It was very quiet. I didn’t want to be the first to break the silence that enveloped us. By us I meant Alice, Jasper and me. Jasper was driving somewhere. They hadn’t told me. I was particularly worried; I knew I could trust them. Also because Jasper was working his magic on me so it was hard to feel worried. So I was left with my thoughts to keep my company. It was hard being away from Edward. I had spent so much of my time with him that it felt wrong that he wasn’t by my side. My heart felt like it had been ripped into tiny pieces and scattered across America. It would take a lot of time to find them but if Edward was with me, I knew that one look into his golden eyes would send those pieces flying back to me in an instant, making my heart whole.
I sighed and leaned my head against the window. The scenery outside flashed by. I didn’t pay much attention to it. It was of no interest to me.
What I had done to Charlie. I couldn’t even look myself in the mirror. How could I do that to him? How could I put him through that much pain? But would he have let me leave if I had told him the truth? Would he have willingly let me walk away with Alice and Jasper not knowing when he would see me again? Of course he wouldn’t. He would have tried to protect me and get himself killed. Charlie may think that he is up to it but I know that he would stand a chance. He was too old. Yes, he had his abilities but when was the last time he used them. His abilities only resurface when he thought the Cullens were a threat to me but the Cullens wouldn’t have harmed Charlie anyway so they aren’t much of a danger.
I jerked my head away from the window and looked outside. Did I see what I thought I had just seen? It couldn’t have been. It shouldn’t have been. They were no where near this way; Alice had made sure of that before we started driving.
From the corner of my eye I saw it again, but out of the window on my other side. A white blur that stuck out sharply against the green of the trees that dashed by.
“Alice?” I called uncertainly from the back. I was trying to look out of both windows at once but it was difficult as my eyes wouldn’t go in opposite directions.
“Yes, Kayla?” she asked, unconcerned from the front passenger seat.
Jasper’s gaze flicked from the road to me. He could feel my panic break through the calm he was pressing on me.
“I think I just saw-” Before I could finish my sentence there was a loud thud from above us. Something had landed on the car roof.
Jasper moved with speed. He turned the car off the road and into the trees that lined it. A hand broke through the metal roof and grabbed at me. It caught my hair and tried to pull me up but Alice was in the backseat next to me and her teeth clamped around the arm. The hand let go and retreated back up before Alice could bite it off.
“Stay here!” she hissed and she shot out the car. Jasper was out after her. I thought that it was foolish to stay here. I was like a sitting duck, an easy target. They could get to me easily if they could defeat Alice and Jasper? Wouldn’t it be safer to run? I could have a chance to escape, a chance to survive.
I could hear snarls and ripping noises from above me on the roof. There was a fight going on. But who was winning? I winced as there was a loud bang as something was slammed against the roof of the car. I looked up, scared that it might be Alice or Jasper who had been hurt.
My eyes averted, I didn’t see the vampire until it was too late. My neck stretched up and my head and eyes turned to the roof, I was exposed and unguarded.
I didn’t hear their footsteps nor see them as the crept into the car next to me. I only realised I was being ambushed when his cold hands were pinning me against the backseat. I tried to scream but nothing came out. I was terrified. I had never felt like this before. I had been scared when I fought the newborn in the forest but that was when I knew I would survive. But as Jared face inched closer to mine I knew I couldn’t. The fact that I could die when his venom touched my red blood cells blocked out any survival instincts. The only thing that went through my mind was death. My death. My horrible excruciating death as my heart attacked itself.
“Persephone wanted you badly,” Jared whispered and his cool breath blew onto my face. “But she wasn’t smart enough. She attacked too soon. But I waited.”
He could see the terror in my eyes and he loved it. Did all vampires get pleasure from inducing fear into their victims?
“I knew that if I was patient enough I would get you.”
It was Persephone that had jumped on the car roof. It was Persephone who Alice and Jasper were fighting right now on the roof. It wasn’t me Alice and Jasper were protecting.
I knew I had to do something to defend myself but my muscles wouldn’t work. It was like they were paralysed with fear. I had never felt like this before. Never. I didn’t like it. Not one bit. I had to save myself. I would not die at the hands of Jared. I would die when I was old enough to die. Not at sixteen, not in the backseat of a car and definitely not by this arrogant vampire.
I wrenched one of my hands free and punched Jared in the side of the face. He staggered backwards and I tried to make my escape. I had only reached the door when his hands were around me arm. I turned back and saw him smile at me. It wasn’t a nice smile. Evil sparked in his eyes. His head bent over my wrist and I screamed. I screamed loud and hard. But I was too late. I felt his teeth pierce my skin. I thought I could feel his venom stream into my veins.
It was my scream that alerted Alice and Jasper to my immediate death. It was only then that I noticed that the snarling and the ripping and the bangs had stopped. I don’t even think they were on the roof anymore.
