Disclaimer: Characters and Twilight belong to S. Meyers. Twists, turns and new characters belong to me.

Summary – What if there was something different about Bella? What if it meant that Edward & Bella had a more "normal" relationship?

Another update! All the new readers and reviewers inspired me. Hope you enjoy the new chapter. Sorry it took so long to get this chapter up, but I was in Vancouver twice at the beginning of Dec to see Sam Bradley and Marcus Foster (his first ever Canadian Show! WOOT! ) . If you haven't seen them live yet, go see them. Totally awesome singer/songwriters!

Chapter 35 – My Little Wolf

Edward's POV

I held Bella tightly to my body as she once again drifted off to sleep. The last few hours had been the hardest I'd ever been through. It tore me apart to see her in so much pain. All I had wanted to do was take that pain away from her.

I looked down at her and tried to imagine her as a wolf. What was she going to look like? Did they all look similar to what they do in their human form? It was going to be very interesting to see what happens tomorrow.

As soon as Bella was back asleep, I called Alice to let her know that the process was complete. She had figured as much because as soon as it happened, Bella went off of her radar. She wasn't even getting the flashes like she had before when she was in Arizona.

I knew that Bella didn't want me near when she and Leah did the lessons in shifting but I wasn't going to be far away. The protective feelings I'd had from almost the beginning were becoming more and more pronounced. It had been a good thing that the pack had "allowed" me to be with Bella when I brought her out to La Push. If not, I would've had to just keep her at our house and deal with it ourselves. I couldn't have taken being away from her during at that time.

This imprinting was amazing. I was getting used to these flashes of pictures in my head that were coming from Bella. It didn't help my libido at the moment but it was really remarkable. For so many years I'd had others thoughts in my head but to have the visions that went through someone's mind blew me away.

I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about seeing her shift into her inner wolf. After all, the wolves were supposed to be our natural enemies. Was the imprinting going to overcome my natural instinct to avoid the shape-shifters? They were positive that our imprinting would over rule the natural instinct that she would have to kill a vampire. All I could think at this point was that it was going to be an extremely interesting day.

Bella slept for a few more hours. It was about 9am when she finally started to stir in my arms. Her body temperature was still higher than average but not as high as it had been yesterday.

Bella stretched and moaned, turning her head towards, her eyes filling with smouldering lust. Rolling her body towards me, she reached her hand behind my head and pulled me into a deep, passionate kiss. I groaned at the taste of her and felt myself get hard instantly. What this girl could do to me with one kiss was beyond words.

A knock at the door startled us, causing us to jump apart so suddenly that I almost fell off the bed. We laughed a little and I called at the person to enter. It was Leah that popped her head into the door.

"Are you ready to get started Bella?"

Bella groaned and looked over at Leah. "As ready as I'll ever be, I guess."

I laughed at her. "It'll be fine Bella. Go learn to embrace your inner wolf."

She rolled out of the bed and I reached over to give her ass a smack. She turned to me with a sexy smile and informed me that I shouldn't start things we didn't have time to finish. I just smirked at her.

I watched as she changed into the clothes that Alice had hurriedly thrown into a bag and left at the edge of the reservation for one of the pack to pick up, thinking I would rather be seeing her take her clothes off than put them on. Sighing, I got up from the bed and walked over to her. Taking her in my arms, I kissed her softly and leaned my forehead against hers, looking into her eyes.

She looked back at me with a very serious expression. "You are to stay in the house Edward! I don't want you outside with me. If anything were to happen to you, I don't think I could survive nor do I think I'd want to."

"Alright Bella. I promise to stay inside the house." I hugged her to me one more time and let her go to join Leah. I followed them out to the living room and said good morning to Billy and the rest of the pack that had come over for breakfast. Apparently either one of the parents or one of the imprinted wives would make the meals for the ravenous pack each day. I wouldn't want that food bill even with my bank account, I thought with a laugh.

I watched as the pack greeted Bella enthusiastically including the other Halfling Jared. His thoughts were now more wishful thinking than full on pornographic these days. He seemed to be saving those thoughts for someone else which I was grateful for. I don't think my host would appreciate my killing a guest in his house and I'm sure Bella wouldn't approve either.

