The Consequences {Jacob Black}

Chapter LXXIX

There are a lot of things that I'm afraid of. As a general rule, I don't deal with my fear. No, I generally go running head first towards it until I can make it fear me. Now, there are a few exceptions to this rule, vampires being one of them. But the one thing that I cannot control are my nerves.

My nerves have been a source of contention for ages now. Jake had always been the one that calmed my nerves and made everything better. But here was the problem: Jake was the reason for the nerves now.

I was pacing the small bathroom, running my hands over my hair and let putting them on my hips. I alternated the positions while I walked. I tried convincing myself that I had nothing to be anxious about. Jake and I had been sleeping, just sleeping, in a bed together for ages. And nothing had really changed after we started doing more than just sleeping. Mostly because neither one of us were in the condition to be doing much more than just sleeping.

If I was being honest, I hadn't really enjoyed the night that Jake and I had spent together. I mean, I had. It was beyond anything that I had ever felt before when he'd, uh, taken care of me. But after that, it had just hurt. A lot. There was nothing that Jake could do that was going to make it any easier. Naturally, I had gone and talked to Leah about it.

Unfortunately, she and Sam had never gotten that far, despite the rumors on the Rez. So my last resort had been Sue. I couldn't talk to Emily about it. She was too innocent for that.

Sue had laughed and told me that things would feel better the next time that Jake and I did things. I begged her, down on my hands and knees begged her, not to tell my father or Billy. She made me promise not to do anything without being safe. Jake and I weren't ready for any of that. I was nervous about everything, about all of it. But mostly, I was anxious that I was going to screw something up. I kept pacing, trying to breathe deeply.

"Are you going to come out or just keep hyperventilating in there?" Jake called through the door.

I groaned and sat down on the toilet. Jake pried to door open and stepped inside.

"What's going on in there?" he asked, tapping my head.

"Is it weird if I tell you that I'm nervous?" I asked him. He just chuckled. "This isn't funny, Jake."

"It is, actually. In a normal world, you say that the first time," he laughed. I frowned at him, trying to see the humor in his words. "We don't have to do anything, Annie. Not if you don't want to."

"That's not what I'm worried about," I scoffed. "I know what I want to do." He smirked and I lightly smacked his cheeks. "I'm worried about messing something up and ruining this. And, Jake, you've gone through all the trouble of making this happen. It's got to be the sweetest thing that anyone has ever done for me. I just want to make everything perfect."

His hands slid down my shoulders and twined our fingers together. He pulled me gently to my feet so that I was standing in front of him. His arm slid around me, holding me against his chest. His other hand came up and wrapped around my curls, pulling my head up until he could drag his skin across my jaw, down to my chin and up to my lips. He moved slowly, torturously so. His hand massaged the base of my neck, sending tingles and shivers down my spine. The world around me began to spin as his lips wrapped around my lower lip.

I could feel a gentle tugging sensation on my lip as he pulled it into his mouth and nipped it gently with his teeth. I could feel his tongue sliding into my mouth, but he was still gentle. I tried to force him to go faster. My mouth got ahead of my brain and kissed him back, but he remained slow and steady, forcing me down to his pace. His fingers played with the edge of my shirt, wrapping around the threading and pulling. He broke away from me, his lips trailing down my neck and finding their way to my collar bone. My shirt was gone before I even knew that he had removed it. His hands wrapped around the soft skin of my waist, trailing over the scars on my back.

"Do you remember how you got those?" he whispered against my throbbing pulse. "That was one of the first times that I realized that I loved you."

What was he talking about? The scars were from Murphy. That wasn't exactly a memory that I wanted to think about it. He turned me around so that my back was to him. He leaned down and pressed her lips to my shoulder. His fingers trailed over one of the longer scars that was raised against my skin. And then his hands ran over my skin to the front waistband of my pants. His fingers had worked open the button and zipper of my pants while I was panting. I leaned back against his shoulder, feeling him behind me.

"We don't have to do anything that you don't want to do," he breathed into my ear. "You say when and we'll stop." I just shivered against him. "It's all up to you." I shook my head and turned back into his embrace, tugging at his shirt until he got my hint and took it off. I trailed my nails down his chest, feeling the muscles ripple and tense under my hands. His hands were on my denim jeans again, but his mouth was still moving slowly against mine.

He was trailing down my jaw and neck before he made it to my sternum. He had never gone this far, not even the day that we had done things. He kept descending, until his hands were pulling my jeans down. Slowly but surely, my jeans were pulled away from my legs. His callouses stung as they rubbed up my legs and back to my waist. He lifted his lips from my chest to my mouth again and kissed me.

I couldn't believe that I was being so bold. I jumped up and wrapped my legs around his waist, glad that he was strong enough to catch me. He walked back towards the bed and laid me down underneath him, his hands trailing up and down my waist while he ravished my mouth.

"I love you," he murmured.

•••

I woke a few hours later to feel Jake's arm coiled tight around my waist. He was snoring gently behind me, although loudly. I had learned how to ignore them, how to sleep through his sawing. My phone buzzed to alert me to a call, but I couldn't reach it. Jake's arms tightened around my body and restricted me from finding my phone somewhere behind us. But I was so perfectly content where I was.

I pressed myself back into his body, feeling the painful sting of the stitches in my leg. I wished my sister would realize just how insane she was. She had thought that she would be saving everyone by hurting me. But Seth had been only been faking. And he had managed to save me before the vampire could kill me.

Jake grumbled in his sleep, pulling me tighter to his chest.

"I love you," he murmured. I smiled, fighting against him to turn in his arms. He let me, but once he was sure that I was completely rotated, he constricted around me again. I sighed in contentment. I never wanted to be in another place again. I looked up at his sleeping face. He looked so happy, so peaceful when he was sleeping. I wanted to believe that it was because I was here with him. In fact, that was what I chose to tell myself. I heard my name murmured in his sleep and my smile widened. This was what Jake and I needed. He was right.

I was sure that sometime in the near future, Jake and mine's life together would explode again. We would have to live with those consequences when we came to them. But right here, right now, with his arms wrapped around me and his bare chest pressed against mine, his legs tangled around mine, I couldn't help but be okay with that. He would always be here to protect me. I heard him inhale sharply, a sign that I had learned meant that he was waking up. He tightened his hold on my arms and pressed a kiss into my hair. I could definitely do this more often.