A/N I've used several lines and circumstances from the Twilight book in this chapter. Twilight and its characters belong to their creator, Stephanie Meyer. No copyright infringement is intended or implied.

Special thanks to my beta Saritadreaming and my pre-readers, Popola and radioactive77. Could not have done this hair puller without you, guys.

Italicized lyrics after the chapter title come from the song Temptation by The Tea Party. I highly rec giving the song a listen. It's incredible and Jeff Martin is... just...le sigh and incredibly talented. Yeah, I'm a fan. Lol.


Prey for the Wicked

Chapter 8

Tentação

. . . . . .

We exist in a world
where the fear of illusion is real...

. . . . . .

The hot water pounds down over Bella's head and shoulders, streaming in rivulets that paint her skin with ribbons of pink. She tips her face up, accepting the burn because it matches the burn in her insides; the burn of anger and righteous fury that masks, but can't completely conceal, a riot of other emotions she cannot bring herself to confront.

The pictures on the wall of Mike Newton's apartment play through her thoughts in a sick slideshow she can't turn off.

How did he take so many without her ever knowing? How could she be so unaware of what was happening to her?

She feels violated, exposed, and she shivers despite the heat of the water. Jake's words come back to haunt her.

"Bella. Newton is obviously a sick freak, and no one knows where the hell he is."

She should be afraid, should be worried about her safety, but she seriously doubts Newton is a threat now. He might have been. The pictures and the tale they tell about someone who is disturbed impart a pretty clear message. He was stalking her, invading her privacy, stockpiling images of her, and for what?

Does it matter? You know he's gone, Bella. You know he is. The water burns, but the things she knows burn hotter, like a brand all over her skin. His brand. Edward's brand.

"You're mine, Isabella. From now until death claims you. Until I claim you."

He marked her: physically, mentally, emotionally.

"If any other man touches you, I will tear him limb from limb, piece by piece, without mercy."

She runs her fingers over her wrist. The bruises there from the tight grip of Mike's oily feeling hand are still noticeable.

"Remember this, my beautiful little lamb. Remember who you belong to."

Bella hasn't been the same since that night, and she knows, she just knows, that Mike Newton isn't a threat to her anymore.

She doesn't know how to feel about that. She doesn't know how to feel about anything.

She goes through her shower ritual. Shampoo, rinse and repeat, condition...she drags a razor over her legs, washes skin from her neck to her feet... The patterns soothe, allowing her to fall into a mindless rhythm.

Without conscious thought, she stands under the cooling water and presses shaky fingers to her neck. Unlike the marks on her wrist, these have faded almost completely away, so much quicker than they should have. She's had hundreds of bruises over her life; none of them have healed like this. All that remains are a few patches of yellow with two slightly darker pinpricks in the center. You can't really even see them, but she knows they are there.

Her skin tingles every time she touches those marks. A ghost-like sensation of pleasure-pain that haunts her flesh, as though he left something of himself behind.

Did he?

She spent hours on the internet, searching, not allowing herself to even absorb half of what she read, just letting the information skim the surface of her mind, never accepting anything. Not really. Because if she accepts it, she knows there is no going back. She's either insane, or the world she lives in is nothing like what she thought it was.

Her body still feels the same. She doesn't believe she's changing...

Isn't that the purpose of a bite?

"Stop," she whispers to herself. Stop, stop, stop...

"You're mine, Isabella..."

I'm not yours, you bastard. Whoever you are, whatever you are. I am not yours!

She reaches for the tap and yanks the dial all the way to cold. The blast of freezing water comes so abruptly it sucks the air out of her lungs. The shock of it still can't chase away her next thought.

Aren't you? If you're not his, why can't you stop thinking about him? Worse, why can't you stop wanting him...?

She has ached and yearned for days. Seven long days where she hasn't functioned, hasn't wanted to function, all because she felt that hole in her soul mend and knit itself closed under a stranger's hands, only to rip back open wider than ever when she woke up to a sun-drenched day more alone than ever, more incomplete than ever, more lost than ever...

