Chapter Text
It happened in the nursery.
Edward stood by the window, staring out into the storm. His body was tense, motionless except for the twitch in his jaw.
Jacob had just walked in, tracking mud and rainwater across the floor. He didn’t care. His hands were shaking again, but not from the cold.
From everything else.
Renesmee was asleep, unaware of the war simmering around her.
“I told her,” Jacob said, voice low. “I begged her not to go through with the pregnancy.”
Edward didn’t turn. “And yet you were there. Waiting. Hoping she’d choose you anyway.”
Jacob took a step forward, eyes burning. “You think I was playing games while she was dying in front of us?”
“You would’ve let her die in another way,” Edward said coldly. “Convincing her to kill what she loved most.”
“What you planted in her!” Jacob snapped. “You shouldn’t have touched her when she was still human.”
Edward finally turned, golden eyes blazing. “She wanted a life with me.”
“She didn’t know what she was choosing!” Jacob’s voice cracked. “She didn’t know she was signing a death sentence!”
“Don’t you dare talk about her like she was some naive girl you had to protect,” Edward growled. “She had more strength than both of us combined.”
Jacob’s body trembled with the urge to shift — to throw the pain into something physical. To fight. But the imprint sang in his chest like a warning. Hurting Edward would be like ripping out his own ribs.
And Edward knew it.
“You want to hit me,” Edward said softly. “But you can’t.”
Jacob’s fists curled at his sides. “You think this bond makes me yours? You think I want this?”
“No,” Edward said bitterly. “I think it’s a curse. For both of us.”
That did it.Jacob lunged.
He slammed Edward against the wall with a snarl, breathing hard, eyes burning gold and brown inches apart.
“I should hate you,” Jacob said through gritted teeth. “I do hate you.”
“Then do it,” Edward hissed. “Tear me apart. End it.”
But Jacob didn’t move.
His chest heaved. His hands trembled. The imprint screamed inside him — protect him. Don’t hurt him. Keep him safe. Even now.
“I can’t,” Jacob whispered, devastated. “I can’t hurt you.”
Edward stared at him, and in that moment, the fury drained from his face, replaced with something colder. Sadder.
“I wish you could,” he said quietly. “It would be easier.”
Jacob backed away like he’d been burned, pacing the room now, dragging a hand through his hair.
“You ruined her,” he said, voice raw. “And now I’m stuck with you. You took her life and gave me this chain.”
Edward looked down. “I would trade places with her if I could.”
Jacob didn’t flinch. He just stared, his voice like gravel. It’s good that you can’t. You deserve her death.”
The words cut the air like a blade.
Edward’s head snapped up, eyes flashing with something unspoken — something that had been festering beneath all the guilt and grief.
He stared at Jacob, the words echoing in his skull.
“You deserve her death.”
For a second, he looked shattered.
Then something in him broke.
“And you don’t?” he hissed.
Jacob blinked, caught off guard.
Edward lunged back at him.
He moved faster than thought, slamming Jacob back into the wall with inhuman force. The plaster cracked behind his shoulders. The impact should’ve triggered Jacob’s rage, the shift — but instead, he just stood there, breathing hard, arms trembling but not raising a hand in defense.
Because he couldn’t.
His whole body screamed to protect Edward — to not let him be harmed, even by himself. His bones ached with restraint.
“I didn’t kill her!” Jacob shouted, eyes wide, trying to fight the instincts holding him back.
“No?” Edward snarled. “You told her to kill our child. You would’ve let her die empty. You stood at her bedside and begged her to be someone else!”
Jacob’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t fight back. He couldn’t. He could only take it.
“And I still would!” Jacob yelled. “If it meant she’d be here instead of you!”
Edward pulled back, breathing hard, eyes wide with something deeper than rage-something like grief twisted into cruelty. “Say it again.”
“I wish it were you,” Jacob growled. “I wish I could rip you apart for what you did to her.”
Edward leaned in closer, inches from Jacob’s face. “Then do it.”
Jacob’s hands twitched at his sides. His breathing grew ragged.
But nothing happened.
He couldn’t lift a finger. He couldn’t even want to.
And that broke him more than anything.
Edward saw it in the smallest twitch in his face. The countless hopeless and hateful thoughts going through Jacob’s mind. Not towards him, but himself. The helplessness. The war in Jacob’s eyes between hate and instinct.
He stepped back slowly, disgusted — not with Jacob, but with everything between them.
