The big and massive white elephant in the room hadn't disappeared yet and Scarlett was pretty sure that it wasn't going to go anywhere any time soon. This whole Stefan going back to high school so he could get to know Elena Gilbert was insane, Scarlett really did not understand at it at all. But Stefan was pretty much adamant that he wasn't going anywhere and so there was nothing Scarlett could do as her 'mature' uncle was showing the classic family stubbornness and there was the face that Stefan could still kill her even though he only fed on animals these days. This whole thing was turning into a massive mess and Scarlett seemed to have a permanent headache as the mysterious arrival of a Salvatore had brought them lots of unwanted attention. Stefan Salvatore was pretty much the only thing people in town could talk about and it was quite annoying as it meant that the entire family had this huge spotlight on them. This was the furthest thing that any of them needed right now. Especially Zach. Scarlett knew that she had it bad but she knew her uncle had even worse, he had to burden most of it by himself given that he was the adult here. With Stefan being here, it meant the boarding house was shut to boarders and that meant a loss of income – although they were nowhere near being in trouble. Scarlett's on going health issues was another problem that he had to shoulder and she knew that Zach didn't tend to go to sleep until well after 2am. He worried immensely so that Scarlett didn't have to. She knew that Zach was protecting her as best he could from the impact of having Stefan living with them. It wasn't fair, not to any of them but they couldn't really complain as they were Salvatore's and this what they did. Her family had been keeping the secret of having vampires in their family for the last hundred and forty-five years.

Carrying a small tray Scarlett walked through the kitchen towards the east side wall of the boarding house where Zach was sitting in a little alcove that somewhat doubled as an informal office. He had pretty much been in there all day sorting through paperwork and working on something, Scarlett wasn't exactly sure what Zach had been doing all day but he seemed rather engrossed in it. Lucrezia was always there, sitting on the small table and purring every of often. Being as quiet as she could, Scarlett settled the tray down on the table that had been hand built by her great-grandfather and went about pouring two cups of tea from the teapot she had been carrying on her tray only moments earlier. Zach seemed surprise to see her but nonetheless Scarlett could see a small smile in the corner of his mouth.

"I made us some camomile tea, I figured we could both use it to help us get a good night's sleep. You more than me Uncle Zac, given how worried you are about everything." Scarlett said as she slipped into the bench opposite Zach. The bags under her uncle's eyes were very noticeable and it was clear he wasn't getting much sleep as of late.

"How'd you that I'm worried about something." Zach questioned and Scarlett smiled as her eyes left her uncles and drifted towards her cat.

"Lucrezia. She's never one to sit still unless she knows there's something wrong, she seems to be able to sense our distress and she hasn't left your side once since I've gotten home from work. Plus, you forget how well I know you Uncle Zach! I've known you every day of my life and I know when something is bothering you and those bags under your eyes are terrible. I haven't seen you look this bad since dad died and I was admitted to the hospital. Something is really worrying you and if it's what I think it is, then I don't blame you for being worried as I am too. It's hard not to worry about everything as of late…" Scarlett grimly noted in despair as everything was starting to fall apart again.

"You heard about the animal attacks?" Zach wearily said as he took a sip of his tea and Scarlett slowly nodded, it was hard to not hear about them when you lived in a small town like this one. Even when Zach had going to such an effort to hide the newspapers from Scarlett so she wouldn't see the numerous animal attacks on humans that had been occurring over the last several weeks. It didn't take a genius to realise that it was pretty much a prelude to a storm. Just with vampires.

"Nice try to protect me Uncle Zach but this town talks a lot and there is this little thing called television that we have. I saw a report on the attacks that was done by Logan Fell."

"You can't fault me for wanting to protect you Scarlett, it is my job after all." Zach shot back and Scarlett wearily laughed.

