Damon was covered in blood with his left arm in a sling.
He was shot, a lousy flesh wound to the shoulder, but other than that he was fine because NiKlaus Mikaelson was dead.
It had been a long night and it was almost over, but he had one more stop to make and then everything would be in place.
Damon entered Klaus' mansion with ease because he knew the security code by heart and he slowly made his way up the stairs to the master bedroom.
His arm was killing him. The bullet was still embedded deep within his flesh and needed to be removed, but that would have to wait.
The double doors to the massive bedroom were wide open with the lights off.
It was three o'clock in the morning, so of course Bonnie would be in bed asleep and as he walked through the threshold into the room that was exactly how he found her, lying peacefully in the king sized bed covered in golden satin sheets.
The fatigue from the night had finally set in and Damon's legs gave out on him, making him plump down ungracefully onto the side of the bed next to Bonnie's sleeping form.
Using the finger tips of his good hand, he gently pulled the expensive sheets from her body causing her to wake up and she rolled over expecting to see Klaus, but when she opened her eyes and saw Damon, they widened in surprise. She then noticed the state of his appearance with his suit covered in blood and his arm in a makeshift sling and fear seized her.
"Damon.. what's happened? Where's Nik?" She asked slowly sitting up.
Damon just stared at her , his cold almost dead looking blue eyes absorbed her beauty. He had waited a long time for this...for her.
"What do you think Bonnie? I'm here and he's not." He asked without any emotion to his voice.
And she knew in that moment Klaus was dead.
The first thought to enter her mind was to run, but that was laughable because where would she go?
Niklaus was dead and no one in their right mind would dare go against Damon. He was insane. No one would help her.
When Damon saw the realization dawn on her face, his hand came to rest upon her thigh and he caressed the soft flesh of her brown skin through the silkiness of the sheets, touching her like she already belonged to him.
"Get your things together. You're coming with me."
He didn't even wait for her to respond and just patted her thigh and got up from the bed, expecting her to do as he said while he walked over and stood in front of the floor to ceiling glass window and looked out into the night.
Just as he went to light a cigarette and bring it to his lips, Damon watched as a huge blimp made its way across the dark sky and it read, The World Is Yours.
Damon saw it as an omen because tonight he and he alone had toppled the king of New Orleans.
As Bonnie got out of bed, her mind was going a mile a minute and all she could think about was that Klaus was dead. He was gone. Forever.
From the moment Damon was brought into the organization, Bonnie had a bad feeling about him and she tried to warn Nik about the younger man, but he wouldn't listen to her. Niklaus kept saying how loyal Damon was and that a man like Damon would break his back for him, but Klaus was wrong and that was his downfall because a man like Damon Salvatore only looked out for himself.
Niklaus was so arrogant to believe that he could control someone like Damon and keep him under his thumb, failing to see the hunger in his eyes and that he wanted everything that Klaus had and that included Bonnie. Damon wasn't like the rest of Klaus's men. He was a leader and not a follower from the start. He had his own agenda and waited for the right time to strike and tonight had been the perfect time to make his move and he rose to the challenge unseating the reigning king of New Orleans in front of his own men.
Bonnie's hands began to shake as she gathered her stuff together, not knowing what to take and what to leave behind because she knew after tonight she wouldn't be coming back there. She began opening up drawers and pulling out her things onto the floor and she stumbled across her stash of cocaine. She must have hide it there and completely forgot about it.
It was perfect timing. It was just what she needed to get her through this. She picked up the small vial and began to walk to the bathroom.
Spotting her movements out the corner of his eye, Damon swung around to face her. "Where are you going?"
She didn't even stop to look back at him, but kept walking across the room. "I have to pee."
Damon didn't respond and just let her go, his gaze dropping to her ass and the back of her smooth legs, admiring how her body filled out the little silk nightie she wore.
He only tore his eyes away from her and back to the window when she closed the bathroom door, his mind immediately snapping back to business.
The next few days would be crucial.
He had to fly to Miami and take care of some things down there which meant that he would have to leave Bonnie behind for a couple of days on her own and he didn't want to do that because he didn't trust her to stay put.
Nor did he trust any of his men to watch over her while he was gone because she was too much of a temptation.
And the thought of taking her with him left a bad taste in his mouth because he never mixed business with pleasure.
And Bonnie Bennett was definitely going to be how he got his pleasure.
When a few minutes went by and she still hadn't come out the bathroom yet, Damon tossed the cigarette onto the floor, grinding it out into the carpet with the bottom of his shoe.
Walking across the bedroom, he yanked the bathroom door open.
A startled Bonnie tried to close the small vial of cocaine and hid it behind her back.
Within a few strides of his long legs, he was on her and grabbed the vial out of her hand.
