"You like it?"
Kiara smiled as she leaned against the door frame, the small pick bandaid on her head the only physical reminder of the chaotic night that had occurred hours prior.
"It suits you," she mused, catching Emily's eye from across the room. The woman had held her breath the moment Sam launched to his feet and ran out with just the boys name on his lips, hearing the snarls and howls of the other boys who had already phased. After Paul, Sam and Jacob had gone wrestling back past the tree line, Jared and Billy had bundled up the shocked Kiara into the car and headed straight for Sam and Emily's place.
The elders had already gathered there, having been phoned by Billy during the journey. Kiara hadn't felt exactly as thrilled as the elders seemed to be about her brothers exciting transformation, especially as the cut on her had head stung every time she made a facial expression.
Emily had instantly assumed the worst when she saw the scratches on Kiara's hands and the gash on her forehead. She wrapped an arm around the girl and disappeared into the house with her without so much as another word to any of the others. They'd sat mostly in silence while Emily cleaned up her face and applied a little pink bandaid from the medical cupboard (the pink bandaid that apparently belonged to Kim's little cousin, hence the sparkles on it).
Kiara had fallen asleep in Sam and Emily's spare bedroom while waiting on the boys to get back.
Jacob had barged past all of the adults without so much as a hello, ignoring their calls as he rushed up the stairs to where his newly improved smell could sense his twin. He'd never really known Kiara's scent to be so distinctive before but it was almost instinctual. He wanted to rush in and apologise, and tell her he was sorry and that it wasn't her fault - but as soon as he noticed how peacefully she was asleep on the comforter, he knew he couldn't wake her.
If anyone asked him in years to come what it felt like seeing his sister for the first time since his transformation, he wouldn't have known how to describe it. It was as if something hung in the air between them, their twin bond that had always been sacred yet recently breaking and subdued suddenly finding itself at the forefront of his mind again. The elders told him it was likely the wolf inside of him recognising his biological other half for the first time, and while Jacob knew it wasn't like imprinting (and he hated when they said it could be similar because that really did sound like some incest-y, cult like terminology), he figured it was the twin sibling equivalent.
When Kiara finally had came down the stairs in the early afternoon of the next day, her eyes had immediately latched on to the thick black tribal tattoo that rested on her brothers shoulder. She knew the other boys had them, but she had never really thought to ask the main questions of how and when they even got them.
"Do you? Like it, that is?"
Kiara rolled her eyes before nodding at her brother.
"Yeah, I just said that suits you," she repeated. "When did you get it done?"
"Sue Clearwater did it an hour ago," Jared replied for Jacob, since he had just stuffed a muffin in his mouth. "What, surely you knew she did ours?"
Kiara shrugged as she noticed Sam walking towards the porch with a slight scowl on his face. She always found it fascinating how all the boys instantly turned their attention to the man whenever he entered a room, even when he didn't command it.
Usually, Sam would enter the pack house and walk straight towards Emily with a greeting. Kiara was fully accustomed to this, so when he made a beeline for her straight away she could see the surprise on everyone but Emily's face. He placed a hand on the side of her face, brushing her hair back and quickly inspecting the graze across her face and the area that hid under the pink bandaid.
Kiara noticed how Jacob seemed to slump a little at the exchange and she assumed it was because he was remembering he was responsible for it. She didn't heal quickly the way the boys did. The cast on her arm was a reminder to them all that she was a lot more fragile than the boys in the room, and it reminded them that Victoria had known that too.
The sage green cast was covered in dirt from the previous night, and Kiara didn't want to scrub it too much incase it undid the bandages. She made a mental note to ask if Sue was able to re-wrap it for her if she got a chance.
"You okay, Black?" Sam asked, his tone gruff as he placed his hands on her shoulders and scanned her over. Billy had told him that she was fine to stay over, but Sam wasn't letting her out of his charge until he knew she was fine.
Kiara nodded, smiling at the man she had hated only a few weeks prior. He accepted this with a soft squeeze on her shoulder before breezing past her to give Emily a welcome kiss.
"How long you got let of that?" Embry asked from where he and Paul had been fighting over the last pancake, half of it crumbing out of his mouth as he spoke.
Kiara held her arm with the cast up a little, shrugging as she studied the names scribbled over the material before answering Embry.
"It was meant to be another five weeks but it doesn't even hurt now so I'm hoping it'll be less," she admitted, surprising them all. They'd thought her falling over the night before would have caused it to flare up a little in pain.