"I won't deny that. It's must be getting serious it's become enough public interest that the tv station runs the story. I would have thought that the council, specifically Logan Fell would have buried the story a long time ago as people go missing all the time. But I suppose when the bodies were found, that made it impossible. If I was anyone else I wouldn't have suspected a thing but I grew up with you and ad reading me the family journals and I know that's how vampires like to cover up their killings. I know that these so-called animal attacks are the council's go to way of covering this all up. Have you heard anything yet? Have you been sneaking off to any secret founder's council meetings without telling me Zach?" Scarlett questioned before proceeding to take a sip of her own cup of tea.

"No. Of course not and I haven't heard anything from anyone on the council yet so I suppose no one has connected the dots yet. But if these animal attacks continue, then a meeting will be called and they'll figure out some kind of a plan. I asked Stefan about it yesterday but he just denied it, he said that he has his blood thirst under control but it doesn't explain these deaths." Zach stated as he proceeded to stroke Lucrezia and Scarlett just scoffed in response at her uncle's comment over Stefan. That was somewhat hilarious.

"Has anything Stefan done lately made any sense? Shows up in town to visit us is something I could have brought then. But three months later Stefan is still here and he's convinced that he can try and live a normal life here of all places! Stefan was born and died here! Him coming back after last time is just setting us all up to be exposed. Then there is the Gilbert girl, clearly this whole thing is related to her. Apparently Elena is a dead ringer to this Katherine Pierce, the one who pretty ruined all our lives when she turned him into a vampire back in 1864. The finer details are just a mess but ever since Stefan saved Elena Gilbert's life he's become obsessed with knowing her. The fact that Stefan has taken the step to go back to high school only further proves that he's actually lost his mind. There are so many other and frankly better things he could do with his immortality but he chooses to go back to high school for some girl. I don't think I have seen anything so bizarre in my life." Scarlett replied with a frown as she was a still a bit annoyed about the whole thing.

"Do you think he'll put her in danger? Because we could always put some ver–"

"Uncle Zach, you know that we don't not to talk about that in this house anymore." Scarlett began referring to vervain, the herb that acted like a poison to vampires and if digested by humans, it made vampires unable to compel them. As far as Stefan was aware there was no vervain in Mystic Falls as Damon – the vampire uncle that Scarlett hadn't met, got rid of it in 1865. But that was another family secret, the Salvatore's had been growing vervain ever since, providing it to the founding families when needed and the whole family ingested it. Zach had been drinking it in his coffee for over twenty years and Scarlett had been wearing a necklace filled with vervain and drinking it in her tea since Stefan's first visit since she was eight. That didn't speak of the matter out loud ever since Stefan had returned home because of his vampire enhanced senses thing. "But no, at the moment I don't think he's a danger to her at the moment however I will keep an eye out…"

"Where is he now?" Zach questioned and Scarlett took a sip of her tea before speaking.

"There's some party by the falls and I believe he's gone there with Elena naturally or he's meeting her there, I wasn't really in the mood to listen to specifics. I overheard them talking about it yesterday briefly while I was at work and Stefan was sitting at a table completely surrounded by teenage girls all unaware that he was a vampire and old enough to be their father's great grandfather. It's amazing how he's been my school for two days and already have friends when I've lived in this town my whole life and I have none. You can't miss the whole irony of him being more popular in death than will ever be in life"

"Are you jealous? Because you sound rather annoyed by it Scarlett…" Zach noted and Scarlett scoffed, she was not jealous of anything. It wasn't like she made the personal choice to not have friends but at the same time, Scarlett hadn't gone out of her way to make them either. She was a loner by nature, she wasn't a huge fan of social gatherings and her social skills were terrible. Scarlett could have a conversation with her family with no problem, but anyone else? She couldn't handle it in the way a normal person would,

"No not really as I don't do friends Uncle Zach, you know that, I just find the whole thing rather weird if I'm being honest. It worries me as well though as this new found love affair that female population are having with Stefan. I worry that it'll shed too much attention on us. I just don't like my entire life to be on display for the entertainment of people here in Mystic Falls." Scarlett replied with a small sigh as this was all ever so complicated and showed no signs of resolving itself any time soon. Blowing a piece of her hair out of her face, Scarlett sat and watched as Zach continued to work. The silence was rather welcomed and confronting, there was no need for the two of them to ever force a conversation with each other. They were comfortable enough with each other to sit in silence and it gave Scarlett time to deal with everything that was running through her head. For her it was like her life was becoming a circus again. The what little normality she had known for the last eight years was slowly beginning to crumble all around her. It was somewhat rather daunting. Who ever said life was boring when you were related to vampires?

