Chapter 2

Something was jabbing me in the ribs.

Something was jabbing me in the ribs hard.

I was going punch whatever was jabbing me in the ribs that hard.

"Wake up Swan, I want food." Okay, never mind, there was no way I was punching Leah, I would probably do more damage to my hand than to her and there was no way I was risking it. Instead I just grunted. "Come on Swan, I'm hungry here and we both know I can't cook for shit." I moan incoherently at Leah but she just jabs me in the ribs some more. "Get up, or do you want me to burn down your kitchen trying to make myself something?" At this point I really didn't care if she burnt down the whole house around me as long as I got to stay asleep. "I'll burn your favourite frying pan."

"Oh hell no, I'm up." I say, jumping up and opening my eyes as wide as physically possible to try to wake myself up.

"You are weird Swan, you don't care about your house but you do about a frying pan." Leah says with a scoff.

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a good frying pan?" I ask her as I force myself onto my feet and grab the cup of coffee she offers me.

"I thought we'd both just established that I can't cook, so why the hell would I know anything about fucking frying pans, come on Swan, use your brain." She rolls her eyes and I want to throw my hot coffee at her, but, as it were, I was too tired to throw anything, the coffee was too precious and really, it probably wouldn't hurt her anyway.

If you haven't already noticed, I'm not a morning person.

"Leah it is," I check the clock. "Quarter to six in the morning what makes you think I even have a brain at this time? And while we're talking about the time, what in the world are you doing up so God damned early?"

"I have patrol in forty-five minutes but I need a decent breakfast first, as soon as you're done cooking you can go back to bed." I sigh but stomp over to the stove anyway. I know there's no getting out of this so I just grab everything I'll need for pancakes, bacon, egg, sausage, toast, and everything else I can think of and start cooking.

Leah eats as I cook and it takes forty of the forty-five minutes she has for her to feel adequately fed.

"Thanks for that Bella, I feel a whole lot better now, you can go back to bed if you want." I shake my head as Leah moves towards the back door.

"Nah, I'm awake now, think I might clean up and then get something to eat, might do some baking."

"You should definitely do some baking." Leah says and I laugh at the big smile she gives me.

"Okay, I'll do some baking."

"You'll bake some brownies."

"I'll bake some brownies."

"And some cookies."

"I'll bake cookies."

"And-"

"Leah go!" We laugh together and she nods.

"Alright, I'm going, I'll be back later though okay? So don't go anywhere, I'll be expecting lots of baked goods."

"Okay, I'll see you later." She grins and then runs out the back door into the woods and out of sight. I sigh as I look around the kitchen and then the living room. It's a mess and I know I've got my work cut out for me. Trying to be as quiet as possible so as not to disturb Angela I get to work.

I collect all the dishes first, then all empty packets and wrappers, I wash the dishes, brush and mop the kitchen floor, put a load of laundry on, take out the trash, go get a shower, make myself some breakfast and then start baking, all the while Angela is still sound asleep, softly snoring in the living room. Lucky bitch.

I bake.

And bake.

And then bake some more, until finally, at half past eleven, Angela comes stumbling in from the living room, her eyes squinting open and her hair looking like a rats nest on top of her head. She plonks herself into a seat at the table and gives me a pained moan.

"How you feeling Ange?" I ask her in the softest voice I can manage and she just moans again. "Want some aspirin?" I ask, using that same soft voice again. She nods her head then seems to regret it as she clutches the side of her head with her hands.

"Coffee." She mumbles out as I put the aspirin in front of her on the kitchen table so instead of a glass of water I pass her a cup of coffee. She swallows the aspirins dry then takes three big gulps of her coffee and sighs. "Time is it?" Her voice is croaky when she speaks and she grimaces as the noise hurts her head.

"Half past eleven." She doesn't respond, just gives me a slight nod of her head and then stays resting at the table while I continue to bake.

Just after twelve her head comes up from the table and she asks if she can have a shower, I say of course and she disappears for half an hour. When she comes back down dressed in light jeans and a purple tank top she looks a hell of a lot better.

"Thanks Bells." She says with a smile as I hand her another cup of steaming coffee and I offer her something to eat. "I know I've not had anything else but could I have some of those brownies please Bella, they smell amazing." I grin and pass over the big plate of brownies. She digs in, eating two in less than a minute.

"You feeling better then?" I ask and she nods her head while stuffing more brownie in her mouth.

