Bonnie knew the moment Kai Parker stepped through the doors, because she felt his eyes burning through the back of her neck.
She shivered, dread pooling in her stomach and struggled, futilely, against the cords binding her.
But they were enchanted, dipped with herbs that muted her own power, and all she achieved was another smirk from the vampire Salvatore.
Kai didn't say a word to her, didn't even look at her, but walked around the chair where she sat to the vampires standing in the far corner beside the large bay window.
She watched as the three dark-haired men acknowledged each other silently and then Kai reached into his jacket, and she saw the flash of a familiar amber pendant.
"That's mine!" Bonnie cried, outraged.
He turned then to stare at her. His dark glare seared her and she raised her chin, defiantly. But all he said was a mild, "what's mine is yours, remember?"
Bonnie made a gagging sound. Kai chuckled.
"You sure you want her back?" Damon Salvatore drawled, making Kai turn back towards him. "You know what they say about runaways. Seems like more trouble than she's worth." He swept Bonnie with lazy, lascivious eyes.
Kai stared at the vampire, his face unreadable, and Bonnie gaped at Damon as well. What an idiot.
"Do you have any suggestions?" Kai asked, his voice mild, no sign of the violence Bonnie could read from his body evident.
Damon grinned. "I can take her off your hands, permanently. I always wanted a pet witch and she's a good size. We can even strike another deal where you supply me with some of this anti-witchy stuff, and my brother and I do pro bono work for you."
Kai turned back to her, rubbing his hand on his chin, apparently considering the offer. "A good size for what, I wonder?" he murmured, and Bonnie wondered how no one else could see the storm gathering in his eyes.
"Damon," Stefan said, in warning. OK, maybe not no one else then. Stefan was the smarter of the two vampire brothers, Bonnie had come to realize in her short time with the them. And he must have picked up on what his brother was so oblivious of.
"Oh, you know..." Damon said with a laugh.
Kai joined him. After a moment, Stefan did, too, although his laugh had a hint of wariness. Bonnie felt beetles crawling up her spine. She had long stopped struggling, completely transfixed at the scene about to play out in front of her.
"Which you probably know from trying, I guess," Kai said, in between chuckles. "How did that go?"
Oblivious to his brother's sharp gaze, Damon kept grinning. "Oh, I haven't tried... yet. But I did consider it. Shared a few of my ideas with her, to hear what she thought. She told me she liked my guts, and I would know how much when she yanked them out and made me eat them."
That made Kai laugh even harder. "That's Bonnie, alright. Always had a way with words, didn't you?" He threw her a mocking glance.
"So what do you say?" Damon asked, eagerly. He threw an excited glance at Stefan that made Bonnie want to throw up. "You can tell your coven that the little bitch bit it, and you get a lifetime of free hits from the Salvatore Bros."
Stefan was opening his mouth to say something in protest but Bonnie never heard it.
Kai had reached out a hand to Damon. "I think you've got yourself a deal."
The vampire grinned broadly, his manic eyes lighting up, as he stretched out his own hand.
Somehow he missed Kai's. Which slipped past Damon's proffered hand, past the whole length of his arm, and towards the middle of his torso.
Even in her weakened state, Bonnie felt the flash of potent, silent magic ripple in the air, and then Kai's hand was through the other's body. The vampire had barely moved past shock to pain, when Kai yanked out his hand. Only now, it was soaked in blood up to elbow, and wrapped through his fingers were cords of slimy, bloody, gut.
Damon staggered back, shouting, the pain bringing him to his knees. Stefan made a move, only to go flying through the window. Something shiny hovered in the air where he had been, and Bonnie recognized the lapus lazuli daylight ring before it clattered to the ground.
The sound of his screams filled the air, then it was silent, and all that was left was the anguished shout of his brother.
Damon was struggling to his feet. "You psycho witch... I'm going... to rip your head off." His voice was thick and slurred, with pain, shock and grief.
Bonnie felt almost sorry for him. Whatever he lacked in brains, he certainly made up for in sheer bravado.
Kai shook his head slowly, his hand still holding the other man's guts, a long cord trailing from the mess in his fist to the internals of the vampire in front of him. "No, you're not."
He shoved his hand forward, and smashed the guts into Damon's mouth. Damon's cries were choked silent screams and then he too went flying out of the window, sans daylight ring and an amber pendant that Kai plucked out of the air before it hit the floor.
She turned her head to the side, bent as far off her chair as possible, and promptly threw up.
"Hey, hey..."
Kai was in front of her, his hand on her cheek, coaxing her back into her chair.
She flinched out of his grasp, staring at the blood still on his hands and splattered over the front of his shirt.
He followed her gaze, then looked back at her with a shrug. "Sorry. Spontaneous murder. If I had planned it, it would be a lot less messy." He reached with the back of his hand, and when she kept struggling, he held her neck in place until he wiped her mouth with it. "Did they hurt you?" his voice was almost tender, even as his grip on her was iron. "That Damon, did he...?"
"He won't have had the chance to, if you hadn't sent them after me in the first place."
His eyes darkened, his grip turning painful. "Did they hurt you, Bonnie?"
She glared at him. "You are hurting me now." When he didn't lessen his grip, she gave in. "No, they did not. The last thing I remember was the cafe where I was having breakfast. They must have compelled the waitstaff to drug my food. I woke up here, and they left me pretty much to myself for most of the day. Then I tried to climb out the window and they caught me. I stabbed that one with a bunch of pencils and almost escaped, but his brother was at the door. That's when they tied me up." She sighed. "All he did was threaten me a bit, tried to scare me. You didn't have to kill him."
He chuckled, his hands finally moving to the ropes at her ankles. "I know, but when did that ever stop me?"
Her legs were loose now, and she could make a run for it. But it would be pointless. And the idea of letting Kai chase her through this empty house and eventually catch her made her whole body shudder. The last time that had happened, it hadn't ended well.
He got to his feet, and pulled her to him. The blood rushed to her legs and she staggered, falling into his chest. His arms were around her at once, lifting her into his arms.
She could feel the firm grip of his muscles around her, the warmth radiating from his skin, the smell of blood and magic on his hands. Her body ached a little in reaction to his nearness and she hated herself.
"Why can't you let me go, Kai?" she whispered brokenly, looking up at him.
His mouth twisted into a bitter smile. "For better or for worse, remember?" Then his face was bending down, his fingers slipping through her hair and holding her head in place as he kissed her.
She felt her soul, her magic even as faint as it was now, rise up to meet him. The room faded away, and all sense of time and space as well, as she was lost in the kiss, the sheer overwhelming intensity of his mouth devouring her own, the low growl emitting from his chest as their lips and tongue kept mating and breaking.
Finally, finally, they pulled apart to breathe. For a long moment, they just stared at each other. She wondered if her face was as dazed and desperate as his own.
Then he grinned, and it spread across his face with demented levity. "Let's go home, wifey."
And still with her in his arms, he picked his way through the wreckage of her former cell, and towards the wreckage of the life spread out in front of them.
