Chapter VII: Torrid

Torrid definition: very hot and usually dry air (weather) or full of difficulty, uncomfortable, and unpleasant tribulating times (i.e. To be in, or to get into a difficult situation).

A/N: Bet you thought I forgot all about including Victoria in on the fun, didn't you? Lol.

Bony, moonlit fingers curled as they settled on the sill to move the window into the open position. Using the dark night for her cover, Victoria keenly slipped her lithe body inside what she had previously surveyed as Bella's, aka her prey's, very own bedroom. She could smell the dogs everywhere but does her best to overlook it. She wasn't a maid nor a pet sitter; she was here to snatch and kill a girl and that was it. Good, wholesome, sweet revenge for her beloved James, who had fallen to the hand of a Cullen. Over her. OVER HER!

Disgusting mongrels, she thought disdainfully. There was no accounting for Bella Swan's taste in the company she kept. Hadn't anyone ever told that damn girl that when you lay with dogs, you wake up with fleas?

Victoria supposed not. But she wasn't here to give the girl that kind of lesson either; Victoria came to bring her revenge. For James, she wistfully thought.

After giving two of the mangy beasts the slip on the way here back by the border, no doubt due to her wonderful ability of escaping close situations, it had otherwise been insanely easy for her to sneak into the girl's bedroom when she was sure to be alone. Previous nights she had noted that the wolves always left her house and slept outside by 11pm and the time was now well after three a.m. The witching hour.

Victoria fights off an involuntary grimace when she notes a long-missed aroma, for herself at least, still lingering in the room. It smelled of sex. The sweaty, titillating, and cross-your-toes, animal duo, by the stench of it, sex. She guessed the girl finally did give up the 'goods' to one of the beasts. She wrinkled her nose and proceeds forward.

Well, at least the little vamp pet is now the dog's bitch and I will still kill her even after she just got laid, she thinks cruelly. She'll never feel her James between her thighs again and it's all the damn girl's fault! She was just an ordinary human girl. It should not have been so hard to kill her.

Her taut muscles tense in anticipation as she looms even closer to the bed. Her fangs were salivating at the thought of tearing the girl's head from her body. She didn't even want to drink from her. She would, of course, but again that wasn't the point of this venture. If she could hold herself at bay for long enough, she'd send little chunks of the girl's skin by mail to one of the Cullens once she located them.' Special delivery,' of course. Hell, she might even bring it to them personally. She wanted to see the look on that Edward's murderous, traitor's face when he realized that she, Victoria, had killed his love.

Whether former lover or not, he'd still feel the pain. You don't kill a vampires mate over a human. you just didn't.

Why were you taken from me, James? We had so much time left, she laments woefully for a second before her white, hit anger resumes. Why did those Cullens not think me capable? Even those horrible monsters the girl has protecting her don't think much of me. Why did they think they were all smarter than me? Then she began chuckling darkly in the still quiet room. She had proven everyone wrong in any case. She was still preening over having left the wolves howling like the mangy dogs they were on the border of Cullen land and their own. She hadn't known exactly where the border lines were but when she saw that the wolves hadn't pursued once she had leaped over a huge ravine, she had figured out pretty easily that they couldn't cross into the land to follow her.

Oh well, that was on them.

She didn't follow rules. She followed love. Or at least she had until that damn Cullen-pet had appealed to her James and he had gone after, no matter the cost to her. So now she couldn't follow love because that girl had taken it away from her. It wasn't fair. Victoria began to visualize, again, just how she kill the girl. She hoped that she'd have a little time to torture her first. Maybe she'd even grab the cop father too. Have a two-fer; after all, the damn girl had had both James and her friend, Laurent, killed.

Well, maybe not a friend, but he had at least been fun to have around.

"This is the how," she began to softly recite out loud in the room. She had practiced and envisioned of how this would go. To be so close to her goal, if she had a heart, it would've sped up five times faster than normal. "How did you get Edward Cullen to fall in love with you? How did you get the protection of an entire vampire clan to shelter you? How did you think that your silly, furry pets," Victoria spat furiously, "would be able to keep you safe? I don't fear them and I won't ever fear you. You are a weak, sad, and pitiful girl that has reached her end and I know this because I am your end. I am exactly the how of the how you will DIE!"

