“Anybody like me? Oh, you mean psychopathic vampire who doesn’t give a damn about human life?” he asked, smirking. “Well the good news is that you don’t have to love me.”
Summer’s gaze flickered over his face, absorbing that information. “That was a hundred and fifty years ago. It’s not what hurts you now. So. Can you say what happened when you tried to bring her back?”
Damon sighed, not looking at her. “I went to get her out of the tomb she was supposed to be buried in… And she wasn’t there. She never burned,” he said bitterly. “She was alive the whole time, and she’d just left me thinking she was dead. But then she came back to talk to me… To tell me she never loved me and that she was really only back for my brother, who was in love with her doppelganger, who I also fell for, who now hates me. So really I’ve just spent the last few years being everyone’s second choice. Stefan is the one everyone wants.”
“All that effort, in pursuit of a lie,” Summer murmured. “And you still actually want anything to do with the human race. Impressive.” She let her fingers rest lightly on his hand. “Your brother isn’t here now. So what will you do?”
When he begins to move his mouth elsewhere, she trembles slightly. Not in fear, or nerves, but simply because it’s so new, the way the sensation sends tingles over her skin. She can’t help closing her eyes again, tipping her head back as Percival kisses over her throat, hands clenching on his shoulders.
The hollow of her neck tastes sweet and salty and bitter – bitter, he guesses, from some sort of perfume. He’s kissing her mouth again, more slowly and less feverishly than at first. Tentatively, he lets his arm drop lower, to the small of Summer’s back. His hand travels along the waistline of her skirt to her hip, where he slips his index finger in. He’s hesitant to speak, wanting to hold onto the moment, so places his trust in Summer’s promise that she’d tell him if he did anything wrong.
Muscles under her skin twitch at his touches, half-ticklish and half-pleasant shock. She runs her hands down his arms, abruptly grateful for whatever quirk makes him prefer to be sleeveless, and traces the subtle outlines of muscle with her fingertips. She doesn’t know how to urge him on, except with more kisses, so she presses forward into his kiss. Into the slow sweetness of it, taking the time to explore the way their mouths fit together.
“You aren’t a bad person, Victor, that’s not what I meant at all!” Summer burst out. “Do you really think /I/ of all people would have anything at all to do with you if you were /bad/? I’m just … terrified to lose you. To someone else’s badness.” Oh, gods, he’d been gone so long, and miraculously come home, and this was what they fought about? She blinked hard and more hot tears ran down her face.
“Ok love, I’ll…I’ll take less jobs yeah? Jus’ enough so tha’ I can feed. An’ the ones I’ll take will be quick an’ easy jobs where I wouldn’t be gone more than a day. Otherwise I’ll stay here with you an’ we can jus’ be together.” He gave a small smile as he kissed her tears away, holding her close to him. “Is tha’ alright love? Can we work with tha’ for now an’ figure it out as we go?”
Being this conflicted was exhausting. Summer curled herself over into Victor’s body, clinging to him. “I don’t know. Yes. Okay.” She didn’t even know what might be enough; she didn’t want him to change and yet she couldn’t face the thought of dealing with a repeat of the past six months, either. Almost helplessly, hating herself a little bit for it, she turned away from the tangle and to something she understood, seeking and catching his mouth in a passionate kiss.
The hunter lifted his hands, plastering an entirely unbelievable expression of innocence on his face. He rocked back. “There’s no need for that. Just watch out for her. She’s dangerous.” He turned and walked away, hands in his pockets, very casual, and paused at the end of the driveway. “If you see her, make good on that threat.”
Isaac glared at the man throughout his act of innocence, but he was relieved to see him back off. “I’ll be sure to avoid this… ninja assassin girl,” he reassured the man with an eloquent look. “He’ll be the first one I call,” he added, then watched as the man finally walked away. He closed the door and locked it, then turned to look at the girl with a suspicious glare. “Give me a good reason I shouldn’t just call the Sheriff.”
“I don’t have one,” Summer admitted, coming to her feet. She lifted her hands, keeping the fingers spread, where he could see them. “I don’t know of anything I can say that you would believe, except thank you. All I can offer is to let you ask me anything, and I’ll answer honestly.” Wryly, with a slightly twisted smile, she went on, “Of course that brings you back to the problem of trusting me.”
“I’m trying to figure out why my wallflower status and inability to flirt and lack of being kissed bothers you.”
“And why you’re insisting I’m hot, which I’m not. On a good day I manage plain.”
”It doesn’t bother me, you’re the one who brought it up. All I did was ask if you were going to Danny’s party and you started talking about being a wallflower.”
”As for you being hot, I’m not insisting so much as… acknowledging. Yeah, that’s the word I’m looking for.”
“If I hadn’t mentioned it, you would have asked me why I wasn’t going,” she pointed out. “Then we’d still be right back here, because you seem to want to fix it and I don’t understand.”
“Dammit, you cannot acknowledge something that doesn’t exist!”
“Anybody like me? Oh, you mean psychopathic vampire who doesn’t give a damn about human life?” he asked, smirking. “Well the good news is that you don’t have to love me.”
“Someone you loved,” she said softly. “Someone … like you? Can you say what happened?”
Damon took in a deep breath before looking over at her. “I was in love with her. I knew she was a vampire, and I wanted her to change me… And then she died in a fire and I was killed. But I had her blood in my system, so I came back. And… I fed. So I turned.” He nodded a little and looked at her.
Summer’s gaze flickered over his face, absorbing that information. “That was a hundred and fifty years ago. It’s not what hurts you now. So. Can you say what happened when you tried to bring her back?”
He gently kneels down and shakes her arm. “Summer? You’re gonna get cold out here.” He speaks softly.
She leaned her head against the wall and began to laugh, a strange strangled sort of sound. “You are the /only/ person who could stop me, my lord, you are the king. You could have me locked up, or killed, and nothing I could do or say would save me. If you ordered me to stay, instead of pleading, I would have no recourse other than to obey you.” The expression on her face was a tangled mass of conflicting emotions as she approached him: part desire to stay, part terrible determination, part broken heart.
Arthur gently gripped his pants as he looked at her. “I never said that I wouldn’t stop to try and save you. But if everything would be better for how you need to handle this then yes, maybe it’s best for you to stay away. Just until we figure all this out. Would you rather be in dungeons? I wouldn’t think that you would forgive me afterwards,” he questioned, standing up as he backed up, standing in the middle of the room.
Her laugh came again, even more warped, like her lungs were full of broken glass. “I should stay away, until we figure this out. Do you not even hear what you say?” Summer backed Arthur up against the wall, shattering under the conflict of desire and honour. “If you wish me to stay, you must order it, my lord. You must order it right now.”
Tom Hiddleston attends the Evian Suite on Day 8 of the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club at Wimbledon on July 2, 2013 in London, England [HQ]
