Thanks for the reviews!! (and yes, Seth's ringtone is from mulan, i love that song- and it somehow reminded me of him, lol) Here's the next chapter- keep the reviews coming!!

wwsadd

New Games

I had never run that fast in my life, and in half an hour I had made it back to Spencer's large parking lot. I slowed to a walk, hoping I didn't look as bad as I felt. The last thing I needed right now was to be bombarded by questions I couldn't answer.

By the time I got to my room, my breathing was back under control… mostly. Barging in, I was suddenly excited again. "I figured it out!" I sang.

Too late I realized that it was not just Sarah and Kate in my room.

"What the hell happened to you?" Seth demanded, jumping up from the chair by my desk. The girls were pacing back and forth, making the room seem even smaller than it actually was. He swiftly pulled me into a hug, noticing when I winced.

"Uh… Chase and I had a slight disagreement?" I said, hoping to leave it at that. But no such luck. Seth growled impressively, yanking up the side of my shirt to expose a blossoming bruise that stretched along my ribcage on the right side.

"Shit." He hissed. "What kind of a disagreement?" He demanded.

Kate had quickly come over to examine my side. "It looks like you cracked a couple ribs, maybe even splintered one. You had to be hit pretty hard for this to happen." She said, prodding what I assumed were the broken bones.

"Uh, ouch. He didn't really like the fact that he can't use his stupid little Power on me." I explained shortly.

Sarah's eyes lit up. "It doesn't work on you?" She asked excitedly. I nodded, my own excitement back.

"That's not surprising. His magic dates back centuries, you're like, a new and improved supernatural phenomenon." Seth said.

"Don't you know how to make a girl feel special?" I asked sarcastically, rolling my eyes. "But you realize what this means, right?" I asked them, directing my question more to Kate and Sarah.

Sarah's excitement had turned to apprehension; she saw quickly the direction I planned to take with this new information. "I don't know that you should…" She started.

I waved my hand dismissively. "He's got so much power already in that body, it shouldn't take long for me to get him to use it all for something. It'll burn out his body so bad, there's no way he'll be able to maintain it. He'll wither away in minutes… hopefully. I just have to push his buttons and stay out of the way. It shouldn't be too hard." I explained. Seth's face was dark with anger.

"That's your brilliant plan? Piss him off so much that he throws all of his power at you because you think it will kill him?" He hollered.

"It will kill him, but that's not really the point. He'll more than likely end up taking you with him." Kate snapped, shushing Seth while she was at it.

"I think this is our best shot you guys. Unless you have something better?" I asked harshly, looking between the girls and Seth. They all kept their mouths shut, although I could tell none of them were exceedingly pleased. "We have some time to talk this through; he was even more derailed than I was. I can safely say we have a few days, probably a week. But I think this is a good place to start seriously planning our counterattack. Seth, you can stay here for the time being. If that's okay with you Sarah." I amended.

Sarah nodded vigorously. "Big scary werewolf protecting us at all times. I like that idea." She said quickly. "Especially because I don't want to scare Caleb by insisting on staying at his place all week."

Kate shrugged. "I live with Pogue. He's not gonna notice if I'm a little more clingy than usual. I think he likes it when I insist on spending all my free time with him."

Seth conceded. We'd have to be careful, it was very against the rules to have a guy sleeping in our room all week, but we knew it was in everyone's best interest. I asked Sarah to call Caleb and ask them not to come over tonight. He was suspicious, and insisted on talking to me.

"Caleb? What's up man?" I asked, as lightly as I could.

"Rainy? Hey. I was just checking that everything was all right. You took off in quite a hurry earlier- you worried us. Are you okay?" He asked, and his sincerity rang in his voice. I could easily see how Caleb was Spencer's golden boy; he was probably the sweetest guy in the world.

"Yes, I'm perfectly fine, thank you. I have some family issues going on, so I had to rush off to deal. Sorry if I scared anyone. I guess I'm not used to having such tight friends. I appreciate your concern though. And sorry about tonight, but me and Sarah really just want to go to bed." I said, surprising myself by not lying.

