Paul's POV

Embry had offered to drive Jordan home that night. Explaining that he could stay with her for a bit as they had a health assignment due the following week and they were in pairs and Jordan had agreed to go with Embry as he had been away on patrol the day, they chose partners.

Hands went around my waist as I looked down at her. She was perfect for me; her temper was very brutal though from what I had seen, and I was slightly worried what was going to happen if the grounding didn't end when it was supposed to. "Embry is driving you home tonight." I told her as we walked over to Jake's car. "Well Jake is but Embry is staying with you something about a health assignment."

She nodded standing on her tip toes to give me a kiss on the side of my face. "Ya, we got paired up and I figured Embry would prefer going with me than going by himself. So, I told the teacher that we had already discussed it and we were going to partner up for this one."

I laughed for a second. "Had you talked?"

She laughed shaking her head as the two walked up.

"Okay you two love birds. Let's get Jordan home so hopefully her father won't ground her for longer and make us all pay the price of dealing with Paul." Jake smiled and glanced between the two of us. "Sam was going to go and try and find out what had happened to cause the grounding this afternoon."

Jordan smiled getting into the car. "I'm not too worried as it will be over tomorrow anyway." She shrugged shutting the door.

I turned to Jake. "Any idea if he actually got an answer from her father?"

Jake shrugged. "I haven't spoken to him since before her counselling appointment. You head over and see him he should be at the house by now and find out if he knows anything. I'm going to get these two over to her place and they can get their assignment done. From what Jordan said she has it almost all mapped out just have to put it all good and do a presentation thing for it."

I nodded. "Embry said he should be to Sam's before we start eating dinner." I walked away towards my truck where Jared was waiting for me.

He laughed when he saw my upset face. "Dude stop pouting you will get to see her at school tomorrow and then you have your date the day after that. Have to talked to Emily yet about making you those finger foods you were thinking about?"

I nodded. "Yes, I have spoken to her. She said that she would be completely fine making them and since they are a serve cold thing, she was probably going to do it tomorrow during the day and then just hide them away for me until Friday night."

We both got into the truck and had the short drive over to Sam's. When we got there, I looked at Jared realizing that Kim hadn't come with us.

"She has some kind of meeting tonight. Well, it is a doctor appointment."

I nodded as we walked into the house and settled in the living room.

A minute later Emily walked out with a plate of muffins glancing at me. "What are you doing here, Paul?" She asked setting the plate down on the table.

I stood up glaring at her. "What am I not allowed to be here now either? I can't go over and see my imprint because she is grounded for God knows what reason. I don't want to be at home because I can't think there. So here seems like a logical place for me to be."

She shrank back from me. "I mean didn't you get the text that Sam sent you?"

I shook my head glancing at my phone. I tapped the screen and nothing. "It's dead I forgot to charge it last night."

Jared pulled the charger from his bag handing it to me. "Charge it now but I would go see what Sam wanted to tell you in the message and just explain to him that your phone had died when you were at school today."

I nodded heading out the back door to the woods where I stripped and phased. Sam had been out in the back yard for the past while, but I guess he hadn't seen my truck pull into the front yard.

"You wanted something?" I asked him. He turned and looked at me before phasing back and putting on a pair of cut offs.

"What are you doing here? I texted you before school ended."

I phased back myself. "My phone died during school today. I didn't know that you had sent me a message until Emily said something to me. My phone is charging inside right now, I borrowed Jared's charger for a bit. It should be done in about half an hour."

He smiled. "That is okay. But you need to head over to Jordan's place and see her father. He wants to talk to the both of you tonight."

I glanced back at the house. "Embry is with her right now he is working on a school assignment with her. Jake dropped them off there on his way home then he was going to be coming here."

He huffed. "And if they are working on a school assignment neither one of them is going to want to be moving any time soon from that." We walked back towards the house together. "Just get you phone and head over there. I don't know what Sam is going to do about Embry being there and knowing him and the way that I usually am about schoolwork he is going to say that it needs to come first."

I laughed for a second. He was completely right the fact that the two of them had gotten together to work on schoolwork would mean that Embry would be hard to get out of the house especially if we were fighting with Jordan about me being there.

