Chapter 28
I felt Jasper relax into our embrace. It must have so hard for him to tell me all of the horrific things that he had done in his past. No matter what scenarios I might have thought of, they would have never come close to what Jasper had told me. The fact that he was here with me, the caring and sensitive person that I had come to love, was a miracle. He could have easily turned into a complete savage, to continue on that road until he lost all his humanity and was beyond a point of redemption.
I was ashamed that out of everything that he had told me, I hated hearing about the relationship that he had with Maria more than anything else. I figured he had probably been with more than just Alice, but it bothered me to have it confirmed. I wondered whether Maria still existed. I certainly hoped not, all I needed was some jealous ex-vampire girlfriend on my tail. Again, I shook my head at myself. No Bella, doesn't matter that he killed hundreds, possibly thousands of people, it only matters that he had a girlfriend.
"So, if you are feeling up to it, I was hoping that now I could ask you a few questions. I don't want you to feel that you have to answer if it makes you uncomfortable, but there are some things I'd like to know." Jasper still had his arms wrapped around me but I felt them loosen a bit as he shifted himself back so we were face to face.
"What do you want to know?" I asked, hoping that it wasn't, but knowing that it was going to be about Jacob.
"I have questions about Jacob."
Saw that one coming.
"I know he is a werewolf and I want to know how you discovered that. When did he first turn or has he been a werewolf the entire time that you have known him? Are there more of them?" Jasper started rapid firing the questions at me and I held my hand up to his mouth to stop him.
"Okay, slow down. I'll tell you, but I need you to promise me something." I paused to look him straight in the eye. His gaze narrowed slightly as he considered my request.
"I don't like having to promise something before I even know what it is." He replied. Well, don't we just have a ton in common? I hated doing that as well, but this was necessary.
"It is nothing major. I just want you to promise to remain calm until I tell you the whole story." I could feel my eyebrows lifting up as high as they would go, as if I was trying to will him to agree.
"I promise." He put his hand over his heart, well, his chest, and promised.
I wasn't quite sure how to tell the whole story so I opted for the Coles notes version and made it very quick. Closing my eyes, I spoke as fast as I possibly could. "Okay, here goes. After Edward left, Victoria sent Laurent back to look for me because she wanted revenge for the death of James. Laurent found me alone in the meadow and just as he was about to kill me, a pack of wolves came out of the bushes, chased him off and killed him. Well, of course, I didn't know that at the time, but… yeah." I managed to get that out so quickly that I was sure Jasper had a hard time understanding me even with his superb hearing. I sat back and watched as what I said sunk in. His eyes transformed from their beautiful topaz to a pit of pure black. It was like I watched someone shoot ink into them. His nostrils flared and I could see the muscles in his jaw begin to twitch as he worked his jaw back and forth in a grinding motion, his lips peeling slightly back, exposing his deadly teeth. Okay, Coles notes version not such a good idea.
"I'm sorry, I don't think I caught all of that. Would you please repeat it, slowly and perhaps with a bit more detail." He asked through his clenched teeth.
I took a deep breath and slowed my speech to a normal rhythm. "Victoria sent Laurent to find me. She wanted to kill me to get back at Edward for James. An eye for an eye, I guess. He was supposed to report back to her, but he came across me when he hadn't fed for a few days and he decided I was too tempting to let go. So, just as he was about to attack me, Jake and the rest of the pack came out of the woods and went after him."
Jasper stood up abruptly causing the bed to bounce and began to pace in front of the bed. "You mean to tell me Laurent came back for you?" He asked incredulously. "We all left you. You were unprotected and he came back for you. He would have killed you. It was our fault and you could have died and I wasn't there, no one was there. And to think, your life was in the hands of a young werewolf. That is just as bad as Laurent. God, I will never forgive myself." At this point Jasper was speaking more to himself than to me. I slowly stood up and put myself directly in front of Jasper in order to stop him from pacing, his eyes still darkened pools of anger. I placed my hands on his bare chest and he stopped moving immediately. He looked down at me and opened his mouth to say something, but I stopped him with two fingers gently pressed against his lips.
