Author's note: some of you are too young to remember a very popular ad campaign for the Yellow Pages—Bella, however, is not. I haven't been around quite as long as my Bella, but when I was a teen, "LYFDTW" was an oft-quoted euphemism among my girlfriends.

I see my readers from the UK and Oz and Finland and Ireland—such beautiful places; please review and say hello/cheers/g'day/hei/Dia dhuit—I would be thrilled to hear from you! (Well, all of my readers, actually!)

Music ideas: Angelo Badalamenti's soundtrack for Twin Peaks; also his work with chanteuse Julee Cruise.

Chapter 9

I could smell him as I crossed his street: soap, mint, the warm yeasty scent of his skin, and all male. After he touched his lips to my hand, I thought I'd collapse if I couldn't touch him back. He looked a bit flustered and his shirt was inside out, so I reached up, using that as an excuse to brush my fingertips along his collar. I absolutely hated that Tanya was right: the more I touched him, the more I wanted to. He was wearing knee-length shorts made from sweatshirt material, and it moved along his thighs, revealing then hiding his muscles. It was maddening. I hadn't seen so much of his skin before. His arms and legs were dusted with fine hairs the color of Italian sunlight, his calves were strong and his forearms were just sinful. When he pushed his long fingers through that glorious mane of hair, his scent swept over me and I was certain I was going to eat him right on his porch.

Instead, I kissed him.

Well, Tanya had said I needed to learn my body's responses—I was nothing if not a good student.

Glad to have the excuse to move, I launched off the porch—too fast! Slow down!—and taunted Edward to keep up. He could try. I was going to show that boy what running was all about.

Edward was a superb runner, and I'm sure he'd give any partners but me a run for their money. He moved out with long, even strides, perfectly balanced. He wasted no energy bobbing up and down—all his motion was efficient, his powerful legs propelling him forward. His arms hung freely from his relaxed shoulders, his elbows moving in exact opposition to his knees, his hands loosely fisted. His body torqued with the same muscular grace of the cats I hunted and drank down like syrup, like sap. I dropped back numerous times to watch the muscles in his ass clench and release; I could almost feel those muscles moving under my hands.

By the time we'd circled around the campus and stopped in front of the place where we'd talked yesterday, Edward was winded. His delectable sweat was rolling down his neck and his arms were slick with it. I wanted to lick him. I threw a few boxer's jabs to dissipate the impulse. I could hardly wait to run with him some more. I couldn't remember—and I have perfect recall—when I had felt this elated. Well, possibly certain hunts.

My desire to hunt Edward was transforming into just plain desire. When he'd called me this morning, I wanted to scream in triumph. I had replayed for hours the feel of his tongue on my lips. His taste! There were no words, only a constant dampness between my legs. It wasn't remotely an issue to take Tanya's suggestion to touch myself. Before the phone buzzed, I'd just finished the third round of "Operation Let Your Fingers Do the Walking."

While Edward indulged his need to obtain me some human food, I checked my messages: I'd promised Charles I'd spend the whole weekend with him. Even though school had just started, he missed me, and this new development in my life had him both worried and excited. There was nothing on my phone from Charles, but a positively irritating text from Tanya: Tell him you're a virgin. I texted back furiously: Are you insane? Her reply was virtually instant: Trust me on this. It will solve boatloads of problems.

Plus it's true.

I shoved my phone into the cuff of my sock, letting my body go still so my mind could fully absorb what she'd suggested; how exactly does one reveal to a human man that you are that most elusive of creatures: a twenty year old virgin. Far easier to admit I'm a monster. Just you wait, Henry Higgins. That time may come.

By all that is holy, what am I thinking? Just as I'd decided to quit this perilous path I was on, leave school, leave Seattle even, Edward and his mouth-venoming smell returned. My mind may have been determined to call the whole thing off, but my body rose to the occasion like it was about to take the world record in lust.

I almost sloshed my tea, pulling it to my nose so fast. The berry aroma was becoming my signal to calm down.

Well, my lust reasoned unreasonably, if you're going to run away, at least use this opportunity to gain a little practice.

