chapter 19: problems

The wedding night came quickier then I was expecting. Anya had talked me into staying with her and Jason the night before. The empty feeling was still inside me as always. It didn't help that the wedding was the very next day! I was sitting at the kitchen counter, impatiently drumming my fingers on the counter.

"Have you fed at all?" Jason asked as he cooked dinner for his pack.

It smelt good but nothing I was interested in of course. They always had pretty big dinners at least twice a week. They called it the "gathering," where they all got together and informed eachother of what was going on with themselves. It was like a family dinner in a way, only somewhat different considering they were a pack of wolves.

"Right before I came here." I spoke absent mindedly.

Jason's cell phone suddenly rang. As soon as he answered it I heard Jacob's voice.

"Sure." Jason said to Jake then handed me the phone.

"Hi Jake."

"Hey Jamie..." He sounded nervous. If he wanted to talk to me why didn't he just call my phone?

"What's going on Jacob?" I frowned at the sound of his voice.

"Oh I just need to ask you a question..."

"Okay...?"

"Ummm," He cleared his throat. "You do plan on showing up tommorow, right?"

"Jeez Jacob!" I sighed.

"I'm just making sure."

"You're making sure or Kale is?" He didn't say anything. I sighed again. "Tell Kale I love him and I'll see him tommorow."

"Will do...Oh, wait. He heard you." He laughed.

"Of course he did--" I began to mutter.

"I love you too, Jamie." Kale's voice cut me off.

Hearing his voice sent chills through me. Being away from him again was almost too much. We stayed on the phone until we were both forced off. Shane and Jacob were complaining in the background. Anya and Jason were doing the same.

That morning I had a dream that Jake, Shane and Anabelle completely ruined the wedding. It was aweful. I woke up from my dream just as the sun had set. Anya was in my room seconds after.

"We have three hours to get you ready." She grinned.

