A/N: This is it, the final chapter. There will also be an epilogue, but this is really where the story concludes. I'll let you all get right to it and save my long comments for an end note.
Twilight is the property of Stephenie Meyer.
Chapter 41 – When I Live My Dream
Leah POV
Time crawls.
Even though it seems impossible, time lingers oppressively. The minutes limp into hours into days like a wounded animal dragging itself into a dark hole to hide and die.
Time crawls.
Especially for me.
SSW/SSW/SSW
Mom's clump of keys landed on the kitchen table in front of me with a loud thwack!
Startled, I jerked in my chair, and my eyes snapped to her face.
I hadn't heard her car approach the house, her footsteps tread up the paved walk, or the front door open. I didn't know how long I'd been sitting, motionless and silent, at the kitchen table.
I'd drifted again. It was the only thing that dulled the sharp ache that gnawed constantly behind my breastbone.
"That's it, Leah," Mom fumed, her eyes blazing with anger. "Take those keys …" her finger stabbed in the direction of the wad of metal, "… and get the hell out of this house."
Listlessly, I pulled my hands off the table, settled them in what little was left of my lap, and directed my gaze over her right shoulder. Beyond her back, a picture window looked out on the snow-covered, gently sloping front yard. A thicket of towering ponderosa pines obscured the distant road. The afternoon sun had been bright and crisp on the immaculate snow when I sat down. Now, twilight frosted everything a deep, smoky blue.
It was a pretty scene, the kind they used to paint on the lid of cookie tins when I was a kid. The kind that should have warmed my heart with thoughts of home—if I'd still had a heart. Or a home.
We'd been in this sprawling ranch house in South Dakota's Black Hills for four months, but it wasn't home. Mom, Seth and I had settled here with Charlie, who took early retirement, when the Cullens and Jake's pack had left Forks following Joham's defeat. The new Cullen house—a monolithic structure built into the side of a hill—was just a twenty-minute hike north through the thick pine forest.
Jake and Renesmee had married in grand style just before we left Forks and were now living in a house of their own that was about the same distance from the mansion as ours was, but in the opposite direction. Beau and Embry, the unattached members of our pack, were staying in the mansion. Quil and Paul had remained in Forks. Quil, because of Claire and Paul, because of Rachel, Billy and the kids. Neither had been thrilled to rejoin Sam's pack, but they'd made their peace with our former Alpha.
In my own fashion, so had I.
Sam had made me the same offer he'd given Paul and Quil, even though he didn't want me back in his head any more than I wanted to be there. But he probably thought that if Nahuel ever did come back, La Push might be the first place he would look for me.
Nahuel wasn't coming back. I told myself that every single day. I didn't do it because I needed convincing. I did it in the hopes that if I exposed myself to that excruciating fact often enough, I could build up a resistance to the pain, the way an assassin would use repeated exposure to train her body to resist a specific toxin. So far, it wasn't working very well.
No one else seemed as certain, however, that Nahuel was gone for good—including my first ex. The fact that Sam would try at all to help reunite me with my absent imprint spoke volumes for how much he'd mellowed. How much his perspective on life had changed.
But then, losing a child will do that to you.
We'd been back from Alaska—minus Nahuel—for just one week when Emily had miscarried. I'd bolstered my courage and gone to their house to offer my condolences, even though I'd planned to keep my mouth shut about my own pregnancy. Not only was I embarrassed to be knocked up and alone, I didn't want to add to Emily's pain.
But they'd already known. Sam had heard it from one of the loud-mouthed elders, who'd gotten it from my overly responsible Alpha.
They'd been sympathetic and without judgment, as if their grief had washed away their ability to resent anyone else for having what they had lost. Probably we'd never be able to completely bury the hatchet, but that day, we blunted it enough that it wouldn't hack at the three of us anymore. No matter how permanently pissed I was at both of them, I'd never wish losing a baby on anyone.
Still, when Sam made his offer, there was never any possibility that I'd accept. When the Cullens vacated Forks, I packed up, too.
I needed Carlisle's care to see me through my pregnancy and delivery. I needed the emotional support of my family and pack. I needed to be with Seth, to help ensure he continued to heal. And I needed to be the hell away from the memories that choked the air from my lungs every time I sat in the kitchen of our house on the rez, or slept in my cold, empty bed.
Going after Nahuel wasn't an option. When Joham had kidnapped my imprint from my house, I'd used the draw of the imprinting bond to help me find Nahuel. That time, he'd been pulling on the other end of that invisible cable with everything he had. Now, it felt like he'd taken a cleaver to that connection and then run like hell. There was nothing left but a throbbing, smoking crater in my chest where my heart used to be. Pervasive pain crippled that internal sense of direction that should have guided me to my imprint; I couldn't have found him even if I'd wanted to.
And if he didn't want me enough to overcome his fear and anger … well, then, I didn't want him, either, I told myself. Repeatedly.
All that kept me going through the long, lightless days was the hope that the baby growing beneath that hole in my chest would eventually be enough to fill it.
The move to the Black Hills was supposed to be temporary. We were there until the weather improved and it would be more practical to relocate a huge troupe of people and three households of stuff. In the spring, the house Esme was having built in North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains would be finished. My daughter would be a few months old by then, and the whole bizarre clan would pack up and move again.
When the time came, I'd be sorry to leave. Even though it didn't feel like home, the place was peaceful and quiet. I could hide away inside my head from the ever-painful throbbing of that frayed and broken psychic cable—most of the time.
