Disclaimer: Unfortunately, I do not own The Vampire Diaries or any of the characters. Since this Rebecca is not the same character as the Rebekah on the show, I do own her. And the plot, such that it is.

Chapter 4

"It's a date." Becca had been thinking about those words ever since they had come out of Damon's mouth, but she hadn't been sure if Damon meant what she hoped he had meant. Especially since he had been pretty wasted – her fault, mostly. But Damon had been subtly different since they had arrived at the music festival. He was still her friend who teased her and cracked jokes, but he had been touching her all day, much more than ever before, his hand resting on her arm, his fingers brushing her thigh as they sat together on a blanket. Now his hand had settled at the small of her back as they waited in line for beer.

Damon bent down close to her, and she could feel his nearness in every inch of her body. His hand slid around her body to rest on her hip. "Normally I don't stand in line, but it's not so bad with the right company." His voice was huskier than usual.

She teased him to hide her reaction to his touches. "Are you learning patience?"

"Me? Never."

"I think I have seen definite signs of patience." She caught his free hand in one of hers and began rubbing circles on his palm. She heard his breath hitch, and she spoke softly. "Maybe you should be less patient."

He laughed, the sound she loved so much. "You have to be the first person to ever tell me that." Then they were at the front of the line, and they collected two beers to drink while watching the main act.

Becca didn't know much about modern-day music – it was nothing like the music she had heard in previous centuries – but she thought the band was good. The room pulsed and vibrated with energy, and she felt the sound washing through her. The band was well into their set when Damon slipped his arms around her from behind and pulled her to his body. His lips ghosted along her ear, and the delicate touch sent a shiver through her. Even at that closeness, she wasn't sure she would have heard him if she wasn't a vampire. "Is this good?"

"Very good." She loved the feeling of being surrounded by his arms, his scent. She gave herself over to the sensation and the music. She was a creature of blood, not of magic, but this was a kind of magic.

When the band stopped playing, she turned in Damon's arms. She saw a flash of doubt in his blue eyes, and she brought her arms up around his neck. She met his beautiful eyes and saw the doubt swamped by a range of other emotions, too many for her to even identify. But she forgot everything as he leaned down and brushed his lips against hers. His lips were warm and soft, and his tongue teased along her lower lip before he pulled away. His lips hovered just out of reach, and Becca pushed closer to him, knowing what she wanted. Damon obliged her, closing the gap between them and reclaiming her mouth. His was open this time, and she let him slip his tongue into her mouth. She felt the kiss through every inch of her body, and she melted against him as his hands brushed up her back. She tangled her own fingers in his hair as his mouth did things to her that she hadn't felt in a very long time.

Finally, Damon pulled away slightly, and Becca gave a little moan of disappointment and instinctively tugged him back to her. She realized suddenly that she had forgotten her own strength and stopped, remembering past assignations with male vampires who had not wanted to be reminded that she was the stronger, but Damon just grinned at her. "Not letting me go?" His voice was teasing, and his lips pressed back against hers to give her what she wanted.

"Nope," she said when he finally let her breathe again after a kiss that went on far longer than a human could have managed. Her whole body burned for him, and they had done nothing but kiss.

"Want to get out of here?" The low, husky words went straight between her legs, and she pouted at the thought of the long drive back to Mystic Falls before she could have what she wanted. He must have seen her frustration in her eyes because he smirked with triumph. "I booked us a room at a bed and breakfast just a few blocks away."

"When?"

His grin was huge and his blue eyes danced with light. "When I bought the tickets to the music festival."

An answering grin spread over her face. "Someone was confident," she teased.

He shrugged, his smile shifting slightly to what Caroline had once referred to as his fuck-me smile. "I know I'm good." She suddenly knew exactly what the younger vampire had meant.

"Then what are you waiting for?"

By the time they made it to their room at the bed and breakfast, the door hadn't even closed behind them before they were tearing each other's clothes off, desperate to join their bodies.

•••••

Becca watched Damon as he slept beside her, sprawled in loose-limbed exhaustion. When he was awake, Damon seldom stopped moving, filled with an almost frenetic energy. She had rarely seen him still, only late at night staring into the fire when it all caught up with him during the long months they had sought Klaus and Stefan and then when he had lain near death after the battle with Klaus. This was different, everything was different now, and she could feel his relaxation, contentment, peace as sleep claimed his body and mind.

He was beautiful, she thought, and she wanted to know everything about him. She stroked his face with a feather-light touch, and Damon sighed softly in his sleep. They had explored every inch of each other's bodies, and his was perfect in every way. And he exactly knew how to use that body to bring her pleasure. No one had ever taken her to such heights or kept her there so long, and Becca smiled as she remembered screaming his name many, many times that night. Thanks to being dead, she hadn't had sex in hundreds of years, but she didn't remember it being that good. But she suspected that it was Damon who was that good – or Damon and her together. She felt a strange feeling, a hope that perhaps she had found something, someone truly special and perfect for her.

