Message from the author: Thank you for being patient as I continue this fic. I'm not even halfway through this story, but I'll be better about updating on the weekends, even if it's a short chapter. Thank you for all the reviews and messages of support.

Chapter 14

"Elena," he yells, pressing on the gas. "What the fuck is going on?"

I slide down the seat and lower my head so no one outside the car can see me. "Nothing."

Damon swears, his eyes flicking to my crouched position. "Clearly."

"Just drive, Damon."

"My fingers still smell like your pussy, so don't tell me to just drive."

"Dick!" I blurt out. "Enjoy the smell while it lasts cause it's never happening again."

I cringe at how dirty my words sound but Damon's dark chuckle eases my embarrassment. He turns his head and lazily gazes my bare legs still dripping rainwater on the floor mat. "You're squirming says otherwise."

"Turn right, right here," I order, ignoring his comment and peering out the rearview mirror to see if the Mercedes is following us. I no longer see it.

He makes a sharp left.

"What are you doing?"

"Losing the Benz," he mutters.

He knows.

His speed picks up and when I look out my mirror, I see the Mercedes back behind us. I scream as Damon swerves into oncoming traffic to pass a sedan that was going too slow. "Oh, my God. You're going to kill us."

"Tell me what's going on," Damon orders.

I cling to the door handles and brace my feet against the floor mat. "Nothing!"

"Clearly." The Mercedes is back on our tail following us closely. Too closely. "You're really going to tell me nothing is going on?"

I ruined the moment we briefly shared in the rain, but so did he. We're back to where we were except neither of us know how to navigate. He may be driving but he has some nerve demanding answers. "I don't know, are you going to take me to a strip club, get me drunk, and film me?"

Damon scowls. By the way, his eyes are narrowed and the way he's gripping the steering wheel, he's pissed. Instead of throwing me a snide remark, he takes his aggression out on the road. He swerves in and out of traffic, making illegal left-hand turns, attempting to get away from the Benz which is still able to follow closely behind. We come to almost a stop behind an eighteen-wheeler carrying lumber. "Damon, don't even think about it."

"Tell me what's going on."

The moment my face sets in a scowl, he swerves back into oncoming traffic and going over a hundred, speeds down the wrong lane. I scream when a car crashes swerving away from us. He's crazy. One minute he's kissing me in the rain and the next he's trying to kill me. "Tell me, Elena."

My lips remain firmly pressed in a line. Damon bares his teeth in a growl and swerves off the street to avoid another car before straightening and going back into the wrong lane of traffic. We're parallel with another truck and the lights of a big rig shine before us. I look at him but he looks crazed and resolute. Stubborn motherfucker! "A drug lord is after me," I finally blurt out.

Damon swerves back into the right lane, we've long lost the black Mercedes. He doesn't say anything, but his knuckles are white and his face is set. We're outside of town, driving past plots of land with cows grazing. Damon shuts off his lights and turns right down a side road and continues to drive. We both glance behind us to make sure we're not being followed. The rain stopped, and the sky has started to clear up. Patches of stars illuminate the vast land around us. "Where are we going?"

He pulls over off a deserted road and inside his jacket pocket, he takes out a flask. I snatch it from his hands before he can take a sip and, unscrewing the top, knock it back. The liquid burns down my throat. Fuck. "Explain," he demands.

"Did you know the entire time that I was telling the truth?" I ask. I need to know before I say anything. He evaded the question earlier but it's still on my mind. "I need the truth. After the party when you were going over the footage, did you see Noah's assault?"

Damon sighs heavily, takes the flask out of my hands and takes a long gulp. "No," he finally says.

His face is cloaked in darkness, but I know Damon. If he knew, he wouldn't have let things go this far. No matter how much he hates me, he wouldn't have let someone get away with sexual assault. "The Gilberts owe Domenico Moretti a debt that I'm supposed to pay. He wants me to sell for him."

Damon curses. "Where's your mom?"

I shrug, taking the flask back. "She's not my mom," I remind him.

Damon turns toward me, his face knit in confusion. "What did she say to you?"

It doesn't matter and I'd rather not explain. "I need to see my d-," I pause and shake my head. "I need to see Grayson."

