Confrontation

"Bells, get in the car," Jacob said as he ran through Emily's kitchen. "Emily, Sam is still running. One of us will let you know as soon as we can when he'll be home." Jacob had a hold on my wrist and was dragging me toward the front door.

"What's the rush?" I stammered out in shock.

"Charlie headed home. We've got to get to your house."

I managed to wrench my arms onto the doorframe to stop his momentum. For a fleeting moment, the look in his eye made me think he may throw me over his shoulder and carry me out kicking and screaming. "Jacob, you're being rude. I think Charlie will understand if I'm a little late."

Jacob grabbed my face with both hands. "Bella, we lost them. We divided up to search. Charlie is on his way home and there is no one with him until we catch up."

The gravity of what he told me nearly dropped me to my knees, but I couldn't allow that. "I've been here for hours," I said as calmly as I could manage, forbidding the shock to sink to deeply into my thoughts, "Emily should come with us in case they follow my scent here."

Understanding flashed quickly in Jacob's eyes. "She's right. Emily, get in the car," Jacob said bluntly and taking advantage of the fact that I had loosened my grip on the doorway, continued his path with me in tow.

A light rain had begun falling while I was with Emily. Moistened gravel flew as Jacob floored the gas pedal and sped toward the main road.

"What happened?" asked Emily from the back seat.

I glanced back in her direction. Her face was an almost frightening mask of forced calmness, but I caught the reflective glint of the tears on her cheeks. I could relate to how hard it was to keep the "game face" on when someone was watching, then how quickly the tears could flow when you thought no one would see.

"I'm sure Sam has told you that the female is a real crafty wench. Sam nearly had her - his teeth were inches from her shoulder and she dodged at the last minute." Jacob slammed his palm on the steering wheel in frustration with such force that it bent.

I grabbed his hand with both of mine and massaged. I lifted it to my lips to gently kiss the tension away. We rode in silence. I knew that Jacob's mind was with his pack. I wanted to ask if he was hoping that they dispatched her while he was away, or if he was hoping they would wait and let him in on the action. After a time, I felt his fingers relax and caress my cheek. No matter where his mind wanders, I whole-heartedly believe that his heart is always with me.

"There he is," Jacob said as we spotted the cruiser in front of us about 100 yards. He sped up to tail him a little closer.

"Um, guys," Emily spoke from her seat, "what are we going to tell Charlie about why I'm along?"

I was completely tapped out of adult answers. I debated for a moment what the repercussions would be if I just told him the truth. Fortunately, I stopped myself before I said it out loud. "Got anything, Jacob?" I finally managed to ask. The police cruiser was now in plain sight; I could see Charlie's outline in the driver's seat. I felt his hand tense again so I re-started my ministrations.

"Wasn't Sam supposed to help his cousin…"

"Charlie!" My scream bounced off the windows, reverberating through the car.

We watched the wild redhead jump out of the trees onto the road in front of us and push the cruiser off the opposite side of the road lifting the tires completely off of the pavement. Victoria crouched in the middle of our lane holding her hands out in front of her awaiting the oncoming rabbit. The sneer on her face was confidant.

Emily and my screams blended together, creating a constant racket. Jacob slammed on the breaks and the car fishtailed out of control. Victoria took a step to the side. I originally thought she intended to displace Jacob's car as she had Charlie's cruiser. With her new position, it appeared as though she meant to yank me out as the car skidded past her. I was fairly certain that I would not survive the extraction, let alone anything she had planned once she had me removed from the vehicle. The car hit a wet stretch of pavement and made a sudden lurch to the left sending it off the road and into the brush.

"I love you Bella," Jacob declared as he wrenched his door open, knocking down a sapling in the process. Two steps into his sprint toward the evil vampire, he phased into his full impressive wolf form.

"I love you," I shouted after him, praying that it was not the last time either one of us would hear it said.

I sat frozen in my seat watching Jacob and Victoria slowly pace as they sized each other up, Jacob carefully keeping himself between Victoria and me. My heart sank as, moments later, the situation deteriorated. A pale blur appeared from the trees on the north side of the road; Victoria's accomplice had rejoined her. He was a blond man who was in his mid-twenties when he had been turned. He looked to be less than six feet tall and on the stocky side. He had nothing on the girth of Emmet, but he was wider than Edward. They positioned themselves about ten feet apart. They sauntered toward my Jacob with evil smiles on their faces. The wolf in front of me bared his teeth and growled, splitting his gaze evenly between his two pursuers.

I watched in horror as the two inched closer. He was confident in his abilities, downright cocky at times, but he was now outnumbered. My only consolation was that if they overpowered him, I wouldn't have long to suffer from my broken heart. There would be nothing left to stop Victoria from carrying out whatever tortures she had for me.

"Emily, go," I stated coolly. "If they get through Jacob, you won't want to be anywhere near me."

"Bella," Emily said meekly.

"We can't fight them."

"I know," she agreed. "Let's get out of here."

