Saturday, December 26th, 2080
JPOV
"Hello, Jasper."
"Savannah." That one word, her name, was acid on my tongue.
I had thought she was dead, killed by Maria after I escaped—Savannah would no longer have had a purpose without me there to torture, but I hadn't actually witnessed it. Somehow I wasn't all that surprised that she was still alive.
Except for the modern clothing, she looked the same. I didn't know why, but I'd somehow thought that after all these years, that after the haze of war had lifted, she would look different. She didn't, still standing at five foot five with that same shade of honey blonde hair that was so similar to mine hanging just past her shoulder blades, the same pale, pearlescent skin that bore hardly any of the crescent scars that mine did and her eyes the same startling shade of crimson of a newborn vampire—her eyes had never deepened into the ruby color it did for the rest of us as we settled in to this life—the same fine-boned features. She was still beautiful, but I wanted her to look different, less innocent and angelic. Eye color aside, that was what she had always reminded me of—an angel. Why couldn't she look different?
I wouldn't ask what she was doing here. It didn't matter. It was the look on her face that did, that apologetic look that always graced her features when she was about to do something she regretted.
"Whatever it is you're about to do, don't," I warned. It wasn't an order exactly. Except for right after her change, she had always answered directly to Maria, and Maria barely ever gave her the time of day unless she needed Savannah to torture me or keep me in line. The woman standing before me wouldn't follow any order I gave her, not because she had the type of personality that balked at the idea—like Bella, for example—because she didn't. She wouldn't because she had an agenda, and whatever that was, it didn't involve caving to anything I demanded of her. Still, I hoped it would make a difference. Savannah was the only person that could bring me to my knees, using my own gift against me to do so, and giving her an order—no matter how mild—was what I would always automatically resort to first to try to get her to change her mind.
"I wish I didn't have to," she said, and I could feel her sincerity. It would be so much easier if she wasn't. "But I didn't come here to die."
"I won't kill you," I promised, and I meant it. As long as she didn't take away my control, I wouldn't touch a hair on her head no matter what she'd done to me in the past.
"Maybe you won't," she responded, not believing me, and then she gestured behind me and to the left. I didn't turn to look. Even without hearing their approach and smelling Charlotte and Edward, I knew it was the two of them and Peter. I could also hear the rest of the family, more distant, hurrying to catch up. None of them would make it to me in time. "But Peter and Charlotte will."
She was right. Even if I made a deal with her, Peter and Charlotte would kill her without waiting to see what she or I had to say. In this instance, just like Savannah, neither of them would follow any order I gave.
"Don't," I warned again, trying to buy myself some time. An extra minute, an extra hour, an extra century would make no fuckin' difference, but the idea of a few more minutes of freedom made me feel less hopeless.
"I'm only playin' by the rules of survival, Jasper," she responded, sadness in her eyes. "The rules you taught me. I'm sorry."
I rose up on the balls of my feet, willing to give rushing her my best shot but knowing it was a useless endeavor. I was fast; her gift was faster. It was already too late. Still, this wasn't the Southern Vampire Wars, Maria wasn't pulling her puppet strings anymore, and if I was gonna be Savannah's little bitch again, I was going down fighting.
The second I took a step forward, she made her move.
oOo
PPOV
Things were looking up. My gift was still a little screwy where Bella was concerned but whatever mystery my Punk had herself wrapped up in was less important than the other cogs in the machine at the moment. My instincts, not to be mistaken with my gift, were telling me, "All in good time, Pete." My instincts had always served me well, so I chose to focus on the other, more important shit. All that other shit was slowly but surely working itself out.
Jasper, for example. He still wasn't quite okay with his feelings for Bella but he had accepted his love for her. After he'd realized it—though he still didn't realize she was his mate—he wouldn't touch the idea of actually being with her with a ten-foot pole, but as time passed, that pole had begun to shorten. If my calculations were correct, it was down to no more than an arm's length, and that pole was no longer made of industrial strength, vampire-proof steel but a simple wooden staff. A staff made of solid oak, mind you, but with a few well-placed blows, it would be nothing more than kindling and Jasper would cave. There wouldn't be a single argument anyone, including him, could come up with that could keep him from making a play for her.
As usual, Bella continued to be the biggest problem. There was no longer any shadow of a doubt in my mind that she felt something for my oldest and dearest friend and brother. Was it love? I suspected it might be, but she was still fighting it, still trying to tell Fate to go fuck itself. I had no idea why she was fighting it so damn hard, but that didn't ultimately matter. She won battles but she lost them too, and in the end, she would lose the war. Charlotte and I just had to find a way to get her a little more caught up to where Jasper was, and we had been strategizing on how to do just that for the past week, especially since she seemed to be losing more of those battles lately even if she still won the majority of them. It was encouraging and it was time to stop standing at the sidelines. Charlotte and I were getting back in this "Jasper gets the girl" game of ours.
And then there was the fact that my "knower" was dead on when it came to Jasper needing to feed on human blood to help him get a grip on his vomiting thing. So it hadn't worked the first or second time, but it had worked the third one and wasn't the third time supposed to be the charm? The point was, I was right. My gift was right. I was back … until everything got royally fucked up again.
For whatever reason, Jasper had been extra pissed off and sullen this morning—probably something to do with Bella since, aside from me, only she seemed to have the ability to infuriate him that much—so Charlotte, Edward and I had given him more space than we usually did until he was ready to actually attempt to make a kill. It didn't help that his human blood feed had been far less successful yesterday than the one before it; he had only managed to down one bag instead of just over four. Generally it took less human blood to satiate our thirst than it did animal, but Jasper had been starving for weeks, so that principle didn't really apply at the moment since he was making up for lost time. He would get over whatever had crawled up his ass eventually and everything would go back to being peachy. He and Bella would go back to doing that delicate and awkward and volatile little dance they did, much to the entertainment of all the rest of us, and continue to make stilted progress, and all would be right in the world once again. Eventually the time would come when I would bash their heads together and tell them to get to it already, but unfortunately, I still had to sit on my hands for now.
It was only five minutes later that everything went to hell. The oddest and most disorienting sensation overtook me, like a black hood had been slipped over my head, temporarily paralyzing me and blinding my literal vision and whatever part of my brain it was that tapped into the flow of the universe or whatever that provided me with the shit I just knew was cut off. A sharp pain shot through my right ear and straight through my head to my left, reinforcing that feeling of paralyzation. I didn't cry out but my hands shot to my temples out of reflex, fingernails digging into my scalp hard enough to draw venom. My gift may have been cut off, but I knew.
She was here.
Savannah fuckin' Devane.
