Happy Valentines day!
Things I know very little about: Playing Bridge or Whist.
Chapter 7
A coven of vampires huddled in the alley behind a dingy bar in an industrial section of Anchorage. If the patrons had been aware of who—or what—was just a few feet away from them, separated by a flimsy cement block wall, they would have fled screaming into the street.
As it was, they needn't have worried, as the vampires were too busy arguing amongst themselves to be any sort of threat to any nearby humans.
"Explain to me once again why we're here?" Alice said, looking around in disgust. "Because I am standing in vomit here, Jasper. Vomit and urine. I'm going to have to burn these boots, you realize. I don't understand why you didn't just kill it. Two to one. It shouldn't have been a problem."
"Alice!" Carlisle said sharply. "We don't just kill sentient beings out of hand. That's not who we are. They weren't being threatened."
"I think certain exceptions could be made to that rule, Carlisle. Not to mention that past threats should certainly be figured into the equation."
"Besides," Jasper said sourly, glaring at his brother, "Emmett didn't want me to. He feels he owes a debt—"
"I do owe him a debt," Emmett said firmly. "If it weren't for him, I'd be walking around with one arm right now. Don't tell me that if the situation were reversed, you wouldn't feel a certain amount of warm fuzzies for the dude that gave you your arm back. Not to mention the fact that we were told not to make a scene or draw attention to ourselves. I'm pretty sure dismembering a dude in the bar would count as 'making a scene'. After all, its not like he'd go down without a fight like a human would."
"Fine," Alice said, glaring at the figure in question, who stood further down the alley, pointedly ignoring their conversation. "So you left him alive. That doesn't mean you had to haul us all down here to meet him. Just...let him go on his way. Live and let live."
"It's not that easy, Alice." Jasper sighed. "He wants our help."
"Your help," Alice said firmly. "I did get that much from your little tale. He wants your help."
"Yes, my help. And I can't send him on his way. He'll just follow us home."
"We're in a car. He can't track us."
"He's a really good tracker, Alice. Driving off in the Tahoe isn't going to stop him. Trust me."
Alice huffed and fell silent.
"If you're so sure you can't get rid of him, why didn't you just bring him home with you?" Esme asked, joining the conversation—or argument—for the first time. "I have to agree with Alice. Was meeting in this vile alley really all that necessary?"
"Because...Carlisle said he wanted to use the town home as the place to meet with any vampires that come up this way looking for us. Do you really think having it smell like werewolf is something we want to do? I'm thinking that that is not the image we want to present to the vampire community at large. And half that vile scent you smell right now is coming from him."
"I thought they didn't smell so...pungent...in their human form," Carlisle said, looking at the figure in question with a burning curiosity in his eyes.
Jasper sighed. He knew that look, and the feeling that was now oozing out from Carlisle in an almost visible cloud. Curiosity. Mstislav was as good as set up in the guest room, which they didn't have one of.
"He just came off the change. His smell will improve over the next couple days."
"It better," Alice warned.
"He just came off his change?" Esme asked worriedly. "Here? In Anchorage? Oh, my...that can't be safe. We can't let him just run around loose here. He could start biting people! We can't introduce that into North America. However did he manage to control himself...? Or did he?" She looked downright horrified now. "I feel like we have a certain responsibility there, don't you, Carlisle?"
Yep, Jasper thought, the guest bedroom was definitely in Mstislav's future, complete with the fancy guest towels.
"Chains," Mstislav offered helpfully, joining the conversation. They all turned to look at him in surprise. Standing almost 50 feet away from them, it was a reminder that they were dealing with someone who was no more human than they were. "I have chains. It is a well-tested method used by my family for generations."
"Chains?" Esme squeaked, turning to look at Jasper. "They can be contained by chaining them up? I thought they were as strong as we are..."
"Apparently a nasty rumor. Unless they are enraged. Or young," Jasper said. "I can't imagine who would have spread that one. According to Mstislav, they can indeed be chained up. With enough chains, it appears to work fine, as long as nothing enrages them further during that time period."
