It was maddening. We ran and swam and swung through the forest as fast as we were able, but he just toyed with us, constantly building his lead. He was very practiced and, I was sure, quite confident in his success. The advantage was entirely his now. We’d keep lagging behind, and eventually he’d be able to lose us completely.
The thousands of miles between Bella and me kept me always anxious. This plan, leading him away, was turning out to be no more than a minor delay in his real search.
But what else could we do? We had to keep chasing after him and hope we could somehow catch him out. This was supposed to be our big chance to stop him without endangering Bella. We were doing a pathetic job.
He confused the trail again in another miles-long glacial lake. There were dozens just like this, all raking north to south through the Canadian valleys as if a giant hand had gouged its fingers down the center of the continent. The tracker took advantage of them often, and each time we had to imagine and decide, then wait for Alice’s C or Em or Ed, a y or an n. We got faster at the mental part, but every pause put him farther ahead.
The sun rose, but the clouds were thick today and the tracker didn’t slow. I wondered what he would have done if the sun was shining. We were on the west side of the mountains now, and running into human towns again. Probably he would have just quickly slaughtered any witnesses if he’d had to.
I was certain he was heading for the ocean and a clean getaway. We were much closer to Vancouver now than to Calgary. He didn’t seem interested in moving south, back to Forks. There was a slight northern trend.
Honestly, he didn’t need any more stratagems. He had enough of a lead to just race flat out to the coast with no chance of us catching up.
But then the trail led into yet another lake. I was ninety percent sure that he was toying with us simply for his own entertainment. He could have escaped, but it was more fun to make us jump through his hoops.
I could only hope that his arrogance would somehow backfire, that he’d make a bad choice that would put him within our reach, but I doubted it. He was too good at this game.
And we kept following. Giving up didn’t feel like a valid option.
Midmorning, Esme texted. Can you talk?
Is there any chance he’ll hear me?Carlisle wanted to know.
“If only,” I sighed.
Carlisle called Esme and they spoke while we ran. She had no real news, she was mostly worried about us. The redhead was still in the area, but she wouldn’t come within five miles of Esme or Rosalie. Rosalie had done some scouting, and it appeared the redhead had gone to the high school in the night, and through most of the public buildings in town. She’d hadn’t gone north toward our house again, and she’d only gone as far south as the municipal airstrip, but she seemed to be hiding herself to the east, maybe keeping close to Seattle for a bigger hunting ground. She’d tried Charlie’s house one time, but not until he’d left for work. Esme had never been more than a few yards from Charlie throughout, which was impressive, since he had no idea she was there.
There was nothing more, no clues. She and Carlisle exchanged pained I love yous, and then we were back to the mind-numbing chase. The tracker was headed north again, enjoying himself too much to take the easy escape.
It was midafternoon when we came to another lake, crescent-shaped and not as large as the others he’d used to slow us. Without having to discuss it, we each decided to follow our usual search routes. Quickly, Alice responded Em. Backtracking to the south, then.
Once we had his scent again, it led us through a small town tucked into a mountain pass. It was big enough for a light flow of traffic on the narrow streets. We had to slow down—and I hated that, even though I knew it didn’t matter. We were too far behind for our speed to make any difference. But it soothed me to think that he’d probably had to move at human speed, too. I wondered why he would bother. Maybe he was thirsty. I was sure he knew he had time to stop for a bite.
We darted from building to building, trusting my senses to let us know if anyone was watching, running when we could. We were obviously not dressed warmly enough for the weather here—and if anyone looked closely, we were also soaking wet—and I tried to weave us around human vantage points to avoid catching any attention.
We made it to the outskirts of town without discovering any fresh corpses, so he must not have been looking to quench his thirst. What was he seeking, then?
To the south now.
We followed his trail to a large, rough shed in the middle of an open field, thick with thorny brambles that were still winter bare. The wide doors to the shed were propped open. The inside of the shed was mostly empty, just stacks of mechanical and automotive clutter lining the walls. The scent led into the shed and was more set into the ground here, as if he’d lingered for a moment. I could only think of one reason, and I searched for the scent of blood. Nothing. All I could smell was exhaust… gasoline.…
I felt sick as I realized what I hadn’t seen at first. With a low oath, I darted out of the shed and vaulted over the tall brambles. Emmett and Carlisle followed, back on high alert after the stupefying hours of failure.
And there, on the other side, was a long line of flattened dirt, rolled as smooth as possible, about two hundred feet wide, stretching at least a mile to the west.
It was private airstrip.
I cursed again.
I’d been too focused on the water escape. There was an air escape, too.