"I will call Embry and ask him to come here, then hopefully you can convince Jordan to come out of her room and not lock herself in somewhere." He pulled out his phone dialling Embry's number when it went right to voicemail. He turned to me. "You head over there after you grab your phone. Hopefully his phone isn't dead, and he was just on the phone, and he will call me back when he gets off of it."

I laughed again grabbing my phone and heading for the door and my truck. It had been a long week, and I did wonder what was going on that would cause Sam to be willing to break the rules that he had set out for Jordan to follow through the week. Though I did know that when Sam got edgy about something he could really convince some people to do a few things.

I got into my truck going for the short drive over to Jordan's place, parking behind her father's truck and recognizing Rav's and Ed's vehicles in the yard as well. I knocked on the door waiting for someone to come it. Rav opened the door looking really grim.

"Come on in Paul. We have a minor situation here that we are just waiting for Lou to get over here."

I walked into the living room and Sam didn't look good. He was pale and his head was in his hands not even looking up at me when I walked in. "Why are you waiting for Lou?"

Ed glanced up. "Jordan found out you were coming over and she locked herself in the bathroom. Embry said he was going to try and call Jake to come over to see if he could get her out and he is apparently on his way over right now too. Lou can pick the lock on the door."

I nodded walking towards Jordan's room, Embry was sitting on her bed playing with his phone when I walked into the room. "So, you are here?"

I nodded. "Sam ordered me to come. He also said he wanted you to call him when I got here and he hoped that you had been on the phone when he tried to call you and that you would call him back when you got off of it."

He just shook his head. "I was trying to call Jake. He is on his way over here. I figured with the way Jordan reacted to him. That day with the bathroom situation that he might be able to do that again if we need him to and convince her to come out of there. I am not going to call Sam back though until Jake gets here and I can explain the situation to him completely."

I nodded. "Care to tell me what happened?"

Jake walked into the room, smiling at the two of us. "That goes double for me and why haven't you called Sam back yet?"

Embry just shrugged. "I didn't want him to order me to leave here." He shut the door to Jordan's room glancing at the two of us. "When her father came into the room everything was fine. But when he asked if she wanted to talk to him, she just simply ignored him like she hadn't heard what he had said to her at all. She simply just continued talking to me about our project. He looked at me and then told me that Paul was going to be coming over so that they could all talk and she ran into the bathroom. I haven't heard a sound come from there since. I tried to get her to knock on the door or something to say that she was okay but nothing. I got worried that something may have happened to her that is when I called you." He looked over at Jake. "I was hoping that with the way she had reacted to you the other day at school that maybe you could do that here and force her to unlock the door and at least talk to one of us at all. I know that probably any of the three in the living room would probably talk to her."

Jake's POV

I opened the door walking out into the living room looking at the three men that were sitting there. "I might have a way to get Jordan to come out of the bathroom almost willingly."

Rav looked up at me, "Are you sure it will work?"

I shrugged. "Honestly, I am not sure. But I am willing to try something that possibly will work but I need to know if she askes to talk to any one of you that you would be willing to come and talk to her about what is happening."

Sam shook his head at that before glancing at Ed. Ed just nodded having a conversation that I didn't understand between the two of them.

"Rav, what is the verdict?"

Ed nodded to me. "Anyone she wants to talk to even if they aren't here, we will get them. Everyone on the team knows what the situation is." He stood up walking over to the kitchen nodding his head over for me to follow him. "I will warn you about the situation. Jordan is a trained negotiator, and that mind is probably going 90 miles an hour right now trying to figure out what to ask for. I will keep my distance but if you need anything cleared have either Embry or Paul come and ask but they are asking me. Sam is pissed about the situation right now, so he isn't thinking clearly."

I nodded walking back to the bathroom door knocking on it. I placed my ear up to the door and I could hear sniffles. Glancing into her bedroom I could see that Embry was back working on the assignment and Paul was sitting on the bed looking really grim.

"Jordan" I let the alpha power that I so rarely used seep into my voice "you need to unlock this door and let someone in to talk to you."

The sharp inhale of her breath made me smile. For whatever reason she was reacting to the alpha voice and that would be the saving grace tonight. The door lock clicked before a small voice came through saying "You and Embry. I want to know why my father is punishing me by inviting Paul over."

