Jacob Black paced back and forth across the torn up linoleum flooring that had covered the kitchen floor for longer than he had been alive. He remembered crawling across the floor, back when it looked new. He remembered playing with the blocks his father had carved for him on the floor, when the wear and tear was just beginning to become noticeable. These were the vaguest memories, the ones covered up by stuff like the pack and legends and Bella. Covered up by stuff like chemistry class and rebuilding an engine.

He wondered how much longer they could spin tall tales to keep Charlie from having every officer in the state crawling all over the reservation. He wondered how much longer Billy could lie to Charlie's face and how they were going to explain this away.

The camping story was stretching a little thin, Charlie had been asking when they were coming back more and more. He was asking if everything was okay. And Billy had lied to his face, said that everyone was keeping in contact with him. He'd said that everything was fine, they were just kids having fun. It was summer vacation, he kept saying, let them enjoy themselves. Let them stretch their wings a little bit.

But he couldn't help but wonder when Charlie would ask him to have Bella call him. What he would do when Bella didn't call. Couldn't call, not the way she was now.

He wondered how much longer they could bullshit their way through this one. How much longer could Billy lie before Charlie was up here, knee deep in the reservation himself, looking for his daughter.

Jacob flinched, it was hard thinking about Bella.

He hadn't been to see her in weeks. Emily was taking care of her and Sam kept telling him that she was okay. Everything was okay. But he wouldn't believe that until he saw it himself and he couldn't bring himself to go up there. He couldn't bring himself to watch Emily pour more antiseptic into Bella's wounds or peel off the bandages and he couldn't bring himself to look at Emily's face because it all could have been worse. It could always be worse, he knew, but this felt pretty damn bad to him.

He had promised her she would be safe with him. He had spent so many hours telling her how unsafe it was with the Cullen's, how lucky she was that they had left her alone. Because now she wouldn't live with danger on her heels, the possibility of death dogging her every foot step. And every word had been a lie, because now she was laid up at Sam's house and she could very possibly die. Even if she lived, he knew she would never look him in the eyes again. He knew that he would never see her lips curve up in that smile that only she had. Not again, not now.

He heard the creak of the wheel chair ramp, the door opening. Billy was home and he knew by the sadness coming off of him like radio waves that he had been with Charlie.

"Dad..."

Billy smiled up at him, wheeling himself into the kitchen with arms that were too big for the rest of his body. The muscles in his shoulders, his forearm, tensed and flexed until he slowed down. Stopped at the kitchen table and laid his big hands flat on its surface.

"I don't know, son," he said, softly. Billy had never judged him, never looked at him any different, no matter what he'd done. And now was no exception.

"How much longer?"

"I don't know, son," Billy repeated. "I can't stand lying to Charlie. He's always been a good friend. When your mother-" Billy trailed off and Jacob's guts twisted into tight knots. He knew. Charlie had always been there for them, for Billy. And now he was forced to lie to him, to string him along helplessly and tell him how much fun his daughter was having. When, in truth, he might never see her again.

"I can't keep doing this to him," Billy said, "Maybe the best thing to do would be to tell him, maybe he can handle this."

Jacob flinched, lowered his heavy body down into one of the kitchen chairs that protested loudly underneath of his sudden weight. "No, dad." He had to keep this going, had to give them just a little bit more time. Everything could change in a day. Two days, maybe three. He just had to give her a little more time… Bella was strong. He knew she was strong but… what if what he'd done had been too much for even someone as strong as his Bells to handle.

"Dad, please," he begged, "Just, let's give it a little more time. Just a little more."

Billy shook his head sadly, "Ok..." his eyes flickered from Jacob's face down to the scarred table top. "Ok, son. Just a little bit more time, I don't know how much longer I can hold him off. He wants to speak to her, he says he's antsy with her gone this long. It's already been a week, Jacob."

Just a little bit more time, a few more days and maybe she would wake up. Maybe she would be okay. Maybe she wouldn't hate him.

But he had to know that she would.

When he thought about Bella for too long his skin itched and the restless urge to give in to the wolf and run prickled at the edges of his senses. He hadn't let the wolf out since… since what he'd done to her.

