My eyes were puffy when I entered the kitchen in the morning. I had been up all night, trying to reach Ethan, but he still hadn't picked up his phone. I would never say it aloud, but I was starting to freak out.
"Hey, what's up with you?"
"I didn't sleep well, Charlie. Don't worry about it."
"Bad dream? Do you wanna talk about it?"
"No, I would rather not. But thanks for your concern, Charlie."
"I will always worry about you. The same goes for Bella. You haven't seen her, have you?"
"No."
"Alright. I'm off to work now. Behave and please, tell Bella that I need to talk to her when you see her."
"I will, Charlie."
"Good. I will see you later, kiddo." Charlie grabbed his jacket before leaving me on my own.
"I hope you didn't say anything to Dad." I turned to see Bella staring at me. I gulped hard. What had I done now?
"Listen, about yesterday. Jake was only kidding. He's really bad at making jokes."
"I don't understand anything of this, Bella."
"And you shouldn't. You don't belong in our world, Rileigh." I couldn't help but notice her blush.
"Jacob will pick me up for school." I grabbed my bag from the chair, ready to leave, but Bella stopped me.
"No, Jacob won't give you a ride to school."
"Why?"
"Do you honestly have to ask?" I couldn't say a word. What was she playing at now?
"Listen, I'm sorry about this, really. I'm going now and you should, too, if you don't want to be late for school." She was about to leave, but I stopped her.
"Wait a minute. I don't have a car."
"Not my problem. You shouldn't have come to Forks, Rileigh. Nobody wants you here." The truth was that I already knew that nobody would ever want me in Forks. I nodded. Tears raced down my cheek when my cousin left. I needed a plan. Soon. I put on a face smile when I stared out the kitchen window. Jacob had just arrived. He gave her a cheesy smile when he saw Bella. I wanted to shout at them, but it wouldn't change anything. They would still hate me. I waited until they had left before I went outside. Even though I was disappointed and mad, I didn't slam the door. Instead I kept staring at it with narrowed eyes.
"If you stare at that door any longer it will break down."
"Paul, what are you doing here?"
"It's always nice to see a pretty girl in the morning."
"No, really? Why are you at Charlie's house at 6 am?"
"I knew Jake wouldn't drive you today. I just thought you need a ride to school."
"How did you know he wouldn't give me lift?"
"Let's just say he was furious when he left this morning, cutie. I just knew that he wouldn't drive you to school." I swallowed hard when I noticed that he wasn't alone. I could only see his back, but I was sure that I had seen him before. Paul followed my gaze and let out a deep sigh.
"Who's with you?"
"Just Embry. You can ignore him if you must. Most of the time he won't say a word anyway." Paul chuckled to himself, but I could see that his smile didn't reach his eyes. Clearly, something was wrong. We went to his car in silence.
"Hello." My voice quivered. The teenage boy greeted me with a cold smile. Not a word came out of Embry's mouth.
"Right. Let's go then," said Paul, opening the passenger door for me. I thanked him with a smile. Embry Call was a mystery to me. He kept staring at me while playing the jacket zipper when Paul finally started the engine. What was his problem? Maybe he hated me? But then, I hadn't done anything to him, right? I stared back at him with a deep frown on my face when our eyes met. There was this feeling again. The feeling I couldn't explain even if I wanted to. I had this weird tingling all over my body as soon as he broke eye contact with me. This was going to be a long day.
"Sooo, what are you doing after school?" Paul's voice so soft as if he didn't want to scare me.
"Rileigh?" He then looked at me.
"Oh, yeah. I don't know yet. Why?"
"Do you wanna come and meet the boys?"
"Meet the boys?" I had no idea if I wanted to meet Jacob again.
"Don't worry. Jake and your dear cousin won't be there. It will just be Brady, me and some other guys you haven't met yet." I was ready to answer his question when someone spoke before me.
"She can't." I turned around to face Embry.
"I'm sorry?" Embry didn't look at me when he said his next words.
"She can't come, Paul." There was a gleam in his hate filled eyes as soon as he had said those words. I deepened my breathing, still not ready to turn away from him.
"Right. You know what. He's right. I promised Charlie that I would help him with something. Maybe some other time."
"Yeah, maybe some other time." Paul's hand tightened around the steering wheel and I knew without a doubt that there were a lot of things he was hiding from me.
