Kimi and I hadn't said a word since the police station and questioning, but even then, few words were exchanged. I could tell she was angry with me, infuriated even. I didn't have to be an idiot to guess that, regardless, she kept her eyes screwed to the road. Her hands clenched the steering wheel, her face pulled into a deep pensive frown.
It almost was dark now; sunset rays were casting in, irradiating the tree tops in a warm orange-lemon glow. If there was one thing in Forks you couldn't deny, you could have the worst day, yet somehow, Olympia always proved to be a view that took your breath away. The forest went out for miles, and just past it, the Calacha river and the lake. Despite the upheaval of a day we had, it was nice for the world to seem untouched by the chaos.
A paradise that remained on the outskirts always looking in—a glass castle.
My world was starting to become full of broken glass castles—and with it, chaos.
I couldn't get the image of that girl's face out of my mind, among others. How that carnal vampire ripped into her, tore her neck open, and sucked her boneless dry. It was sickening, disgraceful, an abomination.
And yet, even after managing to kill the creature, it still somehow got away with taking another innocent's life.
I was too late. If I had just left sooner, if I had listened to my instincts, if I had just stormed into the chaos, then maybe, that girl would still be alive.
By the time we reached the house and pulled the car into the driveway, Kimi turned the engine off and released a slow, controlled breath. I didn't have to look at her to know she was prepared to say something. My mind was elsewhere.
I kept revisiting the events of today—it was amazing how many times my brain could rehash every scene as if on clock work. I rewinded the tape, again and again, until I was futilely to the point of numbness. It wasn't even about punishment or self-deprecation because I let a poor innocent person die—it was because somehow, some deep part of me, felt it necessary to memorize the moves of a carnal creature possessed by its thirst for blood. It was an eye opener—that not all vampires took on the harmonious lifestyle as the Cullens did. There was a world of dangerous vampires, controlled by their bloodlust, and lost to the night.
Today was evidence enough of that.
And I wasn't fast enough to stop someone from getting hurt. . .
