AN: Let me start off by saying thank you to everyone who read and reviewed the last chapter. I'm glad most of you are still following along even if I lost a few followers. Yay for updating two weeks in a row! I really want to make sure to be consistent with my updates again and provide you with a story you love. This chapter contains a lot of tension and a major cliffhanger. Enjoy!


CHAPTER 29.

The loud riff of a guitar solo from his stereo system filled his apartment. Damon bopped his head along with the beat as he clicked through his work emails deleting them one by one. What Elena had said about having an expiration date had been morbid, but eye opening. As the hands of the clock ticked away, he had finally began to sort out his priorities and work was no longer one of them. Seeing his absence for health reasons had already left him unemployed for a brief time, he didn't see why he needed to go back at all. The thought of sitting behind a desk eight hours or more a day didn't sound ideal when time was of the essence. All he wanted was to be with her. His decision to quit was the smartest move he could make considering everything, and so his voluntary termination had been made that morning. Freedom was being welcomed with open arms.

As Damon's fingers tapped the keyboard with excitement, his eyes landed on the silver band around his finger. He smiled and shook his head. Not messing around with the idea within twenty-four hours of his proposal him and Elena were husband and wife.

Intimate, quiet, and about fifty miles away from the city just the two of them stood before a minister, who preached his words and they promised their vows. "I do." Damon spoke those two words proudly. Elena beamed the biggest smile she could wear and responded to the minister's martial question in a loud voice, "I do". Her hands squeezed his impatiently waiting for the words they both wanted to hear. "I know pronounce you husband and wife." He circled his arms around her and held her close as he sealed the deal with a longing kiss. While he wore a black suit, Elena wore a non-traditional beautiful white dress. It wasn't the typical wedding they had imagined, but it meant more to them than any fancy, pre-planned extravaganza. All they needed was each other and now by law they were legally binded to one another as well. It wasn't easy though, considering by record Elena had deceased. No one knew of her return, but him. They were still working out the kinks of it all. Sooner or later the truth would be known and how they would explain it would be harder to tell than her actually being alive.

In the next room over, he heard the shower running. He felt bad keeping Elena cooped up in his apartment while they figured things out, but the time they spent together didn't go wasted. As much as he missed her, he missed her in the physical way too. Never would he find someone like her who knew every inch of his body and vice versa. She was the only girl he wanted to make love with and to fuck the shit out of morning, day, and night. The thought of anyone else just didn't seem right.

"Damon!" His name being called with heated anger behind it caused him to jump in his seat at his desk. "Where the hell are you?"

Fuck. It was Alaric and he didn't sound like he was alone. A high pitched, judgemental voice followed the shouting, while a calming, yet worried voice tried to hush the two. Stefan and Caroline had clearly tagged along for the ride. Double fuck! He had to think quick and act fast. Deep down he knew the reason for their intrusion. No communication had been made since the night he ran off to make his deal with the devil. He had tricked Caroline and Stefan into a date night and then led them on to believe that Ric was coming over to keep an eye on him. His betrayal would not sit well once they figured out that they had been played and judging by the stomping feet and roaring voices they were aware. But what was he supposed to do, tell them about his master plan? Tell them he was running off into the night to bring back Elena? No, it wasn't smart and so that's why he lied. It was his only option to finally have the freedom he needed to make his getaway. Honestly, he was shocked they had gone this long without knocking down his door, however he had cut ties with any form of communication. His interests were preoccupied with the woman he loved dearly.

Caught in the middle of a messy situation, one he was not prepared to discuss or explain, Damon rose from his desk and walked out into the living room of his apartment. Three pairs of blazing gazes locked on him and he prayed Elena would stay put. This was not the time nor place to reveal their secret.

"You lying bastard!" Caroline shouted. Stefan gripped her arm to halt her from moving toward him and probably preventing her from striking him. She had nasty habit of doing so.

"I guess this is the part where you come to give me an intervention." Damon sneered and smirked.

"Knock it off Damon." Stefan replied. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Probably drowning himself in the best whiskey this town has to offer." The cruelty in her voice made him crack his knuckles. Caroline was always jumping to conclusions with him. She never gave him the benefit of the doubt, but in this case, he deserved whatever accusations they had about him. They had every right to believe he had sinned considering his lies. "Isn't that right?"

Damon crossed his arms in front of him. "Clearly you're mad at me." He stated.

"Oh, mad doesn't even describe what I'm feeling right now." Caroline gritted through her teeth.

