ELENA POV

I ask Elijah to drop me off at the boarding house because I can't even wait long enough to go home and get my car. I have to call off the plan.

I let myself in through the front door that they never bother to lock and take the stairs two at a time.

Damon is still in bed, but awake, probably because he heard my footsteps. He's shirtless, his hands laced casually behind his head. He's wearing a confident smirk that doesn't make it all the way to his eyes.

"Miss me?"

I drop my purse and don't even unbutton my coat before I straddle him in bed. My hands spearing into his hair, I pull him up to me and kiss him with all the ferocity of my resolve. There is nothing on earth or in heaven that could compel me to put this man in danger.

I feel his smile turn genuine before he kisses me back, his body already responding to mine.

"Well, good morning to you, too."

The way he kisses me back belies the playful tone of his voice. His mouth is needy in a way he never allows his voice to be. He rolls us over, the sheets tangling around his legs as he props his elbows on either side of my head and bends to taste me, achingly sweet and urgent.

Two tears that I've been holding back streak down my cheeks and mingle with our kisses. Damon pulls back, searching my eyes.

"Hey, easy there," he says lightly. "What's wrong?"

"I love you. God, I love you so much, Damon Salvatore." I pull him back to me, but his kiss is half-distracted now.

"That's not anything to cry about. Not anymore, anyway," he murmurs, smoothing the teardrop away with his thumb.

I pull away and stand up. "Get dressed. I need to talk to you and Stefan."

His eyes go distant and it hurts like he punched me. I go back and kiss him again, even harder, crushing him against me. "Don't you ever listen to me?"

"Get dressed. Drama to ensue. Gotcha." His tone is the same, but the hurt has faded from his eyes. He believes me again, for now. I have the feeling it is going to take a long time to convince him of how much I really care, but I've got years yet. I hope.

I take the stairs two at a time and hurry to the hallway outside Stefan's room. He probably heard me come in, but I don't know if his hearing is good enough to know that I went to his brother's room first since it is in a separate wing. It can't be helped now.

"Stefan? Are you in there?"

He comes to the door, still buttoning his jeans. He's shirtless too, the rose tattoo on his shoulder rippling with the movement. His shoulders are bigger than they used to be. The human blood, probably. Gallons of it. My stomach twists a little and I hope he doesn't see it in my eyes.

"Can you come downstairs, please? I need to talk to you."

He nods, his green eyes concerned, with an intimacy that makes me remember that this bedroom is familiar to me, that it is the place where I used to spend my time in this house.

I head downstairs, still riding the wave of my certainty. I'll need all the conviction I can muster if I am going to convince these two of anything.

Stefan is there first, but Damon saunters in a moment later. He's barefoot and wearing a dark blue shirt, but hasn't bothered to button it. For once, I'm not distracted (much) by the sight of his chest.

"The plan is off," I say, pacing. "We can't do it. Klaus is too dangerous and there is no way I'm risking any of you on him. We'll run. Katherine's done it successfully for half a millennium. It has to be possible. We'll hide the coffins around the world for leverage and we'll go."

I don't want to admit it, but I was really counting on Elijah to kill Klaus. Or at least slow him down. Now, every outcome I imagine seems too risky, too dangerous. I don't have anything more to lose than I did last week, but it feels like I do.

Damon settles onto the couch and puts one foot up on the table, his arms stretched out on the back of the couch. With a bedhead that looks artfully touseled and dark, low-slung jeans, he looks like a Vanity Fair photographer posed him there. "Somebody had a Red Bull this morning to wash down her crazy pills. What are you talking about, Elena? Did you only now realize this was kinda risky?"

Stefan looks far more concerned. He can tell how serious I am, and I think he senses that I am not just willing to make sacrifices to do the right thing this time.

This time, I'm willing to do the wrong thing. I can be as cruel, as evil and Machiavellian as Klaus himself to stop this from happening. I'm willing to burn churches and kidnap orphans. This time, my will is going to prevail.

Stefan steps forward and his voice is given depth by the sorrow he wears like a lead cloak. "It's wrong, Elena. We can't just stand by, even if Klaus wouldn't kill us as soon as he got the chance. 'For God did not hold his angels back but sent them out to fight.'"

I don't know if he's quoting the Bible or something else, but I don't care.