"We can't outrun them either. Maybe they'll be satisfied with…"

Five more blurs came into view. Jacob and his brothers now formed a circle around the two vampires. I allowed my heart a sigh of relief. I wouldn't do a victory dance until the fight was over, but I knew the odds were now more in favor of the wolves.

"Now, Bella," Emily said firmly. "Let's get Charlie and get out of here."

"Charlie," I gasped and pulled my eyes away from the scene on the road a few yards away.

Emily had already scurried past the up-rooted tree outside of the car. I quickly joined her and we raced toward the police cruiser not daring to look back at the road.

Thankfully, being an officer of the law, made Charlie very conscious of all safety regulations. He was wearing his seatbelt. The airbag had deployed from the steering wheel, but the sudden stop of the sideways motion that Victoria had created had caused his head to star the side window. "Bella," he groaned as he began to come around when Emily and I started moving him.

"Dad," I choked out, "I'm here Dad. Let's get you out of this car." I had read in a magazine that despite what you saw in movies, it was very unlikely that a car would catch on fire after an accident. But I didn't feel like taking any chances.

"Emily?" Through bleary eyes he looked toward her as the two of us began to remove him from the driver's seat. The car was tilted at an awkward angle. The driver's side had settled against a ditch which meant we would have to get him out the far door. Emily had climbed into the backseat to help him along. I was in the passenger seat pulling his arm around my shoulders. We inched him slowly across the seat. He tugged and pulled until finally we were standing on the uneven ground with Charlie between us.

"Emily, what are you doing here?" he asked more plainly; he was becoming more lucid.

"Let's get you over there, beyond those trees," I said firmly, giving Emily a pleading glance then motioning back toward the stand-off still taking place on the road. On the plus side, the vampires seemed to have their full concentration on the pack, so they were not paying any noticeable attention to me.

"Yes, Chief Swan. I think we need to move away from the cruiser. I'm pretty sure I smelled gasoline when we were getting you out."

Charlie was now attempting to move although leaning heavily on Emily and me and wincing with each step on his right leg. Fortunately, he was not a large man.

We settled under a large evergreen tree that shielded us from the majority of the rain that continued to fall. He shivered in the cold night air and with every shudder, he whimpered. He was trying to be stoic, but I could tell he was in a lot of pain. The three of us huddled together to conserve heat. We listened to the threatening growls of the wolves not far away. I was thankful that I had put Jacob's dress shirt on before the accident, and I was equally as thankful that Charlie hadn't noticed that I was wearing it. The blow to his head must have really messed with his perception. I silently hoped we could get him help soon. I didn't know anything about how to take care of someone with a head injury.

"Bells," Charlie choked out between clenched teeth, "did you try the radio before we headed over here? I don't remember hearing you."

"Ya dad," I lied, "it wasn't working." All of this deceit was becoming exhausting. It made me think of Jacob and his pack. They had to be so careful every day not to let anyone know what they were really doing when they would phase into a wolf to run patrols through the woods. It must get taxing.

"I think there are a couple of blankets in the trunk. Could you get 'em while we're waiting for help to come?" He looked half-heartedly between Emily and me. "Jacob went for help, then?"

"Yes dad." This time it wasn't totally a lie. Jacob was trying to help us more than Charlie would ever know. "Emily, stay with him, O.K. I'll get the blankets."

"Be careful, Bella," Emily said cautiously.

I made my way back to the cruiser, stopping at the edge of the trees to see how the fight was progressing. The wolves seemed to be circling the vampires, backing them toward each other. As if they had been waiting all of this time for their audience to return, the action started. Victoria lunged toward a wolf to her left, I believe it was Sam. Through the misty rain and moon light, it was really hard to tell. If it was Sam, I couldn't help but think that Victoria had chosen poorly. Sam was one of the better fighters. Victoria had been eluding the pack for months, and any of them that had fought her so far touted her craftiness. The choice did not seem like her. I thought maybe she was trying to shield her accomplice who didn't appear to be as able to defend himself. The move had positioned her in somewhat of a protective stance in front of him.

What I saw next actually turned my stomach. Victoria had not chosen Sam in an attempt to protect her partner; she had chosen Sam to sacrifice him. Her movement wasn't truly a lunge but the prelude to a leap. She launched herself over Sam once he had set himself toward her, effectively assuring that Sam's teeth would sink directly into the slower vampire. In the next instant, the craftiness that the wolves had spoken of came into full view. Not only had she pitted Sam onto her partner, the next closest wolf was Jacob. Victoria took off into the woods. Jared leaped at her, knocking her off course momentarily, but she quickly regained her equilibrium and, in a red streak, disappeared into the night with the rest of the pack in hot pursuit. But the fiercest two werewolves of the Quilute pack remained on the pavement ripping the blond to pieces.

I remembered something Edward had told me once, "I'm not always the worst thing out there," he had said. It was in the early days of our relationship when he was admitting how much he craved my blood. At this moment, I truly believed I had just bared witness to the worst. Not only was she willing to murder me to exact her revenge for her slain lover, she was willing to forfeit one of her own kind to accomplish her goal. If she hadn't been after me, I may have actually admired her tenacity.

