An AU/AH fic that came from me watching one too many episodes of Law and Order. Rated M for some mature content, deaths and dark atmosphere (I guess). In this story you will meet a TON of TVD characters some more minor than others, all placed in random parts of the story (but still relatively important nonetheless)
It was sort of a random decision I made a couple of weeks ago to write this, and while working on One Hundred Years and Even in Death (oh and the thousand of other fics I have going on in my brain) I had to get this one on paper. I will be updating regularly (probably once a week, maybe every week and a half depending on how I progress with the others) but please be patient I am not starting this just to abandon it!
I still do not own The Vampire Diaries or it's characters (personally, I would settle for just the characters, but I digress) I also do not own the band Of Monsters and Men, which is where the title to this story came from because I was lacking in originality, and it seemed horrifyingly fitting. (And I don't know how it happened, but somehow this story became marked Elijah/Caroline...completely unintentional! This is an EE fic lol so it's fixed now!)
Chapter One
Drip, Drop, Drip, Drop
Rain pattered against the window, like the sounds of horses hooves clacking onto the cobblestone path through Central Park, but it was ten at night so the horse drawn carriages were gone for the day.
"Already leaving Elena?"
The woman pulled her jeans on quickly a she turned back to the man in his bed, as she never took anyone home to her place.
"Yeah Damon, it's late and I have to take Koga out since Jer isn't around." She replied quickly and by the look over Damon's ice blue eyes, too quickly.
"You can stay the night you know, it is raining…kind of hard. I'm sure the mutt will be fine." He made a reach for her hand, but Elena stepped away, tying her long pin straight brown hair into a pony tail.
The truth was, Elena didn't want to spend the night, it was a bit too "relationship-like" for her, and when two NYPD detectives (who were also partners) bed together, things could only get more complicated. She didn't need any bumps in the road when her career was a straight path ahead of her.
"A little rain never hurt anyone, besides, we have work in the morning, or did you forget?" She already had her boots on and was pulling her coat over her body when thunder crashed from above.
"Of course I didn't forget, but I'm surprised you didn't. Isn't that the only reason you slept with me anyway? You want to forget about work?"
Rustling around under the sheets, Damon sat up, the burgundy cloth still wrapped around his waist and Elena had to divert her gaze from him. Damon Salvatore was an exceptionally good looking man and she could easily find herself physically attracted to him, the way his bright blue eyes contrasted against his raven colored hair, and the scruff that shadowed his jawline would make the aqua pools shine even brighter as they pierced directly into her chocolate browns. She refused to examine the rest of him, even as he would force his presence on her to draw attention to each and every muscle. She had seen enough of him tonight, and from the mood that she was in, for the rest of eternity. Elena needed more than him, and while he was right –she was using him to forget about the current horrors of the case they were working on- Elena knew what they were doing was wrong.
While growing up, she was raised in the belief that only "city girls" had friends with benefits, and while she grew up in the small town of Mystic Falls, she saw after two years of living in New York City just how much she had changed.
"I am not talking about this right now Damon. I'm sorry."
"Fine" he sneered, folding his arms over his chest, "Do what you have to do."
Her partner was usually the cold one of the pair, playing more the "bad cop" to Elena's "good cop" , but most of the time he understood her motivations while now things seemed to get clouded in the act of removal of clothing and everything else that happened after.
This was not who she was though, Elena Gilbert was a young promising detective who many believed to have moved up the ranks too soon and at the bright age of twenty five to Damon's twenty eight, had never been in love before. She was driven solely by her job, helping those in need, it was her dream. Homicide was what she lived, breathed ate and drank, and apparently even made love in it's name.
Seeing Damon stare at her with glazed eyes made her heart sink, the same look as the time before this.
She had made a mistake.
"I will see you at work tomorrow," the brunette tried to smile as she opened his bedroom door, she felt absolutely dreadful for what she was doing to her partner-her friend most of all- but she had to cut this off before it became even more complicated.
"All right, get home safe." He grumbled, and Elena knew usually he would have told her to text her when she got home, or give him a call but by now he was probably done with seeing her face as well.
