"Are you still with Damon? How is he?"

Alyssa peered behind her to see Damon is feeding off a young sorority girl. There are other girls dancing to the song "Black Hearts On Fire" playing in the room. All of the girls have bite marks up and down their bodies. Damon comes up for air after feeding.

"How do I taste?"

Alyssa turned for the scene behind her and gave a one shoulder shrug though Elena wasn't able to see it over the phone. "I'd say pretty well considering. How's Bonnie doing?"

"I'm waiting for a call back."

"She still at her aunt's?" Bonnie had gone to stay with her aunt after Sheila's funeral.

She turned to Damon as Elena answered "Yeah, I hope she isn't driving her too crazy." The lights switched on and Stefan walked in.

"The calivery is here," she hung up after telling her Stefan was there which meant she was free to go. She walked over to them after Stefan sent the sorority girls away, "you're here so I assume my babysitting duties are over."

"And here I thought we were having fun," she ignored Damon's comment turning back to Stefan.

"You can deal with him now." She told Stefan and walked away.

"Ms. Donovan," she was the last person Alyssa expected to see.

"Alyssa," Kelly smiled at her pulling her into an unexpected hug, "it's nice to see you again."

Alyssa was still shocked to when she pulled away, " You too...though you were the last person I expected to see."

"I don't know why. I live here." She turned to the door. "Though I can't seem to get my key to work."

Alyssa stepped in front of her, "here," she used her key to open the door jiggling the handle a few time, "it just gets jammed sometimes." She turned the lock and the door opened.

"Thank you," Kelly said looking at her with a small smile. She nodded and let her walk inside first. She followed behind her.

"Oh god," Alyssa stopped behind her.

"Mom," Alyssa turned away when she saw Matt and Caroline shirtless on the couch.

"Not on my couch."

"Mom! Hey." He covers Caroline up with a pillow. Caroline places her hands on her face, embarrassed.

Matt showed her out when they were both dressed, "I'm sorry about this."

"No worries, go spend time with your mom. Call me later?"

"Yeah."

Caroline smiled kissed him and left.

Kelly turned towards Alyssa in the kitchen silently questioning her about the newest development in her son's life. Alyssa shrugged her response turned and started to make breakfast for the impromptu Donovan family reunion.

Kelly started in with the questions as soon as the door was closed. "So blonde's the new flavor of the month, huh? Sorry to scare her off," she said though she didn't sound like it.

"She's not a flavor, Mom." Matt leaned against the counter. "I like her."

"So she's the one?"

"No, probably not, but maybe."

"You know I always thought you two made a good couple." Lyssa look to Matt as she passed him getting the plates out of the cabinet. "You're always taken care of him. Both of my kids, I've always appreciate it."

"Someone had to," she placed the plates on the table, "you're never around. Where've you've been Kelly? It's been months."

"Ah, you know, here and there." She waved. "Never one place too long," she looked at Matt. "You know Pete."

"No, actually," he leaned up from the counter. "I don't. Because you never brought him around."

Kelly grabs a clean glass from the sink and opens the fridge, grabbing a bottle of vodka, before

sitting down at the table. "Well I've been meaning to, but you know how you and your sister get." She held out the glass and held it out to Matt. "Ice Please?"

Matt takes it opens the fridge putting ice in it. "Speaking of, have you heard from Vic?
Matt hands Kelly the glass and she pours some vodka in it.

"No, but don't worry. She'll come home eventually when she needs something." Alyssa looked down guilty knowing that won't ever happen. "I played that game."

"Are you playing it now?" Matt asked his mom and Alyssa thought Matt had a valid question.

"No."

"Then what are you doing' home?"

"Are you trying to say I need a reason to come back?" No, but Alyssa knew that there had to be a reason she came back and it wasn't just because she missed her kids. Kelly gestured towards the chairs.

"Sit down. Eat with me." Matt shared a look with Alyssa and they sat down across from her. "So," she leaned forwards with a smile, "tell me what I missed."

Alyssa sat and listened while Matt filled his mother in on what she had been missing and after dinner she and Matt with the dishes.

"Now that your mom's on her fourth drink and well on her way to passing out." She whispered to him at the kitchen sink. "How do you really feel about your mother being back?"

"Ask me that when I know why she's here."

Alyssa phone rung keeping her from replying and she dried her hands off. She stepped away from Matt. "Stefan," she replied. "If you're calling about Damon,"

"It's about Elena. I need your help."

Alyssa scanned the grill visional for Damon and found him at the bar with the sheriff who was walking away and she approached. "It's a little earlier in the day for a drink don't you think."

"Stefan send you to check up on me?"

"In my own way Damon I've grown to care about you, so while Stefan has elected me as your babysitter when he isn't around so won't suck this town dry in order to drown your sorrows, I also care about you too."

