Do you think Damon is so easily read? I doubt it.

Disclaimer: Characters, places, and the like from the Vampire Diaries are the property of LJ Smith. I'm just borrowing them to create this tale. All other characters that have no ties to any other fics belong to me!

Chapter Four

December 10th and he still hadn't tried. Why should he? It was a stupid dream.

Why would she want to talk to him after so many centuries without talking to him before now?

But she wouldn't leave him alone. His mother had come to him every time he rested. All she needed was for him to close his eyes for a given length of time, and then she took over completely.

"Damon, please don't reject my gift. Only you can move to help the life that will save yours." She wept.

Again he woke up with a start. He had only lain back in his chair to rest his eyes. It had been nine days since he slept decently. What did that woman want of him? Why wouldn't she just come out and tell him?

It was driving him to an edge.

Once again he read that letter. The little witch couldn't really be that bad off … could she?

He threw it to the floor in agitation. Why should he care about the little red headed firecracker?

He remembered how she was ready to fight him for his dying brother, and Damon couldn't hide back his smile. She wasn't one for backing down – even if it cost her her life.

Then he licked his lips as he remembered that stolen kiss so long before. It was different from any other before or since for him. She was excited for the attention, scared to seem like a child before a full-grown man, longing to feel his lips, afraid that he wouldn't give her the thrill.

He had to admit that he wouldn't mind feeling her lips against his again.

^*^*^*^*^*^*^

Bonnie groaned as she turned in her bed. She was so tired anymore, and her joints hurt.

She gave up trying to contact the rest of her friends. It would be Christmas before any of them call her. And still, she just knew that she wouldn't make it till then.

She heard the doctor tell her family that she had gone down faster than anyone he had ever treated before. They all had given up … and so had she.

The only thing she would like would to at the least see Damon one last time. But that was a dream Bonnie didn't dare to hope would come true.

She had the same dream the night before. A woman sitting at the end of her bed weeping, but Bonnie had no idea who the mysterious woman was. Behind her Damon was pacing back and forth like a caged animal. Bonnie wasn't sure if he was waiting to talk to her or for her to die.

Two days eventually passed and on the twelfth Bonnie heard the doorbell ring. Even as weak as she was, Bonnie could sense a Power that was familiar. Maybe it was Stefan. But then again … where was Elena?

^*^*^*^*^*^*^

Damon leaned heavily against the door jam. Why was he here? To get his mother to give him peace.

She hadn't given him a moment's peace since the day he got that letter from the red haired witch. That meant that his mother's weeping had something to do with Bonnie, as if he cared.

When the middle-aged woman opened the door he wasn't really certain how to handle this situation, though one could not tell it from his expression. He brushed his dark glasses off of his face. "Ciao, I was hoping to visit with my old friend Bonnie."

"Um, Bonnie is very ill at the moment. She was …"

Damon didn't like being told no. "I know. The name is Damon Salvatore."

"Oh, the young man she wrote to. Come in." The woman opened the door enough for him to enter. "I'm her mother, Rachel. I haven't been able to contact any of her other friends she had on her write to list. You were the only one she had the strength to write to. I'm glad you were able to come."

Damon held back his chuckle. If she knew anything about how he and Bonnie met or what he really was, he doubted that she would be that glad to see his face. "Let's say that I wondered why she would bother to write me. She tends to be afraid of me at times."

"I wonder why. She said that you help rescue her and several of her friends almost a year ago when some freak attacked them." Rachel said.

Damon was surprised that Bonnie said anything about Klaus. "Well, he was also attacking my little brother, and he and I are the only members of our family still alive."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I know how that feels … I was the only member of my family to survive a fire when I was a child." A man said as he joined them in the foyer. "I'm Bonnie's father, Nathan."

"Damon Salvatore."

"I thought that your last name was Smith?" Mary asked with a suspicious gleam in her eyes as she descended the stairs.

Damn, he had forgotten about that. "Tyler Smallwood was causing severe problems for Stefan, so I felt it would be better if I did not reveal my true identity."

"Oh, I understand. Well she is in pain, but awake. I was just getting her some tea." Mary wiped a tear from her eye.

Damon nodded at the implied invitation to go to Bonnie's side. After all that was his reason for coming back to this God-awful town.

He quickly climbed the stairs and found that familiar room. Elena didn't know that he had watched Bonnie sleeping while he had waited for the blond to fall asleep the night she had stayed over to protect Bonnie.

