It was another night as usual: play around on the laptop to get two online comp classes done, get to the two ag classes, and then fiddle around with the laptop in another comp class before heading home. The teacher had left something in the greenhouse for her and had given her a key to it so she could get into it. She had to use a little vampiric persuasion, of course. She'd told her she wouldn't be able to make the plant sale during the day, but she could buy a couple of things in advance and pick them up after her classes. Her teacher, fortunately, had been mortal - and so easy to manipulate. Now she headed to pick up the plants she'd bought. Once she got them home, she could practice her agricultural skills outside the classroom with plants she'd helped to raise in the classroom. One of them, in fact, had been her project plant throughout the quarter.

Now she was heading over to the greenhouse to get the plants so she could take them home. She was almost there when she slowed to a stop, stunned. THERE HE WAS. That sexy man, that handsome devil. He was the one she spent her days having wet dreams about. He was the one she wanted to jump every time she saw him - or rather, she wanted him to jump her. God, she wanted him...but bad. She'd heard he was taken, but she could care less. What she wouldn't give for just one night of passion with that hunk...

...that hunk, of course, being one of the most powerful vampires in Demaitre. His name was Marcus.

She felt like a lovesick little girl again as she watched him walk across the campus, every stride a teasing reminder of how bad she wanted him. If vampires could sweat, she would have been drenched by now and red as a Washington apple. Were vampires able to breathe, she would have been breathless. She hadn't felt this hot under the collar - which in this case was a hot-pink tube top (as she was trying out new colors to see how she liked them; she'd never thought much of pink, but she was old and her tastes had changed somewhat over the last six decades) - since...well...ever. Even her sire hadn't done this to her, though he'd come close. What was it about that god of a man that made her body ache so? What was it about that demon of desire that made her want to feel his fingers - not to mention the rest of him - all over her like skin on a potato? God, she wanted that man...

Marcus’s evening had not gone well.

Nearly three quarters of the students in the orchestra had refused to focus on the pieces at hand, instead preferring to let their minds wander off toward their plans for the impending Easter break. Or, if not that, they were preoccupied by the workload leading up to said break. He had found out, of course, by eavesdropping on stray thoughts once their first arrangement of the evening had gone sour. Regardless, the end product of their distraction had been several wasted hours of fouled notes and mistimed entries, resulting in mildly annoyed pupils and an extremely agitated conductor.

Marcus knew that they were capable of better, particularly with so many of them attending university on a music scholarship. He wouldn’t have considered working with them if the truth were otherwise. Their lack of apparent passion for their art dismayed him; he had expected more than just a tiny dedicated handful of performers from such bright young students.

This was why his stride was quick and angry as he crossed the campus. His left hand was a veritable fist around the handle of his violin case, and the other restlessly twirled the key ring that held the keys to his Corvette around his index finger, only to be snapped to a halt in his palm every few seconds. If this kept up, he’d have to take control of every single one of them during a performance, just to maintain his reputation.

He stopped walking abruptly as that last bitter musing crossed his mind, and released a slow sigh. This was bothering him far too much; they were still only children, after all. He couldn’t expect perfection; in all reality, he should be grateful of the fact that anyone in this day and age still bothered with traditional instruments. In theory, anyone with a computer and a database of notes could create the same music as a full orchestra.

As his temper cooled, Marcus glanced around the mostly empty campus, and paused as his eyes caught on a young woman who seemed to be openly staring at him. He subtly arched a brow in her direction as he realized that she seemed vaguely familiar, though he couldn’t quite place her. One swift psychic whiff informed him that she was a vampire, and that in itself was worth wondering over; there weren’t many that could get away with being a university student. Even fewer who would take the time and expense to bother.

Of course, he was assuming; it was entirely possible that she was lurking about on a less innocent agenda. With that thought came a slight narrowing of eyes; the vast majority of the prey out and about at that hour were likely to be his students, and he was not about to lose a single one of their precious, if fainéant, hides.

He pocketed his keys, and began to close the distance between himself and the other vampire, forcing a disarming smile to his lips as he went.

He was looking at her...he was coming toward her! She didn't know quite what to do. Had she been mortal, she really would have been red now. She didn't know why. After all, it wasn't unusual for her to hook up with some hot guy for a night or two. So why did Marcus have her all hot and bothered. She found herself leaning against a tree nearby very soon, though, and smiling weakly back at him. It took her three tries to speak, and even then it was soft (though never to soft for a vampire, of course, especially one as powerful as Marcus) and hesitant.

"H-hi...Marcus. We meet again."

God, that body...those firm muscles...that tight ass...

‘H-hi...Marcus. We meet again.’

So they had met before. Mostly out of practice, Marcus kept the smile on his face, performing a courtly half-bow as he combed through his internal collection of vampire records in an effort to place a name to the woman before him. This was why he had Tasia and the digital records she was creating for him; there just wasn’t any other feasible way to keep track of nearly two and half thousand years worth of faces.

After a second or two of fruitless searching in his own mind, he surrendered and swiftly extracted the name out of the girl’s memory, ideally without leaving a trace of the tiny invasion. “Good evening, Ms. Jaeger,” he greeted in return as he straightened up from the bow. “For what reason are you wandering the campus tonight, if you don’t mind my asking?”

