Let It Hurt

Chapter 1

“Jess, come on! You’re going to be late for school!”

Jessenia stared in the mirror thoughtfully, chewing her bottom lip and could already feel the nerves building up inside of her. She recently moved to Mystic Falls, Virginia to live with her second cousin, Meredith Fell, and was starting her senior year in high school. After finding out who her father was from her mother, Jessenia wanted to meet him and was told her second cousin lived in Mystic Falls.

Welcoming her with open arms, Meredith told Jessenia she could stay as long as she wanted, though Jessenia still hadn’t asked her about her father’s whereabouts. Meredith knew who he was and didn’t want her cousin meeting him, so she never brought up the subject. Jessenia had moved to Mystic Falls only two weeks prior and was still adjusting, getting ready to start school.

She had more important things to focus on.

That and Meredith had to try keeping all the secrets of Mystic Falls away from her at the same time. There were so many things she didn’t want her cousin to know. When Jessenia called her asking to move in, Meredith didn’t know how to respond. That was until her mother, Monica, explained exactly why Jessenia wanted to live with her in Mystic Falls. Meredith knew she couldn’t deny her cousin the opportunity to meet her father, even though in her mind he was the scumbag of the earth.

How was Meredith supposed to tell her cousin that her long lost father was a vampire?

“Be right down in a sec!” Jessenia called back, finally deciding what she wore would have to do for the first day of school.

Simple skinny blue jeans and a short sleeved wine colored top that had a black embroidered design all over it would have to suffice. Her long brown hair was piled on top of her head –Jessenia had spent an hour on it- and she wore simple black eyeliner that rimmed her jade green eyes. Her lips were painted a clear gloss and foundation was applied to hide any blemishes, black steel toed boots on her feet to finish the outfit off.

Grabbing her bag and hoisting it over her shoulder, Jessenia walked out of the bedroom and down the stairs, smiling tentatively at Meredith. “Sorry, I couldn’t decide what to wear.” She explained and Meredith nodded.

“No problem, but we are running a little late. Do you have your key and cell phone?” Meredith asked, refusing to let her cousin leave the house without those two things.

“Of course.” If Jessenia didn’t have her nose stuck in a book or computer, she was texting her friends back in Maryland, where she used to live.

“Good, I want you to take one more thing with you.” Meredith pulled something out of her own bag and handed it over, watching her cousin slowly raise a brow. “It’s a special kind of mace. Keep it with you at all times and only use it for emergencies.” It was actually mace laced with some vervain, a potent herb that was lethal against vampires. “Promise me you won’t leave anywhere without this on you, Jess.”

Confused, Jessenia just nodded and slowly took the small black container from her cousin. “I promise, Meredith.”

Nodding, Meredith grabbed her keys and opened the front door, stopping short at the sight of Alaric Saltzman. He was Mystic Falls high school history teacher and Meredith’s current boyfriend, but that’s not all he was. In Meredith’s eyes, he was a phenomenal vampire hunter and even taught her a few things her family hadn’t when it came to defending against vampires.

He was dating Jenna Sommers, but things didn’t work out between them. Alaric was hit by a car shortly after their breakup and brought to the hospital, where Meredith treated him. She was sure he was going to die from the extent of his injuries, but Alaric ended walking out with a clean bill of health.

After Meredith hunted him down and demanded to know how he’d healed himself, Alaric finally came clean about it, explaining the ring he wore. It was a magically enhanced ring his dead wife, Isobel, gave him and prevented him from dying. Meredith was fascinated and they started dating shortly after that.

Of course, Jessenia didn’t know any of this and Meredith hoped she never found out.

His hand was up in a fist, she had stopped him mid-knock and couldn’t help smiling, staring up into his eyes. Alaric smiled with twinkling eyes and a handsome smile at the sight of Meredith, slowly bringing his hand down from the door. Jessenia hadn’t met Alaric yet and tilted her head slightly, eyeballing her cousin and knew instantly this was the guy she had talked a lot about ever since she moved in two weeks ago.

“You must be the famous Alaric I’ve heard so much about.” Jessenia stepped forward, extending her hand with a smile of her own. “I’m Jessenia, but most call me either Jess or Jesse.”

“Beautiful name.” Alaric complimented, shaking her hand politely. “I’ve heard a lot about you too, Jesse. It’s nice to finally match the face with the name.”

“Alaric is going to be your history teacher, Jess.” Meredith informed her softly, wrapping an arm around her cousin’s shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze.

Jessenia blinked, not believing her cousin was actually dating one of her teachers, but didn’t say anything. “Oh okay cool.” What else was she supposed to say? “I’m pretty good with history.”

Alaric grinned, nodding. “You’ll do just fine in my class, Jesse.”

“What are you doing here, Lark?” Meredith asked, curious as to why her boyfriend would stop by this early in the morning, especially on the first day of school. “Everything alright?”

“Yeah.” The look Alaric gave her clearly told Meredith something was up. “I just had to talk to you about something before I headed to the high school.”

Meredith knew that look all too well and sighed, nodding. “Jess, why don’t you go start the car up?” She handed over the car keys, smiling. “I’ll be there in just a minute.”

Not thinking anything of it, Jessenia nodded and took the keys, heading down the steps to the car. She did look over her shoulder though and instantly knew something was going on because her cousin had a look of concern cross her face. Jessenia unlocked the door and slid into the passenger seat, doing what her cousin instructed, deciding some country music was definitely in order.

“Are you sure?”

Alaric nodded, frowning a little. “That’s why I came to warn you ahead of time that things might get a little hairy today because of Elena’s…transformation.” Pulling something out of his pocket, Alaric took Meredith’s hand and placed the objects into it, closing her fist around them. “I want you to wear one and give one to Jessenia. Elena used to wear it so she wouldn’t have to worry about compulsion. I’m not taking any chances now that Elena is…different.”

Elena Gilbert was a teenager that had lived in Mystic Falls all her life and was Jenna’s cousin. Alaric was technically Elena’s step-father because he’d been married to her biological mother. Elena was adopted at birth and found out awhile back who her biological mother was, which ended up being Alaric’s dead wife, Isobel. She was murdered by a vampire, but later on Alaric found out that was all a hoax…that Isobel begged the vampire to turn her into one.

On her eighteenth birthday, Elena decided she wanted to be a vampire forever and asked her boyfriend, Stefan Salvatore, to change her. Stefan did what she said, even though it killed him to have to murder her. To become a vampire, she had to have vampire blood inside of her and then killed while the blood was in her system. Alaric respected Elena’s decision, understanding why she wanted to become a vampire and supported her.

“How is she doing?” Meredith asked, knowing what happened and pulled back to look up at her.

“According to Stefan, she’s handling the transition pretty well. I’m still worried though because she’s going to have that uncontrollable thirst for blood.” Alaric explained, cupping Meredith’s face in his strong hands, kissing her softly. “That necklace I’m giving you for Jessenia was originally Elena’s, but with vervain laced in it, she can’t wear it anymore.”

Meredith understood, slowly opening her hand to look down at the two small necklaces with silver charms on them and lifted one up. “This one mine?” It was a beautiful silver heart locket that had her first initial engraved in it in little rubies.

Alaric nodded, taking it to clasp around her neck. “I saw it and thought of you. Bonnie put the spell on it. You have a big heart, Meredith, it fits you perfectly.” He kissed her again, this time a little longer.

“Mmm quite the charmer you are.” Meredith murmured, chuckling when Jessenia began blowing the horn, telling her to hurry up. “We really should be going. I’ll give this to her before she leaves the car.”

“Good, thank you.”

Kissing her one last time, Alaric promised to see Meredith later on and walked away, heading to his own car. Meredith touched her cheek, not able to wipe the smile from her face and slid into the driver’s side of the car. She buckled up and slowly looked over at her cousin, who was eyeballing her with curious jade eyes.

“Did you have fun?” Jessenia asked innocently, smirking when Meredith flushed even more.

“Quiet you. Here, Alaric wanted me to give this to you. It’s a welcome present and, since we’re family, he decided to get me one too.”

She showed the necklace to Jessenia while dangling her own teasingly. She smiled when Jessenia took it, staring at it thoughtfully while Meredith pulled out of the driveway, heading down the street. Why Alaric wanted to give a gift to someone he didn’t even know was beyond Jessenia, but her if her cousin wanted her to wear it, she wasn’t going to deny Meredith anything.

Fastening it around her neck, Jessenia smiled down at the small charm that had light red stone at the top. It was definitely a unique design, she loved it and made a mental note to thank Alaric later on for the gift. Meredith hoped her cousin wore that necklace always, even in the shower, even though vampires were not allowed in her house for any reason because she’d never, to her knowledge, invited any of them inside.

Pulling up to the high school, Meredith looked over at her cousin and patted her leg gently. “You’ll do just fine, Jess. Remember what I said, keep the mace on you at all times and NEVER take that necklace off. Keep your cell phone on you as well.” She hoped she sounded like an overprotective parent instead of a scared child, but either way Meredith wanted to stress the importance.

“I got it, Meredith.” Jessenia raised a brow at her cousin and reached over, hugging her. “I promise I’ll do what you said. Now stop worrying. It’s just high school.”

If only that were true, Meredith thought, plastering on a phony smile for her cousin to cut the tension. Laughing softly at her own lame joke, Jessenia stepped out of the car and watched as Meredith drove off. Jade eyes slowly turned to look up at the building, where she would end up graduating from, all Jessenia could do was breathe as she headed inside.

Everywhere she looked, classmates were bantering and carrying on in the hallways, some even making out openly. Jessenia pulled the piece of paper out of her bag and unfolded it, thankful she had home room first because that would give her a chance every day to fully wake up. She was never a morning person, one of the many reasons Jessenia couldn’t wait to get the hell out of high school. She headed down the hallway, looking down at the paper and tried watching where she was going so nobody mowed her down.

“Stefan, I’m FINE.” Elena stressed for the millionth time, closing her locker and turned to face her boyfriend, folding her arms in front of her chest. “And why is HE here?”

“You know how Damon is, Elena. I can’t exactly force him to stay home.” Stefan said, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “I know you’re going to be fine, we just want to make sure.”

Damon was actually his backup and Stefan’s older brothers. Both of them were vampires and now that Elena was a vampire, they really had to keep an eye on her so she didn’t attack anyone Damon smirked at Elena, folding his arms in front of his chest and raised one brow, deciding if he should be smarmy.

“Nice to know you’re always thinking of me, Elena.” Smarmy was his middle name.

Elena rolled her eyes, opening her mouth to retort and stopped short at the sight of a girl heading down the hall. She was new, Elena could smell the new scent and looked up at Stefan and Damon, both brothers sensing the same thing. It smelled like gardenias and something else that Elena couldn’t quite put her finger on. Her eyes suddenly locked on the charm around her neck and Elena felt her brown eyes widen, suddenly realizing who it was.

“That’s her!”

“Who?” Damon demanded, looking confused for a second.

Elena shook her head, turning her attention to Stefan. “That’s her, Stefan. That’s Meredith’s cousin that recently moved here. Alaric came to me a few days ago and asked if he could give my necklace to her since I can’t wear it anymore.” Being a vampire, Elena no longer needed vervain to protect herself, though she still had to be cautious of it because it could now paralyze her.

Now Damon was intrigued. “Meredith’s cousin…” He started walking away when Stefan stopped him, both brothers locking eyes.

“Stay away from her, Damon.” Stefan ordered, his tone stiff and even. “She’s wearing vervain so you can’t play with her.”

Damon snorted, rolling his eyes. “You truly have no faith in me, Stefan. It ALMOST hurts my feelings. I just want to go say hello and welcome her to the town…” Possibly have a taste of her as well, whatever Stefan and Elena didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.

“Yeah AFTER you take her to bed, sleep with her and then attack her.” Caroline chipped in, having overheard the conversation. It was one of the many perks of being a vampire. “After all, that’s exactly what you did to me.”

“And how I wish I could forget.” Damon grunted, not amused by the blonde and leaned against the lockers as all three stared him down intensely. “Alright FINE, I’ll stay away from her…” He paused, a smirk suddenly tilted his lips, all three knowing it too well. “But I can’t guarantee she’ll stay away from me.”

Stefan groaned when Damon took off before he could say anything else, looking at both Elena and Caroline, all three frowning. “I know what you’re going to say…”

“We have to protect her from him, Stefan.”

Stefan could only nod, guiding Elena to class with Caroline following suit.

Chapter 2

Fourth period found Jessenia in Alaric’s class and she sighed a huge breath of relief, thankful her cousin had been right. So far, Jessenia wasn’t having the best first day at Mystic Falls High School. First period found her trying to read a book, but that was quickly ended when the teacher in there decided to give them a forty minute lecture on how to be quiet.

Her second class was math and of course the teacher had to put everyone in a group exercise. She didn’t know anyone and ended up with two people that wanted nothing to do with her. Third period was gym and Jessenia forgot her uniform to change into, so she ended up having to run in her jeans, which was not comfortable.

Alaric looked up when Jessenia walked in and smiled at her before going back to looking over his paperwork. “Is there anywhere specific I should sit?” She asked him, thankful she was the only one in the classroom.

“You could take a seat anywhere, I don’t have assigned seating.” Alaric replied softly, shuffling more papers on his desk and started writing something on a pad.

“Thanks.”

Looking around, Jessenia finally decided to take a seat near the back so she would be out of sight. She sat down and pulled out the notebook designated for this specific class along with her math book, a pen and pencil. One by one, students began filing into the class and Jessenia just kept to herself, feeling very lost. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea for her to move away from Maryland her senior year of high school.

“Hi.”

Jessenia looked up at the greeting and stared at a brown doe-eyed girl that sat next to her. “Hi.” She greeted back politely, looking very uneasy.

Elena smiled, extending her hand and ignored the worried expression on Stefan’s face. “I’m Elena.”

Jessenia took her hand, shaking it gently and winced slightly from how strong Elena’s grip was. “I’m Jessenia, most call me Jesse or Jess.” Elena released her hand thankfully and Jessenia shook it a little to get the circulation going again.

Elena chewed her bottom lip, not realizing just how strong she was now that she was a vampire. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt your hand.” She apologized in a mumble, grabbing her bag and decided maybe it wasn’t a good idea to come so soon.

“No problem, I’m fine.” Jessenia assured her, watching as Elena stopped from grabbing her bag. “You didn’t hurt me.”

“Really?” Elena grinned when Jessenia nodded, physically relaxing and looked over at Stefan, pleading with him to say something.

“So Jessenia, are you new in town?” Stefan asked, his voice smooth and already knew the answer, but figured this was the best way to change the subject.

“Yes.”

“Where are you from originally?”

“Maryland.” Jessenia answered, turning her attention to the front when Alaric began the class.

“First of all, I want to thank you all for showing up on time. Now then, let’s get started.” Alaric wasn’t about to embarrass Jessenia by pointing her out to the entire class.

“Umm Mr. Saltzman, don’t you think you should introduce the new girl?” Caroline asked sweetly, sitting next to Elena on her other side and peeked over to wave three fingers, flashing a pearly white smile.

Apparently, Caroline was going to do that for him. “Jessenia, do you want to stand up and introduce yourself?” Alaric asked, deciding to let her make the decision and watched as she slowly stood up in her chair.

This was nerve-wracking, but Jessenia wasn’t about to back down, clearing her throat. “Not sure what to say, but my name is Jessenia Winters.” There really wasn’t anything else she could say so Jessenia sat down, causing Caroline to get the class to applaud her.

“Alright people, let’s get down to business.” Alaric directed the attention off of Jessenia and back to schooling, not believing Caroline just did that.

“Not cool, Caroline.” Bonnie whispered, leaning over since she sat beside Elena.

Caroline just shrugged, paying attention to what Alaric was teaching.

After class was over, Jessenia was the last one to walk out of the classroom and wasn’t surprised when Alaric stopped her. “I’m fine, it wasn’t that bad.” She whispered, assuring him the blonde hadn’t bothered her with what she did. “Oh and thank you for the necklace.” Jessenia fingered the charm again, which had reminded her that he was the one that got it for her. “I appreciate it.”

It took a few seconds for Alaric to realize what Jessenia was referencing, finally nodding once he eyeballed the necklace. “Keep that on, it will protect you.” He murmured quietly, patting her shoulder and sent her out the door to go to her next class.

Confused, Jessenia could only nod and shouldered her bag, walking out with a million questions in her head. That was the second time she had been told to keep the necklace on. What was going on? She headed to her locker, thankful it was just a few feet away and opened it to swap out her history book for her science.

When she closed it, Jessenia jumped about a foot in the air at the sight of a man towering over her, jade eyes wide. Her heart was pounding like a beating drum against her chest as Jessenia stared into his ice blue eyes, trying to learn how to breathe again because he was truly breathtaking. He had short cropped jet black hair that looked a little haphazard, which Jessenia thought was incredibly sexy and his eyes were the lightest of blues, reminding her of an aquamarine stone. He wore a leather black jacket with a black shirt, black pants and black shoes.

“Hi.” Jessenia was proud of herself that she’d found her voice finally after staring at him for what seemed like hours.

Damon smiled charmingly back at her, leaning against the lockers. “Hello there.” He greeted smoothly, ignoring the warning looks both Stefan and Elena were shooting him from across the way. “You dropped this.”

Breaking eye contact, Jessenia blinked and looked at the book the gorgeous man was extending to her, flushing a little. “I didn’t even realize I dropped it…” She started taking it from him, raising a brow when he instantly pulled it back.

“Not very observant are you?” Damon observed snidely, glancing at the book to see what it was. “Hmm science…my favorite subject in school, especially biology...”

“Good for you.” Jessenia snatched the book from his grasp, holding it against her chest tightly, not appreciating the tone of his voice while shutting her locker. “I hate science. If you’ll excuse me, I really must be going.” Turning, Jessenia started walking away and stumbled a foot back when the man was right in front of her again.

“Now that wasn’t very nice. We were just getting to know each other.” Reaching out, Damon fingered a tendril of her soft light brown hair, smirking when she recoiled. “Aww what’s the matter? Is the little girl scared of me?”

This guy had to be on crack or seriously deluded if he thought for a second she was. “Actually no, I just don’t like being touched by assholes.”

Both Stefan and Elena were gaping at Jessenia now, eyes wide.

“Is that right?” This woman had a fire about her that Damon couldn’t walk away from, not yet at least. “So you’re calling me an asshole?”

“As a matter of fact, yes I am. You’re not as slow as I thought you were.” Jessenia retorted, jade eyes narrowed, wondering what he wanted with her.

“You don’t even know me, girl.”

“You’re right and I don’t care to know you.” Jessenia stated, meaning every word that came out of her mouth, smiling coldly. “Now get out of my way, I have to get to class.”

“Why you-”

“That’s enough, Damon.” Stefan decided to diffuse this situation before it got out of hand, seeing how pissed his brother was for being mouthed off to. “Let her go.”

If only Damon could kill his meddlesome brother, then he would force this girl to get to know him…personally. “Very well.” He put his hands up, stepping away from her and snorted. “She’s not worth my time anyway.”

Elena shook her head at Damon, looking up at Stefan, frowning. “Get him out of here please. Come on, Jesse, we have to get to class.”

Jesse? Was that the little bitch’s name that just called him an asshole? Damon filed that information away in his mind and decided to leave for now, but he wouldn’t be leaving the grounds. He would go outside for some air, deciding he would be paying miss attitude a visit later on.

“Leave her alone, Damon.”

“Did you hear what she called me?” Damon demanded, sounding hurt even though he wasn’t, just mildly irritated.

Stefan smirked, nodding. “Of course I did and so did Elena. We thought it was amusing.” To his knowledge, a girl had never stood up to Damon that way, not even Elena when she first met him. “And now you will leave her alone or we’re going to have problems.”

“What’s so special about her?”

“Because she’s Meredith’s cousin.” Alaric stated from behind, causing both brothers to turn around, his eyes narrowed in on Damon. “She just moved here recently and you WILL leave her alone or Stefan won’t be the only one you have problems with, Damon.”

Meredith’s cousin…That meant she had the bloodline to one of the Founding Families, just like him. The Founding Families was originated back in the 1860 and the Fell Family was one of the original families to be part of it, one of the founders of Mystic Falls. Meredith was also a member of Mystic Falls Founder’s Council, which was a body of high-ranking civil servants who officially were in charge of commemorating the foundation of the town.

However, their true goal was to protect the town from the threat of vampires.

Being a cousin to one of the Founder’s Council, Damon decided maybe he’d been a little too rude to Jesse and would rectify it. “I will.” He walked away from Stefan down the hall, stroking his chin in thought while staring up at the sky.

“What the hell was that about?” Alaric had walked out of the classroom to get some water from the drinking foundation and noticed Damon had approached Jessenia.

“I have no idea, but I’ll find out.” Stefan said, nodding when Alaric handed him a hall pass before they went their separate ways.

Once inside the science classroom, thankfully Jessenia and Elena weren’t late, they both sat beside each other while the teacher explained what they were going to be doing throughout the first part of the semester. Jessenia couldn’t pay attention, her mind solely on the mystic blue eyed man that had lit her blood on fire in both a good and bad way. It was sweet of him to pick her book up, but his snide behavior just got under her skin in ways nobody ever had. Jessenia really wanted to clock him in the face, but settled for just calling him an asshole.

“Don’t let Damon bother you.” Elena whispered, seeing how deep in thought Jessenia was and patted her hand gently. “He’s like that with everyone.”

“I didn’t even do anything to him.” Jessenia whispered softly back, hoping Elena could hear her.

“Doesn’t matter, like I said, he’s like that with everyone.” Elena knew that better than anyone, remembering the first time she met Damon.

She had gone to find Stefan at the Salvatore Boarding House and had first been polite, but then mentioned Stefan’s ex-girlfriend, Katherine. He planted seeds of doubt in her head about her relationship with Stefan about being a rebound for him and Stefan walked in on their conversation. Stefan was very distant and told her in a polite way to leave, only for Damon to try persuading her to stay, but Elena decided it was better that she left. He kissed her hand before letting her leave, pulling off possibly the best charming hoax act.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Science was a lot better than the first three because Jessenia had someone to hang out with and she didn’t have to search for a partner when it came for a group assignment. It was all about chemistry right now, which Jessenia wasn’t very good at, but thankfully Elena was. Jessenia couldn’t help thinking back to what Damon said about biology and physically shivered, unable to stop it.

“Cold?” Elena raised a brow at her partner, sounding amused.

“Yeah, sorry.” Jessenia lied, hoping it sounded smooth enough and did the next step for the assignment. “I get cold easily.”

“It’s eighty degrees outside.” Elena pointed out the obvious, not able to resist.

Jessenia didn’t respond to that and just focused on what they were doing, appreciative when Elena changed the subject. Once class ended, Jessenia was relieved because it was lunch time and she was starving. She went to the snack bar, buying a salad with ranch dressing and a chicken sandwich.

Deciding she felt claustrophic in the cafeteria, Jessenia decided to eat outside, smiling when she found a nearby tree with some shade. Settling in for the next half hour, Jessenia opened her salad and began pouring the dressing on it, humming softly to herself. It was such a beautiful day, the sun shining brightly and warm, but not humid.

“Mind if I join you?”

Jessenia felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up because she could feel hot breath on her ear, her breathing turning heavy and her heart rate sped up several notches. She closed her eyes briefly, knowing exactly who it was and soon broke out in goose bumps. Every part of her lit on fire once again, every nerve-ending sparking, Jessenia had never felt like this before and it honestly scared the hell out of her.

“I rather you didn’t, Damon.”

Chuckling, Damon moved to sit beside her anyway and could feel the annoyance from her. “So you know my name, Jesse? How kind of Elena to inform you.” Now he sounded slightly annoyed, raising a brow at the salad that was on her lap.

“My name is Jessenia. Only friends and family are allowed to call me that.” She corrected him coldly, suddenly losing her appetite, but Jessenia knew she had to eat something and stabbed her salad like it personally did her wrong.

Damon closed his eyes when she said her full name, a soft growl escaping him. “Mmm Jessenia…” He could feel her shiver beside him and smirked, turning to fully face her. “I think I prefer Senia.”

Jessenia finally looked up at him, blinking. “Senia?” Nobody had ever called her that before and it felt…weird, but not necessarily in a bad way. “What do you want, Damon?”

“You’re very judgmental you know that?” Damon shot back, sitting with his knees drawn up, his elbows resting on them, ice blue orbs unreadable. “I mean, I was nice enough to pick your book up that you dropped and you’re treating me as if I’m the biggest dick in the world.” Which he was, but Damon wasn’t about to admit that to her…yet.

She would soon find out.

Chapter 3

“Well if you weren’t such an asshole to me, then I wouldn’t have treated you that way.” Jessenia shot back, eating her salad slowly and figured she would have to endure Damon her entire lunch hour.

Narrowing his eyes, Damon moved closer and took the salad away from her, forcing her to meet his eyes. “What are you doing in Mystic Falls?” He demanded, completely changing the subject.

Unbeknownst it to Jessenia, the vervain was saving her at the moment from being under the influence of Damon’s compulsion. “That’s none of your business.” She pressed back against the tree as Damon hovered over her, feeling her mouth go dry.

“Oh yes it is and I’m going to find out your secret, Senia.” Damon promised in a dark voice, reaching out to run his finger down her cheek and smirked when she smacked it away instantly. “You are very feisty. I like it.” His eyes flashed at her.

Jessenia was pretty sure her heart was going to leap out of her chest at any second with how fast it pounded. “I have no secrets.” She said in a softer voice, refusing to tell him the reason why she had moved here. “And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you any of them.”

That just fueled his curiosity further and Damon really wished Elena hadn’t given her vervain necklace to Alaric to give to Jessenia because, at that moment, he really wanted to compulse her. For the first time, Damon noticed just what shade of eyes she had. They reminded him of emerald stones, maybe a little lighter, very unique. Just by her saying what she did told Damon she was here for a specific reason, one he intended to find out. She wasn’t what he was, he would’ve been able to scent it, not to mention her strength would’ve been heightened to where that slap would’ve actually hurt.

“Senia, I’m the safest person you can be around in this town.” Damon said seriously, standing up and decided to leave her alone for the time being, smiling. “And the most dangerous.” He was gone before she could even open her mouth to respond.

No matter how hard she tried, Jessenia could not get what Damon said out of her head for the rest of the day. Her first day of school ended and Jessenia decided to walk home since it was warm outside. Meredith was still at work until later that night and Jessenia really didn’t feel like asking her history teacher for a ride home. She had a few assignments for homework, but nothing major so Jessenia wasn’t worried about hurrying home to get it done.

Reaching up, Jessenia let her hair down, her long loose curly light brown hair cascading down her back in waves, resting just above her waist. She began plucking out the bobby pins she used to put it up that morning and ran her fingers through it several times, placing them in her bag. As Jessenia walked, she started looking around and familiarizing herself with the area.

There was a local bookshop just down the street from the school along with a tool and antique shop. Everything was new and different from Maryland, it was such a beautiful little town. There were woods that surrounded the town, which was another thing Jessenia enjoyed and planned on visiting soon.

Her thoughts went back to Damon, his words plaguing her mind. In what universe did he actually think she would believe he was the safest person in this town? The most dangerous, maybe, but definitely not the safest. She felt absolutely no safe vibes from Damon, only danger, and Jessenia decided she was staying far away from him.

“You really shouldn’t be walking by yourself.”

Jessenia stopped and looked at who was talking to her. It was the blonde from class that made her appearance public, basically forcing her to introduce herself in front of everyone. Jessenia should’ve been livid with her, but she wasn’t, simply eyeing her skeptically.

“What?”

Caroline chuckled and continued rolling the car on the street, not worried about hitting anything because she had keen senses. “I said you shouldn’t be walking out here by yourself. Never know what can happen.” Elena had asked Caroline to track Jessenia down to make sure that Damon didn’t bother her. “How about I give you a ride home?”

“No thanks, I’m fine. It’s not that much farther.” Jessenia called back with a tentative smile, starting to walk again.

One second Caroline was in her car driving alongside a walking Jessenia and the next second she was standing in front of her with deep dark eyes. “I insist.” Her valley girl voice sounded a little strained, though Jessenia managed to keep the urgency out of it. “Come on.”

“No thanks, I said I don’t need a ride.” How the hell did these people move this quickly? Jessenia had to back away because of how close Caroline was, frowning. “I’ll be fine, it’s just another two blocks or so.”

“Look, I didn’t want to say anything, but I saw your confrontation with Damon earlier.” Caroline admitted, chewing her bottom lip. “And again outside during lunch.”

Sighing, Jessenia scrubbed a hand down her face, suddenly giving her full attention to the blonde. “Yeah…I don’t know what his problem is. He asked me what I was doing in Mystic Falls, like I should have a specific reason for being here. Then he said he would find out all of my secrets, which I don’t have any.” That was a lie, but Jessenia didn’t know blondie well enough to tell her anything at the moment.

“That’s Damon for you, the paranoid freak.” Caroline flipped her blonde hair over her shoulder, laughing. “Look, Elena asked me to track you down because she didn’t want Damon bothering you. You’re a new face in town and he’s curious about you, that’s all. He wants to make sure you’re not up to no good, which I know you’re not just looking at you.” Extending her hand, Caroline smiled wider with more friendly eyes. “How about we start off with an introduction and I’ll walk you home?” She decided to try compromising, not blaming Jessenia for being a little cynical. “I’ll go first. Hi, my name is Caroline Forbes. What’s yours?”

Taking her hand, Jessenia shook it a few times. “Jessenia Winters, most call me Jesse or Jess though.”

“It’s nice to meet you.” Caroline said, intrigued by the name. “That’s a unique name, what does it mean?”

“Some sources I’ve read say it means flower, but I’ve also read it means jasmine flower.”

“That’s what you smell like.”

Both girls whipped around at the sound of that voice, Caroline instantly jumping in front of Jessenia, eyes narrowed. “What do you want, Damon?” Caroline didn’t move an inch when Damon went from being around twenty feet away to right in front of her, shoulders squared. “Nobody invited you into this conversation.”

“I never need an invite, blondie.” Damon snorted, arrogance pouring from him. “Not that it’s any of YOUR business, but I need to have a word with Senia.”

Caroline raised a brow and folded her arms in front of her chest, remembering what Elena told her. “There’s nothing she has to say to you.” What the hell was Damon’s game and why couldn’t he just leave the poor girl alone?

“She can’t speak for herself now?” Damon retorted smoothly, fighting not to smirk.

“Don’t make me kick your ass again, Damon. Leave now.” Caroline ordered, no longer afraid of the vampire that tortured her when they first met.

He fed on her for months, used her as his little toy to do his dirty work, though Caroline did admit that the sex was amazing. The things he made her do was despicable, but Elena quickly put a stop to it once she figured out what was happening. Damon had used compulsion on her, forcing her to do whatever he wanted. Under that influence, any human who didn’t have vervain on them didn’t have a prayer because it could be applied during a simple conversation.

Caroline ended up being hospitalized after getting into a serious car accident that nearly claimed her life. Stefan gave her his blood to heal her so she wouldn’t die, which she would be forever grateful to him for saving her. However, Stefan had an enemy come back into town by the name of Katherine -his ex-girlfriend and the woman who changed him- and, to send a message to Stefan, she suffocated Caroline with a pillow with the vampire blood still inside of her system, changing her unwillingly.

Once Caroline woke up, all the compulsion that Damon used on her vanished and she remembered every single thing he did to her. All the blood he stole, all the wretched things to her friends, the only good thing being remembered was the sex. So when Caroline came face to face with Damon again, which was in the school hallway during one of the ceremonies the town was famous for having, she beat the hell out of him, exacting some much needed revenge for everything he’d done to her.

“You could try, but I won’t be caught off guard like I was last time, Caroline.” Damon promised darkly, giving her a once over, almost outright laughing. “If I have to do this forcefully, I will.”

“What the hell do you want from me?” Jessenia finally opened her mouth to say something before a fight broke out between Caroline and Damon, looking incredulous. “There is no need for violence, especially between the two of you.” How Caroline had kicked Damon’s ass was something Jessenia would definitely have to find out at a later date.

“Glad you decided to cooperate.” Damon smiled charmingly, though it didn’t reach his icy eyes. “I want to talk to her alone, blondie.” He stated, waving her off as if she was an annoying fly that wouldn’t go away. “So take a hike before you get hurt.”

