in her human world, something to let me belong there.
My smile softened. “I’ll be back soon.”
I appraised the humans on the porch one more time. Jacob Black was embarrassed, thinking caustic thoughts about his father for dragging him out to spy on Bella and her boyfriend. Billy Black was still suffused with fear, expecting me to suddenly begin butchering everyone in sight. It was insulting.
In that frame of mind, I leaned over to kiss Bella goodbye. Just to mess with the old man, I pressed my lips to her throat rather than her lips.
The agonized shouting in his head was nearly drowned out by the sound of Bella’s heart racing, and I wished the irritating humans would disappear.
But her eyes were on Billy now, appraising his distress.
“Soon,” she commanded. After one short, forlorn look, she opened the door and climbed out.
I sat very still as she jogged through the light rain to the door. “Hey, Billy. Hi, Jacob,” she said with forced enthusiasm. “Charlie’s gone for the day—I hope you haven’t been waiting long.”
“Not long,” the man said quietly. He kept glancing at me and then away again. He held up a brown paper bag. “I just wanted to bring this up.”
“Thanks. Why don’t you come in for a minute and dry off?”
She acted like she was unaware of his piercing stare, unlocking the door and then gesturing for them to enter, a smile glued to her face. She waited till they were inside the house to follow.
“Here, let me take that,” she said to Billy while she turned to shut the door behind her. Her eyes locked with mine for one instant, and then the door was closed.
I quickly moved from Bella’s truck to my usual tree before they could reach any windows that had a view of this side of the yard. I wasn’t going to leave until the Blacks did. If things were going to get tense with the tribe again, I needed to know exactly how far Billy was willing to go today.
“Fishing again? Down at the usual spot? Maybe I’ll run by and see him.” Even more urgent now. I didn’t know it had gotten so bad. Poor Bella, she doesn’t realize—
“No,” Bella protested sharply at the same time my teeth snapped together. “He was headed someplace new… but I have no idea where.”
Even through the walls, I could hear that her tone was seriously off.
Billy also noticed.
What’s this? She doesn’t want me to see Charlie. She couldn’t know why I need to warn him.
I could see Bella’s expression as he analyzed it; her eyes flashed, her chin lifted stubbornly. It reminded him of one of his daughters, the one who never visited.
I need to talk to her alone.
“Jake,” he said slowly, “why don’t you go get that new picture of Rebecca out of the car? I’ll leave that for Charlie, too.”
“Where is it?”
Jacob’s pure, clear thoughts were all gloomy now, replaying the kiss in the truck. It affected him in a much different way than it did his father. He knew she was too old to think of him the way he wished she would, but it depressed him to see the proof. He sniffed once and then winced, distracted. Something’s gone rancid in here, he thought, and I wondered if he was reacting to his father’s gift in the paper bag; I’d smelled nothing amiss this
morning.
“I think I saw it in the trunk,” Billy lied smoothly. “You may have to dig for it.”
Neither Billy nor Bella spoke again until Jacob exited the front door, his shoulders slumped and his face down. He trudged to the car, ignoring the rain, and—with a sigh—started to sift through a pile of old clothes and forgotten junk. He was still rehashing the kiss, trying to decide how into it Bella was.
Billy and Bella were facing off in the hallway.
How do I start…?
Before he could say anything, Bella turned and walked away toward the kitchen. He watched her retreating figure for a second, and then followed.
The refrigerator door creaked, then rustling ensued.
Billy watched as she slammed the fridge and whirled around to face him. He noted the defensive set of her mouth.
Bella spoke first, her voice unfriendly. She’d obviously decided there was no point in acting oblivious. “Charlie won’t be back for a long time.”
She must be keeping that thing a secret for her own reasons. She needs to know, too. Maybe I can say enough to warn her without actually breaking
the treaty.
“Thanks again for the fish fry.” Bella’s words were clearly a dismissal, but Billy didn’t think she looked surprised when he held his ground. She sighed and folded her arms across her chest.
“Bella,” Billy said, his voice no longer casual. It was deeper now, graver.
She held as perfectly still as it was possible for a human to stand and waited for him to continue.
“Bella,” he repeated. “Charlie is one of my best friends.” “Yes.”
He said the words very slowly. “I noticed you’ve been spending time with one of the Cullens.”
“Yes,” she said again, barely veiling her hostility now.
He didn’t respond to her tone. “Maybe it’s none of my business, but I don’t think that is such a good idea.”
“You’re right,” she retorted. “It is none of your business.”
So angry.
His voice turned ponderous again as he considered his wording carefully. “You probably don’t know this, but the Cullen family has an unpleasant reputation on the reservation.”
Very careful. He stayed just barely on the right side of the line. “Actually, I did know that.” Bella’s words flew hot and fast, in direct
contrast to his. “But that reputation couldn’t be deserved, could it? Because the Cullens never set foot on the reservation, do they?”
This pulled him up short. She knows! She knows? How? And how could she…? She couldn’t. She can’t know the whole truth. The revulsion that colored his thoughts made my teeth grind again.
“That’s true,” he finally conceded. “You seem… well informed about the Cullens. More informed than I expected.”
“Maybe even better informed than you are?”
What could they have told her that would make her so defensive of them? Not the truth. Some romantic fairy tale, no doubt. Well, obviously she won’t be convinced by anything I have to say.
“Maybe.” He was annoyed to have to agree with her. “Is Charlie as well informed?”
He watched her expression get more evasive. “Charlie likes the Cullens
a lot.”
Charlie doesn’t know anything.
“It’s not my business,” Billy said. “But it may be Charlie’s.” Bella’s gaze dissected his expression for a long moment.
The girl looks like a lawyer.
“Though it would be my business, again, whether or not I think that it’s Charlie’s business, right?” she asked. It didn’t really sound like a question.
Again, they locked eyes. Finally, Billy sighed.
Charlie wouldn’t believe me anyway. I can’t alienate him again. I need to be able to keep watch on this situation.
“Yes, I guess that’s your business, too.”
Bella sighed and her posture relaxed. “Thanks, Billy,” she said, her voice softer now.
“Just think about what you’re doing, Bella,” Billy urged. Her answer was too quick. “Okay.”
Another thought caught my attention. I’d paid little notice to Jacob’s fruitless search, too focused on Billy and Bella’s standoff. But now he realized—
Oh man, I’m a moron. He wanted me out of the way.
Full of dismay over how his father might be embarrassing him, and with a measure of guilty fear that Bella might have told on him about the treaty breaking, Jacob slammed the trunk and loped toward the front door.
Billy heard the trunk and knew his time was up. He made his final plea. “What I meant to say was… don’t do what you’re doing.”
Bella didn’t answer, but her expression was gentler now. Billy had a faint moment of hope that she was listening to him.
Jacob banged the front door open. Billy glanced over his shoulder, so I couldn’t see Bella’s reaction.
“There’s no picture anywhere in that car,” Jacob grumbled loudly. “Hmm. I guess I left it at home,” Billy said.
“Great,” his son retorted with heavy sarcasm.
“Well, Bella, tell Charlie…” Billy waited for a beat before continuing. “That we stopped by, I mean.”
“I will,” she replied, voice sour again.
Jacob was surprised. “Are we leaving already?”
“Charlie’s gonna be out late,” Billy explained, already wheeling himself toward the door.
What was even the point of coming up? Jacob complained internally.
Old man is getting senile. “Oh. Well, I guess I’ll see you later, then, Bella.” “Sure,” Bella said.
“Take care,” Billy added in a warning voice. Bella didn’t answer.
Jacob helped his father over the threshold and down the one step of the porch. Bella followed them to the door. She glanced toward the empty truck, then waved once toward Jacob and shut the door while Jacob was still loading his father into the car.