"Preach it, Father Salvatore!" Damon crows. "I love it when he gets all holy. He was supposed to be a priest, you know? Perfect name and all." He leans forward and flares his eyes conspiratorially. "That turned out well."

I glare at him, distracted despite myself. "Damon, don't be cruel."

He smirks. "Actually, baby bro, you would have made a perfect Catholic priest. Guilt, check, stupidly rigid moral standards, also check. You don't like little boys, but I suppose that could also be a point in your favor."

I ignore him. "I'm not going to let you do it. You have no idea how destructive I can be if I want to."

Damon rolls his eyes. "Haven't we had this conversation already? We're nice, sturdy vampires. Good at killing things," he says with deliberate emphasis. "Tell her, Stef."

"Would you set him loose upon the world, Elena?" Stefan asks, crossing the room toward me and tilting his head with those eyes slicing at my selfish resolve. He probably doesn't know it, but those eyes make you want to be good.

"Would you, really? Save the ones you love at the expense of everyone else he will hurt if we let him live? With his own army of hybrids?"

"Ooh, good one," Damon agrees, nodding once at his brother. "What he said."

Stefan is on a different track from Damon, but one far more crafted to actually convince me. I feel a dull pain in my chest when I think that he knows me so well. I won't be able to be close to him again in the future, not the way I once was.

We used to talk about everything; about God and family and what life was all about. No matter how I spin it, I won't be able to keep him in my life in any comfortable way. I will never be able to lie on the spring grass beside him again and laugh. But I might be able to save his life. I fought hard for his sanity two nights ago and I'll fight just as hard for his life. Even if he has to hate me in the end.

"Yes, Stefan," I say. "I would."

"What, and leave Elijah here to have all the fun?" Damon complains. "Uh-uh, no way."

Tears leap into my eyes again and I round on him furiously. "You don't know him. He is not our sacrifice. He's not going to be anyone's sacrifice."

Damon throws up his hands. "Great. Saint Elena. I should have known better. Of course you would set the bait free before we caught a fish."

His eyes narrow and I turn away, annoyed.

Damon catches my arm and turns me back toward him. "Did he kiss you? Is that what this is about?"

"No." I tear my arm free. "He was a perfect gentleman."

"So you had an attack of conscience," Damon sighs, flopping back down on the couch and rubbing his eyes tiredly.

"No," I say coldly. "I had an attack of sanity. None of the three of you are going anywhere near Klaus."

"Elena," Stefan says patiently. "It has to be done. You know what he's capable of. Do you think he's really just going to walk away after what Damon and I have done to him? And you'll never be free of him as long as you live. Do you want to be his servant forever?" His jaw tightens. "Trust me, it isn't a pleasant position to be in."

"Does it, Stefan?" I ask him. "Does it really have to be done?"

I know they're never going to listen to me. If I want them to stay out of this, I am going to have to force them.

Suddenly I know how Damon feels when he goes off the deep end. I feel totally calm and utterly unhinged at the same time. I know how to stop this and I am capable of it, damn the consequences.

"You think you know so much, Stefan?" I ask him dangerously, moving closer.

"Well, how about this? I'm never going to be with you again because I'm in love with your brother!" By the end of the sentence, my voice is a howl. I scream it into his face and he jerks back, his eyes wide.

That gets Damon off the couch. He plucks me off the ground and swings me around behind him, away from Stefan.

"Wow, Gilbert, really?" he asks. "Are you out of your fucking mind? What, because the Ripper is going to be so useful?"

"No." Stefan's eyes clear and that almost hurts more. Because he knows me too well. By the time this is over, we are going to be even for Wickery Bridge in terms of deliberate cruelty.

"Damon, don't listen to anything she says today," he instructs, eyes narrowing. "She's trying to make me angry so I will take off and let Klaus have her. I don't know what she's going to say to you, but something."

"No, Stefan," I say, keeping my voice soft because I am a heartless, brilliant bitch and I know if I'm gentle, he'll believe me.

I try to step around Damon, but the most he'll allow is for me to look past him to Stefan. "It's true. I shouldn't have said it that way. I meant to tell you at the right time, but you deserve to know." The truth burns my throat like battery acid. I should crumple under the weight of my sins.

"I wanted to help you get off the blood, to find the life you deserve, because I love you. I care about you so much but I'm never going to be with you again and it isn't because of what you have done or anything that you are or aren't. It just is."

