Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of Stephenie Meyer. I am in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of the "Twilight" franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Kissing Bella

Kissing Bella was like nothing I had felt in all my hundred years of existence. Feeling the heat from her body crawling into my skin, into my very bones - a reminder of how very alive she was - was equal parts elation and agony.

My hands wrapped around her waist and with the barest movement of my arms, I had lifted her onto the counter so that she wouldn't have to stretch to reach me, so that I wouldn't have to bend to reach her. Her mouth was level with mine, moving so softly against my lips that I could never hope to match it.

I resisted the temptation to open my eyes, to see the flush of her cheeks. I would see it soon enough. For now, we sat wrapped in each other.

Equal.

The very thought of that word made my stomach drop.

At the same time I felt the inevitable shift within her. The other part of kissing Bella was agony.

There was a tight clenching of every muscle in my body as I felt her arms lock around my neck. Her body pressed itself tightly against my chest, her delicate frame sending shocking waves of heat into the core of me.

I could feel the burn in my throat growing slowly as my control began to slip.

Living through that day - the day I spent thinking she was gone forever - had cured me of my lust for her blood, which smelled so much sweeter to me than anyone else's. I would never want to drink from her again.

But this - kissing Bella - this awakened something else entirely. Something I didn't know I would have to fight because I had never known of its existence. Never felt it before I met her.

I didn't want to drink from Bella.

I wanted to consume her entirely.

Everything that was hers I wanted to be part of me. Everything that I was, I wanted to be a part of her. In every horrible and wonderful and frightening and beautiful way, I wanted us to become one. I would never deserve it and I would always long for it.

So, as gently as I possibly could, I pulled away.

My eyes opened to the entirely predictable look of disappointment that crossed her flushed, excited features.

She felt it, too.

She didn't know what it was that she wanted, but she desired it with the same undeniable force that I did. I looked at her heartbreaking pout, so human in her lust.

Could she even grasp at all the concept that she wished so desperately for?

I laughed in relief, in the purity of my happiness, in the never-ending delight that she could possibly feel the same way. As much the same as a human ever could.

Her love was not a fraction of my own, but if she was capable of it I knew that wouldn't be true. It saturated every part of her, just as it did me.

It was all a matter of percentages.

I easily, and somewhat reluctantly, extracted myself from her arms that wound tightly around my neck and her legs that wrapped firmly around my waist. I was careful not to show my unwillingness to leave her grasp, afraid that if she saw even the slightest hesitation she would throw herself around me again. How many times could I be expected to say "no"?

As many as it takes, I resolved firmly.

Still, I was far colder than a normal vampire, far emptier, when I wasn't touching her. So I leaned against the counter at her side - her eyes still locked grudgingly with mine - and snaked my arm around her shoulders.

Flames licked my arm at the touch, even through our clothes.

"I know you think that I have some kind of perfect, unyielding self-control," I commented, hoping to wipe the pleading look off her face, my voice coming out slightly more longing than normal. I wondered if she would pick up on the difference, "but that's not actually that case."

She looked at me for a moment and sighed, "I wish."

I echoed her sigh with one of my own. You have no idea what you're asking. And you have no idea how badly I want to give it to you.

"After school tomorrow," I changed the subject smoothly so we wouldn't have to discuss anymore the thing that tortured us both, "I'm going hunting with Carlisle, Esme, and Rosalie. Just for a few hours - we'll stay close. Alice, Jasper, and Emmett should be able to keep you safe."

She made a disgusted noise and her face instantly soured. "I hate being babysat," she grumbled at me, but she looked away.

Just as she always did.

Every time I told her I would be leaving to go hunting, she would hide her eyes for a few moments. I knew why she did it. She was quickly composing herself, masking the pain that flashed across her face at the thought of my abandonment.

It was shorter now - just the flicker of her eyes from my face and then back again - and it was probably something she wasn't even conscious of doing, but it wrenched at my insides just the same.

"It's temporary." I promised her immediately.

I was just as unwilling to leave her as she was for me to leave. Those months we had been apart had been the longest of my existence. I had felt each moment of them just as acutely as she had. Maybe more so.