Though I would have liked to join Bella and talk over what had just happened, I knew my job wasn’t done yet. I heard her stamping up the stairs as I dropped from the tree and cut through the woods behind her house.
It was much more difficult to follow the Blacks in the daytime while on foot. I couldn’t very well pace them along the highway. I ducked in and out of the thicker knots of forest, listening for the thoughts of anyone close enough to see me. I beat them to the La Push turnoff, and chanced a full-tilt sprint across the rainy highway while the only visible car was headed in the other direction. Once I was on the west side of the road, there was plenty of cover. I waited for the old Ford to appear, then ran parallel to them through the dark trees.
The two weren’t talking. I wondered if I had missed any earlier recriminations from Jacob. The boy’s head was busy replaying the kiss again, and he was concluding morosely that Bella had been very into it.
Billy’s mind was caught up in a memory. I was surprised that I remembered this, too. From a different angle.
It was over two and a half years ago. My family had been in Denali at the time, just a short courtesy visit on our way from one semipermanent home to the next. Groundwork for the move back to Washington had included one unique chore. Carlisle already had his job lined up and Esme had bought her fixer-upper sight unseen. My siblings’ and my fake transcripts had been transferred to Forks High School. But the last step of preparation was the most important—while also the most atypical. Though we’d moved back to former homes in the past—after an appropriate amount of time had elapsed—we’d never had to give warning of our arrival before.
Carlisle had started with the internet. He’d found an amateur genealogist named Alma Young working out of the Makah Reservation. Pretending to be another family history enthusiast, he’d asked about any descendants of Ephraim Black who might still live in the area. Mrs. Young had been excited to give Carlisle the good news: Ephraim’s grandson and great- grandchildren all lived in La Push, just down the coast. Of course she didn’t mind giving Carlisle the phone number. She was sure Billy Black would be thrilled to hear from his very distant cousin.
I’d been in the house when Carlisle had made the next call, so of course I’d heard everything Carlisle had said. Billy was remembering his side of it now.
It had been such an ordinary day. The twins were out with friends, so it was just Billy and Jacob at home. Billy was teaching the boy how to whittle a sea lion out of madrona wood when the phone rang. He’d wheeled himself to the kitchen, leaving the child so focused on his work that he barely noticed his father leaving.
Billy had assumed it was Harry, or maybe Charlie. He’d answered with a cheerful “Hello!”
“Hello. Is this Billy Black?”
He didn’t recognize the voice on the other end of the line, but there was something sharp and clear about it that put his back up for some reason.
“Yes, this is Billy. Who’s asking?”
“My name is Carlisle Cullen,” the soft yet piercing voice told Billy, and it felt like the floor was falling out from under him. For a wild second, he’d thought he was having a nightmare.
This name and this keen-edged voice were part of a legend, a horror story. Though he’d been warned and prepared, it had all been such a very long time ago. Billy had never actually believed that one day he’d have to live in the same world as that horror story.
“Does my name mean anything to you?” the voice asked, and Billy noticed how young it sounded. Not hundreds of years old, as it should.
Billy had struggled to find his own voice. “Yes,” he finally rasped. He thought he heard a faint sigh.
“That’s good,” the monster replied. “It makes it easier for us to fulfill our duty.”
Billy’s mind went numb as he realized what the monster was saying.
Duty. He was speaking of the treaty. Billy struggled to remember the secret accords he’d so carefully memorized. If the monster said he had a duty to discharge, then that could only mean one thing.
All the blood drained from Billy’s face and the walls seemed to tilt around him, though he knew he was sitting safe and stable in his wheelchair.
“You’re coming back,” he choked out.
“Yes,” the monster agreed. “I know this must be… unpleasant for you to hear. But I assure you that your tribe is in no danger, nor are any of the people in Forks. We have not changed our ways.”
Billy couldn’t think of anything to say. He’d been locked into this treaty since before his birth. He wanted to object, to threaten… but treaty or no, there was nothing he could do.
“We’ll be living outside Forks.” The monster rattled off a set of numbers, and it took Billy a moment to realize they were coordinates, lines of longitude and latitude. He scrambled for something to write with, and came up with a black Sharpie but no paper.
“Again,” he demanded hoarsely.
The numbers came more slowly this time, and Billy scrawled them down his arm.
“I’m not sure how well you know the agreement—”
“I know it,” Billy interrupted. The blood drinkers got a five-mile radius around the location of their lair that was off limits for any member of the tribe. It was a small space compared to the land that belonged to the tribe, but in this moment it seemed like much too much.
How would they convince any of the children to obey this rule? He thought of his own headstrong daughters and his happy-go-lucky son. None of them believed any of the stories. And yet if they ever made an innocent mistake… they’d be fair game.
“Of course,” the monster said politely. “We know it very well, too. You have nothing to worry about. I’m sorry for any distress this causes you, but we will not impact your people in any way.”
Billy just listened, numb again.
“Our current plan is to live in Forks for about a decade.” Billy’s heart stopped. Ten years.
“My children will be attending the local high school. I don’t know if any
of your tribe’s children come up to the school—” “No,” Billy whispered.
“Well, if anyone wishes to, I can assure you it will not be unsafe.”
The faces of the children of Forks flashed through Billy’s mind. Was there nothing he could do to protect them?
“Let me give you my number. We’d be happy to have a more cordial—” “No,” Billy said, stronger this time.
“Of course. Whatever makes you most comfortable.”
And then a panicked thought intruded. The monster had spoken of his
children.…
“How many?” Billy asked. His voice sounded like he was being strangled.
“Pardon me?”
“How many of you are there?”
For the first time, the smooth, confident voice hesitated. “Two more found our family many years ago. There are seven of us now.”
Very slowly and deliberately, Billy hung up the phone.
And then I had to stop running. I’d not quite reached the treaty line, but this particular memory made me loath to cut it too close. I turned north and headed homeward.
So nothing very helpful from Billy’s thoughts. I felt reasonably sure that he would follow the same pattern: return to his safe zone and contact his cronies. They would hash through the new information—which was pretty meager—and come to the same conclusion. There was nothing they could do. The treaty was their only protection.
I imagined that Billy’s longstanding friendship with Charlie would be the point of contention. Billy would fight very hard to be allowed to warn Charlie in a more detailed fashion. A cold one had chosen his only daughter as… a victim, a target, a meal; I could guess how Billy would choose to describe our relationship.
Surely the others, more impartial than Billy, would insist on his silence. Regardless, Billy’s earlier attempt to alert Charlie to the danger of
Carlisle working at the hospital hadn’t gone well. Adding in a heavy helping of the fantastical would certainly not help. Billy had already recognized that himself.
I was nearly home. I would give Carlisle the update and my analysis of
the situation. There really wasn’t much else to do. I was positive his reaction would be the same. Much like the Quileutes, we had no option besides following the treaty to the letter.
I darted across the freeway again when there were no cars passing. As soon as I was on the drive, I heard the sound of a familiar engine coming from the garage. I stopped dead in the middle of the single lane and waited.
Rosalie’s red BMW rounded the curve and screeched to a stop. I waved halfheartedly.
You know I’d hit you if it wouldn’t mess my car up.
I nodded.
Rosalie revved her engine once, then sighed. “You heard about the game, I guess.”
Just let me go, Edward. I could see in her mind that she had no destination in mind. She only wanted to be away from here. Emmett will stay. That’s enough, isn’t it?
“Please?”
She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. I don’t understand why this is so important to you.
“You are important to me, Rose,” I said simply.
Everyone will have more fun without me.
I shrugged. She might be right.
I won’t be nice.
