Disclaimer: not mine! Pooh.
Due to threat of Emmett doing the hokey-pokey on my pillow (I'm afraid he'd break my bed!) I'm giving you two chapters in two days! So...if you're just now getting back to the story, the last chapter was only posted last night! Go, read! And if you're itching for some good B/J reads, head on over to the C2 Only the Best Jasper/Bella. The name speaks volumes.
"Thank you, Jasper," she said, leaning forward to wrap her arms around me. I hesitated for a moment, but returned the gesture. She had no idea what she was asking. No idea what this would do to her-to me. But when she said I owed her, I knew I had no choice. She must have been desperate for my help to bring that up. But maybe I could keep my distance-if I just went with her and then stayed behind, I wouldn't be tempted. Maybe she would change her mind.
I was so busy thinking of ways to keep my sanity that I didn't notice that we were still in an embrace. And Bella was feeling…warm. It's the best way to describe the way her emotions wrapped around me, unaware of what she was doing, but feeling a little bit turned on. An unconscious feeling on her part. And then I remembered that we were barely dressed. Her body pressed up against me in an innocently erotic way, igniting a part of me that I hadn't felt in a long time. The part of me that was a man. With Alice, she was always one step ahead of me. Always the one leading the way. I never felt like she truly needed me, because she always knew what was going to happen. But Bella? She needed me to teach her. To be with her. To let her learn on her own. I felt the primal urge to protect and defend this small woman holding on to me with a ferocity I locked away after the war.
I also wanted to throw her onto the ground and claim every part of her. Against my better judgment, I let my hands move from her back to her waist, where they rested on her hip bones. I drank in the scent of her-she was cinnamon and flowers. She hadn't moved, but she wasn't unaware of what I was doing. She was holding her breath and confusion swirled around her like a fog. That snapped me out of it. I pulled away, shaking my head.
"Bella, I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me. Well, I do, but that's no excuse…" surprisingly, she grinned.
"It's because I'm still in my underwear, isn't it?" she laughed. I was glad she could be light hearted about this, and I wasn't going to tell her all of the other things I was feeling.
"Yes. I'm a man, Bella, and I would be ignorant to not feel something towards you in this state. You're rather catching, if I say so myself." She rolled her eyes, but stood up and reached for her clothes.
"What dictionary did you get that phrase from, the first edition?" she chuckled. I scowled at her, but stayed where I was. Standing up would embarrass me further. I would wait until she left the room.
"There's nothing wrong with using proper English, Bella. Why don't you go wait for me on the porch and when I'm dressed, we'll…go." The mood changed; she knew exactly what I was talking about. Nodding, she left the room. I dressed slowly, trying to quell the thoughts I had earlier, but they wouldn't go away. It's as if I unlocked a part of me and it had become the dominant part. I could also no longer deny my attraction to Bella-whether it was just because she was a beautiful woman, or because I was developing feelings for her, I don't know. But I had better just drown those thoughts away, because nothing would ever come of them. When I stepped outside, she was sitting on the steps staring out into the darkness. "Are you ready?" I asked.
She stood up and turned to face me. "As I'll ever be. How will…this…work?" It was too late to find a hiker, which would have been the optimal situation, so I had to think of an alternative.
"It appears that we'll be doing this 'old school' if you will. We'll have to go into town and find someone alone. There won't be any hikers out this late-it's our only choice. You stay by my side until I tell you what to do. Can you handle that?" She was unsure.
"I don't know. I've never been that close to humans before. Will you…hold on to me?" I wanted to tell her that she was by far stronger than I was right now and that if she wanted to break my grasp she easily could, but I wouldn't.
"Yes. Take my hand, and let's go. When we get there, you're going to feel all reason fly out the window. You're going to want to take the first person we come across. But you can't do that, do you understand? You have to wait until I tell you to go. And when I tell you to stop, you must. Am I making myself clear, sugar?" She took a deep breath.
"Yes. Okay. Let's do this." We walked into town slowly, staying behind buildings and in alleys. It was a small town to begin with, and that worked in our favor. I could make this look like a bear attack in no time, and no one would be the wiser. I felt Bella tense as we got closer to the populace, but she didn't try to pull away. I noticed that she wasn't breathing. We waited in an alley that was directly to the left of the bar-not the most appealing clientele, but options were limited.
