CHAPTER SIX: NAKED

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Agent: Brady Fuller.

Age: 19

Relevance: Accomplice; Suspect.

Location: Charleston, West Virginia.

Last Official Statement: …

Lied? What do you mean I…? I've told you everything!

Goddamn it, Leah! Always, always Leah. Every single thing comes back to her, doesn't it?

How many times do you need me to repeat it? Embry had nothing to do with this! He was just trying to be there for a friend. To keep an old promise. Typical Leah Clearwater, shows up on our doorstep, drenched in blood, sweat and gasoline, and beggs us to save the life of a wanted fugitive. I swear, Em and I didn't even know his name. We knew something was wrong, of course, but it wasn't until his face showed up on our television we realised the extent of it. I wish I could say I would have turned him away, but Mr Salvator was just so... so broken. No human being should ever have to suffer that way, so yes, we helped him.

Of course it would bite us in the ass, wouldn't it? I should have known better than to let my guard down. I never should have let it happen. I should have grabbed Em when I had the chance, grabbed him and gotten the hell away from her. But Embry's a bleeding heart Mr Michaelson, he cant turn his back on people - hasn't dealt with his abandonment issues from childhood. And Leah knew he wouldn't hold out for long against the whole lost puppy attitude.

And yeah we were lovers, what's that got to do with anything?

You... you think I had something to do with this?

No. I'd never... look, sure we started living together when I was fourteen, but we didn't become involved till the night we left Washington, and that was years later. I don't resent Embry, and I never felt used by him. Life was... it was screwed on the rez, you know. Tough. We were poor and misunderstood, and gay, and don't even get me started on what it was like suddenly exploding into a massive dog. We didn't get to have parents holding our hands through the worst of it like the others. My dad's an abusive asshole and Tiff... she tried, but there's so much the other tribes aren't allowed to see. That's probably why Em and I got so close in the end... we knew what it was like, having no one else understand. And he was protective, in a really, sexy masculine kind of way. Honestly, I should have figured out much sooner how absolutely bent I was. No straight teenage boy spends that much time staring at another boy's stomach...

I digress... Colin.

Sam quit and Jake left and… fine I'll admit it, Leah was trying alright? But then Colin happened... See, I can understand that she fell apart. We all did. He was a kid. But she just... she ditched us like we meant nothing to her, when we needed her more than ever. Jake wouldn't have done that. Hell, Sam wouldn't have done that. She just ran and never looked back. She was supposed to be different but in the end she left Embry to pick up all the pieces. Not that the Council made it easy for him. A bastard, gay, Half-Makah in charge of the Council? They were horrible to him. Fought him every step of the way for even daring to claim what was rightfully his.

And then one day we were running in the forest and... he was so tired. We reached the boundary line when he thought, 'no one will miss me when I'm gone.'

It was the dumbest thing I'd ever heard him say. I thought he'd known already, how I felt... I thought it was obvious. But he seemed genuinely surprised when I followed him without hesitation. The idiot. As if I'd ever let him run away into the unknown without me.

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(Damon)

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Clearwater's eyes are full of a silent dare. There is a glowing flush to her cheeks, no doubt a result of the hour-long walk through Kanahwa Forest, and her brows furrow in consternation as she waits patiently for your answer.

She is completely at home in the autumn woods. Her legs are sure as she hikes the trails, her muscles certain in their ability to carry out her every movement and there's a startling grace in the way she brushes wilting, whirling leaves from where they catch in her thick hair. It hasn't escaped your notice how hyper-aware she is of her surroundings, how alert she always is. But it's concentrated in this environment, you think. In the woods her vigilance is more direct, more focused.

It's probably a good thing. You're tipsy, and there should be someone sober if the two of you are going to make a habit of traipsing around populated areas without steel. Still, even with the effects of the cherry lingering in your system (everything's tilting slightly to the left) you're not fool enough to believe she's actually asking about a proposed detour from the Davis Creek trail.

