Chapter Twenty: It Only Hurts When You Lie
Forks High School, January 31st
It was dusk when Isabella's long walk ended at the high school, where she expected to pick up her bike and head home. Instead she found Edward, still waiting by her motorcycle. She wanted to scream, this was the last thing she needed. He pushed off from the wall he was leaning against and plunged his hands in his pockets.
"Isabella, I was hoping we could talk." Edward pleaded, his voice soft and regretful. Or perhaps cautious and timid, Isabella wasn't sure which fit him better.
"About?" She replied with a small sneer, trying not to sound as hostile as she felt. After her conversation with Alice, she wasn't convinced that she could allow Edward to leave this conversation unscathed.
Edward frowned slightly, his face expressing concern. "I wanted to talk about you. I need to know what happened to you. What made you so angry with me?"
"You don't want me to answer that." Isabella tried the diplomatic approach, even through gritted teeth.
"Yes, I do. Please, I deserve the truth." He sounded polite but it was clearly a demand. Isabella clenched her jaw in an effort to calm herself, she couldn't fly off the handle again as much as she wanted to remove that smarmy fake lopsided expression of worry and compassion from his face.
"You left Bella to die, so she died. Your Bella is gone forever. I am all that remains, and I do not owe you anything." She leaned forward aggressively as she spoke, her sneer exposing her teeth.
"I don't understand." He said with clear confusion, although Isabella knew it was selective memory because Alice and Rosalie were very clear that they had figured out parts of what happened already. There was no reason to believe they kept that information from Edward, or if they even could given his telepathy.
"Yes you do. Don't feed me lies expecting a more pleasant response. I am not seventeen anymore. I am not some naïve girl swooning over the pretty vampire boy. I am Isabella di Volterra, daughter of Marcus. Do not speak to me as though I were a child." Isabella leveled a dangerous look his way, and he flinched back, liking his lips in an obviously desperate attempt to figure out what to say next.
"Of course, but you've been one of us all these years and you never once tried to contact us or get in touch, and then-." Edward started, but Isabella held up a hand.
"Remember, you promised that there was no trace left behind. No pictures, no gifts from your family. You told me they didn't want me, that I wasn't good enough for you. Then you left me in the forest alone." Her voice was cold, and she cocked her head examining him for a moment, "I always wondered whether you thought I would die alone? Eaten by wolves maybe? Well it was a wolf that saved me, and they tried to keep me safe. More than I can say for you." Isabella got onto her bike, turning her back on him.
Edward glared at her, "I was trying to do the noble thing, the right thing, and let you live a normal life."
Isabella turned her head sharply to face him again, crossing her arms over her chest. "Normal, that's a joke. Did you honestly think I would ever be able to live normally after discovering the truth about vampires? I told you to change me. I begged you to change me. I would have given up my entire life for you. I gave you my heart. What more did you want?"
Edward's voice was a growled protest, "I wanted to protect you."
Isabella raised an eyebrow, her voice sarcastic. "Protect me from what exactly? By leaving, you only protected me from your nineteenth century chauvinism and your utter conviction that the universe revolves around you."
"From all of this." Edward twirled a hand in her direction, "I wanted to protect you from our life, from the dangers we face. I wanted to protect you from the pain of leaving your family behind. I wanted to protect you from becoming one of us. I wanted to protect you from the thirst, from those feral months as a newborn. I wanted to protect you from becoming a soulless monster!"
Isabella shut her eyes and pushed down her rage. "You seem to like that word, protect. Let me give you a scenario; Carlisle decides for your protection that you must never be around humans again because he knows you will partake of their blood. You cannot help it. He has to literally chain you to a wall to keep you from your own weaknesses. Would you accept this? It's the moral answer, right?"
"Perhaps, but he would be taking away my choice." Edward didn't even seem to realize what she was doing, and his answer gave her just the right leverage for her point.
"Exactly, you took away my choice. Get it, your protection was at the cost of agency over MY life!" She climbed off the bike and got close to his face, barely constraining herself. "You wanted a relationship on your terms or not at all. You wanted things your way or not at all. You made the choice to leave me because that's what you wanted. Your own twisted beliefs gave you an out. It allowed you to dump me without turning me and to think of yourself as noble and self sacrificing. You did it for yourself. You've never done anything for anyone except yourself."
