The Man in the Long Black Coat, Chapter Seven

Edward did not move. He knew that if he showed fear in front of Felix, he would lose before the battle had even begun.

“Well that was fast,” Edward said.

Felix didn’t lose the grin.

“The fucking internet is wonderful,” Felix said. “It’s not like the old days, relying on rumors and legends to find rogues like you. We have so many Google alerts set up, there’s no way we’d miss a story like that.”

Edward appraised his opponent. Felix stood at least a half a foot taller than he did, and outweighed him by a good fifty pounds. His pectoral muscles strained the shirt that covered them as he moved about the clearing in the woods.

“Don’t get me wrong,” he continued. “We still have agents in the field. All the big cities. Virtually every country in the world. Some things, well, they don’t make it to Twitter.”

The Volturi Council was almost entirely made up of vampires with special abilities, from the leader Aro’s power to read a person’s every memory to Jane’s sadistic ability to inflict a mental illusion of burning pain.

Felix, though, was the lone exception. Aro had recruited him solely for his brutal fighting ability. The man was a barbarian who could rip apart most vampires before they had even started fighting.

“That story was posted to the Seattle Times’ website just after midnight,” Felix continued. “Aro knew it was you. The stupid black overcoat and all. He wanted to send Jane, but I volunteered. Shit, I begged to come. You and I have long unfinished business.”

Edward stiffened, but still he said nothing.

He glanced quickly over Felix’s right shoulder. He saw a narrow path between two trees that would be big enough for his lithe frame, but that he doubted Felix’s bulk could fit through. Felix’s thoughts focused on ways he could inflict the most damage on Edward’s body without actually killing him. He was becoming distracted by his own desires.

“My instructions are to bring you back to Volterra. Unharmed if possible. In one piece if possible. Headless if necessary.”

Edward breathed in. He tilted his chin downward, as if he were resigned to his fate.

And then he sprinted to his left. He hoped his superior speed would allow him to get by before Felix could react. He knew that if Felix got ahold of him, there was no way he’d make it out of this in one piece. He would not go to Volterra voluntarily. Aro had been trying to recruit him for the better part of the last fifty years, but Edward always said no.

An eternity ticked by as the world whizzed past. Edward felt a grin forming. He began to believe he would actually escape. He eyed the slim opening between the two trees and adjusted his trajectory.

Felix grabbed him by his right arm so hard the limb nearly ripped from its socket. The beast picked Edward up and slammed him to the ground with such force that the trees around him shook. Birds took to the air. Dust swirled. Leaves fell upon the ground.

Felix was laughing.

“You think I don’t know you, Edward?” He placed a boot on Edward’s neck. Edward grimaced, but gave no other reaction.

“I was hoping you’d run, you dumbfuck.”

He dug the boot into Edward’s neck harder, until Edward was forced to grab Felix’s ankle and try to pry it free.

“I knew you had some fight left in you! That’s it! Come on, Eddie. Let’s party!”

He released Edward, allowed him to stand.

“Now’s when the fun starts.”

Edward didn’t wait for the attack. He went after Felix with everything he had. Edward gripped his opponent’s neck with both hands, his thumbs on the Adam’s apple. He squeezed with all his might until he heard a crack.

Felix showed no reaction.

“You done?” he croaked.

He pulled Edward’s arms from his neck as if they were nothing more than a nuisance. He twisted Edward’s left hand until he heard the bones snap. Then he did the same to his right hand and slammed his forehead into Edward's nose.

Edward grunted in pain. He was able keep his balance, though. He eyed Felix carefully. In his mind, he saw Felix considering whether to grab Edward by his feet and string him from a tree or grab his head and twist until his neck broke.

He focused. He watched the twitch in Felix’s fingers, the crow’s feet around his eyes pull together, the corners of his mouth lift almost imperceptibly.

He would go for the feet. It was the option that allowed for the most torture.

Edward closed his eyes. He clenched his fingers into fists and tightened every muscle in his body. He felt the bones in his wrists healing already.

“Felix, will you tell Aro something for me when you see him?” he said through gritted teeth.

Felix grinned.

“What’s that?”

“Tell him I said Fuck You.”

Edward spun his left leg over his right, used the momentum to lift his body from the ground. He went with it and slammed his fist into Felix’s jaw. He felt the bones in his hand snap, along with those in Felix’s face.

