Disclaimer- I own NOTHING because Stephanie Meyer owns Twilight.
POV - Jacob ;) - I love writing in Jacob POV.
PLEASE REVIEW otherwise I won't update, and that's a shame because the story is uploaded and waiting :)
August 14th, 2006
DEATH IS ANOTHER COUNTRY. I JUST HOPE THAT IT IS BETTER THAN THIS ONE.
Fat chance of the happening.
I sat myself down. It was the first time I had actually sat down for nearly twenty four hours. I could never get used to this job. Protector. I can't even protect myself at times.
I ran my fingers through my messy hair. God, I was a mess.
A huge mess.
I looked at the table where Quil and Embry were seated. Quil was nearly falling asleep and Embry was circling his mug of coffee with his fingertip. Seth was asleep on the couch, curled up, snoring. Jared was leaned against the coffee table, his head balancing on the edge. Leah was stood by the window, glaring out of it. I could see her reflection in the glass and her eyes were like daggers.
"How long do we have to wait?" Leah spoke harshly.
I rubbed the back of my head. "We have to wait until Sam gets here. You know the rules Lee." I answered.
Leah huffed. Needless to say, I wasn't in the mood for one of her tempers today. None of us were. Last night, well, apart from the wedding drama and male ego flying left right and centre, last night had been unusual for many reasons. Some reasons that I couldn't fully explain, no matter how hard I tried to find the words to say what I meant. No explanation would have been able to prepare the pack for what had happened to me last night. Just sitting here was killing me. Literally.
I felt like piggy in the middle – one part of my soul was keeping me here, with my pack, with my family, meanwhile, the other part of soul, the part on which I had literally no control over, was pulling me in the other direction – along the corridor, into my room where she was laid in my bed.
My bed.
I shouldn't have left in there by herself. I sat there for half the morning sat beside her, watching her sleep, making sure her breathing was okay. She hadn't stirred once. It was like she dead; well, I guess in a sense, she was. The awkward part was having to undress her. That was when I was glad that Emily had brought Kim with her. It meant I didn't have to endure the discomfort of undressing her body for the wrong reasons. Standing outside had made me anxious waiting for them to clean her up and dress her. I was literally banging my hands against the door for Emily to let me back in. Still, Emily worked wonders I was grateful to her for that. She told me that she had no internal damage from she could tell, but she told me that she had a few bruises which had formed on her body and some scars along her back. The most painful truth was when Sam identified the scar on her neck. A crescent shaped scar just under her left ear. The same scar that Bella had on her wrist which immediately confirmed one thing. This girl had been bitten by a vampire. Whether or not she was a vampire, was something still under discussion.
I rubbed my temples. Was she okay? Was she still breathing? Did she still smell of strawberries?
I had been worried about her for the entire ten minutes I had been apart from her. That was when I knew that what had happened, well, what had truly happened. I didn't see how it was possible. As I thought back, I never really ever could be certain that I had imprinted on Bella. My feelings didn't feel quite like this. Maybe with Bella it had been a tester. This time, it was the real deal. I had most definitely, without a shadow of doubt imprinted on this girl.
Nobody else knew of course. Embry, Quil, Jared, all of them, knew nothing. I think the only person who did know was Sam, but that was because he the Alpha and more perceptive than the other dimwits I associated with. Embry never knew what day it was half the time, so he was a safe bet at never knowing my secret. The thing that worried me most was how long was this going to stay a secret. I was bound the give the game away soon enough and the pack never withheld secrets from each other. Even if I could keep it secret, that didn't mean that I wouldn't accidentally give it away in my thoughts when we phased.
Downside of being a wolf. No damn privacy.
I still had to figure out what my dad was going to think of this whole thing. Thank goodness he had spent the night over at the Clearwaters. Luckily, Seth had followed his orders that Sam has given him. I was fully aware that Sam has called a meeting last night, but it was brief. The problem we as a pack had was that nobody knew the story. The full story about what happened last night. The only person who did was lying unconscious in my bed.
I didn't even want to think about what my dad was going to do when he found at that she had stayed over in our house. He was going to freak out and he didn't even know the half of it.
And he wasn't going to find out either.
I sighed heavily and banged my head against the table. Just as I place my forehead on the table, Leah slammed her hands on the wall causing both Seth to fall of the couch onto Jared, Embry to spill his mug of coffee and Quil to bang his head on the table waking him up.
