~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Okay, all kidding aside, I need to level with y'all.  I started this story with a fairly solid outline in my head.  At this point, though, the characters have taken that outline, crumpled it up, and tossed it out the window of a moving bullet train.  It's causing MAJOR pacing problems, and I fear dropped plot threads may follow.  I'm tempted to give it up as a lost cause, except that I'm a little bit curious just where the hell these people are leading me.  Which is to say, I know this story has issues.  My apologies for that.  I hope some of you are curious as well to see where this is going to go.  

Fanfiction.net link:  http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6910203/13/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Inside my skin, there is this space.

It twists and turns; it bleeds and aches.

Inside my heart, there's an empty room.

It's waiting for lightning, it's waiting for you.

Muscle and sinew, velvet and stone,

This vessel is haunted – It creaks and moans.

My bones call to you, in their separate skin.

I make myself translucent, to let you in.

For I am wanting,

And I am needing you

Here, inside the absence of fear.

                        Jewel, "Absence of Fear"

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Jenna popped the last bite of her s’more into her mouth and licked the melted marshmallow from her fingers before pulling her hands under the blanket and leaning back against Elijah's bare chest.  The night was crisp with autumn, but the fire in the outdoor fireplace was warm, and the bright, full moon overhead had made the balcony an awfully romantic place to be.  Throw in the cozy fleece blanket, the s'mores, and the comfy chaise that they had just had superior sex on, and she couldn't think of anyplace in the world she would rather be.

Elijah was warm too, where she snuggled against him.  He must have fed before she had gotten there.  Which was probably just as well; she wasn’t sure how often one should feed a vampire.  Was it like donating blood, where you were supposed to wait 56 days in between?  Someone really needed to write a manual for dating a vampire.  Everything You Want To Know About Your Undead Lover, But Were Afraid To Ask.

With her mind meandering down that path, a thought occurred to her.  “You fed me your blood last night.”  God, had it really only been last night?  “Will that have any effect on… you know?”

“On the child?”  Elijah stroked his thumb over the back of her hand, his arms wrapped over hers.  “No.  It will pass harmlessly through your system – it probably has already, actually – and out again.  How did Jeremy and Elena take the news?”

"Better than I did," she said, rueful.  "Elena didn't really say much.  Jeremy was sorta 'WTF?' for a minute, but then I think he actually was getting a little bit into the idea of having a baby around.  Which is weird."  She turned onto her side, so she could see his face.  "That is weird, right?"

"Why would it be?"

Jenna shrugged.  "I don't know... I guess I just figured teenage boys were allergic to babies or something.  Of the two, I would have thought Elena would be more likely to be open to the idea."

Elijah pressed a kiss to her forehead.  "Elena is a worrier.  She's already no doubt worrying about the logistics of having an infant in the house, the midnight feedings, the diaper changes, the added vulnerability to the family that a small child brings, the additional responsibility, which preschool to enroll in... it's college fund..."

Jenna gave him a poke to the ribs.  "Great.  Now I'm worrying about those things."  He was probably right, though.  Elena worried about everything.  And now here she was, adding yet another wild card to the constant chaos of their lives.  It probably didn't bode well for her parental instincts that she found dealing with vampires, werewolves and witches to be less terrifying than the prospect of one small infant.  And what about Elijah?  He hadn't really given her any indication of what he thought about the whole mess.  “Can I ask you something?  You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” she assured him hastily.

“Of course.”

She took a moment to pick over her words, for once choosing them with care.  “You said that you had five children, when you were…”

“Alive?”

She nodded.  “How old were they when you turned?”

“The eldest was eleven; the youngest, two.”

“Boys?  Girls?”

“Yes,” he answered, grinning impishly when she poked him in the ribs again.  “Two boys, three girls.”

“Was it very different, after you turned?  How you felt about them?”

Elijah was silent for a while, and she thought perhaps he wouldn’t answer at all.  “No,” he said at last.  “It didn’t change how I felt.”

Jenna stroked her hand along his side.  “How did you handle seeing them grow up and grow older, when you didn't age?  Was it hard, or were you glad that you were able to be there and watch over them?”

 “I didn’t," he said, after a moment's hesitation. "See them grow up, I mean.” 

She saw his throat work, and regretted having asked him.  “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

He pulled her to him more tightly, resting his chin on her head.  “No, it’s all right.” Taking her hand absently, he brought it to his lips and brushed a kiss over the backs of her fingers, then tucked it against his chest.  “When someone turns, the transition can be… well, it can be devastating.  Heightened emotions, lack of control over the bloodlust, the feeling of being a stranger inside your own skin…  It’s particularly difficult to be with the people whom you care about.  I couldn’t stay with them.  I was afraid of what else I would do.”