I couldn't be sure if Bella was a blind spot to my gift, but I did know for certain that that blonde-haired bitch was. Even my gift, which was so different from most other vampires', was susceptible to hers. If she got within a ten mile radius of me, her gift made mine go kablooey. Not even Bella, who so thoroughly muddled it, affected my gift the way Savannah's did, and Bella certainly couldn't use it against me. I didn't know for certain if Savannah could. For all I knew, she had never tried, but that didn't mean she wasn't capable of it. I hoped like hell she wasn't.
Charlotte's gaze snapped to mine, her eyes wide.
"Savannah," we murmured in unison, her name more a curse than a simple word.
"What?" Edward demanded, not understanding, and I didn't blame him. I didn't understand either. How in the fuck had she found us? Scratch that—how in the fuck did she find Jasper? Because I sure as hell knew she hadn't come here for me and Charlotte. I guess my gift didn't just go kablooey within a ten mile radius of her; she was just flat immune. She was to most everyone else's. I had just hoped mine was an exception.
Neither Charlotte nor I answered, merely turned and took off in the direction we knew Jasper was.
"Carli—" Edward's inner shout was cut off abruptly. It was Savannah's doing. A brief glance over my shoulder showed how disturbed and panicked he was over the loss of his ability, and I could hear faint internal choking sounds as he fought to regain use of his gift. I vaguely registered the crash of underbrush in the distance as the rest of the family rushed in the direction of Edward's aborted call. His gift had a wide range, wide enough that they heard his attempts.
"Whatever you're about to do, don't," we heard Jasper say, his tone a subtle warning.
"I wish I didn't have to," was Savannah's response. The sound of her voice made me sick with rage, my hands clenching into fists as I ran. "But I didn't come here to die."
I let out a derisive snort, Charlotte, Edward and I pushing ourselves even harder to get to them at her words. Did she think Jasper, Charlotte or I would show her mercy? She couldn't have because she knew what we would do to her if we ever saw her again, so if she hadn't come here to die, she shouldn't have come at all. Her death would be drawn out and excruciating. She would know agony like no other before we ended her pitiful, worthless existence. I had been contemplating what I would do to her and Maria when, not if, I ever saw them again for decades. One of my ideas was to make them suffer for years, the same way they had my brother. Unfortunately, Maria would probably enjoy it. Savannah, however, would not.
"I won't kill you," Jasper promised and the damndest thing was, he meant it. After everything she'd done, he meant it. He wouldn't kill her, not that she was going to give him a choice.
She wasn't here to reminisce on the old days. Her reasons were nefarious. I would bet my life on that.
"Maybe you won't," she replied with mistrust. "But Peter and Charlotte will."
Savannah was right and Jasper knew it. We would kill her. We would not allow her to take him from us if we could help it, not that we really had much choice either, but we were going to do our best to keep it from happening.
"Don't," he warned again.
"I'm only playin' by the rules of survival, Jasper," she said. "The rules you taught me. I'm sorry."
The three of us broke through the tree line, the family not far behind, only feet away as Jasper launched himself at her. We flanked him, taking up the positions we always did while in combat, snarling in rage and anticipation. Even Edward, who had very little experience in this sort of thing, moved with us like a pro and was growling and snapping his teeth in fury.
Just as we were about to close in, Jasper spun around and took up a defensive position in front of Savannah, letting out a roar so fierce and terrible and loosing such rage with his gift, projecting for the first time since his fight with Bella about the Winter Formal, it knocked us off our feet. My head cracked against the ground with the force of a bullet train crashing into a thick, steel wall, leaving me dazed for a moment. When I recovered enough to meet Jasper's eyes, my heart sank. My brother was gone.
I stood up and held out my hand to my mate, helping her up. She surveyed the two vampires in front of us, Savannah calm as could be and Jasper still crouched in front of her protectively, Charlotte's eyes filled with devastated, angry tears. Despite what she knew would happen, she lurched forward, cursing the woman she hated so thoroughly for destroying the man that was more than just our family. I caught her around the middle and held fast, barely managing to keep her at bay as she raged but knowing that if we pushed our luck right now, Jasper would kill her. That was the whole point. It was why Savannah had done what she'd done—forged another fake mating bond, this one between her and him. She had done it because Jasper was the only person that could keep her safe from me and Charlotte, and if she tied him to her, she was also safe from him.
I hated her. I hated her so fuckin' much.
The rest of the family crashed into the clearing gracelessly and took in the odd scene before them.
"Peter?" Carlisle questioned, confused, as he and the others remained at their places far back. "What's going on?"
"Back away, Edward," I instructed as I moved Charlotte and myself several feet from a still very volatile and agitated Jasper to lessen the threat he thought we posed to Savannah, the very real threat we did pose to her, even more uneasy now that five other vampires had just shown up to the party. He was overwhelmed by the newness of the fake mating bond and was too disoriented to understand anything that was going on. Essentially, he was operating under the most basic of instincts, like a newborn. He would come back to himself enough to remember who we all were eventually and gain more control as well, but right now, we were strangers. The only thing that mattered to him was Savannah and protecting her.
When we reached a safe enough distance, all the Cullens having followed us, I let them absorb the seriousness of my features and the intensity of my scowl. "That would be Savannah Devane," I announced, gesturing at our unwanted and hated guest before folding my arms over my chest. "For all intents and purposes, she's Jasper's mate."
The bewildered looks on Emmett's, Rosalie's, and Esme's faces did not go unnoticed. My revelation at the dance that Jasper's mate wasn't coming along for another hundred fifty-five years had spread through the family as Charlotte and I had intended it to, so this was a particularly fierce blow to the three of them. Since Edward, Alice and Carlisle knew about Savannah and what she could do, and had done, they weren't surprised, but they faked it. At the moment, the family's confusion, genuine or faked, didn't matter.
"For now," Charlotte bit out, managing to make the threat carry across the clearing to her nemesis despite its low volume.
That's my girl! I hooted with grim, internal satisfaction, knowing Savannah could feel it if she was tapping into my brother's gift.
"For now," I echoed.
Jasper let out another roar that raised the hairs on the back of my neck.
oOo
"I have no intention of takin' Jasper away from you," Savannah promised shortly after Charlotte's and my overt threat.
"Prove it," Charlotte challenged.
Savannah could not take Jasper away from Forks. We had moved here for him, Fate had brought Bella here, for him and whatever other reason, and Savannah was fucking everything up enough. If anything could be salvaged at all, and that would become more and more debatable the longer she was around, he had to stay here.
Despite all that, I had to believe that something good would come out of her presence here. I just had to. Why would Fate finally bring Bella, Jasper's true mate, to him after more than two centuries only to ruin it by throwing the wrench that was Savannah fuckin' Devane into things before he could get his happily ever after? Even after all I'd been through in my life, I wasn't so jaded that I believed that's how things would play out. Besides, blind spot though Savannah may be, my gift had always unequivocally told me that Jasper would end up happy, and not just the temporary, shiny, skin-deep kind, but the earth-shattering, soul-quaking eternal kind.