Edward shook his head violently in denial. "I was trying to keep you from becoming one of us. I was trying to save your soul!" Edward scowled but managed to keep from snarling in response. "I did it for your own good. If now is any testament to how you've adapted to the change it was for the best, I mean look at the way you're acting. Snark and violence, rage without excuse. You've all but spit at my family, when all we did was love you. What did the Volturi do to you?" Edward demanded as if it was his right to know.
"Love… I've heard that word bandied about lately, and I wonder if it actually has any real meaning to you. You say you and your family loved me. Then explain to me why you went against their wishes?" The question seemed to hit him in the face and he looked shocked for a moment and turned away. He looked up at the clouds for a few seconds before turning back.
His voice took on a totally different tone, full of remorse and acceptance, "look, our relationship was a mistake. I should never have given in to my desire to be close to you. It was reckless, and I deeply apologize for it. That day, I had to decide between what my heart wanted and what my mind knew was the moral choice. We had to separate from you, my family wasn't objective enough to see that."
Isabella nodded, her face neutral enough to be mistaken for understanding. "So you chose for them?"
"Yes, and I would do it again. They wear their hearts on their sleeve, it suits them, but is a weakness. As a member of the Volturi you must know that lesson explicitly." He held out his hands palms forward, motioning towards his chest as he spoke, and then shut them tightly as he mentioned the Volturi.
"Another guy thinking he can teach me a lesson." Isabella couldn't help but roll her eyes, turning back and getting on her bike, lifting her helmet and putting it under her right arm.
"It's important." Edward pleaded.
"Fine, what's this lesson?" Isabella turned towards him again, impatience written on her face.
"That romantic love isn't real. What we had was chemical, our bodies telling us that we were in love. Once I had some distance, I knew it was true." His eyes were wide, but Isabella couldn't figure out what game he was playing at now. Countering the idea of love made no sense to her, unless he was confessing that he never loved her. Which lined up, but she couldn't quite grasp his rationalization.
"So this illusion of love, why do so many believe in it?" Her own feelings were strained and cloudy, she felt something deep for her daughter and there was Alice who had managed to dredge up a surprising amount of feelings she thought had died decades ago.
"Because it is a biological imperative. For example; we were drawn together because we're a match. You were destined to be my mate." He seemed to like the idea of matches rather than the emotional connection, and suddenly it clicked. Edward couldn't feel, he couldn't love. She felt almost sorry for him, because it meant that he was a psychopath. Someone without feeling, cold, calculating, manipulative and controlling… it all made sense. Her anger abated immediately, he wasn't worth her fury anymore.
She almost laughed at him, but instead she gave him a tired sigh, "no, I was simply a temptation. My blood sang to you, nothing more. I was never supposed to be your mate. Now, I wouldn't touch you if you were the last creature on earth."
"Mate, singer whatever. You're my Bella." Edward insisted, moving around so that he was almost in front of her bike.
"I made it very clear twice now, I am not your anything. Do you need me to teach you that lesson again?" Her eyes narrowed and her anger returned a fraction, her voice very cold and threatening.
"I don't care what the rest of my family says, I don't care what the Volturi have drilled into your head. You are mine." He said with his eyes wide with anger and frustration.
"I've tried to be civil, for my daughter's sake. But I'm done. You have one chance to walk away, or I will take your head, burn your body and dance on your ashes right now." She was beyond fed up, her frustration at nearly her limit and yet he had to keep pushing.
He immediately stepped back and raised his hands. "So be it, but this isn't over Bella."
Isabella leveled him a look of icy rage and said with a touch of satisfaction in her voice; "If you persist in the delusion that I am yours, I will be forced to remove your lying tongue. I wasn't sure about your choice and manipulation of your family. I couldn't grasp how they were so fooled or why you would even lie, if I were so unimportant. Truth is, the answer is simple, they think you love them. Just like I did. Be careful Edward, your family may not be your family for long if you continue down this path."
Unbeknownst to Isabella, despite her relatively calm external demeanor, she had just completely crushed her helmet. An object designed to withstand one-hundred mile per hour impacts with her bare hands. Disgusted and trembling with rage she threw the now baseball sized hunk of plastic to the ground shattering it into a thousand pieces, and started up her motorcycle with a roar of power, backing it up with a kick of her feet and sped out of the parking lot without a backward glance.
The Cullen Residence - January 31st
"Where's Rosalie!?" Edward demanded at a yell as he slammed the front door. Rose cracked her neck in irritation at the sound of Edward's voice, and then rose from her work station in the garage and had to take a deep breath before racing into the house.
