Disclaimer: I don't own the Twilight Saga... or the sexy boys of La Push.

AN: No Beta. Just me.

I hope you enjoy...

Bella Swan

My insides were in complete knots, my heart was in my throat, and my hands were shaking from my nervousness.

As I glanced around the room, I see Sam rip the sixth napkin he's tried to fold because his hands were shaking so bad. I see Jared with the palms of his hands rubbing into his eyes. I see Leah glaring off to the side, the arms that were crossed over her chest was shaking. I see Collin and Brady glancing around the room anxiously. I see Seth tapping his right foot impatiently. And I see Quil and Embry staring into the forest.

And then my eyes meet his, he smiles softly and my insides loosens, my heart calms, and I'm filled with confidence as my mind goes back to a few hours ago.

~*~

"Okay, tell me what happened?" I asked Paul, as he came from his hiding spot in the men's restroom.

I had to send home the only other employee that was working. They couldn't see Paul all kinds of messed up one day and the next be completely fine. So I made him hide in the bathroom, while I sent Cassie, an older woman with a crush on Sam, home.

Paul sat down on a stool and moved over to him with a rag. He had already got all the blood off his face but there were still some on his legs, arms, and chest. I quickly got to work wiping down his arms. I worked from his elbow up, and once I got to his shoulder he hissed. I pulled back sharply and saw that the very tip hasn't healed up yet. I watched as his skin stitched itself up, it was always cool to watch.

"Sorry, now speak." I urged.

Paul sighed, and rubbed the back of his neck, and glanced sideways at me.

"We got into a fight. We were in gym class , you know our last period?" He paused long enough for me to nod, before he continued, "well we did our warm ups, but since we're wolves, we get shit done just a little faster , so afterwards coach sent us out to do our runs." He paused again and took a breath.

"I was minding my own business. You know, Sam put that injunction on me, so I couldn't speak or get more than 15 feet near him, right? So I'm running behind him, while Quil and Embry are up front with him."

He sighed, "Anyway, I was listening to my iPod and your playlist came up. Jacob instantly recognized it and started saying shit. I snapped. And we fought." He shrugged.

"You boys got into a fight on school property? In public?" Quil asked incredulously, making Paul wince and slowly nod his head.

"We kept to human form for quite a bit. Quil and Embry tried breaking us apart, but… couldn't" Paul shrugged, "So they pushed us into the forest. And then we phased."

Quil huffed, and I threw the rag on the counter and crossed my arms, as I stared at Paul's healing face. The bruised eye, swollen cheek, and flat lip were already gone and the pink scars were starting to fade.

"What did he say, Paul?" I demanded.

He looked away and started tugging on his left ear lobe. Oh, God. It had to be bad if Paul was doing that. He never did that unless he was nervous.

"Paul…" I grabbed his chin and turned his head towards me, I waited until he did to ask, "What did he say?"

Paul jerked his head out of my hand and glared over at the clock, before looking back at me and sighed.

"It wasn't good, Bella, okay?" I nodded for him to continue.

"He said, he didn't understand why everyone was treating him like such an asshole for imprinting. That we should be happy for him. And… he said… we're all stuck up your ass when we shouldn't be."

"Wait, what's that supposed to mean?" I cut him off.

"He was calling us out on our loyalty. Saying we're being loyal to someone outside of the pack. Someone that didn't belong here..." He trailed off.

"Someone not Quileute." I finished for him.

Paul hesitated and sighed before looking over at me and nodded slowly.

"Wow." I whispered.

I was… hurt. In the beginning it had been Jacob who made me feel like I belonged. He was the reason these people showed me any kind of loyalty. Now that he wasn't, will they fallow in his footsteps and turn their backs on me?

No, I couldn't think of that. It'll just eat away at me, and I fought long and hard with myself to show myself that I was worthy enough. If I let myself think I didn't belong, well, I'd ruin any progress I've made in the past two years.

"You know he's wrong, right?" Paul's soft voice brought me out of my thoughts.

"What?" I rasped and cleared my throat, trying to clear the thickness of my throat.