The bitch had the nerve to smile. It was a tiny smile but still a smile. I wanted to break her fuckin' face in half. My Char wanted to do far worse. "I don't suppose you know of any place with lodgings available?"
Carlisle cast a brief glance at me and my mate before he made a move.
"You can stay with us," he offered, willing to play ball and do anything to save Jasper. He knew what was at stake. It was an offer my Char and I wholeheartedly approved of, even if we knew she'd been fishing for the invite, which did nothing but make us hate her more. We needed to keep eyes on Savannah at all times.
"I appreciate that. It's very kind," Savannah thanked him. The woman always had been polite, the definition of a Southern Belle, the perfect Georgia Peach, and I could hear the remnants of her Georgian accent in her lilting voice. It grated on my fuckin' nerves, but under different circumstances, I would have found it pleasant. She'd been named after her birthplace—something I just knew. "I know this must be a bit of a shock."
I couldn't curtail the bitter snort that escaped me.
Esme threw a disapproving frown my way before refocusing her attention on Savannah. "Nonsense, dear," she refuted. "You are absolutely welcome here, despite some people's—" she shot glowers at me and Charlotte again— "horrible manners, and we have plenty of room. We certainly can't say you aren't a surprise but definitely not an unpleasant one. Jasper is family and all we want for him is to be happy. If you can give that to him, then you are family too."
Shut up, Esme! Shut up! Don't give her any fuckin' ideas!
I was happy to observe that neither Emmett nor Rosalie were thrilled with either of the developments that had occurred in the last twenty minutes. They hadn't said it but they'd been rooting for Jasper and Bella, even hoping that Bella might turn out to be his mate even though Charlotte and I had told them otherwise. They certainly didn't want this unfamiliar bitch living under the same roof as them. Of course Edward and Alice, knowing who Savannah really was, hated the idea too. I knew once we explained things to our "mother," she would want to eat every word she'd just said.
"His happiness has always been important to me as well," Savannah murmured absently.
At least Savannah didn't seem smug about her bullshit declaration. Didn't change that it was bullshit and the absence of that emotion didn't make me want to throttle her any less.
Charlotte surged forward again, a litany of violence pouring from her lips that scorched my ears but also made me insanely proud. I wanted to join her in it but restrained myself. One of us had to keep a cool head. It was the only way we would find a solution out of this clusterfuck.
"Wait," Emmett interjected, his confusion more pronounced, the fact that the wheels in his head were whirling at a dizzying pace clear on his features. "You already know him?"
"Yes," she answered impassively, giving nothing away. I had to admit I was grudgingly impressed. Her emotions had always shown naked on her face during the Southern Wars.
"For how long?" he persisted.
"It's been years," Savannah said vaguely.
Emmett wasn't the only one whose bemusement deepened. Now Esme and Rosalie were clearly struggling to hide how discomfitted this new tidbit of intel made them because it conflicted with what we'd told them and what they were seeing now and had seen over the last months. They knew without a doubt that Jasper loved Bella but they also couldn't deny that Jasper's current behavior was that of a mated vampire. If Jasper had known Savannah before, that meant he was mated to her before—as in before he met Bella—and there was no way he could have fallen for Bella. Once a vampire found their mate, they couldn't fall in love with anyone else. The three of them were figuring out that something was inherently wrong with all this.
Emmett gave her a slow nod but said nothing. No one did.
Instead, we waited in tense silence, aside from the sound of Jasper's restless pacing and irritable growls.
After an hour, I turned to Edward and Carlisle and spoke to everyone through Edward's gift, unwilling to reveal any more information to Savannah than need be. "The two of you need to be headin' back to the treaty line to meet with the wolves. We can't keep them waiting much longer."
"No," Carlisle agreed. That I heard his response meant that Savannah had stopped blocking Edward's gift. I just hoped it also meant she wasn't listening. It defeated the purpose if she was, but I wouldn't put it past her.
"Jasper didn't try to feed today, but you need to make them believe he did," I said. "I need to know you can."
"I can," he assured me with confidence.
I nodded tersely, having faith that he could do it and would.
"You're going to need to shower and change before you meet them," I said. "We can't risk them picking up on even the barest trace of a strange vampire's scent on you. They cannot know about her." My eyes shot briefly to Savannah to emphasize my point and to gauge whether or not she was listening. I couldn't tell. "They will insist on meeting her." I looked pointedly at Jasper. "And it'll be a fuckin' bloodbath if they do."
The pack had more than a dozen wolves, and though Jasper was only one vampire, he was a wrecking ball of mass destruction even when the God of War wasn't riding his ass. Spending a century at war honing your skills in combat did that. Every last one of them would die and die bloody. I would help and so would Charlotte.
They nodded this time.
"Go," I ordered, and they left without another word.
It was another two hours before Jasper calmed down enough to let any of us get within twenty feet of him and Savannah, and even then, he was a hostile, snarling son of a bitch ready to snap at the drop of a hat. I bitterly suspected that the only reason it hadn't taken longer was because Savannah had hijacked his gift again and used it to subdue him. I would rather he lose his shit and tear us all apart than be her slave.
We escorted them back to the house, keeping a healthy distance as we did so, Charlotte and I instructing the remaining family members to form a perimeter around it while she and I went to discuss some things. We had some serious strategizing to do.
oOo
My mate and I were three miles from the house we'd come to call home in the past months, out of earshot but close enough that we could get back in a flash to do damage control if things went to hell, and it was only a matter of time before they did.
"We need to get Bella home immediately," Charlotte proclaimed right off the bat, beginning to pace in her agitation over everything that was going on.
"No," I refused flat out.
She whirled around, her dangerously narrowed eyes trained on me, wrath in them like I'd never seen before. It was a frightening sight; it was also a beautiful one. Still, I stood my ground.
"What did you say?" she demanded, her tone informing me that I'd best choose my words carefully if I valued my balls.
"No," I repeated firmly. I hated refusing my girl anything but this was a necessary evil.
"Why?" she bit out through gritted teeth, clenching her fists as she crossed her arms over her chest and planted her feet shoulder width apart. I was the one she was prepared to launch herself at now. "Bella is the one person who can fix this!"
"Which is precisely why we can't involve her, darlin'," I said gently. "At least not yet."
"Please explain," she requested, trying for patient and calm and failing.
"When Savannah forged the fake mating bond between Jasper and Maria, she used the ones he felt off others, ones he'd only felt periodically. This time, she used not only the four particularly strong ones he's been exposed to on a near daily basis for practically a century but his own bond too, babe. That makes this one infinitely more powerful, less warped and more pure, and outside of Maria, Savannah has more control over the God of War than anyone else on this Earth, including Jasper, especially Jasper."
