CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

"Can I just tell you again how incredibly stupid this is?" Jay says as she follows behind Bella as they trek through the undergrowth of the forest.

"You didn't have to come with me." The older girl tells her.

"I was supposed to let you come out here all alone when there have been multiple bear sightings, and people have been killed?" She questions. "Think again, muchacha."

"And what are you gonna do if we find a bear?" Bella asks as they cross over a stream.

"Trip you, run home, tell Charlie that you died saving my life." She says. "Isabella Marie Swan — my hero, may she rest in peace."

"That's nice." She says sarcastically.

"We will never forget her. She sucked at singing, had suicidal tendencies, made bonehead decisions that threatened the safety of herself and her friends, crashed her motorcycle the one and only time she ever drove it; but she was my Ohana, and we will never forget her."

"What a riot."

"Hey, that'd be a killer eulogy." She defends.

"And that's dark, even for you." Bella shakes her head as she leads the way over rocks and fallen tree branches.

"What? The death joke about your funeral?" She chuckles. "Too soon?"

"Well, seeing as I'm not dead yet..."

"Yet being the operative word." Jay says as she ducks under a low-hanging branch. "You keep making decisions like this one, and your funeral will be sooner than later."

"Says the girl who followed me out here." She glances at the younger girl over her shoulder.

"Fair point. Maybe it'll be Kim giving the eulogy at our funeral." She says as they enter a large clearing in the woods. "Aw, we could have a joint funeral, be buried together. We'll be together forever in the afterlife too. What a beautifully tragic story." She continues as she walks past Bella into the field that's full of brown grass. "I hate to break it to you, Bell, but this place is kinda ug— Bella?" Her eyebrows furrow when she turns back around and sees her distraught friend on one knee with two fist-fulls of the dormant blades.

The older girl straightens up again, but instead of returning her attention to Jay, she stares at something over her best friend's shoulder. The little brunette turns and finds a man that hadn't been standing there a few moments ago. He has black skin and long dark brown dreadlocks, and in truth the man is beautiful. But even at this distance, Jay can see his crimson red eyes.

Jay takes a step back as her hand reaches into her sweater pocket where her phone is, and she pushes the button to call back the last person dialed on her call-log.

"Bella." The man speaks, and the younger girl's dark eyes widen.

"You know this guy?" Jay questions.

"Laurent." Bella mutters.

"You seem pleased to see me." His voice is eerily low.

"I almost believed that none of it happened." She says, and Jay's eyebrows furrow once again as she turns her head the slightest bit in her friend's direction.

He chuckles, suddenly standing much closer, and Jay jumps back a step, startled. "What an odd thing to say." Again, he's closer in the blink of an eye. "I didn't expect to find you here." He says as the side of Jay's arm brushes against Bella's, having backed up to get away from him.

"Yeah, and I'm thinking we should be leaving." Jay says, but Bella grabs her arm; the younger girl gets the feeling that running wouldn't be in their best interest.

"I went to visit the Cullens, but...the house is empty." Laurent says as he begins to circle the two teenage girls, and Jay then notices the slight accent in his voice. "I'm surprised they left you behind. Weren't you sort of a...pet of theirs?"

"Yeah, you could say that." Bella nods as she turns as well, moving Jay behind her.

"Do the Cullens visit often?"

The older girl gasps as she looks at something that Jay can't see. "Yeah, absolutely, all the time. I'll tell them that you stopped by." She lies as she and Jay continue turning while he circles the two of them. "But I probably shouldn't...tell Edward. 'Cause he's pretty protective. He might misinterpret this little get-together." She says, and he smiles.

"He'd be right, if he were here. But he's far away, isn't he?" He questions.

"Why are you here?"

"I came as a...favor to Victoria." He tells her, and that clearly takes her by surprise.

"V-Victoria?"

"She asked me to see if you were still under the protection of the Cullens." He explains. "Victoria feels it's only fair to kill Edward's mate, given he killed hers. An eye for an eye."