Every few weeks, the pain would overwhelm me and I'd wallow in it for a few days. Eventually, though, my inner wolf would get sick of my bullshit, remind me that I was being a self-pitying little bitch, and kick me back into some semblance of functionality. I had no right to marinate in my depression when Seth's situation was so much worse than mine. At least my imprint was alive somewhere. Being apart from him was still far less excruciating than watching your imprint die, as my brother had.
If I'd ever wondered which of the Clearwater kids was emotionally stronger, the past few months had answered the question. While I barely kept my nose above the waterline in my whirlpool of depression, Seth tenaciously clawed his way back to life. Maybe that haunted emptiness behind his dark eyes would never entirely disappear, but every day, my brother strove heroically to walk in the sunlight and not allow the darkness to consume him. For the most part, he succeeded.
One month after we'd moved to South Dakota, Seth returned to Denali with Jake's blessing. He was determined to find Anjali's daughter and the other hybrid children. Garrett and Kate agreed to go with him. Seth had Jake's borrowed memories of Ivvavik, and with Garrett's knowledge of the terrain, they probably stood a better chance than anyone at finding the lost children.
I'd actually thought of going with them for all of two seconds. That was the first time the baby kicked me in the bladder and the sharp pain reminded me why I couldn't go. So the trio went off without me, and they managed to check in by phone every few days. So far, they'd had no luck, but we hadn't heard from them in two weeks. Everyone hoped it was because they were busy making real progress.
"Leah!" My mother's irritated voice snapped me back to reality.
I dragged my eyes back to her face. Guilt poked me painfully at the mix of frustration, anger and fear I saw there. Tiny lines that hadn't been present six months ago webbed around her beautiful eyes, and I knew worry for me had put them there.
"You're throwing me out?" I mumbled.
I didn't feel disturbed at the thought. Only slightly confused about what I'd done this time to make her lose patience with me once and for all.
She clapped her hand to her forehead, and the plain gold band on her left hand glinted brightly in the harsh overhead light. She and Charlie had married quietly just a few weeks after the major production of Jake and Renesmee's wedding.
"Of course not!" she sighed. "I just want you to get out of the house for a while. Do you realize you've been cooped up in here all week? When was the last time you even walked to the end of the driveway to get the paper?"
I dropped my eyes and smoothed my grungy gray cardigan over my rounded belly. The baby reacted to my caress as she always did, and I felt a gentle nudge under my hand. It was one of the few things that could make me smile these days.
"We don't get the paper," I reminded her, trying for a teasing tone. Her eyes narrowed, but the tilt at the corner of her mouth told me I'd at least partially succeeded in tickling her.
"You know what I mean," she replied, pulling out the chair across from mine and dropping into it. "Look, why don't you go into town and check out that new baby store?"
With about a month left to go before my due date, Mom and I had begun outfitting one of the spare bedrooms as a nursery. It was hard to get excited about much of anything since Nahuel left, but I did want to make a nice home for our baby. She deserved at least that much from her fucked-up mother. Her room wasn't anywhere near done, so Mom's suggestion actually didn't suck.
I cleared my throat and rubbed my beach-ball-sized belly absently. "I do still need a few things," I muttered. "I don't even have any clothes for her."
Mom's eyes popped.
"I thought Dr. Cullen wasn't able to see the baby's sex on the ultrasound? When did you find out?"
I shook my head.
"We didn't," I corrected her. "I'm just guessing."
Although every other sign indicated the baby and I were both perfectly healthy, ultrasounds were useless. It seemed my baby was some kind of shield, like Bella—or at least that was the consensus of vampires in the know, namely Carlisle, Eleazar and Edward. Eleazar seemed certain that the baby had somehow broken Joham's hold over me that night in Denali.
We weren't sure what was really going on, but our best guess was that the baby was blocking the ultrasound. Why she objected to the ultrasound but accepted the Doppler was a mystery. It was also a mystery why I was able to hear her heartbeat but no one else could. Jasper could pick up her emotions but not influence them, and both she and I were totally silent to Edward.
There didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to how her abilities worked, but I just didn't have the emotional energy to worry about it. I just accepted that the baby's talents—and its sex—would remain an enigma until she was born. Still, I assumed I was having a girl because every other vampire-human hybrid was female, with one painfully noteworthy exception.
"Oh," Mom said, disappointment salting her voice. "Well, in that case, I'd advise against buying pink until after the baby is born. Stick with light green, white or yellow."
I blinked. "Uh, yeah sure." It was the kind of mundane, everyday detail that I simply didn't have the focus for anymore. Good thing Mom was still thinking.
I rose easily from the chair, and Mom snorted and shook her head, obviously disgusted.
"What?"
She pointed an accusing finger at my stomach, which, in the final stages of my pregnancy, had grown to roughly the size of Rhode Island.
"You're toting that around and you still move like you're lighter than air," she griped. "On behalf of women everywhere, I ought to slap you silly."
Even I had to smile at that. Just a little.
I grabbed the keys and headed toward the door.
SSW/SSW/SSW
Two hours later, I'd decided Mom's baby shopping suggestion actually did suck. Big time.
Bad enough the store was packed because its opening was the biggest news story the podunk little town had seen all year. Worse that it was crawling with other pregnant women, all of whom looked a hell of a lot happier than I ever expected to be again. Killer that every one of those women was accompanied by a guy who looked either totally shell-shocked or proud as punch.
Was I the only single mother in the whole freaking state of South Dakota? After bumping bellies with more Stepford moms than I'd ever imagined could exist, I was ready to go the hell home.
