This story takes place after the Laurent incident, but before Bella finds out that Jake is a wolf. Special thanks to my betaboo for whipping this baby into shape. No copyright infringement is intended & obviously I do not own.

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Alright, my lovelies, this story is going to be a bit different from what I usually write. It's going to be darker, and it is not for Paul fans. Don't get me wrong, I love me some bad-boy-turned-good Paul/Bella stories, but...quite frankly, this ain't gonna be one of them. Sometimes bad boys remain bad and innocent hearts get broken. This story will eventually be a Peter/Bella, but it will take a little bit to get there.

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Also, please forgive me for the butchering and twisting of great lyrics to fit my twisted little story. When I'm feeling down, I have a very bad habit of taking love songs and warping them to fit my mood. I'm just a regular bag of sunshine, aren't I?
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The lights are on, but I'm not home
My mind is not my own
My heart sweats, my body shakes
One glance is all it takes

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I can't eat, I can't sleep

There's no doubt, I'm in deep

My throat is tight, I can't breathe

Save me from, what I need

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A one-track mind, I can't be saved

Oblivion is all I crave

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Bella POV

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Another week had passed and Jacob still hadn't called me. I missed him terribly. Over the past two weeks I had called him repeatedly and while I was happy to learn that he didn't have mono, I was more than a little bit hurt to find out that he had been well enough to go out with his friends but apparently not well enough to take any of my phone calls.

I absentmindedly threw my backpack into my truck and started towards home still mulling the whole Jacob situation over. I wasn't paying attention to the familiar road, letting the sound of the engine deaden my brain and silence the worries, when my subconscious delivered a verdict it must have been working on for some time without my knowledge.

As soon as I thought of it, I felt really stupid for not seeing it sooner. Sure, I'd had a lot on my mind –revenge-obsessed vampires, giant mutant killing wolves, a ragged hole in the center of my chest– but when I laid the evidence out, it was embarrassingly obvious.

Jacob avoiding me. Charlie saying he looked strange, upset. . . . Billy's vague, unhelpful answers.

Holy crow, I knew exactly what was going on with Jacob.

It was Sam Uley. Sam had gotten to Jacob. Whatever was happening to the other boys on the reservation had reached out and stolen my friend. He'd been sucked into Sam's cult. He hadn't given up on me at all, I realized with a rush of feeling.

Without giving it any conscious thought, I found myself turning off to go to La Push. I was going to get to the bottom of this and get my friend back one way or another. He would do no less for me, after all.

I finished the drive to La Push determined to wait him out. I'd sit out front of his house all night if I had to. I'd miss school. The boy was going to have to come home sometime, and when he did, he was going to have to talk to me.

I stopped in front of Jacob's house, killing the motor and rolling down the windows. It was stuffy today, no breeze. I put my feet up on the dashboard and settled in to wait.

A movement flashed in my peripheral vision. I turned and spotted Billy looking at me through the front window with a confused expression. I waved once and smiled a tight smile, but stayed where I was.

His eyes narrowed; he let the curtain fall across the glass.

I was prepared to stay as long as it took, but I wished I had something to do. I dug up a pen out of the bottom of my backpack, and an old test. I started to doodle on the back of the scrap.

I'd only had time to scrawl one row of diamonds when there was a sharp tap against my door. I jumped, looking up, expecting Billy.

"What are you doing here, Bella?" Jacob growled.

I stared at him in blank astonishment.

Jacob had changed radically in the last weeks since I'd seen him. The first thing I noticed was his hair–his beautiful hair was all gone, cropped quite short, covering his head with an inky gloss like black satin. The planes of his face seemed to have hardened subtly, tightened…aged. His neck and his shoulders were different, too, thicker somehow. His hands, where they gripped the window frame, looked enormous, with the tendons and veins more prominent under the russet skin.

But the physical changes were insignificant. It was his expression that made him almost completely unrecognizable. The open, friendly smile was gone like his hair, the warmth in his dark eyes altered to a brooding resentment that was instantly disturbing. There was a darkness in Jacob now. Like my sun had imploded.

"Jacob?" I whispered.

He just stared at me, his eyes tense and angry.

I realized we weren't alone. Behind him stood four others; all tall and russet-skinned, black hair chopped short just like Jacobs. They could have been brothers–I couldn't even pick Embry out of the group. The resemblance was only intensified by the hostile stiffness of their bodies.

I swallowed hard, mentally preparing myself for confrontation. I defiantly raised my eyes to glare at them, only to be brought up short as I met the second pair of eyes.

I could do nothing more than gape, open-mouthed, as I felt my entire being shatter only to reform again as I helplessly stared into the stranger's eyes. For one brief second, I felt as if I could breathe again. The hole left from Edward's betrayal was gone and I found myself reveling in the joy of finally being free from his confines.