"Oh, and being surrounded by a bunch of his mortal enemies isn't going to enrage him?" Alice asked sarcastically. "I'd love to say, with all the power of my visions backing the statement up, that this is a REALLY STUPID IDEA, Jasper. But I can't, now can I? Because I can't see anything with him around! It's by far and away the stupidest fucking idea you've ever had. I can sure as hell tell Emmett had a hand in it." She glared at both her brothers.
"There's no need to talk like that, Alice," Esme chided. "While I wish there was some other way to handle this...are you quite sure he can follow us?"
"Quite sure," Mstislav said.
"You said he was looking for you, Jasper," Carlisle said, "but you didn't say why."
"He says I owe him a debt," Jasper said, rolling his eyes.
"A debt? And how does he figure that?"
"Because his relatives helped me destroy the Volturi."
"As I recall, he used you in that endeavor."
"Revisionist history. Blame it on the Soviet influence in his life."
"But why? What does he want from you?"
Jasper tipped his head back and let out a huff. "He's in love."
"Excuse me?" Carlisle, Esme, and Alice said, all at the same time.
"He is apparently in love. It seems he encountered an American woman while visiting Moscow this past winter. It seems he has formed some sort of...werewolfy attachment to her, and he wants me to help him find her."
Now they were all staring at him.
"You can't deny a man in love," Emmett added. "I mean, come on, look at that face..."
They all turned to look at Mstislav again.
"Um, yeah, not really tugging on my heartstrings here, Emmett," Alice said, turning back to continue her glare.
"Did you explain to him that we are sort of in the middle of a...situation of our own?" Carlisle asked.
"I did. Believe me, I did. He says he's willing to wait."
"Did you explain to him how big the United States is? Does he really expect you to just be able to find this person?"
"Yeah, I explained that, too. It seems he has a bit of information for us to go on—not that I'm agreeing to help," Jasper hastened to add.
"I should think not," Esme said. "We can't just kidnap some poor unsuspecting woman and hand her over to a...a..."
"Don't say monster, please," Mstislav said. He'd appeared beside them. "We are all monsters here together, are we not? When you condemn me to that category, you condemn yourselves also. Just because we are not human does not mean that we are monsters."
"Too thick, dude," Emmett muttered.
Esme had quickly stepped behind Carlisle when Mstislav appeared in the group, and Jasper pulled Alice behind him and Emmett.
"All right," Carlisle sighed, "I suppose the long and short of it is we're stuck with him. For now. Esme is correct, we cannot let him run loose around here, especially as he'll just follow us home anyway. And certainly, if he is searching for his...mate?" he looked at Mstisalv, who nodded, "then he could cause even more trouble if we don't keep an eye on him, if the process is any similar to our own mating."
"Wonderful," Esme growled. "How are we supposed to get him home? I don't want him riding in the car...no offense," she hastened to add, glancing at Mstislav.
"None taken," he said.
"We thought maybe he could ride on the trailer, with the lumber and stuff," Emmett offered.
"Like that won't draw attention to us," Alice said.
"And it will be cold," Esme added.
"We can put him in a box. It'll be fine," Emmett said.
Mstislav was nodding. "I will be fine. Summer in Alaska is considerably warmer than winter in Siberia. I do not mind being in a packing crate for the trip."
"How appropriate," Esme murmured. "Well, we need to make sure to buy a cook stove of some sort tomorrow, and cooking...things. And some dishes. And food..." Her mind was clearly already off and running with new plans involving getting to cook for someone.
As if things weren't going to smell bad enough as it was, Jasper thought sourly, now they could add the smell of cooking food to the list of stenches in the cabin. He wondered how quickly he and Bella could finish one of the little cabins for themselves. Better yet, maybe Esme could be convinced to use one of the little cabins as a kitchen and keep it out of the main cabin completely.
"You realize, don't you, that Bella is going to kill him, right?" Alice asked, sounding almost cheerful. "Which will end the problem for us. And then, there's a good chance she's going to dismember Jasper and Emmett."
"You can see that?" Jasper asked.
"I don't have to see it. I know my sister."
~AM~AM~AM~AM~AM~
"Nice place you have here," Bella said, getting out of the truck and looking around the small clearing that surrounded the house.