The wedding was actually a couple hours away in an open field that me and Kale found. I sighed, getting up and following her into the bathroom.

~~~~~~~~

I was fidgeting as I stood inside the white tent. We had arrived long before anyone else. No one saw me. As I waited I heard everyone begin to arrive. I began to pace. Anya grabbed my arm, trying her best to hold me in place.

"Deep breathes, dolcetto." She told me softly.

Then I heard all three of them show up.

"Come in." I said before they could even ask.

One at a time they entered, gasping as they did. I didn't really need them to react that way. William was the only one that just smiled when he saw me.

"I think Kale might just be the first vampire to die from lack of breath." William teased.

Shane nodded as Jacob gawked. I didn't look at myself in the mirror before I left. I looked at Anya. What had she done to me? She just smiled.

"Give it to her." William suddenly ordered after a moment.

"Oh. We got you something." Jake shook his head, snapping himself out of staring at me like that. Shane handed me a box. I opened it, seeing a necklace with three hearts, one inside of the other. It was obvious what the meaning behind it was. Each heart stood for one of them.

"You—I..." I almost cried, at a loss for words as I hugged all three of them. "I love you guys."

"We love you too." William laughed. It sounded best coming out of his mouth.

There were more voices coming from outside the tent now.

"How's Kale?" I asked as Anya helped me put the necklace on.

"Freaking out!" Shane blurted.

"He's a mess!" Jacob added. William rolled his eyes.

"He's just nervous. How are you feeling?"

"Nervous." I nodded. "Very nervous."

"Well we shouldn't delay any longer then." Anya decided.

"Right. You two should get back to the groom." William agreed, shooing the boys out of the room.

"Why does he get to stay?" Jacob pouted. Shane shrugged.

"Because I'm not one of the groomsmen." William informed them as they sulked out of the tent.

"Don't give away how beautiful she looks!" Anya called after them.

There were even more voices outside the tent. I was fidgeting yet again. This time I had the necklace to fidget with. William grabbed my hands so I'd stop.

"I've never seen anyone so nervous." He practically laughed.

"Me either." Jason said walking in. "Oh, I thought you were talking about Kale." He looked at me grinning. "You two are practically the same person sometimes."

"He's really as nervous as me?" I asked.

"Yeah. It's like everything just hit him at once. He's also really excited." He assured me.

"Are you ready, dolcetto?" He then asked. How was it they both managed to call me that in less then an hour?

I nodded slowly. Since I had no one else to walk me down the aisle and give me away, I asked Jason if he would. He said yes and seemed flattered by the request. William slipped out of the tent. Anya squeezed my hand and kissed Jason before she left too. Jason held out his arm, I hooked mine with his.

"You look beautiful, Jamie. And I don't usually say that to vampires." He grinned down at me teasingly. I smiled back. We both knew I would have been blushing by now. The butterflies in my stomach were going crazy.

"Let's go." He puffed out his chest as if somehow encouraging me to be brave, like him. This made me smile. I took a deep breath and we moved out of the tent in unisoned strides.

~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~

We were covered perfectly by trees until we rounded the corner. The sea of faces staring at me took me by surprise. Not only was Zero's whole clan there and Jason's pack, but Dante's clan and Maverick's pack as well. There were packs and clans that I didn't recognize too. I guess when I told Anya to send out invitations to whoever everyone else wanted to come to the wedding, she did just that. I didn't even know most of them!

We rounded gracefully around the crowd to the middle ailse. I couldn't force my eyes to look up, not even when Kale let out an awed gasp. Jason nudged me and I finally looked up. For a second I saw Anya and Anabelle. I told Anabelle she could be part of the wedding, not that she wanted to, but Will seemed to talk her into it.

Then I saw Jacob, Shane and Jared but only for a split second. When my eyes met Kale's, everyone else disappeared. That was alot of people to just have them disappear from my vision! His jaw was slack at first, his eyes wide. Then he had the most incredible look in his eyes. The most handsome unbreakable smile spread across his face.

If my heart hadn't already, it would have stopped dead at the sight of him. It took forever to get to him! I was becoming very impatient. I was far from wanting to run away scared now. Finally we got to him. Jason kissed my cheek, winked at Kale then stepped away from us.

Kale grabbed my hands and pulled me towards him. His hands were shaking. I squeezed them.Our eyes locked. The whole time, we didn't look away from eachother. I felt like I was in a dream but unlike the one Kale showed me it was so different. Kale had a very different image of the wedding. Probably because he had no idea what I would actually look like.

The ceremony went quicker then I expected it to. Everything was moving so fast. Even at the end Kale was still shaking, just not as much as before. When he got told to kiss me, "Kale, you may now kiss your bride," it was obvious to me that he was trying really hard to just kiss me. I pulled away so he wouldn't attack me in front of our wedding guests. As we left to change for the reception, everyone's voices began to pick up again.

"How adorable!"

"It's like they were made for eachother!"

"Did you see Kale's face?"

"Did you see the way they looked at eachother?"

We headed into the tents, having a few moments alone.

"Are you okay?" I asked him as he still gripped my hands. He nodded.

"You-You're just-Jamie, you are so--" He stammered over his words.

"Kale--" But I didn't get far before he completely attacked me.

"Wait! We should go back out there..." I gasped.

He groaned but obviously knew I was right. He took a step away from me but only ended up coming forward again. I let him.

