At the mention of love, Damien instinctually recoiled, feeling suddenly too vulnerable and exposed. Kerr would most likely feel a bashful withdrawal for only the briefest of moments, almost imperceivable as Damien tucked the feeling down deep somewhere far away from him and re-established himself as secure and calm in the conversation.
Love had never been and would never be part of the equation between Rachel and himself; it couldn't be. Rachel had been denied too much in her life to also be denied the rites of passage of being a human woman: living on her own, lack of supervision, having a career, a husband, children... He had no right to ask for anything that would take any of that away from her. Damien would never be so selfish, despite his growing fondness and protectiveness of her. And yet...
He had begun to spend many of his days embracing her in their bed, talking about things that would make her laugh, enjoying the feel of his lips in the corner of her eye more than anything he could remember. She brought out of him a tenderness and a warmth that he had forgotten he could experience. He had the habit of laughing again, looking on his cell phone at strange fish found at the bottom of the sea, naked with her curled on his chest. He took her to the beach and found her clamshells ringed with purple and teased her with stinking crab husks. During the day, he would lay on her chest, cuddling one breast and listening to the beating of her heart as she stroked his hair. Damien would often lose himself in the feeling, remembering (imagining) what it was like to have a pulsing heart as he drifted to sleep.
There was no vibrancy of life with him; beyond what money could buy he had so little to offer her, his own life lacking in the complexity that made life worth living.
Damien chose not to acknowledge the comment about love anymore than he already had (and completely unsure of how to!). He chewed on Kerr's response for a brief moment instead. The comment about Jake, however, confused him considerably, his furrowed brow reflecting this. "Jake has done no wrong by me. I had gambled on his rashness and his impulsive desire for blood to give me what I wanted: the access to potentially confidential city documents and city personnel to hunt and kill a demon in an act of vigilante justice." He passed images of the conversation he and Jake had that night through their tether to color in the details of what Damien had missed, especially the staredown that had taken place between them, antagonized by Damien himself. The elder had presented the Central District Leader with a direct challenge, despite knowing that hunting demons now has political implications at the time, and Jake McCloud had taken the higher road.
"In a gesture of maturity and growth, he denied my request on fair, political grounds: he would not justify a manhunt as I described. Instead, he asked for the information to pass around to the other District Leaders and the City Ward, with his own personal team doing the bulk of the investigating separate from the city's resources and funding. More than this, he will not tell me. He has assured me, however, that he is doing this regardless of my status in his campaign. My agreeance to be his campaign manager has everything to do with my personal decisions rather than his repayment of my skills. Of the two candidates, Jake has more political experience and a history of command to back it. Besides, while Ben has cultural and intellectual capital and sway with the development of this academy and the Lovebite app, it seems that the position for his campaign manager was already filled." Damien gave Kerr another crooked smirk, allowing a touch of humor to coat the sentiment. His agreement with Jake had also just come as a sudden opportunity that Damien recognized may be a means to an end.
"Charon, on the other hand, strikes me as quite... laissez faire... about such matters. That is simply my perception, though. i haven't had enough dealings with him to know better. Even if weren't true, however, what would I then owe him in return? I'm sure he's no more interested in money than I am, and I am not particularly fond of the idea of owing favors to immortals thrice my age. I am accustomed to relying upon myself and mine, not the resources and wisdoms of others. Why would Charon waste resources upon a personal issue for a human? As far as we can tell Laurent hasn't come after anyone else in the city - there have been no more human trafficking situations reported in or around the city to the mortal police force since the early 2000's. Besides I also have no solid evidence that Laurent still lingers near the city."