Hey there!

I'm really excited about this new story so I really hope you're all liking it as much as I do, thanks a lot for reading and please let me know what do you think of it.

Also, huge huge thanks to Nuha. for being super kind and offering to be the beta for this story, I'm really excited to be working with her so I really hope you're working with me.

Please enjoy!

"We loved with a love that was more than love"

-Edgar Allan Poe-

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CALÍ, COLOMBIA

2009

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He was taken to her from the very first moment they met; a quivering little girl who was ten seconds away from crying in that crowded church. He was ten at the time and had no patience for whiny girls he didn't know, but there had been something in those honeyed eyes that made him reach for her and squeeze her hand.

She had looked up at him and showed him the tiniest of smiles, one that carved itself into his heart and mind. Perhaps it was the fact that she didn't even flinch at the sight of his marred face, the one kids at school were scared about, or maybe it was just the innocence in her expression. Whatever it was, from that moment on Damon became her protector, her saviour, and her family.

She stood at the foot of his bed for the first time in the first week after their parents got married. A tempest was battering the trees outside their windows. The lightning repeatedly illuminated the dark house, along with the echoes of thunder as their parents fucked almost just as savagely as the storm itself. Their noises resonated with such appalling clarity throughout the entire house, that it came to the point where he had to cover his head with a pillow to stop himself from listening.

He felt her watching him though, and removed the pillow to see her staring at him from where she stood. A pink pajama covered her while she clutched a worn out teddy bear in her hands. No words were exchanged, her soft eyes just looked at him expectantly and he pushed aside the covers as an offering of comfort. She smiled brightly before running to him, climbing into his bed with ease.

From that moment on, she slept with him whenever there was a storm, snuggling into his protective embrace and blocking out the whole world outside the room. He became her safe haven. The one who read her stories and smuggled cookies from the kitchen for her. The one who played with her and Stefan. The one who reassured them everything was going to be okay whenever their parents were gone.

But he was also the first to show her pain. He was the one who spoke cruelly and coldly to her before taking her in his arms and comforting her. The one who explained to her the nature of the job they had, even going as far as making sure she witnessed some of his most atrocious acts. He didn't want her blinded to the nature of their world as ignorance meant death, and he wanted her to be strong instead.

So he became her protector, her saviour, her teacher, her family, her best friend, and the one person she longed for more than anyone or anything. She could barely stand to be away from him on the long weeks his maternal grandfather or uncle took him to Colombia or Italy respectively. So it didn't surprise Damon one bit to hear her storming into his room when she heard the news.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" she spat the minute the bedroom door closed behind her. His eyes abandoned the PSP in his hands and focused their gaze on her, her hair high in a ponytail and his honey eyes sparkling with anger as she looked down at him.

He chuckled and shifted his attention back to the game in his hands as he murmured low in his throat, "Oye, qué boca tan sucia tienes, niña bonita!" – "Hey, what a dirty mouth you have, pretty girl!"

Elena rolled her eyes and moved to the bed where he was casually resting, his head leaning against the headboard and legs stretched out lazily. She huffed as she climbed onto the bed next to him, dropping herself onto his plush pillows "You know I didn't understand a thing you said."

"That's because you're lazy and won't work on your Spanish," he answered without even sparing a glance in her direction.

Damon Salvatore descended from a mixture of cultures. His mother, a dazzlingly beautiful Colombian woman named Isabella, had married the Italian mobster Giuseppe Salvatore when she was only sixteen. A marriage that was of course arranged by their parents. Ten years later, not even two months after her first husband's death, Isabella had remarried. Her second husband was Jon Gilbert, New York mobster and Elena's father.

Damon had spent his entire childhood split between Colombia and Italy. Once they joined the Gilbert family, he was forced to divide his time with America, too. The frequent changes sometimes gave him whiplash, but also fed his hunger for knowledge regarding cultures and languages. If he hadn't been doomed to his job since birth, he would have liked to become a travel journalist. Which was why he was always pestering Elena about her studies, spending most of their time frustrated in her lack of interest in other languages.

"I have no Colombian heritage, Damon," Elena said, answering his earlier remark, "I don't need to speak Spanish."

Now it was his turn to roll his eyes as his fingers moved frantically over the buttons of his PSP, "It's called being an educated woman, Elena."

She huffed, "Don't try to change the subject!"

Elena snatched the console from his hands and paused it before hiding it underneath the pillow she was using. Damon muttered a curse under his breath but didn't reprimand her. He only sighed and shifted himself so he could rest on his side and stare at her ,"What is it now, sweetheart?"

Elena stared at him without speaking for a brief moment. He was resting on the good side of his face, so the side of his face bared to her gaze was the one which been mutilated by a bullet when he was only six. The bullet that almost killed him and had left him scarred for life, both literally and figuratively.

It was jarring to stare at him so openly, and Elena felt that ache in her chest that grew whenever she saw his scar. Not because it was grotesque in her eyes, but because it reminded her of the pain he had suffered as a child. It always served as a reminder that no matter what was spoken of him, he was not invincible.

She reached towards his face and traced the marks with soft fingers. "You are going to Italy", she murmured as he closed his eyes at the sensation of her touch.

"Yes, I am."

Elena made a disgruntled noise and moved closer to him, their knees almost touching. "And you're going to leave me here in this hellhole?"