"Embry go in there and sit with her. Don't worry I will handle Sam. I need to go talk to the ones in the living room. Tell her I am finding out what she has asked me to find out."

Embry nodded getting up off the floor and opening the bathroom door. She was sitting on the floor in front of the bathtub. Her eyes were red as if she had been crying quite a bit.

I headed for the living room gesturing for Paul to come follow me. "Embry is with her right now in the bathroom."

Ed glanced down the hallway to see the door slightly open still. "Nice. But what did you have to promise her to get her to open the door."

"She wants to know why her father is punishing her by inviting Paul over while she is still grounded." I glanced between Ed and Sam. "If Paul being here is what is causing this he can easily go back to Sam's for the night. I mean her grounding is over tomorrow so what ever this is it can probably wait until then to be discussed with her."

Ed shook his head. "Always with Jordan there has been a rule when she gets grounded that if at the end of the period, she hasn't figured out what she has done it gets extended by a day." He held up his hand when Paul went to protest. "However, this one will be a problem. You see she really hasn't done anything wrong, and we thought it was only right for Sam to explain himself to both Paul and Jordan at the same time."

A hand on Paul's shoulder held him in place as he started to turn around. "I need you to stay here." The voice was stern but not an alpha command. "You going into that room is only going to irritate the situation more." I turned to the rest of the group. "So, we need her to come out here into the living room to talk to everyone. You apposed to Embry and I staying for this if that is the only way I can convince her to leave that room?"

Ed shook his head. "If you have to stay then so be it. Jordan needs to hear this so does Paul."

I nodded pointing to the chair and walking down the hallway. Paul was very close to the edge right now and I was concerned.

"It's Jake, don't worry Jordan nothing is going to happen."

I could hear Embry say when I started pushing the door open.

"How did you know?"

Embry laughed. "His hands, well fingernails. Have you never noticed that Paul's are usually clean where Jake's are normally filled with car grease."

Jordan shook her head pulling her hair over her shoulder running her fingers through it. "Nope never but I guess that makes sense. Paul always is washing his hands."

I sat down on the other side of Jordan smiling at her. "So, I was able to find out a few things, but I need you to do me a favour."

Jordan nodded slowly.

"Okay, so your father is in the living room right now with Ed, Rav, and Paul. Embry and I can join you for this, but I need you to go out there and talk to them or at the very least listen to what they have to say about this entire grounding situation. I will tell you that Paul is here because of after the meeting with your father this afternoon Sam asked Paul to come over. Though because your boy friend out there is a dodo, he forgot to charge his cell phone, so he didn't get the message until he got to Sam's place tonight and yelled at Emily."

"Why would he yell at Emily?"

"That is a long story and a bit of a funny one. Don't worry Emily isn't mad or upset at all. There was a slight misunderstanding, and she was the one in the middle. So will you come out to the living room and chat with everyone out there?"

She shook her head. "I will go out there and listen to what they have to say but I am not discussing it at all. So, the deal is this, I go out and listen. Then Embry and I finish the project and go out for pizza afterwards."

Embry scoffed. "You said burgers, I want diner food again."

Jordan just rolled her eyes and nodded. "Fine we can do burgers again."

I laughed. "Let me just go check about this and I will be back with an answer. You might want to brush your hair though before Paul sees it as it is a complete mess." I turned around placing a hand on the door before looking back at Jordan. "You will stay in here with Embry while I go ask if this is okay?"

Jordan nodded resting her head on Embry's shoulder. This had taken a lot out of her. I know when we defy or struggle with orders it drains us. Whatever she was I wasn't sure what it would do to her.

I made my way out to the living room. Pau looked like shit. The fact that she was crying wasn't good for him. I placed a hand on his shoulder hoping to give him some comfort before glancing at Ed and Sam. "I spoke to her and she says that she will come out and listen to what you have to say and then she wants to get this assignment done with Embry. Though she did make a point of saying that she wasn't discussing this."

Ed smiled. "I think in the circumstance that is the best we can hope for from her."