"Right here, no need to shout." Rosalie didn't sound pleased when she entered, and glowered at Edward who leveled a glare of his own back at her.
"What did you say to her?" He said at a hiss, not even attempting to hide his anger.
"The truth, I told her about her mother and friends." Rosalie said flatly, not cowing to Edward at all. He cocked his head slightly, and frowned; Her mind was clear, and all he could get was that she wasn't lying, nothing else.
"What about my decision, how did you phrase it to make her take it so badly?" He pressed, and Rosalie growled slightly.
"I didn't tell her, it wasn't my place. But if it was, I wouldn't have hesitated to tell her the truth. We owe her that much, and honestly so much more." She moved towards him with a small sneer, she hadn't liked Edward in a long time, but with the recent revelation about his century of manipulation and lies, she was starting to actively despise him.
"That isn't your choice, it's mine. She's my mate." Edward's eyes were wild and intense, as he shouted his declaration. The room all stood in shock for a moment at the anger on display. Jasper started to shake his head first.
"Edward, has she taken you back?" He pushed calm at his brother, which seemed to work as Edward's shoulders relaxed a bit and he turned to Jasper with a sad frown.
"No, not yet. But I will not give up. She will be mine, I will convince her it's the only option for her to be a part of this family again." Edward looked off in the distance, imagining a future with Isabella that only he could see.
"Do not presume to have any sway over her heart." Jasper warned, forcing Edward out of his fantasy.
"She said she loved me once, it won't take much to convince her of that again." Edward said confidently, although in truth he wasn't so sure it would be that easy. "Do you know anything that might help me? You've spoken to her and her fake daughter more than the rest of us."
"That's a dangerous assumption Edward, from what I've felt from them, their relationship is as real as any parent and child. They love each other unconditionally." Jasper countered warily, he was trying to understand Edward, but he could feel Edward's emotional state was starting to unravel.
"Okay, fine whatever. I can look past the little bit… Eliza for the time being. What about Alice, did she talk to her?" Edward wasn't asking anyone in particular.
"She isn't back yet so all I know is they had a conversation yesterday, and were due for a class together today. However Isabella disappeared from school around the same time, so I don't know if they even spoke. After school Alice said she needed to feed." Emmett explained somewhat expressionless, his own anger held at bay for the moment.
"Right, I'm not worried about Alice. I need to know why my Bella is not acting like herself. I think the Volturi have done something to her! Maybe they brainwashed her or something. She threatened me twice, and said pretty much every unkind thing she could think of. Do you know why that is? Because someone in this house must've poisoned her to me." Edward turned towards Rosalie, the accusation clearly directed towards her.
"Right, of course you blame me. Like you have no skin in the game? You went behind our backs and forced us to abandon her, then lied to us for a century about that choice. Did you also lie about her wanting to come with us? Tell me, if I asked her if she wanted to be a part of our family back then, what would she say?" Rosalie moved to get in his face and Edward flinched back, his own bravado vanishing.
"How would I know?" He attempted to deflect, but Rose stepped forward.
"You were there, and by your own admission she told you what she wanted." She widened her eyes, daring him to lie.
Edward grimaced and shook his head in frustration. "Fine! She wanted to come with us. I told her we didn't want her to come."
"We, or you?" Rosalie said through gritted teeth, her anger forcing her to work her jaw and her shoulders began to shake from the raw emotions she was feeling.
"It's semantics at this point, we all left and she is clearly pissed at all of us." Edward turned away from Rose and moved towards his piano with a dismissive wave of his hand. Rose started to move but Emmett wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her against him gently. She shut her eyes tightly for a second and then relaxed into his embrace, she looked up at him and mouthed, "thank you."
Then there was a slap that no one saw coming even Edward. Esme left a small crack in Edward's cheek from the impact.
"No it's you, you lied to us and I lost a daughter! How dare you Edward, how dare you pretend this isn't your fault!" Esme screamed in anger, her outburst stunning the room. Her hand shot up and over her mouth, and she immediately ran upstairs to her gallery.
"I'll go check on her." Carlisle said, then paused to scan the room. "No more fighting. There is nothing we can do about the past, all we can hope for is to somehow make amends. We need to be patient with Isabella, show her we care about her and her daughter."