This is insane. All of this is insane. It's not real. Stuff like this doesn't exist in the real world. There are no vampires, no immortal nightmares creeping into my bedroom stitching up my psychological wounds...

God, I don't want this...

The cold water makes her bones ache, her skin feel like it's being lashed into numbness. She tips her head and lets it drum over the back of her head, rush down her goose bump covered back.

Don't you, Bella? Don't you want exactly this?

Her subconscious thoughts bubble to the surface and mock her, because the truth is she's been lost and alone for so long, so tired of the yawning gulf of nothingness inside of her, that she isn't sure this isn't exactly what she wants.

Not him, but what he is. An end to her sadness and desolation, a reprieve from the sentence of more of the same, the peace she's never been able to find, all in one perfect, terrifying package.

He is death, and I'm a willing sacrifice.

Shivering, Bella reaches again for the tap and shuts it off. Her tired mind mocks her with her overly dramatic thoughts. She isn't suicidal, just...exhausted.

She steps out of the shower enclosure, her muscles trembling a little. She hasn't slept well since that night. Not because she doesn't sleep. The opposite is true. She sleeps deeper and longer than normal, barely able to keep her eyes open past the time when daylight begins to fade, falling into bed and not even remembering closing her eyes. No, it's not lack of sleep that makes her tired, it's the dreams she cannot shake that start the minute she succumbs to rest and persist until the late morning, when she drags herself up and awake.

Powerful, erotic dreams that lack clear images, but nevertheless leave her gasping and aching, that empty place inside of her crying out for...something more. Something she's touched and felt. Someone.

She drags her hand over the mirror, wiping away condensation, and revealing her image that reflects back at her all that she feels in the shadows under her eyes and the haunted trembling of her lips. Her hair drips icy water over her shoulders and breasts, down her belly and over her thighs, all too reminiscent of cool lips kissing her flesh, taking her down into sensations she never knew existed.

Why won't you get out of my head?

Dragging a hairbrush through her hair, Bella is grateful she was able to get Jake to leave. She's been avoiding everyone, even Jess these last few days, because she knows she can only hide how she's feeling for a short amount of time. The mirror mocks her with the truth of that. Less than two hours outside of the house, and she's drained and shaking, not from what was revealed about Mike, although none of that is pleasant, but because of the effort it required to bury her turmoil. Turmoil that is growing, not easing, the more time passes.

He isn't coming back. Whatever he is, whatever he did, he's gone. Long gone.

She should feel soothed by that thought; instead she feels...bereft.

What is wrong with me? I'm losing it. I'm not well. This isn't normal...

She tries to ignore the way her hand trembles as she brushes her teeth and smoothes lotion over her damp skin. She knows she needs help because none of this is rational, but she doesn't know who to trust or who to turn to. All she can do is pray this, whatever this is, passes.

Please, God, let it pass...

. . . . . .

In the parking lot of 'Black Automotive,' Jake sits in his truck letting it idle, his head back against the battered head rest. He can feel the vibrations of the engine in his back and legs, and it's a good feeling; a solid, reassuringly normal feeling. Proof that some things can be controlled and repaired. Machinery is so easy. It's why he's always loved the art of mechanics. There is no motor that he cannot bring to life with the right parts – hell even with the wrong ones; no knocking, misfiring, broken engine he cannot coax from a bleating, contentious beast into a purring, docile kitten.

Too bad real life and relationships are not so easy.

He drags a hand over his face, feeling the sticky residuals of nerve induced sweat cling to his palm. Standing in Newton's apartment and witnessing – not once but twice – the sick freak's twisted obsession with Bella, made him want to puke. Not just for the stomach curdling proof that a psycho has been right under his nose threatening someone he loves, but also because it forced him to realize, yet again, how far removed he is becoming in Bella's life.

Maybe if she didn't shut me out, I could have seen this.

The pictures on that wall gave a pretty good representation of the timeline Newton was operating under. He'd definitely amped up his surveillance and photography opportunities during the months after Bella threw Jake out of the house.

