I rolled my eyes. “Same old, same old.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Bunch of vampires trying to kill you. The usual.”

“The usual.”

“Well,” he said as he shrugged into his jacket to free his arms. “Let’s get going.”

Making a face, I took a small step closer to him.

He bent down and swept his arm behind my knees, knocking them out from under me. His other arm caught me before my head hit the ground.

“Jerk,” I muttered.

Jacob chuckled, already running through the trees. He kept a steady pace, a brisk jog that a fit human could keep up with . . . across a level plane . . . if they weren’t burdened with a hundred-plus pounds as he was.

“You don’t have to run. You’ll get tired.”

“Running doesn’t make me tired,” he said. His breathing was even — like the fixed tempo of a marathoner. “Besides, it will be colder soon. I hope he gets the camp set up before we get there.”

I tapped my finger against the thick padding of his parka. “I thought you didn’t get cold now.”

“I don’t. I brought this for you, just in case you weren’t prepared.” He looked at my jacket, almost as if he were disappointed that I was. “I don’t like the way the weather feels. It’s making me edgy. Notice how we haven’t seen any animals?”

“Um, not really.”

“I guess you wouldn’t. Your senses are too dull.”

I let that pass. “Alice was worried about the storm, too.”

“It takes a lot to silence the forest this way. You picked a hell of a night for a camping trip.”

“It wasn’t entirely my idea.”

The pathless way he took began to climb more and more steeply, but it didn’t slow him down. He leapt easily from rock to rock, not seeming to need his hands at all. His perfect balance reminded me of a mountain goat.

“What’s with the addition to your bracelet?” he asked.

I looked down, and realized that the crystal heart was facing up on my wrist.

I shrugged guiltily. “Another graduation present.”

He snorted. “A rock. Figures.”

A rock? I was suddenly reminded of Alice’s unfinished sentence outside the garage. I stared at the bright white crystal and tried to remember what Alice had been saying before . . . about diamonds. Could she have been trying to say he’s already got one on you? As in, I was already wearing one diamond from Edward? No, that was impossible. The heart would have to be five carats or something crazy like that! Edward wouldn’t —

“So it’s been a while since you came down to La Push,” Jacob said, interrupting my disturbing conjectures.

“I’ve been busy,” I told him. “And . . . I probably wouldn’t have visited, anyway.”

He grimaced. “I thought you were supposed to be the forgiving one, and I was the grudge-holder.”

I shrugged.

“Been thinking about that last time a lot, have you?”

“Nope.”

He laughed. “Either you’re lying, or you are the stubbornest person alive.”

“I don’t know about the second part, but I’m not lying.”

I didn’t like having this conversation under the present conditions — with his too-warm arms wrapped tightly around me and nothing at all I could do about it. His face was closer than I wanted it to be. I wished I could take a step back.

“A smart person looks at all sides of a decision.”

“I have,” I retorted.

“If you haven’t thought at all about our . . . er, conversation the last time you came over, then that’s not true.”

“That conversation isn’t relevant to my decision.”

“Some people will go to any lengths to delude themselves.”

“I’ve noticed that werewolves in particular are prone to that mistake — do you think it’s a genetic thing?”

“Does that mean that he’s a better kisser that I am?” Jacob asked, suddenly glum.

“I really couldn’t say, Jake. Edward is the only person I’ve ever kissed.”

“Besides me.”

“But I don’t count that as a kiss, Jacob. I think of it more as an assault.”

“Ouch! That’s cold.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t going to take it back.

“I did apologize about that,” he reminded me.

“And I forgave you . . . mostly. It doesn’t change the way I remember it.”

He muttered something unintelligible.

It was quiet then for a while; there was just the sound of his measured breathing and the wind roaring high above us in the treetops. A cliff face rose sheer beside us, bare, rough gray stone. We followed the base as it curved upward out of the forest.

“I still think it’s pretty irresponsible,” Jacob suddenly said.

“Whatever you’re talking about, you’re wrong.”

“Think about it, Bella. According to you, you’ve kissed just one person — who isn’t even really a person — in your whole life, and you’re calling it quits? How do you know that’s what you want? Shouldn’t you play the field a little?”

I kept my voice cool. “I know exactly what I want.”

“Then it couldn’t hurt to double check. Maybe you should try kissing someone else — just for comparison’s sake . . . since what happened the other day doesn’t count. You could kiss me, for example. I don’t mind if you want to use me to experiment.”

He pulled me tighter against his chest, so that my face was closer to his. He was smiling at his joke, but I wasn’t taking any chances.

“Don’t mess with me, Jake. I swear I won’t stop him if he wants to break your jaw.”

The panicky edge to my voice made him smile wider. “If you ask me to kiss you, he won’t have any reason to get upset. He said that was fine.”

“Don’t hold your breath, Jake — no, wait, I changed my mind. Go right ahead. Just hold your breath until I ask you to kiss me.”

“You’re in a bad mood today.”

“I wonder why?”

“Sometimes I think you like me better as a wolf.”

“Sometimes I do. It probably has something to do with the way you can’t talk.”

He pursed his broad lips thoughtfully. “No, I don’t think that’s it. I think it’s easier for you to be near me when I’m not human, because you don’t have to pretend that you’re not attracted to me.”

My mouth fell open with a little popping sound. I snapped it shut at once, grinding my teeth together.

He heard that. His lips pulled tightly across his face in a triumphant smile.