He walked her to the door tentatively, and with each step, Elena felt the air of regret weighing down on her. The turning of a key in the lock brought them both to freeze and instinctively (as if it wasn't his apartment) Damon put his hand out in front of her to stop her stride, but she pushed past regardless, opening the door.
On the other side was a young dirty blonde haired man who looked worn down to the core and like a soaked rat.
"Stefan!" Elena smiled, pulling Damon's younger brother into a quick hug. "Sorry I haven't gotten the chance to see you yet, but how is the new job?"
The younger Salvatore, at twenty six years old, had just started the fall semester as a history teacher at the local high school. Elena and he had become fast friends when she started working with his brother, and knew it wasn't his dream profession (working in a high school that is) but it was a good way to get his foot in the door. In a way, Stefan was like a brother to her (which added yet another reason why she could never be with Damon in that way, she looked at him like a brother as well) so as long as he was content where he was, she was happy for him.
"Not bad, brings back enough memories I would rather not come to mind, but it could be worse."
Elena nodded, knowing exactly what memories he was talking about. High school, even with states between them, had been hard on both of them.
"Well I'm on my way out so I'll see you around Stef okay?" she passed a smile to her friend and turned back to wave at Damon, but frowned when she saw he disappeared into the bathroom, most likely to avoid questions from his brother. It was a normal sight for Stefan to find Elena in the apartment at all hours of the night, but with Damon in only a bed sheet? That was not something he would not want to see, and they wouldn't hear the end of it…ever.
The Salvatore's apartment was slightly more "middle class" than her own cheap one bedroom, but the halls of the building were still grey and dismal with some of the paint peeling to the ground. As she ran to the elevator, she could hear the sounds of the Russians down the way, arguing and tossing around the furniture. She made it down to the main floor without getting roped into a conversation with any of the straggling neighbors (which for city people, Damon's neighbors were freakishly polite to them both, but that was most likely because they knew the two were cops.) and ran outside, throwing her blue hoodie over her head as she waved on for a cab.
It was eleven at night when the cab dropped her off at her own building which was, in comparison to Damon and Stefan's, much less inviting (as the people were too) and dark since getting the maintenance man down to fix anything was like pulling teeth from a rabid dog lately. She waved hello to John, the lonely bitter old man who spent his entire day sitting behind the desk in her cringe-worthy apartment building, Elena scurried up to the elevator and crossed her fingers the entire way up to the eighth floor. This was a habit that had become routine since her first day of moving in with Jeremy (who moved into the apartment down the hall) and the elevator had broken down, taking nearly two hours for the repair man to come and get them out. It was not the most inviting way to be welcomed to the Big Apple.
The grey doors to the urine smelling elevator squeaked open, and she brushed the hair out of her eye which was plastered against her skin. When she reached her door, the key that would manage to get stuck sporadically, clicked into place and thankfully turned allowing it to open straight into the living room, which was decorated with pictures of her life before the city. That was before she got promoted and transferred to the New York Police Department Homicide division two years before. It was an attempt on her end to make the apartment look like home, even though it was only an empty shell of the life she now lived.
Crime scene images have filled her thoughts as of late, and if she wasn't at the precinct or at the bar with her work friends, the only reason she ever went home was to sleep the memories away, only to be plagued by others, and to spend time with her dog. It was a never ending cycle, going in, going out.
Just as Elena moved to slump onto her couch (one of the only things she bought brand new once moving to New York ) the house phone rang, stirring Koga up from his sleep in the bedroom doorway (a reminder she had to let him out before going to bed herself) with a soft growl. There was only one reason that anyone would call her this late, somebody had to have died, and with a look at the caller ID, her suspicions were confirmed.
They had been chasing him for weeks, whoever this murderer was. Already the psychopath had twelve kills under his belt…that they knew of…with three people murdered each Friday night. They should have been prepared, she should have known better than to go out, she should have gotten her sleep. It was going to be one of those evenings.
It was midnight when Elena arrived at the crime scene, this one in a back alley, and this time around she was thankful to remember her umbrella.
Hopping out of her cab again, (she saw no point in buying a car, she had nowhere to put it) Elena bumped into the coroner who was rushing past with his assistant and a stretcher carrying a body bag on top.
