The two of us ran, hands entwined, for almost a whole minute, deep into the pitch black trees of the forest. I wondered vaguely where he was taking me…and why. Talk, he'd said. Alone.
But something…still wasn't quite right with Jasper. His face was still just a bit too composed; so similar to Edward's stony mask he'd worn for so long back in Volterra…his eyes unseeing, lost in his own thoughts. Miserable, wretched thoughts, they looked like – I didn't like it, didn't like this dark, brooding side of him I knew only too well, had seen so many times before…
Guilt. That was what it was, what it always was, with Jasper. He was blaming himself, just like he always did – blaming himself for the stupid mess I'd gotten myself into, blaming himself utterly, torturing himself with guilt. And I wasn't going to let him, this time. I wasn't.
"Jazz!" I called over the skimming of our feet across the forest floor, the creak of the dark trees, the speeding heartbeats of the terrified animals fleeing from our predatory presence. "Jazz! Wait, let's stop a moment – Jazz? Jazz?"
No answer. He wouldn't stop, wouldn't even turn to look at me, his face buried away from mine…
"Jazz!"
No answer. I tried to slow my running, to pull him to stop with me – he didn't want to, didn't want to slow even the slightest…
…his shoulders were starting to shake, though, his feet stumbling as he fought to keep running, dragging me along with him…
"…Jazz…?"
That did it.
Without warning, abruptly Jasper skittered to a stop. I almost didn't catch myself in time – the pause was so sudden.
"Jazz? What's wrong, what is it…?"
He wouldn't look at me. Still wouldn't look at me. I reached up to touch his shoulder; both of them were trembling now, shuddering, his hands twisting together, his face turned away, refusing to meet my gaze even as I tried to turn him back to me, hands around his...
"…Jazz? Jazz, look at me, please! Jasper? Jasper?"
He took a deep, shuddering breath, a tremor running through his whole body. Then he turned, slowly, to face me.
He face was still composed. Just. Teetering on the edge. But then his eyes met mine; took me in, really looked at me, for the first time since the airport…and that was it.
The whole oh-so-carefully-constructed façade crumbled. Collapsed. His face twisted with emotions that made my heart clench with horror – and suddenly I was in his arms again, feet off the floor, crushed against his chest…his body shuddering against mine with tearless sobs.
Oh Jazz, Jazz, Jazz…
"Don't," I murmured to him, hands reaching desperately for his hair, to caress his face, touch his cheek – anything, anything to comfort him. "Don't – oh Jazz, don't, please, it's ok –!"
"Never again," he choked, his voice trembling so much I could hardly understand the words, as he fought against dry tears. "Never, Alice, I swear to you, never, never will I let you be in that kind of danger again, never will I let you go alone, never without me, never be afraid, never…ohAlice, Alice, Alice…"
"Shh, Jazz…" I murmured trying to extract my arms from his vice-like grip to pull back and see his face – but he wouldn't let me, struggling at all costs to hide his face, his weakness, his vulnerability... "I'm safe, Jazz, I'm safe. We're home. We're together. And I love you, I love you, I love you so much…"
I didn't get to finish my sentence. Jasper drew back, drew back minutely – just enough to crush his lips against mine with an almost frantic urge. There was a desperate, borderline frenzied edge to them, to the way his hands clutched at my face; once again, it was as though he were terrified I would vanish, disappear from sight, dissolve into thin air, at any moment.
I sighed quietly, hopelessly; letting my arms wind around his neck too, but meeting his urgent kisses slowly, comfortingly, trying to calm him down…
Several far-too-short minutes passed before he finally drew back and away a little, pulling me over to the very same log I realised, with a jolt of déjà vu I knew had nothing to do with my visions, we'd sat on all those months ago, after that disaster of a birthday party…
…wow. So much had happened since then, it was dizzying…
Jasper was still talking, streaming out promises, self-condemnations, words I could barely catch as he gathered me up onto his lap and against his chest again.
"Jazz, don't, don't, please, don't –!"
"If they'd done something to you," he choked, lips against my forehead, my cheek, "if they'd…if they'd…hurt you…
"But they didn't," I murmured, stroking my hands over his hair soothingly.
"You couldhave been k-killed," he choked, voice breaking as he tried to stem the dry sobs. "And it would have been my fault…"
I shook my head desperately, hating this, hating how he was finding ways to blame himself for everything. "Jazz, you know that's not true…!"
"It's true," he choked, lips at my throat, my shoulder, my collarbone, and then up again, brushing over mine. "You have no idea…" he whispered brokenly, breath cool, so sweet as it danced against my lips. "No idea what I went through whilst you were gone…"
My eyes closed, guilt bubbling up inside me this time like a fountain. Why, why, why was it always him? Why did my husband have to be so…so…good; so unconditionally selfless, always taking the blame for anything that happened to me or the others around him…?
What happened in Italy could have ended in ways I could hardly begin to imagine…but none of that mattered anymore. I was safe. And I had to reassure him. No matter how much I hated, hated lying to him….I had to try.
Slowly, tenderly, I leant very close to my husband, closing my eyes to lean my forehead against his. His fingertips traced every plane of my face, soft as a whisper, as though my icy immortal skin was the most precious and delicate thing in the world. Like a single brush would shatter me; break me; smash my feeble body into a million unfixable pieces. His hands still shook.
"Jazz," I murmured softly, opening my eyes to meet his gaze, so close to mine. "I…I was never, never in anydanger, I told you, I promised you…"
He was shaking his head even before I'd finished; slowly, hopelessly, almost pityingly, his fingers still tracing my face with a feather light touch.