The plane would be tiny and slow, not much faster than a car. No more than one hundred forty miles an hour, if it was in good condition. The slipshod little hangar made me think it probably wasn’t. He’d have to stop for gas frequently if he intended to go far.
But he could go in any direction at all, and we had no way to follow.
I looked at Carlisle, and his eyes were just as disappointed and hopeless as mine.
Will he go back to Forks to try to pick up her trail?
I frowned. “It would make sense, but it seems a little obvious. Not quite his style.”
Where else can we go?
I sighed.
Should I?
I nodded. “Make the call.”
He pressed the redial button. It only rang once.
“Alice?”
“Carlisle,” I heard her breathe.
I leaned closer, anxious, though I could already hear.
“Are you totally secure?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“We lost him about a hundred seventy miles northeast of Vancouver. He took a small plane. We have no idea where he’s headed.”
“I just saw him,” she said urgently, and also totally unsurprised by our failure. “He’s headed to a room somewhere, no clues to the location, but it was unusual. Mirrors covering the walls, a gold band around the middle of the room, like a chair rail, mostly empty but for one corner with an old AV set up. There was another room, too, a dark room, but all I could see was that he was watching VHS tapes. I have no idea what that means. But whatever made him get in that plane… it was leading him to those rooms.”
It wasn’t enough information to help. The tracker could be planning to enjoy some downtime, for all we knew. Maybe he wanted to make us wait, make us stew. Ratchet up our anxiety. It seemed in line with his personality. I pictured him in an empty house somewhere random, watching old movies while we crawled out of our skins awaiting his return. This was exactly what we’d wanted to avoid.
The good news was that Alice was seeing him independently of us now. I could only hope that with continued familiarity, she would get a better line on him. I wondered whether there was any significance to the rooms she described that would tie back to us. Maybe it meant that we would eventually hunt him down to one of those places. If Alice got a better view of the surroundings, it was a possibility. That was a comforting thought.
I held my hand out for the phone, and Carlisle handed it over.
“Can I speak to Bella, please?”
“Yes.” She turned her head away from the receiver. “Bella?”
I could hear Bella’s feet thudding as she ran awkwardly across the room, and if I hadn’t been so demoralized, I would have smiled.
“Hello?” she asked breathlessly.
“Bella.” Relief saturated my voice. The brief separation had already taken a toll.
“Oh, Edward,” she sighed. “I was so worried!”
Of course. “Bella, I told you not to worry about anything but yourself.”
“Where are you?”
“We’re outside of Vancouver. Bella, I’m sorry—we lost him.” I didn’t want to tell her how he’d toyed with us. It would make her nervous that he’d gotten the upper hand so easily. It made me nervous. “He seems suspicious of us—he’s careful to stay just far enough away that I can’t hear what he’s thinking. But he’s gone now—it looks like he got in a plane. We think he’s heading back to Forks to start over.” Well, we had no other theories, anyway.
“I know. Alice saw that he got away,” she said with perfect composure.
“You don’t have to worry, though,” I assured her, though she didn’t sound worried. “He won’t find anything to lead him to you. You just have to stay there and wait till we find him again.”
“I’ll be fine. Is Esme with Charlie?”
“Yes—the female has been in town. She went to the house, but while Charlie was at work. She hasn’t gone near him, so don’t be afraid. He’s safe with Esme and Rosalie watching.”
“What is she doing?”
“Probably trying to pick up the trail. She’s been all through the town during the night. Rosalie traced her through the airport.…” The airstrip to the south of town. Maybe we weren’t wrong about his intentions after all. I continued before Bella could notice my distraction. “All the roads around town, the school… she’s digging, Bella, but there’s nothing to find.”
“And you’re sure Charlie’s safe?” she demanded.
“Yes, Esme won’t let him out of her sight. And we’ll be there soon.” We were definitely headed there now. “If the tracker gets anywhere near Forks, we’ll have him.”
I started to move, loping south. Carlisle and Emmett followed suit.
“I miss you,” she whispered.
“I know, Bella. Believe me, I know.” I couldn’t believe how diminished I felt apart from her. “It’s like you’ve taken half my self away with you.”
“Come and get it, then,” she suggested.
“Soon, as soon as I possibly can. I will make you safe first,” I vowed.
“I love you,” she breathed.
“Could you believe that, despite everything I’ve put you through, I love you, too?”
“Yes, I can, actually.” It sounded like she was smiling as she spoke.
“I’ll come for you soon.”
“I’ll be waiting,” she promised.
It hurt to end the call, to disconnect from her again. But I was in a hurry now. I passed the phone back to Carlisle without looking, and then pushed my lope into a sprint. Depending on how difficult it was for the tracker to locate fuel, we might actually be able to beat him back to Forks, if that was where he was going.