"Hey! Do you two want to come out of there? You know, it's kind of your wedding!" Anya laughed.

We pushed away from eachother and headed back to the wedding. I smiled at Anya as I followed behind Kale. He gripped my hand tightly. She rolled her eyes but smiled back at me as always. Shane and Jason were in front of us suddenly.

"Kale, we need to talk." Jason was frowning deeply.

"Jason. It can wait." Anya frowned at him now.

"Anya I--" He began anxiously.

"No, it can wait. Whatever it is, I don't care at the moment." Kale said firmly.

"But Kale--" Shane began.

"Shane, please." I finally pleaded now.

Both of them exchanged glance and sighed frustrated. Anya glared at both of them and began scolding them as Kale pulled me along.

"I can't believe you would try to tell him now at their wedding!" She hissed.

"He needs to know." Jason said in a hushed whisper.

"They both do!" Shane let out.

"Hush! Not. Now." She growled between her teeth.

I glanced back at them. They turned away from me abruptly. I couldn't worry about them right now. All I wanted to pay attention to was Kale's warm silky hand in mine. It's kind of funny, now that I was a vampire too Kale's skin against mine was warm, as if the coldness of both our skin balanced eachother out.

Chief Maverick was one of the first people to come up to us. As always being followed by the majority of his pack. In a way it seemed he was just like royalty to the shapeshifters, his pack almost acted more like guards. It was a much different pack then with Jason and Anya's, who's pack was more like family to them. Maverick seemed tense and spoke stiffly. I figured it was because he was around so many clans.

Kale was glowing! I knew he was still uncomfortable around the packs but it seemed nothing could bring him down.

"When you have a moment, I would like to talk to you both." His eyes were tight. He glanced around the reception then looked at us, seeming to force a smile. "And congratulations. You two are perfect for eachother." He didn't say anything else, which wasn't too strange. He spun around and fell into the crowd with his pack surrounding him.

We actually didn't stay long. Just long enough to talk to everyone and even dance a little. Shane and Jacob cut in a couple times. Kale watched with almost an annoyed look on his face. He danced near us with Anya and he even danced with Anabelle. But fair was fair. I was dancing with Shane, Jacob, Jason and also William.

I met some of the clans that had known Zero for years. They had never heard Kale before tonight. A few of the girls were intimidatingly pretty. But none of them were Anabelles. I also met some packs that were very close with Jason and Anya. All of them seemed to already know our whole story. Every single one of them knew I was human just a few months ago.

"I never thought Zero would fall for a human." One of the female vampires sighed. Her shiney black hair was short and her eyes were dark, but not from hunger.

"It surprised me too." Kale admitted with a smile still on his face. I realized I was still smiling too.

Everyone usually said about the same things. I met alot of people but I remembered each and every one of them clearly and perfectly. That was something I wouldn't have been able to do. Before we left Shane and Jacob were in front of us in seconds.

"Whatever is so important, we'll talk about it soon." Kale promised Shane.

He was still in a great mood. Our hands still locked. They both nodded. There eyes shifted to me. They tried there best to look away. Finally Jake spoke without thinking.

"Have you looked at yourself tonight, Jamie?" He asked as if he were being tortured, as if I were the one doing it on purpose.

"Umm, no." I murmured. My body subconsciously moved closer to Kale. They both stared at me. Kale almost angrily cleared his throat.

"I'm glad you like the necklace." Shane changed the subject, flashing a small smile.

"I really do." I smiled back. "It's so beautiful."

"I picked it out!" Jacob informed me proudly. Shane laughed.

"Right." He rolled his eyes, looking at me now. "It was me." He pointed to himself smugly. Jacob opened his mouth to protest.

"It was me." William interrupted annoyed, appearing out of nowhere. I couldn't get used to him not having a scent. "Now let them go. They have a long day ahead of them." He nudged Kale playfully.

Kale only laughed, grabbing my waist. Both Shane and Jacob groaned, understanding way too well. Kale laughed again. A full hearted, happy laugh.

"It is our wedding night." He informed them casually with a shrug.

I didn't say anything. It was official. Now that we did it, I was more then estatic.

"We know." They murmured in unison.

They were still having difficulties with the fact that we were now married. I sighed. All there eyes were suddenly on me, as if they had just noticed I was there. I got that alot from them and it was really weird. How could they love me so much but forget I'm right in front of them.

"You guys will always be my best friends. Nothing will change that." I promised them. They both nodded.

"You're lucky Kale." Shane told him.

"Very lucky." Jake agreed.

"Always remember that." They said in unison.

This reminded me of there conversation they had with Kale when I wasn't around. My body tensed slightly as I got ready to confront them about it. Kale's arm knowingly tightened around me. Once again he laughed. That laugh! I wanted to turn and attack him right there. I looked up at him. He grinned down at me, kissing my forehead.

"You can always do that later." He chuckled. Yes, we were vampires but how did he know what I was thinking? I sighed again and let my body relax.

"Get out of here. We'll think of something to tell your guests." William insisted.

"Wait!" Anabelle was suddenly standing in front of us beside William. I moved closer to Kale's side. I was surprised she didn't try something when she was dancing with Kale earlier. "I never got a chance to congradulate you two..." Her voice trailed off.

She glanced at Will. He shot her an encouraging smile. She smiled back slightly then looked at me.

"I know he'll be happy for the rest of his life as long as you're always with him."

