Introduction

With every night, a new day must come.

Everybody knows Jacob's story. But what about mine? I mean I might not have been important to the events that happened to my best friend, but it doesn't mean I don't have my own story to tell.

Hi. I'm Embry Call and not a whole lot of people know me. I'm pretty quiet, I'm loyal and I always thought I'd be 'forever alone..' But then that all changed with her.

Her name is Carlie and she's more special to me than she even realizes. I didn't know you could possibly love someone this much.. But I do, already. This is my imprint story. And yes, there will be complications, imperfections and craziness. But I honestly wouldn't trade that for anything in the world. Welcome to a new dawn...

CHAPTER 01

Her chocolate brown eyes darted around the small dirt road town as her mom's car came to a stop in front of a red and white house almost exactly like the other red and white houses in the village of La Push.

"This is it?" Carlie asked her mother who sighed, nodded yes quietly before speaking to add "This is what your father would've wanted for us." as Carlie nodded and then said quietly, "So this is the cabin he grew up in?"

"It is, yes." her mother said quietly as she nodded and looked out the window at the small red and white house, then around at the other surroundings, the lush green forests, the dirt roads, the trees in the yard.

It wasn't bad, really.

But it wasn't Chicago, either. And she'd been born in and raised in Chicago, in the big city.

Just one more thing that'd make her an outsider here in La Push, Washington. As if her almost golden brown blondeish hair, the freckles and her accent, her strange hobbies wouldn't already.

"I know it's not your old school and your old house.. But that place.. It hurt too damn much to be there after.." her mother said quiely as Carlie nodded solemnly and said in a flat tone, "Mom, it's fine." before getting out of the car, looking around tentatively.

Her mom sighed and shook her head quietly. Being back in La Push bought back a lot of memories for her.

Some were painful, some were good. All of them reminded her of Carlie's father, Leo.

Carlie stood in the doorway of the house they'd be living in, trying to get a feel for the place. It wasn't home.

It felt a little warming, a little inviting, but it wasn't home. Her father wasn't here listening to his heavy metal, there wasn't any of their junk from the apartment in Chicago lying around.

Her mother wasn't down the hall in the kitchen cooking, her friends weren't in and out, she wasn't in her old room.

"It's not much, Carlie, but it's a new start. We both needed that." her mother said from behind her as Carlie shrugged and then said "One of us more than the other." as she walked wordlessly down the hall and into her room, shutting the door behind her.

She sat against the door, her hand in her hair as she tried not to cry, tried to keep the tears at bay, the anger she felt towards her mother at bay.

'It was all her fault. If she hadn't been fighting with him, drinking and driving, he wouldn't have died. And now she's twice as bad with drinking as she was before. Do I just not even matter?' she thought to herself for the millionth time as she bit her lower lip and sighed, standing up, pacing the entire length of the medium sized and empty bedroom.

Her mother called out from the living room "I'm going over to the neighbors and introduce myself. You can stay here and be antisocial all you want, Carlie."

Carlie flipped off her shut bedroom door and rolled her eyes as she muttered "What you mean, mom, is you're sneaking down to that bar we passed between here and Forks on the way. At least don't lie about it." to herself and worked on unpacking.

When she heard the car cranking again, she ran to the window, peered out. She'd figured as much, really. She happened to look across the lawn, into the next door neighbor's yard and she gave a small and curt wave to the male sitting on the porch.

If memory served, the neighbor was a guy named Sam Uley, he was related to her father somehow, but her father didn't really know him that well, something about Sam's mother not allowing Sam to hang around him.

She'd just turned on 3 Days Grace on her laptop and started really getting busy with unpacking her things, settling in when the door was knocked on.

A male voice called her name down the hallway and she raised a brow but peeked out her bedroom door and said "Back here."

"Your mom went into town." Sam said as he looked at his niece, really looked at her.. Since his mother told him that his half brother's widow and daughter were moving into his half brother's old house, he'd found himself wondering about this other side of his father's life, and about that family in general. He hadn't gotten to know Leo very well when Leo lived here, his father's girlfriend Anna kept that from happening, as did his mother, even though the two boys were half brothers.

"What you mean, sir, is that my mother is at a bar." the girl said quietly as she remained almost as calm about it as if she were just telling him the time. He sighed and said quietly, "She told me to check on you.. I'm Sam."

"My dad's brother or something.. Right?" Carlie asked as Sam nodded and raked his hand over his hair then said "Your uncle, actually."

"Well, as you can see sir, I'm clearly fine. Just enjoying the silence before she comes back and I have to be the mother while she gets to be the child." Carlie said with a shrug as Sam gave a nod and then looked at her a few moments before saying quietly, "She's always been that way?"

"Probably since I was 4." Carlie answered, seeing no reason to lie to the man. She wondered if he were standing there, judging them already, he just had this look as if he were doing that. She said nothing.

Sam watched the girl a few moments and then said quietly, "If you need anything, Emily and I are right across the lawn."

Carlie nodded, gave him a wave and walked back into her room, continued to work on unpacking. When she stopped to take a break, she smelled the smell of barbecue drifting through her open bedroom window, and she peered through the curtains.

