A/N: Thanks so much for all your wonderful thoughts.
We're getting close to the finish line. :)
Most characters belong to S. Meyer. The rest belong to me. All mistakes are mine.
Chapter 39 – Bedroom Window
Bella
In the morning, while we clean up after breakfast, Emmett conveniently receives a call, and Alice decides to take a break, which leaves me to finish loading the dishwasher. She sits at the table and texts away.
"Bella, what's that flavor of ice cream you like?" she asks.
"You mean Rum Raisin?"
My bland reply belies the heat that suddenly rises to my face as I recall how Edward and I finished off that last quart. Swiping a soapy hand across my warm forehead, I indulge in a private smile.
Of course, Alice catches it and snickers.
"Oh, shut up, Alice," I mutter.
"Hey, hey, hey," she pretends to rebuke me, feigning indignation. "That's Agent Brandon to you. You need to learn to show some respect for your babysitters, girl."
I look at her askance as I shove clanking utensils into the dishwasher, making her chuckle all the more. Unrepentant, she stretches out her arms to show me the text.
"Look at what Elayna sexted Anthony."
Anthony darling, can you please bring home a pint of Rum Raisin ice cream tonight? You know how sticky you like getting me with it, and we're all out. ;)
"Oh, my God, please tell me you didn't actually send- you actually sent that?" I shove her phone and arms away while purposely splashing her funky glasses and dark curls. "How bored are you?"
She chortles loudly, wiping off the suds soaking her phone and glasses on her tee-shirt.
"What? Hey, normal couples sext, don't they?"
"Do they? I've never been part of one. Ask me how a thief breaks into a high-security room and swipes some jewels, and I may be able to help you. Oh, wait, you already did ask me all that," I smirk. "But as far as what normal couples do…" Shrugging, I wipe my hands with a kitchen towel and turn to lean on the counter. "I have no clue. Do they meet on opposite sides of jewel heists, chase one another across states and down city streets, go a few rounds in dark, rainy alleys, then hide out in an apartment while they wait for the bad guys to be locked up?"
She looks at me earnestly. "I mean…I'm not gonna say there aren't some issues there."
We burst out laughing.
"Alice…" I say once we've settled down, "why have you always been on my side, from the beginning? More than the rest – even more than Edward at times?"
He's told me about how Alice stood up for me from the very beginning…even when he momentarily questioned my motives.
Alice doesn't answer right away. "Bella, like most of us in this job, I joined the Bureau because I wanted to take down the bad guys. And yeah, I've done that, and it's felt good," she nods, "but helping as opposed to thwarting, trusting as opposed to questioning…befriending as opposed to injuring, it feels a thousand times better."
Befriending. Friends.
Yes, we are friends. And yes, she's my protector and my warden as well; but more than all that, she's the closest thing I've ever had to a sister, one who understands me in ways that Jake…and perhaps even Edward might not always understand me.
For a moment, I contemplate letting Alice in on the plans Edward and I have discussed regarding our future. On the heels of that thought, the bittersweet realization hits me that, just as soon as I've found a sister, I'm about to lose her. Edward won't be the only one leaving behind family, after all.
Either way, for her own sake, I can't confide in her regarding this mightiest of secrets.
"Anyway," she says, once again grinning mischievously because she may not know what Edward and I have planned, but she does understand that I have difficulty with emotional displays. "Normal. What the fuck is that anyway?" she muses. "And what's more normal than-"
Emmett storms into the kitchen.
Assuming he's in another rage over one of his TV shows, I turn to him with a smirk. It withers and morphs into an instant panic when I see his own cell phone clutched tightly in one hand, when I observe how his usually cheerful features are set in stone – and when I note the revolver in his other hand.
When he speaks, his words are quick and clipped, and Alice replies in the same manner.
"It was Brady. Says he and Eric observed possibly suspicious activity outside."
For two heartbeats, they look at one another, both deliberating.
"Might be nothing," Emmett says.