Deviating from a popular trail in a woodland? Sure, why not?

Doing it in a creepy ass wood with a self-proclaimed werewolf? Motherfucking yikes!

"Let me guess," she smirks, "the big, bad hitman scared of a little rule-breaking with a little wolf?" when she grins you can't help but think she must have spent her entire life hiding her feelings from other people. She's doing a damn good job of hiding her nervousness, her fear of rejection. Though you can feel her trepidation as surely as you remember her memories, you can't see a hint of it in her face.

You snort, "Of what big eyes you have? Sorry to disappoint you, little red."

You would have missed her slight sigh of relief if you weren't looking for it. "Prick." She says, before tilting her face towards the paling sun and stretching her arms out behind her head. A small smile graces her face, and despite your muscles complaints and the cold bite of air currently assaulting you because of her Impromptu hike, you can't help but return it.

"That was a Little Red Riding Hood reference." You return sharply, enjoying the back-and-forth far more than you should. "Honestly Clearwater I'm starting to think you're the problem."

She's the one who snorts this time, and you can't help but think that you like the sound; that you're glad that for once in your life, something is easy. Except for the part where people keep trying to kill you, its actually been an interesting few weeks. She's let you see her - you get the feeling she rarely lets anyone share in her life - and because of it you've witnessed for yourself how intensely loyal she can be, how much her brothers trust her, how her confidence is the surefire, single-minded sort, how unrelentingly tenacious and strong she can be.

You're not much experienced about building trust with people. Cold, skeptical assassins generally don't build emotional connections with others as much as they exploit rapport with their targets, but despite your own logic you want things to be different with her. After all, how many people have actually known what they were getting themselves into with you and chose you regardless?

"I've never been one for fairytales, Leah." You declare suddenly, interrupting her steady pace as the world comes into focus around you. The songs of crickets chirp loudly around you, and the cool air seems to thicken with the scent of wet earth as your voice becomes quiet, intense. "I don't know how to... I don't know what you... Things rarely end with a happily ever after, in my experience. In my world."

It is unlike you to feel intimidated by anything, you are the terror in the darkness after all, but she holds your gaze, her jet black eyes intense as though she understands your your hesitation, as though she knows that it is not so much about her and the Imprint as it is about yourself. "Mine either." she admits quietly. "Come."

She pries the small bottle of cherry-blossom wine from where it hangs out of your leather jacket pocket and heads towards the stream. You follow her lead towards the freezing waters, and she jumps and hops, negotiating a dance through the thick foliage and moist earth. You're skilled in most environments and enjoy hiking just as much as she, and so it is satisfying when you land on the other side, even if your designer jeans are now ripped and clinging messily to your soaked skin.

You're pleased that she hasn't gone easy on you. There's a warm, triumphant pride in her eyes each time you push your healing body to keep up with hers, and you wonder if that's more her, or her wolf. She is more wolf than woman now, you think. Completely in tune with the forest and moving almost harmonically with the breeze. A comforting, blazing heat radiates from her skin, and for a moment you're sieged by a cruel and horrible thought; that your life will go back to a cold, barren wasteland if you reject the Imprint. And yet, you can't help but think that she deserves better. That you would be a selfish bastard to keep her tethered to you, running for the rest of her life because of your history. You're gonna die with a bullet in your heart and another in your head, you've always known it. But Leah could go on to something more. Marry a good guy. Adopt a family.

But would you survive such a separation?

Would she?

There's what happened with Sam and Emily to think about. And worse, you get the feeling that there's more to her relationship with Jacob Black than she's willing to admit. Something tells you he hurt her deeply.

"You're not afraid." Clearwater says suddenly, interrupting your train of thought. You must look confused, she continues. "Your heart." She draws her right hand to her chest, gesturing a pumping motion. "You're in a quiet wood, on a non-existent trail. No one knows who you are, or what I am, or that we're even together, except my friends. Yet it beats calm and steady as a drum." She smirks, "I have you all to myself mister... aren't you even a little afraid?"

