I am extremely sorry for the delay guys, I'm extremely ashamed of myself; the only thing I can currently do is apologize.
Ever since Stefan had told Elena about the school camping trip, it was the only thing she could think of. Certain things kept on repeating through her mind like being in the company of her friends during the road trip and mostly spending her entire week in a forest faraway with Damon.
Elena's father had returned the previous day and surprisingly permitted her for the trip. So currently she couldn't help but smile in front of the mirror of a shop's dressing room, as she tried another dress from her selected pile.
After giving herself one last look, satisfied she headed outside where Damon was standing in the waiting area. This was part of their routine, every time Elena went shopping Damon stayed in the waiting area while she put on all the dresses she selected turn by turn and modeled them in front of him.
"How about this one Damon." Elena asked a totally uninterested Damon, who looked as if he'd want to be anywhere but a shopping mall. As Elena twirled in front of him, he robotically nodded his head. "Absolutely perfect Miss Gilbert, now if you're done then can we please go." the guy's voice sounded almost pleading.
Elena stared at him for a moment, then as if all of a sudden she shamefully realized what she put him through every time she went shopping, "I'm extremely sorry Damon, I know it's hard for you to tolerate all this, but there's no way around it, you're suppose to be with me, and while shopping I can't help it, I just get carried away…," Damon simply cut her halfway through her rambling by placing his hands on her shoulders.
"It's alright Miss Gilbert, I get it, but once in a while you have to realize that I'm a guy and sometimes I need a break from such things." He tried saying that without being expressive but failed miserably, and internally he was having a debate with himself about even mentioning his displeasure to Elena, it was a part of his job he had to do it without any objection. Discarding all thoughts aside immediately, he just realized that he wanted to do nothing more than to escape this stupid place.
Suddenly Elena's face lit up with an idea, "Damon how about this, why don't you go and take a walk around the mall, buy anything you want, it's on daddy, and then meet me an hour later in front of the lobby."
Damon quietly stared at her for a moment as if she had gone insane, "You know Miss Gilbert I can't do that, it's my job not to leave you alone even for a second, I hardly do that while we're at home. How can you expect me to just do that while we're in a mall?" He gave her a fake smile as if showing his annoyance towards the obviousness of the situation.
"Come on Damon." Elena huffed, "It's not as if the world's gonna get off its axis, if you just take five minutes off for yourself."
"The answer is still the same Miss Gilbert; I'm not leaving you alone."
Elena raised a sleek eyebrow and stared hard at him, "Of course Damon, how can you leave me here all by myself? You care too much, you can't imagine the thought of leaving me alone for even a second, because you think something's gonna go wrong. Like something bad is gonna happen to me in your absence, right?"
Each and every word she spoke was full of sarcasm and something else, something else that Damon recognized really well. It was Miss Gilbert's wishful thinking. Or better yet, it was her trying to make him feel something he would never feel.
By looking at Damon's angry expression a small smile escaped Elena's lips, "You just can't bear the thought of me getting hurt, can you?"
Elena pouted prettily for a minute then sighed in disappointment after getting no response, "Oh come on Damon can't you just say that it would matter to you if I do get hurt. You have no idea how happy it will make me."
At first he simply glared at her, because somehow that felt true, he couldn't bear the thought of her getting hurt. She was someone innocent and if any such circumstance did arise of her getting hurt, then it would only be a result of her being Grysion Gilbert's daughter. She'll only get caught in-between the crossfire created by her father and his enemies, if ever. 'But was that it, or did it have something to do with it being her... What the hell are you thinking Salvatore? Snap out of it!'.
Damon gritted his teeth cause his thoughts had momentarily confused him, he raised his finger at Elena and replied, "You know full well that it's a part of my duty not to leave you, so you might as well leave this argument and get done with what it was that you were doing."
"Why are you so angry Damon?" She asked worriedly and moved forward to touch his face.
In response Damon side stepped her and shouted," I am not angry!" It caused Elena to take a step backwards. Instantly regretting his outburst, he moved forward and clasped his hands around her wrists to stop her from going any further.
Taking a few deep breaths he tried calming himself, he was angry with himself more than he was with Elena, he had a slight idea where his thought went off to, a few seconds ago. "Listen Miss Gilbert, I'm sorry about that…I…I guess you're right. I should take a break, think I'll get something to drink." With that Damon let go of her wrists and turned around.
Just as he crossed the threshold of the shop he said, "I'll see you in ten minutes, in the lobby."
Elena stared after him for a moment and sighed. 'Great! Gilbert you did it again, you managed to annoy him even more than he already was! Perfect.' Scolding herself, she gathered her stuff and headed towards the counter. After paying her bill she exited the shop and headed for the main lobby of the mall.
As she got of the escalator, that brought her to the ground floor she headed straight for the lobby. Turning around the corner of a long hallway deeply immersed in her thoughts, Elena collided with something that was inexplicable.
The impact of the contact was so great that Elena fell a few feet away from her previous position. She raised her head to see who it was that she had bumped in. And what she saw petrified her. There was a group of tall, broad angry looking men, all clad in dark suits, and they were staring at her as if she was a worthless piece of junk. Astonishingly they were also pointing guns at her, and it seemed as if they were waiting for an order to pull the triggers at once.
Elena's breath got caught in her throat and she froze. It was then she heard someone clearing their throat and saw a movement amidst the group of men. A man emerged at the front who was previously hidden behind the wall of all those angry men. He was different than the rest, for one he was older and held an authoritative air. He was wearing a perfectly fit gray suit and his entire presence spilled grace. Half of his light brown bangs fell into his dark brown eyes, eyes that sent a wave of shivers through her entire body. Gradually a frown covered his forehead, and his eyes widened slightly, the mere expression sent more shivers down Elena's spine. He bent and stretched his right hand forward and offered it to the girl, who coiled away from it on instinct. Her heart beat rapidly within her chest, she didn't know why it was doing that but something within her told her that she shouldn't be in their presence, and once again in peril her heart cried for Damon.
The rejection barely made a smile cross the man's face. As he straightened himself, one of the men standing behind him stepped towards him and began urgently, "Sir you do realize," but before he could complete his sentence the gray suited man cut him angrily , "I am very well aware of the current situation Jeremy, no need to outline things until necessary."
After responding to the man called Jeremy, the leader of the gang turned his attention towards Elena again. A smile crept up on his lips again as his eyes swept over her face once more. Elena could swear at the moment that she had never felt this vulnerable in her entire lifetime.
"Well Miss, it seems as if you are pretty content with your current position, as you've made quite obvious you don't need any assistance with getting up." The man said before directing his attention towards his group "Very well then, let's move men. I believe we had business to attend to before we got caught in this fortunate incident"
All the men nodded in unison and started following their 'leader' in the direction they were headed before, but after a couple of steps the 'leader' stopped and addressed Elena once more "Oh and one thing more Miss, I am terribly sorry for the rude behavior shown by my men earlier, hopefully We'll bump into each other again, no pun intended of course." And with one last smile he left her trembling on the floor.
So wanna guess who that was….
I know most of you might be disappointed with this as you guys couldn't wait for the camping chapter, I'm sorry about that but in time you'll see that this was important. Anyway hopefully you'll forgive me for the delay and I'll try for it to not happen again.