As her declaration finished and in anticipation of what was to come, Victoria excitedly grabbed the bed throw with enough force to shift the tiny bed. Her pale face shifts in amazement to see that it only contains a small pile of unwashed clothes. And something else.

A mocha skinned colored native was naked on the bed, his hands resting behind his neck. "Nice speech," he commented dryly.

He was an impressive, nude specimen, yes, but he was not what she had been expecting. She took a small step back. Was this a trick of her eyes? "What the--?"

"Guess I'm 'your how,' then," he declares menacingly, baring his teeth at her. "Surprise, bloodsucker."

Then he attacks, launching himself at her and into the air, pushing her undead body and his large one with such tremendous force that they both fall out of the bedroom window in a fit of angry snarls, broken glass, and loud grunts. Paul begins phasing in the midst of it. Victoria hears a soft pop and then a growl as the young, handsome face twists and consorts into a bright silver wolf's head with the bluest colored eyes that rivalled a sapphire. And then all she can see is his pearly whites again.

Intuitively she manages to grab him by his furry neck, but he manages to move at the last second and mauls her tunic top with his metallic grey paw. Victoria tries to shake him off, but then Paul clamps his massive jowls down on her actual arm. Son of a—

"Argh!" She screams at the same time he yowls with her arm still in his mouth. Paul pulls it, tearing it off in one successful, quick yank. Victoria felt the jerking motion more than the pain of losing the appendage as both her and the giant wolf land on the ground outside Bella Swan's bedroom window with a crunchy thump. It seemed like a longer fall.

Her body automatically rolls over trying to escape, but half of Paul's wolf body is on top of her and she can't move fast enough. She spits a very clear hiss at him and his gray head turns a fraction as he spits the detached arm aside to resume his assault on her.

"Now that's rude," she pouts. "Bad doggy," Victoria continued to taunt, attempting to maneuver out from underneath his girthy body. The action was interrupted once more as the hulking wolf took the opportunity to lunge at her again, however Victoria manages to lift her leg as his weight shifts just in time. She skillfully kicks him directly into his front leg and as the grey Lycan jumped back five feet while yelping out a whimper, she herself managed a triumphant grin.

When he swung back toward her, Victoria flipped herself over and heels him directly in his side as he approached her again. Shit, he's quick! she thinks with momentary alarm. She grasps at the earth with the one arm she has left but feels her other leg being tugged into the opposite direction of where she's trying to move to. Damnit, this pooch won't quit! Her lower half jerks in reaction and she kicks at the grey wolf again, this time hearing a snap and a low bark of pain. Though she didn't see where her hit had landed, she hoped that she broke something serious.

Victoria is able to leap up with not too much difficulty despite her slight lopsidedness, but she wasn't able to congratulate herself on a job well done when she hears another growl to her right. Then another to her far left. Neither noise sounded very far from her.

"Damn dogs come in multiple, diseased-pairs now? Must be rabies," she mutters out loud. "All this over that girl?"

Victoria abandons all other thoughts and takes off to her left anyway, leaving her dismembered arm behind. Those mutts can keep the damn arm, as long as I still get away. Maybe she had left her middle finger up for them to enjoy. To give the 'bird' post-mortem would be hilarious. Suddenly she hears a loud howl much too close to her for comfort and suddenly there's two wolves at her heels. They give chase, matching her inhuman stride for stride, neither losing nor gaining, for now. She found that the faster she went, the faster they too pursued. She couldn't shake them. Not this time.

She wasn't getting away.

The sudden terrible thought of possibly not getting out of this made her misstep and almost falter to the ground at the exact same time as a large onyx wolf sailed over her head, barely missing her. Victoria turned violently away from the beast just as her remaining arm meets and throats a chocolate wolf that had been half a second from taking her completely by surprise. A happy surprise.

These animals were everywhere! Gotta get away! There had never been this many on her before. She had always managed to best them because they had been always one or two at a time. Now it seemed as if they were under new management; there was definitely more than two on her now. Feeling a sudden rush of despair, she attempts to stop herself just as another wolf appears. She begins to turn but feels herself being wretched back by her top with a muffled, but snarling force. She bites down a reflex gag, even if she doesn't need to breathe, as the smell of wet fur invades her nose. Her back is on the earthy floor as she snarls and claws with one arm at the dark figure dragging her by the collar of her ruined tunic. Victoria's five fingers manage to grab a floppy ear as the wolf pulling her had its head bowed down and she makes a movement to rip. Eureka! It yelps and jumps back for half a second but it's enough. When the monster's jaws let go of her, she turns again to flee. The wolves take chase once more.

