A/N Meyer is very good at making me feel exactly what Bella is feeling: My true love lies with Edward but I still hold an affection for Jacob. So as the result of my brief thought (and subsequent giggle fit) at the chief of police having a daughter intent on dating a motorbike riding werewolf I wrote this. (This being post-New Moon and AU in the sense that the Cullen's never returned.)

This prefacey chapter is told in Charlie's POV, but everything else is in Bella's. Enjoy :)

Preface - Unhinged

"Jacob Black!" I roared charging out the front door like a bull. I was only vaguely aware that I was still wearing the scrappy pyjamas Bella had bought me last Christmas.

God knows what the neighbours thought.

As any father will know, daughters are a very touchy subject, and as a single parent everything increases ten fold. Normally, I allowed Bella to have a free reign – I'd always been rather smug about my ability to keep it cool and not be over bearing. But there was one thing that could unhinge me without any trouble at all.

Jacob – Freaking – Black.

My constant worry.

His father was a great friend of mine but that of course meant nothing in the face of the shocking truth that Jacob was my daughter's boyfriend. The words made me want to recoil and vomit all over the road. Those five words had kept me up for months worrying about all kinds of terrifying things that I really didn't enjoy thinking about.

There were many reasons why Jacob Black was excellent for Bella. The main one was that she actually looked happy when she was around him – not empty and lifeless like she'd been when he had left Forks.

But there were many reasons why he wasn't excellent – not anywhere near the meaning of excellent. Actually there were three reasons. Three, very, very good reasons.

One – he owned a motorbike. The most dangerous form of transport there is. The very form of transport I had made Bella promise at age ten never to use.

Two – he was a dangerous mythical creature. I was still averse to say what he actually was. Sometimes I thought I'd dreamed the entire conversation up – that the conversation I'd had at Billy Black's kitchen table in La Push was just the result of me eating something before bed.

Three – by far the most worrisome and unhinging reason of them all – I had just caught him in a state of undress in my daughter's bedroom at three in the morning.

These three reasons convinced me that not only was he not excellent for my daughter but that I was also in my own right to murder him with the shot gun in my hand.

Being the chief of police did have its perks.