"Jasper, I know where you are going with this and I forbid you to blame yourself. Do you understand?"
"It was my fault we left…"
"It wasn't your fault Edward didn't love me enough to stay or even take me with him. You know, back then, I would have gone with him in a heartbeat. So none of what happened is your fault."
Jasper shook his head, his black eyes full of sadness. "Bella… Edward…"
"Jasper, Edward did what he thought was right I guess or what was best for him at the time. Anyway… I don't care, it's the past. Besides, how were you to ever know that they would come back for me?"
"Alice should have…"
"Stop right there. I refuse to rehash the shoulda, woulda, coulda's! It doesn't matter now. Yes, it was a very close call, but Jake and his pack saved my life that day. So...it's okay, I'm okay. I survived, and after everything else, I healed and now, I'm here with you and there is no need for you to be so upset." I pressed my cheek against his chest, wrapped my arms around him and held on as tightly as I could. Looking up at his face, he was staring into mine and I watched as the blackness dissipated until his eyes returned to the brilliant topaz as he let go of his anger.
"I'm sorry. I just broke my first promise, didn't I?" He pushed my hair back from my face and kissed my forehead, both cheeks, the tip of my nose and then, finally, my lips. "Your touch has the most calming effect on me.
I smiled. "There is no need to apologize. I should not have made you promise since I knew it was going to be upsetting for you."
"You need to tell me everything Bella. Everything. Consider no detail unimportant. What happened after that? Was that the first time you knew of the wolves? How many are there?"
"Let's sit back down." I pulled him back to the bed and pushed him down. I crawled onto his lap and snuggled into his chest. He wrapped his muscular arms around me. I was already starting to sweat having to relive that horrendous night and Jasper's cold body temperature was doing nothing to cool me down.
"I decided to try and find the meadow where I used to go with Edward." I felt Jasper's posture stiffen as I mentioned his name but I chose to ignore it and continue. "This was a few months after everyone had left. It took me forever to find it and I had tried several times before but with no luck. I was so excited that I finally come across it again when all of a sudden someone stepped out of the trees. I was so shocked that I almost thought it was Edward until I realized that it was Laurent. Ridiculously I was actually excited to see him." I stopped talking for a second to look at Jasper to gage his mood. He tightly smiled at me and rubbed my back in small circles.
"He was just as surprised to see me. As you know, he had been in Alaska with Tanya's family, but it wasn't until I got closer that I noticed his eyes were still red." Jasper's hand stopped moving on my back so I began to trace my fingers along his arm, which was laying across my lap. "That's when he told me he was surprised that the Cullens had left their pet behind and that he was in Forks as a favour for Victoria. She wanted to kill me herself and he told me how upset she was going to be at him for doing it instead." I brought my hand to Jasper's face and turned it toward me so I could see his eyes again.
"I'm fine."
"I know. I just want to be sure that you know I do not blame you, any of you, for that happening. I don't want to go into the whole discussion about if you hadn't existed, this wouldn't have happened, if you hadn't left, this wouldn't have happened, blah, blah. You do exist, it did happen and we are here now, together, and that is what is important."
I could tell he disagreed with what I said but I didn't want to have that conversation. It would get us nowhere.
"So what happened next?" He prodded.
"He told me that he would make it very quick, that I wouldn't feel it and he would lie to Victoria about it so she wouldn't be too angry with him. I guess she had planned quite a torture session for me." Jasper's face contorted into a grimace, but he nodded at me to continue. "So, it was at that moment when he was telling me how mouth watering I was that a wolf came out of the trees, only, it was not like any other wolf I had ever seen. It was huge, with the biggest teeth I had ever seen. It was snarling so loudly that it sounded like thunder." I shivered at the memory of first seeing Sam in his wolf form. Even though he was beautiful in a totally dangerous wild animal sort of way, he was like a nightmare come to life.