It was all a matter of percentages.

"Jasper will be bored," she looked up at me again. There was no trace of hurt in her deep, brown eyes now. Only slight annoyance. "Emmett will make fun of me."

The corners of my mouth twitched slightly. "They'll be on their best behavior."

"Right."

She didn't believe me. Didn't believe me because she was correct, as usual. She knew my family just as well as I did, without the gift of being privy to every one of their thoughts.

Then, all of a sudden, something lit behind her eyes.

She looked at me, her voice was hesitant, but hopeful. Imploring. "You know...I haven't been to La Push since the bonfire."

I was careful to keep my expression completely frozen, even as the immediate and almost irrepressible desire to refuse her ripped through me from my chest all the way down to my feet.

I remained calmly motionless under her scrutinizing gaze. She knew what lurked under the surface. She was waiting for it.

"I'd be safe enough there." She added after a moment. She was being very careful about how she was wording the request.

She was refusing to say his name.

"You're probably right." I said after a few seconds, with some effort.

She watched me for several moments, and I watched her watching me.

I wondered, not for the first time, what she saw when she was looking at my expression. Was it the flawless mask of serenity that I meant for it to be? How much could she see of the truth?

Finally, after several moments of silent thought, I saw the barest hint of a smile touch her lips. She reached out her hand and allowed her fingers to breathe against the smooth skin just under my eye.

"Are you thirsty?"

I hesitated.

She could obviously see the still-gold color of my eyes; she knew what that meant. It followed that she wasn't really asking the question she had voiced out loud, and so she was looking for an entirely different answer.

And I knew only too well where that answer would lead.

"Not really." I said finally. "We want to be as strong as possible. We'll probably hunt again on the way, looking for big game."

"That makes you stronger?" She asked immediately, her eyes filled with surprise.

I studied her reaction carefully, trying to see what she was really thinking. The reason we needed to be stronger was the real issue here. But all I could see in her face was unmasked curiosity.

For the hundredth time I wished that I could hear what she was thinking.

Her eyes, so open and unassuming, were deceptive. Or, they could be when she wished it. They could make me believe I knew her thoughts, and that was usually the moment when she would say something totally and completely unexpected.

More often than not it was simply the wrong thing for her to be saying.

"Yes," I told her at last. I felt like no time had passed between this moment and when I had first met her.

And, to be honest, after over a year with her I was still waiting for the running and screaming.

Always waiting.

"Human blood makes us the strongest, though only fractionally. Jasper's been thinking about cheating - adverse as he is to the idea, he's nothing if not practical - but he won't suggest it. He knows what Carlisle will say." I told her, completely honest.

Jasper's thoughts had thrown me initially, worried me. But they were just errant thoughts, not to be controlled.

He would never dream of really doing it.

"Would it help?" Bella asked quietly.

She would.

I blinked at her, staggered.

There it was.

Backwards instincts. Kill a few innocents to make my family stronger, to give them more of a chance. It was never what I expected to come out of her mouth, and a thought that she surely would never have entertained if I hadn't come into her life.

I pushed that reasoning aside quickly and selfishly. She wouldn't tolerate it and neither would I. Never again.

"It doesn't matter." I said firmly, willing her to understand. "We aren't going to change who we are."

If it wasn't about saving innocent lives, make it about keeping us true to ourselves, respecting the choices we'd made. Maybe she would understand that. So backwards.

She frowned, but I couldn't read her expression.

"That's why they're so strong, of course." I changed the subject quickly again before she thought anymore about it. "The newborns are full of human blood - their own blood, reacting to the change. It lingers in the tissues and strengthens them. Their bodies use it up slowly, like Jasper said, that strength starting to wane after about a year."

As always, her eyes sharpened with interest at the new information about my kind. She absorbed what I told her quickly and without surprise and then she smiled.

"How strong will I be?"

I couldn't help but grin at the question. "Stronger than I am."