The wolf was anxious in the back of his head, dragging its claws against his skull as if to say let me out. Let me run. The obvion of becoming the wolf and running from this pulled at him.

Jacob dragged a hand through his unfamiliar, short hair.

He wanted the escape from every terrible thought running through his mind but he hated the wolf for what it had done to Bella.

He didn't remember much after he pulled her out of the raging ocean except the gut clenching fear that she wouldn't come back from this. And the feeling that maybe he'd missed something that he should have seen. He'd known she was sad… everyone had known that. It was a small town and people talked especially when they didn't have much to talk about.

But he'd thought… he'd thought that those hours they spent in his garage talking and coaxing smiles and laughs out of her that had gotten more and more frequent...

...he'd thought that they'd meant something.

He was burning hot as he dragged them both out of the ocean and pressed his mouth to hers for the first time. Not the way he'd day dreamed about while he was trying to fall asleep but to try a version of CPR that he'd cobbled together from movie scenes and the first aid video he'd had to watch during one of his years lifeguarding for extra cash over the summer.

In those moments, beating on her chest and hissing iBreathe, Bells/i between clenched teeth, Jacob had been panicked. He'd been flooded with adrenaline and fear and even the wolf had taken a back seat to the eminement threat of his own grief.

But once she was breathing and alive and lying to his fucking face… he'd been angry. The anger was where the wolf lived right now, it felt like. The anger was where Jacob was weak and the wolf was strong.

He'd been angry the first time he'd ever been the wolf. He'd been laid up sick in bed when Billy had opened the door for Sam Uley and led him back to Jacob's bedroom and wouldn't meet his son's eyes. That feeling that Sam was just watching him… waiting for him… it was nothing compared to that sick feeling in his stomach when he'd realized he was right.

Sam had been waiting for this.

Whatever was happening to him… suddenly it felt like Sam's fault. And he'd never been so angry.

The wolf had crept in then and he'd barely made it to the muddy backyard before he burst out of his own skin and into something stronger, faster and deadlier than the little boy who had played with wooden blocks on that vinyl floor was ever going to be.

Pack speak meant nothing was hidden and he knew that Sam worried because he could only ever give into the wolf when he was so fucking angry that it made him want to come right out of his skin and so he did.

When Bella had blown the whole thing off as cliff diving, fuck he'd been angry. Anger edged in disbelief, though, and he'd been able to keep the wolf back. But when she'd told him that she kept risking her fucking life because it was the only way the fucking blood sucker felt close…

He'd lost it.

Bile crept up his throat now just thinking about it.

Jacob couldn't think about what he'd done.

What the fucking wolf riding shotgun in his body like a goddamn parasite had done.

When Emily called and told him that she needed him to swing by the pharmacy Jacob felt guilty about just how relieved he finally was to have a task. Something that he could accomplish.

An hour later, Jacob paced uncomfortably down the narrow aisles of Fork's only drug store with his arms full of gauze bandages, more peroxide and antiseptic. Really, he should have gone further. Maybe run up to Port Angeles or something. But Emily had sounded like it was urgent. He had to get in and out before anyone saw him, especially Charlie Swan, the tiny town's police chief.

If he saw Jacob, his arms full of first aid supplies, Jacob knew that everything would crumble down around him before he was ready.

Jacob swallowed hard when he thought about what he would return to whenever he was done here. The last time he had seen her, Bella was laid out in Sam and Emily's bedroom, bloody and prone. Sam and Emily took turns on their run down couch that sagged uncomfortably in the middle. Emily changed her bandages every few hours, dabbed on more antiseptic, tried to keep her as comfortable as possible. Jacob was grateful for that, despite the twinge of guilt that told him that it should be him tending to her wounds, coaxing her into a few sips of water. It should have been him, after all, he was responsible for her. He was responsible for this whole damn mess.

Jacob helped as much as he could stand to, being around her hurt more than anything else he had ever experienced. It was the type of gut wrenching pain that he had never experienced before and god, he hoped he would never experience it again.

