"I guess I don't really know where to start," Bella said with a nervous laugh. "Like I said, there's a lot."

I made a considering noise as I picked through her current emotional state; while the tumultuous undercurrent was still there, a gentle blend of relaxation and trust took pride of place. Loathe as I was to disturb the comfortable blend, I knew the only way she – and by extension we – could move forward, was to address the vampire in the room, so to speak.

"How about what you were feeling before you came upstairs," I suggested. "What were you thinking about?"

She tensed slightly before forcing herself to relax and I drew some comfort from her pressing a little closer to me. "I was thinking about our conversation from this morning," she said quietly. "About vampires and human pets."

I'd seen some heinous things in life, both human and undead, but that topic ranked right up there as some of the worst. I didn't know for sure if that's what her ex-boyfriend had in mind for her, but even just the thought of my Isabella being little more than a talking blood bag was intolerable.

I held her a little closer all the same. "Yeah? What about it?"

She licked her lips as she considered her next words. "I don't think that's the future Edward had in mind for me. And I'm not saying that because of my feelings for him, but because I know he valued my humanity, despite his… desire for my blood."

I snorted. "A vampire's feelings for their singer aren't just desire, darlin'. It's more like an obsession. An all-consuming need to obtain, dominate, and consume."

Her irritation flared with spicy heat that made my toes curl in my boots. "He wasn't like that. He fought it, every day. When we first met, I thought he hated me but really, he'd went to Alaska to protect me."

"From himself," I said, stressing the second word. "It's good of you to want to see the good in him, but you're makin' the mistake of lookin' at him through a human lens. If he'd been as strong as you claim he is, he wouldn't've come back."

She twisted in my arms too look up at me, her mouth set in a hard line. "You don't know him like I do. The Cullens worked really hard to retain their humanity. They valued human life, cherished it, him included."

Then why did they throw you away? The words sat on the tip of my tongue, but I refused to utter them. I didn't understand how she could defend them so ardently, even after the damage they'd done to her. I thought I had understood her capacity to love, but evidently, I had been wrong. Her heart was large, that was a given, but I was beginning to wonder if her devotion to them was strictly because of how enormous capacity to love, or if perhaps she had pre-existing abandonment issues.

I'd thought what Maria and I had was love, but it wasn't until I paid attention to Peter and Charlotte that I learned what love was. Maria had made herself my everything: she fed me, fucked me, gave me purpose in an existence that made no sense. She was the source of pleasure and pain, agony and adoration, and I would have given her every last piece of me if it wasn't for the way I saw Char smile at Peter when she thought no one was looking.

I didn't know all the details of my Bella's previous relationship, but I could see some eerie similarities to mine with Maria.

She hadn't started out a tyrant; in the beginning she'd been kind, luring me in with gentle hands and honeyed words. Peter had thought she'd used her gift on me, but the truth was, she didn't force me to do anything I didn't already want to do. She didn't have too. She may have been a Warlord first, but she was just as skilled at dissecting people to the sum of what they were as she was at murdering them.

After I changed, she saw me for what I was: a powerful, unstable newborn desperate for connection. She fed that desire, stoking it so that I wanted – no, needed – to please her. In the unstable emotional climate of a warzone, even the smallest positive emotion hit me like a drug. I was little more than an addict looking for my next fix in the pleased curve of her rare smiles.

My strange, beautiful Isabella was a lonely soul; it didn't take a genius to see it. She'd loved Edward but she'd loved the rest of his coven and felt their absence keenly. If she had other meaningful connections outside of them, I doubted she would be quite as messed up as she was.

Which begged the question: did they isolate her on purpose, or did she do it herself? Just how deep did the effects of enthrallment go? Because she had been enthralled, I was certain of that much. I'd seen other thralls go through a similar withdrawal when their masters abandoned them. But I'd never stuck around to see their recovery, and a part of me was afraid it may not even be possible. The human mind was complex, just as fragile as it was resilient.

I hadn't realized I'd tightened my hold on her until she'd made a noise of discomfort. Sheepishly, I relaxed my grip and buried my nose in her hair as I sought to calm myself with her scent.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

I shook my head, closing my eyes as I inhaled deeply. "They ain't worth that much."

"I disagree," she replied as she shrugged off the blanket and twisted in my grip to wrap her arms around me. "But you don't have to tell me if you don't want too."

"It's not that I don't want to darlin', I just don't know how to get the words out in a way that won't send you runnin'."

She snorted and I basked in the fizzy burst of humor. "That makes two of us." She was quiet for a few moments before she murmured, "Jasper?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think I'm going to be broken forever?"

