Disco Night (open)

She held up a hand.

"I have to stop you there. Whatever is between Chase and I, to my knowledge, he never cheated on me."

"His unsustainable economic fantasies and need to have a harem settle it for me. "

Her lips twitched, only somewhat amused.

"He does like his harems."

"Primitive hunter king with his women. The strong survive, society stagnates, and the heroic ideal dies among disease, poverty and suffering. "

She winced.

"Ouch. I was just reduced to a woman of a hunter-king. Yeesh."

Victor laughed "Sorry. You are better than that. But back to reputation. You've got a reputation for honesty, but most of our sort who have any sort of standing tend to at least keep the letter of our word and bond. But that's not why Miyu let you operate on her. My banker sense told me I could trust you, not to keep the letter of a bargain, but to actually do the right thing because it was right."

She thought about that, then took a sip of scotch.

"You know, my giving Miyu back her voice and fixing your leg had nothing at all to do with doing the right thing. I just don't like to see people struggling. If I can change that, I usually will."

"That is the right thing to you" he smiled "You don't like to see people struggle, and if you can fix it, you will. Therefore, it is the correct and right thing for you. I don't like to see hard working people in crippling poverty, so the right thing for me is to try and change that circumstance when I encounter it as best I can."

Victor took a long sip of his drink and continued. "The right thing is nebulous and circumstantial at times."

She smirked a little.

"Once upon a time, that was what Chase lived for, you know."

"And so now he's changed, but still runs off the momentum of whatever reputation for doing the right thing he developed at the time?"

He drained his glass and debated a refill before deciding against it.

"A man like Chase needs to channel his arrogance into doing the right thing, or he loses sight of it, in the light of his own grandeur and magnificence. This..." Victor smirked "I know from experience"

She tilted her head at him and grinned.

"Did I tell you that I threw a chair at his head?"

"Poor chair" he laughed

She leaned forward and laughed.

"Killed the chair. But he deserved it! Oh, my God, so get this..."

She leaned forward, getting into what was surely 'gossip' mode.

"The night of the dance performance, Erik waited around for me to close up so that he could take me to dinner and then drive me home. So I'm sitting there, eating french toast with Erik and Chase sends me a text message. Says he needs to talk and could I please meet him. I ask him where, he says his study, says that someone took cell phone video of me dancing and it's all over the internet. I told him that I was busy having dinner but would come over after, and he gets all pissy at me, wanting to discuss my 'dinner with the young man who seems to have very quickly replaced' him. So I asked what there was to discuss, because the boy was buying me french toast and tea -- and then it dawned on me that Chase was probably spying on me. So I asked him as much."

She took another drink of her scotch.

"He didn't outright say yes. But he said it was the only way he could see me -- and I think I just right this minute understood the significance of how he didn't directly answer my question. That bastard."

She leaned forward and grinned.

"So I went over there, gave him a hug. He tried to kiss me and I stopped him, because I had just that night talked to Erik and we were discussing the possibility of actually seeing each other exclusively." How's that one for you? Yes, a Kindred, talking about actually being faithful to a mere human... shocking, that. Not sarcasm, either. It really was weird. She had respect for Erik, which was easily heard in her voice. "So then we start to argue. And he said something stupid. So I threw a chair at his head. Oh, I remember what it was. Something about how he bailed for me, to protect me and how he couldn't send me a message. I told him to buy an owl or a carrier pigeon or something because I didn't need to know where he was, just that he was alive. That's all I needed. But he couldn't even give me that. Scratch that -- he wouldn't give me that."

She took another sip of her scotch.

"Apparently, I wasn't important enough to even say 'Hey, I'm working, but I'm alive' to."

Victor growled and made grabby hands at the bottle again.

"That man needs taught a lesson in civility and manners."

She gave up pouring liquor into the glass and just sat the nearly-empty bottle in front of him. Then she reached behind the bar to produce another bottle of the very fine scotch so that they could both keep drinking.

She shook her head with a snort. "Apparently, my job was to stay at home and bake fucking cookies and fall over in a swoon when he got back. And then he wonders how it is that I can look at this guy who is super sweet, asks me out to dinner and then just hangs out and drinks coffee until I'm ready to leave and think 'you know, maybe I should give that guy a chance'. I mean, tell me honestly. Is it that difficult to figure out why?"

Victor poured more liquor into his glass... he was an American, but he wasn't a savage like Covington after all.

"I honestly wish I could kick his butt. I would take pleasure in that."

She leaned slightly forward and grinned.

"I can. And have. And he's lucky that the wall was what I was actually aiming at. If I had hit him in the head with that chair, there's a good chance he wouldn't be walking around right now."

Victor scowled. "Hmmph. Old people and their old people powers."

She giggled and shook her head, taking a drink from her bottle of scotch.

"No, that's because he riled up my Scottish temper. And there was a chair near me."

"Sure" he chuckled. "You know handling money has helped me learn to see the brighter side of things"

Her brow rose.

"How so?"

"Because money is labor and hopes and dreams. Sign a mortgage loan, and you are making the dream of raising a family, growing old and seeing your grandchildren play in the backyard. It becomes a lifetime of Christmas and birthdays, joy and sadness... it becomes a fulfilled dream. And I get to make it come true. "

She smiled, a little sadly.

"A dream none of us will ever be able to have fulfilled."

"I get to live it vicariously "

She smiled.

"That only works sometimes. You think I should do a country music night in here? Cowboy boots, cowboy hat, line dancing? Shake things up a little?"