"Might be something. Did you call Edward?"
"Yeah, but he's not answering."
"He was in surgery this morning," I volunteer. "That's why he left so early. That's why he hasn't answered your text, Alice."
"Shit," Alice grimaces. "Shit."
"Should we call Jasper for backup?"
She ponders for a moment, and then her fingers work over her cell phone's keyboard; this time, without a trace of humor. When she looks up, her features are as grave as Emmett's.
"Emmett, go see what you find. I'll take care of things here."
"Got it." Emmett storms right back out.
The atmosphere shifts. Alice and Emmett are no longer friends hanging out and bullshitting. They're Agents Brandon and McCarty. Alice's ebony eyes, which just a few seconds earlier had gone mellow and tender, like a doe scampering in a summer field, are now as dark and deadly as a summer storm ripping through that same field.
When she reaches behind her and pulls a gun out from somewhere, I internally ridicule the sharp breath that escapes me – stupid, purposely naïve me. Even though we were literally joking about it, I'd truly forgotten. Or I suppose I'd buried the truth, suppressed the knowledge of what her first and foremost job here is. I'd pretended to myself that Edward was the only one armed and that once he stowed his weapons as soon as he arrived home, that was it. I'd tricked my mind into believing that Emmett and Alice weren't armed at all times.
Now, my eyes hone in on the gun, and an uncontrollable shiver rolls up my spine.
Alice turns her gaze back to me, but I can't manage to wrench mine off of her gun.
"Bella. Bella!" With a sturdy shake, she forces my eyes back to her ferocious ones. "Focus. You remember what we've discussed?"
My ensuing nod is jumpy and erratic. "I'm supposed to lock myself in Edward's bedroom – just in case."
"Just in case." Her nod sends her pretty spiral curls bouncing. "Lock the door and do not unlock it unless I tell you to," she stresses, her face close to mine, "no matter what you may hear. Understand. Bella! Understand?"
"Yes. Yes, I understand!"
"Go now."
Sprinting through the apartment, I rush into Edward's bedroom, briskly turn the lock, and…and back up slowly while glaring at the white door.
An eternity transpires, one in which there's nothing but silence. Even the city beyond the shuttered windows and blinds seems to have come to a standstill. There are no blaring ambulance sirens in the distance, no echoes of voices, or even the rustling of the wind. My eyes sweep the room frenziedly, seeing images of Edward and me in every corner, in every nook and cranny. Jumbled and discordant thoughts crisscross my mind.
Where's my phone?
What floor are we on?
What do the bedroom windows face?
Where are they all?
The recurrent nightmare returns, and I cringe and shut my eyes, wrapping my arms around my frame, attempting to stave off the choking hand of dread trying to coil and twist its fingers around me.
Emmett said it was likely nothing, and Alice said to wait. There is no reason to panic.
"Isabella, calmate y enfocate."
Gasping, I reopen my eyes and find no one.
"Calm down, Bella," I command myself, just as the unknown female voice in my imagination just ordered. "Calm down and focus."
With silent, cautious footfalls, I tread slowly toward the window, each step deliberate and measured. Raising my hand into mid-air, I pull back the curtains and push up the blinds, and-
A series of indistinguishable sounds, muted by the door and by the room's distance from the rest of the apartment, echo from somewhere in the apartment. Grunts? Kicks? But my heart is in my throat, and it beats a furiously spasmodic rhythm that closes my windpipe, and that overwhelms every other sound. My temples throb and blur my vision. All the while, I wait. I wait for Alice to give me the all-clear to open the door, for Emmett to rush in with his boisterous grin and loud voice. I wait for what feels like hours.
"Alice?"
"Emmett?"
My chest heaves. Bile sits at the base of my throat like heavy lava waiting to erupt.
"Alice!"