Jacob grinned as he turned back to look at his sister. "Not long before we'll have matching tattoos?"
There was a beat of silence before Kiara sighed in defeat.
"Who wants to break the news?"
______
After Jacob's initial disappointment at the discovery Kiara wasn't expected to turn into a wolf anytime ever, things had pretty much returned to normal in the Uley household.
Kiara and Paul were lying on the grass of the cliff face, watching the other boys prepare to throw themselves off the cliff and into the water below. She smiled at them for a moment before flopping back and letting her head rest against him.
"This is going to kill Bella," Kiara told Paul, her head leaning on his shoulder as they lied next to each other. Jared had already pre-warned Jacob that it was strictly platonic between Paul and Kiara and not to get himself fired up at how close the duo were. Jacob understood but there was a small part of him that wondered if Kiara would ever trust him the way she trusted Paul despite having shared a womb.
"She'll adapt," Paul replied, his eyes closed as he soaked up the sun. They'd been having some decent weather recently, although Billy had warned them all that it was set to rain heavily once again over the next few weeks. "She did when Cullen left."
There was a silence for a moment before Kiara looked up to see the rest of the boys preparing to jump off the cliff. She paused, and almost held her breath as the rest of the pack disppeared over the ledge with battle cries. Paul chuckled, before he sat up after noticing the conflicted look on her face.
"What?"
"The Cullen's didn't just leave Bella, Paul," Kiara muttered lowly, knowing that he would be able to hear her well but knowing that if she spoke much louder the rest of the boys in the water below might have heard. "They left me."
There was a moment of silence between them, and Paul seemed to swallow a breath before nodding slowly. His voice was soft and low when he spoke; a trait he only had ever really shown around his own mother and Kiara. It was gentle and understanding, so much so that Kiara wasn't really sure he understood what she meant at first.
"I know."
"No, Paul, I mean..."
"Kie, I know what you mean," Paul interupted her, not wanting her to say the words outloud incase any of the other wolves heard what they were talking about. He knew the truth would come out any day now but he wanted her to be the one to tell them when she was comfortable doing so. "I've known, since before they left."
"And you were okay with... it?"
"No," Paul answered straight away before feeling like he had to elaborate. "With you? Always. With it being... with her? With one of them? No, I wasn't okay with it. But I'd learn to live with it if I had to, if it meant keeping you in my life."
The boys came crashing up the grassy banks then, interupting the chat that the duo had been having. The look that Jacob gave her made her feel like he knew what her and Paul were talking about, but all thoughts were quickly washed away as the boys sweeped her into the air, pretending to throw her off the cliff.
All thoughts about the strange rivalry between her people and the Cullen family left her mind instantly, instead being replaced by nothing but bliss as she found herself surrounded by the boys that had been there for her even when she wanted nothing to do with them.
_____
"Any luck?"
"Here and there, but she's hard to focus on," Alice replied to Rosalie, the two vampires walking casually amongst the snow covered trees in Denali. They'd gone to visit their friends, but Rosalie was still finding it hard to take her mind off the human girl she'd left behind in Forks. "I don't know what's wrong with me, even looking at Bella sometimes, it's like there's just... dark patches."
Rosalie immediatley shushed her sister, knowing that while she was often portrayed as the least compassionate sibling, she would always stand up for her coven. Hearing Alice talk so negatively about herself reminded Rosalie of Edward's vile mood. She immediatley knew that he must have been showing his frustration with the physic vampire not being able to watch Bella's every move, despite the fact he only had checked in with them here and there.
She was aware from Alice that Edward had contacted Kiara despite ignoring all of Bella's communication, and the very thought of that had almost caused her to hunt the boy down after their previous fallout. It was him getting involved with Bella that had ruined things for their entire family, so why was he still putting Kiara at risk by contacting her?
"Did she reply to your voicemail?" Alice asked, her voice soft as she looked over at Rosalie with a tenderness in her eyes.
"She did," Beverly spoke, alerting the other two vampires to her presence. "But Rosalie still hasn't listened to the voicemail reply from Kiara."
"I'm a monster, we all are," Rosalie replied as she turned away from her sister and Alice. They knew better than to argue with Rosalie when she began one of her self-pity speeches. "Kiara deserves a life free of monsters, pain and the danger that comes with being like us."
