Greg paused in his shaving and admitted, "Well, I was pretty angry at first. I mean, being kidnapped twice in twenty-four hours, then finding out your captors are vampires can be a bit much."
Lissianna was pretty sure that could be considered a stressful day by anyone's standards.
"But then..." He hesitated, then said, "Thomas was wearing Spider-Man PJs."
She blinked in confusion at his words, and he laughed.
"I know that sounds weird, but it's hard to be scared or even angry at a guy in Spider-Man pajamas," Greg said helplessly. "Or you gals in your baby dolls for that matter, so I don't feel threatened. And then, your family kind of reminds me of my own."
Lissianna raised her eyebrows, finding it hard to believe his family could be anything like her own.
"Even Marguerite," he added. "My mom is the head of the family, too. She was widowed when we were little, and she ruled the roost. Like your own mother, she'd go a long way to protect or help one of her children. It's obvious there's a lot of love here and... well... you have to admit, it's pretty interesting. Fascinating even."
Lissianna wasn't sure about the fascinating part, but then she'd grown up as she was and with her family around her. It was all pretty normal and commonplace to her, so she said, "Do you have a large family then?"
"Not really. At least, I don't think so. I mean, no one's had ten or twelve kids or anything. Three seems to be the average, and most of them are female," he added with a grimace. "Of my mother's three sisters, only one is still with her husband. One's divorced and one is widowed like my mom. I have two sisters, about eight female cousins and one male cousin. Us guys are a minority."
"What about your father's side?"
"They haven't bothered much with us since Dad ran off with his secretary."
Lissianna frowned. "I thought your mother was widowed?"
"He died before they could divorce," Greg explained. "He and his girlfriend were killed just a week after they ran off. The secretary's husband crashed into the car they were in." Greg smiled wryly. "Mother tried not to be too smug about it, but she did quote the old saw 'you reap what you sow.'"
Lissianna bit her lip to keep back her smile, and asked, "Why did you become a psychologist?"
"Why?" He blew his breath out. "I guess I like to help people. There's no greater satisfaction than knowing you've helped someone get over something and made his or her life a little easier."
Lissianna felt admiration well up in her. "That's--"
"Before you say something nice, you should remember I also get paid to help them."
She laughed and shook her head, knowing he was being modest and probably uncomfortable at appearing too noble. "You could make just as much money at several other jobs and not be helping people."
Greg shrugged and turned back to the mirror. "Why aren't you married?"
Lissianna blinked at the question, opened her mouth to answer, then paused and narrowed her eyes as she recalled she was supposed to be asking questions now. Rather than remind him of that, she simply asked, "Why aren't you?"
His gaze met hers in the mirror, and she almost expected him to argue that he'd asked first, but then he answered, "I almost was."
Lissianna arched an eyebrow. "Almost?"
Greg nodded, his attention on shaving as he said, "Meredith. I met her the first week of the first year of university. I rescued her from an abusive boyfriend outside the university pub. We hit it off and started dating." He shrugged. "We dated for two years, and everyone started expecting we'd marry, so I proposed and everyone started going crazy making wedding arrangements."
"What happened?" Lissianna asked curiously.
Greg sighed and peered down into the sink as he rinsed the razor. "The closer the wedding got, the more anxious I got about the whole thing. Everyone kept saying it was just cold feet, so I kept letting it go; but about a month before the wedding my psychology professor said I seemed off and asked me what was wrong." He paused to explain, "The wedding was set to take place the week after end of term.
"Anyway," Greg continued, "he asked, and I blurted everything out. I don't think I made much sense. He took me down to the break room, gave me a coffee, and got me talking. We were there forever, but by the time I left, I knew I couldn't marry Meredith. The next day I broke it to her, then changed my major to psychology."
Lissianna's eyes widened. "You weren't a psychology major at the time?"
Greg grinned and shook his head. "Journalism, and while I liked it well enough, as far as 1 was concerned, that professor saved me a lot of grief. I wanted to do that for others."
Lissianna considered what he'd said, then considered what he hadn't said and asked, "From one talk with him you were able to see that Meredith wasn't right for you?"
"Not exactly. That one talk made me look at the things that had been bothering me for months, the reasons behind why I was getting anxious about the wedding."