Felix fell to the ground, on his knees with both hands in the dirt. Edward used the opportunity to plant a steel-toed boot in his ribs. They gave way, cracking. He repeated the action again and again, until he thought Felix would be down for a moment. He jumped on his opponent’s back and wrapped his right arm around his throat.

With no weapons, Edward was forced to compromise. He dug his teeth into Felix’s neck, ripping flesh away, spitting it upon the ground and going back for more. Felix’s injuries were healing, though. Edward knew he had to act fast. He put one hand on either side of Felix’s head and twisted with all his might.

Felix was far too strong.

He stood and threw Edward from his back with one mighty heave. Edward landed on the ground with a thud. He stood, but was greeted by Felix’s shoulder in his abdomen. Felix slammed him into a tree, the trunk shattering as if it were made of papier mache.

The two vampires collapsed to the ground into a barrel roll. Edward struggled to gain the upper hand, but he felt as if he were fighting gravity. Felix picked him up by his underarms and flipped him upside down. He grabbed Edward’s ankle and held him aloft with one hand.

Edward swung to and fro. This was the end, he realized. A century of fighting had come to this.

“Just make it quick,” he said, exhaling an unnecessary breath. “I have no fight left in me.”

His vision blurred, his body wracked with pain, Edward resigned himself to his fate. He didn’t mind dying again. It would be good, he told himself, for it to be finally, blissfully over.

“We all gotta die sometime,” Felix said. He hoisted Edward’s limp body up as high as his enormous arms would allow and swung him overhead like a lion tamer would swing a whip. He slammed Edward’s body into the ground with such force that it dented the forest floor.

Edward didn’t react. He lay there for a moment, feeling his body try to heal itself even as it was disintegrating from within. He took one last look at the forest. He paused to remember his life, so long forgotten, one last time.

He would go out with dignity, neither begging nor pleading. He looked into the midday sun one last time, finally without fear. He couldn’t remember the last time he had done that.

He turned his head when he sensed movement, and he nearly gasped at what he saw.

Bella Swan stood before him, a matte black Remington police issue pump action shotgun aimed squarely at Felix’s back.

He shook his head “no” ever so slightly.

Bella stood 20 yards away, the shotgun at her hip. She creeped toward Felix as the sun cast her face in shadow.

“I don’t want to kill you fast,” Felix said, still unaware. “I want to enjoy this for as long as possible.”

He picked Edward up again by the ankle, moving so quickly Bella didn’t have time to react. He dragged Edward forward toward a massive white oak whose branches sprawled so far out they nearly dragged the ground. Edward saw Bella struggle to keep up as Felix swung Edward’s limp body over the branch, forcing his knees to bend backwards. He screamed in agony as his knees cracked. He felt the ligaments tear as his body swung like a pendulum.

He frantically searched for Bella, unsure where she’d gone in the commotion. He could not find her.

Felix pulled a thick rope from his pocket and twisted it around Edward’s legs, securing him to the tree as he swung upside down. Edward began to feel dizzy. He closed his eyes and readied himself for the pain that was to come.

A boom echoed through the forest. Edward opened his eyes. Felix stood before him, a hole the size of a watermelon in his torso. Another boom. Felix’s head disappeared in a cloud of debris. A third boom, and Felix’s left shoulder exploded. His arm fell free, thudding to the ground.

Felix’s body stood for a moment, as if it were trying to decide whether it could continue without a head. It collapsed to the ground then, a pile of clothing and dead tissue. A second passed. Two seconds. Time did not move forward. Felix’s arm began to crawl back toward his torso. Pieces of brain tissue gathered itself together. Such a sight amazed Edward every time he’d seen it, but he didn’t have the energy to gawk.

He knew his fate would soon be the same if he didn’t get blood into his body. Felix would rise again. He would show neither Edward nor Bella any mercy. Besides, Edward knew he had suffered too much damage to successfully heal himself. His body was simply too weak to continue existing.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here sooner,” Bella said, running up to him. “Charlie keeps the shotgun locked up, and I couldn’t find the key. I had to break open the cabinet with an axe.”

She laid the shotgun on the ground and stroked her warm fingers across Edward's cheek. He didn’t have the strenght to react.

