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“Sometimes, loyalty gets in the way of what you want to do. Sometimes, it’s not your secret to tell.”
I didn’t like that—didn’t like the way his eyes closed as if he were in pain when he spoke of being bound. More than dislike—I realized I hated it, hated anything that caused him pain. Hated it fiercely.
“Another legend claims that we descended from wolves—and that the wolves are our brothers still. It’s against tribal law to kill them.
“Yes. There are stories of the cold ones as old as the wolf legends, and some much more recent. According to legend, my own great-grandfather knew some of them. He was the one who made the treaty that kept them off our land.” Jacob rolled his eyes.
“Werewolves have enemies?” “Only one.”
But Jacob? Jacob, who was just Jacob, and nothing more than that? Jacob, my friend? Jacob, the only human I’d ever been able to relate to.… And he wasn’t even human. I fought the urge to scream again.
There was no cult. There had never been a cult, never been a gang. No, it was much worse than that. It was a pack.
“You aren’t turning into a tree-hugger on me, are you?”
Oh no, is Charlie a republican.
It was bad enough that my best friend was a werewolf. Did he have to be a monster, too?
“Well, I’m so sorry that I can’t be the right kind of monster for you, Bella. I guess I’m just not as great as a bloodsucker, am I?”
He let me go, but took both my hands. “I’m not a killer, Bella.”
TITSOAK
“What would happen… if you got too mad?” I whispered. “I’d turn into a wolf,” he whispered back. “You don’t need a full moon?” He rolled his eyes. “Hollywood’s version doesn’t get much right.”
“Close enough. Sam told me I couldn’t tell you. He’s… the head of the pack, you know. He’s the Alpha. When he tells us to do something, or not to do something—when he really means it, well, we can’t just ignore him.”
“Who’s afraid of the big, bad wolf?”
“How would they go about breaking the treaty?” “If they bite a human. Jake wasn’t so keen on the idea of letting it go that far.”
Love is irrational, I reminded myself. The more you loved someone, the less sense anything made.
This made me brood over what Jared had said, about Jacob involving his “girlfriend.” I supposed that that was exactly what it looked like from the outside. As long as Jake and I knew how it really was, I shouldn’t let those kinds of assumptions bother me. And maybe they wouldn’t, if I hadn’t known that Jacob would have loved for things to be what they appeared. But his hand felt nice as it warmed mine, and I didn’t protest.
😤
couldn’t imagine my life without Jacob now—I cringed away from the idea of even trying to imagine that. Somehow, he’d become essential to my survival. But to leave things the way they were… was that cruel, as Mike had accused?
YES
“Speaking of which, would you like to explain to me how you’re alive?”
“Leave it to you, Bella. Anyone else would be better off when the vampires left town. But you have to start hanging out with the first monsters you can find.”
She’d successfully tracked down the asylum where she’d spent the last years of her human life. The life she had no memory of. “My name was Mary Alice Brandon,” she told me quietly. “I had a little sister named Cynthia. Her daughter—my niece—is still alive in Biloxi.”
I never understood the Biloxi connection, but teenage me was screaming at the hometown mention.
“You can’t see werewolves?” She grimaced. “So it would seem.” She was obviously annoyed by this fact—very annoyed.
“Yeah, I’ll always be your friend,” he said gruffly. “No matter what you love.” “Promise?” “Promise.”
I stared back at him. He was not my Jacob, but he could be. His face was familiar and beloved. In so many real ways, I did love him. He was my comfort, my safe harbor. Right now, I could choose to have him belong to me.
“He’s not here,” Jacob said, and the words were menacing. There was some very short reply, a request for more information it seemed, because he added unwillingly, “He’s at the funeral.”
“It was Edward.” The words were just a choked whisper. “He thinks you’re dead.”
“You saw me become one of you.” I barely mouthed the words. She sighed. “It was a possibility at the time.” “At the time,” I repeated. “Actually, Bella…” She hesitated, and then seemed to make a choice. “Honestly, I think it’s all gotten beyond ridiculous. I’m debating whether to just change you myself.”
“He’s going to keep it simple. He’s just going to walk out into the sun.”
The pilot came on over the intercom, announcing, first in French and then in English, our imminent landing.
Why French??? They were landing in ITALY.
“How strongly are you opposed to grand theft auto?”
The outside bill was a thousand dollar bill.
What.
“Aro needs physical contact to hear your thoughts, but he hears much more than I do. You know I can only hear what’s passing through your head in the moment. Aro hears every thought your mind has ever had.”
“Marcus sees relationships. He’s surprised by the intensity of ours.”
“Unless…,” Aro interrupted. He looked unhappy with the way the conversation had gone. “Unless you do intend to give her immortality?”
“They have a name for someone who smells the way Bella does to me. They call her my singer—because her blood sings for me.”
“It’s fine, Alice.” He grinned. “They can’t all be 911 Turbos.” She sighed. “I may have to acquire one of those legally. It was fabulous.” “I’ll get you one for Christmas,” Edward promised.
Edward frowned. “Sleeping. You should probably know that I’m breaking the rules right now. Well, not technically, since he said I was never to walk through his door again, and I came in the window.… But, still, the intent was clear.”
“I thought I’d explained it clearly before. Bella, I can’t live in a world where you don’t exist.”
“Before you, Bella, my life was like a moonless night. Very dark, but there were stars—points of light and reason.… And then you shot across my sky like a meteor. Suddenly everything was on fire; there was brilliancy, there was beauty. When you were gone, when the meteor had fallen over the horizon, everything went black. Nothing had changed, but my eyes were blinded by the light. I couldn’t see the stars anymore. And there was no more reason for anything.”
“My mortality. I’m putting it to a vote.”
“If there was only some way to make you see that I can’t leave you,” he whispered. “Time, I suppose, will be the way to convince you.”
He really did want me the way I wanted him—forever. It was only fear for my soul, for the human things he didn’t want to take from me, that made him so desperate to leave me mortal. Compared to the fear that he didn’t want me, this hurdle—my soul—seemed almost insignificant.
“Carlisle? Esme? Rosalie? Emmett? Jasper? Alice?”
A “y’all” would have sufficed.
I looked at Carlisle. “After graduation?” “You have my word.”
“So eager for eternal damnation,” he muttered.
Really, the premarital purity allegory is getting old lol
“Forever,” he vowed, still a little staggered. “That’s all I’m asking for,” I said, and stretched up on my toes so that I could press my lips to his.
The fairy tale was back on. Prince returned, bad spell broken. I wasn’t sure exactly what to do about the leftover, unresolved character. Where was his happily ever after?
Abruptly, I remembered what had happened to Paris when Romeo came back. The stage directions were simple: They fight. Paris falls. But that was ridiculous. Impossible.
The sting of betrayal washed through me. I had trusted Jacob implicitly—trusted him with every single secret I had. He was supposed to be my safe harbor—the person I could always rely on. Of course things were strained right now, but I didn’t think any of the underlying foundation had changed. I didn’t think that was changeable!
“The treaty is quite specific. If any of them bite a human, the truce is over. Bite, not kill,” he emphasized. Finally, he looked at me. His eyes were cold.
