A/N for 2018-10-08: Happy Canadian Thanksgiving, all, and thank you for your lovely comments on the last chapter. Enjoy!

~ Erin

No Secrets

Billy was his usual self, Saturday morning, but Jacob was almost falling over himself to be solicitous to Bella. After he'd jumped up to grab her the milk at breakfast, which was somewhere along the umpteenth thing he'd tried to do for her, she blurted out, "Jake, I'm fine, really. We're good. I'm not broken, or upset, or anything—but you're freaking me out acting like you are."

"I'm—"

"Just sit down, please, OK?"

He returned himself to his seat. "If you say so."

"I say so. Trust me."

This made him flinch, and Bella regretted her choice of words.

Their "sorry's" were synchronous.

This made Billy chuckle.

"Look at you two old ladies, clucking around each other," he muttered from behind his paper. "Why don't you go do something today? Toilet paper someone's house or something. You're too worked up."

Jacob snorted at this suggestion.

Bella didn't think much of this either, but said, more politely than Jacob, "Think I'll keep my nose clean."

"Then go see Emily or something," Billy said, looking at Jacob. "Sue was saying there was something up with her truck."

"Yeah, I'll go look. Wanna come?" he asked Bella, his mouth full of food.

"Sure." She'd finished most of her school work. It would be nice to get out. She wanted to go see Edward, but it struck her as being too much too soon…overly clingy.

"Gonna be warm today. You be ready soon?" Jake asked.

Bella nodded, breakfast done.

The ride to Sam and Emily's place was short, Jacob's tools bouncing around in the back of the truck. The shock of the other night had worn off, and when she glanced at Jacob, he was still just Jacob. It was hard to put together him, and what she'd seen and felt that evening. She didn't try very hard to reassemble that memory.

When they walked into Emily and Sam's house, they found a substantial group already there—Paul, Leah, Seth, Embry, Quill and a few other, younger boys she didn't know, scattered around the kitchen and living room.

Jacob looked around nervously, and then at Bella.

"Glad your Dad reached you," Sam said.

"Um, no," Jacob said quietly.

"Finally in on it, hey Bella?" Paul called from the couch, smiling broadly.

Jacob shot him a dark look.

"Well she is, isn't she?" Paul threw back. "Gave her a nice enough scrape by the looks of it."

They all knew? Bella thought. Had she been the only one that didn't know about Jacob? About the others? Jacob hadn't told her who they were, and she hadn't asked.

"Shut it, Paul," he growled.

Paul snorted, but didn't say anything else.

"Least she didn't bring the leech along."

"Shut it, Paul!" Jacob hissed out.

Everyone else was looking uneasy now, including Bella. She took a step away from him.

As if this was her cue, Emily came forward. "Nice to have you here Bella. Come on. They're all going outside, aren't they?" She raised an eyebrow meaningfully at Sam.

He caught the glance, and nodded, jerking his head towards the door.

The room emptied of people, and when the door shut, Emily passed Bella cup of coffee.

"Why're they all here today? Some sort of meeting?"

"You could say that, yes." Emily paused a bit, lips pursed. "How's your arm?"

"Fine," Bella shrugged.

"Mm," she hummed. "And you?" Her intonation was light, but it suggested the disclosing than more than just her general well being. When Bella didn't reply right away, Emily pressed on. "It's just...it's frightening when it happens."

Emily's scars took on a whole new meaning.

As did the group of people in the house.

She had to pause for a moment, putting words together in her head. They weren't quite all lined up properly when she spoke. "Did—?" It would be rude to ask, she realized. "Are they all—?"

"Sam did, yes," Emily answered her softly, tracing a finger down one of the lines on her cheek. "And yes, they all are." She jerked her chin in the direction the boys had gone.

Like it had been timed, a snarling set of growls erupted outside, and both women whipped their heads towards the sound.

"Wait," Emily said, when Bella went to stand. "They'll be fine. We're….less durable."

She didn't need the reminder. Her arm throbbed, but she worried for Jake's sake.

The snarling and yipping sounds died down, and a few tense minutes later, Jacob stomped into the house wearing far less than he had been when they'd gone outside. He looked angry. He was clutching his forearm.

Bella turned her head away after she caught a glance of it.

"Oh God, Jake, you need to go to the hospital—"

"No," Emily said, voice calm, "he doesn't. He's fine."

Bella was still staring at the floor.

"Look again, Bella," she called to her.

"I'm really not good with blood."

"There isn't any."

Bella made a derisive sound. "I'm good—"

"There's no blood, Bella. Look."

Something in Emily's voice made her dare to look up.

Jacob still looked angry, but this was lessened by the worry in his eyebrows. He was watching Bella, one hand slapped casually over what had been a gaping slice through the length of his arm—a more profane cousin to the one she had on her own.

Now it was just an angry red line, the flesh all knit together, as if it were weeks old.

"How—?"

"Werewolves heal quickly," Emily explained. "Unlike us." She looked at Jacob shrewdly, "you trying to teach Paul a lesson again, Jake?"

He snorted. "No point. Nothing takes with that idiot."

"That why you keep trying then, hmm?"

"They're heading out," he muttered. "So I'll look at your truck."

"Thank you," Emily offered politely.

