WARNING: Sexual content. It’s nothing like the first time around…can’t always be flowers and candles!

Chapter 6 Mirror Mirror on the Wall

Hunting had been the single most uncomfortable, disgusting, and unnerving experience ever, but also exhilarating. I replayed the scene over and over as I let the fragrant bathwater relax my tense muscles.

Again, the scene from the woods filled my vision. I could feel all the animals in the vicinity, not just smell them, but like they called to me. Edward and Jasper had been off to the side of the clearing whispering amongst themselves while Emmett had been giving me pointers about hunting. Their whispers had ceased as soon as my predatory instincts kicked in and my body fell into a low crouch, an eerie snarl escaping my bared lips. If there’d been anything remotely human in me at that moment, I’d have been embarrassed by my actions, but as it was, I was more animal than anything.

Emmett moved so swiftly and had a deer between his powerful hands while it struggled helplessly. “Now, once you have them secured don’t hesitate,” he said as his neck tensed and he struck out, mouth firmly clamped around the deer’s throat.

The smell of the blood bombarded me. I found it both desirable and repulsive, but my instincts took over and by the time I’d resurfaced from my hazed mind a deer hung limply in my arms.

I pulled myself out of the vision as disgusted with myself now as I’d been when it had happened.

Again, I was back in the meadow. I was only aware of the scent of the deer and frantic pulse that beat incessantly in my ear. My body reacted before my mind had any idea what it was doing and then sweet scalding blood was sliding down my throat easing the burning discomfort I’d been feeling since I awoke as a vampire. One deer wasn’t enough, even two hadn’t sufficed. I’d gorged and gorged and gorged.

Allowing my instincts to take over had been both thrilling and alarming, but I didn’t think the deer population around here could handle this new Bella.

I climbed out of the bath and wrapped a towel around my marble body commanding my mind to be quiet so I would no longer have to relive that horrid experience, until it was time to feed again, I chided myself. The brush of the plush towel was overwhelming and distracted me from my self loathing. How different everything felt. Wrapping a towel around myself was something I’d done numerous times, and yet, with my new vampire senses it was a completely new experience.