I maneuvered my almost-empty shopping cart to the end of a line that looked like it belonged in a theme park rather than a retail store. The cart in front of me was heaped so high, I could barely see the dude's head over the mound of stuff. He appeared to be attempting a mental tally of just how empty his wallet was going to be when he finally made it to the front of the line.
The petite blonde with him was sporting a modest baby bump tastefully draped in a designer maternity top. She flicked her disdainful eyes over my uncombed hair, down my horrendously-inappropriate-for-the-weather white tank dress and shabby gray cardigan. Her eyes lingered on my ringless hands, where they rested on the shopping cart—I hadn't worn Mom's solitaire, or even seen it, since before we left Forks—before sliding all the way down to my unlaced Chucks. She concluded her inspection and finally met my eyes.
Her expression clearly said frumpiness and depression were communicable diseases and that since I obviously had terminal cases of both, I really shouldn't be mixing with fashionable, happy people.
I held her gaze, waiting. She didn't waste two seconds taking up my non-verbal challenge.
Her perfectly made-up lips said: "Are you all alone?" Her eyes silently added: "Of course you are."
Preggo-princess nodded to the modest pile of baby clothes tossed haphazardly in the bottom of my shopping cart. "If you need a hand carrying that to the car, my husband would be happy to help," she offered in a saccharine tone.
My inner wolf-bitch howled with glee. This petty, mean little witch had just given me the perfect opportunity for some guilt-free venting of the anger I'd been keeping bottled up. I opened my mouth to verbally cap her tight ass, and inhaled deeply through my nose to fuel the tirade I fully intended to unleash.
The scent crashed into me like a wrecking ball.
Cinnamon and spice. Lust and longing.
I stopped breathing.
He's not here, the wolf-bitch growled. You've finally lost it.
I forced my lungs to work and sucked in a desperate breath. His scent hit me again, punching pain through my chest and scorching down my rib cage. The roiling mass of misery at the base of that fucking invisible cable jerked fiercely, shaking my body like a bunny in the jaws of a mountain lion.
He can't be here. He can't be.
My eyes frantically scanned the room. I clutched the shopping cart for support and turned in a wobbly circle, seeking with my eyes what my brain said was impossible and my nose insisted was real.
He isn't here. He's not coming back. He's never coming back.
The preggo-princess took a step toward me and grabbed my elbow. "Hey!" Genuine concern had chased the snark from her voice. "Are you okay? You're not going to faint, are you?"
I couldn't have answered her, even if I'd wanted to. My eyes swept past her pale, alarmed face, raking over the press of bodies surrounding me in the packed store.
"Do you want to sit down?" She raised her voice and barked at her oblivious husband. "Todd, I think she's going to faint!"
The little blonde was pressed up against me now, her hand still on my elbow and the other arm around my waist for support. Normally, I had a strict hands-off policy when interacting with strangers, but I pried one hand off the shopping cart handle and clutched her sleeve, needing the human contact to anchor me. How had preggo-princess gone from my antagonist to my rescuer in just a few seconds?
"Tammy, what's going on?" Her husband was finally paying attention to our exchange.
My dazed stare slid over her shoulder, past the clueless Todd … and slammed to a halt. There, just inside the store entrance, in a spot my eyes had already skimmed over a dozen times—
He stood still and straight and fucking perfect.
His teak eyes were wide and unreadable, and they didn't waver from mine. Coffee-and-cream skin glowed impossibly warm and flawless in the harsh, cold light of the overhead flourescents. Glossy blue-black hair softly brushed the collar of the stained, torn denim jacket he wore, and my mind snagged on that minutiae. Had it grown? I hadn't known that was possible.
As if someone had dumped a bucket of boiling water over my head, heat poured down my body from my crown to my toes. The fiery surge dragged the strength from my limbs as it passed. Only Tammy's grip on my waist, and mine on the shopping cart, kept me on my feet.
His full lips were parted slightly, and the warmth from his higher-than-human body temperature made his sweet breath plume, even inside the well-heated store.
Around him, the ebb and flow of mere mortals fluxed past as if he didn't exist, as if his motionless, implacable form weren't partially blocking the automatic door. His presence forced the door to linger open and admit gusts of frigid, snow-stippled air into the warm interior of the building. The other shoppers moved in and out of the store as if they didn't see him at all.
How was it possible that no one—everyone—had stopped to stare at his inhuman perfection? Was I hallucinating?
Beside me, Tammy stiffened.
"Is that man bothering you?" she whispered, her voice low and urgent.
So … not hallucinating. Tammy saw him, too. And while I couldn't tell at all from his lack of expression what was going on behind his glorious eyes, she apparently thought he looked threatening.
If you only knew, I thought wildly.
Of course, his vampire-sharp hearing caught Tammy's question out of the heavy air. He could probably hear the insane, careening thunder of my heartbeat, too. Still holding my panicked gaze, he shook his head slowly, almost imperceptibly.
What the hell does that mean?
I ordered my knees to stay locked.
While no power on earth could have torn my eyes from his face, I knew I had to say something to Tammy. More importantly, I had to get out of the store immediately. I didn't know what would happen if I allowed this reunion with my wayward imprint to play out in public, and I sure as hell didn't want to find out. And if I were imagining this … well, I still didn't want to end up being the floor show.
Todd stepped toward us, momentarily blocking my view of Nahuel. When his big, fat human head finally moved out of the way, the automatic door was sliding closed and the spot where I'd seen my imprint was empty.
"Todd, that man is bothering this poor woman," Tammy said, her voice still low. She was trying to protect my privacy, I realized, because by now we were getting some curious looks from other shoppers nearby.