"Not much to be scared of from what I can tell." You smirk back, wondering where the hell she's leading you.

Leah stops to take a sip of your cherry, and you can't help but stare, mesmerized by the way she draws the tip of the bottle to her lips, the way her eyes drift shut as she swallows slowly, the way sweat drips down her face, down her neck and how she greedily, slowly licks her lips...

"Oh. My. God." Leah's face breaks into a wide, taunting grin. "You're completely turned on right now."

You clear your throat, roll your eyes. "Get over yourself Clearwater." It's easier to turn away from her than it is to admit you're feeling a bit like a horny teenager. Unsurprisingly, there's more than a few women willing to throw themselves at a dangerous man - especially you - but you've been unable to stomach the idea of being intimate with anyone for a while now. Since the night Katherine told you about Elena. Maybe even before then, since...

The Imprint.

This worries you. How deeply does this bond go? And just how deeply has it sunk it's insidious hooks into you?

"I'm tired now." You grind out, moving away from her and dropping onto the nearest boulder because you want her more than you should and your growing erection is starting to hurt. You ball your hands into angry fists, glare at her like a juvenile. "I need a moment after all that trudging."

With a roll of her eyes Clearwater ignores every stretch of available land and drops happily into your lap, grinning cheekily at you and successfully drawing a hiss from your lips. You tense instinctively. She's warm... too warm. You want to wrap your arms around her, press your nose into her hair and get lost in the scent of saltwater and rosemary. You want to bury yourself in her heat and never return, there's too many fucking clothes in the -

"It's natural, you know." she says suddenly in a matter-of-fact tone. Her lips brush against your ear as she turns to you, and you almost moan at the overwhelm of her scent and skin so close.

"What is?"

"The overwhelming desire to tear off my clothes. You're... hardwired to want me now, more than anything. More than your next breath I know just how badly..." She locks your gaze with hers as she turns in your lap to thread her fingers into your smooth, raven hair. "To fuck me."

You don't give her the chance to tease you. Furiously, you grab her arms, dragging her mouth to yours with a ravenous growl like a man parched, a traveler found a well in a desert. Her warmth seeps into your skin, into muscles and bone and sinew, and you hope it'll always be like this. That kisses with Leah Clearwater will feel like standing on an island and soaking up the sun forever. Like grains of hot sand soaking happily into your toes. Right. And wholesome.

"There's too many clothes between us," You mutter into her hair as your limbs tangle with hers and the two of you fall towards the ground. You forget where you are, how exposed, how any wandering hiker might come across you in the woods, as your mouth drags across every inch her skin you can find, over her neck that stretches out like a map, full of treasures and pleasures yet undiscovered.

"Damon, this can't be..." her own moan interrupts her train of thought as your lips trail back up her neck to her ear. She writhes gently beside you as your hand presses gently against her, "You have to be sure that this..."

"Quiet."

You already know what she's about to say. Irreversible. Lifelong mates. Loss of Free Will. Maybe she's forgotten that she's already given you the memo.

She's wrong, you think, her cousin didn't get any more of a choice in this than Sam did. You know this because stopping now, leaving now, is something you don't even want to comprehend. But that doesn't mean that she wanted one, Leah would retort, and that's probably true too. Because you don't. You want this. You want Clearwater's hands tugging at your hair, you want her lips bold and demanding and messy against your collarbone. You want her sharp bursts of breath playing against your skin as she whispers your name.

"I want this." You admit.

She nods and her nose bumps against your jaw as she wraps her hands around your neck, pressing her warm body in a demand against yours. You both groan as your hardened length grinds against her thigh, sparking acute sensations of pleasure through you. And then you're both pushing and clawing at layers of clothes, tearing away denim and cotton and even a deep blue silk that proves she was hoping to get lucky.