I pulled away from her until I could see her face, tipping up her chin when she tried to look away. "Look at me, beautiful."

She flushed but met my eyes after a beat. "There she is." My hand came up to cup her face. "I haven't been human for a long time, but if there's one thing I do know, your kind changes faster than vampires can. You are a little broken, but that doesn't mean the pieces of you aren't salvageable."

My thumb swept away the tears that dripped from her eyelashes. "You won't be the same girl you were before," I said gently. "But that's not a bad thing."

"But if I'm not the same girl he fell in love with, will he ever want me again?"

My eyes narrowed. "Isabella, why are you holding out hope for someone so unworthy of you?"

Her eyes flew open. "You've got it all wrong," she said. "If anyone was unworthy, it was me. He said he didn't want me, that he would remember me for a while but... vampires are easily distracted." Her face suddenly hardened as she snapped, "My mind is not a sieve!"

I wasn't sure how to respond to that so instead I asked, "Darlin', do you want me to help you calm down?"

She shook her head and sucked in a steadying breath. "No. I… I need to learn to get a handle on this."

Her face softened as I briefly projected my approval. I had no problem helping her, but if she was going to stand on her own two feet again, she'd need to learn to regulate herself on her own. "I'm guessin' by the sieve comment, he thought you'd just forget him."

Isabella looked like she didn't know whether to laugh or to cry. "Yeah, pretty much." She reached up to wipe her eyes, then turned again to reach for the box of tissues on her nightstand. "I know I was just some other human to him, but he meant more than that to me."

"That fact that you were his singer automatically classifies you as more than just another human to him," I replied carefully. "But before you go thinkin' such, that's not a positive thing either."

She balled up the tissue in her fist then threw it toward the garbage can by the desk. "Is it really such a bad thing to want to be special to someone?"

"Of course not. I'd say it's human nature," I flashed her a half-smile, "but it goes for vampires too."

"Even you?"

"Even me," I said, pulling her close once again. "But you're not doing yourself any favors by thinkin' that being his singer is something to be proud of. It's an accident, not an accomplishment."

She was quiet for a long time, long enough that I wondered if she'd gone to sleep until she finally asked, "But what if that's all he was interested in?"

"Then he's a fuckin' fool."

I let her push me away to return her confused stare with my unflinching one. "Why are you so invested in me?"

"Because I see a little of myself in you," I said honestly. I brushed her hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear. "Because you're lonely. Because your heart is entirely too big. Because you're an unfathomably strange human." Her lips quirked and I couldn't stop myself from leaning forward to press my lips against her forehead.

"But mostly because you're worth it."

There was no easy way to say it, and I was the type to call it how I saw it: my Isabella was a hot fuckin' mess.

I hadn't been joking when I'd told her that her emotional climate was chaotic; tonight's little 'therapy session' as she'd called it had barely scratched the surface. But it was a start, and for now that'd be enough.

It had to be.

I'd enveloped her with the gentlest emotions I could muster – a hell of a feat on my part given my own emotional turmoil – and she'd drifted off into a deep sleep within minutes still in my arms. She was freezing, I could feel her trembling even through her thick blanket, but the stubborn girl refused to be moved.

And I admit, it felt good having my mate curled up next to me. I probably shouldn't have indulged in the feeling for as long as I did, but I made sure to disentangle myself from her before dawn broke and slipped out her window to go hunt.

She was already awake and downstairs when I got back, her father having left sometime during my absence, and I let myself back in through her window.

"I'm back, darlin'." I pitched my voice loud enough for her to hear me. I tilted my head at the strange little stutter of her heartbeat before it leveled out again. Her emotions were still unsteady, but not as chaotic as they were last night. It seemed we'd made some progress in unknotting that tangle.

"I'm in the kitchen, Jasper," she called back, and I couldn't stop the small smile that tugged at my lips at the sound of my name.

Forgoing human speed, I darted downstairs and into the chair I'd occupied yesterday morning and contented myself with looking at her. She'd piled her hair up on top of her head in a messy bun that exposed the long line of her throat in a way that was quickly becoming my favorite. She'd picked a red flannel today, and I looked down at myself.

Before coming back to the house, I'd changed into my spare set of clothes, which happened to include a blue flannel over my t-shirt. Before I realized what I was doing, I'd shrugged out of it and said her name to get her attention.

"Do me a favor and wear this today," I said as I held the flannel out to her.

"Why?"

"My scent should help hide yours while I hunt for Victoria," I answered truthfully, although it wasn't the whole of it. It would help keep her safe, but I also wanted her to smell more like me. I loved her scent, but I loved the way we smelled together even more; already I could imagine what it'd be like once we were properly mated, after my venom ran through her veins.