"No, we need to address what was done to her. This cannot be my Bella, she has to have been altered somehow." Edward's insistence seemed to fall flat, as everyone almost in unison shook their heads at him.
"Altered, more like abandoned and put through hell. Then employed by the Volturi as an enforcer for a century. No wonder she's hard and angry, I would be too." Emmett said somewhat by surprise, drawing the attention of the entire room. He just shrugged.
"Settle this, I will not have this fight causing Esme more grief." Carlisle said and left without another word.
"I suggest you let this alone for a while Edward, let her have some time to acclimate to us again." Jasper tried, but Edward immediately shook his head.
"Wait, you're asking me to wait. That's nigh impossible and you know it." Edward closed his eyes and looked like he was almost in pain. It was enough that even Rosalie gave him a doubletake, was his need sincere? They had all assumed that he was being manipulative and obsessive, especially since his behavior regarding Isabella had been so inconsistent and showed a lack of genuine emotion. Jasper narrowed his eyes and probed Edward's emotions, but couldn't quite pinpoint what his brother was feeling.
Jasper could detect a longing in Edward, but he wasn't sure where it stemmed from. Love or something else, something elusive he couldn't figure out. Either way it made him step back and reassess.
"Edward, you have to admit that your choices have consequences. Whatever happened to her, it shaped who she is now. You are a part of that, and perhaps not a good part. Abandonment is a hard thing to get over, and when something is that old and that deep it would be difficult to simply forgive, let alone the fact that we cannot forget. Give her time and give her space. You owe her at least that much." Jasper said calmly, and it seemed to get through to Edward who nodded a couple of times.
"I'll be in my room, could you send Alice up when she gets in?" Edward said more to the room than anyone in particular, and then left, a few seconds later the faint sound of Debussy could be heard through his soundproofed room.
Dearborn Tower, Chicago, January 31st
"Mom, you're not gonna believe this one." Zoey said as Angela and Charlie trudged through the front door.
"I don't have the brain power to guess, just tell us." Angela said, collapsing onto the couch. Zoey picked up her laptop and sat next to Angela and set the computer in her adoptive mother's lap. Angela sighed and looked at the headline.
"Large Explosion Tears Through Top Floors of Tsuchinoko Tower."
"I don't get it." Angela said, and then her head cocked and a dark look crossed her face. "The Tokyo coven."
"Yeah, exactly. Did you find Erica?" Zoey asked, tilting her head.
"Yes, after a fashion. We found her head." Angela didn't like involving Zoey to this degree, but she couldn't deny her ability to research. More than once Zoey had figured out something with her computer that they would never have found otherwise.
"Left on a pile of ashes?" Zoey looked back at the screen, with her own frown.
"In a bag with another head, but yes the bodies were burnt." Angela said while sitting up straighter and reading the story.
"Mojo has been sending me reports of Volturi activity up and down the coasts, and reports of large wolves working with vampires. Something is going on, and I'm thinking it's coming here. If someone wiped out the Tokyo coven…" Zoey started to guess, but Angela interrupted her.
"Then someone may be systematically attacking covens, but why the random attacks elsewhere? Is it connected?" Angela pulled up the information Zoey had gathered to a holo display and started to organize the pieces.
"No idea, but it's certainly keeping the Volturi busy." Zoey said somewhat in awe as she watched Angela work. Then when it was all organized Angela sighed.
"They have putting out fires continuously. With the exception of the West coast, the Volturi have been forced to keeping moving. Damn, we need more, but we should let Michael know that his family may be in danger." She didn't convey the urgency she felt, instead she kept staring at the disconnected puzzle in front of her trying to figure it out.
"Why?" Charlie said from the kitchen island, a cup of blood held loose in his hand.
"We owe him that much." Angela didn't bother to look back at him, her eyes still glued to the holo display.
"Angela, we don't owe that sonofabitch a thing. He's kept us basically enslaved to his coven for a decade." Charlie sounded like he was getting heated, and gulped down the blood with a small growl of disgust. Even after nearly a century he had never gotten used to the taste, so he poured some of the cheapest whiskey he could find and chased the blood to help it go down easier.
Angela sighed, closing the laptop which shut off the glowing projection above her, and then moved into the kitchen. She pulled a blood bag from the fridge and bit off the top, drinking it before responding, throwing the empty into the sink.
"There's a reason for that, and you are under no obligation to stay." Angela leaned against the counter next to Charlie and lowered her head to look down at his empty cup and snatched up the bottle of booze and took a long swig wishing the alcohol could affect her at all.
