"Exactly," Jacob agreed.
"You know why..." Bella started to say.
"Your book self has no idea what he's thinking," Jacob putted out. "And yet you're sitting there, not caring at all that he just said that he thought about killing you."
"Yep," Bella shrugged and then laughed at the expression that Jacob was making now.
She waited, only curious. Her skin was pale, which was natural for her, but it still concerned me. Her dinner sat nearly untouched in front of her. If I continued to tell her too much, she was going to need a buffer when the shock wore off.
I named my terms. "You eat, I'll talk."
She processed that for half a second, and then threw a bite in her mouth with a speed that belied her calm. She was more anxious for my answer than her eyes let on.
"Good," Bella said, that meant that her eyes had become better at hiding her emotions than they were now.
"It's harder than it should be - keeping track of you," I told her. "Usually I can find someone very easily, once I've heard their mind before."
I watched her face carefully as I said this. Guessing right was one thing, having it confirmed was another.
She was motionless, her eyes wide. I felt my teeth clench together as I waited for her panic.
But she just blinked once, swallowed loudly, and then quickly scooped another bite into her mouth. She wanted me to continue.
Jacob chuckled at the image.
"I was keeping tabs on Jessica," I went on, watching each word as it sank in.
"Not carefully - like I said, only you could find trouble in Port Angeles - " I couldn't resist adding that. Did she realize that other human lives were not so plagued with near death experiences, or did she think she was normal?
Bella gritted her teeth at that thought. Of course she knew this wasn't normal... she'd never been attacked before she got to Forks.
She was the furthest thing from normal I'd ever encountered. "And at first I didn't notice when you took off on your own. Then, when I realized that you weren't with her anymore, I went looking for you at the bookstore I saw in her head. I could tell that you hadn't gone in, and that you'd gone south...and I knew you would have to turn around soon. So I was just waiting for you, randomly searching through the thoughts of people on the street - to see if anyone had noticed you so I would know where you were. I had no reason to be worried...but I was strangely anxious..." My breath came faster as I remembered that feeling of panic. Her scent blazed in my throat and I was glad. It was a pain that meant she was alive. As long as I burned, she was safe.
"That's an interesting way of thinking of it," Jacob said. "And I guess I'm going to say that I hope that your throat always burns."
"I started to drive in circles, still...listening." I hoped the word made sense to her.
This had to be confusing. "The sun was finally setting, and I was about to get out, and follow you on foot. And then - "
"Hm... if you didn't already know that he was a vampire, I bet that sentence would have confused you," Jacob said.
"Yeah... I might have wondered why he had to wait for the sun to go down before he got out," Bella agreed, "but I'm not sure if I'm really paying attention to that part."
As the memory took me - perfectly clear and as vivid as if I was in the moment again - I felt the same murderous fury wash through my body, locking it into ice.
I wanted him dead. I needed him dead. My jaw clenched tight as I concentrated on holding myself here at the table. Bella still needed me. That was what mattered.
"Then what?" she whispered, her dark eyes wide.
"I heard what they were thinking," I said through my teeth, unable to keep the words from coming out in a growl. "I saw your face in his mind."
I could hardly resist the urge to kill. I still knew precisely where to find him. His black thoughts sucked at the night sky, pulling me toward them...
I covered my face, knowing my expression was that of a monster, a hunter, a killer. I fixed her image behind my closed eyes to control myself, focusing only on her face. The delicate framework of her bones, the thin sheath of her pale skin - like silk stretched over glass, incredibly soft and easy to shatter. She was too vulnerable for this world. She needed a protector. And, through some twisted mismanagement of destiny, I was the closest thing available.
"Honestly, I'm not any more fragile than all the other humans around me," Bella mumbled.
"I don't know about that," Jacob chuckled. "And add in the fact that everything comes after you... I can really see Edward's point."
I tried to explain my violent reaction so that she would understand.
"It was very...hard - you can't imagine how hard - for me to simply take you away, and leave them...alive," I whispered. "I could have let you go with Jessica and Angela, but I was afraid if you left me alone, I would go looking for them."
"Okay... so now he's admitting to be a murderer... or at least having murderous thoughts," Jacob said. "You're going to take this just as calmly as the stalking thing, aren't you?"
"Probably," Bella shrugged. "Though the more he talks like this, the more I feel like I really do know what he is already."
"Yeah," Jacob groaned. "I know what you mean."
For the second time tonight, I confessed to an intended murder. At least this one was defensible.
"Agreed," Jacob said.
She was quiet as I struggled to control myself. I listened to her heartbeat. The rhythm was irregular, but it slowed as the time passed until it was steady again. Her breathing, too, was low and even.