Damon shakes his head. "You're not seeing your dad."

"You think just because you made me cum that I'm going to let you order me around?"

"Do you really want to see your dad in jail alone?" He counters.

"Do you really think you can stop me?"

"No," he replies. "I know I can stop you."

After everything I put him through years ago, I can't involve him again. The Gilberts have put the Salvatores through enough. No matter what my mom said, Jeremy was still my brother and he wouldn't like me involving Stefan's brother. "You can take me to the Mystic Motel."

Damon stuffs the flask back in his jacket and starts the car. He looks disappointed and I try to not let it get to me. I know what he wanted me to say. I know the destination he wanted me to utter. We had a shared past with shared mistakes but we didn't have a future. I was leaving Mystic Falls and Damon, well… Damon was Damon. He'd probably go to school in New York and then work for his father's company. Too much has happened between us that I don't think either of us will ever overcome. There are feelings there, I won't deny that but one of us would always sabotage it- it's how we function.

I look out the rearview mirror, checking to see if we're being followed but the roads Damon takes are ones only one who grew up here would know. I shiver, my clothes still wet from being outside. Damon cranks up the heat and reaching behind his seat while steering, hands me his leather jacket. "Take off your sweatshirt and put this on," he orders.

I scoff. "No."

"You're freezing and the only way you're going to get warm is if you take off your wet clothes and put this on." I remain unmoved. "You have two choices, Elena. You can do as I say or I can pull this car over and do it myself. I have to admit that I hope you choose to continue to be a stubborn pain in my ass."

I have no doubt Damon would follow through with that threat. "Keep your eyes on the road."

He smirks but keeps his eyes on the road while I take off my sweatshirt and tee and wrap myself in his jacket, zipping it all the way up.

"I never took you for someone who'd own a pink bra."

I punch him in the shoulder. "Asshole!"

He just laughs and continues to drive. I turn my body toward the passenger side window and snuggling into the warmth of his jacket, inhale the warm leather. I let the hum of the car lull me to rest my eyes. By the time I open them again, we're in front of the Salvatore mansion. I straighten up. "Why are we here?"

"You're not staying in some motel."

"I'm not staying with you!"

"A drug lord is after you and you have a cross country meet tomorrow morning. We'll figure out what to do next after your meet."

"There is no 'we' in this situation," I argue, folding my arms. "I'm not leaving this car until you drop me off at the motel."

Damon runs his fingers through his hair and nods like he's decided something. He gets out of the car and walks around it to my side. "No, no, no!" I yell.

He opens the door, leans over and unclips the seatbelt. I try to move to the other side but he grasps me by the waist and tugs me out of the car, flipping me over his shoulder in a fireman's hold. "Damon!" I screech, slapping his back. "Let me down."

He ignores me and like I weigh nothing, holds onto me while grabbing my bag from the back seat. Damon grunts in pain when I hit a blow to his ribcage. Good. He's acting like a caveman. Somehow he recovers, walks me through the front door, down the hall, and to his room. He flips me over and I land with a soft thud on his bed. Ignoring my protests, he strides to his bathroom and runs a bath. "I'm going to make you something to eat. There are fresh towels on the rack and you can borrow any of my clothes if you don't have something in that little bag of yours."

He gives me one last long look, taking in his zipped up leather jacket and my jean shorts, before shutting the door behind him. I look out his window, knowing I can hop out and leave in his car but I think that he wants that. I think that's why he put me in his room because he wanted to give me the option to leave. I could go to a motel and I am tempted to, but I can smell Damon's body wash coming from the steam in his bathroom and I am so tired. I strip out of his jacket and walk to the bathroom to run my fingers under the hot water. When it's high enough, I shut it off and after taking my wet clothes off, get in.

I can't relax under the scalding hot water, even though I try to. I really want to go for a long run because my brain is firing on all cylinders. I can't digest a tenth of the information I took in today. It makes sense really, the fact that Miranda and Grayson Gilbert aren't my parents. Well, Grayson might be but thinking back on my childhood, he wasn't really emotionally present. If we spent time together, I was always the one to bring it up. He gave me gifts, the bracelet and the earrings, but the important things- classroom presentations or birthdays, it was like he always kept me at arm's length. He was so different with Jeremy. Going to his room to give him a hug before bed or taking him to get ice cream every Friday. I always thought it was because Jeremy was younger and so easy to love. Now I know that it's probably because I was never really his.

