forty-nine

(Leah)

Leah suspects she knows the answer, but still she asks Jacob why they're about to waste a rare sunny afternoon in favour of attending a last-minute meeting at Sam and Emily's house—why they can't just send Embry or Quil in their stead and enjoy what little time they have before hell comes knocking.

"You're a part of this discussion," he tells her. Then, as if it might sweeten the deal, he adds, "Kim's going to be there, too."

"Great. I've been waiting to hear what she thinks about two thirteen-year-old kids being kept behind to babysit the poor, defenceless girlfriends."

Jacob swings their entwined hands between them and smiles, unmoved by her ire—possibly because she has been having the same argument with him for half a day now, ever since he spoke with Edward and tried to negotiate Bella staying on the reservation with them. When they'd finally gotten home, she had slept for all of five hours before waking up and continuing her efforts.

"Collin and Brady don't seem to mind," he says.

"Col thinks you walk on water; of course he's going to do whatever you ask him to," she reminds him. "And Brady does whatever Collin does, so it doesn't really count."

Jacob just laughs. "S'pose not. They've got the easy jobs, anyway—the rest of us have some finer details we need to go over. There was a lot we couldn't discuss with the bloodsuckers breathing down our necks. Not as a pack."

"Like what?"

He shrugs easily. "Formation, mostly. If the false trail works, then they'll be coming at us from two sides, so we'll need to split up. Sam will lead one half; I'll probably lead the other. Less for the Cullens to do."

"How magnanimous of you."

"Call it proving a point," he says, a picture of calm—though Leah knows him better, knows that his facade is for her benefit entirely.

She only wishes that it would work.

"And when one of you gets hurt because you're so focused on proving a point, what then?"

"Then I suppose you'll get your chance to stand over my grave and say 'I told you so'," he teases, pressing a searing kiss to the top of her head, but she doesn't laugh. "Come on, honey. It'll be over before you know it."

Whether Jacob is speaking of the pack meeting or the general drama that rules their lives, she's not sure. All she knows is that it would be far too much to hope for the latter, too much to hope she will be able to believe the words anytime soon.

As they approach the Young-Uley love nest, Leah can't decide whether she should be comforted by the fact that, despite the changes the last two years have heaped upon her life, despite the hell she has suffered, the tiny house on the edge of the reservation hasn't changed. The weathered blue door is the same colour; the singular, narrow window beside it is still adorned with marigolds; the rickety porch railings have not yet been fixed. The only difference is that, instead of being welcomed inside by her mother's aunt, it is Emily who stands at the door, half of a smile on her face and something that looks dangerously like hope in her eyes.

(Of course, the visit would mean something entirely different if it weren't a literal life or death situation, though Leah knows that Emily's unyielding sentimentality has surely spun this into some estranged cousins' reunited narrative arc instead of a last-minute battle meeting.)

Inside, the majority of the pack is already assembled in Sam's living room, crammed onto couches and dining room chairs and any other furniture that can moonlight as a seat. In an apparent show of his divine loyalty, she sees that Embry has reserved her and Jacob seats in the form of upturned milk crates.

At their arrival, Embry leaps to his feet and bows low, sweeping an arm out. "Your throne, Majesty."

"Idiot," she mutters. All the same, she can't help the smile that twitches at her lips, especially when she sees Kim nearby, comfortably perched on Jared's lap and giggling at the scene.

"Where's everyone else?" Jacob asks by way of greeting.

"Patrol. Sam's gone to round them up," Quil says around a mouthful of a turkey-lettuce sandwich. He hands over the other half on a plate, ignoring Embry's scandalised gasp that follows. "Want some, Lee?"

She ignores the name and swipes the sandwich, smiling sweetly at Embry.

"Man, you knew I was hungry," he whines, staring longingly as she begins to pick at the crust—mostly to taunt him, if nothing else. "Can today get any worse?"

As if the universe is answering his question, the back door clatters open, Sam leading Paul and the youngest pack members into the fray. Comfortable chatter dwindles into an uncomfortable silence as Sam takes the last remaining seat, leaving Seth and Brady and Collin to settle at his feet like children.

(They are children, she belatedly remembers. The Great Wolf War of 2006 has stooped to conscripting middle schoolers whose most recent battle experience stems from Call of Duty—not that they're overly good at that either.)