"Hey Cary." She had to project her voice over the loud buzz of the rain pounding to the ground and the scattered voices of the other police officers on the scene.
"Detective! We've got two more over that way by your partner and the Captain. You might want to get over there quick; everyone is rushing around as you can see."
Elena surveyed the area, the coroner wasn't joking about the commotion. In an effort to preserve the crime scene, the uniforms and the rest of the investigators were scouring the ground for any possible evidence while flashes, reflecting into the puddles formed, shown brightly as pictures were being taken.
"Elena!"
The brunette turned, gripping onto her badge instinctively, to Damon who was wearing a black t shirt and jeans, which matched Elena's current relaxed style. She didn't want to admit that she wasn't prepared to see him after only an hour and a half before with what happened, but she had a job to do.
"What happened here?" she cut straight to the point, leaving the niceties to the curb where they belonged for the moment while her eyes darted around the scene like chasing fireflies in the night. She was making sure to take a mental note of her surroundings as she looked down to her feet where the rain water ran down the black asphalt, any evidence floating away with it. The coloring of the street however, was off in the slightest; the runoff was flowing red as blood, what little there was left.
"Same M.O as the last four," he replied, pretending as if nothing had happened between them only an hour before, leading her to the center of the crime scene.
One body remained untaken, it was, however, wrapped in thick heavy plastic. "Three victims. Erin Carlson, Mark Ruben and Sean Granger, all drained of blood from their wrists and their neck." He knelt down and lifted the plastic just enough to show a male victim's wavy blonde hair, but Elena had to look away. On the table, she could look the dead straight in the eye without flinching, she could watch the coroner remove the heart, or even examine the brain with the scalp slipped forward covering their face. Where others would get sick, instead she would ask questions and take study the body hands on. Seeing one cold, out in the open, where they didn't belong dead but rather living their lives, was a different story and she would quickly find herself getting attached.
"He's getting smarter." She mused with disgust rolling over her tongue, "Keeping the bodies in the rain will wash away any evidence."
"Or sloppy." Damon pointed out with a pass of his hand, "This time, we have a witness. The Captain is with her now."
Elena shot to her feet and followed her partner's pointed finger in the direction of her police captain, Alaric Saltzman. There has never been a witness before.
"I…I have to go talk to her!" she gasped waving to Damon as the coroner returned. When she went over to the captain and the teenaged girl, she couldn't help but laugh to herself at the relaxed state of her relationship with her partner. Sure it was awkward for both of them as even Elena could cut the tension with a knife, but they managed to keep an airy feel between them in conversation.
"Captain." She announced her presence quietly over the sea of umbrellas, "This is the witness?"
Alaric Saltzman had been the captain of their squad for only four years, and helped her acclimate to the city when she moved in. Elena figured him as more of a father figure, a mentor, since she had lost her own when she was a teenager. He was one of the best men she had ever known.
Alaric turned his attention to her and nodded intensely, his light brown hair plastered over his piercing hazel eyes as he pulled her next to him in front of the young blonde teenaged girl.
"This is Ana Woods. She is a waitress at the diner down the block and was walking home when she saw someone fleeing the scene. That was when she discovered the bodies."
Elena nodded with a frown, pitying the poor girl. Nobody that young should have to see something as horrible as this, yet she stood in front of her, still in her work uniform and soaked.
"Did you call the sketch artist? It might help to get this bastard's face all over the papers."
Alaric agreed but gave his detective a passing look as he realized they had gained a small crowd on the other side of the police tape.
"I'm going to take her home, we don't need her getting harassed…or discovered."
Elena scanned the crowd through the drops of rain coming off of her umbrella when she saw an older familiar face waving frantically from the other end of the tape.
"Detective!" the woman called out while being pushed back by an officer, "Detective Gilbert!"
Elena approached, trying to shield her emotions from this grieving woman. Her son David was one of this killer's first victims, along with his girlfriend and another friend. Over the past month, Elena became dangerously close to the family and they managed to come into her life much deeper than she had intended.