I nodded before turning and heading back towards the bathroom. I bumped shoulders with Paul and smiled at him. "She is okay, I can only imagine how hard this is on you right now but please try to stay calm. Jordan needs you to not lose it tonight."

He nodded and took a steadying breath before heading to a solo seat in the living room leaving the love seat for Jordan and one of us.

Knocking on the bathroom door and opening it. Me giving Jordan some space seems to have relieved some of the pressure from the order. "Feeling better?"

She nodded. "Ya, what happened? I mean it isn't the first time that it has happened. Usually, it only happens with Rav when he is actually serious about something. Yet now it has happened twice with you, and I don't get it."

I shrugged. "I will explain it to you on Saturday. We can go for a walk on the beach or something like that together. Maybe even drag Paul along with us. But for right now, Ed has agreed to your terms of you just coming and listening and then finishing your project then going to dinner with Embry. Though I would suggest that maybe Paul joins you for dinner." She opened her mouth to protest the idea of that to me before I raised my hand. "I know you are grounded but let us just say that probably will be over tonight when this conversation is done."

She simply just tilted her head looking at me questionably. "If the grounding is done as of the end of this conversation, then yes Paul can join us for dinner."

She stood up walking towards the living room placing a hand on Paul's shoulder and ruffling his hair a bit before sitting cross legged on the floor in front of the love seat pointing at it for both of us to sit down on it.

We both joined her there having a seat on the love seat together before I glanced at Ed then to Sam. "I think it is about time we find out why you called Paul over here Sam."

Sam looked up his eyes focused on his daughter. "After what just happened here, I don't know why I would even consider shortening the grounding you are currently on. Locking yourself in the bathroom is not the way to deal with a situation like this." With that he got up walking towards the kitchen before he turned to me. "And you can inform Sam that she is my daughter and when I say she is grounded then it is done for a reason even if the reason isn't right in his eyes, it is in mine."

My jaw dropped. When Jordan went to stand up Embry grabbed her around the arms walking back towards her bedroom going in that doorway instead of the bathroom closing the door over but not shutting it tightly.

My focus turned to Paul who was visibly shaking, well shit he was about to lose it right here in the living room of his girl friend's house. "Go to Sam's stay out in the yard and if he asks why, you are there tell him I sent you."

His eyes met mine then towards Jordan's room before he listened to the alpha order, I had just given him and left the house. A shiver went up my spine as there was little, I could do about the situation with Paul right now. He had been promised that the grounding would be over tonight. Then I turned my attention to Ed and Rav who were still sitting there shell shocked by the situation.

"Care to explain what just happened?" I practically growled at the two of them.

Rav shook his head. "I'm going to go check on Jordan."

My arm went out blocking his way. "No, for the time being just leave her in there with Embry. I am sure that the two of them are back working on their project right now. But one of you is going to explain to me what just happened and why Sam didn't do what he was supposed to do."

Ed shook his head getting up walking to the kitchen. "What was that?" Sam turned away from him before Ed put a hand on his shoulder turning him back around. "No. You were supposed to tell Jordan that you messed up. That this grounding was a screw up. That she didn't deserve to be grounded this time. Not yell at her and complain about what she did when she found you broke the grounding rules on her. What you did tonight was not fair to anyone. You have put a few people in really bad positions right now Sam."

Sam shook his hand off before turning to Rav. "Watch over Jordan. I'm going for a run." He turned to Ed and motioned to the door and Ed followed him outside.

I went for the door intent on listening to their conversation.

Rav glanced at me. "I know this sucks right now, but Ed will try to convince him to tell Jordan what is going on."

I nodded. "I don't get it. All the work that it took convincing Jordan to come out here only to have her yelled at for running into the bathroom in the first place. What was the point, you lot could have done that without calling me over here and just left her in the bathroom and gotten your friend to come over and unlock the door."