Victoria, in one last ditch attempt, is able to make it to the meadow, but to her annoyance there are two other wolves that have blocked her path. She feels instantly that she's made a grave error. In the past she specifically always tried to avoid flat and open spaces with these monsters roaming around. Oh no. Then her ruby red eyes spot a large log and she makes a move to grab it for a makeshift weapon when her sight is suddenly blocked by a giant russet wolf that is bolting directly toward her person. Her head dips low for a brief second before it is then completely removed from her body. Jacob, armed with pure adrenaline and the sheer will to take out the very thing that has been hunting his Bella, his love and friend, had arrived on the scene. And he had successfully ripped off her head cleanly and suddenly in the middle of a leap.

"Holy wow. Holy moly. And holy—," Embry's human head exclaims on a giant, wolf body.

"Shit, Jacob fuckin' Black," Quil finishes for his friend and packmate as he fully becomes human in the blink of an eye. "You fuckin' beheaded that leech! That shit was awesome!"

Embry phased completely out his wolf form, followed by Sam, Jared, and then Jacob himself. Paul was last.

Jacob is congratulated. "Seriously, man, that was some crazy shit you just did, man. I mean, really," Quil continued, "When I grow up, I want to be like Jacob Black."

"Damn, Ateara," Jared said after he whistled, "How does Black taste to you? Always wondered if you ever sucked a dick before, but now I know that you've definitely at least put it in your mouth," he finished crassly.

"Ugh," Embry grimaced. "You actually wondered about that?" he asked.

"The hell, man? You fuckin' taking over for Lahote now, Cameron?" Quil retorted back.

"Anyone can fuckin' see it!" Jared shouted.

"I'm offering my friend a congratulatory and well-deserved bit of thanks," Quil shot back. "No wonder you fuckers weren't catching that redhead without us. We bring this pack results!"

"Enough!" Sam shouted over them. Sometimes he forgot that they were stupid, emotional, and hormonal teen boys. Even with all they had accomplished tonight, he still had had to play Daddy. But Jacob did seem to take this particular win with some humility. So far. "It was a good day. The leech is gone and our packmate is to be celebrated for his achievement. He will be a great leader and a great Alpha, someday." Sam's last sentence was meant with a deafening quiet as the crickets in the meadow chirped on. When a few more painful seconds creeped by, five naked teen boys heard the sound of another's feet shuffling along in the grass due only to their enhanced, combined hearing.

Jacob, who had moved to the middle of the pack circle after he had phased, looked forward as his packmate, Paul, approached him with steady, but carefully placed slow steps. His eyes were definitely more of a shiny, goldish hue in the dark span of the meadow. If any of the wolf pack had spotted only Paul's eyes, they would have mistaken him for a vegetarian vampire, they were so golden.

Paul is somber but finds himself stretching his uninjured arm out to the other teen to give him a handshake. "Congrats, bro," he addresses him in a low voice, but the entire pack heard it as if it had been yelled across a 20-foot canyon with a megaphone.

Sam, Jared, Embry and Quil don't move a muscle. In fact, Sam has an alpha order ready on the tip of his tongue in case either two stepped out of line. Quil instinctively reached for Embry. "Ooohhh," one of them cried.

Paul, to his credit, didn't react or even acknowledge the other pack members, but kept his gaze trained on Black. His silver wolf was toeing the line between gratefulness and all out submitting to the technical Alpha male of his pack. He didn't want to admit that he too had been surprised and a little proud of Jacob's rip-n-jump maneuver, but he had never been the type to just accept authority that wasn't himself. "I said," he repeated, "congrats," when Jacob still had yet to respond.

The pack is still waiting on pins and needles.

Jacob remained skeptical. "Huh?"

Paul shrugged, good hand still out. "You just killed the leech. Offering you my congrats."

