Leah spends some time with a previously unknown quantity and learns a little about herself and others.
1. Chapter 1
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Disclaimer: Ms Meyers and her various book publishers and film production associates own all. I own my own imagination, poor grammar and very little else.
‘What’s up with her?’ Leah asks, totally baffled about why Emily would run out of her dress fitting in tears.
‘This isn’t as easy for her as you think Leah.’ Kim responds quietly, still garbed in the pale lemon bridesmaid dress she’d been trying on.
‘What’s so difficult about trying on wedding meringues?’ the taller girl demands, furious that anyone could seriously think this was hard for the girl who’d stolen her happily ever after.
‘You really think it’s that easy to be an imprint?’ the normally quiet girl questions. ‘I can’t wait to see how you react to it.’
Ignoring Kim’s implication of an imprint for her, Leah sits down opposite the younger girl.
‘What could possibly be so damn hard about having a guy who adores you? Who hangs on your every word like you’re the center of the universe?’ Leah scoffs bitterly.
‘It’s not all hearts and flowers Leah.’ The small brunette sighs tiredly and for the first time since they were properly introduced Leah notices how withdrawn Kim truly appears.
‘I’ve broken up with Jared three times since you left the Pack you know.’ she says, finally lifting her head to look the older girl in the eye.
‘I didn’t know that.’ Leah admits, a little sad that she is so out of touch with her old Pack mates, but mostly just stunned by what Kim has just told her.
The idea that Jared and Kim could possibly be having problems is really quite difficult to wrap her head around. Aside from Sam and Emily they were the most settled couple in the Pack.
The plain girl had been half in love with Jared long before he’d imprinted on her and Leah had always thought (somewhat uncharitably) that Kim had just been grateful that someone as good looking as Jared had even noticed her.
‘Why?’ she blurts before her brain can catch up with her mouth. ‘He’d do anything for you.’
‘Anything but the one thing I want him to do.’ Kim replies quietly, so sad and tired that Leah truly feels bad for her.
‘What is it you want him to do?’ she asks.
‘I want him to love me.’ Kim replies simply.
Leah shakes her head, unable to understand.
‘He adores you Kim.’
‘Because he has to, not because he wants to.’
This Leah can understand. She’s always thought that imprinting was something like a prison sentence for the wolf; she’d just never thought that it might be like that for their imprint too.
She’s not sure what she should say now, so long out of female company has dulled her sympathy instinct and she was never great at it to start with. She was just lucky that she had someone as understanding as Emily as her best friend.
That pulls her thoughts down the hall, where she is sure her cousin is still crying. It’s an uncomfortable notion so she turns her attention back to the other imprint in the room.
‘So you broke up with him huh?’
‘Three times now.’ Kim responds dully.
Leah can’t imagine how hard that must have been for Jared. He may not be her favorite person, but he’s not a bad guy and she really feels for him right now.
‘How did he take it?’ she has to ask.
‘Not well.’ The younger girl replies. ‘He just wouldn’t accept it. He followed me everywhere and he just wouldn’t give up. In the end I even tried dating someone else.’
The female wolf winces, sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that that did not go down well. Wolves weren’t just protective, but possessive too.
‘I bet he took that well.’ She snorts.
‘He nearly phased in front of my date.’ Kim grins back ruefully.
Leah’s mouth falls open in shock. Aside from Jacob, Jared had been the pack member who’d coped with controlling his phasing the best. Pretty laid back for a teenaged boy, he hadn’t had that much of a temper to have to control to begin with. He’d had to have been seriously upset to almost phase in front of a civilian.
‘Yeah, Sam pretty much begged me to take Jared back after that. I got a nice long lecture from the Elders about how lucky I was to be an imprint and how important it was to the tribe for us all to keep ‘the secret’ too.’
‘So you can’t leave him even if you don’t love him?’ Leah asks, horrified and astonished that the council would put so much pressure on an eighteen –year-old girl.
Kim smiles sadly at her and shakes her head, her waist length tresses falling around her small frame. It’s the first time Leah has seen her with it out of the braided bun she normally scrapes it into and she’s green with envy. She’d love to grow her hair out that long.
‘It’s because I love him that I wish I could leave him Leah.’ She insists sadly.
‘I don’t get it.’
She understands that Kim had wanted Jared to notice her before he imprinted on her, hell the girl had had a crush on him for forever, but she cannot understand why that would cause her to want to give him up now that she has him.
Kim sighs and stands up, pulling off the chiffon confection and yanking back on her jeans and tank top, surprising Leah with her lack of self consciousness. She goes to the fridge and comes back with a beer for them both before settling on the rug opposite Leah’s position on the sofa.
‘He told me loved me for the first time after he and Sam and the Elders had sat me down and explained the whole werewolf/imprint thing. He kept going on and on about how relieved he was that he could tell me everything and then he told me that he loved me.
And all I could think was that our whole relationship was a lie. He’d never have noticed me if he hadn’t phased and I would still have just been that mousy nerd in Jared’s English class that Paul used to tease for having a crush on him.
We went for a walk along the beach away from the bonfire and he kept smiling and telling me that imprinting was the best thing that ever happened to him and it was all I could do to keep from throwing up. I don’t even remember getting home that night, but the first thing I did the next morning was come here and ask Sam how to break the imprint.
I think I might have lost my mind if it hadn’t been for Emily then. Sam was horrified and furious that I could even think about it and Jared wouldn’t let me out of his sight in case I tried to leave La Push. I couldn’t tell my family or my friends and she was the only person I could talk to that didn’t think that me just considering wanting to break the imprint was some form of sacrilege.
You have no idea how it feels to go to bed every night with the man that you love knowing that he would never be there if he had a choice Leah and I hope you never do.’
