A dinner date.

I have a dinner date. With my mate. And her grandfather, who also just happens to be a dear friend. Adrian thought in bemusement as he watched his mate and friend walk off with a small, awkward little finger wiggle/wave of his hand. It'd been several hundred years since anyone had bothered to invite him over to dinner at their place.

And with the changing of time and proper decorum- well, he just hadn't been able to keep track of the things found acceptable when invited to dinner at another person's house.

But one thing was for sure, now that he knew who his mate was and that she would be close by, he owed Benson a kiss. A nice, big- hopefully non gay-ish one. The old man was just so...what was the word?

Awesome?

No. That word didn't fit.

Lovely? Well maybe not physically anymore, but he had a damned good heart and now Adrian owed him a kiss for finally introducing his granddaughter to him. He bit his lower lip for a moment as he tried to think of what to do next. He knew that dinner at his friend's place would be no casual affair. After all, the man was old and wasn't terribly likely to put much into his appearance since it would just be him, Adrian and of course Adrian's mate. Willow.

His stomach did this funny little flip flop at the mere thought of his mate's name, causing him to bring his hand up to rub the spot.

Not because it was sore or pained him. But because it sort of tickled and he was about to bust out laughing like he had used to back in the old days when he'd been London's one and only Undertaker. However he knew that if he did so without the benefit of someone telling him a joke or something, he'd look like he'd lost his mind.

And that was the last thing he wanted now that he'd finally found his mate.

But that was neither here nor there.

He had work to do to make himself presentable for this evenings affair and he wouldn't accept failure as an option. He needed a nice new shirt (one that didn't have weird pictures or sayings on it from his favorite TV shows and movies). Maybe something that for once wasn't black. A tie (just in case). And at home he could pull out his best pair of pants and polish his nicest pair of calf length skull and cross bone leather boots.

Maybe buy a few bottles of wine to go with dinner and get his mate tipsy...and see if she wanted to walk him home where he would corner her and maybe if he was lucky he'd get her naked.

No. Wait.

Scratch that idea- he wanted her to like him enough to come to him whenever she needed help and stuff. Not loathe him enough to run in the opposite direction where some faceless guy that he already hated lay in wait to snatch her up and away from him.

Why the thought alone made his ancient blood boil in his veins. But since he wasn't going to allow such a thing to happen, he shifted his mind back to his somewhat short, detailed plan for dinner this evening.

Shirt, tie, wine.

Right. Where was the best place to get all of those things? He wondered before biting his lower lip again to restrain his mirth when he realized that here he was in a town he'd lived in for the past five years...And he still hadn't figured out all the small minute details that a local townie should know.

"I'm pathetic." He muttered to himself under his breath before realizing that he had left out something in his plans. Something for his mate. A small gift of his affections.

But what?

What did modern women like to receive from males?

Again, he would have killed to have Grell at his beck and call for advice on this one since he was pretty sure that anything he got for Willow would only cause him to dig his own grave.