Every time the rain falls, think of me
On a lonely highway
How can we
Turn around the heartache
Baby wait a lifetime before
You love somebody new
Drive me to the dead end, till I
Promise not to run
This time
I can't keep running away cause
I'm never gonna love again.

Lykki Li - "Never Gonna Love Again"

Chapter 42: Runaway

Brady

Ever since she'd woken up, I'd been fighting the urge to run.

The imprint bond we'd shared was broken, or at least severed past the point of healing, of that I was positive.

After watching my imprint take down half a herd of elk and drain them dry, I bolted. My sweet, innocent, funny girl was gone. I'd needed the proof – I guess that was why I'd been hanging around the Cullen crypt for as long as I had. Some stupid part me hoped she would wake up like Bella had – a little wild, but otherwise herself. What that would prove, I'm not sure. She was still a vampire. I guess I wanted my proof that my Lexi was indeed really awake and that she was in fact, a vampire.

I had to fight to keep from being sick every time I thought of her now. That vision was burned into my mind; Lexi, standing in the middle of the frozen forest, her skin pale and her eyes blood red in a newborn rage, elks blood dripping down her throat and soaking her clothes.

Unable to take it anymore, I took off in wolf form and quickly lost track of the days.

The only thing I remembered was my vow to track down the murderous parasite that had done this to her and rip him to pieces. Even with Lexi pretty much gone, the need for revenge still burned in my veins. I knew I wouldn't rest until he was nothing more than a stinking pile of ash on the forest floor.

Things got… dark after that.

When Jake took off after Bella chose Edward over him, he'd fled to Canada in wolf form and hadn't phased back for days after that. At the time, I remember being still in my teens and even then thinking he was being a complete pussy about the whole thing. She wasn't his imprint, she was some schoolgirl crush he'd had, and they'd never done more than have one awkward kiss. I didn't get why he was making such a huge deal out of everything by acting like that.

What good would racing off into the wilderness do? To me, that had been cowering. That had been showing fear and acknowledging rejection of the worst kind – he'd lost his girl to a blood sucking parasite. He'd been beaten, and running off like that was like running off with his tail between his legs and admitting defeat – literally. I could vaguely remember him refusing to phase back into human form to deal with his problems. He'd stayed phased, barely communicating and purposefully keeping his answers ambiguous and his thoughts blocked, which was no easy feat. The pack had panicked at first, but once we realized that was just his way of handling it, we'd backed off and let him be.

Thankfully, the pack seemed to have the same mindset still today. I hadn't phased back in days – maybe weeks - and I didn't know if I ever want to again. At least in wolf form life felt a bit dreamlike. Letting the animal take over was so much easier it was practically painless. Or numbness. I couldn't really tell. The wolf pushed the man aside and lived minute to minute. I guess I had that in common with the wolf part of me – getting through life one minute at a time was about as much as I could handle right now anyway.

My wolf form ran up the coast into Canada, quickly taking a liking to the desolate beaches and abandoned woods. I could hunt and eat raw, sleep under pines, and run until my legs ached. Like I said, it was easy to let the human part of you go and just let the wolf take over, almost like putting a plane on autopilot. It still needed me to be there, but it basically did its thing and let me simply exist in a cloudy void of avoidance. The first time I 'came to' in days, I realized Seth was in wolf form, trying to get my attention. I'd been so focused on running with my nose to the ground, searching for the murderous vampire's scent that'd I barely heard him.

Brady¸ he called. Where are you?

Hunting, I replied. Canada, maybe.

You need to come home, he pleaded.

No, was my short reply.

I felt that weird tingle as Seth tried to read my mind through the pack's connection. It didn't hurt, but it felt weird to have someone try to telepathically wriggle their way into your thoughts. I fought him, the coldness of the wolf taking over and standing his ground. He could probably guess what I'd been up to, but that didn't mean I wanted to tell him all about it.

Brady, Emmett has been looking for you, he pleaded. He needs to talk to you. It's about Lexi.

I froze, my paws digging into the ground as I slid to a halt. What about her? I asked, my curiosity piqued. I dove into his mind, searching through the recent thoughts and memories he'd had. I came across a blurry picture of Emmett, standing at the edge of the Cullen lawn, talking straight at me, or Seth, really.