"You're worried about me. That's nice. Don't be. There's no need. I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be? I spent the last 145 years with one goal: get in that tomb. I succeeded. Granted, Katherine wasn't in there to be rescued, but why dwell? You know, it's so liberating not having a master plan, because I can do whatever the hell I want."

"And that's exactly what I'm afraid of," without any real purpose, it meant that he would have a lot of free time on his hands. They all knew how Damon got when he was bored. "And not because of you going off the rails and suddenly going murder spree but she's going to cause you to lose the person they've I've grown to both be fond of and despise. I don't want to see her destroy you."

She could see that her words didn't register with him. He just changed the subject. "Do you know that I am one of Mystic Falls' most eligible bachelors?"

"You don't say."

"Yep. I'm going to make some desperate housewife very happy tonight."

"As long as you don't use them as a your own personal blood supply." She said helping him out of his chair so she could take him home and sober him up. She dumped him off in his room and went looking for the kitchen so she could make coffee for him hoping that it would sober him up.

It took a while but she was able to find the kitchen and checked the cabinets until she found it and put on a pot and waited for it to finish brewing. She brought it up to his room when it was done but didn't see him where she had left him.

"Damon," she checked Stefan room and saw him coming out of the bathroom in a pair of black jeans but without a shit. She wanted to ask him why but decided she didn't want to know. "How are you feeling?"

He grabs a shirt from Stefan's closet, "never better."

She watched him struggling to button it up. "I seriously doubt that. But for the sake of this conversation let's just go with it."

He dropped his hands, "help a guy out will you? Can't get this."

She rolled her eyes but walked over to him. "It might has a with the bottle of scotch you consumed." She grabs the front of his shirt and begins to button it. "So have you heard? Elena's adopted. Guess that explains her resemblance to Katherine. It also mean she would've have to had a baby before she was a vampire, and wouldn't that just be scandalous." She fastened the last button and looked at him.

They exchange glances for a moment before catching Elena and Stefan walking in over Damon's shoulder, "it's about time." She looked at Damon before walking over to Stefan and Elena. Damon starts to put on his jacket. "You know I do have things to do besides babysitting a pissed drunk love struck vampire."

She left stopping on the Salvatore's porch reaching in jacket pocket taking out her phone when she reached the front porch of the Salvatores and text Matt to found out if he'd made it to the grill. She was in front of her house when he text back but waited until she was inside to read it.

It said that he'd been there for twenty minutes and had already gotten hit on by twelve women all in his mother age range a fact she found that completely amusing and texted back.

Omg you're totally cougar bait lol. She sent it and text after it. They all want to use you to play out their wildest fantasies. The lonely housewife and the jock.

She unlocked the front door and called out for Jenna and looked down and checked her phone to see that he had sent an emoji with the monkey covering his ears, eyes, and mouth.

"Hey," she looked up when Jenna walked in. "What took you so long I expected you an hour ago?"

"Sisterly duties," she put away her phone. "But I'm here now."

"I'll grab my coat."

She text Matt while she waited for Jenna to return. "Ready."

Alyssa put away her phone following her out to the car. "I'll drive," she wanted use that time to find out what she had dug up if anything about Elena's birth mother and what exactly it had to do with Damon.

"Your dad kept everything from his medical practice—records, logs, old appointment books.I found an entry from the night she was born. Patient and a birth date. Isobel Petersen."

"Wait Isobel," she glanced at her recognizing the name, "like Mr. Saltzman's wife Isobel?" She remembered Jenna mentioning to her once that Ric wife Isobel had gone missing. "You think she could have been Elena's birth mom?"

"It's a possibility. She was from around here."

"Does Elena know?" She knew she would want have talked to anyone who knew Isobel from that time. She also was beginning to realize Stefan knew more than what he said.

"She found out this morning. I binged anyone in the area with the last name Peterson who was born around the same time and came up with a name Trudie. I figured Isobel wouldn't have used her last name if she were a teenage pregnant runaway."

"And you connected the dots?"

"I found out that she stills live in Virginia."

"Elena's going to want to talk to her." She knew she wouldn't be able to let it go until she got answers until she did.

"I already gave her the address."

She said, "good," but wasn't really sure that's how she really felt. She wanted Elena to found about her birth mother only if that's what she really wanted. But she was afraid that that trail would lead her straight to Katherine whom they've already established wasn't in the tomb.

It also meant that she had faked her own death and to her that only meant she was running away from something. If that was the case, Elena being the exact replica of a vampire on the run did bode well for anyone. She had already seen hints of that with Noah. The vampire who entertained himself by messing with Elena all because she looked like Katherine. Then there was also her getting kidnapped as an insurance policy for Damon. He was an complication altogether.