“I’m going to cut you down. I won’t be able to break your fall. It’s going to hurt.”

She shrugged off her backpack, tossed it to the ground. She pulled a kitchen knife from within and began hacking away. Edward struggled to keep his eyes open as he watched. The sinewy muscles in her neck throbbed with each stroke. As she reached high for the rope, her sleeves rode up her arms, exposing a criss-cross of scars. Some were more recent than others.

“Here goes.” She sliced through the last strand of the rope, and Edward fell to the ground, the back of his neck striking first. He collapsed, unable to move.

“Can you stand?”

Edward struggled to respond. He shifted his feet, his knees still broken, his ligaments unhealed. He winced at the pain as he lifted his body, able to prop himself up on one elbow. He tried to speak, to tell Bella the danger she had put herself in, to thank her for doing what she had done.

But he couldn’t get breath into his lungs, and so he couldn’t speak. His ribs were shattered, unable to bond themselves back together because he was so weak.

Bella bent over him. She pushed up her sleeve. She slid her knife slowly, gently across the middle of her forearm with practiced motion. Nothing happened at first, the wound appearing superficial. But soon, dark red liquid began to ooze. It ran slowly across her arm until it ran over the edge. Drop after drop striking the ground.

She leaned further into Edward as he lay prone on the ground. He felt her hot breath on his cheek as she lifted his chin and spoke.

“Here,” she whispered. “Drink this.”

-30-

A/N Did you guys hear the news? The Man in the Long Black Coat is up for Fic of the Week at The Lemonade Stand! Yahoo! I really appreciate the reviews, follows and faves. They validate my existence. As always, hugs and kisses to the super-hot MazzyStarla for beta-ing out the serious goofups. The ones that remain are my fault. See you next time. :)

The Man in the Long Black Coat Chapter Six

Edward didn’t stop running until Forks was a faint glow on the horizon. He stopped at a clearing in the forest and pulled his new, disposable cell phone from the pocket of his long black coat.

“Good. No service.”

He put the phone back and took a seat on a fallen tree. He wasn’t eager to think about what had just happened, but he knew he must. Trusting his instincts is what got him into this mess. It was time for deliberation.

Who was this girl? Why was he so taken with her? Why, for that matter, was she so taken with him? Could it be possible that she knew what he was? She appeared not to care about what he had done. Hell, she seemed to be inviting death.

It started with the smell of her blood. Of that much Edward was sure. The aroma was overpowering, virtually irresistible to him. She was not a normal human being. But there was more than that. She was a mystery, a puzzle that needed to be solved. Bella Swan could not be read, and Edward had a powerful urge to read people. He had no choice but to figure her out.

And Bella? He had seen the scars on her arms. He had read the things people thought about her, the concern that Charlie showed every time he looked at her. She was a troubled girl. But why? Edward believed that whatever had brought her to Forks was where he would find the origin of her troubles. No teenage girl moves across the country halfway through high school without a reason.

He stood from the log and looked east, into the rising sun. He wanted to go in that direction, away from Forks, away from the tangles that lie there. But he could not. He sighed and turned around, into the darkness to his west. He knew he must head that way, back to Forks. Back to the police chief who’d seen him run, the reporter who’d eyed him with suspicion, the teenagers who’d thought him odd, and the ethereal girl who’d captured him whole.

He hunched his coat up and walked, to give himself time to think, to give the sun time to fully rise. He walked down the middle of the two-lane highway, his pace neither fast nor slow. His black steel-toed boots followed one another on the double yellow line.

He carried himself like a man with concern, his shoulders slumped and his brow furrowed. His disheveled hair clung to the back of his neck and his sloppy, three-day beard began to itch.

He came to the crossroads and turned, passing by the gas station where this had all started. But he stopped then, drawn there by the thoughts of the people who had gathered for morning coffee.

He approached slowly, his head down. He glided through the front door without a glance, everyone deep into their own world. A barrage of thoughts attacked him. “It’s a fucked up world.” “We don’t need no strangers in this town.” “Dumb kid probably deserved it. Heard he was into drugs.”

A group of elderly men were having coffee in the breakfast area. Each was hunched over the day’s newspaper. And each was reading the same story.