Snapping open the glove box, he roots through the contents to find a pack of Marlboro's. He started smoking at the age of sixteen, quit when he started dating Bella, and now, full circle, he is back at it. He flips the pack open and fingers the cigarettes inside, thinking about bad habits and hating the proof these stupid cancer sticks are pointing out. He's self destructing. Cigarettes are only the tip of the iceberg. He's been drinking more lately, and doing that is stupid given his family history. Billy, his father, was a raging drunk for years. Sarah, his mother, fed up with all of it, packed Jake and his sisters up one rainy Monday morning while Billy snored on the couch sleeping off his last bender, and drove them out of the Res. She hit the highway out of Forks and never looked back.

Jake was five at the time. His memories of those early years are hazy flashes seen through a child's eyes, but he can still remember the sound of doors slamming, Sarah crying, Billy slurring - an endless repetition of moments repeated too many times. For ten years after they left, his mom raised him and his older sisters by herself and did a damn fine job of it. When she got sick and passed away just after Jake's fifteenth birthday – ovarian cancer – he was forced back to the Res and a world he really didn't want any part of. Quileute may be his blood, his heritage and lineage, but he grew up outside of all of it in a thoroughly modern, normal world. By the time he returned, he was a big kid with a chip on his shoulder, and a whole lot of resentment that didn't give one shit that Billy Black had been sober for years and desperately looking for his kids. He gave even less than one shit about all the history of 'his people,' and all their screwed up legends and fantasy stories.

Billy tried for years, and failed miserably, to teach and include his only son in the beliefs of the tribe. Jake eventually found a way to forgive Billy for the past. He didn't have much of a choice given the circumstances, and the last thing he'd promised his mother was that he would make the best of his life. That meant sucking it up and dealing with the status quo, but that sucking it up didn't pertain, in Jake's mind anyway, to the sucking up of the shit Billy shoveled out.

Descended from wolves. Protectors of their people. Cold ones. First wives and treaties...

All that werewolf, vampire, bogus stuff embarrassed the hell out of Jake, and he made it very clear the first week after his eighteenth birthday, when Billy tried to recruit him to some asinine group of tribal Elders, that he wasn't ever going to be a part of the world Billy lived in beyond the basics of an address.

A fist through the wall and a broken kitchen table after that particular argument, emphasized his point clearly enough that Billy finally backed off. A car accident shortly after Sarah had vacated his life left Jake's father paralyzed from the waist down, but even if it hadn't, Billy lacked the physical size and strength, not to mention the knowhow, to control Jake.

Thinking back on that day leaves a bad taste in his mouth, worse than any cancer stick – not because he regrets doing what needed to be done to get Billy off his back, he doesn't. What he does regret though, is the hot-head temper that has been a part of him since the day his voice first started cracking and hair started showing up on his body. Like a living electrified wire of energy inside of him, it could be tripped with the slightest provocation. He's been battling it ever since puberty, and the truth is he's still not winning.

Like the cigarettes in his hand, anger and his poor self-control are just another self-destructive bad habit. He can't blame those traits entirely for the ending of his relationship with Bella – hell, she has a temper, too, and she's never had trouble holding her own against him. Case in point, him almost getting brained twice tonight. What it did do though, was ensure she wouldn't give him a second chance. Ever.

Jake lights his cigarette and rolls down the window. It's starting to get dark, and a light drizzle is beginning to fall. Inhaling the smoke, he lets his mind wander back to the night it all fell apart. Familiar twinges of guilt make his guts twist uncomfortably with the memories.

Bella was bitchy all that day. Jake would have chalked it up to PMS, but Bella really didn't have that issue, and it was the wrong time of the month anyway. He was tired and not exactly chipper himself. One problem after another had popped up at the shop that day. Piddly-ass stuff mostly, but still the kind that just piled up one on top of another until he was nursing the mother of all headaches. He'd just wanted some peace and quiet, a little time on the couch with a game to unwind, maybe a beer or two.

