Imprinting
Leah woke up with an aching groan.
Everything hurt.
She was a forever twenty-one year old woman with the pains of an eighty year old.
Logically, she knew that she was only twenty-one until she stopped phasing, and she knew that her aches would be gone by lunch, but whatever. It felt good to bitch about it still.
Leah rolled out of her bed and inspected the now nearly faded bruises on her ribcage. Man, those newborns could fight.
Fucking Jacob and his damn vampire loving ‘I wish she was my girlfriend’ bitch.
Fucking Sam and his ‘we must defend our land’.
Fucking everything about being in this dumbass pack.
Dumbass pack or not, Leah still got dressed quickly so she could slip off to Billy’s and check on Jacob. Technically, Jacob got hurt helping her (not that she had asked for his damn help) so she should at least go see if he’s healing or if the vampire doctor drained him of his blood.
She grabbed the first clothes she could reach- a pair of black basketball shorts, a faded La Push High basketball shirt that had been made into a cutoff the day she got it, and her dirty old sneakers. She didn’t bother with brushing her chin length black hair, nor did she fuck around with niceties like a bra. It wasn’t as if the guys hadn’t seen her fully nude multiple times now, who cared about a bra after having your teenage brother see you naked?
Not Leah.
Leah made her way over to Billy’s at a leisurely pace. With the newborns gone and Jacob’s little leech loving girlfriend engaged to one of the vampires, Leah doubted if the pack would be working as hard now. There were so many of them now that they could easily pair up for patrols and only run one day a week.
Leah would obviously call dibs on Seth, and everyone would let her have him in an effort to not be stuck with her.
It bothered her a very tiny amount at first when she saw, felt, and read how much she was universally disliked within the pack after first joining, but then she embraced it. If they all thought she was a bitter bitch, then she’d be the most bitter bitch they ever met.
It wasn’t as if she didn’t have plenty to be bitter over, in her opinion.
Phasing and being a part of a pack was great for the guys. They could all gush over their growth spurts and their muscles and coo about when they would meet ‘the one’. Quil and his weird fucking toddler imprint, Jared and Kim, Sam and Emily.
It was fine for them. They were guys. It wasn’t fine for Leah, who, contrary to popular belief, was actually a woman. She didn’t want to be 6’ tall- short compared to the other guys, giant compared to most of the guys her age. She didn’t want to have her body frozen- never changing, never cycling.
If Leah was supposed to meet ‘the one’, this mysterious ‘the one’ who would be her ‘soulmate’, her ‘other half’, the ‘genetic carrier that would produce stronger wolves’, then she was shit out of luck.
Because if she wasn’t cycling, then she wasn’t fertile, she wasn’t capable of producing future wolves, and she’d never meet ‘the one’.
It wasn’t that Leah wanted to be chained to some fucking loser by a mythical red string of fate, but damn if she didn’t want to forget about Sam, forget about her pathetic loneliness, and just…
Whatever.
It was mostly bullshit anyway.
Leah shook off the ever constant bitter thoughts and bound up the shitty little ramp Jacob and Quil built for Billy and rapped her knuckles on the door lightly.
Then she let herself in anyway, because she could hear that the TV was on and someone had to be home. She stepped in and saw that the TV was tuned to some shitty basketball game and Jacob’s dad, Billy, was the only one in the living room.
“Hey, Leah,” Billy smiled up at her with his crinkling eyes in his weather worn face. “Looking for Jake?”
Leah shrugged. “Just seeing if the leech drank his blood or not.”
Billy chuckled and his eyes kept flicking distractedly to the TV. “Nah, Doctor Carlisle did us a favor, Jake’s right as rain now. He’s down at the beach with his cousin.”
“His cousin?” Leah kicked at Billy’s braided rug on the floor for a moment. “Quil?”
“No,” Billy laughed again, leagues more relaxed than he had been before the newborn invasion. “I guess distant cousin is a bit of a better descriptor. It’s my…” Billy twisted his lips up for a moment while he thought it over, “My third cousin’s godson,” he finally said. “He showed up this morning with some old family heirlooms,” Billy nodded toward the table where Leah spotted some leather bound journals and some little silver nicknacks. “Kid looks rough, we told him he could stay for a while, visit and get to know us, but he’s down at the beach with Jake now. I think Jake’s trying to sell him on staying for longer than a few days.”
“Yeehaw,” Leah muttered sarcastically. Sand, sun, happy families, and Jacob acting like a moron with his cousin.
Billy peeked over at her again and raised his brows. “You should go down there,” he said with a casual tone of dismissal. “Harry’s a nice kid.”
Leah didn’t want to go down there and meet ‘this nice kid’, she just wanted to see that Jacob’s dumb ass was fine and then go help her mom at the diner.
“Fine,” she huffed. “See ya later, Billy.”
Billy didn’t even hear her close the door, his attention was already back on the game.