"And what do you do, Bachelor Number 3?" Alyssa walked over over to Stefan as he walked into the grill as Mrs. Lockwood was introducing the bachelors.

"Earth to Alyssa," Matt called grabbing her attention.

"What?" She'd been so focused on her own thoughts that she hadn't heard anything he said. Nor did she know that the raffle had started.

"Yeah, I'm a plumber." She saw Elena wave at Stefan from the door and he walked over to the table.

"Well, isn't that wonderful? We could always use more plumbers. Moving on." Mrs. Lockwood moved down the line to Mr. Saltzman. "Number 4, "Alaric Saltzman." Wow. That's quite a mouthful. What do you do, Alaric?"

"I'm a teacher at Mystic Falls High." She debated whether or not to talk to him about what she feared would happen if she continued to look for her but she didn't want to bring up the possible connection between Isobel and Damon knowing that Stefan had been keeping or protecting her from it.

"History. Oh, well, give us a fun fact about Mystic Falls, something crazy."

She saw Rick look over at Damon who places his hand up to his ear, sarcastically anticipating a response.

On that he struggled to come up with, "Uh, well…"

Carol pulls the microphone away. "He's probably saving the best stories for his date." She moves down the line. "And last, but not least, Damon Salvatore. We don't have much on you."

"Well, I'm tough to fit on a card," was his response.

"Do you have any hobbies, like to travel?"

"Oh, yeah. L.A., New York. Couple of years ago, I was in North Carolina. Near the Duke campus, actually. I think—I think Alaric went to school there. Didn't you, Ric?" Damon turns to look at Ric, who does the same. "Yeah, 'cause I- I know your wife did."

Alyssa quickly releases where he was going and figured he must have put the connection together after all the questions and looks over to Elena to who she could see was also slowly putting the connection together.

"I had a drink with her once. She was—she was a great girl. I ever tell you that? Cause she was - Delicious. Mmm! Mmm mmm mmm."

Alyssa walks away from the table when she see Elena's put it altogether.

"Elena," she said in concern and she shook her head.

"I just need some air."

She accompanied her outside shooting Stefan a look as they past to let him know to give them some space and stood there as paced back and forth.

"He killed her? Damon was the vampire that killed her?"

"Elena I am so sorry."

"And I was feeling sorry for him, hoping that this whole Katherine thing would change him. I'm so stupid."

"If it makes you feel any better I don't he knows about the connection to you. He wouldn't have flaunted in front of you if he did. Stefan wanted to confront him but he's already so on edge about Katherine that I didn't think it would be safe."

She runs her fingers through her hair looking over Alyssa's shoulder and does a double take when she recognizes the man from earlier down the street.

"That man." She turns around and looks at the man who's watching them. "I saw that man outside of Trudie's."

"Let's get back inside. Come on." She gently pushes her back inside the Grill and follows her soon thereafter.

"And bachelor number 3 goes to 37458." Carol Lockwood pulls a raffle ticket out of the bowl.

"That's me." Kelly walks towards Carol.

Alyssa finds Stefan and tells him what happened. He goes outside to check. She watches him leave and turns to find Elena and sees her talking to Damon and walks over to them.

"Just as I was starting to think that there was something redeemable about you."

"Elena." She shakes her head at him.

Damon looks between them. "Am I missing something here?"

"Did I forget to mention earlier when we were talking about my birth mother? The one that

gave me up?"

"Mm-hm."

"Her name was Isobel."

Damon's face falters.

"Go ahead. Reminisce about how you killed her." Elena rams into Damon's shoulder as she walks past him.

He watched her go before turning to Alyssa, "don't look so judgy."

"I don't have any hopes of you ever changing so no judgement from me, because unlike Elena, when someone shows me who they really are, I tend to believe them. Taunting Rick the way you did about his dead wife shows me exactly the kind of thing you really are." She walked over to Jenna. "Please tell me you're ready to go?"

"Seeing as how I just lost my date," she grabbed her coat. "I'd say that's a yes."

Elena's on her bed when Alyssa finds her with a picture of their parents. Kicking off her shoes, she climbs in bed beside her resting her head on her shoulder.

"I'm really sorry about your mom."

She reached for the phone on the opposite side. "I got this off the the man that followed me from Trudies. He told me to stop looking for her before he walked in front of a truck."

"Isobel?" She sat up facing her, "She's alive? Does that mean…?" It was even too crazy to think about. "That's his?" She reference to the phone. "Are you going to call?"

Elena opens the phone and finds the last number that was dialed. Before she can change her mind, Elena calls the number and places the phone to her ear. After a few rings, a woman picks up on the other end.

"Was there a problem? Did you find her? What's going on?"

"Isabel?"

Isobel hangs up without another word. Elena shuts the phone, looking tearful and Alyssa leans in to comfort her.