His eyes snapped open, one perfect eyebrow rising in her direction."Hellhole?"

"They don't even let me go outside," she whined with a roll of her eyes, making her appear as a petulant child. Damon had to bite back a smile in response.

"This is a fucking paradise!" he answered, referring to the state they were currently in. Ever since their parents got married it became a custom for them to spend the summer vacations at Damon's grandfather estate in Colombia. The place was massive and had every single amenity a five-star hotel could have. Elena had always loved spending her summers there, which was why Damon was taunting her after the silly complaint she had shared.

"I hate it!"

He chuckled at the sight of her pout, pinching her cheek in an affectionate manner. "Que consentida la nena, creo que la culpa me la tuve yo!" – "What a spoiled little girl, I think it might have been my fault!"

Elena swatted his hand away,"Don't do that!" He laughed once more and Elena felt her heart breaking, thinking of how she would not hear him laugh for the rest of the summer. Somehow she was the only one that could make him laugh "Why do you have to go?"

Damon sighed, "Uncle Zach is taking me to oversee some of dad's business."

"Why now?" Elena asked, her lower lip quivering."Can't he wait until we're back in the States?"

Damon smiled at her in a way she couldn't understand. It was a mixture of sadness and joy, a bittersweet thing she didn't want to dwell on too much "The fact you're asking, let's me know you're not ripe yet."

Not liking the expression on his face, Elena decided to lighten the mood and make a joke. "I don't want to stay alone with Stefan," she said "He's still whining about Valerie not returning his calls."

Damon laughed low in his throat. Though the three of them were close and had been thick as thieves all their childhood, most of the times Damon and Elena teamed up to make fun of Stefan, who secretly loved to be the object of their pranks because it was the moment where he could see his brother truly smile.

He shook his head, the smile still lingering on his face "Don't be mean, bonita," he told her before nuzzling her nose and allowing their lips to graze each other softly, a purely platonic gesture they had been doing since the first time she cuddled with him on a stormy night. "I'll be back before you know it" he reassured.

He motioned for her to give back his console and she complied, not without another roll of her eyes. She was constantly doing that to him, so much that he wondered how her eye sockets didn't end up hurting by the end of the day.

Damon continued playing for a while as she remained laying down on his bed, her eyes taking in everything about his room. A room she knew almost as well as she knew her own. Her eyes landed on the black discarded shirt he had been wearing the day before and suddenly the urge to ask him about what she had seen was too much.

She had promised herself she wouldn't mention anything, not after the way he had reacted the last time, but Elena Gilbert had never been too good at keeping her promises.

"I saw you again last night," she said, and continued when she didn't get any reaction out of him, "with that girl father brought."

Elena tasted bile in her mouth as she spoke. Despite the fact that half of his face was disfigured, Damon still attracted the attention of a great deal of females. And he was always more than glad to comply with their every wish. Elena hated it, hated the moments when other girls took priority over her.

"Saw me?" He asked, his eyes still trained on his console's screen.

Elena bit her lip, unsure of how to phrase her words,"You were fucking her… from behind."

"Jesus, Elena!" he muttered as he dropped the game onto his bed, stormy blue eyes flickering towards her and looking her in a way that made her feel like a child.

Hating that look, Elena stuck up her chin, refusing to back down. "Does it hurt?" she asked, "to be fucked from behind?"

One finger went to rest above her lips. "Quiet, you're being too loud."

Elena huffed and pulled away, she sat upright and crossed her legs beneath her as she stared down at him "I want to know," she said eagerly, "to be prepared."

"Prepared for what?" he asked, following suit and sitting in front of her "You'll be at least eighteen before I let some shitface anywhere near you." he bit out, jaw set in a straight line as he looked at her with the stony look he had reserved for the people he loathed. Elena didn't like to have that stare directed at her.

"How do you know it hasn't happened?" she threw in his face, simply wanting to defy him because she didn't like how childish he made her feel sometimes.

His face transformed and his lips tipped up in that wicked smirk girls seemed to love and men seemed to fear."Because I can read you like a book." He reached out for her and gripped her chin, moving her face so it was inches away from his. "And I know you know better than to disobey me"

"Cabron" – "Asshole", she whispered, one of the few Spanish words she managed to catch. "But I want to learn"

"You need to learn nothing." he replied with finality as he dropped her chin, moving to rest on the bed, the PSP back in his hands. "And you need to stop with your voyeuristic acts, it's creeping me out."

Elena huffed and dropped down next to him, "You should try being more private then." He didn't answer her and she remained at his side for awhile, just watching him. "Can I play something?"

He smiled and moved his arms so she could enter the circle of his arms "Sure thing bonita, come here." She moved until her head was resting between his shoulder and chest and he handed her the device.

"When are you leaving?" she asked after a while.

"Next week," he answered, lazily stroking the soft hair of her ponytail.

Elena sighed sadly, "This summer is going to suck." He just chuckled in response. Damon continued to watch her play until nightfall came around, signaling that it was time to eat dinner.

Little did they know, that summer was going to change so many things. That Damon's visits would become more infrequent and the demons that haunted him were going to grow. Basking there in the safety of one another, they couldn't possibly have known this. That seven years were going to pass before she could hear him laugh again. Have him back with her, this time never to let her go.