Stormy Sneak Peek

From the next chapter (not beta'ed yet)

Gabe's POV

I decided on impulse to swing by Sam Uley’s house. Maybe Gracie would be around. I was about to knock on their front door when it swung open. I took a cautious step back as Ryan came out, his face becoming thunderous when he saw me.

“You said I could come here,” I reminded him.

He nodded and walked by me without a word, leaving the door open.

“Thank you for that, by the way,” I called out.

Ryan froze before he slowly turned toward me, his body shaking slightly. I kept my pose relaxed and non-threatening, but my senses were alive, aware of his every move.

“I didn’t do it for you,” he gritted out. With a nod toward the house, he added, “I did it for her.”

I watched his aura go from an unsettled color of brownish black to bright pink. I shook my head as I watched the color blaze.

“Why don’t you tell her you love her?” I questioned—because only feelings of strong love could formulate that shade of pink. I knew from a conversation with Gracie a few days ago that she and Ryan were still trying to be friends. What I didn’t understand was why. Was he playing a game with her…or with himself?

Update

Hey everyone, I'm getting a lot of questions about the new imprints that happened in Stormy recently. I just wanted to clarify that I'm not going to really delve into those other storylines. Stormy has always been about Nate, Meena, Ryan, Gracie, and Gabe. Even with this last chapter, I wanted to show what Nate was dealing with as Alpha. So the story is going to remain focused on those five. :)

And in case you missed my tweet, the next chapter will be in Gabe's POV.

Author's Note

Spoilers for the latest Stormy chapter.

If you read the latest Stormy chapter "Quileute Song," a lot happened. Lindsey's death was actually harder to write than I thought it would be considering I've been planning on killing her since I wrote Early Imprint. But there's a back story as to why I did it.

Believe it or not, the idea started off as a joke. Lindsey, Amber, and Ashley are named after real people I’d gotten to know through a particular fandom site. Now Lindz was pretty popular on this site, and at the time everyone was writing her into their stories. When I realized she was getting hooked up with all these hot characters, I jokingly told her, "That's it, I'm throwing 'Lindsey' off a cliff in La Push. You don't need any more hot guys."

I wasn't serious at first. But then I thought about it some more. At the time I had never read a story where an imprint gets killed (we're talking two years ago). I wondered how it would impact the pack, and as it's not a subject I'd ever tried to write before, I decided to go through with it. Originally, Amber wasn’t even a factor. I decided that Lindsey was going to have a baby and die in childbirth. Collin would then have to remain strong for the baby’s sake.

However, I realized pretty early on that even the baby wouldn’t be enough motivation to keep Collin going. As it says in the Eclipse chapter “Legends,” Taha Aki imprinted on his third wife and they had children together. After she killed herself, he laid down by her body in wolf form, growled at anyone who came near her for an entire day, and then disappeared in the forest to live out the rest of his life as a wolf. He was never heard from again. It didn’t matter that he had small children. He couldn’t live without his imprint.

I knew Collin wouldn’t be able to survive if Lindsey died. It didn’t matter if he had a baby who needed him or not. The only thing that could have saved Collin was if he found a second love that was just as strong as the first. I figured if Collin imprinted again, it might be enough to keep him sane and alive…even if he resented it.

Originally, Ashley was going to be imprinted on. If you go back and read chapter 28 of Early Imprint, Amber and Ashley visit Claire while she’s in the hospital. Collin and Lindsey walk in, and Ashley ignores Collin and leaves the room. I had planned on her acting that way because it hurt too much for her to be around him. But then I lost touch with the real Ashley and decided to make Collin imprint on Amber instead. LOL, I’m happy with that decision too. Amber’s a lot softer of a character than Ashley.

So that’s the story why Lindsey was killed off. You don't know how badly I started to dread writing her death. After awhile, I didn't want to kill her off, but once the storyline was put into motion, I couldn’t take it back since Collin's connection to Amber was mentioned in all my stories since Early. Ah well, it let me try to something new.

Stormy Extras

This post contains spoilers if you haven't read chapter 29 of Stormy.

Alexis Paden as an adult.

Azra & Natalie

I've also updated the Imprint Saga Info section to reflect the events of the most recent chapters. :)

Stormy Outtake

If you haven't read Stormy's chapter 28 "Queen of the Castle" this post will contain spoilers.

When I sat down to write the chapter, I originally considered doing it in Gracie's POV. I even wrote a scene, but I decided Meena needed to tell her story more (by the way, that's the last Meena POV you'll be getting in Stormy). Anyway, here is what I wrote of Gracie's perspective. I wrote this before I wrote any of Meena's POV so everything is out of sequence from how it appeared in the final version. For example, Sean never phased, and Claire and Quil hadn't left yet for the hospital when the vampires arrived.

Gracie’s POV

Nate froze and turned to Meena. “Do you recognize the scent?”

“No,” she replied.

Nate looked at his pack. They immediately started heading for the woods, taking their shirts off as they went.

“What’s going on?” I asked Meena.

“Vampires…from the smell of it, they recently fed on human blood.”

“Can I help?” Gabe offered to Nate.

Nate looked at Ryan’s retreating back before he slowly nodded. “Can you stay at the house? I don’t want to leave everyone unguarded—”

“Quil?” Claire called out.

“—And if the vampires come back this way, you and Meena can use your powers against them until we finish the job.”

“Claire?” Quil questioned.

“The baby’s coming,” she announced.

Pandemonium broke out. I saw Brady stiffen and turned around, his eyes immediately going to Kayley who was holding Quil’s hand. 

“Brady,” Nate said. “Go with them to the hospital, but keep in contact with Gabe. If anything happens and Gabe can’t get a hold of me through our Alpha connection, then you'll need to notify me.”

Brady nodded and grabbed his shirt. I heard Nate mutter something to Meena about how Brady was going to be useless in the field anyway. I could understand that. The Atearas were Brady’s family now. He’d want to make sure they were looked after.

The rest of the pack disappeared into the woods, Jason Pachena looking especially excited. Nate kissed Meena quickly before he hurried after his pack. 

Like Father, Like Son

Paul:

Devlin:

Paul:

Devlin

And one of Sean:

Stormy Extra

Here are a couple of outfits the girls wear in the next chapter of Stormy (chapter 28).

Meena's dress

Gracie's Dress

Absent Sneak Peek

Currently working on the new Absent chapter. Here's a snippet:

Sam reached for my arm suddenly and ran his fingers over the surface of my skin. I jerked in surprise.

“Hey Leah…” he said, his fingers clasping mine.

“What are you doing?” I asked cautiously as he brought my hand to his mouth.