*CPOV*

It was early spring, and Sue, me, and the kids were spending the day at La Push. Sue was all keyed up about it being "Bark Peeling Day."

It was some ancient Quileute tradition where, on this one certain day, the cedar sap would be just right for peeling the bark from the trees, later to be used for weaving.

The whole tribe would head out to the cedar forest in the back of the valley and break up into two groups. Sam's group, the youngest and strongest, so Jake and his rowdy crew, which of course included Seth and Leah, would hike into the forest and harvest the bark from the trees.

The other group, the women, children, and elders stayed behind with the vehicles. It was their job to separate the outer bark from the cambium layer on the inside when the boys (and Leah) returned with the long strips of bark.

The cambium was then dried out, soaked, and finally cut into strips, ready for weaving clothes, baskets, and other traditional items.

Sue told me all about it on the car ride over here. And then when we got there, Billy was doing his Quileute elder thing, sharing the tradition with the kids in even greater detail, so I was now an expert on the ancient custom of Quileute bark peeling.

I snorted to myself. And here Renee always thought there was no culture on the Olympic Peninsula. Not that she cared to look for it.

When he was done sharing the history, Billy wheeled over to where I was sitting on the tailgate of Sue's SUV. She had gone off to chat with some of the other ladies.

"You look happy, Charlie. So does Sue. It's a beautiful thing to see! I'm happy for you, old friend." Unable to reach my arm from his lower position, he affectionately whacked me on the leg with the back of his hand and smiled widely with a flash of bright, white teeth.

"Thanks, Billy. I'm a lucky man. I know it," I nodded as my gaze flickered over to where Sue was laughing with her friends. "I'm glad you're not bent out of shape that Sue and I broke tradition and eloped. She was worried about that. It's just the whole thing with Leah..." I frowned.

"Sue didn't want Leah to have to choose between participating in a big tribal ceremony that would only make her miss Harry more...or feeling guilty for the rest of her life about missing her mother's wedding. So we took the choice out of her hands," I explained, nervously knotting my hands together.

"It would be one thing if we thought you were trying to distance Sue from her tribe," Billy spoke in the plural form, as he often did, on behalf of the Quileute. "But we know you were just trying to make things easier for the girl. We understand, and we welcome you.

"And now here you are," Billy boomed with pride, holding his arms out wide, gesturing to the woods around us. "On bark peeling day! You've always been my family, but now it's official. Welcome to the Quileute Nation, my brother," he clapped me on the leg again.

I ducked my head, feeling my cheeks burn. "Thanks, man," I muttered, wishing I had a bottle of beer to hide behind.

"So how'd Bella take the news?" the old gossip asked.

"Uhh, well," I stuttered, rubbing the back of my neck. "I haven't exactly gotten the chance to tell her yet. She emails a lot, but it always feels like we're playing phone tag.

"I'll leave her a message and then she'll call when I'm at work or on the lake...I didn't want to tell her in an email or a voicemail," I explained. "You know how it is with the kids being busy with college and life…"

Of course, Billy knew. He had two grown daughters that only ever spoke to him on his birthday and holidays. So when Bella's calls started dropping off, while I missed her terribly, it wasn't all that surprising.

She was an adult, a newlywed adult. In an Ivy League school on the other side of the country. A fact that I boasted about to just about anybody that would listen. So it made perfect sense that I didn't hear from her much.

When I did hear from her, she always sounded happy. Different, somehow, but happy.

And while I didn't like the creep and probably never would, at least with Edward attached to her hip, her ring finger, and I didn't want to think about what else... I didn't have to worry about Bella getting into the usual sorts of trouble that college kids often did with their newfound freedom.

I wasn't even all that worried about drugs or alcohol. I knew my kid, and I knew I didn't have to worry about that. Despite all of my and Renee's many fuckups in the parenting department, she turned out to be a genuinely great kid.

But she was just so small. And too nice. And, lord, was she ever clumsy. But worst of all, she was beautiful, like her mother. So I knew there'd be boys sniffing around.

Marijuana-peddling, date-rape-drug-using, condom-spurning boys just waiting to use her up and throw her away. I saw it happen on the job too many times, and those were only the girls who bothered to report their assaults.

