Elena twisted in the tight space. Her eyes searched Matt's. They had, after all, been boyfriend and girlfriend for quite a while last year. Elena saw the look in Matt's blue eyes: hewanted to kiss her, as much as he could want anything after that pain. And he realized that she'd had to go through all that fancy footwork to save him from Damon.
Somehow, we'll get out, Elena thought to him. Now, will you cooperate? Some boys didn't have buttons in the selfish sensations area of their brain. Some, like Matt, had buttons labeledHONOR or GUILT .
Now Matt held still as she took his face between her hands, tilting it down and going up on her toes to kiss him, because he'd grown so much. She thought of their first real kiss, in his car on the way home from a minor school dance. He'd been terrified, his hands damp, his whole interior quaking. She'd been cool, experienced, gentle.
And so she was now, drawing a warm tongue tip to melt his frozen lips apart. And just in case Damon was eavesdropping on her thoughts, she kept them strictly on Matt, on his sunshiny looks and his warm friendship and on the gallantry and courtesy that he had always shown to her, even when she broke up with him. She wasn't aware when his arms went around her shoulders or when he took control of the kiss, like a person dying of thirst who's finally found water. She could see it clearly in his mind: he'd never thought he'd kiss Elena Gilbert like this again.
Elena didn't know how long it lasted. Finally she unwound her arms from around Matt's neck and stepped back.
And then she realized something. It was no accident that Damon had sounded like a film director. He was holding up a palm-sized video camera, staring into the viewfinder. He'd captured the whole thing.
With Elena clearly visible. She had no idea what had happened to the disguising baseball cap and dark glasses. Her hair was disordered and her breathing came quickly, involuntarily. The blood had risen to the surface of her skin. Matt didn't look much more together than she felt.
Damon looked up from the viewfinder.
"What do you want that for?" Matt growled in tones completely unlike his normal voice. The kiss had affected him, too, Elena thought. More so than her.
Damon picked up his branch again and again waved the end of it like a Japanese fan. Pine aroma wafted by Elena. He looked considering, as though he might ask for a retake, then changed his mind, smiled brilliantly at them, and tucked the video camera into a pocket.
"All you need to know is that it was a perfect take."
"Then we're leaving." The kiss seemed to have given Matt new strength, even if it was for saying the wrong type of things. "Right now."
"Oh, no, but keep that dominant, aggressive attitude. As you remove her shirt."
"What?"
Damon repeated the words in the tones of a director giving an actor complicated instructions.
"Undo the buttons of her shirt, please, and take it off."
"You'recrazy ." Matt turned and looked at Elena, stopped aghast to see the expression on her face, the single tear running down the eye not hidden.
"Elena..."
He moved around, but she moved too. He couldn't get her to look him in the face. At last, she stopped, stood with her eyes down and leaking tears. He couldfeel the heat radiating from her cheeks.
"Elena, let's fight him. Don't you remember how you fought the bad things in Stefan's room?"
"But this is worse, Matt. I've never felt anything this bad before. This strong. It's - pressing on me."
"You don't mean we should give in to him...?"That was what Mattsaid and he sounded as if he were on the verge of being ill. What his clear blue eyes said was simpler. They said:No. Not if he kills me for refusing.
"I mean..." Elena turned suddenly back to Damon. "Let him go," she said. "This is between you and me. Let's settle it ourselves." She was damned well going to save Matt, even if he didn't want to be saved.
I'll do what you want,she thought as hard as she could to Damon, hoping he would pick some of it up. After all, he'd bled her against her will - at least initially - before. She could live through him doing it again.
"Yes, you'll doeverything I want," Damon said, proving that he could read her