Hey there chickadees. Sorry 'bout the long update time but finals slaughtered me. And then the day after I moved back home I started working, so let's just say I've been very busy. lol. My short story for Creative Writing turned out fannnnntastic. I'm extra proud of it--it's evil and slightly disturbing. Some of the feedback I got was "Wow. That was good, do you need therapy?" or my personal favorite from an education major told me he loved it but, "if a highschool student had handed this to me, I would've called Social Services.". Hahaha. I tried something new and I guess it paid off...sort of. lol.

btw. I just saw XMen Origins: Wolverine...it was AWESOME. Im kinda sorta in love with Gambit already and this movie just made me like him better, although I have to say...Deadpool is also pretty fantastic. xD

Well, enough of this chit-chat...

Enjoy!

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Beware the person who wakes me from my slumber. Beware. I'm not a morning person. Just putting that out there. I'm angry and violent and you should probably just shout at me from the other room.

The problem with waking me up is that whatever object is nearest to me tends to become the projectile that is tossed in your direction. I realize now that I should've probably told this to Embry. I probably also should have mentioned that I tend to say words that would make even the most seasoned sailor blush.

So I was happily in sleepy-land when someone interrupted my fantastic dream about saving the world ala Lord of the Rings style. This pissed me off. Not to mention I wanted to sleep.

So I cracked one eye to a small slit, snatched the object nearest to me—an antique looking clock—and lobbed it in the direction of whomever was shaking my shoulder. Then I mumbled some horrible profanity and shut my eye.

There was no satisfying crash though. There wasn't even a surprised grunt of pain. There was silence. Which I was okay with. So I went back to my dream land to fight off some Orcs and Goblins.

And then the bastard was back. Shaking my shoulder. I growled low and feral. Snatched the next thing that my eyes felt—a bible?—and threw it. Someone chuckled and the shaking continued.

"Pippa," the voice said.

"Fuck off," I mumbled into my pillow.

There was more laughter. "Pippa, it's time to wake up."

". . . fuckin' hate you sonova—"

Oh Lord. That was not in my dream. That hot hand sliding up my scantily clad legs and that mouth pressing scorching kisses to the back of my neck. In my semi-asleep state I did the only thing that came naturally to me. I flipped out.

"Holy Shit!" I cried and launched myself out of bed grabbing whatever could be used as a weapon on the way out. I stood there crouched and breathing heavily holding a silver candle stick holder thingy in my hands ready to brain my would be attacker.

Instead my eyes slowly focused on Embry who was lounging on the bed, his head propped up on his elbow and his lips pressed together to stop a laugh. I blinked again rapidly before straightening up.

"That was interesting," Embry said between laughter.

I glared at him. This was not funny. Okay, it was kinda funny. If you weren't me. But it was me. So this was most definitely not funny. While I was pondering whether or not this situation was funny or not Embry climbed out of bed, walked over to me and placed a fantastic kiss on my lips—he didn't even seem to mind morning breath!

Swaying slightly in the after-Embry-kiss glow I stared at him. Embry smiled at me and headed into the bathroom. I heard the shower turn on and that's when it hit me.

Embry was naked. And only a flimsy wooden door was separating his glorious, naked, body from me. Blushing red from the roots of my hair to my toes I hurried out of that room as fast as possible hoping to get away from those . . . impure . . . thoughts.

As it was I managed to run headfirst into a solid mass of human. Looking up at the human wall from my spot on the carpet I realized that I might be a tad screwed.

The man that I had run into was tall, dark and gorgeous. I realized at that moment why people are always moving to the west coast—they had fantastic looking men! He was tall—almost as tall as Embry—with this deep mocha colored skin. He was wearing a very tight red shirt and jeans that clung to his muscled legs. His face was classically handsome with pronounced cheekbones and chiseled jaw. Black hair in a swarm of short dreadlocks framed his face. His eyes were interesting though—they were a strange yellow color almost.

"I'm sorry Miss," he said in a very deep base with just a hint of an accent that I couldn't place. He smiled warmly at me and held out his hand. I grasped it and he helped me to my feet.

"Oh, nah," I replied thinking that my hair had to be a complete mess. "It was my bad. I should've probably been paying more attention."

Dark Chocolate as I named him hadn't released my hand. "I'm rather glad that you weren't."

Oh. My face flushed and I pulled my hand away from him awkwardly. "Well, um . . . I'm just going to go . . . get some breakfast. Bye." I edged past him and was on the stairs when he spoke again.

"Do you mind if I join you Miss?" he was right behind me.

I scurried down the stairs so that I could face him. Talking to him on the stairs would've been dangerous. I would probably have been so caught up in his deliciousness that I would've tumbled head first down those stairs.

"Uh, well. Breakfast is included. And I can't really stop you . . ." I muttered awkwardly. His eyes were trained on mine. It was like I was caught in his eyes—I couldn't look away. Luckily Mrs. Wilcox was there to break the moment.