Sitting up, she tilted her head and asked him, “What else?”

He was quick to hide it, but the expression that flashed for a split second over his features hinted to her that he perhaps hadn’t meant to say that much.  “Nevermind,” she told him.  “You don’t need to answer that.”  Jenna took her arms out of the blanket and started boxing up the graham crackers and marshmallows, intending to run everything in to the kitchen.  God, Jenna.  Insensitive much? When it comes to killing a mood, you are Jack the Fucking Ripper. "I'm sorry," she told him, standing to gather the food.

"No, don't be.  Come here," he told her, pulling her back under the blanket and settling her onto his lap.  "I've had over a millenium to come to terms with what I did.  It doesn't cripple me anymore, or define who I am.  I've learned to shoulder it."  He tucked her hair back, where the soft breeze had blown a tendril of it across her face.  "I just don't normally talk about it.  In fact, I think I've only ever told one other person."

"It's okay.  You don't have to – "

"Shh."  He laid a finger gently over her lips.  "I know I don't.  But for some reason, I find I wish to."

Looking into his eyes, Jenna found herself nodding slowly, praying that she had the strength to hear what he was about to tell her.  Cold, from more than just the night air, she pulled the blanket tighter and wrapped it around the two of them.  "Okay."

He paused for a moment, perhaps not certain of where to begin.  "The ritual that changed us took place on the eve of battle, so the bloodlust that came with it had a natural outlet at first.  I'm not certain we truly gave it much thought while we were engaged in war.  It wasn't until afterward, when the battle was done, that it became evident that our basic natures had changed, had taken on this new, darker dimension.

"By the time I returned to my home, I knew that I had this thing inside me, and I feared what would happen if it took control – and it often did, in those early days.  So to keep it from my family, I absented myself from the household as much as I could.  But I only got away with that for so long.  Leah, my wife... she wasn't a woman to be ignored.  She made it plain that she wouldn't tolerate my continued absence and, for a time, I thought perhaps she could help me bring it under control."

"But she couldn't," Jenna murmured.

"No."  He grew quiet, staring into the fire, though she suspected he wasn't really seeing the fire at all, but rather something that had occurred over a thousand years ago, and remained with him still.  "One day," he said, after a time, "Henry, my eldest, did something to anger me... I don't even recall what.  I could feel the control slipping away from me, and I wanted to...  well, I'm sure you can figure out what I wanted to do.  Leah came upon us and, when she saw what I was about, she clubbed me with something.  Not enough to do any damage, of course, but enough to divert my attention from my son.  She told him to run and interposed herself between us."

With a pit opening in the bottom of her stomach, Jenna could see where this was going.  She didn't want to hear it.  Well, no, that wasn't exactly right; it wasn't that she wanted to deny it.  It wasn't about her experience of the story.  She didn't want him to have to say it.  She was making him relive this horrible thing with her stupid questions, and she was sorry – so sorry.  "Elijah –"

"Hush," he repeated, shaking his head.  "Let's finish it."  He settled his arms around her waist and pulled her more firmly against him.  "Leah tried to talk me down, to reason with me, but there was too little reason left at that point.  Her attempts to fight me off were ineffectual, to say the least.  She might have run; if she had, perhaps some small shred of control would have kept me from pursuing, but I think she feared that, if she did, I would go after the children."  Elijah caught her gaze and held it.  "So she stood her ground.  And I killed her.  Her, and the child she carried."

"Oh..."  Jenna covered her mouth with her hand, wanting to say something – anything! – that wouldn't be inane and wholly inadequate, and unable to imagine what it could possibly be.  A tear ran down each cheek, making her feel stupid and ridiculous.  It was his memory, his pain.  Not hers.  Pinching her lips together, she did the only thing she could think to do:  she put her arms around his shoulders and simply held onto him.  Sitting on his lap as she was, she was slightly higher than him, and she held his head to her shoulder, her fingers stroking the back of his hair.  His body slightly tense at first, she felt him gradually relax against her as she sat and stroked, trying to give him whatever comfort he would take.

He eased her back, after a time, taking her chin in his fingers..  "I've made my peace, Jenna.  I'm not haunted by it; it is what it is.  I just... found I wanted to share it with you."