Just the thought of that being true would have made my heart flutter if it had been able. She would be so completely and utterly unbreakable. I would be free to love her in any way I wanted, in every way I wanted, with all my strength. As fiercely as a beast.

"Stronger than Emmett?" she confirmed dubiously.

"Yes." My grin got bigger, stretching across my entire face at the thought. "Do me a favor and challenge him to an arm-wrestling match. It would be a good experience for him."

She laughed then, a sound of utter and absolute delight. One of the most divine sounds in my world.

Her laughter turning to a giggle, then finally a sigh, and she jumped down from the counter.

My arm was physically warmer than before I had put it around her, but at her absence it felt suddenly colder than the rest of my body.

Knowing what the sigh was about, and having my suspicions confirmed as she slowly started to climb the stairs to her room, I followed her silently. Ah, high school.

Even though she was annoyed at the prospect of cramming for finals, I had never had more fun with high school than when I studied with Bella.

Her irritation, her interest, watching her slowly begin to understand something as I explained it; it was one of my favorite pastimes.

Unable to glimpse insider her mind as I was, when we studied I almost always knew what she was thinking. And I was almost always sure it was something I was teaching her. It was a fascinating process, one that I enjoyed immensely.

Almost as much as I was sure she hated it.

When I first offered to help her with her homework, I was positive she would get immediately defensive and insist that she could do it herself. But I had learned long ago that I could never be positive about Bella's reactions to anything. She had agreed enthusiastically and, I was certain, without actually thinking through her answer.

That was back when she was desperate to keep me with her at all times, sure I was going to disappear at any moment. Something which she should have known me incapable of.

Almost incapable.

I pushed the thought away again. Violently.

At first I was surprised at how much she appreciated everything I taught her, how delighted she was with the ease of which I was able to explain everything in her course load.

I had told her it was because I had been to high school more times than she had had birthdays, ready for the blatant reminder of my age to unsettle her a bit. But she had only smiled and assured me that when she went to high school again she would probably pay less attention to the work, not more.

I hadn't responded, too preoccupied by the ease with which she talked about her inevitable life as a vampire, and my silence had ended the discussion.

Any annoyance she felt later wasn't in response to that fact that I appeared smarter than she was (which was a gross falseness anyway); she was always gracious and eager for my help.

All the annoyance was directed, seemingly, at the course material.

No matter how much she seemed to struggle with it, I got the distinct sense that she hated it so much because she was so far beyond it. The most difficult Calculus equations were something that were not important to her. In a way, they were too simple to figure out. Complex, but they had rules which were firm and unyielding.

Nothing ambiguous. Easy.

I knew exactly what she meant.

There was something so much more difficult in the simple act of driving Bella to the edge of La Push the next day. An action anyone could have preformed, and yet I would rather do any manner of mathematical equation in its stead.

"So how do you feel you did on you exams?" I asked her, trying to keep it light as I drove.

If my heart could beat I was sure it would be hammering so loudly that even she could have heard it. As it was, I could still feel an uncomfortable weight settle itself in my chest.

"History was easy," she told me. I looked over at her, interested - as always - in her response, "but I don't know about the Calculus. It seemed like it was making sense, so that probably means I failed."

I laughed in spite of myself. Her self doubt was adorably infuriating.

Still, she had a point. Even with all her intuition and uncanny ability to understand and adapt, Calculus was something that was beyond her.

I wanted very much to kiss the worry line that had formed above her eyes.

Instead I chuckled to her, "I'm sure you did fine." I was sure. I had heard Mr. Varner grading the exams. "Or, if you're really worried, I could bribe Mr. Varner to give you an A." I added, simply to see her reaction.

Her mouth twisted up into a light, amused grimace. "Er, thanks, but no thanks."

I laughed again.

The expression on her face, the polite decline to the offer of completely illegal and unethical bribery, almost made me forget where we were going.

I was immediately and abruptly reminded as we turned the last bend to La Push, where his small red car sat waiting for us.

Immediately I was hit with the brunt of his thoughts. Even as I tried to block them, I found I couldn't completely.

I'm going to tell her today.

She has to know already.