"Caroline, please. Let me deal with him." Alaric piped up. "So, where have you been?"

"In my office." He replied.

"Cut the crap. Where have you been?" His tone lowered and he knew he meant business. "You're not answering your phone. I checked the apartment yesterday, you were gone. You sent Stefan and Caroline on a date night and told them that I would be watching you. And we all know now that was a lie, so please fill us in on what you've been up to?"

What explanation could he give? He had fooled the three of them for at least a day. On a routine schedule, they rotated their shifts. He fucking hated the idea of being babysat even if he deserved it due to his lack of control. Damon scanned each one of them over knowing that beyond their angered exterior was only some sort of love and care for him. Not many people like him had the support system that he had and honestly he was thankful for that, but right now he wished he could pull the wool over their eyes just for a little bit longer.

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe I needed some room to breathe?" He suggested.

"What?" Their confusion echoed.

Dropping his arms down to his side, he sighed. "You all have been smothering me. Can't a guy get some fucking alone time?!" He shouted. "I get it that I fucked up on the whole sobriety thing, but I'm working on it and personally, I think I'm doing a pretty damn good job of it."

"So you swear you haven't drank?" Alaric asked.

"Clean as a fucking whistle." He responded.

"Unless you're lying about that too." Caroline spoke. Her gaze could burn a whole in him. "It seems you're pretty good at that lately."

"Apparently, I'm good at everything you hate." Damon yelled.

Taking a step forward, Alaric held up his hands to end their bickering. Just when he thought Caroline was getting on his good side, the bitch came back out to play. How in the world Elena was ever friends with her he would never know? The sound of the shower had stopped and he was glad no one else had noticed the running water. He listened keenly for her movement, but none could be heard. Was she listening to them? Was she finding a way to hide? The thought of her hearing all of this hurt him and he wished she didn't have to.

"So what were you doing during this alone time?" Alaric fished for answers.

"Pondering life. Watching bad re-runs of the Golden Girls." He mocked him. "I don't know! Just getting the fuck away from everyone. I drove around, cleared my head, actually fucking took some time to think for once without you guys hounding me every minute about what I'm doing."

"Why didn't you just say you need this?" He asked.

"Like you actually would let me be by myself."

It was true. If he actually admitted to wanting alone time, would they have granted him that? Sure they would have, but with a catch. There was no chance in hell they'd let him roam around unsupervised. In their minds, they assumed alone time meant finding the farthest bar from here and getting trashed. Just having this conversation made him want a drink, but he scolded himself internally from having such a thought. He was a fool for what he did. The mistake he made for letting that poison touch his lips again would sit with him for the rest of his life. But he found hope, he found his will to fight the urges. He was clean and yet, they viewed him like the rotted piece of shit that he once was before, and he hated that he couldn't convince them otherwise.

"Damon, I need you to be honest with me." Alaric demanded.

"I am." He confessed.

"Damon, we all just want you to be okay." Stefan added.

He flickered his gaze over to his brother. "I am." The words were spoken with a bitter taste in his mouth. "What I'm not okay with is being treated like a child. I swear on Elena's grave..." Damon paused feeling his stomach drop hard. He couldn't believe what he had just said. His heart shrunk knowing she probably heard it too. "That when I tell you that I haven't drank, it's the honest to God truth."

"I wish you could have least told us what you were up to." Alaric sighed. "Instead you had us all worried."

"I'm sorry I lied to you guys." Damon apologized.

Caroline huffed and took a seat on the couch. The tension in the room had shifted back to a normal amount. It seemed he had got through to them and finally he felt like he could breathe again. He knew they were all wary of his suspicious behavior, but what he admitted to sounded reasonable. He did want alone time just the kind that involved his undead fiancé, now turned wife.

As Stefan ran his hand through his hair and Alaric rubbed his chin, both contemplating on what to do with him, Caroline leaned forward and picked up something from beneath the couch. "Why is one of Elena's shirts under here?" She asked.

Fuck! He swore he heard Elena's heart stop from wherever she was out of sight. Dangling off her finger, Caroline examined the shirt and eyed Damon looking rather confused, but slowly creating some assumption in her tiny head. How was he going to explain this one? The presence of her shirt under the couch had been placed out of heated passion. It wasn't like he knew they were coming over, if he had he would have disposed of any signs of her. Now he was caught red handed in an explanation he didn't know how to answer. When she died, he had not touched anything of hers. He had left it exactly the way it had been the night before she died. The panic now inside him told him he had to come up with another blatant lie.