Rav just shrugged. "Sam has never messed up this badly. There was a break ages ago between Jordan and Jules. Before I joined the team. Jules messed up like this and grounded Jordan for 2 weeks for something that Jordan didn't do. The teacher had misplaced Jordan's assignment for one class and the teacher had called home. Jules had helped Jordan with the assignment and the day it was due Jordan went to school while both Sam and Jules were at work. 3 days later the school calls and says that the assignment wasn't handed in. It was the end of the grounding before Jules found out that the teacher had misplaced the assignment and found it then marked it. Jordan even got an A on the assignment and Jules tried to apologize but it didn't work, she had even admitted that she was wrong. Apparently after that Jordan had made a deal with Ed that if something like this ever happened again that something would be done and all those who took part in it would be punished in some way. So pretty much everyone who looked after her this week at all will be punished by Ed as well as Sam."

I looked up at him. "So, Sam doesn't want to admit he was wrong because he is going to be punished for messing up?"

Rav nodded. "Pretty much. Knowing the deal with Jordan is probably going to be pretty bad like something she normally does, and we all hate doing that we are each going to have to do. And for this I am included cause I watched over her the other night."

A minute later Sam Ulley came through the door with Sam and Ed. I glanced at Sam. "How was your run?" I asked with a smile.

Sam just shook his head. "Jordan's room is the last one on the right?" I nodded going to follow him when he shook his head. "Embry called me to come over. You stay in the living room."

Rewind

Embry's POV

When I got Jordan into her room, she sank against me. "Don't worry, Jake is going to work this out I promise he will and if not I won't leave."

She nodded returning to work on our project that was sitting on the floor in her room. I laid down beside her and helped her out on the part that I had been working on when Jake had arrived. A few minutes later she passed me her phone after she had typed something on it.

Can you call Sam to come over and explain what is going on? I trust him to tell me the truth and if Paul is over here then he should really know why.

I nodded. "You do realize he could order me to go back to the house." I ruffled her hair a little but sat up to pull my phone from my jeans. Dialing his number and putting it onto speaker so she could hear what I was saying to him.

"Sam, I know I should have called you back but there is a slight issue here."

'I heard about the issue. Why are you calling me?'

"Well Jordan wants you to come over here. She says that she trusts you to tell her the truth about what is going on right now."

'She still doesn't know?'

Jordan just shook her head.

"Silly he can't see you do that. No, she still doesn't know what is happening. To be honest with you I am a little confused about the situation myself. Though Jake or Paul might know more about the situation going on."

'Am I on speaker?'

"Yes, you are. Jordan and I are in her room working on the school assignment right now. Should be done within the next half hour at most."

'Okay, you are going to have to give me a few minutes, but we should be able to get something worked out here. Jordan, I will come over and find out what hasn't been done and why you haven't been told about what the situation is.'

She nodded pressing the end button on the phone. Before going back to the project. "I think we will be done in the next 10 minutes or so."

I nodded hearing the door at the front of the house open and close. Jake must be pretty pissed off right now about the entire situation. Paul was probably not doing so great. "Maybe you should send Paul a text, you know make sure he is doing okay, and he hasn't started moping around Emily's again."

She nodded grabbing her phone sending a quick text. "I don't know if he is working tonight or not but with him working this morning he should be off tonight, right?"

I shrugged. "I think it might be Jake and Jared or Jared and Quil on tonight. Which would mean that unless there is a situation that Paul should be off so if you wanted to have him stay over after this is all sorted; I am sure that would be a possibility."

Her phone dinged and she looked at it starting to giggle before texting back whoever had texted her and then put her phone down again and putting the finishing touches on our assignment. "Done, finally we can hand it in tomorrow and then do the presentation next week."

"So how did the appointment go today?"

Jordan smiled at me. "It went okay, thanks for typing in Sue's number for me. Turns out because I called her before the appointment actually started, I didn't get into trouble. She said she would have to tell Sam about the mix up but the fact that Jake had forgotten about it and you were with me when the timer went off and seen it that it didn't matter that I was a little late for the appointment."

I smiled. "See I told you handing over your phone was a good idea. The last thing any of us want is for you to get into trouble again."

She just shrugged. "I honestly have been trying to wrap my brain around what I could have done this time to get myself into trouble. I can't come up with anything. Then Sam goes and breaks the rules tonight about inviting Paul over. I ran for the bathroom because I figures it would be the safest place to hide out. But then Jake had to come and order me to unlock the door."