I mean, how could she not?

No.

I still have to tell her I love her.

There's something so different about suspecting something and hearing it out loud.

Will it be enough to change her mind?

I mean, she has to love me, too.

Why else would she want to be around me so much...

It went on like that, a steam of consciousness, snippets of thoughts, doubts and hopes, pouring out of him. And even without my extra hearing, I could see it in every line of his face.

I doubted Bella could see his expression from inside the car, but I saw it too well. The resolve, the stubborn determination.

He was so like Bella.

I couldn't help the frown that crossed my features as I tried to block what he was thinking.

I parked the car with a reluctant sigh and I could feel Bella's eyes flicker to my face. Her hand was already on the door, but she had paused for a moment to say goodbye. My expression had made her suddenly suspicious.

She missed nothing.

"What's wrong?" She asked.

I shook my head quickly. "Nothing."

What is she waiting for? Jacob was wondering.

I could see him watching our motionless forms from his car. He couldn't see me as sharply as I could see him, but near enough.

Mostly his gaze was fixed on Bella.

All of a sudden he was shouting.

Is he keeping her from coming?

He can hear my thoughts!

He doesn't want me to tell her!

Afraid she'll chose me!

That filthy leech!

He can't keep her there against her will!

I'll find a way to get to her again!

I'll show up at school every day until...

"You're not listening to Jacob, are you?" Bella's voice cut into Jacob's thoughts. They still reverberated loudly in my head, but I was able to concentrate on her again.

Her voice always broke the spell so easily.

I looked at the scowl on her face, heard the accusation in her words.

"It's not easy to ignore someone when he's shouting." I told her, looking at her significantly.

"Oh." She bit her lip, considering that for a second. All traces of irritation were gone. How easily, how effortlessly she trusted me. Well, she knew that was the surest way to get me to be honest with her. "What's he shouting?"

My lips pressed into a hard line for a moment before I answered, "I'm absolutely certain he'll mention it himself."

Bella looked like she wanted to say something else, but her words were cut off by two loud honks from the red car.

Come on, Bella!

Let's go!

I can smell the bloodsucker from here.

He reeks!

"That's impolite," I felt a growl at the edge of my words.

I didn't like his tone. Even though he hadn't said anything to her, I still didn't want him thinking that way. Commanding her to hurry, like he owned her, like he had the right.

My resolve to be reasonable - to let her go - was quickly fading.

"That's Jacob," Bella sighed, by way of an explanation.

Her assurance was empty to me. That's Jacob. What did that even mean?

Quickly, as if she could sense my wavering resolve, Bella opened the door and jumped out of the car.

The swirling warmth and scent, every silent thought and expression, suddenly cut off from me when she shut the car door behind her.

I felt the sudden and crushing emptiness I always felt when we were apart.

I watched her cross the invisible line confidentally - if not completely gracefully; she stumbled twice - with no small amount of pain.

Leaving her with Jacob, even when his thoughts were not so impassioned, was always a test of my sanity.

I wasn't sure if she would ever know how truly difficult it was for me.

How could she? There was no one in my world that commanded even a fraction of the affection I felt for her. No one to divide my interest. No one that could tear me from her side willingly.

No one except myself.

Again I rejected the thought.

Or, I tried to. It refused to be silenced now, in her absense.

I had left her. And that was the problem, wasn't it? That was where this all started. I had done to her the most unspeakable cruelty, and Jacob had saved her; brought her back from the abyss. I owed the obnoxious werewolf child my life, many times over.

It only made everything harder. I owed him the right to see her. Still, I was sure even that wouldn't be enough if she had no desire to see him.

I had never known such pain, such utter torture, as I did the moment when I had realized that she loved Jacob Black.

Loved him, perhaps, in a way which she would love a brother. Still, there was a connection she felt with him, my mortal enemy, and it was a connection that was based in the same desire that the connection she felt for me was based in: need.

I barely said a word to anyone when I arrived back home.

I didn't say a word throughout the hunt. I tracked one lion, but didn't pursue the other - its mate.

