CHAPTER TEN

It was a twenty minute walk from the bus stop to Bobbie's house. I jogged there in less than half the time and then walked up the long winding driveway. He lived a in a large house away from any others, the drive lined with trees so it was easy to remain unseen. I noticed a new red Dodge Dakota parked to one side of the house and guessed that was Bobbie's. He was already sixteen and he had been heard boasting at school that his parents had bought him a truck for his birthday. I imagined it parked up by the gas station while he and Steve sat in the cab, laughing together as they planned to ambush Jacob. I ground my teeth together and leaned against a tree as I waited.

Bobbie always went out on Saturday nights without fail and I guessed it wouldn't be long before he set off. I had plenty of time and I simply stood there watching the house, concentrating on keeping my breathing steady. The last thing I wanted to do was phase right now – I wanted to be able to speak to him.

About thirty minutes later Bobbie came down the side of the house, a bunch of keys jangling in his hand. He was alone and I watched him get into the truck, then turned and sprinted off down the treeline to the far end of the driveway. I was far enough away to be invisible from the house and the drive turned onto a deserted stretch of road. I stood there by a tree with my heart hammering, adrenalin pumping as I watched the truck's headlights slowly approaching me. Just before it reached the end of the drive, I stepped out into its path. The truck screeched to a halt inches from me and the engine died. Bobbie leaned out of the window.

"What the fuck? Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

I stepped around to the window. "You already tried that once, remember?"

"Paul! What are you doing here?" He gave a small smile, which seemed just a touch nervous to me.

"I thought it was time you and me had a little chat," I said pleasantly. "Maybe about what you were doing Friday night."

"I was at the gym with the guys, like always," Bobbie said at once.

"Before that." I gave him a hint of a smile.

"Um...I can't remember, I guess I went home for dinner...yeah, I did. Then I went to the gym."

"Bullshit!" I snarled. "You and Steve got in your fancy new truck..." I took hold of the wing mirror and tore it off, tossing it away behind me. "...drove down to La Push and waited by the gas station for the bus, didn't you?"

"Hey, you broke my fucking mirror!" Bobbie cried, ignoring what I'd said.

"You were seen!" They hadn't been so far as I knew, except by Jacob, but Bobbie's face took on a slight look of anxiety.

"We can't have been seen. We...weren't even there."

"Listen to me," I said. "I didn't come here to argue with you. I came here to warn you and you can tell Tom and Steve this too. You lay one more finger on Jacob Black – even look at him wrong – and I'll do the same to your arms as I just did to your mirror."

"You're fucking insane, man," Bobbie gasped.

"No, I'm protective. Leave Jacob alone and make sure Tom and Steve do the same and you won't hear anything more from me."

"No, but you'll hear from me." Bobbie regained a little composure suddenly. "All I have to do is call Chief Swan and tell him you're out of your mind, going around threatening people, damaging their property..."

"And who's he going to believe, huh? You? You think he's going to be listen to someone who's having... hallucinations? He might want to check your truck and your room to see what you've been smoking."

I knew full well Bobbie smoked grass – the other guys did too and had offered it to me more than once. They had thought I was boring for saying no.

"What do you mean, hallucinations?" demanded Bobbie.

I stepped back just a couple of feet and brought Jacob to mind, lying on the ground bleeding with Bobbie kicking him in the ribs. I phased in an instant and thrust my muzzle back through the window, growling.

"Mother of God!" exclaimed Bobbie, jerking back.

I withdrew my head and raised a paw, dragging my claws down the truck's door, making a screeching noise and ruining his paintwork. Bobbie fumbled desperately for the keys and after a moment got the truck started again. I let out another snarl and quickly noticed the unpleasant stench of urine issuing from the cab. Then Bobbie stamped on the accelerator and the truck lurched away from me to the end of the drive, turned into the road and began to head away from town. The poor kid didn't even have the brains to realise that if he turned the other way, he'd be in town in less than a minute and I wouldn't be able to do anything.

I began to bound after the truck almost gleefully, easily gaining on it until one determined spring landed me in the back of the pickup. I paused a moment to gain my balance and then reared up and brought my front paws down on the roof of the cab, denting it in two places. The truck swerved, but continued down the road and I pulled myself up until I lay across the roof, my front legs sliding down onto the hood. I grabbed one of the windshield wipers in my teeth and ripped it off just for the fun of it. Bobbie braked hard and the sudden stop threw me forward. All four sets of claws tore across the hood, ripping up paint and metal as I attempted to save myself, but I rolled off the front of the vehicle into the road.