Her body hummed as she remembered the third, or perhaps it had been the fourth, time they had come together last night. She had again forgotten her strength and pinned him beneath her, and Damon had not only not complained but responded, eyes, smile, and sinful body daring her to have her way with him. In fact, it had been that time that he had bared his throat and invited her to bite him. His blood had been exquisite, and she had given him hers in return, reveling in the feeling of his fangs slicing into her neck and laughing at his surprise as her blood sent him on an unexpected high (and yes, she probably should have warned him about that). The sharing of blood had further electrified the passion between them as each began to feel what the other felt, and it had driven them to continue touching each other, neither willing to give up the spiraling pleasure. Even now she could still feel him as he slept and she wondered at that – that was the sign of a blood bond, and such a bond formed only after sharing blood many times. It was impossible that they had formed a blood bond in one night, and yet somehow it seemed that they had.

His willingness to be vulnerable had blindsided her. Damon had always been so guarded, and she had seen how he concealed his fractured heart behind a façade of cocky confidence. She related to it, as she had been scared to risk feeling or caring for a very long time. But he had trusted her tonight. He trusted her now as he slept far more deeply than was usual for a vampire, as if his deepest instincts told him he was safe here and his guard could finally come down for a few hours, and she felt a desire to protect him and keep him safe, to ensure that trust was not misplaced. He had already become her best friend months ago, and now she thought that perhaps what she felt for Damon Salvatore was an emotion that she had not truly felt for a very long time – love.

She wanted to stroke her hand down his back and feel his muscles ripple under her touch, to run her fingers through his silky hair, but she stopped herself. There was a point at which even a vampire needed to rest, and they had surpassed that point that night. So she simply watched him and smiled at the peace and happiness that sang along the bond that they had created between them.

•••••

Damon woke up gradually, his body blissfully relaxed. For a moment, he was afraid it had all been a very, very good dream and he would find himself in his own bed, alone or with some compelled human – probably alone, since he had given up hooking up with random women months ago. But as he stretched and opened his eyes, he felt Becca press herself against him in a way that instantly awakened his body. He purred with pleasure. It had been real. It had actually been real.

He felt her lips trail along his shoulder and up his neck. Her voice was soft in his ear. "Good morning."

"Morning." His own voice was husky with the remnants of sleep, but he was waking up quickly. Before she could answer him with more than a caress, he had flipped their positions to hover over her. "You know, we haven't had morning sex yet." He bent to kiss her and felt her body arch up against his as their lips met. Damon was looking forward to his best morning in a very long time.

They skipped breakfast, naturally, but the bread and breakfast did have a check-out time so eventually Damon and Becca were forced to shower, which proved distracting, and get dressed. He thought they would at least make it downstairs before the proprietor came to throw them out, and he didn't care about a late check-out charge.

"Are we going to the second day of the music festival?" Becca was pulling on her shirt as she spoke, and Damon suppressed a feeling of disappointment. Clothes were highly overrated.

"Yeah, that's my plan. Unless you don't want to?"

"No, I want to. You were right that it is fun. And I like that it is just us." She looked at him. "We should go hunting first."

"You're hungry?" Damon was hungry, but he could wait until they got back to Mystic Falls that evening.

"No, but you are."

He shrugged. "I'm fine." In truth, he was getting used to his boring blood bag diet, even if it made him a tame vampire. That seemed to be what everyone wanted of him, after all, and he was tired of being a disappointment. He could just imagine how Elena would look at him if he went back to feeding on humans. He might be over his foolish love for her – might have found someone better, someone whom he hoped could actually love him – but he wasn't sure he was ready to give up on the way he had tried to change for her, the expectations she had of him.

Becca's brown eyes were boring into his, and he was afraid that she could somehow read his mind. "Damon, you are not going to stay in Mystic Falls forever, are you?"

"Of course not." Where was she going with this?

Her voice was eminently reasonable. "So when you show me the world, we are going to have to feed, yes?"

She had a point. Blood bags were really only an option when one was settled in a place with a refrigerator, and stealing from hospitals had its disadvantages – starting with the taste of the blood, of course. But he still hesitated. Elena would be disappointed in him, but he was a vampire after all and he had to eat. And he had never really wanted to give up his vampire nature – or if at times he had wanted to, he had always known that he couldn't. He would never be Stefan. And he didn't want to be. Especially not now, not with Becca.

Becca seemed to sense his uncertainty, and she continued. "We will not kill anyone, of course. I have fought side-by-side with you, Damon, and I know how good your control is."

Not always, Damon thought, remembering Jessica and Jeremy and other times where he had lost control and killed people he hadn't meant to kill. But none of those had been about bloodlust, really. "Okay, why not? Let's hunt."