"Angela, don't give me that bullshit. You two are my family." Charlie said, looking over at her. She emptied the bottle and slammed it into the sink shattering it on impact. She turned towards him with a small sneer.
"Am I?" Her voice was dark, almost goading him into a fight.
"I'll be in my room." Zoey said under her breath, knowing they could both hear her.
"You are my daughter, now and forever. Nothing will change that." Charlie shook his head in confusion, backing up a step. His expression broke Angela's anger and she closed her eyes.
"I'm sorry, I know how you feel. But I'll never be your Bella." Angela said at a whisper. She tried to never invoke the name of the ghost that seemed to haunt both of them. Victoria had made it clear to Angela that Bella was to blame for her actions. For a time Angela had been angry at Bella, until she found Charlie and realized that Victoria was just a monster using whatever happened with Bella as an excuse.
"Bella will always be in my heart, but you are my family. You and Zoey. I think she would've been happy that we found each other. I just wish she could meet Zoey. I just wish…" Charlie face showed his pain, and Angela quickly pulled him into a hug, holding him tightly. The show of affection was rare from her, and so he knew she had just lashing out before.
"I know." She said pulling away. "I'm going to call Michael. We don't owe him any favors, but I cannot just let him die."
"His guard is nearly as big as the Volturi, he'll be fine." Charlie tried, but Angela shook her head.
"Doesn't matter. It's the right thing to do." She gave him a small shrug, and he almost cracked a smile. Even though she had been through trauma that would harden anyone's soul, she was still the same person deep down. Her humanity kept him close, and he held on to hope that someday her heart would fully heal.
"Do what you have to do, I'll be watching the game." He grimaced slightly, and shrugged, and then turned towards his den.
"There's no game." She said with a smirk.
"I'll watch an old one!" He said without turning back, disappearing into his private sanctum and closing the door quietly.
Angela turned towards the sink and started to pick up the glass when the windows began to rumble. She dashed towards the balcony, which had a view of the lake. A large plume of black smoke was rising from near the waterfront, in the general area of the Caravelli compound. Charlie was at her side a second later and then Zoey rushed out to join them.
"Is that…" Zoey started, and Angela nodded in confirmation.
"I'll need to confirm, but I'm pretty sure that Michael and his mate are dead." Angela said feeling as though she had failed on some level. Even though she had no way of knowing the attack would happen so quickly.
"I'm going with you." Charlie said, and they both rushed out of the house leaving Zoey staring at the fires that were starting to spread from the compound to the surrounding neighborhood.
Charlie and Angela made it just before the fire trucks arrived, the heat from the fires could be felt nearly a thousand feet away, the sound of the fire like a lion roaring into the sky. Along the line of people being pushed back by arriving police Angela spotted a familiar face staring with excitement at the destruction.
"Lauren." Angela whispered to Charlie low enough that her old friend couldn't hear her. Then she pushed towards Lauren's mind to see if there was anything she could pull from her thoughts. She caught glimpses of something vast and terrible, a global effort to do something for the master of all of this… a vampire named Joham. She couldn't see the plan, or what was the end goal, perhaps Lauren didn't know those details. But it was all connected, the attacks on the covens and the build up of forces, and the next target was a coven in Alaska.
Highway out of Forks, February 1st
"Alice." Isabella whispered to herself. Then she pulled out her phone and opened the email tab. The web client didn't even exist anymore to her knowledge, but she remembered the email. How could she forget, she had sent so many to that address.
"Alice. There are so many things I wish I could've said to you back then. I wish I had been courageous enough to say no to Edward and tell you how you made me feel. When I was with you, stealing moments of closeness, I felt whole. Complete in a way I still can't quite explain. So I was in love, without ever realizing I was in love. I displaced that love onto Edward because he was pretty, and he wanted me. But I knew we had nothing in common, nothing real to tie us together long term.
Not like with you, where you didn't just quote Romeo and Juliet because you read it and memorized the best parts with your vampiric memory. You loved it as much as I did. I could almost see tears forming in those stony eyes when we watched Pride and Prejudice together and listened to that heart wrenching letter Darcy wrote to Lizzie. God I was a sap, and you brought that out in me and never made me feel ashamed for feeling girlie. You made me warm, comfortable and happy. I wanted nothing more than to curl up with you every day, and listen to your voice as you read to me. Or stroked my hair when we watched television. I wanted to touch you, kiss you, be yours even though I could never articulate that desire.