He quietly opened the door and was stunned. She hadn't really lost a large amount of weight, but she was thinner. He could see in her face that the young woman was in severe pain just trying to breath.

And then she stunned him. "Are you going to come in Damon, or just stand there looking at me?"

"How did you know it was me and not Stefan?" He kept his voice even, but he was thrown off by being caught.

Bonnie wearily smiled. "Your power was always slightly different – stronger and more imposing. Plus Elena would be with him."

"So you had the advantage on me. How bad is it?" He couldn't help but ask. He was unnerved how similar Bonnie's appearance was to his mother just hours before the woman died.

"I'll be gone soon … I can feel it. I'm glad I'll get to tell you goodbye to your face. I guess you got my letter."

"Yes. You don't have to die you know." Damon was unnerved at the thought of not having the witch there for some reason. If it weren't for her they all would have died, before – that he admitted without argument or pause. But his voice was tempting and smooth, to hide the confusion in his chest.

Bonnie sighed painfully. "Damon, I barely handled my powers. I doubt I could handle your powers with mine as well. Maybe it is just my time to go."

Damon growled. She was throwing his gift back in his face! "Do you think I would just turn you and leave? That isn't how it works Bonnie. I know that your Powers would be strengthened and you would need help figuring everything out. What is it, do you want to die?"

"What do you think? After all we survived, I am alone in a town that has the ability to draw evil to it." Bonnie felt the tears rising. This shouldn't be how they say goodbye.

All she wanted was to tell him goodbye. Again she heard him growl. "Damon, please. I know that I'm nothing to anyone. It is time for me to go."

That shattered Damon's protective walls around his heart. Those had been his mother's words of farewell to him centuries before. "If it was time for you to go, then why would my mother not give me a moment's peace since I read your letter? I think that we will still need you soon. And I …"

Bonnie was stunned by his admission. Damon was not one to open up to others, not even his brother. "You what Damon?"

"I would miss you. There I admitted it! But, don't you dare tell that to any of the others this January. And don't try telling me you want to die, I think I know you better than that red. You want to go to New York and skate at that Center and drink champagne with the others."

Bonnie had tears in her eyes. She smiled and reached out for him. When he took her hand in his cool one, she could see an emotion in his eyes – one that she knew he hadn't faced in a long time, and seemingly refused to acknowledge now. She didn't want to leave this world until he did.

Taking a breath she gave in. "I'll keep that our secret and let you change me on one condition."

"I'll bite (AN: cheesy, I know). You're not laughing at my pun. I grinned at yours." Damon feigned hurt.

Bonnie gave him a smirk that put his to shame. "Ha, ha. We both know what you want to bite. Anyway, I want you to tell my parents and sister the truth about everything while I'm out of it."

"Do you think they can handle the truth?"

"They have too. I don't want to wake up in a box six feet underground. I know it is asking a lot, but I want them to understand." Bonnie groaned as a sharp pain shot through her body.

Damon didn't understand why keeping her there was so important, why he didn't want to lose her. If that was what it took to keep her … "fine. Do you want me to explain it to them first or …"

"I don't know how long it will take to get them to believe it, and I feel myself slipping away." Bonnie panted out. Damon nodded.

In minutes it was done. Damon and Bonnie exchanged blood and Bonnie slipped into the transformation peacefully. He smiled and stole a kiss. Just as he had remembered it before – soft, sweet, tender, and left him wanting more.

Shutting her bedroom door, Damon stopped Mary before she could walk past him. "She's sleeping and I need to talk to you and your parents."

"Alright. Mom and dad are in the living room. Come on. Can I get you something to drink?" Mary was uncertain. Could this Damon Smith … or Salvatore … or whoever he really was just be trying to bringing them together to say that Bonnie had passed on?

Damon read her thoughts and smiled. "I assure you miss that your sister is asleep and that the cancer will not take her life."

"Now that is going overboard! Where do you get off getting her hopes up and then think you can get mine up? I'm a nurse and I know that my sister is going to die!"

Damon's face turned to stone for a moment. "The cancer is not going to kill Bonnie. I will explain it when we find your parents. And believe me that if it weren't for the fact that this was a condition Bonnie put on me, I wouldn't be having this talk with the three of you."

"What talk?" Nathan asked.

Well another chapter done! Whoo! So Damon is turning Bonnie, and now he has to talk to her family! Ooooh, Nathan might not like what Damon has to say.