A/N: Lemonade!

"This time around I won't cling to those paper crowns. I won't tear you down. This time I'll listen like it's love's first secret. So come bring your love here with all its mistakes. Speak to me softly like lovers do. Here are the fragments I've saved for you."

-Hey, I Won't Break Your Heart, Corinne Bailey Rae

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This Time Around

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They stayed that way for hours. The young lovers with their limbs intertwined; a woman staving off soft swoons and melodramatic sighs as her young wolf watched intently, grinning cheekily as he watched her try.

Leah narrowed her sleepy eyes at him when she caught the expression. She'd meant to warn off his laughter but only succeeded in casting herself - in his opinion - in an adorably harmless light. So Embry leaned forward in a way that was quickly becoming second nature, pressing his lips to her delicate shoulder while his hand abandoned its post at her waist to set a course across the skin of her vertebrae.

Her breath caught at his touch, her body shuddering slightly at the contact. His small grin exploded into a full-blown smile.

'Oh shut it.' Leah rolled her eyes.

Embry made a playful but defensive sound, 'I didn't say anything. '

'Yeah, you did.'

He pressed another kiss to her copper skin, this time to the most sensitive part of her neck, and he watched as a play of scarlet streaked across her face. To call being in her company lovely was such an understatement, he'd never felt for anyone what he felt for her. And watching her be so free with him, so completely vulnerable and breathtakingly open, it made him want to take her again and again.

'No.'

'No?' he lifted a brow, wondering when she'd started reading his mind. 'Had enough of me already?'

He'd only been teasing of course, but the sudden flare of possessive desire in her eyes was so piercing it pinned him to the spot. The air became loaded between them, tense like heavy clouds taut with electricity split seconds before the earth is struck. And then suddenly, as it often did where she was concerned, his self-control crumbled.

Leah's eyes widened as she found herself flipped onto her back, her wolf keeping her in place as though to make sure she'd never leave his warmth again. His lips were ravenous, his tongue insistent as it coaxed a strangled moan from her, and her eyes drifted shut without her permission. The kiss became tender only a few moments later, as theirs usually did, as they finally remembered that they were made of flesh and water and not fire or air. She might have moaned as his one hand dragged covetously through her hair and his other pressed moon shaped imprints into her waist and left his claim to her there.

It was only a few seconds before Leah felt the familiar hardness pressed against her thigh, and she smirked despite the gnawing realisation that she was still very sore from the night before. Reaching down to grab his length, she watched as his blazing eyes flew open and his body stiffened.

'Leah…' he warned.

She ignored him.

The night before, he'd driven her past the point of sanity slowly, enjoying his complete power over her as she all but melted under his ministrations. He'd watched her fall apart over and over again, smirking the entire way. Not that she'd minded. It had been hours of deep elongated strokes and blinding pleasure and blissful pain, and only after she'd been thoroughly ravished had he given into his own urge for completion. Werewolf healing or no, she'd never walk straight again. He was no doubt the best lover she-d ever had, ever would have. He'd made it all about her so this time, she would make it all about him.

She rolled onto him, mounting him this time as he watched her with something akin to hunger. His eyes trailed from her face to her neck, below her collarbone to her breasts, and then skimmed across her torso with painstaking slowness. She fought the urge to blush as his hand reached up to softly touch every silver-blue battle scar strewn across her chest, and she felt silly for it - it wasn't as though her blemishes were the ugliest parts of her he'd ever had the pleasure to witness. And yet she couldn't help but feel so fragile as his thumb skimmed slowly over every single one of them, as though he never wanted to forget them.

'I like your scars….' He said quietly, almost like he was in some kind of trance, 'All your scars. Like coffee stains in my favourite book, they add character.'

Leah dropped her head to kiss him chastely, feeling silly and girly and feeling so safe she forgot to care about it. 'Look at me Embry,' she ordered as she pulled away briefly. Immediately his eyes snapped open, his wolf obeying her Second's command although he knew she hadn't meant to do it purposefully. 'I don't want you ever doubting just how much you mean to me.'

Before he could tell her that was impossible, that he knew her now about as well as she knew herself, she moved, and he was finished.

'Don't shut your eyes.' She ordered, and then she was rocking him, building speed as her fingernails dug into his thighs and her head fell back to expose her throat. As Embry watched in awe, completely engrossed by the sight that would no doubt stay ingrained in his mind for many, many nights to come, his lover's name slipped from his mouth. Everything faded away. The world might have stopped spinning on its axis. Existence was nothing save for Leah and a red haze of pleasure and a terrifying overwhelming of something warm in the center of his heart.

Her second orgasm had just crashed over her first when every one of his muscles went taut – and he bucked almost violently into her as his own climax followed. Slamming her down onto his cock, he let go of all the self-control he'd fought so hard to maintain the night before. He saw her shudder as he groaned, and he could do nothing but watch as her body writhed over him, aftershocks holding her body captive just as much as his arms. She was uninhibited and unthinking, and so, so… sexy.

So beautiful.