Jenna drew in a shaky breath.  "Thank you.  For trusting me enough to tell me."

Elijah gave her a small smile and slid his hand down her back.  "Do you want to go inside?"

"No."  Taking his face in her hands, she pressed a kiss to his lips, soft and warm and chaste.  Twisted from being sideways on his lap, Jenna resettled herself so that she was straddling him and faced him head-on, pulling back to just gaze at him for a bit, her fingers brushing the hair back from his temples.  Elijah quirked a brow at her, his expression quizzical.

She wished she could explain to him what she was feeling, but words failed, as they so often did.  So she kissed him again, more deeply.  Teasing his lips with her tongue, she darted it into his mouth as it opened under hers, and he kneaded her hips as he stirred again between them.  As she leaned back to adjust her position, the blanket slid a little way down her shoulders, and the crisp air tightened her nipples almost painfully as it whispered across her skin.  Folding her legs into a lotus position around him, she pulled the blanket back up, enclosing them in a cocoon of warmth as she took him inside her, into her own warmth.

Jenna didn't know if this was supposed to be tantric or Kama Sutran or what; she just wanted to be close to him.  The night before, as well as their earlier tryst this evening, had been all lust and fireworks.  This was intimacy.  No gymnastics, no one-upsmanship.  A slow rocking, deep kisses, heart pressed to heart as they embraced.  It lasted forever, or maybe time just stilled – she didn't know.  She just knew that she wanted to give him something.  They moved, as slow and steady and inexorable as the tides, and when they crested together, she looked into his eyes, and knew she was lost to him.

Later, when she lay in bed with him, drifting off to sleep, she wondered why she wasn't afraid of him.  Part of her, albeit a small part, warned that she should by all rights be terrified of this vampire who had lived for over a millenium, who had done God only knew what over that time, who had by his own admission slaughtered his own wife and unborn child.  Just as she should be terrified that she was falling deeply and profoundly in love with him.

