"Why?" I barked out, to force her to speak again.
"He's telling everyone that he's taking me to prom," she said, her voice filled with her tiger-kitten
outrage. "Either he's insane or he's still trying to make up for almost killing me last...well you remember
it," she inserted dryly, "and he thinks prom is somehow the correct way to do this. So I figure if I
endanger his life, then we're even, and he can't keep trying to make amends. I don't need enemies and
maybe Lauren would back off if he left me alone. I might have to total his Sentra, though," she went on,
thoughtful now. "If he doesn't have a ride he can't take anyone to prom..."
It was encouraging to see that she sometimes got things wrong. Tyler's persistence had nothing to do
with the accident. She didn't seem to understand the appeal she held for the human boys at the high
school. Did she not see the appeal she had for me, either?
Ah, it was working. The baffling processes of her mind were always engrossing. I was beginning to gain
control of myself, to see something beyond vengeance and torture...
"I heard about that," I told her. She had stopped talking, and I needed her to continue.
"You did?" she asked incredulously. And then her voice was angrier than before. "If he's paralyzed from
the neck down, he can't go to the prom either."
I wished there was someway I could ask her to continue with the threats of death and bodily harm with
out sounding insane. She couldn't have picked a better way to calm me. And her words-just sarcasm in
her case, hyperbole-were a reminder I dearly needed in this moment.
I sighed, and opened my eyes.
"Better?" she asked timidly.
"Not really."
No, I was calmer, but not better. Because I'd just realized that I could not kill the monster named Lonnie,
and I still wanted that more than almost anything else in the world. Almost.
The only thing in this moment that I wanted more than to commit a highly justifiable murder, was this
girl. And, though I couldn't have her, just the dream of having her made it impossible for me to go on a
killing spree tonight-no matter how defensible such a thing might be.
Bella deserved better than a killer.
I'd spent seven decades trying to be something other than that-anything other than a killer. Those years
of effort could never make me worthy of the girl sitting beside me. And yet, I felt that if I returned to
that life-the life of a killer-for even one night, I would surely put her out of my reach forever. Even if I
didn't drink their blood-even if I didn't have that evidence blazing red in my eyes-wouldn't she sense the
difference?
I was trying to be good enough for her. It was an impossible goal. I would keep trying.
"What's wrong?" she whispered.
Her breath filled my nose, and I was reminded why I could not deserve her. After all of this, even with as
much as I loved her...she still made my mouth water.
I would give her as much honesty as I could. I owed her that.
"Sometimes I have a problem with my temper, Bella." I stared out into the black night, wishing both that
she would hear the horror inherent in my words and also that she would not. Mostly that she would not.
Run, Bella, run. Stay, Bella, stay. "But it wouldn't be helpful for me to turn around and hunt down
those..." Just thinking about it almost pulled me from the car. I took a deep breath, letting her scent
scorch down my throat. "At least, that's what I'm trying to convince myself."
"Oh."
She said nothing else. How much had she heard in my words? I glanced at her furtively, but her face was
unreadable. Blank with shock, perhaps. Well, she wasn't screaming. Not yet.
It was quiet for a moment. I warred with myself, trying to be what I should be. What I couldn't be.
"Jessica and Angela will be worried," she said quietly. Her voice was very calm, and I was not sure how
that could be. Was she in shock? Maybe tonight's events hadn't sunk in for her yet. "I was supposed to
meet them."
Did she want to be away from me? Or was she just worried about her friends' worry?
I didn't answer her, but I started the car and took her back. Every inch closer I got to the town, the
harder it was to hold on to my purpose. I was just so close to him...
If it was impossible-if I could never have nor deserve this girl-then where was the sense in letting the
man go unpunished? Surely I could allow myself that much...
No. I wasn't giving up. Not yet. I wanted her too much to surrender.
We were at the restaurant where she was supposed to meet her friends before I'd even begun to make
sense of my thoughts. Jessica and Angela were finished eating, and both now truly worried about Bella.
They were on their way to search for her, heading off along the dark street.
It was not a good night for them to be wandering-
"How did you know where...?" Bella's unfinished question interrupted me, and I realized that I had made