While he played at being oblivious to her flustered state, he had, in reality, made note of it, and had already come to two conclusions: she was either afraid of being caught at something, or his presence was exciting her for an entirely different reason.

Given the glimpse he had caught of his own rear end being predominant in her thoughts, he was willing to bet on the latter, and for a moment his smile became more bemused than polite.

"Oh, um...not much, y'know...just, um...classes. Having cla-taking classes. Yeah...I'm finished now, though," she said brightly - more brightly than was obviously her usual manner. "What about yourself, hun-er, Marcus! I mean...how are you tonight?"

She cleared her throat a bit too noisily, as though she actually had something stuck in it. Could vampires choke? She didn't know, but it was a very human - a very mortal - habit and she really had to berate herself for it. She hadn't done that in a very long time, and now she did it as she once more made a fool of herself before this undead god that stalked the earth, forever sexy...er, forever damned. Yeah, that was what she meant. Really. She blinked, her thoughts no doubt betraying her, though she said nothing else. She really did look rather meek at the moment - something she most definitely was not in most instances.

It was always something of an embarrassment for Marcus when a normally respectable woman, mortal or vampire, seemed to lose their ability to conduct themselves in a controlled manner in favor of falling to pieces in an effort not to fawn all over him. It had been more enjoyable in his younger days (his first few centuries of life, that is), when he’d had a more flirtatious attitude in virtually all of his encounters, and enjoyed the provided ego stroking with relish. However, after so very many years of such behavior, his ego was as inflated as it was going to get.

And, as of the last handful of years, he’d had Colum in his life, more often than not, and Colum respected monogamy. Meaning, Marcus rarely allowed himself to flirt back, unless he was wooing his next dinner date.

The result of the latter was that Marcus maintained an exterior of polite interest as Ms. Jaegar stuttered her way through an explanation as to her presence on-campus, acting as if he was failing to notice her awkward behavior that now undoubtedly sprung from a burning attraction to the Amman leader.

“I admire your willingness to continue a formal education,” he commented idly. “And I suppose I’m fairing well, though I’ve certainly had better nights.” Briefly, his expression soured; evidently he still hadn’t quite forgiven his students for their lack of commitment that evening. “What is it that you study?”

She was clearing her throat again as she prepared to answer him.

Stop that, dammit, you fool woman! That's exactly what you are now! A woman, not some stupid little girl! Get aholt of yourself already!

But her thoughts did nothing to harden her features as she stammered out a response to his rather simple question. If anything, in fact, she grew even paler (if that was possible). Had she been mortal, she would have been flushing as dark as air-exposed mortal blood. God, how she wanted him...it was all she could do not to fall before him right then and there, practically clawing him in an attempt to latch herself onto every fibre of his being as she kissed that manly chest, those muscled arms, those strong cheeks - all the while pinching and squeezing his other cheeks and begging him to take her for his own. She hardly noticed the shake of her own head as she tried desperately to bring herself crashing back into harsh reality, thereby metaphorically slamming her head into the ground in order to knock some semblance of sense into it. All the while, she was struggling (and failing) to maintain her womanly dignity and usual supreme confidence.

"Computer classes, mostly, but agg classes as well," she said in a rush, her words like a bullet train heading for the other side for all the speed they'd gained in the last three seconds. They could have driven her to the moon in under an hour for their haste alone. "And, um...you, hot stuff?"

Realizing her error at once, she drew a sharp, panicky breath.

"I mean, Marcus!"

Another clearing of the throat.

Stop that!

Discreetly, Marcus constructed a shield around his mind to block out the rush of rather vivid imagery that was slipping into his consciousness due to Ms. Jaegar’s excited state. It wasn’t to protect his less-than-delicate sensibilities where such things were concerned, but rather to protect his opinion of the woman opposite him. He could do nothing about the stammering and Freudian slips, unfortunately, but they were easier to ignore than the wave of erotica being broadcasted into his psychic eye.

A smile slipped past his composed expression as she addressed him as “hot stuff”—that wasn’t something he normally heard outside of clubs—and he came to the decision that he needed to say a little something if they were going to continue to have any form of normal conversation. “You can relax a little, Colleen. I’m aware that you are attracted to me, and I’m flattered, but there’s no reason to be on edge about it.

“As for my business on campus, I’m the conductor for the university orchestra.”

Well, that was good to know - kind of. That he was flattered only made things worse, really. Were she a mortal girl, her heart would have been racing; her pulse would have made a doctor panic; she would have been all over him in an instant, too. But she was a vampire - a vampire of eighty or so years, at that. This was no way for a woman to behave. She desperately struggled to gain control of herself and actually managed it to some extent before she spoke again - but she couldn't help her thoughts, despite all her attempts to ignore them. After all, how could one ignore the tempting scent of passion, the sounds of ecstacy as she called out his name, that firm body lying close to hers as she dragged her fingernails across his skin ever-so-lightly. She wanted to please him, she wanted to woo him - overall, she just wanted him. Badly.

"Oh," she said to the part about him being the music director, "well, that's cool."

Her voice was relatively calm, though her thoughts betrayed her in an instant to anyone nearby that might not have been entirely mortal. She really wasn't sure what else to say, though, other than some lame excuse that would (hopefully) get him into bed with her. She'd had plenty of practice with that, of course, but it usually involved mental manipulation as well as smooth womanly charm.