They're good at sitting, and listening, too, content to let Sam wax poetics about treaties and integrity and comradeship until the very notion of warfare is rendered painfully dull. And when Leah is the only one brave enough to point this out to their Alpha, it is unsurprising that said Alpha is rather unappreciative.

It does, however, seem to inspire him to hasten in reiterating tomorrow's plan.

"Jacob will meet Edward and Bella, then he'll take her to—"

"No," Leah says.

Sam groans. "Leah."

"Sam," she parrots, earning a few quiet snickers from around the room.

"This is the plan," he starts.

"So change it," she argues. "Jacob isn't taking her anywhere. It's not even our plan—that was to keep her here, on the Rez, only her controlling bloodsucker doesn't think we're good enough to—"

"I'll take her," Embry offers.

It is an effort for Leah to not jump to her feet, to pin her boys down and keep them from being so goddamn eager to seize every opportunity to risk their lives. She settles for grabbing his hand instead, her fingers locking around his in a vice-like grip. "No."

Embry smiles gently, because he understands her perhaps more than anyone else in this room—more than Jacob, sometimes; more than her own brother. "Someone has to take her, sweetheart. You can't look after everyone."

"I know that," she lies. "I'm just saying, Jasper had some good ideas—"

Sam lets out a deep sigh, cutting her off. "Jacob?"

Jacob raises his hands in surrender. "Don't ask me; I'm not getting involved."

"If you ask me, I think she's onto something," Paul interjects, rubbing his hands together with apparent excitement. "With bait, we'd be home by lunchtime."

"I don't think that's ethical," Quil says cautiously, eyeing Leah's deepening scowl.

"I don't think I asked," she retorts.

"For the last time, we aren't sending Bella on a death march," Sam says exasperatedly, silencing the disappointed jeer from Paul with a glare that promises violence. "We have to work with the Cullens—if a little hiking is what it takes to get them on board, then we're doing it. I'm done having this conversation."

In the end, the only solution they can unanimously agree on is to draw straws for the honour of carrying Bella wherever it is her bloodsucker deems the safest.

(Leah's sure that the fact they have a jar of straws on standby says something about them all. But Jacob swears on his life he has never lost a round, and that makes it a winning strategy in her eyes.)

To Emily's horror, and his pack's eternal amusement, Sam loses the draw.

(Jacob)

With the plan set, and the weight of babysitting Bella off of his shoulders, only one thing remains.

Leah waits until the sun sets, until they are finally alone in the darkness of his bedroom to finally let her fear show. Most days, she masks it with her well-practised bravado, with her cutting smirks and lethal retorts, but Jacob has spent months learning her poker tells, months figuring out what each flicker in her expression means. He knows her better than he knows anyone else in the world.

She curls up in his lap, her fingers digging into any part of him they can, and she whispers, "You're not allowed to leave me."

Only to him would she ever admit as much. Only he knows how much it means for her to say those words, to show this side of herself that is so rarely seen by anyone else.

"Promise me," she says, her voice a pitch away from begging. He does not think he's ever heard her beg in his life. "Promise me you won't be reckless, or stupid, or take unnecessary risks."

(She knows him, too.)

"Promise me you'll come back."

"We've got seven vampires on our side," he reminds her, though it pains him to admit as much. Allying with the Cullens after all the pain they have caused is not something he ever thought he'd allow happen, not in his lifetime. "We've already won."

"Promise," is all she says.

Jacob leans back against the headboard, enough to see her face, and he cups her cheek, holding her gaze. "You know I can't do that, honey. But I'll be fighting the hardest to come back. And you," he says, his thumb brushing her lips, "—you have to stay with Collin and Brady, with the other imprints, okay? I'm gonna be out of my mind otherwise."

Her expression tightens, and whatever the thought is that crosses her mind causes her pulse to race wildly. Jacob slips his hand underneath her shirt and begins to rub her lower back in small, gentle circles, and he waits for her tears—of anger and frustration, not sorrow—but, unsurprisingly, they don't come.

(She has never been much of a crier, and for that he is grateful. The handful of times he has seen her cry scared him absolutely witless.)

"I can't do this if you're not safe," he says gently, once the worst has passed. She lowers her gaze, but he hooks a forefinger underneath her chin, almost near-begging himself. "I won't be able to think straight."

"So I'll join Bella on her little camping excursion. That's going to be my whole family out there. My brother."