The girls went out the kitchen door to the back yard and I could hear Leah's thoughts while she explained how the shifting worked for her. I could see Bella was doubtful whether she could actually do something so foreign to herself but she seemed willing to give it a shot. The males were talking among themselves, actually placing bets on how long they thought it would take her to take on her wolf form. Apparently Jacob was the only one that was able to do it on the fly so to speak. It was a talent that could certainly come in handy.

The kitchen area was getting a little crowded and the smell of dog was starting to become overpowering but I wasn't going leave the only vantage point I had to keep an eye on her. Jacob seemed to be studying Leah quite closely as he stood beside me at the kitchen window.

The pack didn't really talk to me which was fine. I was there for my love, not to make friends. Although I guess I should make the effort since Bella was one of them now. I was just grateful to Leah that her attitude towards me was friendly. Bella needed the support of a pack member to get comfortable with the changes in her life. I would always be there for her but there was going to be some things that I would have no idea about.

I watched as Leah took Bella by the hand and led her away from the house towards the woods near some picnic tables. She went about 100 yards and stopped turning to Bella with a smile. Leah spoke for a few minutes; I could hear in my mind her words.

"Alright Bella, you ready?"

I could see Bella nod.

"Okay. Simply put, in the beginning, all you have to do is to envision the wolf and become it. After a while, you won't have to think about it, you'll just shift. It's sort of like calling your inner wolf out. It's really hard to explain to someone that hasn't really grown up with our legends and beliefs. This is one of the reasons I wish that those descended from the Quileute wouldn't move away from the tribe and pretend that this can't happen to their children. It makes it so much harder on them."

I never even thought of how difficult this transition was going to be for Bella beyond the physical pain. She had to now psychologically change as well. Drawing out her "inner wolf" sounded easy enough but given how difficult she could make things, I was beginning to think that Leah had her work cut out for her. Bella could get very frustrated if she didn't get something right the first time.

Bella seemed to indicate that she understood the process and I could see her take a big breath. The boys in the room were laughing and joking around. One of the younger ones proposed a bet on how long it would take Bella to actually shift. The bets ranged from minutes to hours.

Bella seemed to be concentrating with an intensity I hadn't seen in anyone before. Not even Jasper when he was trying to not attack a human. She scrunched up her face and her body was tense. I could see it wasn't working.

I heard Leah's thoughts at that moment. "Do you want me to show you how I shift? Now keep in mind, I've been doing it for a few weeks now so I have an easier time of it."

Bella nodded and I watched as one moment Leah was standing there and the next her body seemed to explode and a wolf stood in her place. Now this was not an ordinary wolf, she was a wolf of massive size; more resembling a small furry horse than a canid.

I saw Bella's eyes grow huge at the sight of Leah's wolf form, and then a huge grin came upon her face. Leah shifted back and grabbed the robe that was sitting on the table near them and turned back to Bella again.

The pack and I watched for hours as Leah went through the process with Bella over and over again. There seemed to be more giggling than anything going on between the two girls during that time. Leah's thoughts were pretty amusing as she tried to get Bella to take what they were trying to do seriously.

The boys were actually getting a little impatient for the show to get going and the bet to be won. I was fine with Bella taking this new experience at her own pace. Jared started grumbling that it wasn't fair that she was already ready to shift. Apparently he was of closer descent than Bella and felt that his transformation should have been completed before hers. I guess he didn't have any vampires to hang around with and accelerate the process, I thought with a snicker. If only he knew.

It was getting close to dusk and I could see that Bella was getting more and more frustrated with herself and angry at the whole process. The boys had gotten bored and had dispersed around the reservation and to start their patrolling of the area.

I was just about to open the door to go out to her when all of a sudden, I felt a change. A shiver went down my spine and I walked back towards the window to look outside. There, in the place where my beautiful Bella had stood, was a very large gorgeous female wolf. Her undercoat was a cream colour while her overcoat was a deep mahogany. The colours in between her two coats ranged from gold to a deep brown. The guard hairs along her back were pitch black.

