"Tell me you're not going to do what Kai wants."
He looked at her reflection in the mirror from where he leaned tiredly over the bathroom counter. He'd taken off his jacket, and his tie hung loosely around his neck. Similarly, Elena had removed her halo and wings but still wore her long flowy angel dress. All of her jewelry was gone, destroyed. He recognized that dreaded Gilbert stubbornness in the cant of her jaw and sighed. She was all filled in and ready to fight, but he found himself too weary to argue.
"Elena, it's been a long night." Not really, but it felt that way. "Could we maybe do this some other-"
"Please tell me you're not!"
His eyes snapped with cold blue fire as they met her gaze in the mirror. "Need I remind you what happened tonight?"
"No, I was there."
"Enlighten me, then, Elena. What's my alternative? Do I just let him come up with another way to torture you? Do I let him kill you?" His hands tightened on the counter enough to crack the surface. "You no longer have a daylight ring because he melted it through your finger."
"I was there, Damon. That doesn't justify doing what he wants. That doesn't justify killing a bunch of innocent people."
"I'm not putting you through that again." He straightened up and turned, agitation riddling his posture as he crossed his arms, the black silk of his dress shirt straining over his shoulders. "I won't let him hurt you again."
"That's not what I'm worried about. If Kai gets what he wants, think how many more people will end up dying. You can't help him. Help me find another way."
"A hundred and thirty two minutes."
"What?" His non sequitor threw her off-balance.
His focus on some unknown point in the distance, his mouth a bleak line, he informed her, "That's how long it was from the moment Ric died in my arms until you came back as a vampire. That's how long I thought you were dead. A hundred and thirty two minutes."
Her face softened, and he continued, lowering his voice, "No one knew you had vampire blood in your system. The entire drive to the hospital, I thought you were dead. Really dead. It wasn't some mistake, either, or Ric would still be alive. You weren't coming back as a vampire. No one had done a magic spell for you. Nothing. You were just gone." He was silent for a moment before his voice returned, hard as steel. "I'm not going through that again. I won't."
Elena's face was crumbling, her lips trembling, yet she remained unbearably beautiful. "You still can't kill all those people."
Yes, he could. Easily. "I don't care about them. I care about you."
"No, if you cared about me, you wouldn't do this. There are other ways, and we'll find them! Please, Damon, I'm asking you not to do this."
Rage blossomed inside his chest at the impossibility of his situation, the incompatibility between his competing desires to keep her safe and make her happy. No matter which choice he made, he might end up losing her, but at least in one of the scenarios she stayed alive.
"I am not Stefan!" he exploded. "You can't ask me to let you die! I would burn the world and everyone in it to ash before I let you anything happen to you."
"That's insane." She clasped her temples. "Damon, that's not healthy."
"Have you met me? Name one thing about me that is." His face was almost sad as he gently shrugged his shoulders, the severity of his tone softening. "You know I'm not a good person. I don't know why you're expecting something different."
She gave him a heartbreaking look, and in that moment he found himself hating that he was too fucking selfish to do as she asked, that his choices always ended up hurting her. But how could he choose differently when the alternative might be losing her forever?
He moved close, clasping her cheeks between his palms to prevent her from speaking further. "I will always do whatever it takes to protect you, Elena. There is no line I will not cross, and if that upsets you or makes you hate me," brilliant blue eyes searched hers, "then I guess it's a good thing I have an eternity to earn your forgiveness."
She sniffed and looked away. "It's not right, Damon."
"I know." He pressed his forehead against hers. "I know, princess, I'm sorry."
He wasn't sorry about killing some random people. He was capable of much worse for her; no soul-searching required for him to know that to be absolutely true with a bone-deep surety. He was only sorry for hurting her in the process.
At first, his kisses were soft, questioning, hesitant. He half expected her to turn away, reject him. But she stayed still, allowing his lips to move over hers, so he grew bolder, more demanding until she wasn't able to remain impassive, her mouth opening for him like a slow-blooming flower.
As their kisses deepened, her fingers snuck their way up his untucked shirt, sliding across a ridge of muscle to slowly wind through the black hair descending from his navel, making his stomach muscles clench involuntarily. Her petting was tentative like she didn't want to touch him but couldn't help herself. .