No one had complete control over that bastard, but he still listened to them sometimes, and sometimes was enough.
Charlotte's eyes widened. She knew all of this, but in her rage, she hadn't taken the time to consider any of it.
"And Savannah has an edge over Bella, a fierce one," I continued, sighing—in frustration, in weariness, in mild desire to whop Bella's head against a wall. An ugly scowl marred my lips and the words I was about to say coated my throat with the sweet-tasting venom equivalent of bile. "Despite all the shitty things she did to him, Savannah loves Jasper. She always has. Bella isn't even willing to acknowledge the possibility of loving him."
The girl refused to see what was right in front of her fuckin' face. She didn't want to waste her first kiss on a guy who had only ever thought of kissing her because of a stupid, cliché holiday plant? Seriously? How could she miss the way he looked at her? Yeah, he hid it or he tried to. He'd been excellent at it at first but the more time that passed, the more the guy was starting to suck at it! And it wasn't just naked lust there either; there was a softness in his gaze I'd never seen before. It was impossible to miss that he cared even if he could be a jackass. Maybe she didn't know she was his mate, maybe he didn't either, but how could she not tell just how utterly hers he was. Was she really that goddamn clueless? I wanted to choke her.
"And Punk has no fuckin' clue she's Jasper's actual mate whereas Savannah is currently ridin' high on stealing something from her she has no idea is even hers to begin with."
It would be so much easier if she did, if she would just wake the fuck up and at least figure out how he felt, acknowledge how she felt and fight for him, but telling her the truth wouldn't do us any good. Knowing how similar the two of them were, she probably hated the concept of being mated or even just belonging to someone on any level just as much as Jasper did.
"Whether we like it or not, the bond between Savannah and Jasper is almost as real as the one between him and Bella—"
"But it's not real!" my Char cut in furiously.
"No, darlin', it isn't," I said evenly. "But it's real enough, and the edge Savannah has is everything. Through his gift and the fake bond, she might be able to pick up on the fact that Bella actually is Jasper's mate, and with her ability to sway the God of War …" I buried my face in my hands, scrubbing it roughly with my palms. "Savannah finally has the one thing she's always wanted—Jasper."
Charlotte's expression turned murderous. She opened her mouth to say something but we didn't have time for her to go into another tantrum. "I have always known Jasper would never hurt Bella but this fake mating bond shit changes things. That edge of Savannah's could mean a split second's difference where she can use her ability to make him lose just enough control to hurt Bella, even kill her, and a second is all it would take."
"Do you really think he would hurt her?" she asked quietly, all signs of her impending outburst gone.
"He wouldn't," I emphasized. "But Savannah would, and she'll use him to do it. If anything happened to Bella and at his hand, Jasper would never come back from it, darlin'. You know that, and if anything does, he loses his shot at happiness. We just can't risk it, we can't risk her and we can't risk him. We have to try to figure this out ourselves first. We broke through the first bond. Maybe we can break through this one."
"Okay," she conceded, her voice thick with tears. She understood now; she knew I was right. "Okay."
I caught her as her knees buckled, her body wracked with dry sobs that broke my heart. My girl hadn't broken down like this since we left Jasper behind in the Wars, since he'd forced us to leave him behind. My own eyes flooded with tears that would never fall—for her, for me, for Bella, but mostly, for my brother.
Ten minutes later, we had collected ourselves and were back in the frame of mind to strategize.
"So what do we do?" my Char questioned, her jaw set with determination, her eyes fiery.
"What we always do," I announced, my lips twisting into a cocky smirk and my eyes filling with that same determination and fire as hers. "We look for a chink in Savannah's armor and when we find one, we pounce. Until then, we do recon, we try to figure out why the fuck she's here and we try to twist everything to our advantage. We watch the Major too. He won't be himself entirely, but when he gets over the initial haze, he's gonna be pissed, and the part of him that wants to rebel and rip Savannah to pieces will give us cues when he can, so we pay attention."
Charlotte nodded. "And what about the Cullens? What do we tell them?"
"The truth," I stated. "Not all of it like we have from the get go, just not for the same reasons."
Her eyes lit up with comprehension. With Savannah's ability to sense the gifts of other vampires, and block them and/or use them against the vampire in question we couldn't risk telling them the truth about what Bella was to Jasper. Before she could turn a vampire's gift against them, and luckily, she could only do this to one vampire at a time, she first had to commandeer it. It was the only way for her to truly understand the ability and use it to her fullest advantage, and with Edward being a telepath ... the only reason we could block him was because Savannah had touched us with her power back during our time with her in the Southern Wars, and when she used it that way, it was generally permanent. There had been no guarantee it would work on Edward because her gift was only supposed to work on the vampire she'd temporarily stolen it from. Jasper, Charlotte and I speculated that the only reason it did work to block him was because his gift was similar enough to the other telepath's to be effective. Either that or it was some sort of cosmic fluke. At any rate, even if Savannah extended her power to the others to teach them to block Edward's mind-reading, it wouldn't make them immune to her use of his power. She would still be able to pluck their thoughts out of their heads, so telling them that Bella was Jasper's actual mate was not an option.
oOo
We had arrived back at the house half an hour ago to collect the family. Charlotte and I had agreed beforehand that she would stay behind to keep an eye on Jasper and the treacherous she-devil and I would explain everything to the Cullens.
So here I stood in the same spot I had with my mate just minutes ago, taking them all in.
"How did it go with the Quileutes?" I asked first and foremost.
"Good," Edward answered. "They were actually relieved Jasper wasn't with us since he was so damn surly this morning, and after the way he not so subtly threatened to put Billy in his place at the outset of our arrangement, he makes them uneasy anyway. Luckily, Savannah's power wore off at that distance, so I was able to put images in their heads, and the ones I concocted were airtight. They didn't suspect a thing."
Carlisle nodded his agreement. I smiled in grim approval. "You're gonna need to practice blocking your own gift, brother. I don't know for certain if Savannah will be able to read everyone else's thoughts if she decides to use your gift, but she will be able to read yours."
Edward frowned. "That's …"
"Odd? Ironic? Twilight Zone-ish?" I suggested, my amusement breaking through over the prospect in spite of the suckiness of the situation.
"Yeah," he agreed. "And something I obviously never thought I'd ever have to do."
I slapped him on the back in sympathy.
Rosalie, who had been tapping her foot in agitation, finally spoke up, "What the fuck is going on, Peter?"
I couldn't help but laugh at the question, a harsh, terrible sound that echoed through the trees and left me feeling hollow and bleak but more determined than I'd ever been in my life. We would fight this and we would win because we had to. That was all I needed to know. Fuck my gift. I didn't need it.