My eyes almost popped out of my head. I looked up at Kale seeing the same shocked expression on his face. It took me a moment to find my voice.

"Thank you, Anabelle." Was all I could come up with.

"Don't get used to it." She murmured with another slight smile, it was kind of forced.

"I won't." I almost burst out laughing. I would definitely not get used to something like that coming from Anabelle.

"I appreciate that, Anabelle." Kale told her as he picked me up by the waist.

"I know you do." She muttered, staring down at the bottom of my dress. He nodded.

"We'll see you all in a few days. Whatever the problem is..." Kale's voice trailed off. Both Jake and Shane began to speak.

"It can wait." William interrupted them.

Kale smiled greatfully at Will and took off. He held tightly to my waist. Usually, I would complain and argue with him about this but I couldn't bring myself to do so when he was unbelieveably happy.

"I hope no one misses us." I thought out-loud. He picked up his pace. The bottom of my dress twirled in the wind. He shrugged.

"Of course they will! But there's no way I could control myself any longer."

Behind his happiness I did notice he had been slightly tense through out the night. As always I lacked the attention to detail. Now that I really thought about it, him being tense made sense.

"Would that be my fault?" I asked.

"Do you really have to ask?" He teased.

"Well I'm sorry I did that to you."

"That's OK." He grinned. "You'll easily make it up to me."

"Oh, really?" I raised my eyebrow at him as he ran even faster.

"Yes, really!"

It didn't take long to get to his black truck. We took off at a normally dangerous speed for a human. Since Kale wanted this big wedding, I just asked to go somewhere where we could be completely alone. He knew of a beach house not too far from the field we found. I liked the idea of going somewhere that wasn't surrounded by a forest.

We pulled into a long winding driveway. I was nervous becuase all I saw around us were trees so far. But finally the path opened up to a light brown textured house, with vines growing up the sides of the house. Like some sort of italian villa. The ocean and beach looked beautiful behind the house.

"This is exactly how I imagined it!" I let out excitedly.

His hand squeezed mine as we pulled to a stop. I glanced at him, kissed him quickly and jumped out of the car. I took off quickly toward the house, he was a little quicker then me this time. He grabbed my waist and tore into the beach house.

The kitchen, which we had just walked into was very large. Big windows and a sliding glass door were at the back of the kitchen where the view was stunning. He turned abruptly, kicking down the door to a red and gold bedroom. He dropped me on the bed.

"I'll try not to ruin your dress this time."

"Like I care about my dress right now!" I laughed.

"I adore you Jamie Luna Vandera." Then his stricking smile grew wider. "Mrs. Vandera." He breathed out as if to himself.

There was nothing I could say, he made one quick smooth leap in my direction. I felt unusually slow because he was so quick. I didn't react until his mouth crushed mine. That was when I grabbed his hair.

He managed to not shred my dress to pieces which surprised us both. Unfortunately we did manage to destroy the bed but we'd just replace it before we left. The only difference between this time and all the others was that we weren't just bound by blood or connected physically, but now we were even more then what we were before.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We were lounging out on the beach under the silver full moon. No one was around. No one lived or came near here. We were completely alone. We had been here for two nights. Being lazy for two active vampires. But we were supposed to be doing this.

We had just got back from hunting. There wasn't much to worry about and that's why I started to think about our friends and how they had been worried about something at our wedding. Kale, being the one that actually did pay attention to detail, noticed this as I became suddenly quiet and extremely still.

Maybe if I were any other vampire this would have been normal, but alot of my human habits were still very clearly in my head and I acted them out often. Of course he knew all of this about me, so he noticed instantly when I acted out of habit.

"What's bothering you?" His oh so perfect, distinct voice asked behind me.

As always I was in front of him, melting perfectly into his form of his chest and stomach as I leaned back. His chin rested on the top of my head. His hands tracing up and down my arms.

"Well, don't you wonder what exactly Shane and Jason were talking about at the wedding?"

He shrugged.

"It's been kind of hard to think about anything else but you these past few months."

It sounded like he was frowning, that's why I crained my head and looked up at him. He was upset. I instantly spun around, facing him as I sat between his legs.

"What did I say?" I was frowning now as I cocked my head to the side. He looked over my head, directing his gaze toward the ocean. "Kalsaban Nicolas-Troy! Why are you angry at me?" I grabbed his face and moved it toward me. His eyes followed.

"You know I hate when you call me that." He murmured. I rolled my eyes at him. He sighed. "I just don't like that you're sitting here worrying about something that you probably don't have to worry about. If something's wrong, they'll get a hold of us."

I let go of his face but he grabbed my hands, holding them to his chest.

"This is all I wish you would think about." He continued.

"That shouldn't be too hard." I agreed. As I gazed at his adorable grin I still couldn't help but to let my mind wander. "Can I ask you something?" I finally forced myself to speak.

"You know you can."

I bit my lip, chewed on it really, hesitanting then finally began.

"Usually you're so sure of yourself, but lately it's almost like your self-conscious maybe..."

"That's not a question." He interrupted me queitly. I gave him an annoyed look and continued.

"Why are you suddenly like that? First, it was you not being good enough and then this, as if you think that I prefer not to think about you or us..."