So as much as I disliked my son-in-law, I knew, at least for this old man's worrying heart, Edweird was a safer alternative than sending her off to college alone.

"When you do tell her, I'm sure she'll be thrilled to hear her old man runs with the wolves now," Billy cackled like an old woman. He was always talking about wolves, some kind of Quileute symbolism, I guessed.

It didn't seem all that strange to me. The guys down at the lodge called each other "dog," so what was the difference? It was even kind of fitting...dogs being the domesticated version of wolves and whatnot.

Just then our attention was turned toward the trees by a bunch of loud howling and carrying on.

"Ah, the boys are back. And successful by the sounds of it." Billy grinned.

I shuddered. I'll tell you, it was impressive how realistic it sounded when they did that. They sounded like honest-to-god wolves.

Billy started to wheel his chair toward where the other Quileutes were milling around in smaller groups in preparation for the tree bark stripping.

I jumped off the tailgate of the SUV and slammed it shut. "I'll come and find you and Sue in a minute. Nature calls" I nodded towards the trees where I was going to take a w

"Leaves of three, let it be!" he snickered as he rolled away.

I rolled my eyes and walked in the other direction, wandering into the trees. The tribe's excited chatter was loud enough that I didn't worry about losing my way.

When I was out of sight, I turned toward a suitable-looking tree and unzipped, marking it with the little thrill that came with relieving oneself in the outdoors. As I emptied my bladder, I heard a low exchange of voices as heavy feet stomped through the bracken that covered the forest floor.

"You think the leech has sucked the life out of her yet?" It sounded like Paul.

"I think Bella is none of our concern anymore," the other older voice, Sam, curtly replied. My daughter's name out of his mouth made me stand a little straighter with my ears perked up.

"How can you say that?! They broke the treaty! We should be hunting them down and ripping their throats out!" Paul argued.

My eyes widened, confused by his words and alarmed by the threat of violence, but what Sam said next sent a chill through me and made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

"She made her choice, and as much as it hurts to lose Bella to that bloodsucking scum, at least it means the Cullens will never come back here. I'd say it was a worthwhile trade," Sam replied hotly.

What in the hell was that supposed to mean, 'The Cullens will never come back here?' I quickly pulled up my zipper and turned toward the direction of the voices. I was damn well going to find out!

*BPOV*

"It's the most wonderful tiiiiime of the yeeeear" Emmett began the old Andy Williams holiday standard in his booming baritone voice.

"With the tasty bears waking,

Hungry and irritated

Don't you worry, ole' Emmett is heeeeeeeere.

It's the most wonderful time of the year."

I couldn't help but smile at his contagious enthusiasm. He was like a kid on Christmas. Or Charlie on the Mariners' opening day.

Emmett came across a tree trunk with the bark freshly stripped off the trunk. He put his nose right up to the tree and took a long whiff.

"Ahhhhhh!" Em exhaled loudly like Charlie would after his first sip of frosty beer after working a double. "I almost forgot how much better they smell than stinkin' ungulates. Get your nose in there, kid. This one is really something special," Emmett said, taking another sniff.

I could smell the gamey scent just fine from where I was standing, but I knew Emmett wouldn't take no for an answer. And, after all, Emmett was leading this bear hunting excursion, a fact that he reminded us of often.

I decided to humor him and sniff the damn tree while Edward chortled into his closed fist from a few paces behind me.

It was easy enough to follow the bear's pungent scent from one mauled tree trunk to the next. When we found the full-grown male, his snout was shoved up inside a hollow log, licking the termites crawling around on the inside.

"Come to papa!" Emmett bellowed with his arms outstretched wide. Emmett's greeting startled the bear out of his log, knocking his head on the interior in his haste to see the source of the threatening voice.

The irritated beast reared up on his hind legs, standing easily eight feet tall, head and shoulders above Emmett's gargantuan form.

The agitated animal looked positively bewildered by Emmett who stepped forward, too fast for the bear to keep track of and wrapped his thick, sinewy arms around the bear's middle like he was embracing a beloved relative at the airport, even lifting the bear off the ground in the same way my feet would dangle whenever Emmett hugged me.

This, of course, enraged the bear who roared in protest at Emmett's unshakeable arms, batting at his face with razor-sharp four-inch claws but finding no purchase.