"Of course, you're part of the gang now, get used to my over protectiveness, it doesn't go away." He said, and I could tell that I had, at least momentarily, eased his fears. "I'll pass it on to Reid too; he was freaking out more than I was- which was a new experience for all of us. It was kind of fun actually. I think it's going to be good having you around." He joked.

I laughed. "I think I can say the same about all of you. At least there's never a dull moment! Tell Reid I said to calm the fuck down… and I'll call him in the morning, okay? Thanks Caleb." I said, hanging up Sarah's phone and handing it back to her.

Seth was big enough that he took up my bed all by himself, and Sarah and I climbed into hers. They had both wanted me to go to the doctor to get my ribs checked out, but I didn't need records of suspicious injuries floating around- my family didn't need any more chances to find out what was going on.

I felt hideous in the morning, and couldn't make myself get out of bed for class. Seth walked Sarah to her first hour, and I took the chance to call Reid. I took a deep breath and picked up my trusty cell phone. It rang twice. "Rainy?" He answered. I involuntarily smiled at the note of anxiety apparent in his voice even over the phone.

"Hey you. I'm not interrupting a class, am I?" I asked, getting a weird adrenaline rush just by hearing him say my name.

"Not for me. Shouldn't you be in Calculus though?" He asked. I stuck my tongue out at the receiver, even though I knew he couldn't see me.

"You're the one who suggested I not go to class, remember?" I teased lightly, ignoring the throbbing in my side when I laughed.

"Well I meant if you were skipping class with me. Obviously. Is everything okay?" He still sounded concerned, and I had no desire to lie to him. But I knew better than to tell the truth.

"Of course. I'm simply skipping cuz I overslept. And you know how much they love tardiness around here. Plus I just really hate math." I quipped. He laughed and I hoped I'd calmed his fears at least a little.

"So… what happened yesterday? Sarah and Kate seemed really on edge when they came back downstairs. I thought I was going to have to come after you and make sure you were alright. Caleb convinced me to calm down though." He explained. For some reason it seemed like he must be embarrassed.

"Awe. That's so sweet." I cooed.

"Again, not a word to anyone." He said, and I could tell I was seriously ruining his bad boy image.

I giggled. "What, you don't want all of Spencer to know that Reid Garwin has a heart?" I asked sweetly.

He groaned. "No one else needs to know babe." He said arrogantly. "Please?" he added at the end, like he couldn't help it. I could almost see the puppy dog look on his face.

"Oh, all right. I won't tell." I conceded with another laugh. "I really just called to let you know everything is okay. I need to get ready for my next class; apparently I'm not supposed to be skipping alone." I said lightly.

It was his turn to laugh. "Damn straight. But next time you don't want to go to class… you know all you have to do is call." He said with a snicker. "You are coming to Nicky's tonight, right? I miss dancing with you." He whined.

I sighed. I wanted to go, more than anything, and pretend like nothing had changed in the three days since he had proven that he was, in fact, Prince Charming- in the most alluring disguise ever. But that didn't change the fact that right now I had huge problems, problems that were not going to solve themselves. I couldn't justify a night of fun at this point, no matter how vital it was to my sanity.

"I want to, really, I do. But there's a lot of things going on with my uh, family right now, and really need to be responsible and deal. Maybe…" I trailed off, my sixteen year old heart waging an intense war with my seemingly ancient practical-minded conscious.

"Rainy, please, you're killing me here. Tell me what is going on! I want to help you, but I can't do that if you keep shutting me out." He said, frustrated.

More than anything, I wanted to give him the rundown of everything that had happened since the day Chase first appeared in my car. I wanted to tell him about who I really was, and let him hold me and tell me everything was going to be okay. But it wasn't my life in danger, well not ultimately. Chase was using me to get to Reid. To get to Caleb, Pogue, and Tyler most of all. For the millionth time I told myself that I had to be strong. We could start being honest with each other when this mess was over.

Rare tears formed in my eyes, and I prayed that my voice would stay steady. "Reid… I'm sorry. I don't want to shut you out, exactly the opposite, actually. It's just; there are secrets involved… that aren't mine. Things I'm not at liberty to share, and it's already so hard to… I don't want to pull you into this, trust me, please?"