"Guy was probably just satisfying curiousity, earlier. He didn't actually care or anything. People say they do all the time and they don't.. Except my dad.. Now he's gone." Carlie muttered as she shut the curtain, flopped down onto her bed and turned up her music, dreading the long night that lie ahead when her mother finally dragged herself in from another all nighter at the bar.

Next door, Sam explained quietly to Emily, "It's just like his last letter said.. Her mom is in really bad shape.. The girl seems okay, a little distrusting of pretty much everyone.. But I mean how the hell am I supposed to help them if I barely knew Leo?"

"He wrote you that for a reason, Sam. He went around the way you two were raised apart for a reason. He obviously wanted a relationship with his little brother. And now that they're going to be living across from the two of them, don't you think you should at least try to get to know your niece?"

Sam nodded and flipped the chicken he had on the grill, smeared a little barbecue sauce on the naked side as he said quietly, "I want to.. Just not too sure she wants to get to know anybody. Parts of me think she's afraid that everyone will be like her mother is.. But losing a parent is hard.. At her age, when it's the parent who took care of you for nearly all of your life, it's gotta be killing her." Sam remarked as Emily nodded and said "And if her mother is really on a downward spiral, Sam, maybe her father knew they'd need to be near family."

He nodded.

The pack filtered in, whispering amongst themselves and Emily joked "And again, their wolf sense of smell lead them directly to the food. I told you, Sam, we wouldn't have to call and invite any of them over.

Sam chuckled and looked at the other members of his pack, noticed Embry seemed to be looking around as if he were trying to find something. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." Embry said through gritted teeth as he thought to himself 'just another desperate false alarm, Uley.. Thought I smelled this delicious.. Nevermind.. The point is, duh, I am still forever alone.'

Sam of course, got what he meant and didn't comment aloud on it, instead, he said aloud, "No traces of any more rogues?"

"Leech free." Paul said through a mouth full of hotdog as Jared almost said something but was silenced by Embry's glare. Sam's gaze shifted to Embry and he asked "Something wrong?"

"Nothing, damn it." Embry said as Quil spoke up and said calmly, "Embry broke from the pack.. Found some scent trail, it lead him to the backyard of that empty house next door.. So he's pissed. You know why."

"Not funny." Embry said as he tore into a hamburger.

The music kicked on, Papa Roach at full blast, and his head snapped up as his gaze settled on the supposedly empty house next door to Sam's.

Sam gave a growl and he glared as he said "What?"

" . ."

"No.. I probably didn't. Nobody lives there." Embry said, not understanding what Sam was actually angry about.

Emily laughed a little and then cleared her throat and said aloud "Sam, calm down.. Embry, there actually is someone living next door. Sam's never told you guys, but he had an older half brother, Leo.. Leo died recently, and his wife Kate and teenage daugher Caroline are living next door."

Embry turned and stared at the house, brow raised before turning back to Sam who was not very happy at the moment. He glared and then said "Not like it matters. It was probably false anyway. Given how much I wanted to imprint."

Sam studied him a few moments and then shrugged.

Paul coughed and continued eating before bursting out "Well, we could at least go find out."

Both Sam and Embry glared at him as he said this for very different reasons.

But Paul had already made up his mind and standing, he walked over, then through the fence that seperated the two houses, emerging on the other side right as Papa Roach's Broken Home reached a fever pitch.

It took Carlie 10 minutes to finally hear the door being pounded on, and when she finally walked out of her room to open the door, two giants stood in the doorway, arms crossed.

"What?"

"That shit being that loud makes people deaf." Paul stated as she looked at him and said "That shit is being played in my room. And it's not so loud that anybody in the houses around my mom's can hear it."

Embry chuckled and Paul glared as the tiny brunette grabbed an apple from the kitchen before stopping to look at them again, mild amusement playing across her face as she asked with a hand in her long and messily braided hair, "Is that all or...?"

"If you're hungry.. We're kinda having a barbecue next door." Embry muttered quietly, his voice coming out shy.

"Nah, I'm good. Not sure that guy who lives there or whatever, Sam, really wants me around." Carlie said as she bit into the apple and then added in a quieter tone, "Thanks though."

They'd just stepped out the door when Paul asked him, "Well?"

"It's her.. She's the one." Embry said as he sighed and then added "Why's she think Sam hates her?"

"The way the whole thing played out between Sam and Leo's parents.. It can't have been pretty. And Sam's dad's never really been a father.. he's good at making the kids, not so much so at taking care of them." Paul said with a shrug as Embry nodded and then asked "Did you get the feeling that she wasn't really sure about us?"

"Yeah. Little firecracker though. She's feisty." Paul said as they walked back through the fence. Sam looked at Embry and asked "Well?"

"You don't want the answer, Uley."

Sam growled and Paul stepped between the two males and said calmly, "She's his imprint, Sam."

"Yeah? Well she's my niece."

"That you didn't even really know about until a few months ago." Seth spoke up to defend Embry who nodded and said calmly, "And I'm not going to try and reject the whole process. Not when I've wanted this to happen for so long."

The two males stared each other down intently, neither intent on backing down. What was this going to mean for their pack?