Then you left. At first I thought it was Edward who crushed my heart and tore away a large part of my soul. Yet as much as his rejection hurt, I felt worse about the fact you never said goodbye. You were the first cut, the beginning of my darkness. Victoria created the rest of it. Now, to know that was all because of manipulation, that you have lived in pain for a century and I have been alone in my misery because I thought you didn't want me? That doesn't just make me angry, it makes me feel something else, and I don't know if I can process that emotion anymore. It took every ounce of what is left of my self control not to kill Edward outright. I don't know what I'm going to do now, but there is something there. I didn't feel it until I left you this afternoon, but as soon as you were out of my sight I missed you. That hole where my heart used to beat doesn't feel quite so empty, and I don't know if that is real or just a phantom of a feeling I had for you.
I don't know if I can love you. I want to be able to love you. Could you accept me as I am? Could you love someone who may never be able to reciprocate that love?
No… I could never ask that."
Isabella looked down at her phone and then shut her eyes as trembles of emotions coursed through her. The phone shattered in her hand. She lowered her arm to her side, letting the ruined pieces of glass and plastic drop to the ground. Then she turned over the engine of her bike, and started home.
The Waterfall House, February 1st
"Okay, three movies is my limit." Leah said with a wide yawn. "Although what's next on the list?"
"A western called Dust. I've never even heard of it before, I hope it's good." Eliza was glancing at the synopsis with a slight wrinkle between her eyebrows.
"Don't you look them up before you start watching them?" Leah asked, wondering how much effort Eliza devoted to this strange odyssey of entertainment.
"Sometimes, but I liked to be surprised. Honestly I was a little taken aback by two of those movies. Did you notice the girl from Thirteen looks like Rosalie and the one from Uptown Girls looks vaguely like Jane."
"I've never actually met Rosalie and I have no idea who Jane is." Leah chuckled slightly, feeling a little bit lost. Then she turned to look at Eliza directly and gave her a sympathetic smile. "I hope it wasn't a problem with all that Cullen nonsense today?"
"It wasn't so bad, Emmett actually jumped into help during the cafeteria fight." Eliza frowned, she had such a clear picture of the Cullens as false and emotionless. Yet their compassion was clear, Emmett had no reason to jump in, except to offer a hand in a tense and potentially dangerous situation. The blood of innocents was at stake, and Emmett's shear size defused the situation entirely.
"They helped out here too, I hate to admit I'm indebted to Carlisle now for saving my brother." Leah looked down at Eliza and couldn't help reaching down to run her fingers through Eliza's hair. Leah watched Eliza's expression curiously, it was obvious that Eliza wanted to talk, but equally as obvious that she would do it only in her own time. Eliza closed her eyes, just taking a few moments to enjoy the sensation of Leah's fingers through her hair. Eliza wasn't used to such casual touching. She and her mother would occasionally clasp hands or support one another with a hug. This sort of physicality was different and Eliza found herself very much enjoying it.
Eliza murmured quietly, "You're so warm."
Leah's hand flinched back and she quickly murmured an apology. "I'm sorry; it's the whole werew- wolf shifter part of me." She said hastily correcting herself, still adjusting to calling herself something other than a werewolf. "We're about ten degrees warmer than your average human." Leah said almost in an apology.
Eliza shook her head slightly, and then reached up and grabbed Leah's hand, bringing it back down to her hair. "Don't be silly, I don't think I'd be using your leg as a pillow if I didn't like it." The touch was curiously intimate and relaxing and Eliza found herself loath to let it stop.
Leah blushed and smiled shyly, but returned to running her fingers through Eliza's hair slowly. "You're still worried about your mom?
"Yeah, she's been so closed down for so long; being here seems to be helping, at least a little bit. She's at least smiling and laughing sometimes. She's nowhere close to working through her anger with the Cullens though." Eliza sighed and murmured quietly. "I just hope she can do it without losing it."
Leah frowned and then murmured quietly, "The relationship she was in with that… leech was not a healthy one. I got to see what she looked like when she was found in the forest after he left her. She had invested so much of her emotion and spirit in that family. She loved all of them, not just him, and when they left, it was like they ripped the emotional skeleton out of her. I remember her when she was here and she was human. She carried so much hate around with her. It was hard to tell who she hated more, them or herself. Although to be honest I didn't interact with her much. I... wasn't very nice to her." Leah looked down at her lap, desperately wanting to take Eliza's hand in hers.
