A/N - I need to thank an army of people for this chapter which went through a re-write. My kick-ass betas Mac214 and Jkane180 for not being afraid to tell me when major changes are needed. My wonderful pre-readers who are probably more helpful than they even realize - Katinki and DoUTrustMe. Finally my guest beta readers on this chappie are MeraNaamJokerFF (read her fics!) and fellow Canadian Snowyhedwig.
I was a dead weight in the monster's arms. Surely he couldn't keep carrying me through these tangled woods? My head lolled over the crook of his arm, and I watched his feet move faster than flight, never quite touching the earth. The ground beneath us seemed to cringe away from his touch.
Time stood still amidst the chaos of motion.
The scenery melted into a blur of green and brown mush, like abstract art comprised of messy brush strokes.
There were no mile markers in the wilderness. Death was surely my destined path. What else could he have planned for me? My instincts were backwards. Certainly my fight or flight instinct should have taken hold of me at this point? Why wasn't I freaking out more? I tried to take stock of my body, but everything was pins and needles - completely frozen and numb. Still, my stupid mouth wouldn't shut up, spilling forth every guileless plea in my head.
"Home," I begged fruitlessly.
"It's not possible." He sighed almost apologetically.
"Why not?" I didn't understand.
The only reply he offered was, "You've seen too much. You know what I'm capable of."
I shook my head. "No, I didn't. I don't know what I saw!"
So kill me, then. Why did he keep me with him if I'd seen too much? Those words didn't bode well for me. People who'd seen too much were inexorable liabilities - something to dispose of. My only frame of reference were Mafia films . . . but this creature seemed nothing like Corleone.
Would he tear me apart and eat my flesh? Could it be quick? Maybe it would be over before I realized it. Maybe I was already dead. Fear made my breath scream through my lungs in quick bursts, my heart buzzing out a ruthless beat like a hummingbird rattling against my ribcage.
"Will it hurt?" I whispered my worst fear - pain.
"I'm afraid I don't understand your question. Will what hurt?"
"Never mind." I closed my eyes, feeling myself float into oblivion.
Falling in and out of consciousness, I only noticed we'd stopped because the sound of crunching branches ceased, giving way to a new, rushing noise - water.
"I need to wash you."
I opened my eyes and saw a river.
"Why?"
"The blood," he explained. "I need to get as much off you as possible before I take you back to my home." He set me down on a cold riverbank; the rock from the sand-bed felt like glass under me.
"Why?"
"You know why . . . you saw what I did to that-" he paused as if searching for the right noun, "-that man." He spoke the word like a curse. "The blood can cause a frenzy for my kind."
"So . . . you are a monster?"
"Not exactly. We try to quell some of our more natural impulses." He unbuttoned his plain, white shirt, shrugging it off his shoulders. His skin glistened delicately, and I looked away; dim light made its way through the dense cloud cover. I tried not to look too closely at his chest, tried very hard not to notice how strangely pretty he was. "What are you thinking? The fear in your eyes is jarring."
"I'm terrified; I can't pretend not to be," I whispered, burying my face into my shaking hands so I wouldn't offend him with my fear. "You're scaring me." Tears dropped out of my eyes, feeling hot in contrast with my cold skin.
"I apologize." He dipped his shirt into the water as it bubbled over the river rock. Slowly, mechanically, methodically, he dragged the wet cotton over my face and arms; my teeth gnashed together violently in response. I thought I'd been numb, but the icy water was unbearable, freezing my body to the point it felt like burning.
"Please!" My voice was a scream, and he stopped wiping me down. "Too cold . . . please stop."
"You can have a proper shower at my home. For now, let me do what I need to for your own safety."
He didn't care about my safety. "Please just kill me. Please don't make me freeze to death."
He dropped the makeshift cloth and attempted to warm my arms by creating friction with his hands. "I'll stop cleaning you. I was only concerned about the blood, you understand. It's so easy to forget how fragile you are to the elements."