I put my hand on Damon's shoulder and Stefan twitches as if he's gotten an electric shock. I know he can see the connection between us. I know he can see the truth.

"Elena," Damon sing-songs between clenched teeth. "This is not going to make him less violent!"

Stefan takes one step forward and he looks closely at me. I can't move, so I have to watch his heart shatter. It is all pain and disappointment, and then it is like the moment when he came back to the boarding house after he fed on me. Everything that is Stefan disappears from his eyes.

His eyes move to Damon's for just a second and I think they might fight but then there's a breeze and Stefan is nowhere.

My hand goes to my stomach, my body curving forward, hunching against the pain that arrives like a blow.

"Wow." Damon says, half-admiringly. "That really takes the medal for plan ruining. And we've got some stiff competition for that award in these parts. C'mere," he says, opening his arms and pulling me absently against his chest, resting his chin on my head.

I move back after only a second, my nerves still jangling with urgency. I don't have time to think about what I've done, or to wonder why Damon isn't angry that I've messed up his plan. I need that silver dagger.

"Where are you going?" he asks as I take off toward the stairs. "Oh, wait, exactly how do you think-."

That's all the longer it takes for him to catch on.

"You're going to try and dagger Elijah, aren't you? Elena, don't be stupid," he groans. "That's never going to work. You don't even know where I hid the dagger."

"Weapons display in the second floor study?" I toss over my shoulder.

He catches me around the waist and for all my energy, I make zero headway in getting loose. "And then what? Nail me with a vervain syringe when I'm not looking? Please. I've seen that episode. Not happening."

I don't bother to argue with him until he waggles a syringe in front of my face. "Left your purse in my room," he says. Which means he figured out why I was here before he even came downstairs.

I don't care. I'll just get another one.

"Elena, you kind of know we can't release Klaus, right? Stefan was right."

"I know that. I don't care, Damon," I tell him sharply. "I've had enough of sacrificing good people to the cause of stopping evil. Screw evil. It can keep being evil without us."

"Um, in point of fact it can't, Elena. You're kind of the mommy hybrid, much as I hate to say it."

"Even if we forget that Klaus will never stop trying to kill Stefan and me after this, or the fact that he wants to use you, um, forever, he's really a dick, Elena. The kind of dick who could put Stalin to shame if he felt like it."

A buzzing noise interrupts Damon and he answers the phone.

"Jerry Springer Show."

I try to yank free again and get nowhere.

"No, Elijah, it's a joke about a television show. Nope, not important." He listens for a second.

"You are correct. She is off the reservation and may have already triggered a multiple state killing spree. I figure by afternoon we should be all the way up to worldwide crisis of some kind," he says cheerfully. "Yeah, unfortunately, she's usually like this. Risk-averse and all that. Women."

I consider biting him.

"Uh-huh. Right. I will let her know. Nope, but thanks for the offer. Don't want to babysit, do you?" Damon chuckles humorlessly, losing some of his good spirits. "Actually, never mind. Think I've got another idea."

He hangs up. "If I let you go are you gonna get all crazy?"

I don't answer. He lets me go anyway, which is annoying because we both know he could catch me again with no trouble.

I glare at him. He smiles unrepentantly.

"Elijah says hi. Says he thinks you might do something nuts to try to derail the plan, and to tell you he's gonna rip Klaus's heart out no matter what you do," Damon recites like a kid with a boring lesson. "I think there were a few more pleases and thank you's in there, though. He's such a stuffed shirt."

There's a blur and his head wrenches with a terrible crack.

"Damon?" I say, reaching for him.

A second later, I hit the floor under his weight as he falls dead in my arms.

Author's Note: I know you won't believe this, but this hurts me as much as it hurts you: I'm leaving town again, on a river trip, so no internet access. It's going to be about a week before I can post again, so hit the button to follow story/author, because you don't want to miss the end to this story. It is brutal and beautiful. There's vicious fighting, including Elena kicking some ass, multiple character deaths, sweet Delena, steamy Delena, and some brotherly bonding, appealingly-dysfunctional-Salvatore-style.

In the meantime, check out my other story: Sanguine Veritas, which is a spin-off of the blood sharing scene in 04x02 Memorial, and is intense enough to hold you over for a week at least. If I'm wrong, and you still need more reading material, try my brand-new novel on Amazon. "Becoming Katelyn" by Michelle Hazen.