The so-far-utterly-useless Todd swiveled to stare in the direction his wife indicated, before turning back, confusion draped across his bland features. "What man?"
Tammy blinked and peered around her husband's beefy shoulder.
"Crap," she muttered. "He took off."
She pushed her lower lip outward and nibbled it for a moment, obviously debating. "I think we should call the police," she announced after a moment.
"No!" I croaked. "Don't call the cops. I'm fine. Really."
Tammy's eyebrows rose skeptically. Todd maintained his bewildered expression, but still had the presence of mind to edge his cart and mine forward as the line moved up.
"No, really, I'm fine," I insisted. I scrubbed my sleeve over my forehead. I was sweating like a parochial school boy whose favorite nun had just caught him with his hand down his pants, massaging his balls. "I just thought I saw someone I knew, but it wasn't. Anyone I know, I mean."
The old Leah would have been pissed by Tammy's persistence and her sympathetic attitude.
"Sweetie, I saw that guy," she said, shaking her head worriedly. "He was looking at you like you're something to eat."
Crazed, totally inappropriate laughter welled up behind my teeth, and I clamped my lips tight to hold it in. The pressure made my eyes water. I shook my head.
"No," I managed to grind out after a few moments. "It was no one. I'm fine. Thanks for asking, though. I think I just need to go home now."
Tammy's sympathy sulked into antipathy. Clearly, she thought I was one of those women who refuses to accept help getting out of a bad boyfriend situation. I momentarily felt bad for fobbing off her overture, until sense reasserted itself and I realized just how dangerous it could be for them if I allowed these two innocent, normal people to get caught up in my supernatural drama.
"Fine," she sighed. "At least let Todd walk you to your car. You don't mind, right honey?"
"Uh …" Todd opined eloquently, looking like he actually did mind, fuck you very much. "… sure."
He looked at the handful of items in my cart, which obviously had yet to be paid for. "You ready to go now?"
There wasn't a thing in that cart that I couldn't live without for a while longer, I decided. And stupid as I knew it was, I didn't want to walk to my car alone. Not that I was in any way afraid of Nahuel. If he'd been unwilling to cause a scene in the store, I doubted he'd do so in the equally busy parking lot. But I wasn't sure my legs would stay functioning all the way to the car, and I figured Todd might at least be able to keep my ass off the wet pavement if they gave out.
I shoved the cart aside and looked at Todd.
"Yeah, let's go," I said and started for the door, pausing at the last moment to look back at Tammy. "Thanks," I added sincerely.
She shrugged, bent over her cart and began shoveling items onto the checkout's conveyor belt. "No problem," she murmured, disinterestedly. "You take care."
I turned and headed out the door with the surly, resentful Todd in tow. As I passed over the spot where Nahuel had stood moments before, a shiver skittered down my spine. Was it dread? Fear? Hope? I couldn't say, but other more pressing questions crowded my mind.
Where did he go? Where had he been all these months? How had he found me?
And why the fuck had he come back?
SSW/SSW/SSW
The house was empty and silent, but not dark, when I arrived home.
Mom had left a light on for me in the foyer. A note propped against it informed me that she and Charlie had decided to go to dinner and a late movie. Her breezy sign off of "don't wait up" reminded me that even though time had crawled for me these past torturous months, it had moved on for everyone else. She was happy with Charlie, and I couldn't resent her for it. I didn't even consider disrupting their date with a phone call to tell her about the incident at the baby store.
My hands had shaken the whole way home. As I'd driven through the darkened streets, I'd told myself I really had imagined the encounter. A brain could conjure up some amazing shit when it was under the kind of strain I'd lived with for the past several months. Even Tammy's reaction could be reasonably explained. She'd merely followed the direction of my stare and seen someone else that she thought looked suspicious. That didn't mean she'd really seen Nahuel.
If he'd actually been there, he would have trailed my car and jumped in front of it by now and … done what? I had no idea. But I took the fact that nothing happened on the drive home to mean the whole episode had been nothing more than my cheese finally sliding off my cracker. I'd imagined the whole event. It was easier to believe my mind had cracked than to accept that my imprint had come back to find me. Allowing myself to feel that kind of hope would only lead to more heartbreak.
I locked the door behind me, ditched my wet Chucks in the mud room and switched off the light. Moving slowly, I wandered through the dark house. It was much bigger than the home I'd grown up in, its size and quality courtesy of the Cullens' vast fortunes.
My bedroom was at the back of the house, on the opposite corner from the master suite where Mom and Charlie slept. With two bathrooms and a third bedroom separating my sleeping quarters from theirs, they were oblivious to the number of nights I spent pacing around my room. And I didn't have to hear whatever was going on behind the bedroom door of the middle-aged newlyweds, either.
Evening seemed to be the baby's favorite time for engaging in prenatal calisthenics that made it very difficult for me to rest. But tonight, she was still and quiet in my tummy. Her heartbeat was slow and steady, and I thought she might be asleep.
I was wrecked, too emotionally exhausted to think straight. I knew I should at least call Jake and tell him what I thought had happened, but all I wanted at the moment was to lose the psychological weight of the last few hours—the last few months—in dreamless slumber.
Tomorrow I would pick up the question of whether or not I'd really seen Nahuel—and what it might mean if I had.
Nothing stirred or made noise in the still, quiet house. It was as empty and echoing as the chasm where my heart used to be.
I padded into my bedroom, shut the door behind me and made my way to the bed. Instead of peeling the covers back and climbing in as I'd intended, I stood staring down at it.
I felt numb. Lost. Alone and hollow.
