CHAPTER THIRTEEN - DAY 31, EARLY EVENING
Seven feet up in the knobby pine at the edge of the meadow, I see what I think is a green backpack. It's camouflaged against the foliage, so I cautiously approach it, circle underneath it. "Em!" I call. It almost blends in with the needles. Searching the ground for a long enough stick, I yell for him again, my heartbeat pulsing in my veins with impending dread.
"What?" He jogs over to me and raises his eyebrows as I peruse the forest floor.
I stop, brushing wisps of hair from my sticky face. "Are you tall enough to get that?" I point up at the backpack hanging precariously.
His head swivels. "Woah."
"Yup."
He looks around the meadow as if expecting the owner to come over the hill. To start yelling at us for disturbing his stuff. That he clearly forgot about. For months. "Do you think someone left it there while camping?" He asks, voice laced with apprehension.
"This isn't a campsite." I huff. "We just passed one a mile back." I point my thumb over my shoulder in demonstration. "It could be from one of the lost hiker's."
He puts his hands on his hips and looks up at the backpack again.
"Can you get it or what?" I snap. I guess I'm more anxious than I thought.
"Jeez, Bells, fine." He takes his pack off as if that will help him get more height and jumps once, twice - his arm outstretched, fingers reaching - and grabs it. We watch as it nearly falls out of his hand and onto the ground, the seam of one of the straps snapping. Em shifts and is able to snatch it before it falls. "Almost lost it," he mumbles.
He sinks into a crouch and unzips it.
"What's in there?" I hover, trying to see around his head.
One of his meaty hands pushes my face away. "Stop being so nosy, Baby B." He thumbs through the bag as I stand next to him, nervously fidgeting with the ties on my daypack.
"Is it the hiker's?" I ask, trying surreptitiously to peek over his shoulder.
"It's a hiker's," he says sarcastically. "Give me a sec." He adds, clearly frustrated with my impatience. "There's some weird folders in here with papers, writing. Several dehydrated meals. No wallet or ID that I can see." A pause. Then, "Oooh! More mac and cheese." He grins up at me, waving the pouch.
I ignore his deflection. Humor is his coping mechanism. "Let's bring it back to the lookout then. I'll make a call." I gnaw on my lip.
He zips it back up and stands. "You just wanna chance to be nosy."
Which isn't a lie. But I won't give him the satisfaction of being right.
When we get back to the lookout, Emmett goes down to the lake to bathe and I report the backpack to Edward on the walkie. I assume he knows how to get in touch with the Forest Service. Or will otherwise care about it because I do.
He doesn't answer right away, so I decide to riffle through the bag because I do really like to be nosy.
I move it to the center of the lookout and start pulling everything out on the ground in a semi-circle around me. A few cracked and crumbling granola bars that have expired. A notebook. A folder stuffed with maps and guides of the area, all clearly marked, but for what purpose, I don't know. Several packets of dehydrated food. They aren't expired, but I don't want to touch them if it's needed as evidence or something.
There's a creaking noise out on the deck and I pause with the notebook in my hands, its pages and cover crinkled from water that has long since dried. The noises of the forest surrounding me, cocooning me have seemed to stop, as if holding its breath. I watch as the knob turns on the door, my back ramrod straight. My breathing stops.
Edward pokes his head in, his bronze hair wind blown.
I take in a big gulp of air and my hand flies to my chest, the notebook plops onto my lap. "What the fuck, Edward?"
"Did I startle you?" His lips are curved into a slight smile. He slips into the room noiselessly.
"Obviously." I take another deep breath.
He stalks forward and sits sinuously in front of my half circle. "I got your message." He thumbs through the folder, pulling out and studying the maps.
I blink rapidly. "I thought you couldn't come out during the day?"
"It's overcast," he explains as he turns a map this way and that, his long fingers moving just a bit too swiftly.