I would have stopped then, but again I saw Jacob in my head, bleeding and groaning in pain because of what Bobbie did to him and I was up in a second, rage boiling inside me, springing back onto the hood, thrusting my front paws towards the windshield as if punching. They exploded through the glass and a second later Bobbie was screaming, almost the way Jacob had when Sue Clearwater put his shoulder back in. I pulled my legs back and peered into the cab. One of my paws had landed on Bobbie and from shoulder to elbow his flesh was torn with deep clawmarks, blood running freely. He began to sob and beg.

"Leave me alone, please, I'm sorry, I'll do anything. I'll make sure nothing happens to Jacob, I swear. Please don't hurt me."

I jumped to the ground and backed off a few paces. I got what I wanted. I hadn't intended to physically hurt him, but I couldn't bring myself to feel guilty over it. I turned and raced off in the direction of La Push, my heart banging against my ribs and my tongue hanging out of my mouth as I panted.

It was only minutes before I reached Sam's house and I ran around the back and sat down beneath my bedroom window, breathing deep to calm myself down. It seemed an age before I could relax enough and in the end I had to close my eyes and think about Jacob, holding him, kissing him, lying on that couch in the workshop with him. I phased back and stood up, grabbing the shorts I had left on my windowsill. My dick was hard and standing up against my stomach.

"Goddamnit," I muttered, smirking as I shoved it into the shorts and fastened them.

I waited outside for a few minutes until my erection subsided and then let myself in through the back door. I could hear Sam and Emily talking in the lounge room and I hurried past the door to the bathroom.

"I'm back!" I called out and quickly closed the door. I had mud on my feet and decided I had better not make it obvious I had phased or Sam would ask questions. I showered quickly, put the shorts back on along with a t-shirt and then went to sit down and watch television with them for a while. Neither of them asked me anything other than how was Jacob. It was Sunday night before I heard something about what I'd done.

I spent most of Sunday over at Jacob's house again. The minute I woke in the morning I had an almost overpowering urge to see him. It was like part of me was empty and the only thing that could fill me up was being with him. I nibbled half-heartedly at breakfast and fidgeted constantly, glancing at the clock every few seconds.

"What?" I said when I noticed Sam grinning at me.

"Imprinting – that's what it does to you. You'll calm down when you see him."

Annoyingly I could feel my face turning red.

"Go on, get out of here," added Sam.

Twenty minutes later I was knocking on Billy's door. It wasn't even nine o'clock, but both he and Jacob were up eating breakfast. I joined them and ate some toast. Sam was right – as soon as I saw him, everything fell into place and I felt at peace.

We spent a couple of hours in his room watching a DVD and then went down to the workshop to try out our new den. It was perfect; we switched on the heater and some music and sat on the couch, me with my feet up on a crate and Jacob's legs resting across my thighs. I slid my arms around him and cuddled him, loving the feel of him against me.

"I don't know how you can be so hot all the time, it's freezing outside," he said. He was wearing a thick sweatshirt and I wore just a t-shirt, but as usual I was too warm.

"Guess I'm just hot blooded."

I turned my head to kiss him and he closed his eyes, his lips caressing mine eagerly. I plunged my tongue into his mouth, exploring, tasting him, feeling my pants rapidly becoming uncomfortably tight. Jacob let out a whimper and only succeeded in turning me on more. I was dying to slide my hands under his sweatshirt, stroke them over his body, unfasten his pants...

I drew my lips away from his with a groan and pressed my face into his neck, breathing hard. I didn't dare do anything other than hold him gently for fear of putting my hand on a bruise.

"Woah, sorry!" Embry's voice exclaimed from the door.

"Fuck me!" added Quil.

I looked up quickly. "I'd rather not," I said, trying not to be embarrassed.

Jacob snorted with laughter and pulled away from me slowly.

"What are you two doing here?"

"Well...um..." Embry's face was scarlet. "We thought you might want to hang out..."

"Too busy making out by the look of it," Quil grinned.

"Come in." Jacob got up and turned the music off. I didn't dare move and folded my arms across my lap, willing my hard-on to go down.

Embry sat down on a crate next to the heater and pulled his coat off. "So what's been going on, other than the obvious?"

Quil sat down too and Jacob and I filled them in what had been happening. They were horrified to discover Jacob had been beaten up.

"Did you report it?" Quil asked. "It's about time someone sorted those guys out."

"I don't want it reporting, Charlie Swan will tell my Dad and he'll be upset," Jacob said.

"Anyway, it's already sorted," I put in. "I talked to Bobbie; he promised there won't be any more trouble."

"You talked to Bobbie Delaney? When?" Embry asked.

"Yesterday. He's just a coward at heart." I'd already given Jacob a brief outline of my 'conversation' with Bobbie and he hadn't asked any questions although I'm sure he guessed violence was involved. Now I changed the subject to avoid Embry and Quil asking too much.