My reaction disturbed her so much that her tapping abruptly ceased, the rest of her body freezing as she stared, waiting. Everyone else was equally unmoving, alarmed and eager to know what the hell was going on, so I got down to the business of explaining. I rehashed the time Charlotte, Jasper and I had spent with Savannah in the Southern Wars without going into a lot of detail, told them about her gift and revealed what she'd done.
Unsurprisingly, Rosalie was spitting mad by the time I was finished and so was Emmett. What was most surprising was the depth of Esme's wrath. I had never seen such a scowl on her face or her eyes so black, and I had never, ever seen her lose her shit, pounding the hell out of a thick tree until it fell, nothing more than wooden pulp, by the time she was done. She had never been menacing or violent but she was the perfect picture of both now.
"And I invited that, that fucking bitch into our house!" she exclaimed, her voice a distinct growl as she trembled with rage, her chest heaving as Carlisle stood at her elbow with a comforting hand on her arm and a dark look of his own contorting his features. I had never heard kind-hearted, sweet, gentle Esme growl in all the years I'd known her either and I sure as hell had never heard her curse. It was a shock to my system but it made me grin the widest I had since this whole debacle began. "How do we fix it?"
"It'll be tricky and it'll take patience," I told them, meeting each of their gazes with the utmost sobriety. "For now, we show Jasper that we love him and support him without overdoing it. You don't have to like Savannah and you don't have to pretend to. You do have to be civil, and most importantly, we do not, under any circumstances, present ourselves as threats to her. Jasper's gonna be unstable with her around and pissed off. He'll be conflicted. Part of him is gonna know exactly what she did and hate her for it, but the other part will be forced to love her because that's what the fake mating bond does. It won't be pretty, so tread lightly but do your best not to treat him much differently than usual. Treating him with kid gloves will only make things worse. Also, Bella has got to stay somewhere else while Savannah is here. Just because Savannah used Jasper's love for Bella to help intensify the fake mating bond doesn't change that he loves her. If she comes around, Savannah's ability to hitchhike along on his gift will tip her off to that and it will put Bella in danger. We can't risk that."
"She can't stay with Leah without risking revealing that Savannah's here," Alice mused. "Maybe Angela Weber. At least for a few days. And what are we going to tell Bella? How are we going to keep her away? You know how stubborn she is. I don't want to lie to her but if we tell her the truth, that'll just make her insist on coming home and you know once she sets her mind on something, she gets it done, even if she's a human up against nine vampires."
"Alice is right," Edward said. "There'll be no stopping Bella from coming home if she finds out the truth, and if our excuse is lame, it will only spur her on. I also agree that Angela Weber is the best choice. The only other relatively close human friend Bella has is Riley Dwyer, and Jasper may be mind-fucked right now, but I doubt that would go over well regardless."
I sighed. Why did Bella fuckin' Crawfield have to be just as stubborn as her mate? And why did she have to be such a goddamn wild card? She was a pain in my ass, but I loved her so damn much.
"Angela Weber it is then," I agreed. "And I'll think of something," I promised. The next thing to be discussed had to be said in a way that brooked no argument. "We can't talk about Bella in front of Savannah. We can't even say her name. We have to do our best not to even think about her, as hard as that's gonna be."
"We'll do it," Emmett guaranteed fiercely, wrapping his arm around Rosalie's shoulder. She was too incensed and just downright upset to even speak.
"Take some time to collect yourselves," I instructed, "but don't take too much." I turned to Carlisle. "We need to get to brainstorming because we've got to start makin' arrangements for Bella, and we need to get it all ironed out before your shift at the hospital. Everything has to proceed as normal as possible no matter how fucked up things are right now."
He nodded.
"We've got work to do, people," I said in a near bark, officially taking command. "I expect it to get done."
They all gave various forms of assurance that it would, so I left them to come to terms with our current circumstances and made my way back home.
oOo
CharPOV
Savannah was camped out in Jasper's bedroom. The moment we got home, he'd dragged her up here, secured his window and any other areas he saw as tactically weak as best he could against creatures as formidable as vampires and had taken to patrolling the scant distance between each of them and the door, which was held open by one of his heavy bookends so he could keep an eye on me as I stood guard across the hall. It wasn't the wisest place for me to be, but there was no way in hell I was going to station myself any farther away from them than this.
In truth, I had been contemplating ending Savannah in spite of what Peter and I had discussed. I probably wouldn't get close enough to succeed; the attempt, whether successful or not, would get me killed, but I wasn't sure I cared. I hated her.
There was a time when I might have felt different. I knew firsthand how cruel and ruthless Maria was and Savannah wasn't like other vampires. Maria ruled through fear, and Savannah, more than anyone else, had reason to be afraid. I had always believed the universe strived for balance and she was proof of that theory if ever there was some. Her gift was probably the most powerful one I had ever seen, but that was as far as it went. There had to be an equilibrium—every vampire paid some sort of price, even if it was only a small one, to wield that extra ability. For Jasper, it was the burden of having to bear the terrible weight of the negative emotions of others. For Edward, it was the slight madness of being bombarded by everyone's thoughts and learning things about people he didn't want to know and could never unlearn. For Alice, it was never knowing if the visions she had were concrete or fleeting and the frustration it caused. For Peter, it was never knowing where the shit he just knew came from or if he knew enough to keep the people he loved safe. For Kate, it was feeling the pain of the electric shock when she used her gift on others. In Savannah's case, there was a particularly nasty price to pay. There had to be some way to level the playing field between all that power and everything else it meant to be a vampire, so nature had played somewhat of a joke on her. She wasn't as fast or as strong as a typical vampire nor did she heal as quickly or as well. Her senses were as sharp as the rest of ours were but her reflexes weren't. In short, she was well-equipped enough that no human stood a chance against her, but she stood no chance against another one of us. Even if her gift rendered another vampire's useless, it couldn't take away our natural strengths and negate her natural shortcomings. She was weak, not cut out for the life Jasper had brought her into—for war or life as a vampire in general—and the only advantage she had was the fact that no one knew about it … except for Maria, Jasper, Peter and me. It was why, despite how useful her gift would have been in battle, she never saw one. The extent of Savannah's value to Maria began and ended with the way her gift could be used to mold Jasper into the weapon Maria desired him to be and its ability to keep him tied to her. That was why we'd thought she was dead all these years—once Jasper escaped Maria's clutches and that hellhole, Savannah had outlived her usefulness. There would have been no point in keeping her alive, and I was resentfully impressed that she had found a way to extend her shelf-life.