"Where is he? I need to find him," Emmett pleaded, his golden eyes wide and imploring. "Rose said to find him. Do you think you can track him down?"

"I can try, but he really doesn't want to be found right now. He… he ran off. We haven't seen or heard from him in days, Emmett."

Emmett sighed. "He's hunting the one that did this to her, isn't he?"

"Yes," Seth sighed.

Emmett shrugged, jamming his hands in his pockets. "Can't say I blame him. If Rose wouldn't have killed the guy that raped her and left her in the street to die, I'd have gone after the bastard and turned him inside out myself," he admitted quietly. "But she took care of that, her bein' so independent and all."

Seth winced internally. "Yeah… can't say I really blame her. But no, we haven't heard from him. He'd determined and on a mission to find that guy and turn him into ash."

"I get it. But can you maybe just get him a message for me?"

"Um, sure, I can try."

"Right," Emmett said with relief. "Tell him to come back. Lexi wants to talk to him."

The memory faded away as I stood frozen in the woods. Shit. Lexi… Lexi wanted to talk to me? In his mind, Seth was in my front yard of the house I shared with Embry, pacing. I focused on the image of my house, with my truck in the driveway and felt a pang of homesickness. Bastard was doing that on purpose to get me to come back.

Yes, Seth answered. You need to come back and deal with this. She's ready. A few days after that, I went to the house to test her. This is what happened….

I watched as the pictures in Seth's mind warped and changed, the pictures of his memory swirling together to bring the image forward in his mind. I felt him mentally push it on me, forcing me to watch.

He was creeping through the forest behind the Cullen's backyard; I'd know that landscape anywhere. His gait was slow and he was keeping low to the ground, his lips pulled carefully over his teeth to hide them. The hackles on the back of his neck were up in caution, but he wasn't afraid. He moved slowly forward as the house came into view. Seth's feet crunched over the slightly frozen grass as he moved forward at a snail's pace. The smell of vampire burned his nose, but I realized he was making an effort to smell it instead of pushing it to the back of his mind like we normally did when they were around. Why isn't he trying to fight their smell, I wondered. The Cullens all stood in the backyard, spaced apart and stock still like action figures; Carlisle, Esme, Emmett, Edward, Bella, Jasper, Alice… but in the middle of them was Rosalie, standing in front of someone. Her stance was almost protective, but… not? I didn't immediately understand.

As Seth drew closer, I realized Rosalie was blocking another figure – a shorter, slighter figure with white blonde hair. Her arms were held up, shielding whatever was behind her from Seth. Slowly, the white-blonde head leaned sideways, her red eyes staring inquisitively into Seth's.

Lexi.

"So far, so good," Edward muttered.

So I'm not lunch? Seth thought.

Edward's mouth quirked slightly. "No."

Lexi peeked further out from behind Rosalie, her eyes widening slightly. A small hiss sounded from her lips, but she didn't move. Instead, she looked more embarrassed.

"This… this is Seth?" she asked. Rosalie nodded. "I've seen him before," Lexi exhaled. She took an experimental breath. "I've seen the wolves before."

It sounded more like a statement than anything. "He doesn't smell like food. He smells… earthy. And… spicy, but not… not like the ones we hunt do," she finally said. "It's coming back to me… the wolves… the way they shift and there's a pack and… Brady," she said finally her voice cracking slightly. Rosalie reached back and patted her hand.

"He won't hurt you. We're friends. You won't attack him, will you?" Rosalie asked her.

Lexi shook her head and swallowed. "No, no… I won't hurt him. I know he's not food. I… I remember Seth," she said, turning to look at him. I started for a moment, temporarily breaking the trance I was under. I knew she was looking at Seth through a memory, but it was almost like… like she was looking at me. It was weird. It was like looking straight at her.

"We were friends," she stated slowly. "I was best friends with Regan… and Claire. How are they?" she asked, her voice sad.

Seth bobbed his head in wolf form, wagging his tail.

"They're quite fine," Edward answered for him. Lexi turned her head, meeting Edward's gaze. "When he can trust you to be in his human form, he wants to tell you all about them."

She gave a weak smile. "I'd like that. I remember them. I miss them," she breathed. "I want them to know I'm okay."

Seth gave his tail another wag, which made her smile again. "Is… is Brady okay?"

