There was always something so bittersweet and intoxicating about the way that his fangs pierced her flesh. The one-sided exchange of her crimson life source that often left her weak at the knees, her every thought fleeting from her mind as it all faded to black somewhere between her cries of pain and his guttural growls. She should have seen it coming. Just like every other teenage boy, he took what he wanted and then he went back to ignoring her existence at his whim, as if nothing ever occurred between them. But he was no teenage boy.
It was sweet at first, back when she'd bragged about him to Elena about being with the better brother, but Caroline soon came to realize the dangerous mess in which she'd fallen into. One that she only understood for a few moments at a time, before his eyes would stare right through her, piercing her mortal soul while whispering sweet nothings into her ear. His low, husky tone controlling her, robbing her of free will, and not allowing her to think for herself.
But like any other relationship, it always started off the same way. Fleeting glances from a distance, though Caroline's eyebrows often furrowed towards the middle when he disappeared in the blink of an eye. Then one night she took him home, because he was a stud and she wouldn't be caught dead passing up this opportunity… more emphasis on the dead later.
Or maybe she was just lonely and needed something to call hers. Her misery was her own. So was her longing, even if it was for someone that continued to hurt her, only offering her material gifts that would serve to protect his own identity instead of truly being thoughtful. But she didn't need him to be original. In fact, she didn't really expect much from him at all.
As time passed, Caroline wondered if their displays of public affection were because he actually gave a damn, or just for show. Maybe it was even a ploy for Elena… it wouldn't surprise her very much if it were, since she already had it all. She'd tried not to notice the way that he looked at Elena and Stefan when they were together, confirming her doubts. At first she thought that it was just a sibling rivalry, but there was just this… this way that he looked at Elena.
Damon never looked at her like that, no matter how much she gave to him, even when it was everything she had.
Caroline often wondered what made Elena so special. For it was no big secret that she'd first pursued the younger Salvatore, tossing him flirty smiles here and there, as her heart swelled with the hope that he'd look her way. Just once. Just long enough to make her feel like she was worth something to someone, even if she fooling no one other than herself. But no, Stefan was always interested in Elena and she knew at some point that it was useless to try to change fate.
It was always someone else, it was never her. Maybe that's why she'd allowed Damon to play these games with her, because for once, Caroline wanted someone to look at her like that. She wanted someone to want her. Even if it was because she was simple, or for the way that her blonde tresses fell over her shoulders when she set them loose after cheerleading practice, or the dimming light in her eyes when she smiled the smile of a broken girl.
Even now as she tasted the earth that stuck to the corner of her parted lips and her hair, there was still a semblance of a smile on her doll-like face. Crooked and imperfect.
It was the worst—and possibly the most boring—feeling in the world to be like a tamed animal. Dominated by the sun without his ring, Damon had been kept indoors at the mansion for the better part of the day without his consent. It angered him to think that his brother was out there gallivanting with Elena, as if the world was how it should be.
It wasn't. He was bitterly and utterly bored. So he quickly harvested an intense irritation for Stefan as he taunted him over the phone, not telling him where the ring was. The youngest was always playing games with him, thinking that he would win. But what Stefan didn't know wouldn't hurt him.
Incase you were wondering, Damon had won tonight. He'd taken his leave after the sun set and lurked in the shadows, following a small group out to a campsite. Surely, he was already a bit tipsy when he got there, but his reflexes weren't a second out of sync. He mercilessly drank from them until their lifeless bodies went limp, before moving over to the last victim.
Not a whimper or a cry. No please or apologies. In fact, they didn't move at all, which caused his head to tilt curiously as he moved closer.
He should have caught her scent earlier. Maybe the smell of booze had messed with his senses, or maybe Damon had just been trying to forget. Caroline, his favorite toy, now lay sprawled out in the dirt with the worms and other lowly creatures that would never compare to her beauty. For she was a pretty face, he'd be the first to give her that. But there was also this neediness about her that fed this fantasy of an unrequited love.
After ending the call with his brother, Damon leaned down to cradle her porcelain face in the palm of his right hand, his eyes trailing over the dirt stains that now muddled her fair complexion. His fingertips were also tainted with the blood of another, but the taste could never compare to hers. He slowly reached out to touch her neck, and upon seeing that the bitemarks had already healed, his lips nearly fell into a neat frown. He was so close that Damon could almost taste her again, the way that her warmth rushed down his throat, though the other worthless corpses had satiated his thirst.
"Never thought I'd see you so low," the vampire mused aloud as he stared down at her fragile form, half-tempted to leave her there for the so-called wolves that lurked these forests and had been causing the recent attacks. But he knew that her mother was an officer of the law. The bloodlust fled from his eyes as they returned to normal from their blackened state.
Caroline had been so quiet before he arrived, already passed out from her terribly low tolerance for alcohol. After the other two bodies were soaked in the very substance that their pathetic lives thrived on to escape the horrors of high school, Damon lit a match and brought it up to his eye level, the small flame in between his fingers playing shadows across his ghastly pale face, before he tossed it towards them in one swift flick of his wrist.
Picking up the petite blonde into his arms easily with a low grunt (more out of hesitance than any real effort), Damon stumbled back to the mansion. It would be light out soon and he didn't need her involved in a crime scene, whether it was for selfish reasons (like possessiveness) or not. Damon had managed to convince himself in his stupor state that she witnessed some of his attack and because she no longer wanted to see him again (or so she claimed), then she'd spill the beans. But perhaps there were still a few words left unsaid between them.
She was as light as a feather as Damon hummed to an old song playing in his head on his way back home, unaware that it had been playing during one of the first times that they'd slept together during their secret, deadly affair.