When she went boneless, still breathing heavy, he wrapped his arms tightly around her and drew her close. 'Did I hurt you?'

She shot him an odd look before she smiled and shook her head, laying her head on his chest. Sighing in relief, he felt his eyes drift closed, exhausted and spent after depleting whatever miniscule reserves of energy he'd still possessed after the night before.

Leah watched as her partner drifted off the world he'd come from. Pushing away a feeling she was too afraid to name, she drew her free hand to his face and brushed the stray locks of dark hair from where they'd fallen over his eyelids. He was in bad need of a haircut, but she rather liked his hair long. It reminded her of the shy, gangly boy who'd once had little co-ordination and long, shoulder length hair parted in the middle.

It would have been wise for her to chase sleep as he had, but instead she watched him as he slept, unable to tear her eyes away from the rise and fall rhythm of his chest. He was soft and sweet and beautiful and she had no idea how she could be so lucky as to have someone like him.

Her heart thumped peculiarly as her fingertips drew away from his hair, following the brown planes of his face down to his nose and pink lips. He was so tender and beautiful, so endearingly sweet. Was it any wonder then that she was falling in love with him?

That was it, wasn't it? The swelling in her chest. It had happened before, so she should have recognized it immediately. But that had felt so different compared to this. It paled deeply in comparison. This was the violent thrill of jumping off a cliff, not the gentle dip she'd felt when she'd been no more than a child.

He could Imprint.

Her mother's words from the day in the market kept coming back to her at odd times, when she least wanted to think about them. She had no shields where the pale grey wolf was concerned; she'd thrown her lot in with him and whatever happened, happened without a back-up plan. Perhaps it was a foolish place to lose herself. But then she would think of Harry sometimes. Of how heartbreak could find you even when you did everything possible to keep yourself from harm's way, and she knew she didn't want to spend the rest of her life afraid. Nestling into the protective arms of her mate the young warrior closed her eyes and let her mind drift off to dreamless sleep. She'd start fearing the possibility that she was falling in love the day life decided to start offering guarantees.

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'Hello…' Allison sang, waving her hand in front of the she-wolf's face. 'Earth to Leah…?'

Shaking her head slightly, the she-wolf forced her focus back to the present; to her mother's wilting garden, to Seth's birthday banners and to the golden ribbon and balloon still untied in her hands. Checking her wristwatch, she had no choice but to blush when she gathered that she'd been out of it for over fifteen minutes.

Julietta smirked, 'I take it the d-catching was more than adequate.'

'What?' both Kim and Leah asked together as Allison and Julie smirked knowingly to each other.

Leah lost her confusion long before Kim did.

Understanding her best friend's dirty mind, she grumbled a quick 'mind your business' as she rolled her eyes, heading inside to where her mother and Charlie were finishing up – well, whatever it was old people did when they were in love and left alone and stuff.

The Police Chief shuffled away from her mother as soon as she stepped into the kitchen, his face flushing crimson as he picked up the nearest thing he could find – a turkey baster – and played with it awkwardly.

'So,' Leah narrowed her eyes mercilessly at the blushing man, 'I take it Seth's still applying questionable amounts of hair jell to his mop of a head.' She smiled when she heard the little guy's string of expletives and she couldn't help but yell up the stairs this time, for Charlie's benefit. 'Seriously. You've used enough cologne to put skunks to shame Seth.'

'Leah, be nice.' Her mother chastised.

'This is me being nice.' Leah defended with a smirk, 'Sarah, like most girls, will appreciate a little subtlety.' The she-wolf grabbed a potato chip off the plate, stuffing it into her mouth as she hopped onto an empty counter, 'When's this little shindig supposed to be starting anyway?"

'Twenty minutes ago.' The nurse shrugged, placing more bowls of potato chips on the tiny kitchen table and briefly wondering if it was enough. She gestured to the numerous trays of hotdogs, fries and pies arranged all around the room, 'Do you think these are enough? We should be heading off to Billy's soon.'

'They'll never be enough.' Leah admitted honestly, 'But stop worrying about it and head out already.'

Her mother fixed her with a stare. 'I trust you, Kim and Julie will make sure nothing goes awry?'

Leah heard Seth snicker upstairs.

'We'll be fine.' She promised her mother. 'And speaking of Kim…' the wolf lowered her voice, leaning forward slightly in a manner that was universally associated with secrecy and mischief. 'Why is she… you know. Here.'

'What do you mean?'

'Well…' Leah glanced far too conspicuously at Charlie. (But that was alright because the Clearwater women weren't famed for their subtlety). 'You know, she's…' Part of the enemy's pack '… one of them.'

'Nonsense Leah.' Sue waved her daughter's concern away, 'besides at this rate its practically Jake's pack anyway.'

Leah furrowed her brow, not really understanding what her mother meant, but before she could ask the relevant follow up questions she was interrupted by Charlie.

'Hm.' The Police Chief tilted his head slightly to the side, as though inspecting a crime site. 'Leah, you look… different. Suzy… doesn't Leah look different today?'