He was late. He didn't call to let her know. He didn't remember to turn his cell phone on, again. She'd wanted him to pick up groceries for the dinner she was making, the dinner he was late for – typical relationship stuff that resulted in a snarky spat. One that should have ended with him eating crow, apologizing, and then taking her to bed for some loving make-up sex.

And it would have, except all week Bella had been doing her 'holding her guts in with her arms' routine, acting distant and being too quiet, the way she always got when whatever the hell made her do the self-hugging shit got bad.

It still would have, except all that week Jake had watched her do it and felt more and more helpless to know what to do for her. More and more tired of trying to figure out how to help her. He just wanted peace and quiet. He wanted to eat dinner and crash on the couch, have a little down time and then take his girl to bed, spend some time rolling around in their sheets and feeling her skin all over his.

Except, when she got like that, she never wanted sex, and the dry spell over that last two-weeks had been getting on his nerves.

Except, Bella wasn't in any mood for his excuses; she was a wounded little thing just looking to lash out, probably sick of his shit, too, because yeah, at that time he hadn't exactly been acting like a good boyfriend.

She yelled, he yelled. Stuff was said, and he doesn't really remember all of it. He might have verbally thrown things in her face he shouldn't have, things about Leah being there for him more than she was, which wasn't a lie, but still, he shouldn't have said it.

Leah, at that time, was a friend, nothing more. He hadn't crossed any lines, but he'd be lying if he said it didn't occur to him, even then, that he could cross lines, that Leah was more than willing to let him cross lines.

Just like tonight, Bella lost her cool and pitched stuff at him, an ashtray, the TV remote, only that night Jake's temper snapped, and snapped good. He punched three holes in the wall by the door just before he stormed out of it, yanking the screen right off its hinges, leaving it hanging by splintered wood pieces as he stalked to his truck and screeched out of the driveway down the road.

He went to the diner and hit the booze, hard, knowing it was stupid, but too pissed off to care. Later, too drunk to drive home, he tried to call Seth Clearwater to come and get him, only Seth wasn't home. Leah was.

She drove out and picked him up, and somehow they ended up parked on a dark side street where Leah made her way onto his lap, her tongue down his throat. It never went any farther than that. Not that night. Passing headlights sobered him up, and he'd pushed her away only to spend twenty minutes heaving his guts out in a ditch, effectively, and thankfully, ruining anything that might have been left of the mood.

Leah, pissed off and slighted, drove him home, and maybe it still would have been okay, except Bella was waiting for him. She watched him stagger out of Leah's car, then walked back in the house and locked the door, wedging a chair under the knob so he couldn't get in without doing more damage than he already had.

Leah left, and a half hour later, two busted out windows, and the forever memory of Bella standing on their porch crying, got stamped into his brain as Charlie slapped him in handcuffs and shoved him in his police cruiser. Jake spent that night in the Forks equivalent of the drunk tank. He woke up the next morning with the worst hangover and the jarring sound of Charlie dropping a duffle bag packed with his clothes at his feet.

"Bella doesn't want you home right now, and frankly, I don't blame her. Go stay with, Billy. Give her some time to cool off."

Ashamed, Jake staggered to his feet, unable to meet Charlie's eyes. As he went to leave the cell, Charlie spoke very quietly.

"I like you, Jake. You're like the son I never had, but Bella is my baby girl. You ever pull another stunt like this, you ever make her cry again, I will beat your ass to a pulp and charge you with criminal misconduct. Get your act together, son. You hear me?"

Jake lets the memory fade out. The sting of regret and humiliation is still fresh, despite the months that have passed. The worst part of it wasn't the embarrassment, it's the fact that he let Charlie down and hurt Bella.

He exhales smoke out the window and feels those emotions all over again, fresh and deserved because once again, he's failing to protect Bella. Some sicko perv right under his nose had a jones for her, and he never fucking knew it. His skin crawls with the thought of what Mike could do to her, given a little more time to incubate his delusions. And who knows where the cocksucker is now? Or what he's planning?

Jake's skin begins to crawl in earnest now.

His cell phone chirps, and he drops the half finished smoke out the window, snatching it out of his pocket, his heart kicking in his chest.