At precisely that moment, Edward leaned toward me and my dead heart whimpered. He could not have surprised me more when he reached out and gently removed my hair clip. My hair slid across my shoulder blades and I was so aware of my skin, I almost sighed. Had Edward somehow sensed my reaction? He made a very human gesture of nervousness, whipping off his glasses and polishing the lenses on his shirttail. His long lashes glinted in the faint daylight, shadowing his fabulous eyes.

Here goes nothing, I thought, inhaling deeply. I asked him to leave his glasses off. His eyes were simply too beautiful to cover up, and I told him as much. I watched myriad emotions flash across his eyes as the birds called surprise, delight, and—what was that last one? Desire?—winged across those dark green depths.

He called me an angel. I had long been a horrifying angel of death, but when Edward called me that, he meant something divine. Such a simple thing really: a casual use of a term for something no human had ever seen and few believed in, but it knocked me off that mountain where I'd long piled up peaks of loneliness, anger, self-loathing, and fear, preventing all those harsh emotions from running free.

When Edward called me an angel, I flew off that black mountain into a place of lightness and open air, and when I landed, softly, on my feet, I was an angel. His angel. I knew I could never hurt him. It would be my job to guard him, guide him, and yes, even love him. There was no job I wanted more.

When Edward told me he wanted to play one of his compositions for me, my entire long existence crystallized into that one shining point. Everything up to that moment had been about running away. Justlikethat everything was about running toward. Toward companionship. Toward eternity. Toward Edward.

So I told him I was a virgin.

I might have predicted any number of responses: mirth, dismay, ridicule, disbelief. He had none of those reactions. Instead, he told me quietly, almost shyly, that he was sorry I'd had to tell him in a public place ("Oh Bella," he'd said wistfully, "I wish we were alone right now in a beautiful garden surrounded by flowers and moonlight"—which was irritatingly sappy and incredibly sweet), that he felt privileged to be entrusted with such a significant piece of information, that I must think highly of him to reveal something so personal—it was all so old-fashioned and endearing that I wished I could cry.

And then, having played the V-card, I told him I had to leave.

I asked Edward to come with me to my truck. As we walked, I said I'd promised I'd spend the weekend with my father, but I told Edward I'd be thinking about him a lot; I asked him if I could call him, and if I could see him again before class next week. He'd agreed eagerly.

Moving side by side, I stole quick glances at him. He really was quite gorgeous. From my travels so long ago in Italy, I had studied marble statues carved to represent all that was perfect in the human male. But to my eyes, Edward was better, simply because he was less perfect: his thick hair was ruffled, some parts dark with his sweat with dry pieces tufted up, copper in the clouded light. His skin was pale, with a subtle lavender cast where his blood pulsed close to the surface. His upper lip was straighter and more sculpted than his full, almost pouting bottom lip. His chin and jaw were strong. Nothing about him was boney, but everything was defined, masculine but not muscle-bound.

With my sharp sight, I could see the salt drying on his skin. I preferred the taste of sweet things—likely a side effect of our venom being sweet—but I wanted to sweep my tongue along his neck, feeling the roughness of his stubble. I could almost recall the taste of bread with butter, and I thought he'd taste the same. Warm. Tangy. Salted. Yummy.

We stopped next to my truck; Edward raised an eyebrow in question, and I pulled a chord holding my key around my neck, shaking it while I motioned to my truck. The look on his face as he took it in was priceless. Even men who weren't typical "guys" loved my truck; they couldn't keep their hands off it, and the few who'd dared speak to me were transparent in their desire to get inside. None of them knew my truck was my sanctuary. I sat in it or on it for hours, thinking, writing in my journals, coming down from the high of hunting, reading, listening to music. I rarely even let Charles get in it, and I think he drove it once. As sensitive as my family had to be to the plight of the planet, one of my purest pleasures was driving. I could do it for hours on end. I reveled in the feeling of all that power in my control; if I'd wanted to, I probably could have picked up the truck—although leverage and balance would be tricky—but it was still a big, strong, responsive brute of a thing, and I loved it.

This is your truck? Edward had breathed. I nodded, full of pride. Fantastic, he'd said, but I saw he was looking at me.