"Jesus Leah! What the fuck?" Quil cursed.
"He's here." she said through gritted teeth. "Finally. As if we don't have better things to be doing."
Funny how she never referred to him as Sam.
"It's not as if you have to be here Leah." I answered sharply.
"What, and miss all the fun of you being bollocked by Sam? No chance." She sniggered, moving away from the window, placing herself against the wall awaiting Sam.
"She's just sad because it not her for once." Jared stirred, pushing Seth off him. Seth howled lightly.
Within seconds, Sam entered through my front door, followed by Paul. Why did he have to bring Paul? Oh yeah, because he's part of the pack. For a few seconds none of said anything. What could we say? None of us truly knew what to make of the situation. Paul made himself comfortable next to Quil, much to his dislike. I didn't even need to read Quil's thoughts. His face said it all. I glanced over at Sam. I decided I should probably make the first move.
"Sam listen—" I began.
"Allow me to speak first." Sam interrupted. 'I have a few things I wish to say.'
I nodded, stepping back.
"Right, now you all know what happened last night and I must say, that I won't start on a bad note. Everyone followed their orders and I thank you all for that."
I inhaled deeply. All except me.
"Which is why I am sorry that we all have to carry this burden—"
"Burden? I would call it a lot more than that." Leah scoffed, interupting.
Sam growled. "Leah, now is not the time to start judging. Jacob knows what he did. He carries most blame," He turned to face me. My eyes met with his. "You should have called us the instant you smelt anything unusual." He didn't sound angry, just disappointed. That made me feel worse.
"I'm sorry Sam." I apologised, geniunely.
"Sorry doesn't cut it Jake. The whole pack could have been put in danger, not to mention our families and the residents in La Push and surrounding areas. How could you be so selfish?" Paul's deep voice made itself heard.
'Well Sam is no better! It was his decision to bring her back AND let her stay on our lands!' Leah hissed, her eyes narrowed glaring at Sam.
Sam stared back at Leah. She wasn't going to back down. 'I understand that you are pissed Leah-'
'Don't even get me started. Or did I not make my feelings clear to you last night?' Leah stepped forward, her hands balled into fists.
'You have feelings Leah?' Embry joked, to which Sam hit round the back of the head, causing him to spill his coffee even more. I shook my head. Embry should learn to keep his mouth shut.
'Look, I made the decision, based on what is best for the pack, and for our families-,' I heard Leah slam her hand against the wall, but decided, like everybody, else to ignore her. Once again, her amateur dramatics were on show. '- regardless of what all of you may think, killing her would not have helped us. She's different to any of the other vampires we have come into contact with, therefore, we need to try and communicate with her, find out what she knows. If she is part of another breed of vampire, we need to know, for our own protection, how many there are and where they are. They could pose as a threat to our whole existence, but then again, she may prove be harmless. That is what we need to know.'
I sighed. To me, the thought that she could be a threat to my family was something I didn't wanna think about right now. It would seriously complicate things more than they already were.
'So the reason she's here, is because you seem to have some sort of fascination with her?' Quil piped up for the first time since Sam arrived.
'Like I said,' Sam replied, his eyes widened as he looked over at me as he did. 'She's different.' I saw Sam grit his teeth together. I knew this was hard for him, but I saw what he was doing. He was trying to protect me and my secret. But he wasn't completely lying. She was different and we did need to talk to her and see what she could tell us.
"Look guys. I should apologise for going after her. I thought I could handle the situation. I was just hotheaded from the whole wedding thing and with Cul—" I stopped. I couldn't even bring myself to mention his name. Even his last name was venomous to me.
Sam sighed. This time, he wasn't going to defend me. He was going to grill me,which seemed fair, otherwise the pack would get suspicious about why he had not given me a hard time for not following pack codes. "Jake, you cannot keep blaming that Cullen for your foolish actions. It's not fair on the pack and it's not fair on you. Imagine if you had been killed. Did you ever think how that might us a pack?"
I rolled my eyes, trying to think of a clever answer. "Well you're the Alpha. You can always find another Beta." I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jeans.
Everybody exhaled.
"Maybe," Sam paused. "But Billy can't just go out and find a new son Jake. I know that you are hurting but going out there and getting yourself killed won't help the situation. One mistake is all it takes."
My tolerance levels were lessening slightly. "Okay, I'm sorry. Jesus! What do you want me do? Get down on all fours and plead forgiveness?"