Leah grumbled and bitched to herself clear down to the beach.
Jacob wasn’t her responsibility, even if she did feel a little responsible for his injuries. She could just wait until she phased again and check on him through someone else’s thoughts then. Or ask one of the guys when they inevitably stopped by the diner for lunch. She didn’t care about Jacob. Hell, most of the time she hated Jacob.
But…
But it sucked falling in love with someone and watching them fall in love with someone else. Especially when Bella Swan was a fucking human and Edward Cullen was a nasty little vampire probably hundreds of years old.
Didn’t that make it pedophilia or something?
It would certainly be necrophilia if Bella slept with him. And it would be homicide when Edward killed her during it.
Not that Leah really gave a damn about their disgusting sex life past wondering why Bella thought that a frozen dick would feel good inside of her at all.
Ugh.
Better not to think about it at all.
Leah stormed across the sand, her eyes peeled for Jacob’s familiar hulking body and loud ass voice. It took her a while, but she finally found him in what looked like a dramatic frisbee contest with a few of the other guys.
Leah saw Quil and Embry, and even Seth as he made a leap in the air to catch the bright green frisbee, but no rough looking third cousin twice removed or whatever.
“Leah!” Seth tossed the frisbee, hitting Quil in the back of the head, before running over to his sister. “Hey! What are you doing?”
“Checking on you,” Leah lied. “Aren’t you working today?”
“Nope.” Seth grinned and ran a hand through his hair, making his already messy dark hair that much messier. “Mom said that we could both have the day off because of the you-know-what yesterday.”
Seth was an idiot.
Leah rolled her eyes at him and glanced toward the others. Jacob looked fine, really. He had a bit of a limp in his left leg and some nasty looking black bruises on his side, but she’d guess that those would be healed by night.
“D’you wanna play?” Seth asked Leah with big pleading puppy eyes. “If you play then we can get Harry to play and have three-on-three. Pleaseeeee?”
Leah almost caved in the face of her brother’s pout, but then the rest of his words clicked in place and she scowled. “Who’s Harry?” she asked, ignoring the sharp pain in her chest at the name.
“Jake’s cousin,” Seth said, bouncing in place eagerly. “He’s over there…” Seth pointed vaguely to a guy with wavy black hair sitting on a cooler near where the others were showing off with the frisbee. He had his back to them, so Leah couldn’t make out much more than the dark hair that was cut in a shaggy short mess and the pale arms sticking out of the green tshirt he wore.
“So, will you?” Seth asked her again.
“No,” she said shortly. She saw Jacob, he was fine. Seth was fine. She didn’t have any more business there. “I’m going to help Mom.”
“She said we can have the day off, Leah!” Seth yelled at her as she spun around and stormed off.
Leah flipped him off over her shoulder and kept going.
Working with their mom in the diner sounded better than laying around having a pity party all day or watching her brother act stupid with his friends.
Not that she got a break from them.
The lunch rush was slowing down when the little bell above the diner door chimed and Seth came bounding in the diner followed by Jacob and his cousin, who were in a whispered debate about something. Jacob and his cousin went immediately to a booth while Seth snuck behind the counter and grabbed a menu and three cokes.
“I’m charging you for those,” Leah called to him as he darted over to the booth with his friends.
Seth turned and stuck his tongue out at her. “I’ll tell Mom.”
“Mom’s at the bank,” Leah smirked.
Seth just stuck his tongue out again, content to be a brat.
Leah stalled as long as she could, but she finally snatched her notepad and went over to take their order. Even if her mom gave all the guys heavy discounts, they were still decent tippers if Leah refrained from fucking with their food.
“What do you…” Leah’s voice trailed off as she finally got a look at Jacob’s cousin. He was sitting across from Jacob, crammed next to Seth, and looked up politely at her when she came to get their order.
And holy shit.
Leah barely noticed those green, green eyes before—
Snip. Snip. Snip.
Everything in her world rearranged itself.
Her fierce love and protectiveness of her brother.
Snip.
Her pride in her hometown and her native culture.
Snip.
Her passion for sports and her love of classic rock.
Snip.
Every string that connected Leah to her world, her earth in general, disappeared as if those eyes cut them away.
The strings all rearranged themselves and attached them to his guy.
This fucking guy who was blinking at Leah in polite puzzlement while her brother and Jacob gaped at her.
Leah threw the notepad at her brother. “You’re in charge,” she said hoarsely. She spun on her heel and abruptly ran right out of the front entrance of the diner and didn’t quit running until she hit the forest.
She almost phased, desperate to get out of her own mind, but the reminder that at least two of the guys were on patrol stopped her.
Instead, she sank to her knees and pressed her forehead on the dirt ground while she worked to steady her breath.
No.
No.
Please, God, no.
Leah desperately wanted someone, anyone, anything, to assure her that she did not just fucking imprint on Jacob Black’s stupid fucking cousin.