P E R S E P H O N E

So concentrated is John that when Elena’s words reach him, he almost gives himself a start. His own brows raise slightly at her accusation, though her perception is far less surprising. That’s his cousin, after all: she would hardly be the ‘ queen bee ’ among the girls at school if she wasn’t half as insightful as she is. Regardless, John isn’t to be coerced quite so easily.

“I can’t believe you’d even think of that,” he hums, considering Elena innocently with a widening of his earnest hazel eyes ( really, it’s for the best that he’s predisposed to be as honest as his appearance suggests; he could wreak havoc with it, otherwise ). “But you could be underestimating me, y’know!” He nudges her lightly as a grin works its way along his lips. “What — can I not have secret schemes?”

     “really now?” elena allows the inquiry to fall from her lips in an aghast tone. as if she wouldn’t think of that? she was elena gilbert and no schemes got passed her. brows rise in response to her cousin’s features and elena almost has to fight back a smirk. was it her, rather than iago, who was truly doing the corrupting? “oh, i don’t underestimate you, johnny. i just didn’t expect you to use your gifts for evil!” not that she believes for a moment-- at least yet-- that whatever he was cooking up had ill intentions. 

     light hues reflect the distant flashing lights of a single cop car outside the gates of the cemetery (two personal vehicles unseen) as elena stands outside yellow crime scene tape. another body found drained of blood, she suspects, though no one’s confirmed anything. golden girl or not, she was a teenager who’d merely been using the cemetery as her usual short-cut to school and happened upon the scene. all events considered, it perhaps didn’t make sense she’d chosen that route-- at least not on the surface-- but elena had wanted to stop by her parents' graves. police officer speaks to the sheriff in hushed tones though the name of her cousin doesn’t go unnoticed by the blonde. elena didn’t much like the idea that she might have to lie, or in the least omit, her suspicions from him but what choice would she have? elena wasn’t about to have her cousin thrown into the ring with stefan’s vampiric brother-- fbi training or not. in any case, it seemed there’d be no school for the queen bee that day given she’d have to make a statement about finding the body.