"You have to want this too," You force yourself to disentangle your lips from hers. She tips her mouth back up to yours, her hands slipping between your bodies to cup around your cock. "Leah..." you grind out in a feral warning as she strokes a painfully slow rhythm around you. "Leah, I won't take your choice from you. Tell me to stop, and I will. I promise-"

You hiss as she interrupts your attempts at chivalry, pushing you against her entrance and enveloping the tip of your warmth with warmth.

"Shut. Up." Leah breathes, irritated , before pushing you the rest of the way in, her pussy swallowing you whole.

Her sighs turn into moans as you rock into her, building a steady pace that seeks and taunts as much as it gives. You want to take your time, you want her to beg. But she pulses throbs hot and tight around you, too tight, so that you have to remind yourself more than once that you are no longer a boy. The first time you make love to Leah Clearwater is frenzied and carnal. Her fingers press into your scarred back, etching sensations you imagine will never go away. Your teeth are as zealous on her neck, across her breasts as her hands are in your hair, over your shoulders and across your back - both of you lost in hunt as you touch as much of each other as you can.

"Mine." You declare, driven by a sudden, primal instinct to ensure she knows. "You're mine." You groan, as Leah bucks against you and moans in response.

And as you both come apart, you note vaguely that there's at least a dozen twigs in her hair.

You spend the rest of the afternoon happily removing them, and then fucking them back again.

.

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The boys she loved before you associated her love with duplicity.

Maybe they taught her to do the same thing.

It's not something she openly confesses, but you can see the scars feeling unwanted has left on your Imprint. She blabs endlessly about the shapeshifters, about her breathtaking home near the pacific that she never visits.

She keeps reminding you that you still get a choice in this, that you don't owe her anything because the two of you had sex. Women are sexual beings too, more than capable to make decisions about their own bodies. You can still be friends, she says. Fucking friends.

You'd punch her if she wasn't a woman.

But in spite of her protestations and her jovial tone you can feel the guarded tension that's grown between you two since you two sealed the Imprint in lust. She's afraid, she's worried you're going to reject her now. And you wonder, briefly, if that's what happened with Jacob. You're really starting to hate the bastard, and you don't know a thing about him.

You wonder how long she's been doing that. Plastering Band-Aid smiles over her many, valid fears. Probably since a group of insensitive Tribal elders forced her into thinking that child endangerment, aggressive PTSD and a loss of Free Will was something worth celebrating as honorable. You close your fists, forcing yourself to ignore the sudden, overwhelming urge for violent retribution. You hate them, you truly hate them for how they failed her.

She sits with you in the booth of an understaffed bar and she smiles wryly when you nod distractedly to her never-ending tales about Taha Aki. You haven't told her yet that you're not nervous about the bond - that you're feeling rather blasé about it, to be honest, if not selfishly happy. She's a nice enough girl, if a little damaged, and the longer you think about it, the more you like the idea of being part of the supernatural world with her. Dangerous, sure, but you were made for the shadows after all.

It's fun being with a woman who was made for them too.

Clearwater slams her glass onto the table, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand and yelling over Janis Joplin. "You can still reject it, you know." She announces loudly, again. She's a little tipsy, and you rather like it. "I mean, I'll probably die or whatever, but you shouldn't feel obliged to stay with me because I'm wired to sniff you before I can go to sleep."

Is she?

"Are you?" You shoot her a wicked grin.

"Oh fuck you." She grins before downing another shot of tequila and shaking out her shoulders as heat floods her veins. She lines her seventeenth empty along the table with the others. "Honestly though," she fixes you with a serious look, "You can."

"It almost feels like you want me to leave." You mutter.

"A girl can dream…" she smirks cheekily, but then she's leaning across the space between you and pressing her lips to your cheek. "I guess I'll count my blessings. Seth's Imprint literally ran when she saw his wolf. Like, ran. Miss Screaming-for-the-hills." She snorts, "That's what Quil and Embry called her at every gathering."