"It's probably been under since before died." Damon winced at his last word. "I didn't even know that was under there."

"No. I've been here plenty of times since then and I would have noticed her shirt under there." Caroline argued.

"You know it is possible for you not to be right about everything." He snapped. "Maybe you missed it because you were too busy playing sex eyes with my brother."

Her eyes grew darker and she glared at him with hatred. Stefan locked his jaw and snatched the shirt from Caroline. "Maybe it's time to start going through her things, Damon." He suggested. "You know at some point you can't just keep it all..."

What he suggested he could not believe or listen to. Was Stefan actually offering the idea of him getting rid of her stuff? Even if Elena wasn't just beyond the walls of his apartment right now, in no way was he ready for such a big step like that. It was all he had left of her. He wanted to punch him, pummel him to the ground for saying such a thing. But he was stopped from doing so as Caroline jumped from the couch staring at him with disgust.

"Oh my God!" She shouted.

"What?" He rolled his eyes.

"I know why you wanted to get rid of us that night." Caroline claimed. "You're seeing someone."

"What!" Damon exclaimed.

"The shirt. That's not Elena's, it's someone else's." She took it from Stefan. All of them appeared to be shocked at her revelation and listened as she rambled on. "I knew it! You were lying about being alone. You were fucking some girl and you didn't want us to know. It makes perfect sense."

While her accusation was wrong, he was impressed, yet disgusted with the thought. He wasn't sure if Caroline was more dumb struck or appalled by what she had discovered. She shook her head and looked pleased knowing she had been right about him all along. Little did she know, she was once again wrong, but he wasn't about to give himself that satisfaction. He thought maybe he could play around with the idea of him seeing someone behind their backs, but he couldn't do that to Elena, not with her probably listening. It pained him too much to talk about a hypothetical girl who he was screwing on the side after her death. It was not something he would do either knowing how much he loved her.

"I'm not seeing anyone." He confirmed. Caroline still didn't seem convinced.

"Then why is there a shirt under your couch?" She waved it in the air.

"I don't know." Damon shrugged his shoulders. "Can you please just give me that though."

"Why? So you can return it to this mystery girl." Caroline said cocking her head to the side. "I know we all deal with our grief differently, but you've got a sick way of showing it. Elena only just died and here you are drinking and going back to your old ways of being a player. Did you ever really love her?"

All he saw was red. For the first time in his life, he wanted to hit a girl. How dare she accuse him of never loving her! She knew how much he cared and loved for her. For Christ sake, he drank under pressure because losing her was that hard for him. Elena was his everything and more, she knew that. Damon tried his best not to lunge across the room and hit her because right now the pleasure of doing so would be so gratifying.

"Fuck you!" He shouted. "I know you've never liked me and all, but my feelings for her have never changed."

"Then why is there a shirt under your couch.?" Caroline asked again. "Huh? Tell me because from what I see here, you're already moving on."

"Just shut the fuck up." Damon stepped toward her.

"Hey!" Stefan cut in. "Enough of it, the both of you. If Damon did have a girl over here that really is none of our business." Finally, someone was making sense and it was his damn brother.

"Thank you."

Caroline threw the shirt at him. "But you did." She looked around the apartment. "And she's here right now, isn't she?"

"What?" He froze holding Elena's shirt.

"You're hiding her from us. I heard the shower running earlier and didn't think anything of it." She said sounding so proud of her Nanch Drew like observations. "And now it's stopped. You have your little whore here. Where is she?"

"Caroline stop!" Damon urged as she stomped toward him in the same direction of his bedroom.

"Does she know that you just lost someone? Does she know how much of an asshole you are or does she know and not care?" Caroline ran her mouth. She was in reaching distance and he forced himself to not lash out of her in the physical way.

His hands reached out for her shoulders as moved further into his apartment and toward the bedroom. He had to restrain her. "You're fucking crazy." Damon said to her. She tried to push him off as Stefan ran up behind her.

"Let's see the whore you've doing." She hissed.

"Enough!" This time it was neither any of them who shouted. His chest shook as he saw all of their jaws drop and their eyes grow big with disbelief. It was like someone had flipped a switch and they all froze, stunned by the voice who said it. This was not how it was supposed to happen, any of this. They were not supposed to find out under such madness, but they had. Damon took in a deep breath before he looked over his shoulder. In the door way with wet hair and nothing but a robe on Elena stood.