"You belong. You do. You don't belong anywhere else but with us." He smiled sadly, and rested a hand on my knee.

"But.." I croaked, and cleared my throat again. "He's right. I'm not Quileute. And He's your pack brother."

"So? No one cares that you're not Quileute. And so what if he's my pack brother? I never got a long great with him, even when we were just kids." He shrugged.

"He's your pack brother. You have a loyalty to him." I rationalized.

"You're right; I do have a loyalty to him, because of the pack. But there is no where that says I have to put the pack above what I deem more important. Do I put the pack above my mother?" He asked.

"No." I whispered, as I shook my head.

"Right. And I'm not going to do that to you either. My loyalty lies with you, Isabella Swan."

~*~

Quil Sr. had left quickly after that, his cell phone pressed up to his ear as he walked to his truck quickly. And about an hour later, a bruised Quil and Embry walked into the store cussing up a storm about how ignorant both Jacob and Paul were, and demanding they get some free meals for their hard work. I got them calmed and asked why the hell they were so beat up, to which they explained that they had caught stray punches from Twiddle Dee and Twiddle Dum while they were trying to separate them before they exposed each other.

Sam showed up thirty minutes after Quil and Embry, and had Paul go outside to show his account of what happened. Then he left to go to Jacob's and do the same. All the while, little by little, the pack showed up saying Sam sent them all here for the pack meeting. So I closed up early.

Sam's frustrated growl, as he slammed his fist on the counter, caused me to jump. I was so shocked to see him so flustered. I was so used to seeing him deal with everything with a calm that only he held, that this was just… odd.

"This cannot be happening! In public? Are you fucking insane?" He ran a hand through his hair as he glared at Paul, "How? How the hell did you get past the injunction?"

Paul anxiously glanced at me before looking at Sam and sighing.

"I don't know honestly. All I know is one minute he's bitching at me, and then he said some shit about Bella, and I snapped. I felt the injunction just break in half. You saw my thoughts Sam, you've seen Quil's and Embry's, and you've seen Jacobs. You saw what happened, why don't you tell me what happened?" Paul growled.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sam glared.

"You're hiding something. You're hiding something from me and the pack. What are you hiding?"

Paul stared into Sam's eyes with such intensity that I've ever only seen once, and that was when it was directed at me the day I showed up unannounced at a pack meeting when I wasn't even supposed to know of their existence. It wasn't a stare I wanted to see ever again. It wasn't pleasant while he was human and it was a lot scarier when he was in wolf form.

"What's that have to do with anything? This meeting is about how you and Jacob could've exposed us!" Leah hissed.

But I didn't miss the look Sam and Leah shared. They were hiding something. And I knew it had to be a big deal if the other wolves didn't know either. And they didn't; their furrowed brows and questioning eyes proved that.

"I thought you'd be happy I kicked his ass, Leah." Paul glared over Sam's shoulder at Leah.

"Oh, trust me, I am. But that's beside the point. You guys got into a fight in broad daylight. How about if it wasn't Embry and Quil that were there? How about if they were humans there instead?" Leah asked.

I sighed, and shifted my weight. I had been standing behind the bar for an hour and half already and my feet were starting to kill me. Paul glanced up at me over the counter, and nudged his head, motioning for me to come over. I walked around the bar, and stood in front of the stool between Paul's legs, so he could lift me and sit me on his lap. I rested my forehead against his neck, as my left hand ran through the hair at the back of his neck.

"Morning shifts every Saturday and Sunday for the next month, and you'll be picking up Brady and Collin's shifts also. Amy will have the rest of your punishment ready for you when we get home." Sam ordered.

Paul groaned at the mention of his mother. She was always a little bit harsh with her groundings. I bit back a smile as I thought about the time Paul got grounded for getting detention; he had to clean the entire house while Amy sat around watching soap operas for an entire month.

The bell above the door chimed, and everyone stiffened. I heard Leah and Paul growl low, and I immediately clamped my eyes shut tightly. I did not want to deal with this. I wasn't ready for this.

Not yet.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I heard Leah growl.

"I'm here because of her."