"Laurent had started to back up, but I was frozen on the spot. I didn't know what to do. I thought, if Laurent was scared, what good would it do me to run. An indestructible vampire was in pure terror at the sight of this wolf so I thought I didn't have a chance in hell of surviving. I even remember thinking of which way would be better to die, by vampire bite or by wolf attack." I laughed lightly at the absurdity of my thinking at that time.
"Then two more wolves came out of the trees and then another two. They were so close to me that I could reach out and touch them if I wanted, but all of a sudden, Laurent turned and ran. The wolves took off after him and the commotion was so loud that I had to cover my ears. I ran as fast as I could out of the forest. It took me hours to get out I was so panicked. I was totally lost and I fell down so many times before I finally made it back to my truck. Charlie freaked when he saw me and forbid me to ever enter the forest again because some hikers had come up missing and there had been sightings of those same wolves I saw, but of course I didn't tell him I saw them." I wrapped my arms around myself remembering how cold and filthy I was when I finally got back home.
"You are so unbelievably brave, Bella."
"Yeah, well, I didn't feel so brave that night. I thought for sure that Laurent would have just killed them. I mean… as far as I knew, vampires were indestructible and that either he or Victoria were going to show up in my bedroom that night and kill me. I was so scared that I had put Charlie in danger. I was so ready to give myself up so they would leave Charlie alone." My whole body trembled as the memory of that night flashed back suddenly.
"I can't believe you went through all of this alone." He shook his head as he began to play with the back of my hair.
"But I wasn't alone. Don't you see? I finally put two and two together and figured out that the wolves were Jake and his friends from La Push. I remembered the old legends, the same ones that clued me into your existence. Jake was ordered not to tell me what he was, why he had changed, but once I figured it out, I went to him and confronted him. He told me that the pack had killed Laurent and I would never have to worry about him again. So, I had Jake to protect me. Jake and the others, that is."
"Bella, don't you understand. That is just as bad as a rogue vampire. Werewolves, especially young werewolves, don't have sufficient control over themselves. Whether you want to believe it or not, your life is in danger every second you spend with Jacob."
"Jasper, Jake would say the same thing about you. I'm never going to cut Jake out of my life just like I would never cut you out, so I'm not going to have this discussion. Jake is my family, I love him. I don't want to fight about him. He has saved me more than once and he would never hurt me." I crossed my arms defiantly.
"I know and you are right, I trust your judgement. You know them better than I do and if you feel safe with them, then I'll go along with it. I'm just shocked at all this information. I had no idea that all of this had happened. I was still with Alice then. I don't understand why she didn't see any of it. We would have come back, we would have been there for you."
"It's okay." I didn't want to say anything else about Alice as I had wondered the same thing myself so many times. Why hadn't she seen any of this?
"So, continue with the story, what happened to Victoria?" He asked.
"What do you mean?" I frowned at him.
"Did the pack get her when she came back?"
"She never came back." I shrugged my shoulders as I responded.
Jasper's eyes narrowed significantly in disbelief. "She never came back?"
"That's right. Why?" I didn't know what was so shocking about that.
"You mean to tell me that Victoria was hell bent on finding you so she could torture and kill you, sends out a scout to find you, a scout that never returns and she doesn't come looking for you herself?" It was posed as a question, but I was thinking he sort of meant it rhetorically so I didn't say anything.
"You do see how bizarre that is, right?" He asked.
"Um, when you put it that way, I guess."
"Bella, it doesn't make sense. Victoria wanted revenge. Her mate was killed. Their relationship was not a casual one, they were mated. I explained to you before that once vampires mate, it is for life. Yes, a bond can be broken by both parties like in my situation with Alice, but normally, it is for eternity. She wouldn't just stop and not continue to look for you. That defies everything in our nature. I just find it hard to believe that she didn't come for you. You would have been so easy to get to at your house." He continued to frown as he spoke.