I smiled. “I don’t require nice. I only asked for toleration.” She hesitated.
“It won’t be that bad,” I promised. “Maybe you’ll win the game soundly, make me look bad.”
One corner of her mouth quirked up as she fought a smile. I get Emmett and Jasper.
She always picked the obvious muscle. “Deal.”
She took another deep breath, instantly regretting our agreement. She tried to imagine being in the same place as Bella and… struggled.
“Nothing is going to happen tonight, Rose. She’s not making any decisions. She’s just going to watch us play a game, that’s all. Think of it as an experiment.”
In that… it might blow up?
I gave her a tired look. She rolled her eyes.
“If it doesn’t work, we’ll regroup and come up with another solution.”
Rosalie had a plethora of other solutions, most of them profane, but she was ready to surrender. She would try… but I could see that she would not work very hard at being civil. It was a start.
I suppose I should change, then. With that, she threw her car into reverse and gunned it back toward the house, climbing from zero to sixty before she was fully out of view. I took the shorter route straight through the forest.
Inside, Emmett was watching four different baseball games at the same time on the big screen. His head was turned away, though, listening to the sound of Rosalie’s car squealing into the garage.
I gestured to the TV. “Nothing you’ll find there will help you win tonight.”
You talked Rose into playing?
I nodded once, and a huge grin split his face.
I owe you one.
I pursed my lips. “Really?”
He was intrigued that I clearly wanted something. Sure, what do you want?
“Your best behavior around Bella?”
Rose flitted through the room and up the stairs, pointedly ignoring us both.
Emmett thought about my request. What exactly does that entail?
“Not terrifying her on purpose.” He shrugged. “Seems fair.” “Excellent.”
I’m just glad you’re back. The last months had dragged unusually for Emmett, first with my moods and then with my absence.
I almost apologized, but I knew he wasn’t upset with me now. Emmett lived for the present.
“Where are Alice and Jasper?”
Emmett was watching the games again. Hunting. Jasper wants to be ready. Funny thing—seemed like he was excited for tonight, more than I would have expected.
“Funny,” I agreed, though I had a little more insight into why.
Edward, dear, I can hear you dripping on my floors. Please change into
something dry and mop that up.
“Sorry, Esme!”
I dressed for Charlie this time, pulling out one of the more impressive rain jackets that I rarely wore. I wanted to look like a person who was taking the weather seriously, concerned about avoiding the cold and the wet. It was the little details that set humans at ease.
Automatically, I tucked my bottlecap into the pocket of my new jeans.
While I was mopping, I thought about the short journey to the baseball clearing tonight, and realized that—after yesterday—Bella might not be too keen on running with me to our destination. I knew there would have to be some running, but the shorter the distance the better, I assumed.
“Can I borrow your Jeep?” I asked Emmett.
Nice jacket. He chuckled. Do try to stay dry and cozy. I waited with an overdone expression of patience. “Sure,” he agreed. “But now you owe me one.”
“I’m delighted to be in your debt.”
I darted back upstairs to the sound of his laughter.
It was a quick conference with Carlisle—like me, he could see no course of action besides continuing on as we were. And then I was hurrying back to Bella.
Emmett’s Jeep was in many ways the most conspicuous of our cars just by sheer size. But there weren’t many people out in the downpour, and the rain would make it hard for anyone to see who was driving. People would assume the massive vehicle was from out of town.
I wasn’t sure how much time Bella would need, so I turned up the street a block from hers to make sure she was ready for me.
Before I was even to the end of the street, I could tell Charlie’s thoughts were in a dither. She must have begun. I caught a glimpse of Emmett’s face in his head. What was that about?
I pulled over by a patch of forest between homes and let the engine idle.
I was close enough now to make out their spoken voices. The nearby houses were not silent, but those other voices, both mental and physical, were easily ignored. I was so attuned to the sound of Bella’s voice by now that I could have picked it out over a stadium full of shouting.
“It’s Edward, Dad,” she was saying.
“Is he?” her father demanded. I tried to make sense of what they were
saying about me.
“Sort of, I guess,” she admitted.
“You said last night that you weren’t interested in any of the boys in town,” he remonstrated.
“Well, Edward doesn’t live in town, Dad.… And anyways, it’s kind of at an early stage, you know? Don’t embarrass me with all the boyfriend talk, okay?”
I was able to put together the thread of the conversation then. I tried to understand from Charlie’s emotions how perturbed he was by her revelation, but he seemed extra stoic tonight.
“When is he coming over?”
“He’ll be here in a few minutes.” Bella sounded more agitated about this than her father.
“Where is he taking you?”
Bella groaned theatrically. “I hope you’re getting the Spanish Inquisition out of your system now. We’re going to play baseball with his family.”
There was a second of silence, and then Charlie started laughing. “You’re playing baseball?”
From Charlie’s tone, it was evident that—despite her stepfather’s occupation—Bella wasn’t a huge fan of the sport.
“Well, I’ll probably watch most of the time.”
“You must really like this guy.” He sounded more suspicious now. From the flashbacks running through his head, I thought he must be trying to piece together how long this relationship had been going on. He felt newly justified in his suspicions of the night before.
I revved the engine and made a quick U-turn. She’d finished her prep work, and I was anxious to be with her again.
I parked behind her truck and darted up to the doorway. Charlie was saying, “You baby me too much.”
I pressed the doorbell, and then flipped my hood up. I was good at passing for human, but it felt a lot more important right now than it usually did.
I heard Charlie’s footsteps coming toward the door, closely followed by Bella’s. Charlie’s mind seemed to be vacillating between anxiety and humor. I thought he was still enjoying the idea of Bella willingly being involved in a baseball game; I was almost positive I had it right.
Charlie opened the door, his eyes focused at about my shoulder height; he’d been expecting someone shorter. He readjusted, and then staggered half a step back.
I’d experienced the reaction often enough in the past that I didn’t need clearer thoughts to understand. Like any normal human, suddenly standing just a foot away from a vampire would send adrenaline racing through his veins. Fear would twist in his stomach for just a fraction of a second, and then his rational mind would take over. His brain would force him to ignore all the little discrepancies that marked me as other. His eyes would refocus and he would see nothing more than a teenage boy.
I watched him come to that conclusion, that I was just a normal boy. I knew he would be wondering what his body’s strange reaction had been about.
Abruptly an image of Carlisle flitted through his head, and I thought he must be comparing our faces. We really didn’t look much alike, but the similarities in our coloring were enough for most people. Maybe it wasn’t enough for Charlie. He was definitely dissatisfied about something.
Bella was watching nervously over Charlie’s shoulder.
“Come on in, Edward.” He stepped back and gestured for me to follow.
Bella had to dance out of his way. “Thanks, Chief Swan.”
He sort of smiled, almost unwillingly. “Go ahead and call me Charlie.
Here, I’ll take your jacket.”
I shrugged it off quickly. “Thanks, sir.”
Charlie gestured to the small living room alcove. “Have a seat there, Edward.”
Bella made a face, clearly wanting to be on our way.
I chose the armchair. It seemed a little forward to take the sofa, where Bella would have to sit next to me—or Charlie would. Probably better to keep the family together for an official first date.
Bella didn’t like my choice. I winked at her while Charlie was settling himself.
“So I hear you’re getting my girl to watch baseball,” Charlie said.
Amusement was winning in his expression. “Yes, sir, that’s the plan.”
He chuckled aloud now. “Well, more power to you, I guess.”
I politely laughed along.
Bella jumped to her feet. “Okay, enough humor at my expense. Let’s go.” Hurrying back to the hall, she shoved her arms into her own jacket. Charlie and I followed. I grabbed my jacket on the way and slipped it on.
