Chapter 15: Trust

EDWARD

It was too much.

Kissing Bella obliterated every other thought in my head. For the first time in forever my mind was locked into the present. My worries about our fucked up world fell away. Everything was suspended and I didn't want the kiss to end.

And when I realized what was happening, it terrified me.

Without even realizing that I was doing it, I pushed Bella away. It was a knee-jerk reaction.

However, the minute I did it, I saw how much I'd hurt her.

I clenched my eyes shut as I pictured the hurt in her eyes and how her lips quivered in pain.

I immediately wanted to take it back, but I never got the chance because before I could say anything beyond her name, she left me.

A knot of pain twisted my stomach as I realized I was alone again. I'd expected it to happen all along, but the reality of being alone was so much worse.

I pictured everyone else I'd ever loved and cared about. All of them were gone and now so was Bella.

I'd known that the minute she found out that there were other survivors nearby that she'd want to be with them. I was too cold and hard. I was dangerous. With other options, Bella would be happier than she would be with me.

But as long as she didn't have any other options, Bella would stay with me. I knew that it was selfish, but I couldn't help it. So, I put off telling her about Emmett and Rosalie, hoping that they'd leave before she found out.

But that fucker Emmett just had to put up that sign.

It forced me to have to tell Bella about all of my fuck ups. I had to tell her how I failed my mother and sister, how I failed Garrett, how Jasper realized I was too dangerous to stay with his new family.

I didn't want her to know how much of a mess I was. I'd worked so hard to show her over the months that she could depend on me, that I could be trusted.

But these two survivors had to force my hand.

Now, I was alone and I had to get used to it.

But just as that thought formed in my head, another followed.

You need her, Edward. Don't just let her leave you. Beg her if you need to.

I'd hurt her by pushing her away, but I was just so damn confused.

You're just scared, Edward. You're afraid to need her.

That realization made me quickly come to a decision.

I couldn't let her go. I had to convince her to be with me. If that meant that I had to join up with other survivors, I would.

Striding over to the corner of the cabin where we kept our weapons, I grabbed my crossbow and shot gun in order to go look for her. However, I gasped in horror when I saw that Bella had left her weapons behind.

BELLA

Sobbing and winded, my heart slammed crazed leaping beats into my ears. I knew that I was making too much sound as I ran, but it was all I could do to stay ahead of the dead that were tracking me.

I had no idea where to go, or when I could stop. All I knew was that there was about a dozen dead chasing me and I was weaponless.

Their constant moans sounded like they were only a few steps behind me.

There was no way for me to get back to Edward because the dead blocked my way. And he had no reason to come after me. I'd forced myself on him and at first I thought that he was just as interested in me as I was him. However, when he pushed me away, I knew how wrong I was.

So, like a child, I stupidly ran away.

My only choice now was to head towards the river and pray that I'd be able to find the other survivors.

I felt like I'd been running for hours, but the river still seemed so far away. I prayed with every step that the dead would lose interest or something else would attract their attention, but they were relentless.

I weaved through the trees as fast as I could, trying to avoid the dead that seemed to be coming from all directions.

Too late, I realized that I'd come to a dead end where my escape was blocked by a huge dead fall of rotting wood.

Frantically, I looked around for an escape, but there was nothing.

So, I sprinted across the wooded clearing and crouched behind the pile of rotted wood. I knew that the dead would still be able to smell me, but at least I'd have a barrier between me and them.

Luckily, I found a pile of rocks and dirt built up around the broken branches.

Grabbing a grapefruit-sized stone, I hurled it as far as I could in the opposite direction of the river. The rock banged off a tree, making an enormous clapping sound, which I knew would attract the attention of the dead.

I risked peering over the top of the deadfall to get a better view.

The dead were threading through the thick column of trees, their heads wobbling left to right for a moment searching for the sound. Then, almost as one, they turned in the direction of the sound and began to stagger away.

I didn't even take the opportunity to breathe before bursting from behind the wood and running towards the river again.

I could see the river sparkling through the trees in the distance, but it was still too far away. The dead would be on my trail before I reached it. I could already hear some of them change direction and continue hunting me.

I couldn't run much longer. My lungs were burning and my legs were aching unbearably, which was causing me to start to slow down.

So, I did the only thing I could think of in my desperate situation.

"HELP! HELP ME!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

I knew that I would attract more dead, but I hoped that I'd also attract the attention of the survivors who would bring weapons.

"PLEASE! PLEASE HELP!" I wailed.