Eliza looked up at Leah curiously, eyes searching her face. "Why not?"
Leah looked uncomfortable, her eyes looking away in embarrassment. "I wasn't very nice to anyone. I was very angry all the time. I was dealing with some fallout from my transformation, and Sam. So my head was in a perpetually bad place." Eliza tilted her head curiously, though she didn't lift it from Leah's lap, letting her talk.
"I know a bit about Sam from my mom, but not the details. I'm sorry about your Dad, the memories I have of him were good, he seemed like a genuinely good guy. My grandpa loved him with all his heart." Eliza explained, and found herself getting emotional at the thought of a good father figure.
"Yeah, Charlie was his best friend, along with Billy. Although they both loved my mom almost as much as my dad. As for Sam, well he was the first in his generation to transform into a wolf. It was hard on him and harder on us, but we worked through it. I was in love with him. We were high school sweethearts. Then he imprinted on my best friend and cousin." Leah smiled in spite of herself, thinking about her parents despite how long ago they had died.
"Emily, right?" Eliza said with a thoughtful nod.
Leah nodded, not meeting Eliza's eyes. "I was so mad about it, I didn't understand what imprinting meant back then. When I first transformed, It caught everyone off guard, because I was the first woman to have ever shifted. You know about our pack mind, so you can imagine actually hearing Sam, feeling an echo of his imprint. It made it easier in one respect, because I knew he had no choice, but I resented the hell out of it."
Leah clenched her hands into fists and looked down. "I thought it meant there was something wrong with me. I wasn't fit to be imprinted on. I became pretty miserable to be around. My thoughts were antagonistic to everyone in the pack. Everyone but Jake and my brother Seth actively avoided me. After Bella, Jacob broke away from the pack and Seth and I followed him. A few years later Sam lost the heart to lead, and stopped shifting to spend his life with Emily, they grew older together and had a couple of kids. Our new pack basically just adopted Sam's pack and it's been like that ever since with Jake as Alpha and me as his second in command.
That's when things got better for me, learning to lead and helping to keep the pack strong through the years. I found a best friend in Jake, and I've muddled through even as pretty much everyone else imprinted. For a long time I thought I couldn't stop the change, unable to control myself enough to stop shifting. I thought it meant there was something actually wrong with me. I thought it meant I was at a dead end, no relationship, no future, no aging. Then there was you, I hope that isn't putting too much on you."
Eliza slid forward on the couch to wrap Leah up in a hug. Leah wrapped her arms around Eliza's waist and buried her face in Eliza's neck, not crying, just breathing deeply. Leah murmured quietly. "You know, I used to detest the way vampires smell. It was always easy to track them when they came through our territory because of their stench. But... you smell good." Realizing what she said, Leah immediately leaned back to look Eliza in the face, "I'm sorry, that wasn't weird was it?"
Eliza ducked her head slightly, and if she could have blushed she would have. "No, as long as you don't think it's weird for me to say you feel and smell different. Like, I can hug you or get close to you without fighting the urge to bite you like I would a normal human. It's nice." She looked up at Leah's face and nervously slid a lock of hair back behind her ear.
Leah looked searchingly at Eliza's face, her head moving infinitesimally closer. "I don't think it's weird at all. It makes me feel good."
Eliza allowed herself to move a little closer to Leah, and a shy expression crossed her face as they got closer. "Is this too soon?" Leah asked, almost ruining the mood. But Eliza shook her head and closed the distance between them, locking lips with the wolf. Leah felt utterly overwhelmed, her body shivering in emotion. Eliza was simply enjoying the contact, as their chaste kiss separated slowly and she rested her forehead against Leah's.
"I guess I'm done waiting." Eliza said feeling something deep in her chest blossom, and a wave of both joy and relief spread through her mind.
Author's Note:
Nikki Reed's first movie was Thirteen, she went on to play Rosalie Hale in the Twilight films. Uptown Girls stared Dakota Fanning who went on to play Jane. I couldn't resist putting that in.
The scene between Isabella and Edward was a bit challenging because she was close to tearing his head off. Thankfully we are finally getting into the meat of the story. I know it's only been a novel's worth of stuff so far (seriously I did not expect to have crossed 140k words already).
Next Chapter: Shadow and Fire
