AN: These characters are not mine.
Jake dropped the hood of the Rabbit, leaning on it gently with both hands to click the latch shut. He wiped his hands once more on the rag, his back muscles flexing as he moved.
Bella watched him intently, as she always did. She loved watching him work, he was always so focused on the task at hand.
And he was beautiful.
Especially shirtless.
He turned to her. "Omelet?," he asked, grinning at her. He rubbed his stomach, hidden behind his unreal abs. "I am starving!," he added.
She grinned. "You're always starving, Black. And yeah, I am too. Just watching you work makes me hungry." He took her hand and led her to the house.
Billy was sitting at the kitchen table sipping coffee and reading the paper.
"Hello, Bella," he said. "Helping Jake on the Rabbit? Or should I say, the money pit?"
"Hey, Dad, watch it," Jake said defensively. "That there's a great car, especially considering it's got 110,000 miles on it. It'll run forever as long as I can find parts for it."
"Yeah, well pretty soon you'll have to machine your own, it's so old. But not as old as Bella's truck." He winked at Bella, who raised an eyebrow at him.
Jake laughed, since it had been Billy's truck. "Now wait a minute, I fixed up her truck too, and I can say the same thing about it," Jake said. "Solid as a rock, other than needing a new exhaust in a few thousand miles, and a new door hinge." He nodded at Bells. "Right?"
"Oh, absolutely. It's like a dream truck, perfect in every way. Other than that dent that I got in the school parking lot. But Edward pulled that out right away…" she trailed off.
That was not cool, Swan, she thought to herself. She usually didn't make references to Edward's powers, but she was so relaxed and happy that she'd forgotten.
And anyway, Billy knew everything about the whole Cullen deal. Even though his generation had skipped the whole shifting thing, he had watched Jake go through it.
It had been just about as hard for him as it had been for Jake… seeing him confused, going through huge changes physically and mentally in a short period of time, protecting Jake from revealing his secret to the outside world, and vice versa.
Now that Jake had sort of plateaud, he could relax more. But he was still prickly when it came to the Cullens. And he didn't know his – er, her – truck had been damaged. That hurt.
"What happened to old Bessie?," he asked gravely, using the nickname they called it sometimes.
Bella hesitated. "Um, it was raining, and a kid just lost control of his car when he was parking, and tapped Bessie. Just a tiny dent in the fender."
She didn't menton that Edward had literally thrown himself in harm's way to stop the SUV from slamming into Bella, too. That he'd saved her life.
Jake, who was getting stuff out of the fridge to make omelets, froze for a second. He hated hearing about how Bella was in danger, and he hated even more being reminded that Edward had saved her life. That had been around the beginning of her relationship with Edward.
He cut some pats of butter and slid them into the pan heating on the stovetop, then cracked several eggs and beat them energetically in a bowl.
Bella could feel his anger radiate from his back, still shirtless.
"Edward should've just left the dent and let me fix it," Jake said flatly.
"And it was a big risk, showing his power like that, with all those kids around." He shook his head, muttering under his breath.
"But no one was right there next to us," Bella interjected. "He was just trying to protect me by pretending that nothing had happened to the truck."
"By god, that truck went 40 years without a scratch, and the first week Bella has it, it gets hit?" Billy sighed.
"That's the famous Bella Swan luck for you," Bella whispered darkly. They both heard her though.
"Oh, Bella, I didn't mean anything by that," Billy added hastily. "It's just weird, is all. And Jake's real good with bodywork. See you kids in a bit." He wheeled out of the kitchen into the living room.
Jake folded the omelet in half and pressed down with a spatula before sliding it onto a plate.
Bella grinned. "Good with bodywork. Can't argue with that," she said, stroking his arm.
Jake blushed, cut the toast in half, and they sat down to eat. He grinned back. He couldn't stay mad at Bella for long, no matter what.