I hear a light knock on the door. "Are you okay?"

I duck under the water and pop my head back out. "Yeah," I mutter, wiping water from my face.

There's the sound of a body sliding against the door and a thump. "I don't believe you."

Of course, he doesn't.

"Jeremy used to draw you," he says from the floor on the other side of the door. "I'd catch him looking at you while he was sketching and whenever I looked over at his pad, it was always a hairy monster with your eyes and lips."

I chuckle. That sounds about right. Jer hated it when I was on babysitting duty. We fought a lot but he always came to me when he had a problem or was hungry. He was always hungry. "When mo- Miranda and Grayson would fight, he'd sneak in my bedroom. It got so bad that he started keeping his headphones and iPad in my room."

"What was the funeral like?" Damon asks, because I know he's wondered and I know he would've come if he wasn't in rehab.

"We didn't have one," I reply. We never told anyone, though sometimes I pretended we did- even if it just took place in my mind. We lied and said it was a private affair and maybe I lied to myself, but the fact is we never gathered together to memorialize Jer. "Dad or Grayson or whoever he is was arrested shortly after Jer died and Miranda was trying to figure out her next step. He's buried next to Stefan, though."

"You never got to say goodbye?"

"Neither did you, thanks to me," I reply.

It's quiet for a moment and I wonder if Damon's left until I hear the unmistakable sound of a bottle being opened. "Are we always meant to be in pain?"

"Yeah," I mutter, without hesitation or conviction. It seems like that's how things are supposed to be with us. We both suffer. We both hurt. We both are alone- always alone.

I hear him get up. "Dinner's ready when you are," he says before I hear his bedroom door shut.

I meet Damon in the kitchen wearing sleep shorts and a white camisole with a hoodie zipped up the front. He places a kinda burnt grilled cheese on the counter with sliced apples, which makes me smile. It's officially, we haven't matured since the last time we ate dinner together. I take a bite out of the corner of the sandwich and groan. His grilled cheese, scorch marks and all, is better than mine, though I'd never tell him that.

He takes bite out of the other half of the sandwich. "Are you going to give me any details on the person that you were running from tonight?"

I cast him a look. "I already told you about it."

"You said a drug lord wants you to sell for him. I need more details."

I throw the sandwich on the plate and wipe my hands on a napkin before hopping off the barstool to open the fridge door. "You know as much as I want you to know."

I take a Corona out of the fridge and pop the cap off on the edge of the counter, but Damon clasps his hands over mine and takes the drink away from me. "You have a meet tomorrow, you don't want to be hungover or dehydrated, do you?"

I yank it back out of his hands. He's awfully obsessed with this meet. "You didn't care last time I went to a meet hungover."

I didn't do well during that meet and he had to know. He takes it back out of my hands. "I'll make you a deal," he says, bringing the Corona to his lips. "You tell me about the guy that's after you and I'll tell you about what happened after the trial."

What happened after the trial? I haven't looked at my phone since, and I wonder if anyone tried to contact me. Damon takes a glass from one of the oak cabinets and fills it with ice water. He places it before my plate, waiting for me to decide what to do. Curiosity gets the better of me so I sit down and take another bite of the grilled cheese. "My dad and mom sold for Dominico Moretti. My mom borrowed a lot of money from him and then skipped town. A week ago he confronted me and told me that the debt they owed is now mine- oh, and he bought the house I was living in for the next six months. Dom thinks I'm popular and will be able to sell to all my friends. Today was the deadline, which is why he had people watching me and ready to hand over product."

"Dom?" Damon repeats, full of skepticism.

I take another bite of the grilled cheese and shrug. "He's actually pretty nice. We had a somewhat normal conversation this morning."

Damon casts me a weary look and finishes the beer in one gulp. I don't know how he's still standing. "How much do your parents owe?"

"Didn't say- just said that I have to work for him for the next six months and then we're square."

"So he says," Damon mutters.