Carlisle and Emmett worked to keep up.
We were back in Forks in three and a half hours, taking the fastest route straight through the Salish Sea. We went directly to Charlie’s house, where Esme and Rosalie were on watch, Esme in the back of the house, and Rosalie in the tree in the front yard. Emmett went quickly to join her while Carlisle and I went to Esme.
Now that I was here to appreciate them, Rosalie was thinking bitter thoughts about how selfishly I was putting everyone’s lives in danger. I paid no attention to her.
Bella’s house was ominously quiet, though there were several lights on downstairs. I realized what was missing—the sound of a game from the TV in the living room. I found Charlie’s mind in its usual spot, sitting on the sofa, facing the dark TV. His thoughts were totally silent, as though he had gone numb. I winced, glad Bella didn’t have to see this.
It took only a few seconds of discussion, and then we scattered. Carlisle stayed with Esme, and I felt much better that he was there with her. Emmett and Rosalie did a sweep through the center of town and then searched the area around the airstrip, looking for an abandoned prop plane.
I ran east, following the redhead’s trail. I wouldn’t mind cornering her. But her scent only led into the Puget Sound. She wasn’t taking any chances.
I swept the familiar Olympic Park on my way back to Charlie’s, just to see if the redhead had gone anywhere interesting, but she seemed to have made a beeline for the Sound. She wasn’t the type to risk a confrontation.
Back at Bella’s house, I took over watch while Esme and Carlisle scouted north to see if the redhead had emerged from the water near Port Angeles and was trying to come at Charlie from another angle. I doubted it, but we had nothing better to do. If the tracker wasn’t coming back to Forks—which seemed evident at this point—and the redhead had gone to meet him, then we would have to regroup and come up with a new plan. I hoped someone else had an idea, because my head was a blank.
It was nearly two-thirty in the morning when my phone buzzed quietly. I accepted the call without looking, expecting a report from Carlisle.
Alice’s voice erupted from the phone, trilling with speed.
“He’s coming here, he’s coming to Phoenix, if he’s not already here—I saw the second room again, and Bella recognized the sketch, it’s her mother’s house, Edward—he’s coming after Renée. He can’t know we’re here, but I don’t like Bella so close to him. He’s too slippery, and I can’t see him well enough. We’ve got to get her out of here, but somebody’s got to find Renée—he’s going to spread us too thin, Edward!”
I felt dizzy, dazed, though I knew it was an illusion. There was nothing wrong with my mind or my body. But the tracker had gone around me again, circling, always in my blind spot. Whether by design or by luck, he was about to be in the same place as Bella while I was fifteen hundred miles away from her.
“How long till he’s there?” I hissed. “Can you nail it down?”
“Not perfectly, but I know it’s soon. No more than a few hours.”
Was he flying straight there? Had he been leading us farther away from her on purpose?
“None of you have gone near Renée’s house?”
“No. We’ve not set foot anywhere outside this hotel. We’re nowhere close to the house.”
It was too far to make running an efficient option. We’d have to fly. And a big plane was the fastest way.
“The first flight to Phoenix leaves Seattle at six-forty,” Alice told me, a step ahead. “You’ll need to cover up. It’s ludicrously sunny here.”
“We’ll leave Esme and Rosalie here again. The redhead won’t come near them. Get Bella ready. We’ll keep the same groups. Emmett, Carlisle, and I will take her somewhere far away, somewhere random, till we can figure out the next step. You find her mother.”
“We’ll be there when you land.”
Alice hung up.
I started running, dialing Carlisle as I sprinted for Seattle. They’d have to catch up to me.
25. RACE
EVEN WHEN THE PLANE’S WHEELS TOUCHED THE TARMAC, MY IMPATIENCE refused to ebb. I reminded myself that Bella was surely less than a mile distant now and it wouldn’t be many minutes more before I could see her face again, but that only made the urge stronger to rip the emergency door off its hinges and sprint to the building rather than wait through the interminable taxiing. Carlisle could feel my agitation in my absolute stillness, and he nudged my elbow lightly to remind me to move.
Though our row’s window shade was down, there was an excess of direct sunlight in the plane. My arms were folded so that my hands were hidden, and I’d let the hood of my airport-shop hoodie fall forward to keep my face in shadow. We probably looked ridiculous to the other passengers—especially Emmett, bulging out of a sweatshirt that was several sizes too small—or as though we thought we were some kind of celebrities hiding behind our hoods and dark glasses. More probably northern bumpkins who had no frame of reference for spring temperatures in the Southwest. I caught one man thinking that we’d all remove the sweatshirts before we made it down the length of the jetway.
