Chapter 6
"Melany!"
Leah ran in her ten inch high heels toward her business partner, meeting her outstretched hand in a high five before both of the women burst out laughing.
"You absolutely nailed it with David!"
Melany and Leah walked toward their office, dropping the folders and laptops they were holding in their hands.
"If we won't get that commission I'll eat the damn presentation."
Melany laughed, "I'll hold you to that Leah".
Leah settled at her desk, "I'm going to finish up these three-thousand e-mails in my inbox. And they I'm buying you a couple shots".
She laughed shaking her head as she opened up the laptop, running a hand through her hair. Leah was so glad her hair grew fast and it was down past her shoulders again. But that's what three years of no-phasing did for a girl. She had her full hair again, although nothing else had changed. She still hadn't gotten her period and her hips were still as curveless as ever. But she could handle that, she had given up on certain dreams long ago. Now she had new dreams, like having her hair back to her waist, going out to the club tonight, and landing this amazing new account with her partner.
Leah had moved out to Chicago three years ago, as far away from the wolf pack and her legacy as she could get. She had fallen in love with the city the moment she stepped foot in it. The people were just the right type of rude for her, the cold and windy climate were just enough to make her feel right at home, and the huge skyscrapers and concrete city were fantastically unfamiliar. It was the perfect blend of familiar and foreign. After working as a bartender for three months she had ran into Melany, an up and coming young talent at a well known local PR-firm. She had started a conversation with Leah and had enjoyed her quick comebacks, her lack of interest of what anybody thought of her and the thick skin. Melany had talked to her superiors at the firm and within weeks Leah had gotten herself a temporary position at the firm. Quickly she had showed them just exactly how creative she had been and how driven to get the biggest accounts. Leah didn't need a lot of sleep because of her Quileute heritage and that gave her the opportunity to go out at night to the hottest clubs and network with the biggest names in the industry. Soon she had gotten promoted and she and Melany were now known as the golden duo.
Leah had loved the rush she felt from landing a big account, the more she needed to work for it the more creative she had become and now her job was her new rush. Of course she still made her monthly phone calls to her mom and Seth. But it was enough to know that they were doing alright and were happy. She wanted to know as little as possible of the people back home. She had finally managed to get away and she wasn't planning on returning anytime soon. She should probably call them soon again, it had been a couple weeks since she talked to her mom and Seth. It was always Leah that called them, never the other way around. And she preferred it that way. She wanted to be in control about all the news coming out of La Push.
Leah and Melany were wrapping things up, tossing their large bags in their desk drawers, grabbing their clutches and Leah switches to a pair of high sparkling heals that highlighted her dark skin, when their assisted Todd peeked his head into their office.
"Oooh Leah darling," Leah rolled her eyes.
"Don't call me that."
Todd made a face as he walked into the room, twirling his feathered pen between his fingers, "Well whatever, you have a phonecall".
Leah raised her brows at him wondering what the big deal was.
"Well then you earned your salary again, didn't you Todd. The perfect assistant for telling me I have a phonecall…"
Now it was Todd's turn to roll his eyes, "He says he's your brother. I didn't even know you had a brother, how could you not –"
Leah cut him off when she raised her hand. "None of your business. Which line?"
Todd had already poked out his bottom lip and telling her it was line three as he left the office. Leah pushed the three on the designer phone on her desk and put her hand on the receiver,
"Mel, give me a sec?".
Melanie nodded and said she would be down the hall, flirting with their new colleague Dan. Leah laughed and turned her attention back to the phone, "Seth?"
She was shocked when she heard a voice she hadn't heard in ten years. "Hey Leah, it's Jake."
Leah's jaw dropped as she almost did the phone, she hadn't expected to hear Jacob's voice ever again. Not after he had run off with his little hybrid girlfriend and her leech family. Leah clamped her fist tightly around the phone, finding her voice again.
"Jacob? What is it?"
She heard him sigh though the phone, heard him kick some dirt off, she thought she heard water in the background.
"Are you in La Push?"
Jake took a deep breath, "yeah Leah, I'm back home. Something's happened and I need you".
"What happened?"
Leah always thought that the one good quality that Jacob had was that he didn't beat around the bush, he came straight to the point and told her everything she needed to know. That hadn't changed and quickly she was trembling behind her desk, listening to Jacob's deep voice as he told her how the dirty leeches had dared to cross onto their land. How they had killed so many of the girls she once used to know and how they took all her pack brothers away.
"We don't even know if they are alive anymore, we don't know what is being done to them. But I plan to find out." He told her.
Leah was slowly walking circles around the two desks in the office after she had been unable to stay still anymore during Jacob's monologue.
"You're going after them? You're going to Italy?"
"Yeah Leah, I can't let them just rot," Jacob continued, "Seth is with them too."
A sob escaped Leah when he mentioned her brother. Seth. Her little baby brother, he was the only one who she had been close with, they had always been together when growing up. They had always complimented each other, Leah could rile Seth up, get him fired up for something. And he had been so good at calming her down, listening to her angry words and fits before just hugging her or agreeing with her or making her something to eat or drink so she would calm down. He was the only one she dearly missed from back home, she didn't care about the rest but Seth, Seth was the one person she wished he was closer. They had talked more often on the phone and he had even been to visit her once. It was the best gift that she had ever gotten. And now he was taken too, being used for God knows what. Leah cursed the old spirits in her head again, if only they had never been wolves.
"Alright, I'm in. I can't not know. When and where?"
Soon after that Leah had tossed her sparkling heels back into her desk, putting on her flat Allstars, she grabbed her tote bag and dropped the essentials in it. She grabbed her jacked and rushed out of the office not even acknowledging Todd who already had opened his mouth. She knocked rapidly on Dan's office door, pushing it open without waiting for an answer.
"Mel."
Melany jumped up off the desk cocking her head to the side seeing Leah's sneakers and tote.
"Whats going on?"
"I can't go out tonight. My brother called and I need to go home. Like now."
Melany stepped toward her putting her hands on Leah's arms.
"You okay?" Leah nodded fast, "Yeah, I just really need to go and I don't know for how long I will be gone."
Mel frowned, "Jack isn't going to like that".
"I know, I know. I just have no choice."
Leah squeezed her friends hand quickly before turning and rushing out of the office. She didn't take a cab, she decided the freezing wind would do her much better. Jacob had told her that he and the Cullens would fly to Chicago, they would land there at 8 o'clock tonight. Their connecting flight to Italy would leave at 10 pm and she would have a seat on it.
Leah took a deep breath and embraced the fear that bubbled up inside her like a hot bath. She hadn't seen anybody from back home in three years. Now she would be traveling with her old Alpha, a bunch of filthy smelling leeches and sometime in the very near future she would probably have to phase again for the first time in years. Yippee.