Running through the woods held nothing of the elation it usually did when I was heading home.

Running to Bella.

Or when she was running with me, clinging to me as hard as her frail human limbs would allow, her warmth fanning across my back like the sun, her heartbeat sounding loudly, furiously against my skin.

I was running home to....nothing. She wasn't there.

I slowed when I reached the house, unsure where to go, what to do. It had only been a few hours since I had dropped her off. I hadn't felt the time, and yet had felt every second of it. It was blurred and abstract, but very slow.

The pain was nothing of what the world had felt like believing she was no longer in it. But there was still the uncertainty, and the absence, that I had felt when I had first left.

It was that dark, dusty room in South America.

I stepped into the garage and sat on the hood of the Volvo. I would wait. Wait here. So whenever she wanted me, I could be where she was.

I sat there for several minutes before I gave in to the irresistible urge to dial her cell phone number.

I would pretend that I was calling just to see what she was doing, when she was maybe planning to come home. I wouldn't tell her that I was really calling because I needed to hear her voice in order to keep from going insane.

I would casually inform her that I had just arrived home, not that it mattered, and that I was ready to pick her up whenever she might be so inclined.

Not waiting. Just ready.

I would make it sound like there was something I maybe wanted to do in the meantime, while I was not waiting for her to call. I would make it sound like I was simply wondering how much time I would have to accomplish it, this imaginary something that did not and never could exist. Not without her.

The phone rang four times and then went straight to the voicemail. I felt my body stiffen. She didn't have her phone with her.

Well, that was it then. I would have to wait. There was nothing else for it. I decided it was probably better this way. Better for her. There was no need to upset her with my wild obsessiveness, my insanity.

I would let her think that jealousy didn't consume me in the same way it consumed every one of Jacob's thoughts. I would let her think I was above all the overwhelming, startling possessiveness, at the same time that I was so much worse than Jacob could ever hope to be.

All of a sudden my phone leapt in my hands, vibrating furiously.

I felt my breath shoot out of me in a sharp, wild gasp as my eyes flicked down to the screen. Swan. She was home. She wasn't in La Push. I could go to her, I could get there right now. No need to wait.

I leapt off the hood of the car, wrenched open the door with nearly enough force to accidentally rip it off, and slid quickly into the seat. The phone was still on the first ring when I flipped it open eagerly.

"Bella?" I couldn't keep the delight out of my voice when I said her name. I hadn't imagined she would call me so soon.

I turned the car on and hit the gas, rocketing out of the garage and down the driveway. "You left the phone....I'm sorry, did Jacob drive you home?"

I didn't really care. It didn't really matter. She was home.

"Yes." She replied shortly. "Will you come get me, please?"

There was something in her voice. Something was off. It cut through my happiness immediately and effectively. I pushed the Volvo slightly faster.

"I'm on my way." I assured her at once. "What's wrong?"

Her voice was angry and clinical when she responded, "I want Carlisle to look at my hand. I think it's broken."

I struggled to keep my composure.

It wouldn't do any good to overreact before I knew what had happened. She had probably just fallen. Tripped over something, landed awkwardly. An accident. No one was to blame.

I could not kill Jacob for not being as adept as I was at protecting Bella from herself.

And yet...she was angry. Why?

"What happened?" My question came out more like a demand, but I kept my voice emotionless. I waited.

"I punched Jacob." She replied. I heard something bitter in the way she said his name.

I felt some unnamable emotion stir within me. It wasn't anger or relief or happiness or humor or fury. It was some mixture of all of them.

"Good." I told her, my voice coming out somewhat pleased, even though I tried to hide it. "Though I'm sorry you're hurt."

Bella barked a laugh, but it quickly faded. It seemed like she was still too annoyed to really find humor in my response.

It made me wary.

"I wish I'd hurt him." She sighed now, frustrated. "I didn't do any damage at all."

"I can fix that." I offered automatically. I was only partly joking.

Jacob had done something to hurt Bella. Something to make her want to hurt him, and when she had tried she had gotten hurt. It made my hands itch to be around his neck, venom filled my mouth.