"Ah! I see you're up—Pippa isn't it?" She asked bustling in. Mrs. Wilcox took my elbow and steered me into the red dining room. There were two other people seated at one of the three massive wooden tables that occupied the dining room. They didn't look up as we entered.

"Yeah. I'm Pippa," I told her awkwardly.

She nodded broadly and Dark Chocolate joined me at the table leaning back in the chair. Mrs. Wilcox shot him a withering glare and then smacked him lightly on the shoulder.

"Olivier! Don't abuse my chairs like that!" she reprimanded him. Dark Chocolate/ Olivier smirked and righted the chair so that it was on all four legs. Mrs. Wilcox continued. "Now then, Pippa darling, we're having French toast with eggs and bacon for breakfast this morning. You can also have a bowl of mixed fruit or cereal if those are more to your liking. And of course we have milk, water, coffee and juice to drink."

I loved this woman. "I'll take everything . . . with a coffee."

Mrs. Wilcox turned to walk away and did a quick double take. "E-everything?"

I nodded. "Yeah, everything."

Her eyes widened in shock. I guess she wasn't used to the Lockwood family appetite. Dark Chocolate/ Olivier chuckled and Mrs. Wilcox shot him another glare.

"I shall just have a glass of milk," he said.

Mrs. Wilcox gave a long suffering sigh and left the room. It was just me in my pajamas with my hair sticking out and Dark Chocolate/ Olivier in the room. Oh, and that random other couple who were still ignoring us. Jerks.

"Oliver?" I asked raising my eyebrows.

He blinked slowly. "Oh-live-ee-ay," he corrected me. "The French pronunciation."

"Oh. Well . . . that's nice."

There was a long pause as he continued to stare at me. I looked down at he wooden table top blushing from his gaze. It was unnerving. Like a cat or something.

"So," I began again awkwardly. I was never one for silences. "Where you from Olivier?"

A slow smile stretched across his face. "Not from around here."

I rolled my eyes. "I could've guessed that. Your name for one kind of gives you away."

"I once lived in New Orleans . . . but that was a long time ago. I live in Crescent City now," he said.

"New Orleans, huh? Never been there," I said and smiled a thank you to Mrs. Wilcox who returned with our drinks. I took a long sip of my coffee. "Is that where you get your accent from? I thought it sounded different."

Olivier cocked his head to the side and studied me. "You are very observant Miss Pippa. Yes, my accent is not from around here. I believe you would call it Creole or Cajun."

"Oh! I love Cajun food! Jambalaya is so good!" I said excitedly.

He laughed a low chuckle that reverberated off the walls. He sipped his milk delicately before looking back at me.

"I am glad you think so. Perhaps I could make you some jambalaya or gumbo some time? I make it very well," he leaned forward just a bit to whisper conspiratorially. "I would even allow you to lick the spoon."

My face heated up again.

"She gets plenty of food without help from other guys," an irritated voice said from behind me. Embry looking amazing with his fresh from the shower hair sat down in one of the chairs and pulled my chair closer to his before wrapping an arm around my shoulders. It was like he was protecting his territory or something.

Olivier blinked very slowly at Embry. "I was merely offering her a cultural experience."

"I'm sure that's what it was," Embry said coldly.

"Em," I mumbled warningly. "We were just having a conversation."

"That's not what it looked like to me."

"On the contrary," Olivier spoke up, "it was only a bit of a conversation. No need to get so upset about it." He drained the last of his milk and stood up from the table. "Why so very territorial? She was not doing anything wrong." Olivier turned to look directly at me. "Until we meet again Miss Pippa."

"Bye Olivier," I said waving to him as he exited the room. Then I rounded on Embry. "What the hell was that!?"

Embry grunted noncommittally.

"Embry Call I will not have your jealousy ruining my friendship making!" I pointed my finger at him. "Just because a guy is being friendly does not give you the right to go all crazy on him! I can talk to other guys can't I? I mean, for chrissakes, you're not the only guy in the—"

Embry cupped the back of my head with his large warm hand and kissed my lecture away. Then he saw back with a smirk on his face. I really need to come up with some sort of way to do that to him. It's a very effective way to make people shut up.

My mind traveled upstairs to the sexy lingerie hiding in my suitcase. I bet if I wore that it would shut Embry up. Hm. I filed that away for future reference.

"Don't think that'll work every time," I scowled at him. Mrs. Wilcox returned with my food and Embry reached over for a piece of my bacon. I swatted his hand and he gave me a puppy dog look. "And don't think that anything like that will make you stealing my food okay."

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"Dude. These trees are huge," I said in awe as I stared up at one of the giant redwoods that were found in the Redwood National Park. I walked up to the tree and hugged it barely making it a sixth of the way around the tree.

Embry chuckled and pulled me away from the tree. "Stop hugging trees Pippa. People are staring."

This was true. People walking along the trail were giving us weird looks. I was used to the strange looks people gave me—happened all the time. So I ignore Embry and went back to hugging the tree.

"Em! Take my picture! Do it!"