“A mysterious man, a missing teen, and a town in trouble,” read the headline.

Edward grabbed a paper from the rack and tore it open.

“Hey, you gonna pay for that?”

The clerk. Edward fought back a snarl.

“Of course,” he said, reaching into his pocket and flashing a phony smile. He put a dollar bill onto the counter and began to read.

  FORKS, Wash. -- They say something isn’t right here on the edge of Olympic National Park.

  A teenage boy disappeared more than a week ago from his job clerking at the town’s main gathering spot, a gas station, convenience store and breakfast joint just off the freeway. But little has been done.

  The police chief says he’s doing all he can in the disappearance of Michael Newton, 17. But there were no clues left behind. There was no sign of a struggle. No security footage, no blood.

  “At this point in time, we have no suspects,” said the chief, Charles Swan.

  But that is not true of the people who live in this town, perched along U.S. Highway 101 about three and a half hours west of Seattle. They say a tall, dark stranger has been seen about town in recent days. He showed up, the people of Forks say, just when Newton went missing.

  Strangers are rare here, residents say. The people who call Forks home tend to notice when one sticks around for more than a weekend of salmon or steelhead fishing nearby.

  This man, they say, is not staying in any of the motels in town. He does not appear to have relatives here. And no one, save the groundskeeper at the cemetery, appears to have spoken to him.

  “Stranger? Oh, yeah, real creepy dude,” said the groundskeeper, Waylon Forge. “Wore a long black coat. Didn’t talk much, but he gave off a real strange vibe.”

Edward tore the paper in half and tossed it into the garbage can. He could not afford this kind of attention. A few people looked in his direction, apparently noticing him for the first time. Whispered conversations began. Heads were kept down. Eyes darted about the room.

Edward hustled toward the door. These people noticing him was not his problem. Even the chief wouldn’t be much more than a nuisance. But the media was another matter. The media had the potential to bring attention from the outside. Edward had spent nearly a hundred years avoiding that kind of attention.

He quickly walked away from the gas station and took refuge in an alley several blocks away. He pulled the cell phone from his pocket, turned it on. Thirty seven text messages, all from the same number. Nearly as many voicemails.

He turned the phone off and put it away.

Bella Swan was not his concern right now. He needed to find Charlie. He needed to read his thoughts. To find out what he told the reporter. To find out what he really believed. Find out if he’d been in contact with anyone from the outside.

He found Charlie at home, sitting on the rear deck with a cup of coffee and reading the very newspaper that had the potential to cause Edward trouble. Edward watched from his familiar spot in the woods nearby. He lit a cigarette and sat on the ground, his legs crossed.

At first, the chief’s thoughts mirrored the words in the article. Soon, though, they turned to Edward himself.

“Got to check this guy out.”

“Can’t believe Bella was dancing with him.”

“Seems like a real creep.”

“Have to corner Bella on this one, let her know I’m serious this time.”

Just as Edward expected. The chief was suspicious. Edward would have to deal with that, eventually.

His train of thought was interrupted when Bella walked onto the patio.

“Oh,” she said. She hugged her arms around her body. “I didn’t know you were out here, Charlie. I’ll come back later.”

She turned to walk back into the house, but Charlie reached out and put his hand on her shoulder. “Don’t go,” he said. “Have a cup of coffee with me. We should talk.”

Bella rolled her eyes and shoved her hands into the pockets of her tattered jeans. She looked toward Edward hiding in the woods and smiled.

“Sure, Charlie. I’ll have some coffee. What is it you want to know?”

She sat down with her back to Edward and crossed her legs at the ankles.

“This guy,” Charlie said. “The tall man I saw you dancing with last night. Who is he?”

“His name’s Edward,” she said. “He’s new in town. I don’t know. I just thought. I was just trying to be nice.”

“Bella.” Charlie sighed.

He got up and began to pace. He waved his arms about.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “You spend the whole of your senior year in high school studiously avoiding making any friends. You drop out two days after your eighteenth birthday, a month shy of graduation. You don’t talk to anyone about why, including your own father. And yet I’m supposed to believe that some stranger comes to town and you’ve all of a sudden become the Forks Welcoming Committee?”

Bella said nothing. She stared into her coffee cup. Blinked. Got up from her chair and walked to the railing. She stared at Edward. He smiled, despite himself.