Black's forehead creases in confusion. "That's it? Your thanks? You aint gonna bitch about how she should've been yours even though clearly the better wolf won?" he said snarkily. He couldn't help it; Sam had always told them all that Paul was the best fighter. Now the pack had at least two warrior wolves. He had never known Paul to just say…what had he said, again? Offering his congrats? To him? "What's the catch, Lahote?"

"No catch, little warrior," Paul says a little jokingly, still determined to keep his wolf and himself from exploding in anger. "You got the bloodsucker, man. Way to go." I gave first chase, but still. He kept that last added bit to himself.

Jacob's eyes dart down at Paul's extended hand and then he takes a deep sniff. It smells like Paul. And something else. It's familiar, Jacob thinks, but he's not exactly sure. Then he remembers. "You smell like Bella," he accuses. He'd have to talk to Bella about that. Was Paul using her shower gel or something? It was weird. Paul was just supposed to watch her and make sure that vampires didn't get into the house. That was it. Why the hell was he taking showers and using her stuff at her place? Wait a minute, he thought with a stop. Lahote didn't have to watch Bella anymore. Bella was free. Free! She was free to live a long, happy life with him, Jacob Black. Eh, so what if Paul used Bella's shower stuff. Hell, Jacob was Bella's savior. Only he had been able to form an attack plan quickly enough to kill the vampire stalking his beloved Bella. She was safe and that was all that mattered.

Jacob finally takes the outstretched hand, but doesn't say anything at first. He had never felt the palm of Paul's hand against his before. He guessed there was a first time for anything. Maybe he was finally getting a little respect. Sure, it was a pack he hadn't wanted to be a part of and then became a pack he didn't want to lead, but now that was all changed; Jacob Black could be the leader that they needed him to be. With Paul finally coming around to seeing him as the leader he was supposed to be, Jacob could turn things around for La Push. No more Cold Ones would be coming back to Forks. Bella, the rez, and his family could live here in peace. Yes, Bella—BELLA!

Somehow his thoughts always came back round to her. And Bella's smell was still lingering. That wasn't a soapy smell, at all. It was…Jacob's brows resumed to their narrow, calculating expression as he peered at his packmate, his hand still shaking his.

He instinctively gave a little growl at his packmate. He smells it. Jacob can smell it. But it's not possible. He had to go see Bells for himself. Bells? His Bells? Could she even still be his anymore? He's more hurt than betrayed. He doesn't want to give in to the pain. Not yet. Not until he knows. His full view of Paul is obstructed suddenly by Quil and Embry, who have again approached him with congratulations and adoration in their eyes and actions, but he can still feel his hand. Fuck! Right now, all he wanted to do was get to Bella. He so wanted to tell her that she was safe. That she could remain whole. That he had been the one to make it happen. And see if she would deny what...what he knows his nose is telling him. Goddamn, fuckin Paul Lahote.

During this Paul caught the rapidly forming, new question on the new Alpha's face and he quickly withdrew his hand out of Jacob's grip, taking half a step back at the exact same time as Embry and Quil rush up in front of him. Paul gives the two welcoming distractions a wider berth and quickly strolls over to Jared's small fire that he had begun so as to burn the evidence of the vampire. Paul passes him and throws the detached leech's arm without stopping. Besides Sam, Paul was able to tolerate Jared the most, but not tonight.

"Leaving?" Jared asks.

"Looks like it, right?" Paul says back, but he was more despondent than angry. He just wanted to get outta here. He walks on without another word to Jared, stiffly holding his other arm.

"Hell is wrong with him?" Embry voiced after watching Paul practically run past Jared and the leech's remnant bonfire. "Thought he'd be pissed at Jake for stealing his thunder."

"Yeah," Quil echoed. "Or at least happy that he doesn't have guard duty anymore. He always hated it." His eyes narrowed at Paul's shrinking backside, his suspicions from earlier in the evening returning to him in a flash. He glanced nervously at Jacob, his friend and new Alpha, on how to properly react. The wolf in him was slightly more patient but the teenage boy in him was what couldn't keep quiet. "You notice anything about Lahote yet? Man, I told you."

"Told him what, Q?" Embry prompted. Had he missed something? Then he too smelled something faint in the air. "Huh? Fuck man, when the hell had Paul found the time to get laid? And he was still here fighting? Man, the fuckin energy he's got." A small amount of awe laced in voice.