Seth paused before nodding his head once. Lexi bit her lip and nodded at him. "I hope he's okay… wherever he is."

He cut me off after that. I growled in response. My heart felt like it was in tatters. Confusion made me reel as I struggled to get a grip on my feelings. It was Lexi in his memories, but then again… it wasn't.

I took off at a run.

Pushing him out of my mind, I realized I needed to separate myself to figure out what all this meant. My legs churned beneath me as I turned sharply around a bunch of rocks and darted North – the opposite direction of forks. I'd never felt so conflicted in my life – was she still my imprint? Or wasn't she? Was what I felt towards her more confusion and concern, or was it my feelings and the pull between us? I didn't know if it was simply damaged or severed completely.

Fuck.

Seth had gotten through to me and he knew it. Now that'd he'd telepathically 'found' me it was easier than ever for him to get inside my head and find me so that he could bombard me with thoughts and memories related to Lexi. Maybe he could sense my weakness and feeling so uncertainty when it came to her, or maybe he just cared enough about her that he wanted me to come home and talk to her. Either one was typical of Seth I guess.

I'd been gone five weeks – it was January now. She'd been bitten at the end of November, just before the holidays. Time was a blur and I'd made no effort to keep track of it, so it had slipped away from me like sand in an hourglass. I'd missed Christmas, I realized, my legs slowing to a halt. Turning my head South, I sniffed the air and contemplated what it would mean if I returned. I needed to see my mom and make sure she was okay. I needed to see if I still had a job or if my dad realized I was even gone, and I knew I needed to deal with Lexi. Emmett said she'd wanted to talk but that was a few days ago.

Seth wriggled his way into my head again, wherever he was. Of course she still want to talk to you, he said. Come home, Brady. So much has happened.

His thoughts shifted slightly, showing me how he'd started coming around Lexi more and more in wolf form to get her used to our scent.

I heard her talking to Rosalie the other night, he told me. She was begging her to help her adjust to being around humans and wolves. She doesn't want to live an isolated life, Brady. There's still hope.

Easy for you to say, I sneered. Your imprint doesn't want to drain you and everyone else in town. Last time I checked, Regan was still a warm little human. You wanna tell me again how to handle my problems?

No need for that, he chided me sternly. I'm only trying to help you both. Lexi is a sweet kid; she didn't ask for this. I only want to help her through it. If talking to you would help her find her human side then I'll do it. That's not for you to be snide about, he said.

Listen, you don't know about my problems -

Enough! He snarled through our link. If I have the power to help that helpless, scared girl in that house, I will! He growled. Be a man and face your problems!

I quieted at that. I knew he was right, but I was a stubborn ass who could barely admit he was right. Fuck, I hated it when Seth was right.

You know I am. Now come home, he finally said. I watched through his mind's eye as he gazed up at the Cullen house to the room I could only guess belonged to Lexi now. The back door opened, Emmett stepping out. He flashed to Seth's' side in an instant.

"What's going on?" he asked. "Did you find Brady?"

Seth bobbed his head in response. He wasn't phasing back to human form just to torture me, I was pretty sure.

Emmett glanced back at the house. "She wants to talk to him. She's calmer now, more controlled than she was at first. She just needed time. Shit… I guess she has nothing but time now. Well… just tell him to come back. She's been around you plenty. I think we all know she isn't going to rip his head off. To feed on him, at least. She might be pretty pissed he's been gone so long, she might rip his head off just for fun," he snorted.

Great, I thought. Turning South, I made up my mind. It was time to go home and face the music.

Good choice, Seth echoed. Coming home might be easier than you think.

Shut up.

As soon as I made the decision to run home, my body felt immediately lighter. Damn it – Seth had been right. I'd been dreading going back to Forks to deal with reality for so long that I felt like an idiot. It's just that people would have questions, and I didn't want to answer them. I knew everyone would have endless questions about Lexi's transformation and what it meant for me as an imprinted wolf and I didn't know what I wanted to do yet. And yes, I knew that was childish of me. Sue me.

As I ran in the direction of Forks, I realized that I wasn't just avoiding something I knew would be unpleasant. That wasn't why I'd been hiding away in the wilderness for several weeks. It wasn't simply avoidance, and I realized I'd been using the fact that I was hunting for Lexi's killer as my biggest scapegoat. No, I realized, that wasn't it.