I nod. "Which is why I left."

Damon leans against the counter and rubs his face with both of his hands. "The Moretti family doesn't forget, Elena."

"I figured that. I'm just trying to buy time and figure out what to do next." Does he think that I don't antagonize over this day in and day out? Even if I left Mystic Falls, the Moretti family's reach is far enough that I know I could never escape them. I need to change the subject. "What happened after the trial?"

Damon shakes his head, his blue eyes pierce me with remorse. "Noah was kicked off the football team."

"Seriously?"

"For a month."

I throw the grilled cheese I was eating back on the plate, suddenly feeling nauseous. They had a total of one game in November that he'd miss because of the holiday. Playoff games were in December and if we were invited to a bowl game, the season should continue into January.

"And this won't go on his record," he finishes.

"How did that happen?"

"Family lawyer deemed the video footage as not reliable proof- they said it had been doctored."

I knew it wasn't. Damon knew it wasn't. "So nothing good came out of all of this."

Damon smirks. "A lot of good came out of this."

"Like what?"

"He was exposed as a liar and everyone knows you've been telling the truth the entire time," he replies.

I'm silent for a moment pondering Damon's side in everything. He had a lot to gain out of this. The Prince of Darkness lost control of his kingdom momentarily and now is back on top. I look at Damon as he eats the grilled cheese sandwich while checking his phone. Chase, Noah, and all the guys have been meeting without him and Damon must know if he has cameras everywhere. Was this his way of reminding them who's on top? They have to know Damon's responsible for the video.

I hop off the barstool and leave the kitchen to find my phone. I need to see what people are saying. My backpack is in Damon's room next to his bed. I open it up and take my phone out of a pocket. The moment I turn it on, it lights up with hundreds of notifications. Some are good, people I don't know congratulating me on winning the case. Thanking me for taking down Noah. However, most are bad.

Kill yourself.

You lying bitch, tell the truth.

That video was doctored and you know it. Come clean so we can get our star back.

You're not welcome here.

Leave town.

Do MF a favor and OD like your brother

See you at the Dancing Pony

U like saggy balls

None of the messages is a surprise, the saggy balls comment threw me until I remembered the accusations that I slept with Giuseppe Salvatore. A shudder runs through me. "You look like you're going to be sick," Damon comments from the doorway.

"Do you know why Luciana said that she'd seen me with your dad?"

Damon shrugs. "She was probably paid off by Noah's family."

"The information was too detailed for her to just make it up."

"Are you saying you slept with my father?" Damon grimaces.

I sigh heavily. He and everyone else knows I'm a virgin, though I guess they don't have to believe me. Actually, it's more likely that no one believes me. Damon could be one of the many. I need to see my dad and get some answers. I look up visiting hours for the state penitentiary. Saturday morning until noon. I look up the bus schedule and see that I'd have to take the one scheduled to leave at five, meaning I wouldn't be able to make my meet. Honestly, I don't care about running or college right now, this is at the forefront of my mind. Damon will never let me leave, so I have to get creative.

I pick up my backpack. "I'm not sleeping in your room."

For about a second, Damon looks offended but quickly recovers. "There are about ten other rooms, go find one then."

I slip under his arm. "Maybe I'll stay in Giuseppe's room. It'll bring back fond memories."

Damon grabs my wrist and pulls me to him. His eyes fall on my lips and then slowly makes it to my eyes. His gaze is angry and heated and it's clear that with one comment, I seriously pissed him off. "Not funny, Elena."

I cock my head to the side. "Says the funny man who's tortured me on several occasions. I don't forgive easily, you should remember that."

I yank my hand free from his grasp and make my way to a downstairs guest room, on the opposite side of the house. I hear Damon's footsteps follow me, but I'm quicker. I dart through the entertainment room and swing a right for the east wing of the mansion. I find the closest guest room, shut the door and lock it. I turn off the lights and wait for Damon to leave. He bangs on the door and insists I open it, but I don't speak. Instead, I turn on the television and blast the latest episode of Real Housewives of wherever knowing he'd leave quicker the longer I watched- even though I wasn't watching.

