Chapter 7

...

What could she possibly be doing here? Was she insane? I thought I told her to stay away! Damon thought all these thoughts as Charlotte crumpled to the ground in a heap. He vamped towards her just in time to catch her before her head hit the pavement. Her arm fell away from the wound on her neck and the blood continued to flow. Holding her with one arm, Damon bit into his wrist until his own blood flowed and put it to Charlotte's mouth to drink. You are not dying on me! Damon thought as he urged for her to drink the blood. Though she was unconscious, some of the blood must have flowed into her because the wound steadily began to close. They couldn't stay here much longer, Damon was not sure how long the man in the suit would stay down and there was no doubt that more of his friends couldn't be far off. Carefully he picked up Charlotte, bridal style, and made his way to the place he knew that they would be protected for now.

...

When Charlotte woke up she found herself surrounded by familiar walls and furniture. As her fingers grasped at the sheets surrounding her she realized she was back in her apartment, lying on her bed. She put a hand to her head as her eyes adjusted and she slowly came out of her induced sleep. Charlotte shut her eyes tight. When she opened them again she was staring into deep blue eyes.

Damon was sitting on her bed beside her waiting for her to wake up. Carefully, Charlotte sat up. He must have brought her back after she passed out. She groaned.

"You ok?" Damon asked looking at her with concern.

"Yeah," Charlotte replied smiling before feeling a pain in her hand when she moved it.

"Ow," she muttered staring at her knuckles, there were no bruises but she could still feel the force of the punch on her fingers.

"Yeah, remember when I told you never to punch a vampire again or you'd regret it. I take it back" Damon chuckled.

"How about you?" Charlotte asked staring at his face, there wasn't a scratch on it.

"There are perks to vampire healing." Damon commented with a slight smile.

"Right," Charlotte began. "Wait, my neck." there was no pain so Charlotte hadn't noticed it but there was no forgetting the feeling of teeth sinking into her skin.

"It's completely healed!" she exclaimed rubbing her fingers over the soft skin that now only bore traces of dried blood.

"How?"

"I fed you my blood." Damon told her.

"You, what?" this was strange to her and the idea of drinking someone else's blood made her squeamish.

"To heal you, vampire blood has healing capabilities." he informed her.

"Oh," Charlotte replied one hand still on her neck before a not so subtle rumbling noise came from her stomach. "I'm starving" she commented more to herself than to Damon.

"Thought you might be." Damon told her and got up from her bed and walked over to her tiny kitchen. Then, Charlotte realized that her tiny apartment was filled with the smell of food which only made the rumbling in her stomach worse. Soon Damon returned with an entire plate of it. Charlotte could barely contain herself.

"Losing that much blood would make anyone hungry, trust me I know." he commented flashing her a half-smile and handing her the plate. Charlotte's eyes widened as she stared at the food.

"Tha-thank you." she stuttered. She was not used to people doing things for her.

"I guess I owe you, and I don't like owing people." Damon replied nonchalantly. Charlotte didn't wait a moment longer as her hunger overtook her and she dug into her plate of food.

"Yeah, I didn't have much options with your limited groceries." he told her as she engulfed the food. When she had a free moment Charlotte nodded and then froze pausing before swallowing. There was a distinct silence before Charlotte finally asked the question that was hanging in the air.

"Damon?"

"Mmmmm?"

"Who was that guy?" The silence ensued for a while before Damon finally spoke.

"A member of the Paragon's" Charlotte's brows furrowed into a questioning gaze. Damon sighed realizing he would have to explain further.

"A secret society of vampires."
"But, you're a vampire" she commented.

"Very old vampires." Damon elaborated. "They've been involved with every major power struggle in history since the beginning. Kings, rulers, warriors, all very old and very powerful"

"What did they want with you?" Charlotte asked.

"All you need to know is that I took something from them, now they want it back."

"What did you take-"
"I said that's all you need to know!" Damon snapped not liking where this was going, he should have been gone by now. A moment of silence ensued.

"Look, they're my problem not yours, so you don't need to be pulling any more stunts like that because I don't need your help." Damon snapped, Charlotte was appalled.

"You don't seem very grateful, I saved your life!" she exclaimed.

"And nearly killed yourself."

"But I didn't"

"Yeah, because of me! You don't know anything about this world so why don't you just stay out of it!"

"Fine!" Charlotte exclaimed, "Then just get out of my life and stop showing up everywhere!"
"Fine! You stupidly risked your life to help me now I made sure you were ok. We are done, even."

"Fine!"

"If you know what's good for you you'll go back to your bartender job, work really hard, maybe meet a guy in a few years grow old and forget this ever happened. This entire thing was a mistake." With that last word Damon got up and walked out of her apartment, slamming the door behind him leaving Charlotte sitting alone in silence.