"Blood?"
"It's not yours." His lips moved upward into an unnatural smile before snapping back into a line like an elastic band. "The boy's, mostly."
"Mike." My body started to shake harder, and I tried to wrap my arms around my chest but couldn't feel them anymore. Blood left my extremities to heat my core. My skin felt like ice; droplets of water from the river froze on my arms in crystals from exposure to the frigid air. Tears burned in my eyes, and my throat tightened. "His blood-" Hot bile rose in my chest, and I gagged as vomit burst into my esophagus.
"I'm sorry." The monster held my hair out of the way while I regurgitated the watery contents of my empty stomach.
Now I was covered in blood, shit, and vomit.
"My name's Edward." Um, what? Why was he telling me his name?
He extended his hand as if he wanted me to shake it. I stared at the appendage, unsure of the right thing to do. That was the hand that had punched a hole through the gunman's chest. His cordial smile hid the teeth that had torn into his flesh. The tongue he used to speak politely had licked blood from his skin.
"B-bella," I stammered. Please don't make me touch you. Please just leave me here to die. He dropped his hand when it became apparent I had no intention of touching him.
"Bella," he repeated, inching his fingers toward my face while I cringed and recoiled away from him.
"No!" Please don't touch me. "Please . . . just please!"
He pushed my soiled hair away from my eyes with surprising gentleness. "I promise not to hurt you."
"I don't understand." I wanted to ask why he wouldn't let me go, then, but was too terrified of what his answer would be.
"You must listen to me. I know you don't understand what's happening at the moment, but I need you to trust me." He paused, waiting for me to reply. I was distracted by a terrible wailing sound, and it wasn't until I gasped in a frightened breath that I realized the sound was coming from me.
"Please stop crying, Bella."
"Okay," I warbled.
"Perhaps it's time for that shower."
xxx
We came upon a house in the middle of the wilderness, and I thought about Hansel and Gretel. Instead of candy, the house was made of wood and stone - a narrow, Victorian structure of three stories.
A blonde woman threw the door open and came at us like a hurricane. I found myself on my ass suddenly, pressed up against a shrub.
"Stay back, Rosalie. She has blood on her."
"Edward," the woman hissed. "Is it not enough for you to hunt in town? You brought back a human snack to tempt us with? She smells like feces. Disgusting!"
"I'm sorry," I muttered. This would be humiliating if the circumstances weren't so horrific.
"I'm taking her inside." Edward hunched his back like a cat defending its territory before dropping into a defensive crouch, making a terrible sound that was part-hiss, part-growl.
"You will not. The smell of it will be all over the place."
"I'm going to wash her."
"You're disgusting. Kill it. Do it quickly before Carlisle returns."
"I will not." Edward grabbed her wrist and wrenched her arm behind her back at an unnatural angle.
"Fine," she seethed. "I'll do it. She's seen too much."
"Why do you both keep saying that?" I keened from my place on the ground. "I swear I saw nothing. Please just let me go!" Wails wracked my chest, and I gasped for air to speak, to beg, to plead with. I kept blubbering, "I don't understand anything! No one would believe me anyway. Just—just leave me on the side of the highway somewhere. I'll pretend I have no clue how I got there."
"Make it stop talking. Kill it." Rosalie's red lips stretched into a sneer, revealing a mouthful of teeth, the pointed edges glistening with saliva. "Do it, or I will."
"You will not," he replied calmly. "You're going to go find Carlisle. I need him."
"No. He's miles away by now. What do you need him for, anyway?"
"Medicine."
"Medicine," she vociferated, lowering suddenly to her haunches; the dress she wore muddied along the hem. "No medicine can fix her, Edward. Look at her - sitting in her own waste. Look at the vacant expression in her eyes. Her soul's already gone; now all you need to do is dispose of the body."