"Much, thanks." She says through the brownie and I laugh as some crumbs fall out of her mouth. As she giggles at herself and blushes the back door opens and in strolls Leah.

"Nice one Swan." Leah says grabbing up three brownies and eating them faster than Ange did the others.

"Where did you go?" Angela asks, smiling at Leah while slowly munching on her third brownie. Leah gets up to grab some of the cookies I'd baked as well as a few muffins.

"Out for a run, I like to run." Angela takes the explanation without question and we start talking about the night before.

"You have to admit Leah, the lights going out like that was really freaky." I say as we talk about the 'spell' we cast the night before. We all knew it wasn't real and would never work but it was fun at the time.

"It was just a coincidence." Leah says, popping a piece of cookie in her mouth.

"We know that," Angela says with a smile. "But it was still pretty weird that the lights and the candles all went out right at that exact moment." Leah rolled her eyes but nodded.

"Yes, it was a little weird but it was just the fuses." I roll my eyes at Leah, she can never just agree.

"At least she admitted it was weird." Ange says and we grin at each other as Leah rolls her eyes at us.

"Whatever, what are we doing now?" Leah asks but we're given no time to think because someone starts banging on the front door. Leah sneers towards the front door and it's that look that lets me know who's here. I go to answer the door, knowing there's no use in ignoring it and hating that I can't even get one day with my friends without vampires interrupting.

The door swings open to reveal Edward, and hey, look, he's glaring at me again, just like yesterday.

"Hey, I thought I said I'd call you." I say to him as he stands as still as a statue on my front porch, looking seriously creepy might I add.

"No, Isabella, you never said you would call me, you said we would talk and I have been calling and texting and Alice has been calling and texting you all morning and you haven't answered so I came over to find out what was going on." The only part of him that moved the entire time he spoke was his mouth. That is some creepy shit and if what he said hadn't bothered me so much then I think I would have just stared at him.

"Edward I don't know how many times I have asked you not to call me Isabella, you know I hate it so please, just call me Bella, and I don't even know where my phone is so I didn't even know you were calling. Maybe next time you should just call once or twice and then wait for me to call you back when I'm no longer busy, which I still am."

"That's not good enough Isabella." He snapped out at me and I flinched back. "You are my girlfriend, you should answer me when I call you." That's when I noticed his eyes. They were pitch black. The heavy, metallic taste of blood filled my mouth and my stomach started to feel heavy and somehow I just knew that in that moment all Edward wanted was to sink his teeth into my neck and drink my blood until I died, to get rid of me once and for all.

I stumbled back a few steps and Edward came a step towards me, entering my house even though we both knew he wasn't allowed.

"Leah." My voice was weak but Leah was beside me in a second with Angela not far behind. Edward glared at Leah.

"Mutt." He said as he continued to glare at Leah but the taste of blood in my mouth started to dissipate and when Leah put her body in front of mine and hid me from his view the heaviness in my stomach started to lessen.

"I think you should leave." Leah said, her voice strong and demanding leaving no room for argument. Edward continued to glare at her for a long moment, but, slowly, he lowered his eyes and took a step back.

"I'm sorry for barging in like that, I was just very worried." He looked up at me, his eyes slowly fading back to molten gold. He looked ashamed of himself. "Forgive me." He says in that honey sweet voice he uses so much that I usually love, but, I realise, I don't even like honey. And it's not even a request, not an apology, it's a demand, he's demanding my forgiveness.

Well, Edward Cullen is about to learn that he's in for some tough fucking luck.

"Just go Edward, I'll call you when I want to talk." The calm mask falls back onto his face and he nods.

"I'll be waiting for your call." He says calmly but I get a very strong feeling that he's anything but calm.

We watch him walk down the drive, get into his car and leave before we close the door and go back into the kitchen. I go to lean against the counter but Angela pulls me in for a hug and I gratefully hug her back, accepting her strength.

"Are you okay?" She asks after we've pulled away from each other.

"Yeah, thanks, he just, scared me is all." I shiver at the vivid picture I have in my head of his eyes and the feeling I got when he looked at me, so filled with hate.

"I'm not surprised, he looked really mad." Ange says and I sigh. "Why was he so mad?" She asks.

"Because I hadn't answered my phone when he called, not that I even know where my phone is."

"Nutter." Leah says which, even after that, makes us giggle a little.

We decide to watch a comedy and eat junk food to try and get our minds off what happened and then Angela had to go home.

