"I'm trying to calm down here too," Jacob shrugged. "I usually do that by joking around..."

"Right, sorry," Bella said. "That just wasn't a very good joke."

"I'll try better next time," Jacob shrugged.

Only the fact that she needed me held me inside the car. I could hear the man's thoughts, his disappointment and anger... I knew where to find him... I closed my eyes, wishing that I couldn't see anyway...

"Um..." She hesitated - trying to make sense of my request, I imagined. "I'm going to run over Tyler Crowley tomorrow before school?"

Jacob started laughing at that, albeit it was a weak laugh, but still.

"Why would you do that?" Jacob said, but Bella didn't answer.

She said this like it was a question.

Yes - this was what I needed. Of course Bella would come up with something unexpected. Like it had been before, the threat of violence coming through her lips was hilarious - so comical it was jarring.

"I can cause violence," Bella mumbled.

"Sure you can," Jacob said laughing.

Bella glared at him, which only seemed to make Jacob laugh more.

If I had not been burning with the urge to kill, I would have laughed.

"Why?" I barked out, to force her to speak again.

"He's telling everyone that he's taking me to prom," she said,

"Jerk," Bella hissed at the book. "How can he tell people that... he didn't even ask me."

"Don't know," Jacob shrugged, still laughing.

her voice filled with her tiger-kitten outrage.

More laughter at that from Jacob and Bella glared at the book. However, she did note that this talk had definitely helped both her and Jacob relax a little after what had just happened. Her glare loosened as she thought of that and her tone was lighter when she started reading again.

"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.

"That's not why he's asking you out," Jacob laughed.

I don't need enemies and maybe Lauren would back off if he left me alone.

Bella groaned at that, even madder at this Tyler guy.

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?

Bella blushed at the idea that she appealed to the other guys at school, but that wasn't anything to the blush she had at the mention of her appeal for Edward.

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."

"What's the matter, Bells, don't you like that Edward knows about this?" Jacob chuckled and she glared at him.

I wished there was some way I could ask her to continue with the threats of death and bodily harm without 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,

"I guess that's right," Jacob said, he had calmed down quite a lot by this point.

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.

Bella smiled at this, it was rather intoxicating to know that she had this kind of power over him. Though she didn't think of him as a killer, it was still nice to know that he was trying to be better for her.

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.

Bella narrowed her eyes at this point, not agreeing with him at all.

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?

"That depends," Bella said.

"On?" Jacob encouraged her to continue her thought.

"On whether he acts differently or not," Bella said. "If he starts acting even more moody than he already is, it would be hard to miss."

"Would you forgive him... if he did kill this guy?" Jacob asked.

"I don't think he's the monster that he seems to think he is," Bella said in a way to answer.

"That's not an answer," Jacob said.

"I don't want him to kill him," Bella said, "but it wouldn't change the way I think of him."

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.

Jacob shivered at that, a little afraid how he would react to this in his maddened state, but he wasn't too worried.

"How does my scent make it so he doesn't deserve me?" Bella said a little angrily.

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.