The plane in the air had felt unbearably slow; this taxiing might kill me.
Just a little more restraint, I promised myself. She’d be there at the end of this. I’d take her away from here, and we’d hide together while we figured this out. The thought soothed me a tiny amount.
In reality, it took very little time for the plane to find its assigned gate, open and ready. There were a million possible delays that hadn’t gotten in our way. I should have been grateful.
We were even fortunate enough to end up at a gate on the north side of the airport, tucked into the late-morning shadow of the larger terminal. That would make it easier for us to move fast.
Carlisle’s fingers rested lightly on my elbow while the crew took its time going through checks. Outside the plane, I could hear the mechanical Jetway maneuvering into place, and the knock against the hull when that was achieved. The crew ignored the sound, the two forward-cabin stewards staring together at a passenger list.
He nudged me again, and I pretended to breathe.
Finally, the steward approached the door and worked to heave it out of the way. I desperately wanted to help him, but Carlisle’s fingertips on my arm kept me focused.
With a hiss, the door opened, and warm outside air mixed with the stale cabin air. Stupidly, I searched for some trace of Bella’s scent, though I knew I was still too far. She’d be deep inside the air-conditioned terminal, past the security post, and her pathway there would follow a route from some distant parking garage. Patience.
The seat belt light turned off with a tinny ding, then all three of us were moving. We eased around the humans and were at the door so quickly that the steward took a surprised step back. It moved him out of our way, and we took advantage of that.
Carlisle tugged the back of my sweatshirt, and I reluctantly let him pass me. It would only make a few seconds’ difference if he set the pace, and certainly he would be more circumspect than I. No matter what the tracker did, we had to adhere to the rules.
I’d memorized the layout of this terminal in the onboard pamphlet, and we’d been loosed into the branch closest to the exit. More good luck. Of course I couldn’t hear Bella’s mind, but I should be able to find Alice and Jasper. They’d be with the other families waiting to greet passengers, just up ahead to the right.
I’d started to edge ahead of Carlisle again, anxious to finally see Bella.
Alice’s and Jasper’s minds would stand out from the humans’ like spotlights surrounded by campfires. I’d be able to hear them any—
The chaos and agony of Alice’s mind hit me then, like a sudden vortex erupting out of a calm sea, sucking me under.
I staggered to a stop, paralyzed. I didn’t hear what Carlisle said, barely felt his attempts to pull me forward. I was vaguely aware of his awareness of the human security officer eyeing us suspiciously.
“No, I’ve got your phone right here,” Emmett was saying too loudly, providing an excuse.
He grabbed me under one elbow and started to move me forward. I scrambled to find my footing while he half carried me, but I couldn’t quite feel the floor under me. The bodies around me seemed translucent. All I could really see was Alice’s memories.
Bella, pale and withdrawn, twitching with nerves. Bella, desperate-eyed, walking away with Jasper.
A memory of a vision: Jasper rushing back to Alice, agitated.
She didn’t wait for him to come to her. She followed his scent to where he waited outside a women’s restroom, face clouded with concern.
Alice following Bella’s scent now, finding the second exit, darting at a speed that was a little too conspicuous. The hallways full of people, the crowded elevator, the sliding doors to the outside. A curb teeming with taxis and shuttles.
The end of the trail.
Bella had vanished.
Emmett propelled me into the giant, atrium-like space where Alice and Jasper waited tensely in the shadow of a massive pillar. The sun slanted down at us through a glass ceiling, and Emmett’s hand on my neck forced me to bow my head, to keep my face in shadow.
Alice could see Bella a few seconds from now, in a taxi, speeding along a freeway through brilliant sunlight. Bella’s eyes were closed.
And in just a few minutes more: a mirrored room, fluorescent tubes bright overhead, long pine boards across the floor.
The tracker, waiting.
Then blood. So much blood.
“Why didn’t you go after her?” I hissed.
The two of us weren’t enough. She died.
I had to force myself to keep moving through the pain that wanted to freeze me into place again.
“What’s happened, Alice?” I heard Carlisle ask.
The five of us were already moving in an intimidating formation toward the garage where they’d parked. Thankfully, the glass ceiling had given way to simpler architecture, and we were out of danger from the sun. We moved faster than any of the human groups, even the late ones running past us for their connections, but I chafed at the speed. We were too slow. Why pretend now? What did it matter?
Stay with us, Edward, Alice cautioned. You’re going to need us all.
In her mind: blood.
To answer Carlisle’s question, she shoved a piece of paper into his hand. It was folded into thirds. Carlisle glanced at it and recoiled.