"Well...I wasn't at my house for long because it was right after that when Char...when both of my parents died. I moved to the reservation with the Black's and pretty much didn't leave until I came here." My voice was quiet as I rarely spoke about my parents anymore as it was always so painful and the feelings of guilt that I had surrounding that time were too much to bear.
Jasper pulled me towards him. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you think of so many painful memories."
"It's okay. I should think about them more often than I do, it just hurts so bad. I was such a mess when he died. I feel so guilty about what I put him through." Poor Charlie had died not ever knowing whether I pulled out of my funk from Edward. He'd never know that I was going to college, he'd never know that I had found happiness again. The tears started to flow as I thought back to that horrible time.
"Come on, that's enough for this evening. It's really late so let's get you to bed and we can start fresh in the morning." He kissed my forehead and lowered me back onto the bed.
All of a sudden, I started to feel really nervous. Our first love making experience was fast and frantic and fantastic, but I didn't have time to stop and think of anything that was happening. It was just go, go, go, need, need, need. Now, my mind was all scattered from the information that Jasper had shared and with bringing up my past and I was worried that, if things were slowed down, would I be any good at this?
"Sshh." Jasper whispered as he gently held me with one arm and pulled the covers up over us. "I felt that. Bella, you have no need to be so nervous. We don't have to do anything more tonight. It has been a bit taxing for the both of us to open up as we have. I think that you should get a good night sleep and I should go out and hunt before anything else happens." I grasped his arms, stupidly worried he was going to leave me now. "No, don't worry, I'll wait until you are sound asleep before I go out and I'll be back before you wake up. You won't even miss me."
I scooted over on the bed and made more room for him. He lay on his side and opened his arms for me to slide into them. I sighed deeply as he encased me with his body. He was so big and strong and powerful, I felt so tiny next to him. He tucked the blanket around me so I wouldn't get cold next to his bare skin. His fingers played softly through my hair just as they did all those beautiful nights we spent together at Martha's Vineyard. It was so wonderfully soothing and I didn't want to miss a second of being with him by having to sleep. But, no matter how much I wanted to just lay there and enjoy it, stay awake the whole night and every night after that, I was getting droopy eyed and even yawned. Then Jasper whispered, his cool breath blowing over my ear.
"It's amazing, Bella. The way you make me feel." His arms pulled me in tighter as his leg went over mine. "I remember, I felt this way once before. When we were in the hotel in Phoenix, you were so worked up over one of us possibly being hurt by James and I touched you. I was trying only to calm you down, but what swept through me was so intense, I sent it back to you through my touch and you passed right out. I didn't mean to do that… it just happened. It frightened me, to feel such an overwhelming peaceful emotion inside, something I had never felt before, so I was even more diligent about keeping my distance. Sometimes… I wonder… if maybe I had touched you back then, if I would have felt the same. If at the moment I attacked you, I would have stopped the second my skin touched yours."
"Do you mean, you might have… you know… fallen in love with me back then?" He was silent, which made me wonder if my assumption that he loved me now was off, but suddenly, for no reason, I started feeling very, very happy and thoroughly loved and I knew it was coming from him. He moved my hair aside and placed a small kiss on my neck.
"Yes, possibly, but…" Jasper hesitated so I filled in the rest.
"God! That would have been awkward. You, me, Edward, Alice."
"Awkward is an extremely nice way of putting it." Menace dripped from his whispered words and I felt a spike of intense jealousy pass over me. Not my jealously, his. I turned in his arms, facing him.
"Jasper, Edward doesn't love me, if he ever did and I am so over him. Please don't be jealous of the past." I kissed his smooth lips then, nuzzled my face into his hard chest.
"Oh, Bella…" He whispered so low I could hardly hear him. "My beautiful Bella."
I held him tighter, sleep quickly claiming me as he used his gift to relax me completely and sweep away any cares I may have had. The sweet scent of Jasper brought a smile to my face and a sigh to my lips as I drifted off into a deep dreamless sleep.