I was afraid.

No, I was terrified. I didn't know what any of this would mean for me or more importantly, for Lexi. Would she remember me enough to remember what we'd had? Every time I closed my eyes in human form, I was tormented with memories of her; her smell, her eyes, her laugh, the way she talked with her hands, even the sound of her heart. It was all so clear in my mind: my last memories of Lexi. I guess it was why some people avoided going to funerals and seeing the body; they didn't want that to be their last memory of a person that had meant so much to them while they were living. They hated the fact that their last moment in time with that person was after the flame of their existence had been blown out.

I didn't want any more new memories of this version of her.

Of course I'd seen her in the woods that day, but I think I was still too paralyzed with shock to really register what had happened just yet and the image of her was easier to push away. Seeing her feed, covered in blood still felt like a bad dream. Sometimes when I woke up, I could convince myself it was, and I was running home to a living, breathing, vibrant Lexi.

The fear I felt for what I was walking into closed around my heart and made it practically feel as dead as hers.

I ran for an entire day, blocking the pack from my mind. I didn't want to deal with them yet – I only let Seth into my head when the scenery started to look familiar and he was doing his nightly patrol.

Tell Emmett to meet me at the boundary line, near the creek, I told him. I need to talk to him first.

Fair enough, Seth answered. You know we don't have to follow the boundary lines, right? We did it at first to give Lexi her space, but she knows our scent now. She knows we're not food and not to follow our trails.

Just have him meet me, okay?

Okay.

I was reminded of a lesson I'd learned when I'd first met Lexi; she'd asked me why I acted so angry with my father and lashed out the way I did. It wasn't until she asked me that question that I truly focused on how I felt when I was so angry. It wasn't rage that fueled my bad behavior, it was sadness. Before my father became such a terrible person to me and my mother, I remembered feeling sad. It made me so, so sad that the man I'd looked up to for so long could be a monster when he wanted to, and I had no defense against that. I learned early on that it was much easier to be angry or upset with someone than it ever was to truly tell them that they hurt you. I felt fear and anguish taking over me as I neared the boundary outside of La Push and had to fight to temper my inner fire down. A level head would be needed if I was going to make the most of this meeting with Emmett.

He was waiting for me when I arrived. Nodding, he tossed a pair of freshly washed sweatpants to the ground at my feet and looked on as I phased back to human form. My joints all cracked and protested at the sudden transformation, causing him to raise one eyebrow.

"Been a minute?" he asked with a smirk.

I ran my hand over the stubble on my jaw that was the beginnings of a decent beard and nodded. "You might say that."

"Where you been?"

"North. I think Canada. Dunno… it was cold. No people. I didn't care to know," I answered shortly, pulling the sweats into place. "Thank you for coming."

He shrugged. "I'm here for Lexi."

I nodded and tried to figure out what I wanted to say. It was best to just start with the obvious. "I didn't find him," I admitted, my voice low and trembling. I bit back the anger and tried to keep myself from shaking. "I lost the scent around Vancouver, but I never found it again."

He raised his chin, narrowing his eyes. "That why you were gone?"

Shrugging, I ran another hand over my jaw. "Yeah. I wanted to find him. Dole out some wolf justice," I said darkly.

Emmett looked skeptical, but he didn't say anything. "It's good that you're back. Lexi seems to think… she's ready to talk."

"She doesn't hate wolves yet?"

"She tolerates Seth. Embry has come around, some of the older guys… Jake. She kept it under control around Ness well enough. Just said it burned, but that's nothing out of the ordinary. So no, she wouldn't kill you if that's what you're asking."

Rolling back on my heels, I leaned against a tree and inhaled deeply. "What does she want?"

Emmett gave me another narrow-eyed look. "To talk? Closure? A friend? Who knows, man, does it matter?"

Raw emotion bubbled up in my throat; I could tell he was losing his already short patience with me, but what could I do? I was terrified and I had no idea what to do about it. The heat from embarrassment began to darken my cheeks and my heart started to pound against my rib cage. Sometimes it felt like the fear might strangle me. Sometimes, lately, I wished it would.

