Alice has visions of Maria coming for Jasper.
She'd come with a sticky, sticky Summer.
They were reading on the porch out back that Esme had let him build. The climate around them was still, calm and peaceful. Contentment insulated them like a blanket from what little wind floated on the air. It wasn't an absence of feeling, but more a foundation, a sense of stability. And like she always did when struck by her gift she just…checked out.
Her eyes unseeing stared at the trees. His eyes stopped moving across the newspaper. Lord how he hated this. It was the only time when he couldn't get a solid read on her. Emotions would pop up like embers, or dying flares. Undeniable but too brief to understand. He always had to wait until she came back to him.
And come back she did, with fear, apprehension and anger.
"Honey?"
"She's coming for you."
The wind, feeble as it was, breathed between them. He knew who she meant. He didn't even have to ask.
"When?"
"I think - soon. The tarmac on the drive is bubbling."
He snuffed. "Of course it is. That's the devil walkin' on it."
Her anger pricked a little stronger, but that dainty face was all concern and her hand crept into his. "She wants you. She's very, very resolved. I - she thinks she needs you."
"She probably does."
"Her temper always got her in trouble, you said."
He nodded. "It does. It did."
"You hate her."
"Oh yes. But so do you."
Her little jaw jutted out. "It's going to take a lot Jasper, to dissuade her."
"Ain't no dissuadin' about it. We're in the North. She's nobody here."
"You're her mission."
"I was before, darlin'. It's no surprise to me she's findin' a way of ropin' me in again."
She let herself lean in to him, into his side, just a little bit. Jasper pressed right back.
"You haven't asked me."
Finally, she breathed a laugh. "Of course not. Besides, you'll get enough of that from Rosalie."
He groaned into her hair. "We'll be given the full protective sibling show I should think. I can hear her shriekin' at me now - if you so much as look at her instead of Alice..."
Alice's laugh tinkled in the air. " - Alice he needs us to be calm, so don't be getting insecure on me. You're a Cullen."
"She is wonderful," he said through his smile.
"She loves you very much. Us both, actually, but you especially."
"You know I didn't believe you at first, but I was wrong. We have a family here."
She touched his face again and he let himself kiss her fingertips. "And she's going to try and take you away from us." From me, he could hear.
She had stood, and moved in between his legs, and he raised his neck to look to her face and breathed up at her - "There ain't a damn chance in hell."
She wrapped a blonde curl around a finger. She grinned. "Foolish little girl."