It certainly wasn't in Scarlett's life and she most certainly got a rather rude awakening when the side door suddenly burst open and in ran Stefan in some kind of panic. Things went a little crazy. Zach knocked his tea over, Lucrezia started hissing in annoyance and Scarlett got the fright of her life and for a second, she worried her heart was about to leave about her chest. A flurry of swear words come flying out of Scarlett's mouth as she went about trying to calm herself down.

"Uncle Stefan, what's going on?" Zach questioned and Scarlett wearily looked between her two relatives as something had to be pretty wrong if Stefan had come back like this.

"Someone else was attacked tonight and it wasn't me." Stefan told them in a firm manner before running up the backstairs that lead to his bedroom. It just left Scarlett and Zach to clean up the mess they had made when Stefan had come barraging in through the door. The table was soaked as was most of Zach's papers but neither of them rushed to start cleaning up. Scarlett was rather stuck on Stefan's words, somebody had been attacked tonight and with Stefan flat out denying that he was behind it, that only meant there had to be another vampire in Mystic Falls. It was going to take some time to absorb this information but Scarlett knew that they didn't really have time. If people were getting attacked in town then were going to have to do something before the council got suspicious. The town could not find out about a vampire being in town and coming from one of the founding families. The Salvatore family had kept this secret for a hundred and forty-five years and they intended to keep it like that. That wouldn't be too hard Scarlett thought to herself, until she heard a loud crash from upstairs and she was certain that she heard something smash and come out to the garages that were located at the back of the house.

"Okay, now I'm really worried… What the hell is Stefan doing up there? Should we go up there" Scarlett said slowly and at first Zach said nothing, he simply motioned for her to be quiet. Not sure where this was going, Scarlett followed Zach's instructions and she could only watch as he walked away from the alcove and went to look out the back windows. He didn't look out for long but whatever it was that was out there had freaked Zach out. All the colour was devoid from his face and Scarlett could see that her uncle was terrified of whatever it was out there. This wasn't good at all. Something was terribly wrong and there was something outside of her house.

"Scarlett I need you to listen to me very carefully and do what I say; I need you to go upstairs to your bedroom and look the door behind you. Do not open the door until Uncle Stefan or I come for you and tell you it's okay, do you understand me?"

"Uncle Zach was going on? Whose outside?" Scarlett questioned, if Zach was reacting like this something bad must be really going on. The last time she had seen her uncle act so odd was the morning after her father had killed himself and she was asking him where her dad was so he could make her pancakes.

"Scarlett just do what I say and go." Zach snapped in irritation and Scarlett did what she was told as whatever it was, had to be bad enough that Zach had lost his temper over it. Picking up Lucrezia, Scarlett slowly made her way back through the kitchen and kept walking through the house until she reached the lounge and heard another loud crash, which caused her to stop walking and she turned back to look in the direction that she had suddenly come from. She knew she should have carried on going and made her way to her bedroom but the silence stopped, the silence that had suddenly fallen over her family home had just as quickly replaced with the sound of someone cheerful whistling. It was unnatural and kind of scary. It couldn't be Zach, Scarlett knew her uncle couldn't whistle to save his life and there was no way it was Stefan, he was never that cheerful and whistling didn't seem like something he would do.

