A/n: I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to review! You guys have been wonderful! I'm really sorry I've taken so long to update!

Warning: I'm going to say this chapter is rated M for language and adult themes.

Prompt: Night Fever (#20)

"It's bugging me, grating me
And twisting me around
Yeah I'm endlessly, caving in
And turning inside out."

-Muse, Hysteria

It took a little less than a week for her ribs to heal, but it was torture to remain in bed with nothing to do and having to grit her teeth through kindly meant visits. She could feel the imprint, constantly, like a large hook through her heart, constantly tugging. Not simply constantly, but viciously and the longer she tried to ignore it, the more intense it felt so that she lay curled up, writhing more from the pain of the imprint bond, than her healing ribs.

Today was the first day her mother let her get out of the bed, and she was allowed to attend the bonfire. It was a pseudo celebration that none of them had died during the battle with the new-borns. Apparently the pack had merely been waiting for Leah to heal to throw it.

Leah almost felt touched... though she knew that in all likelihood, the only people who cared about her attendance were Seth and Sam. And Sam was the only one with the power to delay the bonfire, what with being Alpha and all.

Standing, staring into the fire, flipping the fancy white card in her fingertips, Leah admitted that Sam did that a lot; took her sentiments into consideration, as much as a twenty-year old male could. Though she supposed that Sam was usually, for a man, mature for his age. Unfortunately that usually meant he didn't have much of a sense of humor.

In the past, when she'd newly started phasing, she focused solely on Sam bossing her around and how much she loathed it, that she couldn't see that he often played favorite with her and attempted to make things easier for her. In fact in the beginning, he tried to give her space to mourn by assigning her virtually no patrol duties, something that Leah resented and opposed. But even when he gave in and gave her assigned patrols, he didn't give her as much shit as the guys when she skipped one.

Tearing her gaze away from the fire, her eyes sought out the male that was so often on her mind. As she spotted him with Emily, her heart gave a familiar twinge, but it was nowhere near as intense as it used to be. And she found that Emily practically became a non-entity to her.

And here I thought imprinting would free me of thinking of him, Leah thought as she watched how utterly in love Sam and Emily were, wishing that could be her. While the imprint had dulled her feelings of hurt and love towards Sam, and made her think less often of him, the feelings hadn't disappeared as she expected them to. And Sam was still one her mind, more often than she would have expected.

He was simply... not as important anymore. Not by comparison to... her imprint.

She supposed she really couldn't give Sam shit for telling her so often that he still loved her, but simply loved and needed Emily more. She supposed that without imprinting, there was simply no way that one could understand having their heart somewhat wrenched by two separate people.

She had a feeling that, imprint and all, she'd never stopped loving Sam. She simply didn't need him. She could live without him.

Tearing her gaze away, she stared down at the card in her hands. It was his business card, all in white with Dr. Carlisle Cullen written in clear, block script in black ink that was raised off the smooth paper. It had his work phone number, his pager number and even his cell phone number. Leah had looked at it enough times that she had all the numbers memorized though she didn't want to have them memorized.

She absolutely had no intention of contacting him. She was resolute about fighting the imprint.

And yet, she couldn't stop thinking about him. Couldn't stop looking at that stupid card.

"Hey Leah."

The voice startled her out of her thoughts, causing her head to snap to her right. Raising a brow, she stared at Embry Call as he stood next to her, staring at her with his warm brown eyes and a shy smile on his handsome face.

For a moment, she merely stared at the younger boy, taking the moment to get over her annoyance about being approached while lost in her thoughts about him. As if by their mere presence, they'd know who she was thinking of, making her feel weak and vulnerable.

"Hey Embry," she replied, trying desperately to let go of all her emotions. She didn't want to continue being a bitch, at least not to Embry.

Embry... who was always polite and nice to Leah, even when she rubbed it in his face that he was a bastard. Embry, who had the biggest crush on Leah, and everyone in the pack knew about it. Though he never once tried to put the moves on her, and his thoughts towards her were always modest and respectful, which was more than could be said for the rest of the guys, even if they did treat her like crap.

"I just wanted to see how you were doing. You know, since you were injured," Embry said in quiet tones, causing Leah to continue to merely stare at him.

It never really made sense to Leah that Embry would be a wolf, and not simply because they hadn't known he was part Quileute. Embry was simply... too nice a guy, too even-tempered and calm. Though, she supposed, it didn't make much sense that Seth would be a wolf either, as he was too much of a happy-go-lucky kid.

"I'm fine," Leah replied shortly, causing Embry to flush and shift his large bulk around. "Thanks for asking," she stated as an afterthought, thinking about how thoughtful it was of him to ask, and not wishing to make him feel too stupid for asking or even trying.

Embry's brown eyes widened in shock, before a pleased and shy smile spread across his face and averted his eyes. "It's nothing," he said with an easy shrug of his shoulders.

Turning away from the boy, thinking they were done, Leah turned back to contemplate the business card still in her hands. She could see the fire burning in her periphery as she took a deep and steadying breath. If she could only let go of it, she felt she might be able to breathe... would have a chance of being free.

"What's that?" Embry's voice called softly as he took tentative steps towards her, as though wishing to look over her shoulder and to what she was looking at.

"Nothing," Leah replied, tossing it into the fire and watching as it was quickly consumed by the flames, taking a deep and shuddering breath as her heart pulsed painfully.

XxX

Leah wasn't sure how far gone she was as she fell on her ass on the beach, laughing. She wasn't even sure what she was laughing about as she grabbed Embry by the back of his shirt and yanked him so that he was tripping over her legs and sprawled on his back, while her left hand held a bottle of moonshine.

