enjoyed the hunt when he was the prey. I would see what he thought of my style of hunting.
Jacob didn't think about that comment at all... he didn't care what Edward had just thought because at the moment he was thinking something similar (though perhaps not how Edward had meant it).
In another compartment of my head, I was already sorting through the range of tortures I'd born witness to in my vigilante days, searching for the most painful of them.
He would suffer for this. He would writhe in agony. The others would merely die for their part, but the monster named Lonnie would beg for death long before I would give him that gift.
Bella frowned at that... she didn't want that. Jail, a life time imprisonment, something along those lines... but she didn't want Edward to kill them... because of her.
He was in the road, crossing toward her.
I spun sharply around the corner, my headlights washing across the scene and freezing the rest of them in place. I could have run down the leader, who leapt out of the way, but that was too easy a death for him.
I let the car spin out, swinging all the way around so that I was facing back the way I'd come and the passenger door was closest to Bella. I threw that open, and she was already running toward the car.
"Get in," I snarled.
What the hell?
Knew this was a bad idea! She's not alone.
Should I run?
Think I'm going to throw up...
Bella grimaced at these thoughts, wondering if Edward was really going to kill them. They had seemed so normal... and yet what they would have done to her... She shivered at that thought.
"Are you okay?" Jacob asked, his face was stony at the moment, but it was clear that he was relieved that Bella, book Bella that is, was safe now.
"It's hard reading this," Bella said.
"Do you wa...?" Jacob started to ask.
Bella shook her head, "I'll read... anyway, it's thinking about it..."
"Yeah," Jacob agreed as the both shuddered.
Bella jumped through the open door without hesitating, pulling the door shut behind her.
And then she looked up at me with the most trustful expression I had ever seen on a human face, and all my violent plans crumbled.
Bella was a little relieved by that.
It took much, much less than a second for me to see that I could not leave her in the car in order to deal with the four men in the street.
"Argh... obviously you can't do that," Jacob said thinking about what that would look like and cringing at the idea. Then he cringed inwardly at the fact that he didn't really care at the moment if Edward did rip these guys... not just the sick bastard... apart limb from limb. Then he thought of what the bloodlust might do to Edward if that did happen... and how much more dangerous he would be to Bella then... No, Edward had to leave those guys alone.
What would I tell her, not to watch? Ha! When did she ever do what I asked? When did she ever do the safe thing? Would I drag them away, out of her sight, and leave her alone here? It was a long shot that another dangerous human would be prowling the streets of Port Angeles tonight, but it was a long shot that there was even the first! Like a magnet, she drew all things dangerous toward herself.
Bella felt a pang of annoyance at that sentence, but with all the other emotions she was feeling it barely registered to her.
I could not let her out of my sight.
It would feel like part of the same motion to her as I accelerated, taking her away from her pursuers so quickly that they gaped after my car with uncomprehending expressions. She would not recognize my instant of hesitation. She would assume the plan was escape from the beginning.
I couldn't even hit him with my car. That would frighten her.
I wanted his death so savagely that the need for it rang in my ears and clouded my sight and was a flavor on my tongue. My muscles were coiled with the urgency, the craving, the necessity of it. I had to kill him. I would peel him slowly apart, piece by piece, skin from muscle, muscle from bone...
Bella shuddered at that image and Jacob looked a little sick by it, too.
Except that the girl - the only girl in the world - was clinging to her seat with both