It was that weakness and fear that might have made me feel sorry for her if not for all the pain and suffering she'd put Jasper through as a result, especially since she'd been in love with him from the moment she laid eyes on him. Even if I could look past all that, it was what I saw now that sealed my hatred—the look in Jasper's eyes. They were empty. He was empty. The lights were on but no one was home. It wasn't the same as when he was in God of War mode, but he was still a husk, a shadow of himself. Even when he "woke up," that emptiness would still be there. He was her slave, and this time, no matter her reasons, Savannah wasn't doing all of it out of fear and the hardwired instinct to do what needed to be done to survive. She'd used that as her excuse, but she hadn't had to find us and she didn't need to come here. She could lie to herself all she wanted, but she was doing all this just because she could. So yes, killing her, even if it resulted in my death, would be worth it.
Savannah had sat in the comfy chair of Jasper's that allowed her a view of me in the hallway, watching his movements with little emotion, as if it was no big deal, as if it was to be expected; but it was a big deal. It was a really big fuckin' deal. This was the way mates acted but she was not his mate! I didn't care that the fake bond she'd suckerpunched him with told him otherwise. There was fact and there was fiction. Savannah wasn't Jasper's mate, Bella was. I hated this. I hated her, and I still wanted nothing more than to drag Bella's ass here to see if she could snap Jasper out of it. I understood why we couldn't but I still wanted to. At the same time, I wanted nothing more than to keep her safe from this bitch and to shield her from this side of Jasper. She needed to know about the Major and the God of War, to see it, because of what she was to him, but it had to be on his terms. It had to be his choice, and he wasn't ready.
"You look well, Charlotte," Savannah commented casually, trying for civil. "But that doesn't surprise me."
The last thing I planned to be was civil. "And you look surprisingly alive for a woman who should have been nothing but ash one hundred twelve years ago."
She merely smiled at me, and it took all the self-restraint I had to keep myself rooted to my spot instead of sprinting forward to remove it from her face.
Jasper was not impressed by my less-than-cordial tone or emotions, snarling to show it. I didn't happen to give a fuck. As long as I didn't present a physical threat to her, he was still too preoccupied with covering all the tactically unsound areas of his bedroom to bother with me.
"Lets not pretend this is anything more than it is," I bit out, reining my emotions in and attempting to mask just how genuine my animosity still was. "You and I are not friends. You have stolen my brother's free will from him, again, and if he wasn't standin' in the way, you would be screaming in agony right now."
Jasper snarled again, but apparently I'd succeeded in minimizing my malice because it was less pronounced than the last one.
Savannah's smile didn't falter. "I always have admired your loyalty."
"And I've never been impressed with yours," I retorted with every ounce of bitterness and hostility I felt, but still tempering it enough physically so Jasper didn't hurl himself at me.
Finally, I saw a flicker of doubt flash across her face which gave me a gleeful sense of satisfaction. "Still, Jasper is lucky to have you and Peter."
"Yes, he is," I agreed. "We would do anything for him. You know exactly what that means."
"Yes, I do," she acknowledged. "Which is why you and I should try to get past this and get along … at least for a little while."
"Get past this?" I hissed incredulously. "There is no getting past this, you selfish, underhanded, cowardly bitch! After everything you've done—"
"I am perfectly aware of everything I've done," Savannah cut in coldly. "There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about it. I regret—"
My snort was scornful. "Don't you dare try to feed me that line of bullshit, Savannah, because that is exactly what it is—bullshit! If you regretted what you did even a little, you wouldn't have bothered lookin' for him and you certainly never would have shown your face here. More than a century has passed since you and Maria tortured him and turned him into the God of War and he has yet to find any sort of peace. He deserves that and you just shot any chance he had of gettin' it to hell for at least another century."
Her eyes dropped from mine in what looked to be shame, but I didn't believe for a second that she actually felt any. When she looked up, she gazed at my brother for a long while with a longing that made my venom boil. It was fuckin' hard to suppress the growl it caused, but I managed. I was already pushing my luck.
"Jasper does deserve peace," she said, still gazing at him. "And I truly didn't come here to ruin his chance at it—" another snort from me— "which is why it is so important that we at least pretend to get along. He needs you and Peter, and this family he's taken up with, I think he needs them too. The two of you and I all know what's at stake here. I'm not delusional. I know how angry he'll be once the initial haze wears off, and you know where that could lead. Being at each other's throats isn't going to help, and the others seem to take their leads from you and Peter. I'm not askin' you to like me. I know that's impossible, but for God's sake, set an example ... at least for a little while. For Jasper's sake."
"You're right. I don't like you," I sneered. "I fuckin' hate you, and you've got a lot of goddamn nerve spouting all that shit off. I won't pretend to get along with you because the sight of you makes me sick. The best I would be able to promise is to pretend like you don't exist, but that's impossible since I'm going to watch you like a hawk and wait for my chance to take you out."
I had finally taken it a step too far. Jasper surged forward, grasping me by the neck in a choke hold with his right arm and gripping mine with his left hand, giving a sharp yank.
The cacophonous, grating, metallic keen of vampire flesh parting ways reverberated through the house, and I found myself staring at my severed arm, lying ten feet away in front of the stairs. It wasn't just my arm though; it was my entire shoulder from the crook of my neck and the whole of the right side of my rib cage. Venom gushed from the wound, soaking my ruined shirt and leaving me feeling cold not because it was, but because I still found myself in a little shock over it, even though I shouldn't have been. It hurt like a son of a bitch but I didn't make a sound, waiting for him to finish the job—I wasn't Peter; despite how close we were, I wasn't sure Jasper had the same inability to kill me. That wasn't the only reason I remained silent. I refused to show fear or weakness, in part out of pure defiance and also because it would only further inflame him.
"Jasper, stop!" Savannah commanded sharply. He immediately released me, and even though I'd just gotten a stay of execution, that it was her that was responsible for his mercy pissed me off. I would rather he kill me than save me because she had ordered him to. No one gave Jasper Whitlock orders. Savannah gave me a reproachful look. "That didn't have to happen, Charlotte. You know I might not always be able to control him. Don't let your pride and anger be the end of you."
"Fuck you!" I spat venomously. She frowned, displeased. It was only after that that I went to retrieve my broken body part and began the process of reattaching it. As I did so, I again took up my position across the hall facing the doorway of Jasper's room. Ripped apart or not, I still wasn't letting that bitch out of my sight.
oOo
BPOV
Are you working today?
The text was from Angela and had come about twenty minutes ago when I was slammed with customers, but I was on my last break now. My shift ended at half past seven.
Yes. —B
Can you come by my house before you head home tonight? —A
Sure. —B
I hadn't seen Angela since the day I'd been suspended, but we'd kept in sporadic contact. I kind of missed her, so it would be nice to see her for a few minutes before I went back to the Cullens' house, not home. That's how I had to start thinking of it, to help make the break cleaner. It never really had been my home anyway. I would be gone by the time school started up again, so this was my only chance to say goodbye to one of my two human friends. I wouldn't get that opportunity with Riley.