Bella?

He stares at the unfamiliar number, confused, before his outdated cell finally kicks in with the caller display feature.

Shit. Leah.

He lets it go to voice mail and shoves the door of his truck open. Long legged strides eat up the distance to his shop and the computer inside with the fast internet connection. Disregarding the new message sign flashing on the screen, he dials Embry's cell and unlocks the door to the garage, heading up the stairs to his office three at a time.

"Hey, Jake." Embry doesn't sound surprised to hear from him. He does sound resigned.

"Embry, you know what I want."

"Jake, don't even go there. I know you're upset…"

"I want to know everything you know about Mike Newton."

"You know I can't do that. This is an open case, and it's privileged information. I can't discuss any of it with a civilian, not even you."

"Don't give me your shit, Embry. Did you see those fucking pictures? This is Bella we're talking about. Don't make me remind you that you owe me."

"Damn it, Jake…"

"I'm at my office. Get here, now."

Jake hangs up, and boots up his computer, already dialing out again.

"Ja...aay...kie, boy. How's it going, man? Long time no talk." Quil laughs, sounding a little stoned, which he probably is. Jake doesn't care.

"Quil, I need you."

There's a pause and the sound of car keys being picked up off a table. Jake closes his eyes, grateful for the friend he knows will always have his back.

"Where are you?" No other questions, and in the background the rumble of a lovingly rebuilt 1969 Mustang vibrates to life.

"The shop; my office. Doors unlocked. Embry's on his way."

Another short pause as Quil digests and wonders, but doesn't ask. A door closes and the rumble increases.

"I'm on my way; be there in ten."

Jake makes one more call to Seth, grateful when Leah doesn't pick up, then settles into his chair to stare at his computer screen. Seth is the computer genius, but he's taught Jake enough that he can get a head start. He pulls up a series of programs and starts his search.

With a little perseverance, he's sure he'll find Mike Newton before the moon hits its highest point in the sky. The little sick fucker can't stay off the kind of grid Jake is working with. No one can.

. . . . . .

In comparison to the brighter lighting in the bathroom, Bella's bedroom is dark. Even before her eyes can adjust to the growing gloom cast by evening shadows, she freezes in her tracks because she knows she isn't alone.

The skin on the nape of her neck prickles, and her heart skitters in her chest alarmingly. Adversely, she feels able to take the first full breath of the day around the tightness in her chest.

Edward.

She knows it's him, recognizes it on a level far that goes deeper than observation. Her mouth gets dry, and her palms get damp. The aching emptiness in her center dissipates.

In the corner, she catches a glimpse of movement and turns toward it.

"Hello, Isabella. Have you missed me?"

She can make him out now; a dark silhouette sitting in an even darker corner, in her rocking chair. Her hand fumbles for the light switch, heart in her throat. Cool fingers touch hers, and she jumps back, a soundless cry coming out of her tight throat as a gasp. The light floods the room from the small lamp, and he's there.

Oh, God, he's here, standing right in front of her…

He looks exactly as she remembers him. Dark, auburn tinted hair that's more copper than red, blazing black eyes, pale complexion. His jaw is cut from stone, his nose a little severe yet perfectly proportioned under those damned eyes. Lips, softly full and sensuous, balance out features that would otherwise be too hard, too angular, too chiseled out of marble like some demigod carved in ancient Greece.

He's so beautiful…

She never heard him move.

Dozens of panicked questions flit through her mind like scared birds.

Who are you? What are you? What do you want? Why are you here? Why me?

Her mind gets stuck on the last one, the final frightened little bird that can't stop bouncing off the transparent glass even though it offers no exit.

Why me? Why me? Why me? Why me?

She never asks why, so she focuses on getting sweet unrestricted air into her lungs and calming her racing heart.

Edward of the dark eyes and even darker intents, Edward of her dreams that should have been nightmares but were something so much more, cocks his head to the side like a lion perplexed by the actions of its meal. He studies her.

"You haven't answered my question. Did you miss me, Isabella?" His voice is a soft baritone tinged with an indescribable velvety feel that wraps its way around her like a physical touch.