Rose shrugged. "It's not much, but it's cozy. It has electricity, wi fi, running water—HOT running water—and easy access to the national forest. And the neighbors can't see us. And, no, you and Jasper cannot move in with us here. But you're more than welcome to come by and use the shower."
"I wasn't going to ask," Bella said stiffly.
"I know you weren't. I'm just saying. Emmett and I really need the break from your mate, if you know what I mean. All of this is stressing me out, and King Jackass isn't helping matters. We just need to...be apart. Hell, you're probably ready to have a little space, too. His attitude can't be easy on you, either."
"Jasper is just concerned for his mate," Peter said.
"Yeah, well, I can understand that. Bella is a danger magnet. But he needs to tone that shit down out here in the back of beyond."
"I'm not making it easy on him," Bella said quietly. "I'm just...all over the place. I need to learn to control myself more."
Rose snorted. "Bullshit. Your control is just fine. Okay, shower is through there. You three decide who's going first. The laundry room is that way. I'm gonna check the computers, see what we've missed while I was gone. Peter, the TV's through there. Holler if you need any help with the controller."
"You go first in the shower," Bella told Charlotte, watching Peter head towards the living room. "I want to talk to Rose."
"All right. Thank you," Charlotte said.
"Shampoo and soap are in the cupboard under the sink!" Rose hollered.
"What makes you think I have good control?" Bella asked Rose, curiously, following her into the second bedroom. Several computers were set up on tables around the room, all blinking lights and humming drives.
"Because. When Jasper left you hanging back there in the woods earlier today? If that had been Emmett, I would have ripped his dick off and finished the job myself," Rose said bluntly, busying herself at a keyboard, not looking up at Bella.
Laughter came from the bedroom and the bathroom. If Bella could have blushed, she would have.
"Did everybody know...?" she began.
"Bella, there are no secrets, remember? Personally, I don't know what the hell Alice was thinking, calling you in like that. She could have freakin' waited. It's not like 30 minutes would have mattered. I guess she just freaked out, seeing Jasper go all "Rambo" on Charles and Makenna if they came back to the house."
"I think she just wanted to interrupt us," Bella muttered.
Rose stopped and looked up. "Jealousy? You think Alice is jealous?"
Bella shrugged.
Rose considered this for a moment. The silence of listening vampires came from the other rooms. Bella, for her part, appreciated not having her worries dismissed or thrown back in her face, even if she was surprised at the source of support.
"I don't think so..." Rose said thoughtfully. "I really don't. Alice, though...she often acts first, off the cuff, when she gets her visions, especially when she's stressed. And to be honest, it's probably going to take some getting used to for her, not having Jasper right there at her beck and call."
"Well," Bella said, "she'd better get used to it."
"Do you want to help me here?" Rose said, indicating she was done with the conversation.
"Um...no thanks," Bella said, backing out of the door. "Computers were never my strong point."
"Suit yourself."
"Rose!" Peter hollered from the living room. "Do y'all get that Judge Judy show on here?"
"KXD!" she hollered back. "That's 147 on our dish. It comes on at three, but I think if you try over on 265 it's streaming all day!"
"Excellent!" Peter crowed.
"Yeah," Bella muttered under her breath. "Excellent."
Three hours later, the four of them were sitting around the table in the kitchen, playing cards.
"I love Canasta," Rose said. "I used to play it all the time with my mother and her friends."
"Me too!" Charlotte said. "And Bridge. Do you play Bridge?"
"I do. Esme does, too. She adores it. The boys aren't too keen on it, but Carlisle will play sometimes."
"Maybe Alice could join us?" Charlotte asked. "Then we'd have four girls!"
Rose shook her head. "You can't play games with Alice. She always wins."
"Well...Carlisle, then. I'm so glad you seem to be enjoying this, Bella."
"Anything's better than Judge Judy," Bella said, studying her cards and scowling.
"I can't believe you don't like Judge Judy," Peter said, pretending to look hurt.
"It's such an old person show to watch," Bella said. "I can't believe you like it!"
"But, Miss Bella, I am an old person," Peter said. "I'm the oldest person in this room, both in physical age and years spent on this planet. Older, and wiser. Wisdom that you, too, could absorb if you'd only sit down and watch Judge—"
"Shut up, Peter," all three women chorused.
