There was a rap on the door. Stefan frowned. He wasn't exactly used to Zach's family and their routines yet but they seemed to do the lion's share of their socializing away from the boarding house. From the looks they were giving each other, they weren't expecting anyone.

Damon wouldn't knock. Who was it then?

Stefan thought about answering the door but before he made a decision, Zach was walking towards the front hallway. He could get ahead of him, of course, but they were still not used to him and Stefan didn't think flaunting his vampire speed would help with winning them over.

He followed his great-great-great nephew down the hall, stopping by the turn where he had unobstructed view of the doorway without crowding Zach or drawing attention to himself.

Zach opened the door. A female figure stood on the doorstep, looking to be somewhere between seventeen and early twenties.

"Excuse me, can I help you?" Stefan's nephew sounded polite but confused. As normal and almost, almost familiar looking as she was, she must not be from Mystic Falls then.

"Are you the only Salvatores in town?" She asked. "I don't know if I'm in the right place."

A vampire then? Stefan furrowed his brow. The movement seemed to catch her eye and she spotted Stefan. Her expression brightened and she stepped over the threshold.

"Oh, good! I must be in the right place then. Hullo, Stefan." She pulled down the hood of her raincoat to release wavy brown hair.

Not a fellow vampire then since she had come in without an invitation, unless she had encountered Zach earlier and compelled him to issue her an invitation. But if so, why pretend to be unsure of her location?

Zach was now glaring at him as though he held Stefan responsible for her presence. He supposed he must be. After all, it was he she'd addressed by name. However, despite that earlier almost familiar feeling he'd gotten from seeing her, he had not the faintest idea where he was meant to know her from.

Stefan wasn't in the habit of maintaining connections with humans, other than his family and even so he didn't keep the kind of regular communication the word would have conjured up. He was positive he would remember befriending a twenty year old human and all the more so for every year younger she might have been when they would have been introduced.

So who was she? Or maybe the question ought to be what was she?

Gail appeared at Zach's shoulder and made quick work of the situation. He should have noticed her movements without even bothering, so clearly the stranger had rattled him. Her manners were better than Zach's. They ought to hope Sarah took after her rather than him.

"You're a friend of Stefan's? Come in." Gail said, gesturing the stranger not towards the small den where she, Sarah, and Zach spent much of their time together as a family but towards the older, larger room Stefan was more familiar with. Once upon a time he would have called it the morning room.

The four of them made their way from the hallway to the drawing room, not really together as a group but more clustered separately.

The stranger took a seat on the left couch when offered a place and crossed her ankles. She held her wet raincoat bundled over both arms to keep it from wetting the sofa. Idly Stefan noticed she carried herself with a self-possession that seemed to have fallen out of favor with society today.

Gail settled herself on the opposite sofa, smiling at their visitor. Stefan and Zach had apparently had the same idea, each of them took up places on either side of the fireplace. Zach stood closer to Gail while Stefan was closer to the stranger.

"I'm sorry I didn't catch your name." Gail said. Stefan shot her a grateful glance.

The visitor unwrapped one arm from the bundle of limbs and raincoat.

She stuck out her hand. "Belinda. Belinda Lennox but I prefer Billie."

Zach stepped forward to intercept his wife and shook her hand. "Zachary Salvatore."

"A pleasure to meet you." Billie said with what appeared to be genuine sincerity. She must have had a pulse because when Zach stepped away from her, some of the tension had drained from him and he took a seat beside Gail rather than returning to his post by the fireplace.

Unfortunately, the name meant nothing to Stefan and he continued staring hard at her, wracking his brain for some connection.

"Could I offer you something to drink?" Gail asked.

"Lavender tea, please, if you have it." Billie replied promptly.

Something about his posture must have registered to Zach and Gail because when he bothered to listen to the words of the conversation again, Gail was calling out to Sarah to put the kettle on and he wondered if Billie was able to pick up on the artificial way she was playing at her normal self.

Stefan dropped into the seat beside Billie. She turned to face him. He didn't think she was dangerous, she certainly didn't seem liable to fly off the handle at some wrong move of theirs but he was in a better position to put himself between her and the humans in the room if the situation changed from here.

"I'm terribly sorry," he said smoothly, "but where did you say we met, I'm afraid I don't remember."

"Chicago. By way of New Orleans, of course! You were keeping company with a pair of the Old Ones and I didn't realize you were Damon's brother at first."

Old Ones? What was she talking about? And she knew Damon too? How was it that every answer she gave only led to further confusion.

"Speaking of, is he home?" Billie asked. Now she was the one feigning casualness.

Had Damon compelled her to follow after him as a walking source of food? That seemed insane and didn't fit with all the information he had but then the information he had didn't seem to add up to any one thing.

"No," Zach answered. "Damon's not home."

She looked disappointed.

Gail bent forward. "What's your connection to Damon, honey?"

"Oh, he's my husband." Billie said, smoothing a bit of wet hair back from her face.