Ch10:

A/N:

Another fairly quick installment. A nice Jared/Kim moment here. And yes, *guest* you are on the right track about the imprint and trust ;) More on that in the next chapter (ch.11).

The three of us made our way back to La Push. I could tell Anna was fully preoccupied, calculating, plotting her next scientific steps.

We dropped her off at the library, across from the school. She said she needed to focus, that she'd be a while. I started to walk in the direction of the house, but before I could get far Jared stopped me with his large, warm palm on my shoulder.

"Your feet are killing you. Let me drive you home." He took a few steps toward his truck while delicately holding on to my fingers.

His scent, although ever present, had dissipated slightly in the fact it wasn't making me love sick drunk at the moment. Still, the air was always fog thick around him.

I got into the cab of his truck and as I turned to look at him I noticed that, mysteriously, his eyes were back to brown.

"Why do they do that?"

"Do what?"

"Your eyes. They're green sometimes. And… glow. I first noticed a tiny bit in my room last night. But today…"

He smirked as he put the car in reverse and laid a calloused hand on my thigh, stopping any coherent thoughts.

"Hmmm. So you don't know everything." He gave me a large, self-assured smile. "You'll have to show me some of your cards, sweets, if you want to see mine."

His voice was husky and his tone was deep and it made goosebumps spread over my skin. He ran his hands up and down my Jean clad leg. My whole body ignited like firecrackers simultaneously exploding. Heat filled my cheeks.

Noticing, he pulled into a gravel lot and cut the engine. I looked out the windshield to a moonlit covered ocean.

"The beach?"

He nodded as he gave my thigh a squeeze. He got out, came around to my side and scooped me out of the truck and set me down on my feet. Jared towered over me with his long and lean body. I looked up at him like you look up at the stars. "Why are we…"

Before I could finish my words he pulled me closer, tighter.

"You said we would talk later. It's later."

His hand made its way to my cheek and he tilted my chin up to him so I was perfectly aligned to his lips. An insatiable feeling wrapped my whole body, inside and out. I felt full and warm and steady in my heart, but also physically electrified. He felt it too.

"Incredible." Did he say that about me, or this feeling? I wasn't sure. Maybe it was one in the same.

"Uh... this isn't talking," I stated dumbly.

He chuckled at my words and it felt like the whole world. I looked up at him and his eyes were aglow, again. His lips parted and now so close to my face.

"No, it's not," he said in a breath right by my mouth. And then, his lips were on mine, my heart explode and melt all at once. I reached up to brush my hands through his shaggy hair as one of his snaked down to my waist. His lips, as suspected, were pillowy soft. In that moment, it was if all of my nervous insecurities were place on pause. I knew I was in the right place and the right time. There was absolutely no doubt. Just for that now, just to experience this: this fullness. This levity.

His hands moved up and down my whole body as he kissed me with such ferocious passion. I tried to keep up, to return the hunger, but he was the motor on this boat, pushing me through unknown waters.

Jared broke the kiss to pull back to look at me with… was that endearment? No one had ever looked at me this way. That's what I wanted, right? What I craved at the hospital. What I craved while spending hour after hour watching #couplegoals videos, wishing I could feel anything like those gorgeous, beloved girls.

"Let's walk, baby doll. Time to have that talk."

Baby doll. He had sprinkled pets names at me all afternoon. It didn't feels forced for awkward, just like a normal confident thing that he did.

As if we were suddenly so familiar with each other.

Jared pressed me beside his ember like body as we walked down the beach. I felt toasty, as if snuggling by a fire. We walked and watched the waves for a while until her turned to me with expectant eyes.

"You ready to spill, Kim?" A lump in my throat returned. And my mind went back to my wavering thoughts, where I had been stuck most of the afternoon. He stopped us, tugging me from beside him to in front of him, right by the water's edge.

"Babe, you clearly know about imprinting, and the werewolf thing and… vampires. If you're not ready to tell me how you know… fine. I'll wait. But there is one thing that I need to make clear."

I inhaled a shaky breath.

"I am yours and you are mine. That's what this imprint means to me. You are mine to protect. I'm not gonna bail on you."

I was silent again just trying to remember to breath. Here he was, all in. And I felt it, smelled it, sensed it. But my brain… it worked in over time trying to connect all the pieces that would not, could not connect. He was so disinterested in me before, and now so fully committed? None of it sat right.

This is because you are not the real Kim, his Kim, echoed in my mind.

I attempt to create some space between us, give myself some breathing room, but Jared stayed firm on the sand in front of me and then moved my whole body closer to him.

"Stop it."

"What? Stop, what?" I gazed up at him.

"Whatever you're thinking about that makes you go cold as a dead fish and drift off to God know's where." He studied me and then changed to a softer tone before he took a long breath of air.

"Listen, honey. I'll try to respect your wishes here, let you do whatever you feel you need, but you can't put yourself in danger like that — what you did today -- going in the woods looking for vampires."

"I didn't think… I mean, I don't think they'd hurt me, aren't they vegetarians?"

"They," he said with disdain, "are gone."

I wracked my brain. I must be in the part when the Cullens move away after Edward left Bella in the woods. The movie montage part that mostly gets skipped over. That's where I was.

"Oh…"

"But there are others… ones that will definitely, intentionally, hurt you. Try and kill you, Kim."

That made my whole body freeze and the spell from earlier was fully broken. I shook my head trying, willing myself to focus. I had to get out of here. I couldn't be distracted by Jared and his love smell and this magical adoration.

It's Fantasy, I reminded myself.

I tired to take another step back from him, but once again he tugged me firmer to him.

"Stop man handling me," spilled out of me, more pointedly than I intended. I placed my arms on his chest to push my self off. He frowned.

"Stop pushing me away. Get out of your head."

"I want to go home, Jared."

This was all too much. I needed 2022 and to loose myself in the safety of mindless tik tok videos and non-paranormal normalcy.

He sighed. If only he knew which home I meant.

A/n:

Kim just has so much of the 2022/23 social media induced anxiety. If she could just learn to live in the moment :)