Swallowing past a dry throat, she licks her lips in a useless attempt to wet them, her mouth like a desert. He watches the movement all too intently. Somehow Bella manages to shake her head in negation to his question, though it damns her for a liar. The almost cruel turn to his lips paints his smirk as proof that he knows it.

"No?" he mocks, arching a heavy eyebrow. He turns more towards her, and she takes a step back in reaction. The move feels wrong, but there is enough fear in her to keep her from doing what she truly wants. Move closer. It brings her up against the wall, trapped, and he smiles again, dark, taunting.

"I'm wounded, Isabella." He's directly in front of her now, so close she can taste the sweetness of his breath on the air as he leans in closer, angling his head so that his words are a touch free caress on her ear. "After what we shared the other night, I haven't been able to stop thinking about you, and now I come to find you do not feel the same?" He exhales with a fake wounded sigh, and Bella feels one lone finger touch her neck, beginning at her runaway pulse and then moving down slowly to the hollow of her throat. "My male pride is affronted. Will you not even falsify a little to ease the sting to my ego?"

She feels so many different things at once. Fear and tension at the forefront, but as his finger strokes the sensitive skin at the base of her neck, she feels a longing start up in her body that is almost violent. His touch is cool, yet it makes her skin feel hot, over-sensitive and thin, as if the nerves are closer to the surface.

He angles his head, and comes away from her ear to look down at her. His eyes are different she realizes, struck by the thought and clinging to it like an anchor in the sea of her insanity. Her body feels like it's been attached to his by strings. She can feel the pull, and she wants, aches, to sink into his center of gravity, fall into it and give up her own.

Fall. He'll catch you, some secret voice inside of her reassures, even as a saner version screams at her to run.

"Your eyes are different," she whispers, speaking out loud to give matter and substance to her anchor. "They were black with red rings around them before. Now the rings are more…golden."

His expression switches from amused to speculative. His finger pauses its relentless, mind assaulting, feel good attack on her skin.

"Are they?"

"Yes." A little more life comes back into her limbs, and Bella shifts her feet, suddenly aware of how little she is wearing. The death grip she has on the flimsy towel makes her fingers numb. She doesn't dare flex them.

Edward smiles, those strange eyes flashing with amusement, and her heart pounds harder.

He's more than just beautiful…

"Perceptive," he muses, as though noticing something for himself and merely speaking the thought out loud.

The chain on her vocal chords frees up, and she asks, "How did you get in here?"

"The door," he answers, mocking again.

"It was locked. I locked it…"

"I broke it, again. I'm afraid it's not repairable this time, but don't worry. I'll have a new one installed. One that only you and I will have the key to."

Bella blinks.

Edward's finger resumes its stroking, moving lower, sweeping back and forth along the towels edge and the slight swell of her breasts. His head lowers.

"Enough of trivial things like eye colour and locks that cannot ever keep me out. Perhaps a kiss will help restore your memory of our time together. You see," he breathes the words over her mouth and her head fogs, "I know you enjoyed our time together, Isabella. I can still hear your sweet little cries for more ringing in my head."

His lips, cool and solid, yet softer, silkier, than anything she has ever felt before, touch hers. All the air in her lungs leaves her in a moaning rush, and her knees buckle. Only the thinnest thread of sanity remains, but it is enough to empower her to twist her head to the side.

"No, please, no." There is no volume or conviction to her plea. He chuckles darkly.

"Your mouth says no, Isabella, but your body is speaking to me in an entirely different language."

It is; she knows it. She doesn't want his kiss, and yet she does. Her body is burning for a whole hell of a lot more than just a kiss, too. The rapidly fast beating of her heart is being kept company by a matching drum throbbing between her legs…

"Please," she manages again, only she's not entirely certain what she wants. Despite that, a mere second later she is aware that he is no longer in front of her. Blinking past a burning rush of tears she refuses to let fall, she sees he's moved back to the rocking chair.

