Forbidden Imprint [Book 5] ✔️

10 • Welcome To The Party

EMBRY'S POV

I walked into Paul and Rachel's house carrying a gift bag. It was their son Devlin's 7th birthday. I wasn't sure what to get a kid that age, but the lady at the story pointed out a few choices. I decided to get him a Transformer toy. For one thing, they were kick ass. For another, I had to admit I found it sweet irony that I was getting a former shape-shifter's son a toy that could shift into another shape.

I walked through the house and entered the backyard where the festivities were being held. Sean, Paul's youngest son, waddled over to me as soon as he saw me. He was going to be two in another couple of months. Though Paul had insisted that Sean looked just like Rachel when he was born, the kid was a miniature of Paul. He certainly had Paul's strength. He didn't show any signs that he had once been a preemie. Rachel had also made a full recovery after the horrible time she had giving birth to him.

I picked him up and lifted him in the air. His attention was instantly drawn to the colorful bag in my hand.

"Whaz that Unca Embee?" Sean asked.

"Your brother's birthday present," I told him, before setting him back down on the ground.

He quickly grabbed my hand and dragged me over to where Rachel and Paul were. Over the past year and some odd months since I graduated from college, I had become increasingly close to the Wakeh family. I secretly thought my need to spend time with them had to do with the fact that Rachel looked so much like Rebecca. If I couldn't be with my imprint, her family could give me the slight fix I needed to survive.

It wasn't that I was attracted to Rachel. I couldn't even see her face. She was blurry to me like every other woman who wasn't my imprint. But just the fact that she shared the same DNA as her twin helped alleviate the longing I felt for Rebecca. Paul and Rachel were understanding enough that they let me hang out with them whenever the unsettledness I felt began to overwhelm me.

It was strange. Ever since my graduation night, I felt different. I tried to describe it to Sam once. It was like when a person goes to the dentist to have a cavity filled and they're given Novacaine. You can feel your face with your hand once your mouth goes numb, but it seems alien to you. That's how my body felt. It was like I was living inside someone else's body where the skin didn't quite fit the bone structure.

Something had happened to my imprint connection the night of my graduation. I knew Rebecca was all right. After I had walked away from that woman I had sex with that night, I had passed out in my car. As soon as I had woken up, I'd rushed to Rachel's house and made her call Rebecca. Rebecca amazingly had been awake, given that it had to be early in the morning for her. She'd grouchily told her sister she was fine and hung up the phone.

Just as I was about to have a full blown panic attack because I'd known, contrary to what Rebecca said, she wasn't fine, Rachel offered me coffee and we'd sat and talked. As we talked, the strange numbness settled in and it never quite left.

My anti-social behavior worsened. I had been distant with my friends before my graduation night, but now I was practically a recluse. The only time I seemed to get out anymore was when I was hanging out with Paul's family or when Sam asked me to patrol. My sex life had become non-existent. I never even thought about sleeping with another woman since that night. I never returned to school to get my teaching certificate either. I just went through the actions of life without really living it.

Even now as I watched Devlin run towards me with excitement flushing his face, I could only feel the lightest twinge of joy in his expression. Rachel took my gift bag from me and set it on the table with some other gifts.

"So, did you hear anything?" I asked Rachel. She had asked Rebecca to come home for the party, but Rebecca hadn't been sure what her plans were.

She shook her head, looking at me with sad concern, "Sorry Embry, Becks isn't going to make it to the party after all."