"You think you're scared? You should see the girl at the house right now. Pacing, worrying, scared to death you never want to talk to her," he said. "Everything in her life is an unknown right now. Everything she left behind is part of the human world, man, and it has to stay there. You get me? Nothing from her life can come with her because it doesn't belong in this supernatural fucked up space we all live in," he said, motioning to the two of us. "But you know what she realized? You're a wolf. You're supernatural, just like her. You are the one thing from her former life that might be able to translate. You've lived in in it for over a decade. Now… whether or not you feel that imprint pull or whatever is left to be determined. But you could at least have been there for her."

Shit, I realized, Emmett could see right through me. I'd always written him off as a brut, a dumb jock; but he was able to see right through to what this was really about.

"I'm not… it's just…"

"Say whatever you want, man… but when you took off without even hanging around to let her have five Goddamn minutes to get herself together… you just bolted. You were gone. Not one word to her. It took her a few days, but Brady, her memories started coming back. Once she realized what had happened and she remembered, she wanted to talk to you. Not Carlisle, or me, or Rose… as much as it broke her heart. She wanted to talk to you, dude. And you were just gone."

"I had to try to see if I could catch him -"

"- Don't use that as an excuse, come on now," he said in a low voice as he shook his head, "she knows that's not why you left."

"Funny, I don't remember even talking to her about it," I shot back. "I left for her. I hunted him for her."

"And partly for yourself," Emmett interjected knowingly. I cast him an annoyed glance because he was right.

"I'd appreciate it if you'd just stop telling Lexi things and maybe stay the fuck out of it."

"So you'd rather she still be wandering around the woods of Forks, alone, afraid, and not knowing what she is and how to stop herself from slaying the whole town? You want me go to back to where I was when I got that call and just abandon her? Or worse, live with her and be her friend and play dumb when she asks about you? Come on, Brady, not even you are that stupid."

His stance was relaxed, but I could tell I'd irked his temper. I felt my anxiety flare in my chest and my nostrils flared as I stepped closer to him.

"You wanna tell me if you came home tonight, and your precious wife was a shape shifting wolf, you'd still love her the same? You can really look at me right now and say that without a doubt?!" I clenched my fists and felt a growl grow in the pit of my chest. "If she bursts into a ball of fur and smelled like a wolf and wanted to rip you to shreds, you'd be just fine and dandy with that? I don't think so Emmett. Don't be a hypocrite."

He grit his teeth and growled at me. "Maybe not, but you know what, dog? You can bet your ass I'd go back home to her and do whatever I could do make sure she was okay. That she wasn't scared, or lonely, or hungry. I'd fight every vampire bone in my body, and I'd try to love her a million different ways until I found one that worked for a vampire and a wolf. And if at the end of the day it didn't work, then you'd better believe I'd make fuckin' sure I'd tried every way under the God damn sun to be with her again."

I glared at him, the silence stretching between us.

"How would I know what to do, huh? My imprint is a vampire that I could barely even look at, much less love. I saw a glimpse of it, and I…" I choked back bile. "I didn't know if I could do it."

"How nice for you," he sneered. "You were afraid? You think you're living in fear? Walk a mile in her shoes, dude. She's sitting up at that house right now still so terrified she's going to accidentally kill someone and then have to live with that forever. She's afraid of herself, of what she's capable of… you don't even know."

"You think I don't know about waking up a monster? Huh? You think I don't know shit about that? Try again," I snarled. I know what it's like to be something out of a deranged fairy tale." Turning, I rammed my fist into the closest tree to me and felt the satisfying crack of the bones. The tree groaned in protest as I balled up my fists even tighter. Heat was rolling up and down my spine, pooling in the vertebra as I felt myself giving in.

"Fuck this," I spat before phasing. And I did what I historically do best; I got pissed, and then ran away.

Ooooh, pissy Emmett! I think at this point Emmett and Rose have officially shifted into 'parent' mode for Lexi. They aren't sure how else to help her and they've always wanted a family of their own, so I imagine them shifting quite easily into that role for Lexi.

I realize Brady's behavior will irk some of you, but remember- just because he imprinted on Lexi doesn't mean his asshole ways are gone. They're magnified in times of stress because Brady is still basically a temperamental brat. His favorite thing has been taken from him, so in my mind he shifts to be very much an asshole again now that Lexi is gone. Or is she?

Thanks to NinkyBaby for beta-ing!

Thank you for reading and please review!