A few people came out in pairs, and that wouldn't do. Bella tensed and lunged after a couple of them, but I was able to reign her in. I knew deep down she was trying to follow the rules that I had set for her, so maybe that was what was keeping her here. Finally, a lone man came staggering out of the bar. He turned the corner and started walking down the alley we were waiting in. Bella was practically vibrating with the force of her thirst. I turned her to where she was facing me.
"Take him. Don't let him see you-go from behind. And do it quickly-we can't risk getting caught." I let her go.
She was a blur as she flew up behind the man, placing one hand around his waist and the other around his head. She yanked it to the side-by this time, the man had realized that something was wrong and had begun pleading with her. His terror could have brought me to my knees.
"P-please…Take what you want! Just don't hurt me. Don't hurt ME!" He was struggling. Bella was hesitating. I looked at her, trying to urge her to do it without letting on my presence. I felt the mans feelings turn from terror to resignation, as his body went limp. When Bella didn't let go, he gave up. He was smart enough to know that this wasn't a normal mugging, and he was too drunk to think clearly. But he didn't stop pleading. "Please…if you kill me, just…just tell my wife I love her." So quickly I almost didn't see it, Bella dropped the man to the ground and shot past me like a bullet. She ran towards the hills where we were staying-she was going home. The man was still sobbing on the ground. He couldn't be allowed to go home, not like that. That ran the risk of exposure. I walked towards him and knelt down beside him. He didn't even look up. I gave him a sharp blow to the head, just hard enough to knock him out. I hoped with the combination of his drunkenness and the confusion of the darkness that he would think he fell and hit his head. I left him there to wake up on his own.
When I got back to the house, Bella was curled on the floor in the far corner of the room. She barely glanced in my direction as I came and sat beside her.
"Do you understand what I was trying to tell you before? How much that would have changed you? You don't just take the life of one person, Bella, you take the lives of many." She sniffed and nodded her head.
"Oh, God, Jasper! What did I almost do? How could I have…I don't like feeling this way! I feel…crazy. I can't decide what I want to do one minute, and then I'm all bloodthirsty the next! I don't know how I managed to run away from him-that's the sad thing! I wanted it. But then he said the thing about his wife, and I just…lost it. I thought about if that was Phil, or Charlie, and that he's probably got kids somewhere, an I just couldn't do it. But I could have! I'm not making any sense!" I grabbed her shoulders and forced her to look at me.
"Bella, you are a newborn vampire. That is exactly how we all felt in the beginning. And if you hadn't hunted before you decided this, I don't think you would have been able to stop. The desire is always going to be there, you just have to learn to control it. You have to remember that feeling. But it's not always going to be enough. Sometimes…you slip." Here I was, giving her a lesson in control! Her eyes were burning with the intensity of her feelings.
"It's like I have all this energy and I don't have anywhere to put it! It's thirst and thoughts and having too much room in my head. And I don't get tired, and my body never feels worn out. I just feel supercharged all the time!" I should have seen it coming. I've dealt with enough newborns to know that sometimes they lose control. And it doesn't always have to deal with blood. And Bella was out of control.
She flew at me, knocking me to the ground. Before I could recover, she pressed her lips to mine, desperately trying to release her abundance of energy. She took the first natural outlet she could think of. Her hands clawed at my hair as she placed her legs on each side of mine, effectively pinning me to the ground. She was turned on, and upset, and angry all at once-she didn't know what else to do. I should have stopped her. I should have snapped her out of this, brought her back down to earth. But I didn't.
Instead, I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her closer to me. I yanked at her shirt until I had ripped it to shreds; all the while our lips never parted. The force of her hands hurt as she clawed her way down my body, pulling at every inch of clothing she could find. She writhed against me, desperate for contact, and I arched into her-there was nothing else I could have done. And it was glorious. She covered me-the smell of her, the feel of her, all of it. I was drunk on her.
"Please…" she moaned as her lips bombarded mine. "Please make it stop…." She was desperate to find an outlet. There was enough of me left to think this through. I could let this continue-I could take her over the edge and make her feel better. Make her feel normal again, if only for a moment. But I didn't know if I should. She didn't know how to cope with these emotions, and this…this wasn't the best way. Would it be taking advantage of her? Because I wanted this so much, but all she wanted was a release. I knew there were other ways to help her. I just didn't know if I gave a damn.
Sorry! I had to do it. But I bet you feel better about Bella and Jasper not taking out that guy at the bar, huh? And I don't want you all to think I've given her super self control, because I didn't. I just let her mind win one of the battles. Hmmm...what's our Jasper going to do?