In another lightning-fast maneuver, Emmett then adjusted his hold so that one hand wrapped over the bear's shoulder, and the other reached between his legs, gripping him around the thigh. He then picked the bear up and body-slammed him flat on his back as if he were Hulk Hogan in Wrestlemania.

The animal was stunned for a moment but quickly returned to his feet, infuriated. Growling and frothing at the mouth, he took another run at Emmett who goaded him on.

"I know you can do better than that," Emmett crooned at the lumbering animal. "It's been a long winter, and you're a little scrawny right now, so I'm gonna give you another chance," Emmett tutted like a coach disappointed when his star player wasn't giving it his all.

After wrestling with the bear for another few minutes, Emmett grew bored and sunk his teeth into the whimpering bear, pulling long draws of blood from the animal for much longer than it would have taken me to drain a wolf or an elk.

I wondered if I could even finish a bear that size. It didn't seem possible that I could fit such a large volume of animal blood inside my body. But I was eager to try.

After Emmett's demonstration, we went hunting for my own bear. Steering clear of bear trails that had more than one heartbeat attached to them (indicating a mother bear with her cubs) I finally found an older female who had no cubs.

She may have been older, and quite a bit smaller than Emmett's bear, but she had no intention of dying that day. The mature bear fought valiantly as I tackled her to the ground with bared teeth while Edward and Emmett watched close by.

"Submitted by a guillotine hold! And that's all she wrote, folks, and that's all she wrote!…I tell ya, Edward, the new kid's got real promise," Emmett commentated into his meaty fist, pretending it was a microphone. He then held his microphone fist in front of Edward so he would join in on the commentary.

"And you called her tame," Edward said, sounding a tad smug.

Though I was keenly aware of my audience, my focus was on the gulps of hot, delicious blood wetting my scorched throat like a soothing balm. I moaned at the taste.

"Right?!" Emmett spiritedly agreed from somewhere off in the distance.

She tasted even better than the wolf, and there was so much more of her to enjoy. I could easily see why my family got so excited by the prospect of big game.

As the bear's blood ran dry, I rolled off of it, feeling sloshy and very full. Like I'd gone back for the stuffing too many times at Thanksgiving dinner.

As was his habit, Edward wordlessly carried off the carcass to be buried somewhere nearby. I smiled at him gratefully. He really was such a gentleman.

*CPOV*

After I marched up to Paul and Sam, startling them in the woods with my demands for an explanation, they looked at me horrified and said it would be best if it came from Billy.

So when I marched up to Billy, he just looked sad and resigned and said it was a conversation best had somewhere more private, so we came back here.

So there I sat on Billy's couch with my Sue at my side, holding my hand, trying to keep my head from exploding off my shoulders in frustration. Did she know something about this? What did they know about my daughter that they weren't telling me?

"What the hell is going on Billy?" I demanded. Billy and Sue exchanged a look, and then I knew for sure she was in on whatever this was. My nostrils flared, infuriated.

"Charlie, you have to understand that as the leader of our tribe, there are some things I could not share with you because you were an outsider.

"Sue couldn't tell you either. And if you hadn't married her, I still wouldn't be able to tell you. But, technically, you're one of us now, which complicates things…" he exchanged another worried glance with my wife.

"Billy!" I reproached. "Spit it out."

My oldest friend heaved a weary sigh. His russet-skinned face seemed to have aged ten years or more just in the few minutes we'd been sitting here.

And then he launched into the most laughable, ludicrous tale I'd ever heard about warring vampires and werewolves and peace treaties and boundary lines. He even had the gall to include my daughter in his lies by asserting that, wait for it, Bella had married a vampire! And I had been the one to give her way. I laughed maniacally at the thought of it.

Billy told the tall tale with a completely straight face, an Oscar-worthy performance if I ever saw one. That's how I knew my friend had completely lost his freaking mind.

But the worst part was that my wife was making that same face. Like she believed the horror story Billy was swearing up and down was the truth.

I just gaped at them both, feeling like someone had given me crazy pills. Or maybe this was a weird dream I wasn't waking up from. I needed to stop watching Twilight Zone reruns before bed. I just shook my head at them, speechless.