"Edward would know who did it." Bella says quickly, starting to panic. "And he'd come after you."

He shakes his head. "I don't think he will. After all, how much could you mean to him if he left you here unprotected?" He sighs. "Victoria won't be happy about my killing you, but I can't help myself. You are so mouth-watering."

Jay's phone makes a noise, and she clenches her teeth as the man's red eyes move to her. "Son of a bitch." She mutters, and then he's standing directly in front of them.

Laurent reaches into her pocket and pulls the phone out so that he can look at the screen before crushing the small device in his hand. Her eyes widen, and then he grabs her by her throat. She starts choking as Bella tries hopelessly to make him let go, and then something slams into them from the side.

Jay flies across the clearing before rolling to a stop, and she groans when she lands on the gun that she'd had tucked into the back of her waistband. Bella's eyes widen when she sees Tyler's glowing yellow eyes and the fangs in his mouth as he growls at the man who was about to kill the girls. He and Laurent start fighting as Jay picks up her gun and flicks off the safety. She looks up, cocking it, and sees Tyler fly back into a tree; the impact being so hard that it snaps his spine.

"Tyler!" Jay screams, and Laurent turns back to her. "Oh, shi—"

The red-eyed man runs at her, his movements a blur, and she quickly pulls up the gun and fires off a shot. She swears she hears a noise like glass shattering, followed by Laurent's pain-filled scream as he suddenly stops in his advance. He's clutching his shoulder when the sound of a twig snapping pulls his attention away from her, and he turns. 

Jay looks to her left and her dark eyes widen when she sees a six-foot-tall, jet black wolf step out of the tree line and into the open clearing. The red-eyed man mutters something under his breath and then runs in the other direction, he turns into a blur again as he runs away from the animal. More wolves follow the first one as it chases after him, and Jay quickly gets up and runs across the clearing to where Tyler still hasn't gotten back up.

"What..." Bella mutters as she slowly walks over to Jay and the dead hybrid beside her.

"Get out of here, now. Go back to the truck, and get the hell out of the woods." Jay tells her.

"Leave you?" She shakes her head. "No."

"I'll be fine. Just go." The younger girl tells her. "Bella, go!"

Four wolves chase after Laurent as Bella turns around and runs in the opposite direction out of the clearing. Jay gets to her feet as she looks down at Tyler's body and sighs, but then she hears something behind her. The little brunette cocks the gun as she spins around, raising and aiming the gun at the huge wolf that's standing there.

The dark gray wolf towers over her, but it doesn't seem menacing. Something about it almost looks curious as the animal watches the freaked out brunette. The wolf's ears flatten on its large head as its expression softs — as though that were even possible — and it lowers itself down as it slowly walks forward, till it's practically crawling toward her on its stomach.

"Okay." Jay exhales. "Nice wolf. Nice abnormally large wolf. Sure... Not the craziest thing that I've ever seen, I guess." She says as she lowers her gun, and the animal lays on its stomach. "I'm not gonna put this away though. No offense, I just have trust issues." She says as she uncocks the gun and then clicks the safety back on.

Jay watches the wolf as its eyes travel from her face, to the gun, and back up again. She then looks down at Tyler and nudges his leg with her foot. The little brunette sighs as she reaches up and brushes her hair back.

"He's only temporarily dead." She says as she looks back at the wolf. "So, if you decide to stick around until he wakes up, could you not attack us when he gasps?" She nods as she looks at the wild animal for a moment. "Mhm. I spend far too much of my life talking to wolves. I guess that either makes me Cinderella...or I belong in a nuthouse."

The wolf makes a noise, and she swears it's like the animal almost laughed.

"Yep, I've gone insane. I am totally bat-shit crazy." She kicks Tyler again. "Wake up so that I can kill you myself. This is your fault, damn it... How long does this usually last again?" She mutters to herself. "I'd call Damon, but the damn red-eyed...thing broke my phone." She then looks back at the wolf. "I don't suppose you have a phone?" She says sarcastically.