"I'll ask you once again, Rosalie. Please leave - and before you reply, please keep in mind that I'll have trouble acting like a gentleman if you choose to disregard me."
A hissing growl rose first from Edward and then Rosalie, a seeming concert of sibilant challenge between the two, until Rosalie finally lowered her head in assent. "Fine, but don't let it near my things. Everything it touches will have to be burned."
"It would do you well to learn a little courtesy, sister."
Rosalie's eyes narrowed angrily, and she spat the word, "sister," back to him. She lunged away from us, moving like a cat on all fours before making a lithe jump onto her feet again. "Put her in the cellar."
"No." Edward bent down smoothly to pick me up, and I wrapped my arms around his neck without thinking.
"No? Where will it stay, Edward . . . and sleep?"
"She's my responsibility. She'll stay with me." His eyes darted down to meet mine, and I'm pretty sure I was looking back at him with maniacal terror. What did he mean by with him?
"You're taking a frightened rabbit into your bed? I knew you were depraved, but that's just wrong for so many reasons."
"Stop dehumanizing her. She's a woman."
"She's a snack!"
I'm food to them. Oh, Jesus, God, and fuck! I knew it. So if Edward planned on keeping me . . . what did that mean? Was he sadistic? He didn't seem like it, but why didn't he just kill me already and make it easier on everyone?
"She's not something to eat. Please stop glaring at her; she's already terrified of us."
"Please," I entreated the scary blonde woman.
"Don't speak to me. You're food," Rosalie snapped.
"No," I replied. Food wasn't kept alive and sadistically forced to wait for its death. "I'm livestock."
xxxx
Edward carried me up two flights of stairs still cradling me like a child. Everything on the walls - the light fixtures, pictures, and trinkets - was covered with an inch of dust. The carpet runner on the strip-wood flooring beneath us was faded, unraveling.
"Everything is rather dingy, I'm afraid, Bella. We weren't expecting company."
"Company," I repeated, feeling half-insane and mostly-dead. I kept my whimpers as soft as I could manage, and he opened a door at the top of the last staircase. Dingy was the wrong word. There were holes in the walls and mold stains around the floorboards. What kind of disgusting creatures could live in ruins like this and not even notice?
"Anything we don't use tends to be destroyed from neglect before we even realize it."
Was he reading my mind, or was the disgust on my face so plain? "Of course."
"I'll clean up now- now that you're here. I know it's not healthy for a human to live in these conditions."
The house and all its contents were relics. I suspected Edward and his family were relics too. "Why bother?"
"With what?" he asked, and I squeezed my eyes shut as I felt his fingers unbutton my shirt. "I need to take the soiled clothing off," he explained as my shoulders became tense. His fingers came dangerously close to grazing my breasts when he reached the buttons on my chest.
"Please," I begged hoarsely, my throat tightening with panic. "Don't rape me . . . I'm a virgin." As my blouse fell over my shoulders, I started to scream and thrash.
"Stop, please, Bella. Don't struggle with me. I don't want you to hurt yourself. There's no need for you to cry - I told you, I promised I wouldn't hurt you."
I couldn't pull the right amount of air into my lungs.
"What was your question? And please don't cry, Bella. I promise not to hurt you."
"Um . . ." I swallowed my tears and covered my naked breasts with my hands while Edward knelt to unbutton my jeans. "So, you're not going to rape me?"
He shook his head.
"Are you going to kill me . . . Rosalie said I was food."
"You're not food. You're a guest in my home." His cold fingers slipped carefully into my jeans at my hips. "I'm lowering your pants now."
"No!" I screamed, thrashing in his hands and effectively bruising the skin beneath his fingers from my struggling. "You said you wouldn't hurt me!" I looked him in the eyes - his strange orange-hued eyes.
"You misunderstand my intentions. I'm not using your body for my own pleasure. I'm helping you bathe."
"Fuck you!"
"Um, no, thank you." He looked puzzled.