“Not too late, Bell,” Charlie cautioned.
“Don’t worry, Charlie, I’ll have her home early,” I said.
He eyed me keenly for a second. “You take care of my girl, all right?” Bella performed another dramatic groan.
It felt more satisfying than I would have thought to say the words “She’ll be safe with me, I promise, sir” and be confident that they were true.
Bella walked out.
Charlie and I laughed together again, though this time it was more genuine on my part. I smiled at Charlie and waved as I followed Bella outside.
I didn’t get very far. Bella had frozen on the small porch, staring at Emmett’s Jeep. Charlie crowded behind me, looking to see what had slowed Bella’s determination to escape.
He whistled in surprise. “Wear your seat belts,” he said gruffly.
Her father’s voice galvanized her. She dashed out into the pouring rain. I kept my speed human but used my considerably longer legs to get to the passenger side first and open the door for her. She hesitated for a moment, eyeing the seat, then the ground, then the seat again. She took a deep breath and bent her legs as though about to jump. Charlie couldn’t see much of us through the Jeep’s windows, so I lifted her into the seat. She gasped in surprise.
I walked around to my door, waving to Charlie again. He waved back perfunctorily.
Inside the car, Bella was struggling with the seat belt. Holding a buckle in each hand, she looked up at me and said, “What’s all this?”
“It’s an off-roading harness.” She frowned. “Uh-oh.”
After a second of searching, she found a tongue, but it wouldn’t fit into either of the two buckles she tried it with. I chuckled once at her baffled expression, then snapped all her attachments into place. Her heart drummed louder than the rain when my hands brushed across the skin of her throat. I let my fingers trail across her collarbones once before I settled into my seat
and started the engine.
As we pulled away from the house she said, sounding a little alarmed, “This is a… um… big Jeep you have.”
“It’s Emmett’s. I didn’t think you’d want to run the whole way,” I admitted.
“Where do you keep this thing?”
“We remodeled one of the outbuildings into a garage.”
She eyed the empty harness behind my back. “Aren’t you going to put on your seat belt?”
I just looked at her.
She frowned and started to roll her eyes, but the expression got stuck midroll.
“Run the whole way?” Her voice rose to a higher octave than usual. “As in, we’re still going to run part of the way?”
“You’re not going to run,” I reminded her. She moaned. “I’m going to be sick.” “Keep your eyes closed, you’ll be fine.” Her front teeth bit deep into her lower lip.
I wanted to reassure her—she would be safe with me. I leaned over to kiss the top of her head. And then I flinched.
The rain in her hair affected her scent in a way I hadn’t expected. The burn in my throat, which had seemed so stable, seized me in a sudden flare. A groan of pain escaped my lips before I could block it.
I straightened up at once, putting space between us. She was staring at me, confused. I tried to explain.
“You smell so good in the rain.”
Her expression was wary as she asked, “In a good way, or in a bad way?”
I sighed. “Both, always both.”
The rain pelted the windshield like hail, sharp and loud, sounding more solid than a liquid. I turned onto the off-road track that would take us as deep into the forest as the Jeep could go. It would cut a few miles off the run.
Bella stared out the window seemingly lost in thought. I wondered whether my answer had upset her. But then I noticed how tightly she was bracing herself against the window frame, her other hand gripped around
the edge of her seat. I slowed down, taking the ruts and the rocks as smoothly as I could.
It seemed as though every method of travel besides her lethargic dinosaur of a truck was unpleasant to her. Maybe this bumpy ride would make her less loath to travel the most convenient way.
The track died in a small open space surrounded by close-packed fir trees—there was just enough room to turn a vehicle around in order to head back down the mountain. I shut off the engine, and suddenly it was nearly silent. We’d run through the storm; it was just misting now.
“Sorry, Bella,” I apologized. “We have to go on foot from here.” “You know what? I’ll just wait here.”
She sounded breathless again. I tried to read her face to see how serious she was. I couldn’t tell if she was really that frightened, or being stubborn.
“What happened to all your courage?” I demanded. “You were extraordinary this morning.”
The corners of her lips twisted up into a very small smile. “I haven’t forgotten the last time yet.”
I dashed around the car to her side, wondering about that smile. Was she teasing me a little?
I opened the door for her, but she didn’t move. The harness must still be an impediment. I worked quickly to free her.
“I’ll get those,” she protested. But it was already done before she could add, “You go on ahead.”
I considered her expression for a moment. She looked a little nervous, but not terrified. I didn’t want her to give up on traveling with me. For one thing, it was the simplest way of getting around. But more than that… before Bella, running had been my favorite thing. I wanted to share it with her.
But first I had to convince her to give it another try. Maybe I would attempt a more dynamic form of dazzling.
I thought through all our past interactions. In the early days, I’d often misinterpreted her reactions to me, but now I saw things through a new filter. I knew that if I looked into her eyes with a certain intensity, she would often lose her train of thought. And then when I kissed her, she forgot all kinds of things—common sense, self-preservation, and even life- sustaining activities like breathing.
“Hmmm…” I considered how to proceed. “It seems I’m going to have to tamper with your memory.”
I lifted her out of the Jeep and set her gently on her feet. She stared at me, a little nervous, a little excited.
She raised her eyebrows. “Tamper with my memory?” “Something like that.”
In the past, I’d had the strongest effect on her when I’d been searching most intensely to hear her secret thoughts. Amused by the futility, I tried again. I stared deeply into her clear, dark eyes. My own narrowed and I struggled fiercely through the silence. Of course there was nothing to hear.
She blinked four times fast, her nervous expression shifting to one that was more… stunned.
I felt I was on the right path.
Leaning closer, I placed my hands against the hardtop, one on either side of her head. She took a half step back, pressing herself against the door. Did she need more space? Her chin angled up, her face set at the perfect incline for me to kiss her. Probably not, then. I moved a few inches closer. Her eyes closed halfway, her lips parted.
“Now, what exactly are you worrying about?” I murmured.
She blinked fast again, and took a gasping breath—I wasn’t at all sure what I was supposed to be doing about her frequent breathing lapses. Did I need to remind her at intervals?
“Well…” She swallowed, then sucked in another ragged breath. “Um, hitting a tree. And dying. And then getting sick.”
I grinned at her order of events, then forced my face back into its former expression of intensity. Slowly I leaned down and pressed my lips into the small indentation between her collarbones. Her breath caught and her heart fluttered.
My lips moved against the skin of her throat. “Are you still worried now?”
It took her a moment to find her voice. “Yes?” She whispered the word, unsure. “About hitting trees… and getting sick?”
Slowly I tilted my face up, tracing the length of her throat with my nose and lips. I breathed my next question into the hollow just under the edge of her jaw. Her eyes slid all the way closed.
“And now?”
She was breathing in quick pants. “Trees?” she gasped. “Motion sickness?”
I brushed my lips up the side of her face, then softly kissed first one eyelid, then the next.
“Bella, you don’t really think I would hit a tree, do you?” My tone was gently chiding. After all, she was the one who thought I was good at everything. Perhaps if I made the question about her faith in me.
“No,” she breathed. “But I might.”
Slow and deliberate, I kissed my way across her cheek, pausing right at the edge of her mouth. “Would I let a tree hurt you?”
My upper lip touched her lower lip with the slightest pressure imaginable.
“No,” she sighed. It was a soft sound, almost a coo.
Now my lips moved lightly against hers as I whispered, “You see, there’s nothing to be afraid of, is there?”
“No,” she agreed with a shuddering sigh.
And then, though I’d only been intending to overwhelm her, I found myself wholly overcome.