"You. Are. Scaring. Me." He said slowly. "I'm on my way." Click. Damn. This was so not going to be my day.

Seth came back then, flopping back down on my bed next to me. "How you holdin up?" He asked, and I curled up next to him. His arm came down around me. "We will figure something out Ness, you know, me n' Jake are pros at this kind of stuff. Did we ever tell you about when Victoria came back for your mom? And the Volturi picked the exact same day to come check that she wasn't still human?" He asked, creating a distraction that, as always, worked.

I shook my head, I had heard many stories, mostly from Seth or Emmett, both of whom were tremendous storytellers. But this one was new. I had heard the one about James, the one about Laurent, the one about Volterra itself, but I hadn't heard this one. "What did you do?" I asked, trying to keep tears back by not focusing on my problems.

"Your dad and Jake took Bella up into the mountains, the pack and your family split up the twenty newborns Victoria had created to take out the Cullens. Jake left me with your parents while everyone else was down fighting. But Victoria had only made a distraction for everyone- and came after us up on the mountain. Your dad and she fought like hell, of course, in the end; she couldn't beat his mind reading trick. I dominated her little lieutenant person, and then, everything was going great, we thought it must be over. Until my stupid sister had to go pull some idiot stunt.

She almost got herself killed, but Jake jumped in and saved her. Unfortunately, he got the crap beat out of him. And, of course, that is when the Volturi decide to show up. The pack all booked it back to La Push, and left Carlisle to deal with the psycho vamps. It was a crazy close call of a day. But in the end, everything worked out- and Jake heals fast, if you haven't noticed, so within days everything was back to normal." He finished.

Just then there was a sharp knock on the door. "Rainy! Open up, it's me." I heard Reid say impatiently. I crawled off my bed and made my way to the door. I unlocked it with shaky hands, concerned about what else could possibly go wrong.

The minute the door was open, Reid pulled me roughly into his arms. I tried not to wince when his arms crushed my broken ribs. I tugged him inside and shut the door. He had stopped short when he saw Seth, still casually lying on my bed.

I could tell he wasn't sure what to think, and I didn't want him to jump to conclusions. Pushing him over to Sarah's bed, I crawled up into his arms and snuggled into his chest. "Seth Clearwater, this is Reid Garwin, Reid, Seth." I said, making my introductions short as possible. Reid jerked a nod in Seth's direction; Seth returned the somewhat hostile gesture.

Seth looked angry, but also disappointed, and it looked like it wasn't directed at me, or even Reid- which puzzled me. But he was as good an actor as everyone else who'd spent their whole lives keeping their identity a secret. "Nice to meet you." He spit out. Reid's arms tightened slightly.

"So who the hell is going to tell me what is going on?" He asked harshly. I wasn't completely comfortable with Seth watching so surreptitiously, but I turned around in his arms, so I was practically straddling him. I took his face in my hands and stared at him seriously.

"Calm down." I enunciated. "Everything is okay. I promise." I said, hating the lie, and hating myself for telling it.

Unfortunately he didn't buy it anyway. "Bull shit." He said. I tried not to let the images in, but I was already so upset that it was hard to keep my powers in check. I could see the images of the different scenarios that he was coming up with in his mind, none of them even close to what was actually happening. Each was actually less dangerous than what was actually going on. Run-ins with cops, some sort of family crime deal; it hurt me to see that he really thought I could possibly be cheating on him. I let go of his face, I couldn't handle seeing any more of where that thought was going.

I pulled out of his embrace, wondering for a split second if it would just be best if I let him believe it- if he started to hate me so that Chase's threats became useless. But then I realized that I was the only thing standing between them and Chase. If I bowed out of this fight, they were all dead.

Instead I climbed up and sat on my desk, away from both of them, feeling more alone than I ever had in my life. "You don't trust me." I said, hoping that he couldn't see how much it hurt me to say that.