"That wasn't an offer," I wailed. "I don't want you to touch me."
"Bella . . . I know I've given you no reason to trust me. Please understand me when I make two promises to you: the first is that I'll never hurt you." He cupped my chin in his hand, nudging my head back up so we could examine each other's eyes.
"Promise?" I whispered like a child.
"Of course."
"What's the second?"
"To never let you leave, so please stop begging."
I shivered and hiccuped. What choice did I have? My head kept bobbing, not because I agreed to his terms, but because I simply couldn't stop shaking. My entire body seemed to convulse with violent tremors. "Cold . . ."
Edward nodded. "It's possibly shock. We need to get you warm."
My clothes landed in a pile outside the door of what I assumed was his room. I didn't look around at much more than the floor as I allowed him to lead me into a bathroom. The white, tiled floor was surprisingly clean, unlike the rest of the house. He knelt over a claw-footed tub and fiddled with the taps.
"The water will take a minute to heat up," he explained, draping a towel around me. "Can you wash yourself?"
"Yes," I snapped but stood frozen, unable to move.
He nodded. "I'd better find you some clean clothes before Rosalie returns. Will you be alright on your own for a few minutes?"
I meant to say yes, to tell him to get the fuck out and leave me alone. I wanted to scream, to fight, and to run, but I heard strange sounds coming through the walls, and I nearly pissed myself again.
"What was that?"
"Just Carlisle," Edward explained as if I should be comforted by that answer.
"Son?" a deep voice called from outside the door.
"Don't leave," I whispered. "I'm too afraid."
"I won't," he said softly. "Carlisle? Did you bring the bag?"
"I did, son. Do you need any help in there?"
"No, thank you," Edward replied quickly. "Just leave it on the bed." He dipped a face cloth under the tap and placed it in my hand. "Wipe away as much as you can manage. I'll help you get the rest in the tub."
Without another word, he left the room, and I could hear him rummaging through a bag in the bedroom.
I kept the towel wrapped around my body, and tried to clean myself of as much vomit and feces as I could manage without falling over or passing out. The cloth became sullied too quickly, and I rinsed it in the sink until it wrung clean again.
Turning to face the tub, I bent down to wash the shit off my ankles, working my way up my legs to my knees. Something sharp suddenly jabbed me in the hip and I cried out in surprise, dropping the cloth.
"You'll feel better now," Edward said apologetically, clutching a hypodermic needle in his fist.
"What?" I gasped.
"Valium,' he explained. "It will calm you within moments."
No. I'd never feel calm again.
"Time for that bath, Bella." He pulled the towel away from my body, and lifted me into his arms. Without removing his pants, Edward stepped into the tub, lowering us both into the water while I clung to his neck. "You're okay," he whispered into my cheek and turned my body around so I was settled between his legs. I leaned back against him to steady myself.
"This doesn't mean . . . I'm not offering myself . . . don't rape me."
"Shhh. I promise never to hurt you, Bella. There's no need to beg for your virtue."
He soaked a clean cloth in the water and covered it with what smelled like lye. With gentle fingers, he dragged the warm fabric along my back, my arms, my chest, my legs, covering every part of me without really touching me in any kind of lecherous way.
My body stopped shaking, and a strange calm washed over me in waves, easing my mind like the bathwater warmed my cold flesh.
"I need to make another promise to you," he said thoughtfully after awhile.
"What's that?" I murmured drowsily. My eyes felt so heavy.
"I promise to always take care of you."
His hand on my nude hip, the way he touched me without taking from me, made me feel like maybe he really wasn't going to hurt me. Maybe he didn't want me to suffer after all.
"Edward," I said carefully. "Please, I only need one promise from you."
"What's that?" He, too, seemed lulled by this strange moment.
"Let me go home."
"Bella." His voice was suddenly cold, his arm dropping from my skin.
"Yes?"
"Don't ask me that again."
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