"Lisbeth Smallwood?"

"Yup," Leah quirks her brow. "Is there really nothing you don't know about my life?"

What the fuck happened with you and Jacob? "One or two trivial details."

"And you're not running for the hills, mister?"

"Why wouldn't a hunted hitman want a beautiful, intelligent, capable immortal who unconditionally accepts him for what he is standing by his side?"

"Touché," she lifts another shot before downing her tequila.

"How are you still standing?" You marvel, "You've been drinking for hours and you're barely buzzed." While she sniggers at you, you pause, pondering whether or not you should tell her the rest. "I've had to … discard more dead bodies of my paramours than I can count." You shoot her a quick, wry grin, unwilling to let her see just how damaged and lonely you've been. "Stick around long enough and you just might be the one running."

She frowns at you carefully before using the sudden hush as an opportunity to gesture to a passing waiter for another round of drinks. "Did you grieve them?" she asks.

"Who? Vicky and Lexi and… uh, was it Caroline? Cara- Something?" You snort a self-deprecating sound before tossing back your whiskey. "No use grieving agents. I didn't really care about them. Probably didn't even know their real names."

Clearwater looks stuck somewhere between horror and shock, still she's taking her possible future quite well, you think. She watches you curiously, dropping her cheek into her palm as Janis Joplin roars on about rock 'n roll and statutory. "You know Damon; I think you're a lot less heartless than you'd like to believe."

She's wrong, but you humor her. "You don't say…"

"I do, actually." Her gaze becomes sharp again in that way of hers that says she sees more than you'd prefer. "Tell me about her."

"About who?"

"The one that mattered. Elena."

You meet her with a resolute stare. "Nope. We're not doing that. We're not bringing up exes."

"We're going to have to talk about them eventually."

"Not after we've spent a perfectly good autumn afternoon having toe-curling, mind-numbing, unbelievable sex in the forest." Her blush is brilliant, and you can't help but feel smug satisfaction. "So let's talk about literally anything else, say, who wants you dead?"

She shrugs quickly, almost too quickly. "Not sure."

You know there's more to it, want to question her about it, but the waiter arrives and she keeps deferring and it's not long before you're both disgustingly drunk, laughing yourselves silly as she sways on the table and butchers both rock and roll and the English language. Embry's oversized shirt lies abandoned on the sofa and she's clad in cotton sweats and a sports bra as she wobbles along to the drums.

You clutch at your painful stomach. "Oh please, please stop. You said... you said the point is that you can't get drunk? The fuck is this, Clearwater?"

"Shhut your pitarap." Leah shushes you, precariously maneuvering her way to the couch so she can press a wonky finger to your pink lips. "Haven't pha- phathesed in… forever. It makes me... " She bites her lips as she searches for the word, and that fucking does it. You glide your hand across hers, sliding her finger into your mouth and smirking a devilishly slow smile.

"It's unfair how your eyes do that. Damon…" she moans groggily as your tongue swirls how and sultry over her digit. It's so easy, pretending that it's her clit. Her eyes drift shut, her breath hitching as you. "God, I want ytoo..."

The husk in her voice has you coiling with tension already. Ravenous. You draw your lips to her ear and drop your voice to a growl. "You want me to what?"

Without giving her a chance to answer, you wrap your hand around her hips and drag her flush into your lap. Leah inhales sharply at your greedy touch, her eyes lustful as they follow your hands. "Make me… lose my… capa… my capabl… my memry."

You'd laugh at her inebriated state, if you weren't so turned on yourself. Her eyes trail down to your mouth, and that's all you need to skim your mouth lips against hers, hungry, teasing as she bares her neck in submission. "Damn please…" she whimpers.

"You're drunk out of your mind, Leah." You grind out into her ear, pushing away the consuming desire to fuck her into a puddle. She already has the Imprint fraying on her Free Will, you won't sear what's left of your damnable soul by taking advantage of her in this state too. "And we're in public."