She would never allow it.

"I was hoping you would say that." Her voice was like ice now.

I paused, momentarily stunned.

What could Jacob possibly have done? What would make her demand his life, even in jest? I knew she would never allow him to be hurt, but the fact that she had voiced that desire made my insides crawl.

"That doesn't sound like you," I said quietly. Even when he told you that he wished you dead, you forgave him. "What did he do?"

There was a pause so minor that I was sure she wasn't even conscious of hesitating.

Maybe Jacob was still in her house, maybe she was looking at him now. I could imagine her anger, so pointed and direct, written all over her face.

"He kissed me."

Agony.

I felt my entire body go numb at her words, which had come out of her mouth as practically a growl. More vampire than human.

He had kissed her.

He had touched the ecstasy and pain of her lips with his own.

He had felt every shift of her body, every murmur of her heart under his hands.

Her breaths had mingled with his in the sweetest pangs of hurt he could have ever known.

And now she was angry.

The numbness quickly sped from my limbs as I made the connection. It was replaced with the wrenching pain of all-consuming fury.

He had kissed her, had tasted her skin.....without her permission.

The right pedal hit the floor abruptly and the scenery flooded past me like water. I had to get to her.

I could hear her breath on the phone, waiting for my response. Or not waiting. She heard the rev of the engine and that might have been enough. I heard Charlie in the other room, talking softly. I heard Jacob reply. His voice sent another wave of fury crashing through me.

"Is the dog still there?" I asked her, even though I knew the answer.

"Yes." She replied calmly. She wasn't afraid for Jacob. She either trusted me completely or she really wanted him to die.

"I'm around the corner." I told her, and then let the phone click shut in my hand. I took a deep breath and tried desperately to calm myself.

I slammed on the brakes so that the car slid to a stop right in front of her house. I could hear the tension in Charlie's thoughts, and the calm façade held carefully over Jacob's fear.

Jacob was a child.

He had hurt Bella, but it was in a way that was far less damaging than the way I myself had.

When I stepped out of the car I forced my steps to take on their slow, human pace as I walked to the door. It took evey ounce of strength still left in my body not to break through the wood that seperated me from her.

I could hear Bella's footsteps approaching the front of the house, I could hear her heartbeat. It was beating too fast. She was either nervous or still angry. A bit of both.

"How's your hand?" I heard Charlie ask as she walked past him. I will not have fighting in my house. Although, I bet Jacob could get a few good ones in at Cullen. He'd deserve it...

I grimaced, but Charlie stopped his own thoughts, once again becoming the responsible parent and Chief of Police. Charlie was a good man.

"It's swelling." Bella replied, her voice had me picturing her mouth twisted into a grimace.

"Maybe you should pick on people your own size." Charlie suggested.

"Maybe." She agreed. She wasn't amused.

The doorknob clicked and then she was there in front of me.

I now saw the anger that I had heard in her voice. Yet, as soon as our eyes met, she softened. I, too, felt the unbearable rage and urge to kill Jacob Black filter from my body.

Suddenly...there was no need. She was with me again.

"Let me see." I requested quietly, my voice steady and quiet now.

She lifted the ice pack off her hand and held it out to me.

I closed my hands around it gently for a moment before I ran my eyes over it. It was swelling, just as she had said, and I could see a flaw in one of her knuckles. I knew every plane of her hands and I knew when one was out of place. I ran my fingers over the back of her hand as lightly as I could, feeling around the delicate bones through the silk of her skin.

She never pulled away.

"I think you're right about the break," I told her, my voice hard. Then, not being able to resist, I met her eyes again. She was watching me, her entire body calm. "I'm proud of you. You must have put some force behind this."

A smile touched the corners of her eyes. "As much as I have." She sighed. Then added, her voice tightening slightly, "Not enough, apparently."

I lifted her hand to my lips and kissed it softly, my lips would work just as well as the ice she had held to it before. The chagrin left her face immediately at my touch.

I knew the feeling.