“Listen, Bella,” Charlie said. “I know it’s been hard these last couple of years. Your mother -”

“Don’t you dare,” she said, turning around. She balled her hands into fists. “You have no right to talk about her. You’re the one who abandoned her. You’re the one who let that asshole into her life.”

They stared at one another for a while, until Charlie bowed his head, sighed and headed back inside. “You know you can talk to me about anything,” he said. “I love you, Bella. Always will.”

With Charlie gone, Bella looked toward Edward again. She shook a Marlboro from her pack and placed it to her lips, her eyes never leaving his. She lit the cigarette and took a long drag, holding the smoke in as one corner of her mouth lifted into a sad smile. She exhaled a cloud and shook her head, taking her new iPhone from her pocket. She ran her thumb over the phone’s black screen, caressing the button in slow, circular strokes.

“Come for me,” she whispered.

Edward leaned forward and stopped. He knew that if he took one step, he would not be able to refrain from taking another. He would walk to her with purpose. He would leap onto the balcony, and there he would take her. He would do as she wished, and he knew he would regret doing so for as long as he existed.

He bowed his head and ran his hands through his hair in frustration, looking back up at her quickly before he turned to go.

“Why if it isn’t the famous ‘tall dark stranger.’”

Edward stopped abruptly.

“Felix,” he said.

The enormous vampire before him grinned.

-30-

A/N Once again, the people in this fandom amaze me. Thanks so much for the love, y’all. If you like this, I’ll be your best friend if you leave a review. A huge shout-out to my beta/wife, @MazzyStarla. She rocks my world. Look for me on Twitter if you want, @CrackedFIc, or on Facebook @ Cracked.Fic. :)

The Man in the Long Black Coat Chapter Five

The stranger settled into a corner, notebook in hand, camera strapped around his neck. No one paid him much attention as he jotted down his thoughts, snapped a few photos.

Except Edward.

The last thing he needed nearby was a newspaper reporter, but that’s exactly who the stranger was. The big daily down in Seattle had sent him to Forks to tell the human interest story surrounding the disappearance of Mike Newton.

Edward eyed the reporter carefully. He didn't want the man to notice him, but he didn’t want to lose track of him, either. So far, the reporter hadn’t noticed Edward. He hoped it would stay that way.

Reporters had shown up after Edward’s killings before. He’d always left town immediately when attention began to brew. Not this time.

The reason walked in just then, silhouetted by the moonlight.

She let the door close behind her as her eyes adjusted to the light. She looked left, right, ducked her head and let her hair fall over her eyes. A few heads turned her way to see who’d just arrived, but they all turned away quickly, as if they didn’t want others to see that they’d noticed Bella Swan enter the room.

Half the town was gathered at the old dance hall on the outskirts of town for what was supposed to be a candlelight vigil for Mike Newton, but what had become a defacto after-graduation party. Music played over the room’s lone speaker and teenagers gathered around the punch bowl at a table set up near the stage. If Newton had any friends in town, it wasn’t evident on this night.

Edward watched it all from the dark side of the room. He’d debated with himself about showing up at all, but he suspected that Bella might be there. He couldn't resist seeing her again. He hadn’t been near her since the confrontation outside the church five days earlier.

Someone nudged his elbow. “Some party, eh?”

Edward looked at the young man next to him. He was a chess-club type. Tall, with a poor complexion and hair as black as an oil slick. Edward said nothing.

“I’m Eric. Nice to meet you.” He reached out his hand.

Edward said nothing. He did not offer his hand in return. Eric fidgeted. He looked around. He tried to fill the uncomfortable silence with a cluck of his tongue, by humming the song playing over the speaker, some old crooner.

“Yeah, well, it was good talking, I guess,” Eric said. “I’ll, uh, see you around.”

Edward saw Bella staring at him from across the room, a smirk twisting her lips. He was about to head toward her when thoughts from nearby interrupted him.

“There’s that hot guy again,” the driver from the other night was thinking. “I wonder what his story is. He’s definitely not from around here.”

Edward looked her way. Her name was Jessica Stanley, and Edward hoped she would not be trouble. She was a nosy type who’d had a crush on Mike Newton.