It didn’t feel like my mind was in control. My body was as much in command as it was when I hunted—impulse and appetite overthrowing reason. Only now my desire was not for the old needs I’d had time to master. These were new passions, and I hadn’t yet learned how to govern them.
My mouth crushed too roughly against hers, my hands strained her face closer to my own. I wanted to feel her skin against every part of me. I wanted to hold her so close that we could never be separated.
This new fire—a fire without pain, that ravaged only my ability to think
—raged even hotter when her arms wrapped tightly around my neck and her body bowed into mine. Her heat and her pulse were fused against my own form from chest to thigh. I was drowning in sensation.
Her lips opened against mine, with mine, and it seemed every part of me could think of nothing but deepening that kiss.
Ironically, it was my basest instinct that saved her.
Her warm breath surged into my mouth, and my involuntary reflexes reacted—venom flowed, muscles clenched. It was enough of a shock to bring me back to myself.
I reeled away from her, feeling her hands slide down my neck and chest. Horror flooded my mind.
How close had I just come to harming her? To killing her?
I could see it as clearly as I could see her startled face in front of me now—a world without her. I’d considered this fate so many times that I didn’t have to imagine now the vastness of that empty world, the agony of it. I knew it wasn’t a world I could endure.
Or… a world in which she was miserable. If she, in total innocence, had touched her tongue to one of the razor-sharp edges of my teeth…
“Damn it, Bella!” I gasped, barely hearing the words that twisted out of me. “You’ll be the death of me, I swear you will.” I shuddered, sickened by myself.
Killing her would surely kill me, too. Her life was my only life—my fragile, finite life.
She braced her hands against her knees, trying to catch her breath. “You’re indestructible,” she mumbled.
She was close to right about my physical durability, so different from her own; she didn’t know how soundly my existence was knotted to hers. And she didn’t know how close she’d just been to vanishing.
“I might have believed that before I met you,” I groaned and took a deep breath. It didn’t feel safe to be alone with her. “Now let’s get out of here before I do something really stupid.”
I reached for her and she seemed to understand the need to hurry. She didn’t object as I lifted her onto my back. She wrapped her arms and legs fast around me, and I had to struggle for a second again to keep my mind in control of my body.
“Don’t forget to close your eyes,” I warned her. Her face pressed tight against my shoulder.
The run wasn’t long, but it was long enough for me to get myself in order. It seemed I couldn’t trust anything when it came to my instincts; just because I was confident about my self-control in one way didn’t mean I could take any other control for granted. I would have to take a step back and draw a careful line to protect her. I would have to limit physical contact to some form that didn’t affect her ability to breathe or mine to think. It was pathetic that the second concern should be more important than the first.
She never moved during the short journey. I heard her breath coming
evenly, and her heartbeat seemed stable, if slightly elevated. She held still even when I came to a stop.
I reached behind me to stroke her hair. “It’s over, Bella.”
She loosened her arms first, taking a deep breath, and then relaxed her taut legs. Suddenly, the warmth of her body vanished.
“Oh!” she huffed.
I spun around to find her splayed awkwardly on the ground like a child’s doll tossed to the floor. The shock in her eyes was rapidly turning to indignation, as if she had no idea how she’d gotten there, but knew someone was surely to blame.
I’m not sure why it was so funny. Perhaps I was just overwrought. Maybe it was the powerful relief I was beginning to feel now that the close call was once again behind me. Or I just needed the release.
For whatever reason, I started laughing and couldn’t immediately stop.
Bella rolled her eyes at my reaction, sighed, and stood up. She tried to wipe the mud off her jacket with such a long-suffering expression that I could only laugh harder.
She glared at me once, then marched forward.
I choked back my humor and darted after to catch her lightly by the waist, trying to force my voice to sound composed as I asked, “Where are you going, Bella?”
She wouldn’t look at me. “To watch a baseball game,” she answered. “You don’t seem to be interested in playing anymore, but I’m sure the others will have fun without you.”
“You’re going the wrong way,” I informed her.
She inhaled once through her nose, tilted her chin to an even more stubborn angle, then spun 180 degrees and stomped off in the opposite direction. I caught her again. This was not the correct way, either.
“Don’t be mad,” I pleaded. “I couldn’t help myself. You should have seen your face.” Another laugh escaped; I tried to swallow the one that followed.
She finally looked up, meeting my gaze with anger sparking in her eyes. “Oh, you’re the only one who’s allowed to get mad?”
I remembered how little she liked double standards. “I wasn’t mad at you,” I assured her.
Her voice nearly dripped acid as she quoted me. “‘Bella, you’ll be the
death of me.’”
My humor turned black but didn’t totally disappear. I’d spoken more truth in that moment of wild emotion than I’d meant to. “That was simply a statement of fact.”
She twisted in my hold, trying to pull away. I put one hand against her cheek so she couldn’t hide her face from me.
Before I could say more, she insisted, “You were mad!” “Yes,” I agreed.
“But you just said—”
“That I wasn’t mad at you.” Nothing seemed funny now. She’d taken the blame on herself. “Can’t you see that, Bella? Don’t you understand?”
She frowned, confused and frustrated. “See what?”
“I’m never angry with you,” I explained. “How could I be? Brave, trusting… warm as you are.” Forgiving, kind, sympathetic, sincere, good… essential, crucial, life-giving… I could have gone on for a while, but she interrupted.
“Then why…?” she whispered.
I assumed her unfinished thought was something along the lines of Why did you snap at me so cruelly?
I took her face between both my hands, trying to communicate with my eyes as much as with my words, trying to put more force into each one.
“I infuriate myself,” I told her. “The way I can’t seem to keep from putting you in danger. My very existence puts you at risk. Sometimes… I truly hate myself. I should be stronger, I should be able to—”
I was surprised when her fingers touched my lips, blocking the rest of what I wanted to say.
“Don’t,” she murmured.
The confusion had disappeared from her face, leaving only kindness behind.
I lifted her hand from my mouth and pressed it to my cheek.
“I love you,” I told her. “It’s a poor excuse for what I’m doing, but it’s still true.”
She stared at me with such warmth, such… adoration. There seemed to be only one answer to such a look.
It would have to be a restrained answer. There could be no more impulsiveness.
“Now, please try to behave yourself,” I murmured, speaking more to myself than to her.
Gently, I pressed my lips against hers for one brief second.
She was very still, holding even her breath. I straightened up quickly, waiting for her to breathe again.
She sighed.
“You promised Chief Swan that you would have me home early, remember? We’d better get going.”
Helping me again. I wished my weakness didn’t force her to have to be so strong.
“Yes, ma’am.”
I freed her, taking one of her hands to lead her forward on the correct course. We only had ten yards to go before we passed the edge of the wood and entered the huge, open field my family simply called the clearing. The trees had been scraped away by a glacier long ago, and now just a thin layer of soil covered the bedrock beneath. Wild grass and bracken were the only things that flourished here now. It was a convenient play place for us.
Carlisle was setting up the diamond while Alice and Jasper practiced some new tricks she wanted to perfect: If Jasper decided in advance to run a certain direction, Alice could see this decision and throw to his new position before he’d telegraphed the move. It didn’t give them much of an advantage, but as closely matched as we all were, anything had the potential to make them more competitive.
Esme was waiting for Bella and me, with Emmett and Rosalie sitting close beside her. When we stepped into view, I saw Rosalie yank her hand out of Esme’s before she turned her back to us and walked away.
Well, she hadn’t promised nice. I knew it was a large enough concession for her to simply be here.
Utterly ridiculous. Esme didn’t agree with me. She’d been trying to cajole Rose out of her mood all afternoon without much effect, and she was exasperated.