"You kind of make me that way." He spoke matter-of-factly as my voice trailed off.

"Jeez, my fault again." I muttered.

"I'm not blaming you...this time..." He teased only for a moment before becoming serious. "You have to know by now that you're the only one I've ever fallin in love with. Like you said a long time ago, vampire or human, I still have feelings. Which includes an insecurity that I've never felt, not even when I was human."

"I don't like that." I frowned.

"I know you don't."

"Then stop."

"Jamie, if I could I would. You have no idea what it's like to feel like the one person in the world I love more then anything is going to find something better."

"This again? What is it going to take to get you to believe that I really love you and you are perfect for me? Seriously, what happened to make you think like this?"

He shut his eyes. I recognized the grimace on his face.

"What'd they do now?" I asked reffering to Shane and Jacob.

"It's easy for me to ignore them but seeing you interact with them..." His voice trailed off.

I stared at him, well glared at him really. When I first met Kale I never would have imagined I would ever see him so down and insecure about himself. I stood up, pushing out of his arms. He did the same.

"You know I love you and whatever they say, or do, or however the three of us interact doesn't matter. They may be my best friends but you're my husband." I hissed threw my teeth.

"Look at you, Jamie! How many times do I have to point out that you could be with--"

"Kale!" I snapped. "I can't believe we're having this conversation! I married you, I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you. You tell me to look in a mirror, why don't you? You have always been an unworldy angel to me, everything about you, not just your looks." I was really angry. '

I was tired of having this conversation with him. This was worse then when I kept begging him to turn me. With no warning what-so-ever I burst into tears. Not even a second passed before I was tightly in his arms.

"Why don't you understand," I gasped into his chest. "We've been married for two days and we're already fighting!" I had the sudden realization that this wasn't the way marriages were supposed to be right away, which made me sob harder.

"I'm sorry Jamie. I know you love me, I've never doubted that." He took my face in one of his hands. Our eyes locked. I looked at him. Even through these tears I could see him way too clearly. "Please stop crying." He begged, brushing his fingers under my eyes brushing the tears away that were only replaced by more. "Please." He breathed.

I shut my eyes. I was trembling. Alot of things were going through my mind. I took in a deep breath, opening my eyes. The last of my hysteria was finally gone. He was anxious once again as he looked at me.

"I'm done, Jamie." He told me. "All I want is you and you're right, nothing else matters. I'm really sorry, you have no idea."

This reminded me of the time when he accidently turned me. He felt so bad and felt like I wasn't safe anymore so he took off. I wrapped my arms around him. He pulled me into his arms. We went back inside just as the sun was about to rise.

~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We stopped having conversations like that. I was glad to have complete alone time with only him and not having to worry about getting interrupted. We spent a week at the beach house before anyone made contact with us. We were in the middle of doing the usual when his phone went off.

To be honest, I had to talk everyone into getting phones a few months ago. They were used to just running to find whoever they were looking for. But it just felt so inconvienent for me. They were hesitant about it for some reason at first. But they did it for me. His phone was somewhere in the room, in a pair of dirty pants that were nearly torn to bits.

"Go answer it." I gasped, pushing him away. He shook his head and came back toward me. "Kale, we haven't talked to anyone in a week."

"Let's keep it that way." He spoke against my lips.

I laughed, pushing him away again. He sighed. The ringtone was in the middle of repeating for the second time when he picked it up.

"This better be important."

"It is." I could hear Jason's voice even as I was all the way on the other side of the room.

"It's about the pack of werewolves that were at the wedding..."

"The ones that Shane kicked out?" Kale interrupted.

"Yes, them. Well, they left, their scent completely disappeared but sudddenly it's back again."

"Is this relivent to us?" Kale asked annoyed. Jason was quiet for a moment.

"Shane ran into them earlier tonight. Apparently they were his pack before. They want to see you and Jamie. They refuse to leave until they do." His voice got smaller and quiter the more he spoke.

Kale was looking at me now. He made a face as Jason spoke. I stiffled a laugh.

"Listen to him." I breathed out as sternly as I could.

"So, if you want, we'll come to you." Jason continued to speak.

"No. I'd rather not have this place disturbed, we'll come to you."

"How soon?"

"Well--" Kale began.

"Kale?" Now Shane was on the phone. "Let me talk to Jamie."

"Why?"

There was silence. The phone went dead. Kale frowned at his phone, sliding it shut. Now my phone was going off. I grabbed it. It was Shane. I looked at Kale who was at my side in a second. I shrugged.

"What's wrong?" I asked into the phone.

"I need you to come right now. Kale was going to give or take a few days. Please Jamie, I really don't want them around any longer." Shane begged. I could hear strain in his voice.

"Alright. We'll try to be quick."

"I know you will." He sounded only somewhat releaved. "Thanks Jamie."

"I'll see you soon."

"OK."

The phone went dead. My eyes, which had wandered, moved back to Kale. He sighed yet again. We were quick to get dressed and took off as soon as we did.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yay! they got married :3 I love my characters and their relationship! But now there's problems with werewolves, uh oh. just cause Dante is dead doesn't mean the drama's over ;)

Please vote and comment...or just keep reading if you really can't stop I guess. haha