"No. No way. I can't leave you in the protection of a bloodsucker."

"Leave me with Seth, then. I can play cellphone, too."

"No," he says again.

"Why?" she demands. "Collin and Brady are younger than he is. Do you really think they stand a better chance than Seth if a few of those newborns stray a little too far down the mountain—towards the Rez? I won't be safer there than I am on any other day, so I don't see why—"

"It won't come to that." He shakes his head, resolute despite the small shudder that rolls down his spine at the thought. "The trap is going to work. Their psychic has seen it."

"You don't know that. She can't see the pack."

"We're not taking any chances here, okay? It's going to—"

"Don't you dare say it's going to be fine," she snaps. Her eyes immediately flick to the door, remembering his father down the hall who is able to sleep through a thunderstorm. Still, she lowers her voice to a hiss. "Stop telling me things that you think I want to hear, that the imprint is making you say—"

"This isn't an imprint thing," he insists. And then, at the look she levels his way, he adds, "Okay, maybe it is a little bit, but it's not just that."

The lift of her brow says that she doesn't believe him.

"It's not. You don't get it—you're human. Nobody in their right mind is going to let you be anywhere near the clearing. Nobody in the pack, anyway. And I'm certainly not letting you anywhere Edward thinks is safe," he declares. "We might have to be allies, but I don't trust him, or his judgement. So don't even think about asking him. Or anyone else, for that matter."

She scowls. "It's good enough for Bella."

"Bella's crazy," he says. "And a total martyr. The girl should have lived back when she could have gotten herself fed to some lions for a good cause." Jacob taps her nose. "You're smarter than that."

"Flattery," she scoffs, batting his hand away.

He turns serious, all lingering traces of humour dropped quicker than either of them can blink. "I'm not playing. I don't trust anyone else. If the bloodsuckers so much as pushed you . . ." he says, his voice becoming audibly more strained with each word. "You could get hurt." He swallows. "Or worse, you could . . ."

He tries, but he can't say the final word.

Leah says it for him. "I could die."

"Or bitten. I'm not sure which one is worse."

"Die. I would rather die," she declares firmly.

"Me, too," he replies quietly. He imagines her with red eyes and sparkling skin, without a heartbeat, and he knows that he would prefer to see her burn.

"Maybe I'm like you," she says as if she has heard the thought. Vampire venom is poison to the pack—whatever magic runs in their veins will not allow them to turn. It would kill them. "The heat, the extra senses . . . Maybe the imprint makes me too much like you to ever be like one of them. Getting sick proved that."

He closes his eyes and gives a quiet groan, head dropping on her shoulder. "Don't remind me."

It only takes a second before her warm hand comes to rest comfortingly on the back of his head, her anger finally receding in the face of his misery. Nightmares had plagued him until she'd opened her eyes again, until her fever had finally broken, and still he is not convinced that she's truly recovered.

Leah shifts within his arms, refusing to leave even an inch of space between them, and she begins to thread her fingers through his hair, suddenly the one who is providing the comfort and reassurance that they both need.

"I know I can't help," she says softly after a long minute or two of leaning against each other. "I can't fight, or leave trails, or help protect anyone, but I don't know how I'm supposed to just sit around, waiting until I know if you're all coming back or not."

He doesn't have an answer for her.

If the roles were reversed, he wouldn't be able to watch her go, either. Wouldn't be able to do anything else but worry until she returned—if she returned at all. And asking something of her that he would never give is the very worst betrayal, yet he doesn't know how else to keep her safe.

Jacob kisses her shoulder instead, hoping that she'll understand and forgive him one day, and pulls her with him as he lies down on the bed. Tomorrow, their ploy will be set in motion and there will be no time for quiet moments, no time left to be this way together before the newborns start moving west.

They're tangled up in one another before he knows it, their bodies pressed so tightly that Jacob can feel her heartbeat against his chest. And though she returns his kisses with equal desperation, she is the first to push away.

"Jake."

He feigns innocence, chasing her in an attempt to catch her mouth again. It has her laughing breathlessly against him, unable to stop herself from reciprocating for half a minute until—

"Jake."

He groans into her neck, the sound on the verge of a whine and the most coherent response that he can give with her leg hooked over his waist, even as it begins to slip and she pulls away, hands flat against his chest.

"We're not doing this."

