~ Santa Fe, New Mexico - October 1999 ~
I stood in the shadows outside of the Chapel of San Miguel. It was 2:00am and three other vampires were stalking me. They were unaware of my gift or that I allowing myself to be followed.
When I returned to the United States last week I couldn't help stopping by Phoenix to check on my singer. I spent the week cleaning up the neighborhoods around my singer's home. The local papers indirectly picked up on my activity by lauding the local Police with capturing a prominent drug dealer and two murderers within a one-week span. Each night, I made my way back to my singer's house to experience the delicious torture of her blood and to check that her house was secure. I forced myself to never peek into the house, but on each visit I saturated myself on her lingering scent and the cadence of her heartbeat. If was honest with myself, I would have to admit her blood was no longer an issue. I made sure I hunted often, but after spending months in Rio, around millions of people, my control over my thirst was rock solid. It also didn't hurt that the desire to protect her far out weighed the desire to drain her.
Two days ago, a package arrived for me from Alice. It contained a map of Santa Fe and a cellular phone. Several moments after I powered on the phone, I received a call from Alice. She warned me that my prowling around of Phoenix was going to capture the attention of three vampires. Given my numerous visits to my singer's home, the three nomads would stop by to see what or whom I found so fascinating at that residence. If they found my scent at her house, both the mother and my singer would die. I vowed to stop it from occurring, and with Alice's help she led me to Santa Fe.
The plan was simple. I was to intercept the three nomadic vampires, and allow them track me around Santa Fe for a couple of days before meeting with them. I would then discourage them from traveling to Phoenix. Emmett, Rose, Jasper and Alice were positioned about a twenty miles outside of Santa Fe as a precaution, but Alice assured me their presence shouldn't be needed, assuming I could use my gift to convince them to change their plans. Alice claimed I would be successful, unless I managed to get the leader mad at me.
Before I could continue rehashing our plan, I heard the thoughts of the three vampires as they approached me. James, the leader, was mated to the female, Victoria. The third was Laurent, who seemed to follow James and Victoria without much loyalty. James was a tracker, but unlike the Volturi's Demetri, who tracked not only by scent, but also by the tenor of a vampire's mind, James' tracking was limited to scent only. However, he was very skilled. From what I had been able to gather, he enjoyed toying with his conquests prior to killing them. He also enjoyed playing games with other vampires. Which is why they were following me. James loved to steal a victim from another vampire. It was one of the few ways he found a sense of excitement in his existence. He rarely worried about repercussions from the targeted vampire as Victoria was adept at escaping, and Laurent added an additional threat solely by his presence.
They were stalking me. I was stalking a despicable, lowlife pedophile that would deserve the fate my plan called for. I darted from my hiding spot until I was about a block behind my human target. It did not take long for James to home in on the man I was following. I slowed my pace, but kept up the illusion that I was preparing to strike. Mentally, I heard James give the order to split up and attack the pedophile once he turned down the only available alley in his walking path. Within seconds they descended upon the man and drained him quickly. By the time I turned the corner and entered the alley they were done and standing over his dead body. I pretended to be shocked by crouching low and releasing a warning hiss.
"Too bad. It appears we've beat you to your meal," James replied coolly. The three of them took a defensive stance. Each one evaluated me to see if I would attack. James sized me up as an adversary. Victoria considered me an unpredictable threat so she plotted a quick retreat path to their right. Laurent knew James would take me on first and that he would most likely follow Victoria if she left.
I needed to play up the part for the deception to work, so I growled at the three of them while I inched closer to James.
"He was mine!" I hissed.
"Well, maybe next time you'll spend less time following and more time feeding!" Victoria taunted.
Before I could respond, James cocked his head to one side and spoke. "What is wrong with your eyes?" I could see that none of them had any experience with animal drinking vampires.
"It's always the same questions." I shook my head in mock disgust. "The Volturi just asked me that too," I replied in a calmer voice. I slowly raised myself up to standing position. "My eyes have been this way since my change. It's just the way I am. They'll get slightly darker after I feed."
"The Volturi?" Laurent asked. He and Victoria were worried that they could be looking for them. In the past, their coven had not been very discrete in their hunting tactics. I decided to use this fear.
"Yeah, I was just in Phoenix where I ran into several of the Volturi Guard. They're doing a sweep of the southern cities."
Victoria's thoughts conformed that Phoenix was their next stop.