The rest of my shift went by without incident. The people of Forks were still in "holiday tipping mode" and I'd made decent money, but I was glad it was over. The whole day had dragged by even when it was busy, giving me no reprieve from thoughts of this morning, and about an hour after I arrived at work, a truly awful feeling had set in. I had nearly let Jasper kiss me. I kept trying to tell myself that I would have stopped it, that even if Carlisle hadn't called, I would have come to my senses and pushed him away, but that was a lie. If not for that ringtone, Jasper and I would have kissed and I would have been fucked, and that knowledge had haunted me all day. I just hoped that hanging out with Angela for a little while would help banish those thoughts and images from my head the way work hadn't, but my hopes for that weren't high …
Until I turned on to Angela's street and noticed Peter's Impala parked in front of her house. I pulled in behind it and brought my Shelby to a stop, listening to the five people and one vampire just beyond the lit, curtain-covered window. Peter's voice was smooth as honey as he regaled Angela, her parents and her little brothers with nonsense tales I wasn't sure were true or bullshit or somewhere in between, but he had a way about him as he spoke—the way of a true storyteller. He didn't have quite the same magnetic draw that Jasper did, but he was rakish and roguish and damn near irresistible anyway, and the worst part was that he knew it and he capitalized on it. The humans in the house were eating out of his hand. This concerned me not because I gave a fuck that Peter was dazzling them but because he felt there was a need to, and the awful feeling I'd had all day seized my gut more tightly as I realized this. Angela hadn't asked me here because it was her idea, if she was even the one who'd sent me those text messages at all. She had been used as nothing more than a pawn in whatever game Peter was playing, and I thought back to Jasper's revelation about how he'd come to the treaty line the day Carlisle had proposed he try human blood to fix his feeding problem:
"Peter and Charlotte lured me out to the treaty line under false pretenses … they all fuckin' ambushed me!"
The first part was certainly true—I had been lured here under false pretenses—but there was nothing that could be done about that. As for the last part, was that what this was? Was Peter ambushing me? And if he was, why?
There was only one way to find out.
I got my shit together literally and figuratively, preparing myself for anything, and exited my car, making my way carefully up the ice-slicked path to the Webers' front porch and purposely crunching the cold ground with my boots more than necessary as I walked. It was overkill—Peter already knew I was here—but I was feeling theatrical.
When I pressed my thumb down on the doorbell, I left it there just long enough to start to be annoying. It only took six seconds before Mrs. Weber answered.
"Hello, Bella," she greeted me warmly, gesturing me inside. I walked past her and waited for her to lead me to the living room, where I already knew Peter and the others were.
Angela was on her feet when we got there, ready to greet me herself, rushing up and wrapping her arms around my shoulders in a brief but tight embrace. "I'm so glad you're here! I missed you."
Despite my wariness, I smiled at her. "I missed you too."
She smiled back and was about to say something else when her father spoke up. "We'll just leave you to talk to your brother, Bella."
"Mom set you up in the guest room this time," Angela told me, "so come find me when you and Peter are done and I'll help you get settled."
"Yeah, sure," I agreed, confused. Guest room? Why would I need the guest room?
Then they all filed out of the room, Mrs. Weber and Angela's twin brothers seeming very reluctant to do so.
I plopped down on the couch perpendicular to Peter and met his gaze head on. I held my index finger and thumb up, pinching them so they were nearly touching. "This close to charming your way into Mrs. Weber's panties, I see."
He smirked but it wasn't cocky the way it usually would have been. "It's a gift."
I rolled my eyes at that but didn't bother commenting, instead choosing to get to the heart of things. My voice was quiet when I began to grill him. "Did Angela even send me those text messages?"
His smirk widened. It was all the answer I needed. "I may have 'borrowed' her phone for an hour or so when I first got here," he admitted impishly, his voice just as quiet.
"Why?"
"So that when you showed up here, she and her parents wouldn't know we blindsided you with this," he explained matter-of-factly.
"And what is this?" I questioned, barely masking that it was more of a demand than anything else.
"I'm gonna be honest, Punk," he said. "I considered lyin' to you but I know you and how goddamn stubborn you are, and I just love you too fuckin' much. If you ever found out I lied … I can't do it."
"Alright," I said, frowning. I did not like the sound of this.
"You've got to stay here for a few days," he told me succinctly.
"Because …" I prompted.
"Because there's a situation at home," Peter replied, his eyes boring into mine and relaying the seriousness of it. "One you can't help with, one that's dangerous. You can't be there while we're takin' care of it."
I just stared at him, knowing I shouldn't protest.
"Promise me," he demanded, his tone hard even as he reached for my hands and squeezed them imploringly. "Promise me you will not be your usual stubborn fuckin' self and come home in some misguided belief that you can help. You can't."
"That's all you're gonna give me?" I asked.
"It's all I can give you," he said, squeezing my hands again. "Please, Punk."
I studied him: the tense set of his jaw, the pleading and weariness in his eyes, the worry. I didn't want to heed his request, and I certainly didn't like giving in so easily, but I would do this for him. He wouldn't ask this of me if he didn't have a good reason.
"Fine," I conceded. "I promise."
Peter let out a breath of relief and pulled me into a bone-crushing hug. It still made my skin crawl but I made no move to pull away because he obviously needed the reassurance of wrapping his arms around me, and even if I wasn't fond of it, I needed it too. I was almost sad when he retreated from our embrace.
"And the Webers?" I questioned. "What do they think is going on?"
"That we were invited to spend New Year's with Carlisle's sister in Alaska last minute but that you can't get all your shifts covered for the days we'll be gone. You have decided to stay here because you refuse to leave your boss and fellow waitresses high and dry. It's been forever since Carlisle's been able to visit his only 'blood' relation, so he can't pass up the opportunity, and you absolutely must have parental supervision in our absence what with being the juvenile delinquent with loose, questionable morals that you are," he said with a hint of teasing in his voice. "I also may or may not have let it slip that you're not ready to meet the extended family … you know, since you haven't decided whether or not you want us to adopt you."
"Was that last part really necessary, Peter?" I demanded harshly, scowling. It really had been too much to hope the adoption papers would never be brought up, but mentioning it to anyone outside the family wasn't cool. Angela was bound to ask me about it now, and what the hell was I going to say to her? Maybe he wasn't serious.
He shrugged innocently. "It's true."
"Do you even have family in Alaska?" Carlisle had mentioned that he'd made a few friends over the centuries, but he hadn't made it sound like they were close.
"Yes, as a matter of fact," Peter responded.