Caroline went to say something and actually took a step toward Damon when Jessenia stopped her, grabbing her arm. “Please don’t, I really don’t want you getting hurt because of me.” She pleaded, watching as Caroline turned to look down at her. “I’ll be fine. He just wants to talk.”

Jessenia had taken the small black can of mace out of her bag and had it in her hand as soon as she left the school. It was small enough to where her entire hand could hide it, so Jessenia wasn’t that worried. If Damon so much as laid one finger on her, she would spray him right in the eyes and blind him. Her cousin definitely was right, she required safety in this small town, especially from someone like Damon.

“I’m not going to hurt her.” Damon assured Caroline, seeing the hesitation in her eyes and sighed. “I promise.”

“Your promises don’t mean jack to me, Damon.” Caroline didn’t think it was a very good idea to let Jessenia walk alone with him because she knew what Damon was capable of. “Jesse, are you sure about this?”

“Yes, I’ll be fine.” Jessenia sounded more confident than she felt, her insides quaking and squeezed Caroline’s arm gently. “Go on, we’ll talk more later.”

Sighing resignedly, Caroline finally nodded and slowly backed away from Jessenia. “Don’t hurt her, Damon. If you do, I will kick your ass.” Before Damon could fire something back, Caroline was back in her car and driving away faster than the speed of light.

“How does she do that?” Jessenia wondered aloud, blinking and jumped when Damon tapped her shoulder, bringing her attention back to him. “Alright she’s gone, what do you want from me?”

“My, my cutting straight to the chase, eh? No foreplay first?” Damon teased lewdly, smirking when Jessenia rolled her eyes and couldn’t help being more intrigued by her. “Walk with me?” It wasn’t an option as Damon laced her arm through his, both of them starting to walk down the sidewalk slowly.

Jessenia had no choice except to go with him, knowing he wouldn’t stop until she talked to him, but still had the mace in her hand in case he tried any funny business. “Well? Are you going to tell me what you want or should I just cut this ‘walk’ short now?” She demanded, trying not to sound annoyed even though she was.

“Can’t two friends walk down the sidewalk together?” Damon asked innocently, raising a brow when she tried pulling away from him and kept a vise grip on her arm. “Now come on, I didn’t say anything to make you run away from me.”

This man was very arrogant and full of himself, Jessenia really just wanted to nail him right between the legs, but had a feeling if she even tried it, he wouldn’t hesitate to hurt her. “Let go of me.” She whispered in a demand, gasping when they abruptly stopped and Damon yanked her behind a tree out of sight, pushing her against it. “Damon…”

“Shut up.” He ordered in a low voice, standing so close to her that their noses were practically touching, jade mixing with aquamarine. “Just shut that pretty mouth of yours before I end up doing it for you and listen. There are…certain people around this town that are a lot more dangerous than me and, if you’re here to screw with one of them, you’re going to need protection. So the reason I’m asking you this is because there’s only a few Fell family members left that are alive, I know all of them and Meredith is the only decent one. You being a cousin of the Fell Family has me intrigued and also on edge…” Damon ran his finger down her cheek, his eyes searing her soul. “And when I’m edge, Senia, bad things happen.”

“I’m just here for my senior year in high school, nothing more.” Jessenia hoped he bought her lie because right now she was terrified and squeezed the bottle of mace, her stomach tightening. “Now let me go.” This conversation was over.

“Why don’t I believe you?” His voice had gone quiet and soft, which wasn’t a good sign as he studied her for a few seconds. “You know I can tell when someone is lying to me, right?” Damn her vervain necklace, this would’ve been so much easier to compel her so he wouldn’t have to pry information out of her the hard way. “You’re lying to me.”

Jessenia closed her eyes, trying not to let the fear consume her. “No I’m not…”

Damon growled, sick of the games and grabbed her chin roughly, forcing her eyes to fly open. “Yes you are and if you don’t-AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!”

Jessenia had just sprayed him with the mace and shoved him away from her hard enough to make him stumble back several feet. Not wasting a second to get away, Jessenia took off down the sidewalk as fast as she could, tears stinging her eyes, scared to death by now. Pounding pavement was going to start being something Jessenia did on a regular basis. She just had this sinking feeling and didn’t stop running until she was home, safe and sound, locking the door behind her, pressing her back to it.

“Thank you Meredith, thank you…” She whispered to the mace bottle, pressing it to her chest and finally forced herself to move from the door, heading upstairs to her room to start her homework.

Chapter 4

“That little BITCH!!” Damon roared, trying to get the vervain mixed mace out of his eyes and downed another tumbler of whiskey. “DAMN IT!!”

Removing his shirt, Damon tossed it on the floor and kicked it, scowling angrily. He thought she just had regular mace on her, but apparently Meredith had it laced with vervain. Being one of the council members of Mystic Falls, Damon should’ve seen it coming a mile away. This was a Fell he was investigating, not some low-class girl.

“What the hell happened to you?” Stefan asked, having heard his brother’s ranting and had to see what was going on.

“Vervain, what else?” Damon snapped, not in the mood to chat and poured himself another tumbler, needing something to get his mind off the current pain while his face slowly healed. “Apparently, Meredith gave Jessenia a mace bottle that was laced with vervain and she sprayed me with it.”

Stefan raised an eyebrow, sighing and walked over to where his big brother, folding his arms in front of his chest. “What did you do to her?” He asked bluntly, watching as Damon stopped from downing the tumbler to stare incredulous at him.

“What makes you automatically assume I did something, Stefan?” Damon growled, taking a cool rag and dabbed at his eyes more, the burning slowly subsiding as his seared skin slowly returned to normal.

“Because I know you and I know how you work.” Stefan stated flatly, not feeling an ounce of pity for his big brother. “So out with it. What did you do?”

Damon snorted, finishing off the second tumbler. “Like I’d tell you.”

The glass fell from Damon’s fingertips and shattered to the floor because Stefan slammed him as hard as he could against the wall. Damon wasn’t that strong due to the vervain, but tried pushing Stefan off of him anyway. Stefan jammed his forearm against Damon’s throat, applying as much pressure as he could, causing Damon to growl.

“Get…off me…NOW!”

“Not until you tell me what you did to Jessenia.”

“What do you care?” Damon coughed out, slowly regaining his strength and pushed on Stefan’s forearm, gritting his teeth. “You already have a girlfriend!”

“Fiancée to be exact.” Stefan corrected him, seeing the different emotions swirling in his brother’s eyes, and released him instantly. “You like her.”

Damon glared, rubbing his throat and stood straight up, squaring his shoulders. “No I don’t. I want to know why she came to Mystic Falls. She’s hiding something.”

Stefan smirked, pouring himself a tumbler and ignored the shattered glass for the moment. “You’re seriously going to try playing that card with me?” He drained the tumbler and set it down, turning to face his brother. “Why are you so suspicious of her?” Stefan decided he would play along for now.

“Because she’s new and nobody comes to this town without a purpose.” Damon stated, walking over and yanked the bottle of whiskey from his brother’s hand, pouring himself a shot. “You know I’m right, Stefan.”

“So you went after her, after I specifically asked you not to?” Stefan demanded, running a hand through his hair when Damon nodded with one of his smug smiles. “What did you do to her?”

“Nothing. I may have scared her a little with what I said, but I didn’t physically hurt her.” Damon said, telling the truth for once and drained the tumbler again, refilling it. “I told you, I just want to find out why she’s here and then I’ll leave her alone.”

Sighing, as much as Stefan didn’t want to agree with his brother, Damon definitely had a point. “What if I found out?” He suddenly asked, turning his head to stare at Damon, raising a brow. “What if we got Elena to get the truth out of her, if there is one?”

“There is one.” Damon was positive of it and threw back another shot. “What makes you think she’s going to tell Elena?”

“Because, unlike you, she’s not afraid of me.” Elena said from the doorway, causing both brothers to turn to look at her. “What do you want me to find out?”

“You seriously expect me to trust you to find out the truth?” Damon chuckled, no humor in his tone as he sat down on his bed, a bigger glass of bourbon this time dangling from his fingertips. “And if she doesn’t tell you?”

“Then we’ll let you handle it your way.”

“Stefan!!” Elena did not like the sound of that, rushing up to him. “No! What if he kills her to get the truth? Have you lost your mind?”

“You give me no credit whatsoever, Elena. I’m not going to kill her.” Damon surmised, standing up to stare down at her with those intense ice blue eyes of his.

Elena wasn’t backing down as she stepped up to him, lips a firm grim line. “Promise me then. Promise me you won’t kill her to get the truth.” The gears in Elena’s mind were already turning, trying to figure out a way to get the truth out of Jessenia.

“If I kill her, I’ll let you stake me.” Damon stated, watching as both Elena and Stefan’s eyes widen, a smirk tilting his lips. “Well?”

“Y-You would actually put your existence on the line for this?” Stefan couldn’t believe what he was hearing, wondering what was going on in his big brother’s head. “Damon…”

Elena swallowed hard, looking very uneasy. “You’re serious aren’t you?” She smiled with sparkling brown eyes and couldn’t stop from hugging him around the neck. “I knew there was good in you, Damon.”

Damon looked over at Stefan, wanting to make sure his brother didn’t attack him because his girl decided to have contact with him. “Yeah…” He broke away from the hug and took a few steps back, his feelings for Elena not completely faded.

Truth be told, Damon didn’t know if he would be over Elena fully. He still thought back to the time they were standing on her porch and Damon told her he would give himself a reason for feeling guilty. He kissed her and it was probably the most wonderful feeling in the world. Her lips were so soft against his, everything about her lit his blood completely ablaze.

His feelings had diminished a little when Elena made the decision to be with Stefan after their little fling and Damon retreated into himself for awhile, keeping quiet. Now, he was back and ready to get back in the game, which was going to start with finding out what Jessenia Winters was hiding. Whatever it was, he would be handling it personally as he stared out the window, downing another shot.

“We done here?” Damon wanted to be alone with his thoughts, his tone telling them the conversation was over.

“Yeah, come on Stefan.” Elena murmured quietly, grabbing his hand and lead him out of Damon’s room, closing the door behind them. “I know how I’m going to get the information out of Jessenia. I don’t want Damon hurting her.”

“How?” Stefan asked softly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

“That necklace that used to be mine has to come off. Then I can use compulsion to find out her reason for being here.” Elena explained, making sound so simple and watched as Stefan’s smile grew.

“How do you plan on doing that exactly?”

Elena simply smiled and brought his lips down to hers, kissing him. “You leave that to me and just take me upstairs.”

“Whatever you want.” Lifting her in his arms, Stefan carried his future wife up the stairs to their bedroom to spend some much needed alone time together.

~!~

The next day, Jessenia was in gym and thankfully remembered her uniform, so she didn’t feel completely out of place. She was currently running on the track, deciding since she was more than likely on Damon’s radar, she would have to learn to protect herself against him. Pounding pavement seemed like the smartest way to do that since she outran him…or so she thought. If Jessenia knew what Damon really was, she probably would’ve moved back to Maryland in a heartbeat.

But she didn’t.

“Hey!” Elena greeted, breaking Jessenia out of her thoughts. “How are you?”

“I’m fine. Just been awhile since I ran so I’m trying to pace myself.” Jessenia was one of the slower runners, but she wasn’t nearly as out of breath as some of the other students. “What’s up?”

“Caroline told me about what happened yesterday with Damon. I’m so sorry, Jesse. Stefan is going to talk to him again and hopefully he’ll leave you alone.” Elena meant that, hoping Damon kept his promise about not killing her because she seemed like a really nice girl. “Are you okay?”

Jessenia nodded with an assuring smile. “Yeah, I told Caroline to leave so he could talk to me. Things got a little out of hand though…and I sprayed him with mace.” His roars of pain still echoed in her mind and actually gave Jessenia nightmares.

“Yeah I saw that, nice aim.” What the hell had Damon done to make her spray him with mace that was apparently laced with vervain? “That is some pretty strong stuff.”

“Yeah, my cousin gave it to me. She said that I need protection around this town.” Jessenia explained, shrugging nonchalantly. “I didn’t mean to spray him, but he grabbed my chin a little too hard and…I panicked. He wasn’t hurting me, I shouldn’t have done it, but he seems a little unstable and like I said it scared me, so I reacted the only way I knew how.”

Elena completely understand what Jessenia was talking about, both girls crossing the finish line, finishing gym class on a positive note. “Don’t apologize for defending yourself.” She said, stopping Jessenia from walking away, turning her around to face her. “I mean it, Jesse. You did nothing wrong and he had no right to lay a finger on you. I would’ve done the same thing if it was me.”

That made Jessenia feel a little better about what she did to Damon. “Thanks Elena, I really appreciate it.” They walked back inside to head to the woman’s locker room to change for their next class. “So what’s with him anyway?”

“Damon? He thinks you’re here for a reason, but I told him he’s just being paranoid. He really does mean well and I know he didn’t mean to hurt you.” Elena hoped anyway, not wanting to lead Jessenia into a false sense of security. “But I wouldn’t let my guard down around him, not for a second. He can be a good guy when he wants to be, but he can also be very dangerous and it’s just better to keep your distance.”

Something told Jessenia there was a lot more history between Damon and Elena than she was letting on, but it wasn’t her business, but she wasn’t about to pry. Jessenia pulled her blue jean skirt on that went two inches above the knee, not too short or long, with a white sleeveless top since it was around ninety degrees outside. She couldn’t wait for the summer to go away so the winter would come and they wouldn’t have to be baking in a high school with no air conditioning. Her long hair was pulled back in a ponytail, but it still hung to the middle of her back, keeping it off her neck at the very least.

“Hey, did you know that necklace you have around your neck used to be mine?” Elena asked, wearing jeans and a short sleeved blue shirt that had buttons up the top of it, which were undone, a camisole underneath.

Not thinking anything of it, Jessenia nodded, turning to face Elena. “Yeah, he told me. Why did you give it up?” She couldn’t help asking because it was a beautiful necklace, fingering it lightly.

“I didn’t want it anymore.” Elena wished there was a way to lift the vervain curse from it, but knew that was impossible because she honestly loved that necklace. Stefan had given it to her to protect her from any other vampires compulsion. “It looks much better on you anyway.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, do you mind if I look at it for a second? I think I see a chip on the side. You can’t really see it unless you take it off.” Elena pointed out, hoping this worked and watched as Jessenia slowly looked up at her from admiring the necklace.

“I don’t see one…”

“Just for a second, then I’ll give it right back to you, please?”

Elena really hated doing this because it really was nobody’s business what Jessenia was doing here. She didn’t seem like the type to be hiding anything, but Damon had told her at one point to never trust anyone, no matter what. She had to take that into consideration and decided if this protected Jessenia from Damon, she was willing to do just about anything.

Eyeing Elena for a few seconds, Jessenia finally decided it couldn’t hurt since it was Elena’s necklace before given to her. “Just don’t run off with it.” She half-joked, both girls having a laugh.

“I won’t, I promise.” Elena took it by the chain, knowing she couldn’t touch the charm because of the vervain and looked it over.

“Do you see anything?” Jessenia asked, getting closer to look at the charm for a closer inspection and suddenly her entire mind went blank. “What’s going on?”

“Jessenia, I want you to listen to me very carefully.” Elena had her in the trance, she could feel the pull as her brown eyes swirled just a little.

“I’m listening.” Jessenia murmured evenly, arms at her side, feeling completely powerless.

“Good, I need you to tell me what you’re doing in Mystic Falls. Are you hiding something? Is there a specific reason why you’re here?” Elena really hated Damon for this, but kept the connection, her own curiosity burning.

“My father.” Jessenia said in a zombified state, staring straight ahead. “Long lost, never met. Need to find him.”

Now Elena felt like a complete bitch for doing this, sighing. “Who is your father? Do you know his name?” Jessenia nodded, not saying anything. “What’s his name, Jessenia?”

“Logan Fell.”

Elena’s jaw dropped when that name spilled from Jessenia’s lips, not believing this. “Thank you, Jessenia. Now before I break this trance, I need to tell you something. You will not remember any of this. This conversation never happened. You will remember coming in here getting dressed with me and we’ve been talking about TV shows the entire time. Do you understand?”

“Yes I do.”

Elena took a deep breath and finally broke the contact, still holding the necklace that dangled from her fingers. “You know what? I love that show How I Met Your Mother, hilarious right? I don’t see any nicks on this either, I think I was seeing things.”

“Oh…” Jessenia blinked, smiling. “I love that show too.” Taking the necklace from Elena, she put it around her neck before letting her fasten it, hating the kind of clasp it had. “Thanks.”

Elena looked at Jessenia in the mirror’s reflection, nodding. “You’re welcome. Come on, time to get to history.”

Nodding, the girls walked out of the bathroom together and Elena could feel eyes on her, looking over her shoulder, not surprised to find Damon standing there, watching their every move.

Chapter 5

“So, did you find out what she’s hiding?”

Elena closed her eyes at the sound of Damon’s voice behind her, slowly turning to face him. “You’re not supposed to be here unless you’re going to school.” She pointed out, slamming her locker shut, heading outside to meet Stefan.

“I’m aware of that and could care less.” Damon informed her, walking with Elena. “What did you find out? Was I right? Is she hiding something?”

Elena was at a crossroads and decided she would talk to Stefan, wanting his opinion on what she found out from Jessenia. “I used compulsion on her and there was nothing. She just said she moved back here to live with her cousin because things at home were rough with her family.” She lied smoothly, sighing when Damon stopped her from walking through the double doors. “What?”

Damon searched her brown eyes, looking for any hint that she might be lying to him, not finding any. “Damn it.” He growled, scrubbing a hand down his face. “I really thought she had a motive for moving here.” Then he had a thought. “Did you do it right?”

Now Elena looked offended, eyes narrowing. “Of course I did! The necklace was off and everything. Now please leave and go back home. You shouldn’t be here.” Brushing past him, Elena headed straight for Stefan, wishing she could use her super speed around the others, but knew blending was the key.

Damon watched Elena hurry over to Stefan and snorted, deciding he would be having another chat with Jessenia. He would have to get the necklace off of her, wondering if blondie would help him with it. Obviously, he couldn’t trust Elena because she had hurried over to Stefan a little too fast for his liking. Already setting his plan in motion, Damon knew he would have to play the good guy act with Jessenia and get her trust him again.

This was going to be very painful.

Stefan watched his brother walk away, keeping his eyes glued just in case Damon tried anything, while listening to Elena. “Wait, what?” He blinked when Elena got to the part about Logan Fell being Jessenia’s father. “Are you certain?”

Sighing exasperatedly, Elena lowered her eyes to the clasped hands in her lap. “I wish at least one of you had a little faith in my abilities, Stefan.” She said, sounding a little hurt, which she was. “Yes, she said Logan Fell is her long lost father. She’s never met him before and she wants to find him.”

This was definitely a game changer, one that Stefan didn’t expect at all. “Have you told Damon yet?” He asked finally, staring straight ahead with intense eyes.

“No, I lied and told him I didn’t find out anything.” Elena murmured quietly, looking up at him and could see the trouble on his face. “Stefan…”

“Keep this between us for now.” Stefan said, hopping off the table and turned to face her. “The less Damon knows, the better. You and I both know he hates Logan.

“I know…”

“If he finds out that’s Logan Fell’s daughter, Damon will use it to his advantage.” Stefan explained what Elena already knew, their foreheads meeting gently. “Promise me.”

Elena smiled, caressing his face tenderly with her hand. “Of course I will, you know that.”

“Good.” Stefan kissed her tenderly, trying to forget about what Elena told him even for a second.

Meanwhile, Jessenia was once again under the tree alone with a book, leaning against it while eating a salad. When she looked up from her book, Jessenia jumped at the sight of Damon crouching right in front of her with those aquamarine blue eyes. She didn’t have the mace in her hand and Jessenia had a feeling she wouldn’t need it because they were around other people. Slowly closing the book and setting it aside, Jessenia folded her arms in front of her chest, her knees already drawn up and simply stared at him.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot, Jessenia.” Damon broke the silence between them, seeing she was willing to hear him out. It shocked him a little and it wasn’t easy to do that to someone like him. “As much as that burned, I’m willing to look past it and start over.”

Jessenia raised a slow eyebrow, eyes narrowing almost sharply. “Why?”

“Why what?” Damon asked, scooting over to sit beside her, their arms touching.

It sent an electric shock through her body as soon as Damon touched her, but thankFelly Jessenia didn’t physically react to it. “Why do you want to start over? I already told you, I’m not hiding anything, Damon.” She said, looking away from him to stare out at the other students.

“That’s precisely the point.”

Damon stared at the beautiful skin of her bare neck, glad she put it up and could already feel his instincts kicking in. What he wouldn’t give to just be able to sink his fangs right in her succulent flesh, just to taste her one time. She smelled incredible, jasmine not gardenias, or maybe it was a mixture of both. He wasn’t even mad about the whole vervain thing because he knew he scared her and she just defended herself against him.

“I know you’re not. That’s why I want to start over, to apologize for my foul behavior towards you and wipe the slate clean.” His mouth hovered over her ear now, resting his hand gently on her side and could feel how fast her blood raced. “I won’t hurt you, Senia.”

Normally, this would’ve been grounds to use the mace because he was touching her. For some reason, Jessenia enjoyed him doing this and she couldn’t figure out why, confusion filling her jade eyes. What was it about Damon that drew her in, that wanted to get to know him better, even after their intense talk? This was an entirely new intensity she was feeling and Jessenia was short of breath, wishing her pulse and heart rate would slow down as her chest rose and fell faster.

“I have to go.”

Jessenia pulled away from him instantly, fear overpowering every other instinct. Grabbing her shaking hand before she could get to her feet, Damon knew if she didn’t calm down she would end up having a heart attack. He pressed his finger to his lips when she tried pulling away again and placed her hand against his chest, the thin material doing nothing to hide his muscular body. They rippled against her soft touch, this girl had possibly the softest skin Damon ever felt in his life.

“Breathe in and out slowly.” He ordered in a soft voice, his eyes locking with her and smiled when she actually started doing it. “Good girl, keep doing it.”

Jessenia did it several times, inhaling and exhaling slowly, her eyes never leaving his. “Thank you.” She whispered, once her heart had slowed back to normal along with her pulse.

“You’re welcome. Sorry if I scared you, wasn’t my intention.” Damon said honestly, slowly letting her hand slide from his chest, not wanting to frighten her again. “I meant what I said, Senia. I want to start over with you, only if you want to though.”

“You still didn’t answer me why you want to though.” She pointed out, wrapping her arms around herself and didn’t pull away when he lightly placed his hands on her upper arms.

“Because Elena doesn’t have a lot of friends. She has Bonnie and Caroline, the blonde you met yesterday along with her brother and a few others. She likes you.” Damon shrugged, letting his hands slip from her upper arms and took a step back. “I don’t want my actions interfering with your friendship.”

Jessenia could only stare at him, wondering if he was telling the truth and could hear Elena’s words in her head about staying away from him. “That’s very…noble of you.” She lowered herself to the ground, being mindful of her skirt and picked up her things, shoving them in her bag. “I’ll think about it, Damon.”

That’s more than what he was expecting from her, especially after yesterday and Damon nodded in understanding with a small smile. “That’s all I ask.” He murmured, holding out the same book he picked up for her the previous day, their fingers brushing together when she took it. “Have a nice day, Senia.”

“You too Damon.” Jessenia whispered at his retreating form and turned to walk in the opposite direction back into school to finish the day off.

Elena had watched the exchange with Stefan, both of them staring at Damon with dubious eyes. “What was THAT about?” Stefan couldn’t help asking, glancing down at an anxious Elena. “What are you up to, Damon?”

Damon rolled his eyes, waving his brother off dismissively. “Nothing, I felt bad and wanted to apologize for what I did to her.” He had his own agenda and refused to divulge any of it to Stefan and especially Elena.

“Why don’t we believe you, Damon?” Elena retorted, not believing a word Damon said because she knew what kind of man he was. “I told you I didn’t find out anything…”

Damon was tired of this and finally threw his hands up in the air, growling. “Fine, I went over there and told her I didn’t want to interfere in your budding friendship. I can see you like her, Elena. That’s why I did it, for YOU.” Spitting ice daggers at her, Damon stormed away from both of them and headed back home to have a few tumblers of scotch, needing the rush.

Elena blinked, looking up at Stefan and wondered if he believed Damon or not. “Come on, we need to get to class.”

Nodding, Stefan guided her inside and couldn’t help being skeptical of what Damon said. “Don’t worry about him right now.” He whispered, sitting down with her in the classroom and both just focused on their studies for the time being.

Elena could only nod, but that was definitely easier said than done when it came to Damon Salvatore.

After school, Jessenia was heading home on foot again when she heard someone calling her name from behind. Turning, she smiled at the sight of Elena and Stefan, though it was Elena that was calling her name. In the very short period of time she’d been in Mystic Falls, Elena was the first person that ever came up to her wanting to be her friend.

Elena pretended she was breathing heavily, even though she could’ve ran several marathons without breaking a sweat, perks of being undead. “Hey, you’re a fast walker!” She exclaimed, chuckling and finally stood up straight. “I wanted to ask you something.”

“What is it?”

“Well, Damon told us about what happened today and…if you’ve forgiven him, we wanted to invite you over for dinner tonight.” Elena said, smiling widely. “It would give us a chance to get to know each other better, hang out. What do you say?”

Jessenia was taken aback by this offer, blinking. “Will Damon be there?” She didn’t mean to ask, but had to know, secretly hoping he was.

Elena chewed her bottom lip, nodding. “I know I said to be careful around him, but with me and Stefan there, you won’t have any problems. I promise.” If Damon so much as said one wrong thing, Elena would beat the hell out of him.

“My brother means well, Jessenia.” Stefan piped in, an easy smile on his face. “He’s not really that bad of a guy once you get to know him.” Something told him big brother felt something for Jessenia and tonight would definitely be a test. “He will be on his best behavior.”

“Hey if you want, we can invite Caroline and Tyler over too.” Elena offered, looking up at Stefan, her eyes glittering. “That way it’s not just the four of us?”

How could Jessenia turn down this offer? She would be able to see Damon again, not to mention hang out with Elena, who she already considered a friend. The main reason she was agreeing to go though was to see Damon, their moment from earlier under the tree not forgotten. If he wanted a fresh start between them, Jessenia didn’t see the harm in doing it, trusting Elena wholeheartedly.

“The four of us is fine, I know you won’t let anything happen to me.”

“So that means you’ll come?” Elena squealed out when Jessenia nodded, throwing her arms around her neck, hugging her tightly. “Okay we really need to get going then. Is there any preference for dinner?”

“Nothing spicy, I can’t eat it because I have really bad acid reflux.” Jessenia said, refusing to spend her night in the hospital just to satisfy someone. “Other than that, have at it. What should I wear?”

Elena thought about it for a few seconds, deciding it wouldn’t hurt to dress up a little for this. “No jeans, is that okay?” She didn’t want to make Jessenia uncomfortable and watched the woman nod, both of them grinning. “Be there around six or six-thirty so we can relax a little before eating.”

“Got it. What is the address?” HopeFelly it wasn’t too far away from Meredith’s because Jessenia didn’t have a car at the moment, so she had to walk.

Elena gave her information and then Stefan informed her she would have a ride. He had a feeling her only transportation was Meredith, who constantly worked at the hospital. Jessenia agreed and they parted ways, heading in opposite directions to get ready for tonight. ThankFelly, Jessenia had finished her homework in every class that day so she would have at least two hours to find something decent to wear.

Arriving home, Jessenia headed upstairs instantly to get ready, tossing her bag to the side and stared in the Fell length mirror. It was antique, something she couldn’t part with when she moved from Maryland. Taking a deep breath, Jessenia stepped into the walk-in closet and began sifting through her clothes, smiling when she saw the perfect thing to wear. Pulling the dress out of the closet, Jessenia couldn’t help touching her neck and closed her eyes, still able to feel Damon’s hot breath.

He was dangerous and not trustworthy, but none of that seemed to bother Jessenia. There was this intense attraction to him that she just couldn’t ignore and that scared her more than anything. What if she lost control with him? Jessenia could already feel her cheeks burning and touched one, shivering.

“Pull it together.” She whispered, coaching herself and walked over to hold the dress of choice up to her, smiling in satisfaction. “Tonight is definitely going to be interesting.” Chuckling, Jessenia tossed the dress on the bed and stripped out of her clothes, deciding a shower was in order.

All Jessenia could hope was that she was making the right decision by going to this dinner.

Chapter 6

At exactly six-thirty, the doorbell rang and Jessenia knew her ride had arrived, staring in the mirror one final time. Her hair was down in loose curls with just a hint of hairspray to hold them in place, flowing over her shoulders and down her back. She had a black ribbon in her hair, bangs angled for style and it went a little above her waist. The dress was strapless and pale green with a black band around the waist that went just below the breasts.

It was two inches above the knee, which was the perfect length because Jessenia really didn’t want to be construed as a whore. Her makeup was simple with thin black eyeliner that made her jade eyes pop with a hint of green eye shadow. Her lips were painted in clear gloss and foundation was applied to hide a few blemishes.

She had her necklace on that Alaric gave her, which went with the dress surprisingly, but Jessenia had also added another one. It had an oval shaped emerald stone, all silver, Jessenia hated gold and went perfect with the outfit. Two inch black open toed heels completed her outfit, no nylons because Jessenia couldn’t stand the feeling of them and wanted to be somewhat comfortable.

“Coming!” Jessenia called out, fluffing her hair one last time and grabbed her purse that had everything she needed, heading down the stairs.

As soon as the door opened, Jessenia felt her breath catch in her throat as aquamarine eyes met hers. He looked incredibly handsome in a long sleeved dark blue shirt that had three buttons on the top undone with black dress pants and a black suit jacket, black shoes on his feet. His hair was that sexy haphazard style and Jessenia suddenly felt the urge to run her fingers through it, fighting temptation.

“Damon…”

“Elena asked me if I would pick you up.” Damon explained, after slowly devouring her with his eyes, the image almost too beautiful to be true. “You look exquisite.”

Flushing, Jessenia lowered her eyes from his and tried to get her cheeks to stop burning, clearing her throat. “Thanks, you look nice too. Come in for a second, I forgot to grab something.”

The biggest smirk crossed his face as Damon slowly did so, the barrier broken since she invited him in her home. “Take your time, Senia.” Now Damon could enter whenever he wanted and Jessenia didn’t even realize it.

Walking into the living room, Jessenia just pretended she had to grab something so she could learn how to breathe again, taking a few seconds to compose herself. ‘I can do this, just pull it together.’ She mentally coached and took a few deep breaths, finally feeling herself calm down. ‘Okay here we go.’ Turning around, Jessenia let out a small shriek when she bumped right into Damon’s chest. “Christ, you scared me!”

Damon chuckled softly, grabbing her arms since she’d stumbled back. “Did you find what you needed?” She didn’t need anything, Damon had watched her silently and knew she was having an inner battle about him. It was obvious. “You ready to go?”

Nodding, Jessenia followed him to the front door and walked out, locking it behind her. Damon guided her to his car, which was a beautiful blue 1967 Chevy Camaro that looked in perfect condition. She went to open the door when Damon stopped her, looking up at him and smiled when he did it for her, slipping inside. Jessenia clicked her seatbelt on while Damon simply pulled out of the driveway, heading to his and Stefan’s house.

“Did you mean it?”

Damon looked over at Jessenia, raising a black brow. “What?”

Jessenia turned to face him. “Did you mean what you said earlier today about us having a clean slate?”

“Of course I did.” Damon stated, nodding. “I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t, Senia.”

Chewing her bottom lip, Jessenia reached into her bag and handed over the small black bottle of mace, setting it in the middle of the seat. “Then prove it.”

Looking back out the window, Jessenia stared into the woods they lived apparently lived in, the moon shining brightly in the sky with a million stars glittering. Damon slowly picked up the black bottle while he drove down the path, eyeing it carefully and could instantly smell the vervain coming from it. He thought it was her necklace, which was also laced with it, but that overshadowed the mace bottle. That’s why Damon hadn’t caught onto it until she sprayed the mixture in his face.

“Here.” He handed it over to her, pulling up to the house and cut the ignition. “You need to protect yourself, Jessenia.” Not only from him, but other vampires that were lurking in the area.

“What does that even mean?” She was really tired of people telling her she had to protect herself and figured there had to be something nobody was telling her. “Why do I need protection so badly?”

So she didn’t know about vampires, Damon leaned back against the seat, rolling his head to stare back at her. “From people like me.” He left her with that thought and stepped out of the car, walking around to open her door for her, extending his hand. “I won’t hurt you, I promise.”