"Who were they looking for?" James asked. His thoughts flashed to Demetri and Jane. He had met them both many years back in Jackson, Mississippi. The Guard had caught his trail just outside Biloxi and tracked him north to Jackson. They questioned him about some deaths down in Biloxi. Demetri sensed James' talent and let him know that he was far superior. James did not like Demetri's taunting or his superior skills. He snarled back at Demetri, but Jane intervened and took him down with her gift of pain. Jane tortured him for several minutes before they let James know that they were going to check out what happened in Biloxi. If James had been involved, Demetri would find him no matter how far he ran.
James thoughts flashed to a mental hospital in Biloxi. I was stunned at the vision of James stalking a then human Alice Brandon. The night James went to the institution to finally drain Alice, he found that another vampire thwarted his plans by hiding and changing Alice before James could kill her. In retaliation, James killed the vampire and left to look for newborn vampire Alice. The Volturi started tracking him during his search.
We had never known about Alice's change or her human history. I had already disliked these three vampires because they could threaten my singer. I now hated James, like I have hated no other creature, because of his previous desire to kill Alice and his lingering resentment for never finding her. Despite being mated to Victoria, James has long desired Alice as a sexual conquest. His plan, if he ever found Alice, was to have his way with her sexually, then destroy her.
I flexed my fingers as a feral growl ripped from my throat.
"What has made him so angry?" Laurent thought. I could see myself in their eyes and I was ready to attack. With my speed I could easily take out James and possibly Laurent, however Victoria would most likely flee before I could reach her. Just inside the periphery of my gift I heard Alice's thoughts. They were to the south and far enough away that James would not pickup their scent, however I could just pickup their thoughts.
"Please don't, Edward!" Alice's pleading stopped me cold. "I…I never saw this in my visions. I'm so sorry. Don't fight them." She showed me that I would loose an arm in my attack and that Victoria would indeed get away.
"Stay focused, Edward." Jasper thought out to me. "Get them outside the city. I have a plan. Go north to the Nambé Reservoir. Bring the body, it will help mask our scent." Jasper's mind was icily composed, and his thoughts were calculating, remorseless, and predatory. I had only sensed this from him before when he thought back on his days of fighting in Maria's vampire Army. Jasper was in full-on military mode. Alice was his mate and his savior. He planned on ending James for his desires to hurt Alice. Emmett, Rose, and Alice were all on board. Our simple plan to redirect these three vampires had just become a violent chess match.
I willed myself to relax and I stood up straight. I had a role to play in this new game.
"I'm sorry. It's just that…in Phoenix one of the Volturi, a vicious vampire named Jane, did something to me. She has a gift that caused me pain like I never felt before." I shook my head as if I had been trying to forget what happened. "All because I wouldn't tell her how many people I fed from while I was in Phoenix."
"Jane is in Phoenix? Who else was with her?" James asked. I had to hide the smirk as he relived his painful encounter with her.
"Yeah, along with her brother Alec, and two other vampires, a Demetri and Felix." I replied. James was not afraid of Jane or Alec as much as he was of running into Demetri again. He was not familiar with Felix.
I went over and lightly kicked the dead body. "I know of a place to dispose of this. It's north of here. I've used it before. It's a place that's hard to find any remains. Why don't you all come along? I've been saving a nice remote house with five delicious family members."
"Really?" Laurent asked in his slight French accent. "You would share with us?"
Luckily, my gift had allowed me to catalog a variety of traits about these three vampires. I knew all three enjoyed blood and sex. Laurent would come for the blood, but ultimately he would only come if James did. James was willing to go, not only for the meal, but to watch me further. Victoria was against my offer. Her senses were telling her it was not safe. She wouldn't come for the blood, but maybe for another thirst. James and Victoria being mated never stopped them from indulging in carnal pleasures with outsiders. I knew she found me attractive, maybe she would come for the chance to have sex with me.
"I'll share." I replied before I reached out and ran a finger along Victoria's jaw and down her throat. "Maybe you would share as well?" Victoria's arousal spiked. Her scent disgusted me but I sniffed the air in mock appreciation before turning to James. "That is, if you're okay with it?" James considered my request. Whereas I was revolted, James was getting turned on at the promise of a blood and sex orgy.
"We'll see," James replied coolly. However his mind was set. For him it would be blood and sex, then they would head north into Colorado, away from the nonexistent Volturi threat.
Victoria's reluctance melted away as well. Thoughts of her and I engaged in various blood fueled sexual acts assaulted me. If a vampire could retch, I would have at the thought of her, James and I having three-way sex. "Yes," she purred, "let's see what happens."
Laurent was going for the blood, but a small hope remained that perhaps he would finally get a chance at being with Victoria. She may have been open to sex with other partners, but never with him.
I picked up the man's body. "Okay, let's go."