Jacob didn't know if his two friends were being intentionally daft or if his nose, as an alpha, was just better than theirs but he wasn't interested in giving them a lesson or stating the relatively simple, logical truth. Besides, he could be wrong. Just because Paul reeked of recent sex didn't mean that...no, it couldn't mean that. He'd get to the bottom of it. He'd sort it out with Bells. He forced a smile for his two friends. Suck it up, leader, he thought. "Don't care if he participated in a fuckin' orgy tonight. He was here fighting and Bella is safe. No arguments about that," he said, trying to will away the bad thoughts he was thinking currently. Don't be true. Don't be true. Please don't be true.

"Just saying," Quil continued. "Dude always hated guard duty until a shift or two ago. Don't know what changed in him, but man, and now he's all quiet n shit, getting ass, running after a vamp—dude should be a personal trainer or something for the pack. Fuck, I don't know."

"Nah," Embry said. "You gotta be good with people to be a personal trainer and that definitely ain't Lahote. He hates Bella. Ugh. Just saying that sentence makes me sad. Hate Bella? The sentence just doesn't flow. Don't know how you could hate Bella anyway," he continued. "That guy is just weird. All the empty-headed bimbos he screws make him blind to what a good girl Bella is."

"And she cooks!" Quil said excitedly.

"And she cooks," he agreed, sighing dreamily. Yum...

Jacob shakes his head, trying to get his friends focused again. "You guys serious? Who cares what Paul Lahote is feeling or who or what the fuck he's diseasing up with his dick?! We got the damn leech!"

"Yeah, but," Quil begins, "the point of all this is that Paul should be skipping and hopping about not being on Bella duty anymore. He ain't. He threw in the vampire's arm, barely said boo to Jared, and walked off. Told you he was acting weird earlier. When have you known him not to talk shit when any of us got something done that he didn't get to do? And it wasn't just today: dude has been quiet for a long minute now. When was the last time before tonight that he was phased during any of our shifts? And even then, when has anyone ever asked him a question and he actually answered it? Without a snide remark? Without a bullshit retort?"

"He was talking about your mom earlier," Jacob reminded him. "You don't think that was bullshit?"

Quil shook his head. "But that was after I engaged him. Paul Lahote is always talking shit. Sometimes he doesn't even have to be thinking of you to start talking shit about you," he argues. "I'm just saying, I think being around Bella made him almost a mute."

Jacob looks thoughtful. "Yeah, well, I'm glad he won't be around my Bella anymore," he says possessively. "Don't want him hanging around Bells more than he has to at this point. You know he's yelled at her? Her. She's like the most awesome human being and he just yells in her face."

"It's Paul. He yells at everyone."

"Well, not my Bells," he declares again. "Not anymore. I gotta go. Gotta tell Bells the news and...just gotta tell her we did right tonight. By her, our Rez... everything. We did it."

Quil and Embry both nod at him. That gave him a little more strength and a glowing warmth in his belly. It felt nice to have their approval and comradery, especially now. Cause they may be sad tomorrow once they heard the news of Paul's demise. Nah, not gonna happen, cause it didn't happen. Not between them. No way.

"I'm gonna tell her," Jacob heard himself repeating. "Gonna go tell her that she's safe now and that I was the one who made it happen."

Both Quil and Embry unsuccessfully hide their smirk. "Uh, doesn't, uh the pack get an honorable mention in all of this?" they teased.

Jacob laughs good-naturedly, something he's failed to do in the past few weeks due to all the patrols for the redhead. "Sure, sure," he can't help but reply. It'll be ok. It'll all be ok. Bella will set him straight and then he'd go home feeling great. Just great, great, great.

His packmates know nothing of their new alpha's inner turmoil. All the pack knows is that they'll be lucky if Jacob Black mentions them at all. They watch him, still adoringly and still grinning, as their new alpha leaves the meadow clearing to tell Bella Swan the good news.

Sam purposefully kicks a rock ahead of Paul's racing human form. Paul ignores it. His arm was already starting to heal, but Paul could feel it wasn't quite right. He probably should have had one of the pack mates look at it; they had all sustained an injury or two on prior patrols and sometimes five additional pairs of eyes were better than just one, but Paul had needed to get out of there. The look on baby Alpha's face was getting the better of his nerves. His wolf had been almost ready to challenge Black, but Paul, the man, knew that that would have been stupid. Besides, he didn't want to run Jacob's pack anyway. Sam hadn't wanted to keep it, that was obvious, but Paul just plain didn't want it. He and his wolf wanted something else. Something very unexpected.