“I know you won’t.” Jessenia believed that wholeheartedly and slipped her hand into his, having placed the mace bottle back in her purse, stepping out of the car.

“You have a lot of faith in people you don’t even know.” He pointed out, not sure if that was a good or bad thing because he didn’t want Jessenia trusting the wrong people. Extending his arm, Damon flashed another charming smile, raising a brow when she just stared at him. “Shall we?”

Linking her arm through his, Jessenia let Damon guide her into the huge house that looked more like a mansion. As soon as the door opened, Jessenia was greeted by both Elena and Stefan, who were both dressed up as much as she was. She had a feeling Damon didn’t enjoy dressing up and honestly felt the same way, but figured since this wasn’t her dinner party she would look presentable.

“You look beautiful!” Elena praised, taking Jessenia by the hand and smiled softly at Damon. “Thank you for picking her up.”

Damon saluted, walking past them to head to the parlor for a much needed drink. Elena gave Jessenia the grand tour, but stayed away from Damon’s bedroom. Jessenia was very observed and noticed they didn’t see that room, but kept it to herself, looking at all the fantastic décor the house had. It was very old, she could tell, but also well preserved. Once the tour finished, they headed into the room where Damon currently nursed a tumbler of bourbon, standing in front of the fire.

“I’m going to go check on dinner. Make yourself at home, Jesse.” Elena offered, walking out of the parlor to go see what Stefan was doing in the kitchen.

Jessenia watched Elena walk out of the room before turning back to sit down, gasping when Damon was right in front of her. “You really need to stop doing that.” She ordered, placing a hand over her heart and walked past him down the few stairs to one of the couches, sitting down.

“Why is that?” Damon smirked when she jumped again, now sitting beside her on the couch, chuckling. “You’re really jumpy, Senia. Do I scare you?”

“Stop it.” Jessenia whispered, starting to scoot away from him, but Damon’s arm wrapping around her waist prevented that. “Damon…”

“I asked you a question and it’s rude to ignore me.” Damon murmured, his mouth by her ear again like earlier that day. “I just want to know.”

Jessenia moved her head away from him, but she couldn’t go far because of his tight grip on her waist. “Fine, yes I am. You terrify me, now please let me go.” She trembled slightly when he gently gripped her chin, turning her face until their eyes met.

“No.” Damon whispered, running the pad of his thumb over her cheek, those jade eyes piercing him again. “Breathe, you’re safe here.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Damon mockingly touched his chest with his free hand, scoffing. “Oh you wound me. And here I thought we were making some progress.”

“There is no progress with you. You were an asshole when we first met and you’re an asshole now. There is no starting over. Now let go of me.” Jessenia ordered, pulling her chin out of his grasp and stood up from the couch.

“Your spunk is very attractive.” Damon grabbed her wrist and yanked her to sit sideways on his lap, causing her to squeak out. “Admit it, you’re enjoying this little fling we got going on.”

“I’d hardly call this a fling.” Jessenia snorted, folding her arms in front of her chest and was thankful her legs automatically crossed, not sure what Damon was capable of. “This is you manhandling me and being an asshole.”

Damon laughed, finding this incredibly amusing. “I’m not manhandling you, Senia.” He suddenly buried his hand in her hair and yanked, causing her head to snap back until their eyes met again. “Now THIS? This is manhandling.”

Now she was terrified, tears forming in her jade eyes and swallowed hard when his head dipped down to her neck. “Please don’t do this…” She pleaded and knew Damon could hear how fast her heart currently pounded.

“Don’t do what?” His hand moved from her hair to grip the back of her neck gently, not wanting to hurt her. “You like this, admit it.”

“No I don’t!” Jessenia gritted out, a few tears slipping down her cheeks and shivered when his lips softly caressed her neck. “Let me go!”

“You didn’t say please.”

The smell of jasmine surrounded him, inviting him in and saw how fast the vein in her neck pulsed. He just wanted a taste, she smelled delectable and he was having a hard time controlling himself. If only he could use compulsion, Damon could have his wicked way with her.

The thought of just taking her to his bedroom and locking them both inside was very tempting, but Damon also didn’t want to deal with his brother. He wasn’t worried about Elena so much as Stefan, especially since he now drank human blood instead of living off of animals. Still, Damon didn’t have a struggling human in his bed in awhile, it could be fun.

Panic set in again as Damon continued assaulting her neck and Jessenia wondered where the hell Stefan and Elena were. Gritting her teeth, Jessenia reached over to grab the closest sharp object she could get her hands on, which was a tumbler. She pretended to start enjoying what Damon was doing to her, overpowering the fear in exchange for survival.

A second later, glass shattered as Damon released her instantly, Jessenia falling to the hard floor. “YOU LITTLE BITCH!!” He roared, holding his head and blocked out the pain when he noticed she was getting ready to run.

Jessenia skidded to a halt when Damon ended up right in front of her, stumbling back and fell down the few stairs right back into the parlor, hitting her head. “STAY AWAY FROM ME!!” She screamed, tears pouring down her face and scrambled back on her hands and heels, knocking things over to try stopping him from getting too close.

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON IN HERE?” Stefan roared, both him and Elena rushing inside, their eyes wide at the still bloody Damon.

“H-How are you…oh god, what’s happening?!” Jessenia cried out as she watched the cuts on Damon’s head heal by themselves, terrified now as she kept scrambling back.

“That little bitch just smashed a glass over my head all because I wanted to have a little FUN.” Damon growled, ice blue eyes spitting daggers at her while Elena went to her side, glaring at Stefan’s disapproving eyes.

Stefan shook his head, heading over to check on Jessenia. “Go get cleaned up, Damon.” He ordered in a low voice, daring his big brother to fight him right now. “Now.”

“You’re not going to order me around, Stefan. She saw what just happened, she needs to either die or compelled.” He said flatly, wiping the rest of the excess blood from his head. “And since that LOVELY necklace is on her, death it is.”

Damon was over to Jessenia in a flash, yanking her away from both Elena and Stefan, his arm feeling as though it might crush her throat at any second. “N-No please, PLEASE I won’t say anything!! Please don’t kill me!!” Jessenia screamed, struggling against him and shot pleading jade eyes to both Elena and Stefan to stop him.

“You know this has to be done.” Damon stated, not caring about a human life because he’d taken so many in all the time he’d been on this earth. “Unless we use compulsion, which isn’t an option. Too bad, I was starting to really like this one…”

Jessenia closed her eyes when Damon pressed his cheek against hers, applying more pressure across her throat, trembling so hard her teeth were chattering. “Please don’t kill me…” She whispered brokenly, both of her hands gripping his forearm to try to relieve some kind of pressure.

“LET HER GO NOW, DAMON!!”

Elena and Stefan whipped around at the sight of Alaric, their eyes wide. “Alaric…”

“Oh you’ve GOT to be kidding me!!” Damon crowed sarcastically, backing away with Jessenia slowly, refusing to release her. “And what happens if I DON’T, Alaric? You going to kill me?”

“Yes.” Alaric already had the sharpened wooden stake in his hand, eyes narrowed to slits, daring Damon to take another human life that was linked to his girlfriend. “She’s done nothing wrong. Now let her go or ELSE!”

“Take one more step and she dies.” Damon stated, meaning every word he said and smirked coldly when Alaric stopped advancing. “Good boy. Now, here’s what’s going to happen.” Yanking back on Jessenia’s hair, Damon stared down into her tear-streaked face, her eyes still closed. “You’re going to tell me what you’re doing in Mystic Falls or I will drain every last drop of blood in your body, Jessenia. Do you understand?”

“T-That’s all you w-want?” Jessenia stammered out in a whisper, feeling as though she might faint from everything that happened.

“Yup, that’s all I want. You tell me your dirty little secret,” He grunted, running his tongue down her cheek to catch a few more salty tears, groaning. “And I’ll let you walk out of here with Alaric completely free.”

Elena knew her lies were now costing her a friendship with Jessenia and she hated Damon for it, shaking her head. “You’re such a bastard! I know the reason why and you couldn’t leave well enough alone, Damon!”

“Elena!”

“No Stefan, I have to tell him or he’ll kill her! That’s the only way he knows how to eliminate the problem is by force or death! I won’t let that happen to her!” Elena backed away from Stefan and slowly walked toward Damon, her brown eyes pleading with him to let Jessenia go. “I know the reason, I’m not going to lie to you again. Just please let her go.”

“No.” Damon applied more pressure, pissed that Elena actually lied to him and his suspicions of it were true. “I want to hear it from HER mouth, not yours.”

“Jesse, just tell him why you’re in Mystic Falls and he’ll let you go.” Elena pleaded, hoping her friend did the right thing because Damon would not hesitate to kill her.

Nodding, Jessenia knew she had no choice and started crying even harder, everything crashing down around her at that moment. “I-I came to Mystic Falls because…of my father.” Damon instantly released her, dropping her to the floor like a sack of potatoes and Jessenia started coughing, grabbing her throat.

“Who is your daddy dearest?” Damon demanded, daring this girl to deny him answers because he would snap her head clear off her shoulders.

Slowly looking up at him with tear-filled jade eyes, Jessenia locked them on his ice cold blue ones, her bottom lip trembling. “Logan Fell.”

Chapter 7

Logan Fell was dead as far as everyone in that room knew.

Alaric rushed to Jessenia’s side and lifted her in his arms, glaring at all three vampires, cradling her close to his body. “You’re safe, Jessenia.” He whispered, trying to calm her down and hated hearing her heart-wrenching sobs against his chest.

“You’re a dick, Damon. You didn’t have to find out this way.” Stefan wasn’t happy with his brother, wanting to rip him apart and pulled Elena in his arms, running his fingers through her hair. “Elena told me earlier today, but we were afraid you would kill her if you knew she was a Fell. We were going to tell you…”

“When?” Damon growled, stalking up to his little brother and shoved him, livid right now. “You FORCED me to do that to her and you knew the WHOLE time?! I thought she was purposefully hiding something!!”

“That’s what happens when you’re a paranoid asshole.” Elena stated coldly, slowly walking over to Alaric and frowned when Jessenia just held onto him for dear life. “I-I’m so sorry, Alaric. I had no idea Damon would do something like this. We were honestly going to have a nice quiet dinner and hang out for awhile.”

“Give her to me.” Damon ordered, shoving Stefan away when he tried stopping him from advancing on Alaric. “I’m not going to hurt her!! I have to talk to her,” He paused, locking eyes with Alaric. “Both of us do, alone.”

“I-I saw…He healed…P-Please…”

“She’s hyperventilating, give her to me.” Damon ordered, waiting for Alaric to deny him and backhanded him, catching a trembling Jessenia in his arms. “Next time listen to me. I’m taking her to my room, all of you stay out.”

“No!” Alaric stood up instantly, wiping the blood from his lip, which was already healed. “Hand her back over to me now, Damon, or so help me I will stake you.”

“You could try.” Damon knew Jessenia was in no position to fight him and took advantage, slowly backing away down the hallway while keeping his eyes on everyone.

“Stefan, do something!!” Elena ordered, shoving him, worry swimming in her eyes. “He’s going to kill her!”

“No he’s not.” Stefan hated Damon’s methods of getting information out of people, but damned if it didn’t work. “He won’t hurt her. If we have to, all three of us can get in there if she needs help.”

Elena couldn’t believe what she was hearing, starting to head for Damon’s room, when Stefan stopped her. “Let go of me! She has to be safe!”

“If you go in there and piss him off even more, he will kill her, Elena.” Stefan said reasonably, placing both hands on her shoulders, forcing her to meet his eyes. “Trust me, I won’t let him kill her. Something tells me he feels something for her. What that is, I’m not sure yet.”

Alaric listened to all of this and headed straight for the bar, needing a drink.

“Here we go.” Damon gently set Jessenia on the soft king sized bed, staring down into her eyes and sighed heavily. “I’m going to get you some water. Don’t move.” He walked out of the room to the connecting master bathroom.

Jessenia waited until he was out of sight before bolting off the bed to the door, needing to get the hell out of here before she ended up dead. She barely opened the door before Damon stopped her, his hand slamming it shut again, pinning her chest first to it. Not stopping, Jessenia tried yanking the door open and began pounding on it, not believing nobody was coming to save her.

“What did I tell you,” Damon paused, grabbing her arm and turned her to face him, her back now pressed against the door. “About not moving?”

“Get away from me.” Jessenia demanded in a cracked shaky voice, her hand still on the doorknob. “Let me out of here.”

“You are very bossy.” Damon said, planting his forearm over her head, eyes locking with hers. “Look, I had to scare you into spilling what you were hiding. I’m not going to apologize for it either. It had to be done.”

“Why?” She whispered, immediately regretting it and lowered her eyes. “Forget it, I don’t even care anymore. Now you know, I want to go home now.”

Damon smirked, placing his mouth by her ear. “Not so fast.” He pulled away from her, knowing he could easily catch her if she tried running. “We have a few things to discuss before I let you roam free.” Pouring himself a glass of whiskey, Damon turned to face her, smiling. “Such as your abusive behavior towards me and how, if you EVER do it again, I’m going to snap that pretty neck right off your shoulders. Don’t think I can’t do it either, Jessenia.”

“You deserved it, manhandling and forcing yourself on me…” Jessenia pressed back against the door more when Damon flew over to her, their noses practically touching. “What, I’m not allowed to speak my mind now?”

“I didn’t do anything you weren’t enjoying.” Damon argued, downing his shot before setting the glass slowly on the table that was by the door. “Try denying it all you want, but today during your lunch, there was a spark between us. And then tonight, there was definitely more sparks. I felt them and I dare you to stand there, lie to me and say that you didn’t.”

“Are you kidding me?” Jessenia stared at him incredulously, refusing to admit anything she felt because, deep down, she knew everything Damon just said was the truth. “You scared the hell out of me and manhandled me!! I haven’t enjoyed a single second with you!”

Damon rolled his eyes and took the glass to get a refill, downing another shot. “I’m not buying it.”

“Think what you want, I really don’t care.” Jessenia looked around his bedroom, but also kept one eye on him, not trusting him at all. “You obviously want to talk about something, so we can get on with it so I can go home?”

Damon snorted and laid down on the bed, crossing his ankles with his drink resting on his stomach, leaning against the headboard. “Come join me and we’ll have a little chat.” He patted the bed invitingly, draining the tumbler and set it on the nightstand, not moving. “I’ve got all the time in the world, Senia.”

“Why do you call me that?” Jessenia had to ask, slowly moving away from the door cautiously. “Nobody has ever called me that before.”

“Don’t know, it just kinda came to me.” Damon said indifferently, rolling his eyes at how slow she was approaching the bed.

Jessenia grunted when she was suddenly slammed back on the bed full force, Damon hovering over her. He had inhuman speed that she’d never seen before and strength that could probably kill even the world’s strongest man. Jessenia could feel it radiating off of him in waves, the sheer power taking her breath away along with the whole package.

“That’s much better.” He murmured, his lips mere inches from hers, wanting to kiss so bad he could taste it. “You really need to relax. I’m just an impatient man, especially when I have a beautiful woman in my bed that I can’t have my wicked way with.”

Jessenia swallowed hard, trying not to let the tears build up again, but couldn’t help it. “W-What did you want to talk about, Damon?” She asked, giving herself props for keeping a straight strong voice, even though her insides were quaking right now.

“Besides all the ways I’d love to ravage you right here and now?” Damon smiled, not moving from where he currently was and ran his hand up her arm to lace their fingers together, his eyes never leaving hers. “Your father.”

She figured as much, feeling him entwine their fingers together and went to move her hand, but it was pointless. Damon was much stronger than her, built like a brick house and even through the thin material of his shirt, Jessenia could feel his muscles rippling. He groaned again because her scent was intoxicating him, driving him closer to the edge with each passing second.

His face buried in her neck and Damon could feel his face starting to change, the sclera’s of his eyes turning red. It’s what happened when a vampire was incredibly aroused and smelled something extremely delicious, which was human blood. She wasn’t bleeding, but her fear was allowing her scent to increase and nearly overwhelm him. Taking a few deep breaths, Damon got himself under control by softly kissing her soft skin, right over her pulse point where his fangs could sink in to get a taste.

“Do you know who he is?” Jessenia was trying not to let Damon get to her, squirming beneath him and tried once more to pull her hand out of his, biting her lip. “Damon, please stop it…” Hadn’t he put her through enough tonight?

“Do you have any idea how much fun we could have together, Senia?” Damon demanded, very slowly lifting his head from her neck once he was sure he was in control, aquamarine locking with anxious jade. “I’m not going to hurt you. I never was going to.”

“You didn’t answer my question…” She was breathless and Jessenia hated that she was showing he had gotten to her, but she was only human after all. “Do you know who my father is?” She also didn’t believe a word he said about not hurting her, not after that episode where he nearly choked her to death with his arm.

“Yes.”

Damon allowed her to sit up a little, sitting on his knees in front of her, but didn’t release her hand in case she decided to try whacking him with something else. “Where is he? Does he live in town? How do you know him?” So many questions fired off at him, but this was definitely the first time she’d heard about her father. “Please, you have to tell me something about him-”

“He’s dead, Jessenia.” Damon released her hand instantly and stood up from the bed, needing another drink.

Jessenia felt as though the breath was suddenly sucked out of her body, tears forming in her eyes. “W-What? What do you mean?” She scrambled off the bed and walked over to him, the fear temporarily evaded.

“Dead as in buried six feet in the ground.” Damon clarified flatly, downing his shot and swallowed any remorse he might have felt at that moment for Jessenia. That’s not who he was. “I killed him, he came back to life. Then Ric killed him again, this time for good.”

“Ric?” Jessenia blinked as huge tears slid down her cheeks now, every part of her body breaking out in a cold sweat, her heart feeling as though it might give out. “N-No…” There was a reason Jessenia had moved from Maryland, but she’d been keeping it from everyone except Meredith. “T-This can’t be happening…”

“Oh trust me, it is.” Damon turned to face her, seeing how pale her face was and lifted her up in his arms, laying her back down again before she ended up fainting on the hard wood floor. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about before we got into the talk about your daddy, but can’t have everything perfect.”

Jessenia didn’t care to hear anymore and rolled away from him, taking the nearest pillow and buried her face in it, her tears soaking right through. Her father, the only part left of her, was gone? He was dead? Suddenly, Jessenia realized who she was with and went to bolt out of bed, but Damon’s arm wrapped around her waist, preventing her from going anywhere.

“LET ME GO!!” She screamed at the top of her lungs, sobbing violently. “YOU KILLED HIM, YOU MURDERER!!”

“It had to be done.” Damon stated calmly, expecting this kind of reaction and tightened his grip a little more on her. “He deserved it, Senia…”

“DON’T CALL ME THAT!! DON’T YOU DARE CALL ME THAT, YOU MONSTER!!” Jessenia was past the point of being composed, every part of her wanting to get as far away from Damon as possible. “LET ME GO RIGHT NOW!!”

“No.”

“YOU MURDERED MY FATHER!!”

“Had to do it.”

“STOP SAYING THAT!!”

Damon growled, forcing her on her back as he straddled her, forcing her eyes to meet his. “I did what I had to do to save this town, Jessenia.” He stopped her from looking away from him, applying a little more pressure to her chin, which he held in a vise grip. “Before you start screaming at me and calling me a murderer, you need to know EVERYTHING. In order to do that, you need to stop screaming at me and grow up a little.”

“Fuck you!” Jessenia hissed, spitting right in his face and slapped him as hard as she could, her hand stinging. “GET OFF OF ME!!”

“LISTEN TO ME THEN!!” Damon roared finally, tired of being screamed at by a human girl he could easily rip to shreds. “You will listen to what I have to say and then you can run screaming back home to your cousin, who is on my side, along with Alaric, in case you were wondering.”

That instantly made Jessenia stop fighting as she sank back down on the bed, the tears not stopping, but her screaming ceased. “What?” She whispered, disbelief crossing her face and began shaking her head. “N-No…Meredith would never keep something like this from me. He’s the WHOLE reason I moved here in the first place!! You’re lying!!”

“No I’m not.”

Damon sighed when she started screaming again and did the only thing he could think of shut her up. His lips suddenly crashed down on hers, feeling her struggling against him and didn’t pull away. He didn’t dare slide his tongue inside her mouth because she would bite it off, that much he was certain. Very skilled at everything he did, Damon coaxed and manipulated the kiss, forcing her feel every single thing she’d been denying and then some. Being a vampire, Damon didn’t need to breathe so he could keep kissing her until she either passed out or calmed down.

This was probably the most passionate, toe-curling kiss Jessenia ever experienced in her life and it was at the worst possible time. She fought against him every step of the way, tears pouring like two rapid streams, but absolutely nothing was stopping Damon. Finally succumbing to what she’d been dying, even after everything he did tonight with threatening her life, Jessenia kissed him back. She felt him slowly release her arms and buried her hands in his thick black hair, deepening the kiss even more.

Every part of her was relaxing, Damon could feel it and was really surprised Jessenia was kissing him back. He just admitted openly and bluntly that he killed her father. This woman definitely had issues, but Damon wasn’t about to complain or pull out of the kiss. His hands moved down her sides to her outer thighs, squeezing them gently, not wanting to hurt her anymore than he already had.

When Jessenia could no longer breathe, she finally pulled out of the kiss and could only stare up at her father’s murderer, the realization of what she did slowly washing over her. Damon stared back at her, knowing exactly what was going through her mind and didn’t reach out to touch any other part of her body. Instead, he did something he normally never did. He pushed himself off of her and stood up from the bed, gesturing mockingly to the door.

“You’re free to go now, I’m done playing with you.”

Jessenia didn’t waste a second as she flew from the bedroom, tears flying behind her and didn’t hear Damon slam the door behind her harshly.

Chapter 8

Elena was the first to greet a sobbing Jessenia, stopping her from running past them, a deep frown marring her face. “Jesse, what happened?” Her lips were slightly swollen and Elena could already feel her blood boiling, knowing Damon had put his hands on her. “Did he…?”

“Did you know?”

That question took Elena aback, confusion entering her eyes. “Did I know what, sweetie?”

“Did you know that he and…and…” Jessenia couldn’t go on, jumping when Alaric took a step toward her, shaking her head. “Stay away from me. All of you stay the hell away from me!” Breaking free of Elena, Jessenia ran up the few stairs and took her heels off before bolting out the front door, running as fast as she could.

Alaric was going to kill Damon, glaring when the son of a bitch showed his face and started for him, but Stefan stepped in the way. “Ric, it’s not worth it.”

“What did you say to her, dick?” Alaric demanded, watching as Damon went to get another drink. “What the hell is going on?”

“Told her the truth about what we did to Logan.” Damon smiled and walked over to sit on the couch, propping his feet up on the table while the heat of the flames washed over him. “She didn’t take it very well.”

“Well no kidding! She just ran out of here and told us all to stay away from her!! I’m dating Meredith, do you have any idea what this is going to do to our relationship?!” Alaric was pissed; it showed on his face, squeezing the wooden stake in his hand, really wanting to end Damon’s existence and rid the world of him.

Elena could tell what Alaric was thinking and stopped him before he did something he would surely regret, shaking her head. “Go find Jesse before she ends up hurt. We’ll talk to Damon and tomorrow I’ll sort things out with her.”

“Damon, I’m only warning you one more time, you stay the hell away from Jessenia or I will kill you.” Alaric wasn’t giving him another caveat and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

“Whatever.” Damon downed the rest of his whiskey before setting it on the side table, ignoring Elena’s disapproving look. “I don’t need a lecture. I did what I had to do.”

“Do you have any idea how much pain you caused that girl tonight, Damon?” Elena asked softly, still having her compassion and humanity even after being changed. “You possibly destroyed her.”

“And that should bother me why?” Damon retorted, standing up from the couch to stand in front of the fire, the flames dancing in his eyes. “I may have caused her a world of pain, but that pain will cease since she didn’t even know the guy.”

“And what if it doesn’t?” Elena demanded, watching as Damon turned to face her, their eyes meeting.

“Believe me, when you chose Stefan instead of me it nearly destroyed me, Elena. I got over it though. And what makes you think I even care if she does survive? She’s a HUMAN and I’m a VAMPIRE, did you suddenly forget that? I don’t feel anything for humans, not anymore.” Taking the glass, Damon launched it as hard as he could in the fireplace, watching as the flames exploded briefly, gritting his teeth.

Elena frowned, knowing she had really hurt Damon when she chose Stefan over him, but the heart wanted what the heart wanted. “Good night, Damon.” She whispered, leaving him alone and went to join Stefan in bed, having sent him away so she could talk to him privately.

“Yeah, night.” Damon muttered, walking away from the flames and headed to his bedroom, slamming the door shut.

It wasn’t that Damon wasn’t over Elena because he was, had been for awhile. He enjoyed making Elena feel guilty because she chose the wrong man. Damon loved her more than Stefan, or loved, now she was stuck with his weak brother who refused to show her how to feed on a human.

When Elena transitioned, Damon had to be the one to track the human down for her to feed on to complete the process. If she hadn’t, she would’ve died and Stefan didn’t care. He thought animal blood would be strong enough to complete Elena’s transition, but as soon as she tried it, it made her sick. So Damon took matters into his own hands, which he did often, and found an older woman that was ready to croak, allowing Elena to use her blood to survive.

That was fine though, Elena and Stefan could have each other because Damon was done with her.

Pouring another glass of bourbon, Damon plopped down in bed and instantly closed his eyes, the smell of jasmine surrounding him. Jessenia was definitely a one of a kind woman, one he really wanted to get to know better and on a more personal level. Of course, that was going to be really hard now that Alaric had a stake with his name on it if he went near Jessenia again.

There was always a way around that though, Damon smirking as he downed the rest of the liquor and just lay there for awhile, thinking about the burning kiss he shared with Jessenia.

~!~

Jessenia somehow found the main road that lead back into town, making it out of the woods. She had to hide behind a tree out of sight when Alaric drove by, needing to get home to tell Meredith what she found out. Damon and Alaric were responsible for her father’s death. The more Jessenia thought about it, the more her heart broke into a million pieces because she had no other family besides Meredith.

An hour later, Jessenia arrived at home and was thankful to see Meredith’s car in the driveway. However, that wasn’t the only car and Jessenia suddenly recognized it as Alaric’s. This wasn’t good. How was she supposed to face one of the men that killed her father?

‘I have nowhere else to go.’ She thought miserably, slowly walking up the stairs and reluctantly opened the front door, closing it behind her.

“Jessenia?” Meredith called out, walking out of the kitchen and immediately rushed over to her, hugging her close. “Oh thank god…”

Jessenia instantly broke down against her cousin, hugging her to the point of almost cutting off circulation, burying her face in Meredith’s neck. Meredith had no idea what happened, running her fingers through Jessenia’s hair and looked over her shoulder at Alaric, frowning. What the hell happened over at the Salvatore house?

“It’s okay, Jess…”

“No…No it’s not!” Jessenia sobbed brokenly, every part of her hurting from both what Damon did to her and the heartbreak. “It never will be again…”

Meredith pulled back, staring into her cousin’s red swollen bloodshot eyes, feeling all the pain pouring from her body. “What happened, Jess? Talk to me.”

“Get him out of here.” Jessenia ordered through gritted teeth, trembling from head to toe and staring deadly at Alaric. If looks could kill, he would be on the floor dead at her feet. “I’m not saying a single word until he’s gone.” Pushing her cousin away, Jessenia rushed up the stairs to her room, the door slamming shut echoing down the stairs moments later.

Meredith slowly turned to face her boyfriend, realization evident on her face. “She knows?” When Alaric nodded, Meredith instantly went into his open arms, tears stinging her eyes. “Christ, I was just waiting for the right time to tell her.”

“I know.” Alaric whispered, slowly pulling back to stare into her eyes. “It was Damon who told her. He…He forced her to tell him the reason why she moved to Mystic Falls. You know how paranoid he is.”

“We should’ve told her.” Meredith muttered, walking away from Alaric to go back inside the kitchen, running a hand through her hair. “I have no idea how I’m going to explain any of this to her without her freaking out. I mean how do you tell someone that vampires exist?”

“I don’t know.”

Alaric didn’t even believe they did until he witnessed his wife die at the hands of one. Only she hadn’t been murdered, she was changed, after begging Damon to do it. Alaric sighed heavily, scrubbing a hand down his face, having lived the last few years of his life as a vampire hunter. Now he was friends with a few of them, it was irony at its finest.

“Damon had no choice, but he didn’t actually kill him. I’m the one who did it, technically.”

“I know that and I love you for it.” Meredith said, reaching up to wrap her arms around his neck, kissing him softly. “Everything will work out, Ric. You just have to have a little faith. But in the meantime, I think you should leave so I can talk to her. She’s upset and not rational right now.”

Alaric nodded, completely sympathetic and kissed her forehead. “I’ll call you tomorrow. I’ll understand if she misses a few days of school too.”

Meredith nodded, kissing him one last time. “Hey, this doesn’t change anything between us. I still want you.” She wanted to assure him, refusing to lose Alaric because of vampires and especially Logan.

Smiling, Alaric caressed her face and ran the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip. “I know, I’m not going anywhere.”

Meredith watched him walk out the front door and looked up at the ceiling, knowing her cousin was going to be furious with her. When Monica died unexpectantly, Meredith was the only one who would take Jessenia in, the other family members turning their backs. This wasn’t in Meredith’s plans, but she couldn’t leave Jessenia to fend for herself in Maryland and moved her to Mystic Falls.

Sighing, Meredith headed up the stairs, replaying over and over what she was going to say in her head. The sobs coming through Jessenia’s bedroom door broke Meredith’s heart, hating that she caused her cousin so much pain. She should have just told her the truth instead of bringing her to Mystic Falls with false hope.

“Jessenia, can I come in? We really need to talk.” Meredith tapped lightly on the door, leaning her head against it. “Please?”

Jessenia didn’t move an inch, curled up in a tight ball on her bed, crying her eyes out. Meredith slowly walked over and sat on the bed, placing a hand on her back, her own tears forming. Having to raise a teenager at her age definitely wasn’t on Meredith’s agenda, but here she was.

It reminded her of what Jenna Sommers had to go through, which was Alaric’s ex-girlfriend. Elena Gilbert’s parents had died in a horrible accident off of Wickery Bridge, both of them drowning. She took in both Elena and Elena’s brother, Jeremy, becoming their legal guardian much the same way she did with Jessenia.

“What do you want, Meredith?” Jessenia asked in a cracked voice, staring straight at the wall.

“I should’ve told you this from the beginning, Jess, and I’m so sorry you had to find out like this.” Meredith said sincerely, placing her hand on Jessenia’s shoulder and let a few tears slip down her cheeks. “You were going through so much and I was waiting for the right time…”

“The right time?” Jessenia’s sarcastic laugh echoed around the room as she slowly sat up, wiping her tears away. “The right time would’ve been before I was threatened with my life if I didn’t reveal my secret!!” Scrambling out of bed, Jessenia walked over to stare out the window, touching her throat. “And scared to the point of hyperventilation and manhandling.” Light bruises coated her throat, along with her upper arms and even her lips, her fingertips running across them.

“What?” Meredith stood up instantly, eyes widened. “W-What do you mean? Are you okay?” She turned Jessenia around, staring at the bruises that marred her throat and hugged her tightly, rubbing her back. “I-I’m so sorry, Jess. God I’m so sorry…”

Jessenia held onto her cousin for dear life, trying to stop trembling and crying, but it wasn’t happening. “Alaric killed him…” She whispered, slowly pulling back to look at Meredith. “Why?”

Sighing heavily, Meredith took Jessenia’s hands and guided her over to sit down on the bed, not releasing them. “Before I tell you what happened, there’s a few things you need to know about this town.” That definitely got Jessenia’s attention. “I need you to have an open mind about this. Do you promise?”

Jessenia nodded, simply waiting for Meredith to explain. So she did. Meredith explained about the Founding Families of Mystic Falls, which were the townspeople descended from the original settlers. They formed the Founder’s Council, an association of the Founding Families that was dedicated to celebrating Mystic Falls’ local history. Secretly, however, the council’s actual mission was to hunt down and destroy vampires. Each of the Founding Families kept journals that described how to catch and kill a vampire, which have been passed down through the generations.

“That’s not the only supernatural being in Mystic Falls though, Jessenia.” Meredith stated, looking down at her clasped hands, swallowing hard. “There’s also witches and werewolves.”