Leah scoffed once more. "Yeah, that's something you don't need to phase for." Leah chipped in sarcastically.
"Shut it Leah." Sam silenced her. She rolled her eyes and moved back over to the window. I turned away from the pack and placed my hands behind head. I paced for a few moments.
Paul chirped up again. Damn, I hate his voice sometimes. No, sorry, ALL the time.
"Look, we need to make a decision, as a pack, about what we are going to do here—"
I spun around to face him, removing my hands from behind my head and putting them on the breakfast table. "Decision? Decision about what?" I asked, slightly panicked.
"About what we do about that thing through there." He towards my bedroom.
"She's not a threat Paul." I replied as calmly as I could.
"I don't think anybody is in a position to say what she is and what she isn't mate." Paul sneered. 'You heard Sam, we need to get her talking, figure out what her game plan is.'
Okay, tolerance levels lessening even more. Stupid Paul.
"What's that supposed to mean?"I snapped.
Everybody started rambling into the argument and I suddenly felt that pull on my body again.
"HEY! Will you guys keep it down?" I shouted. I didn't want her waking up to shouting.
"Yeah, do you want that leech to be listening in?" Paul hissed.
"Look Paul. Don't call her that." I said surprisingly calm.
"Her? Since when did you become a leech-lover Jake?" He mocked. He had no idea.
'I'm not.' I hissed back at him, gritting my teeth. 'But that doesn't give you the right to label her. She has a beating heart, so therefore that puts her in a different category altogether.'
"Jake's right. Some of us don't have a problem with vampires remember?" Seth spoke out, walking over to stand by my side. It was nice having one person on my side.
"Some of us aren't naive idiots Seth." Paul scoffed back.
"Hey don't call my brother that Paul you ignorant jerk!" Leah stepped in moving to stand next to Seth. "I don't like that thing through there any more than you do, but don't talk down to my brother like that."
Go Leah!
Wait hang on—
"So has anybody got any rational ways in which we can deal with this?" Embry spoke.
"I say we finish her off ourselves. We don't want a freak in these parts. " Paul hissed.
"What did you just call her?" I asked, half angry, half confused.
"Well she's not what we would call normal is she Jake?"
"You can say that again." Leah smirked.
"And what you think we are?" I raged.
"That's not what I meant. We're genetic, she isn't. She was changed to be that way which therefore means she decided her own fate. She should deal with that."
"Or maybe she didn't have a say? Ever think about that?" I snapped once more, getting closer to Paul. I felt Seth tug at my sleeve, urging me to refrain.
"Stop it! This is what she wants. All of us to be fighting over her fate." Leah said, trying to gain a bit of dominance.
"It's not our decision to decide her fate. You know that as well as I do." Sam spoke, calming his pack, however indicating his words at both Paul and myself. I exhaled deeply. I wanted to kill Paul. I had never felt that way about one of my brothers.
Seth spoke up. "I still think we need a second opinion."
"Like who?" Sam questioned.
What did Seth have in mind?
"I think we should talk to the Cullens." Seth answered, his voice lowering slightly. The pack broke out into rabble again.
"What would need to talk to those moronic bloodsuckers for?" Leah responded to her brother.
"Maybe they can help?" Seth continued.
"Yeah, maybe they'll help us finish her off." Paul sniggered.
That was it. My tolerance time bomb went off in that second. I lunged at him without a second thought.
"Easy there Jake." This time, Sam stood in front of Paul, pushing me back. Paul backed off, raising his palms in surrender with a giant smirk on his face. "Jake what the fuck is wrong with you? Jesus! Talk about manic wolf temper, you are hitting a whole new level today mate."
I growled at him. He growled back.
"Okay guys, just cut it out already! Imagine if the Elders were here now, would you behave like this in front of them? Well would you?" Sam questioned. "Now, Seth continue."
"Well maybe we have it all wrong. She's obviously not a full human, but she has a beating heart and a pulse and she bruises body. None of us can deny that can we?"
Everybody shook their heads. We had all witnessed it. Not even Paul nor Leah could deny it. If they did, they were looking for early graves.
"We all know that vampires heal, just like we do, so they don't get scars. This girl had three giant scars down her back. If she was a full vampire, then that would not be possible. So, maybe there is an explanation for it." Seth concluded.
"Seth, listen mate, if she isn't a vampire and she isn't a human, then she ain't right. She needs to be destroyed. God knows how many things like her are roaming about, breeding and killing. If she was a vampire, fair enough, she is just one form, but divided, she can't be safe." Embry said.