"But you won't really be gone?" I double-checked, narrowing my eyes at him in a dare to lie to me.
"No." It wasn't a lie. I knew it wasn't. I knew it even before I asked. "Carlisle has two more shifts at the hospital he has to work before our 'visiting the family' cover goes into place, but as far as the Webers know, the rest of us are leaving as soon as I get home. They're overnight shifts."
"Fine," I muttered again. "But what if this whole situation takes longer than New Year's for you to deal with? What then?"
"We'll figure something out," he said. "We're gonna tell the wolves the same cover story tomorrow. Our situation isn't any of their business but they might decide otherwise if they find out about it, and it won't do anybody any good if they stick their noses where they don't belong. We'll be stayin' out of sight to keep up the charade that we're gone. I know you know that means you've gotta keep your mouth shut."
"And I know you know I'm not a fucking idiot," I snapped with a glower, offended.
"I do know that," Peter assured me. "But it's worth sayin' anyway."
It was a full minute before either of us spoke again.
"Is everyone okay?" I had to ask. I didn't like the flicker of emotion that passed over his face when I did.
"They will be," he answered vaguely.
I wanted to interrogate him, insist that he tell me who wasn't fine, but I didn't.
"You can't call," he continued. I didn't even bother to hide how much that alarmed me. "We'll call you if we can. Just don't, don't call. Don't even text or email."
My frown intensified but he carried on before I could say anything. "That's very important, Bella. Please tell me you won't."
"I won't." I didn't like agreeing to this either, but I didn't see that I had any other choice.
My acquiescence elicited a weak smile from him, one I didn't return. "Do me a favor?"
"Aren't I doing you enough favors?"
His smile turned sardonic. "Do me another one."
"I'll take it under advisement," I responded sarcastically.
"How reassuring," Peter retorted, snorting with exasperation. "Just, stay out of trouble, okay?"
"I will do my very best," I promised, giving him a flippant salute. It didn't amuse him, but I couldn't bring myself to care. His amusement was not high on my list of priorities at the moment. If he was going to ask all this of me and not tell me why, why should it?
"Thanks, Punk," he breathed, even more relief palpable.
"Don't thank me. Doing what I'm told isn't my strong suit, and even if I manage it, it might not turn out the way you want it to," I informed him frankly.
"Maybe not," he admitted. "But points for effort. You get how important this is though, right?"
"Considering you couldn't possibly vague this whole situation up for me any more, yes," I assured him soberly. "Like I said, I'll do what you asked, but don't hold your breath on the outcome being in your favor."
"Of course not," Peter came back at me. What he said next was uttered so quietly that I doubted he meant for me to hear it, not that that mattered. "That would be too easy, and Lord knows, nothin' in our lives ever is."
I shrugged.
"I've gotta get goin'," he said, getting to his feet and facing me, beckoning for me to get to mine. "Give me some love before I go," he requested.
It was a somber one so I didn't even consider refusing him, whether there would be consequences for it later or not. It was another bone-crushing hug, like he was worried he would never see me again and this was the last time he would ever get to hold me. It probably was. If whatever was going on with the Cullens wasn't resolved by New Year's it definitely would be because that was the absolute latest I would stay in Forks.
"Love you, Punk," he murmured against the crown of my head as he pressed a kiss there, the truth of it so stark it felt like a punch to the gut.
"I love you too," I whispered back. It was a difficult thing for me to say for many reasons, the most prominent being that I had never said it to anyone before. I nearly choked on the words as I did, but they were true. It went against everything I believed in, everything I had been trained for, but I loved Peter. He really was my brother whether I wanted it or not.
He was beaming when he pulled away but the expression didn't last, his face turning grim and his eyes betraying just how much older he was than his appearance let on.
Then he was gone.
oOo
I had gone to find Angela a few minutes after Peter left, and we chatted as she helped me settle in, which included hanging the clothes that had been packed for me—most likely by Alice—in the closet or folding them and putting them in the chest of drawers. Once that was done, however, I was in no mood to visit, so I told her I was tired and needed to go to bed. The last thing I was, was tired though. My mind was too busy, warring over which of the events of the day to dwell on.
I still couldn't banish what had happened between Jasper and me this morning from my brain, from the moment he knocked on my door to when he left. It played on a constant loop I couldn't escape, leaving so many questions, too many questions, swirling in its wake. His wariness and uncertainty when he gave me my Christmas gift, how bewildered he was when I presented him with mine and the look on his face as I explained why I'd chosen it were certainly present, but they weren't the moments that stood out the most. The suddenness of his confession of how he'd thought about kissing me before the mistletoe incident and after Louisville, like he hadn't meant to say it, and the flicker of shock that overtook his perfect features after he did were some of the ones that had made the most deep-rooted marks. All I could think about that now was what the fuck? How could that possibly be true? He had told me, more than once, that our encounter had been a one-time, random bout of lust between two people who happened to be in the same place at the same time—a coincidental opportunity we'd both decided to take advantage of and nothing more. He had said it would never go there again, that he didn't think of me that way, that he didn't want me. Hadn't he? Or was that just what I'd wanted him to say, how I'd wanted him to feel, so I heard what I wanted to hear? No, no that wasn't right. It couldn't be right. Why would he want to kiss me? The knowledge that he did, or had at least thought about it, left me reeling and off-kilter.
The feel of our knees touching, the sight of him running his tongue so enticingly over that perfect and very kissable bottom lip of his and the sting of my teeth sinking into my own, the heat of his cool hand next to my thigh—those stuck out pretty fucking clearly too. We had come so close to closing that distance and devouring each other, because that was what Jasper had looked like he wanted to do, and I couldn't figure out if I was more relieved or disappointed that we'd been interrupted before we could. That made me feel even more off-kilter. I couldn't decide if I was more disturbed by that or by Peter's insistence that I stay with the Webers and not make any form of contact with any of the Cullens, and the nasty feeling that had settled around me earlier in the day intensified as I contemplated both situations.
I was desperately curious about why I had to stay away. I needed to know, but I had promised him, which only served to further heighten the bad feeling I had about whatever was going on. I had to trust Peter though. I had already come to the conclusion that he wouldn't have asked me to stay away if he didn't believe it was absolutely necessary and in my best interests, and what could I possibly do? Whatever the situation was, it was clearly vampire business. Jasper had told me that, as a human, I couldn't understand how their world worked. With my background, I probably understood better than he thought I did, but I still didn't really understand. I had to let the Cullens handle this … even if I didn't like it.
The last thought that passed through my head before I fell into an uneasy and brief sleep was that I hoped I didn't wake up tomorrow with crazy, rainbow-colored hair because I didn't know how I would calm down enough in light of everything that had happened today to change it back, and I definitely wouldn't be able to explain it to the Webers.