It’ll be all right once we start, Emmett was thinking. Like me, he was just relieved Rose had come.
Esme and Emmett moved forward to welcome us. I gave Emmett a cautioning look, and he grinned at me. Don’t worry, I promised.
He eyed Bella with interest. It was one thing to be around humans while
visiting in their world, but something else entirely to have one visit ours. It was exciting. And a human who was, to his mind, more or less one of us now. He had only positive experiences with adding to the family. He was eager to include Bella as well.
I might have enjoyed his enthusiasm, but underneath his fascination with something new, I could see that he didn’t doubt Alice’s version of things.
I would be patient. They would all come to understand over time.
“Was that you we heard, Edward?” Esme asked. She made her voice louder than was necessary so Bella wouldn’t be left out.
“It sounded like a bear choking,” Emmett added. Bella smiled shyly. “That was him.”
Emmett grinned at her, pleased with her gameness to play along. “Bella was being unintentionally funny,” I explained.
Alice was rocketing toward us. I supposed it shouldn’t worry me that she was being so herself. She could see better than I could guess what would frighten Bella and what would not.
She skipped to a stop just an arm’s length away.
“It’s time,” Alice intoned solemnly, working the oracle vibe for Bella’s benefit. Thunder shattered the stillness right on cue. I shook my head.
“Eerie, isn’t it?” Emmett murmured to Bella, winking when she looked surprised that he was addressing her. She grinned at him, only a little hesitant.
He glanced at me. I like her.
“Let’s go!” Alice urged, reaching for Emmett’s hand. She knew exactly how long we could get away with playing unrestrained, and she didn’t want to waste any time. Emmett was no less eager to get started. Together, they raced toward Carlisle.
Can I have a moment with her? I’d like her to be comfortable with me, Esme entreated. I could see how much it meant to her, for Bella to see her as a person and a friend, not something to be feared. I nodded, then turned to Bella.
“Are you ready for some ball?” I grinned, easily inferring from Charlie’s comments that this evening was an anomaly for her. Well, hopefully we could keep her entertained.
“Go team?”
I laughed at her put-on enthusiasm, and then gave Esme her desired
space, chasing after Emmett and Alice.
I listened to Esme chatting with Bella as I joined the others. She didn’t have any information she wanted to impart or extract—she just wanted to interact with Bella—but I was riveted regardless. I divided my attention between that conversation and the one around me.
“Edward and I already picked teams,” Rosalie said. “Jasper and Emmett are with me.”
Alice was unsurprised. Emmett liked the odds. Jasper was less enthused; he preferred to work with Alice rather than against her. Carlisle was, like me, pleased at Rosalie’s engagement with the game.
Esme was complaining about our poor sportsmanship, obviously preparing Bella for the worst.
Carlisle pulled out a quarter. “Call it, Rose.” “She chose the teams,” I objected.
Carlisle looked at me and then pointedly at Alice, who had already seen that the coin would fall heads up.
“Rose,” he said again, and flipped the quarter into the air. “Heads.”
I sighed, and she grinned. Carlisle caught the coin neatly and flipped it onto his forearm.
“Heads,” he confirmed. “We’ll bat,” Rosalie said.
Carlisle nodded, and he, Alice, and I moved to take our fielding positions.
Esme was telling Bella about her first son now, and I was surprised at the intimate direction their conversation had taken. This was Esme’s rawest wound, but she was gentle and composed as she spoke. I wondered why she’d decided to share that.
Or perhaps Esme hadn’t decided at all. There was something about the way Bella listened.… Hadn’t I been eager to spill every dark secret I’d ever had? Hadn’t young Jacob Black betrayed an ancient treaty simply to amuse her? She must have this effect on everyone.
I moved into deep left field. I could still hear Bella’s voice clearly. “You don’t mind, then? That I’m… all wrong for him?” Bella asked. Poor child, Esme thought. This must be so overwhelming for her.
“No,” she told Bella, and I could hear that this was true. All Esme
wanted was my happiness. “You’re what he wants. It will work out, somehow.”
But, like Emmett, she could only see one way. I was glad I was far enough out that Bella couldn’t read my face clearly.
Alice waited until Esme was in the umpire’s position, Bella at her side, before she stepped onto the makeshift mound.
“All right, batter up,” Esme called.
Alice hurled out the first pitch. Emmett, too eager, took a massive swing that whistled so closely by the ball that the air pressure disrupted the straight line of the pitch. Jasper snagged the ball out of the air, then whipped it back to Alice.
“Was that a strike?” I heard Bella whisper to Esme. “If they don’t hit it, it’s a strike,” Esme responded.
Alice fired another pitch across the plate. Emmett had recalibrated. I was running before I heard the detonation as the bat and the ball collided.
Alice had already seen where the ball was headed, and that I was fast enough. It took a bit of the fun out of the game—honestly, Rose should have known better than to let Alice and me play on the same team—but I was intending to win tonight.
I raced back with the ball, hearing Esme call Emmett out right as I made it back to the edge of the clearing.
“Emmett hits the hardest, but Edward runs the fastest,” Esme was explaining to Bella.
I grinned at them, happy to see that Bella looked entertained. Her eyes were wide, but so was her smile.
Emmett took Jasper’s place behind home plate while Jasper took the bat, though it was Rosalie’s turn to catch. That was irritating; surely standing within a ten-foot radius of Bella was not that enormous a burden. I was starting to wish I hadn’t pushed to get her here.
Jasper wasn’t planning to see how fast I could run; he knew he couldn’t hit as far as Emmett. Instead, he caught Alice’s pitch off the end of the bat, driving the ball close enough to Carlisle that it was obvious he would need to be the one to chase it. Carlisle dashed right to scoop it up, then raced Jasper to first base. It was very close, but Jasper’s left foot connected with the base just before Carlisle connected with him.
“Safe,” Esme declared.
Bella was leaning up on her tiptoes, her hands covering her ears with the v visible between her brows, but she relaxed as soon as Carlisle and Jasper were on their feet again. She glanced toward me, and her smile came back.
I could feel the palpable tension as Rosalie took her turn at bat. Though Bella was out of her line of sight while she faced Alice on the mound, Rosalie’s shoulders seemed to curl inward, away from Bella. Her stance was stiff and her expression rigid with distaste.
I glared at her critically, and she curled her lip at me.
You wanted me here.
Rose was distracted enough that Alice’s first pitch sailed past her into Emmett’s hand. She frowned more deeply and tried to concentrate.
Alice launched the ball toward Rose again; this time Rose got a piece of it, whacking it past third. I ran in, but Alice already had it. Instead of throwing Rose out, for which there was time, Alice whirled and bolted toward home. Jasper was already halfway between third and home. He put his shoulder down as though he was planning to knock Alice off the plate the way he had Carlisle, but Alice didn’t wait for him to charge her. She executed a clever half-spin, half-slide maneuver, gliding past him and then tagging him from behind. Esme called him out, but Rosalie had made use of the distraction to get to second.
I could guess their next play before Emmett traded spots with Jasper again. Emmett would hit a long sacrifice fly to get Rosalie home. Alice had seen the same, but it looked like they would succeed. I moved back to the tree line, but if I ran to the spot Alice saw the ball heading to before Emmett actually hit it, Esme would penalize us for cheating. I coiled my muscles, ready to race—not the ball, but Alice’s vision.
Emmett hit this one high rather than long, knowing gravity was slower than I was. It worked, and I ground my teeth as Rosalie touched home plate. Bella, however, was delighted. She clapped her hands with a huge smile, impressed by the play. Rosalie didn’t acknowledge Bella’s spontaneous applause—she wouldn’t even look at her, instead rolling her eyes at me— but I was surprised to hear that she was ever so slightly… softened. I supposed it wasn’t that remarkable; I knew how much Rosalie craved
admiration.