"That was your last hit, after tonight you are officially done with this shit...do you understand me? No more!"
Bonnie hauled off slapping his face.
"Who the fuck are you to come in here and tell me what to do?! You're nothing but a piece of shit and a low life of the worst kind! I tried to tell Klaus to get rid of you but he wouldn't listen! And now he's dead and it's because of you and I hate you! I hate your fucking guts, you rotten bastard!"
It took everything in Damon not to strike her back because thanks to his father it was very much ingrained in him to do so and he'd done it before, more than once in his life.
But there were two things stopping Damon from putting his hands on Bonnie.
One was the fact that she was so fucking beautiful to him that he didn't want to mess up her face, and the other being that she was tiny.
If he did hit Bonnie, the force of the blow would probably kill her because she was no more than 5'2 and didn't weigh over a hundred pounds.
Damon glared at her for a long moment, his light blue eyes chilling as they held hers and she could sense the danger radiating off of him in waves.
Only when Damon knew he had control over his emotions did he address her.
"The first thing you will learn is that I am nothing like Niklaus. Your little hissy fits are not cute to me. I will not tolerate it. There will be a consequence to every wrong action that you make against me, starting now.
And he proceeded to pour out what was left of the cocaine right down the toilet.
Bonnie lunged at him, trying to grab the vial out of his much larger hand.
"What are you doing?! That's mine, you have no right!"
Damon easily pushed her off him and the force of it had her tumbling to the floor as he towered over her.
"That is were you are wrong. I have every right because you belong to me now and that is the second thing you will learn."
"Fuck you Damon!" Bonnie screamed angrily at him. "You're crazy!"
When the vial was empty of all its content, he just dropped the glass container into the toilet and flushed it.
Damon chuckled lightly at her angry outburst. "Oh I am...and you will. Don't worry. Just as soon as I have you tested."
Bonnie's outrage was all consuming. She seethed with anger. "How dare you? If there is anyone who needs to be tested it's you because I know for a fact that Hayley Marshall has been passed around every man in Klaus's organization and you were stupid enough to fuck her too!"
Damon squatted down in front of her.
"I pegged Hayley for the skank she was the moment I laid eyes on her. I never fucked her...but I did let her suck my dick a couple of times and each time I wore a jimmy extra tight. But with you I don't plan on wearing a condom, ever... because I want to feel every single part of you." He told her, reaching out to gently caress her cheek.
Bonnie pushed his hand away from her face in disgust. "Don't touch me. You're just a foot soldier Damon. You're beneath me. And I'll never belong to you. Never."
Again Damon just stared at her with his cold blue eyes not saying anything and Bonnie found that she hated when he did that. It was so unsettling to her nerves.
"Finish getting your things, we have to leave soon." Was all that he said in reply to her biting words.
Bonnie wanted to tell him no, that she wasn't going anywhere with him but with Klaus gone she had no one else to turn to and the both of them knew it, so what was the point in trying to object.
"Then move."
A tiny lopsided smile appeared on Damon pink lips and then he did as she asked by rising to his full height.
He then surprised them both by reaching out his hand to help her up.
But Bonnie didn't want his help.
"You can't just push me to the floor and then expect me to trust you enough to help me up. It doesn't work like that. Not with me." She said getting up on her own.
When Damon didn't respond to her words, Bonnie took that as her cue to leave the bathroom.
It felt as if they had been driving for hours.
The sun hadn't rose yet, so it was still a little dark outside but Bonnie knew enough to know that they were no longer in New Orleans but hadn't left the state.
She was shocked when she realized Damon didn't have any of his men with him. That he was alone.
It was just the two of them driving in his car.
Nik never went anywhere without at least three of his guys with him.
But Damon was armed.
He had a loaded gun laying inside of the console of the car, as well as one tucked inside of the holster wrapped around his torso.
The car suddenly swerved into the opposite lane, but Damon immediately righted the steering wheel putting them back into theirs.
Thank god no one else was on the road that early in the morning.
"What's wrong with you, you getting sleepy or something?"
"No, my arm is starting to go numb."
"What?! Pull over and let me drive before you kill us both!" She demanded.
"Relax Bonnie, I got it. Besides we are almost to our destination."
And within five minutes they were pulling up to this huge boardinghouse that was literally in the middle of nowhere.
As soon as Damon put the car into park, he pressed down hard on the horn and within seconds people were rushing out of the house and when he saw his brother Stefan it was only then that Damon gave into his body and lost consciousness behind the wheel.
Because he knew it was now safe to do so.
Bonnie watched in stunned silence as the men carried Damon's unconscious body into the house and laid him out on the kitchen table, cutting off the clothes from the upper part of his body with a pair of scissors.
Surgical tools were being boiled in a pot of water on top of the stove to sterilize them.