She shrugged out of her flannel, leaving her in a tank top that exposed the creamy expanse of her skin to my hungry eyes, before hiding it away with my shirt.

I definitely had not thought that one through; I swallowed a mouthful of venom at the sight of my mate in my shirt, my nostrils flaring involuntarily as her scent mingled with mine. She turned back to the counter but not before I saw her discreetly inhale the collar; she radiated a spark of pleasure like a solar flare, and I had to force myself to not reach for her.

"Won't Victoria be curious by another vampire's scent?" she asked, pulling out a knife to cut up some fruit.

"Possibly, but I'm banking on her instincts to outweigh her curiosity."

She paused mid-chop to look over her shoulder at me. "I don't understand."

I gestured for her to continue her task as I said, "Finish up, and I'll tell you while you eat."

Once she was settled, I launched into her second lesson of vampirism. "Vampires are creatures that rely heavily on instinct. Some more so than others. That isn't to say we can't be rational, but a lot of us can't mix with humans for very long because of how strong our instincts are."

"The Cullens could, and so can you," she said.

I shook my head. "I have a theory on that, but you're wrong about me."

She tilted her head in obvious confusion, gesturing between us. "But you're able to sit here with me."

"You're a special case, Isabella. If you were anyone else, I'd have already drained you dry."

Her eyes narrowed. "You said you didn't want to hunt humans."

"And I don't," I replied swiftly. "But my instincts run deeper than most vampires; what my mind wants and what my instincts tell me are two very different things. I am what I am, Isabella, and I make no apologies for it. But I'm also very aware I'm going to have to work twice as hard as your Cullens to have half of their control."

She would not be undeterred. "That doesn't explain why I'm a special case. If anything, that means you should've killed me the moment you met me in the meadow."

We stared at each other for a long moment, neither of us willing to break the stalemate first. Her need to blink won out and she looked slightly put out by that fact.

"Can you at least tell me why you won't tell me?"

"Because it's too soon," I said and didn't stop myself from reaching across the table to take her hand in mine, sweeping my thumb over the back of her hand. "And I need a little time to adjust too."

She wasn't happy with my answer, but she accepted it for now. "What's your theory about the family?"

"I'm not entirely certain yet, but I think their diet of animal blood allowed them to maintain more rationality than a traditional vampire."

"Do you think it's the blood itself, or the philosophy behind it?"

I shrugged. "Both very good questions, but I won't know for a least a few weeks, if not more. It's too soon to tell." Ideally, I'd like to talk to the Cullens about it, but since I had no way to contact them currently, my only option was the hard way. "But going back to our original topic: some vampires are more heavily ruled by their instincts than others. From what little I've been able to pick up about Victoria in the area, I imagine she's one of them. She's too at home in the wilds not to be."

"Is it possible that she's gifted?"

"It's not unlikely," I admitted with some irritation. "An enhanced sense of self-preservation? Useful, but annoying to work around."

"But doable?"

"Anything is doable provided we plan for it." I squeezed her hand and projected a small burst of comfort. "Proper preparation prevents piss poor performance."

She snickered and straightened in her seat at the word 'plan'. I bit back a smile at her eagerness to help. It was very endearing.

"What do you need me to do?"

"You're already doing it," I replied, gesturing to the shirt she was wearing. "My scent should confuse yours enough that she might think you're gone if she doesn't look to closely. That's the best-case scenario."

"And what's the worst-case scenario?"

"That she does investigate further and decides you've been claimed."

"Why is that bad?"

"It isn't." I ran a hand through my hair, a nervous gesture I'd picked up from Peter. "It's how she chooses to act with that information that could be bad. Ideally, she gives up and moves on, but given the situation, I can tell you that's not going to happen. It's more likely to incite her further. With any luck, it'll make her desperate and she'll get sloppy, which would leave me an opening."

"But that depends whether or not she is actually gifted," Bella finished, and I nodded grimly. "And the capabilities of that gift, assuming it exists."

"Exactly."

She made a thoughtful noise as she cleaned up her dishes before slinging her backpack over her shoulder. "I have to go to school, but I'll give it some thought today," she promised.

She paused beside my chair on her way out the door and before I could react, she dropped a kiss on my forehead before rushing out the door.

A/N: Ah, Jasper. Have you considered that you are also a hot fuckin' mess? Emphasis on hot but a mess, nonetheless.

I promise, we'll spend time in other places besides Bella's bedroom and her kitchen in the next update.

Thanks for reading!