Unfortunately, it didn't last. Only seconds after my old ties snapped, I was bound once again. I could almost see the ties binding me to the beautiful stranger, wrapping themselves around us both until once again my each and every breath was heavy in coming to me.

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry at my terrible luck. For that one brief second, I was free. To have felt that freedom only to have it snatched back seconds later was...indescribable. I wanted to mourn the loss of it, knew that I should, but it was like my body wasn't quite my own at the moment. I could feel nothing but overwhelming happiness. I felt a smile pull at my lips even as my mind rebelled against it.

What the hell had just happened to me?

I was pulled from my panicking by an agonized cry. I managed to turn my head and stare at Jake in confusion. He was shaking his head back and forth, glancing from me to the stranger in quick succession as he muttered lowly under his breath. He stopped suddenly and stared at me as if I had single-handedly just broken his heart. At my look of confusion, he finally seemed to snap.

"No. Please, Bella, no. Tell me you don't feel it. Tell me," he begged, taking a step closer to me. I looked at him helplessly as I quietly asked my own questions.

"Why do I feel like this, Jake? What's happening to me?"

Another agonized wail fell from his lips and I noticed that his whole body was shaking now. I was very faintly aware of someone yelling in the distance, but I didn't pay it much attention because my entire being was focused on the trembling boy in front of me. His pained expression quickly turned to one of pure hatred and I gasped as I realized that it was directed at me.

"I will never forgive you for this," he spat at me. I reeled back in shock and hurt . . . and it was a very good thing that I did because in the next instant Jacob erupted and suddenly I was left staring into the eyes of a giant wolf who was once my best friend.

Our eyes locked for the barest moment before he tipped his head upward and let out a long, mournful howl. Startled, I gracelessly fell backwards, wincing as my butt connected with the hard ground.

The wolf let out another bone-chilling howl before turning and darting off into the woods, leaving me a shaking, confused mess. Seeking reassurance, I instinctively turned back towards the man whose gaze started this whole sordid affair.

Reassurance, however, was not what I got. As soon as I met his eyes, he started stalking angrily toward me. My eyes widened and I fought against the overpowering instinct to move closer to him. Instead, I forced myself to do a weird sort of backwards crab walk to try and put distance between us, even though it seemed my body fought me for every single movement.

"Paul!" I heard Sam yell. The man, Paul, paused briefly but continued on until he was standing right in front of me, looking down at me. I quickly shuffled to my feet, trying to force myself to take another step back from him. I couldn't do it and that terrified me. I yearned to be with him, to be near him. What control did this man have over me that I couldn't even dictate my own feelings? I was so confused.

"How the hell did I end up imprinting on Bella fucking Swan?" he sneered, disgust written all over his face. "There's no way in hell that I'm taking sloppy seconds from a vampire. Fuck this imprinting shit. I refuse."

How was it possible for such a few words to cause such immense pain? I felt as if my chest was cracking open as I fell to my knees and cried out in agony. Through blurry eyes, I watched a myriad of emotions pass across Paul's face before he finally turned around and ran, exploding into a wolf as he retreated.

With every step he took, I felt a little bit more in control of myself. The pain seemed to be lessening down to a more manageable level, although it was still there. After a few minutes, I was finally able to get my sobs to stop altogether. I tensed slightly as I realized that someone was holding me, only to relax again as I heard Embry speaking softly to me.

I looked around and noticed that the only other person still here was Sam Uley. He was staring at me with a look of pitied confusion. It didn't comfort me in the least.

"What's happening to me?" I barely breathed. Somehow, he heard me and a small smile pulled at his lips.

"I can explain some of it, but be warned that nothing about this has been normal, even by our standards." He motioned for us to follow him. I scrambled up, sending a grateful look to Embry. He smiled softly at me and helped me get my footing.

I spent the next few hours at Sam and Emily's house, learning the ins and outs of werewolves and imprinting, although Sam readily admitted that there was nothing normal about the imprint between me and Paul. And when I looked at Emily and examined the way she and Sam seemed to fit perfectly together, I had to agree.

I finally left after promising Emily that I'd come back for dinner sometime. Neither Jacob nor Paul ever showed up and I was honestly torn between how I felt about that. Sam had taken the time to explain to me that Jake was just hurting because he thought himself to be in love with me and that I should give him time to come around. He also said that I should give Paul time as well...that he'd had a difficult life.

Still, that night as I lay in bed, I found myself replaying Jake's words and the look on his face and I started to get angry. Did he honestly think that I would choose to imprint on Paul? No. He knew that I had no choice. He was simply hurt and decided to lash out at me.

And Paul...I didn't even really know what to think about him at the moment. I found myself questioning if he could even feel the imprint at all. He sure didn't seem to be able to as he spewed all the hurtful words at me as he left. My last thought before sleep claimed me was that surely it had to get better from here.

If only I would've known just how wrong I really was.

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The lights are on, but I'm not home
My mind is not my own
My heart sweats, my body shakes
One glance is all it takes

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