"Uncle Zach? Uncle Stefan?" Scarlett found herself calling out but there was no response just more whistling and it was getting even closer. The panic finally set in and Scarlett was certain that her brain had shut down as she couldn't move, she could barely even think. All she could do was stand there in the middle of the lounge whilst whoever was whistling made their way closer to her. They weren't far from her now; the whistling was all but ringing in Scarlett's ears. It didn't take long for them to finally reach her and coming from the exact route Scarlett had come from minutes earlier was the mystery whistler followed by Stefan. It wasn't the dark look on Stefan's face that immediately caught Scarlett's attention. No, it was something else. It was the man who was with Stefan. His face was so familiar to Scarlett even though she had never seen this man before. Scarlett recognised this man's face because it was essentially her own, in pretty much every way. The chalk like parlour of his face, the pale icy blue eyes and the dark hair that looked black in colour but really was the darkest of brown. All those features Scarlett shared with the man in front of her. It was like she was staring at another version of herself, what she would look like if she was a boy. The resemblance was pretty uncanny. There was only a little difference between them and that was their jawlines. It was the only thing that separated them. Scarlett couldn't believe what she was seeing, everyone used to say that she was the double of her father but that was nothing compared to the similarities that Scarlett was seeing between her and this man. Scarlett was practically his double – not like Katherine and Elena but this was very close.

"Well if it isn't the little bambina! All grown up it seems…"

Scarlett swallowed a lump in her throat as she stumbled back a few steps, although she had never met the man in front of her before she had a pretty good idea who he has. His eerie resemblance Scarlett had raised a few flags, their shared features ran within the Salvatore line but it was how Zach and Stefan were reacting towards him that confirmed what Scarlett had feared the most. It had to be her Uncle Damon, that was the only way to explain why one person could walk into the house and unnerve both Stefan and Zach so much. Even though Scarlett had never met him before, she felt like she had known Damon all her life as she had grown up being told stories about her dear Uncle Damon who was ruthless and had no qualms killing anyone, even his own family. He had killed Scarlett's great grandfather Joseph Salvatore back in the fifties.

"Uncle Damon…" Scarlett barely managed to say and the smirk the man gave her confirmed that it was indeed Damon. It was like Scarlett's worst nightmare had come to life and was now destroying everything she once knew. This was terrible, it was more than terrible. It was pretty much the end of Scarlett's life as she it.

"Gabriel's little one, Red isn't it?"

"Scarlett actually."

"Close enough."

"If you say so." Scarlett quietly murmured.

"So this is a nice little family reunion that we have going on here, I've always said that family is the moment important thing we have in this life. It's just a shame that Gabriel isn't able to be here with us on this so happy occasional. Been a while since I've been home for a visit but he killed himself, right? In this very room if I'm correct." Damon stated and Scarlett had to take a deep breath in order to stop herself from crying. She couldn't believe that Damon had the nerve to come into her house and make some wholly inappropriate comments about her father, who on all accounts had detested Damon.

"Ignore him." Stefan said as he walked over to Scarlett and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder before turning to Damon. "Gabriel is dead and let's leave it at that Damon because there is nothing to be said on the matter. Let him rest in peace."

"Relax Stefan, it was just a joke to break the ice." Damon scoffed and Scarlett went from being upset to oddly homicidal and she would have gone to strangle him with her bare hands if it wasn't for the fact that Damon would probably kill her before her hands managed to connect with his neck.

"Well it wasn't funny and trust me this is no happy family reunion!" Scarlett snapped as she managed to pull herself together, she could not believe that her 'Uncle' Damon had strolled into the house and made a joke about her father's death, in the room that he killed himself in. All of them knew that this was the room that her father had died in but the rest of them didn't feel the need to point out for the sake of making conversation. Scarlett hated Damon in this moment and already she was fed up with him and needed to leave the room before she lost his temper. Taking a deep breath Scarlett turned to Stefan and Zach. "I've had enough of this; I'm going to bed before I get myself killed…"

"If you're going upstairs dear niece of mine, you can go right ahead and make up my room for me. I feel like staying for a while to catch up with my beloved family…" Damon said and Scarlett couldn't believe the attitude on this guy, strolling into her house and making demands like he owned the place.

"Do it yourself, I am not your damn maid!" Scarlett spat with a sneer as looked at her uncle in disgust before walking away. Not only were there now two vampires in Mystic Falls but both of them were living under her roof. This was just fantastic. Scarlett's life was never going to be the same again and whether or not she would survive living with her two vampire uncles was yet to be seen.