“This is hell,” Edward said coldly. “And we’re both stuck in it.”
Jacob slid to the floor, chest heaving. He covered his face with his hands, shaking, his wet messy hair making his demeanor seem more instinctual and reckless. Almost foreign to Edward’s world.
He would’ve killed Jacob if he hadn’t caught one of his many, loud, stray thoughts. Two, maybe.
It’s law to wolves that when they imprint, that person can not be killed.
It’s their purpose to be anything for that person at all costs.
Jacob would be anything for him no matter what, whether he wanted to or not.
He almost felt bad, but it would save him and Renesme.
But, he didn’t want Renesme saved.
He wanted Bella.
He wanted the light in her eyes to return and her thin body to be full and healthy and glowing a soft pale instead of a vampire-ish, dead one like his.
Edward didn’t move. He just stood there, still trembling, as Renesmee let out a soft cry from the other room — a reminder of the life they couldn’t escape.
The fight was over.
But nothing felt finished.
Jacob let out a groan, rubbing the back of his neck as he turned away.
“I didnt impregnate her or let her die with that demon feeding off of her life force, y’know? Is that your twisted idea of love, leech..?”
Edward looked up, and for once, his voice broke.
“I thought loving her meant respecting her choice. But now she’s gone, and all I have is this child she never got to hold… and a man who reminds me every day that I failed.
“Your love is just as twisted as mine.”
The silence had weight.
It was just after midnight.
Renesmee had finally fallen asleep, her faint heartbeat the only thing grounding the house in something living other than the mutt.
Rosalie noticed their odd stillness and reluctance to see Renesme, but she knew Edward thought of her as inhuman, despite her heartbeat.
Thought of the child as a monster.
As for Jacob, he seemed just as emotional, but more directionally towards Edward.
She knew Edward could handle himself, so she thought maybe he’d have to let it out on Jacob instead of Renesme. She couldn’t care any less.
Edward was in the kitchen, unmoving.
Jacob stood in the doorway, watching him like he didn’t know how he got there.
Neither spoke.
And then Edward turned. Slowly. Eyes rimmed red — not from thirst. From something older. Deeper.
“She’s never going to come back,” he said. “I can still hear her laugh echoing in this house.”
Jacob swallowed hard. “I know.”
They stared at each other.
“You don’t.”
The silence stretched until it snapped — when Edward crossed the space between them in two strides and grabbed him.
It wasn’t gentle.
Jacob’s back hit the wall with a thud, and he didn’t fight it. He just breathed hard, eyes locked on Edward’s. His heart thundered — not in fear. In something darker. Need.
Anger.
Grief.
Edward’s hands fisted in the fabric of Jacob’s shirt. “I can’t stop seeing her face,” he said, voice cracked and trembling. “And then I look at you and I feel like I’m dying all over again.”
Jacob didn’t pull away. “Then stop looking.”
Edward kissed him.
Hard. Desperate. Like punishment. Like prayer.
Jacob stiffened, fists clenched at his sides — but he didn’t shove him off. He didn’t run. He let it happen.
And then he kissed him back.
Rough.
Wet.
Teeth.
No softness in it, just grief in a different shape. Hands dragged through hair too hard, breath stolen, bodies pressed together like they needed to hurt to feel anything at all.
And then it changed.
Jacob’s chest hitched. His hands gripped Edward’s arms, not to push, not to pull-just to hold on.
Because suddenly he was crying.
Tears broke free without warning, and when Edward felt it, the shaking, the heat of it, his own control shattered too.
Their mouths tore apart.
Jacob turned his face away, biting down sobs like they were shameful.
Edward leaned forward, foreheads pressed together, breath ragged, and the first sound he made was a choked sob that didn’t sound like him at all.
Why was Jacob crying? This is what he wanted.
Why isn’t he punishing me? Edward was thankful that Jacob couldn’t also read his thoughts. He wanted to understand Jacob because he knew Jacob couldn’t understand him.
Maybe that was for the better, because he was trying to get Jacob to at least bite back with words. His tongue. Anything.
Or was Edward just going to hurt Jacob more?
Use this against him and tear him apart.
“Why her?” Jacob whispered. “Why did it have to be her?”
Edward’s voice broke. “Because I loved her. And love ruins everything. I..I ruin…”
They held each other then, but not out of hate or love, because their emotions that day had numbed them to just two men falling apart in the space between what was and what will never be again.