Hanging my head, I gave in and finally admitted to myself how much I'd been hoping I'd come home to find Nahuel waiting for me. The tears I'd been holding in for months finally broke free, trickled down my cheeks and splashed onto the stretched front of my worn sweater.
Stupid bitch. He wasn't really there. He's gone. He didn't come back. He's not coming back. Ever.
This time, his scent wafted over me like a warm blanket dropped gently around my sagging shoulders.
Slowly, as if a fast move might gust that comforting, delectable scent from the room, I turned back toward the door. My hand fumbled for the bedside lamp, shaking so badly I could barely twist the switch, because I knew—but was fucking afraid to believe—what I'd see in its illumination.
Nahuel stood with his back pressed firmly against my bedroom door, vampire still and silent.
Every muscle in my body clenched painfully at the sight of him. Warring desires—to go to him, run from him, kiss him, slap the shit out of him—paralyzed me. Pins and needles pricked my palms with the urge to feel his skin beneath my hands.
Neither of us moved a millimeter.
His eyes were huge and round, damp and tormented. They lingered on my face before sliding slowly down my body. When his gaze reached my bulging belly, it snagged there, and he gulped a huge, ragged breath. That creepy immobility shivered from his form and his long, lean body began to tremble violently.
Abruptly, like a moth helplessly drawn to the flame that will crisp it, he fluttered across the room, his long legs carrying him to my side in three uncertain steps. For a heartbeat, he stood with a hand's breadth of space between us, and the delicious heat of his body pulsed over mine.
Funny that I hadn't realized just how cold I'd been until that moment. Cold as a shadow on the ocean floor. Cold as a virgin's grave. Nothing ever felt warm to me but Nahuel.
I didn't see him move, but suddenly his mouth was on me and his greedy hands were fucking everywhere. He roughly groped every part of me he could reach, stretching his arms wide around my ballooning belly, gliding his fingertips over my ass, gripping my back and shoulders, massaging across my sides and up my rib cage to fondle my breasts.
Every touch was like feeding a bar of Belgian chocolate to a starving woman. Desperate, animal craving swamped my senses, burying my anger and resentment beneath a thick, sweet frosting of desire.
He didn't touch his mouth to mine, but his tongue and lips scorched over every other inch of my face and throat. When that didn't seem enough for him, he grasped the collar of my cardigan and yanked it, baring my shoulders to his frantic, devouring kisses. Two sharp tugs on the neckline of my dress left my tits exposed almost to the nipples.
He'd abandoned me and broken my heart worse than anything Sam had ever done, so you would think his manhandling would piss me off. And anger was definitely there among the mess of emotions clattering around in my head, but intense, euphoric relief was wining out.
I'd been motionless under his hands, but the hot lick of his tongue across the crevasse of my cleavage broke my lethargy. I buried my fingers in his hair and dragged his head up until we were nose to nose. I wanted to kiss him senseless. Wanted to see in his eyes that this moment meant the same thing to him that it did to me, but his eyes were closed tightly. He panted in short, whistling breaths.
Finally, he spoke, gasping against my lips. Instead of the lush, rich baritone I loved, his voice was papery thin and feeble, as if he hadn't truly used it in a very long time. I was so shocked by the weakness of his voice that it took a moment to register what he was saying.
"You are alive."
Stunned, my fingers unclenched, releasing his head from my control. He immediately buried his face against the naked skin of my neck.
"You are alive," he repeated, an alarming edge of hysteria seeping into his speech. He giggled madly against my throat, and his hard, warm body trembled feverishly. His hands were still moving, squeezing and gripping so recklessly that he was surely leaving a trail of bruises wherever he touched.
"Oh, my heart, Seth said … but I did not believe … so much pain ... I thought it must mean you died. I did not know. I would have come sooner. I did not know … You are alive! You are alive!"
So many disjointed thoughts were zinging around inside me that my brain was on a ten-second delay. One thing floated to the top in the emotional cauldron boiling in my head.
"You thought I was dead?"
At my bluntly worded question, he broke.
Sobs wracked his body—wretched, pathetic weeping like I'd heard from Seth the night Anjali died—his quaking arms crushed me to him, and his legs gave out. He crumpled slowly to the floor, dragging me down with him. I cradled him in my arms like a child as he wept brokenly against my chest.
In that moment, the screaming agony of the past five months sank into silence. The thick coating of betrayal that had smothered my heart sizzled and smoked away. He'd abandoned me, turned his back on our child and our future, and left me emotionally crippled—and none of that mattered at all.
The simple truth was neither of us had known jack shit about love—real love, the kind that flattens your world and rebuilds something incredible and new from the ruins—until we'd loved each other. We'd both made mistakes and would certainly make more in the centuries ahead of us. But neither of us would ever want or need anything more than each other.
That was all that mattered in this moment. We had eternity in which to work out everything else.
I stroked his tear-slicked face and pressed my lips to his hot forehead. He was still babbling between his breathless sobs, and some of it was in his own language, some of it was English and some of it was surely just gibberish. I breathed deeply, saturating my brain with his spicy-sweet scent, and let him ramble. What little I could understand told me he'd suffered as much from our separation as I had. Maybe even more.
"Inchepoyeneimi … thought you were dead … hurt so fucking much … surely, you were gone … wanted to die, wanted to die … kisu … kept going … owed it to my sister to find Ahlia… Inchepoyeneimi!"
He burrowed his face into my body where the mound of my belly met the swell of my breasts, and paused long enough to suck in a shuddering, staggered breath.