Something else Edward had told me popped into my head. To destroy a vampire one had to rip them apart and burn the pieces. "Burn the pieces," I said out loud. I looked up at the gently falling rain and then over at the police cruiser. I knew what I had to do. Sam or Jacob would have to phase to human form and somehow build a fire which would take precious time away that they could be pursuing Victoria.

I ran to the trunk and grabbed the blankets. I frantically searched for something combustible. It didn't take me long, signal flares. I had seen Charlie light them in the past.

I circled the car, sniffing for the gasoline Emily had spoken of. I realized that she may have said it simply to get Charlie to leave the cruiser willingly which I hoped was not the case. I spotted a puddle under the rear portion of the car and in the moonlight I thought I could see the tell-tale rainbow formation of gasoline floating on the surface.

I didn't take time to think about what I was doing, so I didn't have time to tell myself how wrong what I was doing actually was. I pulled the top off the flare and tossed it under the car then turned to sprint toward the wolves.

I guess I could consider myself lucky that I was successfully able to start the fire so quickly, but it was hard to count it as luck when I was knocked to the pavement by the blast behind me. I chanced a look at my dress as I tried to scramble back to my feet. It was now covered with mud and several snags from various stones and branches that I had encountered. The modest slit on the left side that had reached just above my knee at the beginning of the evening, now extended to just below my panties. I sincerely hoped that Jessica would never see the dress again under any circumstances; she may be reluctant to show any kindness to me in the future.

I sprinted into the fray just as the two wolves had the vampire completely dismembered. "Go after her," I yelled to them, "I'll burn the pieces."

Sam disappeared in a blur in the direction that the rest the pack had taken. Jacob's large brown eyes searched me. I could see the internal war that was waging in his head.

"Go after her," I assured him. "I'll be O.K." I willed myself to not think about what I was truly doing. I bent down and picked up the lower portion of the former vampires leg. I ran as close to the fire as I could stand and hurled it into the flames then returned for another piece.

"I can do this Jake. Just get her."

And with that, he must have been convinced. I watched him sprint away. I felt utterly alone as I took a moment to survey the damage in the flickering fire light. I shook myself out of my reverie. I picked up piece after piece, wearing a path with my footsteps back and forth to the fire.

I wasn't certain how thorough I needed to be, so after all of the obvious chunks were incinerated, I continued. At this point, I figured the dress couldn't get any worse, so I crawled on my hands and knees looking for bits of clothing or tissue. I found one clump of matted fire-engine red hair, but no other evidence of damage to Victoria.

"How is he?" I asked as Emily and I tucked a blanket around Charlie. He appeared to be unconscious again.

"I really think he needs help," Emily stated with concern in her voice. "He was talking and then all of a sudden he just laid his head back. He mumbled something about having fish for supper."

I scooted as close to him as I could get under the boughs of the tree. I threw my arms around him, ignoring the perimeter of space we usually gave each other. "Oh please, hang on Charlie, hang on Charlie, hang on Charlie."

As I rocked back and forth, the events of the evening began crashing into me. The tears started to flow and I couldn't make them stop. "Hang on, Charlie…" I continued to mutter. I knew that Jacob was out doing what he needed to do, but I was beginning to regret sending him away. I had no idea how I could get help for Charlie now.

"Emily," I asked through my sobs, "how far do you suppose it is to town?" I could kick myself for not trying the radio before I went for the flare. I knew that time was of the essence for getting the fire started, but I couldn't help but think that I hadn't taken the big picture into consideration. I hadn't even stopped to regard how I would help Charlie. Just when I thought I had the knack for adult thinking, I did something like this and realized that I was still eighteen.

I don't know what I would have said to the officer at the station on the radio anyway. "Hey Bart, could you send help. Charlie is hurt. Just look for the flames shooting into the sky, because I'm about to set fire to the cruiser. Oh, and be careful, there is a bloodthirsty leech on a warpath here!"

"I imagine it's about 5 or 6 miles."

"Do you think anyone will see the fire?" I was grasping at a straw. My next option would be to try and make it to town to send someone which is what I knew that I would need to do. I was gathering my strength.

"I don't know," she whispered. "I'm going to go and try the rabbit. It's banged up, but it may start."

That thought had never even occurred to me. It was so obvious. "Thank you," I managed to croak out.

Emily scooted toward the edge of the shelter of the tree. She turned back to me and despite the darkness, the fear showed clearly in her eyes. "Do you think they are gone?"

"I know one of them is," I said dryly.

"I don't suppose you'll tell me it's the red-head?"

"I wish." I realized as soon as I said it, that I had never wished for someone's demise before. I knew that there should be a considerable portion of my psyche that should feel guilty about that, but I couldn't find it. Maybe that portion would surface at some point in the future, but it was dormant right now.

I listened beyond the steady drum and drip of the rain around me. I didn't hear any howling. I was at least relatively certain that Emily would be safe. If the wolves were far enough away that we couldn't hear them anymore, Victoria probably was too.

At first I thought that my ears were deceiving me. I couldn't be hearing what I was hearing.