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“They don’t like me,” I guessed. “That’s not it,” he disagreed, but his eyes were too innocent. “They don’t understand why I can’t leave you alone.”
There was a piece of white paper folded on my seat. I got in and closed the door before I unfolded it. Two words were written in his elegant script. Be safe.
And what was my other choice—to cut him out of my life? Intolerable.
“As if you could outrun me,” he laughed bitterly.
“As if you could fight me off,” he said gently.
“I don’t want you to leave,” I mumbled pathetically, staring down again. “Which is exactly why I should. But don’t worry. I’m essentially a selfish creature. I crave your company too much to do what I should.”
“So what you’re saying is, I’m your brand of heroin?” I teased, trying to lighten the mood. He smiled swiftly, seeming to appreciate my effort. “Yes, you are exactly my brand of heroin.”
And I was filled with compassion for his suffering, even now, as he confessed his craving to take my life.
“Bella, I couldn’t live with myself if I ever hurt you. You don’t know how it’s tortured me.” He looked down, ashamed again. “The thought of you, still, white, cold… to never see you blush scarlet again, to never see that flash of intuition in your eyes when you see through my pretenses… it would be unendurable.”
“You are the most important thing to me now. The most important thing to me ever.”
“You already know how I feel, of course,” I finally said. “I’m here… which, roughly translated, means I would rather die than stay away from you.” I frowned. “I’m an idiot.”
“And so the lion fell in love with the lamb…,” he murmured. I looked away, hiding my eyes as I thrilled to the word.
“What a stupid lamb,” I sighed. “What a sick, masochistic lion.”
Hungers I don’t even understand, that are foreign to me.” “I may understand that better than you think.” “I’m not used to feeling so human. Is it always like this?” “For me?” I paused. “No, never. Never before this.”
“I don’t know how to be close to you,” he admitted. “I don’t know if I can.”
“You’re better at this than you give yourself credit for,” I noted. “I have human instincts—they may be buried deep, but they’re there.”
“Come on, little coward, climb on my back.”
If I’d ever feared death before in his presence, it was nothing compared to how I felt now.
“I guess that wasn’t the best idea,” he mused. I tried to be positive, but my voice was weak. “No, it was very interesting.” “Hah! You’re as white as a ghost—no, you’re as white as me!”
Not the way a man might hesitate before he kissed a woman, to gauge her reaction, to see how he would be received. Perhaps he would hesitate to prolong the moment, that ideal moment of anticipation, sometimes better than the kiss itself.
Edward hesitated to test himself, to see if this was safe, to make sure he was still in control of his need.
“I’m stronger than I thought. It’s nice to know.” “I wish I could say the same. I’m sorry.” “You are only human, after all.” “Thanks so much,” I said, my voice acerbic.
“I was born in Chicago in 1901.”
“Carlisle found me in a hospital in the summer of 1918. I was seventeen, and dying of the Spanish influenza.”
“He acted from loneliness. That’s usually the reason behind the choice. I was the first in Carlisle’s family, though he found Esme soon after. She fell from a cliff. They brought her straight to the hospital morgue, though, somehow, her heart was still beating.”
“Alice and Jasper are two very rare creatures. They both developed a conscience, as we refer to it, with no outside guidance. Jasper belonged to another… family, a very different kind of family. He became depressed, and he wandered on his own. Alice found him. Like me, she has certain gifts above and beyond the norm for our kind.”
“How often did you come here?” “I come here almost every night.” I whirled, stunned. “Why?” “You’re interesting when you sleep.” He spoke matter-of-factly. “You talk.”
“Of course Rosalie is beautiful in her way, but even if she wasn’t like a sister to me, even if Emmett didn’t belong with her, she could never have one tenth, no, one hundredth of the attraction you hold for me.”
“Are you scared?” he asked.
I love how he keeps asking her this
“Well, do you find me attractive, in that way, at all?” He laughed and lightly rumpled my nearly dry hair. “I may not be a human, but I am a man,” he assured me.
More tired than I realized, exhausted from the long day of mental and emotional stress like I’d never felt before, I drifted to sleep in his cold arms.
“I love you,” I whispered. “You are my life now,” he answered simply.
“And you’re worried, not because you’re headed to meet a houseful of vampires, but because you think those vampires won’t approve of you, correct?”
The music slowed, transforming into something softer, and to my surprise I detected the melody of his lullaby weaving through the profusion of notes. “You inspired this one,” he said softly. The music grew unbearably sweet.
“I have to, because I’m going to be a little… overbearingly protective over the next few days—or weeks—and I wouldn’t want you to think I’m naturally a tyrant.” “What’s wrong?” “Nothing’s wrong, exactly. Alice just sees some visitors coming soon. They know we’re here, and they’re curious.”
“How old is Carlisle?” I asked quietly, ignoring his question, still staring up. “He just celebrated his three hundred and sixty-second birthday,” Edward said. I looked back at him, a million questions in my eyes.
“Alice says there’s going to be a real storm tonight, and Emmett wants to play ball. Are you game?”
“You will be watching,” Edward clarified. “We will be playing baseball.” I rolled my eyes. “Vampires like baseball?” “It’s the American pastime,” he said with mock solemnity.
“He’s too old for you,” he ranted. “We’re both juniors,” I corrected, though he was more right than he dreamed.
“You smell so good in the rain,” he explained. “In a good way, or in a bad way?” I asked cautiously. He sighed. “Both, always both.”
“Emmett hits the hardest,” Esme explained, “but Edward runs the fastest.”
“We thought we heard a game,” he said in a relaxed voice with the slightest of French accents. “I’m Laurent, these are Victoria and James.”
“Don’t forget that this was your idea.” “It was the best idea—of course it was mine.” His answering smile was bleak and disappeared immediately.
He’s absolutely lethal. That’s why I joined his coven.” His coven, I thought, of course. The show of leadership in the clearing was merely that, a show.
“Go in peace,” was Carlisle’s formal answer.
“You’re wrong, you know,” he said quietly. “What?” I gasped. “I can feel what you’re feeling now—and you are worth it.”
but then Alice stepped through the front door and came toward me with her arms held out. “May I?” she asked. “You’re the first one to ask permission.” I smiled wryly.
“It’s been almost a century that Edward’s been alone. Now he’s found you. You can’t see the changes that we see,
Do you think any of us want to look into his eyes for the next hundred years if he loses you?”
“Would you tell me the truth, though?” “Yes. I will always tell you the truth.” Her voice was earnest.
