We slept together.

Wow, that didn't come out right. I mean, we were unconscious in the same bed for about eight hours. That kind of "slept together."

Though I would have been all over the other kind of "slept together." If you catch my drift.

Yes, Leah, we catch your damn drift! Shut up already!

Make me, I challenge Quil, bumping my nose against his flank. You're just pissed 'cause you missed all the drama yesterday.

He protests immediately, snapping at me: Yeah right! I'd rather play Barbie's with Claire than listen to you drool over your demon-spawn-numero-uno imprint.

Not a demon spawn, I remind him cheerfully.

Quil does the wolf-version of snorting, which involves a lot of snuffling and huffing and pawing at the ground. That's what you call Renes-whatever.

Different.

Except it's totally not.

Hyp-o-crite! Quil sings in his head.

Whatever, pedo.

Aha. I always win with the "pedophile" jab. But this time Quil appears to be ready for it. Yeah? Says the chick whose imprint is a hundred years old. Old man fetish, much?

He's a hundred and fifty, I correct automatically, before realizing that this probably doesn't help my case much. Okay, so doesn't count. He looks like he's freakin' twenty.

Claire looks like she's four and she is four.

I shake my head, tail swinging. Which just means you got another twelve years to go before you even think about getting it on with Claire. I can get it on with Nahuel right now, I boast, knocking my snout against his.

Quil shies away, tongue lolling out. Oh God, what's he so happy about?

Isn't he supposed to be, like, venomous or something? So technically you could make out with him and he could kill you. A short pause. Just sayin'.

Dude, that's not even—

Wait a minute.

Quil snickers in his head while I back peddle in my memories, examining the kiss from last night again (like I haven't already done it a million and one times; I swear, I feel like I'm thirteen). It was definitely strictly closed-mouth. Not that it wasn't insane and incredible and made me feel like I wanted to stay there forever—

No offense Sis, but that's really, really TMI.

Quiet, I snap at Seth, who has just deigned to bound into the already-too-crowded clearing Quil and I are sharing. Shit. He's got vamp poison, doesn't he?

Seth lies down, stretched in a strip of sunshine that filters through the layers of trees, and looks at me with confusion. Uh, yeah. You didn't know that?

Shit!

Quil vaults over a rotting log, laughing hysterically in his wolfy-head. Oh my God, Leah, you really know how to pick 'em. So what happens if he goes down on you? Will he burn off your—

DAMNIT, QUIL! I screech, tensing all my muscles and springing on him. He yelps, trying to dislodge me, but I've got my claws dug in just enough so that he has to twist all the way around and nip sharply at my fur.

Woah, what's got Leah got homicidal?

Life, Seth answers Embry lazily, rolling over onto his back. Embry trots over, the clothes tied around his ankle dragging in the grass. The distraction gives Quil time to fling me away, tossing me onto the ground and hurrying over to stand behind Seth, who is still sprawled across his back, the obvious pinnacle of a protector.

I'm very intimidating, Seth protests.

Sorry to burst your bubble, kid, Embry says, baring his teeth to me in the wolf-equivalent of a grin. We just hide behind you 'cause Leah would never kill you.

Seriously maim, however…

Yeah, she would, Seth agrees, but without any real conviction. Remember that time I was like, six, and you tied me up with your jump rope? I had to hop around until Mom found me.

Wow, you were even kinky back then, Leah.

Fuck off, Embryo. I growl, stamping my paw in the grass, and turn back to Seth. Dude, you didn't even fight. You were just like, "Ha ha, jump rope! Ha ha, Leah!"

I was not!

Both of you, orders Jacob's voice idly, popping up in our heads as suddenly as a puff of smoke, be quiet. Seth, don't be annoying just because your sister is the Anti-Christ. Leah, no tying people up.

Damn. Now what am I supposed to do with my spare time?

Dude, why the hell are you late? Embry asks Jacob. You're the one who called this patrol in the first place.

I didn't mean to be! Nessie was showing me her new book and— crap! Ow… Give me a second.

One Mississippi, two Mississippi... Quil sings.

