A/N: I'm so sorry that I have neglected this story for so long. This is why I should have stuck to posting one story at a time. . . . Anyway, I hope some of you are still interested in this story, and at least this chapter is a fairly long one. For those of you who want more Katherine, it's coming. We just have to be patient. I actually have an awesome Damon-Katherine scene that I've already written, but we have a few chapters until we can get to it. In the meantime, here is more of what Damon is doing with his freedom.

Disclaimer: I do not own The Vampire Diaries or any of the characters, unfortunately. This story is purely for fun.

Chapter 13

Finally everyone had left except Ric, who had apparently stayed to keep Damon company. For once, Damon didn't mind. He was already tired of group meetings but he was tired of being alone, too, and Ric was good company. He poured his friend a drink and sank down into his favorite leather chair in the library.

"Damon," Ric began seriously. "What is it you're not telling us about Stefan?"

I'm going to have to rethink that idea about Ric being good company, Damon thought. He played dumb. "What are you talking about?"

"I was there last time, and you went charging in to save your brother without a moment's hesitation. Why do I get the feeling that you aren't in a hurry to rescue him this time?"

Damon just shrugged.

"Damon?" Ric pressed.

Damn it, he was going to have to answer. "Stefan," he began. He paused, then forced himself to continue. "Stefan might not be too unhappy where he is."

"What do you mean? You said that Katherine forced him to drink human blood? And got into his head, like brainwashing or compelling him, right?"

"Kinda like that, yeah," Damon drawled. He got up and poured himself another drink before chugging it down. "And now Stefan seems perfectly happy to help Katherine." He paused, drinking straight from the bottle now. Ric was watching him intently. "Stefan helped her, not me," he finally confessed. "When she gave me the potion, Stefan helped her."

"He wasn't himself," Ric said. "Was he?"

"I don't know." Damon flung the now empty bottle of bourbon at the wall, seeing Ric flinch out of the corner of his eye. He didn't really care if he upset his friend in that moment. Struggling to harness the mixture of anger, pain, and hurt that threatened to overwhelm him, Damon slammed his hand down on a nearby table. It shattered under the force of the blow. He stared at the pile of wood, stung by the agony of large splinter that had pierced his palm. He pulled it out with a wince. He should stick to breaking bottles and glasses; it hurt less. "I guess not," he finally said. He couldn't bring himself to admit how much it had hurt that his brother had abandoned him when he had needed him. He should have known better than to believe that his brother might have his back, that he might be able to trust Stefan. Never count on anyone but yourself – that had become his mantra for a reason.

"You know Elena is bent on rescuing him," Ric said after a moment.

"I know." Damon sighed, anger draining away slowly. His hand still throbbed. "I'll help her. He is still my brother, no matter how much Katherine has corrupted him. And I suppose I've done worse to him over the years." He wasn't actually sure that he had, although killing Lexi was right up there, but he knew just how effectively Katherine could corrupt just about anyone. Damon picked up another bottle. It wasn't his favorite bourbon, but it would do. He sat back down in his chair. After a moment, he spoke again. "I answered your question. Now you answer one of mine."

Ric looked at him cautiously. "That seems fair."

Damon watched Ric closely. "What's the deal with Judgy?" He was certain that there was something they were all keeping from him, and it had to do with the little witch. Ric was looking at him blankly, however. "Bonnie," he clarified, and now he saw a look of recognition in the teacher's eyes.

Alaric sighed. "I guess you should know. She lost her powers. Some warlock took them away."

Damon just nodded. That explained a few things, and it made sense that Katherine would get Bonnie out of the way. He was a bit surprised that Katherine hadn't just killed her. It was definitely going to make things harder if they didn't have a witch on their side, though. He supposed he was going to have to talk to Bonnie and find out what had happened. That ought to be fun. At least she couldn't give him aneurysms anymore.

As he and Ric lapsed back into companionable silence, Damon noticed the slanted rays of evening light coming into the window, painting rectangles of sunlight on the floor. It was beautiful, in a way. "Hey, don't you turn into a pumpkin at sunset?" he asked Ric.

"It's midnight, Damon," Ric replied. "And what are you talking about?"

Damon smirked. "I do know my fairytales, Ric. But it's almost dark. Don't you have a family of helpless humans to protect?"

Ric finally got his point. "Shit," he said, glancing at the window. "I guess I do have to go." He got up and headed toward the door. "I'll, uh, talk to you tomorrow. Good night, Damon."

