A/N: These events correspond with Jasper's story in Chapter 13 of "Eclipse," specifically pages 300-301.

Eowyn77 and Kimmer22—thanks, as always, for the betas.

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Stephenie Meyer owns all.

With a final clap of thunder, the thunderclouds burst open, releasing their burden onto the city street below. I felt the rain begin to seep through my clothes, weighing down the fabric of my trench coat and flattening my hair.

Each drop on the sidewalk where I stood pounded in my head, competing unsuccessfully to drive away the humanity surrounding me. The distinct, rapid clicks of women's heels as they sought the quickest route to dry shelter. The rustle of newspapers as men shielded their faces from the deluge. Children squealing with delight at the sudden downpour, as if it were a surprise from Nature herself.

But the predator in me snarled. The rain was not a gift from a benevolent Mother to her offspring, or even a trifling annoyance. Rather, it was the kiss of Death, and the wetness saturated their bodies, the pure scent of the rain acting like a magnifying glass to light. It concentrated the aroma of their sweat, muscle, skin…their blood. Only the last truly captivated my interest. The others were merely garnishments to flavor the feast.

Nature was practical and efficient, and her laws were remorselessly just. She gave and took in her unapologetic reality of checks and balances—and the rain gave with full understanding that it would lose. The relationship was elemental and primal; desired and so often partaken.

I wanted to partake now.

Here I stood in the city of brotherly love, desperately wanting to destroy that namesake affection. Here in the midst of my natural sustenance, I desperately yearned to shake off the shackles of control I'd painfully imposed upon myself.

My hungrily-black eyes narrowed, and the thirst in me purred in anticipation as venom pooled in my mouth. It had been too long since I'd fed. The monster cunningly whispered, Most will be inside soon. You'll be able to catch a straggler and no one would notice.

My fingers twitched as I scanned the thinning crowd around me.

Would it be the elderly woman rushing, presumably home, with the day's groceries? She would be a rather simple kill. Just an easy snap of her osteoporotic neck.

Would it be the man puffing quickly on his cigarette in the alley? His destitution was obvious from where he was hunched in his tattered raincoat. I doubted anyone in society would miss him much.

Or would it be the young mother teetering a toddler on one hip while she balanced wrapped parcels on the other? I could offer my assistance—the child would have her distracted and would be no obstacle himself.

Not that any of my prey ever presented a real, satisfying hunt. Only their warm blood satiated. For a time….

...As I was suffering from that truth now, their scents caused my parched throat to burn agonizingly.

I heard a duet of footsteps approaching from inside the door next to me as a couple's light banter floated through the air-thin brick and glass. Their feelings preceded them—piercing through my red haze of thirst—and I watched when, a second later, they tumbled out into the pouring rain. Laughing and stumbling over the threshold, they kissed right in front of my eyes before continuing down the sidewalk.

They were in love. Granted, a young, giddy, fleeting summer romance kind of love; but still it was an emotion that I personally had never experienced.

Their affection distracted me slightly from my deadly reveries.

It was enough.

Suddenly, I remembered why I was here, standing among all these humans. I wanted to resist the monster and all that it elicited: the depression, the despair, the emptiness. I wanted relief from the haunting awareness of my victims' panic and terror as I stole their lives from them to basely feed my own.

My unique ability was both a blessing and a curse. While I could both project onto and absorb the emotional climate around me, I was never free from the barrage. Every action I took had a reaction that I was always conscious of, a concurrent judgment sentenced on me with each movement. At any given moment during my hunts, I was both the predator and prey: two warring sides of the same damned coin.

The only way to combat the monster, then, was to allow myself to be acted upon rather than to act, thus submitting to the inherent two-way flaw in my power. I chose to conduct my actions from the viewpoint of the prey even if, for now, that choice was motivated more by self-preservation than concern for human safety. Granted, I gravely knew, I would hunt when I no longer could stand the thirst—my resistance was now up to a week between feedings. Yet solace steadfastly remained my end goal; my only mission, to find rest from the weariness of killing.

So I chose to humble myself again. Now.

My thirst could be checked. It would be. None of these people had to die here. I didn't have to feel Death now.

My entire being trembling, I suppressed ruminating on the unsuspecting young lovers' aroma or on the way their pulses thudded—deliciously enhanced with their passion.