Even through my anger, I could feel the sweetness of her proximity loosening every piece of me, and hurting Jacob wasn't something that could hold my interest for more than a few seconds at a time.

When I was looking at her.

"I'll take care of it." I promised. Then, willing my eyes to move away from her face, I called Jacob's name quietly into the house.

"Now, now."

Both Charlie and Jacob stepped into the hall. Charlie was eyeing me warily, his thoughts laced with warning. Jacob's eyes were eager, ready. His thoughts matched them perfectly. He wouldn't mind killing me right here.

Trust me, child. You couldn't come close.

"I don't want any fighting, do you understand?" Charlie's eyes didn't move from my face. He trusted Jacob as he would never again trust me.

I didn't begrudge him that.

"That won't be necessary." I told him, when he offered to go put on his badge. Looking at Jacob made the restraint in my voice harder to accomplish, but I could still feel Bella raging at my side.

Her anger didn't fuel my own; it made mine fade, just as it always did in its endearing impotence. Only this situation was slightly different than usual, her anger not quite as comical, because it had gotten her hurt.

And Bella getting hurt was something I did not tolerate very well.

"Why don't you arrest me, Dad?" her voice cut through the tension in my body immediately. "I'm the one throwing punches."

Charlie raised an amused eyebrow. Apparently I wasn't the only one who heard the emptiness of Bella's threats...and appreciated them. "Do you want to press charges, Jake?" he asked the boy standing beside him.

"No." A grin spread across Jacob's face, his eyes lighting up, even as he watched me. "I'll take the trade any day."

I stiffened and, again, a surge of rage shot through me.

Bella, as always, replied as if she could sense the murderous hatred in my thoughts and knew perfectly well how to make it dissolve.

"Dad, don't you have a baseball bat somewhere in your room? I want to borrow it for a minute."

No one would ever love her as much as I did. My tiger-kitten.

"Enough, Bella." Charlie's voice was firm.

"Let's go have Carlisle look at you hand before you end up in a jail cell," I said quickly, putting my arm around her and steering her towards the door. I wasn't sure how long her adorable, completely harmless anger could keep Jacob Black alive.

I wasn't interested in finding out.

"Fine," she grumbled and I felt her body relax, leaning against mine. Her annoyance was leaving her again, as if my presence was enough to calm her.

I understood. It was the same for me.

The only difference was that she was never in danger of hurting anyone.

It was all a matter of percentages.

As I lead her down the sidewalk I heard Jacob come after us, and I heard Charlie try to stop him. I ignored this pointedly until we reached the car. I opened the door and helped Bella inside gently.

When I closed the door and turned to face Jacob, she didn't protest or try to get out of the car. Instead I heard her heart begin to race as she leaned her head out the window. I could feel anxiety rolling off of her in waves, but she was still mad enough at Jacob that it kept her motionless. Waiting.

That was what decided it for me.

I could not hurt Jacob Black.

She trusted me so much, so completely, that in the moment where I was more likely to kill him than at any other time, she said nothing. She trusted that I wouldn't.

I had to earn that trust. Always be worthy of her. Always.

I looked at Jacob, his stance clearly defensive. But there was that same stubborn conviction in his face as I had seen earlier. He wasn't as relaxed as he had been inside, around Charlie, and so I tried my best to block his violent thoughts. Far too tempting.

"I'm not going to kill you now, because it would upset Bella." I told him softly, after I saw that he had no intention of speaking.

I heard Bella make an annoyed sound behind me. Try me, it seemed to say. I couldn't resist turning my face to look at her, throwing her a quick smile.

I reached out, brushing my fingers across her face, and I watched again - fascinated - as the anger evaporated from her body at the contact. "It would bother you in the morning." I assured her.

Much sooner than that.

Then I turned back to Jacob, who had watched this exchange silently, but with no small amount of unease and protest. My voice got slightly harder as I continued.

"But if you ever bring her back damaged again - and I don't care whose fault it is; I don't care if she merely trips, or if a meteor falls out of the sky and hits her in the head - if you return her to me in less than the perfect condition that I left her in, you will be running with three legs. Do you understand that, mongrel?"