I change into a pair of jeans and a tee and throw a black sweatshirt over my top. I pull up the hoodie and climb through the window before Damon figures out what I'm up to. With my backpack slung over my shoulders, I sprint across the front lawn of the Salvatore mansion and keep running until I'm a safe distance away. It's late at night and I figure I can sleep on the bus. I have about twenty minutes before Damon realizes I ditched him.

When I'm far enough away, I pull up the Uber app and request a ride. Since the Salvatore mansion is so far out of town, it takes a while for my ride to arrive. The lights of the mansion are a block away but I keep my eyes peeled for Damon's car. My stomach does a nervous flip flop. He's been nice and he's trying and I'm being my usual stubborn self. I can defend my actions, he hasn't exactly been forthcoming with information, but he was more open tonight and now I'm blowing it. I just know he would try to prevent me from seeing my dad or he'd want to go with me and I don't want to deal with that right now.

Uber arrives and takes me to a bus station forty-five minutes away and from there I buy a ticket to Huntsville, a small town next to the penitentiary where I'll have to transfer to another bus to the prison. Even though I'm sitting and waiting for the bus to arrive, I scan the crowd of passengers. A man in a fedora looks suspicious but so does the middle-aged man in a baseball cap. I know I'm being paranoid, there's no way Moretti tracked me from the road to Damon's to this bus station, especially since I didn't see anyone following me from the Uber. But the tingling sensation that creeps up my spine doesn't go away until I decide to unlock my phone and scroll through social media. Even though I don't have a real account, I still have the one I used to get information from the trial.

The moment I turn on my phone, notification after notification piles in and most are from Damon. I click to listen to the voicemail before looking at the twenty-seven text messages he sent. "Elena? Open the fucking door," he heaves a sigh, and I hear him knocking. "I will kick down this door. Pick up your phone." Damon bangs on the door more and then I hear the unmistakable sound of splintering wood. The television I left one sounds louder as I assume Damon walks further in the room. He curses and the phone drops.

Where are you?

I can't believe you left.

Get. Back. Here.

Are you serious? Someone is after you.

You have a meet tomorrow morning.

Do you have any regard for your own life?

When I find you, you won't be leaving again without armed security.

His text messages are a flurry of threats of what will happen if I don't return right away, cementing the fact that I'll never go back. He's determined to find me, but he won't look for me here. At least, I don't think he will. I scan the waiting area again but don't see anyone suspicious or anyone that looks like Damon, although Damon wouldn't hide- he'd have no problem flipping me over his shoulder and carrying me out. The man in the Yankees cap looks my direction but I think that's just because I've been glaring at everyone for the past forty-five minutes.

The call for the bus blares over the loudspeakers, so I line up with everyone else and find a spot towards the back of the bus. I put on my earbuds on and sit back, listening to Houses, A Quiet Darkness. The adrenaline from leaving continues to pump through me. The sensible part of me should go back and stay with Damon. I should wake up and go to my meet and pretend that the last twenty-four hours didn't happen- but I can't. Grayson Gilbert has answers to questions I've been asking myself on repeat since Miranda talked to me. Running a stupid meet? Working on college application essays? Planning a future? So fucking stupid to think about or even consider. This is all some sort of cosmic punishment for the past five years.

I wake with a start when the bus driver announces the arrival to Huntsville. I wait for everyone to depart the bus before I get up but when I do, the guy in the baseball cap follows me. He must've been sitting directly behind me. I try to act casual as I walk off the bus and in the opposite direction I intend to go. I spin around and check my surroundings, but I don't see him among the rows of busses arriving and departing the station.

No one is following me.

No one is following me.

There's no way Moretti knows where I am.

We lost him.

Damon and I lost him in the Camaro.

These thoughts bounce around in my head, a rationalization that what I'm doing is right. I need to talk to the man that called me daughter and nothing is going to get in the way of that, not even my own paranoia.

Huntsville is small, so Uber doesn't work here. The prison isn't far, and I'm a little early for visitation, so I decide to walk. With my backpack over my shoulders, I walk along the highway to see the one person I've tried to avoid since my brother died to get answers that I don't know if I want to hear. The sun rises over the horizon streaking the sky with brilliant pinks and purples. Today, I have decided, is going to royally suck.