My inner predator snarled again, but this time in protest to the cage I was shoving it into. Just barely. The denial was still uncomfortable, yet for the time being, my self-discipline would remain the stronger force. I sucked in a ragged breath and held it. Resisting was easier when I could eliminate even one source of temptation.

With slight panic, the emptiness of the street registered in my mind. I was alone on the sidewalk, soaked through. Though my body found the sensation of the rain tolerable, it was unnatural for a human to be thus unaffected by anything cold and wet. I would attract unwanted attention.

The door through which the couple recently exited had not closed completely, and I threw myself through it. My eyes calculatingly scanned the half-empty diner: the only outside door was the one I'd just come through; all four booths were occupied; three people sat at the counter. Because I was not breathing, even this closed-in space would be a manageable refuge until the storm let up. Then I could escape back to the outskirts of the city. My limits had been stretched far enough for one day.

Unbidden, my uncommon sense sampled the environment and was instantly surprised. Conviction and hope perfumed the small space so thickly that, like heat waves of a desert mirage, the air pulsed and shimmered with them. Oddly enough, a surge of elation shot through the already charged air roughly half a second after I entered.

These were not feelings that put me on edge, however—it was probably the couple sitting closest to the door…perhaps a double date with the couple outside—so I prepared to sit down at a table near the back. While one of the booths near the door would have been preferable in case I needed to escape quickly, sitting at the table would provide a safe vantage point. I would be here for a while, judging by the thickness of the rain, and I would need something positive to contemplate after what had just transpired outside...to keep my thirst firmly in check. My anxiety began to recede, leaving me grateful: I could afford to bask in the stranger's euphoria while my true nature remained unnoticed.

Or so I thought.

Before I had taken one step towards my intended seat, one of the diners at the counter hopped down, landing lithely on the checkered floor—a woman, barely so, with jet-black hair smoothed down into a rather avant-garde style. She was ethereally beautiful.

Nor was she human.

An immortal.

I breathed in her scent to verify my assessment, and instinctively my body tensed for an attack. Had Maria finally sent an assassin to make sure that no one else could have me? I crouched slightly, a hiss poised in my throat. Though the female was petite, size did not indicate weakness or lack of strength for our kind. All my experience had me alert to danger.

Yet, as though unfazed by my reaction, she was smiling at me. From her, I finally recognized, flowed the powerful emotions I'd sensed earlier. They were directed at me. I knew without a doubt that I did not know this female, at least not in my vampire life. Surely I didn't know her from my mortal life. Even a pale, human memory of this captivating creature would have stayed with me through my transformation and the hell I'd been through since.

What was it, then, that I had done to deserve her attention...her love? Yes, my bewildered mind reassured, it was love.

Stunned, I watched her gracefully walk towards me. Her eyes glowed brightly, holding me in place with their fervency. No amount of strength or thirst could make me move one inch from where I stood.

Stopping a foot away, she beamed up at me. "You've kept me waiting a long time."

My thoughts whirled as I tried to make sense of her words through the intensity of her elation. She knew I would be here—how? Overwhelmed, I realized I didn't care at this moment. I only knew that she was waiting for some kind of response from me, and I didn't want to disappoint her.

My mind felt as jammed as my limbs, but I managed to form a coherent reply. "I'm sorry, ma'am," I said softly, with a nod of my head.

Something was pulling on my arm. Confused by the sensation, I glanced down. My hand was raised slightly. Comprehension added its voice to the cacophony in my head: a phantom gesture to touch the brim of my non-existent hat. She was evoking in me the desire to be courteous, a gentleman…my human self—a distant echo suppressed from nearly a century of hate.

Before her, any natural impulse I had to fight or defend was obliterated, dissolving. I tensed again, this time anticipating my own fear at being so thoroughly exposed. But my body rocked with the change that flooded the void: I could no longer keep her distinct from myself. I wanted to pull her into me and absorb her warmth…just touch her to make sure she wasn't a glitch in my imagination. I had never before felt compelled to so connect with another of my kind.

As if she had read my mind, she offered her hand to me, her mirrored yearning for contact filling the space between us. I took her hand in my own. Her touch sizzled across my skin and seeped into me, anchoring me in the tidal wave of her emotions. Her love and certainty burst into my reality, pulsing new life into my every cell—she was warm. I never wanted to let her go.

Finally, it felt right to hope.