Alice didn't say anything. She could still see Kiara and Rosalie running through the forest in the future together. She could still see Bella and Edward running through the forest together. She knew, deep down, that it wasn't truely over for either couple yet.
She just dreaded to think what situation would bring her family rushing back to Bella, Kiara and the rainy town of Forks.
_______
"Hey dad, where's Jake?" Kiara asked as she opened the fridge, seeing her father peering through the blinds as he observed something outside. She'd just gotten back from school, having opted to skip doing her homework at Sam's and instead coming home to spend some time with Jacob.
It had been a week since his first shift, and while Kiara was happy for her twin, it had hurt to see how excited Billy had been for Jacob. He had never been that excited for her about anything in her life yet finding out his only son turned into a wolf seemed to be the best news that Billy had ever been told by any of his kids.
She was trying to not let it get to her but with Billy's energy being fully focused on Jacob and Bella constantly hounding her at school with questions about Jacob, she was starting to feel a little envious of the boy. She was sure the other boys in the pack had picked up on it and had been making more of an effort to discuss anything but Jacob when she visited the packhouse.
"Bella's here," Billy told Kiara, his eyes not leaving the arguing that was happening across the lawn. Kiara peered out too, unable to make out anything they were saying but watching with fascinated eyes.
"I wish we could hear them," she muttered to her dad, who mused in return.
"I think it's probably best that we can't," Billy admitted back, knowing that Jacob's big mouth would certainly bring up the Cullen's and vampires. They were yet to explain vampires to Kiara and Billy thought that if she heard those two things at once her thoughts might cause her brain to explode.
Across the grass, Jacob could feel the rain almost evapourate as it touched his body. He'd been working on keeping his anger in check, and the only reason he wasn't phasing out of anger was reminding himself of the scars on Emily's face as he stood chest to chest with Bella Swan.
"If you want somebody to blame, how about those filthy bloodsuckers you love?" Jake snapped, noticing how Bella immeditaley began to turn defensive. "The Cullens."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Bella said straight away, her posture stiffening as she felt like she had just been slapped across the face. There was no way Jacob could know... surely?
"You know EXACTLY what I'm talking about!" Jacob roared back, lowering his voice to more of a snap than a yell as he remembered Kiara was in the house and might overhear. "You've been lying to EVERYONE! Charlie... Kiara... But you can't lie to me. Not anymore, Bella."
Jacob turned his head away from Bella as the familiar shout of Sam from the tree line echoed across to where he was standing. He assumed his father had phoned Sam as soon as Bella turned up again, worried about the teenage boy losing control.
"We can't be friends anymore," Jacob told Bella, trying to hide how much it hurt him. It was different for Kiara, she wasn't having to risk accidentally giving their secret away to Bella. She wasn't under alpha's orders. Unlike him, Sam trusted Kiara enough to not spill their tribe's secret to the brown haired girl standing in the rain before him.
"Jake, I know that I've been hurting you and it's... it's killing me! It kills me, but like if you give me more time..."
"It's not you," Jake interupted Bella's pleading, knowing fine well it was a mix of him and her. He didn't want to cut her off, but he had to for the sake of his new brothers.
Kiara watched from the window as Jacob and Bella exchanged a few more words before the boy turned on his heel and ran towards the rest of the pack. Kiara rolled her eyes a little, knowing that her plans to hang out with Jacob were obviously off the cards.
Just as Bella pulled out of their driveway, a battered silver car exchanged her place. Kiara looked up in confusion at the noise of tires on dirt, seeing her father turn to look at her with a small smile.
"I told Sam that you might be disappointed if Jake can't spend time with you, so Emily's came to take you out for dinner."
Kiara smiled gently at her father, before grabbing her jacket from the hook at the door and rushing outside into the backseat of Emily's car. Kim was grinning at her from the passenger seat, happy to see the younger girl again.
They'd all agreed to not tell Kiara about the other vampire they had been tracking over the past week, and Sam had asked the girls to try and keep her mind off the sudden increase of patrols the boys were going on.
They were going to have to tell her about vampires soon, but none of them wanted to break her innocence even more. Paul had been baggering Sam about telling Kiara ever since Victoria had attacked her, but Billy had made the alpha promise that they wouldn't tell Kiara unless absolutely necessary.
She'd find out soon enough anyway.