"I am sorry, ñi piuque," he whimpered. "I am sorry. I should not have left. I was a coward. I beg you, forgive me—"
I pulled hard on a hank of his silky hair, and though he refused to lift his head, his babbling ground to a halt. Into the silence, I gently lay the only words I could think of that could start to heal both of us.
"I love you, Nahuel," I murmured, stroking his back with the hand that wasn't buried in his hair.
His arms tightened around me crushingly, and his lovely, perfect nose gouged into my sternum hard enough to make me wince. Someone else objected to the tight squeeze, too, and I felt from inside the sharp jab of a little fist against the source of the discomfort.
Nahuel jerked back like he'd been stabbed. His mouth fell open and his eyes rounded in astonishment.
"What was that?" he gasped, gaping at my belly like he expected it to generate an electrical charge next.
Angst was still heavy in the air, but I had to laugh at his stunned reaction.
"That was your daughter," I chuckled. "She probably didn't appreciate getting squished."
Dismay crashed over his perfect features, and his gaze flashed to my face.
"I am sorry! Did I hurt you?" His eyes dropped to my swollen stomach. "Did I harm … her?"
Five months ago, he'd thought of her as an "it," and wanted her dead. Now he was worried that some enthusiastic nudging might have hurt her. If he could change that much of his attitude about our baby, what else had changed? Was it possible he would want to be a father now?
I swallowed hard, trying to clear my throat of the emotion clogging it.
"She's fine," I whispered, smoothing his shaggy hair back from his cheeks. "I'm fine."
He studied my face for a long moment, as if trying to decide whether I was really okay or just saying so to make him feel better. He scrubbed the wetness from his face with the sleeve of his jacket. Finally, he nodded and looked wonderingly at my stomach again. His hand tentatively lifted, fingers hovering over the stretched fabric of my dress.
"May I?"
My heart did a happy little jig. He wanted to know about our baby.
I grabbed his hand and brought it the rest of the way to my body. His long, warm fingers spread over the hard curve of my stomach. His touch was so light, so gentle I didn't think he'd feel anything, so I pressed his hand firmly against my flesh. The baby responded with another energetic push.
He gasped again, and his eyes shot back to my face. Worry saturated his golden gaze, and I didn't know what was wrong.
"What?" I asked, shaking my head in protest at the anxiety in his eyes.
"Are you in pain when the baby moves?"
A weak memory surged to the fore: the loud crack as bone fractured, and Bella's voice screaming in agony. On the heels of that recollection, realization crowded in. Nahuel would surely have comparable memories of a similar experience, only his would be from a different perspective. His would be from inside his mother's womb.
In a hurry to reassure him, I let the words spill from my mouth without thinking.
"No, I'm not in any physical pain," I told him, watching his face so I could catch the moment when he would finally accept that I was in no danger from our baby. "She has never hurt me."
Anguish flared brightly in his liquid gold eyes.
"I have hurt you," he choked. "If the pain you have borne in these past months was even a fraction of what I experienced—" He laid his cheek against my belly and slid his arms as far around my waist as he could reach. "I am a monster."
"Nahuel, no—"
He interrupted my protest, speaking over me gently but insistently.
"Yes, I am," he corrected, turning into my stomach so that his face was hidden and his voice muffled. "Perhaps I will be always. But I hope you are able to learn to live with my monstrosity, because I will never leave you again. Not even if you command me to go."
My heart soared into my throat, pushing my emotions in front of it. Joy leaked from my eyes, hot and salty.
"That will never happen, baby," I hiccupped messily. "I'll never tell you to go. I'm sorry I lied to you and started this who mess—"
Again, he cut me off in that gentle, tender tone. "I forgive you," he murmured. "I do not like that you deceived me, but I understand now why you felt you had to. Only promise me you will never do so again."
I smiled through my tears. "I promise I won't ever lie to you again. And I'm telling you right now that if you ever try to leave me again, I will hunt you down and kick your ass until you see sense."
He made a snorting sound—something between a laugh and a sob—against my belly.
"I know. I will depend upon that."
I laughed with him and wrapped my arms around his head, holding him against me tightly. I had no intention of ever letting go again. I'd be perfectly happy to spend eternity parked right here, on the warm, carpeted floor of my bedroom with the man I loved resting in my arms.
Someone else had other ideas though, and an energetic stomp on my bladder reminded me of the third party in the room. Nahuel apparently felt the movement, too. Reluctantly, I released him as he straightened to a seated position beside me on the floor. His palm rubbed low over my belly.
"We have much to discuss, ñi piuque," he sighed, as if he regretted the need to speak at all.
My skipping heart stumbled at his tone. The last time he'd asked to talk about something, he'd wanted me to agree to an abortion. Tension wound tight around my throat. Before he could say something that would re-break my freshly healing heart, I jumped in first.
"Nahuel, where have you been?" Then, as something he'd said earlier bubbled to the surface of my consciousness, I added: "What did you mean about Seth telling you something? When did you see him?"
He continued palming my stomach, watching his own hand sweep slowly back and forth, as if he couldn't bear to lose contact with my body for even a few seconds. His voice was growing stronger, but was still only a shadow of the silken cadence that I loved.
"When I left Denali, I went in search of the hybrid children," he murmured, not looking away from his hand. He brought the other up to join the first. "I found them very quickly."
At my surprised gasp, his eyes flickered to mine and his hands stilled momentarily.
"I could not let my sister's child remain in the hands of anyone associated with my sire," he said simply. "I thought it might take a very long time to find them, and that I would have to battle to free them from whomever Joham had left in charge. But when I located them after just a few weeks of searching, they were completely alone."