I heard Billy, Jacob and Jared all gasp behind me. They must have felt the change in Bella when it happened. Leah was bouncing up and down, reminding me a little of super-hyper Alice in a way. She kept repeating "You did it Bella!" over and over again.

The beautiful animal that was my beloved started bouncing up and down on all four paws and spinning around in a joyous dance. She was a sight to behold. In the blink of an eye, Bella changed back to human form still dancing with happiness as she grabbed the other robe on the table.

She turned towards the house suddenly, her face full of need. I was at the door and outside before she could start heading to me. I was next to her in the next moment, drawing her into my arms.

"Did you see Edward! I did it!"

"I saw, my love. You make a very beautiful wolf too."

She hid her face in my shoulder, blushing bright red. "Thank you."

I put my thumb under her chin to draw her face up to mine. After kissing her gently, I leaned away and smiled at her.

"Have you finished playing for today? Alice is getting very anxious to see you. She's been burning up my cell phone with messages for the past 3 hours."

She looked back at Leah who was slowly walking towards us before turning back to look at me. "Yeah. I think I've had enough for today."

Leah reached us nodding her head. "She's worked hard today Edward. You can take her home. Bella, do you want to do this again tomorrow?"

"I guess I should. Edward will be happy to bring me out here tomorrow after school. I'm sure he won't let anyone else do it." She said this with a smile at me.

"You're darn right you won't be coming out here with anyone else. Not as long as Victoria and James are out there planning who knows what."

We said good bye to Jake, Billy, Jared and Leah and left with the promise to be out here around 4ish the next afternoon and headed back to the Cullen's house. Bella appeared to be very happy to see Alice and the rest of the family.

Emmett of course grabbed her in a huge bearish hug. "Bella! How's our little wolf girl! Hey, you don't smell like the others do! No doggie smell! Hey Eddie, so when you and Bella here have babies, are they going to be a litter of puppies?"

Rosalie slapped him up the back of the head before I had the chance to reach him. I was surprised to hear Bella laugh out loud against his shoulder.

"That's a pretty interesting question there Em!" She said while still chortling. Turning to me, she quirked her brow, "So what do you think Edward, are you ready to raise a litter?"

I didn't have a chance to answer before Carlisle's voice came from behind me. "Bella, how are you feeling?"

She turned towards him with a huge smile. "I'm a little tired at the moment. It seems to take a lot out of a girl to bring out her inner wolf."

Carlisle laughed with the rest of them. I was happy to see Bella in such high spirits after the gruelling day she'd had with Leah. I knew she should be off her feet with exhaustion and I was sure she was putting up a good front for the family.

I put my arm around her waist and drew her to my side. I knew then that I was right when she eased her head down onto my shoulder and nuzzled my neck, her body shivering slightly.

"Carlisle, can Bella discuss this all later? I think I'll take her up for a rest before she falls down."

"I'm fine Edward."

"Love, you aren't fine. You're exhausted. I need you to take care of yourself while you learn how to do this shifting stuff. Please?"

"Okay, I guess you're right. I could use a bit of a rest. Carlisle, can we meet in your study later? I can answer all your questions then."

"Absolutely Bella! Have a good nap."

As we headed up the stairs to my room, I could hear thoughts Alice behind me. Edward, we have to talk soon. It's about James. I turned my head slightly and nodded indicating that I'd heard her but whatever she knew about James could wait until I spent some time with Bella.

I got Bella upstairs without any further interruptions and got her comfortable and in bed. She instinctually turned to wrap herself around me as I lay down beside her. I inhaled her unique scent and wished for once that I could sleep myself so I could share this time with her completely. As it was, I just laid there with my eyes closed, holding her in my arms and listening to the beat of her heart.

I'd waited a very long time for her and even after such a short amount of time, I knew that my existence would be futile if she wasn't in my life. Whatever happened now, Bella and my lifelines were irrevocably linked forever and I truly wouldn't have it any other way.

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2786 words.

Updated Dec 21, 2009