Pushing off from the counter, Jacob launched himself into a determined walk back to the door, closing it roughly as he went.

Emily snapped her eyes back to Bella when he left. "He's worried about you."

"Hear that's going around," Bella quipped. She didn't need anyone's pity or sympathy.

"Not because of what happened in Seattle."

An angry flush swept up her cheeks. She'd never expected it to be private, but she'd hoped some people would at least try to be discrete.

"More the company you're keeping now."

Ah, yes, this prejudice. It seemed well ingrained.

"I'm fine."

Emily looked at Bella's forearm, and the small shake in her hand. It came and went at will. Bella clamped her fingers around the coffee cup.

"They're not safe, Bella. Don't fool yourself into thinking they are."

And with that, Bella had had enough of Emily's nose in her business.

"Think I'll go give Jake a hand with the truck."

Emily flicked an eyebrow up, but then shrugged. "Feel free to come back inside if you get bored. I won't pester you with repeating myself."

In the garage, Jacob was bent over the engine, hood up on Emily's truck one hand holding a light, the other fishing for something amidst the indiscernible parts.

"Want me to hold that?" Bella asked.

"That'd be great," Jacob said, smiling a little when he saw her there. "Thanks."

He worked quietly for a bit while she held the light, muttering and then making gratified sounds when he found something long and snake-like.

"Did you have a fight with Paul?" Bella asked.

Jacob made his favourite soun—a snort.

"No, not really. More just lost my patience with his lack of brain-to-mouth filter."

"Yeah Jake, most people call that a fight."

"Sure, sure. I prefer 'attempted filter installation'." He fiddled with a screw-like object on top of a dome by the windshield.

"What did you fight about?"

Jacob put his tool down, and took the light from Bella's hand. His fingers felt hot where they brushed hers.

"He's…" he sighed, and then gestured to the bench along the wall, inviting her to sit with him.

"He's just talking what a lot of people are thinking...but are too polite to say in front of you."

"Oh? And what are they thinking?"

"They don't like that you're spending time with the Cullens. And they really don't like that you're seeing one of them."

Her eyes narrowed. More of this. "And how do they know that I'm seeing one of them Jake?" Something felt like it was snarling in her stomach, hot and distempered.

He sighed. "Not by choice."

"What the hell does that mean? What, your tongue just up and spat my business out all on its own?" She stood, taking several angry steps away.

"No! I'd never say anything, Bella."

"Then how do they know, Jake? I don't think your dad is blabbing it around."

"It's not a choice—"

She snorted. "Sure, someone made you say something." She hooked her fingers around the words.

"I didn't say anything—" He spoke this through clenched teeth.

"I'm sure you just shared it telepathically then!" She spat the words out.

He stared at her, and then said, "We can't keep secrets, Bella. They just—there's no keeping anything private."

"That's the worst excuse—"

"We hear each other's thoughts."

She looked up at him.

"No, not like your...not like him. Just us, just between us. And only in our wolf forms."

Bella sat down again. "How—?"

"We hear and see each other's thoughts—everything that we're thinking. It's hard to keep things separate. I really tried, Bella, with everything, but it just took one slip and then Paul—" He put his face in his hands. "I'm really sorry. Really."

This explained so many of Paul's comments.

"So they would've seen what I looked like—when you brought me back."

"Yes."

She didn't so much as sigh, as let the air leave her lungs. It felt worse, somehow, knowing they'd see it, instead of just hearing about it.

"We all try to respect each other's boundaries."

"Sure."

After a moment, Jacob spoke again, but quietly. "Emily's right, Bella. They're not safe."

"You don't think there isn't a certain irony to you saying that, Jake?" She arched an eyebrow at him, glancing at her forearm, and then back up at him.

His answer was soft and dangerous. "I've never killed anyone, Bella, and I know their kind have. We protect people."

"Sure, Jake." The 'whatever' was inferred.

"They kill people, Bella."

"The Cullens don't. You wouldn't have a treaty with them, if they did."

"Don't think our treaty makes them special, Bella."

She shook her head. "Fine." There was no point in trying to convince someone who was so prejudiced. Standing, she felt Jacob's hand grab her fingers.

"You're their natural food source, Bella. You can tell yourself anything else you want, but don't ever forget that."

This was just feeling cruel now. She yanked her hand away, and was moving towards the garage door when Jacob's words reached her.

"They killed your Dad."

She stopped. She knew she couldn't have possibly heard him correctly, but she turned her head to ask him, anyway. "What?"

"Your Dad. He didn't die in an animal attack, Bella. It was vampires. We know, because we found him."

"The Cullens?"

"God no, you think they'd be alive if they had?"

It was as if the sinews of her midsection snapped. She felt partially detached from her balance, the ground, and the notion that the world was real, not some cruel experiment she was the star rat in. "When were you going to tell me?—Wait, were you ever going to tell me? Or just saving it to fuck me up with?" The cadence and volume of her voice rose over these questions.

She didn't wait for his answer.

Jamming her key into the ignition of her truck, she heard the dirt and rocks spray as she reversed out of Emily and Sam's driveway.

If Jacob's voice called after her, she didn't hear. She was too focused on the road, and the blurry tears she saw it through as she drove west.