I raged again. "How do you know that?"
"Jake come on! You cannot be serious." Paul chipped in, once again.
"Well she isn't an immortal child. Otherwise, she would be well—" Jared began.
"A child?" Quil sniggered. Ironic.
"And she definitely wasn't a child." Jared smirked.
I didn't even want to know what was going through his head for the fear that I might kill him.
Jared continued. "Well I never thought I would say this, but agree with Jake and Sam. We shouldn't just kill her, because where's the logic in that? We should find out what she is before we do anything rash. And I think she owes us an explanation. We should grant her that much. It's the least she deserves. And I think Seth's right. We may need the Cullens on this one."
"I'm not going to them. You do this, you do this by yourself. I am not stepping a foot onto their ground." Leah hissed.
"Who wanted you to come anyway?" I snapped. She snarled at me before turning away.
"I agree with Leah," Paul spoke again. " Hey, here's an idea. Why don't we take her back to woods and lay her down as a trap to lure those other leeches back in then BAM! We take them out as well?"
My hands gripped the table, pulling off the edge. I threw it to the ground whilst everyone gawped at me. "Be thankful its not your neck Paul." I spoke dangerously. I wasn't even trying to keep myself calm.
Paul sniggered. "God Jake. If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were in love with that mons-"
Before I had time to react, Sam quickly intervened. "Paul, I think its time for us to go control the perimeter. Make sure whatever was tracking her doesn't come back."
Thank god for Sam. Truly a life saver.
"Sure whatever Sam." Paul got off the stool giving me a dead eye before walking over to the door.
"This is the new plan. Jake's in charge of her, so you do as he tells you,' Sam smiled weakly standing by the door. 'I promised the Elders I would give a full report this morning, but seeing as she is still unconscious, I won't be able to tell them anything just yet. As soon as she wakes up, try and communicate with her and alert me as soon as you can. You have my permission to take her to the Cullens, and we'll meet you there to discuss this.'
"Sure thing." I mumbled. Sam nodded at me, before closing the door.
"Well I guess that's it then. Come on Seth, let's get home before Mom freaks out about where we've been." Leah moaned.
"Actually Lee, I might stay here for a bit, if that's okay." Seth answered.
"Suits me fine. Leech-lovers should stick together, right Jakey?" she mocked.
I snuffed her prescence and turned away from her. "Haven't you got an appointment with a cliff and a long drop into a vast sea?"
"Come up with a new one Black." She slammed the door so hard on the way out it was a miracle it stayed on the hinges. The bitch has spoken.
I swallowed hard as I rubbed my eyes and yawned. "You want some breakfast Jake? Some tea or coffee maybe?" Seth asked politely.
"Erm..actually I was thinking I might go check up on her and erm…try to get some sleep. I'll kip in my dad's room if I get too tired. Make yourselves at home. Just don't eat my dad out of the house because he is going to be pissed with me as it is without having to do another supermarket trip for you lot."
Seth smiled uneasily. I had the feeling Seth wanted to tell me something but I was in no mood or state to comprehend anything he said to me. Only one thought was going through my head and that was her.
I knew had to do whatever I could to save her. I didn't care what she was or what she wasn't. I could go back on what I had done.
I began to walk down the corridor when I heard a smash come from my room.
A window?
Shit.
"What's going on Jake?" I heard Seth shout.
"You stay there Seth. Tell Embry and Quil to stand outside and guard the front door." I yelled back.
If anybody had spoken any words to me after that point I didn't hear them. I raced down the corridor of my house and towards my bedroom. I grabbed the doorknob, nearly taking the door off the hinges.
I saw her stood there, her body half leaning out of the window. Smashed glass everywhere. The smell of blood tickled my nose. I watched as her body hesitated. Her pulse was faster than last night, but she wasn't scared. It was more like a warning to me. I sensed it straight away. Her body turned to face me. As if I could control my pull usually, my pull as tighter to her than ever; even with her stood there, half naked with her hair messy, pale skin and blood dripping down her arm, she looked beautiful to me. My eyes met with hers and for the first time, my life felt almost complete.
I used to think if Death was another country it had to be better than this one.
I was wrong. I liked this country much better.
My mind was interrupted by the sound of Embry's voice calling my name "Jake!" He couldn't have picked a worse time.
I guess that's werewolves for you.
