And here I go, beating myself up again for acting like a typical heroine from a romance novel. It was spectacular whatever it was, and it would be grand if it was genuine.

Apparently, I can’t leave a good thing alone; I mean it was amazing in the cafe, but am I the first one he’s shared his thoughts with like this? If that’s what it was.

How many times has he seduced women right in their minds with some handy-dandy vampire trick? If that’s what he is.

“Not that I’m complaining, just… you hardly know me. How many girls have you used that on?”

I toss a smile I mean to be humorous up at him, to take the sting out, but really, I’m starting to feel pretty dumb and more than ashamed for having fallen all over him. He’s got to be, well, possibly ancient, and if so, likely pretty powerful, and he must have had his pick of women over the centuries. Or he’s not any of those things and he’s gone to a lot of trouble if he’s a mortal for little old me. Well I can’t imagine any ordinary human guy going to that amount of effort for me so if he is some sort of supernatural life form; I suppose I’d like to know just how effortless and lighthearted a conquest I am to him. If I’ve set a new ‘shortest use of the ‘whammy’ before complete seduction’ record with him.

I’m walking along beside him, and then I’m not; I’m spun right around and I bump into a lamppost or a large mailbox. No, it’s him, and his lips are pressed into a thin, flat line and his already pale skin has gone snowstorm white. I have an impression of immediate rage, and indignation? and just as I focus on the reality of being able to hear his thoughts again, I lose the sense of what he is feeling.