It was his last check of the day. All the others had been fruitless, and Charlie expected this one would be too. Sometimes, police work was just that—futile. The methodical elimination of possibilities.

He used this bland reminder to prepare himself for another disappointment. Then he saw the disturbed dirt on the path that led from the dock. Someone had been here recently.

Securing his own boat, he set the oars down quietly. The small uncharted cove had made it impossible to motor in, and he'd had to row, rather than risk the hull in such unfamiliar waters.

The whisper of voices, carried by the breeze, made him stop. He could have sworn they were familiar. Stepping lightly, he followed the path, feet silent in the August dust.

"Make love to me, Jacob," Bella whispered, pulling his hand closer in hers. Pulling him closer.

He needed little convincing, but those bruises he'd seen, the hurts she'd worn when she was at Emily's—those still lingered in his mind. "You OK?" he asked. "Did he hurt you?"

She swallowed, and he could see the tension there.

"I'm fine," she said, struggling to find her voice.

"Good," he breathed out, relieved, and then pulled her to the edge of the table, her legs sliding around his. Holding her head with his hands, he kissed her, tasting the sweetness of her lips, her mouth, her tongue. He released his fingers to fall to her waist where they slipped under her shirt.

She stopped his left hand immediately, redirecting it to her skirt waistband.

He skipped her directive, and went under the flare of the fabric, massaging her inner thigh. His thumb swirled into the soft skin there, as if testing it, assessing its qualities. This became a more substantial pressure that crept higher to the jointure of her legs.

His other hand trapped itself in the cup of her bra, wedged between the wire and the pooling of her flesh.

Lifting one of her legs up, she slid the zipper down her left boot, and then her right, kicking them off. He didn't notice her palming the knife that had been hidden there. She kept her other hand on his back, trying to make convincing motions as he kissed her.

Jacob's fingers teased their way into the side of her panties, his erection pressed into her leg.

The memory of him inside her rippled up from this touch, and she stopped her hands, stilling the shake that was growing there.

Stay calm, she told herself. This isn't then.

Her hands were sweaty. The grips on the knives held, as Rose had promised they would.

"Bella," Jacob whispered into her mouth, "I want you."

With Jacob's own hands now occupied in two intimate places, she put both her hands behind his back, and silently removed the second knife from the straps on her forearm.

His teeth were making claim on her lips, small nips that would otherwise have terrified her, but now only sharpened her purpose. He was breathing hard, blood appropriated for purposes other than respiration.

The knives were weighty twins in each of her hands, and she rubbed the heels of her fists into his back, needing to convince him of an enthusiasm equal to his own.

Charlie had reached the stairs of the small cabin, and from the foot of them, the picture in the window was clear enough: Bella legs astride, with Jacob arched over her. There was no room to imagine something innocent.

When Jacob's fingers yanked and ripped through the lace of her underwear, and his other pulled down the front of his shorts, Bella clicked the release on the blades.

He didn't hear it, thoroughly preoccupied with shifting her hips towards his, one hand guiding himself towards the softness between her legs.

It was Bella who entered him, both knives finding their fleshy targets, angled up and into his lower back.

There was a fractured moment, where the knowledge registered before the pain. As it slivered up to his senses, his hand, resting again on her breast, squeezed through the growing agony, cracking Bella's ribs.

The sound obscured the cocking of Charlie's gun, as he levelled it at Jacob, and yelled, "Get off of her!"

He turned and roared, leaping towards Charlie, and phasing mid air. The kick of his feet, now tipped with lethal claws, sliced up her legs and forearms as she threw them up in front of herself.

The repeated report of the gun was deafening in the small space, and Bella watched, with deadened ears, the sight of Jacob's wolf form collapsing directly over Charlie.

She knew she screamed out a panicked "Dad!" but she couldn't hear it.