Truthfully, the moonshine almost tasted like gasoline; it was such a high concentration of alcohol, that she was sure her taste buds were being rendered useless. But it was the only thing that made her even slightly buzzed anymore, thanks to her wolf genes. They simply burned through any foreign substance far too quickly.

"No, really! You're so lucky you haven't imprinted, Embry," Leah giggled as Embry managed to get off his back so that he was sitting up, before scooting over so that he was seated next to her.

"I thought you wanted to imprint?" Embry wondered, though he felt like an idiot afterward. While he was aware of Leah's desire to imprint, he was sure imprinting on a vampire hadn't been what she'd meant when she'd said she'd like to imprint on anyone.

Leah merely smiled before raising her hand and shoving at his head. It almost made him think that he was seeing the real Leah again. The one she was before any of this wolf-shit happened... the way she was when she and Sam were together and happy. The girl with the hundred-watt smile that made all the boys of La Push drool. The girl that every boy dreamed about because while she was gorgeous, she also had a great sense of humor and a kick-ass attitude. And while she could be a bitch, she wasn't one of those fake, high-maintenance bitches.

"I thought it would make things easier... make all the heartache go away. But I was soooo wrong, but then again of course I was! I'm Leah fucking Clearwarter, freak of nature extraordinaire!" Leah cheered, falling on her back and staring at the stars that glittered overhead. She smiled blissfully. "Wow Embry, look at that! It's actually a clear night!"

Embry tilted his head up to look at what she was talking about.

"Yeah they're-" a yelp came from his mouth as he found himself suddenly laying on his back beside Leah, as she yanked him down. If that wasn't enough to startled him, he suddenly found Leah making herself quite at home on his shoulder.

"You're so nice, you know that?!" Leah asked, poking him in the ribs, before resting her hand on his flat stomach. "And you have such a nice smile, has anyone ever told you that? Now why couldn't I imprint on a nice, hot boy like you?"

Embry felt his already warm skin, heating further. It didn't help matters that Leah was teasingly skating her fingers across his taut abdomen. When her fingers started caressing his abdomen beneath his t-shirt, making his body shudder with pleasure, he was even further flustered.

"I t-t-think you've had enough m-m-moonshine," Embry stuttered out, reaching for her hand to make her stop even though every male part of him told him to stop being such a pussy, even as his eyes tried to roll back into his head.

"I'm a fucking wolf Embry," she stated in husky tones as she raised on her elbow, so she could lean close to his ear. "I'm barely buzzed and I know just what I'm doing," she stated, nipping suddenly at his earlobe, causing another shudder to rack his body. "Do you?" she asked, licking up the artery at his neck, her voice challenging him, ignoring the way the image of Carlisle popped in her head and the way her heart seemed to whine at her to stop what she was doing.

Embry wasn't sure what it was. If it was the tone of her voice, the fact that this was the girl he'd been dreaming about since he was twelve, or if it was the fact that his dick was so impossibly hard, but he could feel the wolf in him stir. Growling, he quickly flipped them over, so that his body was half on top of Leah and he was staring deep into her eyes.

"Are you sure you-" he started to ask, his brow furrowing as he briefly regained control of his faculties as he stared into Leah's familiar face; knowing he'd never want to hurt her. Leah had already been hurt enough.

"Does that answer your question?" Leah asked as she lowered herself once more after planting an ardent kiss on his lips, leaving him feeling intoxicated.

Embry nodded his head as he dipped it once more to resume their kiss, one of his hands settling at her hips, ignoring the warning in his heart that told him that this was going to end very badly for him. However, Embry brushed this all away, thinking it would be worth it if he could have her in his arms at least once.

XxX

Sex made the alcohol burn out of her system at a faster rate, but at the time Leah didn't care. It was strange, the fact that Embry could actually push all the right buttons and raised her to the heavens. The sensation of her heart being torn to shreds even as her body continued to build that exquisite nirvana that was an orgasm, was stranger still.

A part of her loathed herself, even as she continued to ignore the imprint bond, that was strained so tightly around her that it was almost as though she was pushing it to break. And yet, it never broke. Not the first, second or even fifth round. And every time the bond seemed to grow stronger, Leah merely continued to pull back.

The sun was just beginning to peak over the horizon when Leah finally pulled on her clothes.

"I'll walk you home," Embry offered as he was buttoning his cut-off shorts.

"No!" Leah snapped, startling both Embry and herself. Shaking her head, she gathered her shoes in her hands. "I'm sorry, it's really nice of you but... that's not necessary."

The look on Embry's face as he nodded in response before pulling on his shirt, tugged on her heart-strings, which already felt like they'd been pounded into the ground and were bruised black and blue. Walking towards him, even though every step towards him felt like she was dragging her feet through wet cement because of the weight of the imprint. She put her feet on either side of his knees and dropped into his lap.

Embry looked at her in surprise, as he suddenly found a lap-full of Leah. Gentle hands cupped his face, forcing him to stare at the gentle, yet pained expression on Leah's face.

"I'm trying to fight this imprint Embry, and I'm sorry if by doing so I hurt you. But... you shouldn't fall for me Embry, because I know what it's like to wish for an imprint to get over a broken-heart, and it doesn't quite work that way," Leah stated, opening up more to him than she'd opened up to anyone since Sam broke up with her, because she felt he deserved it.

She planted a chaste kiss on his soft, but bruised lips before getting up once more and beginning to walk away before pausing. "And Embry? If you tell the other guys about this... I'll kick your ass."

Though she was threatening him, Embry couldn't help smiling. It was simply so quintessentially Leah, both old, happy Leah and the New Leah.

"Wouldn't dream of telling anyone," Embry replied, to which Leah offered one lopsided smile before turning and running down the beach.

TBC...

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