He paused again and his perfectly arched brows dipped together. "In retrospect, I believe they wished to be found. They are very intelligent. When Joham and Remy did not return for them, they knew they needed to seek other caregivers. They were very pleased to see me."
A thousand questions jostled for dominance in my brain. I was floored that Joham would have left the children completely alone—abandoned them, really—and that my imprint had been the one to find them. Nahuel's psycho sperm-donor was gone and never coming back, yet the depth of his evil continued to amaze me.
"Seth's been looking for them for months," I blurted.
A shy smile tugged the corner of his mouth upward. My heart rose with that small motion.
"I know," he agreed. "He found us two weeks ago. I had decided the best course of action would be to place the children in the care of Dr. Cullen and his family. Unfortunately, I was ill-prepared to make such a journey with five children. Imagine traveling from the wilderness in northern Canada thousands of miles south with no means of transportation, no money and no telephone with which to call for help."
I hadn't realized my yap was hanging open, until Nahuel gently pressed a fingertip beneath my chin and urged my mouth shut. His smile widened.
"We had been walking for several weeks, living off what animals we could hunt, when Seth, Kate and Garrett found us," he said, shaking his head at the memory of his own stupidity. "They were much better prepared than I had been, and we decided we should take the children to Denali. They are there now, waiting for Dr. Cullen to come for them."
My mouth must have slid open again because Nahuel's gaze appeared to be riveted on it. It occurred to me that I'd better do something constructive with the damned orifice before he decided to occupy it for me, in which case I'd lose my window to keep asking questions.
"Is Seth alright?" It was my second-most urgent question, but a safer topic than what I really wanted to ask, which was if Nahuel was back to stay.
He looked up from his inspection of my mouth and met my eyes.
"He is very strong. Stronger than I was when I thought myself in his stead." His voice faltered again, a sharp edge of anguish accenting his speech. "By the time Seth found me, the pain of being separated from you was so great that I thought your death was the only explanation for it."
He bowed his head, and his hands resumed their urgent movement on my abdomen.
"Seth was very angry with me for leaving you. When he told me you lived, I did not believe him." Shame crept into his tone. "I insulted him unforgivably and accused him of lying."
A short, self-deprecating chuckle slipped from his perfect lips. "He thrashed me soundly for my arrogance. Then he told me where you were and ordered me to go to you. Still, I did not believe you could possibly be alive."
"But you're here," I protested gently. "You must have believed him at some level."
He was silent for a handful of heartbeats. "I wanted to," he said at last. "Very badly. But I do not think I fully did until I saw you earlier tonight."
He shook his head again and dragged one hand through his tousled hair. His head tipped to the side, and his eyes met mine again. Heat and desire simmered in their teak depths.
"I have been dead for five months," he said. "It seems I am incapable of living without you. I was a fool to even attempt it. I will never again be so witless."
Abruptly, he rose to his knees in front of me, bending at the waist to allow both hands better access to my body. His magical fingers continued to stroke over the expanse of my belly, but his caresses seemed to be growing less exploratory and more stimulating.
"I dreamed of this," he murmured. Delicious shivers rippled down my spine at the sensual timbre of his voice. Damp heat collected low in my belly, and I had to force myself to concentrate on his words. "It was wrong, and I hated myself for it, but I fantasized about how you would look round with my child."
Insecurity bubbled up through the desire, and I stiffened slightly. Jake and Charlie had both trotted out that old "swallowed a watermelon" joke until I'd verbally slapped them down. I was definitely not the buff she-wolf Nahuel had fallen in love with. Would he be repulsed by the all-too-human changes in my body?
"You are even more beautiful than I could have imagined," he whispered. Slowly, as if he were reluctant to look away from the sight of his hands on my body, he peeked up at me through his long lashes. "I do not know what kind of father I will be, but I promise I will try … if you will allow it."
The air rushed out of my lungs in a loud woosh, and my head swam dizzily.
For five months, I'd forced myself not to dream of this conversation, not to imagine what it might be like to have Nahuel tell me he wanted me and our baby. If I'd allowed myself to think of it at all, I couldn't have imagined a more perfect scenario. He was saying everything I wanted to hear, and the intense pulse of adoration and honesty that surged down that invisible cable left no doubt of his sincerity.
The moment was so intensely transcendent, that I was afraid to speak and fuck it up.
But while I was totally certain of him, Nahuel apparently didn't feel as confident of me. He misread my overwhelmed silence for resistance. His teak eyes narrowed and determination drew his jaw tight.
"It is pointless to refuse me," he said firmly. "You are mine, and so is our baby. I will not be like my sire. I will be beside my mate when my child enters the world, and I will be a part of my child's life—"
Laughing like a fool, I lunged up onto my knees—a move beyond the abilities of the average pregnant woman—hit him belly-first, and toppled him backward onto the floor. He grunted manfully beneath me as he bore the full brunt of my weight. My ginormous stomach was sandwiched between us and I had to crane my neck to get to his lips, but I managed it.
Between the impact of my girth on his gut and the oxygen-stealing force behind my kiss, he was huffing like a steam engine when I finally released his mouth.
"Leah," he panted heavily, his fingers scrabbling at my thighs, dragging my skirt toward my hips. "I want you."
We still had a lot of work to do, and we both knew it. And we sure weren't going to resolve all our issues just by humping like bunnies. But we'd been apart from each other—hollow and lost—for too long. The imprinting bond, stretched and badly strained through our months of separation, was reasserting itself in the most basic and instinctual way.
I had no intention of resisting that pull ever again.