But somehow, she wasn't.

~~~~~

Sore in all the right places from a vigorous round of morning sex, Jenna peeled herself out of bed while Elijah showered and, buttoning his discarded shirt around her, padded down the hall to the other bathroom, humming to herself.  The essentials taken care of, she headed to the kitchen to see what she could scare up for food.  Culinary ineptitude notwithstanding, even she couldn't screw up breakfast too badly.  Rolling the long sleeves up and out of the way, she inhaled deeply of the shirt's collar, breathing in Elijah's scent.

Oh girl, you are so in trouble.  You have got it bad.

Well, she wouldn't think about that.  Just like she wasn't going to think about Alaric, and how despite her protests, her conscience prickled at the idea of not telling him about the baby.  Though why should she?  It sure as hell wasn't as if he hadn't kept plenty of things from her.  She didn't owe him anything.

That's a little bit different, her conscience chided.  He was trying to protect you.

Elijah was protective of her as well, but he didn't lie to her to do it.  He respected her enough to tell her the truth, trusting that she could handle it, even when she herself wasn't sure about her ability to do so.

Tell you the truth, then lock you up so you couldn't do anything about it.

'That was different,' she silently mocked.  He had done that to keep her from being harmed, and had protected Jeremy and Elena as he'd promised he would.

Alaric loves you.  And he deserves to know he has a child.

"I don't care!"  Great.  Now she was talking to herself.  To busy herself, she found the coffee filters, measured out the grounds, and started a pot of coffee.  She would be like Scarlett O'Hara – she'd think about it tomorrow.  And when tomorrow came, she'd put it off until the next tomorrow, and so on.

Pulling open the fridge, Jenna found that Elijah had done some grocery shopping.  She took out a carton of eggs, cheese, cream, tomatoes, and some... long, skinny, green, vegetable-looking thingies that she was going to hope were:  a) scallions; and b) something that went well with eggs.  She poked through cabinets until she came up with a cutting board and a frying pan, then pulled a knife out of the block and chopped the tomatoes and the thingies.  While the pan warmed, she cracked eggs into a bowl and whisked them with some milk.  She debated making an omelet, but that seemed tricky.  Perhaps she'd stick with scrambling the eggs with the other ingredients rather than trying to be fancy.

Once she'd gotten that going, she opened the fridge again to see what else she could come up with.  She spotted a package of strawberries; she could serve those with cream, maybe a little brown sugar if she could find any.  There were a couple of pears...  toward the back there was a plastic grocery bag.  Wondering what was in there, she pulled it out and set it on the counter, leaving it momentarily to give the eggs a stir.  That done, Jenna unwrapped the top of the bag from around the contents and peered in.  She couldn't really tell what it was.  Some kind of meat?  If so, it looked like it had already been cooked.  Reaching in, she pulled it out for a better look. 

And screamed as she dropped it to the floor.

Elijah appeared around the corner almost at once, shirtless but dressed in slacks.  "What is it?" he asked, glancing down when Jenna pointed in horror at the thing on the floor.

"Is that...  It's a...  Why do you...  Oh God!"  She ran for the bathroom, afraid she was going to be sick.  She leaned against the sink, taking deep breaths, and gagged once or twice, but she managed to fight it down.  Remembering that she had touched the thing, she scrubbed her hands under the hot water until they turned red and started to feel parboiled.  She sank down on the edge of the tub as she dried her hands, hoping fervently that it would be gone when she went back out to the kitchen.  So much for making breakfast.

She heard Elijah walk down the hallway and pause outside the door.  "Are you all right?"

Sighing, she stood up and opened the door.  "Yeah.  I think so.  Is it gone?"

"I took care of it, yes."

"Elijah, what the fuck?"

"I can explain."

"Please!  Explain."

Elijah took a step back and held a hand out, motioning her down the hall.  Crossing her arms, Jenna stepped out and went back to the kitchen.  Thankfully, there was no sign of the bag or of what had been in it.  He had rescued the fry pan from the stove.  The egg scramble looked respectable, even if she didn't feel like eating it now.  She pulled one of the barstools out and sat.

Pouring coffee, Elijah added cream to one and set it in front of her before leaning back against the counter.  "I asked Damon and Marcus to keep an eye out for any unfamiliar vampires who might show up here in town.  One appeared, and they... took him into custody.  That's why I was at the Salvatores' yesterday."

"Into custody?"  Jenna took an experimental sip of coffee, and decided she was good to go.

"Anyone showing up randomly right now is likely to be a spy for someone else, so yes, into custody.  When I questioned this particular vampire, he had been compelled to resist subsequent compulsion.  He had a suicide capsule inserted into one of his molars."

"Like a cyanide capsule that spies in the movies have?"

"Same idea.  Whatever was used was highly effective.  I want to have the residue examined to see what the substance was.  Hence..."  He made a hand gesture to indicate the thing.

She supposed it made a certain sense, when he explained it that way.  Which should probably indicate to her just how far off the rails her life had gone.  "Did you find out anything from him?"

Elijah slipped a couple of plates out of the cupboard.  "Not really.  But the fact that he was here, and so clearly equipped for espionage, tells me something in and of itself.  The others are mobilizing.  Whether for good or for ill remains to be seen."

"Was it the one you were talking about, do you think?  Sebastian."

"Doubtful."  He pushed some of the eggs out onto a plate and sampled a bite, an expression of surprised approval on his face.  "This is quite good."

"Yeah?"

"Yes."  He held the other plate up to her, questioningly. 

She hesitated, then nodded.  "So there's someone else after you now?" she asked, taking the plate when he handed it to her.

"Mmm... probably more like performing reconnaisance."

"All right.  New rule:  No nasty human-slash-humanoid body parts in the fridge without suitable warning given.  Deal?"

"Deal."  He leaned on the island, a mischievous look on his face.  "Nice shirt.  What's under it?"

"Uh-uh, mister.  I am going to eat breakfast, then I'm going to take a shower, then I'm going home to work on my abstract."

Elijah stalked around the island and slipped his hands around her waist, sliding a couple of fingers in between the buttons.  "I can think of other things to do today..."

"Behave!  Don't you have papers to grade, or something?"

"Mm-hmm," he hummed, pressing his lips to her neck.

She giggled.  "I mean it. We are not spending the entire day in bed."

Flicking a button open with his thumb, he slipped a hand inside the shirt and cupped her breast.  "It wouldn't have to be in bed.  We could mix it up.  Try the counter, the table..."

His phone buzzed, vibrating against the ceramic bowl that held his car keys.  Sighing, he slid his hand out of the shirt and went to answer it.  Jenna took advantage of the reprieve to retreat to the bedroom and into the shower, half fearing, half hoping that Elijah would join her in it.  He didn't though.  When she had finished and dressed, she found him in the living room, fully clothed, his expression unreadable.  "Everything okay?"

"No."  He looked grim.

Her stomach filling with dread, Jenna wondered what new emergency had come up.  "What is it?"

"It's Sophia.  She was bitten by a werewolf last night."