Maybe I should tell her some of the complimentary things Bella had said about her beauty… but she might not believe me. If she would look at Bella
now, she would see Bella’s obvious marveling. That would probably soothe Rose even more, but she refused to look.
Still, it made me more hopeful. A little time and a lot of compliments… we could win Rose over together.
Emmett, too, was enjoying Bella’s excited amazement. He already liked her more than I’d expected, and he found this game more fun with an animated audience. And just as Rose loved admiration, Emmett loved fun.
Carlisle, Alice, and I ran in while Rosalie’s team took the field. Bella greeted me with huge eyes and a wide smile.
“What do you think?” I asked.
She laughed. “One thing’s for sure, I’ll never be able to sit through dull old Major League Baseball again.”
“And it sounds like you did so much of that before.” Then she pursed her lips. “I am a little disappointed.” She hadn’t looked disappointed. “Why?”
“Well, it would be nice if I could find just one thing you didn’t do better than everyone else on the planet.”
Ugh.
Rosalie wasn’t the only one who groaned at that, but she was loudest.
How long will the goo goo eyes take? Rosalie demanded. The storm won’t last forever.
“I’m up,” I said to Bella. I retrieved the bat from where Emmett had tossed it, and walked to the plate.
Carlisle crouched behind me. Alice showed me the direction of Jasper’s pitch.
I bunted.
“Coward,” Emmett growled as he chased down the ball, which was bouncing unpredictably. Rose was waiting for me on second, but I made it in plenty of time. She scowled at me and I grinned back.
Carlisle stepped up to the plate and leaned into his stance. I could hear his intention, and Alice’s prediction that he would be successful. I set myself, every muscle ready to surge. Jasper threw a fast curveball—Carlisle angled his bat perfectly.
I wished I could warn Bella to cover her ears again.
The sound it made when Carlisle connected was not something that could be convincingly explained away as thunder. It was lucky that humans
were so unsuspicious, that they didn’t want to believe in anything unnatural.
I was running full out, listening through the echoing boom to the sound of Rosalie racing through the forest. If she moved fast enough—but no, Alice could see the ball landing on the ground.
I hit home plate before the ball was halfway to its eventual destination. Carlisle was just rounding first. Bella blinked fast when I came to a stop a few feet from her, as if she hadn’t been fully able to follow my run.
“Jasper!” Rosalie called from somewhere still deep in the forest. Carlisle flew past third. The sound of the ball zooming in our direction whistled through the trees. Jasper darted to the plate, but Carlisle slid under him just before the ball smacked into Jasper’s palm.
Esme called, “Safe.”
“Beautiful,” Alice congratulated us, holding her hand up for a high five.
We both obliged her.
We could all hear Rosalie’s teeth grinding.
I went to stand beside Bella, lacing my fingers loosely through hers. She smiled up at me, her cheeks and nose pink from the cold, but her eyes glowing with excitement.
Alice was thinking of a hundred different ways to tip the ball as she picked up the bat, but she couldn’t see a way past Jasper and Emmett. Emmett was hovering close to third, knowing that Alice didn’t have the muscle to outstrip Rosalie’s fielding.
Jasper pitched a fastball, and Alice drove it toward right field. He raced the ball to first, grabbed it, and tagged the base before Alice could get there.
“Out.”
I squeezed Bella’s fingers once, then went to take my turn again.
This time I tried to get one past Rosalie, but Jasper tossed out a slow pitch, robbing me of the momentum I needed. I grounded the ball, but only made it to first before Rosalie blocked me.
Carlisle smashed the ball straight down against the rocky ground, hoping it would pop up high enough that I would have a chance to get around the bases, but Jasper leaped up and got it back in play too quickly. Emmett had me cornered on third.
Alice ran through the possibilities as she approached the plate, but the outlook wasn’t encouraging. She did her best, though, driving the ball as hard as she could down the right foul line. Jasper didn’t take the bait, not
even trying to tag her out before he fired the ball back to Emmett, who stood like a brick wall in front of home plate. I didn’t have a lot of choices. There was no way to make it past him, but if our entire team got stranded on the bases—according to our family rules—that meant an automatic end to the inning.
I charged Emmett, who looked thrilled by my choice, but before I could even try to dance around him to the plate, Rosalie was already complaining. “Esme—he’s trying to force an out.” This was also against the family
rules.
Of course, Emmett tagged me, there just wasn’t any way around him. “Cheater,” Rose hissed.
Esme gave me a reproving look. “Rose is right. Take the field.” I shrugged, and headed to the outfield.
Rose’s team did better this time. Both she and Jasper got around off one of Emmett’s big hits, though I was pretty sure she’d cheated. The path of the ball shifted in flight, almost as if something smaller had knocked it off course, but I was too deep in the trees to see where that projectile had come from. I had time to throw Emmett out, at least. Rosalie’s next long fly was too low; Alice was able to jump for it. Jasper got on base again, but I stopped Emmett’s line drive before it reached the forest, and Carlisle and I caught Jasper between us on his way to third.
As the game progressed, I watched for signs that Bella was getting bored. But every time I looked, she seemed completely engrossed. This was something new to her, at least. I knew we didn’t look much like humans playing baseball. I monitored her expression, waiting for the novelty to wear off. We had hours left in the storm, and Emmett and Jasper wouldn’t want to miss any of it. If Bella were weary, or too cold, though, I would excuse myself. I winced internally, thinking of how well that would go over with Rosalie. Ah, well, she would survive.
Manners wore thin as the score fluctuated, and I wondered what Bella would think of us, Esme’s warning notwithstanding. But when Rosalie shouted that I was a “pathetic, cheating tool” (because I’d known exactly which tree to scale in order to catch her fly ball) and later a “leprous swine” (tagging her out at third), Bella just laughed along with Esme. Rosalie wasn’t the only one hurling insults as we played, but this time Carlisle wasn’t the only person who wasn’t. I was on my best behavior, though I
could see this irritated Rosalie more than if I’d matched her trash talking.
So it was a win-win.
We were in the eleventh inning—our innings never lasted more than a few minutes; we wouldn’t stop at any particular number, we’d just end when the storm did—and Carlisle was batting first. Alice could see another big hit coming, and I wished that one of us were on base. Sure enough, Emmett—taking his turn on the mound—couldn’t resist trying to throw a fast strike past Carlisle, and thus gave him all the power he needed to crush the ball so hard it sailed far past where Rosalie had any hope of stopping it. The sound reverberated off the mountains, more like an explosion than thunder.
While that sound was still echoing around us, another sound caught my attention.
“Oh!” The sound huffed out of Alice as though someone had punched her.
The images were pouring through her head in a torrent. An avalanche of new futures swirled unintelligibly, seemingly disconnected from each other. Some were blinding bright and some so dark there was nothing to see. A thousand different backgrounds, most of them unfamiliar.
Nothing was left of the future she’d been perfectly confident in before this moment. Whatever had changed was big enough that it left no part of our destiny untouched. Alice and I both felt a shiver of panic.
She focused. Working quickly, she traced the new visions back to their beginnings. The churning images funneled into a narrow moment very close to the present, almost immediate.
Three strangers’ faces. Three vampires she saw running toward us.
I darted to Bella, considering racing away with her immediately. But there were near futures of us alone, outnumbered.…
“Alice?” Esme asked.
Jasper rocketed to Alice’s side almost faster than I’d moved to Bella’s. “I didn’t see,” Alice whispered. “I couldn’t tell.”
She was comparing visions now. The older ones where, tomorrow night, the three strangers would approach the house. It was a future I was prepared for; Bella and I were far away in that version.
