The Mystic Grill was not an ideal place to work, but desperate times called for desperate measures and Damon desperately needed a change of scenery. He'd had enough of the dark walls of the boarding house. Everywhere he went and no matter how many curtains he shoved to the side, the shadows followed, so he decided to pack up the essentials and take his work to a more open location.
He longed for the days he had spent working from the Gilbert kitchen.
Yes, he had complained about the backless stools to Elena all summer, but he had loved the open space and light that filled the room.
Damon thought of Jeremy playing his ridiculous video games while he was on conference calls and having to mute himself to bark at Jeremy to turn the volume down.
Jeremy never listened; instead of turning the volume down, he would offer the second controller to Damon.

Damon had taken last summer for granted.

He'd never admit it, or maybe he would, but Damon wished Klaus had never brought Stefan back to Mystic Falls.
The Grill was deserted except for the waitstaff. The brunch crowd hadn't started their journey to the local eatery.
Matt and Jeremy were sitting at the bar, a pile of mixed silverware between them.
They nodded at Damon when he walked by as they each continued rolling a clean set of silverware into a freshly washed napkin.
Damon set his things down at a booth towards the back of the restaurant where he could camp out for a few hours. He settled in close to the window, feeling the warmth radiating from the glass.
He sent Jeremy a text.

Damon: Fry me
Jeremy: Ask your server
Damon: Fries
Jeremy: Dick

Jeremy rolled his eyes at Damon's text before hopping off the barstool and disappearing into the kitchen. Matt looked over at Damon and Damon pointed at the liquor bottles behind him.
Damon opened his laptop, taking a moment to assess which emails required the most attention. He had five minutes to categorize and sort them before dialing in to his first call.
Matt dropped off a glass of bourbon and fries just as Damon was adjusting the earpiece Elena had suggested he get.
Damon dialed into the meeting.
He was still a couple of minutes early.
The hold music chirped in his ear as he ate fries.

"Damon, looks like we're all here. Ready?" A male voice cut through the hold music.
"Yeah, I'm here. Go," Damon said into the phone.

He muted his microphone and rested his back against the booth, reaching for another french fry.

This meeting would decide the fourth and final office for GLS Industries. At least until further notice. Four new offices would be a lot to deal with. It would certainly keep him busy for at least the next five years.
The board had decided on opening offices in Russia, Germany, and Iceland (at Damon's insistence).
Australia and Sweden were the last two countries battling it out for the remaining slot.

Damon wondered what his father would say if he knew that his vampire son had taken their small Mystic Falls lumber business and shaped it into a global conglomerate of lumber, lead, copper, and steel.
Giuseppe Salvatore was probably rolling in his grave knowing that the vervain-soaked bullets he had used to kill his sons had inspired Damon's business ideology.

Damon was prepared to live for an eternity solely to spite his father's memory.

As the Australia-Sweden Battle meeting went on, Damon made occasional notes, adding a doodle of a tiny devil with fangs to the corner of his notes.

Australia was making a good case against Sweden.

Tourism and weather, blah, blah, blah.

Matt stopped at his booth again, this time with a glass of water.
Damon ignored him and continued to look down at his laptop, following the presentation until his mind wandered to familiar territory: he wondered what Elena was doing.
He hadn't seen her in a couple of days.
She hadn't left a message the other night when he'd been with Katherine, but she'd tried calling twice since that night.

He ran a hand across his chin thoughtfully.
He was committed to keeping his promise to Stefan.
He was working on a plan to leave Mystic Falls.
Iceland had received the greenlight and he had a team searching for a building in Reykjavik.
He'd secure housing without issue.

All he had to do was book a one-way flight.

Damon was absolutely not stalling.

He wasn't waiting for Elena to wake up one day and realize she had chosen the wrong brother.

Absolutely not.

In fact, Damon had been avoiding the common areas of the boarding house in case Elena was over.

And he certainly wasn't avoiding her because he felt guilty about his adventures in Katherine Land, because he didn't feel guilty.

Speak of the Devil , he thought.

There she was.

Elena was headed towards the Grill.
Damon watched her cross the street. She smiled as she waved to someone he couldn't see from where he sat.
Elena pushed open the door to the restaurant, eyes scanning the room.
She found Damon's gaze and he lifted a hand slowly, carefully, in case it wasn't Damon she was looking for.
She held his stare as she walked over to his booth, a scowl forming between her brows.

Damon sat up straight, suddenly nervous.

He fought the urge to run a hand through his hair or fix his jacket.
She was carrying what looked like multiple envelopes in her arms.

Was it too soon to make a sexy secretary joke?

"Did you do it?" Elena asked when she reached his booth. "I've been calling you for two days."

He held up a finger, pointing to his wireless earbuds.

Elena sighed and sat across from him, fidgeting with the envelopes before setting them down on her lap.

What's going on? he wrote on the notepad in front of him and pushed it towards her.
Elena shook her head and waved her hand dismissively.
Damon held out his pen, insisting.
I can wait for you to get off she wrote back under his question.
He smiled as she handed the pen back and reached for a handful of fries from his plate.
He would save this paper exchange for later.

They would laugh at it when they were in a better place.

Damon studied her as she took her phone, lightly tapping on the screen.
She looked tired and he felt a twinge of guilt for not checking in with her sooner.

"The numbers look good. We'll just have to review the notes from the last call to compare what we've discussed today. We should have a final answer by Friday. Contracts will go out Monday and we can pick it up from there with relocation projections," Damon said.
Thank you , Elena mouthed as she bit into another fry and Damon rolled his eyes dramatically.
"Thank you, all, and please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions or concerns. I would be happy to elaborate on any items we covered today," Damon added.
He ended the call and looked expectantly at Elena.