This was a lot to process as Jessenia just sat there, trying to mull all the information Meredith just told her, blinking. Five minutes passed and Jessenia finally looked up at Meredith, knowing she was telling the truth. Suddenly, Damon popped into Jessenia’s mind and felt her hands turn clammy, her breathing turning erratic.

The speed, the pale complexion, the strength she felt from him…Jessenia was on her feet instantly, watching the confusion cross Meredith’s face. “Meredith, I need you to answer this honestly.”

“Okay…”

“Is Damon…?”

“Yes.” Meredith nodded, not meeting Jessenia’s eyes. “Nobody knew what he was planning to do to you. Alaric said he’ll be dealt with.”

“He’s…a vampire. You’re telling me I was threatened and manhandled by a damn vampire?!” This was too much for Jessenia to take, feeling her legs turn to jelly as she collapsed on the floor, fresh tears sliding down her cheeks.

Meredith went to her aid, wrapping her arms around Jessenia’s shoulders, pressing her forehead against the side of Jessenia’s head. “He won’t hurt you again, Jess. He knows your secret and now we can move on. Alaric will protect you. That’s why you need to wear that necklace at all times, even in the shower. We’re acquaintances with the Salvatore brothers, Damon and Stefan. I’d like to keep it that way since they’re possibly the most dangerous vampires in the Mystic Falls area.”

That was not comforting in the slightest. “What about Elena?” Jessenia asked softly, slowly looking into her cousin’s eyes. “Does she know about all of this?”

“Yes, and she’s also a vampire.” Meredith admitted, being completely open and honest with her. “And it’s okay to be her friend because Elena is a sweetheart, vampire or not. I trust her and you should too.”

“I want to go to bed, Meredith.” Jessenia whispered, having heard enough for one night and she was exhausted after what Damon put her through. “We can talk more tomorrow, please.”

“Of course.” Meredith whispered, slowly getting to her feet and helped Jessenia up as well. “Tomorrow is a new day.”

Nodding, Jessenia hugged her tightly around the neck and accepted a kiss on the forehead, smiling in spite of everything she heard. “Good night.”

“I love you, Jess. Never forget that.”

“I know, I love you too and thank you for taking me in.”

“Anytime.” Meredith murmured softly, hoping her cousin was going to be alright with all this newfound information. “Good night.”

As soon as the door closed, Jessenia stripped out of her dress and changed into a light pink tank top with matching cotton shorts, climbing into bed. She turned the lamp off on her nightstand and snuggled into the pillow, trying to force herself to sleep. The last person on her mind as Jessenia drifted off to sleep was Damon.

Chapter 9

The next time Jessenia saw Damon was on Saturday.

Just as Alaric suspected, Jessenia stayed out of school for the rest of the week, just trying to adjust to her surroundings. Meredith was also afraid she would run off at the mouth, just wanting her to relax, so she decided to take Alaric’s offer. Jessenia didn’t do much, just read a few books and stayed in the house, appreciating the warm weather Mystic Falls offered.

Alaric brought her the schoolwork she missed, which Jessenia appreciated, though she was still hesitant around him. He did murder her biological father, Jessenia couldn’t just forget something like that in the blink of an eye. Jessenia did her homework and then started cleaning the house out of sheer boredom, refusing to step foot outside.

Saturday arrived and Jessenia had all the windows open, letting the warm breeze fill the house. She wore a simple white tank top and matching cotton Capri’s, her feet bare with her hair piled up on top of her head. Currently, she was in the kitchen chopping up some pineapple, making a fruit salad and poured some apple juice. The radio played soft country music, something she always did with her mother on Saturdays in Maryland.

“I always did love pineapple.”

Jessenia jumped out of her skin and whirled around, still holding the knife, staring into the aquamarine eyes of the man that threatened and manhandled her. The man that helped Alaric murder her father, even though Meredith explained to her about Logan being a vampire when he died. That still didn’t stop the panic from consuming her, especially knowing what Damon was now. He had consumed her dreams ever since that night, most of them filled with sex that followed him biting her.

“Get out.” Jessenia demanded, backing away from him slowly and held the knife up in a half-ass threat.

Damon smiled, letting her put the space between them because he could stop her if she tried running. “Figured I’d stop by, see how you’re doing. You know, after I nearly popped your head off like a dandelion.”

“How did you even get in here?” Meredith also explained to Jessenia that a vampire could not enter a human home without being invited first. “I-I didn’t invite you…”

“Oh but you did.” Damon countered, taking a piece of pineapple and popped it in his mouth, not stopping his slow predatory advancement. “You don’t remember?”

His arrogant voice angered her and Jessenia really wanted to sink the knife right into his chest, breathing erratically. “No, why don’t you stop being an asshole and enlighten me?” She shot back, gritting her teeth and didn’t take her eyes off of him for a second.

“With pleasure.” Damon sped over to where she stood, plucking the knife out of her hand and dropped it, pushing her gently against the wall. “When I picked you up for dinner…”

“No…” Jessenia shook her head, jade eyes widening as the memory overtook her, her mouth dropping open.

Damon smirked, reaching out to push her jaw up. “Flies will get in.” He turned around and walked over to the kitchen island, popping a grape in his mouth this time. “So, what are we making?”

“I want you to leave.” Jessenia slowly pulled away from the wall, maintaining her distance. “I know what you are and I don’t want any part of it. I told you what you wanted to know. What more do you want from me?”

“Good question.” Damon thought about it for half a second, snapping his fingers. “I’ve noticed you haven’t left this house since that night. Take a walk with me.” He extended his hand to her, having a feeling she would hesitate. “I give you my word I won’t hurt you again, Senia.”

“And why would I take a vampire’s word? Or go for a walk with a vampire for that matter?” Jessenia demanded with a snort of derision, walking around the kitchen island cautiously.

Raising a black eyebrow, Damon was pleased to see her spunk and fire hadn’t been snuffed out by what he did. “Because it’s a beautiful day outside and you need to get out. Also, I need to talk to you about what happened.” If those weren’t two honest answers, Damon didn’t know what else to say.

“I’m not going anywhere with you.” Jessenia gasped when Damon was suddenly in front of her, using that inhuman speed only vampires had, trapping her against the counter. “Get away from me, Damon.”

“Or what?” He ran a finger down her cheek to her chin, his eyes searching hers. “Give me one day. A whole twenty four hours to prove to you I’m not as bad as you think. At the end of the twenty four hours, if you really truly never want to see me again, you won’t.”

Jade eyes narrowed slightly as Jessenia considered his offer, folding her arms in front of her chest, not pulling away from his touch. “Twenty four hours?” When he nodded, Jessenia slowly turned around so she was looking out the kitchen window, hesitant for several reasons “I’ll go with you…on one condition.” Jessenia turned back around to face him again, fingering her necklace.

“And what might that be?” He asked in a low voice, lowering his head to where his lips hovered over hers, staring at her intensely.

“There will be no biting, no manhandling, no threatening and you have to give me your word you won’t hurt me.” Jessenia stated, laying down her stipulations and watched as his black eyebrows furrowed.

“No kissing?” Damon couldn’t resist, watching as her cheeks flushed a deep crimson red.

His egotism definitely wasn’t winning him points with her, but Jessenia couldn’t help thinking about that kiss they shared. It’s all she could think about, even when she tried pushing it out of her mind. She could still feel the tingling sensation on her lips, the passion and fire that spread throughout her body completely igniting every part and nerve-ending.

“No kissing, unless I say otherwise.” She added as another stipulation, wondering if he would agree to all of this.

“Alright, deal.” Damon’s eyes suddenly narrowed, his hands moving to gently grab her waist, pressing their bodies together. “But I also have a stipulation.”

Her folded arms were pressed against his chest, preventing him from getting closer, though she didn’t push his hands away. “Depends on what it is.”

“You don’t get to attack me unless I provoke you.” Damon stated, tempted to grip her ass, dying to know if it was as firm as it looked.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“Fine, you have a deal.” Jessenia agreed, watching him step back to extend his hand and hesitantly took it, shaking it firmly. “Just so you know, if you decide not to keep your word about any of my stipulations, I will defend myself.”

“Noted.” Damon released her hand, smiling. “Let’s go.” Turning, he started for the front door, but stopped to turn his head back to stare at her. “We’re going into the woods, so if you don’t want your pretty white clothes to be destroyed, I suggest you change. Your time with me starts when you walk out this front door too.”

The woods? Jessenia didn’t like the sound of that, looking at the fruit on the table that was only halfway cut up. Sighing, Jessenia grabbed some plastic containers, refusing to let the fruit go to waste.

“Come on, Senia, the day is passing us by!” Damon called over his shoulder in the house, standing on her porch waiting impatiently.

Closing her eyes, Jessenia hoped she didn’t regret this and finished cleaning up before heading upstairs to change her clothes. She decided on blue jean Capri’s with a black tank top that had a silver design splashed on it. She slipped her steel toed black boots on since they were probably going hiking in the woods and they could also be used as a weapon if she needed protection. She redid her hair, pinning it back a little more and grabbed her keys, cell phone and vervain mace, which Meredith also told her about.

“Senia! You can’t back out on our deal!” Damon called up the stairs, tapping his fingers against the wooden railing and smirked when she appeared at the top of them. “That definitely suits you better. Better grab a sweater and a change of clothes, you won’t be back for twenty four hours.”

“What?”

Damon walked up the stairs, going deliberately slow and could hear how fast her heart pounded, aquamarine eyes twinkling, until he stood right in front of her at the top. “We agreed that I had you for the next twenty four hours once you step outside this house. It’s already going on three o’clock. That means,” He paused briefly, gently running his finger down her chest. “You belong to me until three o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”

“That wasn’t…”

“Yes it was part of the deal.” Damon cut her off smoothly, turning her around and giving a gentle nudge. “Now, go get a change of clothes and a sweater. Unless you prefer to stay over naked?”

Jessenia shot a glare over her shoulder at him, not amused and stalked back to her bedroom to do what he asked. “Asshole.” She muttered, grabbing the nearest bag she could find and put what she needed for the night inside of it.

“I heard that. Not very nice, Jessenia.” Damon clucked his tongue, shaking his finger at her while leaning in the doorway.

“It’s the truth.” Jessenia smiled back at him, though it didn’t reach her eyes and zipped up her bag, tossing a zipped sweatshirt over her shoulder. “I’m ready now. Remember, the deal is off if you break your word.”

“I already told you I wouldn’t.” Damon stated, extending his hand to her and saw the hesitation in her eyes again. “I’m not going to hurt you, Senia.”

Jessenia wasn’t sure of that, especially after what he did to her, but for some odd reason she was willing to spend twenty four hours with him. “I hope not.” She said, slipping her hand into his and let him guide her downstairs, just as Meredith walked in.

“Oh hey!” Meredith blinked at the sight of Damon Salvatore in her house, hand in hand, with Jessenia, blocking the doorway. “Where are you going?”

Jessenia chewed her bottom lip nervously and flashed a half smile, clearing her throat. “I’m going to stay over at Damon’s tonight with Elena.” She half lied, hoping Damon went along with the story. “Damon was just coming to get me. Is that okay?”

Meredith looked between the two, trying to tell if either of them were lying. “Right. You haven’t been at school though…”

“Elena said she’s been missing me and wants to hang out. They want to have a real dinner gathering because the first one didn’t go so well.” Jessenia pulled her hand out of Damon’s, keeping the smile on her face. “I’ll be back tomorrow at-”

“Three o’clock.” Damon finished, heading for the door and stopped to glance at the clock, smirking. “Make that three thirty-five.” He corrected, patting Meredith’s shoulder. “Good seeing you, Meredith, tell Ric I said hi.”

Meredith nodded, looking at Jessenia and had a feeling something was going on. “Have fun, tell Elena I said hi.” Meredith stopped her cousin before she could go out the door, keeping her voice down so Damon didn’t overhear. “Protection?”

Jessenia nodded, patting her hand reassuringly. “I promise.” She walked out of the house and looked at the blue Camaro, taking a deep breath.

“Tick tock.” Damon tapped his wrist, sitting behind the wheel and watched as she slowly made her way to the car, reaching across the seats to open the passenger door. “Come on, Senia, in you go.”

Stepping into the car, Jessenia closed the door and buckled up, placing her bag on the floorboard. “So, the woods then?” She asked, looking over at him.

“Just sit back and relax.” Damon put the car in reverse, pulling out of the driveway and headed down the road, the windows down.

“That’s a little easier said than done after what happened, don’t you think?” Jessenia retorted, leaning back against the seat and lulled her head back, closing her eyes. “We’re not leaving Mystic Falls, are we?”

Damon just slowly turned his head to smirk at her. “Not too far away from Mystic Falls, that’s all you need to know.”

“So what do you expect to accomplish by doing this?” Jessenia questioned and felt his thumb caress her hand almost lovingly, completely confused. “What do you hope to gain?”

“Can’t you ever just go someplace without a ton of speculation and questions?” Damon rejoined, tapping his fingers against the steering wheel. “You really need to have a little more faith and trust…”

“And pixy dust?” She shot back sardonically, refusing to look at him. “You won’t have my faith and trust in you until you prove to me you’re a half decent person.”

“Fair enough.”

Jessenia sighed resignedly, opening her eyes to stare out the window and jumped slightly when Damon grabbed her hand. She didn’t pull away as much as her mind was screaming at her to do so, her heart telling her something completely different. The next twenty four hours were her chance to get to know Damon Salvatore.

Damon pulled over about twenty minutes later and cut the engine, looking over at his company for the next twenty three and a half hours. “We’re here.” Stepping out, Damon walked around the car and opened the passenger door, extending his hand, smiling.

“Damon…”

“A deal is a deal, Jessenia.” He reminded her, waving his fingers and watched as she slowly took his hand, shutting the door. “You can trust me.”

Gazing into his eyes, Jessenia didn’t say anything and let him guide her into the woods, feeling him lace their fingers together. She had no idea what Damon had in store for her, hoping she wasn’t making a mistake by going with him. He was dangerous and drank human blood to survive; he could easily rip her limb from limb. Still, something told her to go with him and Jessenia refused to have what if’s in her life.

Her scent was appetizing and delicious, though Damon wouldn’t dare feed on her. He did have some humanity left him in, knowing how to hurt and love just like a regular human. There were two women in his life that broke his heart, Damon refused to let it happen a third time. He would stake himself before that happened, especially after what happened with Elena.

Damon didn’t know why she agreed to go with him and thought she was a little too trusting. He wasn’t going to hurt her, he liked her too much. Of course, he would never admit that to anyone, keeping it as one of his many secrets. Just like Jessenia, Damon couldn’t get that kiss out of his mind and hoped they shared a few more during this time together.

He wasn’t hoping, more like counting on it.

Chapter 10

“So, are you going to tell me what we’re doing out here?” Jessenia asked an hour later, needing to rest because the hiking wore her out.

They went through countless trees and found a dirt trail that followed up to a nearby hill. Damon guided her by the hand the entire time, being mindful of logs, huge tree trunks, holes and branches. Now they were sitting on top of the hill, the sun slowly beginning to set on the horizon, and it was breathtaking. She looked over at him, waiting for him to answer her, but all Damon did was just stare out at the sun, making her wonder how he could even be in the daylight.

“Okay fine, don’t answer me. How do you walk in the sun then?” She tried again, plucking some grass and fingered it. “Because I thought vampires fried in sunlight.”

“They do.” Damon slowly turned to face her, the sun reflecting off his beautiful blue eyes, captivating Jessenia. “But I’m different, obviously.”

“How? What are you only half vampire or something?” That wouldn’t surprise Jessenia after everything Meredith told her.

Damon chuckled, deciding he did owe her a little explanation, but he wasn’t about to tell her how he walked in the sun. “We’re out here because I figured taking you back to my place and ravishing you in my bed was a little too soon. Unless of course you disagree with me?”

Jessenia looked away from him, feeling her cheeks flush and lost count how many times it happened. “I wouldn’t let you ravish me anyway.” She stated, wanting to make it perfectly clear she wasn’t about to have sex with a vampire.

That piqued Damon’s interest, his eyebrow raising. “Is that a challenge, Senia?” He scooted closer to her until their upper arms brushed together. “Because I LOVE a challenge.”

“Has anyone ever told you your arrogance is annoying?” She asked sweetly, scooting away from him and sighed when Damon wrapped an arm around her waist, keeping her beside him. “Not to mention overbearing.”

“I’ve been called worse, doll.” Damon stated knowingly, splaying his hand against her side and gently grabbed her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes again.

“Why did you bring me here?” Jessenia knew she probably wouldn’t get an answer, but Damon would have to answer her sooner or later. “You did this for a reason. I’m asking you, very nicely, not to keep me in the dark and just tell me why I’m out here with you.”

Narrowing his eyes thoughtfully, Damon slowly looked down and admired her for a few moments, running a finger down her cheek with his free hand. “Fine, if you want to know so badly, I’ll tell you.” He leaned back to lie in the grass, pulling her with him so they could stare up at the blue sky. “I want to know more about you, Senia.”

“There’s nothing to tell.” Jessenia broke free from him and began to stand up, only for Damon to stop her by grabbing her arm. “Let go of me, Damon.”

“What’s so bad about me wanting to know more about you?” This girl was one big mystery, a puzzle that he wanted to unravel. “How about I compromise with you?” He released her arm, showing her that he didn’t mean her any harm, just like he promised.

Jessenia looked skeptical, not understanding what he meant. “What kind of compromise?” She was almost afraid to ask, hating her curiosity.

“You’ve been asking me questions and I keep avoiding them.” Damon said pointedly, not bothering to deny or hide it. “So for every question I ask you, you can ask me one. And we both have to answer them, no matter what.” He was making a lot of deals with this woman, but if that’s what it took to gain information, then so be it. “Is that fair?”

This could get very complicated if Jessenia agreed to it because Damon could ask her absolutely anything. Jessenia was a horrible liar too so he would know she wasn’t being truthful. Did she really want to get to know Damon Salvatore that badly? Jessenia already answered her own question the second she agreed to spend a whole twenty four hours with him alone.

“Okay.”

Damon smiled widely, pleased with her answer and grabbed her hand again, guiding her back down to sit with him in the grass. “Since I’m the dashing gentleman, I’ll let you go first.” He offered, not releasing her hand.

“So I can ask you anything and you’ll answer?”

“Is that a question?” Damon smirked, not able to resist that small jab.

“No, no it’s not.” Jessenia chewed her bottom lip, trying to decide what question to ask him out of the million that she had. “Why did you bring me out here, Damon?”

Not answering her right away, Damon pulled her with ease to straddle his lap, wrapping his arms around her waist and even kept them above the waist. Jessenia was breathless, everything about Damon consuming her and she couldn’t stop it. Her jade eyes completely gave her away and Jessenia knew it, but she couldn’t help how she felt. Maybe it was because of the dreams; maybe it was because he hadn’t killed her…she didn’t know.

“Besides to show you a good time and break your fear of being out of your house, I want to get to know you, Senia.” Damon answered truthfully, leaning forward and wasn’t surprised when she instantly lowered her head. “I didn’t overstep my boundaries by doing this, did I?”

Why did he have to have such a playful voice that sounded incredibly sexy? “It’s fine.” She cleared her throat, her hands planted on his broad shoulders and Jessenia couldn’t help wondering what he was hiding beneath those clothes. “My turn huh?” When he nodded, Jessenia grew even more nervous and blinked when Damon pulled something out of the small bag he took with them. “What is…that…?”

“You’re on edge and, if your heart doesn’t slow down, you’re going to end up in the hospital.” Damon stated bluntly, pulling two plastic cups out with a huge bottle of bourbon, one of his favorites. “This will not only help you calm down, but it will also stop me from wanting to bite you.”

That got Jessenia’s heart beating even faster, her breathing increasing as well. “Oh…”

Vampire, he was a vampire and she was out in the woods with him alone! Was she completely out of her mind? He could drain her dry and get rid of her body; it wouldn’t be hard for him to do. She took the plastic cup he handed over to her and could smell how strong the liquid was, not a big drinker. She was still underage too so technically what he wanted her to do was illegal.

Damon could hear her heart rate increase and placed his hand right over it, trying to figure out a way to calm her down. “Drink.” He ordered in a whisper, his mouth right by her ear and pulled back to throw back the shot he’d poured himself. “I’m not going to hurt you, Senia. You have to trust me.” How many times was he going to have to say that before he finally got bored and just ended up attacking her?

“I’m sorry…” She whispered, lowering her head and set the cup aside, the fear overwhelming her suddenly. “I-I can’t help how I feel. I wish I could just trust you, but after what happened, I don’t know if I can. You really scared me, Damon. I thought you were going to…kill me.”

A few tears slipped down her cheeks and Jessenia felt embarrassed that she was actually breaking down while straddling Damon’s lap. Damon frowned, wishing he could compel her to take the memories of what he did away because it would solve this current problem. He was never going to kill her, that was just his subtle way of getting her to spill her secret. Damon supposed he could’ve been a little nicer about it, but that’s not who he was and refused to monitor his behavior.

“Jessenia, look at me.” He ordered, raising her chin until her bloodshot eyes met his. “I am not going to hurt you.” One thing Damon never did was apologize, but he was doing so right now in his own way. “Now breathe in through the nose and out of the mouth slowly and drink.”

Leaning forward, his lips brushed against her tears, tasting the saltiness of them and bit back a groan. Jessenia did what he wanted, grabbed her cup and slowly sipped the liquor, feeling herself slowly start calming down along with her heart. Damon could feel it go back to normal against his palm and nodded, satisfied that she actually listened to him. Maybe this deal wasn’t a lost cause after all.

“It’s your turn.” Damon wasn’t taking her question about what was in the bottle seriously, wanting to do this right. “Ask me anything.”

“How are you able to walk in the sun?”

Jessenia had asked him that earlier and Damon dodged the question, so she figured it couldn’t hurt to ask again. Holding up his left hand, there was a beautiful silver ring with an oval cut dark blue stone, some kind of silver mark on the top with the letter D in the middle of it. It was on his middle finger and looked centuries old, but it fit him and his style perfectly.

“Your ring?”

Damon nodded, watching as she took his hand to get a better look at it. “As long as I have this puppy on, the sun won’t burn me.”

“But…”

Damon held his finger up, smirking and took another shot of bourbon. “You had your question. It’s my turn. Fair is fair.” He reminded her smugly, aquamarine eyes twinkling. “So, I know you wanted to come here to meet your dad and everything, but after all that time being away from him, why didn’t you just stay in Maryland?”

“I knew this was a mistake…” Jessenia whispered, taking a few deep breaths and looked up when Damon grabbed her wrists, pressing them against his chest. “I can’t talk about it. It’s too painful…”

“That’s why you need to talk about it because keeping it bottled up inside isn’t good for you.” Damon wasn’t backing down this time, seeing how tortured Jessenia was and for some odd reason he actually cared. “Now start talking.”

Jessenia could see the sensitivity in his eyes and knew he was right. “My mother…Can I have another shot first?” She suddenly asked, hands trembling slightly.

“Of course.” He poured some more bourbon in her cup, watching her carefully because once again her heart was racing.

Jessenia took a long sip this time and looked down at the dark liquid, a few tears falling. “I found out about Logan being my father on her deathbed. She was sick for a long time and…suffered a great deal. She wrote a letter to me and I didn’t get it until her funeral.” She took another sip, the alcohol making it smoother for her to open up. “She left me here all alone without any answers. She said Logan wanted nothing to do with me and now I’ll never know because he’s gone.”

“Jessenia…”

“I know it wasn’t your fault. You didn’t turn him into a vampire, I know that. And he had to be stopped from hurting other people.” It took several days for Jessenia to come to grips with what happened to her father. “Meredith explained everything to me about what happened and why Alaric killed him. So what did he do to you to make you attack him first?”

“Is that your question?” Damon cleared his throat awkwardly when she nodded. “Well first, he ended up shooting me several times with wooden bullets to try to get information out of me. Didn’t work out too well. I’ll admit right now, I’m very vengeful when attacked and I wanted to kill him. But I didn’t.” He explained, probably reiterating what Meredith told her, but the Fell woman didn’t know everything and Damon wanted Jessenia to have the whole story. “What did your mother die from?”

“Lung cancer. She smoked for years and got high. Never did hard drugs, just marijuana.”

“Ah a pothead as they call it in today’s world.” Damon joked, trying to lighten the mood a bit.

Jessenia couldn’t laugh, not while talking about her mother. “So what exactly happened to make Alaric kill him?” She asked, finishing off the cup of bourbon since Damon only poured the equivalence of two shots in it.

“He ended up kidnapping one of Elena’s friends, Caroline, who I was seeing on and off. Logan wanted to turn her into a vampire because he was angry for what happened to him. Luckily, Stefan and I found him, saved Caroline, but he got away. Alaric ended up staking him after standing up for Jenna Gilbert, who was Logan’s ex. Logan got pissed and tried attacking Alaric, he was just defending himself.” Damon elucidated, leaving out the reason why Logan escaped because he really didn’t feel like reliving THAT nightmare again.

“Caroline…” That was the blonde she had befriended recently. “So she’s a vampire too.” It wasn’t a question, the super speed definitely told her the answer.

“She wasn’t changed until later, that night she remained human.”

“Who changed her?” Jessenia couldn’t help asking, nodding when Damon raised a brow at her.

“I fed her my blood to heal her. She got in a bad car accident and ended up with internal bleeding that would’ve killed her. I…didn’t want her to die because she was a friend of Elena’s.” Damon knew that would probably open up a can of worms, but he wasn’t about to lie to her either, not fully anyway.

Jessenia took the bottle of bourbon and poured some more in the cup. “Elena...” Why wasn’t she surprised? “You feel something for her, don’t you?” It was more of a statement than an actual question.

“My turn.” Damon shook his finger at her.

“Technically, you didn’t answer my question about who changed Caroline. You said you saved her by giving her your blood, but that doesn’t mean you changed her.” Jessenia argued swiftly, setting her cup down and decided to slow down a little now that she’d had the awkward dead mother conversation. “So, who did it?” The question about Elena could wait.

“You caught that huh?” She was very observant, which could be problem in the future, but for now Damon would amuse her. “Her name is Katherine Pierce.” The same woman that changed him and broke his heart. “Now it’s my turn. Have you ever smoked?” He smiled, watching as she let out a huge breath of what sounded like relief.

“No, never wanted to either, not with how much my Mom did.” She answered promptly and looked out at the sun setting on the horizon, knowing it would be dark soon. “Before we go further with this, you do realize it’s going to be dark in about an hour or so, right? And no, that is not my question for our deal.”

“Yes I’m aware.” Damon tilted his head slightly, noting the concern in her tone of voice. “Scared to be alone with me in the dark?”

Busying herself with drinking more bourbon, Jessenia contemplated that because, the truth was, half of her did and the other half didn’t. “Bad things happen in the dark, Damon.” She settled with that, hoping it didn’t anger him.

If anything, Damon was amused. “Then you have a choice to make.” With ease, Damon stood up from the grass, forcing Jessenia to instinctively wrap her legs around his waist since she’d been straddling him, holding her close. “We can either stay out here and I’ll build a fire…” He dipped his head, putting his mouth by her ear. “Or go back to my house to continue this.” Pulling back, Damon locked eyes with her, knowing her mind was probably going a million miles a minute, possibly even a second. “Now choose.”

Chapter 11

Her choice was to stay out in the woods surprisingly, though they wouldn’t end up sleeping outside. They ended up going down the hill further into the woods so it would be easier to build a fire. Damon had reluctantly let her go to start one before the sun went completely down. It wasn’t hard gathering dry wood because of how hot it’d been lately. Now they sat in front of the fire, Damon once again pulling Jessenia into his arms and sat her between his legs, her knees drawn up while his were bent on either side of her.

“Is this better?” Damon asked, taking a long swallow from the bottle of bourbon.

Jessenia nodded, the heat from the fire washing over her and calmed her down a little more, her trust very slowly building for Damon. “Whose turn is it?” She couldn’t remember because they’d taken an hour and a half break.

“I believe it was yours.”

“Do you have feelings for Elena?” Now was the time to ask that again.

Damon was quiet for a few minutes, just staring into the fire, thinking of how to answer her question. “I did at one point.” He admitted finally, leaning back against the tree. “But not anymore. Have you ever had feelings for someone who didn’t want you?”

“No.” She whispered, lowering her head. “I’m a hermit so I never partied, smoked and this is my first time tasting any kind of alcohol. Is that what happened with Elena? You fell in love with her and she didn’t want you?”

“For a little while I thought she wanted me instead of Stefan. She started dating Stefan before me, even though we met first. I compelled her though to forget and then Stefan came into the picture.” Damon answered, snorting as he took a nice long swallow, drinking away his pain like always. “I was really stupid and you know what’s even worse than that?” Jessenia shook her head, staying silent. “It’s not the first time I let it happen.”

Frowning, Jessenia slowly turned her head to look in his eyes, not sure what to make of vampires having feelings. “I’m sorry, that wasn’t fair to you. Who was the first woman that did that to you?”

“I do believe it’s my turn to ask you a question.” Damon retorted, tapping her nose gently with his finger. “Since you’ve never had feelings for someone and you’re a self-proclaimed hermit, that would mean you’ve never had sex, right?”

Jessenia choked on a sip of bourbon she’d taken when he asked her that, trying not to cough because it would make it worse. “Wrong pipe.” She croaked out, not expecting to be asked about her sexuality.

“That’s a good enough answer for me.” Damon chuckled softly, pouring more bourbon into her cup, suddenly remembering the kiss they shared. “Hmm…”

“What?” Jessenia was a little snappy because she hadn’t expected the conversation to turn to…this topic.

“Ask your question and then I’ll tell you.” Damon stated, setting the bottle aside to give both of them a small break, even though it took A LOT to get him drunk.

“Who was the other woman that hurt you the way Elena did?” Jessenia decided if they were delving into personal information, she wasn’t backing down.

“I don’t get HURT, I face reality.” Damon corrected her, suddenly wondering himself if this was such a good idea because now she was asking about… “Katherine. And yes, the same woman that changed Caroline. She also changed me and my brother into vampires.”

Katherine sounded like a very old vampire and Jessenia filed that information away to investigate more about her at a later time. “Next question.”

“That kiss we shared, it was your first one wasn’t it?”

Damon grinned, even though he somewhat forced it on her. The important thing was she enjoyed it and felt the same spark between them he had, one he couldn’t seem to let go. Turning back around to stare into the fire, Jessenia curled up against him, scooting down a bit to get more comfortable.

“Yeah.” She hoped he changed the subject because right now her face felt like it was on fire.

“That’s what I thought and now you’re embarrassed about it.” He stated the obvious, running his fingers through her hair gently. “No reason to be embarrassed, Senia. I quite enjoyed it and wouldn’t mind doing it again.”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t.” Jessenia clasped her hands together in her lap, doing a full body shiver against him. “What did Katherine do to you?”

Damon heaved a sigh, expecting her to ask that next, even as he tried to get her mind away from that subject. “My brother and I both wanted Katherine and we started rivaling for her affections. Katherine took advantage of that and started seeing both of us. Stefan said she compelled us to do whatever she wanted, to rival against each other, but I don’t believe that. What I DO believe is that she played us like fiddles, like toys, and was planning on changing both of us into vampires. I was willing to give up everything, my own life, to be with her and I never knew she was seeing Stefan behind my back. I think she compelled Stefan though, honestly, which is why I can’t kill my brother. To make a long boring story short, Katherine came back months ago and told me that she never loved me, it was always Stefan. We thought she was dead, but we were wrong and I’m not getting into that right now. I spent over a hundred years pining, loving and wanting a woman that never felt the same way. And that is my boring, meaningless story about love.”

Her heart went out to Damon while he explained his history with Katherine, feeling the sadness pouring from him. Slowly sitting up, Jessenia moved to straddle his lap again and cupped his face in her soft hands, forcing their eyes to meet. Jessenia was starting to see a whole other side to Damon Salvatore, making the attraction she’d been trying to ignore grow and heighten.

“You didn’t deserve that, Damon.” She murmured sympathetically, blinking when he pulled away from her, making her hands drop to her lap.

“I don’t need your pity.”

“I’m not giving you pity. Yes, it sucks that you were in love or had feelings or whatever with two women that didn’t want you, but that just means it wasn’t meant to be. Everything happens for a reason.” Jessenia extracted herself from his arms and stood up, wrapping her arms around herself. “Me being here with you right now in these woods was meant to happen. You attacking me was even meant to happen because it got us here. Hell, even you kissing me was meant to happen. I’m not giving you an ounce of pity. All I’m saying is I’m sorry that it happened to you, you didn’t deserve it and now we can move on.”