"I can see that you don't believe me. And I don't blame you. It's...it's unbelievable. But maybe you'll believe with your eyes what you can't believe with your ears," Billy said quietly. "Let's go outside. I need to show you something."

"Billy…" Sue cautioned, but Billy was set on his course.

Well, this ought to be good, I thought sarcastically. I got up and headed for the door. I was about to leave anyway.

I had to find Jake and tell him that he needed to seek psychiatric help for his old man. His screws were starting to come loose. As were Sue's apparently. I knew it was too good to be true, I thought despondently.

I didn't have to look far to find him. Jake, Seth, and Leah were staying out of the rain in the carport where Jake worked on his rusty little VW Rabbit.

"Jacob, he knows. It's time," Billy nodded to his son. Jake gave me a pained look then nodded back to his father. What the hell was happening? Did they all believe this madness?

Then the damnedest thing happened. Jacob and Seth started taking their clothes off. And Leah got up and walked behind Jake's car.

"What the...why are you.." I spluttered, Feeling my face turn bright red. "What the hell is going on?" I finally managed in a half-yell.

And then I shouted and fell back on my ass in shock and horror as three kids I'd known all their lives turned into giant fucking wolves right before my eyes.

Sitting in the mud and rain, too stunned to move, I felt like I was outside of my body watching my wife and my best friend hurry to my side, trying to calm me as I hyperventilated with panic.

It was true. At least the part about the werewolves. Or I had also drunk the Quileute kool-aid. But if they were telling the truth about the wolves, the rest of it seemed a lot more plausible.

If what they were saying was somehow...impossibly...inexplicably true, then Bella, my daughter, my flesh and blood, and until recently, my whole world was a VAMPIRE?

The medium-sized wolf (but still the size of a pony), the one with sandy-colored fur and oversized paws dropped down to a sitting position and inched toward me, like a labrador wanting to play.

When I was nose to nose with him, I could feel his hot breath on my face. His rough pink tongue lolled out of his mouth and he licked up one side of my face from jaw to hairline. Then he barked out a sound like laughter.

"Seth?" I gasped, desperately trying to put the pieces of my fragmented reality back into a picture that made sense to me.

Werewolves didn't make sense. Vampires didn't make sense. None of this made any sense.

The sandy wolf nodded his head up and down, and then he grazed his forehead affectionately against my shoulder as he walked past me and stood beside Sue.

"I wanted to tell you…" Sue cried with tears welling up in her eyes. "The only reason I didn't was that I couldn't risk breaking the treaty. Couldn't risk a war on my family. And knowing their secret would have put you in danger from their kind, too. That's why Bella didn't tell you herself. Please," she pleaded in a wobbly voice, "tell me you understand!"

"I understand," I said slowly. " I understand you knowingly let me marry off my daughter to a….to a...vampire," I whispered the word, feeling like a crazy person just saying it out loud, "to protect your family at the cost of mine!" I said in an icy voice, shaking free of her arms. "Let go of me. I need to get out of here. I need to talk to my daughter."

"Charlie, wait! Charlie, I'm sorry!" Sue sobbed as I stomped over to my police cruiser and slammed the door shut. Kicking up mud and gravel as my tires spun, I finally got traction and sped out of there like a bat out of hell.

Once I was on the main road out of La Push, I fished my emergency cellular out of the glove box. I punched in Bella's number with shaking fingers.

As usual, I waited for the beep. "Isabella Marie Swan, this is your father," I gritted through my teeth, not giving a single shit if she took her monster of a husband's last name. She was mine first.

"Call me back as SOON as you get this," I demanded, then paused taking a few deep breaths to get myself back under control. I spoke slowly and clearly into the phone.

"I. Know. What. You. Are." Then I snapped the small silver flip phone shut and tried to figure out what the hell I was supposed to do now.

*A/N* A special Father's Day chapter to our favorite Vitamin-R drinking, shotgun-cleaning, mustached daddio. Ask for drama and cliffhangers and ye shall receive! Bwahahaha.

Dying to know what y'all thought of this one. And I really enjoyed reading your feedback after the last chapter, so thank you to those of you who took the time to drop me a line. Your suggestions really do help drive the storyline, so if you want to see something happen, tell me! You never know, I just might write it in!

Til next time, lovelies!