There's a shuffling of trees to our left, and then a red-brown wolf bursts through, half-limping. Fucking thorny plants, Jacob swears, lifting his back paw off the ground to show off the admittedly rather huge thorn embedded there. He takes a few wavering steps and then, apparently deciding to go in for dramatics, keels over onto his side, doing that breathy, whimpering dog sigh. Leah, come take it out.

With what, that handy pair of wolf-friendly tweezers I always carry around?

Don't be stupid. Use your teeth.

…Ew, I complain, shaking my head at him. Go make the kid do it.

Leah, he whines, putting on his best feel-sorry-for-me-face. Yes, this is our esteemed Alpha; fear him. Or wave a thorn at him. Don't be like that! C'mon, it' gonna heal soon and then I'll have to spend eternity with a thorn sealed into my foot!

And?

He contemplates this for a moment. And then I'll bug you for eternity because you wouldn't take it out.

Just your presence is going to bug me for eternity.

Leah!

Ugh. I pad over to Jacob, turning so that my tail hits him in the face. Fine. Whatever. I'll put my mouth all over your nasty, God-only-knows-where-its-been foot, you big baby.

Far from looking ashamed, Jacob rolls over to show me his paw, sticking his long tongue out. Thank you, Beta.

So, old man and foot fetish?

Quil, I'm going to take out this thorn and use it to stab you in the eye, I think calmly, attempting to get a good grip on the thing with my teeth. Your paw is wet.

I ran through a puddle.

R-i-i-i-i-ght.

Huffing, I finally manage to tug the thorn out of Jake's stupid paw, clenching it in my mouth for a moment before spitting it back out at his snout. Gross. Don't get into any more damn plants, I warn, going back to Seth's side. Seth rolls over, bumping into my legs and scrabbling to his own feet.

Why're we patrolling? I thought everybody was still here? he asks, even as Jacob starts to silently line out the perimeter we should all take. I get the side of the river and the top edge of the woods— score. That means no brambles stuck to my fur.

Those two Egyptian vamps are coming back, Jacob informs us while we all take off it different directions, heading along our routes. Amun and Kebi. Edward thinks the dude wants to apologize for leaving right before the battle. I don't really care, but they might be bringing some friends with them.

Friends who associate humans with meals-on-wheels? Embry asks wearily.

Jacob mind-sighs. Basically. So we need to look out for them. Make sure they aren't dangerous.

Dude, they're bloodsuckers. I think they passed "dangerous" a long time ago, I point out, slowing my pace a little when I spot the rocking blue waters of the river. Glancing up, I can see the sky looks patched together with grey clouds— it'll rain soon.

Quil's voice joins Jacob's in my head: Way to talk, Leah, since you're probably gonna end up with one as an aunt-in-law.

If Huilen doesn't rip out her intestines first, Jacob adds cheerfully. I grimace, even though they both can't see it. Huilen is pretty much the only reason I'm going to have to loiter around the Crypt after patrol. According to General Empath (or General Emotion-Fucker, I can't decide which I like more), who apparently felt the need to actually seek me out and tell me this in person, Nahuel managed to piss her the fuck off by staying at my house last night. She insisted they go hunting together, presumably so she could lay into him some more.

Great. More reason for my imprint's family to despise me, and the Cullen's also get a new episode of Leah's Life of Suck!

She doesn't despise you, Seth thinks, attempting to cheer me up. Shockingly enough, it doesn't work.

Right. Which is why she's apparently under the impression my name is "That Woman."

She actually calls you that? Embry wonders, traces of amusement in his voice. What, is that kind of like "The Other Woman"?

No! I am not a mistress!

Suffice to say, all I get after that is a lot of inner-humming and random strains of "I Feel Pretty", filled in with the occasional burst of "Candy Shop." I huff quietly, stewing to myself. It figures I live in the one place in the universe where the evolutionary system runs backwards.

You know, I'm starting to think that anyone else who isn't a supreme being with an incredible sense of smell (and really, in my life, those types of people are becoming ridiculously hard to come by) might find it just a tiny bit odd how interchangeable all of our clothes are.