After I left Jacob's, I went looking for Jared. I knew roughly where he lived and luckily I spotted his father who was an almost identical older version of him, out in their front yard.

"Mr Cameron?" I said.

"Yeah."

"I'm Paul Lahote, I was looking for Jared."

"Oh, you're that new friend of his," Mr Cameron said. "You're staying with Sam Uley, right?"

"Yes."

He smiled and the look on his face indicated he knew exactly how I came to be friends with Jared.

"He's in the house, go ahead." He indicated the open door.

"Thanks, Sir." I walked in, took my boots off and wandered down the hallway. The house was similar in size and style to Sam's.

"Jared? You here?"

He emerged from a bedroom, looking surprised.

"Hey, Paul, what are you doing here?"

"I want to talk to you."

"Sure, come in." He went back into the room and threw himself onto his bed. I closed the door and sat on the swivel chair in front of the computer desk. "So, what's up?" Jared prompted.

"Did you hear what happened to Jacob?"

"I was out of town yesterday with my Dad, what happened?" he frowned.

I recapped finding Jacob beaten up outside the gas station and Jared uttered various expletives under his breath until I finished.

"We need to do something about those guys," he said then.

"I already did," I said. "I went and talked to Bobbie last night."

"Talked?" Jared's eyes narrowed. "What did you do, Paul?"

"Look, it doesn't matter. He's fine and he promised to leave Jacob alone and make sure the others do too. But until they prove it, I want to make sure that either you or I are with Jacob at school all the time."

"Well, that's easy, he's in virtually every one of my classes," Jared said. "The only one he's not in is biology and you're in that so he's not even going to be walking from one part of the school to the other on his own."

"Good." I relaxed now. "I guess there's something else I should tell you. Sam already knows; in fact he was there. I don't know if it's obvious or not to other shifters."

"What?" Jared asked curiously.

"I Imprinted."

"What? When? On who?" Jared's eyes widened. I just grinned. "Oh, shit, you Imprinted on Jacob? Does he know?"

"No, of course he doesn't know."

"What did Sam say?"

"Pretty much the same as you. 'Oh, shit'. He thinks it's going to cause trouble when Jacob shifts."

"Why, because he's supposed to be Alpha?"

"Yeah."

Jared smirked. "I don't see why it should as long as you don't mind him... taking the lead."

"Fuck off," I muttered.

I hung out with Jared for another half hour and then went home. Sam was there on his own, eating pizza.

"Em's gone to see her family," he said. "Help yourself if you want some of this."

The pizza was an eighteen inch one with just about every topping available piled onto it. I dug into a couple of slices and fiddled with my cellphone, wishing I could text Jacob, but he had no phone now. Sam was watching television and I glanced up at it as the news came on. The usual depressing stories – fighting in the Middle East, a murder in New York, a house fire killing a whole family in Seattle. I tuned it out until the newsreader's next article caught my attention.

"And now for some local news. The small town of Forks had a visit from what appeared to be one of Canada's grey wolves Friday night. Local highschool boy Robert Delaney was hospitalised after the wolf apparently attacked his vehicle, causing substantial damage. The boy sustained some injuries, which were luckily restricted to deep scratches to one arm and is said to already have been sent home by his doctor. Town residents are advised to stay indoors after dark where necessary for the present. So far no further reports of wolf sightings in the area have been made, but police are hunting the animal..."

My jaw tightened a touch. If the cops were out hunting, they might have dogs with them. Wouldn't they me able to track my scent back to the house? Doubtful. It was pouring with rain outside now. Anyway, a scent leading to La Push and then vanishing wouldn't make a lot of sense. Nothing could lead them to me unless Bobbie talked and he obviously wasn't going to do that. Who would believe him? I relaxed and suppressed a grin.

"Robert Delaney; do you know him?" Sam's voice broke into my thoughts.

"Yeah, he's in the same year as me at school," I said, not looking at him.

"Odd to find a wolf this far south, particularly in a town."

"Yeah, well, maybe it just didn't like the smell of the guy. Obviously it didn't intend to kill him or he'd have been dead." I glanced sideways at him for a second. He was staring back at me with narrowed eyes.

"Who did you say was responsible for hurting Jacob?"

"I didn't say."

"You think they'll bother him any more?"

"Unlikely."

"Ok." Sam turned his attention back to the television and shoved another bite of pizza into his mouth.

It was fairly obvious he knew I was responsible for Bobbie's attack, but he didn't chastise me for it. One of the pack's main rules was that we didn't hurt humans, but I guess there were exceptions. Protecting my Imprint and the future Alpha of the pack was the best exception there was.