Quiet Rage: Decisions

Bella's POV –

One minute I was being held against the wall by Jacob's strong grip and then felt myself slipping to the floor in a crumpled heap. The pain in my upper arms throbbed from where his hands had dug into my skin. My head was spinning as I tried to center my thoughts on what had just happened.

"Bella," Emily's voice startled me I thought that I was alone. "Bella, here." She reached to help me stand but the second her hands grazed my arm I sucked in a quick breath in pain. "Oh my," I heard her gasp and it was then that I saw the deep purple bruises, almost black, forming across my pale white skin.

It didn't take much for me to imagine what she was thinking. The horror behind her black eyes was all I needed to see. I couldn't help but wonder if she was thinking back to a similar time when she had been the target of another wolf's rage. "I'm fine," I told her as my eyes searched the room for something I could use to cover my arms. It took a bit of effort but I pulled on the brown jacket draped over the back of a chair.

"What happened?" Emily's soft voice filled the silence.

"Nothing," I replied all the time my eyes never meeting hers. I couldn't or else I would have allowed the tears I had been holding at bay escape passed my lashes. Emily was silent for a while like she was weighing what or what not to say. I finally spoke. "Are we all having dinner at your and Sam's place tonight?" I did my best to keep my tone even and light, like any of the other hundreds of conversations she and I had had. "You know you could come here every once in awhile. Charlie will tell you I'm not such a bad cook, really." I heard the rambling of my own voice but wasn't able to stop it. I needed to fill the silence with something other than my thoughts.

"I think you should talk to Sam." Emily's announcement shocked me.

"What? No…what for?" My questions came out in a one sentence jumble.

"He can help."

"Help with what?"

"Bella." Emily's tone was soft still but held an almost offended tone.

"Everything's fine, Emily. Really it's fine." She eyed me unsurely I'm sure wondering who I was trying to convince more me or her.

"Look at me, Bella." She just about ordered. I hesitated for a bit, practically knowing what she was thinking, about to say. Finally I let my eyes come to rest on her once beautiful but now scarred face, a scar that reached all the way down her right side. "You really should talk to Sam."

"Jacob would never hurt me."

"He already has." She pulled back my jacket revealing the scratches and bruises.

Jacob's POV –

I felt the brush and limbs on the forest floor dig through my thick fur into my skin but that didn't stop me from running. The fury that fueled this rage was uncontrollable. I heard the pounding my feet made against the ground. The sound echoed in my ears and on I ran.

I had lost track of time when my body finally slowed. In the cold night air my breaths escaped me in quick bursts of steam. I shouldn't have been exhausted yet I was. My emotions were getting the better of me. Dropping my body to the ground the image of Bella's frighten eyes came rushing back to me. What had I done? I hurt her, I scared her. In all the time she had known what I was I had never frightened her, but in one reckless second I had done just that.

I hung my head in my hands letting out a defeated sigh. None of this would have been happening if he had just stayed away. Bella would be happy with me if he hadn't decided to show his face again. The bile from my stomach etched my throat just thinking about him. Bella smelled like him, she reeked of vampire. My hands began to tremble again as the thoughts of Bella wrapped in his arms overtook me.

I wanted to take my anger, rage even, out on the person, no thing, it was meant for. Without thinking I phased back closing the gap between myself and the treaty border where our lands met theirs. I let my keen sight survey the surroundings looking for even the remotest of signs of them.

A sickeningly sweet scent filled the air and burned my nostrils when I inhaled deeply. I hadn't been wrong. He was still here, they all were! My ferocity encased me, tempting me to step across that imaginary line and rid this world, rid Bella's world, of the enemy.

I could have called the pack in an instant and it all would have been over. They would be gone. They would never see us coming.

'jacob, what are you doing?' Sam's silent words probed my head. I was so consumed with my own thoughts I hadn't realized that he had been shadowing me.

'mind your own business.'

'i am. you and the pack are my business. what are you thinking?'

Even through our silent communication I could hear his disapproval, but knew that he would follow my lead. He didn't have a choice I was Alpha.

Edward's POV –

I was on my feet the instant I saw Carlisle and Jasper enter the Forks Police Department. My conversation with my father, for all intents and purposes, was a short one. Carlisle understood from the little I said that this was totally about Charlie Swan needing to exact his own punishment for the transgressions I had committed against his daughter.

"Chief Swan," Carlisle offered his gloved hand to the man across the desk from him. "Edward tells me there is some misunderstanding with an expired registration for his vehicle." Carlisle's tone was velvet smooth as always.

I saw Charlie reluctantly return my father's handshake. "Resisting arrest too,"

'i did no such thing!' my thoughts silently screamed at Carlisle. I clenched my teeth I was tired of Bella's father already. I know he disliked…well hated me but enough was enough already.