He hears a second rock go ahead of him. Fuckin' Alpha, man, Paul fumed. Sam Uley wasn't going to stop until he had at least heard him out. Let's get this shit over with. He stops short with a sigh and listens as his now seemingly former Alpha approachs him, leading with plenty of nonthreatening noise.

Sam is finally by his side. "Paul," he addressed him cautiously, "are you yourself?"

Paul laughs bitterly. "I'm always myself. Hasn't that always been my problem?" he mocks.

Sam notes the way he's standing, his arm hurt. "Need that looked at," he states, no question.

Figured that much out. "I'll stop by the Clearwater's," he instead responds back.

Was that it? No anger, or threat, or "I'm tough, Alpha," bullshit he was often met with when addressing Paul? Sam took another hard look at his packmate. Paul looked calm and almost serene. Even with his arm disabled, Sam could see that Paul was standing straight and wasn't shaking with the adrenaline of the pack's recent bout with the leech. The anxious, almost ever-present, fight-or-flight baser response of the wolf seemed to have already left him. He knew Jacob Black was still riding the high of finally killing the bloodsucker, but Paul, who had always loved to fight was already quiet and accepting. He was already back to almost normal. That was definitely a leadership quality. Able to take change, react, and let go. Maybe he had been wrong about Paul Lahote. Maybe this pack, if it indeed grew any larger, would be able to stand having three leaders within it.

He had never heard of such a thing before in all the old texts he had read, but there was always a first for everything. He watched as Paul's seemingly gleamful eyes narrow down at him.

Sam exhaled and then drew in a deep breath. That's when he smelled it.

It. It was a very recently mated female scent. With all the commotion, Sam hadn't thought much about it but now he could definitely smell it on his packmate. Sam briefly entertained that Paul had somehow been able to watch over Bella, sneak another girl in and out of her house, and still been able to give chase to the redhead when she happened by all in the same night, but deep down he knew that that scenario was unlikely.

For one thing, it had too many moving parts and he knew Paul hated complications. If Paul could eat, sleep, and fuck all in one place, he would do it to save his precious wolf energy. Paul was efficient that way. Efficiency was another great leadership quality, he noted absently. And for another, he knew Bella wouldn't agree to having her house serve as Paul's hunt-n-fuck grounds so that really only left one possible option. Bella was the recently mated female scent.

Damn these horny fuckin' teens, he thought. Hope Paul's funeral and Jacob's arrest for his murder are on two separate days cause that's two families I'll have to console. Well, he continued sourly, at least the pack was able to be happy for twenty minutes. Just this once though, Sam had really been hoping that Paul could've just kept his cock in his pants. "Paul, tell me you didn't—"

"Tell Black that was really impressive what he did today," Paul interrupted, looking at him hard in the face. "You should definitely tell that story to his old man so that he can recite it to the rest of the rez. They deserve to know, even if they think it's just a tale, ya know?"

Sam's eyes widened a fraction with the other question. The question that he was now thinking about not asking out loud. When Paul's rigid gaze flicked away from him, that then gave him the answer.

Shit. However, this time was different. This time he wasn't met with Paul's usual bravado speech or nasty innuendos he often had after fucking someone new (or old). This Paul was quiet and reserved. He had indeed changed.

They stood silent for some more seconds before Sam finally came to decision. He began by saying, "Make sure you get a flexible cast for that arm if it's broken. If your bone reforms funny cause the set cast is too hard, your wolf will limp for a good long while until we rebreak the bone to heal it correctly." And then he shut up.

A brief look of relief passed through the other teen's face. "You got it, Alpha," Paul replied back and then turned away to begin his human trek back to the rez where Harry Clearwater and Sue, his wife and nurse, also resided.

Sam shook his head at the back of the now maturing teen. Well, I'll be, he mused. Sam was no longer the only levelheaded one anymore.

Not by a long shot.

A/N: Last chapter, coming right(ish) up! Thank you for all the read stats, PM's, favorites, and reviews. Hope you continue to enjoy.