He's frowning, smoothing his hand over the perfect pleat in his dark slacks, watching her. He exhales through his nose, an impatient noise. Despite the sound, his frown fades, and once again his expression becomes devoid of emotion. A quiet, watchful, clean slate.

"Forgive me, Isabella. I'm afraid I've forgotten all the rules of courtship and gotten several steps ahead of myself." He smiles again, but Bella can't tell if he's sincere in that twisted mentality of his or mocking her again.

"Is that what this is?" she asks, hating the way her voice warbles and cracks from her strained throat. She needs a drink of water, but is too afraid her legs won't hold her up without the wall at her back. "A courtship?" The inanity of a question like that doesn't escape her, but she can't find the wherewithal to form better ones.

Edward cocks his head again. The light catches the strange colour in his eyes, making them glint. "In a sense, yes, I suppose it is."

Bella manages to shake her head. "I want you to…to leave," she stammers.

"Do you?" The smirk is back, the tilt to his head arrogant.

"Yes!" She finds some volume to her insistence and with it some of the paralyzing fear fades giving new substance to her jelly-like knees. She manages a step away from the wall. "Leave. I didn't ask you to come here. If you don't leave, I'm going to call the police." It's all bluster, and she knows he knows it.

"By all means, Isabella. Call your father."

Her feet freeze to the floor at the mention of Charlie.

"Interesting man Chief Swan. Rather a mix of several things. Small town cop with little skill set, and yet his instincts, when he listens to them, are sound. And he is so lovingly proud and protective of his only child."

"How do you know…?"

"Isabella, please. Do you think I'd neglect such an important facet of a courtship as meeting your father? I admit I've stepped out of bounds in the normal time line of events. I should have met him first and garnered his permission, but then, I'm old-school. It's not how things are done nowadays, is it?" He doesn't wait for an answer, simply smiling as her head reels. "Modern courtships are so…lax in rules. A benefit to me, I suppose, given the liberties I've already taken with you."

She ignores the sexuality that oozes out of him, and the way his eyes skim her entire body when he wraps his sensuous lips around the word 'liberties.' She even ignores the way her body responds to it.

"What did you do to him?" For the first time since she walked into the room, her fear has real substance. It bolsters her courage, giving her a boost of adrenaline that has her moving closer to him. "If you hurt him…"

"Relax, Isabella. Your father is fine. What reason would I have to harm him? I merely introduced myself. It is always wise to let authorities in small communities know when someone new comes to town, after all."

What fear hasn't been able to accomplish, relief does. Bella feels her knees give out, but before she can collapse, solid arms are supporting her weight effortlessly.

Oh, God. He smells so good…She wants to push her face against his chest and sag into him, let him carry this weight, do what he wants with her…

What is wrong with me? She thinks, desperately scrambling to find sense, to find reason, to find some damn shred of common sense that tells her what she should be doing.

She tries to pull away, but her hands are pushing against a cool cement wall that doesn't give an inch.

"Let me go."

He lifts her instead and carries her to the bed, the movement too quick and too alarming, making her cry out. He settles her there, and suddenly he's over her, too close, too in her space.

Not close enough…

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Isabella. You've gotten under my skin." He isn't touching her, just hovering over her, his hands braced on either side, and he looks like he's trying to figure out a puzzle. It's unnatural how he's holding himself so perfectly still. She doesn't even think he's breathing.

"What are you?" she gasps, her heart hammering so hard in her chest she wonders if it will burst.

He smiles and lowers his head until his nose skims her cheek, her jaw, slipping lower into the curve of her neck and shoulder. Her skin ignites everywhere, heat and need pulsing harder between her legs. She feels a small rush of moisture there, warm and soft. His nostrils flare and she wonders if he can smell her. She's sure he can when his eyes seem to get darker.

"You know what I am, Isabella."

With a violent jerk she shakes her head, her hair tangling against the pillow behind it.

"Yes, you do," he reputes her denial. "Say it," he whispers, and she feels something cool and…God…his tongue on her skin, licking right where her pulse is jumping and she wants…she doesn't know what she wants…she just…wants, please…

"Please."