"Do you really have to go?" I ask her. Aside from the whole Edward thing we'd been having so much fun I really didn't want it to end.

"Yeah, Saturday night's family night, but I'll see you at school on Monday Bella. Leah, it was great hanging out with you."

"Yeah, you too."

"We should definitely do this more often." I say to Angela as I hug her and then she's gone.

"Okay, now we can start getting ready for the bonfire." I turn to Leah as she heads up stairs and frown.

"Bonfire? What bonfire?"

"The bonfire down in La Push tonight."

"How come you're only just telling me about this?" I ask her as I follow her into my room, where she sits me down at my desk and grabs her duffle bag.

"Because Angela's only just left and I thought it would be rude to mention it in front of her." I frown even more and give Leah a disapproving look.

"Leah why wouldn't you just invite Angela? I thought you liked her."

"I do like her, I really do, I just don't know her very well yet, and it's a pack bonfire anyway so she couldn't come even if I wanted her too." Leah gets some hair products and make-up out of her bag.

"If it's a pack bonfire then how come you're inviting me?"

"Because you know the secret. Look, I wasn't even going to go, I never do, but you clearly need cheering up and getting out of here and I wouldn't go to this thing without you so it just sort of works out, relax okay?" I kept on frowning but I did try to relax as she did my make-up and my hair and then let me help her do hers.

By seven o'clock we were made-up, dressed and I had packed all the leftover cakes and things from earlier into Leah's car as a sort of peace offering to the pack and we were ready to go. We drove straight to First Beach to find it already filled with pack member and imprints and the bonfire already roaring.

I glanced at Leah to make sure she was okay and watched as her nervous eyes darted around all the people clearly looking for the Alpha, Sam, who also happened to be her ex-boyfriend that left her for her cousin. I knew this was going to be hard on her so I grab her hand and give it a squeeze to show her I'm here for her.

"We don't have to do this." I say softly, trying to keep my voice quiet so the rest of the Pack can't hear, although if the way a few faraway heads tilted in our direction was any indication I would say they could hear us perfectly fine.

"Yes, we do." Leah says. After taking one last deep breath and giving me one last smile she opens the car door, grabs a bunch of the containers with food in and heads towards the bonfire.

I follow her lead, picking up the rest of the containers and we trudge down the beach together. At some point as we walk towards the circle of people, everyone turns to look at us. It's a little unnerving, the way some people stare and others glare, but we hold our heads up high and keep walking. The first person to approach us is actually someone I know. Sort of.

Jacob Black is the son of my father's best friend and he comes over grinning a big sunny grin that kind of reminds me of Seth. It's the first time I've seen him in months and even though I had known he'd phased I hadn't actually seen him since before it had happened.

I had to crane my neck to look up at him since he'd gotten so very, very tall. I smile up at him and with a big grin on his face he seems to purposefully make eye contact with me, which is weird, and then the smile on his face falls a little, which is even weirder. He mumbles something to himself, something that sounded an awful lot like 'never mind' before giving me a warm, but ultimately less enthusiastic smile.

"It's good to see you Bella." Jacob says and then bends down to give me a hug. It's a little awkward because I barely know him but I try anyway.

"It's nice to see you too Jacob, how've you been?" I ask and he shrugs.

"Oh you know, just running around as a giant furball, how about you?"

"I've been alright."

"Good." That's when Jacob acknowledged Leah. "Hey Leah, surprised to see you at one of these, what made you decide to show up this time?" He speaks to her casually and it surprises me, I didn't think she really got on with any of the pack but they seem at least a little bit friendly. Leah stops staring across the bonfire at nothing to look Jake in the eye and reply. But as their eyes connect something strange happens, they both get this weird stunned look on their faces and it's like they're seeing each other for the first time.

The whole group goes silent and watches as a slow, languid smile comes over both their faces.

Something seems to snap Leah out of whatever trance she was in quickly though because she takes a small step away from Jacob and does a lot of blinking for a moment while Jacob looks on at her like her step away from him broke his heart. Weird.

"Holy shit." Leah says and I wonder what's bothered her so much. "How the fuck did that just happen?" She asks as she looks back up at Jacob.

"I have no idea." He says and the confusion is just too much for me.

"What happened?" I ask Leah and she looks at me like she'd forgotten I was even there.

"We imprinted on each other."

Thank you all for reading and for the follows, favourites and reviews. Anything that may have confused you in this chapter will be explained in later chapters.

GB!