Life and Death: Twilight Reimagined (Twilight #5)(97)

Suddenly she was angry. “What am I supposed to do with you, Beau? Yesterday, I kiss you, and you attack me! Today, you pass out!”

“Sorry.”

She sighed deeply, then darted in suddenly to kiss my forehead. “It’s a good thing that it’s physically impossible for me to have a heart attack,” she grumbled.

“That is good,” I agreed.

“I can’t take you anywhere like this.”

“No, I’m fine, really. Totally back to normal. Besides, your family is going to think I’m insane anyway, so what’s the difference if I’m a little unsteady?”

She frowned. “You mean more unsteady than usual?”

“Sure. Look, I’m trying not to think about what we’re going to do now, so it would help if we could get going.”

She shook her head but took my hand and pulled me out of the chair.

This time she didn’t even ask, she just headed straight for the driver’s side of my truck. I figured there was no point in arguing after my latest embarrassing episode, and anyway, I had no idea where she lived.

She drove respectfully, without any complaints about what my truck could handle. She took us north out of town, over the bridge at the Calawah River, and continued till we were past all the houses and on to close-packed trees. I was starting to wonder how far we were going when she abruptly steered right onto an unpaved road. The turnoff was unmarked, and almost totally hidden by thick ferns. The trees leaned close on both sides, so you could only see a few yards ahead before the road twisted out of sight.

We drove down this road for a least a few miles, mostly east. I was trying to fit this lane into the vague map I had in my head, not very successfully, when there was suddenly some thinning of the forest. She drove into a meadow… or was it a lawn? It didn’t get much brighter, though. There were six enormous cedars—maybe the biggest trees I’d ever seen—whose branches shaded an entire acre. They pushed right up against the house in the middle of the lawn—hiding it.

I don’t know what I expected, but it definitely wasn’t this. The house was probably a hundred years old, three stories high and kind of… graceful, if that word could be applied to a house. It was painted a soft, faded white and all the windows and doors looked original, but they were probably in too good shape for that to be true. My truck was the only car in sight. When Edythe shut off the engine, I could hear the sound of a river somewhere close by.

“Wow.”

“You like it?”

“It’s… really something.”

Suddenly she was outside my door. I opened it slowly, starting to feel the nerves I’d been trying to suppress.

“Are you ready?”

“Nope. Let’s do this.”

She laughed, and I tried to laugh with her, but the sound seemed to get stuck in my throat. I mashed my hair flat.

“You look great,” she said, then took my hand casually, like she didn’t even have to think about it anymore. It wasn’t a big thing, but it distracted me—made me feel just a little bit less panicky.

We walked through the deep shade up to the porch. I knew she could feel my tension. She reached across her body to put her free hand on my forearm for a second. Then she opened the front door and walked inside, towing me behind her.

The inside was even less like what I was expecting than the outside. It was very bright, very open, and very big. It must have started out as several rooms, but most of the walls had been removed from the first floor to create one wide space. The back, south-facing wall had been entirely replaced with glass. Past the cedars the lawn was open, and it stretched down to a wide river. A massive staircase dominated the west side of the room. The walls, the high ceiling, the wooden floors, and the thick carpets were all different shades of white.

Edythe’s parents were waiting for us. They stood just to the left of the door on a little platform in front of a huge grand piano. It was also white.

I’d seen Dr. Cullen before, of course, but it hit me again how young she was, and how outrageously beautiful. She was holding hands with Earnest, I assumed—he was the only one of the family I’d never seen before. He seemed about the same age as Dr. Cullen, maybe a few years older, and had the same pale, perfect features as the rest of them. He had wavy hair, the color of caramel, a few inches longer than mine. There was something really… kind about his face, but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was that made me think that. They were both dressed casually in light colors that matched the inside of the house.

They smiled, but made no move to approach. I thought they were probably trying not to scare me.

“Carine, Earnest, this is Beau,” Edythe said.

“You’re very welcome, Beau.” Carine stepped forward, slow and careful. She raised her hand hesitantly. I stepped forward to shake, and I was kind of surprised by how okay it felt to do that. Maybe it was because she reminded me of Edythe in a lot of ways.

“It’s nice to see you again, Dr. Cullen.”

“Please, call me Carine.”

I grinned at her, surprised that I felt pretty confident. “Carine,” I repeated. Edythe squeezed my hand lightly.

Earnest stepped forward as well, offering his hand. His cold, stone grasp was just what I expected.

“It’s very nice to know you,” he said sincerely.