Embry laughed. "Okay," he took my camera out of my backpack and snapped a picture of me. After I saw the flash I skipped over to Embry and stood on my tip-toes to see the picture. Then I snatched the camera out of his hands and took a photo of Embry.

"I wasn't ready for that," he whined.

I giggled. "Too bad." I held the camera out and took a picture of Embry and I together.

An older woman with a fanny pack saw us and offered to take our picture. I told her that would be great and Embry pulled his arm around my waist. We stood arm and arm and waited for the woman to take our picture.

"One, two, three," the woman said.

At the last moment Embry pulled me into a kiss causing me to grip his shirt tightly. The woman said something about young love and handed the camera back to us. Embry and I looked at the picture.

There was something to be said about the snapshot. Embry and I had our eyes shut in it but there was a palpable chemistry in the picture. I was gripping his shirt like it was my life boat and his arm was wrapped around my waist in a very loving fashion. His other hand was on my collarbone—his fingers just barely reaching the skin. If my parents ever saw this picture the wedding invitations would be out before you could say I do.

"Uh, well, that's . . . um . . ."

Embry took the camera out of my hand. "I like it."

Oh boy.

We continued our little hike through the forest. I had to say one thing about this park—it was gorgeous. And I'm not into nature.

The trees were massive and the ground was covered with large green ferns that fanned out on the forest floor covering the brown earth. Basically, it looked ethereal and prehistoric at the same time. I kept waiting for some velociraptors or something to come bursting through. When I told Embry this he raised an eyebrow so then I had to mime what I meant eliciting some strange looks.

All in all it was a fantastic hike. Embry even had packed us some lunch so we plopped down on one of the large boulders and ate. There's just something classy about eating Pb&j in the middle of a forest.

As we exited one of the trails to take the truck back to the B&B we held hands. Which was just about the most adorable thing. As we were walking back it started to rain. And not just a drizzle but a full out torrential downpour complete with lightning and thunder.

Normally the idea of a storm would piss me off to no end. But being on this special trip alone with the guy that I loved—it just made it special. People bolted past us screaming and trying to cover their heads as lightning flashed.

Embry tugged on my hand trying to usher us quickly to the car. I smirked at him and let go of his hand, raised my eyebrow and took off running—back onto the trails. I should've realized that Embry, both being male and a werewolf, would catch up to me. And he did.

I laughed and tried to beat him to whatever finish we were going to. My hair was soaking as were my clothes but I didn't care. Embry caught me from behind and swung me up into his arms and to complete the moment I kissed him ala Rachel McAdams in The Notebook.

I know, it's totally a cliché kissing in a storm—but you should definitely try it. Especially if your boyfriend happens to be a toasty warm werewolf. We broke off for air and purple lightning danced across the sky. Embry set me back on the ground and pushed a piece of my hair from my face.

"Em," I said softly. Embry's palm lingered on my cheek bone and I stepped close to him so that we were chest to chest. His eyes softened as I covered his hand with my own. Then I inhaled deeply and sucked up all the courage I had. "Embry . . . I love you," I whispered.

Embry let out a little whoop and pumped his fist in the air before wrapping me in the tightest, warmest, best embrace of my life. The rain thundered down on us and lightning flashed but it didn't matter because I was in love. With a guy who loved me. And he knew it.

We broke apart again both of us gasping for air. Embry still held me around the waist tightly as he looked down.

"Pippa," he smiled flashing me those white teeth in the gloom. "I love you, so much."

I returned the smile. "I know. And I—I love you too."

"That's good," Embry replied looking down at me. "Because we need to get you back to the room. Right now."

My eyes widened. Oh. My. God. Sex!? Now!? I wasn't even sure I was ready! And how dare he just jump to a conclusion like that because if he thought I was going to give it up to him just because I confessed my love—

"Pip. Calm down. I meant you need to change clothes. I can see your bra. And while I appreciate this, I don't appreciate other guys seeing it."

I glanced down at myself and flushed bright red. My blue bra was definitely exposed under my shirt. Very exposed. Flustered I tried to cover my chest with my arms. Embry chuckled at that.

"Omigod. Em! Don't just stare at me! I feel so naked!" I whined starting to panic. Not that there was anyone around—I just didn't feel like I could hold out against Embry if he kept staring at me like that. I'm only human!

Embry whipped off his own shirt and shrugged it over my head. The black material went the middle of my thighs. It was slightly damp but warm and smelled delicious.

Which was exactly what I would call Embry standing in the rain without a shirt. Delicious. If I had thought my resolve was weakened before, it was nothing compared to right now.

"Uh, yeah . . . we better go," I stumbled over my words and started to walk back towards the car.

Embry smirked widely and walked along side me. "You like me without my shirt on, don't you?"

Oh Lord, yes. "What would make you say that?" I squeaked.

Embry placed an arm around me so that I was tucked into his naked side. My eyes strayed from his face back to those beautiful, bronze, washboard abs that would make any Abercrombie and Fitch model jealous.

His laugh was low and animalistic as he squeezed my side. "Call it a hunch."

Oh boy.

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Didja like it? Huh? Huh? Let me knooooooow. :)