When her finger tips brushed along the waistband of his pants, he whispered against her mouth, "Stay with me tonight." He couldn't bear the thought of facing the darkness alone. He wanted to find refuge in her softness, her light.
She drew back, jerking her hand away as if his skin was hot enough to burn. "I can't."
"Why not? What is it this time?" he said sullenly. "We have a bed."
She turned away from him and wrapped her arms around herself. "Our first time is not going to be on the eve before you commit mass murder."
He couldn't help the irritability that permeated his words. "You sure have an ambitious vision of what our first time should be like."
She looked at him over her shoulder. "And you don't?"
Honestly…no. At this point, he'd fuck her in a trash can. "That's not what I meant." He closed the distance between them with a single step. "Please, don't go. I promise I'll behave."
He wrapped his arms around her midsection and pulled her into him, her back to his chest, nose rubbing in her sweet-smelling, silky brown hair. He felt her surrender and relax, melting bonelessly against him. He planted small kisses on the back of her neck, his only intention to make her feel good.
One hand slowly traveled down her stomach, his fingers gently sliding between her legs, only the thin gauzy material of her dress preventing skin-to-skin contact. He began to rub in slow circles while his lips continued their soft caresses on her neck. She sighed slightly, a gentle exhalation of air that communicated her pleasure.
"Say you'll stay, Elena." He cringed internally at the degree of pitiful hopefulness that laced his plea.
She clamped down on the hand caressing between her legs, her fingers curling around his wrist, arresting his motion. "Say you're not going to do what he wants."
"I can't."
"Then, I can't stay, Damon, not like this." Propelling herself out of his arms, she made for the door.
Just like that he was reliving every time before when the girl he loved didn't choose him, that old wound of never being good enough ripped open yet again before it ever had any chance to heal, eating away incessantly at his insides like acid. What he and Elena had between them was still so new, so fragile that he didn't know if it would survive this fight, or if what they had had ever really been anything at all. Maybe this was it, this was all he was going to get, and she was going back to where she'd belonged all along – not with him.
Before she could get to the door, he appeared in front of her and took both of her hands between his. "Wait, before you go, can I ask you a question?"
Her look was cautious. "I'll probably regret this, but sure, I guess."
His chin fell almost to his chest, gazing across at her through black lashes. When he spoke, his voice was thick and raw. "Are you mine?"
Confused, she blinked. "I don't understand. Are you asking if you're my boyfriend, because I thought we already established that."
"No, Elena," he snapped coldly, "I mean, are you mine?"
Angry and frustrated, he was taking it out on her, but the problem was him. He wasn't articulating himself right, wasn't really sure what he was trying to say. Before she walked out that door, he needed to know – what? That she felt for him even a tenth of what he felt for her? That she hadn't decided she'd made a horrible mistake? That she wasn't running right back to his brother the first time there was a bump in the road?
He tried again. "Is this – are we real?"
"You mean am I going back to Stefan?" She hurled the words at him like a spear, pulling her hands from his.
Aiming his own barb, he sneered, "Thought'd crossed my mind. Doubt my brother had to jump through so many hoops before you slept withhim."
Her face instantly assumed the expression and pallor of someone who'd just been sucker punched.
Fuck, why did he say that? He reached for her hand again. "Elena-"
She violently avoided his touch. "I'm going to say this once, because I get that you have a legitimate reason to be insecure about it, but then I don't want to talk about it ever again, okay?"
He nodded mutely, subdued by the force of her anger.
Speaking slowly and deliberately, her eyes sparkled with unshed tears. "I'm not going back to Stefan. He and I are done, and I don't want to be with him anymore, no matter what happens between us."
One of those glittering tear drops glided slowly down her cheek. He longed to say something, anything, to remove the pain from her eyes because it was killing him, but everything he said was the wrong thing and just ended up making things worse. So he said nothing.
Another tear fell. "Good night, Damon." She ghosted through the doorway, leaving him alone.
He went to the door with the purpose of closing it but instead found himself leaning his forehead against the heavy wood and staring down at the ground.
Tomorrow night he planned to kill twelve innocent people in order to protect the girl he loved, and he didn't even care. What really bothered him? She'd never answered his question. Are you mine?