“You’re right.” Damon stood up from the grass and dusted his pants off, deciding now would be a good time to head back to the house. “That’s exactly what I plan on doing, Senia.”

“What do you mean?” Jessenia swallowed hard, feeling Damon grab her hand and turned her to face him. “Damon…”

“Ssshhhh…”

Damon pressed his finger to her lips, stopping her from saying anything and replaced it with his lips. This kiss was different than the first one, a lot softer and more passionate, every part of her melting. She wanted to push him away because of what he did to her, but this day had been so wonderful, the most fun she’d ever had.

It wasn’t over yet either, the moon shining bright over them.

Even though she hadn’t said it was alright to kiss her, Jessenia wasn’t going to hold it against him unless he started breaking more of her stipulations. He wasn’t hurting her or manhandling. Just simply holding her close against him, all Jessenia could do was wrap her arms around his neck, burying one of her hands in his soft black hair.

When Damon knew she needed air to breathe, he reluctantly broke the kiss and stared into her eyes, waiting for her to lash out at him. “That’s what I mean.” He whispered, running a finger down her cheek and admired her swollen succulent lips. “Probably shouldn’t have done that, huh?”

Jessenia opened and closed her mouth several times, finally able to get her voice box working again. “I don’t understand…” She whispered, suddenly remembering what they were talking about before he kissed her. “Oh.”

“It’s getting late, let’s head back to the house and talk more.” He suggested, giving her a chance to gather her thoughts and released her to put the fire out.

Jessenia nodded and stepped back a few feet, watching as he put the fire out quickly. The speed was a definite perk in this situation and Jessenia was suddenly thankful that Damon made her bring a sweatshirt. She pulled it on, the night air cooling off after the hot summer day. Once the fire was completely out, Damon grabbed Jessenia’s hand and lead her back through the woods to his car, opening the door for her. Jessenia slipped in, buckled up and a few seconds later, they were headed back to his house.

The drive was made in silence, which Damon was fine with because he knew he’d shocked Jessenia with the kiss. He didn’t regret it though, it was just delicious as the first time. What Jessenia said about moving on was a very good idea and Damon planned on doing it…with her.

She had nobody pining for her that he knew about and, if there was anyone, he would dispose of them. Jessenia was his and nobody was going to take her away from him. However, if Jessenia didn’t want anything to do with him after their twenty four hours together was up, he wouldn’t bother her again like he promised. Damon was a man of his word, but something told him after that kiss in the woods, he had her wrapped.

Pulling up to the house, Damon cut the ignition and started to get out, freezing when Jessenia stopped him. “I-I don’t want to have sex tonight.” She somewhat blurted out, the fire rushing up her neck to her cheeks.

“We won’t.” Damon said, turning to face her and took her hand, pressing a soft kiss to the back of it. “Not unless you change your mind.” Or he seduced her, which Damon was still thinking about doing.

“Thank you.”

Damon nodded and stepped out, flying over to her side to open the door for her and extended his hand. “Come on, the night is still young beautiful.” They walked into the house and Damon automatically knew Stefan was staying the night at Elena’s, which was very convenient for him. “How about something to eat?” He suggested, guiding her into the kitchen. “You’ve gotta be starving by now.”

“You eat…food?” Jessenia blushed when Damon merely raised an eyebrow down at her.

“It helps with the craving for blood. As long as I maintain a balance of blood in my system, my body functions regularly. I’m thinking a steak dinner, is that okay with you?” Of course he would have his meat cooked rare because it would have some kind of blood in it, which would satisfy him for the moment.

“Yeah that sounds fine.” Jessenia looked around the pristine kitchen, running her fingertips over the counter and looked over at Damon. “Do you need help with anything?”

“No, I want you to go sit down and relax while I cook. Have a drink if you want.” Damon stated with a smile, pulling the steaks out of the refrigerator. “This won’t take long.”

Jessenia did as he said and walked out of the kitchen, heading for the parlor where the fireplace roared with life. She went down the few stairs and looked over at the spot Damon had threatened to kill her. It made her question what she was doing and why she was even here with him. Forcing herself to keep walking, Jessenia spotted the small bar and walked over, suddenly needing a drink.

‘I’m going to turn into a lush at this rate.’ She thought, pouring some liquor in a tumbler before heading over to sit on the couch.

“Why don’t you go get more comfortable?” Damon proposed, smirking when she jumped, not letting it faze him. “There’s a bathroom down the hall or you can use my room, which is the last one.”

“Okay.” Jessenia reached down to grab her bag and stood up, jumping again when Damon stood right in front of her. “I’m never going to get used to that.”

“Still jumpy?” He placed a hand on her shoulder, wondering what had changed in the last five minutes that he was in the kitchen. Then Damon figured it out. “I won’t hurt you, Senia.”

“I know you won’t. I just…It all came back to me and…” Jessenia’s words were cut off by another heart stopping kiss, her hands gripping his wrists to keep herself steady.

Damon broke the kiss when he felt her relax against him, fingering her chin gently. “Now go get more comfortable.” He ordered, turning her and gently nudged her toward the hall, tempted to smack her ass, refraining.

Flushing, Jessenia walked down the hall, found the bathroom and stepped inside, closing the door behind her. She looked in the mirror, staring back at her reflection and ran the faucet to splash some cold water on her face, the heat slowly diminishing. Undressing, Jessenia contemplated taking a shower and decided it couldn’t hurt, not wanting to smell like the woods anymore.

Turning the shower sprays on, Jessenia stepped inside and closed her eyes as the warm water cascaded over her, thoughts of Damon instantly entering her mind. She finished twenty minutes later and stepped out, feeling refreshed after spending nearly all day in the woods. Jessenia pulled on a pair of red cotton shorts with a matching camisole that had a bra underneath.

It wasn’t an ordinary bra though, it basically looked like a half-camisole with lace, the same color as her regular camisole. They were extremely comfortable and she had one in every color that they made them in. Deciding to just leave her hair down, Jessenia packed her dirty clothes in her bag before stepping out, shutting the light off.

“Bout time. I was about to call the search party.” Damon joked, standing at the bar having a drink and turned to look at her, knowing if his heart beat it would’ve stopped. “Feel better? Dinner’s ready.”

“I hope you don’t mind that I used your shower…” Jessenia smiled when he waved her off, padding over to the couch where the plates of delicious food were. “This smells incredible.”

“Of course it does. I made it.”

Damon winked when she rolled her eyes and immediately dug into his food, Jessenia doing the same. Once they were done, Damon gathered the dishes and put them in the kitchen before guiding Jessenia to his room. All Jessenia could do was follow him, no longer afraid because, if Damon wanted to kill her, she would be dead already.

Chapter 12

The light shined through the thin curtains as Jessenia slowly opened her eyes, blinking several times to get fix her blurred vision. The room slowly came into focus and Jessenia didn’t recognize it at first, slowly turning her head. Damon was sleeping beside her on his back, one arm over his head and the other resting on his stomach.

He looked so peaceful when he slept and Jessenia suddenly remembered the night’s events. Woods, coming back here to eat dinner and then lying in bed talking to Damon until the sun came up. That’s all they did was talk and kiss a little, but nothing went farther than that. She looked at the clock on the nightstand, which flashed noon, her eyes widening.

“Lay back down.” Damon rumbled, pulling her into his arms and buried his face in her neck. “I still have you for another three and a half hours.”

Chuckling softly, Jessenia turned to face him, reaching up to caress his face gently. “Is this all the time I get with you?” She asked, watching as his blue eyes opened to stare back at her.

“I hope not, but I already told you I would leave you alone if you wanted me to, once the twenty four hours was up.” Damon replied, enjoying her soft touch and placed his hand over hers, linking their fingers together. “And I don’t want your answer until I pull into your driveway to drop you off.”

Jessenia nodded and snuggled further against him, resting her head on his chest. What if she didn’t want the time to end with them? What if she wanted to be with him? If Damon never wanted to see her again once the clock hit three thirty, this was her only chance. She’d already made the decision and now had to act on it, wondering if he would push her away.

Moving out of his arms, Jessenia sat up and took her camisole off, tossing it to the floor. Damon watched her every move, wondering what she was up to, and got his answer when she removed her shorts next. Damon sat up, turning her to face him and could see in her jade eyes this is what she wanted. Whatever the reason, Damon wasn’t questioning it, hoping he wasn’t wrong in his assumption.

“Senia…”

It was her turn to press her finger against his lips, Jessenia cracking a small smile and pushed him back on the bed. “Don’t talk, just kiss me.”

Her lips met his and Damon instantly rolled her over on her back, both of them hungry for each other. Damon’s hands ran down her sides, her legs parting to bend and press against his, caressing her almost lovingly. Jessenia moaned against his mouth, her hands running up and down his muscular back, touching every part of him she could reach. She loved the feeling of his hair, it was always soft to the touch.

Jessenia felt Damon lift her up off the bed, his hand reaching around to unsnap her camisole bra and pulled it off, tossing it behind him. Surprisingly, she didn’t feel embarrassed or exposed, only reddened because of how his eyes devoured her whole. He kissed her again, this time more passionate and trailed down her chin to her throat, suckling gently.

Startlingly enough, Damon didn’t feel the urge or need to sink his fangs into her skin, refusing to hurt her. He continued the journey down her throat to her collarbone, nipping it gently, deciding he was definitely drawing this out. Being as this was her first time and she wanted him to take her virginity, Damon was going to spend the next three and a half hours showing her what she’d be missing if she didn’t want to see him anymore.

Jessenia cried out softly when Damon took one of her rosy nipples in his mouth, feeling it instantly harden against his tongue, while massaging her other breast. Jessenia had never felt like this before and knew sex for the first time was a once in a lifetime experience. It did her heart good that Damon was actually taking his time and Jessenia felt as though she might explode, her moans echoing off the bedroom walls.

Once Damon thoroughly teased both breasts, his lips moved down her flat stomach, leaving a trail of fire ridden kisses until he arrived at the waistband of her red panties. Red was definitely a great color on her. Damon took the material in his teeth and yanked a little, his now dark blue eyes locking with smoldering forest green. Without a single word, Jessenia lifted her hips and felt him pull the panties down her legs.

Damon growled as soon as he brought the panties to his nose, inhaling her intoxicating scent and instantly felt the veins come out in his cheeks, his sclera’s slowly turning red. Jessenia noticed it, her heart beat increasing tenfold, especially looking at her like a predator. He tossed the panties aside and felt his mouth go dry, the hunger and thirst starting to overpower everything else.

“Damon…”

He didn’t answer her, slowly crawling back up her body with fangs out, the blue flashing against the red in his eyes, and pressed a finger to his lips. The fear in her voice didn’t stop him as Damon buried his face in her neck, running his tongue along her carotid artery. His favorite spot besides the breast, though Damon wasn’t about to taste her that way.

“Damon, no!!” Jessenia screamed as soon as his fangs punctured her neck, instantly beginning to struggle against him as the tears poured down her face. “NOOOOOOOOO!!!”

~!~

“NOOOOOOOO!!!” Jessenia bolted upright in bed, breathing heavily and jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder. “DON’T TOUCH ME!!” She scrambled out of bed, perspiration covering every inch of her body, tears pouring down her cheeks.

Damon knew she had a bad dream and it was about him just from her reaction alone, heaving a sigh. “Jessenia.” He called her name, eyebrows furrowing and stood up from bed to pull some black jeans on. “Jessenia, can you hear me?” He tried again, walking around the bed and by now she was backed up against the nearest wall, trembling from head to toe.

“P-Please…Please don’t kill me…” She begged, her eyes still closed and buried her face in her hands, sobbing violently. “Damon…”

That confirmed his suspicion of the dream being about him, though Damon wasn’t about to let it bother him. “I’m right here and I won’t hurt you.” He crooned in a low voice, squatting down in front of her. “Open your eyes, Senia. It was just a dream. I’m not going to kill you.”

Very slowly, Jessenia let her hands drop and looked up, finally meeting aquamarine eyes that belonged to only one man. “Damon?” She started crying when he nodded and touched her neck, not feeling any puncture wounds or any sign he had bitten her. “It felt so real…”

“I’m sure it did.” Damon stood up and extended his hand, plastering a smile on his face. “Come on, time to get up. It’s going on noon.”

Nodding, Jessenia stood up without taking his hand and tried to stop shaking, but that was easier said than done. “Damon…”

“Come on, I’ll make us a late breakfast.”

He walked out of the bedroom and raked a hand through his hair, needing a drink after being startled awake. Jessenia knew she probably just ruined the rest of their time together and went to the bathroom to splash some water on her face. She also wanted to check her neck and other parts of her body because that dream felt too factual. He hadn’t touched her though, it was all a dream that turned into a nightmare.

Turning the water off, Jessenia patted her face with a hand towel, taking a few minutes just to breathe. She was caked in sweat still and Jessenia felt nasty, suddenly needing another shower. Jessenia jumped when a knock sounded at the bathroom door, knowing it was Damon and stepped back when he cracked it open.

“Everything okay in here?”

“Yeah, I was just going to take another shower, if that’s okay.” Jessenia was shocked she managed to keep the shakiness out of her voice, but tears still shined in her eyes.

Damon frowned, pushing the door open more and pulled Jessenia in his arms, running his hand up and down her back. “We made so much progress, don’t let a stupid dream change how you feel.” He cupped her face in his strong hands, pleading with her to trust him. “I don’t know what you dreamt, but whatever it was, forget about it.”

“It wasn’t just a stupid dream!” Jessenia snapped, pushing him away and turned around, rubbing her arms to get rid of the chills that suddenly invaded her body. “Dreaming about you biting me and possibly killing me is NOT stupid.”

“Wait what?” He demanded, eyes narrowed and didn’t dare touch her. “You dreamt of me killing you?”

“While we were having sex, or about to have sex.” She added coldly, wiping her tears away.

“But I didn’t. That’s gotta count for something, Jessenia.” Damon pointed out, grabbing her arm and turned her around to face him again. “I would never do something like that to you.”

“Just like you threatened to drain every last drop of my blood if I didn’t tell you why I moved here?” Jessenia shot back, instantly regretting it as the guilt flashed through his eyes. “Damon…”

“No I got it loud and clear, Jessenia.” Damon backed away with his hands up and walked out, slamming the door hard enough to shake the walls.

Jessenia flinched, knowing she had angered him by saying that and couldn’t believe a single dream had destroyed everything they had built. “Damn it.” She whispered, grabbing her stuff and simply changed into blue jean shorts with a lime green tank top that had a black sun design on the front.

She pulled her brown sandals on and put her hair up in a high ponytail, trying to keep the tears in until she was taken home. Walking out of the bathroom, Damon was nowhere to be found, though there was a note on the table. Something told Jessenia it was from Damon as she walked over and saw her name written on it, already feeling her stomach tighten. Sitting on the couch, Jessenia opened it and began reading the short letter, which was from Damon.

“I never want to see you again.” She read aloud, dropping the piece of paper to the carpet and closed her eyes, the letter making her completely breathless. “Damon, I’m sorry…” Standing up, Jessenia first started walking and then ended up running out of the house down the driveway, tears flying behind her.

Caroline was singing to the radio, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel and frowned at the sight of someone running down the middle of the street. “Oh my god, Jessenia?” She stopped the car and got out, suddenly standing in front of her.

Jessenia jumped out of her skin at the sight of Caroline and stumbled back, her vision temporarily blurred by tears. “No…” She thought it was Damon, but when she blinked as the huge tears slid down her cheeks and saw Caroline, Jessenia just cried harder. “Caroline…”

Caroline had no idea what she was doing all the way out here, but had to get her home. “What are you doing out here, Jesse?” She couldn’t help asking. “It’s not safe.” Not this close to the Salvatore house where she nearly had her life ended by Damon.

Wiping her tears away, Jessenia sniffled a bit, the harsh words from Damon’s letter still fresh in her mind. “No reason, just felt like taking a walk.” She lied, not even caring if Caroline believed her or not. “I was just on my way home…”

Of course Caroline didn’t believe her, but that didn’t mean she was going to pry either. “Let me give you a ride, Jesse. You look dead on your feet.” She wasn’t taking no for an answer, already guiding Jessenia into her car. “Come on, in you go.”

Jessenia could only stare out the window as Caroline drove away, fingering her necklace while fresh tears fell from her eyes. Did Elena and Stefan know about Damon’s plan? It was only one o’clock, she technically still had two and a half hours with Damon, but of course that didn’t matter. He didn’t want her anymore, he had his fun and now it was time to move on. The more she thought about Damon using her, the harder she cried, her heart shattering into a million pieces.

Caroline didn’t know what to think about this, wondering where Jessenia came from because obviously she hadn’t gone for a walk that lead her all the way out here. “I know Elena is your friend, but you can always talk to me too, Jesse. I know we didn’t exactly get off on the right foot, but I’ve been told I’m a great listener.” She had to at least offer, having heard what happened to her at the hands of Damon from Elena. “We’re here for you.”

“Thank you.” She whispered, refusing to talk about it and decided she was done with vampires, Elena and Caroline included.

They weren’t her friends and this was the last time Jessenia got hurt by anyone, the anger already welling up inside of her. First a dinner planned that ended with her nearly losing her life and now she’d fallen for a vampire that wanted nothing to do with her. Damon had forced her into this twenty four hour deal and ended everything just because of a nightmare she had about him biting her.

“Thanks for the ride. Goodbye Caroline.”

Before Caroline could say anything, Jessenia had already gotten out of the car and was inside her house, slamming the door shut. “You’re…welcome…” Whipping her cell phone, Caroline called Elena while pulling out of the driveway, worried about Jessenia.

Damon was downstairs getting some more blood bags and thought he heard something, frowning. He knew Jessenia was upstairs waiting for breakfast and hopefully him. It did hurt that she reminded him of what he did to her when they first met, but would deny that until the day he finally did perish. He also wasn’t giving up on her either, refusing to let a stupid dream destroy what they had already.

“I hope you like eggs.” He called out while coming up the stairs, heading into the parlor where he knew she’d be waiting for her and stopped at the sight of a piece of paper lying on the carpet. “What the hell?” Picking it up, Damon opened it and read, blinking. “I never want to see you again. Damon. I didn’t write this!”

“Of course you didn’t.”

Damon whipped around at the sound of that voice, his aquamarine eyes widening. It couldn’t be, there’s no way it was her. Damon was seeing things, maybe he was in a dream and neither him or Jessenia had woken up yet. He had to be. Doing something that was lame but effective, Damon pinched himself on the arm, his breathing increasing when he felt it.

“Kassandra?”

“Hello again Damon.”

Chapter 13

Elena laughed at something Stefan said when she felt her phone vibrate against the nightstand beside her bed, both of them engrossed in a kiss. “Don’t answer it.” Stefan whispered, his mouth moving to nibble on her ear and groaned when Elena pushed him away.

“Sorry, it could be important. You’ll live.” Elena grinned, answering after the fifth vibration. “Hello?”

“Elena, I really hate bothering you, but something is wrong with Jessenia.” Caroline said while driving over to her boyfriend’s house.

Elena stood up from the bed, a worry expression crossing her face. “What do you mean something’s wrong? What happened, Caroline?” The last she knew, Jessenia was at home trying to get over a sudden flu.

“I don’t know it was the weirdest thing. I was driving and saw her walking down the middle of the road. She was near Stefan’s house…” Caroline chewed her bottom lip nervously. “She was crying and wouldn’t tell me what happened. Elena, what if Damon…?”

Elena looked at Stefan, both of them having knowing looks on their faces. “We’re on it. Did she say anything to you, Caroline?” She asked, already grabbing her purse and car keys.

“Just thanked me for the ride and goodbye.” Caroline reiterated, sounding concerned and rightfully so because Jessenia wasn’t acting right. She could feel it. “I have a feeling something bad happened, Elena.”

“Where is she now?”

“I dropped her off at Meredith’s.” Caroline pulled up into the driveway and cut the ignition, stepping out of her car just as Tyler walked out. “Listen, I’m at Tyler’s, so just keep me posted on what’s going on, k?”

“I will, thanks Caroline.” She hung up the phone and turned to look at Stefan. “Damon did something to her. She was right down the road from your house, how else would she get that close? She doesn’t really know her way around town yet.”

“Let’s not jump to conclusions yet. Why don’t we go over and talk to Jessenia, find out the story that way?” Stefan suggested softly, trying to diffuse his fiancée’s temper before it flared. “Come on, one thing at a time, Elena.”

“It’s Damon; you know he did something to her.” Elena wasn’t backing down, walking out of her bedroom with Stefan following suit, heading out to the car. “If he hurt or bit her…”

“Let’s just go find out from Jessenia first.” Stefan simply said, taking the keys from Elena because she was emotion right now. Every emotion she had was amplified now that she was a vampire. “Just relax, breathe.”

Elena knew he was right and could only nod, staring out the window, only able to imagine what Damon could’ve done to her new friend. Stefan pulled into Meredith’s driveway about ten minutes later, thanks to three slow stoplights. Elena was the first one out and flew to the door, ringing the doorbell.

“Jessenia, I know you’re in there!” She called through the door, continuously knocking on it. “Whatever Damon did to you, we’ll fix it, just open up!”

Jessenia was currently in her bedroom with the door closed and locked, curled up in a tight ball in bed, ignoring the incessant knocking. She didn’t want to see anyone right now, trying to mend her splintered heart and forget all about vampires, especially Damon Salvatore. Jessenia supposed the old saying was right about how a first love always cut the deepest because the pain she felt currently was nearly crippling.

“Damn it!” Elena growled, kicking the door and walked over to sit on the porch steps. “I don’t want to go in there if she won’t open up, but how else are we supposed to find out?”

Stefan wasn’t sure how to answer that, staring at the door and frowned, closing his eyes. He suddenly heard heart-wrenching sobs coming from the window upstairs and knew it was Jessenia. He held his hand up when Elena began asking him what was going on, not wanting to lose what he picked up. Being a vampire, they had a very keen hearing ability too and could hear anything, depending on how well they focused.

“Why would you do this to me, Damon?” She cried out, burying her face in the pillow and clutched it for dear life. “I’ve lost too many people in my life…”

“Let’s leave her be for now, Elena.” Stefan said quietly, stopping the eavesdropping and walked down the stairs, heading for the car.

“What?” Elena stood up, shaking her head. “Stefan, we have to help her. Damon did something…”

Stefan didn’t want to tell Elena what he’d overheard, but figured it might get her off Damon’s back for a little while. “I overheard her, Elena. She doesn’t want to be bothered right now by anyone. She’s ignoring the knocking. And you’re right, Damon did something to her, but he didn’t hurt her physically. Emotionally and mentally definitely, but not physically.”

Frowning, Elena looked up at the bedroom and window and closed her eyes, channeling the hearing ability. If her heart still beat with life, it would be broken by now at the distressing crying Jessenia was doing. She really wanted to help her friend, but Stefan was right, if Jessenia didn’t want to talk to anyone, they had no right forcing her.

“It’s time to go get some answers from your brother, NOW.” Elena ordered, anger clear in her tone and slid into the car, Stefan pulling out of the driveway.

Pulling herself up from the bed, Jessenia looked out the window and wiped her tears away, watching them leave. Good, she hoped they stayed away from her and that included school or she would be transferring to a different one in the next town. Damon ripped her heart out and stomped on it after she gave him a chance, regretting making that deal with him.

Gritting her teeth, Jessenia pulled away from the window and jumped slightly when a flash of lightening lit the sky up, rain beginning to pour outside. One thing she did enjoy was a good thunderstorm and it looked as though she wasn’t going to be disappointed. Sitting on the big ledge of her window, Jessenia leaned back against the wall and simply watched, letting the rain take her pain away.

~!~

“I thought you were dead.”

Kassandra chuckled softly, walking over to the couch and sat down, already having a tumbler in her hand. “Now is that any way to greet me after all these years, Damon love?” She took a long sip before setting it down on the table.

“Considering I thought I’d never see you again and you were currently rotting in the ground six feet under, yeah that’s how I’m greeting you.” Damon shot back, walking down the few steps to the bar, really needing a drink. “How long have been here?”

“Oh just a few minutes. I saw your little blood bag leave the premises though.” Kassandra informed him smoothly, looking over at him with haunting grey eyes. “I never pegged you for someone that slept around.”

“A hundred and forty six years will do that to you.” Damon swallowed down half a tumbler, filling it again and stopped when he looked down at the piece of paper, gritting his teeth. “So, when were you changed?” He asked, trying to sound conversational and planned on ripping her head off the first chance he found.

Smirking, Kassandra stood up from the couch and walked toward him, moving as graceful as she had when she was human. “My sister.” She answered, pouring another tumbler. “I’m sure you know her.”

“Of course he does.”

Damon spit out the bourbon he just ingested, eyes narrowing at the sight of Katherine Pierce standing before him. “You two have a lot of explaining to do.” He stated heatedly, tossing the piece of paper in the garbage before walking past both of them to take a seat in front of the fire.

“Damon darling, don’t you remember me?” Kassandra asked, sounding hurt even though pure amusement shined in her grey eyes. “You were my first love as I was yours.”

“That was until I compelled him to forget so he could be with me.” Katherine said rather bluntly, pouring herself a drink as well.

Damon completely snapped when he heard that, seeing red and flew at Katherine, knocking her to the floor. “WHAT DO YOU MEAN?” He roared, his hand wrapped tightly around her throat, beginning to snap her neck.

“Get…off…ME!!” Katherine grunted out, throwing Damon halfway across the room and watched impassively as he landed with a hardening thump.

Kassandra merely stood by and watched, not getting in the middle of this. “Sister, come now. You do owe him an explanation.” She reasoned, sipping more of her tumbler.

“Of course he does, but choking me is not a way to get on my good side, Kassie.” Katherine replied, standing up and walked over to sit beside her sister while Damon slowly got to his feet. “And he made me drop my drink too.”

“What the hell is going on?” Damon demanded once he was back on his feet, wanting to rip Katherine apart. “The last thing I remember about Kassandra was she left town and never wanted to see me again.” His aquamarine eyes glowed with fury, barely containing it. “Or so I thought…”

“You thought wrong, Damon.” Katherine stated, sounding bored and snorted. “I compelled you to forget all about her. Mystic Falls was starting to find out about vampires and I refused to let my baby sister be with a common human. I stayed behind with Pearl and Emily to try making a decent man out of you for her.”

“Sleeping with me and my brother at the same time was your method?” Damon retorted crossly, not believing this sudden turn of events. “You know what? I don’t even care.” His eyes turned to Kassandra, a woman he did love at one time before meeting Katherine. “So you were a vampire all along?”

“Of course I was. My sister and I have been vampires for centuries, as you well know. She was always lurking in the shadows while I put myself on the scene. There were a few times we swapped places, but other than that, it was mostly me while she stayed in the dark. Being my little sister and all, I had to protect her.” Katherine didn’t sound regretful, not a drop of remorse in her flat voice. “Kassie, get me another drink please.”

Nodding, Kassandra stood up to walk over to the bar, refilling her sister’s glass as requested. “I met you Damon and instantly fell for you. You were so charming and those dimples were adorable, but my sister convinced me it wasn’t safe for us to be together until you were turned. Granted, it hurt when she told me she had slept with you, but I knew it was for the greater good.”

“Are you compelled or just plain stupid?” Damon growled, stalking over to where Kassandra stood and whipped her around by the arm, staring into those grey eyes he had seemingly forgotten once he met Katherine. “Why would you listen to that lying bitch sister of yours?”

“Don’t call her that.” She ordered, shoving Damon away with authority, eyes flashing. “She did what she thought best for me! She was going to turn both you and your brother so we could all four be together! But that never happened and she was captured because of your brother’s big mouth!”

“She made me fall in love with her, Kassandra.” Damon stated, trying to get through to her, but knew it wouldn’t do any good. Katherine was very good at manipulating people, even her own flesh and blood. “She compelled Stefan to make him want to turn into a vampire and she made me forget all about you. How is that doing what’s best for you?”

“She had to do it that way in order to turn both of you. The plan was for her to leave town with both of you, Pearl, Anna and Emily as soon as the transition was completed. I was waiting on the outskirts of town when Emily came to me with distressing news on how my sister was captured. The guard released her though because he was obsessed with her, as you already know. She met me outside of town and told me we had to go, that you two were safe, that I’d see you again someday.” Kassandra reached up, caressing Damon’s face and frowned when he pulled away from her, tears forming in her eyes. “Please Damon, she did it all for us.”

Sick of hearing that, Damon shoved Kassandra back against the wall when she put her hands on him again, snarling. “NO! She did it for HERSELF because she’s a selfish, inconsiderate SLUT! She ruined our lives and made me PINE for her for over a hundred years!! She never gave a damn about your happiness, Kassandra, NEVER!!” He was pissed and it showed, stopping Katherine from ramming a piece of wood into his side. “Nice try.” He grunted, sending her sailing against the wall right against her sister, glaring at both of them. “Get the hell out of my house.”

“Damon, please!!”

“NO! I don’t want to hear it!!”

“This isn’t my fault though!! I love you, I’ve always loved you!! Kathy, tell him please!!” Kassandra begged, looking over at her sister with pleading grey eyes, her long dark brown hair hanging down her back in loose curls. “PLEASE!!”

“Damon, is this how you treat house guests? Kassandra has pined for YOU for over a hundred years and I have finally brought her back to you.” Katherine shook her head sadly, folding her arms in front of her chest. “You will not break my sister’s heart or I will rip yours right out of your chest.”

“You can try.” Damon riposted with a snort, taking his drink and downed all of it, shattering the glass in his hand. “Sorry, I’m not interested in your sister anymore. Show yourself out of my house before I THROW you both out.”

Kassandra’s jaw dropped at how Damon was treating her, not believing this and grabbed her sister’s arm. “Katherine, you said everything would be fine. You said he still wanted me after all these years!” She shouted, gasping when Katherine backhanded her across the face, making her slightly stumble.

“Shut your mouth and let me handle this.” Katherine hissed, eyes narrowing to slits at Damon. “You know you still love her or else you wouldn’t be so angry with me, Damon.” She said in a calmer tone, ignoring her sister for the moment. “It’s not her fault what I did. Don’t punish her for my mistakes.”

“So now I’m a mistake. That’s GREAT to know. Get out.” Damon ordered for the third time, starting to walk away from her and felt her grab his arm, stopping him from walking away.

“Listen to me, Damon…”

“What the hell is going on here?”

Katherine smiled and walked around Damon, releasing his arm for the moment, her eyes locked on the man she had loved since 1864. “Hello Stefan, please join the party.”

Chapter 14

“Katherine, what an unexpected surprise.” Stefan said by way of greeting, walking in holding Elena’s hand, looking a bit confused. “Care to fill me in, Damon?”

Damon didn’t even know where to begin and downed another tumbler, suddenly just taking the bottle of bourbon over to the couch away from Kassandra. “Stefan, say hello to Kassandra Meyer. You remember the woman I thought ran out of town on me before I could propose to her, right?” His voice dripped with sarcasm, glaring hatefully across the room at her.

Stefan’s eyes widened as his eyes moved from Katherine to stare at Kassandra, blinking. “I thought she was dead…” He couldn’t imagine what his brother currently thought and watched as Elena went over to Damon. “We weren’t aware you were changed, Kassandra.”

“I know.” She whispered, wishing she could go comfort Damon, but knew he would probably send a stake through her dead heart.

“I did what was best for MY sister, Stefan.” Katherine said effortlessly, looking over at Elena, snorting. “So you changed her huh?” No matter, Stefan was still hers and always would be, no matter what.

“Kassandra is your sister?” Now Stefan was fuming, his own eyes narrowing.

“Oh yeah, did I forget to mention that bitch compelled me to forget about Kassandra? Only, she told me that Kassandra left town because she didn’t want to be with me anymore. All so Katherine could change us and then all four of us could be together.” Damon snorted, drinking straight from the bottle and was kind of thankful Jessenia wasn’t here at the moment with four vampires.

“WHAT?” Stefan grabbed Katherine by the front of her silk shirt, yanking her against him. “Why the hell would you do that to him, Katherine?! HE LOVED HER!!”

Katherine started laughing, the sound dripping with pure evil. “Because I could.” She head-butted him and watched as Stefan flew to the floor, cracking her neck a little. “I wanted to taste both of you to see who I fantasied more and it was you, Stefan. It’s always been you. I did love Damon too, but not as much as you.”