Did I really believe it would be that easy, or was it all just another lie I told myself? Was I truly planning a happily ever after for my wayward hero and his little thief? As if those responsible for the current situation would allow Edward and me to have one, to ride off into an incandescent and undisclosed sunset, where we could live out an isolated yet blissful existence with all this madness behind us.
Even knowing all this, when the doorknob jerks and rattles, I stagger back, still stupidly praying it's Alice.
"Alice?"
Something slams against the door, and the determined siege begins in earnest now. I cross the room to the nightstand, open the top drawer, and…and stare at the gun Edward left for me. When I reach for it, my fingers remain stiff and outstretched, refusing to curl around its handle. All the while, the banging continues, and all my mind's eye can see is the barrel of another gun pointed at me up on a dark cliff. With this fucking phobia, I wouldn't hit a target if it stood still and begged me to.
I'm sorry, Edward. I'm so sorry, my love.
When the door gives, it smashes against the bedroom's inner wall and resonates, booming like rolling thunder. And instead of the gun, I use what I am ready to use, what Emmett, Alice, and Edward have drilled me with over the past couple of weeks.
They come for me, and drawing up, I hike a leg and jump kick the first masked face that dares approach, striking him so hard he jerks back, startled. Now, I take advantage of his pain and stupefaction to ram my leg into his chest. He hurdles into the wall head-first and goes down.
The second one receives a series of left and right hooks to the face, and when he tries to reciprocate, I feint from side to side then spin jump, using the momentum to kick him in the chest as well.
"Oof!"
He doubles over, and I land a solid foot to his face. As he reels backward, blood spurts and splatters around his mask. He grabs for his nose, and I drive my foot into his groin. Another one down.
Drawing in a few successive breaths, I quickly scan my surroundings. There are two down, and one left standing off in my periphery. Although the two that are down may recover in a few seconds, a few seconds is all I've ever needed. If I can get past the one blocking the door…
I round on him…
…and freeze. My heart comes to a massive, ponderous stop. Every hair on my body and in my scalp stands on end.
"Boy, you've got some strong legs, kiddo," he says, his voice an appreciative, blood-curdling whisper. Unlike the other two, he leans against the shattered door frame, making no attempt to rush me. This one stares, patient, disguised by his mask yet calmy gazing at me through cool, blue eyes I recognize from my nightmares. Out of the corner of one eye, I vaguely see the gun gripped loosely in his lowered hand. I'm not making it past him and through that door.
"James," I breathe.
He merely snorts under his breath, his gaze impassive, neither affection for Maria nor hatred for Isabella reflected in them. He is, once again, the unfeeling animal of my nightmares.
And my only chance, my only way out now, will be by employing a similar tactic to the one I used the last time we met, not when we knew one another as Maria and James, but as predator and prey, up on the cliff of my darkest dreams.
With a sprint, I reach the nightstand and wrap a fist around the heavy lamp, the one that Edward always turned on when we made love. Lifting it over my head, I aim for the man in the mask. When he ducks, buying the ruse, I hurl it at the window instead. The glass shatters into a prismatic light show.
Where does the window face? What exactly am I going to do once I'm on that windowsill because we're fucking high up.
These are questions I only vaguely consider as I rush forward, ready to jump, ready to fly because no matter what, it's my only escape from the man in the mask.
But he's fast, he's always been fast, and this time, he's on to me. He's aware of what I can do with my legs, of the strength in them.
So, he grabs me by the waist and from behind just as I'm about to jump, one arm wrapping roughly around my hips. Before I can react, before I can use those legs to kick him in the shins, or before I can jab an elbow into his ribs, punch him in the face, bite off an ear, before I can manage anything, a thorny, piercing sensation pricks my arm.
Wildfire shoots through my veins, swift and scorching. I cry out as he pulls me back, and I have just enough time to feel every muscle in my body go slack, to panic as my limbs go numb, and to hear his whispered words spoken soothingly in my ear…
"Sorry, kiddo, not this time."
…before darkness envelops me.
A/N: Thoughts?
Just a few chapters left. :)
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