He looked back to where Bella had been, but she was gone. Instead, Charlie was there. He was staring at Edward with a confused look on his face. Edward zeroed in on his thoughts. “I need to look into this guy,” Charlie was thinking. “I could swear he was outside the church the other day, too.”

Edward was not a man who lost his cool easily, but he was coming close. He felt like his world had been twisted inside out. Only days ago, he had been minding his own business, intent on doing whatever he had to do to get by, whatever he had to do to satiate the monster inside him. But now he found himself infatuated with a strange girl, stuck in a town where people were starting to notice him, and trying to figure out a way to dodge a small-town police chief.

“Fuck,” he muttered as he hurried toward the exit. He was putting himself in danger for no good reason and he knew he had to stop it as soon as possible.

A hand grabbed his as he neared the door. He snarled and prepared to strike, fed up. This was it. He was going to slaughter whoever it was and skip town, never to be seen again.

“Stop. Don’t go.”

He saw her, but he did not believe it. Bella Swan held onto his hand. He wanted to wrench his hand away. He wanted to hold her hand more tighy. He wanted to forget he had ever come to this place and he wanted to stay there forever.

“Uh,” he said.

She looked over at her father, who was sipping watered-down punch and huddled in a corner with the mayor. Edward turned up the collar on his coat and ran his hand through his hair.

“I can keep him busy,” she said, “if you promise to wait for me outside.”

She looked into his eyes with the kind of confidence he hadn’t seen in her before. She lifted her eyebrows and waited for a response, the smirk returning.

“OK,” he said. “I’ll be around back.”

He walked outside, certain that he would not stop. He would walk until he was far enough away to run, and then he would run to the next town, and the next, and the next. He wouldn’t rest until he was halfway across the country.

He sat down at a picnic table that fronted a pond behind the dance hall. He waited, despite himself. He breathed in the air, taking in the smells of northwest Washington. He thought that he didn't do that often enough, appreciating the good things his existence had to offer.

What am I doing? he thought. He got up to leave. Bella approached him.

“We need to talk,” she said.

Edward didn't trust himself to reply, so he said nothing.

“I’m. I didn’t mean. Uh, I guess I’m sorry about the other day,” she said. She looked at her feet, back up at him. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you like that.”

Music drifted out an open window. The Doors. Someone was on an old-school kick.

Bella broke first. She looked up at him, her eyes glistening, her pale skin almost blue under the full moon.

“Dance with me,” she said. She looked away. She bit her lip and turned back toward him. She took his hand in hers and squeezed.

Edward did not reply, his face like a mask.

She pulled him to her, and began to dance as a Van Morrison song played.

We were born before the wind

also younger than the sun

Bella laid her head on his chest, and he breathed her in. He placed his hands on her hips and closed his eyes, consuming her in his thoughts. He felt her heart pounding, her blood coursing through her veins, an oncoming tsunami.

He opened his eyes to see her bare neck inches from his mouth. His salivary glands reacted; his mouth watered.

“Bella,” he said.

She held him tighter. “Shh,” she whispered. “Just hold me.”

He held her tighter. He put his head against hers, his mouth tantalizingly close to her neck. He nuzzled his cheek to hers, his nose behind her ear. He breathed in again and felt his inner demon coming out to play. He opened his mouth and bared his teeth, running them slowly over her carotid artery. He stopped and ran his tongue over it, savored the warmth as his teeth ran over it again, less gently this time.

Bella moaned softly. “Yes,” she whispered. "Do it."

Edward opened his eyes so he could take it all in. He wanted to remember this moment for as long as he existed. He looked up and Charlie Swan was staring at him through the open back door. He stood with the reporter from Seattle, who was staring too.

Edward broke their embrace.

“I have to go.”

He turned and prepared to run.

“Wait! I don’t even know your name.”

He turned back to her and reached into his pocket.

“This is for you,” he said. He handed her an iPhone, his fingers lingering on hers as she took it from him. “My name and number are in the contacts.”

And he ran.

-30-

You guys. No, seriously, you guys. I love all of you. Thanks so much for the response to the first few chapters. I’m feeling really good about where this is going. Mucho thanks to the incomparable @MazzyStarla, the best beta/wife I ever had. (Buttcrack Santa = her idea). Look her up. Give her some love, too. :) Until next time ...