"Huh." I reply, opening the notebook and trying to focus on the words. The handwriting isn't very neat, but it's a journal dated from over six months ago. I squint as I try to decipher the chicken scratch. There's vague descriptions of sightings, of tracks. Random coordinates. Some areas scratched out. "I think this was some type of wildlife research. Seems to be studying the habits of some elusive animal."
Edward leans back on his hands, the map open on his lap. "What kind of animal?" He wonders, cocking his head.
I flip a page. "Not sure." I hold the notebook out to him. He plucks it from my outstretched hand with quick, unsettling movements. I surprise a flinch.
As he takes some time to study it, his bronze hair flops a little onto his forehead. He shoves it back. Flips a page. I ask, "Is it the hiker's?"
"No."
I fiddle with the hem of my sweatshirt. "What did you do to them?" I whisper.
He looks up at me, his eyes deep honey, wary. "I told you. You didn't hear them."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
He sighs. "I'm not the most dangerous thing out there." Each word is punctuated, laced with venom. Harsh. They slither down my spine.
"So… was it another vampire?" I ask quietly.
He stares at me for a moment, then looks back down at the notebook, flips another page. The sound of the paper rustling cuts through the pounding beat in my ears.
I glance around the lookout for the moth, decide to open some windows to let in the cooler evening air. Hopefully, I can give it a place to go if it is indeed still trapped here.
As I open the fifth window, I ask, "So… who's Rosalie?"
His eyes don't leave the notebook. "My sister."
I pause on the sixth window. "Wait, for real?"
He flips a page. "No." I can't tell as his face is still turned away from me, but his cheeks pull up a bit. I think he's smirking. The asshole.
"Oh." Then who is she? I head back to my spot in the semi-circle.
His eyes still scan the notebook meticulously. I sit up on my knees to look over the pile at it. "What does it say?"
He slams it shut. "It's some kind of research journal. About an elusive animal," he teases dryly.
I crawl over the pile toward him. "No shit." I tug at it.
He doesn't let go, his knuckles whitening impossibly at his grip. "Wait your turn."
"No." I tug again childishly.
His golden eyes drag up to meet mine. When he registers the position I'm in, how close I am, his pupils widen and his gaze moves sinuously over my body. "You're not very patient," he warns.
"I could say the same about you."
He smirks for real this time and it's so sexy that I bite my lip. Hard. To jolt my system. It works. Sort of. "So who's Rosalie?" I ask again.
His eyes flick down and then up again so fast, I'm not sure if I imagined it. "Are you curious, Bella? Or jealous?" He leans forward, his eyes hungry. They dart to my lips and up to my eyes.
When I scoff and sit back on my haunches, his smile widens. Fuck. I just confirmed my feelings for him. "She's a member of my coven," he explains.
"You have a coven?"
"You ask a lot of questions." I roll my eyes goodnaturedly. Then, he says, "Your brother is coming back."
My eyebrows knit together. "How do you know?"
He taps his temple. "I read minds."
I choke on air. Sputter, "What?"
Edward moves so he's on his hands and knees in front of me, mimicking my pose earlier. He kisses my lips thoroughly, sucking my lower lip into his mouth, caressing it with his tongue. He moves forward until he's pushing me back onto the floor, one hand guiding me until he hovers over me like a predator again, fingers pushing my shirt up and up and up until his cool hand brushes the bottom of my breast. Flicks my nipple so I writhe under him. When he pulls back, he says, "Just not yours." I feel one quick tap to my temple. His black eyes look down at me. "I'm going to keep you, Isabella Swan."
I blink and he's gone. The door clicks shut.
I look around the lookout, gasping for breath, yanking my shirt down.
In the spider's web above my cot, the moth twitches, its legs entwined.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath to calm my heart. When I open them a moment later and sit up, I scan the pile in front of me. The ladder creaks familiarly as Emmett begins to climb.
Edward took the notebook. He also knows my full name. And my chest and core aches for him.
"Motherfucker," I hiss.
A ghostly chuckle flutters through the open windows.