"Well can you blame him, Chief? You did accuse him of having stolen a car. A car I might add that you know very well belongs to him."

"Doesn't matter," Charlie's voice was gruff. "I can hold him for forty-eight hours."

"What?" I couldn't help but shout from behind them. "This is ridiculous. I didn't steal anything. My only crime is having forgotten to put the new registration in my glove box." I was exasperated now.

"Is that really necessary Chief? Especially, when I have the current registration right here?" Carlisle offered over the illusive document.

I imagined that Jasper had begun to work his calming magic since it looked to me as though Charlie was suddenly having second thoughts about holding me for forty-eight hours. Carlisle had been smart to bring Jasper along, I thought.

"Let me see that," Charlie all but ripped the small paper from Carlisle's hand.

"As you can see, perfectly legal and up to date."

I grabbed the cold steel bars in front of me agonizing over the length of time this was really taking. I easily could have snapped the brittle metal between my fingers, but that would have gotten me nothing but another set of problems entirely.

"Fine." Charlie reached for the key ring that hung on a peg behind his desk. "You're free to go." The door swung open granting me escape.

"Thank you, Chief Swan. I am sorry for the inconvenience." Carlisle put his hand on my shoulder and lead me towards the door as Jasper followed a few steps behind making sure that Charlie's amicable mood remained long enough for my hasty exit.

Carlisle tossed me the keys to the Volvo before handing me the current registration. "Perhaps you should put this in its proper place?" He raised his brow trying not to laugh. "You can follow me."

I saw Jasper smirk before I slid behind the wheel and immediately gunned my engine. I saw Carlisle's disapproving look in the mirror. 'could we at least get of the parking lot first?' he thought knowing I would hear.

I knew exactly where we were headed and what I was in for when we got there. Maybe a night in jail would have been better. I pulled the Volvo alongside Carlisle's Mercedes and braced myself.

"It won't be that bad, Edward." Carlisle put his hand on my shoulder again.

'I wouldn't bet on that.' Jasper thought.

"Here comes the jailbird!" Emmett howled the minute I stepped inside the house.

"Edward," Esme came forward. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, jailbird tell us all about it." Emmett wasn't about to let up and I knew it.

"I'm fine, Esme," I turned to her doing my best to ignore Emmett and his big loopy grin.

It was then that I looked around and the house looked as though we had never left. Gone were the white sheets and everything had a familiarity of our once home. "What's going on?" I thought and said simultaneously.

'we're staying!' Alice's thoughts screamed in my head.

'NO!'

'yes we are. we're staying in forks,'

I whirled around to face Carlisle with questioning eyes. "We aren't staying!" I announced matter of fact.

"This is ridiculous!" Rosalie's voice dripped with sarcasm. "Aren't all of you tired of giving in to Edward's every whim? We go, we come back, we leave again. How long is it going to be before something that little human does summons us all back again because he," she pointed directly at me. "says so? I personally am sick of all of it!"

"Rosalie, we are a family."

"Yes we are," I watched Rose point to the group of seven vampires in the room. "the reason we are back here isn't though."

I wondered if anyone would dare to say Bella's name in my presence.

"We're back here babe, cause Edward went and got himself arrested." Emmett chuckled again.

"Technicality."

"Have you seen Bella? How is she? I can't wait to see her myself!"

Of course Alice would have been the first one to use Bella's name. "Yes," I said answering the first question. "She's married," I replied for the second. Those words brought silence to the room all but Alice of course.

"I would have seen that. You have to be wrong."

"I'm not and you wouldn't have been able to see."

"What?" Alice's confusion was obvious.

"Bella's married?" Carlisle spoke.

"Yes." I answered. "You wouldn't have seen any of it because she married," the word nearly stuck in my throat. "Jacob Black."

"The dog?" a few voices said in unison.

All I was able to do was nod. Alice came forward and embraced me as did Esme their thoughts exuded I pulled out of their hold, unsure of where in the house I could go without being bombarded by thoughts, memories of Bella.

'serves him right,' I heard Rosalie's angry thoughts.

'i'm sorry,' Jasper thought. He still felt ultimately responsible for what had pushed me to leave Bella in the first place.

"Edward," Carlisle stood behind me and I let him lead me to his study. "We don't have to stay. We, well most of us," I knew he meant Rosalie when he qualified his comment, "knew how much you miss Bella and still love her. We just wanted you to be happy. We can leave here and never come back if that's truly what you want."

What did I want? I honestly didn't know. Did I stay and torture myself watching Bella from a distance? Did I dare try to talk to her, tell her how I really felt? Did I leave her defenseless against a pack of werewolves married to one or not? I just didn't know.