Leah would have gagged at the endearment if her mother hadn't tilted her head much in the same way the Chief had, further strengthening the metaphor of detective-and-partner-at-the-scene-of-a-crime. 'Yeah,' Sue frowned, 'She looks… almost… happy.'

Her mother made a face at that last word, as if it had left a bitter taste in her mouth.

'Ha ha.' Rolling her eyes for the umpteenth time in the last ten minutes, Leah turned away from Sherlock and Watson, heading back to where Julie, Allison and Kim were still setting up chairs and décor in the garden. She half-expected her best friend to say something about her flustered appearance, but the meddlesome little wench was wise enough keep whatever commentary running through her merry little mind to herself.

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Ten minutes later Seth finally made his way down the stairs, his hair a little too shiny, his dress far too formal and his teeth so bright Leah wondered what on earth he'd done to them. As if sensing his descent, the doorbell rung, and Leah was vaguely aware of Sue answering it to two excited pups and Quil.

'Hey Mrs. Clearwater.' Quil chirped, hoisting the eldest Clearwater into a massive bear-hug.

Before Sue could respond Brady and Colin had charged into the house, reaching the first bowls of food they could find and stuffing their oversized faces. Brady at least had the decency to wish his friend well before he started munching on the fare. 'Happy birthday Seth!'

'Dude whas uo withu teeth?" Colin said through a mouthful of tomato chips. He swallowed before he quickly grinned, exposing red-stained teeth, 'and is that a bowtie?'

'It… its… it's fashionable!' Seth protested as Quil chuckled and the doorbell rang again.

'I take it Sarah's coming?' The Ataera said as he let go of Mrs. Clearwater long enough to fling open the front door open again. Beyond bored already, Leah zoned out again.

The next thing she remembered was sitting on the couch, hearing Kim and Julie's distant laughter and vaguely being aware that Sarah had arrived and she and Seth were talking in whispers at the top of the stairs. She turned and found herself seated beside Quil, his eyes twinkling mischievously as he regarded her with undisguised curiosity.

'Leah….' he started slowly, 'You look… different.'

'That's what I said,' Charlie agreed loudly on his way out of the house, and as Leah glared at him, her mother snickered and made her way after him out the door. Luckily, a boisterous assortment of teenagers stormed into the house as they left, distracting Quil enough to give Leah the chance to sneak to the garden.

'I'm officially too old for this party.' Julie was saying to Allison and Kim as the youngest girl nodded far too eagerly in response.

''Tell me about it.' The youngest girl replied, surprising them all by speaking without being prompted by her Imprint. Leah eyed the plastic glass in Kim's hand suspiciously as she added, rather loudly, 'I feel as old as the furniture!'

The Imprint took another slurp from her cup, hiccupping slightly, and Leah turned to her best friend, her eyes accusing, 'What did you do to Kim?'

'Just a little something to get that stick out her ass. She'll thank me for it in a few years.' The rainbow-haired menace grinned evilly as the doorbell rang again.

It was about fifteen minutes later, when Leah was considering leaving the party and going for a run in her spirit form, when she felt it. Suddenly, she knew. He was there, and he was looking for her. It was as though all the air was suddenly sucked into the atmosphere, and it was just the two of them. Every bit of space between them felt almost painful, and it wasn't until Julie leaned nearer and whispered 'I spy a hunk of yummy headed in your direction' that she realized she'd been holding her breath.

Leah turned towards her mate, stunned by the breathtaking sight of the young man clad in all-black, his hair slightly tousled and his cheeks faintly flushed. 'Hi.' She whispered as he walked the last few steps separating them, and the whole world faded to a blur.

'Jules, Kim…' Embry greeted the group on no more than a hum, barely turning his eyes away from her to enquire another name.

'Allison.' Julie's girlfriend offered eagerly while her eyes went wide with awe and disbelief. Julie rolled her eyes when she added, 'But you can call me Ali.'

'Hi Ali.' Embry grinned quickly, and at least half the girls in the garden swooned.

'EMBRY!' Quil yelled from the open sliding door, forcing the group to turn their eyes to him. The young wolf made his way to them, a jovial bounce in his step as he regarded his newcomer friend. 'Bro, where have you been? I feel like I haven't seen you in days!'

Leah hid her slight blush by taking a sip.

'Jake needed some help with the security stuff,' he casually pushed some loose hairs away from his face.

'You need to get a cut.' Quil said absently. And then, to Leah's absolute horror, the young wolf tilted his head slowly to one side, eyeing his best friend with a curiosity she'd already seen far too many times before.

'Embry…' Quil started slowly, 'You look… different.'

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A/N: Hello, I come back! I hope all of you are having a good year so far, and staying safe. This is the last playful chapter before I consolidate all the Kaheleha/Sakari/Chenita dreams with Leah's reality. I reckon we only have a handful of chapters left before we draw to a close. Thank you all for being patient with me as I battle with sticking to my update schedule, it's been a crazy hectic year that started off on a bad note but I will do my best to post updates as often as I can. This fic will be finished, promises.