Elena couldn’t hear any more of this and left Damon’s side to join Stefan’s, standing in front of him. “It doesn’t matter if you love him or not, he belongs to me. We’re getting married, Katherine, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Katherine smirked wickedly, dusting her shirt off and pulled a piece of lint as well. “You underestimate me, girl, just as you always have.” A second later, Elena was flying through the air and crashed against the wall, a vase smashing along with her body. “Now then, where were we?”

Stefan decided to let his actions speak louder than his words and tackled Katherine to the floor by the neck, his hand so tight she couldn’t escape. He had just fed before coming home with Elena and they were both incredibly strong at the moment. After all these years, Stefan had finally realized just what a cold-blooded monster Katherine Pierce was and her sister was no different.

“You’ve destroyed your last lives tonight.” He promised in a growl, hearing Elena coming up behind him and didn’t take his eyes off of Katherine.

“Stefan…Stefan, no please…”

Elena handed over a piece of wood from the table, wanting Stefan to ram it right through her chest to end all of their pain, especially Damon’s. “Do it, Stefan. End her so we can be happy together.” She whispered, already healed from her injuries and looked over at Kassandra.

“NO!!” Kassandra couldn’t let them kill Katherine and started flying toward them, but Damon stopped her by tackling her to the floor, letting his brother do the deed.

“End her, Stefan!!”

“Stefan…” Katherine whispered pleadingly, shaking her head. “Please…”

Stefan growled, lifting his arm up with the stake, ready to drive it right into Katherine’s black heart, but for some reason he couldn’t do it. “You have one day to get the hell out of Mystic Falls. If you don’t, I WILL end you.” He released her and stood up, keeping the stake in his hand just in case Katherine decided to do something stupid. “Now get the hell out of our house, both of you.”

“Stefan, are you insane?!” Damon shouted, releasing Kassandra out of sheer surprise. “Why the hell are you letting her go?!”

Stefan ignored him for the moment, watching as Kassandra rushed over to pick Katherine up from the floor, both of them flying out the door. Both Elena and Damon just stared at him with mouths hanging open, not believing he didn’t stake Katherine when he had the chance. Why Katherine would bring Kassandra to him after all these years, but Damon wasn’t about to get roped into Katherine’s games again.

“Stefan, after everything she’s done to us…” Elena didn’t understand why he took mercy on Katherine, frowning. “She’s not leaving, you know that right?”

“Of course she’s not.” Damon swallowed down another tumbler, his anger blocking him from getting a buzz, which he desperately needed right now. “Those bitches.”

Stefan wasn’t sure why he couldn’t kill Katherine, knowing both Damon and Elena had a point about her making their lives miserable. “I’m sorry…” He didn’t know what else to say and walked over, setting on the couch with his head buried in his hands.

“You’re weak and pathetic.” Damon grunted, ignoring Elena’s glare and suddenly launched the glass right into the flames of the fireplace, hearing them explode temporarily.

“Damon, now isn’t the time to call him names.” Elena made the attempt to stand up for Stefan, but even she was having a hard time with this. “He did what he thought best…”

“That’s a load of crap and you know it, Elena!” Damon snapped, pacing back and forth with the bottle in his hand, wanting to launch it, but also didn’t want to waste bourbon.

“Can we all just calm down for a few seconds please? Damon, I know you’re upset, but stop lashing out. We came over here because we need to talk to you.” Of course they didn’t think Katherine was going to magically appear with her sister.

Damon shook his head. “Not in the mood right now, Elena. I’ve had a VERY bad start to my day.” First Jessenia had run off on him, breaking their deal and now the sisters from hell had shown up.

“It’s about Jessenia.” Elena stopped Damon from storming to his room, watching as he slowly turned to face her.

“Where is she?” Damon demanded, walking back over to stand in front of Elena. “Is she okay?”

“We were hoping to find out what you did to her, but judging by the look in your eyes, I’m guessing you didn’t do anything. What the hell was she doing here anyway? What did you do, Damon?” Elena demanded, pursing her lips tightly together. “Because if you hurt her, I will hurt YOU.”

“I didn’t hurt her.” Damon didn’t appreciate being accused for something that wasn’t his fault, scowling. “And why she was here is none of your damn business.”

“Yes it is my business because she’s my friend and I’m tired of you screwing around with my friends! First Caroline, you tortured Bonnie for her powers and now Jessenia. You will tell me what you did because she’s at home crying her eyes out right now and I have no idea why! She won’t let anyone into the house and I’m not about to go in uninvited.” Elena shoved him, surprised when he stumbled back a few feet, her new vampirism doing wonders for her strength. “Now tell me what you did.”

“I took her out and showed her a good time, rocked her world.” Damon lewdly stated, taking a swig from the bottle and was already planning on paying Jessenia a visit.

Elena wasn’t amused and had a feeling Damon was lying to her because he was being sarcastic. “Damon, please tell me what you did. I’m not saying you did anything bad, I’m not accusing you. I just want to know what happened to upset her so much.”

Damon reached down and grabbed the little note out of the trash he’d found, handing it over to her. “Jessenia and I made a deal that if she spent twenty four hours with me, I’d leave her alone if she wanted me to. We spent most of the day in the woods and some of the night before coming back here. She stayed the night, apparently found that note when we got up and took off while I was downstairs grabbing more blood.” There, Elena wanted the whole story, Damon gave her his version, leaving out the intimate details.

“W-Why would she make that deal after what you did to her?” Elena wondered aloud, completely confused and read the note, frowning deeply. “This isn’t good. That’s not your handwriting, Damon.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.” Damon snorted, snatching the piece of paper out of her hand and shoved it in his back jean pocket. “She thinks I wrote it though and that’s why she took off. That’s probably also why she’s at home crying.”

“Whose handwriting is it? Katherine’s or Kassandra’s?” Elena knew one of them had to of written it, looking over at Stefan, who had remained quiet.

“Like I’m supposed to know that? Come on Elena, get with the damn program! One of them did it and they should have stakes driven through their hearts.” Damon planned on doing what his little brother couldn’t, which was ending Katherine once and for all.

“I’m sorry…” Stefan murmured again, hating himself for letting Katherine get away again and wished he could just turn off his emotions when it came to her.

Damon swallowed down another shot and slammed the bottle down on the bar, glaring over at Stefan. “Sorry doesn’t cut it, brother.” He buttoned up his long sleeved black shirt, rolling the sleeves up and decided against bringing his leather jacket. “I’m going out, I’ll be back later.”

Stefan was up in a flash, standing in front of Damon. “Where are you going?”

“Going to the liquor store because we’re out of bourbon.” Damon stated, shoving Stefan away from him and stormed out of the house, slamming the door shut.

Elena rushed to Stefan’s side, helping him up. “You know he was lying, right?”

Stefan just nodded, both of them hoping Jessenia was going to be alright. “Do you want to go after him?” He asked softly, running a hand through his hair.

“Part of me does because who knows what he’s capable of in the current mood he’s in.” Elena answered truthfully, worry etched in her beautiful face. “We don’t have to go in unless she needs us.”

“Lead the way.”

~!~

Pulling out front of Meredith’s house, Damon cut the ignition and looked up at the window, the fading light emanating from it. She was up and home, Damon knew that was her room. She wasn’t crying anymore, which was a good thing because Damon really didn’t feel like dealing with a hormonal woman. He didn’t blame her for being so upset and running off, but Damon hoped she listened to reason.

“Here goes nothing.” He muttered, noticing Meredith wasn’t home from the hospital, so Jessenia was alone in the house.

Knocking wouldn’t do any good because Damon knew she wouldn’t answer the door. Heading to the back of the house, Damon checked the screen doors and was surprised they were open, letting himself inside. He could hear soft music playing upstairs and immediately headed in that direction, his assumption Jessenia was in her room right.

Jessenia was currently lying in bed reading one of her books and trying to escape, fresh out of the shower. She barely ate because she was too upset from what happened, a half a sandwich on a plate with a drink on her nightstand. Tapping on her bedroom door made Jessenia jump slightly, her head turning to see if Meredith would barge in, pleased when she didn’t. Setting her book aside, Jessenia stood up from the bed and walked to the door, opening it up.

Nobody was there.

“Meredith?” She called out, stepping into the hallway and frowned when she didn’t see or hear anything. “Hmm…could’ve sworn I heard something.”

“You did.”

Jessenia whipped around so fast, she nearly gave herself whiplash, jade eyes wide at the sight of Damon standing in the middle of her bedroom. What the hell was he doing here and how did he get inside the house? Refusing to hear anything he had to say, Jessenia made a run for it and barely got out the door when Damon caught her, his super speed working against her.

“LET ME GO!!” She screamed, hoping Meredith walked in soon and started flaying her arms and legs wildly, trying to get away from him. “NO!!”

“Jessenia, you have to give me a chance to explain!!” Damon threw her on the bed with ease, straddling her waist and held her arms down so she couldn’t strike him. “Calm down!”

“NO, GET OFF OF ME!!” Jessenia wanted nothing to do with him, the pain and unbearable heartbreak coming back full force, tears already falling.

Stefan stopped Elena from entering the house, holding her by the arms. “No, not yet.” He stated, wanting to give his brother a chance first.

Damon didn’t do anything she said and kept quiet, letting her tire out so she couldn’t fight him. He was barely applying pressure, being mindful of his super strength, not wanting to hurt her. It wasn’t her fault this happened, but she at least owed it to him to explain the situation. When Jessenia kept fighting him after twenty minutes straight, Damon finally let her go, letting her get the aggression out.

“Go ahead, hit me and get it out of your system.” Damon ordered, his head barely snapping to the side when she slapped him. “Harder, come on.”

Jessenia started throwing her balled fists at his chest, hitting him as hard as she could while crying her heart out. All the pain and heartache was seeping out of her pores and all Jessenia wanted to do was hurt him as much as he hurt her. She did this for another twenty minutes and finally sagged, dropping her fists at her sides.

“What do you want from me now?” She whispered desolately, not trusting her voice because it would crack under pressure.

“I want you to give me a chance to explain what happened before you lash out at me.” Damon stated calmly, knowing getting pissed off at what the hellion sisters did wasn’t going to solve anything between them. “You ran out on me, Senia.”

“What did you expect me to do?” She demanded, breathing heavily from exerting a lot of her strength hitting him. “You clearly don’t want me, the note told me everything I needed to know.”

Damon snorted, pulling the note out and dropped it on her chest. “Oh you mean this?” When she nodded and refused to look at him, Damon grabbed her chin, forcing her eyes to meet his again. “Jessenia, that’s not my handwriting. Do you want me to prove it to you?”

Jessenia didn’t understand, confusion registering in her eyes. “I-I don’t understand…”

Sliding off of her, Damon walked over to the small pad of paper and pen, scrawling something on the pad before ripping it off, handing it to her. “Look at it and then look at the note.” He ordered, watching as Jessenia took it with a shaking hand. “Go on.”

Taking it, Jessenia looked down at the notes and compared them, her jade eyes widening in shock.

Chapter 15

The writing was definitely different, Jessenia couldn’t deny it if she wanted to. The original note had an elegant, almost calligraphic style while the one Damon just wrote was a sloppy scribble. There was no way he could write with the style the note had and this just muddled Jessenia even more. Damon didn’t write the note and she’d left him, running out of the house heartbroken, probably hurting him in the process.

“I don’t know what to say.” She said finally, dropping both pieces of paper on her lap.

“Well that’s a first.” Damon knew he sounded like a jackass, but it was his way of dealing with the current anger he felt. “You ran out on me, Jessenia. Did you think I’d be that low and write you a note if I didn’t want you?”

Jessenia lowered her head in shame, shutting her eyes. “I didn’t know what to think.” She whispered, wiping away the tears that started slowly falling. “I was hurt and confused. I know my dream put damper on things and I figured you didn’t want to deal with me anymore.”

“You thought wrong.” Damon really wished she had some liquor because the way he was feeling right now was deadly. “I didn’t give a damn what you dreamt about. I told you that and you still ran after finding that lame note. That just shows how little you really think of me and I guess I can’t blame you.”

“Damon…”

“That still doesn’t change the fact that you actually thought I would take the coward’s way out instead of telling you to your face.” Damon cut her off, gritting his teeth and took a few deep breaths to try calming himself down. “Unless you were just looking for an excuse to get away from me?”

“No…No that’s not it…”

“Really?” His eyebrows narrowed along with his eyes, almost glaring at her. “Then what exactly is it, Jessenia? Please enlighten me, tell me why you wouldn’t stick around and confront me about the note. Tell me why you ran off.”

Jessenia opened and closed her mouth, but nothing was coming out, just more tears spilling down her cheeks. “I thought…”

“STOP SAYING YOU THOUGHT!” Damon roared, the anger consuming him and knew he should probably leave before he ended up hurting her. “YOU THOUGHT WRONG! I DID want you, bad dreams about me and all, but you saw a note that isn’t even my handwriting and BELIEVED I WOULD DO SOMETHING THAT LOW!!”

“I-I didn’t…”

“What?” Damon growled, stepping toward her and watched as she instinctively backed away on the bed, which hurt more. “You can’t be with someone you fear constantly, Jessenia. You can’t be with someone you think is going to kill you or write a stupid note telling you they never want to see you again. That’s so damn cliché, I would NEVER do something like that and you should’ve known better. But all you did was run like a COWARD instead of fight for me.”

He was angry and had every right to be. Jessenia thought he was capable of something that low because of who he was. He hurt Jessenia the first chance he got all because he wanted to know her secret. Instead of waiting and getting to know her better, he lashed out, scaring her nearly to death. So of course when she found the note, she automatically assumed he didn’t want to be with someone who was emotionally unstable as her.

“I’m only human, Damon.” She said quietly, not looking up at him. “I don’t know what else I can say to make this right.”

Snorting, Damon backed away from the bed, putting distance between them. “You’re right, I don’t think there is either. But I wasn’t about to let you walk away from me without knowing why you ran off. Now that I know what you think of me, I’ll leave you alone now, Jessenia.” It was like Elena all over again, except he was the one walking away from the only human he’d ever opened up to fully.

“Damon…” Jessenia reached out for him and stopped when he held his hand up.

“Don’t. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I get it.”

No matter what he did or how hard he tried, Damon was never going to be capable of finding someone. Maybe that was his punishment for all eternity was to be alone. This was the third woman that ripped his heart out and hurt him. Damon had vowed he would whoever hurt him after what happened with Elena, but he couldn’t do it to Jessenia.

Love really was painful, pointless and overrated.

“Please don’t go!” Jessenia cried out, making one last feeble attempt to stop him from walking away, standing up from the bed. “Please Damon, I’m sorry…”

Slowly turning around, Damon really wanted to go to her, take her into his arms and kiss all the pain away. He wanted to take it all away for her, wishing he could compel her to make this easier. From the moment he laid eyes on her, Damon felt something for Jessenia that couldn’t be explained and he didn’t want to ignore it.

“Goodbye Senia.” Damon had opened her window and flew out of it, landing on his feet right in front of Stefan and Elena. “Enjoy your eavesdropping, brother?” He ignored Elena for the moment.

“What are you doing?” Stefan asked, keeping his arm tightly around Elena’s waist.

“What does it look like?” Damon shot back, walking away from them toward his car. “I’m doing what all women are the best at doing: Walking away.”

That stung Elena a little because she knew the meaning behind that. “I’ll go check on her.”

Damon pulled out of the driveway and sped down the road, hitting the steering wheel a few times. Kassandra was back and now that Stefan suddenly had a soft spot for Katherine, Damon was screwed either way he looked at it. He had to push Jessenia away until the threat of the K sisters from hell was taken care of. Of course, he wasn’t telling Stefan and Elena anything, Damon liked to do things on his own terms.

Elena tapped on Jessenia’s door and pushed it open, hearing her distressing sobs, having heard everything Damon said to her. “Jesse, can I come in?” She asked softly, frowning when Jessenia didn’t respond.

As if finding that note wasn’t painful enough, Damon’s unexpected visit had just made everything ten times worse. Jessenia hadn’t meant to run away, but how was she supposed to respond reading that note? Something told her there was a bigger reason why Damon reacted the way he did.

“Jesse?”

“Please go away.” Jessenia whispered with her back facing the door, curled up in a tight ball with the blanket drawn up over her.

Elena didn’t listen and sat down on the bed, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. “Jessenia, he didn’t mean what he said…”

“H-How do you k-know that?” She demanded in a faltering voice, wishing the tears and pain would stop.

“Damon is a very volatile man, if you haven’t noticed. He does things…irrationally, but he’s still a good person. He has a big heart, but doesn’t like showing it.” Elena explained softly, running her hand up and down Jessenia’s covered up soothingly. “He’s doing this for a reason and we’ll find out what it is.”

“No.” Jessenia slowly sat up in bed, wiping her tears away and slowly looked at Elena with red rimmed eyes. “I’m just going to leave him alone like he wants and focus on my schooling.”

Deciding to get Jessenia’s mind off of Damon for the moment, Elena smiled widely, grabbing her hand. “That’s an excellent idea. You know the Homecoming dance is coming up in two weeks right? We really need to go shopping and find dresses for it.” Elena would find out what was going on with Damon and hopefully he would be Jessenia’s date for it.

Jessenia looked a little skeptical. “I don’t think I’m gonna go…”

“What?” Elena shook her head. “You have to go. This is your first Mystic Falls high school memory, Jesse. Don’t let a guy get you down like this. We’ll go together and Stefan will just have to get over it.” Unless Damon came around by then, which Elena was currently counting on. “Come on, it’ll be fun going shopping together and trying to find those perfect dresses.”

Jessenia had to admit it did sound like fun, she had never gone to any school dances because of her mother. “You’re not going to leave me alone until I do this are you?”

“Nope, you might as well just say yes so I don’t have to grovel and beg.”

Sighing resignedly, Jessenia reluctantly agreed just to get Elena off her back, deciding maybe it wouldn’t be so bad having one best friend in Mystic Falls, even if she was a vampire.

~!~

Walking into the local bar and restaurant, Mystic Grill, Damon instantly headed to the bar area, needing several drinks. He tapped the counter and got the bartender’s attention, asking for a double shot of scotch. Slowly twirling the glass in his hand, Damon downed the liquid and smiled coldly when he felt a familiar presence sit beside him.

“Hello Ric.” He greeted flatly, asking for another round. “Rough day?”

“Something like that.” Alaric replied, asking for a jack and coke. “You look like you’re ready to either get rip-roaring drunk or tear someone apart. So, what happened?”

Alaric and Damon weren’t exactly friends, but they were about as close as it got to the actual term. Alaric had come to Mystic Falls trying to figure out what his deceased wife, Isobel, found so fascinating about the small town. That and he wanted to track down the vampire that killed her in front of his eyes.

It was Damon, but Alaric ended up finding out that Isobel hadn’t been murdered like he thought. She had tracked down Damon and begged him to turn her into a vampire, which Damon did. After that, Alaric just focused on his job, which was Mystic Falls High School history teacher and a secretive vampire hunter, helping the Salvatore brothers and Elena.

Technically, by marriage to Isobel, Alaric was Elena’s stepfather, so he felt the need to protect her. Elena had been adopted as a baby from Isobel and her adoptive father’s brother, John Gilbert, who was Elena’s biological father. John ended up giving his life to save Elena, having Elena’s witch friend Bonnie cast a spell that would take his life force into his daughter, sacrificing himself in the process.

“I don’t think you want to know, Ric.” Damon said honestly, having a feeling he’d probably get punched in the face if he told this man what happened with Jessenia. “Think its best if I just keep my mouth shut and keep drinking.”

“Now that’s not like you, Damon.” Ric chastised, downing his first shot of jack and chased it with a beer. “Usually you’re gloating about all the things you do.”

“True that, partner.” Damon clinked his glass against Alaric’s, both of them downing shots. “You really want to know?”

“Would’ve have asked if I didn’t.”

Damon eyeballed him for a couple seconds, deciding it couldn’t hurt to tell him what happened. Worst case scenario, he would end up getting punched in the face and heal within minutes. Given what he did to Jessenia prior to their deal, Damon had a feeling Alaric wasn’t going to go easy on him either.

“Jessenia and I spent some time together and it didn’t end well.” He didn’t have to go into details, just gave Alaric the bare minimum. “And no, I didn’t hurt her, physically anyway.”

Alaric raised a slow eyebrow, wondering what ‘some time together’ meant and turned to fully face Damon, eyes narrowed. “You have my undivided attention. What the hell happened?” Didn’t he tell this vampire to stay away from Meredith’s cousin?

Before Damon got into the whole Jessenia story, he was going to need a few more shots in him and so was Alaric. “I went over there yesterday and made a deal with her. She agreed to spend twenty four hours with me and we ended up in the woods on the outskirts of town. We talked, asked each other some questions and then ended up back at my place. Nothing happened in the physical sense, but…Katherine showed back up with a guest.”

“Who?” Alaric was more than curious now, running the pad of his thumb around the rim of the glass.

“An old flame from way back in the day, before I was turned. Kassandra. Turns out, she was the bitch’s sister. So now the K sisters from hell are in Mystic Falls. Cheers.” Damon downed another shot, deciding he needed something stronger and changed his next round to whiskey. “Oh and you want to hear what’s even better? One of those bitches decided to write a note and left it in the parlor for Jessenia to find. She thinks I wrote the damn thing. So she ran out on me and I confronted her about it. I’m not really upset about it because she’s only human.” He snorted, losing count at how many shots he inhaled.

“So let me guess, and I’m taking a wild guess here, you told her it did bother you to push her away.” Alaric could’ve been a psychic, chuckling at his own mental joke. “And you think that’ll work, honestly?”

“Honestly, no I don’t and you wanna know why? Because of Elena. She’s friends with Elena and you know she’s going to badger me until I come clean about why I pushed Jessenia away.” Damon wasn’t looking forward to that confrontation at all, groaning inwardly.

Alaric couldn’t help chuckle at Damon’s bad luck with women, shaking his head. “You want in on a little secret?” When Damon nodded, Alaric downed another shot, smirking. “I knew all along that Jessenia spent time with you.”

Damon closed his eyes, shaking his head and asked for a Bloody Mary. “Meredith told you I take it?”

Alaric nodded and held his drink up. “She knew you wouldn’t hurt Jessenia, even though you threatened to kill her.”

“Yeah, yeah I’m about tired of hearing that.” Damon grunted, leaning forward on the counter and started nursing his drink. “Surprised you’re okay with this considering you told me to stay away from her.”

“Hey, if Meredith’s fine with it, then so am I.” Alaric said reasonably, stretching his arms in the air and clapped Damon hard on the back. “I know you think you’re protecting her by pushing her away, but trust me, you’re not.”

Damon rolled his eyes, waving Alaric off dismissively. “I know what I’m doing, don’t worry about it.”

Holding his hands up, Alaric decided to leave Damon alone for the time being, already expecting a phone call from Meredith regarding this. “Hey, if Meredith is upset, I’ll have to defend Jessenia’s honor by slapping you around a little bit. You don’t mind do you?”

“Not at all, have at it.” Damon watched as Alaric slapped some bills on the counter before walking out, leaving him there to drink himself into oblivion.

Chapter 16

“Okay how about this one?”

Elena stepped out of the changing room of the local dress shop, heading straight for a full length mirror to see if it was the one she wanted. Jessenia thought she looked stunning, the gown really bringing out of her deep brown eyes. This was the third gown Elena had tried on while Jessenia hadn’t tried on any, not finding anything that suited her style.

“You look stunning, Elena.” Jessenia said, standing up and walked over to help her fluff it out a bit. “Stefan isn’t going to know what hit him when he sees you in this.”

“If I pick it.” Elena smiled, turning around to look at the back, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “I really do like this one.”

It was a black and champagne leopard print strapless floor length ball gown with a jewel encrusted waist belt. The dress had a jewel attachment on the left side, the necklace sweetheart designed. Elena looked incredible in it and Jessenia could tell she liked it more than the others, especially with the smile on her face.

“This is the one.” She announced after a few more seconds of contemplation, finally turning around to stare at Jessenia. “Now, it’s time to find YOU a dress.”

Jessenia groaned, not looking forward to this. “Okay, but nothing too fancy or flashy. I’m not the dress up type of girl.”

“Just trust me with this.” Elena grinned, already sifting through the gowns while tapping her chin in thought. “We’ll start with three and work from there, if you don’t like any of them.”

This was going to be a very long afternoon.

Elena handed over the gowns and nudged Jessenia into one of the changing rooms while she went into her own to change. Jessenia looked at the gowns, trying the first one on that she saw, which was gorgeous. She would never admit that out loud and carefully took it off the hanger after shedding her clothes, slipping into it. It was hard to believe Jessenia actually agreed to go to a school dance, having avoided them for most of her adolescence.

“Come on out, Jesse. I want to see how beautiful you look!” Elena crowed, tapping on the door and stepped back as Jessenia walked out, her eyes widening. “Wow…”

The dress was a champagne strapless gown with a sweetheart neckline. It featured a nude underlay with an embellished emerald green print top bodice and a layered tulle skirt. It was floor length and really made Jessenia jade eyes pop, which is what Elena was aiming for. Pulling Jessenia over to the full length mirror, Elena stood behind her and forced her friend to look at her reflection, beaming.

“You look magnificent, Jesse.”

Jessenia didn’t know what to think or feel as she stared in the mirror, slowly smoothing her hands down the chiffon material, chewing her bottom lip. She had to admit, it was a breathtaking dress and she didn’t look half bad in it, but this wasn’t her type of fun. Still, Jessenia appreciated the effort and decided she didn’t need to try the rest of the dresses on because no others compared.

“I’ll get this one then.” Jessenia looked over at Elena, cracking a phony smile.

“Are you sure?” Elena asked, tilting her head slightly. “There’s no rush, Jesse. If you want to try others on, you can. Though, I don’t think the others will live up to this one honestly.”

“I’m sure.”

The girls paid for their dresses and walked out of the shop, heading for Elena’s car. The wind picked up a little too strongly and Jessenia ended up accidentally dropping her dress on the sidewalk, thankful it was in a protective bag. Gathering it in her arms again, Jessenia stood up and jumped at the sight of Damon standing right in front of her, jade locking with aquamarine.

It’d been a week since she last saw him, the hurt still very fresh, but Jessenia was just taking one day at a time. Elena had really helped her by keeping her distracted with the homecoming dance and school. She also attended a small gathering in the town square and hung out with Elena’s friends Caroline, Matt, Tyler and Bonnie. If they knew about what happened with Damon, nobody talked about it, just keeping the conversation calm and light.

“Hi.” That was the only way Jessenia could greet him.

Damon missed her and had gone on a drinking binge the first few days before Stefan finally forced him to sober up. As much as his little brother annoyed him, Damon was thankful because he did have to get his head on straight. Kassandra and Katherine were still a threat that had to be dealt with, especially since they were still in town according to Alaric, but hadn’t been back to the house.

Stefan had tried talking to him about Jessenia, but Damon wasn’t budging or talking about it. He knew what he was doing and didn’t need Stefan interfering, basically telling him to focus on Elena. Being the more human between the two, Stefan told Damon he didn’t have to push away Jessenia to solve his problems. Damon hadn’t responded and walked out, needing some fresh air.

“What’s that?” He asked, tapping the huge white bag with his finger, already knowing what it was because Damon had seen her in the dress through the window.

“My homecoming dress.” Jessenia answered softly, lifting her leg up to hold the dress a little more securely. “Elena’s making me go.”

So that’s why Stefan was trying on different shirts and ties this morning. “Sounds boring, who are you going with?” Damon made it sound like he wasn’t interested, but secretly he was, ready to tear out the guy’s spine who was taking her.

“Elena.”

Now that was an interesting response. “Elena isn’t going with Stefan?”

“She said he’d have to get over it because we’re going together.” Jessenia said, repeating Elena’s words. “Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” Damon shrugged, plastering on a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Just curious if you’re aware that Stefan is going to the dance.”

“Of course he is, he does go to school here.” Elena said from behind, causing Damon to turn to face her, smiling. “We’re going as a group with Caroline, Tyler, Matt and Bonnie.”

“Sounds like a big orgy to me.” Damon snorted, his eyes once again on Jessenia, who looked very uncomfortable.

Elena sensed it and was by her side a second later, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “Why don’t you head to the grill and I’ll meet you there?” She suggested, wanting a few words alone with Damon and smiled reassuringly at her friend. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Jessenia wasn’t arguing with her and walked past Damon, heading to her car, trying to stay positive. Elena waited until Jessenia drove off before slapping the taste out of Damon’s mouth, brown eyes flashing. Damon hadn’t expected that and ended up dislocating his neck from the blow, having to crack it back into place.

“That’s your only warning. Stay away from Jessenia or I will kick the hell out of you the way Caroline did, Damon.” Elena didn’t know what his game was, but she wasn’t playing it and refused to let him hurt Jessenia again. “You walked away from her, you chose this. Now leave her alone.”

Damon was tempted to show Elena his own strength, but decided against it, knowing she was only defending Jessenia. “Do that again and I will hurt you.” He promised darkly, rubbing his cheek. “I walked away from her for a reason, Elena. Stay out of it.”

“You call walking away from her, over a stupid note your ex-girlfriend from back in your human days, a reason?” Elena scoffed, thoroughly disappointed with him. “I can’t believe you, Damon. That has to be the lamest excuse I’ve ever heard of. I thought you had a bigger heart than that, but I guess I was wrong.”

“Guess you were.” Damon shot back, no longer smiling. “You can thank Katherine and yourself for that too.” Elena had broken was Katherine had left of his heart and Damon refused to apology for any of his actions. “We done here?”

“I can’t help who I fell in love with, Damon.” Elena said honestly, tired of feeling guilty over something that was out of her control. “I know we met first, but you compelled me to forget that memory, remember? It’s your fault I didn’t choose you. You decided that night I wasn’t worth getting to know, that you didn’t want me remembering because you didn’t want anyone else knowing you were in town. Think about that the next time you try to make me feel guilty.”

Damon watched her walk away and knew Elena was right, hating her for it. “Damn it.” He muttered, raking a hand through his black hair and stalked down the sideway to his car, feeling very conflicted.

When Elena walked into the grill angry, Jessenia assumed her conversation with Damon hadn’t gone well and didn’t say anything. It wasn’t her business what they talked about, Damon wasn’t hers as much as she wanted him to be and Jessenia had to get over it. She popped a fry in her mouth after dipping it in ketchup, laughing at something Matt said.

He was such a nice guy with baby blue eyes and blonde hair, the quarterback of Mystic Falls High School football team. He wasn’t like other jocks though, he actually had a brain, a job and supported himself, which Jessenia admired. Matt also had a great sense of humor and a killer smile, but it didn’t compare to Damon.

Why couldn’t Jessenia fall for someone like him who wasn’t completely out of her reach?

“So, I heard you two found your dresses.” Caroline grinned, eyes sparkling. “I can’t wait to see them!”

“Yeah, wait until you see Jesse’s. Mine is beautiful, but hers is going to take everyone’s breath away.” Elena winked at Jessenia, smiling when she flushed. “It’s the truth!”

“I found my dress too.” Caroline stated, everyone excited for the dance and grabbed Tyler’s hand under the table, squeezing it.

“Really?” Elena grinned, sipping some of her soda that Matt ordered for her. “What color is it?”

“It’s this really light baby blue, strapless with a sweetheart neckline and it has this huge silver sparkling belt that covers the abdomen area.” Caroline described, looking dreamy while she did it and jumped when Tyler pinched her arm to get her back to reality. “Sorry.”

“Short or long?” Jessenia asked, getting into the conversation while eating her food, starving after shopping for dresses with Elena. “Ours are long.”

“Short of course.” Caroline giggled, slapping Tyler playfully when he growled, sending a shiver down her back. “Behave.”

Tyler smirked, bringing Caroline’s hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “Do I ever behave?”

Rolling her eyes, Caroline snorted and turned her attention to Jessenia, changing the subject. “So, who are you going to the dance with, Jesse?” She asked innocently.

“Elena and I are going together.” Jessenia answered for the second time that day, twirling it around in her drink.

Caroline blinked, looking confused. “I thought Stefan was supposed to be taking you, Elena?”

“Yes well given this is Jesse’s first official school dance and she doesn’t really know anyone, I was thinking we could all go as a group.” Elena suggested, having partially lied to Damon regarding how they were attending the dance.

“Matt doesn’t have a date.” Caroline pointed out coyly, eyeing Matt to see what his reaction would be. “He could always take you, Jesse.”

