What now?
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"And they're together?" Alice squeaked, eyes wide, horrified.
Edward nodded, his form still, pose morose.
"You're sure?" She said, reaching for his shoulder. "Edward?"
"Jacob's thoughts are...loud," he said, settling on a word that wouldn't reveal more than he needed to.
Alice looked at him, watching his eyes. "This makes no sense," she said, moving away, pacing by the window.
"It makes perfect sense, Alice," Edward said, looking up, "I left."
"Then why did she go with me? She dropped everything—including him—to go save you. Why would she do that?"
"What other, logical explanation do you have, Alice, that would explain what I saw?"
"What did you see?"
He didn't reply right away, and Alice's imagination supplied her with a multitude of possibilities. "I don't think Bella would—I don't think she would be that way, with someone that she didn't...love," he finally offered.
"But you aren't sure." Alice pointed out.
"No, I don't suppose I am, Alice, but Jacob was pretty clear on his end, and Bella didn't dispute it," he said. Jacob's name came out like a curse.
"Bella can't read minds."
"I wasn't about to ask her, Alice," he gritted out, his voice rising.
"You aren't sure," she said again, this time more firmly.
"Why don't you just go ask her what she and Jacob have been up to then, Alice? Go, get all the gory details, and satisfy yourself, because I'm done."
The words hung in the air, not spent before he was gone. She heard the slap of his feet on the ground, and wondered, with an anxious clutch on her insides, when she would next see him.
He's probably going for a run, she told herself. He'll be back. And she let her mind follow the threads of his choices, and saw his return, settled, late tomorrow, just before sunset.
Perhaps, she thought, he would be open to talking then.
Maybe it would be good to speak with Bella. Poke at things tenderly, see what she could learn.
She hoped, against a hard wall of probability, that Edward was wrong.