Agnes, the mother, was an elderly woman who always managed to stay positive even though her husband (who she had only met twice) seemed more depressed on the matter but Elena knew the woman was only putting on a strong front. She had done it herself when she lost her parents. She called daily for an update on the case, and each day Elena became increasingly distressed to have to tell her they had nothing and over the month more bodies for these ritualistic killings built up, yet no evidence had ever surfaced.
"Is it him again?" she whispered, her hands frail from worry as her body shook like a leaf. It killed the detective to nod a yes to her, just as it did each week she had seen her since her own son's murder.
"It's looking like it…"
"I may just be a convenience store clerk, but I have watched enough episodes of Law and Order and CSI to know that the rain washed away the evidence…" She grabbed onto the detective's hand with pleading, desperate eyes the rain water hitting her face where tears could have (should have) been, and the look shattered Elena's heart. Hope was becoming lost to this woman, and Elena Gilbert was her only anchor.
"Will we ever catch him?" She was crumbling before the detective, all of her heart and soul had gone into searching for her son's killer. This was only another piece to be washed away.
"There is only hope Agnes…" she placed a reassuring hand on the woman's cold, wet shoulder. "There is always margin for error. You have to keep that in mind. We will catch him."
The woman laughed while wiping a tear (or rain, Elena couldn't tell the difference anymore) from her eye.
"Easy for you to say…you do this for a living…"
Elena shook her head as her heart dropped. Had she really turned so cold? Turning her back against Damon, shutting him out as she did (regardless of if it was truly wanted, because she didn't, but she could have let it down easier) this woman and her feelings, maybe she had become numb.
"We have a witness this time. I told you, there is always a margin for error." For a moment, there was a look of relief on the haggard mother's face.
"You need to go home and spend time with your family." The brunette directed, nodding to an officer who was standing guard by the yellow tape, "and this officer will take you home all right?"
Agnes stepped even closer to Elena, a new look shining in her eyes that even the rain couldn't dim.
"They have a witness?"
Elena had never seen the woman so elated, they were brought together by the destruction of her family, yet now she was smiling. This is why she loved her job.
"You should be going home too Detective. You look exhausted."
With a sigh, Elena waved goodbye to the woman as she followed the officer to the squad car and turned back to the now cleared crime scene.
No body, no evidence and enough rain to flood a basement to the top, there was nothing more that she could do here.
"Need a ride?"
The brunette turned sharply, her heart pounding in her chest, to be face to face with Damon, who seemed to have lost his umbrella on the way.
"No, I'm all right, I'm just going to hail another cab." She wasn't prepared to be in the car with him just yet.
Her partner's lips turned into a frown and his eyes turned into tiny disappointed beads as he stared at her. "You don't need to be like this Elena."
Of course she knew this already, they were partners, and in the head of the moment (or two) they had made a mistake (or two).
She wanted to feel what love was, but this was not the way.
Elena arrived back at home with only a couple of hours left to sleep. She had specifically moved close to the precinct, yet one more way to tie herself only to her profession, so she wouldn't have to commute.
"Hey Koga" she grumbled, greeting the two year old black Great Dane, a gift from her Aunt Jenna before she left Mystic Falls to "protect her niece from the city". He was one of her only friends outside of work, besides the ones she kept from Mystic Falls, and the only thing she looked forward to coming home to. "I owe you a jog I know…Sorry buddy." She scratched him behind the ear before filling his food bowl, barely able to stand on her own two feet, let only take her one hundred and twenty pound dog for a run.
With a sigh, Elena dragged her feet to the bedroom and changed into an oversized t-shirt and shorts before checking her cell phone, which she conveniently left behind when she got the call to the crime scene. She had one text message from Caroline, one of her best friends who moved to New York a year before she did to attend school for fashion design. Ignoring it, knowing she would get back to it tomorrow, she set her alarm clock, and saw she had three hours until sun rise.
A new day, a new case, and hopefully new evidence for the old.
With all of this "new" in the equation, the days should not feel the same each time around.
I will make this clear right now, this is not a story about a love triangle (some of you may be confused.) This is an Elijah/Elena fic, but this chapter becomes important later on in the story so (unfortunately/fortunately ) it was necessary.
Please review! :)