Matt really wanted to kill Caroline for suggesting that because he knew what happened with Damon, thanks to Elena. Still, he did find the idea intriguing, wondering what Jessenia thought about it. He found her attractive and she definitely had a killer body that blew both Elena and Caroline out of the water. Of course, he would never admit that aloud, liking his genitals where they were.

“I wouldn’t mind.” Matt said with a charming smile, looking across the table at Jessenia. “What do you think, Jesse?”

“I think that would be great.” Bonnie piped in, having busied herself with looking over her notes for a test in science. “What do you say, girl?”

“Matt is an excellent dancer, trust me.” Caroline knew she was probably pressuring Jessenia, but after what Damon did to her, she had to get back into the swing of things. “Come on, you two will have a lot of fun together!”

“Yeah!”

Jessenia was looking at each person around the table and could already feel the tears stinging the back of her eyes. She didn’t want to go to this dance in the first place, but Elena was making her. Now everyone was pressuring her to go with Matt, who was a nice guy, but he wasn’t Damon. Not able to deal with this right now, Jessenia put her wallet in her purse and stood up from the table, shaking slightly.

“I have to go, see you guys later.”

Elena went to stop Jessenia from running out, but Caroline stopped her, both of them frowning. “Well that didn’t go over well…”

“Damn it Caroline, I told you to be subtle about it.” Bonnie chastised, feeling horrible that they ambushed Jessenia like that. “I’m sorry Matt. We tried.”

“Wait, you wanted to take her to the dance, Matt?” Elena blinked, wondering when this came about and watched him slowly lower his head. “If I would’ve known…”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it. Look, I gotta get back to work. It was worth a shot, thanks anyway guys.” He walked away from the table dejectedly and vowed to apologize to Jessenia the next time he saw her.

Elena felt awful and really wished Caroline would’ve kept her nose out of Jessenia’s business because this was a major setback from all the progress they made. Damon had no idea what he did to her when he basically pushed her away to protect her. She wasn’t stupid, that’s how Damon worked.

He did things irrationally, going from one extreme or the other. Either he was fiercely protective the way he had been with her when she was human or he pushed people away he cared about most, possibly even loved. Elena had to talk to him and left the grill, heading over to the Salvatore house. All she could hope was that she could get through to him and change his mind about Jessenia.

Jessenia didn’t drive home and instead headed out of town, just needing to get away for a while. She pulled over on Wickery Bridge and walked down to the water’s edge, tears pouring down her cheeks. What happened at the grill was definitely unexpected and Jessenia felt terrible because she rejected Matt in front of everyone.

Nobody deserved embarrassment like that, but what was she supposed to do? Go to the dance and act like everything was fine, like her heart wasn’t ripped into pieces? She couldn’t do that, it wasn’t fair to Matt to use him because he was genuinely a nice guy. Maybe going to the dance wasn’t such a good idea.

“Well, well what do we have here?”

Jessenia turned around, eyes widening at the sight of Kassandra and knew she had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.

Chapter 17

Kassandra smiled coldly at the human girl that currently had Damon wrapped around her finger, deciding maybe to break it. “Hello there. Jessenia isn’t it?” She slowly began making her way down the small path, considering her prey.

“W-What do you want?” Jessenia stammered, slowly backing up a foot or two, worry in her jade eyes. Elena explained all about Kassandra, or what she knew anyway, so this wasn’t that big of a surprise.

Kassandra laughed, kicking a rock out of her way. “There’s a lot of things I want, girl, like Damon.”

“Go have him then. He’s yours.” Jessenia wished she’d just gone home, tears still in her eyes.

“If only it were that easy and simple, Jessenia.” Kassandra sighed wistfully, running a hand through her dark brown hair, which was curled to perfectly and hung down to the middle of her back. “You see, Damon is smitten with you. Don’t look so shocked dearie, I know you have feelings for him as well.”

This wasn’t good as the vampire continued moving down the hill. “N-No I don’t…”

“Lying is not your strong suit either, love.” Kassandra stated, stopping to run her fingers over the wood of the bridge while the sun shined brightly on both of them. “So don’t even attempt it.”

“He doesn’t want me though!” Desperation was kicking in and Jessenia was afraid for her life, having a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. “P-Please, he’s all yours! You don’t have to do anything to me. I’m staying away from him.”

Kassandra laughed openly, shaking her finger at Jessenia. “Is that what you think I’m going to do? Kill you? Heavens no, child. That wouldn’t serve my greater purpose.” She sounded darkly amused, the sound of her laughter sending chills throughout Jessenia’s body.

“What is your greater purpose then?” Jessenia whispered, trembling now and was tempted to jump in the water.

“Now why on earth would I tell you that?” Kassandra made it sound as though they were discussing the weather, her voice soft and almost kind. “Let’s just say you’re going to become quite useful to me and leave it at that.”

Jessenia didn’t like the sound of that, wishing she hadn’t left the grill because Elena could’ve protected her. “I won’t help you do anything.” She had to be strong, backing up again and felt her shoes engulf in water, not taking her eyes off of the vampire for a second.

“Oh I think you will, human, or I will kill Damon right before your eyes.” Kassandra threatened, raising a brow when Jessenia didn’t seen too troubled by that. “Or I suppose I could go to your guardian and precious cousin, Meredith. I hear she uses vampire blood to heal measly humans, the world would be a better place without her in it.”

“If you go near her…”

“You’ll what?” Kassandra was standing right in front of Jessenia now, running a finger down her cheek delicately. “Such a pretty flower you are, but it’s time to stop this idle chit-chat. Now, you can either come with me willingly or…”

Jessenia looked up the pathway with wide eyes, shaking her head. “No…”

Katherine smiled and shoved Meredith down on her knees at the top of the small pathway, a dagger in her hand. “Now be a good little girl and nobody has to get hurt, hmm?”

“You have to swear to me no harm will come to my cousin. I don’t care what you do with me, but let Meredith go and I won’t fight you.” Jessenia ignored Meredith’s pleas to save herself, tears sliding down her cheeks. “Please, she has nothing to do with this.”

Kassandra eyed Jessenia skeptically, wondering if she was telling the truth and nodded. “Very well. Sister, release her.”

“But…”

“You owe me this after what you did to me, Katherine. Don’t make me hurt you too.” Kassandra threatened, grabbing Jessenia by the upper arm and turned around to face Katherine. “We have a deal. Now let her cousin go unharmed. We’re doing this my way, remember?”

Katherine glared down at her sister, not believing she was actually foolish enough to trust Damon’s current plaything and reluctantly cut the binds on Meredith’s wrists. “Run.” She ordered, shoving the human away from her and watched as Meredith took off down the bridge. “So what now, Kassie?”

A second later, Jessenia saw complete darkness, her body crumpling to the ground at Kassandra’s feet.

~!~

“Not in the mood for company right now!” Damon called out, hearing the front door open and downed another tumbler of bourbon. “I said I’m not-what are you doing here?”

“I’m here to talk about Jesse.” Elena said, walking down the few steps that lead to the parlor while Damon poured another glass. “So drink up because I’m not leaving until we do.”

Damon rolled his eyes, not taking her seriously. “Go away, Elena.” He ordered, carrying his tumbler over to the small seat right in front of the roaring fireplace.

“No, not until we talk about this, Damon.” Elena sat on the couch, staring at him from the side and frowned, wishing things could be like they used to. “I know you think you’re protecting Jessenia by pushing her away, but you’re only hurting her…”

“So what?” Damon snorted, not in the mood for a heart to heart with the woman who ripped out his own just like Katherine had. “She’ll get over it. This is for the best and you know it.”

“Damn it Damon, are you even hearing yourself?! When you were protecting me, you consumed me with everything you had, all of your feelings and love. You were fierce and didn’t let anything or anyone stand in your way. Granted, you sabotaged a lot of plans we had, but we always came out on top…because of you.” Elena stood up and walked over to squat down in front of him, cupping his face in her soft hands. “You can lie to a lot of people, but you can’t lie to me. This isn’t what’s best for her or you. You deserve to be happy, but not if you keep pushing people away.”

Gritting his teeth, Damon shoved her hands away from his face and stood up, downing his tumbler in one long swallow. “I can’t talk about this with you, Elena.” She really had to leave before Damon ended up hurting her worse than he had Jessenia, vocally since he could never hurt her physically.

“Why? Because you’re in love with me still? Or because you’re so afraid of falling for someone again because they might reject you the way Katherine and I did?” Elena squared her shoulders when Damon stormed toward her, brown locking with ice blue. “Whether you believe it or not, you do have your humanity still intact, Damon.”

Damon was about to lose his temper and fast if Elena didn’t back down and he really didn’t feel like knocking her head off her shoulders. “Leave.” He ordered, pointing to the hallway that lead to the front door.

“No.”

“Damn it, Elena, I said LEAVE!!” Damon shoved her, causing her to skid across the floor and instantly regretted it, turmoil filling his eyes.

“NO!” Elena shouted, stumbling to her feet and shoved him right back, sending Damon to the floor this time. “You’re not going to push me around like you did when I was human! I’m much stronger now and will kick your ass just like Caroline did!”

That had definitely been a blow to his ego when Caroline ended up being changed into a vampire, courtesy of his blood in her system and Katherine suffocating her with a pillow in the hospital. Caroline had ran into him and she ended up getting some much needed revenge, which Damon didn’t blame her for. He could’ve easily staked her, but honestly he liked Caroline and didn’t want to end her.

“I SAID GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!!” Damon roared, flipping the table over and launched his tumbler into the fire, watching as the flames exploded temporarily, sizzling. “I don’t want or need your help with this! I GOT THIS!!”

“I’m sure you do. I’m sure it’s easy for you to break someone’s heart and walk away like a coward. Especially when it’s happened to you twice.” Elena knew it was wrong to open up the fresh wounds concerning them, but if it helped open Damon’s eyes to what he was doing to Jessenia, it was worth it.

Damon started laughing, no humor in it whatsoever. “Believe it or not, Elena, what I did to Jessenia has nothing to do with you. I’m over what you did to me, what Katherine did. I have been for a while now because I knew you’d choose Stefan all along. I’m not stupid. So whatever you think you’re doing here trying to right my wrongs and make me a better person, forget it. I don’t need your help.” He dusted himself off and unbuttoned his shirt, peeling it off his rock hard frame, tossing it aside. “Now leave and don’t come back unless my brother is with you or I’ll tear you limb by limb.”

Tears glistened in Elena’s eyes as she stared back at Damon, stumbling back a little. “You wouldn’t hurt me.” She shot back weakly, wishing his cold words didn’t hurt her as much as they did. “Damon, all I’m saying is there is a better way to handle things besides pushing Jessenia away. I see the way you look at her and she looks at you. Whatever you did to make her trust you, it worked and now she’s fallen for you. There is no other man in the picture. Matt tried asking her to the dance and she walked out of the grill because she didn’t want to hurt his feelings. She wants you, don’t you see it?”

Damon had both hands placed on the ledge over the fireplace, his back turned to her and closed his eyes, trying to reign in his emotions, black eyebrows furrowed. “I want her too.” He hated admitting it to Elena of all people, but she wouldn’t leave it alone until he was brutally honest with her. “I’m not mad at her for running off on me and breaking our deal.”

“The twenty four hour deal.” Elena whispered, nodding when Damon turned his head to look over his shoulder at her. “She told me about it, said it was the most fun she’d had in years.”

Damon half-smirked when he heard that, turning his eyes back to the fire and heaved a sigh. “You don’t know this, but today when you two were playing dress up…”

“You were there.” Elena cut him off, slowly walking over to stand beside him. “I felt you and I didn’t say anything because I know you miss her.” She placed a hand on his back, rubbing it comfortingly. “Damon, I’m on your side with this. Stefan told me to stay out of it, but I can’t, not when both of my friends are hurting.”

“Of course you can’t.” Damon retorted softly, not pulling away from her touch. “So, what else did she tell you?”

“She really didn’t say anything about your time together. I think it hurts her too much to talk about you, to be honest.” Elena pulled away from Damon and sat back down on the couch, leaning back against it. “But she did tell me one thing.”

Damon turned around to face her, folding his arms over his bare chest. “I’ll bite, what did she tell you?”

“She’s happy her first kiss was from you.” Elena smiled, remembering how flushed Jessenia got when she revealed that intimate information. “It just amazes me that you threatened to kill her and she ended up trusting you in seemingly the blink of an eye. And I know you didn’t compel her because she’s got my old necklace on and she’s having vervain slipped into her beverages.”

“Noted.” Damon walked over to the mini bar, really needing a drink after having that explosion with Elena. “Want one?”

“Sure, why not?” Elena took the tumbler from him and clinked her glass against his, both of them swallowing down the liquid like it was water. “Thank you.”

“Welcome.” Damon refilled his, having grabbed the bottle and plopped down on the opposite couch, both of them deep in thought. “Did she say anything else about me?”

Elena smirked, shrugging innocuously. “Maybe.” She said in a sing-song voice, teasing him a little. “She didn’t tell me a lot, but she did say she wanted you to take her to the homecoming dance.”

That got Damon’s attention, his eyebrow quirking in wonder. “Really?” When Elena nodded, Damon actually contemplated it, studying her solicitously as if trying to read her to make sure she wasn’t lying to him.

“Of course she did. Who else would she want to take to the dance?” Elena retorted amicably, grinning from ear to ear. “And judging by that look on your face, you want to take her.”

Damon looked away from her, clearing his throat awkwardly. “I can’t…”

“Why not? You want to be with her and she wants to be with you…” Suddenly, Elena started putting the pieces together and groaned, actually standing up to whack him upside the head. “Are you crazy? You’re actually pushing her away because of KATHERINE?”

Growling, Damon didn’t fight back, though his jaw did tighten. “It’s not just Katherine we have to worry about, it’s Kassandra too. Those two looked dangerous when they left and the only way I can protect Jessenia is for her to stay away until they are dealt with.”

Elena sighed, smacking him again. “You’re doing it again, Damon. You’re taking control over someone’s life and it’s not right. It wasn’t right when you did it to me either. I should’ve fought you every step of the way.”

“You did!”

“Well guess what? Jessenia is going do the same thing until you do something so wreckless and stupid that she’ll never forgive you for it.” Even as a vampire, Katherine was still controlling their lives in one form or another and Elena was tired of it. “I wish Stefan would’ve killed her.”

“Makes two of us.” Damon swallowed down another tumbler and turned around, ready for another refill, when he heard commotion coming down the hall. “What the hell was that?”

“I have no idea.” Elena headed for the hall and rolled her eyes when Damon stopped her, both of them being hesitant. “I can take care of myself now, remember?”

“Still not taking any chances. Follow me.” Damon ordered, taking the lead and headed down the hall slowly, both of them stopping at the sight of a body lying in the open front door.

“It’s Meredith!” Elena cried out, rushing over to her with Damon following, grabbing her hand.

Damon frowned and bent down, seeing the two holes on the side of Meredith’s neck. “Vampire.”

He bit his wrist and put it against Meredith’s mouth, letting her drink some of his blood to heal her. Once Damon was sure she had enough, he pulled away and lifted her in his arms, the cut in his wrist already healing. Him and Elena walked back into the parlor and gently lay her on the couch, covering her up, knowing she would sleep for a while.

“Who did this to her?” Elena wondered aloud, not about to leave Meredith’s side and texted Alaric to let him know what was going on.

“Guess we’ll find out when she decides to wake up.”

Chapter 18

Slowly opening her eyes, Jessenia let out a loud groan, every muscle in her body aching from head to toe. She had to blink several times to clear her blurred vision and reached up to rub her sore neck, wondering what the hell happened. It took her several minutes to realize she was in a place that wasn’t familiar or recognizable, which automatically made her more alert.

Jessenia looked around, frowning at the thick metal bars that blocked her only way out and slowly got to her feet. She turned around and saw a huge crypt in front of her, instantly backing away from it, tears shining in her eyes. Where the hell was she? The place was dark and incredibly dirty, no light except from whatever came in from outside.

Suddenly, the memory swept over her of what happened and Jessenia instantly stumbled to the barred door, gripping them tightly. “HELLO?” She yelled out, shaking them as hard as she could, but Jessenia didn’t have that much strength. “IS SOMEONE OUT THERE?”

No response, it was pure silence.

Backing away from the bars, Jessenia started searching for another way out, her eyes adjusting to the darkness. No sunlight entered the tomb or whatever it was she was in, which didn’t make things easier. Kassandra put her here; Jessenia remembered everything now that she was fully awake and aware, needing to find a way out.

“Damn it.” She whispered, kicking the wall and wondered how long she’d been in here.

Kassandra had attacked her, but Jessenia didn’t remember how it happened or what she did. One second she was standing at the river’s edge at Wickery Bridge and the next her cousin is being held over her head to go with Kassandra. Meredith was let go, safe at least and that’s all that mattered to her. Now she just had to figure out a way to escape, hoping Elena was out searching for her.

“It won’t do you any good.”

Jessenia turned around so fast she ended up getting a head rush, leaning back against the wall. “Where am I?” She called out weakly, looking over at the barred door and saw Kassandra’s smiling face staring back at her.

“In the Salvatore crypt.” Kassandra answered, sounding proud of herself and ran her fingertips over the bars. “A fitting place for you I must say. My sister does have brilliant ideas.”

“Why am I here?” Jessenia asked, the dizziness slowly subsiding and made her way toward the door, tears glistening in her eyes. “Please let me out of here.”

“Oh don’t worry, child, I will.” Kassandra reached through the bar, taking a strand of Jessenia’s hair, twirling it around her finger. “Once I have what I want.”

“Damon.” She whispered, locking jade on determined grey and felt more tears slide down her cheeks. “I already told you…”

“Yes I know what you said, but that doesn’t matter. As long as you’re around, Damon will want you instead of me. So keeping you here locked up and away from him is the only solution I see to make sure he belongs to me again.” Kassandra simplified, releasing Jessenia’s hair and hummed softly. “I’m thinking in a couple of years I’ll finally let you out and let you get on with your miserable human life.”

“A couple of YEARS?” Jessenia shook her head, feeling her breathing quicken and began yanking on the bars again. “No…NO! Let me out of here! You can’t do this!!”

“Oh but I already have, child.” Kassandra winked, backing away from the bars. “Don’t bother screaming either. Nobody will hear you.”

“No! No, let me out of here! HELP!! SOMEONE HELP ME!!” Jessenia screamed at the top of her lungs, shaking the bars until all the strength drained from her body, slowly dropping to her knees, sobbing. “Damon…Damon, please help me…”

~!~

Damon was busy reading the local newspaper, sipping an afternoon glass of blood from one of the blood bags they kept downstairs in the freezer, when he heard a groan. Slowly lowering the paper, Damon folded it up neatly and set it aside, leaning forward in the chair, watching her. Meredith was out cold the entire night and all morning, the clock chiming two behind them.

Elena and Stefan were currently out searching for Jessenia while Damon watched over Meredith. It wouldn’t do him any good to get uptight and bent out of shape until he found out what happened. That and Jessenia wasn’t exactly fond of him after what he did to her, not blaming her a bit. Damon had his phone on, waiting for any update from Stefan and Elena, but so far they hadn’t contacted him.

“Don’t sit up too fast.”

“W-What happened?” Meredith whispered, feeling like a brick was on her head and slowly sat up, holding it. “Oh god…”

“No, but you’re close.” Damon half-joked, downing the rest of his blood and stood up from the chair, walking over to her with a glass of water he already had ready. “Sip slowly.” He ordered, knowing if she drank too quickly, she would choke on it.

Meredith slowly took it, her vision slowly becoming clear and stared at Damon, wondering what he was doing in her house. “Why are you here?” She asked, beginning to sip the water, her throat completely dry as a bone.

“I could ask you the same thing, considering you’re in my house.” Damon countered softly, no malice or sarcasm in his tone, too concerned about Jessenia right now.

“What?” Meredith set the glass on the table, confusion entering her brown eyes. “What do you mean I’m in your house?”

“That’s exactly what I mean. You were dropped off last night by someone and ended up passed out at my front door.” Damon explained, leaning back against the couch, knowing it would take a few minutes for her to get her head straight.

Blinking, Meredith couldn’t remember anything and grabbed the couch to sit up more, taking the aspirin Damon procured. “Thanks.” She popped them without hesitation, hoping it stemmed the current pounding in her head. “How did I get here?”

“I just told you.” Damon said impatiently, running a hand through his hair. “Look, I really need you to try remembering everything you can from yesterday.”

Meredith could see the worry in his blue eyes and swallowed hard, anxiety washing over her. “Damon, what’s going on?” She suddenly demanded, trying not to be frightened, but it was hard with this vampire.

“Jessenia is missing.” Damon bluntly stated, decided to just cut straight to the chase and clasped his hands together tightly. “The last time Elena saw her was yesterday at the grill after they went dress shopping. She was supposed to go home, but apparently never did. Have you seen her?” He somewhat demanded, knowing Meredith was the only one who could give him any indication of what happened.

Meredith didn’t say anything for a few minutes, wracking her brain and finally started remembering something. “I remember coming home from work and getting ready to start dinner. Then the next thing I know, I’m at Wickery Bridge…with two women...and Jess…”

Damon’s eyes narrowed to slits, gritting his teeth. “Do you know the names of the two women?” He asked, trying not to sound angry, but he had a feeling he knew who had Jessenia. “Meredith?”

“No, I’m sorry.” Meredith swallowed hard, watching as Damon stood up and whipped out his cell phone to call someone. “Damon, is she…?”

He held his hand up when Stefan answered. “I know who has her.”

“Who is it?” Stefan demanded, waving over to Elena, who was asking people on the sidewalk if they’d seen Jessenia anywhere.

“I’ll give you three guesses and the first two don’t count, brother.”

Stefan could tell from the tension in Damon’s voice he was angry and didn’t blame him, his own eyes narrowing. “Katherine and Kassandra.” He practically spit out, watching as Elena’s eyes widened when she approached him. “We’re on our way.”

“Slight problem is we have no idea where they took her.” Damon raked a hand through his black hair, deciding he would need a second glass of blood to heighten his strength. “I have a plan, but I don’t think Elena is gonna like it.”

Elena snatched the phone from Stefan, holding it to her ear. “What is it, Damon? I’ll do anything to save Jessenia.” She stated, chewing her bottom lip.

“Glad to hear it. You two get back to the house and I’ll tell you the plan then. Remember, I warned you ahead of time.” Damon ended the call and tossed his phone aside, scrubbing a hand down his face while he downed the blood in two large gulps.

“W-What are you going to do?” Meredith asked hesitantly, not moving from the couch, still feeling incredibly weak.

“MEREDITH!!”

Damon turned around at the sight of Alaric rushing into the parlor, snorting. “Bout time you got my messages, Ric. Where the hell have you been?” He demanded irritably now that he knew who took Jessenia.

“Having my neck snapped by someone.” Alaric shot back; his eyes focused on Meredith and frowned at the small cut on her head. “I just got your message and flew here as fast as I could.”

“Did you see who did it?” Damon asked, walking over after filling a tumbler of brandy, handing one over to Alaric. “We’re both going to need this.”

Alaric took it and threw it back, placing the tumbler on the table while Meredith snuggled against him, pulling her carefully on his lap. “No, I didn’t see who did it. It came from behind; I didn’t have time to react.” He asked, running his fingers through her hair and could tell she was hurting. “What happened, Mer?”

“I-I don’t know.” Meredith replied quietly, leaning her head on Alaric’s shoulder. “The last thing I remember is being on Wickery Bridge with two women and they were letting me go because of…Jess…” She looked into Alaric’s eyes, the worry already building. “After that, everything is blank until I woke up here.”

“She was at my doorstep last night. Someone dropped her off and not lightly either.” Damon chimed in, sitting back down in his chair, nursing his brandy. “I know who took Jessenia.”

“Who?” Alaric demanded, eyes narrowing. “Damon, if you know something…”

“It was Katherine and her bitch sister Kassandra, who I used to date way back in the day before I was turned into a vampire.” Damon explained, setting his tumbler down and leaned forward to bury his head in his hands. “Apparently, Kassandra never got over me and now she wants me back. I know how Katherine works…”

“Katherine has her?” Elena had overheard the conversation, looking up at Stefan and left his side to go to Meredith’s. “Do you remember anything?”

Meredith shook her head, frowning. “I told Damon everything I can remember and it’s not much.”

“Except it is because you pinpointed who took Jessenia.” Damon argued, looking up at his little brother. “We need the witch.”

“Bonnie?” Elena shook her head instantly, standing up. “No absolutely not. She’s been through hell with us, Damon. We’re still not on good terms because I’m a vampire and she hates them. She’s still my friend, but there’s still a lot of tension between us.”

Damon growled, standing up as they came face to face, eyes locked intensely. “If you want to find Jessenia, you will get the witch to help us. She’s the only one we know of her kind.”

“You want a locator’s spell.” Stefan guessed, watching Damon nod and knew that would probably be the only way to find Jessenia without going hunting all over Mystic Falls for her. “He’s right, Elena. We need Bonnie’s help with this or we may never find her.”

Elena didn’t like the sound of that and sighed heavily, deciding they would need a few more people to help with this. “I know she still talks to Matt. I’ll get him to bring her here under false pretenses and hopefully she’ll work with us. But we have to be nice to her.” Her brown eyes darted to Damon, who had walked away from their standoff. “That means no snarky comments, Damon.”

“Cross my heart…” Damon smirked, doing the crisscross over his dead heart and rolled his eyes. “Just call him and get her over here. The sooner the better.”

“What about your plan or is that it?” Elena asked, not forgetting why she and Stefan had to rush back here like their pants were on fire.

Damon sighed, knowing Elena was not going to like this next part of the plan, but it had to be done. “Stefan and I are going to seduce Katherine and Kassandra.” He held his hand up before anyone could protest, eyes flashing. “Let me finish first before you both verbally rip me apart. We won’t go all the way, but we have to make it look like we want both of them. It will give the witch enough time to do her juju and find Jessenia. Then we can take care of the bitches and go to Jessenia. Wherever she’s being held at, she’s safe for now.”

“You hope.” Elena pointed out, really not liking the sound of this plan. “There’s no other way to give Bonnie the time she needs?”

“If you can think of one, Warrior Princess, please let me know.” Damon shot back sarcastically, downing the rest of his brandy and looked over at Stefan. “Unless Prince Charming has any ideas?”

Stefan thought about it, sadly not coming up with anything. “What makes you think they even want us, Damon?”

Damon snorted, wondering if little brother was serious. “You’re kidding me right? Katherine has been in love with you for decades, Stefan, or did you forget that?”

As much as he hated admitting it, Damon had a point. “True.” Stefan grunted, looking apologetically over at Elena, who did not look happy. “Kassandra sounds like she’s not over you either.”

“Exactly.” Damon was glad Stefan was on the same wavelength as him, filling another glass. “Some music, candles and dinner, we’ll have them eating out of our hands while the witch works her magic juju, stake the two bitches and save Jessenia’s life. All in a day’s work.”

“You make it sound so easy.” Meredith commented, having listened to all of this and looked up at Alaric worriedly. “We have to find her, Ric.”

Alaric nodded, kissing the top of her head. “They will, we just have to trust them.” He said, hoping the Salvatore brothers knew what they were doing. “Elena, call Matt at the grill. He’s working, but gets off in about an hour. Tell him to come straight here.”

Elena nodded, trusting Alaric more than anyone in that room at the moment and pulled her cell phone, dialing the grill’s number. “Is Matt Donovan there? It’s Elena.” She waited a few minutes and heard some static on the other line, followed by Matt’s voice.

“Hey Elena, what’s going on?” Matt already knew they were searching for Jessenia. “Did you find her?”

“Sort of.” Elena really hated doing this, but they had no other choice. “I’m calling because we need your help…”

“Sure, whatever you need to find her. What is it?” Matt asked, cleaning off a table while holding the phone between his ear and shoulder.

“I need you to get ahold of Bonnie and bring her to Stefan’s.”

Chapter 19

“Bonnie, your phone is ringing!”

Groaning, Bonnie really didn’t want to be disturbed right now because she was working on a new spell from her grimoire, which was basically a spell book. Bonnie came from an ancient lineage of powerful witches from the Salem sorcerers and inherited most of their gifts. The Bennett bloodline was one of the most powerful lineages known, though Bonnie had been forced to do some things she didn’t want to do because of her ancestors. They had the ability to send her dreams and possess her through them, sometimes making her sleepwalk to fulfill what they wanted done.

The ancestor that channeled –the act of drawing and/or summoning extra forms of energy by focusing on celestial events- her the most was Emily, who was Katherine Pierce’s handmaiden during the nineteenth century. Katherine took Emily under her wing, showing her ways of life she couldn’t imagine and they became very close friends. That was until the city counsel of Mystic Falls found out about what they were.

Emily feared for her family’s safety and knew they were coming for Katherine, so she struck a deal with Damon. If he kept her family safe from harm, she would cast a spell in the church the council had rounded all the vampires up in, including Katherine, which would protect her from death. However, in order to spare Katherine’s life, she had to cast the spell on all the vampires that were in the church, which was burnt to the ground by the city council. The Founding Families ended up burning Emily at the stake, but Damon kept his promise in protecting her family, saving them.

Bonnie began experiencing weird things happening a year ago, when she was a junior in high school. At first it started with candles lighting on their own, but then Bonnie was at a school carwash fundraiser when the real magic began. A girl named Tiki had a bad attitude and Bonnie ended up making the hose run with her powers, soaking her.

Tiki got her revenge later that day by forcing Bonnie to sweep the pavement, making the excuse it had to be dry. Her anger consumed her and Bonnie ended up lighting the pavement on fire, making it travel up along the water until it engulfed Tiki’s car. Luckily, Stefan was there, noticed what was happening and stopped it by shaking Bonnie physically out of it.

After that, Bonnie went to her grandmother Sheila, and began her witch training instantly, learning more and more about witchcraft. Damon ended up finding a small amber stone that was in an iron setting design, but lost it to Caroline when he and Stefan were at odds. Stefan had tried vervaining Damon and locked him up, wanting to desiccate him because he was terrorizing the people of Mystic Falls. Caroline ended up finding the stone and gave it to Bonnie for Halloween, along with a witch costume, because she thought it was ugly.

Come to find out, the amber stone was actually a witch’s talisman, Emily’s to be exact, who was Bonnie’s great-great-great-great grandmother. The talisman was passed down through the Bennett generations and somehow found its way back into the Bennett family. Deciding to give it back to Caroline, Sheila told Bonnie she couldn’t because the talisman had found its way back to her for a reason. Of course Bonnie agreed with her grandmother.

Sadly, Sheila passed away soon after Bonnie discovered she was a witch because of a spell they did together for the Salvatore brothers. They had to break the magical seal that Emily casted to open the tomb Emily protected Katherine in…or so Damon thought. When the witches opened the tomb, Damon went in to find Katherine, but she wasn’t in there. Come to find out, Katherine had been released by the guard because she promised to turn him into a vampire in return.

So Bonnie’s grandmother died for nothing in her eyes.

Sighing, Bonnie walked out of her room to grab her cell phone and tilted her head when Matt’s name flashed on the caller ID. “Matt? What’s going on?” She answered, walking back into her room for privacy.

Matt didn’t know how to go about asking for Bonnie’s help, feeling awful he was being forced into this. “I need your help, Bonnie. Something happened to Jessenia.”

That instantly got Bonnie’s attention, her new spell the furthest thing from her mind now. “What happened, Matt?” She demanded, eyebrows furrowing as he explained, closing her eyes. “So it’s really Elena who needs my help.”

“No, I need your help too because Jessenia is our friend. We can’t let her down. You can help her, Bonnie. Don’t let the past change who you are. Please, help us find her.” Matt pleaded, walking out of the grill toward his truck. “I’ll pick you up so you don’t have to drive.”

“Matt, I don’t know…”

“Bonnie, all we need from you is a locator spell. That’s it. We have no idea where she’s being held at.” Matt stated, slipping behind the wheel and started his truck up, pulling out of the parking lot with one hand. “You’re the only one who can help us.”

There were times Bonnie hated being a witch and this was definitely one of those. “Fine.” She reluctantly agreed, refusing to let an innocent die, which would happen if they didn’t find Jessenia. “Come get me and tell Meredith’s I’ll need some of her blood to do the spell.”

Sighing with relief, Matt made a mental note to hug Bonnie when this was all over. “Thank you, Bonnie. I’ll be there shortly.” He ended the call and then immediately dialed Elena, waiting for her to answer. “Hey, she’s going to help us.”