"Did you set off the explosion that killed the town council?" She asked.

He pulled the plate of fries from her reach. " Jesus Christ . No greeting or warning. Am I wearing my 'I Blew Up the Council ' t-shirt?" He was instantly annoyed. Leave it to Elena to eat half his fries while assuming he was behind the mass casualty that had claimed the lives of the entire council.

"Did you?" She pressed.

"No, anything else?" He thought of impulsively disclosing that he had been with Katherine when the incident occurred, but thought better of it.
The town had suffered enough with one explosion.

"Who were you on the phone with?"

"Sydney."

"Who's Sydney?" Elena asked with narrowed eyes.

"Easy, tiger, you'll sound jealous if you use that tone, " Damon smirked, holding up his hands in mock surrender. "Sydney, Australia. GLS is probably going to open an office there early next year. We just have to hammer out a couple of things before pulling the trigger. It's between Australia and Sweden."

"Oh," she said, looking down at her hands.

He pushed the plate of fries back towards her.

"What's that?" Damon said, pointing at the envelopes with an extra-crisp fry.
Elena's eyes lit up. She picked up the envelopes and fanned them out before turning them around dramatically to show him the logos.
Med school. Princeton, Stanford, NYU, and UCSF.

"Did you help me get into these places?" She whispered.

"I sure didn't," Damon shook his head with a smile.
He wiped his hands on a napkin and reached for the envelopes.
They were unopened.
He'd helped her with applications, essays, and driven her to a couple of the interviews, but that wasn't the kind of help she was asking about.

"Are you sure?" She asked excitedly.

"Elena, between trying to keep you alive, which I failed at, and running a company, I don't have time to compel admissions offices for you. I assure you, it was your own grades and accolades that got you in. Why haven't you opened them yet?"

"I was waiting for you," Elena said as she took the envelopes back from Damon.

"Why?" he asked.

"You've been my biggest supporter," she smiled. "I wanted to share this moment with you." She smiled as she ripped one of them open. "How will I choose one?"
"What did Stefan say?"
"I haven't told him yet," she admitted.
"He doesn't know you applied to med school or he doesn't know you got acceptance letters?"
She was looking at him with an unreadable expression.
Damon blinked expectantly back at her, taking his earbuds out and placing them on his notepad

She took a deep breath.

"There's something else I wanted to tell you," she said looking down. "Something's wrong. I can't keep any of the animal blood down."
"Well there's a shock." He was underwhelmed. "I'm assuming you also haven't shared this bit of news with Stefan."
"Things with Stefan are weird right now," she admitted. She was still looking at Damon with a cautious expression. "Stefan thinks my emotions are heightened and that I'm being dramatic, but he's wrong. Something's changed. I'm different now. Darker. And Stefan wants to keep fighting for the girl I was before I died on that bridge. Lately, I feel like I'm a project to him. Like I'm a problem that needs to be fixed. I think I make him sad. You've never looked at me like that. Never. That's why I need your help."
Elena was looking at him the way she used to look at him before the transition.
Like she loved him.
He wanted to tell her he loved her.
He loved her when she was human and he loved her now.

"Fine," was all he said instead.

He got to his feet and caught Matt's eye from the bar. "Watch my stuff, will you, Donovan?"

Matt nodded and Damon reached for Elena's hand. "Come on."

Damon pushed open the door to the bathroom, pulling Elena in behind him, and locking it behind them.
His blood would sustain her until they figured out why her body was rejecting the transition.
Damon held out his palm to her, offering her more than just the blood he'd drawn for her.
Stefan had been so convinced he'd be able to avoid leading Elena down a road of temptation and murder.
Just like he thought he could save her with rainbows and butterfly kisses.
But what Stefan refused to understand, and what Damon had known all along, was that Elena didn't need to be saved, she didn't need to be fixed.
Elena was perfect.
Damon's blood had turned Elena into a vampire.
It had given her a second life, a better life.
He could show her how to live it. How to draw unapologetic pleasure from a new existence.

She just had to let him.

"Don't tell Stefan," Damon added in a low voice as an afterthought. "Since we're keeping things from him, this is kind of…personal."

The last time he'd seen this darkness in her they'd been in Denver.
Elena reached for his outstretched palm to accept his offering as Damon pulled her body close.
The force of their bodies coming together pushed them towards the wall.
Damon could feel Elena vibrating against his body, sending waves of arousal into his chest, limbs tingling in anticipation.
He closed his eyes and brought his free hand to stroke her hair, encouraging her to keep going.

Elena's lips were on his palm, drawing the life out of him, making him light headed.
He wanted to feel her lips on every inch of his body.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt this aroused.
He opened his eyes, his eyelids felt heavy.

Elena was draining him, and he wanted her to take all of him.
Damon had imagined this exact moment with her hundred of thousands of times.
He wanted to do this forever. With her.

He looked behind them and caught their reflection in the mirror.

Elena let go of his palm, fangs retracting.

"Who's going to take care of me when you leave for Iceland?"

"I can't be your emotional support vampire," he breathed into her hair.

Elena twisted in his arms, turning around so her chest was pressed against his, rising and falling rhythmically.

"Damon," she whispered. "That's not all you are to me."

Something in him snapped.
He was going to fuck her. They were in a public bathroom and he was going to fuck her.
He knew it.
She knew it.
He didn't care that this was his brother's girl.

They'd been doing this song and dance for too long.

He had to have her.