The voice made me freeze. Made the hand in Paul's hair freeze mid stride and made my eyes snap open.

And there she was.

The girl that ruined my happiness by just looking at my Jacob in the eyes.

Raven Call.

"You shouldn't be here, little girl." Paul growled, and I watched as Raven flinched.

I felt my lips twitch. I knew exactly how it felt to be hated by Paul. It wasn't very nice. Raven's face hardened before her hazel eyes found their way to mine, where they narrowed and she did an unattractive sneer.

"It's your entire fault." She took a step towards me, and my body automatically straightened up.

"What is?" I asked, in a monotone voice.

"That they're," she pointed around the room, and I saw Sam's eyes widen in the corner of my eye, "all being mean to my Jacob."

I flinched.

Her Jacob.

"I don't have them on a leash. They do what they want." I shrugged.

I needed to get her out of here. I didn't want her here, in my store. And I know they boys and Leah didn't want her around either.

"Oh, yeah? And you're not the reason why Jacob came home barely breathing?" I sent a glare above my shoulder to Paul.

He did not tell me that.

"No. That'd be me and the product of him not keeping his mouth shut." Paul growled.

"Look," I hopped off Paul's lap and walked towards Raven, "You need to leave. I don't know what Jacob told you about all of us, but it's not safe for you to be here. So I suggest you to leave." I pointed to the door, "You are not welcomed here."

"You can't tell me what to do, bitch." Raven sneered.

"Actually, that'd be me. And yes, she can. She owns this place, so we could just call the cops. Hey, who knows? Maybe even her dad, the Chief of Police, will be the one to arrest you." Leah smirked, as me and Raven stared each other down.

Raven looked over my shoulder and smirked, making me suspicious as I kept glaring at her.

"You know, maybe you are the La Push whore everyone says you are. What? Couldn't have Jacob anymore, so you jumped on the next dick you could find?"

I finally realized what she was looking at over my shoulder.

Paul.

He was growling viciously at her.

And I felt like I had totally lost it, as I pulled my fist back.

But my fist never made contact with the cheek I was aiming for, because a large hot hand is wrapped around my wrist holding me back. I follow that hand up its arm, over its shoulder, and to its face.

Sam's apologetic face.

"You don't wanna do that, sweetheart." He rubbed his thumb on my wrist.

"Why the hell not?" I glared over at the girl.

"Because she's… she's pregnant, Bella." Sam murmured but everyone heard.

Three things seemed to happen all at once. I flinched and staggered back, like I had been slapped right across my face, only to have Paul catch me. Raven's face drained of all its color. And the bell chimed, as Jacob Black walked into the diner.

I was a little shocked at seeing him. Because, if I thought Paul was bad, Jacob was way worse. Jacob's right side of his face was still healing, and had pink claw marks running down his face, neck, and disappearing into his shirt. His right arm was in a sling and he was walking with a horrible limp.

But that only registered with me for a few seconds, because I was busy trying to explode.

"How… How long?" I croaked.

No one answered.

"I want a fucking time! HOW LONG?" I yelled.

"About a month." Sam whisper and I watched as Jacob's face grew guilty.

Oh, God. About a month? No.

Embry's birthday had been on the second week of January. That's when we met her. I didn't hear about the imprint for two weeks. I had stayed home for two weeks. And it's been a week since Paul threw me in a cold shower.

That's about a month.

No. No. No. No.

"Get out."

No one moved.

"GET OUT! GET OUT! GET OUT!" I yelled.

My knees buckled, but I didn't hit the floor. There was shouting, but I didn't hear it. There was sounds of something crashing, but I couldn't really hear that either.

Because I felt a veil being drawn over my eyes.

But before I was fully succumbed into the darkness, I heard a voice.

A voice that gave me hope.

"It's okay, baby. I got you. I got you."

AN: Well, well, well... Jacob's been naughty... tisk tisk...

And Paul knows Sam's hiding something... What does Sam know?

Oh, God, Everything is starting to get exciting! I'm on the edge of my seat! ;)

Tell me how you feel about this chapter.... like NOW!