“Really?!” Everyone turned to stare at Elena, their eyes full of hope. “Oh my god that’s incredible, Matt, thank you!”

“We’ll be there shortly. Bonnie said she needs some of Meredith’s blood for the spell.” Matt reiterated, running a hand through his blonde hair.

“Okay, we’ll get everything else prepared. Don’t bring her here. Take her to my place.” Elena stated, knowing Damon and Stefan had to stay here to keep the sisters occupied while Bonnie worked her magic.

“Will do, see you in a few.”

Elena turned to face everyone, nodding and felt the room vibrate with sighs of relief. “Meredith, we need some of your blood for the spell.” She stated, watching as Damon rushed off to get a syringe.

“Of course.” Meredith whispered, willing to do anything to get Jessenia back. “So we have to vacate I’m assuming?”

Stefan nodded, hoping he could pull this off Katherine and already knew Damon would have Kassandra handled. “Damon is making the call right after you two leave.”

“You two can come to my place if you want.” Elena offered, looking at Alaric and Meredith, watching them both nod. “We’ll take off now then because Bonnie and Matt are on their way.”

“Are you going to call Caroline?” Stefan asked quietly, pulling Elena gently into his arms. “Bonnie might feel more comfortable having her there.”

Nodding, Elena reached up to press her lips against his softly. “No wonder I love you so much.” She whispered, pulling back and ran the pad of her thumb across his lips. “I’ll call her on the road. Are you going to be okay?”

“Always.” Stefan assured her, looking up when Damon came back in with the syringe for Meredith.

“Alright, give me your vein.” Damon ordered, sitting down beside Alaric since he still had Meredith in his lap, tying the band around her arm to get it to pop out more. “I was even nice enough to get you a butterfly needle.”

“How kind of you.” Meredith snorted, not even flinching when the needle went into her skin, the blood filling the small syringe.

Once it was completely filled, Damon took the needle out and placed a cotton ball on the small hole, Meredith bringing her arm up to apply pressure. “Alright, everyone needs to leave now before I make this call. Where’s Elena?”

“She left already to go meet Bonnie and Matt.” Stefan said, staring at his older brother and wondered what was going to happen once Jessenia was rescued.

Damon nodded, looking pleased. “Good. You two head over to Elena’s and text me when Bonnie finds Jessenia’s location.” He already had two wooden stakes with the sister’s names on them.

Alaric nodded along with Meredith, standing up carrying her in his arms and headed out of the house toward his car. He waited for Meredith to be buckled in before leaning over, kissing her lips tenderly, thankful she was alive. When he’d gotten the messages from Damon, Alaric thought the worst, not knowing if he could survive losing another love of his life the way he did Isobel.

“Stefan, if you don’t go through with it this time and kill Katherine, I will stake you myself.” Damon promised, watching Stefan nod in understanding and poured himself a drink before dialing Katherine’s number.

“Well hello there, Damon.” Katherine’s sultry voice came over the line, smiling over at her sister and put the speakerphone on so Kassandra could hear him. “What can we do for you?”

Good, Kassandra was right by her sister, which is what Damon wanted. “Actually, we were thinking we could do something for you instead, both of you.” His voice dropped an octave, smirking.

“We?” Katherine was intrigued, studying her fresh manicured nails. “And just what might that be? You know the only one I want is Stefan and he’ll never leave Elena’s side.”

Damon chuckled, doing thumbs up to his little brother. “As a matter of fact, he and Elena are over. Do you want to talk to him yourself?” He offered, feeling the hesitation from Katherine. “He’s right here waiting for you, Katherine.”

“And what about you, Damon?” Katherine demanded, standing up from the couch she’d been occupying. “What is your game?”

“No game. We just realized the error of our ways. I could never feel the way I do for Kassandra with a human blood bag and Stefan is tired of Elena. He misses you, Katherine just like I miss Kassandra.” Damon was a master of deception and downed half his tumbler of whiskey. “You miss him too, you even told me it would always be him you wanted, remember?”

“Of course I do.” Katherine somewhat snapped, beginning to pace back and forth while chewing on her thumbnail lightly. “Damon, if you’re trying to trick us…”

“Katherine.” Stefan’s deep voice filtered through the line and Katherine openly shivered. “We’re not trying to trick you. I told Elena I’m still in love with you.” This killed him to say those words, but if it meant saving Jessenia’s life, Stefan would do it. “I’ll prove it to you.”

Now Katherine was intrigued, though she was still being cautious. “Why the sudden change of heart?” She demanded, not about to walk into a trap. “You almost killed me, so why do you suddenly want me again?”

“Elena doesn’t do it for me anymore.” Stefan was going to kill Damon if he didn’t get the smirk off his face, glaring. “I think we need to sit down and…talk. We have a lot of time to make up for. I’m sure Kassandra wouldn’t mind doing the same with Damon.”

“No I wouldn’t!” Kassandra shouted into the phone excitedly, already picking out what she was going to wear.

“No she wouldn’t.” Katherine sighed; sounding amused and knew their plan was working perfectly. “Isn’t Damon even the least bit curious about his human blood bag?”

Kassandra glared at her sister, not believing she actually brought Jessenia up in the conversation. “Hmph, she can’t satisfy him the way I can.” She purred in the phone, taking over from Katherine, grey eyes flashing. “Where’s my darling Damon?”

“He’s currently getting ready for tonight.” Stefan answered without hesitation, refusing to tell them that Damon was sharpening the wooden stake that would be embedded into Kassandra’s heart before long. “So what time should we expect you lovely ladies?”

“How does seven o'clock sound?” That was an hour away, which would give the sisters plenty of time to get ready.

“Sounds good, see you then. Tell Katherine to wear something…enticing.” Stefan smirked when Kassandra said she would, the call ending. “It’s done.”

“Good.” Damon cracked his neck as he finished the sharpening before standing up to go put it back in his room, where the festivities would be held. “Katherine is all yours, remember that.”

“Why are you doing this?” Stefan had to ask, stopping Damon from walking away from him. “I know you pushed her away because of Katherine and Kassandra, but there’s another reason. Why are you really doing this?”

“I care about her and don’t want to see her hurt because of me.” Damon answered, sounding annoyed because Elena had questioned him about his motives earlier. “You and Elena really were made for each other.”

Stefan chuckled, knowing what that meant and went to get ready for tonight, already having his stake sharpened. He decided to just change his shirt, black since it wouldn’t be that hard to stain along with a pair of pants. There was no way Stefan was going all out for the likes of Katherine, already missing Elena like crazy. He hoped whatever happened tonight with Katherine didn’t come back to destroy their relationship because a lot of Damon’s plans never turned out exactly right.

Damon knew this was going to be messy and didn’t want to destroy one of his favorite shirts. So he decided on a simple short sleeved black shirt with a black long sleeved buttoned up shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He straightened the collar, leaving the top two buttons undone and pulled on a pair of black dress pants. Sitting on the bed, Damon pulled on his black dress shoes, shined to perfection and fixed his hair in the mirror. Damon walked over to the window and looked out of it; the sun slowly starting it’s descend on the horizon and pressed his hand against the glass.

“Hang in there, Senia. I’m coming.” He whispered, taking a few seconds to get his head in the game. Pulling away and walking out of his room, Damon headed to the stairs, tapping on the banister. “Hey Stefan! I’m going out to get some dinner for tonight!” He called up before heading out the door.

If they were going all out with this plan, Damon and Stefan had to make the sisters think they were savages. So unfortunately, Damon was going to end up having to compel two women to come back with him to the mansion. He wouldn’t let them die, but it had to look real so they would end up being fed on. Getting in his car, Damon pulled out of the driveway and headed down the road, not having a lot of time to get this done, heading straight for the grill.

Chapter 20

Elena pulled up to her house and cut the ignition, seeing Matt and Bonnie were already waiting for her. She looked in her rearview mirror and saw Alaric pull up with Meredith, hoping this worked. This entire plan was revolved around Bonnie’s ability to find Jessenia and the Salvatore brothers keeping Katherine and Kassandra occupied. Elena wasn’t going to think about how Stefan planned on killing Katherine, knowing it would have to be intimate before turning deadly.

“Sorry I’m late.” Elena apologized, walking toward Matt and Bonnie, her eyes locking with her ex-best friend. “Thank you for doing this, Bonnie.”

“I’m not doing it for you.” Bonnie stated, wanting to make that clear. “Did you bring the blood?”

“I have it.” Meredith stated, walking up slowly with Alaric’s arm firmly wrapped around her waist. “Jessenia will be forever in your debt for this.”

Bonnie just nodded, taking the vial of blood and followed Elena up the stairs to her house. “We don’t have much time. I’ll need a bunch of candles to do this.” She stated, heading straight for the dining room and began clearing the set dishes off it with Matt and Alaric’s help.

“I’m here!” Came Caroline’s voice moments later as she rushed inside the house, closing the door behind her. “What’d I miss?”

“You can help me gather the candles.” Elena said, dragging Caroline with her away from Bonnie and headed upstairs, needing to fill her friend in on what was going on.

~!~

At seven o’clock sharp, the doorbell rang and the brothers were ready for this, especially Damon. They couldn’t say anything about Jessenia or the plan would be foiled, unless one of the sisters brought it up first. Straightening his collar again, Damon answered the door with Stefan, both of them plastering on smiles at the sight of Katherine and Kassandra.

“Right on time.” Damon murmured, extending his hand to Kassandra and kissed the back of it lovingly, guiding her inside toward the parlor.

“Hello Stefan.” Katherine greeted, wearing an old fashioned baby blue dress, her brown hair in tons of spiral curls that flowed down her back and over her shoulders.

“Hello Katherine.” Stefan smiled, extending his hand to her and did the same thing Damon did, following his big brother’s footsteps so to speak.

“Can we interest either of you ladies in a drink?” Damon gestured to the two women he’d picked up at the grill earlier, both in a trance so they had to stay perfectly still and not utter a sound. “Kassandra?”

“Mmm don’t mind if I do.” Kassandra headed over to the dark haired woman and sat beside her, looking up at Damon with smoldering grey eyes. “Join me.”

Damon smirked, unbuttoning his shirt slowly and could feel Kassandra devouring him whole. “Don’t mind if I do.” He rumbled, sitting on the other side of the woman and took her wrist while Kassandra moved her hair out of the way.

Stefan looked over at Katherine, both of them deciding to do the same thing with the other blonde woman, hoping Bonnie was working as fast as she could.

~!~

Once the candles were fully lit throughout the room, Bonnie placed a map of Mystic Falls on top of the table that she’d used several times to find people. “We’re ready.” She murmured, everyone staying silent with bated breath as Bonnie took the vial of blood and poured it on top of the map.

Elena held both Meredith and Caroline’s hands, incredibly nervous about both this locator spell and Stefan being alone with Katherine. She didn’t know if she’d be able to feel anything if Stefan had to take things a bit too far, trying not to think about it. No matter what, she would love him because he was doing this to save Jessenia. For once, Elena thought Damon had full control of the situation while Stefan could pose as a problem since he hadn’t killed Katherine when he had the chance a few days ago.

“What are you thinking about?” Caroline whispered, not wanting to distract Bonnie from her spell.

“Stefan.” Elena answered honestly, keeping her voice quiet and felt Caroline squeeze her hand reassuringly.

“Everything is going to be fine.” Caroline wasn’t angry that Elena had kept her in the dark about Jessenia’s disappearance, just thankful she could be here for Bonnie. “We’ll find Jessenia, Bonnie will do it, Elena.”

“I know, that’s not what concerns me.” Elena said, watching as Bonnie closed her eyes and began chanting the spell out. “Stefan has to be alone with Katherine.”

“What?” Caroline cringed when Bonnie jumped, breaking her focus and swallowed hard. “Sorry!”

“If you two are going to talk, please do so in the kitchen or I’ll never find her.” Bonnie stated heatedly, not appreciating being interrupted before turning back to the map, needing to be relaxed completely before trying again.

Caroline dragged Elena with her in the kitchen away from Bonnie’s area, sighing. “So much for being Bonnie’s support.” She muttered, needing a drink and pulled the bottle of Vodka from on top of the refrigerator. “Want one?”

Elena nodded, really needing one because she was two seconds away from calling Stefan and completely blowing the plan. “Yeah, I need you to do something for me, Caroline.”

“What?” Caroline asked, pouring each of them a glass of Vodka and grabbed the juice out of the fridge to mix it with. “Anything Elena.”

Dropping her cell on the counter by Caroline, Elena took the glass of Vodka and downed it in one gulp. “I need you to keep that as far away from me as possible until we know for sure where Jessenia is. Because the way I’m feeling right now, I’m going to screw this up.”

Caroline nodded in understanding and took the cell phone, slipping it into her back pocket. “You’ll have to fight me for it now.” She half-joked, refilling Elena’s glass and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, downing half of her own. “Have faith in Stefan, he won’t let you down.”

“I know, it’s not Stefan I’m worried about.”

~!~

After feeding, Damon knew he had Kassandra right in the palm of his hand and pulled her away from the human, letting the woman slump to the floor in a heap. “Come here.” He whispered, bringing her into his arms and began slowly dancing with her, both of them gazing into each other’s eyes.

Damon looked over at Stefan, locking eyes with him briefly, just making sure his little brother went through with the plan. If they didn’t kill Katherine, she would keep haunting them for the rest of their existence and Damon refused to let that happen. Kassandra was under her sister’s thumb so she had to be disposed of, there was no chance saving her, especially after that note stunt she pulled.

“How about we move this party someplace else?” Damon suggested, running his hands down her sides, his mouth right by her ear. “Someplace alone.”

“Mmm where did you have in mind?” Kassandra purred, pulling back to stare in his aquamarine eyes and kissed him before he could answer her, pouring every single feeling she had for him into it.

“Bedroom now.” He ordered, taking both of her hands and backtracked up the stairs with her following, their eyes never leaving each other.

“Well it seems as though they’re getting reacquainted famously.” Katherine observed, her brown eyes moving back to stare into Stefan’s jade stones, running her finger down his shirt covered chest. “I think Damon had a fabulous idea, don’t you?”

Stefan plastered on a smile and knew he couldn’t let Damon or anyone else down, nodding. “Absolutely.”

He didn’t need to ask Katherine if she wanted to go to his room and lead her from the parlor upstairs, trying to get through this without losing his nerve. Katherine slammed him against the door, effectively shutting it and ripped Stefan’s dress shirt open, buttons flying, raking her nails down his flesh. How she loved the feeling of his muscles rippling beneath her touch.

Katherine sorely missed him and wasn’t about to waste time with talking, letting her actions speak louder than words. Stefan kissed her back reluctantly, moving her back to the bed and guided her down on it. All Stefan had to do was keep this up a little longer, having a shot of vervain under his pillow ready to inject into Katherine’s neck.

It would weaken her to where he could stake her without much of a fight. Damon had come up with the idea at the last second because of how strong the sisters were. They were much older, wiser and they wouldn’t go down without a fight unless immobilized. While he was out procuring the two women for their meal, Stefan busied filling two syringes with vervain.

~!~

“Elena!”

Both Caroline and Elena rushed into the dining room, watching as Bonnie slowly turned around, their hands clasped together. “I found her.” Bonnie said, moving aside as Elena walked over to stare down at the map.

“Oh my god.”

Bonnie nodded, wiping tears from her eyes since the spell had taken quite a bit out of her. “She’s at the Salvatore crypt in the cemetery.” She confirmed Elena’s suspicions, watching as her friend pulled her jacket on.

“We have to find her now. She’s been locked up in there this whole time with no food or water.” Elena wasn’t waiting, blinking when Alaric stopped her from flying out the door. “Anyone can come with me, I don’t care. I need to send Stefan a text message. Caroline, I need my phone.”

Caroline hesitated, chewing her bottom lip. “I’m sorry Elena, but…I think it would be best if we just let Stefan deal with Katherine on his own while we find Jessenia.”

“WHAT?” Elena gaped, not believing what she was hearing. “Damon wants to be there when we find her!! They’re supposed to kill Katherine and Kassandra and meet us at the spot where Jesse is!”

“Then let me send the text message.” Caroline didn’t trust Elena since she was emotionally unstable with this situation. “Cooler heads prevail, honey.”

Elena knew Caroline was right and hated her for it, scowling. “Fine, send the damn text to both of them and then we’ll take off.”

Caroline nodded, doing what Elena said and a few minutes later, everyone had filed out to their vehicles, following Elena to the destination.

~!~

Damon felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and knew they’d found Jessenia’s whereabouts, continuing his assault on Kassandra’s neck. Bonnie had come through for them, the witch was good for something after all. He didn’t pull back and very carefully slid his hand under the pillow, knowing Kassandra was too dazed to notice. Having this effect on her was making this a little too easy, but Damon wasn’t overthinking or analyzing it right now, feeling the point of the needle against his flesh.

“Damon, I love you.” Kassandra whispered, arching her neck into his mouth, completely melted.

“Mmm then it’s fortunate for you,” Damon paused, slowly pulling his hand from beneath the pillow and pulled away, locking deadly aquamarine on startled grey. “I don’t!” Before Kassandra could stop him, Damon plunged the needle right in the side of her neck and pressed down, filling her body with enough vervain to immobilize her.

Kassandra gasped for air and tried pushing him away, but she was already weakening against the substance, tears in her eyes. “Vervain…” She croaked out, rolling over to try getting away from Damon, but it didn’t help any. “Damon…”

Yanking Kassandra roughly to lay on her back, Damon straddled her with the wooden stake in his hand, gritting his teeth. “You’ll never stop going after Jessenia. You asked for this, remember that. Goodbye Kassandra.” Without preamble, Damon plunged the wooden stake right into her heart as hard as he could, watching as she desiccated right before his eyes.

Snorting, Damon pushed her carcass off of his bed, letting her hit the floor with a hard thud. He looked up at the ceiling, hearing some commotion and frowned, wondering what the hell was going on. If Stefan failed to do his part, Damon was going to follow through on his promise to stake him. Rushing out of the room, Damon stopped at the stairs and could hear shouting above, crossing his eyes.

“Damn it, Stefan.” He growled, flying up the stairs and stood right outside of Stefan’s room.

Stefan was having a little trouble with Katherine because she refused to let him get the upper hand in what was supposed to be their reconciliation. She always had to be in control, some things truly never changed. So now Katherine was against the wall in the room pouting while Stefan was trying to kill her without her knowing it. He went toward her, but Katherine moved to the other side of the room, causing Stefan to pinch the bridge of his nose.

He’d already received the text from Elena and they were on their way to where Jessenia was being kept. There was no time to waste and Damon was counting on him to do this, but Katherine was a lot more cunning than her sister. Katherine kept berating him for undermining what she wanted in the bathroom and turned her back, which gave Stefan the perfect opportunity to strike.

Launching the needle, Stefan took what was granted to him and plunged it right in her lower back, the way to a vampire’s heart. Katherine struggled and scratched at the window, coughing out in pain while trying to dislodge the needle. It was too late, the vervain was already in her system and now the only thing Stefan had left to do was stake her.

“Stefan...Stefan, please don’t…” Katherine pleaded in a raspy voice, the vervain flowing through her veins that would eventually stop her heart if Stefan didn’t stake her. “Please don’t kill me…”

“Do it already, Stefan!! We have to go NOW!!” Damon shouted, barging into the room and shot ice daggers at his little brother. “DO IT!!”

Stefan was struggling, knowing once he did this, there was no turning back. He had the wooden stake in his hand and couldn’t understand why killing Katherine was so hard for him to do. Then it clicked in his head. She was related to Elena, so in truth he was killing a member of Elena’s family, something that didn’t settle well with him.

“I can’t.” Stefan whispered through gritted teeth. “She’s part of Elena, I can’t kill that part…”

Damon couldn’t believe what he was hearing and snatched the stake from Stefan, lowering himself as he pressed his fist right against Katherine’s cold dead heart. “After everything you’ve done to us, you deserve this just as much as your sister did. In your next lifetime, don’t be such a conniving bitch.” The stake plunged right into Katherine’s chest and the brothers watched as their worst nightmare, and the woman who had changed them into vampires, died before their very eyes.

“Let’s go.” Damon ordered, shoving Stefan out of the room, rushing to Jessenia as fast as they could.

Chapter 21

Jessenia had no idea how long she’d been in here, but with every minute that ticked by, she was growing weaker. She currently sat up against the wall, covered from head to toe in dirt, her face tear streaked. Nightfall had come again and Jessenia was having a hard time staying awake, the pain in her stomach fading since she was used to it.

Her body was incredibly dehydrated and the only air she could get was from the barred door, which wasn’t that much. With how hot it’d been lately, the heat was almost suffocating, the night providing only a little amount of relief. Jessenia had searched high and low for any way out of here, not finding any and finally just gave up, hoping somebody found her soon. Closing her eyes, Jessenia lead her head lull to the side, breathing in and out slowly, all of her strength gone.

“Are we almost there yet?” Caroline groaned, hating that she decided to wear heels today of all days.

“I don’t know the exact location, it has to be around here somewhere.” Bonnie stated evenly, keeping her eyes peeled and wished there was an easier spell to find someone.

“JESSENIA!!” Alaric called out, forcing Meredith to stay in the car, but of course the woman was stubborn and had followed anyway.

“Jesse!!” Elena called out next, flying from one side of the cemetery to the other along with Caroline, trying to cover as much ground in the cemetery as possible.

“We have to find her.” Meredith was getting really worried, a slight panic setting in. “Ric, she’s gotta be here somewhere.”

“I know Mer, we’ll find her.” Alaric assured her, calling out Jessenia’s name again, this time louder.

“She’s a strong girl, she won’t give up.” Matt said confidently, walking beside them since the rest of his friends were vampires.

“I wish Stefan and Damon were here because it’s their family’s crypt.” Elena grunted, wondering if it was in the far back of the cemetery, but they had to check everywhere instead of jumping around.

Damon pulled up to the cemetery and didn’t even bother cutting the ignition, jumping out and catching up with the group in no time. “Where is she?” He demanded, causing Meredith to jump out of her skin.

“She’s in your family’s crypt.” Bonnie answered, watching impassively as Elena rushed to Stefan’s side, who didn’t look too worse for the wear.

“That bitch…” Damon hissed, not believing he couldn’t figure it out sooner and didn’t wait for anyone to follow him, racing straight to the crypt.

“JESSENIA!!”

Her eyes slowly opened and Jessenia could’ve sworn she heard her name being called, coughing a little from having a desert dry throat. “Hello?” She whispered out as loud as she could, the tears instantly falling because nobody would be able to hear her.

“SENIA!!”

She heard it that time. Jessenia knew that voice anywhere and there was only one person on the planet who ever called her that before. Pushing herself on her knees, Jessenia couldn’t walk because of how weak she was, but she was able to crawl on her hands and knees, coughing as some dirt went up her nose.

“Here!” She rasped out in another whisper, hitting the ground in frustration and started crying. “Damon!”

Thanks to his incredible hearing ability, Damon heard that whispering and followed it, stopping at the sight of the crypt before him that had the name SALVATORE in big lettering. “Jessenia!!” He shouted, rushing down the steps and stopped at the barred door. “SHE’S OVER HERE!!” He roared, seeing her face down on the concrete floor and ripped the iron door right off its hinges.

“D-Damon…” Jessenia breathed out shakily and felt her body being lifted, her head resting against a rock hard chest.

“I’m here, Senia. I got you.” He whispered, walking out of the crypt and up the stairs, the cool night air rushing over them.

Elena, Caroline and Stefan arrived with Matt, Alaric and Meredith following, everyone moving as fast as they could, stopping at the sight of Damon with Jessenia in his arms. Elena buried her face in Stefan’s chest while Alaric held Meredith close, Caroline and Bonnie openly crying with relief that they hadn’t been too late. Damon didn’t take his eyes off of Jessenia for a second, pushing her matted hair out of her face and even through the dirt, she was still the most beautiful woman he ever saw.

“Jess!” Meredith broke away from Alaric to go check on her cousin, holding her limp hand as more tears fell. “Damon, she needs medical attention immediately.”

“No she doesn’t.”

“But…”

Damon gently laid Jessenia in the soft grass and bit into his wrist, ignoring everyone and held it up to her mouth, urging her to drink his blood. It would heal her instantly and that included hydration. Meredith didn’t discourage him because she cheated with medicine by using vampire blood to heal patients, hating death. Alaric held her close while Damon worked on Jessenia, watching as the girl slowly began sucking on Damon’s wrist.

“There you go, that’s it.” Damon crooned, running his fingers through her hair while she drank from him, slowly pulling back when he was sure she had enough in her system. “Screw the hospital, she’ll be fine.”

A few minutes later, Jessenia slowly opened her eyes and felt refreshed, her body no longer aching with pain. “Damon?” She slowly reached up to grab his arm, making sure he wasn’t a mirage and felt more tears fall.

“Welcome back.” He murmured, grabbing her hand and slowly pulled her to her feet, keeping an arm around her waist in case she wasn’t fully healed yet.

“Jess.” Meredith wrapped her arms tightly around her cousin’s neck, squeezing. “I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“So am I.” She whispered, patting Meredith’s back gently and looked at the other people that were there, smiling tearfully at all of them. “Thank you.” It was all Jessenia could say, not able to think straight right now.

Damon started walking away back to his car when he felt Jessenia grab his hand, turning to stare down at her. So much had happened between them. He wouldn’t blame her for not wanting anything to do with him, even if he did save her life. Prepared to hear anything she had to say, Damon stayed silent, the relief still coursing through him that she was alive.

“Please don’t leave.” Jessenia whispered, her bottom lip trembling. “If you don’t want to be with me, I get it, but we can still be friends.”

Damon sighed, reaching out to cup her face tenderly in his hand and could feel Elena’s eyes boring into him. “I can’t be your friend, Senia.”

Jessenia’s heart broke all over again, her eyes filling with hot tears and released his hand. “I understand…” She started walking away from him, heading back to Meredith’s side, still drained.

Suddenly, Damon pulled her into his arms, not understanding what it was about this woman that mesmerized him. “Damn it.” He whispered, pressing his forehead against hers and could feel the tremors rush through her body. “I want so much more with you than just friendship, Senia.”

“You do?”

Damon nodded, lowering his face to hers and kissed her breathlessly, holding her tight against him. “What does that tell you?” He whispered once the kiss broke, seeing the biggest smile cross her face and kissed her again, this time lifting her in his arms, Jessenia’s legs wrapping around his waist. “Wanna get out of here?”

“Yes, I need a shower and I still owe you three hours.” Jessenia replied, hoping Meredith condoned this because all she wanted was to be with Damon.

“Yes you do.” He turned to where they were facing everyone, a smirk on his lips. “Hope you don’t mind if I steal her away for the night, Meredith. We have a lot of talking to do.”

Meredith simply smiled, shaking her head. “Whatever Jess wants.” She leaned against Alaric, suddenly drained from the day’s events. “See you tomorrow, be safe.”

“I will.”

Jessenia held onto Damon as he flew to his car, setting her in the passenger seat while he walked over to slip behind the wheel, their hands instantly clasping together. She scooted across the leather seat to lean against him, wanting to be as close to Damon as possible. The whole time she was in that crypt captured, all Jessenia could think about was being back in his arms.

Once they got back to the house, Damon guided Jessenia straight to his personal bathroom, grabbing a towel on the way. He reached in to turn the sprays on, getting it to a decent temperature before turning to face her. Jessenia was staring in the huge mirror and slowly running her fingertips over her cheek where she’d cut it on a rock. Damon’s blood had healed her completely, though now all Jessenia really felt was grimy, in desperate need of cleansing.

“I’ll leave you to it.” Damon began walking out, only to be stopped by her soft hand grabbing his again. “I’m not going anywhere, Senia.”

“Don’t leave.” She pleaded, pulling him toward the shower and released his hand long enough to remove her top, tossing it to the side. “Join me please.”

Raising a black brow, Damon wondered if she was serious and smiled when he saw absolutely no hesitation in her eyes. Reaching back, Damon pulled his short sleeve black shirt off, tossing it on top of hers in the corner. Jessenia removed her shoes, socks, bra, jeans, panties and while Damon removed his jeans, always going commando along with his socks and shoes. Together, they entered the shower and the sprays instantly washed over both of them, Damon instantly taking Jessenia in his arms as their lips met again.

Jessenia ran her hands up to cup Damon’s face, her fingers moving to grip his black hair and felt her back suddenly hit the shower wall. Lifting her up with ease, Damon kept her there right under the sprays as he continued massaging her lips with his, moving down her throat. He had no desire to puncture her beautiful skin to taste her, having gotten his fill earlier on with Kassandra.

Thankfully, a few of the vampires in the area had come to take care of the women and bodies for the Salvatore brothers while they went on their quest to save Jessenia. Damon had paid them well to do it, not wanting any bodies strewn all over when he brought Jessenia back to his house. Senior in high school or not, she was the love of his life and he wasn’t letting her go again without a fight.

Jessenia moaned softly, every part of her melting against him and didn’t push him away because she wanted this. More than anything, she wanted Damon to be the one who finally took her innocence. Being a vampire, there was no need to worry about using protection, which was another perk being with him since Jessenia never wanted children. In fact, she hoped that sooner or later after graduating high school Damon would change her into a vampire, wanting to be with him for all eternity.

“I love you, Damon.” Jessenia whispered just as he penetrated her.

Holding on for with everything she could, Jessenia bit back a cry of pain when he completely broke through her barrier. Damon nearly lost his breath at the tight feeling that surrounded him, burying his face in her neck, trying to gain control. The veins were already popping out in his face, his sclera’s changing to red and fangs slipping out. He couldn’t pull away now and felt Jessenia lift his face as their eyes met, her fingers running over the veins in his face.

“Don’t stop.” She pleaded, kissing each vein with every thrust he produced inside of her body before finally capturing his lips in a passionate kiss.

“I love you, Senia.”

Three times was his absolute limit to say those words to a woman, so if this failed with Jessenia, Damon was done. He would stake himself because he didn’t know if he could cope with a third heartbreak. Katherine and Elena had really put him through the ringer, he hoped Jessenia wanted him completely the way he wanted her.

~!~

“You look absolutely breathtaking, Jesse.” Elena crowed happily, ready for the homecoming dance as she curled the final strands of Jessenia’s hair.

“Thanks.” She just hoped Damon was satisfied with how she looked, feeling like herself again after a week and a half of recuperating at the Salvatore house.

“Damon is not going to be able to take his eyes off of you.” Caroline assured her, her blonde locks piled up on top of her head in what looked like a crown of gold.

“Neither are Tyler and Stefan for that matter.” Jessenia winked at the girls and stood up when Elena finished with her hair, walking over to look in the full length mirror. “Wow.”

Her hair was half up and half down with a small bulge in the back that had a sapphire accessory embedded. The rest of her hair had loose banana curls throughout it, hanging down her back and over her bare shoulders. She didn’t have gloves on like Elena and Caroline, preferring to just stay simple as possible.

Her makeup was sapphire eyeliner with natural eye shadow and clear gloss on her lips, foundation to hide any blemishes. To finish off Elena and Caroline’s masterpiece, Jessenia wore a beautiful gold sapphire necklace, the stones going all the way around and clipped in the back along with a matching bracelet and studded earrings. She was definitely going to blow Damon away, there was no doubt about that.

Walking out of Elena’s bedroom, Jessenia slowly took a deep breath before descending the stairs and smiled when her eyes locked on Damon, who was waiting for her. He looked so amazing in his dark blue long sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up, no tie, with black dress pants, shoes and his jacket was draped over his arm. Damon had to learn how to breathe again, even though he was technically dead, at the sight of his gorgeous girlfriend.

Katherine had nothing on her.

“You look exquisite.” He stated, extending his hand and smiled when she took it, pressing a soft kiss to the back of it. “Truly stunning.”

Jessenia blushed, her cheeks turning a deep rosy red and kissed Damon softly, not caring if she smeared her gloss. “You don’t look so bad yourself.” She commented, both of them heading out of the house while Stefan followed suit with Elena, Tyler with Caroline.

Once at the dance, Damon guided Jessenia to the dance floor and began dancing, his eyes only for her. “You do realize I’m a hard man to love, right?” He asked, pressing his forehead to hers, never wanting to let her go. “It hurts to be loved by me at times.”

“Let it hurt then.” Jessenia simply replied, feeling Damon twirl her around before dipping her, kissing him softly. “I’m ready for anything.”

The End.