"Night, Ric." Damon was left alone then, drinking and watching the traces of sunset that penetrated the windows. He knew that he seriously needed to get his shit together, and he needed to do so as quickly as possible, before Katherine made another move. He had no idea why she had released him – he was still sure he hadn't escaped – but she was definitely up to something. Katherine always was. And Elena and all of her friends seemed to be counting on him to stop her and rescue Stefan, who probably didn't even want to be rescued. The problem was that Damon knew he was a complete mess. As usual Katherine had done quite a number on him. She had turned his life upside down in 1864; she had done it again just by not being in the tomb and then again when she had arrived in town. And now she had fucked with his mind and his body one more time.

Damon's years as a vampire tended to blend together in a haze of blood, sex, and alcohol – the three things that had largely governed his life for 145 years – but he could remember every detail of his last months as a human. The months in which he had fallen in love with Katherine. He remembered her silvery laugh, her flirtatious smile, the teasing way she had accepted his first tentative touches, the way she had made his body feel more alive than it ever had – he had loved her with his whole heart. And she had taken that heart and crushed it beneath her delicate little shoe.

Damon thought that should have freed him from her – and if that first destruction of his heart hadn't done the trick, surely the subsequent times she had cruelly stomped on his heart until it bled should have gotten her out of his system. But somehow, she was still in there. He had tried to tell himself that his love for Katherine had morphed into hate, or better yet into indifference, that love for Elena had replaced his feelings for Katherine. But deep down, Damon knew Katherine still had her claws in him. He closed his eyes, and he remembered her touch in 1864 or just days ago in that horrible dungeon. Despite knowing that she was even more of a heartless monster than he had ever guessed, part of him still wanted her.

Abruptly, Damon decided that sitting around his house brooding would do him absolutely no good. That was Stefan's thing, after all, not his. No, if he wanted to feel like himself again, he had to act like himself. He was going out.

•••••

A couple of hours later, Damon was seated at the bar in an elegant establishment in the next town over, having decided that the Grill had never been much fun even before the populace was afraid of the dark. And he was completely wasted. He had had a lot to drink before he had even arrived, and he had compelled the bartender into giving him a bottomless glass of bourbon, of which he had taken full advantage. Several attractive women had already tried to flirt with him, only to give up when they realized he was more interested in his drink and his thoughts than them. The current one was more persistent, or more drunk, however. Damon had already forgotten her name – Tiffany or Tina or something like that, maybe? – but she was a pretty little fake blond in her early twenties. She had convinced him to do shots with her to celebrate . . . something. And a few rounds into the celebration, she was all over him.

She had pulled her barstool about as close to his as it would go, and Damon was well aware of the way her hand had slid up his thigh to a place that made her intent very explicit. Her other hand had been rubbing up and down his arm or caressing his hand for the past few minutes, and yeah, she had gotten his attention. Her lips were just inches from his, and Damon missed what she was saying as he stared at them. Her hand slid even further up his thigh, and without any conscious thought, Damon was kissing her. Her lips were warm and soft, and they parted almost immediately to grant his tongue access. She moaned into his kiss and pressed herself closer. Damon brought his hand up to run it through her hair, only to find it hard with too much product, and she smelled wrong, a cheap perfume that didn't appeal to him, but he was drunk enough – or desperate enough – not to care. She was gasping for air when he finally broke the kiss. "Let's get out of here," she whispered breathily, and Damon nodded.

A small voice in Damon's head was saying that he didn't even know the woman's name, but he ignored it. She wasn't Elena, and she wasn't Katherine, and there was no history and no emotions were involved; it was purely physical, and in that moment that was what Damon wanted. Much of his life as a vampire had been this – alcohol and a girl in a bar or a club or a speakeasy or a saloon, sex and blood – and it all felt familiar to him, safe even. Whatever-her-name-was didn't even need to remember him in the morning, after all, any more than he would remember her.

They left the bar, bodies pressed together, Damon's arm around her shoulders. He thought about just taking her in the alley behind the bar, but instead he led her to his car, ignoring her squeal of excitement at the sight of it. The drive back to the boarding house was, well, dangerous since Damon was too drunk to be behind the wheel even with the reflexes and night vision of a vampire. His passenger didn't help things by continuing to touch and tease him during the drive, but somehow they made it back to the boarding house intact. They were barely in the door before Damon was pushing the woman up against a wall, kissing her hungrily. She moaned in pleasure as he hiked up her short skirt and tore off her thong. A second later Damon had unzipped his own pants and he was thrusting into her. She cried out, and Damon noticed that she remembered his name just fine as she fell apart around him in record time. He stuck with the generic "baby" as his own orgasm hit and he pumped his seed into her.