But, yeah, pretty much everyone I hang around with has super-nostrils or whatever. So it shouldn't come as such a shock when Nahuel shows up, finally, Huilen and her permanent hatred of me nowhere in sight, looks me up and down, crinkles his forehead, and announces, "You smell like Jacob and Seth and yourself all together, and it is rather perplexing."

I run a hand through my hair, hopefully dislodging several leaves. "This is Seth's shirt. And Jacob's pants," I explain. "And wow that sounds weird."

He smiles one of those slow, melting-onto-his-face smiles, and leans against the railing of the Crypt's porch. "I wouldn't worry. It isn't much of a departure from your usual dialogue."

"Thanks. Call me weird while I'm wearing another guy's pants," I say, standing in front of him. He rolls his eyes, which makes me inexplicably, oddly, dementedly happy. Why? Hell if I know. Does it have to do with strange mystical creatures? Given my history, quite possibly.

"I very much doubt that you wearing Jacob's clothing indicates a secret sexual relationship," he informs me, quite seriously, while I struggle not to burst out laughing. "But do let me know if I'm wrong."

"Yes, you're number one on the list of people I would tell that I was screwing Jake." I attempt to say this as solemnly as possible, but it doesn't particularly work. Screwing Jake is just… ew. Not that he isn't a cool Alpha and the most-non-annoying-werewolf I know, but he's like, three years younger than I am. I can remember him being five and crying because I hit him— it would be hard to do somebody and not think about that all the time.

"So!" Grabbing his hand so as to loftily spin myself in a pirouette, landing next to him against the porch railing, I take in his smell with one big breath of air. It's like a freaking drug, I swear. "Now that you mention things I'd rather not talk about… where'd your lovely aunt get to?"

The smirk he gives me is wry. "Either continuing on with her hunt or hurriedly devising plans for your immediate death. With Aunt Huilen, it is difficult to be sure."

My laugh sounds more like a harsh cough. I clear my throat, my elbows propped up on the wood of the banister. "Dude, no offense, but… she sort of creeps me out." I pause. "A lot."

"I live with her. I've spent my entire existence feeling that way."

I tilt my head to look at Nahuel, frowning, intuition making my move a millimeter closer, and then a millimeter more. "You don't like her?"

"Of course I do," he says pensively, before I can even start to feel bad for insinuating that he didn't. I can almost feel something in the air changing, all the teasing and snarky remarks vanishing into whatever void I've opened up by asking about Huilen. "She's just… difficult."

"Difficult how?"

I'm scared of how that question might be taken, how it could be seen as prying and rude and awful, so I lift up my hand and touch his arm. It's fleeting and it's soft and I don't feel like my hand has done it while detached from my body. This isn't imprinting making me touch him, try and comfort him. This is me.

Which, honestly, is a whole lot scarier.

Nahuel sighs, and, to his credit, doesn't mention the touching-of-the-arm. Or the fact that it's happened again, and this time my hand is staying right where it is. And it's… nice. For him not to get all weird and wondering about the sudden display of affection the way that all of the guys jump on me when I actually smile.

"Aunt Huilen… Aunt Huilen has many differing emotions concerning me," Nahuel says simply, as if I'll let it go there. Like that's all there is to it. My hand slides further down, down, until it's over his and then our palms are pressed together and then we're holding hands. And it's not that big of a deal, really.

"Like what?"

I wonder if it's just my imagination, but I think he may tighten his hold on my hand, just a little bit. Or maybe I'm distracted trying to decipher what his faint smile means, and why he shakes his head. "I'm the one who created her, grilla. She knows that she wouldn't be a vampire if it weren't for me."

"That's insane!" I explode, because when I'm so sure of something then I have to explode with it. It's just the way I am. "You were a baby. It wasn't your fault."

The smile on his face gets even fainter, a skeleton of a real smile. "That may be so."

"That is so."

"But it can't stop her from disliking me," he finishes, in a voice that's completely resigned to this. Completely resigned to the fact that his aunt doesn't even love him after they've spent a hundred fifty years together.

