It is ten minutes after midnight, and Damon Salvatore is bored. This girl is too easy, he thinks lazily, reclining back into the pale pink pillows on Jessica's bed. The girl in question lies beside him, recovering, her hand pressed tight against the twin puncture wounds on her neck. Her aura radiates shock, fear, adrenaline. Delicious.

"Are you going to kill me?"

Jessica's voice is breathless. Chest heaving, heart fluttering like a bird trapped up against her ribcage, she looks up at Damon with scared-doe eyes that seriously don't inspire anything close to sympathy in him.

"Maybe. I haven't decided," Damon drawls, absently licking at the crimson blood - Jessica's blood - that has leaked into the spaces around his fingernails. He looks at her, considers her, cocks his head to the side. She is pretty, slender in a willow way. Pale blue eyes, long blonde hair. She is almost perfect - except…

Except Elena's hair is lighter, Damon finishes the thought automatically. The idea makes him cringe. He is out of bed and across the room in half a second, breathing hard, the heels of his hands pressed to his eyes.

How could he be so mind-numbingly stupid? The whole point of this Wham-Bam-Thank-You-Ma'am thing with most of the eligible bachelorettes in town is to forget Elena, not to actively search for a replacement.

Disgusted with himself, he takes a few deep breaths before lifting his head from his hands.

Jessica is sitting up on the bed, watching him nervously with those not-as-pretty-as-Elena's eyes, fiddling with the loose strap of her camisole.

"Have you decided?" she asks meekly, dropping her eyes.

Damon is fed up. With himself, with Elena, with this Jessica (aka, Bachelorette number 27), with his life. With everything. And Jessica sits there, all wide-eyed innocence on her pink comforter, heart beating fast and scared - scared of him. He smiles devilishly. She is the perfect scapegoat for his frustrations.

"Yes," he answers her, moving forward, crawling onto her bed, denting the mattress with his knees. Despite her fears, she does not resist as he moves closer, does not flinch from his hand as he touches her supple cheek. Smart girl.

Jessica closes her eyes, falls back on the pillows, gives in to him as his fingers stroke down the pale white column that is her throat. He pauses at the wounds left by his teeth, presses down with the edge of a nail. Jessica whimpers. Damon smiles.

"Say goodnight, Princess," he whispers darkly.

He doesn't give her time to speak, doesn't give time for pleading or fighting or even one last whispered prayer.

He lowers his mouth to her creamy white neck.

Bites.

And drinks.