With a tilt of his head that just oozed You asked for it, Ben said, "I'm a vampire. Yeah, I vant to suck you blood and everything. Becca... I've known her since she was born, and your mother too." He paused for a moment, glancing to the bouquet. "Most of fiction tends to get it right. Except the parts we try to keep the masses from understanding at all. Most importantly...

"Well, vampires don't just feed willy-nilly on anyone. We can only drink from our sire's blood relatives or else we go insane and starve." Ben raised his brows, watching for how quickly those pieces might click together in Shawn's mind. Although he had known so many generations of the family before Shawn, Ben knew virtually nothing of the man in front of him. His only option was to barrel through and hope for the best. "As you may or may not know, what with your mother cutting off all ties with her family and all, you don't have any aunts, uncles, cousins or grand-relatives to speak of. It isn't a cult so much as... an heirloom."

It wasn't the best way to describe it, and the twist of his face was more for Shawn's benefit than anything. At least it might give Shawn a different frame of reference for where Ben was coming from outside of insane dark magic voodoo club or whatever he thought lay hiding under the bed of his family's history.