Catching his breath, Damon set the woman down on wobbly legs. He kept a hand on her to keep her upright. "Let's go upstairs," he murmured.

She grinned at him, trying unsuccessfully to straighten her skirt. "Are you as insatiable as I think you are?" she said with a flirty toss of her hair.

"You have no idea," Damon answered. He half-pushed her up the stairs. He could hear her accelerated heart rate, and he could practically smell her blood pumping through her veins. He liked to make sure his victims had at least one orgasm before he bit them – he thought the blood tasted better that way – and it was all he could do to keep his fangs from coming out as he followed her up the stairs. All the alcohol he had consumed was playing havoc with his control.

"Wow, I love your place," the woman declared as Damon opened the door to his bedroom. She glanced around excitedly. "This is even better than the downstairs. More modern. Do you live here alone?" Damon felt a twinge of emotion through his drunken haze at that, but luckily his companion went right onto her next thought without waiting for an answer. "Ooh, great bathroom. Let's make use of that tub."

"Later," Damon growled. He stripped off his shirt and pushed the woman toward his bed, kissing her again. She giggled. He shoved her down on the bed, hovering over her as he turned his attentions to her neck. He watched the pulse of her blood for a moment before his face changed.

The woman turned her head slightly and apparently caught a glimpse of the black veins tracing his face because he felt her freeze under him. "Damon?" she stuttered, fear in her voice. "What's going on?"

Damon pulled himself up for a moment and captured her eyes. "There's nothing to be afraid of," he compelled her. "You had a great time with me tonight, but you know it was a one-time thing." Then he bit down into her neck. Her blood tasted good all right, fresh and warm and with that hint of recent pleasure. He could taste the alcohol that she had consumed that night, too, and the taste reminded him of many nights of feeding just like this. Damon let the blood erase any thoughts that had managed to survive his own drinking binge. A few minutes later he had had his fill, and he rolled away from the woman and promptly fell asleep, mind blissfully blank.

•••••

Damon woke up to sunlight streaming in through his open drapes. His first thought was to wonder why he hadn't closed them, and he pushed himself up with a groan, prepared to shut out the light and crawl right back into bed since it wasn't like he had any plans for the day. Then he caught a glimpse of spray-tanned arm and blond hair, and he realized he wasn't alone in the bed. He stared at the motionless figure for a moment. Just how much did I drink last night? Damon wondered. I can't even remember her name. Then he realized it got worse. He didn't hear a heartbeat. The woman was dead.

Shit. Damon sank back onto the bed, wide awake now. Shit, shit, shit. He couldn't remember many details from the previous night, which told him that he had had way too much to drink. Vampires didn't really get hangovers – thank you, accelerated healing – but that was small consolation at the moment. He was lucky that he apparently hadn't had any visitors that morning since he suspected that, friend or not, Ric would probably try to stake him if he thought Damon was killing again, and then Damon would have to defend himself and, well, they had already played out that scenario once. It was a good thing that Bonnie had lost her powers, or he could be in trouble from that front, too.

The question was whether he had killed the woman for any reason or whether he had simply screwed up and taken too much blood. He strongly suspected the latter. He had clearly fed from her and had sex with her, and it was by no means the first time Damon had woken up next to a corpse over the years – he ignored all the obvious vampire jokes that came to mind, since he really wasn't in the mood – but it had been a while since he slipped up like this. Killing was part of his nature as a vampire, but Damon was afraid that this woman had only died because he had lost control. And he didn't like losing control.

Damon groaned. He had really been trying not to kill any more people since he had decided to stay in Mystic Falls for a while. It had started out as a way to lay low, and more recently he had felt that odd desire to live up to Elena's expectation that he could be a decent person and to make it up to her for accidentally, temporarily killing Jeremy. Plus he had somehow picked up friends with at least some morals, like Ric. But this just proved, Damon decided a bit ruefully, that he had been right all along that he couldn't fight his nature as a vampire. It was one thing to kill someone who needed killing, like Mason, and another to kill because he simply lost control and did what came naturally. Obviously, he wasn't a good person, and he never would be.

With a sigh of disgust at himself, Damon got up and looked for a shirt. He had a body to dump.

A/N: Okay, I hope no one is too upset with me (or poor Damon) here. Damon screws up all the time on the show, and since I am trying to write him true to character, it seemed like it was time for him to screw up. Let me know what you think. Reviews are love!