Something had changed their plans. She moved forward, just a few minutes, into this new timeline. A friendly meeting was a possibility,
introductions, a request. Alice realized what had happened. But I was fixated on the fact that Bella was there in this vision, quietly in the background.
We were all in a tight circle at this point, Alice at our center.
Carlisle leaned close, putting one hand on her arm. “What is it, Alice?”
Alice shook her head quickly, as though trying to force the pictures in her head to line up in a way that made sense. “They were traveling much quicker than I thought. I can see I had the perspective wrong before.”
“What changed?” Jasper had been with Alice for so long that he understood better than anyone besides me how her talent worked.
“They heard us playing,” Alice told us; the strangers would reveal this information in the friendly version of events. “And it changed their path.”
Everyone stared at Bella.
“How soon?” Carlisle demanded, turning toward me.
It was not an easy distance for me to hear across. It helped that on a late, stormy night like this, the mountains around us were mostly empty of humans. It helped more that there were no other vampires in the area. Vampire minds were slightly more resonant; I could hear them from a greater distance, pinpoint them more easily. So I was able to locate them— aided by the landmarks I’d seen in Alice’s vision—but I could only catch the most dominant thoughts.
“Less than five minutes,” I told him. “They’re running—they want to play.”
His eyes flashed to Bella again. You have to get her away from here.
“Can you make it?”
Alice focused on one strand of possibility for me. Trying to escape, Bella on my back.
Bella didn’t slow me down very much—it wasn’t the burden of her weight but the need to move carefully so as not to hurt her that impeded me
—but I wouldn’t be quite fast enough. This strand tied into the other future I’d seen: us surrounded, outnumbered…
The strangers were not so enthusiastic about baseball as to be careless. Alice saw that they would come at the clearing from three different angles, surveilling, before regrouping to present a united front. If any of them heard me running, they would come to investigate.
I shook my head. “No, not carrying—”
Carlisle’s thoughts roiled in alarm.
“Besides,” I hissed, “the last thing we need is for them to catch the scent and start hunting.”
“How many?” Emmett demanded. “Three,” Alice growled.
Emmett snorted. The sound was so at odds with the tension that I could only stare at him blankly.
“Three?” he scoffed. “Let them come.”
Carlisle was considering options, but I could already see there was only one. Emmett was right: There were enough of us that the strangers would have to be suicidal to start a fight.
“Let’s just continue the game,” Carlisle agreed, though I didn’t need to read minds to hear how unhappy he was with this decision. “Alice said they were simply curious.”
Alice started combing through all the possibilities for an encounter here in the clearing, the images more solid now that a decision had been made. It looked like the vast majority were peaceable, though they all began with tension. There were a few outliers on the spectrum of outcomes where something ignited a standoff, but those were less clear. Alice couldn’t see what would trigger the conflict—some decision yet to be made. She didn’t see any stable version that would result in physical combat here.
But there was so much she couldn’t interpret yet. I saw the blinding sunlight again, and neither of us could understand where she was seeing.
I knew Carlisle’s decision was the only decision, but I felt sick to my core. How could I have allowed this to happen?
“Edward,” Esme whispered. Are they thirsty? Are they hunting now?
Thirst wasn’t in their thoughts, and in Alice’s vision, every second more clear, their eyes were a satiated red.
I shook my head at her.
That’s something, at least. She was nearly as horrified as I was. Her thoughts were, like mine, snarled up in the idea of Bella’s being in danger. Though Esme was no fighter, I could hear how fierce this made her feel. She would defend Bella as if she were her own child.
“You catch, Esme,” I directed. “I’ll call it now.”
Esme took my place quickly, but her focus was locked on Bella’s position.
No one was eager to stray deep into the field. They hovered close, ears all trained toward the forest. Alice, like Esme, had no intention of moving away from Bella. Her protective thoughts were not exactly like Esme’s— not as maternal—but I could see that she, too, would shield Bella at any cost.
Despite the sick feeling consuming me, I could feel a rush of gratitude for their commitment.
“Take your hair down,” I murmured to Bella.
It wasn’t much of a disguise, but the most obviously human thing— besides her scent and her heartbeat—was her skin. The more of it we could hide…
She immediately pulled the band from her ponytail and shook her hair out, letting it fall around her face. It was clear she understood the need to hide.
“The others are coming now,” she stated. Her voice was quiet, but even. “Yes,” I said. “Stay very still, keep quiet, and don’t move from my side,
please.”
I placed a few locks of her hair in a better position to camouflage her face.
“That won’t help,” Alice murmured. “I could smell her across the field.” “I know,” I snapped.
“What did Esme ask you?” Bella whispered.
I thought about lying. She must already be terrified. But I told her the truth. “Whether they were thirsty.”
Her heart thudded out of rhythm, then picked up faster than before.
I was vaguely aware of the others pretending to continue the game, but my mind was so focused on what was coming that I saw nothing of their façade.
Alice watched her visions solidify. I saw how they would split up, which routes they would take, and where they would reassemble before confronting us. I was relieved to see that none of them would cross Bella’s earlier trail before entering the clearing. Perhaps that was why Alice’s vision of the cordial if cautious meeting held firm. Of course, there were hundreds of possibilities once they were here. I saw myself defending Bella many times, the others always standing with me—well, Rosalie taking Emmett’s flank; it looked like she had little interest in protecting anyone
besides him. There were a few fragile future threads where it came to a fight, but they were as insubstantial as steam. I couldn’t get a good view of the outcome.
I could hear their minds approaching, still distant, but clearer. It was obvious that none of them had any hostility toward us, though the one trailing the pack—the redheaded female Alice had seen—was skittish with anxiety. She was prepared to run for it if she felt any hint that we were aggressive. The two males were just excited about the possibility of some recreation. They seemed to be comfortable with approaching a group of strangers, and I assumed they were nomads familiar with how things worked here in the North.
They were splitting up now, doing their due diligence before exposing themselves.
If Bella hadn’t been here, if she’d rejected the idea of spending her evening watching us play… well, I probably would have been with her. And Carlisle would have called me to let me know the strangers had arrived early. I would have been anxious, of course. But I would have known I’d done nothing wrong.
Because I should have foreseen this possibility. The noise of playing vampires was a very specific sound. If I’d taken the time to think through all the conceivable contingencies, if I’d not accepted Alice’s vision of the strangers coming tomorrow as gospel—set my watch to it, so to speak—if I’d been circumspect rather than enthusiastic…
I tried to imagine how I would have felt if this encounter had taken place six months ago, before I’d ever seen Bella’s face. I thought I would have been… unperturbed. Once I’d seen these visitors’ minds, I would have been confident that there was nothing to worry about. Probably, I would even have been excited about the novelty of newcomers and the variation they would add to the pattern of our usual game.
Now I could feel nothing but dread, panic… and guilt.
“I’m sorry, Bella,” I breathed just loud enough for her to hear. The strangers were too close for me to risk speaking at a greater volume. “It was stupid, irresponsible, to expose you like this. I’m so sorry.”
She just stared at me, whites showing all around her irises. I wondered if she kept silent because of my warning, or if she just had nothing to say to me.
The strangers reunited at the southwest corner of the clearing. Their movements were audible now. I shifted my position so that my body would hide hers and began tapping my foot quietly to the rhythm of her heartbeat, hoping to disguise it as long as I could by creating a plausible source for the sound.
Carlisle turned to face the whisper of their approaching feet, and the others followed his lead. We would not give away any of our advantages, but would pretend to have no more than our extensive vampire senses to guide us.
Frozen, motionless as if we were hewn from the rock around us, we waited.