I heard the moaning of the dead grow louder as I stirred them into a frenzy.

"Please…" I whimpered as I continued to run.

The woods vibrated with moans from all directions, closing in on me.

The panicked thoughts in my head were slowly solidifying into one. I was about to die a horrible death.

"I'll see you soon, Dad," I thought.

But Charlie didn't answer.

Suddenly, a great hulking figure appeared about a hundred yards ahead, coming towards me quickly.

I started sobbing as I saw my death approaching.

"Get down!" the silhouette shouted.

I didn't have time to think. I just dropped to the ground.

A gunshot thundered through the trees and then another and another.

I didn't move. I kept my face pressed into the dead leaves and dirt.

"Okay. Run, girl! Keep going until you reach the river!"

Without even thinking, I jumped to my feet and began to run, putting my absolute trust in this stranger.

I'd only made it a few yards when I heard the rhythmic snapping of twigs in another part of the woods speeding up as it came towards me.

It was coming from the river, forcing me to turn and head away from the water.

I jumped over an uprooted tree whose large roots stretched across the ground.

Too late, I discovered I was on a slight hill. Stumbling forward, my feet slipped out from under me. The momentum threw me forward onto my stomach and I began to slide down the hill, my face being whipped and scratched with rocks and branches.

At the bottom, I frantically rolled over, knowing that the dead were probably still following me.

Blood started dripping down my forehead from some cut that I'd gotten falling down the hill and it blurred my vision. However, through the red tinted haze, I could see that a large dead man was coming towards me at a fast pace. He was missing bits and pieces of his body and one of his arms was hanging by only a few threads of flesh. However, without a weapon, I was no match for him.

I screamed a breathy scream, trying to claw my way to my feet, but my feet couldn't get traction in the dirt.

The dead man sniffed the air and with a roar, he lunged at me. He was practically on top of me when a figure burst out of the foliage with a double-barrel shot gun already in mid-swing. The weapon struck the corpse with an incredible force on the side of his skull. From the impact, the corpse staggered one step and then fell to the mossy earth.

Wiping my face, I tried to clear away the blood that was obscuring my vision, but it didn't do much good. I watched helplessly as the blurry figure savagely finished the job with four more tremendous blows to the corpse's skull. It was a sickening sight as blood, brain, and tissue flew everywhere with each blow. The cast off spray covered my rescuer, but it didn't seem to faze him.

However, no sooner had he obliterated the dead man then another lumbered out of the woods.

Again, my rescuer attacked the corpse with a ferocity that seemed almost inhuman.

I couldn't process what was happening in front of me as the fear and panic pounded in my head. The only thing I could think of was to get away. I sprung to my feet and began to run again.

"Bella!"

I nearly fell as I suddenly came to a halt at Edward's voice.

Spinning around, I realized that it was Edward under all the zombie blood who had saved me.

With a sob, I sprinted towards him and threw myself into his arms.

"Oh god, Bella. That was—that was—fuck, that was so close!" he gasped, his arms holding me against him so tightly that I could barely breathe.

"I… ccccc… couldnn't gggett back to you," I sobbed. "Tttthere were ttttooo many…"

Edward didn't respond with words. Instead he buried his face in the crook of my neck, breathing me in.

Gunshots thundered through the woods suddenly, causing Edward's face to snap away from mine.

My heart jumped in fear when I realized that it was my other rescuer who was still trying to fight off the dead.

"Edward, we have to help him," I said, stepping back and grabbing a hold of his hand. "He's fighting the herd that was chasing me all alone."

Without hesitation, Edward pulled me along with him as he ran in the direction of the sound.

Turning his head this way and that, Edward tried to guess the direction of the gunshots. After another one, Edward zeroed in on one direction.

With a nod of his head, he handed me his gun and swung his crossbow off his back.

At first, there were only a few dead in our path which we easily took down with gun and crossbow. But as we approached the gunfire, the dead started to increase in number.

Edward took the lead, using his axe now instead of his crossbow.

Swing after swing, he took down the dead, but there were still too many.

Most of my shots were kill shots. But as we got closer to the centre of the fighting, I worried that I would shoot my rescuer by accident.

So, I hauled out my ice pick and tried to take down the dead that were out of Edward's reach.

It was hard. I didn't have Edward's power to take down more than one corpse at a time, so I was not that much help.

Just as I finished killing a middle-aged female corpse, I looked up to check on Edward.

What I saw startled me into stillness. Even being in the midst of them, the deads' focus was not on Edward. Many of them seemed to not even be aware that he was right in front of them.

