Chapter Twenty Two

Bella

I looked round the ranch house, it was big enough without being too huge but it didn't look as if anyone had lived in it for years. There were dust sheets over the sparse furniture and an old moth-eaten rug on the wooden floor which I thought would look beautiful if polished. There were no drapes at the shuttered windows and one pane was broken, the floor below it still showed signs of being wet and there were a few slivers of broken glass still on the boards. I felt awkward as if I were trespassing in a strangers space. Then I came upon his bag, laying beside a chair. There were a couple of rumpled tee shirts on top and rolled up socks but nothing personal, no books or CDs, no I pod, no wallet, nothing. I picked the bag up and folded the tee shirts and socks which had been washed but not folded or ironed and put them back inside.

As I did so I saw his cell phone tucked in a side pocket, where would he have gone without that? I got the strongest feeling that he wasn't far away and I put the bag down again and walked outside. The light was fading but I went to the paddock and the horses came to be petted. I remembered seeing hay bales in the barn so I carried one out and breaking the twine holding it I scattered it for them and they started grazing straight away so they were hungry. The water trough was still full and I saw it was drip fed from a long hose attached to an outside tap. Next I went into the stables and they were neglected as if he hadn't the will or the strength to clean them but that was crazy, he was a vampire, of course he could do it in minutes so why hadn't he. Or was this really Jaspers home? It could be another cruel trick of the Cullens and I wavered before deciding to stay in the barn for the night. The house seemed empty and slightly eerie so collecting my bag from the car I locked it and went back into the barn.

It had been set up as a workshop too and had a toilet and wash basin in it, probably for the stable staff or any workmen employed in its past days. I cleaned my teeth and washed up in cold water before rolling two clean horse blankets into a mattress filled with hay and another as a cover. Laying in the darkness, broken by only a shaft of moonlight coming through the door which didn't shut properly, I dozed off hoping when I woke Jasper would be here. Something woke me in the night, a ringing and I jumped up, I'd forgotten I was to stay by the phone. I ran to the house and grabbed the receiver hoping it wouldn't ring off before I answered very out of breath.

"Where the hell were you? Didn't Garrett tell you to stay by the phone?"

Garrett? So it was a friend.

"Sorry."

"There is a car approaching the ranch from the city and it's not Garrett or Peter so get back in the barn and roll yourself up in whatever smells the strongest just in case its the Volturi."

He cut me off and I ran back to the barn as quickly as I could. I sniffed the horse blankets, they weren't too pungent but I didn't have time to find anything else. I could hear the sound of tires on the track leading to the house so I dived into a heap of straw hoping it wasn't too full of dung and lay as still as I could with straw poking through my clothes.

I heard the car pull to a stop and the door open and shut then footsteps on the gravel, it sounded like a man's footsteps but how I knew that I couldn't explain. I heard the footsteps go up the steps onto the porch and a knock at the door. Well it wasn't the Volturi knocking politely so that was a relief. Then the steps approached the barn and I froze. Through my little breathing hole I could see a pair of boots enter, the visitor was wearing boots and jeans. He stopped and I guessed he was looking around then the feet disappeared and the footsteps sounded on the gravel once more. I debated moving but was glad I didn't when the boots reappeared but closer this time, then I heard a voice talking on the phone.

"Yes I'm here but I can't find her, you sure she's here?"

There was a short pause then the voice came again,

"OK I'll wait for you Garrett."

I heaved a silent sigh of relief, it was a friend of Garrett's but I was hesitant about coming out in the open with a vampire I didn't know standing just a few feet away. I heard him take a few deep breaths then he sat on a straw bale in the centre of the barn and I could see him which wasn't very reassuring. He must have been Emmett's brother by his build, he was huge. Not only that but he was wearing a suede jacket that groaned with the stress of draping his huge shoulders. His hair was cut very short and his complexion was darker than any other vampire I'd met, possibly because he was Hispanic. He sat on the bale looking around and started to whistle a tune I didn't recognise.

After a few minutes he looked at his watch then he spoke conversationally,

"If you're finished inspecting me maybe you'd like to come out and introduce yourself. If not then you stay there until Garrett gets here but you can explain that I offered you a more comfortable seat to wait."

He patted another bale he pulled up next to his and looked directly at the straw heap. I saw red eyes like James and shivered but his face didn't have the same cruel look James had so deciding I was hot and uncomfortable and I'd already been discovered I crawled out and stood up dropping the blankets and picking straw out of my hair. I must look a real mess but he stood up and held out his hand.

"You must be Bella, how do you do. I'm Luke, a friend of Garretts. When he found out how long it was going to take him to get here he asked me if I'd drive over. I live in Houston, well out the other side actually. I didn't know The Major was in town or I'd have visited. Garrett tells me you have a problem with the Volturi. If you had to choose someone to have a problem with, the Volturi probably aren't the most sensible people to choose."

"I know that, at least I think I do. So you haven't seen Jasper?"

No sorry. This may be an impertinent question and you can tell me to mind my own business but isn't he tied up with Alice Cullen? I always thought it was an odd choice but there you go."

"I don't know what's going on or why he asked me to come here."

"He asked you?"

"Well not exactly, it's very confusing really and if I've got to explain it to Garrett then I'd like to wait so I only do it once. Do you know him well? Jasper I mean."

"Not well but then I don't like the Volturi so if there's a chance they are trying something and I can help stop them I'm in."

I smiled at him but his face changed and he sniffed the air again,

"They were in here, the Volturi. Looking for The Major I guess or maybe..."

He moved a little closer to me and sniffed again,

"I'm sorry, I just smell awful with all this horse sweat on me from the blankets or...oh, are you thirsty?"

He put his head back and laughed,

"That was the last thing you thought of, for a human you are very unusual but then are you?"

"Unusual? Not really."

"No not that, you have a very strange scent."

His eyes went to my arm which was brushing back my hair, the bite mark from James showing.

"You were bitten?"

"Yes by a nomad, but Jasper sucked the venom out."

"Why?"

"Why was I bitten? James the nomad wanted to turn me and make my boyfriend at the time, Edward Cullen, watch it on a movie."

"No I meant why did The Major suck the venom out?"

"Edward didn't want to turn me, he said it would be a tragedy at the time. Before he left me that was."

"But it wasn't him who sucked the venom out?"

"No, he didn't get there in time."

"So The Major did it? I wonder if he knew"

"Knew what?"

"It's not for me to say Bella but perhaps you'd be more comfortable after a shower and change of clothes."

I followed him back to the house where he soon had a fire going to heat water for me and I had a soak in the tub while he rang Garrett.