Kim gets up, sets down her beer and follows the sound of Emily’s tears down the hall, leaving Leah to her disturbed thoughts.
She actually feels kind of sick now too after listening to that. At least while she’d been with Sam she’d never had any doubts that he’d truly loved her. She can’t imagine what it must be like to be in Kim’s shoes and finds that she has developed a whole new respect for her.
The girl had always been so easily overlooked; plain, bookish and shy and always apparently content to be at the side of the older, better looking Jared Tala. Leah guessed that in hindsight it wouldn’t have been easy to miss the fact that Kim’s smile never quite reached her eyes, hidden as they were behind the girl’s glasses.
Her eyes always looked small behind her spectacles, but when she’d removed them during the dress fitting they were far prettier than Leah had thought; big and dark and doe-like. And having just seen her strip off, she knows that the girl has a nicer body than her usually baggy clothes suggest.
The thoughts weird her out some, but being the only female in a Pack full of boys, she has grown used to seeing certain females from a different perspective. In some cases it’s manageable and can in fact provide fantastic teasing material.
She’d once spent two straight weeks winding Jared up about his obsession with Kim’s boobs and seeing just how far she could push Jake about Paul boffing his sister. But god knows she’d happily bleach her brain to get rid of the dream she’d once had, courtesy of her idiot Alpha, of kissing Bella bloody Swan.
This shift in perspective and her new found respect for his imprint make her think that Jared is really the lucky one. Sure Kim is no Rosalie Hale, but she is attractive in her own unassuming way.
The girl is smart too. Smart enough to be two years younger than them but still have been in a lot of the same classes as Paul and Jared. If Sam’s right and this imprinting thing is all about finding the best possible mate to pass on your DNA with, then she can definitely understand why fate would choose Kim for Jared.
Poor Jared, as awful as this whole deal is for Kim, it can’t be too easy for him either. Just because he’d been too young and dumb to see past the glasses and conservative clothes of the shy girl next to him in class to the young woman beneath it all, he now had more heartache than he could ever have imagined.
The idea of imprinting on someone who may never truly believe that you love them is just awful and she is just thinking about it in relation to her own imprint problems when Jared enters the house calling for his girl.
‘Kim? You here babe?’
He spots Leah still standing in her bridesmaid dress and smiles in greeting. He really is one of the best looking men she has met Leah muses as he spots Kim stepping out of Emily’s bedroom and just lights up at the sight of her.
‘Hey Leah, nice boots, you wearing them to the wedding?’ he teases, pointing to the rain boots she forgot to take off before pulling on her own chiffon confection.
The back of Kim’s hand carefully connects with his abs in admonishment as Leah flips him the finger and the two girls grin at one another. Jared rolls his eyes at them both as he tugs his girl into his embrace.
‘You ready to go babe?’ he asks as Kim steps away a moment later and begins gathering her things to leave.
‘Yeah, just give me a minute.’ She answers, shooting a glance Leah’s way.
‘I’ll go start the truck. See you around Lee.’ He replies.
Then he is gone, out into the daily Washington drizzle and she is alone with his mate once more.
‘She misses you.’ Kim begins without preamble, surprisingly direct for someone she always thought so shy.
But then if today has taught Leah anything, it’s that things aren’t always as simple as they appear on the surface. Her gaze narrows in place of a reply, not sure where Kim is going with this.
‘God knows Leah if anyone got the short shrift from this imprinting thing it was you. But it hasn’t been that great for the rest of us wolf girls either. I lost any chance I had of Jared wanting me for me, Rachael gave up some great career opportunities to be with Paul and Claire may never have the chance to be anything but Quil’s imprint.’
Leah smirks at the thought that even considerate little Kim hasn’t included Jacob’s little freak in their exclusive imprint club.
‘Rachael and I may be her friends, but you’re her sister in her heart and really only you can help her with what she’s going through right now.’
Not sure she should speak in case something nasty comes out on reflex; Leah merely inclines her head for her to continue.
‘Emily may be the one marrying Sam Leah but he truly loved you of his own free will long before he ever imprinted on her. Don’t you think it’s never crossed her mind that he’d still rather be with you if he had had a choice?’
The words are like a sucker punch in the gut and Leah suddenly finds it hard to breathe, but not for the reasons she thinks she should be upset. She thinks she should be furious at Kim for bringing up the idea that she and Sam could be together if he had a choice. Instead she finds that her pain is really for the girl she has always loved as a sister.
Before she can get over the shock she is being hugged and Kim is whispering in her ear to go talk to Emily and telling her to say hi to Embry for her. Not sure whether she should be more shocked by Kim’s brave attempt at affection with someone as acerbic as her or her knowledge of the unexpected developments between she and her Pack mate she nods and carefully squeezes her back.
Then she is numbly watching brave little Kimber Siletz step out of the house and into the waiting arms of her wolf. She grins mulling over how much she has learnt about her fellow wolf girl today, amazed that the girl she had always thought so timid had such serious balls.
But then being the mate of a guy who’s over six and a half feet, built like a body builder and can turn into a giant wolf when upset would likely dull the fright reflex of even the most timid little mouse. Plus, she’s seen inside Jared’s head and even she would find him dominant and demanding, Kim had to be pretty damn strong to cope with that crap.
She hears movement from Emily’s room and turns resolutely toward it. Her sister needs her. All of the drama and the pain caused by the imprints, both Sam’s and now her own matter little in the face of that fact. It’s time to face the future and let go of the all the rest.
It’s about time she got her sister back. Besides, if no one else is going to do it Leah needs to berate Em’ about the awful colour of her bridesmaids dresses. This club of theirs is small and they all need to play their part if they are to survive being wolf girls.