He raises his head and pins her with that stare. "Say it out loud, Isabella" he urges. "Tell me what I am."

There is nothing left inside of her to deny what he's asking. He could ask anything, and she'd give it to him now. The thought is terrifying, liberating, sickening, thrilling.

"Vampire."

He looks at her with such intensity, those eyes missing nothing. "And are you afraid?"

Something inside of her gives, loosens, like a weight sliding off her. Realization is quick and abrupt, bringing sweet relief. She is terrified, but not of him. She is terrified of what all this means, of what he wants, but she isn't afraid of him.

"No. You won't hurt me." She has no idea why she is so certain of this, but the second she says the words she knows they're true.

Edward's eyes get blacker, darkness swelling and swallowing the gold. "I've already hurt you," he says, a snarl to his tone. His eyes fall on her throat, on the place he just licked that still throbs and tingles like she's been stroked by electric sparks, the place just beneath her pulse that still bears marks – his marks. "Your blood is beyond compare, Isabella. I don't plan to deny myself the pleasures of you. All of them, do you understand?"

"You won't hurt me," she repeats.

His lip curls and he's gone. Bella blinks, sits up slowly, disoriented, oddly disappointed and relieved all at the same time. He's standing by the window, looking out, one hand clenched around the curtain he's holding back, the other in his hair, raking the strands, fisting them. He looks angry yet contemplative when he turns his head to look at her.

"Such faith," he says, tone dripping condescension. "And yet your heart is racing, and this entire room is perfumed with your fear."

"You won't hurt me."

His expression softens, and he moves at normal speed to the side of the bed. He touches her face with one hand, stroking the back of his knuckles down her skin.

"I feel…very protective of you." He drops his touch with a harsh exhale of breath, his hand falling to his side and curling in and out of a fist.

He regards her for a long minute while she wrestles with the dual desires inside of her.

Run, scream, fight, give in, let go, trust…

"How much do you trust this instinct that believes I won't harm you?"

Bella swallows, licks her lips.

She's chasing the elusive, and the hole in her chest is stuffed so full there isn't room for anything else. She can't lose this feeling, she…just can't.

"I trust it," she answers simply, and with that statement her heart beat slows and steadies. A strange sense of calm washes over her.

Edward holds out his hand, palm up, steady as a rock. "Come with me," he urges in that velvet-laced voice that makes her feel hypnotized. A beautiful smile teases up the corners of his mouth, no less dark and dangerous for the beauty of it.

She doesn't think, simply reaches out and places her hand in his, letting him lift her up.

"I'm not dressed."

Edward plucks a dark blue silk robe off the back of her bedroom door, a birthday gift from Renee she's rarely ever worn, and holds it out. Slipping her arms in, she shivers a little at the touch of the material. Her skin is so hyper sensitive, so aware. Edward pulls the towel down and away. When his eyes skim her body, she feels it like a touch.

"Ah, Isabella, so beautiful," he compliments, before wrapping the robe around her and belting it.

Her body aches…

She is poised on the precipice of self destruction and self discovery. She knows it but leaps blindly ahead anyway.

"Where are we going?"

"Someplace private, where we can talk," he tells her.

She follows him as he leads her out of the house, past the broken lock, and out into a sultry late summer night. He sweeps her off her feet, and a heartbeat later she's seated in a car with sumptuous, leather interior seats. Edward is at the wheel, the car already in motion before she can assimilate the actions that have brought her here, the madness.

In for a penny, in for a pound…

. . . . . .


A/N Just a reminder. As explained in chapter 5, Jake is not a full-fledged werewolf in this story. He carries the werewolf gene, but he cannot phase/change into a wolf. The Cullens never came to Forks, remember, so therefore the window of opportunity for the werewolf transformation to begin has closed. (In this story the change must happen/begin during puberty or the genes remain dormant.) He does have some traits common to the werewolf that make him a threat. Time will tell just how much.

Edward is making some mistakes that might catch up to him. Some are obvious, others not so much. Can you spot them? ;-)

Thanks for reading!

Aleea