He stood quickly. "That's not fair. I'm worried about you. Damn it Rainy, you're driving me crazy!" He said, raising his voice slightly. "Please? Please tell me what is going on. I just want to help." He pled, his voice returning to its normal octave.

I couldn't hold back the tears anymore, and they started to slowly run down my face. "I. Can't." I said. "You don't get it Reid, I cannot tell you. I want to, and I can't, okay? I'm sorry! But it's just the way it has to be!" I hiccupped, beginning to cry harder.

"I think you should leave now." Seth growled at Reid, pointing at the door. "You aren't doing anything but upsetting her. She'll call you later."

"Who the hell are you to tell me what I should and should not do? I have as much a right here as you do." Reid snapped.

"I'm her friend. I'm the one helping her here- so beat it." He snarled.

Reid's eyes flashed, I seriously thought they were going to go black. "Stop it! Both of you stop!" I cried. They both turned to me, like they had forgotten I was there. "Seth, knock it off. Reid, I'm sorry- this is getting blown way out of proportion. But Seth is right, you should probably go, he and I have a lot of work to do, and not a lot of time." I said, drying my tears even as more fell. The accusations in his eyes made me snap.

"And don't look at me like that! I can't believe you would really think for a second that I would do that to you! Seth is one of my oldest friends, and he's only here to help me. I love you, you idiot! Now go!" I yelled, leaping down from the desk and throwing open the door. I physically shoved him out, he seemed in shock, and didn't recover before I slammed the door.

Throwing the lock in place, I turned back to Seth. My pain had turned to anger. "Well that went well." He growled. "What the hell was all that about?"

I imitated his growl, mine not nearly as impressive. "You didn't have to be so mean to him. He really does care about me." I snapped. "I'd tell him what's going on in a heartbeat if I thought he wouldn't rush out and get himself killed."

Seth dropped heavily back to my bed. He shook his head sadly. "I told Jake this was going to happen. He should have known better than to leave you alone so long. I told him." He muttered.

"Whoa, since when do you get to blame Jake for this?" I asked. I didn't blame him, not for a second. Did I wish he was around more? Of course, but I walked into this. "He didn't force me to make the decisions I made. I knew there was something dangerous about them the minute I met them- I made my own choices here, and the only one to blame is me. I will fix this- if it's the last thing I do." I ranted.

"It won't be the last thing you do, Nessie- if I in any way get the impression that it is, well, you know it'll take me less than thirty seconds to have the entire pack on alert. Whatever plan we come up with will not put you in danger- if it's the last thing I do." He said, turning my words around.

There was suddenly another knock on the door. "Oh joy." I muttered, going back and unlocking it. There stood a very confused looking Tyler- skipping swim practice.

"What the hell Rainy!" He said, pushing past me into my room, which he basically lived in with me and Sarah anyway. "Want to explain to me what is going on? Since apparently Reid just doesn't get it?" He asked. "And by the way, I've never seen him that messed up in the nearly eighteen years I've known him."

"Because he'd rather think I'm cheating on him or something just as stupid than stopping for five minutes to think that I might actually have a legit reason for keeping something from him! Geez Ty, he's impossible- I'd never do that to him." I said tiredly. The emotional rollercoaster ride was making me nauseous.

"I know that, he knows that too. He just doesn't have a clue what's up with you. You're scaring him- and he doesn't scare easily." Tyler said, putting his hands lightly on my shoulders so I couldn't turn away from him.

I sighed. "I'm sorry about that. I don't mean to be. Can't you convince him he's being ridiculous? Please? All I need is a week- a week without worrying that the four of you are going to beat down my door any minute and freak out on me. Is that in any way possible?" I begged.

Tyler groaned. "Alright. One week. But you owe me big time for this." He said lightly. "And if you need anything at all, you call me- no questions asked." He said. I threw my arms around his neck, more grateful than I'd ever been before in my life.

"Thank you Tyler. You're the best." I whispered.

"Rainy, just promise me you'll be careful playing whatever game this is." He said, hugging me tightly before leaving without a single glance at the large werewolf that still occupied my room.


yeah, tyler is the best :) review!