However, before I really had time to think about it, another dead was in my face.

"Shit," I grunted, stabbing at its face with as much force as I had.

It took three or four jabs before I found my mark and the corpse went limp. However, before I was able to jump out of the way, it fell forward on top of me.

I struggled to push it off of me, but its dead weight pressed me into the ground.

"Edward!" I gasped, rolling from side to side to try to knock it off of me.

"Need some help, little lady," a deep voice said from above me.

I looked up startled to hear a voice other than Edward's.

It came from a large barrel-chested man with cropped brown hair who was standing over me with a bright smile plastered on his face.

With no effort at all, the man grabbed the corpse covering me and heaved it off to the side.

Then, he reached down and took my hand in order to help me to my feet.

I looked for Edward and saw that he was finishing off the last of the dead with a downward swing of his axe.

"Your man is pretty good with an axe," my rescuer said, flashing me his dimpled smile again.

"Yes, he is," I said, speculating on why the dead seemed to ignore Edward.

As I was thinking, Edward strode over to us, shaking off his axe that was covered in gore.

"Bella, are you okay?" he said, his eyes filled with concern.

"I'm okay. Are you?" I looked him over for any injuries and breathed a sigh of relief when I didn't find any.

I pulled the bandana that I'd been wearing to keep my hair out of my face off and made a move to clean him of the zombie guts. However, he took it from me instead and began dabbing at the cut on my forehead.

A throat cleared behind us, snapping us both out of our concern for each other.

"My name is Emmett. It's great to meet other survivors even if it hasn't been under the best circumstances," he said, reaching out to shake my hand.

I took his hand in mine and gave him a smile.

"My name's Bella. Thank you so much for coming to help me. You put your life at risk for a stranger. I can't thank you enough," I said, shaking his hand and then releasing it.

During this exchange, I felt Edward tense behind me.

"What about you, red-haired guy? Am I going to find out your name this time?" Emmett said with a teasing smile.

I looked at Edward from the corner of my eye.

This was going to be hard for Edward. He didn't trust strangers.

I held my breath as I waited for him to respond.

When he finally did, I had to repress a sigh of relief.

"I'm Edward. Thank you for helping Bella," he said in a guarded voice.

Emmett either didn't notice Edward's tense behavior or chose to ignore it because the smile never left his face.

"Well, when Rose and I heard her call for help, I had to come. There aren't many people left in the world."

Edward flinched when Emmett said that I'd called for help, but otherwise remained impassive.

"So, where's your group?" Emmett asked.

"Why? Why do you want to know?" Edward snapped, his body becoming rigid.

"Whoa, buddy. I'm just asking because Rose and I would love to join up with a group. It's only been us for so long and as I said on the sign there's safety in numbers," he responded, his hands raised in a calming gesture.

However, Edward's defensive posture didn't ease up.

"We're not with a group. It's been the two of us for months now," I said.

I knew that Edward probably wasn't happy with me for sharing any amount of information with Emmett, but we had to start somewhere. We had to start thinking about the future.

"Oh, well I guess we're in the same boat then," Emmett said, looking slightly defeated by the news.

"Being in a group doesn't mean safety," Edward said, coldly.

Emmett gave him a contemplative look.

"You're right. Rose and I saw some shit go down near the beginning of this insanity that really questioned our belief in humanity… but we have to try, don't we?" he responded.

Edward just grunted in response.

For a moment, the three of us looked at each other in awkward silence.

It was Emmett that broke it.

"I'd like to invite the two of you to come back to my camp with me. I don't know where your camp is, but it's late in the day and no one should be wandering the woods after dark. When I left, Rose had supper cooking and there's plenty. We could get to know each other over a meal. I bet it's been a long time since you've had a delicious steak," he said with a wide grin. "Plus, we have shelter tonight if you need it."

Looking at Edward, I tried to decide what he wanted to do. He came after me, so I knew that he cared for me. However, I didn't want to pressure him into doing something he didn't want.

However, Edward didn't say anything. He didn't show his feelings, either for or against going to Emmett's camp.

I waited a few moments longer before deciding that it wasn't just up to Edward.

Meeting other survivors was something I needed to do.

"We'd be happy to join you…" I said to Emmett with a smile.

"Great!" Emmett said with a laugh and then looked at Edward seriously.

"We have water back at camp for you to wash up, dude. I'm assuming you don't always look like you've bathed in zombie guts. You're pretty fucking gross."