vampire diaries the return shadow souls | Page 6

up off his back. �Matt�oh, my God! Are you all right? Are you hurt?� Elena cried at the same time as Matt was shouting in tones of anguish:
�Elena�oh, my God! Is the Jag all right? Is it hurt?� �Matt, are you crazy? Did you hit your head?�
�Are there any scratches? Does the moonroof still work?�
�No scratches. The moonroof is fine.� Elena had no idea if the moonroof worked, but she realized that Matt was raving, off his head. He was trying
to get down without getting any mud on the Jag, but he was handicapped since his legs and feet were covered with mud. Getting off of the car without
using his feet was proving difficult.
Meanwhile, Elena was looking around. She herself had once fallen from the sky, yes, but she had been dead for six months first and had arrived
naked, and Matt fulfilled neither requirement. She had a more prosaic explanation in mind.
And there it was, lounging against a yellowwood tree and eyeing the scene with a very slight, wicked smile.
Damon.
He was compact; not as tall as Stefan, but with an indefinable aura of menace that more than made up for it. He was as immaculately dressed as
always: black Armani jeans, black shirt, black leather jacket, and black boots, which all went with his carelessly windblown dark hair and his black eyes.
Right now, he made Elena acutely aware that she was wearing a long white nightgown that she had brought with the idea that she could change
her clothes underneath it if necessary while they were camping. The problem was that she usually did this just at dawn, and today writing in her diary had
distracted her. And all at once the nightgown wasn�t the correct attire for an early- morning fight with Damon. It wasn�t sheer, being more akin to flannel than
to nylon, but it was lacy, especially around the neck. Lace around a pretty neck to a vampire�as Damon had told her�was like a waving red cloak in front
of a raging bull.
Elena crossed her arms over her chest. She also tried to make sure that her aura was pulled in decorously.
�You look like Wendy,� Damon said, and his smile was wicked, flashing, and definitely appreciative. He cocked his head to the side coaxingly.
Elena refused to be coaxed. �Wendy who?� she said, and at just that moment remembered the last name of the young girl in Peter Pan, and
winced inwardly. Elena had always been good at repartee of this kind. The problem was that Damon was better.

�Why, Wendy�Darling,� Damon said, and his voice was a caress.
Elena felt an inward shiver. Damon had promised not to Influence her�to use his telepathic powers to cloud or manipulate her mind. But
sometimes it felt as if he got awfully close to the line. Yes, it was definitely Damon�s fault, Elena thought. She didn�t have any feelings for him that were
�well, that were anything other than sisterly. But Damon never gave up, no matter how many times she rejected him.
Behind Elena was a thump and squelch that undoubtedly meant Matt had finally gotten off the roof of the Jag. He jumped into the fray immediately.
�Don�t call Elena, Elena darling!� he shouted, continuing as he turned to Elena, �Wendy�s probably the name of his latest little girlfriend. And�and
�and do you know what he did? How he woke me up this morning?� Matt was quivering with indignation.
�He picked you up and threw you on top of the car?� Elena hazarded. She talked over her shoulder to Matt because there was a faint morning
breeze that tended to mold her nightgown to her body. She didn�t want Damon behind her just now.
�No! I mean, yes! No and yes! But�when he did, he didn�t even bother to use his hands! He just went like this��Matt waved an arm��and first I
got dropped into a mud hole and next thing I know I got dropped on the Jag. It could have broken the moonroof�or me! And now I�m all muddy,� Matt
added, examining himself with disgust, as if it had only just occurred to him.
Damon spoke up. �And why did I pick you up and put you down again? What were you actually doing at the time when I put some distance
between us?�
Matt flushed to the roots of his fair hair. His normally tranquil blue eyes were blazing. �I was holding a stick,� he said defiantly.
�A stick. A stick like the kind you find along the roadside? That kind of stick?� �I did pick it up along the roadside, yes!� Still defiant.
�But then something strange seems to have happened to it.� From nowhere that Elena could see, Damon suddenly produced a very long, and very
sturdy-looking stake, with one end that had been whittled to an extremely sharp point. It had definitely been carved from hardwood: oak from the look of it.
While Damon was examining his