Leo met Lexi's cautious gaze again. He could read the clear warning in her eyes: if he dared to attack Stefan, she would retaliate instantly, and her target wouldn't be him—it would be Elena, sitting right in front of her. It was a classic predator's move, going for what an opponent cares about most.
He also scanned the crowded grill.If anything supernatural happened—If he were to use any power here, anything beyond human capability, and someone saw it… that would create a huge problem. Questions, panic, exposure. It was a risk he couldn't take lightly. And on top of that, there was Lexi herself. She was fast, old, and cunning. If she decided to go after Elena in the chaos, even he might not be able to stop her without revealing everything.
Keeping all these calculations in mind, Leo let the moment pass. He broke eye contact with Lexi, reached for his glass of water, and took a slow, deliberate sip. It was a gesture of forced calm, a way to buy time and show he wasn't acting on impulse.
At the other side of the table, Lexi was still chatting with Elena. Their conversation had moved to lighter topics—school events, town gossip—but it was clearly winding down. The initial, probing questions had been asked. Now, they were just filling the space, two women maintaining a polite, surface-level social exchange.
Stefan, meanwhile, sat in complete silence beside Leo. After Leo's direct threat, he had withdrawn. He wasn't looking at anyone. His eyes were fixed on a point somewhere in the middle of the crowded room,lost in his own thoughts of dread and strategy.
As he sat there, surrounded by this tense standoff, Leo's mind drifted back to earlier in the day. When he was alone in his home, he had been testing the limits of what he could do, exploring the powers he now possessed. That's when he remembered. In all the chaos since transmigrating into this world—dealing with vampires, the locket, Elena, Damon—he had been so focused on the immediate physical threats and the plot that he had completely forgotten one of his most… interesting abilities.
It was a special power, simple in its phrasing but profound in its effect. The power of desire: What is it you desire?
A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched his lips as he recalled it. This power wasn't about force or destruction. It was about truth. If he asked that question while looking directly into someone's eyes, they would be compelled to answer. They couldn't help but spill out their deepest, most secret desire, the thing buried closest to their heart.They would be utterly unable to lie or resist.
He hadn't used it even once since arriving here. He'd been too busy in managing crises. But now, sitting across from a centuries-old vampire who was sizing him up, and next to a brooding one who saw him as a devil, the potential of this forgotten power suddenly seemed very appealing.
Leo then placed his glass back on the table with a soft clink. The idea was fully formed now, a spark of dark curiosity in the midst of the tense standoff. He turned his attention to Lexi, interrupting her conversation with Elena with a tone that was deliberately casual, almost playful.
"Hmm, Lexi," he said, a faint smile on his lips. "Looks like you're liking Elena more than us. But you don't have to forget about me and Stefan." He turned his head to look pointedly at Stefan, who was sitting stiffly beside him, and gave him a cold, knowing smile. "Isn't that right, Stefan?"
Stefan's jaw clenched, just a little. He didn't say anything back. His green eyes moved quickly from Leo's face to Lexi's and back again. He didn't understand what Leo was doing, and not knowing felt like its own kind of pain.
Leo turned his attention fully back to Lexi. He put on a friendly face, but it was all fake. Lexi looked right back at him and decided to play the game. She smiled a big, bright smile that was just as fake as his. She tilted her head to the side, pretending to be curious.
"How could I ever forget you?" she said, her voice sugary and sweet. "Even when I'm having a nice talk with Elena, there's something about you, Leo, that always pulls my focus. It's very distracting."She was flirting with him, obviously and on purpose, and she was doing it right in front of his girlfriend, Elena.
On the side, Elena listened.A heavy, awkward feeling started to build up inside her, mixed with confusion. She didn't get the quiet, dangerous thing happening right in front of her. Lexi was a complete stranger to her, just someone Stefan knew. Elena barely knew Stefan herself. This was the first time they were all meeting, and Lexi had done all the talking—firing one question after another at her without a pause. Elena hadn't had a single chance to ask a question back. It didn't feel like someone trying to be friends. It felt more like she was being investigated.Now,this flirty comment toward Leo just added a layer of uncomfortable weirdness to the whole encounter.
Leo chuckled softly at Lexi's words. "Am I really that attractive to you, Lexi?"he asked, his tone going along with her flirting while steering it toward his own goal."Anyway, since we're getting along so well, I should tell you… I know a magic trick. A special one. Do you want to try it?"
The feeling around the table changed in a second.Lexi's perfectly composed expression became a fraction tighter, more guarded. Her first, instinctive thought was no. This was the "devil" Stefan had warned her about. Who knew what kind of trick or trap this was? But her strategic mind quickly evaluated the situation. Elena was here, a shield and a source of leverage. From her subtle questioning, Lexi had gathered that Elena and Leo were deeply in love. That bond was Leo's primary weakness in this moment. Furthermore, Stefan's chances with Elena were nonexistent as long as Leo was alive.Perhaps this "magic trick" was an opportunity—a chance to see a glimpse of his power firsthand, to assess the threat.
She let her body settle back into her wooden chair. She made sure her posture looked loose and interested, like someone relaxing at a show. It was an act, a careful performance of calm.
"Alright," she said, her voice kept light and easy. "Why not? I've always liked a good magic trick." She was saying yes. It was a clear answer to his unspoken challenge
A flicker of pure, hot jealousy passed through Elena. Her eyes snapped to Leo. He's never shown me any magic trick, she thought, hurt mixing with her earlier irritation. But this stranger shows up, flirts with him, and he's immediately offering to perform for her? She looked at him, waiting for him to notice her displeasure, to include her.
Leo, however, was completely focused on Lexi. This was the test. This was the moment to use the power he'd forgotten. All his attention was narrowed to the centuries-old vampire across from him. He didn't see Elena's wounded look.
"Okay, Lexi," he said, his voice dropping into a softer, more intimate tone, despite the noisy surroundings.Even with the background noise of the place, his words cut through clearly."First," he continued, the word simple and heavy, "you just need to relax." It didn't sound like a suggestion or a friendly tip. It sounded like an instruction.
Lexi did not relax. Not one bit. Every muscle in her body stayed tight and ready, coiled to move in an instant if she had to. But she did as he asked in one way: she fixed her hazel eyes directly on his. She looked into the deep, dark brown of his irises, her gaze sharp and focused, looking for the sign of any compulsion or trick she knew from the vampire world.
Leo met her look and did not look away. He didn't blink. He leaned forward, just a little, from his chair. His own gaze held hers, trapped it. The clattering dishes and talking voices in the Grill around them seemed to grow quiet, becoming a low, muffled background sound. For that moment, it felt like they were the only two people there, locked in a quiet, staring battle.
Then Leo spoke. The words were simple, quiet, but they carried a weight that seemed to vibrate in the air between them.
"Lexi," he said, his voice a low, compelling murmur. "Tell me. What is it you desire?"
The question didn't fade away. It stayed there, fixed in the quiet space between their faces. This wasn't a normal question, like asking what she wanted to drink. It was different.
It was an order, pushed forward by the old, deep-down power that belonged to the King of Hell. That power didn't care about clever lies or the walls people put up in their minds. It went straight through all of that. Its only goal was to dig down and find the truest, most hidden want that lived in the very center of a person. It demanded that truth to come out.
....
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