The wolf tilts its head as he watches her for a moment, then it moves its large paw toward Tyler, bumping his foot.

"That's...actually a good idea." Jay nods. "I'm gonna pretend that I thought of it myself, so that I don't have to admit that the scary large wolf just understood and answered my question. Again, no offense."

The little brunette leans down, keeping the gun in her hand, and starts searching through Tyler's pockets. Luckily, it's in his sweater pocket, so she doesn't have to check his jeans.

Damon doesn't answer. Stefan doesn't answer. Elena doesn't answer.

"Damn you all... You're in Nova Scotia." Jay sighs. "Who didn't go on that stupid... Caroline."

"You're supposed to be—"

"Alive?" Jay cuts her off. "He's not."

"Jay?"

"No, it's the Gingerbread Man. Yes, Jay!" She snaps, her voice a whisper, not wanting to startle the wolf or bring anything back toward them.

"What's going on?" The confused blonde asks.

"Well, something just tried to kill me, but it broke Tyler's back instead, and now I'm in the middle of the freaking woods staring at a huge ass wolf that I'm really hoping is a hallucination because all this supernatural shit has finally broken my brain." She groans as she presses the back of her other hand to her forehead, her fingers still curled around the gun.

"I'm confused."

"Yeah, story of my life." She sighs. "How long does this dead thing usually last when Stefan and Damon throw tantrums and snap each other's necks?"

"Uh... Half hour?" It's more of a question. "Maybe less."

"Oh." She lets out a fake sob.

"Are you okay?"

"Mhm. I'm fine. I'm great, actually." She forces a sarcastic smile as she looks back at the gray wolf that's still watching her. "I am so fan-freaking-tastic. I love when monsters try to kill me, and when I'm five seconds from dying. It's great." She takes a deep breath to calm herself down.

"Do you want some more backup over there?" Caroline offers. "I can get online right now and book the next flight out of Mystic Falls."

"No, you don't have to come here. Something tells me that I'm not hallucinating, and the other four enormous wolves killed that red-eyed thing." She tells her, still looking at the wolf. "I vented, I'm good. Thanks, Care-Bear."

"Ooh, you're adorable." She says sarcastically, and the little brunette chuckles.

"I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Don't get eaten by the wolf."

"You kiddin'? Wolves love me. I'm the Wolf Whisperer." Jay says, and then her eyebrows furrow as she tilts her head to the side, her eyes still on the animal in front of her. "Oh my God." She mutters.

"What?" Caroline asks.

"Uh... Nothing. Look, I gotta go. I'll call you later." She hangs up the phone.

The wolf shifts uneasily as she studies it, the crease between her brows deepening.

"Your eyes..." She mutters as it gets to its feet. "You can understand me, can't you?" She asks, watching it back away from her, then it turns around and sprints across the clearing. "Paul."

Tyler suddenly gasps beside her, and she looks down at him before returning her attention to where the large gray wolf just disappeared back into the tree line. The hybrid quickly gets to his feet and starts checking to make sure that Jay's okay. Once she manages to convince him that she's fine, the two of them head out of the woods and go to Bella's to talk to her.

Since Charlie's cruiser isn't outside the house, Jay just runs up the porch and goes inside before heading upstairs to Bella's bedroom. She knocks twice and then opens the door, and is immediately startled when she sees Jacob standing by Bella's bed as they talk.

"Do any of you ever wear shirts?" The younger girl shakes her head and then looks at Bella. "I need to talk to you after he's gone." She tells her and goes back downstairs to where Tyler is.

"What the hell is going on?" Tyler questions. "What happened after I was knocked out?"

"I told you, I don't know."

"You know something that you're not telling me." He argues. "What was that thing? And how did you kill it?"

"I didn't! I shot it, and it took off." She tells him.

"Is it dead?"

"I don't know, Tyler." She says through clenched teeth, getting angry about everything that's going on now. Then she hears Bella walking down the stairs and she turns so that she can talk to her and hopefully get some kind of answers about this afternoon.