Jacob listened to my threats with growing annoyance, and at the conclusion rolled his eyes dramatically.

He didn't understand what I was saying. He couldn't hear it.

Bella muttered "who's going back?" behind me. I heard the venom in her words as she spoke them, but didn't allow myself to hope that this would end whatever she had felt for this man-child. I continued as if I hadn't heard her.

"And if you ever kiss her again, I will break your jaw for her." My voice was cold and serious, a promise.

You'll be lucky if that's all I do.

"What if she wants me to?" Jacob replied finally, his voice drawling and filled with arrogance.

In his thoughts I clearly saw Bella's hands gripping at his face, I felt the passionate response as he realized she was pulling him closer. Even with the confidence that laced his thoughts I could see that Bella had actually been trying to shove him away. She wasn't strong enough.

I didn't do any damage at all, she had said.

Bella snorted a laugh at Jacob's presumption.

"If that's what she wants, then I won't object." I shrugged.

Of course, it was a lie.

Every part of me, everything in my entire body, in my mind, in the soul I didn't know if I had, it would all object. I could feel myself recoiling from the pain of just the thought of it.

But I forced my voice, and my face, to remain untroubled.

"You might want to wait for her to say it, rather than trust your interpretation of body language - but it's your face."

Jacob grinned. He knew what I had seen in his mind.

Bella misinterpreted his grin and grumbled an angry "You wish."

Jacob's eyes flicked to her quickly and immediately his thoughts went back to the kiss. And then to flashes of her asking for his touch, his lips on hers. Pressing her body against his, saying his name breathlessly as she gasped for air...

"Yes, he does." I answered her comment coldly, my eyes still on Jacob's smiling face. His smile fell immediately at my words.

"Well, if you're done rummaging through my head, why don't you go take care of her hand?" He snapped at me, annoyed, his eyes darkening.

"One more thing," I said, slowly, so I could emphasize each word. Make sure he would understand me this time. His life could depend on it. Because if this happened again, this would be the only warning he would get. I would never be able to control myself long enough to warn him a second time. "I'll be fighting for her, too. You should know that. I'm not taking anything for granted, and I'll be fighting twice as hard as you will."

"Good," Jacob's growl was very much that of a wolf. "It's no fun beating someone who forfeits."

He couldn't hear me. Not really. He was too angry, too resentful, too full of jealousy to really hear what I was saying.

There would be no choice and he would die.

"She is mine." I said the words with something so deeply possessive that I surprised even myself. They were true, of course, but I wondered just for a moment how Bella would react to hearing them said aloud. "I didn't say I would fight fair."

"Neither did I." Jacob retorted, still unthreatened.

"Best of luck."

Not today. I couldn't get through to him today.

Another time maybe, when we both weren't so angry.

When the three of us weren't so angry. I couldn't forget Bella's comical and not-comical fury at my back.

"Yes, may the best man win."

"That sounds about right....pup."

Jacob stared back at me hard for a moment, but he sensed just as I did that it was over. For now.

He leaned to one side slightly to see around me, trying to catch Bella's eye. I stepped away and slowly moved to the driver's side.

I heard Jacob mutter an apology and I watched Bella turn away, not responding. I kept my face completely impassive, but smiled a little inside.

Oh, Bella.

Bella kept her face turned away, her eyes off into the distance, as we pulled out into the street, heading for my house. I wondered if she could feel Jacob's eyes pressing into the car, watching her for any sign of movement.

She kept absolutely still, a model of rigid, self-righteous anger.

"How do you feel?" I asked finally. What are you thinking? She was impossible to read in that moment.

"Irritated." She snapped.

But I knew as well as she did that her irritation was quickly fading, as it always did. I chuckled lightly.

"I meant your hand."

She shrugged beside me, still not really meeting my eyes. "I've had worse."

My stomach clenched uncomfortably and I felt my mouth drift into a frown.

"True." I allowed, a slight ache coursing through my body.

As we drove, her words echoed in my head.

I've had worse.

It was all a matter of percentages.

* * *