Bella's truck was parked outside my house.
Crap.
"Get rid of her." Sam said in calm and collected voice. But I had been inside of his head long enough to hear the raging curiosity and filtering anger in his voice.
"Okay." I agreed solemnly. I walked up to her window, rapping on it playfully. I didn't really look at her as she rolled it down, instead staring at the steering wheel.
"What are you doing here, Bella?" I growled, staring with deep intensity and hat rage for myself at the peeling leather of the wheel.
"Jacob?" She whispered, her breath sounded short and choppy. I knew what she was so shocked about. My beautiful hair, gone, chopped quite short. How aged my face looked. The muscularity behind my arms and shoulders, and the broad veins and tendons encroaching the side of her car.
She shooked her head side to side, like she was trying to clear a bad thought. I could only tell because her beautiful, long mahogany colored hair fell in little waves across her shoulders .I didn't have to balls to look her in the eye. I stared at the pattern of her plaid shirt.
I could feel Sam and the pack's presence behind me, partly backing me up and also wanting to make sure I went through with the plan and not just spilled my heart and soul out to her like I wanted too.
"What do you want?" I demanded, my expression becoming more resentful to just the pained gasps I could hear in her breathing. How can I do this to her?
"I want to talk to you." She said, her voice so weak it cut through me like a serenaded knife.
"Go ahead." I hissed through clenched teeth. The muscles in my body tightened as I could see her shoulders tense up anxiously. I could feel a fissure being sculpted in my heart, getting ready to tear a large and incredible significant portion of my heart away from the whole.
"Alone." She growled with intensity, no doubt shooting daggers with her eyes to my brothers who stood behind me. I turned back, questioning and pleading with Sam. I wanted to get her alone, to talk to her just the two of us. But a small part of me wanted Sam to step in and deny my access to her.
I can't hurt her.
Physically, I mean. I can't hurt her physically. Emily's tattered face flashed behind my eyes. But so did Bella's face. A beautiful and heartbreakingly pained face that I have long stored in my memory. I can't do that to her. I already know I'm about to break her heart. Again.
Sam nodded once, causing my stomach to curl up in knots.
"Just be careful." Sam warned me in Quileute so Bells couldn't understand. Paul, Jared and Embry bounded up the steps to my house. They all rushed to the kitchen and grabbed a bag of chips before stationing themselves behind my dad at the window. This isn't some production.
"Okay." I agreed softly, happy not to have the boys' heavy presence with me.
"You know what I want to know." Bella said once we were alone. I couldn't find the words to respond, instead just took a deep breath. I need to stay calm.
"Can we walk?" She asked in a measly voice. I still hadn't looked her in the eye yet, so I was glad for this distraction. I didn't have to be this close to her then. I didn't have to smell her warm and comforting scent, the smell of home. I didn't have to hear her shattered heart beating because each drum line was like a firecracker in my head.
Ba-boom. You love her. Ba-boom. She loves him. Ba-boom. You can't do this to her. Ba-boom. You're an asshole Jacob. Ba-boom. She needs you. Ba-boom. You can't hurt her.
I strutted into the forest, clenching my fists to control my overflow of emotion. I could hear her small steps behind me. I stopped abruptly, forcing her to stumble to a stop as well. I just wanted to melt away in her chocolate brown eyes.
But I knew the second I looked at this beautiful girl I loved, I would lose all the control I have over my emotions now, and the confessions would come pouring out like a floodgate.
"Let's get this over with." I said in a hard, husky voice, mostly to myself. She didn't say anything because I knew she knew I could practically hear the words in her head.
"It's not what you think." I said, suddenly weary. My memories flashed to our moment beside the cliff, pouring out my most terrifying secret to her. The thought of her warm and smooth body pressed up to mine when she hugged me tight sent shivers down my spine.
"So, what is it then?" she pressed.
"I can't tell you." I said finally, the anger never leaving my voice.
"I thought we were friends." She said, her voice hard with an emotion I couldn't recognize. Was it frustration? Or something more? Like panic? Pain?
"We were." I tried to put as much emphasis on the past tense as I could.
"But you don't need friends anymore." She said in a bitterly sour voice. "You have Sam. Isn't that nice- you've always looked up to him so much."