I laughed breathlessly against his throat, ignoring the ratty denim jacket he wore in favor of attacking the buttons of the shirt beneath it.
"I'm not sure we'll be able to accomplish anything around this beach ball I'm carrying," I joked.
"We will manage," he growled.
He hooked all ten fingers in the neckline of my dress and dragged it down below my breasts. Stretching his neck, he latched on to my nipple and drew on it hard. I moaned loudly enough to crack glass.
A second later, I squeaked in surprise. He'd used that damned vampire speed and strength to catapult us both off the floor and onto my bed so quickly my stomach wobbled dangerously. When the room stopped its momentary spin and my eyes refocused, Nahuel was poised on his hands and knees above my massive belly and naked tits.
His eyes were luminous and adoring and hungry, but he hesitated.
What the fuck? The wolf-bitch had been silent throughout our reunion, but found her voice over the delay in the action. What's he waiting for?
I felt the by-now-familiar and finally welcome tug of the invisible cable, and I knew without a doubt what he needed from me. I reached up and cupped his beautiful, earnest face in my hands.
"Say it, baby," I urged gently. "Out loud."
In the life-altering light of his joyous smile, the last of the darkness in my soul fled forever.
"Inchepoyeneimi," he breathed, reverently. "I love you, Leah. Forever. Always."
While my body was clamoring to get on with business, my damned curious brain snagged on that foreign word again, just as it had the first time we'd made love.
"Is that what that word means?" I demanded. "Itchy … po … whatever. It means 'I love you?' "
He laughed fondly. "Inchepoyeneimi," he corrected my atrocious pronunciation. "Yes, it means 'I love you.' Do you recall the first time I said it to you?"
I silently cursed myself for distracting him from the matter at hand. The last thing I wanted right now was a language lesson.
"Of course," I said hurriedly. "In my room, the first night you slept with me after we almost made love."
His white teeth flashed in a gloating grin. "No, that was not the first time." He laughed again at my confused expression and lowered his lips to my skin. His mouth moved down my collarbone to settle again on one—two, really—of his favorite portions of my anatomy.
"Think on it, my heart," he teased throatily. "It will come to you."
Nahuel the sexual multi-tasker was back and in fine form. As he licked, sucked and nipped at my breasts, his hands plunged under my skirt and whipped my panties down my legs. I should have been enjoying his talented hands. Instead, I wracked my brain, sifting through memories of times he'd spoken in his native tongue, times when I hadn't known what he was saying.
Suddenly, I gasped, and not because his clever fingers were buried between my thighs. I grabbed his head and forced it up so I could see his face and eyes.
"On the beach!" I accused. "The first time you kissed me and I pulled away. You said something and I couldn't really understand you. It was then, wasn't it?"
He pressed his lips together and remained silent, but the quiet joy dancing in his eyes said I was right.
I drew a shuddering breath, trying to process this newest revelation in a night that had already been filled with plenty of them. Belatedly, he seemed to realize that I might be less than thrilled with this one.
"Are you very angry with me?" he asked hesitantly.
For a full ten seconds, I was pissed.
How much easier would our lives have been if I'd known from the beginning how he felt? We could have skipped weeks of angst and deprivation if he'd told me in plain English that he loved me. It might have inspired me to admit sooner—to myself and to him—that I'd loved him, too, even then. But would I have believed him? Like Nahuel, at the time, I hadn't really thought myself worthy of love.
Two seconds more, and I realized I didn't give a flying fuck about any of that anymore.
Calm settled over me. We were together. He was mine, and I was his. He loved me, and because of that, I was finally whole.
I shook my head and smiled. "I love you, too, Nahuel."
I pulled him closer, and the obstacle of my huge belly made it graceless and awkward and utterly, totally perfect. Just before his lips claimed mine, I whispered the reminder of the only truth we would ever need to carry us through eternity:
"Always have. Forever."
THE END
End note: I started "Season of the She Wolf" a little over a year ago, largely because I wanted to see if I still "had it." I've been a professional writer all my adult life, but left creative writing behind when I entered the working world. I figured writing fanfiction would be a good exercise and a learning experience. What I didn't expect was to connect with so many wonderful people through this story.
I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating yet again. I truly could not have done this without the support and brilliant editing help of my betas, Evelyn-Shaye and MunkeeRajah. Not only are they marvelous betas they are both damn fine people, too. I am deeply grateful to have met them.
There are many others who deserve thanks: All the folks at Project Team Beta (where I found my betas) are also wonderful. Einfach_mich made my banner and pimped my story every chance she got. The folks who nominated and voted for SSW at the Sunflower Awards and She-Wolf Awards.
Finally, you, the readers, made this experience very special for me. I wish I could do something to show each and every one of you how much I appreciate your support for this story. The best I can do is to say "thanks" and present you with the "Season of the She Wolf Reader Recognition Awards":
Reader whose reviews always made me think: Inosolan
Best penname (tie): If The Bunny Was Dead and TheTreeWasHappy
With me all the way (Readers who reviewed the very first chapter and have consistently given their support throughout the story.): brankel1, Eliza Douglas, connect2tjb
Reader who's become a friend: BellaEdwardLover1991
Reviewer who consistently cracked me up: Noble Korhedron
1000th reviewer: inuyashafanwhitehair
Well, that's it. As I said in the opening note, there will be an epilogue because there's someone you all have to meet before this story can truly be done. Lots of you knew that the chapter titles are all David Bowie song titles, but nj11 was the first reader to guess that, so she got to pick the baby's name from a short list. Her choice will be revealed in the epilogue.
Thank you again for taking this journey with me!