Either I'm getting worse at keeping my emotions to myself or it's some Imprinting Thing (which, yes, deserves capital letters), but Nahuel takes one look at my face and says, "Don't think that she has no feelings of love towards me. I'm sure that she does."

"But what about when you were little?" I press, running my thumb up and down his finger. "Still growing, I mean. She's never told you she loves you?"

Nahuel shrugs. "She was still mourning her sister back then. I wasn't particularly important, unless she took me to hunt." He pauses, a contemplative expression taking over his face. "And no, I can't say that she has. But perhaps my memory is faulty."

Bullshit. Jacob's told me a million times how the kid has perfect memory— perfect as any leech's. But I don't mention that. I can't. There is something wrong with that woman, I swear to God. Who raises a child whose mother is dead and never thinks to say that she loves him?

I take a deep breath, to control the ready-to-phase-shakes I'm sure I'll be having if I keep up with that train of thought. "Is that why you thought she'd be happy I imprinted on you? So that you could— stay? Here?" I ask carefully, remembering him mentioning something to that effect when we had our little rendezvous on the staircase a few days ago.

"I think," Nahuel muses quietly, looking up at the sky, "that as much as she may resent me… she is even more afraid of being alone."

I stare at him, face blank. "Couldn't she just go hang out with your dad? And your sisters?"

"Leah," he reminds me gently, "my father is the reason all of this came about. She doesn't spend any more time with him than necessary."

Oh, I think, way to not catch the obvious, Clearwater. And then the little word-association game starts in my head. His father. His mother. They had sex. Even though his dad was a bloodsucker. With venom. He has venom. Venom. Fuck.

I twist around so that I'm standing in front of Nahuel instead of beside him, without breaking our hands. "Hey," I start, leaning over so that I'm probably violating every personal space rule ever written, but I can't bring myself to care because it feels so nice. I shake my head, make myself focus. "Shit, I totally forgot, what about your—"

"Qué estás haciendo con ella!"

Of course.

Huilen positively storms across the yard, except with her super-vamp speed or whatever the effect is lessened with the all of one and a half seconds it takes for her to be standing right there. Her smell, so close up and so soon after she's hunted, is an unearthly sweet, like choking on musty perfume, so biting that my eyes actually start to water. Through the sea of tears she's managed to give me, I can see how sharply her arms are crossed over her chest; the way her features are so vampire-perfect that even with rage being the dominating emotion on her face, hair an absolute tangled mess, and a streak of blood on her cheek, she still looks scarily beautiful. Like a fashion model/stay at home mom whose five kids are all sick/infamous serial killer.

Nahuel reaches over and wipes the blood off of her. "Hello, Aunt Huilen. Have you completed your hunt?"

"Of course I have!" she snaps, recoiling away. What a way to treat your nephew. She rubs furiously at her own cheek, blood smearing onto her wrist. "I asked you what you are doing with her."

"I know what you asked me," he answers, while I'm slipping back into my position beside him. "I do speak Spanish, if you recall…"

My snort is covered up by Huilen's almost derisive shriek of, "Don't use sarcasm with me!"

"I apologize." Except the look on his face says that he totally doesn't.

And then I realize that she's staring at our hands. Which we're still holding. Her tone drops so low that, if she were a wolf, I would classify it as a growl. "Why. Are you so attached. To. That. Woman."

I swear, I don't mean to say it. But sometimes this little fairy pops up in my brain with a sentence and whispers, say it! It's a good idea! So yes, magical brain-fairies are the only excuse I have for intruding on their conversation and wondering out loud, "Would you be really pissed if I just legally changed my name to That Woman? Or would you find something else general and vaguely insulting to call me?"

There's a moment of silence before a grin seeps onto Nahuel's face, even as he tries to cover it. Huilen's mouth falls open, purses shut, and her jaw clenches like she's grinding her teeth.

"I would suggest you not speak to me that way," she says stiffly, letting her arms fall to her sides, rod-straight and unbending. Her lips curve into an honest-to-God sneer when she hisses, "It would be such a shameif someone decided to bite your pretty neck."