Bella whined and twitched in her sleep. Moaned sometimes and when she was awake, well… he tried not to be around for that. He was a coward, he knew it; but he couldn't stand those deep hazel eyes, confused and clouded with pain. Sam didn't tell him as much, but thanks to the shared mind of the pack, he knew that she asked for him when she was awake. He saw it in Sam's mind: her weak voice, her eyes hazy and cloudy from the pain.

The last time he had hovered in the doorway while Emily had tended to the deep wounds marring her chest and belly, she had sighed and lowered her head. Infection was starting to set in, she said. They maybe needed to take her to a hospital, they could tell everyone she'd been attacked by a bear while they were camping, Emily said. It was the same story that Sam and Emily had told everyone when Emily had earned the deep scars that crossed her beautiful face.

He knew that Sam and the rest of the pack, they would back him up on this right or wrong. It was his decision; they had effectively placed Bella's life in his own two hands. Sometimes, he wished that Sam would take over, make some grand executive decision and lift just a little bit of this burden off of his shoulders. It was too heavy for him to carry.

At the counter, he pulled a couple of sweaty twenty dollar bills out of the pocket of his jeans and pushed them across the counter. His mind was clouded with worry, doubt; he never stopped second guessing himself. Maybe that was because he knew; deep down, that he was making the wrong decision. That Bella would die under their ministrations, no matter what they did. Because he was too afraid to make the decision that would save her life and damn himself.

Outside, Jacob took a deep breath, sucked it in through his teeth and pushed everything out of his mind. Everything but getting the first aid supplies that Emily badly needed back to Bella and doing the best he could to keep her alive. He could do this, he could make everything better. But he knew in the back of his mind that even if Bella pulled through, he was only making things worse. Charlie would probably never speak to Billy again, never allow Bella to come back to La Push. Not that she would want to. In the back of his mind, he knew she would hate him. Forever.

He shoved everything in his backpack and cinched it tight, throwing it over one shoulder. Once he was safely out of the little town's limits, he would let the change that he itched for take him. He would let himself change and become the animal. He could move faster in his wolf form, much faster than he could have moved by car but beyond that, the silence he was craving. He could give in to the animal's instincts, even just for a few minutes. The wolf didn't feel guilt, or worry. The wolf didn't second guess his own decisions over and over again; it was a creature of instinct.

Jacob blinked, squinting his eyes against the fog that was still burning off, receding back to the coast lines of the reservation. Once, and it felt like forever had passed, his biggest fear was Edward Cullen sweeping back into town to steal Bella's time, reclaim the pieces of her heart that Jacob had just started to claim for himself, ride away with her his stupid silver Volvo.

But now his biggest fear was Edward Cullen coming back into town and finding out what he had done to Bella. Because in the end, that's what it came down to and all of the excuses he made to himself about what had happened were just that, feeble excuses thought up by a guilty man.

The wolf… Jacob… they were one and the same. And he'd nearly killed his best friend. Maybe had absolutely killed his best friend. The thought made him sick.

He smelled him before he saw him. If the rain hadn't let up and a soft breeze moved in, Edward Cullen would have been on top of him before he even knew he was there. But the edge of sweet rotting death on the wind told Jacob that the leach was iright fucking there/i.

Jacob froze, fear coursing through his body. Edward Cullen hadn't been Bella's favorite subject to talk about over the past six months, but he knew enough to know that the leech could hear his thoughts. His pixie sister could see the future. Jacob turned on his heel and ran, his bag banging against his back and his breath coming in anxious spurts.

When he was far enough away to let the wolf take over, he stopped and paced the wet pine needles that littered the ground. Edward had been the one to leave while Jacob had picked up the shattered remains and tried his best to put them back together; even if he had only made it worse. How much could Edward Cullen care though, when he had been the one who had left her in the forest, alone and broken, so many months ago. Maybe he wouldn't have even cared enough to glean that little bit from Jacob's mind. Maybe his thoughts hadn't caught the vampire's attention after all.

But still, something in his gut told him to keep running, not to look back until he'd crossed over the boundary lines. None of the leeches could follow him there, at least.