"Children," he muttered.
~AM~AM~AM~AM~AM~
By the time the sun was well on its way to midday the next day, Bella had mastered the finer points of Canasta, Whist, Pinochle, and she had a good start on Bridge. She'd also grown seriously sick of playing cards, although she appeared to be alone in this among the vampires at the table.
"I've gotta hunt," she announced, after a particularly sad hand of Bridge.
"Didn't you and Jasper just hunt yesterday before...well, you know?" Rosalie asked, shuffling the cards and not looking up at her.
"That was just an excuse to get him to come with me," Bella said. "We didn't hunt."
"You shouldn't need an excuse," Rose said. "He's your mate. You tell him, 'Jasper, I need you. Now,' and then you take him out in the woods."
"I don't think that would work right now," Bella said. "I mean, normally I think he'd be all over it, but now..."
"He's in 'battle mode'," Charlotte injected, trying to be helpful. "They get that way, males do, when they think we're being threatened. Just wait, Rose. Your Emmett would be the same way if you were threatened. You should see Peter when he gets this way. He's impossible to deal with, really."
"I'm sitting right here," Peter mumbled.
"Nobody's threatened Bella around here," Rose pointed out.
"Well, he has a hard time coming down outta that mode, you know?" Peter said.
"Yeah, we've pretty much all noticed that. Well, Bella, I'll go with you...unless you want to, Peter and Charlotte?"
"No, thanks. We'll pass," Peter said. "Its about time for some Big Brother, I'm thinking. Join me, Charlotte?"
"Umm...sure," Charlotte said, not sounding sure at all.
A few minutes later Bella and Rosalie were several miles south of the cabin. "There are some bogs up ahead where we've been finding a lot of moose," Rose said quietly.
"You didn't have to come babysit me," Bella said. "I'm perfectly capable of feeding myself and finding my way home, despite whatever Jasper might have told you."
Rose snorted. "You're preaching to the choir, Bella. This isn't about you. Carlisle issued a 'Only Hunt in Pairs' order years ago, and he hasn't lifted it. I guess you didn't get the memo."
"I guess not."
"Well, since we all normally hunt with our mates, he probably just didn't get around to telling you yet."
"Yeah...I guess. Rose, why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden?"
Rose stopped, and Bella did too, turning to look at her.
"Bella, I don't dislike you. You are my sister. But...I'm a bitch. Always have been, and I guess I always will be, since we're blessed to be so freakin' 'unchanging' in this endless life of ours. And situations like this just brings out the worst in me. And you were an easy target. So...just tell me to fuck off from now on."
"Rose?"
"Yeah?"
"Fuck off."
Rose laughed and took off through the brush, Bella close on her heels. Hunting with another vampire that wasn't Jasper was...different. She wasn't sure she liked it at all. It took self control on her part, in a way she wasn't use to, to not snarl at Rose when they came upon a large bull moose and Rose pulled it down before Bella had a chance to attack.
It took even more control to approach when Rose beckoned her over. "There's plenty for both of us here, if you're not horribly thirsty," Rose said, raising her head from the neck.
Bella nodded but was still hesitant to approach. Rose rolled the huge animal over and offered Bella the femoral artery. "If it will make you feel better to be at the opposite end..." she began.
Bella wrinkled her nose. "It stinks down there."
Rose rolled her eyes. "Then get up here on the neck with me. Christ, Bella, I'm not going to bite."
That did it. Bella took it as the challenge that it was, and in an instant she was crouched on the other side of the moose's neck, maintaining eye contact with Rosalie and helping her drain the huge bull. When they were done, Rose stood up and brushed her jeans off. "We don't have to bury it out here," she said. "We just leave them for the scavengers, unless we're really close to humans."
"Rose?" Bella asked, standing up and brushing herself off.
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry I bit you."
Rose stopped and looked at Bella, holding her eye. "It has been pointed out to me by several family members that I brought it on myself. And I'd have to agree with that assessment, as much as it pains me to admit it, but...apology accepted. I can't promise I won't piss you off again. Like I said, I'm a bitch. But, again, a simple 'fuck off' would be really nice from now on. Not only am I a bitch, I am vain."