I saw it all in his head.
Bella’s handwriting. An explanation. A hostage. An apology. A plea.
He passed the note to me—I crumpled it in my hand, shoved it into my pocket.
“Her mother?” I growled softly.
“I haven’t seen her. She won’t be in the room. He may have already…”
Alice didn’t finish.
She remembered Bella’s mother’s voice on the phone, the panic in it.
Bella had gone to the other room to calm her mother. And then the vision had overtaken Alice. She hadn’t put the timing together. She hadn’t seen.
Alice was spiraling in guilt. I hissed, low and hard.
“There’s not time for that, Alice.”
Carlisle was almost inaudibly muttering the pertinent information to Emmett, who had become impatient. I could hear his horror as he understood, his sense of failure. It was nothing compared to mine.
I could not let myself feel this now. Alice saw the tightest of windows. It was maybe impossible. It was absolutely impossible that we could catch up to Bella before her blood started flowing. Part of me knew what this meant, that there would be a gap of time between the tracker’s finding her and her death. A wide gap. I couldn’t allow myself to understand.
I had to be fast enough.
“Do we know where we’re going?”
Alice showed me a map in her head. I felt her relief that she’d gotten the most vital information in time. After the first vision, but before the call from Bella’s mother, Bella had given her the crossroads near the place the tracker had chosen to wait. It was just under twenty miles, with freeway almost all the way. It would only take minutes.
Bella didn’t have that long.
We were through the baggage claim area and into the elevator bay. Several groups with carts loaded with suitcases were waiting for the next set of doors to open. We moved in synchronization to the stairwell. It was empty. We flew upward and were in the garage in less than a second. Jasper started for where they’d left the car, but Alice caught his arm.
“Whatever car we take, the police are going to be searching for its owners.”
The brilliant freeway gleamed in her mind, blurring with speed. Blue and red lights spinning, a roadblock, some kind of accident—it wasn’t totally clear yet.
They all froze, not sure what this meant.
There was no time.
I moved too fast down the line of cars while the others recovered and followed at a more judicious pace. There weren’t many people in the garage, none who could see me plainly.
I heard Alice instructing Carlisle to retrieve his bag from the trunk of the Mercedes. Carlisle kept a medical kit in every car he drove in case of emergencies. I didn’t let myself think about that.
There wasn’t time to find the perfect option. Most of the cars here were bulky SUVs or practical sedans, but there were a few options a little faster than the others. I was hesitating between a new Ford Mustang and a Nissan 350Z, hoping Alice would see which would serve better, when the hint of an unexpected scent caught my attention.
As soon as I smelled the nitrous, Alice saw what I was looking for.
I darted to the far end of the garage, right up to the edge of the intruding sunlight, where someone had parked their souped-up WRX STI far away from the elevators in hopes that no one would park next to it and ding the paint.
The paint job was hideous—violently orange bubbles the size of my head rising from what appeared to be deep purple lava. I’d never seen a car so conspicuous in a hundred years.
But it was obviously well maintained, somebody’s baby. Nothing was stock, everything designed for racing, from the splitter to the huge aftermarket spoiler. The windows were tinted so dark I doubted they were legal, even here in this land of sun.
Alice’s vision of the road ahead was much clearer now.
She was already beside me, some other car’s broken-off antenna in hand. She’d flattened it between her fingers and shaped a small hook at the end. She popped the lock before Jasper, Emmett, and Carlisle, black leather satchel in hand, caught up to us.
Ducking into the driver’s seat, I wrenched off the casing on the steering column and twisted the ignition wires together. Next to the gearshift was a second stick, this one topped with two red buttons labeled “Go Go 1” and “Go Go 2”—I appreciated the owner’s commitment to upgrades, if not his sense of humor. I could only hope the nitrous canisters were full. The gas tank was at three quarters, plenty more than I needed. The others climbed into the car, Carlisle in the passenger seat and the rest in the back, and the engine was thrumming eagerly as we reversed into the aisle. No one blocked my way. We tore down the length of the enormous garage toward the exit. I clicked on the heating button on the dash. It would take a moment for the nitrous to heat from gas to liquid.
“Alice, give me thirty seconds ahead.”
Yes.
The descent was a tight corkscrew that spiraled down four floors. Midway, I ran up against the back of an Escalade on its way out, as Alice had seen I would. The way was so narrow I had no option but to ride its tail and try to startle the other driver with one long honk. Alice saw that wouldn’t work, but I couldn’t resist.
We spun out of the last curve into a wide, sunlit payment bay. Two of the six lanes were empty, and the Escalade headed for the closest. I was already to the last kiosk.