Two strong hands gripped Jared’s shoulders and yanked him out of the car. His hands and mouth left my arm and he was dragged into the trees by Jasper.
Alice jumped into the car next to me and saw crescent bite on my wrist. Jared had made sure he bit into a good vein.
“Oh no!” Alice’s voice was full of worry. “Oh no! This was something Edward warned us could not happen. Oh no!”
I wasn’t listening to Alice. I was worried about my arm. At my wrist, where Jared had bitten me, had gone cold. Ice cold. There was an almost burning sensation accompanied with it. I wondered how this could be. How could fire and ice survive together? Didn’t they counter each other out? This ice cold and burning sensation was slowly travelling up my arm and I knew what had happening. It was my blood, contaminated with the venom, travelling along my veins. Soon it would reach my heart and I was dead. It was agonizing, this fire and ice, but I didn’t scream. It wouldn’t help.
“Alice, I need the matches.”
Jasper was standing at the door of the car. He hadn’t registered our horrified faces or the bite mark on my wrist.
“Alice! Didn’t you hear me?”
It was only then that Jasper looked at my wrist.
“Shit!” he jumped into the car next to me and pushed Alice out. “You have the matches. Burn the pieces.”
“I can’t leave her!” Alice whimpered her golden eyes wide and staring at me.
“I’ll deal with her, you deal with them.”
Jasper took my wrist delicately in his cold hands. The fire and ice was half way up my arm. It was excruciatingly painful and my arm was jerking with spasms that I couldn’t control. I bit on my bottom lip to stop myself from screaming.
“What are you going to do?” I asked Jasper. My voice was unsteady and shaking, like my arm.
He didn’t answer but was staring at the bite mark. It seemed he was contemplating something. The spasms were travelling along my arm to the rest of my body, faster than the venom. Soon my entire body was shaking uncontrollably and I couldn’t stop it. I fell off the seat and landed hard in the back of the car. I curled up into the foetal position but the arm that Jasper held was extended. It was then that Jasper reached his decision. As I lay on the floor of the car, shaking violently. His lips closed around my wrist. I didn’t feel anything. The ice cold that was my blood and the burning that was the venom had taken over everything else so that I could feel only them. I closed my eyes against the pain.
“Kayla!”
A voice that I was sure I recognised was calling to me. It was so soft and velvety. But I couldn’t think properly. My body was shaking so much it hurt and the burning and ice in my arm was so painful.
“Jasper! What are you doing?” the soft velvet voice sounded angry. I felt someone beside me, holding onto my other hand. He was cold but not painful like the cold in my veins.
The fire and ice that I felt so dominantly was lessening. I could feel it almost like it was travelling back down my veins, back to the crescent bite. But it was going fast enough. I was still in pain and I couldn’t fight it. It was taking over me, this fire and ice. It hadn’t reached my heart but it didn’t mean it wasn’t agony.
“Kayla, honey, is it still hurting?” the velvet voice asked me. “Is your arm still painful?”
Yes. I thought it but I couldn’t form the words with my lips. When I opened my mouth the only thing that came out was an agonizing shriek.
“The venom’s still in her veins,” the velvet voice spoke to Jasper. I felt the burning lessen more and the ice followed.
There was complete silence but the velvet voice seemed to answer an unspoken question.
“You will be able to.”
The fire and ice continued to decrease in their torture. My spasms lessened to slight shudder.
“She’s stopped shaking so much so that must mean the venom is nearly gone. Keep going, Jasper, I know you can do this.”
I was beginning to feel drowsy. The ice cold was gone and the burning was faint. My shaking stopped and I was able to lie still on the floor. My body ached from the spasms.
“Kayla?” the velvet voice was whispering in my ear. “Open you eyes.”
I wanted to open my eyes but they were just so heavy. I felt so drained. I was going to blame the fire that was torturing me but I couldn’t feel it anymore.
“Stop, Jasper, it’s gone.”
Stop what? What was Jasper doing? I could see Jasper in my mind with his lips on my wrist. He was drinking my blood!
“Stop!”
“Don’t worry, Edward. I wouldn’t have killed her.”
Edward! That was who the velvet voice belonged to. My Edward. I tried to open my eyes to look at him but they wouldn’t obey me.
“Open your eyes, Kayla,” Edward told me.
I tried to, I really did but I couldn’t. I felt exhausted. The spasms had left me so sore and my body shattered.
Edward’s voice was fervent now.
“If you survive this Kayla, I will give you anything you want. You just have to open your eyes and tell me you’re ok.”
I felt my mind slipping. I needed to sleep. If I could sleep for just an hour, I could open my eyes and tell him I was fine.
“I’ll give you the Aston Martin.”
I willed my eyes to open. I could have that beautiful car if they would just open. Open! But it was too late; I was already drifting into unconsciousness.