The moment between her scrambling from the table to the steps, where the two forms lay seemed interminable. Charlie was breathing heavily, his body shaking under the weight and shock of Jacob's form. Her hands were covered in Jacob's blood, and she wiped at her clothes, trying to dry them enough to be able to pull Charlie out from under Jacob.

But Jacob was starting to move again, and as he stood, he growled and snarled, shoving Bella away to the side of the door with a push of his head. She scrambled back, scanning the floor for her knives, or anything else that would serve as a weapon, watching Charlie, still on the floor, struggling to get up.

Jacob's paw shoved the fallen gun away, and he renewed his growl at Charlie, looming over him.

It was then that Bella saw the pool of blood seeping out from under her father. Its circumference was a morphing obscenity. His lips were moving, saying the same thing over and over again. She couldn't hear it, but knew the sight of her name there.

Her own voice was silent to her, and she wondered if it would be to Charlie too. "I'm here, Dad. I love you."

He blinked, and then blinked again, and tried to smile and nod.

Then the tone in his neck and face melted away.

"NO!" she shrieked, watching more blood emigrating from his prone form. Throwing herself forward against Jacob's vibrating growl, she landed on Charlie, pressing into his stomach, trying to stop the bleeding.

She fought the push of Jacob's body, shoving her back. Her face was wet with tears, and her arms and legs and were beginning to sting wickedly. She pressed her toes into the floorboards, trying to gain traction.

There was just too much blood, and not enough of it staying where it needed to.

"Don't go Dad, please," she whispered. "It's not time yet. Please just stay."

The ringing in her ears muted everything, but the growl in Jacob's chest made her own vibrate.

She was so focused on Charlie, that she only understood Jacob's absence when she slumped forward further over her father, her wolf shaped counterpressure gone. The sound of shattering glass didn't reach her stunned ears.

It was the cold hand on her shoulder that made her head start up, away from her father.

"Carlisle," she croaked, staring. "My dad!"

She couldn't bring herself to think, let alone say anything about Edward.

Carlisle knelt over Charlie, pulling things from his bag, flicking his gaze up to Bella, speaking.

When she didn't respond, he looked again, a pinched frown taking in her appearance.

"I can't hear you," Bella said, "the gunshots." Her voice was cracking she knew, pained and awkward as it left her throat.

Carlisle took her hands, pushing them into a spot on Charlie's abdomen. He was working on the other side, fingers too fast for Bella to make sense of, his mouth still moving.

When he pulled her fingers away, Bella had difficulty letting them go. They felt stiff. They were covered in her father's blood. And her own. And Jacob's too, she thought.

Where was Jacob? She looked around nervously, wondering.

Then there were other cold arms, these ones circling her familiarly.

"Edward!" He was there, his face perfect but for the panicked worry it wore.

She couldn't hold back the flood of tears. Grasping at him, she took in too many details: the disorder of his clothes, the smears of blood her hands had left, and the tremble that had claimed them.

"You're OK," she said, again and again and again.

Everything became a wobbling mirage, Edward, Charlie and Carlisle distorted into watery images.

Edward pulled her away from himself, looking at her arms and legs, careful fingers running down her side, checking for other injuries. His touch made her smart, and twitch. Things were hurting, but she didn't care.

He was here, and he was alive. She tried raising her own hand, but it was suddenly too heavy—too sore to respond, and it was her eyes that trailed down his form, ensuring he was whole and present.

"You're safe," she rasped. "You're OK." Then she swallowed. "Charlie—my Dad, is he OK?"

She could barely see now, the tears replenishing themselves, the room starting to tremble with them.

Edward said nothing, but picked her up, Carlisle mirroring the same action with Charlie. They were moving, and it was becoming too much to hold on to the present. To seeing. Her eyes were closing, fighting her body's purposeful escape. There were flickers of things: Water spraying, and the thunk of waves painful at her chest, cold air and colder hands. Finally, her mind released itself from the hold of consciousness, and there was the blessing of nothingness.