"Not doing nothing," he mumbles, mouthing against her neck, all the way up to her ear and—

"Sex, Jacob," she says plainly. "We are not having sex just because it might be our last chance."

He snaps back into himself with a jolt of surprise. Guilt is only too quick to follow—he's pushed her. Too far. "I wasn't—that's not what I was trying to—"

A surprised blink. "You weren't?"

"No! Did you . . . Do you really believe that—that it's our last chance?"

"Do you?" she challenges.

"You said it."

"You're really not worried?"

He smooths the wisps of her hair away from her face. "Not as much as you."

Leah holds her chin high, automatic denial bubbling in her throat, but he doesn't buy into her show of defiance for a single minute. Still, he loves her anyway; he loves her even more when her fiery temper flares with the threat of violence that forces anyone else to run and hide—anyone except for him.

He knows better than to call her out on it. After all, he's only just smoothed over the last bump in the road; God knows he doesn't need more angst, not before whatever plays out over the next few days. Instead, he settles for saying words that he knows will soothe her, breathing them like a benediction into the tangled snarls of her hair.

"I'm not worried," he murmurs, his hands skimming over her bare hips, her skin warm and soft underneath his fingertips. He traces pattern after pattern until he feels her relax, until she's leaning against him again and her breathing slows to a steady rhythm.

She's quiet, but she's awake; he can feel her long lashes brushing against his bare chest, little butterfly kisses that tell him she is still conscious, still thinking.

Always thinking.

"You know, I wasn't asking for that," he says quietly, smoothing his palm over her hair again.

"Oh," Leah breathes, sounding surprised. "I would have if I were you. Last night on earth, and all—or close to it. I imagine that's an excellent pick-up line."

He snorts, rubbing a tired hand over his eyes. "Should I be using lines on you?"

This time, it's Leah who laughs, a little too loud for the quiet of his bedroom. "What's the point?" And then, a little more seriously, she adds, "I've made up my mind, Jake. I just didn't want it to happen if you didn't really mean it."

Jacob stares wordlessly up at the ceiling, wondering how exactly he can phrase the very true statement that he would always mean it because it would always be her—that it will always be her.

Her voice is quiet when she finally speaks into the darkness. "Would you . . . mean it?"

"I'd always mean it," he says easily, wrapping both of his arms around her waist.

She hums thoughtfully, running her fingertips along the ridges of his spine. "What if she changes her mind?"

"Who?" he says dumbly, only realising her angle after another quiet moment. "It doesn't matter what Bella chooses. Maybe it's my fault for not telling you more . . . for how I've handled everything . . . but I know what I want, honey—who I want—and it's not her. It's you. She could show up here tomorrow, and it would still be you."

He hesitates, waiting for her response. She's still awake, no doubt about that, but her even breathing reveals no secrets.

"Okay," she says simply, kissing the tip of his nose. "I can live with that."

He lets out an overly dramatic sigh of relief, squeezing her just that little bit tighter. "Thank God. I was starting to think you were going to run off into the sunset with Embry."

"I mean, he's real cute in a lost puppy kind of way," Leah teases, squirming when Jacob peppers her face with a series of noisy kisses. "He's very tall, too—"

And maybe it's her that moves first, or it's Jacob that surges forward, but in the space of a heartbeat, their mouths have found each other again, back at the same place they started. This time, she doesn't push away; instead, she hooks a bare leg over his hips, letting him pull her closer until they're skin-to-skin, connected entirely in the way that the imprint demands. He knows plenty about kissing—sure, she has a cruel, wicked habit of making him work for the chance to kiss her, but she never seems disappointed with him.

Not yet, at least.

When she rolls her hips against his, chasing more of his touch, he freezes, paralysed by inexperience and the lingering fear of coming second-best. They never talk about Sam, not in that sense, but Jacob's gleaned enough through the inadvertent perfusion of memories to understand he is showing up half-cocked—metaphorically speaking, unless his nerves end up getting the better of him.

Leah stills, pulling back just enough to get a good look at him. "Do you want to stop?"

His answer is immediate, spilling from his lips before she can reconsider. "No. I've just . . . I've never done any of this before."

She strokes his cheekbone with her thumb, soothing his racing heart with little more than a smile of the eye-crinkling variety, a smile that she only ever does for him. "How about I show you?"

A/N: The continuation of this chapter can be found here: archiveofourown dot org (/) works (/) 39547293