"Don't lie to me anymore, darlin'. Please. I know the truth. I know you lied on the plane…I know why you're lying now…and I know why."
I bit my lip, eyes on the forest floor; his hands cupped my face to gently tilt it back so he could look at me.
"It's ok, darlin'. You don't have to reassure me; I can accept it. You…all of you, could have been taken from me foreverby those…people…in more ways than one. It would have been my fault. There is nothing more to it. I was the coward too stupid and too afraid to return to Forks with you. I was the unprotective idiot who should have started worrying about you long before you got on that plane, or at the very least should have insisted – or even ordered – you to come home, just as soon as you touched down at the next airport. I'm the one who should have been there, somehow, with you, no matter what you told me or the others to do, no matter what happened, no matter who's fault it was – I should have been there, been there to protect you, to stand at your side, and I wasn't, I wasn't, and you had to face those vile Italians all alone…!"
"Jazz, I had Edw –!"
"Edward wouldn't have protected you!" he burst out, his voice breaking into a near shout, eyes blazing with a horrible mixture of fury and pain as he gazed at me. "Don't you see Alice, love, can't you understand? If he'd had the choice to protect you, or Bella –" – the name was a snarl – "- think of whom he would have chosen! You had no one, no one, because all your protector, your mate, your pathetic husband -!"
"Jasper."
He stopped at my interruption, breathing fast and uneven. There was the briefest moment of silence between us – before his arms pulled me once again against his shoulder, holding me so tight I could hardly move. I tried to reach a hand to squeeze his, to stroke his cheek, to draw back from his shoulder to speak, to kiss him – but he wouldn't let me move.
"Jazz…" I sighed.
"No," he growled, his lips grazing my ear. "No, Alice…no…"
His voice was choked again – I could hear the dry tears threatening, and Jasper's steadfast determination to hold them back. His arms clutched ever tighter around me…and then his lips were at my ear again, tender this time as they moved around soft words.
"I love you, Mary Alice Brandon," he breathed, so quietly it was barely audible…the words were for me, and only me, to hear. I closed my eyes at the memory of the name, burying my face against his neck. "More than I will ever be able to explain to you. More than you will ever be able to understand, to comprehend. To lose you…I would never be able forgive myself, fault or not. Never."
My breath came out in a soft gush. "Jazz…"
"I love you."
I closed my eyes, drawing away a little to lean my forehead against his again, my insides melting, smouldering, burning…
No matter how many times he said that, it would always feel the same way…
"I love you," I whispered, lips a whisper of a brush against his.
We kissed once; chaste and feather-light, and sweeter than any blood I could ever have dreamed of tasting.
When we drew apart, Jasper's face was better. Calmer. Less wrought with guilt, with that horrible, familiar self-hatred and condemnation…and when he spoke, his voice was more like its old self; he spoke very gently, now.
"Did they frighten you, love…? Scare you at all? Hurt you in any way? Did they try to fight you…?"
I sighed quietly. "No, Jazz. No, of course not. I told you…"
"You've been lying to me about a lot of things, darlin'."
That stung. I knew he hadn't meant it that way…but it stung. I bit my lip hard, unable to meet his gaze. "I know. I'm sorry."
He shook his head, tilting my face back to his so he could kiss my forehead softly. "Don't be. It's all right. I just want to be sure, be absolutely sure…after all…they are never anythinglike they appear to be…"
I shifted uncomfortably, not liking the re-entry of the subject – I really, really didn't want to talk about this now…
"It's a lie," Jasper was murmuring in a dark whisper, face set into hard lines – but the hand swept and stroked the coal-black hair back from my face as he spoke was gentle as a breath. "All of it, a lie; a perfectly constructed façade, an Oscar-worthy performance…but you haven't seen what I saw, love, or heard what I heard, back when…back with…Maria –"
– he stumbled over the name, making me clench my own fists automatically –
"- the things she told me, what she'd seen them doing, how they act, how it all works…Carlisle saw it too. You don't know how rare it was for them to let talent like yours and Edward's and a human who knows all the secrets and near-exposer of our kind just slide past with no trouble! They killed over forty innocent newborns without thinking twice about it back with Maria – I saw it happen! For them to let the three of you go…oh Alice, you have no idea how lucky you were..."
I was silent at this – I didn't know how to answer…and part of me didn't quite trust myself to. I let him pull me close again for a moment – then pull back to meet my gaze, his face was suddenly so tender as he cupped my face between his scarred, ruined hands.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, his voice very serious, but with sincerity ringing in every syllable. "I'm so, so sorry, darlin'. For everything. I promise you, I won't ever let it happen again. Ever. I'm so, so, so sorry…"
I stopped him with a kiss. Another. Another. I could have gone on all night and well into the next day – and the next, and the next, and the next, I thought inwardly – but there was something I needed to say, too. Something…I had learnt from this, from what had happened, something I knew now I could never, never go through again – something Jazz most definitely couldn't…and something I needed to promise.
"It won't," I whispered against his lips, "happen again, I mean. Not ever, ever again. Because next time…we'll be together, Jazz. I promise. I promise you…I'll never go any place on earth without you again. Never."
His breath came out in a gush – a long, steaming…colossal sigh of relief.
"Thank you," he sighed, arms encircling me, drawing me against him. "Thank you, darlin', thank you, thank you…I love you…"
"…I love you…"
We were kissing again before I could finish my sentence.