I could hear Sam in the house, chuckling lightly to himself.
"I didn't understand before." I defended weakly. I could only keep my eyes on the ground for so long.
"And now you've seen the light. Hallelujah."
"It wasn't like I thought it was. This isn't Sam's fault. He's helping me as much as he can." My voice turned brittle. I couldn't meet her eyes because I knew no matter what emotion was held in them, I could lose control. I stared over the top of her head.
I thought of the motorcycles. Us in my garage. In her living room, doing homework. I thought of her riding next to me in her truck. Anything but the way she wrapped her arm around herself to keep herself from crumpling. Or the look in her eyes when her heart begins to hurt.
Anything but that.
"He's helping you." Bella grumbled, mostly to herself. "Naturally."
My hands shook with the anger that penetrated my veins. Inhale, I thought. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. This routine continued for a long second.
"Jacob please." She whispered, and I could hear the collecting tears in her voice. My hands shook, but not with anger this time. With pain. "Won't you tell me what happened? Maybe I can help."
You probably could, I felt like saying. If there was anyone in the world who could brighten my spirit, it would be Isabelle Marie Swan. But when I was a crumpling . . . . wolf, would she still want to comfort me?
"No one can help me now." I moaned delicately, my voice cracking. A dead giveaway. She took a step closer to me, a porcelain hand reaching out hesitantly.
"Jacob." She breathed.
"Don't touch me." I whispered, the tears building in my tear ducts.
"What did he do to you?" She growled, emotion cracking he voice.
"Stop blaming Sam." I ran a hand through my cropped hair, a reflex.
"Then who should I blame?" She retorted. That made me smile, bleak and twisted.
"You don't want to hear that." I warned, hearing my brothers hold their breaths inside the house. Embry was whispering the play by play to Billy, the only one without wolfy senses.
"The hell I don't!" She shot back. "I want to know and I want to know now."
"You're wrong." I snapped back, feeling the giddy anger return from the hopeless pain.
"Don't you dare tell me that I'm wrong- I'm not the one who got brainwashed! Tell me whose fault this all is, if it's not your precious Sam!" Brainwashed, that's an interesting concept. Fury boiled in my veins again.
"You asked for it." I growled, my eyes glinting closer and closer to her face. "If you want someone to blame, why don't you point a finger at those filthy, reeking bloodsuckers you love so much?" I exploded, throwing my hands up in the air in defeat.
She said nothing, only taking in a sharp inhale of breath. My whole arms shook now.
"I told you that you didn't want to hear it." I reminded her.
"I don't understand who you mean." She said in a lame and unconvincing voice. I know Bella's face backwards and forwards and I could practically see the way her eyes would have darted, how her cheeks would have blushed with her lie.
"I think you understand exactly who I mean. You're not going to make me say it, are you? I don't like hurting you." I told her truthfully, humor lining my voice delicately.
"It sounds like you're going to do that anyway." Bella breathed shakily. I could hear the tears in her eyes. The sound was practically like a splashing hurricane that was going to drown me.
I couldn't help but look up her now, desperately searching her face until I found her wet and tear soaked eyes.
Heat filled my body like I was set on fire, but this gnawing and furious set of flames didn't burn. She looked at me questionably like she was going to call the big men with the butterfly nets to come and get me.
The pressure in my legs seemed to be lifted, like gravity was rebalancing itself around the forest and situating itself to where Bella stood. Every single nerve in my body felt like it was being shocked with the jumpstart cables for a car.
She stood with her hands on her hips, looking at me angrily.
My heart practically inflated to the point where it pressed against my rib cage. My breath shivered delicately, every limb felt like it was wired to Bella's. There was practically red streaks connecting me to her.
"Jacob?" She whispered, curiously. She still eyed me like she was upset, but I laughed gently to myself. She sighed frustrated, rolling her eyes at me.
"I knew it." I breathed, grins breaking through my face like sunshine.
"Jake, what the hell is going on?" She demanded, still upset.
"Sam. Come here." I called lightly, not taking my eyes off of Bella. The boys were running down the steps, listening edgily to the whole conversation. Bella opened her mouth, furiously about to comment, but I held a hand up to her. "Give me five minutes and I will tell you anything you want to know." I vowed.