A tall blond man cleaned the skin around the bullet wound in Damon's shoulder while barking out orders.
"Faster people. You have to move a lot faster, if we want to remove the bullet before he regains consciousness!"
No one paid any attention to Bonnie. It was the perfect moment to make her escape. The keys to Damon's car were still in the ignition. They forgot to grabbed them when they pulled him out of the vehicle. It was the perfect moment to slip out of the house unnoticed and yet Bonnie remained by the front entrance to the kitchen and watched as the man used some tweezers to dig the bullet out of Damon's shoulder.
"Are you sure it's just the one bullet?" The blond man asked of the room.
A caramel haired man with green eyes who stood by Damon's side spoke up.
"Yeah. The coward was only able to get off one shot before Damon put a bullet into his brain."
Bonnie closed her eyes, shagging a little and grabbing hold of the wall for support.
What was she doing? These people had plotted against Klaus, killing him. She couldn't stay there. What was she thinking? Maybe they were planning to kill her too and just wanted to find out what all she knew about Nik's business dealings before they did so. She needed to leave now while she still had the opportunity to do so.
Not wanting to cause any attention to herself, she slowly backed away from the wall and turned from the scene playing out inside of the kitchen and started to walk towards the front door.
It was so easy.
In fact, almost too easy.
Bonnie should have known better because she didn't reach the bottom step of the porch before someone stopped her in her tracks.
"I'm sorry ma'am but I was given strict orders to make sure you didn't leave off the property."
So she didn't go unnoticed after all.
Bonnie's jaw tensed as she turned around and was surprised when she saw how young her guardsman was. Why he couldn't have been more than seventeen?
"I was just going to the car to get my things." She lied.
"Well ma'am I've already did that for you. Your things are up in the master bedroom."
Bonnie's eyes widened. She hadn't realized that. She was so busy watching the men tend to Damon that she didn't pay any attention to anything else going on inside of the house.
"What's your name?" Bonnie asked, feeling at a disadvantage because it was clear he knew who she was.
"Jeremy, ma'am. Jeremy Gilbert."
"How old are you Jeremy Gilbert?"
He actually blushed. "Eighteen, ma'am."
"Well Jeremy, I'm only two years older than you are so you can stop calling me ma'am and call me by my name." And she intentionally didn't say her name aloud just to see if he knew it.
"Yes ma'am...oh, I mean Bonnie."
Bonnie arched a brow at her discovery. She made her way back up the steps onto the porch and had a seat in one of the chairs they had sitting out there.
"As soon as they get Damon all stitched up, my sister Elena will get breakfast started." He informed her.
Bonnie didn't respond, instead staring up into the sky watching as the sun finally came up.
"So he's going to be okay then?"
"Yeah. Yeah. Dr. Maxfield assured us that he will be fine, just like new in a day or two. He said that it was only a flesh wound but because Damon waited so long to get the bullet out, he lost a good amount of blood. That's why he passed out."
"Well that was stupid. Why wouldn't he want the bullet taken out immediately like a normal person?"
Jeremy was clearly uncomfortable by the question, but that didn't stop him from answering her.
"Because Bonnie, he had to drive forty miles out of the way in order to bring you here. Everyone tried to talk him out of it because he was hurt. That was something none of us anticipated on happening, but Damon refused to let a bullet wound stop him. He was hell bent on getting you out of New Orleans before news of Klaus's death hit the streets."
Before Bonnie could respond to all of this, the two of them were interrupted.
"Jeremy come help me with breakfast."
Bonnie looked up towards the door to see a pretty young woman standing in the doorway. She had long brown hair and dark eyes just like Jeremy. She had to be his sister.
"So they've taken Damon upstairs?" The teenager asked.
"Yeah, just a few minutes ago. So come on. Everyone's hungry."
Jeremy looked back at Bonnie with a smile on his handsome face. "See I told you. He's going to be good as new!"
Bonnie didn't know how to respond so she didn't.
"I'll let you know when breakfast is ready." He told Bonnie.
"Thanks Jeremy."
He smiled back at her before making his way into the house, squeezing past Elena who was still in the door, staring down at Bonnie who remained seated on the porch.
"Whatever this thing is between you and Damon, leave my brother out of it. He's just a dumb kid."
"Excuse me?"
"You heard what I said. I don't want my little brother involved."
"Involved in what, exactly? I'm confused here. There's nothing between Damon and me."
"Then why are you here, Miss Thing?"
Bonnie almost laughed at her. "Are you serious?"
"Just stay away from my brother!" Elena hissed at her before letting the screen door snap shut.
Bonnie shook her head, running her hands through the dark strands of her hair.
In the span of one night, her entire life had changed and she had only one man to blame.
Damon Salvatore.