"I can do that," Bella said, nodding. And she realized, to her surprise, that she probably could. It was progress in her effort to reintegrate into the coven. And what an odd quarter to make progress in. "When do you think they'll get back?"
"Not until tomorrow, at least. They'll call if it's going to be longer."
"I don't think I can take any more card playing. I really don't."
"Really?" Rose said. She actually sounded disappointed. "Well...okay. Maybe it's time to introduce Peter and Charlotte to electronic video games, because I can't take that crap he watches on television."
Bella laughed. "Me either. Okay, how about a little Super Mario Brothers when we get back?"
As it turned out, Rose didn't think any of them were ready for the Wii controllers, or the X-box, or the PlayStation. Replacement controllers were a little harder to come by here. Running to the corner Walmart was not an option, and Emmett would not be happy if his babies were broken. Bella had never played video games after her change, and Peter and Charlotte were completely foreign to the concept. Rose approached the whole thing very scientifically, hauling out an aged Nintendo console. After an hour of duck hunt, Super Mario Brothers, Tetris, and Zelda—during which they'd managed to only break three controllers and one pistol between them—she moved them up to the Nintendo 64.
Another 24 hours went by, and all four vampires were now thoroughly engrossed in the video game world.
"There, now," Rosalie said as they watched Peter steer a souped up Prius around a virtual track somewhere in Europe, "maybe we've seen the last of Judge Judy."
"We can only hope," Charlotte murmured.
"Hey, I heard that," Peter said, not taking his eyes from the screen.
Suddenly Bella's head swung in the direction of the road. "There they go," she whispered.
Rose's head turned, too. "Yes..." she hissed, sounding pleased.
"I wonder why they didn't come here first?" Bella asked, jumping up and running to grab the clean laundry that sat in baskets in the kitchen.
"I don't know. Peter, turn that shit off. I've gotta...dammit, I need to check everything one last time before we leave. Give me just two minutes," Rose said, running into the computer room.
She reappeared almost exactly two minutes later. "All right, let's go, let's go!" She herded them all out to the truck. Starting it up, she quickly pealed out of the driveway, the tires squealing as they pulled onto the road that led to the highway.
"Shit," she said. "I've gotta get gas. Dammit, I should have stopped on the way down here. What the fuck was I thinking?" She sped into Glennallen, speeding through town and pulling into the gas station. She hopped out and slammed the door, almost yanking the gas line out of the pump.
"She gets a little wound up, doesn't she?" Peter asked, watching Rose through the truck's back window.
"It's difficult to be separated from your mate," Charlotte said quietly.
Peter turned to her and leaned over to kiss her softly. "That's why I'm not ever gonna let you get too far away, babe."
Bella watched them and tried to push down the jealousy that suddenly appeared. If it was so easy for Peter to refuse to be separated from Charlotte, why did it seem so easy for Jasper to leave for days at a time?
She didn't have time to dwell on the thought, though, because Rose was back in the cab and they were speeding off again.
They were going so fast that Bella thought they might actually catch up with the rest of the coven on the highway, but it didn't happen. By the time they arrived at the cabin, the Tahoe and trailer were parked in the driveway and nobody was in sight.
"They sure did buy a lot of stuff," Bella said, looking at the flatbed trailer that was loaded down with lumber and a variety of crates and boxes. "Where is everybody?"
"I don't know," Rose said, hopping out of the truck. She immediately started gagging. "What the hell is that smell?"
Bella got out and took a deep breath. "Oh, no..." she whimpered.
"What?" Peter asked, following Charlotte out of the back seat. He scented the air and immediately shoved Charlotte back into the truck. A low growl started in his chest. Bella instinctively stepped closer to him, and he pulled her behind him, too, shoving her in after Charlotte.
"What? What is it?" Rose asked, coming around the truck to stand next to Peter but not going any closer to the cabin. Emmet and Jasper appeared on the front porch.
"Emmett?" Rose shrieked. "What the hell have you done now?"
"Yeah, brother...what have you done?" Peter asked, staring hard at Jasper.