"I like the idea... of piple…watchn…" She admits into your collar.

You lift a brow, "Well, well… isn't drunk Clearwater full of surprises. Noted, kitten."

She gives you a ridiculous, childish roar. "I'mma wolf."

"You're an idiot." You laugh quietly into her ear. "And I'm never letting you forget this night."

She snorts loud enough to garner the attention of a couple sitting a few booths away, and when you look into her face again she lifts her hand to brush your dark hair out of your eyes. She looks happy and ingenuous and entirely too trusting. When's the last time anyone – anyone at all – looked at you that way?

"Shit," you say, because she's going to destroy you. If you hadn't realised it before, you see it clearly now. And yet you can't stop yourself from tilting her face up towards yours, your hands suddenly more adapt at tenderness than you ever knew. "What the fuck is this?" You marvel, because it can't just be the mystical bond that makes her your toy. It feels... far more real than anything forced.

You inhale her scent shakily and it calms you instantly, clearing your head even something strange and foreign flutters in your chest. Your mouth strokes a gently flame as it teases against hers, trailing a slow, tingling pattern across the edges of her lower lip. The kisses are slow and tentative as she follows your lead, trusting implicitly your guidance without hesitation, without thought or fear, and her hands wring into your collar as she pulls you closer. Your hands search across her bared back, licking a fire across her skin as she melts like butter into your embrace.

"Damon," she says, looking intently into your eyes. Hers are slow-simmering coals, hot and passionate. "Take me home."

You think about saying no. You think about the fact that no one really knows what an Imprint is. Still you drop a few notes onto the table before dragging her out of her seat.

Leah grins.

.

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It was all bliss until the quiet drive back.

You had Embry's car window down, and she caught the scent from a mile away, instantly freaking out. Her wolf wanted you far away from the wretched smell as soon as possible, but her woman didn't want the two of you separated with the bounty on your head. You hadn't realized until then that you had become more sensitive to the supernatural, that Leah's DNA was mutating in your system.

She took you along, towards Embry and Brady's, to where the scent of the vampire had grown strong enough to burn your throat, but not strong enough to mask the scent of all the blood.

Leah ran out of the car first, stumbling half-blindly towards the man lying lifelessly on the front lawn. "Embry!" she screamed, arms flinging out towards the unmoving body. You stood there in shock, slightly nauseated by how many shattered bones seemed to be piercing through his bloody, broken skin. "Embry, please!" Leah cried, gently holding the man's face as she wept.

You'd never felt so helpless in your life.

"Leah, go…" The sound seemed to come from nowhere. Piercing the silence that had flooded the area as Embry fought through a thick haze of pain and exhaustion to warn you both to run. "Get him… Brady… go."

"I told you to run!" Leah screamed back, half-out of her mind. Inconsolable. "I told you to go."

And that was when you felt it. Like needles prickling at the back of your neck.

It was staring at you.

Hunting.

.

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"Well, well, well, if it isn't my lucky day. I've found the lost Salvator brother..." The blond woman smiles coldly, managing to make a British accent sound annoying as she meticulously cleans out her fingernails. "We've been looking all over for you, you and your five million dollar whore."

Perhaps Rebekah Michaelson has been wearing contacts over her eyes for years, maybe that is why you never noticed the crimson shade before, but how have you never noticed the slimy, pale stretch of her skin? She has always been pretty - in a sad, desperate unacknowledged daddy-issues kind of way - but that's no excuse for not paying attention to the ghastly white porcelain tone to her skin and the hollowed out look to her body. Nothing but paper and bones. And that god-awful smell...

She's so still, you think, why is she so still? It takes a short while to realise that she's not breathing.

But the moment you do a blur of grey cuts suddenly across your vision.

You watch in horror and awe as a grey wolf rips her head clean off, and silver blood sprays out from her neck.