Jacob buried his face in Edward’s neck, fists trembling against his chest. Edward held him tighter than he should have. Maybe tighter than he ever had with anyone. Anyone else still alive.
It was real.
They were holding each other for anything left of what life they had moments ago. Bella was gone. They were gone.
It’s too real.
Too much.
They were still in a main area and likely could be heard and seen by anyone, any vampire.
They were still very much upset but didn’t need more eyes judging them.
Jacob had dragged him upstairs afterwards, his thoughts too loud to notice the absence of quiet in his very fast and real steps to one of the guest rooms in Carlisle’s house, the two in the middle of a mental battle with themselves and physically with each other.
Edward shoved Jacob back hard, their bodies colliding with the bedframe as the mattress gave beneath them.
“You don’t get to throw yourself at me like this and pretend it means nothing,” Edward growled. “You want this? You imprinted-so what, that gives you permission to stop thinking?”
Jacob pushed against his chest, not hard enough to get free…not even close. “You think I’m not thinking? You think this is easy for me?”
Edward pressed down more, arms braced beside Jacob’s head, breathing sharp. “You act like you want me one second, and then flinch like I’m something filthy the next.”
“Because I do,” Jacob snapped. “I want you, and I hate it.”
Edward’s jaw locked.
“I should hate you,” Jacob went on, voice rising. “I should rip your head off for what happened to her- what you did to her.”
“Then why don’t you?” Edward hissed, eyes blazing. “Go ahead. Hurt me.”
Jacob stilled.
“I said do it.” Edward slammed his hand against the bed beside Jacob’s ribs. “You have every reason to hate me. So why won’t you fight?”
Jacob’s hands gripped the sheets. His whole body trembled, not from fear-from restraint. From something deeper and crueler that kept him locked in place.
“Because I can’t,” he ground out, eyes glossy with fury. “Because no matter how much I want to, no matter how much you push me-I can’t hurt you.”
Edward stared, breath caught.
“I want to scream at you. I want to tear everything apart until I forget your name. But you look at me like this, you touch me, and all I feel is this goddamn pull, this need that I never asked for.”
He laughed once, bitter. “And you think I’m the one being reckless?”
Edward’s voice came quieter, but more dangerous. “Then why do you keep coming back?”
Jacob looked at him, eyes burning. “Because when I’m near you, the grief is quieter. Bella’s dead. Not gone. Just… further away.”
Edward’s composure cracked.
He stared down at Jacob, angry, broken, overwhelmed-and finally saw it. The way Jacob’s hands shook even now, fists clenched so hard his knuckles were white.
“You want to forget her,” Edward said slowly. “Even if it kills you.”
Jacob swallowed hard.
“If you’re going to use me for that,” Edward whispered, “then look me in the eye while you do it.”
That was what undid him.
Jacob’s face twisted, and he suddenly grabbed Edward’s shirt, dragging him down into a rough, aching kiss.
Not passionate.
Not romantic.
Desperate.
It lasted a heartbeat before he recoiled at Edward’s touch again, like he didn’t want it despite his hands clenched on the back of his shirt like it was life or death.
Then Jacob’s grip fell away, and he collapsed against the bed, breath hitching and body curling inward under Edward’s weight.
A low sound escaped him — not pain, not exactly — but something helpless and humiliating.
Like he was trying to hold it in and failed.
Edward froze.
Jacob didn’t speak, didn’t fight, didn’t move — he just cried, shoulders shaking against the bed.
It wasn’t loud.
It was worse — silent, shaking sobs that he clearly didn’t want Edward to see.
The kind you only make when you’ve run out of ways to carry everything by yourself.
It must suck, to be forced into a selfless, devotional connection to someone you hated. Someone who got your best friend killed. Someone you would’ve crushed under your thumb if they somehow became small and puny.
Edward wasn’t sure if he was taking more pity of Jacob or himself.
Why….but why…?
Why was Edward letting the other hurt himself like this. Edward wanted to feel it, feel that weight and get closer.
To add onto it and drown out Jacob’s cries. Whether it was out of aversion or self-loathing, he wasn’t sure.
Part of him wanted to drown with Jacob under waves of helplessness.
Helplessness before the sudden affinity.
“I don’t know how to live with this,” he choked out.
Edward closed his eyes and lowered his forehead to Jacob’s chest, trembling with him.
“Neither do I.”