I pulled her onto the bed so we could sit there together. "Don't worry Paul won't mind this. I am giving you comfort." I gently kissed the top of her head. "Sam will be here soon and don't worry he will convince your father or someone to explain what is happening or push comes to shove he will tell you himself."

She rested her head on my shoulder. "I can't go to sleep or else the meds will wear off and then I won't be able to talk when Sam gets here."

The door opened and Sam walked in grabbing her chair from the computer and wheeling it over to her bed. "You wanted to talk to me?"

Jordan nodded. "What is happening? I went out into the living room and basically got told that the grounding still stands despite Jake saying it would be over tonight. Is it ended? And if it is what happened to cause me to get grounded."

Sam held out his hand for her. "I need you to trust my power. I know you have felt it before and right now you need to know that it can help you out."

Jordan nodded taking his hand and standing up grabbing a hold of my hand before glancing up at Sam and receiving a small nod.

Sam led us out to the living room where Jake, Ed, Rav, and her father were sitting. He had her sit down in the love seat with me before he turned to her father.

"Now Sam, I asked Paul to come over here because this afternoon you agreed it would be a good idea to explain the situation surrounding Jordan's grounding to both of them at the same time. Paul is now at my place, and I will explain it to him when I manage to get back there or if Jordan wishes she can explain it to him. But either way before I leave here tonight your daughter is going to know the entire situation surrounding why she was grounded."

Sam took a step back and sat on the chair that was there beside Jake. Ed went to talk before Sam held up his hand and shook his head. When Rav tried, he got the same thing.

"I don't want to do it with an audience. It is bad enough already that the entire team already knows what the situation is, I don't need these other two knowing as well." He waved his hand between Jake and me.

I went to stand up before Jordan grabbed my arm holding me in place, an orange glow came from her eyes and gently turned to purple. "No. You had your chance to tell me before. You knew I had no idea why this was happening. Now you are going to tell me why you grounded me on Monday."

Sam squirmed in his seat, obviously trying to fight with her purple eyes but not winning against them at all. "Jordan please turn those off."

"Not until I know."

Rav stood up placing a hand on Jordan's shoulder only to have her react instantly by pushing him away from her. He moved back to the couch where he was sitting holding his stomach.

Sam glanced at Rav, "She hurt you?"

Rav both nodded and shook his head. "I'll be fine. I should have known better than to attempt to try and touch her when her eyes are like that. I just thought that maybe I could get her to release him, so it isn't bad."

Jake looked at him. "If she keeps him like this what will happen?"

Ed shrugged. "It is a battle of wills. Eventually he will give in and tell her. Though if he had just opened up when this started earlier nothing like this would be happening." He leaned back on the couch and crossed his ankle over his leg. "My suggestion is we wait this out. It won't go on for much longer than 5 more minutes."

Jake smiled and leaned back on the couch it was obvious that he was comfortable waiting this out until her father finally caved and gave into her demands.

Jordan's eyes gleamed and glinted as she kept hold of her father. Eventually her father sighed, and she backed off returning to her seat beside me.

"Fine, on Monday just before I came to pick you up, I got a phone call from Greg saying that he had heard from Kelly that you hadn't finished your math homework. Math homework that you had promised me that you had finished. It wasn't until today when Sam came to see me that I found out that Quil had grabbed the wrong pages when he picked them up on Thursday."

Jordan's eyes glinted ever so slightly. "Go on."

Her father gulped. "And tonight, I was angry that Jake had done something none of us were ever able to do so when he finally made you come out here, I didn't want to release you from the grounding that you didn't rightfully deserve."

She turned to Ed. "I think it is about time I invoke my deal with you, the one we made so many years ago when this happened the last time."

Ed gulped. "Are you sure about this?"

Jordan nodded grabbing my hand and standing up. "I will give you some space to do what needs to be done and be home in a few hours."

Sam and Jake followed us out of the house, as we started walking towards Sam's place.

Sam glanced down at her. "Are you going to explain to Paul what is happening?"

She nodded looking up at him. "Though I would like you or Jake to be there. Don't worry my father is in enough trouble from what has happened."

Both Jake and Sam nodded to her before looking at me.

"I think it might be best if I bow out of burgers with the two of you tonight. I think the both of you could use some time alone since you have not had much of it this week at all."