____
A few weeks went by before Bella decided to reattempt visiting the Black household. Kiara had been dodging her questions at school, and the rest of the lunch table had begun asking Bella to stop bringing up Kiara's twin brother. She'd decided that she was getting answers once and forall, especially since Jacob had visited her room a few nights prior to tell her that he wasn't able to explain why he couldn't talk to her.
"That was Charlie," Harry Clearwater told Kiara as he put down the house phone. Kiara was sitting on one of their kitchen chairs, her arm laid flat on the table as Sue re-wrapped the coloured bandages around her cast for her. The woman was a fully trained nurse and had rewrapped more than her fair share of casts when helping out on the reservation over the years.
Kiara looked down at the pastel yellow colour that was sitting nicely against the cast, knowing that if she kept getting it dirty she might as well get Sue to change it to a black colour. This was maybe the fourth time Sue had changed in the past few weeks, and Kiara was due expecting the woman to start charging for her services. The Black looked back up at Harry as she realised it was her that he was speaking to, and not to Sue.
"He said Bella is on her way over to see Jacob," he warned, his words carrying a silent warning that Seth and Leah didn't understand. Seth was happy to see Kiara in his house when he'd woken up that Saturday morning, Leah not so much after noticing how Kiara had begun to hang around with her ex-boyfriend, Sam Uley. "I think you should go greet her maybe."
Kiara wasted no time in saying goodbye to the family and rushing outside, breaking into a jog as she headed back towards her house. She wasn't a fast runner by any means, and relief almost flooded her body as she happened to spot the rest of the boys (shirtless, of course) heading in the direction of her house.
Sam turned around, grabbing her lightly as she skidded to a halt alongside them. They could see the immediate worry in her face and almost all jumped into defensive positions.
"What's wrong?"
"Bella's on her way over to see Jake, and I don't think it's going to end well," Kiara told them all, the boys all sharing a glance before turning and picking the pace up as they headed towards the Black residence.
They arrived pretty quickly, but not in time it seemed to have prevented Bella from reaching the house. She noticed the boys and Kiara appear from the dirt path, and instantly stormed across to where they had began to cross the field towards her.
Kiara raised her hands in defense as Bella hurled towards them, her face already scrunched in anger at the sight of the boys - and Kiara too. She was harbouring some ill feelings towards the girl for holding whatever secret Jacob had been trying to tell her.
"What did you do?" She screamed at them, causing Paul to step in front of Kiara protectively with a snarl on his own face. She shoved Sam backwards, causing all the boys to raise eyebrows at how angry she had gotten in their presence. "What did you do to him?"
"Easy!" Sam warned Paul as Paul bristled beside him, knowing that if Paul was to shift right now he wouldn't just give away the secret to Bella but potentially hurt Kiara with how close she was standing to the boy.
"He didn't want this!"
"What did he do, huh?" Paul barked back, squaring up to Bella. "What did he tell you?"
Sam grabbed on to Paul's arm and tried to push him backwards as Paul began to breath heavily. Kiara's mind instantly flashed to the way Jacob had reacted before phasing in front of her and she looked over to where Jared was shooting her a concerned look.
"Both of you, calm down!" Sam ordered, but Paul was getting too wound up by Bella to stop now. Kiara moved from behind Paul, instead going to stand on the opposite side of Jared as the boy angled his body so that he was inbetween Paul and Kiara. They all knew Paul would never turn on Kiara, but they also knew if he ever hurt the girl he'd be unable to live with himself.
"He tells me nothing because he's scared of you!"
Kiara did have to hide a little laugh at that, but unfortunatley Jared and Paul didn't have the common sense to hide theirs. Paul laughed right in Bella's face, causing the girl to get angry and bring her hand back to her side before slapping it straight across Paul's face.
"Too late now!" Jared replied, watching as Paul took two steps forward and phased into the grey wolf directly in front of Bella.
They knew Paul wouldn't hurt her, but Jacob wasn't leaving it to chance. He came running out of the Black household and immediatley ran towards where Bella was sprinting in the opposite direction. She tripped and stumbled to the ground, at the exact moment that Jacob phased on the fly and landed in front of the snarling Paul.
Kiara grimanced as Jake and Paul went tumbling towards the forest, smashing her fathers old boat in the process. She turned back as Sam told Jared and Embry to take Kiara and Bella back to Emily's place, turning around with a final nod to Kiara and rushing into the forest behind the two wolves.
"Guess the wolf's out of the bag," Embry replied, causing Kiara and Jared to roll their eyes.
"Shut up, Embry."