"Did you just threaten me?"

Instinct makes me crouch low, ready to phase, ready to defend myself if she tries anything. The air feels amped up, electrified, and it's only a matter of time before both of us give in to the fact that we're natural enemies. Huilen crouches down too, showing her freakishly sharp teeth, and I think that's when Nahuel decides that he's had enough.

He pulls me up first, jerking me from my wolf-mode so quickly and piercingly that it takes me second, back pressed against the porch, to notice that he's done the same to his aunt, pulled her up like a puppeteer working a marionette.

"Stop it," he says, and it almost sounds like an Alpha command— there's that much power in it. For the first time, I really think about what he would be like if he was angry, is he was actually raging mad.

He would be scary.

That realization uses up most of my brain power for at least a few more seconds, so that it takes longer than it should have for me to notice that Nahuel and Huilen are talking to each other— or, more accurately, fighting with each other. I only get half of it, because Nahuel is resolutely speaking English to Huilen's half-hysterical Spanish, and it makes something in my stomach tighten pleasantly; to know that even if it's pissing his aunt of even more, he wants to make sure I understand.

And, for the record, I do understand. I understand perfectly.

She. Does. Not. Like. Me. I get it. I got it three days ago, I got it three minutes ago, I will get it three years from now. Huilen does not like me. Whatever. I'm an old pro at people not liking me, and I don't dig her that much either. Why she seriously feels the need to threaten me is a mystery.

"That's completely ridiculous!" Nahuel says exasperatedly, a perfect response to my thoughts. I bite back a smile, resisting the urge to join their fight, to smack Huilen down a little— this is not my problem, I chant. Besides, I'd just end up making it worse. You know, because I so have that dazzling ability to keep my temper.

Huilen throws her hands up in the air, the sleeves of her shirt slipping down her arms. "Tu padre no lo cree!" she shouts, gnashing her teeth together, looking completely, undeniably psycho. The small smudge of blood still on her cheek doesn't help that image much.

Then I notice that Nahuel's frozen. Absolutely still, staring at his aunt, the words 'this is not true' practically stamped across his face. Before I can take even one step forward, or just open my mouth to ask what's wrong, Huilen whips around to face me, strands of her hair catching in the wind and giving her an overall creepy effect.

I know that she says it in English just to spite me.

"I've called Joham," she declares, the glint in her red eyes making me want to phase then and there. "He's very interested in you, little wolf girl. And the imprint." The word sounds like a swear from her mouth, a disgusting disease. Which is exactly the way I used to say it— not that it exactly rolls off the tongue now.

Nahuel shakes his head, utterly unbelieving. "Maldición. Aunt Huilen, you didn't."

She curls her lip up, still looking at nothing but me. I can feel vague panic setting it, a domino toppled down with Nahuel's own shock. What the hell has she done?

"Your father will be arriving within the next three days," Huilen announces. Nobody moves. She hisses at me, turns, and walks away without another word.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Thank you to everyone that reviews this story. I'm blown away with the amount of people who enjoy reading it (because I was pretty sure it would drown in the depths of ;P). You all kick ass.

And!I think that, using Nahuel's follow-up comments, it's easy enough to discern what Huilen says (ahem… shrieks) in Spanish, but if you'd like to know for sure, these are rough translations:

"Qué estás haciendo con ella!" – "What are you doing with her?!"

"Tu padre no lo cree!" – "Your father does not think so!"

Oh, and in the end there, Nahuel's "Maldición" means "Goddammit." xD Apparently he's picked up on Leah's use of… expletives.

(EDIT: my Spanish sucks. Thanks to ari11990-- mistakes fixed!)

AND OKAY. I totally meant to talk about the venom this chapter, but Huilen decided to show up and go batshit insane. No, seriously. But this is actually the scene that first popped into my head when I thought about writing a Leah/Nahuel story, and… Joham coming has a lot to do with later plot. Which there is some of, I promise. Nahuel's dad just likes being a pimp and messing things up.

….And I think usage of the word "pimp" signifies that this AN has gone on long enough. :*